The planned reform of the Turkish constitution is a step toward a more democratic Turkey, writes the daily Die Presse: "Things could have been worse for Erdogan. Of course the Turkish prime minister will not be pleased by the fact that parts of his constitutional reform were overturned by the highest court - namely those by means of which he sought to gain more power over the judiciary. But for the most part the Constitutional Court judges had no problems with the reform package. The upshot is that rather than being a defeat for the conservative prime minister, their judgement is a partial victory - even if it does contain a few setbacks. ... A failure of the constitutional reform would be dangerous because the country needs a new constitution. But it needs one that does away with the old authoritative structures while avoiding putting the power of the military into the hands of Erdogan's moderate Islamic governing party. Such a constitution would be a true, clear victory: for all of Turkey."  (09/07/2010)

» full article (external link, German)
More from the press review on the subject » Domestic Policy, » EU neighbourhood policy, » Turkey
All available articles from » Wieland Schneider

With its decision to reject certain parts of the constitutional reform the Turkish Constitutional Court is interfering with the legislature, the left-liberal daily Süddeutsche Zeitung concludes: "The opposition is unhappy with the ruling - because it had expected the judges to once again take over the task of politically sabotaging the government. Meanwhile the government is unhappy because the core of the constitutional package that provided for the reform of the undemocratic judiciary has not survived intact. Unhappy are also the liberal observers who had hoped for more democracy in Turkey. Although the judges allowed a couple of important articles to pass, the people have the power to clip the wings of the powerful military judiciary only via referendums. But the court has committed another grave sin. In Turkey it is the parliament that makes the laws. The constitutional court is really only allowed to examine constitutional amendments for procedural errors, but not evaluate their content." (09/07/2010)

» more information (external link, German)
More from the press review on the subject » Domestic Policy, » Turkey

Turkey's Kurdish minority is the big loser of the constitutional reform, writes the daily Neue Zürcher Zeitung: "Not a single paragraph curtailing the rights of the country's biggest minority has been modified. Despite the modest improvements in recent times Turkish schools have yet to introduce Kurdish-language instruction. The use of Kurdish in local administrations remains banned. The government has also shied away from amending paragraph 66 of the constitution, which says that 'Everyone bound to the Turkish state through the bond of citizenship is a Turk' - including the Kurds. As long as the government refuses to replace the word 'Turk' with 'Turkish citizen' and thus improve the legal situation of the minorities, the many avowals to European standards ring hollow." (09/07/2010)

» more information (external link, German)
More from the press review on the subject » Domestic Policy, » EU neighbourhood policy, » Turkey
All available articles from » Cyrill Stieger

The US and Russia have exchanged 14 alleged spies in what amounts to the biggest exchange of agents between the two countries since the Cold War. Washington and Moscow hope the deal won't damage their relations, the daily NRC Handelsblad writes: "The FBI is running the risk of emerging from a public process with empty hands. But the eagerness to cooperate in the really important areas of espionage is a more important motive: the gathering of information to prevent terrorist attacks and the spread of nuclear material and weapons of mass destruction. A dispute over a relatively unimportant spying network would hamper a phase of rapprochement between the US and Russia. This rapprochement however doesn't mean that the mutual spying will be cut down to a lower level. On the contrary, the interest in gathering industrial and/or confidential information is growing rather than dwindling in today's multipolar world." (09/07/2010)

» full article (external link, Dutch)
More from the press review on the subject » International Relations, » Russia, » U.S.

