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Join us for our upcoming hackathon, focused on LGBTQIA+ rights and issues, where innovation and collaboration will take center stage. This exciting event will bring together bright minds from across the European Union and South Asia, to foster cross-cultural dialogue, raise awareness, and encourage innovative ideas to tackle the challenges faced by the LGBTQIA+ community.

The online hackathon will be held on 17th May, where the top 3 projects will be selected to compete in the thrilling physical hackathon in Colombo, Sri Lanka from 5th to 8th June. The winner of our hackathon will have the incredible opportunity to represent their winning project in the international hackathon in Germany this October!

As a participant, you will have the opportunity to showcase your skills, work with a diverse group of individuals, and make a real impact on the world. Don't miss out on this amazing opportunity to be part of a global movement for LGBTQIA+ rights. Register now to join us in making a positive impact and creating innovative solutions that can change lives.

Visit our partner Hackerearth's website for more information and to register. We look forward to seeing you at the hackathon!

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Global Hackathon : Strengthening Dialogue and Cooperation ... - Friedrich Naumann Foundation

In the eyes of the European Union, Taiwan is a thriving democracy, a like-minded partner, an open and dynamic economy, an attractive destination for investment and an unbeatable producer of cutting-edge technology that keeps the modern world running.

But despite lucrative trade ties and shared core values, the EU does not recognise Taiwan as an independent, sovereign nation.

Why is that?

According to customary international law, a country must meet four essential criteria in order to attain statehood: a defined territory, a settled population, a functioning government and the ability to engage in diplomatic relations, which effectively amounts to international recognition.

In practice, Taiwan, whose official name is the Republic of China (ROC), fulfils the first three requirements but falls woefully short in the fourth one: the island of almost 24 million citizens has diplomatic relations with only 12 countries, all of them small-sized, and the Holy See.

This lack of endorsement stems from the One China policy, a principle that recognises the People's Republic of China (PRC), based in the mainland and ruled by the Chinese Communist Party, as the sole, legitimate government of the country under the name of China.

The One China policy is today followed by the vast majority of the international community, including the EU institutions and its 27 member states, and its history dates all the way back to World War II.

Watch the video above to find out more.

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Explained: Why the EU doesn't consider Taiwan a sovereign country - Euronews

The European Union will launch an 11th wave of sanctions on Russia and seek to crack down on efforts to evade economic penalties introduced in the wake of its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, a top EU official told CNBC Thursday.

"Europe has rolled out 10 packages of sanctions. We will have another package," Mairead McGuinness, EU commissioner for financial stability, financial services and capital markets union, told CNBC's Joumanna Bercetche at the International Monetary Fund's spring meeting in Washington, D.C.

EU countries have been in talks about drawing up a fresh round of sanctions against Russia in recent weeks and McGuinness confirmed an 11th package of measures is on its way.

"Our information is that the sanctions are working, and we will be doing more but we need to look at full implementation," McGuinness said. "What Russia is being deprived of is both the finance and the technologies to reinvent their war machine, and they are having problems on the battlefield."

"We have to make sure that they don't find ways around our sanctions, and I make the point repeatedly that the deeper our sanctions the more impactful they are, the more Russia will look for those ways whether it's other countries or different bank accounts to circumvent."

McGuinness said that as well as coming up with further sanctions on Moscow, Brussels would also seek to ensure sanctions are implemented "effectively" so that it becomes harder for individuals and entities to circumvent them.

"We have to make sure they don't find ways around our sanctions," McGuinness said. "I make the point repeatedly that the more deeper our sanctions, the more impactful they are."

She added, "Don't underestimate the efforts that Russia will make with its pals globally to get around our sanctions theyre affecting the Russian economy, theyre affecting the Russian war machine."

McGuinness was also asked whether the EU will look to penalize countries that aid Russia in evading sanctions with new legislation.

The U.S. Treasury Department last year published a list of countries helping Russia circumvent sanctions, which included Armenia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.

McGuinness said the bloc was instead focused on targeting individuals and entities.

"We're changing our legislation to look at individuals who are involved in sanctions intervention," McGuinness said. "Certainly, when it comes to people or entities that are breaking the law, we would see it that's when we would take action."

Some countries, including Estonia and France, have called on the EU to sanction Moldovan and Georgian oligarchs allegedly working to help Russia destabilize Ukraine.

McGuinness said the EU was working with the U.S., U.K., Canada and Japan, among other allies, to ensure the sanctions on Russia are implemented effectively and gather intelligence on the country's attempts to evade sanctions.

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EU will issue fresh wave of sanctions to stop Russia reinventing their war machine, official says - CNBC

Romanias close ties with Moldova are a strategic asset in the new European security environment.

Charles Michel, the European Council President, traveled to Bucharest in March for his first official meeting in three and a half years with the President of Romania, Klaus Iohannis. The Romanian head of state took the opportunity to call on the European Union (EU) to adopt a new sanctions regime against pro-Russian entities and individuals seeking to derail Moldovas path toward EU accession.

