Category: European Politics

It appears that the Irish media missed this editorial in the Herald Tribune. They might catch up later in the week, or else I missed it being reported. The editorial is fairly positive, it indicates the challenges facing Ahern and Ireland during our EU presidency. That’s because the Irish and their prime minister, Bertie Ahern,…

“By their mentality and culture, the people of Russia are Europeans,” President Vladimir Putin said in an interview this fall, addressing the centuries-old choice here between East and West. The real question, however, is whether Russia is – or even wants to be – part of today’s Europe. There is increasing evidence that the answer…

Marc F. Plattner, coeditor of the Journal of Democracy and director of the International Forum for Democratic Studies, writes an article in the latest edition of Policy Review. Another lengthy essay, this time on the EU and soverignty… take a look.

Will Hutton argues that Italy is the new sick man of Europe. I would have said Ireland was.

This may well be one of the more significant events of 2003. At their summit meeting in Brussels this month, Europe’s leaders decided to establish an autonomous European military planning element, independent of NATO. It will now come into existence despite powerful opposition by the Bush administration. This should be a lesson to Washington about…

Well if France is to ban religious attire in state schools, surely they should also ban croissants!

I sympathise with the views expressed by Max Hastings in the Guardian today. He articulates my own reservations about the European Union, and talks about many of the ideas and thoughts that have often been expressed during European referendum debates here in Ireland. Europe conducts its affairs in an increasingly fantastic spirit that would be…

There is a little more logic in their position than at first might appear. In their recent study of the voting system proposed in the constitutional draft, Moshe Machover and Dan Felsenthal show that it would favour both large and small states but puts states of middling size at a significant disadvantage. They also say…

LONDON — When an aging cargo ship from Virginia loaded with toxic waste crawled into Newcastle’s harbor in northeast England last week, Peter Brookes, editorial cartoonist for the Times of London, quickly saw an analogy. He drew President Bush (news – web sites)’s face on the bow, with a sign reading “Highly Toxic.” Bush doesn’t…

Three major European countries returned to muted economic growth during the summer, underscoring both the momentum of the global recovery and Europe’s lagging role within it. Germany, France and the Netherlands, which together account for more than half the economic activity in the euro zone, on Thursday all reported a modest expansion of gross domestic…