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DAILY NEWS IN ENGLISH

German conservative Manfred Weber aims to lead EU Commission The 46-year-old leads the European Parliamentʼs center-right group, the European Peopleʼs Party (EPP), and would be in with a strong chance of winning the presidency if he can secure their endorsement at the upcoming party congress in November.

Road to the presidency Incumbent Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker is set to step down shortly after European Parliament elections in May 2019.The EPP, currently the most powerful group in the EU Parliament, is due to unveil its preferred candidate by as soon as November when it holds a party congress in Helsinki.As EPP head, Weber will likely be considered one of the favorites. German Chancellor Angela Merkel has also given Weber her backing, according to reports.The CSU lawmaker could, however, still likely face stern competition.

UK charges two Russians over Salisbury poisoning of Skripals British prosecutors announced on Wednesday they had collected sufficient evidence to charge two Russians with theattempted murder of former double agent Sergei Skripaland his daughter Yulia.

Authorities issued a European arrest warrant for two men named as Alexander Petrov and Ruslan Boshirov, both aged around 40.

Photographs of the two men were also released as part of an appeal for any witnesses to come forward. However, Sue Hemming, director of Legal Services at the Crown Prosecution Service, said prosecutors would not be applying to Russia for extraditionsince "the Russian constitution does not permit extradition of its own nationals." The two men can still be arrested in the unlikely event that they travel to a European country.

204/2018 • 06 SEPTEMBER, 2018

Ankara aims to defuse tensions with European allies Ankara will likely use his visit as a chance to score points with Berlin

As Turkey seeks to mend ties with its allies in Europe, German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas is making his first visit to the country.

Wirecard to kick Commerzbank out of DAX A Bavarian startup specializing in online payments is set to nudge Germanyʼs second-largest bank out of the countryʼs DAX index. Analysts say itʼs the latest sign of fintech firms outshining traditional lenders.

The operator of the Frankfurt Stock Exchange, Deutsche Börse, plans to unveil the new composition of the blue chip DAX 30 index of leading German companies later on Wednesday as part of a regular review of listed firmsʼ market capitalization and trading volumes. The odds are that Commerzbank —Germanyʼs secondlargest lender and a founding member of the prestigious DAX clubthree

decades ago — will have to concede its place to fintech company Wirecard. Commerzbank has been an ailing bank for years. It had to be bailed out by the taxpayer during the global financial crisis and has seen its share price plunge by a third since January to give it a market cap of just over €10 billion ($11.5 billion), the lowest of all DAX 30 players.Investors excited about Wirecard By contrast,fintech firm Wirecard has been the darling of investors for a long time. The startup is currently listed on the TexDAX and makes software for cashless and contactless payments. It has seen its share price soar by 110 percent this year.

Chemnitz concert: #WirSindMehr becomes a trending topic on Twitter Die Toten Hosen, Kraftklub, Trettmann: the list of bands who performed in Chemnitz Monday evening reads like a whoʼs who of German rock. The #WirSindMehr (We are more) concert was quickly organized by local band Kraftklub last week after several protest marches took over the East German city last week and demonstrations grew violent. Read

Danish murderer Peter Madsen challenges life sentence in submarine murder case Peter Madsen, the Danish submarine inventor who was found guilty of the torture, sexual assault, murder and dismemberment of Swedish reporter Kim Wall, appeared before an appeals court in Copenhagen on Wednesday to fight against his life sentence. The three-day session at the Eastern High Court will not deal with the April 25 guilty ruling. Madsen still denies murdering Wall but wants to move on, according to his lawyer, so he has accepted the verdict. In Denmark, a life sentence on average is about 16 years, but it can be extended if deemed necessary. Madsen, 47, who claims Wall died accidentally inside the su

Danish murderer Peter Madsen challenges life sentence in submarine murder case Peter Madsen, the Danish submarine inventor who was found guilty of the torture, sexual assault, murder and dismemberment of Swedish reporter Kim Wall, appeared before an appeals court in Copenhagen on Wednesday to fight against his life sentence. The three-day session at the Eastern High Court will not deal with the April 25 guilty ruling.

Madsen still denies murdering Wall but wants to move on, according to his lawyer, so he has accepted the verdict.

weather today BUDAPEST

more: Chemnitz rocks against the far-

right Their appeal to fans from around Germany to descend on the city as a sign of tolerance drew an audience of 65,000 to the streets of Chemnitz. "So many resilient people here on stage, backstage and out in the public," the band tweeted Tuesday with a birdʼs eye view of the impressive crowd.

16 / 26 °C Precipitation: 0 mm

204/2018 • 06 September, 2018

German minister Polandʼs pro-coal government goes pushes for free green trade deal ahead of Africa trip Germany’s development minister Gerd Müller is promoting a "customs-free trade deal in Africa" ahead of his seven-nation Africa visit. Experts say the real issues are being ignored.

When it comes to the economic relationship between Germany and Africa, the issue of customs exemption is no longer an important topic.

