Commission president, who is seeking another term, took aim at group that includes AfD and National Rally in pre-election debate

The European Commission’s president, Ursula Von der Leyen, has criticised the far-right as “Putin’s proxies”, while refusing to rule out working with other rightwing nationalists, as campaigning began ahead of June’s European elections.

Von der Leyen is seeking a second five-year term leading the commission, in the looming reshuffle of EU top jobs that follows the European elections.

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Ursula von der Leyen takes part alongside representatives from seven other parties as EU gears up for European parliament elections

The far-right Identity and Democracy’s representative, Anders Vistisen , wrote on social media ahead of the debate:

“The entire EU system has tried to prevent me and the right wing from participating in the EU top candidate debate tonight. They want to exclude right wing votes! They didn’t succeed - so tonight I will tell the truth about the EU’s disaster course directly to Ursula and the rest of the EU!”

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Labour has also rejected European Commission’s proposal which would have allowed young people to live, work or study in the bloc

Rishi Sunak has rejected an EU offer to strike a post-Brexit deal to allow young Britons to live, study or work in the bloc for up to four years.

The prime minister declined the European Commission’s surprise proposal of a youth mobility scheme for those aged between 18 and 30 on Friday, after Labour had already knocked back the suggestion back on Thursday night – while noting it would “seek to improve the UK’s working relationship with the EU within our red lines”.

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The European Commission president is running for re-election. Yet a political cronyism scandal is dogging her path

Ursula von der Leyen became president of the European Commission in a backroom deal in 2019 without facing Europe’s voters. Now she is running for re-election almost without campaigning. The former German defence minister, 65, was chosen unopposed last month as lead candidate of the centre-right European People’s party for the European parliament elections on 6-9 June, although she does not plan to take a seat in the EU legislature. Since then, she has shunned media questioning as far as possible, and is refusing to commit to debating the other candidates in public.

She has not confirmed that she will show up for the high-profile Maastricht debate on 29 April, according to the organisers, and political sources say a major European newspaper had to drop plans to stage its own debate among the Spitzenkandidaten , or lead candidates, because von der Leyen would not pledge to attend.

Paul Taylor is a senior fellow of the Friends of Europe thinktank

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Markus Pieper resigns from €17k-a-month role hours before he was due to start amid claims of favouritism

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A row threatening to overshadow Ursula von der Leyen’s campaign for a second term as European Commission president has ended after a German colleague in her Christian Democratic Union party quit his new role as her special envoy for small businesses.

Markus Pieper resigned from the €17,000-a-month (£14,500) role hours before he was due to start on Tuesday after pressure from MEPs and European commissioners who had raised allegations of favouritism.

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European Commission defends appointing adviser Markus Pieper after selection process is questioned

Ursula von der Leyen’s bid for a second term in one of the most powerful jobs in Brussels, the presidency of the European Commission, has been dented after accusations of favouritism in the selection of a fellow party member to a lucrative new job.

Four of some of the highest ranking people in Brussels, including the EU’s chief diplomat, Josep Borrell, and the French commissioner Thierry Breton, have written to her to complain that the appointment of German MEP Markus Pieper as a special adviser “has triggered questions about the transparency and impartiality of the nomination process”.

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Brussels vote was cancelled after it became clear law would not pass final stage with majority vote

The EU’s nature restoration laws are hanging in the balance after a number of member states, including Hungary and Italy, withdrew support for the legislation.

Spain’s environment minister, Teresa Ribera, said it would be “enormously irresponsible” for countries to drop the laws, which have been two years in the making and are designed to reverse decades of damage to biodiversity on land and in waterways.

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Proposal aims to stop Kremlin flooding bloc with cheap wheat to destabilise European market

The EU is set to impose a tariff of up to 50% on Russia grain imports amid fears the Kremlin could flood the bloc with cheap wheat to destabilise the European market.

The proposal, unveiled by the European commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, follows a plea on Thursday to EU leaders by the Ukrainian president, Vlodomyr Zelenskiy, to do something about grain “stolen” by the Russians from occupied territories.

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European Commission will open office in the territory, made strategically important by rare resources and melting ice

The president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, is heading to Greenland as melting Arctic ice, demand for green-technology raw materials and competition from China increase the territory’s strategic importance.

While not in the EU, the autonomous Danish territory is of strong interest to Brussels, especially for highly sought after raw materials – it believes it has 25 of the 34 that it needs.

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