Today is World Refugee Day. A day chosen back in 2001 to honour the Geneva Convention for refugees and to remind the world of the plight of refugees worldwide. This year marks two anniversaries: the 20th World Refugee Day and the 70th anniversary of the Geneva Convention. This is a good moment to reflect on the state of global and European protection of those fleeing war and persecution.

In an interview, Dr. Franziska Brantner MdB comments on the results of the “Actually European!? Citizen expectations of the next German government’s EU policy” study and makes the case for greater German engagement in the fields of climate protection, tax policy and ensuring the rule of law.

As a representative survey reveals, citizens expect the next federal government to set clear priorities, to pursue an active and cooperative European policy and to invest more jointly in European issues of the future.

Memorials are more than memories cast in basalt and concrete; as reference points, they are sources of veneration and contempt, at the mercy of political interests and deliberate acts of manipulation.

Crises are moments when the hairline cracks and chips in the structures of our societies start to show. Whether the crisis is of an economic, public health, rule of law or climate nature: for bold responses to the crises of our times, strong and progressive alliances are needed now more than ever. 

Community-based organizations and grassroots-led initiatives across Asia are addressing the growing threat of plastics pollution. Governments must now enact and properly implement policies and regulations to scale up these bottom-up efforts and hold plastics producers accountable.

Today, the Heinrich Böll Foundation is publishing the digital non-fiction book Unpacked! Plastic, Waste, and Me.

In a brilliant and personal essay on the history of Bidoon literature, Mona Kareem shows why literature cannot be thought along national lines.

The “marea verde” – the “green tide” – has spread across the whole of Latin America. Can it make waves in Germany too?

The European Green Deal will only become a true success story if the EU functions as a multi-level governing system in the truest sense of the word and the various levels operate at a well-connected interplay.