After two failed attempts to nominate a Maine candidate friendly to the party establishment, the consultant class is finding better success with its third approach: co-optation.

The MEPs steering the EU’s key industrial law want “Made in Europe” to mean that goods are actually produced in the EU.

Their draft report on the Industrial Accelerator Act (IAA), presented to three parliament committees on Monday (28 September), would reserve the label, and the subsidies and public contracts that come with it, for goods produced in the 27 member states.

Partner countries such as Japan or Korea could be added later, but only if they meet set criteria.

This is a break with the EU commission’s proposal, which would apply to virtually every country with a free-trade or procurement deal with the EU. 

This article continues, but the full version is available only to EUobserver.com subscribers. Visit account.euobserver.com/membership

The European Commission is being pressed to deliver an animal cage ban by 2027 after failing to meet previous commitments.

Several hundred animal rights activists gathered at the EU’s office for health and food safety in Brussels on Monday (28 September) to encourage a ban on poultry cages and on the killing of male chicks. 

The commission’s livestock strategy had committed in July to proposing legislation to outlaw the two practices by the end of 2026, with similar legislation on pig welfare expected to follow by mid-2027.

The legislation stems from a European Citizens’ Initiative (ECI) signed by 1.4 million people in 2021 to ‘End the Cage Age’. A vast majority of MEPs also subsequently voted to endorse the transition to improved animal welfare. 

And while the commission had originally promised to table a proposal by 2024, this was derailed by farming lobbies and the deadline elapsed.

“We are here [at Monday’s protest in Brussels] because the EU has been delaying meaningful reforms for animals for years,” said Ombretta Alessandrini from Animal Equality, which organised the rally.

“Our democratic ask needs to be respected. We feel betrayed by the EU’s broken promises and we want the commission to do what they say,” she told EUobserver.

Animal Equality has also joined legal action against the commission over its broken promises, in a case examined at the European Court of Justice in March.

The commission is legally obliged to respond to a citizens’ initiative once it reaches 1m or more signatures. 

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Amidst a deep socio-economic crisis and acute political confrontation in the US, President Donald Trump is trying to turn around negative forecasts ahead of the congressional elections through populist measures and aggressive rhetoric, which only deepens the rift in American society and undermines the country’s standing on the world stage. Over the past few weeks, […]

The Trump-Xi summit did not mark a US-China rapprochement, but it demonstrates that sustained diplomacy and strategic guardrails are essential to prevent intensifying competition from becoming direct conflict. The recent summit between Chinese President Xi Jinping and US President Donald Trump in Washington has demonstrated a significant paradox in contemporary international politics: the two superpowers […]

Trump’s speech at the 81st General Assembly shows that warmongering USA may accelerate in practice. Whether other nations respond appropriately is a separate matter. Trump’s Military Threat at the UNGA While the UN Charter, the document that established the United Nations (UN), prioritized the cultivation and maintenance of peace among nations, US president Donald Trump […]

Kimberly Guilfoyle, the U.S. ambassador to Greece, has faced scrutiny over remarks she allegedly made during a private dinner in Athens in March 2026, less than six months after she assumed her post in the Greek capital in autumn 2025. According to an exclusive story by the Wall Street Journal investigating the “Balkan actions” of […]

The post US Ambassador Guilfoyle threatened Greek Minister over LNG policies appeared first on Keep Talking Greece.

From Trump’s earlier push to acquire Greenland to the 2026 security agreement with Denmark and Greenland, Washington’s approach has shifted from territorial acquisition to strategic access — a shift that reflects a broader contest for control over the Arctic, supply chains and spheres of influence. Since his first term as the American President, Trump has […]

The persistence of current geopolitical alignments, the attention of Eastern actors to the region, the strengthening of Sanaa’s position in the Red Sea, and the expansion of regional opposition to the UAE’s role will diminish Abu Dhabi’s role in the region. UAE approach For the past ten years, the Southern Red Sea has been a […]

Mass protests have swept Syria—from Aleppo to Deir ez-Zor. Two years of empty Western promises, plundered oil fields, Israeli occupation of the south, and rule by a former terrorist whom Washington and London placed on the throne. The Fuel Crisis as a Trigger In mid-September 2026, Syria was gripped by the largest wave of civil […]

Tucker Carlson discusses how deep the betrayal is. Excerpted from Tucker's monologue on TCN September 9, 2026.

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Benjamin Netanyahu delivered an inflammatory address to the United Nations on Thursday, decrying what he said was a global anti-Jewish conspiracy and swatting aside criticism of Israel’s war in Gaza.

Poll Finds Even Most Republicans Want U.S. to Investigate Israeli Killings of Americans

On September 3, 2026, Argentine President Javier Milei addressed the nation on the issue of the Malvinas (Falkland) Islands. This programmatic speech is noteworthy be-cause Milei had previously taken a more cautious position on the islands and advocated resolving the long-standing territorial dispute with the United Kingdom through diplomatic means. However, in this address, the […]

Iran’s participation in the BRICS Summit sends a clear signal: the West’s attempts to isolate Tehran have failed. The series of meetings held by Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian with world leaders at the 18th BRICS Summit in New Delhi were a clear confirmation of that. Dialogue Instead of isolation BRICS summits long ago outgrew the […]

He also held up photos of a sports hall hit by a US strike that killed 21 civilians, including seven children; meanwhile, he pointed out, Israel has nuclear weapons, is not a signatory to the NPT, has not allowed a single inspection, and has murdered savagely over 70,000 innocents in Gaza

A government can face allegations over assistance to another military without its own troops conducting the attacks. Germany disputes the claims, and the court has not resolved its responsibility.

The hack relates to the website for Medicare, Australia’s publicly funded universal health insurance plan, which was hacked in June.

The hack relates to the website for Medicare, Australia’s publicly funded universal health insurance plan, which was hacked in June.

As Trump chose the path of barbarism, threatening to annihilate the Islamic Republic and dismantling international institutions, Lula took the UN pulpit to defend another path: diplomacy, dialogue and civilisation, and questioned a foundational idea of International Relations. The main international politics and geopolitical messages in Lula’s UN General Assembly speech can be summarised as […]