Corporate Europe Observatory

07/10/2026

Did you know that EU pesticide rules are currently being rewritten, and that Bayer, BASF and their lobby groups appear to have had a significant hand in drafting them?

Our new report traces internal industry documents, obtained through Freedom of Information requests, and compares them to the European Commission's Food & Feed Omnibus proposal and amendments in the European Parliament. The similarities are, frankly, jaw-dropping. Unlimited pesticide approvals. Three-year grace periods for banned substances. Wider derogations. All demanded by industry. All appearing in the proposals.

A committee vote is expected on 5 November. There is still time to push back, but people need to know this is happening.

Read our investigation, share it with friends and family, and help us fight the good fight against corporate capture of EU policymaking. 🌱

Link in the first comment.

28/09/2026

❌ WE SAY NO TO PALANTIR
We and 120+ organisations and unions across Europe are calling on our governments and the European Commission to scrap all existing public sector contracts with Palantir.

It’s time to:
✔️Terminate contracts with Palantir and say NO to future public contracts
​​✔️Develop alternatives that safeguard people from mass surveillance
✔️Protect democracy by investing in people, not corporations

Read the open letter in the first comment.

24/09/2026

🚨 Enough is enough!
👏 Workers from all over Europe came to Brussels to say no to the EU Inc/ 28th Regime proposal which will lead to undermining of workers and trade union rights.

✊ EU Inc is a symbol of the madness we are living in and it shall not pass!
👏 ETUC 👏

The EU Inc/28th Regime proposal is a corporate escape hatch: a parallel legal framework that would allow companies to opt out of national labour laws, collective bargaining structures, and hard-won worker rights to information, consultation and representation. Decades of struggles made optional just like that.

21/09/2026

🗺️ The European Commission’s deregulation frenzy means attacks on labour rights, climate policies, nature protection, and public health. If you want to know more, join us on a free lobby tour of Brussels on 1st Oct at 5.30pm!

✊ We will explain the basic scheme behind this wave of destruction, the lobbying happening behind the scenes, what consequences it can have and how we can fight it.

✍ Sign in for free at: [email protected] (until the day before at 5pm)

16/09/2026

: while Europe faces social, environmental and geopolitical pressures, it's funny how the solution always happens to be exactly what corporate lobbyists have been asking for, and they already have more access to EU decision-making than anyone.

Here's our take on AI, deregulation and climate👇

Link in the first comment for our full press reaction, and please subscribe to our newsletter to be the first to read our content!

16/09/2026

SOTEU you SOTEU me?

🎉 Whoop whoop!
Today is the BIG Day in Brussels.
Yeah! Wait, SOTEU What?! Symptom of the Exterior Universe?
No sorry, it’s the State of the European Union!

For her sixth year Ursula von Der Leyen, president of the European Commission in front of all the members of the European Parliament does her SOTEU.

Hold your breath for some more Orwellian language like “our democracy protects what matters”. This while the same European Commission has the past year been spitting out deregulation packages called omnibuses, which actually do exactly the opposite: they weaken protection for people and planet.

It’s a bit like George Orwell wrote: 2 + 2 = 5!

27/08/2026

🎙️ Our new podcast episode is out, and we are very proud of it!

Bayer ghostwrote a fake scientific study to downplay the dangers of glyphosate, the world's most used pesticide, that had a huge impact. Now, they and their lobby groups are trying to get the US Congress to give them complete legal protection: immunity from all lawsuits.

In other words, a company that committed fraud wants to be rewarded for it.

CEO's Nina Holland sat down with Naomi Oreskes, Harvard professor and co-author of the best seller 'Merchants of Doubt' to talk about what's really going on, what it tells us about the power corporations hold over our political systems, and what we can do about it.

They also discuss the EU's deregulation frenzy and bust the myth that free markets and deregulation drive economic growth.

🎧 Listen to EU Watchdog Radio Episode 10 'Indemnifying Bayer: A corrupt company who uses corrupt science now wants to be rewarded for fraud ' in the link in comments and wherever you get your podcasts.

Help us share it! 💚

05/08/2026

Miriyam Aouragh - Moroccan Dutch anthropologist and professor, as well as Transnational Institute fellow - was on Democracy Now! discussing the events in Ceuta, addressing the complex causes that have been misportrayed by both the media and social media.

👉

An estimated 60,000 people from Morocco crossed into the Spanish enclave of Ceuta, on the African side of the Strait of Gibraltar, in an unprecedented mass movement last week. At least 72 people died during the attempt. The sudden influx of migrants overwhelmed the city’s residents, leading to a h...

05/08/2026

🚨 New report by Centre for International Corporate Tax Accountability and Research shows on how Big Tech company Palantir is managing to pay little to no taxes in EU. It shows how Palantir’s global tax structure drains funding for public services and infrastructure

✊ European Public Service Unions (EPSU) demands tougher rules on public contracts

👉 https://www.cictar.org/all-research/europe/palantir

We at CEO were kindly asked by Gaia Neiman at EUobserver to comment on this important study.

Palantir provides some of the most repressive AI tools implicated in human rights violations and genocide, and its numerous state contracts have meant that its software is positioned as part of an indispensable nervous system of the state, that not only locks in dependency, but its data analysis and integration work plays a role in shaping future policy decisions and directions, which is extremely worrying.

https://euobserver.com/231360/palantirs-eu-tax-tricks-exposed-as-unions-demand-tougher-rules-on-public-contracts/

Who pays for the surveillance state?

28/07/2026

Dear friends,

After a summer of stories about Trump and FIFA we understand the words "glaring conflict of interest" may have lost some of their power to shock.

Impressive, then, that the European Commission has still managed to cross a deeply troubling line in its recent appointment of Siemens chair, Jim Hagemann Snabe, as its AI envoy.

Subscribe to our newsletter for more 👉️

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