In a press conference following the talks, Iohannis stated that Russian aggression is not limited to the war in Ukraine but extends to hybrid activities designed to block Moldovas path to membership and European integration. While Moldovas government seeks a Euroatlanticist future, Russia says that its future course must be Eurasian.

Russia has used Moldova as a punchbag for years, and still illegally occupies a swath of its territory. But in recent months, the Kremlin has stepped up its campaign. It has withheld gas supplies, mobilized political proxies to stage anti-government protests, and exploited Moldovas deeply entrenched ideological and ethnic differences with sophisticated disinformation and propaganda. It has also been accused of seeking to engineer a coup and of nurturing covert pro-Russian networks among opposition parties.

This is troubling for Romania, which has intimate ties to Moldova, not least through its language which is spoken by about three-quarters of Moldovans. About 10% of Moldovans live in Romania, and a third have a passport.

Its not therefore an issue that Romanias leaders could ignore, even if they wanted to. Romania has been making a conscious effort to ensure that Moldovas EU aspirations are at the forefront of the EU foreign policy agenda alongside the war in Ukraine. The focus of the European Council summit was rightly on providing Ukraine with 1m rounds of artillery ammunition. But it was at Romanias initiative that the 27 EU member states asked the European Commission to produce a support package for Moldova ahead of the next meeting in June. Details of the package have not yet been released.

The framework currently used for EU engagement with Moldova is of limited use to confront Russias threat. The EU-Moldova Association Agreement, signed in 2014, establishes foundations for stronger political association and economic integration. However, the scope for political and security cooperation is narrow.

Russias all-out invasion of Ukraine, on Moldovas eastern border, has prompted the EU to reassess its approach to ensure the stabilization and security of its eastern neighborhood. Last summer, the European Council decided to grant Moldova EU candidate status together with Ukraine. Germanys Chancellor, Olaf Scholz, expressed his support for the defense and security of Moldovas sovereignty and territorial integrity in a trilateral meeting in Bucharest in April 2022 with the leaders of Romania and Moldova.

But the overall response has been far from adequate. The EU is failing to meet the moment. While Moldova says it is penetrated by FSB agents and held to ransom by Russian gas suppliers, the bloc is focusing, very literally, on technicalities.

The point was rammed home in a none-too-subtle manner by the Austrian Foreign Minister, Karoline Edtstadler, who said during a recent visit to Moldova with seven of her European counterparts that there can be no shortcuts.

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The rules are rules argument might be fine at another time. But it hardly takes a master strategist to understand that with Russian cruise missiles taking shortcuts over Moldovan territory, the situation is more urgent.

NATO seems to have grasped this. Even before Russia sent its tanks across the border in 2022, the alliance chose Romania, its reliable and strategically-important regional partner, as the home to a new battlegroup under NATOs Enhanced Forward Presence. Allied aircraft use Romanian bases to patrol and reconnoiter the Black Sea region. The decision had to be made quickly and it was.

From Moldovas perspective, the Russian hybrid threat means that there can be no alternative but to pursue EU accession, and swiftly. Moldovas President Maia Sandu has described EU membership as the only way to ensure her countrys survival as a free and prosperous state.

Romania shares this perspective. The Romanian Prime Minister, Nicolae Ciuc, stated that his country would continue to be an active promoter of Moldovas accession to the EU in an official meeting with his Swedish counterpart, Ulf Kristersson, in Stockholm on April 3. Romanias outlook now needs to be heard with more respect than previously. As an EU member state with an intimate understanding of Moldova and the challenges it faces on its European path, Romania is central to how the EU navigates the new security situation in its eastern neighborhood.

It is of course important to maintain respect for the meritocratic procedure of the EU enlargement process, but sometimes events intervene. The security situation now calls for pragmatism and flexibility on the part of the EU to provide Moldova with certainty over its future place in Europe. Moldovas pro-European choice both within its current government and its population as a whole is by no means a foregone conclusion. Pro-Russian forces may very well return to power.

Romanias nuanced understanding of Russias security threat in the region could allow it to act as a mentor to Moldova, continuing to work closely with EU officials to aid its government, channel aid, ensure its delivery, and secure the administration against the Kremlins hybrid threats like the weaponization of corruption.

Most of all, the EU should understand and act as a matter of urgency on the critical issue there is competition for Moldovas future against a nasty, militaristic power with utter indifference for Moldovas 2.5 million people. That point would best be made by a significant gesture from Brussels. Quite what form that should take is a matter for discussion. The EU might start by asking for Romanias advice.

Hugo Blewett-Mundy is a Central and Eastern Europe commentator and consultant.

Europes Edgeis CEPAs online journal covering critical topics on the foreign policy docket across Europe and North America. All opinions are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the position or viewsof the institutions they representor the Center for European Policy Analysis.

