The decision to appoint Herman Van Rompuy and Catherine Ashton as Europe's new leaders is a bad one, and Poland is among the losers here, the conservative daily Rzeczpospolita writes: "The Franco-German tandem and the women's lobby in the Union have won the day. And the British, too, can be satisfied. Meanwhile among others Poland, which had striven to make the process of enthroning the 'president' of Europe more democratic, comes out losing. The triumph of Herman Van Rompuy was foreseeable, but the choice of Baroness Ashton, who has never even been deputy foreign secretary, comes as a surprise. Unfortunately neither of the two nominations bode well for Europe. The advocates of the Lisbon Treaty were convinced that it would endow the Union with a strong leader. … [But] the man who has become president of Europe is one who has no sway in the international arena and the foreign minister is a woman who … has no experience whatsoever in the field of diplomacy." (20/11/2009)

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All available articles from » Marek Magierowski

There is 'a large amount of political calculation' behind the selection of the permanent EU Council President and the High Representative for Foreign and Security Affairs, writes the conservative daily Lidové Noviny: "Should an eminent figure like [British ex prime minister] Tony Blair who the whole world knows be chosen? Or would a lesser known but hard-working and compromise-friendly man like Belgian Prime Minister [Herman] Van Rompuy be a better choice? For the three major powers in the EU, the UK, France and Germany, the latter option was preferable, and they know why. Right now the EU Commissioners are also being chosen, and there are still a number of key posts up for grabs there. … They want to position their people in posts that may have a smaller area of responsibility but also have a larger sphere of influence." (20/11/2009)

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All available articles from » Vladimíra Straková

The daily Aftonbladet says that by electing Herman Van Rompuy the EU has missed an historic opportunity, but that putting a woman in charge of foreign policy is at least a step in the right direction: "Europe has preferred to go on talking with itself rather than with the rest of the world. ... The choice of Catherine Ashton, the British Labour EU commissioner, as foreign minister is problematic partly for the same reasons. ... But one should not underestimate the force of having a woman in a very high position in the EU. The dominance of men is a huge democratic problem. Twenty-six of the twenty-seven heads of government are men. As the French EU correspondent Jean Quatremer has commented, 'it looks very much like a Christian-Democratic version of a Saudi government'." (20/11/2009)

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The new EU president should not be underestimated, writes the Belgian daily De Standaard: "The job of the permanent president is to point the way forward in the long process of forming a European identity. The days when the Union could stride onward with seven-league boots ... lie far in the past. The enlargement to 27 member states requires a new dynamic, and we must start thinking in terms of generations, rather than years. ... Herman Van Rompuy is no superman, but he's not a wimp either. He's able to make the best of a hopelessly complex situation, even if it doesn't amount to much. He can live and make do with the limits that are imposed on him." (20/11/2009)

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All available articles from » Bart Sturtewagen

After his controversial re-election, the Afghan President Hamid Karzai delivered his inaugural address yesterday in Kabul. The daily The Times writes that it is now time for Karzai to show he can lead his country forward: "Western diplomats have identified a number of competent technocrats who might get a grip on the floundering administration in Kabul. Mr Karzai has consistently demurred at their appointment, largely because he has reserved plum jobs for cronies wanting to enrich themselves. ... Second, the promised transparency must include an audit of the Karzai family wealth, now estimated by US officials at hundreds of millions of dollars - a sum incompatible with honest government. Finally, there must be swift signs that he is moving to political reconciliation. Another suicide bombing yesterday killed 13 people. Until there is competent government in Kabul, this violence will only continue to grow." (20/11/2009)

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The conservative daily El Mundo reports that soldiers on a vessel belonging to the British Navy stationed off the coast of Gibraltar used a buoy bearing the Spanish flag for target practice. The paper condemns this behaviour as a political insult for which the Spanish government should demand an official explanation: "It is inappropriate and offensive for soldiers of one country to use the flag of another country as a target. But it's absolutely unacceptable when we're talking about two allied states and members of the European Union. All the more so, one may add, given that [Spanish head of government José Luis Rodríguez] Zapatero is currently backing the candidacy of a barely known British woman for the post of EU foreign minister. The British government must give Spain a convincing explanation as soon as possible in order to preserve bilateral relations." (20/11/2009)

