Far-right advances in EU election, France calls snap national vote

The center-right European People's Party (EPP) was seen winning 189 seats - the largest bloc - in the European Union Parliament, according to the latest projection published by the EU.

The Socialists and Democrats bloc was projected to come in second with 135 seats.

Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni's arch-conservative Brothers of Italy group won the most votes in this weekend's European parliamentary election, exit polls said, confirming its status as Italy's most popular party.

An exit poll for state broadcaster RAI said Brothers of Italy won between 26-30% of the vote, with the center-left opposition Democratic Party (PD) coming second with 21-25%

The other main opposition party, the 5-Star Movement, was seen on 10-14%, while Forza Italia, founded by the late Silvio Berlusconi, was in fourth place on 8.5-10.5%, potentially beating its old ally, the far-right League, which was on 8-10%.

Brothers of Italy won just 6.4% of the vote in the last EU ballot in 2019, but jumped ahead of all other parties in 2022 national elections, when it took 26%, with Italians seeing Meloni as a no-nonsense, straight-talking leader.

Her party traces its roots back to a neo-fascist group and her 2022 victory set the tone for far-right gains across Europe, including in the June 6-9 EU ballot, which has seen the continent swing sharply right.

Spain's right wing wins European election in blow to Socialist PM

Spain's center-right People's Party (PP) came out on top in Sunday's European election, garnering 22 seats out of the 61 allocated to the country, and dealing a blow to the Socialist-led government of Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez.

Sanchez's Socialists, spearheaded by Energy Minister Teresa Ribera, earned 20 seats after a campaign in which the opposition honed in on private corruption allegations against the premier's wife and an amnesty law for Catalan pro-independence leaders passed just one week before the election.

With 99.7% of the vote counted, far-right Vox finished third with six lawmakers, up from the four it had in the previous legislature.

Still, in terms of vote share, support for Vox dipped to 9.6% from 12.4% in the July 2023 general election. The far-right party is struggling to break a vote ceiling of 14%, making it an outlier compared to its peers in other EU countries.

Alvise Perez, a far-right social media influencer running against what he describes as universal corruption, managed to obtain three seats with a campaign mostly conducted through the messaging app Telegram.

The combined right won nearly 50%, while the left followed with 43%.

The leftist vote was split between Sumar - the junior partner in the government coalition - that won three seats and hard-left Podemos, led by former Equality Minister Irene Montero, which got two.

Austrian vote count shows narrow victory for far right, ORF TV says

The count of votes cast in Austrian polling stations on Sunday plus a projection for postal ballots confirmed the far-right Freedom Party won the European Parliament election but by less than had been forecast, national broadcaster ORF said.

The Freedom Party secured 25.5% of the vote, narrowly ahead of the conservative People's Party (OVP) at 24.7% and the Social Democrats at 23.3%, ORF said. A polling-based forecast issued earlier on Sunday had shown the Freedom Party with a 3.5-percentage-point lead over the OVP.

Von der Leyen confident she can win new mandate as EU Commission's president

Ursula von der Leyen said on Sunday she was confident she could win a new mandate as the European Commission's president, after initial projections from the European Union showed her centrist European People's Party (EPP) with the most seats in the EU Parliament.

"Yes, I am confident, but of course I know there is a lot of hard work ahead of me. But I am definitely confident, as far as my running for a second mandate is concerned," she said.