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We are celebrating 40 years of the Schengen area, the world’s largest area of freedom and security. Launched in 1985, in the town of Schengen, Luxembourg, the Schengen area has expanded 9 times to 29 countries today. It guarantees free movement to more than 450 million people. Find out more.

This year’s European Heritage Awards honour cultural professionals and volunteers from 24 European countries, who are working to conserve our heritage. From restoring a church roof in Austria and a market in Cyprus to 3D models of historic shipwrecks in Finland and a children’s festival in Ukraine.

The Council and European Parliament have struck a deal on detergents that will make them safer to use and cause less harm to the environment. It will improve their biodegradability, enable the reduction of harmful substances and improve information on the label, without extra red tape.

Around 8,500 young people from all over the world will take part in activities centred on the future of Europe in Strasbourg on 8 and 9 June. They will debate with members of the European Parliament on climate justice, skills for the future, and media freedom, among many other topics.

EU telecom ministers have adopted the EU Blueprint for cyber crisis management. It clarifies how EU countries can detect, respond to, recover and learn from large-scale cybersecurity incidents and cyber crises that could affect the whole EU. Cyber-attacks pose a growing threat to Europe’s security.

To better protect our ocean, the Commission has presented a European Ocean Pact. This new pact will bring together EU ocean policies under one single and coordinated framework. It will help to promote a thriving blue economy and support the well-being of people living in coastal areas.

The EU has changed the level of protection of the wolf from “strictly protected” to “protected” to give EU countries more flexibility in managing wolf populations. The estimated population of wolves on the European continent almost doubled between 2012 and 2023 to more than 20 000.

The EU’s LIFE awards 2025 have honoured 3 projects doing pioneering work in nature, circular economy and climate action. LIFE Lynx took a prize for helping to reverse the decline of lynxes, LIFEPOPWAT for depolluting contaminated water and LIFE DESERT-ADAPT for tackling desertification.

The Commission has presented a plan to support EU countries in managing water more efficiently. By implementing current EU water laws and actions, we can ensure water security and prepare for water-related disasters, locally and globally. Everyone needs access to secure, clean and affordable water.

The Commission has given the green light to 13 projects that will help it access raw materials located outside the EU. The projects will also boost local value creation in third countries. We need raw materials to build electric vehicles, batteries, high-performance magnets and much more.

The latest Eurobarometer survey shows the highest level of trust in the EU in 18 years and highest-ever support for the euro. It also reveals that Europeans would like to see a stronger and more assertive EU through common defence. Also, peace remains the value that best represents the EU.

The Commission has launched an EU startup and scaleup strategy to make Europe a great place for starting and growing global technology-driven companies. It’s part of the broader Choose Europe initiative, and it will help strengthen Europe's competitiveness.

This year’s European Charlemagne Youth Prize has been awarded to a Hungarian platform, Forum Europaeum, that promotes European identity, values, and unity. The second prize went to a Czech project encouraging young people’s vote and the third, to German legal support for discriminated people.

EU countries have significantly closed the gap to achieving the 2030 energy and climate targets, according to the European Commission. Following improvement to their national energy and climate plans, EU countries are on course to reduce net emissions by around 54% by 2030, compared to 1990 levels.

The Commission welcomes the agreement in the Council on the Security for Action for Europe (SAFE) instrument. The Commission will raise up to €150 billion on the capital markets, providing financial levers to EU countries to ramp up investments in key defence areas.

The EU has allocated €280 million to help with flood recovery in 4 Central European countries, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Moldova, following severe floods there in autumn 2024. The funds will finance all aspects of disaster recovery including temporary accommodation for affected populations.

The Commission has opened investigations against 4 large pornographic platforms for suspected breaches of its digital services rules. EU countries are also taking action against smaller pornographic platforms. This will reinforce the EU's effort to protect minors from harmful content online.

The EU has put together teams of firefighters and aircraft to help European countries affected by wildfires during the upcoming summer. Throughout July and August almost 650 firefighters from 14 European countries will be strategically prepositioned in key high-risk locations.

This week marks European Week Against Cancer (25-31 May). Under its Europe’s Beating Cancer Plan, the EU has provided support to millions of people affected by cancer across the Union. It funds actions on cancer prevention, detection, diagnosis and treatment to improve patients’ outcomes.