
Brazil on Thursday expressed support for the IMF latest aid package for Greece, disavowing its IMF delegate who abstained in a vote on the issue. Finance Minister Guido Mantega spoke with IMF chief Christine Lagarde and backed the Fund's decision to release 1.7 billion Euros in rescue loans to ailing Greece Monday, his spokesman said.

The European Central Bank left interest rates at a record low 0.5% on Thursday and said that they will remain there for some while to come and could yet fall further. ECB President Mario Draghi hinted that policy would not be tightened until well into next year at the earliest, although the central bank will give no time horizon for when rates might move.

The battle over growing genetically modified crops in France flared anew on Thursday as the country's top administrative court overturned a government ban on growing GM corn sold by the US giant Monsanto.

The number of unemployed in the Euro-zone has fallen, slightly, for the first time since April 2011. The fall in June came amid brightening economic prospects, suggesting an end to the bloc’s stubborn recession.

The European Union agreed on Monday to put the armed wing of Hezbollah on its terrorism blacklist, a move driven by concerns over the Lebanese militant group's roles in a bus bombing in Bulgaria and the Syrian war.

On the 1 July 2013, Croatia became the 28th member of the EU after a decade of carrying out all the reforms needed to bring it into line with EU laws and standards.

A sharp rise in the variety of legal designer drugs with names that entice young people into thinking they pose no risk is alarming from a public health standpoint, the United Nations drugs agency said.

By Thomas Richardson - Google has reached a settlement with regulators of the European Union after antitrust charges were levied against the company. The EU accused Google of selectively displaying results based on its preferences. Google, which owns a virtual monopoly on Internet queries in Europe, is also accused of favouring the use of its own products in search results, which has drawn complaints from competitors, and the attention of regulators.

One of Mercosur ‘main obstacles’ is political and has its origin in Argentina, a country that is ‘extremely protectionist’, said the president of Brazil’s National Agriculture Confederation, CAN, Senator Katia Abreu currently in Brussels promoting the idea of a bilateral Brazil/EU free trade agreement.

In a strong display of support for Paraguayan president-elect Horacio Cartes, European Union ambassadors confirmed the leader will be travelling next week to Brussels, seat of the EU in what will be his first contacts out of the region.