Guy Verhofstadt, ALDE Leader today issued a stark warning to the EU following the weak statement by the High Representative, Catherine Ashton on the situation in Syria.  Following her remarks that the idea of creating humanitarian corridors  "has been dropped", Verhofstadt stated if the EU stands idly by - Homs will become the new Srebrenica.

Member States collectively spend about €200 billion a year on defence, which represents only about a third of the US defence budget alone. European countries are already incapable of carrying out military operations (example recent Libya intervention) without US support, whose share of all defence spending within NATO has risen to 75%. The European Parliament today adopted a Report in response to the uncoordinated defence budget cuts in recent years of the majority of EU Member States. The MEPs call for increased cooperation in the field of defence.

The European Parliament adopted today a report on the impact of the financial crisis on the defence sector in EU Member States.

The report is particularly timely as it comes at a moment when the Member States, forced by radical budgetary austerity measures, are looking into possible pooling and sharing initiatives to reduce costs, given the impact of the financial crisis on the defence sector.

And its social aspects 

The global body for professional accountants, ACCA (the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants) is supporting the project to develop a framework for Integrated Reporting (IR). ACCA’s position is explained in its official response to a discussion paper issued by the International Integrated Reporting Committee (IIRC).