Three weeks after the elections in Belgium the Walloon Elio Di Rupo of the social democratic PS party has been given the task of leading the coalition talks. It will be difficult to form a government with the Flemish nationalist Bart De Wever of the New Flemish Alliance (N-VA), according to the daily De Standaard: "Flanders voted in droves  for the changes propagated by the N-VA. Francophone Belgium voted predominantly for the stability of the PS [Socialist Party]. It takes time to reconcile water and fire. ... The result must enable De Wever to explain to his voters and his party that he is making changes by accepting (a certain) stability, while Di Rupo must convince his voters that he is maintaining stability by accepting (certain) changes. A difficult task!" (09/07/2010)

» full article (external link, Dutch)
More from the press review on the subject » Domestic Policy, » Elections, » Belgium
All available articles from » Guy Tegenbos

Cuba has announced that it plans to release 52 incarcerated political dissenters. Spain, which mediated in the affair, immediately called on all EU states to relax their tough stances against the regime in Havana. For its part the business paper Hospodářské noviny urges caution: "It remains to be seen whether fundamental change is really coming to Cuba. For the time being there is not too much hope that Cuba will really become what has tragicomically been referred to as the 'island of freedom'. The released prisoners will not become citizens with equal rights. They are to be forced into exile. Another 110 prisoners at the very least will remain in their cells. ... So far it would seem [President Raul] Castro is no different from [Fidel] Castro. The EU should therefore stick to the hard line of the Czech Republic and other states and wait before it decides to oblige Havana as Spain has done." (09/07/2010)

» full article (external link, Czech)
More from the press review on the subject » EU Policy, » Domestic Policy, » Spain, » Europe, » Latin Amerika
All available articles from » Daniel Anýž

The Czech Republic has been paying tribute to the Bohemian-born Austrian composer Gustav Mahler on the 150th anniversary of his birth. The Internet site of the president's office goes so far as to praise him as a world-famous "Czech" composer and conductor. The publicist Jiří Franěk bemoans in the leftist daily Právo how little the Czechs know about the famous non-Czech-speaking personalities born in their country: "Mahler now has his monument. But things are far worse for one of our most celebrated authors - Rainer Maria Rilke. In the US, which does not exactly have the best educational system, practically every high school student is familiar with him. Here in the Czech Republic he's almost unknown. He was born in Heinrichsgasse in Prague, but wrote in German. ... The same would be true of Kafka if [the Germanist] Eduard Goldstücker hadn't spread his fame. It's not about the monuments, but what we owe to our compatriots who were perhaps not full-blooded Czechs, and even more what we owe ourselves. It is embarrassing not to know that someone was born just around the corner who 'the rest of the world' honours."  (08/07/2010)

» more information (external link, Czech)
More from the press review on the subject » Literature, » Music, » History, » Remembrance culture, » Czech Republic
All available articles from » Jiří Franěk

The veto rights of the Portuguese government regarding decisions made by former state-run Portugal Telecom (PT) contravene EU law, the European Court of Justice ruled on Thursday. Portugal had used its so-called golden share to prevent the sale of PT shares in Brazilian mobile telephone provider Vivo to Spain's Telefónica. The left-liberal daily El País fears that the implementation of the judgement will take too long: "Commission President Durão Barroso said that he guarantees the ruling will be applied. He would keep his promise by acting as quickly as the shareholders (Telefónica and PT have already begun negotiating) and ensuring that the transaction is completed at similar conditions to those agreed on June 30. But the illegal golden share will win the day if Telefónica is forced to forsake its plans to purchase Vivo because of cheating, prolonged negotiations and irrational political obstacles." (09/07/2010)

» full article (external link, Spanish)
More from the press review on the subject » EU Policy, » Corporations, » Economic Policy, » Spain, » Portugal, » Europe

On Thursday the Greeks protested with a general strike against the country's pension reform. This could mark the beginning of an all-out struggle over social benefits, writes the left-liberal daily To Ethnos: "The old age of most Greeks will be marked by suffering, mortification and cruelty. ... The government and the parliamentary group of the Panhellenic Socialist Movement (PASOK) is changing the right to a pension into nothing more than a pittance. ... The general strike can no longer prevent the vote on the most antisocial pension law our country has ever seen. The question is whether this strike ... will be an obituary for adequate social coverage or ... the beginning of a counterattack which will annul the Papandreou government's 'official' policy. We hope for the second scenario, but only time will tell." (08/07/2010)

» full article (external link, Greek)
More from the press review on the subject » Fiscal Policy, » Social movements, » Greece
All available articles from » Giorgos Delastik

