Paris to Berlin in an hour: Welcome to the future of high-speed rail travel in Europe

Picture this: the year is 2045. You’re standing on a platform in Berlin awaiting a sleek Hyperloop pod that will glide into the station to a noiseless halt and then deposit you in Paris an hour later, ready for your morning meeting.

In the afternoon, you’ll take another southbound pod on a leisurely trip to Barcelona for the weekend, a journey that will take no more than 90 minutes.

The speed and ease is no longer a surprise to you because in the last quarter-century, almost all travel throughout Europe has shifted from the skies to the ground.

Read more at: Paris to Berlin in an hour: Welcome to the future of high-speed rail travel in Europe | Euronews

The Netherlands: Uber Loses Battle Over Drivers’ Rights in the Netherlands

Uber Technologies Inc. lost another suit over its drivers’ working rights after an Amsterdam court ruled workers who ferry passengers using the Uber app in the Netherlands are covered by a local collective labor law.

The legal relationship between Uber and its drivers meets all of the characteristics of an employment contract, the court said in its judgement. Uber must apply the Collective Labor Agreement for Taxi Transport to protect drivers, allowing them in some cases to claim overdue salary. Uber was also ordered to pay the local labor union, FNV, 50,000 euros ($59,000) in compensation for failing to comply with the agreement.

Read more at: Uber Loses Battle Over Drivers’ Rights in the Netherlands

EU: Netherlands to stop social distancing but expand Covid entry passes from Sept. 25

Physical distancing rules in the Netherlands that call for people to remain 1.5 meters away from each other will be cancelled as of September 25. From that same date, a coronavirus pass frequently generated by the CoronaCheck app will be mandatory for everyone aged 13 and older when visiting catering businesses and cultural venues, including cafés, concert halls and theaters, sources close to the Cabinet confirmed after reports from RTL Nieuws, De Telegraaf and NOS.

Prime Minister Mark Rutte and Health Minister Hugo de Jonge are expected to announce the decisions during a press conference on Tuesday evening. Rutte and members of the Cabinet met on Sunday with pandemic advisors from the Outbreak Management Team to discuss the coronavirus situation in the Netherlands at Catshuis, the prime minister’s official residence.

Read more at: Netherlands to stop social distancing but expand Covid entry passes from Sept. 25 | NL Times

Europe Doesn’t Want to Fight America’s Battles Anymore -by Christopher Caldwell

To listen to the debate in Europe over the chaotic retreat of United States troops from Afghanistan is to be struck by what a huge vocabulary Europeans have developed over the centuries for describing military calamities. What we just witnessed has already been described as a débâcle, a débandade, a dégringolade and a déroute, not to mention a “rout,” a “fiasco” and a “humiliation.”

The question at the heart of these discussions is whether the botched withdrawal is a failure serious enough to merit a rethinking of European-American defense arrangements. The Afghan war was a NATO operation, involving the core of the trans-Atlantic alliance system that dates from the Cold War. American fecklessness has left European leaders infuriated. In Germany, Armin Laschet, who is running to replace his Christian Democratic colleague Angela Merkel as chancellor in national elections this month, speaks of “the greatest debacle NATO has suffered since its founding.”

Read more at: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/03/opinion/afghanistan-europe-nato.html

EU Main Drug Entry Points: Netherlands, Belgium supplant Spain as main gateways into Europe for cocaine

Belgium and the Netherlands have become the main hubs for cocaine trafficking to Europe, supplanting Spain as the main route of entry into European countries, Europol said on Tuesday.

The report from the European police agency noted that criminal organisations, from Colombia especially, are using the ports of Rotterdam (Netherlands), Hamburg (Germany) and especially Antwerp (Belgium) to bring the drugs into the Netherlands, from where they are transported throughout Europe.

"The epicentre of the cocaine market in Europe has shifted northwards," the report, drawn up in collaboration with the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), said.

Read more at: Netherlands, Belgium supplant Spain as main gateways into Europe for cocaine | Euronews

The Netherlands: Climate change poses serious health risk for people in the Netherlands, says expert

The Dutch medicine journal NTvG joined 200 other medical journals worldwide in their call for world leaders to intensify their effort in combating climate change, NOS reported.

Climate change poses an immediate risk for public health, the experts said. “Climate change and the decline in biodiversity is a much larger problem than the pandemic”, NTvG editor-in-chief Olde Rikkert told NOS Radio 1 Journaal. “While you do have a vaccine for the coronavirus, you don’t have that for climate change and biodiversity.”

The experts said they believe the earth is steering towards a two degrees Celsius temperature increase.

Read more at: Climate change poses serious health risk for people in the Netherlands, says expert | NL Times

GA-ASI SeaGuardian Flies From UK to the Netherlands

In cooperation with the UK and Netherlands airspace authorities, the Royal Air Force, and the Royal Netherlands Air Force (RNLAF), General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Inc. (GA-ASI) flew a company-owned, MQ-9B SeaGuardian® Remotely Piloted Aircraft (RPA) today from RAF Waddington across the North Sea to Leeuwarden Air Base in the Netherlands, completing a two-day series of flights between the two airspaces.

Read more at: GA-ASI SeaGuardian Flies From UK to the Netherlands