"If foreign policy and France's position in the world have been largely absent in the presidential campaign, Europe is slightly better off", considers the lawyer and essayist Laurent Cohen-Tanugi. "The 'no' vote in the referendum of May 29th 2005 having put France in a problematic situation, to say the least, regarding its European heritage and 'future', the main candidates were indeed unable to avoid telling voters how they intend to get the country - and the European Union with it - out of the deadlock. Thus Europe is, for once, a discriminatory factor in this election. ... Whoever moves into the Elysée palace will have to dispense with the ambivalence that has all too long burdened France's European policy." (17/04/2007)

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"Europe has practically disappeared from the agenda during the French electoral campaign", writes Lluis Uria, the daily's Paris correspondent. "For a country that dealt the final blow to the European Constitution, this is rather surprising. As France is on the point of electing a new President of the Republic and starting a new political era, the European question, which divided the country two years ago, is strangely absent from electoral debate. ... According to a CSA [French polling institute] survey carried out for the 50th anniversary of the EU, the French say they are proud to be European (71%) but are wary of a liberal Europe in the making as well as the globalisation upon which they blame all the economic ills that France is suffering. ... And instead of trying to convince citizens of the advantages of the European project, French political leaders regularly fuel suspicion towards Brussels." (17/04/2007)

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French President Jacques Chirac's term in office is coming to an end after 14 years. Polish journalist Aleksander Hall focuses on Chirac's Europolitics in his assessment: "Jacques Chirac wanted power for France. This is no doubt about why - despite his initially Eurosceptical stance and his moves to hinder Spain and Portugal on their path to Europe - he eventually converted to the 'European faith.' He tried to use Europe to boost France's position in the world... Chirac wanted the EU to become a political power in its own right. That was the right path. However, if you take a closer look at France's policies under Chirac you have to ask yourself exactly what role he had in mind for united Europe in the world. Sometimes you get the impression that it was to play the role of a counterweight to the US rather than a bastion of Western civilisation that would be the second great pillar of the West alongside America." (14/04/2007)

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The Dutch author, Margriet de Moor, writes a long essay about her hope that Europe will initiate the reform of Islam. "My Dutch common sense tells me that Iraq is probably the last place where a liberal form of Islam could be born. It also tells me that the social circumstances are - and indeed must be - compatible with theology if there is to be a successful reform. And finally my polder common sense tells me something quite daring. If there is to be a reform within Islam, it won't emerge in the chaos where the religion originated, but in the prosperous West. And then it may well be that the Martin Luther of this movement, by which I mean the voice that will put forward the arguments, will be the voice of a woman. How I miss Ayaan Hirsi Ali !... Sometimes, in my moments of optimism, I see the Netherlands - a small, no-nonsense country which lacks the inclination for great feats and drama - as a laboratory on the outskirts of Europe." (17/04/2007)

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The Russian journalist Ivan Safronov died at the beginning of March by falling from the fourth floor of a building in Moscow. He was investigating the selling of Russian weapons to Syria and Iran. His newspaper, the Russian daily 'Kommersant', doubts that he committed suicide. "Who in Russia doesn't want the truth to be known?”, asks the Czech writer and translator Monika Zgustova. "Many people, if we count the 256 journalists assassinated since the fall of the Soviet Union. … Despite the fact that contemporary Russia offers citizens more freedoms than the Soviet Union did, the methods intended to get rid of those who get in the way are less predictable and harder to elucidate. Whereas the Soviet authorities sent dissidents into exile, to gulags, or locked them up in asylums, today's Russia gets rid of trouble-makers by beating them up, with a bullet, poison or a bomb. Or else they are thrown out of a window, as they did Ivan Safronov”. (17/04/2007)

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"[Jan Peter] Balkenende and [Tony] Blair campaigning against the European Constitution", is the headline of the daily following the meeting on Monday, April 16th, that united the British Prime Minister and his Dutch counterpart. The editorialist Wouter Bax recalls the fact that "Balkenende remained silent for a long time on the subject of the European Constitution, only expressing his desire to participate 'constructively' in the debate. He has now broken the silence by declaring that 'The European Constitution is not necessary for the EU'. The Netherlands are toying with fire. ... Our position can bring on a loss of national prestige. For a long time we have noted that the Netherlands are not very good at choosing political alliances. ... And Blair is not the best person to form an alliance with. He is still Prime Minister, but only until next June 7th." (17/04/2007)

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"Putin is leaving Europe speechless", complains the journalist Andrea Romano, criticising the disunity displayed by Europeans regarding Russia. "The authoritarian style that Vladimir Putin has given to Russian power is once again showing up the great weakness of Europe. This time, however, we are not caught up in the usual lack of a common foreign policy and the habitual lamenting of a European headlong rush forwards. This is a far graver weakness because it comes from the failure of different EU policies that have been applied towards Russia these past ten years. ... If Europe doesn't manage to make itself heard in Russia, Putin's Russia will continue to play a perturbing role in our zone. We would do well to remember this the next time we ostentatiously celebrate the anniversary of the Union." (17/04/2007)

