The ELDR Bureau welcomes the news that Androula Vassiliou has been proposed as the European Union’s Health Commissioner until 2009, subject to European Parliament approval, following the resignation of Commissioner Markos Kyprianou. Former Vice-President of ELDR and previous Chair of the European Liberal Women’s Network, Androula Vassiliou was a Member of Parliament for two mandates and participated in the Convention for the Future of Europe. She is a member of the United Democrats Party of Cyprus and a strong supporter of the negotiations for the re-unification of the ethnically divided island. Read more ...

 A number of Danish newspapers have reprinted several of the caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad which received widespread condemnation and resulted in violent reactions throughout Muslim countries in 2005.The decision to reprint some of these caricatures was taken by a number of newspapers as they looked to show their belief in and commitment to freedom of speech in light of Danish police uncovering an alleged plot to murder one of the cartoonists. Read more ...

 Annemie Neyts and the ELDR Bureau express their condolences following the premature death of the former Slovene President, Janez Drnovsek, who died on Saturday 23rd February at the age of 57. “Slovenia has lost an eminent and sensitive leader – commented Mrs Neyts -. The process of managing the independence of Kosovo will miss such an important figure: He was a fighter in a battle against cancer, and I remember him fondly as a fighter in politics”. Read more ...

 The ELDR Party has long called for the conditional independence of Kosovo and during its Berlin Congress on 18-19th October 2007, approved a resolution on the final status of Kosovo specifying that if no agreement was reached between Kosovar and Serb authorities by 10th December 2007, the report of UN Special Envoy Marti Ahtisaari had to be put into effect as soon as possible. Following Sunday’s declaration the European liberal family is ready to support the process of the independence of Kosovo. ELDR sees the deployment of an EU law and order mission as essential to the process of managing Kosovo’s independence and guaranteeing the rule of law, security, peace, democratic development, and the full respect of human, religious and minority rights of all ethnic communities.  Read more ...

 ELDR President Annemie Neyts-Uyttebroeck met on Monday 11 February with a delegation from the Croatian social liberals of HSLS led by Croatian Vice-Prime Minister Đurđa Adlešič.  Mrs. Neyts, MEP, congratulated Mrs Adlešič with her nomination as Vice-Prime Minister and expressed support for the tough reforms in the judiciary that she started in January of this year. Mrs Adlesic is responsible for home affairs in the Croatian government.  She said: “These necessary reforms may take some time but will be beneficial both for Croatia’s speedy accession to the EU as well for Croatia’s citizens.” Read more ...