At least thatʼs what renowned development economist Robert Kappel from the University of Leipzig thinks.

Instead, agricultural subsidies and trade barriers should be the main topic of discussion. However, Kappel blames Europe for pursuing neocolonialism in its monetary policy. Yet, Müller avoided these issues before his trip to Africa this week. According to Kappel, he has failed to recognize that a trade imbalance has only increased in recent years — despite a customs exemption. "The minister is not well informed, therefore itʼs right to criticize him," Kappel told DW.

Ryder Cup: Sergio Garcia and Tiger Woods among wildcard picks European captain Thomas Bjorn has opted for experience by selecting four previous winners, including Sergio Garcia, as his wildcard picks. Bjorn follows the lead of US captain Jim Furyk, who called on Tiger Woods. Garcia is joined by Ian Poulter, Paul Casey and Henrik Stenson, who have all been involved in multiple winning teams, as the captainʼs wildcard picks. While Poulter has found form after missing the2016 defeat by the United States at Hazeltine, Garcia has struggled in 2018, missing the cut at each of the last five majors.

There are about 4,000 offshore wind turbines in EU waters, most in the North Sea, producing 72 percent of the continentʼs wind electricity. Turbines in the Irish Sea and the Baltic Sea contribute 16 and 12 percent respectively.

But the balance could be about to shift to the Baltic after Polandʼs upper house of parliament recentlyapproved the removal of clean-power investment obstacles in a new renewable energy law. And others in the Baltic region are following suit. Warsaw goes green The Polish electricity transmission system operator PSE said as much

as 8 gigawatts of offshore wind capacity could be installed in Poland, with 4 GW of that operational by 2026/27.

Poland is aiming to meet its EU commitment of 15 percent of renewables by 2020. As offshore wind costs fall on economies of scale and the EU ratchets up the cost of the blocʼs carbon dioxide emissions permits to discourage the polluters, some of the bigger energy players are moving into the sector. Polandʼs installed wind power capacity, including offshore, is about 6.4 GW. By comparison, Germany has about 56 GW.

Summertime: What a joke!

It was only a a bit of fun that late riser Benjamin Franklin proposed daylight savings in 1784 and for more than two centuries it has been a topic of controversy.

It all started with a joke: because the French got up so badly in the morning, Benjamin Franklin wrote a satirical discourse in 1784 about how many candles and money could be saved by changing the time and getting up earlier. In order to achieve this, Paris should tax shutters, ration candles and wake the population in the morning with cannon thunder. When the 78year-old wrote this satire, one of the

USʼ founding fathers had already been living in Paris for eight years. As an American delegate he had been able to win the French over as allies in the fight against the British. Both sides acknowledged the inventorʼs alert spirit and negotiating skills, althogh Franklin by then was struggling with old age; gout and gallstones tied him to his house in the Parisian suburb of Passy. He was joined there often by good friends such as Antoine AlexisFrancois Cadet de Vaux, editor of the Journal de Paris, who encouraged Franklin, known for his humour, to write short texts on everyday problems.

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Can Europe defeat a palm oil ʼmonsterʼ of its own making?

Alongside record heat waves, trade wars have also been grabbing global headlines recently, whether itʼs the United States versus Turkey, the US versus China — or the European Union versus Indonesia and Malaysia.

Rumblings of the latter followed the European Parliamentʼs January 2018 vote to ban the use of palm oil as a biofuel by 2020. Malaysia and Indonesia — both major producers — threatened retaliation, but backed down after the EU opted for a slower phase-out of palm oil as biofuel. Now, under the EUʼs updated Renewable Energy Directive (finalized in June), palm oil imports should peak around 2019, then begin to drop in 2023 before being phased out entirely by 2030. The EUʼs move came amidst growing recognition that the consumption of palm oil in Europecontributes to deforestation, destruction of wildlife habitat and — when industrial palm oil growers clear rainforests — greenhouse gas emissions.

Venezuela hit by magnitude 7.3 earthquake, buildings evacuated A powerful magnitude 7.3 earthquake hit the coast of Venezuela on Tuesday, forcing people to evacuate their homes and offices as far away as the capital, Caracas. The US Geological Survey reported that Tuesdayʼs quake had a depth of 76 miles (123 kilometers) and its epicenter was about 12 miles (20 kilometers) northwest of the Venezuelan city of Yaguaraparo.

The US Pacific Tsunami Warning Center warned that the deep earthquake could lead to small tsunami waves along the countryʼs coastline. It remains unclear just how much damage was caused by the earthquake. A witness inCumana, one of the biggest cities near the quakeʼs epicenter, said several people were injured in a shopping center when an escalator collapsed, although there appeared to be no immediate signs of further damage in the vicinity. It is thought that the quake occurred deep enough below ground to have dampened most of the shaking. Nevertheless, reports suggest that the rumbles were also felt as far away as the Colombian capital, Bogota, in the east and the nearby islands of Trinidad and Tobago and St. Lucia to the northwest.