From 24th to 26th October, the Chairman of the Robert Schuman Foundation, Jean-Dominique Giuliani, is taking part in a conference in Kyiv, Ukraine, organised by the National Civil Service Academy on "Relations between the European Union and Ukraine." He will be speaking on the future of relations between the EU and Ukraine. Mr Jacques Barrot, former Minister, member of the Foundation`s administrative board, member of the Constitutional Council and former Vice President of the European Commission, is speaking on the theme of "Rule of Law, Democracy, Freedom and Justice, the Intangible Values of the European Union".

During the federal elections (renewal of the two chambers of parliament) in Switzerland on 23rd October, the populist party, the Swiss People's Party came out ahead, but it has lost ground in comparison with the previous elections in 2007. Instead of reaching its goal of 30%, it only won - according still partial results - 25.9% of the vote. Its leaders, Christoph Blocher, Vice-President of the party and Tony Brunner, its President, did not succeed in winning a senatorial seat. The Socialist Party is said to have won 18.1%, the PLR (Free Liberals), 15.3% and the PDC (Christian Democratic Party), 13.1%. The Green Liberals and the Conservative Democratic Party (PBD) is said to have won slightly over 5%.

3.1 million Irish are being called to appoint the successor to Mary Patricia McAleese as the president of the Republic of Ireland on 27th October. The Irish will also vote on that day in two referenda - one on the payment of judges and the other on the possibility of the Oireachtas (Parliament) to undertake inquiries. Seven candidates are running. According to the latest poll by Ipsos MMRBI, published in The Irish Timesm the chair of the Labour Party, Michael Higgins is in the lead in terms of voting intentions with 23% of the vote. He is followed by Sean Gallagher, who is due to win 20% of the vote and Martin McGuiness 19%. Mary Davis is credited with 12%, David Norris 11%, Gay Mitchell 9%, and Dana Rosemary Scallon 6%.

On 20th November the Spanish are being convened early to renew the members of their bicameral Parliament (Cortes generales): the Senate, the upper chamber, comprises 208 members elected by universal suffrage (provincial senators) and 49 representatives appointed by the 17 autonomous communities (Community Senators) and the Congress of Deputies, the lower chamber, comprises 300 to 400 MPs (350 in the present lower chamber), elected at least every four years by proportional representation. 10 parties sit in the outgoing Congress of Deputies: the Socialist Party (PSOE) in office, the People`s Party (PP), the main opposition party, Catalonia Convergence and Union (CiU), the Basque Nationalist Party, the Catalonia Republican Left (ERC), the Galician Nationalist Bloc (BNG), the Canaries Coalition (CC), United Left (IU), Union, Progress and Democracy (UPyD), Yes to Navarre (NB). According to a poll by Metroscopia for the daily "El Pais", the PP has a comfortable lead over the PSOE. It is credited with 45.5% of the vote whilst the PSOE is due to win 29.7%. United Left is due to come third winning 7.6% of the vote, Union, Progress and Democracy is due to win 4.5%.

On 20th October the German government reduced its growth forecasts for next year to 1% instead of a previous estimate 1.8%, according to announcements made by the German Economy Ministry. The figures notably reflect a decline in the economy that is suffering due to the debt crisis in Europe. Growth will lie at 2.9% this year, says Berlin, ie slightly more than the 2.6% forecast in the last estimate in April. But "the risks from abroad are significantly higher," commented the German Economy Minister, Philipp Rösler, who spoke of the "growing destabilisation of consumers and businesses to the backdrop of the euro zone crisis."

From 1st to 20th October the European Central Bank, the European Commission and the International Monetary Fund travelled to Ireland to undertake their quarterly assessment of its economic recovery programme. The three partners congratulated Ireland on the rapid implementation of structural reforms. They observed higher growth than originally forecast and an efficient recapitalisation of the banks, thanks to the participation of the private sector. According to the European Central Bank, Ireland is on the right path in terms of budgetary consolidation and is due to achieve a debt rate lower than the required 3% by 2015.

On 20th October the ratings agency Standard & Poor`s downgraded Slovenia`s solvency rating. The country, which has been in the euro zone since 2007, dropped from an "AA" rating to "AA-". The agency highlights the fact that the government has not put forward any credible strategy to consolidate its budgetary situation since the crisis in 2008.