The high indebtedness of private households in Portugal is the result of a strange peculiarity of the Portuguese, writes Henrique Raposos in his blog A Tempo e a Desmodo with the weekly Expresso: "Everyone has to own their own flat. People no longer rent - like in other Western countries. This has naturally increased the total debts in Portugal. But now comes the good news: the number of rented apartments is growing - in 2009 the number of rented flats on offer in Lisbon went up by 40 percent. Because there are no more quick and cheap loans people are finally beginning to see the advantages of renting. And it really does help the economy. Why? Because it doesn't create excessive debt but rather encourages thriftiness. And above all it creates social mobility. Today people can't take a job in X because they're tied to 'their' home in Y. Moreover only the rented accommodation market can mitigate the most shameful phenomenon in our cities: the masses of empty, dilapidated buildings. They disfigure our cities and reduce the quality of life." (08/07/2010)

» full article (external link, Portuguese)
More from the press review on the subject » Economic Policy, » Social affairs, » Portugal, » Global
All available articles from » Henrique Raposo

Freelance artists in Romania have had to pay higher health insurance premiums since July 1. Author Mircea Cărtărescu asks in the daily Evenimentul Zilei where they're supposed to get the money, and makes his point with a few figures: "In Romania we have roughly 20 successful authors. These are the only ones of roughly 3,000 members of the writers' association who earn anything at all from their writing. A run of two thousand copies [in two years] at a book price of 25 lei [5.80 euros] comes to 50,000 lei. The writer receives on average ten percent of the total revenue, or 5,000 lei, 4,000 after taxes. ... So a 'top' author earns 166 lei [38.60 euros] per month. To make matters worse, nowadays it's no longer possible for Romanian authors to publish a novel every two years, or have a run of 2,000 copies." (09/07/2010)

» full article (external link, Romanian)
More from the press review on the subject » Domestic Policy, » Literature, » Tax Policy, » Italy
All available articles from » Mircea Cărtărescu

Two young British girls were crushed to death by automatic gates meant to protect the private estates where they lived from the outside world. People's desire for protection has become a social ill, writes the left-liberal daily The Guardian: "Paranoia seems to be the reason we gate our streets and homes today. But the more we cut ourselves off from one another, the more this paranoia spreads and the less we feel a part of the social and physical fabric of our towns and cities. It does seem odd to find yourself walking along a back street in some salubrious part of London, or other essentially wealthy city, and to be studied in an insolent manner by security guards decked out in comic book American-style cop outfits patrolling some horrendous new estate of bling homes. ... What has happened to us? How can such paranoia, and shortsighted urban planning and design, be worth the death of two little girls? It's time to open our gates, and to shoo the fear away as we do." (09/07/2010)

» full article (external link, English)
More from the press review on the subject » Architecture / Cities, » Social movements, » Demographics, » United Kingdom, » Global
All available articles from » Jonathan Glancey

A number of Italian media are staging an information strike today, Friday, to protest a new anti-bugging law that among other things foresees draconian punishments for journalists who make public investigative files or recorded conversations. That the media are using silence to protest the dreaded gagging legislation may be paradoxical, but in view of Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's "TV dictatorship" it is the only way to make themselves heard, wrote the left-liberal daily La Repubblica on Thursday: "The strike is the only way in an unhappy country that is the victim of an illegal television monopoly [Prime Minister Berlusconi owns the biggest private TV channel Mediaset and has influenced over public broadcaster RAI] to make TV viewers aware of what is going on in the network of power, judiciary, information and public opinion. The only way to break this loop. The investigating magistrates are to be hindered in the giving of evidence, the journalists are to be silenced and the citizens left in the dark. The devout TV news programmes don't talk about this. For the duration of one day the TV blackout will speak for them, and viewers will finally learn that there is a problem that affects them."  (08/07/2010)

» full article (external link, Italian)
More from the press review on the subject » Press freedom, » Italy
All available articles from » Ezio Mauro