On 4th September 2013 in commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the death of Robert Schuman Luxembourg Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker visited the house where R.Schuman was born in Luxembourg-Clausen, then he travelled to the house in Scy-Chazelles near Metz. Jean-Claude Juncker believes that the Schuman Declaration is still a "programme for the future" with which "borders have lost their pernicious quality." The commemorative day that the Prime Minister qualified as "moving" ended with the screening of a fiction/documentary "Robert Schuman: l'Europe en héritage" by Patrick Basso.

The Azerbaijanis will be electing their president on 9th October next. There are no issues at stake in this presidential election since victory seems to be certain for the outgoing President Ilham Aliev (New Party of Azerbaijan, YAP) in office since 2003. In Azerbaijan the President of the Republic enjoys most of the political power. A candidate in the election must have the signatures of at least 40,000 voters in order to be able to stand. 21 people are officially running and have been registered by the Central Electoral Commission. The question is whether this presidential election will be democratic or not.

According to the most recent mid-term assessment by the OECD presented on 3rd September 2013 in Paris by the organisation's Deputy Chief Economist, Mr Jorgen Elmeksov, moderate recovery in growth can be seen in the major advanced economies. The study announces the end of recession for the euro zone even though output is still weak in some countries. The document is still cautious about the euro zone's economic situation however. In this respect it falls in line with the more pessimistic forecasts made by the Commission.

On 2nd September the European Commission published a report indicating that the number of protectionist measures was increasing. Since October 2008 nearly 700 new measures had been introduced. The most frequent measures were applied on borders, those imposing the use of national goods and the relocations of businesses and even those supporting exports or those preserving national industries came next. Since 2008 the countries which had adopted the most restrictions were Argentina (147 measures), Russia (99), Indonesia (73) and Brazil (59) whilst China had only introduced 36 new measures.

On 5th and 6th September the 28 European Defence Ministers, the High Representative for Foreign Affairs, Catherine Ashton and NATO's Secretary General, Anders Fogh Rasmussen met for an informal meeting to discuss the Common Security and Defence Policy and to prepare the European Council that will take place in December 2013 which is to focus on defence and security issues. "The worsening security situation in Europe's southern neighbourhood shows that the EU has to strengthen its role in terms of international security. More active involvement by partners in the EU's Common Security and Defence Policy will help reach this goal," declared the Lithuanian Defence Minister Juozas Olekas.

The Eurogroup President Jeroen Dijsselbloem presented the development of the situation in the euro zone to the European Parliament's Economic Affairs Committee on 5th September 2013. He said that it was "realistic to think that additional support beyond the programme would be necessary in Greece". However no details were given about this. The discussion focused on the emergence of banking union, the fight to counter unemployment and recommendations made per country.

The European Foreign and European Affairs Ministers called on 7th September 2013 in Vilnius for a "clear, strong response" to the chemical attacks undertaken in Syria on 21st August. "Given the cynical use of chemical weapons, the international community cannot remain passive," they declared in the declaration published after their meeting. "A clear, strong response is vital to stress the fact that these crimes are unacceptable and that there can be no impunity. We must avoid the creation of an atrocious precedent for the repeated use of chemical weapons, in Syria or elsewhere," they added. The ministers re-iterated that "only a political solution could end this terrible bloodbath, these serious infringements of human rights and the destruction of Syria." "A federative diplomatic process leading to a political solution is now more urgent than ever before. The initiative of a peace conference Geneva II must make rapid progress."

On 6th September 2013 the European Court of Justice annulled decisions and regulations of the Council of the European Union which had frozen the funds from Iran of one physical person and seven businesses originally decided because of their links with the controversial nuclear programme in Iran. In its decision the Court deemed that the EU "had not provided evidence" that it had attributed to some of the companies involved and that it had committed "an error of judgement" or "infringed the obligation of motivation and the obligation to communicate" regarding the companies involved. As a result the freezing of the assets decided against these financial establishments and Naser Bateni, director of the one of the companies accused, was annulled. However this decision will not take immediate effect. Sanctions will remain in place until the appeal period has expired i.e. in two months and 10 days or if an appeal was made and until this was rejected. During this time the EU can still decide on further sanctions against the people and organisations involved.

The ECB's Council of Governors met on 5th September 2013. Mario Draghi announced that the key rate would remain unchanged at 0.5% and that due to the euro zone's macroeconomic forecasts made in June growth for 2013 had been increased by 0.2% (-0.4% instead of -0.6%). In 2014 growth has been forecast at 1%. Mario Draghi observed that significant progress had been achieved in strengthening the banks' own funds and that household savings had been weakened by the crisis. He did however remain cautious about any euphoria regarding the economy in the euro zone which has just started to grow again repeating that his institution was prepared to act if necessary. He was concerned about the decline in liquidities in circulation and the impact this might have on the monetary market saying that he "was paying particular attention to the situation."

German Chancellor Angela Merkel defended her economic results on 3rd September 2013 as she spoke to German MPs, whilst her Social Democrat rival Peer Steinbrück accused her of having increased inequality as they faced each other in their last direct confrontation before the general elections on 22nd September. "It has been four good years for Germany because many people are better off now than four years ago", said the Chancellor who boasted the sharp decrease in unemployment and the recovery of public finances, which in her opinion, are a result of an "intelligent policy" associating competitiveness and solidarity. Mr Steinbrück stressed that the "country had the largest low salary sector in Europe." He denounced a "fracture within German society". According to a recent survey the CDU-CSU led by Ms Merkel is credited with 41% of the vote which is more than the SPD and the Ecologists together (respectively 27% and 10%).

