It seems hard to believe, but these past few weeks in Brussels, there's almost more talk about civil service exams than the chaos caused by the war in Iran. This is the first general call for graduates who want to work in European institutions since 2019. As expected, more than 170,000 people have applied. It's literally impossible to live in Brussels, be under 40, and not know someone who has applied.

Far from backing down, Pedro Sánchez is standing up for himself. Afterwards from the threat of Donald Trump to cut off all international trade with Spain because of the decision to veto the use of the Rota and Morón bases Regarding the trade war with Iran, the Spanish government has reacted by challenging the US administration. Sources at La Moncloa (the Prime Minister's official residence) assert that Spain "has the necessary resources to contain potential impacts, assist sectors that may be affected [by the trade war], and diversify supply chains." They also take the opportunity to remind the United States that Spain is a "powerful exporter within the European Union and a reliable trading partner for 195 countries worldwide": "We have a historic and mutually beneficial trade relationship with the US." In this regard, the Spanish government issues a warning to the Trump administration: "If it wants to review the relationship, it will have to do so respecting the autonomy of private companies and international law," while also urging the United States to respect "bilateral agreements" with the European Union. Trump's message caught the Spanish government in the middle of a Senate question time session. None of the PSOE (Spanish Socialist Workers' Party) ministers wished to make any statements upon leaving the session. "It's a serious and delicate matter," Spanish government sources have indicated amidst the hustle and bustle of microphones. However, far from tiptoeing around the issue, Spanish President Pedro Sánchez is scheduled to appear tomorrow, Wednesday, at 9 a.m. following the clash with the US administration to assess the latest developments in international politics. In other words, he intends to maintain a standoff with Donald Trump. This is not the first time he has done so: he was one of the EU's most forceful leaders in the face of US threats to Greenland, he rejected increasing military spending at Trump's request, and he spearheaded the recognition of the Palestinian state in the midst of the war with Israel.

BBVA's hostile takeover bid for Sabadell has overshadowed the debate surrounding the infringement proceedings opened by Brussels regarding the legislation the Spanish government used to intervene in this transaction. Specifically, Pedro Sánchez's government used the 2007 Competition Law to impose additional conditions beyond those of the Competition Act, incorporating requirements into the takeover bid for reasons of public interest. The consequence of these conditions is that for at least three years, BBVA and Sabadell will have to operate "autonomously." That is, if the takeover bid is successful—it requires at least the shareholders to sell 50.01% of Sabadell's shares—they will have to operate as if the latter bank were a subsidiary of the former. But the truth is that Brussels goes further and also points to a rule that, so far, the Spanish government has not had to use in BBVA's Sabadell transaction. This is the law on the regulation, supervision, and solvency of credit institutions, approved in 2014 and implemented in 2015 under the government of Mariano Rajoy (PP).

The European Union (EU) has continued to purchase Russian gas despite the aggression initiated by Vladimir Putin's regime against Ukraine. According to the European Commission itself, the bloc has spent more on the purchase of fossil fuels from Russia than on aid sent to Ukraine. However, Brussels has proposed to stop purchasing gas from Russia definitively: it will prohibit European companies from purchasing fossil fuels and will even force them to terminate the contracts they have signed years in advance with Russian business partners, which has set off alarm bells in some affected companies, such as Repsol and Naturgy.

The ballot boxes continue to test the European Union, telling it that it has had enough doubts, and it must go all out and resist the joint assault of Trump and Putin.has been left in a shock, a parody mounted by the ultra-right candidate George Simion, declaring himself the winner when the exit poll estimates indicated that the president would be the pro-European Nicusor Dana. Relief and hope in the EU, coexisting with fears, and all of this surrounded by great uncertainty that will cost him to leave, even if on Sunday, June 1, the liberal Rafal Trzaskowski becomes president of Poland.

Now that Brussels is considering changing fiscal rules In order to leave defence spending out of deficit calculations, another demand is being made. Could it do the same in an area with urgent financing needs throughout the European Union (EU), such as housing? The European Commission did not relax its sacred 3% deficit caps for member states even during the 2008 economic crisis, which put the eurozone at risk. The only exception so far was the pandemic, when these were frozen and governments were given free rein to spend what was necessary for economic recovery. Armaments will be the next anomaly in Brussels' strict rules, but there are no plans or prospects for housing to be added. So how else does the European Commission want to solve a housing emergency that is affecting the Old Continent and over which it does not have the necessary powers?

The after-effects of decades of abuse of temporary employment in the public administration have not completely disappeared. Although the Generalitat has almost closed the process of stabilizing the interim staff, this group continues to express concerns and doubts about their future employment. The Government assures that it has managed to reduce this anomaly and now only 7.9% of its 182,815 employees - Brussels required that it be less than 8% - are temporary, compared to 35.5% in 2021. During this time, 46,800 interim employees have obtained a position.

