Jose Manuel Barroso

EU Commissioner Margaritis Schinas on Friday hailed the bloc's new rules for handling irregular arrivals of asylum seekers and migrants.

"For the first time, the European Union has a migration policy," Schinas said at the Delphi Economic Forum during a discussion with former European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso, moderated by Kathimerini journalist Xenia Kounalaki.

A decade ago this year, the head of the European Union's executive branch stood, visibly shaken, before rows of coffins holding the corpses of migrants drowned off the Italian island of Lampedusa. Some of them, small and bone-white, contained the bodies of infants and children.

Margaritis Schinas, who until now had served as chief spokesman of the European Commission under Jean-Claude Juncker, has been tapped by Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis to serve as Greece's next representative on the European Commission.

New Democracy leader Kyriakos Mitsotakis began a two-day visit to the US Thursday where he is expected to brief investors and outline out his vision for the Greek economy.

He is due to speak at Tufts University's Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy in Boston Thursday, while he will meet with investors in New York Friday.

European Union member states are resisting further integration within the bloc after the Brexit vote, a former EU Commission chief has said.

Former European Commission president Jose Manuel Barroso said Brexit was a “problem” for the bloc.

Speaking to RT, Mr Barroso said a drive for integration had led to resistance.

Unnecessary political clashes prevented Greece from emerging from its financial crisis like other countries, former European Commission president Jose Manuel Barroso has told Sunday's Kathimerini in an interview, adding that he does not expect a debt relief settlement until after German elections in September.

Former European Commission president Jose Manuel Barroso said on Tuesday that the danger of Grexit still looms but that it will depend on the moves of the Greek government.

''Brexit negotiations are on course to fail unless both Britain and the European Union ditch their winner-takes-all approach to the coming talks'', the former president of the European commission José Manuel Barroso has said.

Barroso also suggested that extremists on both sides of the Channel wanted the UK to break away from the EU entirely.

BELGRADE - An ethics investigation has been started by EU chief executive Jean-Claude Juncker into his predecessor, Jose Manuel Barroso, on whether he broke the rules by taking a job at Goldman Sachs.

Tourism Minister Mahir Ünal has called on local and foreign industry representatives to "defend freedom of travel" against threats posed by terrorism, as the Turkish tourism industry continues to feel the chill of geopolitical uncertainty.