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The extreme right-wing party Ataka is still gaining ground In Bulgaria. The left-liberal weekly 168 Óra sees this as typical for Eastern Europe: "Between 2005 and July 2009 the coalition government was comprised of socialists, Simeon Saxe-Coburg-Gotha's conservative party ... and the party of the Turkish minority. Ataka, which was established in April 2005, likes to portray this coalition as an alliance of communists, Nazis and the 'crescent moon'. (Poor Simeon - apart from the fact that during World War II he ascended to the throne of a country that was occupied by the Nazis, he had no contact with the Germans at all). ... Ataka strikes at everything it can. It castigates the socialists and the Turkish party, Nato and the EU, the IMF and the World Bank. ... With its innumerable protests it fulminates against 'traitors' who are 'selling off' the Bulgarian soil. They demand special rights for the nation's majority and a new distribution of public property and taxes. ... And now it's chumming up with Boyko Borisov's governing Citizens for European Development of Bulgaria (GERB). All of this is writing on the wall." (20/11/2009)

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All available articles from » Endre Aczél

This coming Sunday the Romanians are summoned to the ballot to elect a new president and at the same time vote in a referendum on whether the Senate, the upper house of Romania's bicameral parliament, should be permanently dissolved. The weekly Revista 22 writes that other reforms are much more important: "The best thing would be if [incumbent President] Traian Băsescu reformed the administration of the country … and replaced the [41] districts with nine to twelve regions. He has after all explained on several occasions that Bucharest must dispense with its excessive policy of centralisation. … But you can't claim to be popular and pro-European if you fight for centralism and the dissolution of the Senate at home. That's the place where the regions have the best chance of making themselves heard. And since the EU plans to increase funding for large administration units from 2013 on we should preserve the Senate out of pragmatism, if nothing else. … The solution is not what President Băsescu has proposed with the referendum, but rather to resuscitate the tasks of the upper chamber, in which the regions and their specific features and interests are represented." (20/11/2009)

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All available articles from » Armand Gosu

According to many legal experts the new law in Italy on shortening the length of court cases is primarily meant to protect Silvio Berlusconi from trial and sentencing. Stefano Rodotà fears in the left-liberal daily La Repubblica that Italian democracy may soon be in its death throes: "Power has become concentrated in the hands of just a few people, and they increasingly believe they own the state. They do all they can to abolish other state institutions to avoid having their own power curtailed. ... But the main victim here is the constitution. That is demonstrated by the fact that every new law brings with it a discussion over whether the president will sign it, or if it will be declared unconstitutional. ... We must not forget in all this that the constitution ends with an article that deserves special attention today. Article 139 runs: 'The republican form of the state may not be changed by way of constitutional amendment.' ... That means that our constitutional system contains a series of characteristics which define the form of our democracy, and that may not be changed without adopting a new type of regime." (20/11/2009)

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The criticism of the healthcare reform in the US should also give Europe pause for thought, writes Francisco Murteira Nabo, president of the Association of Portuguese Economists, in an article for business paper Diário Económico. The planned US reform, he says, "not only seems to have displeased the majority of liberal economists because it entails tax increases in the US, but it also contradicts the theory of several renowned European economists. The latter doubt on the one hand the sustainability of the European model, and on the other they believe Europe's expensive healthcare and social welfare systems could be one of the reasons for its economy's lack of competitiveness compared with the US economy. … We can learn a lesson from the decision in the US and the current European financing model. In future there will have to be an increasing convergence between the existing liberal US model … and the current European model." (19/11/2009)

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All available articles from » Francisco Murteira Nabo