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Romania Gets Moldova (and the EU Doesn't) - Center for European Policy Analysis

PARIS, April 11 (Reuters) - French officials were in damage control mode on Tuesday as they tried to contain anger, division and confusion sparked by President Emmanuel Macron's comments on Europe's dependence on the United States and its relations with China and Taiwan.

Macron's comments came in an interview on a trip to China that was meant to showcase European unity on China policy, with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen also taking part, but highlighted differences within the European Union.

In the interview with French daily Les Echos and news portal Politico published on Sunday, Macron called for the EU to reduce its dependence on the U.S. and to become a "third pole" in world affairs alongside Washington and Beijing.

As European politicians and diplomats returned to work after the long Easter holiday weekend, they were still struggling to digest Macron's comments, in which he also cautioned against being drawn into a crisis over Taiwan driven by an "American rhythm and a Chinese overreaction".

While many of the remarks were not new, the timing of their publication - at the end of a high-profile trip to China, as Beijing carried out military exercises near Taiwan - and their bluntness annoyed countries in eastern Europe.

Many governments in that region see ties with the United States as sacrosanct, particularly given Washington's key role in helping Ukraine defend against Russia's invasion.

"The return of geopolitics means that we have to see more clearly who is our ally and who is not. Strong transatlantic relations between Europe and the U.S. are the foundation of our security," Czech Foreign Minister Jan Lipavsky told Reuters.

"Europe must invest more in its own security, but I do not see that as an obstacle or a limit for cooperation with the USA," he said via a spokesman.

A senior diplomat from Central and Eastern Europe, speaking on condition of anonymity, said: "President Macron is not speaking for Europe or the European Union. He is unwittingly helping Beijing to dismantle transatlantic unity at the time of war in Europe, when it is most needed."

Marcin Przydacz, a foreign policy adviser to Polish President Andrzej Duda, made clear Warsaw was not in favour of any shift away from Washington.

"We believe that more America is needed in Europe," he told Polish broadcaster Radio Zet. He added pointedly: "Today the United States is more of a guarantee of safety in Europe than France."

Such criticism prompted French officials and diplomats to stress that Macron did not suggest Europe should be equidistant geopolitically from Washington and Beijing, simply that Europe's interests will sometimes differ from those of the United States.

The French foreign ministry cancelled a planned debrief on the trip for foreign diplomats in Paris on Tuesday as officials scrambled to make sure they had a consistent message and to limit any fallout with Washington.

The initial response from Washington was measured. Without directly addressing Macron's comments, the U.S. State Department spokesperson and the White House lauded the bilateral relationship with Paris and its role in the Indo-Pacific region and Ukraine. But there was broader unease.

If Europe doesn't "pick sides between the U.S. and China over Taiwan, then maybe we shouldn't be picking sides either [on Ukraine]," U.S. Republican Senator Marco Rubio said in a video drawing parallels with the conflict in Ukraine.

Even some of the president's closest allies in France recognised Macron had misspoke. "There's a problem with the president's communication. It's a disaster," one Macron ally said on condition of anonymity, saying the timing and location of what he said, although right on substance, were problematic.

"The idea now is to reassure the Americans and tell them there is nothing new and that on Taiwan we have the same position as before," said a senior French diplomat.

"The difficulty I think will ultimately not be with the Americans. I think it will be more complicated with the Europeans, notably the Baltics, Nordics, Eastern Europeans."

Other governments in Europe, however, are at least more sympathetic to Macron's push for "strategic autonomy" - making Europe less dependent on others when it comes to defence, technology and supplies of critical raw materials.

Countries such as Germany, Italy and Spain have also backed strong EU engagement with China, even as Washington takes a harder line with what it sees as an increasingly belligerent Beijing.

"I think we cannot just turn our back to China and try to ignore it. It is a key trading partner, a very large player," Spanish Economy Minister Nadia Calvino said in discussion hosted by the Brookings Institution think tank in Washington.

"We have a shared interest, I think, in ensuring that they engage constructively to put an end to the war in Ukraine as soon as possible and to avoid global market fragmentation, which is going to be lose-lose for everyone."

But even some of those broadly supportive of Macron's agenda lamented the handling of the China trip, in which von der Leyen received a much more muted welcome than the French president.

Nils Schmid, a foreign policy expert and member of parliament for German Chancellor Olaf Scholz's Social Democrats, said both Scholz and Macron had long favoured the idea of "European sovereignty".

But, he added: "The problematic thing about Macron's visit is that he deliberately pulled out the European card and took ... von der Leyen with him. But then he allowed her to be put in the second row. This has destroyed the hoped-for impetus for a common European policy on China."

He added: "China is playing the card of dividing Europe. We must prevent that."

Reporting by Michel Rose, John Irish, Andreas Rinke, Belen Carreno, Alan Charlish, Jan Lopatka and Michel Rose; Writing by Andrew Gray; Editing by Sandra Maler

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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Analysis: Macron's aim of EU unity on China undone by trip fallout - Reuters