EU foreign relations chief Javier Solana, who retires this week, will be remembered as a master of quiet, behind-the-scenes diplomacy. But campaigners say he should have done more to put human rights at the forefront of his work.

they looked forward to decisions on the Member Action Plan (MAP) that will be taken at the Foreign Minister's meeting on December 3rd and 4th.

European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso could announce the composition of his new team as early as Friday, with most powerful economic portfolios already pinned down, according to various press reports.

New procedural rules being considered by member states show that EU president-designate Herman Van Rompuy will have to manage a delicate power balancing act with the country holding the rotating presidency when he takes up his duties on 1 January.

A handful of nominees for the new EU executive could find themselves under fire over past associations with Communism, after the centre-right in the European Parliament indicated it will take a tough line on the issue in upcoming hearings.

Mr Van Rompuy will not formally begin work as EU president until 1 January. But his staff told that he plans to go to the Baltic Sea capitals with Mr Leterme in his interim capacity as EU "president-elect."

"Our new strategy that we have planned to launch in January 2010 is based on four elements," said Turkish EU Affairs Minister and chief negotiator Egemen Bagiş, revealing the following plan.

The EU's external relations commissioner, Benita Ferrero-Waldner, looks set to swap portfolios with her trade colleague Catherine Ashton once the Lisbon Treaty comes into effect on 1 December.

Incumbent Traian Basescu won the first round of Romania's presidential election on 22 November, exit polls showed, but the slim margin gave few clues as to who would form the next government and help resolve the economic crisis.

If MEPs were to rally against her following her hearing, it is unclear what the legal consequences would be.

In his keynote speech, he laid out three central aspects the Alliance needs to address to meet current and future challenges.

A deal struck by EU leaders in Brussels on Thursday evening (19 November) marked the latest step of an improbable rise by two erstwhile little-known politicians.

As foreign policy issues will still require unanimity among member states to formulate a common position, the US will still work with European countries bilaterally, Richard Morningstar, a special advisor on energy to US secretary of state Hillary Clinton

"Turkey is not a part of Europe and will never be part of Europe," Mr Van Rompuy said during a meeting of the Council of Europe on the subject of Turkey's possible entry into the EU, held in the Belgian parliament on December, 2004.

The Secretary General paid his first official visit to London since taking office.

Latest estimates show that the EU is set to overshoot its collective emission reduction target under the Kyoto Protocol, the European Commission said 12 November.

Former Lavian president Vaira Vike-Freiberga, also a declared candidate for the European Council presidency job, said on Thursday that the process was being conducted with Soviet-style secrecy and contempt for the public.

The summit will be in the format of an EU leaders' dinner in Brussels and comes after two weeks of consultations between Stockholm and the other EU capitals.

"If we don't have a decision in December on the whole package …then I would say that we have not drawn the right lessons from the crisis," said Swedish finance minister Anders Borg after a meeting with his EU counterparts in Brussels.

Consultations on filling the EU's new posts are only "half-way" through, Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt said on Monday (9 November) in Berlin, while warning that a Franco-German deal is not sufficient to get the names pinned down.

The EU and US have held the first meeting of a new transatlantic Energy Council, after the US President Barack Obama and EU leaders had agreed to establish the new energy forum for cooperation during a summit on Tuesday.

David Cameron, leader of the UK Conservative opposition, has abandoned talk of holding a referendum on the EU's latest treaty but has promised to seek repatriation of powers in key European Union policy areas should his party come to power next year.

Leaders of the countries next in line to take on the day-to-day running of the European Union have made it clear that they do not wish to be sidelined by any future EU president.

The Czech Constitutional Court has rejected a challenge to the EU's Lisbon Treaty, paving the way for Czech President Vaclav Klaus to sign it.

The flaws in Eastern Europe's model of growth have been exposed by the financial crisis and commodity-reliant countries like Russia must expand their industrial base to make them more resilient, the EBRD said in an annual report on Monday (2 November).

Climate change will feature heavily at an EU-US summit on Tuesday (3 November) as Brussels and Washington each try to find out what the other side is going to bring to the global negotiating table next month.

Given the EU's indecisiveness last week, it is only a matter of time before advocates of greater European integration call for yet another treaty. This has been the consistent pattern, and there is no reason to think it will not reassert itself.

The Obama administration's worldview is still emerging, but its policies toward Russia and China are already revealing.

Watching the Obama administration launch its "new era of engagement" over the past 10 months, most seasoned observers have pondered two questions: First, if engagement fails, will the Obama team ever acknowledge that it has failed? And what then?

The pact would have signatory countries commit to Nato-like security pledges in case of an attack on one of its members and refrain from "any other actions significantly affecting the security of any other parties."

Presenting a new report on 'a post-American Europe', US analyst Jeremy Shapiro and his British colleague Nick Witney said the EU has not yet come to terms with the post-Cold War international order.

European Commission president Jose Manuel Barroso on Tuesday (24 November) received the final names of commissioner nominees, meaning that he can start the distribution of portfolios, a process keenly watched by national governments.

The EU aims to give Ukraine a stern warning about financial and political reform at an upcoming summit, as the two sides head into a new, more pragmatic chapter in bilateral relations.

EU leaders have chosen Belgian Prime Minister Herman Van Rompuy to be the first president of the European Council, while UK trade commissioner Catherine Ashton will become the bloc's foreign policy chief.

After weeks of speculation and recriminations over a lack of transparency, EU leaders will meet in Brussels on Thursday evening (19 November) to decide who will take up the new posts created under the Lisbon Treaty.

Europe has given up hope that a binding global treaty on climate change can be achieved at the UN climate talks in Copenhagen in December.