Today we celebrate International Women's Day. “International Women's Day (IWD), originally called International Working Women’s Day, is marked on March 8 every year. In different regions the focus of the celebrations ranges from general celebration of respect, appreciation and love towards women to a celebration for women's economic, political and social achievements. Started as a Socialist political event, the holiday blended in the culture of many countries, primarily Eastern Europe, Russia, and the former Soviet bloc. In many regions, the day...

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By Steve Zwick; Published March 02, 2012 in Greenbiz.com. The United States has famously failed to develop a strategy for slowing and adapting to climate change, but that hasn't stopped the U.S. states of Oklahoma, California, and Oregon from creating frameworks to support greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions trading. All three are among more than 20 national and sub-national governmental agencies around the world that have incorporated voluntary climate-change solutions into their formal strategies -- creating in the process a means...

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Paris 05/March/2012 Governments must act today to ensure that the infrastructure needed in 2020-2030 will be planned, developed and operational in time, according to a new OECD report. Strategic Transport Infrastructure Needs to 2030 says that air passenger traffic could double, air freight could triple, and port handing of maritime containers worldwide could quadruple by 2030. But the report notes that most of the current gateway and corridor infrastructure could not handle even a 50% increase in demand. The OECD estimates USD...

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Brussels, 1 March 2012 Serbia is granted EU candidate status -- The European Council today agreed to grant Serbia the status of candidate country, following a recommendation by the General Affairs Council on 28 February. It endorsed the Council's conclusions, which confirmed that Serbia has continued to show credible commitment and achieved further progress in the implementation of agreements reached in the dialogue with Kosovo, including on integrated border management. The Council noted that an agreement has been reached on...

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EU leaders in Brussels today signed a fiscal pact which commits the signatory countries to rein in public spending and run low levels of government debt. The Treaty on Stability, Coordination and Governance has governments pledging to keep their deficits down to less than 0.5 percent of their gross domestic product. It was signed by 25 countries of the European Union. "The restoration of confidence in the future of the Eurozone will lead to economic growth and jobs," said President of...

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EU heads of state or government today unanimously re-elected Herman Van Rompuy as president of the European Council for a second term of two and a half years, from 1 June 2012 to 30 November 2014. Herman Van Rompuy was also designated as president of the Euro Summit for the same term of office. He is the first full-time president of the European Council, following the creation of the post on 1 December 2009 under the Treaty of Lisbon. He has...

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Brussels, 1 March 2012 Today, the European Commission completed the fifth review of the EU-IMF supported financial assistance programme for Ireland. In this context, the Commission authorises the disbursement of €5.8 billion to the country, bringing total EU funding to Ireland to €32.2 billion since the launch of the programme in late 2010. The joint review by the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund took place in Dublin 10-19 January 2012. It concluded that programme implementation...

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Brussels, 28 February 2012 In February, the Economic Sentiment Indicator (ESI) rose for the second month in a row in both the EU and the euro area. The ESI rose by 1.1 points in the EU and by 1.0 point in the euro area, to 93.9 and 94.4, respectively. The improvement was broad-based across all sectors except for services, where a decrease in confidence partly offset the rebound observed in January. Among the largest Member States Poland (+1.7) reported the...

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Ambassador João Vale de Almeida, Head of the European Union Delegation to the United States, will be sharing his insights in 140 characters or less with the launch of his official Twitter account. Follow @ValedeAlmeidaEU to interact with the Ambassador and get his comments on the European Union and the EU-US relationship. "Social media has become a powerful tool in public diplomacy," said Ambassador Vale de Almeida. "I look forward to using Twitter as another way to reach out to the...

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