While Germany and France were celebrating 50 years of European successes, David Cameron outlined a much more pessimistic vision of the future of the Union, further underlining, if proof were needed, fundamentally different approaches to the European project. Can these two perspectives ever be reco
On Saturday, the Czechs elected Miloš Zeman, an important figure of the democratic transition of the 1990s, to be their new president. Although this role is mostly a symbolic one, expectations were high for a change in public policy. Are Czech voters bound to be disappointed?
Is the crucial change in the UK's position in the EU, that demands a referendum, really the need to extend UK doctors' working hours? And what of the EU – has it got a better story to tell?
What the Islamist terrorist threat has become is an incoherent pretext to intervene militarily on the part of the west. The only principled position to adopt therefore is the rejection of both, for the self-determination and sovereignty of the peoples.
A decade ago, western leaders' excessive reaction and inflated rhetoric served to amplify rather than diminish the power of Islamist groups. The same danger now overhangs Mali, Algeria and beyond.
By choosing to put party politics before national and European interests, David Cameron has above all shot himself in the foot.
Vladimir Putin’s attempts to draw the countries of central Asia into his fledgling Eurasian Union creates a dilemma for some of them: if they take up his offer, they might lose their valuable trading links with China. Li Lifan and Raffaello Pantucci discuss their options.
Jordan’s elections do not signal a shift towards a more open political system. They may provide a platform for opposition groups or usher in a weak government.
What Israel badly needs is genuine political leadership of the sort that doesn’t shy away from speaking truth to power. So how did it do in the elections?
How one defines Syria’s troubles determines one’s prescriptions. Evidence that a silent majority did not want violent conflict and preferred a political solution leading to reform is not easily dismissible. And Syrian politics, unlike Libya under Gaddafi’s ‘personal rule’, is not about Assad.
When it comes to R2P are the institutions designed some 60 years ago still the best way to represent the ‘international community’?
Are China and Russia destined to form an alliance against the West? Unlikely, thinks Thomas Koenig: any future relationship will be based on economics, rather than politics.