More than one thousand people demanding the resignation of the government demonstrated in front of the Bulgarian parliament on 4th September, the day that parliament returned to work. Demonstrators promised to revive protest against the "oligarchy". The British Ambassador to Bulgaria, Jonathan Allen called on the government to take heed of the demonstrators. The Ambassadors of France and Germany, Philippe Autié and Matthias Hoepfner recalled on 8th July in a common declaration that "the oligarchic model had no place in Bulgaria".

In an interview with a Catalan radio station on 5th September the Chairman of Catalonia's separatist party Convergència i Unió, Artur Mas, rejected the prospects of organising a referendum on self-government promised for 2014 over the sovereignty of this region of Spain if Madrid did not give its go-ahead. He said he wanted to "act legally" and to negotiate with the Spanish government. If Madrid rejected the idea of organising a referendum he added that he intended to turn the regional elections in 2016 into a vote for the independence of Catalonia.

During a press conference on 3rd September 2013 the Finnish business Nokia announced that the American company Microsoft was due to purchase its mobile phone branch for a total of 5.44 billion euro in the first quarter of 2014. Nokia is now due to focus its activities on services and the development of network infrastructures for operators.

During a ministerial meeting on 6th September at the Saint-Paul-lez-Durance site the seven member countries and organisations in the ITER research project recalled their commitment to this international cooperation project. They visited the work site of the future Tokamak reactor. The meeting aimed to achieve the members' approval of the organisation's projects. It took place at the ITER's HQ on Günther Oettinger's initiative (European Commissioner for Energy and the European Community's representative for atomic energy). The EU decided in June to set aside 6 billion euro to fund the project.

On 4th September 2013 the Hungarian Secretary of State for European Affairs, Enikő Győri and the Director for European Affairs from the Foreign Ministry, Bálint Ódor hosted a French Senate delegation from the France-Hungary friendship group. They discussed possible areas of cooperation between the two countries as well as the future of the European Union and relations between Hungary and the EU. After the meeting with Enikő Győri, Deputy Secretary of State, Gergely Prőhle also spoke with the French delegation. They mentioned political and cultural events to come like the visit of Hungarian President Janos Ader to Paris and the joint exhibition at the Orsay Museum and the Museum of Fine Arts in Budapest entitled "Béla Bartók and Hungarian Modernism, 1905-1920".

On 3rd September 2013 during the Krynica Economic Forum Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk gave a speech on the country's economic situation. On 4th September 2013 the government presented its plan to reform retirement pensions. In order to reduce public debt it has decided to transfer assets from private retirement funds, which are presently invested in treasury bonds, over to the Social Security Office, a state organisation which pays out pensions but whose debt is endemic. The assets invested in treasury bonds represent half of the total amount of the retirement funds, the rest, which is invested in shares in the Warsaw stock exchange, will continue to be managed by these funds.

On 4th and 5th September 2013 American President Barack Obama travelled to Stockholm to meet Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt. Their meeting ended in a press conference in which they spoke of their cooperation in terms of economic development, energy and security. In a joint declaration they promised to promote growth and employment and maintained their support to the free-trade agreement between the EU and the USA which is under negotiation at present. This was the first bilateral visit to Sweden by an American president in office.

On 3rd September 2013 Russian President Vladimir Putin met his Armenian counterpart Serzh Sargsyan in Moscow. The two presidents discussed the need for greater Eurasian economic cooperation. In this sense Armenia's membership of a customs union would be the first step towards the creation of a Eurasian Economic Union. They also said they wanted to settle the conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh by cooperating in the Minsk Group. As far as bilateral relations were concerned they strengthened their economic cooperation with an agreement to develop infrastructures and nuclear energy in Armenia with the construction of a new power plant.

During the second quarter of 2013 the European Union recorded a current account surplus of 35.9 billion euro according to Eurostat on 6th September 2013. In comparison with the second quarter 2012 when the surplus only totalled 5.9 billion euro the goods account balance was in surplus whilst it had been in deficit and the services account surplus had decreased slightly. The current transfers account remained stable (-14.7 billion euro in 2013 against -14.3 billion euro in 2012).

Marie-Thérèse Sanchez-Schmid MEP has published a book which reviews the 70 years of progress made by women entitled "1944-2014: Au coeur des femmes". It brings together the portraits of women who have fought for women's rights in France, Europe and the world. This work addresses the issue of gender equality from a humoristic and sensitive angle.

On 3rd September 2013 the situation of asylum seekers in 2012 was presented to the European Parliament. The annual report by the European Asylum Support Office presents the condition of asylum seekers in the various countries of the Union. In comparison with 2011 the number of asylum seekers is up by 11%. Many come from Afghanistan, Russia and Syria. The most requested countries are Germany, France and Sweden.

The Martin Gropius Museum in Berlin is hosting a retrospective of the Swiss surrealist artist Meret Oppenheim until 1st December 2013 - she would have been 100 years old this year. "Freedom is not given, you have to take it" the artist liked to say. She was born in Berlin on 6th October 1913 and died in Basel, Switzerland on 15th November 1985. The exhibition covers more than 200 of the artist's works. Meret Oppenheim was also a writer, painter and friend of the surrealists in Paris in the 1930's; she sat as a nude model for American photographer Man Ray.