Europe

I’d like to start with an addendum to the story alleging that the Azerbaijani government has ordered the closure of the local NDI (National Democratic Institute) office.  As reported on this site yesterday, NDI had issued a denial that they had been told to cease operations. I didn’t weigh in on the matter, and will […]

The Great People’s Day, conceived by a handful of Azerbaijani opposition figures as a country-wide day of symbolic protests and local rallies, was held as scheduled on 11 March, and was for the most part a non-event.  Arrests took place as soon as protesters assembled in various locations, although reportedly one group managed to march […]

Tension is rising in Azerbaijan in the run-up to the 11 March “Great People’s Day.” The event was launched on facebook and has spread to other media, although specifics are somewhat vague, which seems to be a deliberate tactic.  People are being urged to stage symbolic or actual protests “in a civil way without provocations” […]

Image courtesy news.bbc.co.uk In light of this morning’s news of another flotilla of North African migrants approaching Lampedusa in Italy, wanted to quickly post a link (in French) to an excellent post on the generally-excellent BondyBlog, which covers issues related to inner-city France and Europe. It is a first-hand account of what leads one of […]

Interesting take from a Bulgarian magazine on a now decades-long problem troubling almost all of Europe but which is especially acute in peripheral countries. A group of 20-somethings in Bulgaria has formed a network dedicated to curbing brain drain out of their country. Called “Here and There,” the group averages about one hundred people at […]

Has former Armenian president Levon Ter-Petrossian been personally profiting from the Iranian narcotics trade?  This is the conclusion that some people are drawing from a Wikileaks release on the Norwegian news site Aftenposten. The cable can be viewed here, and the story has gotten circulation on Armenian web sites, including PanArmenian.net, whose editors wrote the […]

With the current crises and revolutions in North Africa, Maghreb and Middle East, the political crisis taking place in Wisconsin has flown under the radar in Europe. Wisconsin is going through a major political and social crisis as the future of labor unions’ power and other social rights of public workers in Wisconsin and ultimately […]

How can one country that is often ignored by the world community have such an effect on all of us, even more than Egypt in some ways? Libya has often been under the radar over the last 70 years except for the battle between the Allies and Afrika Corps during the Second World War and […]

Presaging the apparently-imminent departure of Michele Alliot-Marie from the Quai d’Orsay, a recent op-ed in LeMonde written anonymously by current and former French diplomats is sounding the death knell of France’s diplomatic influence. “Africa is drifting away, the Mediterranean region wants nothing to do with us, we’ve been tamed by China and Washington ignores us!” […]

Speculation in Baku was rife last week over the temporary closing on Monday of the Israeli embassy.  Many news sources such as the opposition newspaper Yeni Musavat theorized that the reason for the closing of the embassy was security-related.  In any case, the embassy was apparently closed for “technical reasons” and re-opened. The Israeli Foreign […]

EU foreign policy chief, Catherine Ashton, has her detractors. For clarities sake, let it be said that this blogger is not one of them. For sure, the EU’s foreign policy, which Ashton is head of, is far from optimal. It lacks both coherence and clout, in particular when it comes to the “hard” security and […]

Disturbing news out of Azerbaijan today, where a prominent defense attorney has been effectively disbarred and a young political activist was arrested on drug charges. Osman Kazimov, a well-known defense lawyer who has defended, among others, Said Nuri, was reportedly kicked out of Azerbaijan’s Collegium, a body that functions like an über bar association.  By that […]