Tag Archives: EU

Greece is raising the prospect of debt relief with international lenders as Prime Minister Antonis Samaras announced a primary surplus of 1.5 billion euros as proof the country’s battered economy will begin to rebound this year.   Samaras said, however, he is keen to avoid a third bailout that may contain additional austerity measures, which he has repeatedly rejected, and …

In just 48 hours, Russia took over and occupied Ukraine’s Crimea Peninsula. The seizure of Crimea has created the greatest confrontation between Russia and the West since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. Russia is challenging the world order and so far, the West does not have an adequate response.   At an emergency meeting of the UN …

Democracy can be so inconvenient. Take Switzerland, the closest thing the world has to a perfect democracy.   Switzerland’s eight million citizens vote by referendum on all major issues. The Swiss cantons have made key decisions this way for over 800 years.   Swiss voters on Feb 9 decided by a razor-thin 50.3% to begin limiting immigration from the European …

  The latest crisis in Ukraine broke out in late November with protests against President Viktor Yanukovych’s refusal, under pressure from Russia, to sign a trade pact with the European Union and instead turn to Russia for a $15 billion loan and a significant discount on gas prices. It has been growing ever since with a police crackdown of the protestors, further government restrictions on demonstrations, …

As the most fertile continent in the world, Europe is almost self-sufficient in all major food crops. Almost. We produce more than enough grains, corn and vegetables to feed the continent’s population. But there is only one crop category where Europe is almost completely relying on imports: proteins. Within the EU, we produce only 20% of the total amount of …

The Islamic Movement Unite (LISBA) party’s public challenge to Kosovo’s separation of religion and state and the country’s EU agenda will not succeed, an official said.   Foreign Minister Enver Hoxhaj said religious groups are trying to bring Islam into the public discourse and dictate a lifestyle to citizens.   “Kosovo and its citizens are Europeans by history, geography and …

Declining to sign an accession agreement with the European Union toward the end of 2013, Ukraine struck a major blow to the West’s wish of pulling the Eastern European country out of Russia’s sphere of influence and control. It was a great gift that Russian President Vladimir Putin got for the new 2014. To save the image of its Eastern …

Sometimes history can be too ironic. This week, as Ukraine marked the 80th anniversary of the Holodomor, Stalin’s engineered famine in Ukraine, President Viktor Yanukovich’s government announced that it would not sign a Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Agreement with the European Union at a summit in Vilnius on November 28. Just like that, Ukraine’s chance to transcend its tortured …

A deal signed between Ukrainian and Chinese authorities last month may impact up to 3 million hectares of prime farmland in eastern Ukraine, a space roughly the size of Belgium. China, the world’s most populous country, with over 1.35 billion inhabitants, consumes 20% of the world’s food supply, but constitutes only 9% of the world’s farmland. As the country quickly …