Midday brief, in brief

Today at Commission, nuclear approval and quiet in Versailles

The controversial Paks II nuclear power project has been given the go-ahead despite state aid concerns.

It’s going to be a busy week in Brussels, culminating in a European Council on Thursday and Friday.

To kick things off, the European Commission confirmed that EU state aid regulators had given Hungary the green light for the controversial Paks II nuclear power project.

Hungary had generated considerable controversy by handing the contract to build the reactor to Russia’s Rosatom without conducting a tender. The works will be financed by a Russian loan worth some €10 billion.

Ricardo Cardoso, the Commission’s spokesman for competition, said the Commission had not received heavy lobbying from the Hungarians to approve the state-aid mechanism.

The Austrian government has already signaled it will challenge the Commission’s approval at the European Court of Justice.

Migration policy ruling

Speaking of the ECJ, Commission spokesman Margaritis Schinas declined to comment on an upcoming ruling which could have a major impact on the EU’s asylum and migration policies.

Judges in Luxembourg will tomorrow rule on whether Belgian authorities should have granted visas to a Christian family from Syria in October 2016.

The family claimed that because of their religion they were facing prosecution and the ECJ’s advocate general in February 2017 said that EU countries must provide humanitarian visas for asylum seekers if they are entitled to international protection.

However, the Commission argued that EU countries already had ways of accepting asylum seekers without visas, as enshrined in the EU-Turkey migration deal.

Not in Versailles

Schinas confirmed the Commission will not be represented on Monday night in Versailles when the leaders of France, Germany, Italy and Spain will meet to discuss the Rome summit on the EU’s future.

French President François Hollande in today’s Le Monde hinted that the leaders would push for a multispeed Europe, one of the scenarios in last week’s Commission white paper on EU governance.

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