Government

An expert group will start working on tax on uncultivated lands by end-May, Bulgaria's Agriculture Minister Dimitar Grekov announced at a meeting with agricultural associations

The new tax seeks to stimulate owners to lease uncultivated lands to cooperatives and to local companies in order to utilize fertile agricultural lands.

Bulgarian President Rosen Plevneliev is to take part in the EU-Africa summit, which will be held April 2 and 3.

Foreign Minister Kristian Vigenin will also participate in the event, Bulgaria's CROSS news agency has reported.

President Ivanov, who is seeking another five-year term, is the only one of the four presidential hopefuls who has not yet replied to a call to take part in a debate organized by the US-backed National Democratic Institute, NDI.

French Interior Minister Manuel Valls becomes the country's Prime Minister after Jean-Marc Ayrault resigned.

President Francois Hollande announced the move hours after his ruling Socialists suffered a bad defeat in the country's local elections, where center-right opposition UMP triumphed and far-right National Front showed unprecedented success, France 24 has reported.

The police has banned public gatherings in central Athens from 6 a.m. until 11 p.m. on Tuesday and Wednesday, when the European Union’s finance ministers will be in the Greek capital for an informal Eurogroup and then an ECOFIN meeting.

Dozens of Turks and Bosnians celebrated Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s victory in Sunday’s local elections by gathering to celebrate in Ilidza in Sarajevo and driving through the city honking their car horns and waving AK (Justice and Development) Party flags alongside those of Turkey and Bosnia.

Russia’s Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev is in the Crimean capital Simferopol on Monday.

This is the highest ranking Russian official to visit the autonomous region, since the referendum on March 16, when Crimea voted to split from Ukraine and join Russia.

Center-right opposition UMP party has claimed victory in Sunday's second tour of French local elections.

Ten to fifteen towns could fall into the far-right National Front (FN)'s hands, according to various reports.

FN is poised to install mayors or councilors in some 200 places across France.

PASOK leader Evangelos Venizelos slammed his predecessor George Papandreou for failing to support both articles of the omnibus bill in a late vote on Sunday but stopped short of ousting the former prime minister from the party, a move that would have put the coalition’s majority at risk.

Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) has taken a commanding lead in the country’s local elections.

With just over 60% of the votes counted, Prime Minister Recep Erdogan’s party has 46.8%, while the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) trails with 27.3%, Hurriyet Daily News reported.