The first contract the Commission has negotiated on behalf of the EU Member States with a pharmaceutical company enters today into force following the formal signature between AstraZeneca and the Commission, the EU press service reported. The contract will allow the purchase of a vaccine against Covid-19 for all the Member States.

EC Vice President Valdis Dombrovskis will assume temporary responsibility for trade after the resignation of Ireland’s Phil Hogan, EC President Ursula von der Leyen said on Thursday. The former Latvian PM will be in charge as the EU seeks to ease trade tensions with the US, seal a deal on future relations with Britain and unite around a new leader for the WTO.

Trade Commissioner Phil Hogan resign late on Wednesday over alleged breaches of Covid-19 guidelines during a trip to his native Ireland, news wires reported. Hogan attended a golf dinner last week that outraged the Irish public and led to the resignation of an Irish minister.

EU Member States, Britain and EU partners have agreed on a blueprint for a Covid-19 vaccination plan envisaging inoculation of at least 40% of their populations, a step that may set back the WHO's own vaccine blueprint, Reuters reported. The EU target for early vaccinations is twice as high as the goal set by the WHO.

The EC concluded on Monday exploratory talks with US based company Moderna to purchase a potential vaccine against Covid-19, the EU press service reported. Moderna is the fifth company with which the Commission has concluded talks, following Sanofi-GSK on 31 July, Johnson & Johnson on 13 August, CureVac on 18 August, in addition to the signature of an Advance Purchase Agreement with AstraZeneca on 14 August.

As part of the EU's global coronavirus response, an EU Humanitarian Air Bridge operation consisting of two flights to Venezuela has concluded after delivering a total of 82.5 tonnes of life-saving material to supply humanitarian partners in the field. The flights departed from Madrid, Spain to Caracas, Venezuela.

The Commission decided today to register a European Citizens' Initiative (ECI) entitled ‘Right to Cure', the EU press service reported. The organisers of the ECI call on the Union “to put public health before private profit and make anti-pandemic vaccines and treatments a global public good, freely accessible to everyone”.

The European Commission has today concluded exploratory talks with CureVac to purchase a potential vaccine against Covid-19, the EU press service reported. This is following the positive steps with Sanofi-GSK on 31 July and Johnson & Johnson on 13 August and the signature of an Advance Purchase Agreement with AstraZeneca on 14 August.

Due to the effects of the coronavirus crisis, the Commission today proposed to give Rijeka (Croatia) and Galway (Ireland) the possibility to extend their year as 2020 European Capitals of Culture until 30 April 2021. The Commission also proposes to postpone the year in which Novi Sad (Serbia) is due to host a European Capital of Culture from 2021 to 2022 and the year in which Timisoara (Romania) and Elefsina (Greece) will hold the title from 2021 to 2023.

The Eurozone’s trade surplus with the rest of the world ballooned in June to €21.2 billion ($25 billion) as the bloc’s drop in imports of goods outpaced the fall of exports amid a global slide in trade due to the coronavirus pandemic. The bloc also suffered the biggest drop ever recorded in employment in the second quarter, the EU’s statistics agency Eurostat said.