Ireland and Germany have an excellent relationship within the common home of the European Union, the Minister for Education said today, while opening a conference on contemporary German-Irish cultural relations.

Nicolas Sarkozy and Silvio Berlusconi issued a joint statement calling on the European Commission to “examine the possibility of temporarily establishing internal border controls in the case of exceptional difficulties" in response to an influx of migrants from North Africa. This would be a fairly major adjustment to one of the EU's signature achievements, the Schengen Agreement, which grants free passage accross borders within the union.

Whether to attend the British royal wedding or the beatification of Pope John Paul II at the Vatican? That's one decision the EU's top brass won’t have to make this weekend since the British royal family has simply snubbed all EU politicians when it comes to invitations to the marriage of Prince William and Kate Middleton.

Hungary has taken the rotating presidency of the European Union at a hugely important moment. Having been the UK’s Europe Minister during Britain’s last EU Presidency in 2005, I have some experience of the hard, diplomatic work involved.

The European Union awaits "strong and clear" action from Tunisia to help stem the flow of migrants fleeing the country, European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said on Tuesday.

The crisis in Libya was full of lessons for all sides involved. Turkey understood that it does not have the power to act without the European Union or the United States; and Europe understood that without Turkey it is unable to conduct effective politics in some regions.

The revolutionary upheaval in the Southern neighbourhood and the failures of reforms in most of the Eastern neighbourhood are begging for a revised EU approach to the neighbourhood policy (ENP). In March the EU presented some ideas on ‘a partnership for democracy and shared prosperity’ with the Southern Mediterranean.

Last week I chaired a meeting on Turkey’s role in the Middle East. There seems to be a never-ending interest, in Brussels at least, to discuss and debate Turkish foreign policy.Therefore, and needless to say, the discussion went far beyond recent events in the Middle East and North Africa...