Giorgia Meloni

BELGRADE - Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic spoke by phone with Italian PM Giorgia Meloni on Monday to discuss geopolitical circumstances, the situation in the region, bilateral cooperation and Serbia's EU path.

"We agreed for a summit of our two governments to be held in Belgrade by the end of the year," Vucic wrote in a post on his buducnostsrbijeav Instagram account.

As European leaders flock to Washington for the NATO Summit, selecting the new European leadership is in full swing in Brussels. Ursula von der Leyen is engaged in a series of meetings to prevent any accidents in the secret ballot in Strasbourg next week.

EU leaders have nominated German Ursula von der Leyen for a second five-year term as president of the European Commission. At the Brussels summit, which concluded last night, they also selected Portugal's Antonio Costa as president of the European Council, and Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas will serve as the EU's new high representative for foreign policy.

EU leaders struck a summit deal Thursday to return Ursula von der Leyen as head of the powerful European Commission, while tapping Estonia's prime minister Kaja Kallas as the bloc's top diplomat.

During his intervention at the European Council, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis highlighted the need to upgrade the European Union’s defense capabilities.

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni vented her anger on Wednesday over her exclusion from negotiations over the EU's top jobs, saying unnamed leaders were acting like "oligarchs" and betraying voters.

A far-right camp led by Italian premier Giorgia Meloni's party and a centrist rival linked to France's Emmanuel Macron are tussling over which emerges larger in the EU parliament once the dust settles from elections this month.

When Prime Minister Narendra Modi went to Italy for the G7 summit, it was not diplomatic meetings that dominated headlines back in India, but the relationship with his Italian counterpart.

"Hello from the 'Melodi' team," Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said in a video posted to social media on June 15, waving next to her fellow right-wing leader Modi, beaming a wide grin.

"Bulgaria remains fully committed to the strong and unified response of NATO, the EU, and the international democratic community to Russian military aggression against Ukraine," wrote acting Prime Minister Dimitar Glavchev on the Facebook page of the Council of Ministers.

G7 leaders agreed Thursday on a new $50 billion loan for Ukraine using profits from frozen Russian assets, a move Joe Biden said showed Moscow "we're not backing down".