Emmanuel Macron

Teachers, train conductors and airline controllers walked off the job across France yesterday, disrupting transport and public services in a test of public anger with President Emmanuel Macron's reform drive.

A showdown between French railway workers and President Emmanuel Macron's government grew more threatening on Tuesday after an internal labor union message suggested rail workers could paralyze services even outside of official strike days.

The French president, Emmanuel Macron, is to spend hundreds of millions of euros boosting the French language worldwide, in a push to overtake English in Africa, increase the use of French online and teach French to more European officials to loosen the grip of the English language on Brussels, reported the Guardian. 

The European Union's chief executive has written to Russian President Vladimir Putin to congratulate him on his reelection, saying that Russia and Europe should "reestablish a cooperative pan-European security order", according to Reuters. 

The recent visit to Athens by Michael D. Higgins, president of Ireland, was a reminder of the great similarities and also the great differences between Greece and Ireland.

A survey conducted by the Serbian newspaper Politika of the most trusted foreign politicians puts Russian president Vladimir Putin in first place by a wide mark, with the support of 58 per cent of respondents.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel came second, with 42 per cent saying they trusted her most.

Putin thus "won" in competition with six other global statespeople, in a poll carried out March 9-13, ahead of the presidential election in Russia on March 18.

Belgrade-based daily Politika writes that when asked which of the stated world leaders they trusted, 58 percent said Putin.

French and Indian companies signed contracts worth 13 billion euros ($16 billion) on the first day of President Emmanuel Macron’s visit to India on March 10, the French presidency said in a statement.

Sexual harassment on French streets or in public transport will be punished by a new on-the-spot fine of 90 euros, a government spokesman said Tuesday, while admitting it would be hard to catch offenders in the act.

After five months without a government, members of the center-left SPD have now voted to join another coalition led by Chancellor Angela Merkel. There has been no great sense of urgency in Germany. Its economy continues to grow, and its politics remain stable. Yet, the weakness of this latest "grand coalition" is bad news for Europe and for the world.