* A daily view from EMEA Economics Politics Editor Mike
Peacock The views expressed are his own.

LONDON, Oct 3 (Reuters) – Turkey’s parliament has voted to
give the government a green light to order military action
against Islamic State as the insurgents tightened their grip on
a Syrian border town, sending thousands more Kurdish refugees
into Turkey.

There is little sign of it being put into imminent use but
the vote gives the government powers to order incursions into
Syria and Iraq to counter the threat of attack “from all
terrorist groups”.

By common consent, western air strikes alone are unlikely to
vanquish IS and there is a great deal of doubt that Syrian and
Iraqi forces can best them on the ground.

Service sector PMI surveys for euro zone member states,
Britain and others are forecast to show France and Italy
languishing in contractionary territory while Spain achieves
quite strong growth.

There is a health check with these figures. Germany’s PMI
readings also look strong but Europe’s largest economy is
expected to achieve little or no growth in the third quarter of
the year, having contracted in the second.

The European Central Bank rolled out further measures to
foster bank lending into a stagnant economy and admitted
yesterday that “survey data available up to September confirm
the weakening in the euro area’s growth momentum” though it
predicted modest expansion in the second half of the year.

IMF chief Christine Lagarde offered a similar prognosis,
saying the global economy was weaker than had been envisaged six
months ago. The Fund sees only a modest pick-up next year.

China’s equivalent PMI survey showed services sector growth
eased in September to an eight-month low after new orders shrank
for the first time in at least a year.

New European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker is
expected in Athens to meet Greek premier Antonis Samaras.

Greece has begun talks with the EU and IMF inspectors on
life after its bailout. The 240 billion-euro EU/IMF package is
due to end in early 2016 but Athens last week acknowledged it is
hoping to exit the aid programme over a year early in a bid to
secure the fragile coalition government’s survival.

To do so, it is likely to have to secure some form of debt
relief from its partners, probably in the form of lower interest
rates and stretched repayment terms.

Samaras is seeking to hold a confidence vote next week and
move to elect a new president as scheduled next year, in an
effort to squash growing speculation that the country is moving
towards snap elections.

Juncker has struggled to get his slate of commissioners
through the European Parliament this week with the French,
British, Spanish and Hungarian nominees all failing to win
immediate approval.

Former French finance minister Pierre Moscovici got a rough
ride at his Thursday hearing. Parliamentary sources said a
decision on whether to confirm Moscovici could be delayed until
next week and could be treated as part of a political package
deal involving the other appointments being disputed by rival
party groups.

There are a clutch of potential credit ratings reviews on
the block, notably Fitch on Turkey, Moody’s and Fitch on Nigeria
and Moody’s on Bulgaria.

Bulgarian elections are set for Sunday and the centre-right
GERB party holds a strong lead over the Socialists, whose
government collapsed after a poor performance in the European
Parliament election, massive anti-corruption protests, floods
and a banking crisis.

GERB is unlikely to win an outright majority and may be
forced to lead a coalition that will struggle to push ahead with
reforms.

Stefan Lofven, poised to become Sweden’s new prime minister,
will outline to parliament plans for his minority government
over the next four years. Central bank governor Stefan Ingves
will be speaking separately on the state of the economy.

(Editing by Toby Chopra)