Current affairs

Jul 5th 2008

The main French defense manufacturer called a group of experts and some economic journalists together a few years ago to unveil a new military helicopter. They wanted us to choose a name for it and I thought I had the perfect one: "The Frog".

Jul 4th 2008

"Would it not make eminent sense if the European Union had a proper constitution comparable to that of the United States?" In 1991, I put the question on camera to Otto von Habsburg, the father-figure of the European Movement and, at the time, the most revere

Jun 29th 2008

Ever since President George W. Bush's administration came to power in 2000, many Europeans have viewed its policy with a degree of scepticism not witnessed since the Vietnam war.

Jun 26th 2008

As Europe feels the effects of rising prices - mainly tied to energy costs - at least one sector is benefiting. The new big thing appears to be horsemeat, increasingly a viable alternative to expensive beef as desperate housewives look for economies.

Jun 26th 2008

What will the world economy look like 25 years from now? Daniel Daianu says that sovereign wealth funds have major implications for global politics, and for the future of capitalism.

Jun 22nd 2008

Winegrower Philippe Raoux has made a valiant attempt to create new ideas around the marketing of wines, and his efforts are to be applauded.

Jun 16th 2008

One of the most interesting global questions today is whether the climate is changing and, if it really is, whether the reasons are man-made (anthropogenic) or natural - or maybe even both.

Jun 16th 2008

After a century that saw two world wars, the Nazi Holocaust, Stalin's Gulag, the killing fields of Cambodia, and more recent atrocities in Rwanda and now Darfur, the belief that we are progressing morally has become difficult to defend.

Jun 16th 2008

BRUSSELS - America's riveting presidential election campaign may be garnering all the headlines, but a leadership struggle is also underway in Europe. Right now, all eyes are on the undeclared frontrunners to become the first appointed president of the European Council.

Jun 16th 2008

JERUSALEM - Israel is one of the biggest success stories of modern times.

Jun 16th 2008

The contemporary Christian Right (and the emerging Christian Left) in no way represent the profound threat to or departure from American traditions that secularist polemics claim. On the contrary, faith-based public activism has been a mainstay throughout U.S.

Jun 16th 2008

BORDEAUX-- The windows are open to the elements. The stone walls have not changed for 800 years. The stairs are worn with grooves from millions of footsteps over the centuries.

May 16th 2008
We know from experience that people suffer, prisons overflow and innocent bystanders are injured or killed in political systems that ban all opposition. I witnessed this process during four years as a Moscow correspondent of The Associated Press in the 1960s and early 1970s.
May 16th 2008
Certainly the most important event of my posting in Moscow was the Soviet-led invasion of Czechoslovakia. It established the "Brezhnev Doctrine", defining the Kremlin's right to repress its client states.
Jan 1st 2008

What made the BBC want to show a series of eight of our portrait films rather a long time after they were made?

There are several reasons and, happily, all of them seem to me to be good ones.

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