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Finnish Prime Minister Matti Vanhanen, who together with his Centre Party won the parliamentary elections, has formed a four-party coalition with the Coalition Party, the Swedish People's Party and the Greens. This is the first time in years that the Social Democrats have no part in Finland's government. The newspaper speculates on whether it will mean radical change. "The country's foreign and security policies are being revised, but the blue-green government has not yet announced a clear step towards NATO membership - it's keeping its options open. At least this government reduces the risk of problems in the implementation of the new labour market policies. Apparently it has learned from the conservative government of Esko Aho [1991-1995]: the trade unions now take a more positive view of a right-wing government." (17/04/2007)

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Following his defeat in the battle to push through tougher abortion laws, Marek Jurek, President of the Polish parliament, has resigned his post and left the ruling party PiS, of which he was the deputy leader. The Polish media speculates that Jurek intends to found a new right-wing conservative part. Piotr Semka comments: "The resignation of Marek Jurek is without doubt a blow for the PiS, particularly regarding its traditionally Catholic voter base. On top of everything, the opposition has already announced that this is the beginning of the end of the Kaczynskis' rule. A party's strength resides in its ability to combine pragmatism and idealism. The crisis in which the PiS has been submerged since Friday arises from the fact that a number of its politicians, led by Marek Jurek, are convinced that the relation between the two is out of balance." (17/04/2007)

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The young Polish writer, Dorota Maslowska, criticises the debate about whether to further toughen up Poland's already stringent abortion laws. "Poland's obsession with children, which also affects me as a mother, is shocking. It would be wonderful if all the good intentions were to bear fruit... In the media a strange debate is raging about whether a Polish citizen is such from birth, or from conception, or even as a spermatozoon... The protection of unborn life is exemplary. But no sooner has a citizen been born and taken his first breath of Poland's blessed air than this defence shield is torn apart - even before the citizen who bore him has time to realise it. And those who so bravely and selflessly stepped up to defend him go home and draw the curtains." (17/04/2007)

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"The decree issued by Ukraine's president Viktor Yushchenko earlier this month to dissolve parliament and hold early elections is no less than an attempted coup d'etat, apparently aided and abetted by western powers", considers Adam Swain, a lecturer in geography at the University of Nottingham. "For Yushchenko, the attempted coup is a means to recover some lost power from parliament. For his western backers, it is a way of irreversibly locking Ukraine into western geopolitical and geo-economic structures. ... Paradoxically Yushchenko has returned to the failed authoritarianism of the past, and jeopardised not only his but also his country's democratic future. In so doing he has renounced his right as heir to the Orange Revolution ... ." (17/04/2007)

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Henrik Enderlein, German professor of political economics, considers that François Bayrou, centrist candidate in the French Presidential election, is wrong to want to draw inspiration from the model of Germany's big coalition. "Germany's current government certainly doesn't represent a 'government of national unity', such as the one recommended by Mr. Bayrou. Its origins are fundamentally conflicting: the image of enforced marriage would be more appropriate. … A big coalition contract … depends on the smallest common denominator of the two major parties and thus renders visionary and courageous choices virtually impossible. ... To try to convince French voters that a French version of a government of national unity could succeed in the same way as the big coalition is 'succeeding' in Germany is meaningless nonsense." (14/04/2007)

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The Estonian newspaper expresses its indignation at former German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder's upcoming visit to Estonia on behalf of Russian giant Gazprom. "When Schröder comes to Tallinn in May, he won't be coming as German Chancellor. He shouldn't be given the reception of a former politician because his goal is clear: Schröder will be lobbying for the German-Russian gas deal. Schröder is a corrupt politician who in the last years of his chancellorship didn't act on behalf of Germany or Europe but on behalf of Russia and the new financial empire that is emerging there... At Schröder's reception it should not be forgotten for even one minute that Gazprom is an instrument for Russian foreign policy and that Schröder is its representative." (17/04/2007)

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"Eugène Atget spent a lifetime documenting a Paris that has now disappeared", writes Angel Gurria-Quintal about the photographer who was born 150 years ago. "The Bibliothèque Nationale has put together the first retrospective of his work to be shown in France. ... The astonishing collection illuminates the career of one of photography's neglected masters, and brings to life a city that no longer exists. ... He had witnessed, during the 1850s and 1860s, the destruction of almost two-thirds of medieval Paris under Baron Haussmann's planning schemes. As late as the 1890s, when Atget took to walking the streets with his camera, whole blocks of old Paris continued to be demolished. His work became a labour of conservation. ... There is an intense nostalgia about the photographs in this show. It does not originate in the distance separating us from pictures taken a century ago, but in the feeling that this cityscape was vanishing even as Atget set out to capture it." (17/04/2007)

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Bulgarian writer Julian Popov, author of the book 'English Bulgaria or the Switzerland of the Balkans', raises the question of whether Bulgaria can become the Switzerland of the Balkans. "There are few places in the world where we would say: 'This is how our Bulgaria should be'. As strange as it may sound, Switzerland is the country that comes closest to this ideal. There is something about it that makes us think this is how things should be in Bulgaria. But what is it? When we look at their mountains we can say: we have those, too - the highest in the entire Balkan region... People make schnaps in Switzerland, just as they do here... Their sour milk tastes just like ours. And their cows also look like ours, except that theirs get bathed... True, mountains, schnaps and sour milk may not be enough... But if we can't give up our dream of becoming the Switzerland of the Balkans we must stick to the following formula: houses that are in harmony with nature and have a view of the mountains, local government and good universities. After all, these things are not entirely impossible." (17/04/2007)

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