President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen is set to meet the Taoiseach and T\u00e1naiste in Cork on Thursday.<\/p>\n
Ireland took over the presidency of the Council of the European Union on Wednesday; it was marked by a ceremony at Dublin Castle which was attended by Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky.<\/p>\n
Traffic disruption is expected in the city with drivers in Cork being warned to plan ahead.<\/p>\n
Garda\u00ed have said that temporary rolling road closures will be in place around official events.<\/p>\n
The Gaol Walk near University College Cork will also remain closed throughout the visit.<\/p>\n
People travelling to Cork Airport this afternoon are also being advised to allow extra time, with temporary delays expected on surrounding roads.<\/p>\n
Traditionally, the European Commission visits each country at the start of its presidency to discuss its programme and goals for its six-month term.<\/p>\n
The Government has said it wants to focus on competitiveness, values and security during its tenure.<\/p>\n
Over two days, several meetings will be held, including one between the Taoiseach and von der Leyen and others between Irish ministers and European commissioners.<\/p>\n
Miche\u00e1l Martin and von der Leyen will also chair a plenary session.<\/p>\n
In a statement ahead of the event, Martin said the discussions will include \u201cIreland\u2019s work to progress the negotiations on the EU\u2019s next long-term budget\u201d, \u201cdelivery of the One Europe One Market Roadmap objectives\u201d and how to create \u201ca more integrated Single Market\u201d.<\/p>\n
He said he also plans to raise \u201cIsrael\u2019s persistent and egregious breaches of human rights and international law\u201d.<\/p>\n
The College of Commissioners is the political leadership of the European Commission and is made up of a commissioner from each of the 27 member states, led by the Commission President.<\/p>\n
The former Fianna F\u00e1il Minister for Finance, Michael McGrath, is Ireland\u2019s EU commissioner, with responsibility for democracy, justice, the Rule of Law, and consumer protection.<\/p>\n
Commissioners are also due to visit the Tyndall National Institute, Ireland\u2019s largest deep-tech research centre, to hear from researchers about their work in semiconductors, advanced materials, and space.<\/p>\n
A protest is also due to take place at University College Cork during the visit by members of the European Commission.<\/p>\n
Staff and students have said they are calling on the EU to take stronger action over the humanitarian situation in Gaza and to uphold international law.<\/p>\n
The demonstration will be held outside the university’s main gates from midday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen is set to meet the Taoiseach and T\u00e1naiste in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":529110,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,60,43],"class_list":["post-529109","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/529109","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=529109"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/529109\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/529110"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=529109"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=529109"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=529109"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}