Ukraine and Russia have agreed on punctual gas deliveries this winter. The result of negotiations between the two countries owes much to Ukraine's newly acquired self-confidence, writes the left-liberal Süddeutsche Zeitung: "Last winter it was above all Russian-speaking East Ukrainians who were left without gas, and now public anger is not directed at President Viktor Yushchenko in Kiev but at the Russian neighbour. The gas wars have strengthened solidarity in Ukraine, like the successes of their football team in recent years. ... This new, growing feeling of national pride - including in the southern and eastern parts of the second-largest former Soviet republic is fostered by the media. And the media is in the hands of the industrial oligarchs, who have kept a very close eye on how Putin's Kremlin has toyed with Russias oligarchs. They want to remain master in their own house in Ukraine, which is why they are keen to prevent Moscow from taking control over the county." (20/11/2009)

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All available articles from » Thomas Urban

A large number of Bulgarian civil servants took no holidays in the past years and the country lacks reasonable legislation that regulates when the right to take holidays expires. As a result the Bulgarian state will now have to pay its employees 200 million euros in compensation. The daily Dnevnik criticises the state's failure to take action sooner: "What can this situation be compared with? It could be compared with a bank going bankrupt because all its customers stormed into its branches at the same time to take out all their savings, including the interest. Another analogy would be a free insurance policy that could be terminated at any time. This corresponds to the situation now. And the trick would be that the 'policy holder' would receive loads of money if his or her employment contract were to be terminated. And it wouldn't matter whether he or she actually took holidays or not in all those years. This completely crazy state of affairs has arisen owing to legal loopholes." (20/11/2009)

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All available articles from » Svetlana Georgieva

The ethnic German Agnes Trawny, who was forced to leave Poland after World War II, has been granted the right by a Polish court to retake possession of her former house in north-west Poland. The tabloid Fakt is upset that the Polish authorities have allowed things to go this far: "Janek, Gustlik, Grigorij and Tomus [film figures from the 1960s] most certainly did not fight the fascists for such a Poland. We are the ones who won the war, and yet now some German or other comes along, tosses out a Polish family and takes back her house. To calm emotions somewhat, we have to remember that Agnes Trawny simply knew how to turn the chaos in Polish public life to her advantage. The Polish state requisitioned the property of the Germans who fled from this area, but it failed to record these changes in the land registry. That's what this whole thing comes down to." (20/11/2009)

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All available articles from » Robert Feluś

The right-wing liberal MP Arend Jan Boekestijn has resigned his seat in the Dutch parliament after giving reporters details about a conversation with Queen Beatrix. There is a regulation according to which to preserve the immunity of the head of state the Queen (who is head of the Dutch state) is not allowed to express opinions publicly. Historian Jan Dirk Snel criticises this regulation in the liberal daily NRC Handelsblad: "One can expect the head of state to follow the lead of the government in her views and to refrain from making controversial remarks. But within these limits she must have the freedom to express her opinion, as other members of the government do. … By enclosing the Queen in a cocoon and surrounding even the most banal remarks with the veil of secrecy she is left in a vulnerable position. Then it ceases to be a matter of immunity. … And by the way, [Queen Beatrix] would do well to tell the participants at the next meeting explicitly that they may talk to the media about it, or even ask them expressly to do so." (20/11/2009)

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French national football player Thierry Henry set up the decisive goal in the World Cup qualifier between France and Ireland with his hand. The business paper Les Echos looks at the significance of football in forming a nation's identity. "At a time when France is questioning its national identity, one has to say that sport in general - and football in particular because of its popularity - have become the main, perhaps the sole, mirror of national identity. The grandeur of a nation is often described in relation to its sporting activities, rather than its economic, cultural or intellectual achievements. ... One major problem however is the relative inability to control the negative elements in sport. And another is ... the way sport is used to glorify patriotic sentiment." (20/11/2009)

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All available articles from » Jean-Françis Pécresse