The reduction in the electricity bill will have to wait. The third vice-president and minister for Ecological Transition, Teresa Ribera, admitted this Monday that the government still cannot approve the regulation that should allow a limit on the price of gas because it has not yet obtained the definitive green light from Brussels. Last Tuesday Ribera and her Portuguese counterpart, José Duarte Cordeiro, met the Commissioner for Competition, Margrethe Vestager, and announced they had been given the green light by the Commission to set a limit on gas prices of around €50/MWh, pending only a few technical details. But the final agreement has not yet been reached and, therefore, Pedro Sánchez's government will not be able to approve the measure at this Tuesday's cabinet meeting as Ribera had announced.

The European Commission wants to show Poland that it can no longer ignore the legal foundations of the European Union. On Tuesday, the EU executive activated for the first time the mechanism that allows it to withhold EU funds from a member state for failure to pay a penalty. Specifically, Brussels will withhold for now €14.5m of funds earmarked for Poland after the country refused to close the Turów lignite mine as demanded by the European authorities.

Good news for the European Commission's crusade against Google's monopolistic practices in Europe. The General Court of the European Union on Wednesday upheld the €2.4 billion penalty that Brussels imposed on the tech giant in 2017. The decision refers to the fine for abuse of a dominant position, because Margrethe Vestager's competition department found that the search engine systematically favoured the search pages of its price comparator, Google Shopping, ahead of other rival shoppers. Google can appeal the decision within the next two months.

"Between now and the end of the year we will propose a reform of the gas market and we will review problems surrounding storage and security of supply". These are the words of the Commissioner for Energy, Kadri Simson, this Wednesday in the plenary session of the European Parliament, which debated the escalation of electricity prices across Europe. The President herself, Ursula von der Leyen, admitted that the root of the problem was the heavy dependence on Russian gas. And she reiterated that there is a gas storage problem, a debate that had been brought up by Spanish president Pedro Sánchez. In the framework of the European summit with the Western Balkans, the Socialist leader has again called for a reform of the electricity market and a joint gas purchase to address the rising cost of electricity.

Carrying three chargers with you – one for your mobile phone, one for your tablet and one for your laptop – is a common nuisance (and a mess of cables) for European citizens that the European Commission is proposing to eliminate. It's not just the inconvenience of carrying this many cables, it's also the environmental cost of making them and also disposing of them at current consumption rates. On Thursday, Brussels proposed revising a European directive to force manufacturers of smartphones, tablets, computers and game consoles to use the same charging technology.

Despite the long shadow of the delta variant, the horizon for European economies is becoming clearer. On Wednesday, the European Commission improved its outlook for the Spanish economy's growth by three tenths of a percentage, after having already revised them upwards in its last estimate in May. Therefore, it now believes that the state's GDP will rebound by 6.2% in 2021, mainly thanks to the advancement of the health situation, the rapid progress of the vaccination campaign and the gradual lifting of restrictions. This is one of the largest rebound in the European Union, behind only Romania, Ireland and Hungary.

"Every dose counts. Every dose saves lives." With this message, Health Commissioner Stella Kyriakides announced on Monday that the European Union has definitively started legal proceedings against Anglo-Swedish pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca. Last week the European Commission sounded out European governments to take the initiative, and after obtaining their support the EU executive has decided to file the complaint.

New escalation of the open conflict between the European Union and AstraZeneca. The European Commission is finalising preparations for a lawsuit against the Anglo-Swedish pharmaceutical company for failure to deliver millions of doses of its vaccine. The president of the EU executive already threatened the company a few weeks ago with all options after the company communicated that in the second quarter of the year it would not deliver even half of the agreed doses, and since alternatives have had to be sought, the EU has decided to start legal proceedings.

The European vaccination passport is taking shape. President Urusula Von der Leyen presented the proposal on Wednesday, which has been dubbed a digital green certificate, and which is intended to facilitate mobility in the run-up to the summer and open the door to a new, post-lockdown yet controlled normality. Brussels's proposal is a certificate that authorities will have to issue to all people immunised with one of the four vaccines approved by the European Medicines Agency (EMA): Pfizer/BioNTech, Moderna, AstraZeneca and Janssen. It will be free and bilingual (the official language of the state and English) and will also certify negative tests or whether the disease has been overcome. A QR code will ensure its authenticity and validity, and it can be kept digitally or in print.

The economy of the European Union will not recover the levels of 2019 (before the outbreak of the pandemic) until mid-2022. For this reason, and given the uncertainty of the context, the European Commission has proposed on Wednesday that the fiscal rules (the limit of deficit and public debt) continue to be suspended until 2023. Brussels activated the suspension clause of this fiscal straitjacket at the beginning of the pandemic, to give free rein to public spending in the face of the lockdown measures that have quarantined the economies of European partners.