Doctors and pilots stage a one-day strike in Italy. (BBC) If you’re flying Alitalia in for that emergency appendectomy, try to hold on till tomorrow.

Russian Presidential candidate Ivan Rybkin has gone missing. Police are now looking for him and he has not been seen since Thursday

The EU’s Enlargement Commissioner Guenter Verheugen is confident a deal can be struck to reunite Cyprus before it joins the EU on May 1st

Palestinian Authority foreign minister Nabil Shaath sees Joschka Fischer’s suggestion of an EU/Near East free trade zone, and raises it. Speaking at the Munich security conference, Shaath suggested that an independent Palestine, after concluding peace with Israel, should join the European Union. (Der Spiegel; in German.)

Get your hands on a real fistful of Euros - Europe’s first transnational lottery starts selling tickets today in Britain, France and Spain

Reports on Schroeder’s resignation in English: BBC CNN WaPo

Gerhard Schr?der has resigned the chairmanship of the SPD, handing the reins to Franz M?ntefering (Der Spiegel; link in German). The latter is regarded as to the left of Schr?der (though much less so than Oskar Lafontaine), not to say more popular with the party base.

Far left nationalism - Harry Hatchet on why the British left parties are refusing to be part of the Party of the European Left

The British police have banned over 2000 people from travelling to Portugal this summer, in an effort to keep Euro 2004 hooligan free.

The Irish government will revise the immigration bill expected to pass in the D?il today, says RT?. The bill would permit refusal of entry to those with ‘profound mental disturbance’. As originally drafted, it was feared this provision would bar, e.g., those with Down’s syndrome or autism. The definition will now be narrowed to refer to psychotic disturbance.