Standard & Poor's downgraded the ratings of 24 Italian banks on 18th October - most were of average size, except for the Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena (BMPS), the UBI Banca and the Banco Popolare. They did this because of a worsening in the peninsula's economic situation. BMPS, the oldest bank still in operation in the world, has seen its long term rating reduced by one notch to "BBB+", just like the Banco Popolare which has been downgraded to "BBB" and that of UBI to "A-", said the financial assessment agency in a press release. According to the agency tension on the markets and the "decline of growth prospects" have led to a worsening of the economic context for the Italian banks whose refunding costs "are going to increase significantly" due to a rise in obligatory Italian rates. S&P "does not think that the difficult context is temporary or that it will easily be reversed."

On 23rd October the 27 heads of state and government of the EU insisted on the need to overcome the sovereign debt crisis and discussed the need to recapitalise the banking system. They stressed that the measures taken should not damage either growth or employment, since the European Strategy 2020 goals had to be respected. They also prepared the next G20 summit in order to defend Europe's position. On the sidelines of the European Council the 17 heads of State and government of the euro zone met to institutionalise this meeting at the summit, which will become at least a bi-annual event and to grant Herman Van Rompuy the chairmanship of this. The latter has defined five priorities: restoring public finances, finding a solution for Greece, fighting against the risk of contagion, restoring confidence in the banking sector and improving the governance and integration of the euro zone.

On 19th October the European Commission published its 8th interim report on potentially restrictive trade measures covering the period October 2010 to September 2011. In its study it expresses its concern over the lack of measures taken to remove obstacles to international trade, notably in the G20 countries. The Commission notably highlights the increase in the number of these obstacles, whilst the overall improvement in the economic situation no longer justifies them. These restrictive measures equally concern tariffs (increases in customs duties), quantitative (the application of quotas) and qualitative aspects (discriminatory technical criteria).

On 21st October the Soyuz rocket took off from the launch pad of the Guianese Space Centre. This technical success marks the highpoint in two European scientific cooperation projects. On the one hand it heralds the start of the operation of the satellite navigation system, Galileo, both an economic and strategic competitor of the American GPS system. On the other hand this luanch was accomplished thanks to extended cooperation between the European Space Agency and its Russian counterpart - the former operating this base and the latter responsible for the rocket that put the two Galileo satellites into orbit.

Michel Barnier, Commissioner for the Internal Markets and Services put proposals forward on 20th October for a better regulation of the financial markets. The revision of the directive on financial tools' markets that dates back to 2009 plans for better surveillance of new high frequency trading platforms and enhanced surveillance with the means to implement sanctions and to ban dangerous products. If these proposals are accepted by the European Parliament and the Council, the financial markets will become more efficient, stronger, more transparent says the Commissioner.

The Eurobarometer service at the European Parliament published a study on 21st October entitled "The Europeans and the Crisis", which analyses European public opinion in the face of the present economic and financial crisis. It emerges that 54% of those interviewed believe that the euro has not attenuated the crisis (a decline of three points in comparison with six months ago). Most people who gave their opinion said they supported the pooling of a share of the sovereign debts and the creation of euro-bonds. They said they would like greater coordination between national responses to the crisis. These results vary greatly from one State to another.

The European anti-fraude office (OLAF) published its annual report on 19th October. In 2010 OLAF undertook 419 investigations in the various states of the EU including 81 in Bulgaria, 41 in Italy, 37 in Belgium and 36 in Romania. The investigations mainly involved the European institutions and the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) and led to the recovery of 67.9 million euros, of which 32.9 million in the name of the Cohesion Policy.

The retrospective of the most important pieces of work by Perugino (1448-1523), a major Quattrocento artist, who was the student of Verrochio and master of the decoration of the Sixtine Chapel, is the main exhibition of the Old Pinacotheque of Munich, which is celebrating its 175th anniversary. The exhibition entitled "Perugino - Raphael's Master" is open until 15th January 2012.

The Luxembourg Museum in Paris is devoting an exhibition to Paul Cézanne (1839-1906) until 26th February 2012. The exhibition reviews the major themes Cézanne explored in Paris. His friendship with Emile Zola is a privileged theme. Organised with the Petit Palais, the Beaux-Arts Museum of the city of Paris, this exhibition brings together around 80 major pieces of work from around the world.