It is extremely unlikely that a Middle East peace agreement will be concluded, writes the daily Die Presse commenting on the start of the negotiations in the US: "Talking is better than shooting, they say. It's hard to argue with that. But when the talking goes nowhere and the shooting gets even worse afterwards? This is precisely what happened ten years ago. The American Mr. Fix It back then was called Bill Clinton. He hauled the prime minister at the time and current defence minister Ehud Barak, as well as the late PLO boss Yasser Arafat, over to Camp David to force them to make peace. The negotiations were ill prepared and failed. ... Obama is being more courageous than all the other US presidents before him, who waited until the end of their terms in office before tackling the risky Middle East problem. But he is raising in an unfavourable constellation exaggerated hopes that could morph into bitter anger. A flying school for camels would be more successful than his dangerous peace farce." (02/09/2010)

» full article (external link, German)
More from the press review on the subject » Security Policy / Crises / War, » Middle East
All available articles from » Christian Ultsch

The negotiation efforts by US President Barack Obama will lead to nothing as long as Israelis keep settling on the West Bank, writes the liberal daily The Independent: "The immediate challenge for Obama is to find a formula which can reconcile Netanyahu's reluctance to prolong a partial freeze on settlement building beyond 26 September - probably strengthened by Wednesday night's killings - and Abbas's threat to pull out of talks if he refuses. If the talks do survive, what will they be about? What they've always been about: ending the Israeli occupation which began with victory in the 1967 Six Day War when it took control of the West Bank and Gaza. And that means agreements on borders, which the Palestinians believe must be based on the pre-1967 lines, the future of Jerusalem, which the Palestinians want as a shared capital, and the fate of the families of refugees that were forced from or fled their homes in what is now Israel during the 1948 war." (02/09/2010)

» full article (external link, English)
More from the press review on the subject » International Relations, » Security Policy / Crises / War, » U.S., » Middle East, » Israel
All available articles from » Donald Macintyre

The start of the Middle East summit in Washington prompts former Israeli justice minister Yossi Beilin to examine the role of the Europeans in the daily La Vanguardia: "I have to admit that I don't understand why the Obama administration is keeping Europe out of the negotiations. After all, over the past twenty years the main phases of the process have taken place in Europe. And Europe has dedicated time, experience and resources to the efforts to resolve the world's most enduring conflict since the end of the Second World War: the Madrid Conference initiated the whole process (with strong US engagement); Paris was host to the signing of the economic agreement between Israel and the Palestinians; and the most important compromises of all those reached between Israelis and Palestinians were achieved in Oslo and Geneva, which are not part of the European Union." (02/09/2010)

» more information (external link, Spanish)
More from the press review on the subject » International Relations, » Security Policy / Crises / War, » Europe, » U.S., » Middle East, » Israel
All available articles from » Yossef Beilin

US President Barack Obama's role as mediator in the peace talks is a hopeful sign, the liberal-conservative daily Jyllands-Posten writes: "No one knows whether Obama has a trump up his sleeve. But it would be naïve to believe he had launched into these - in the eyes of many - hopeless negotiations without having very carefully weighed up the possibilities of dialogue, which is a key factor in the Middle East game, between Israel's [prime minister] Netanyahu and [Palestinian President] Abbas. Obama is playing a game with high stakes and it could be that his attempt comes too late to do what his predecessor George W. Bush omitted to do, perhaps because after the 9/11 terrorist attacks Bush saw the Middle East only as a battlefield for militant terrorists and moderate peace forces. But it would be premature to write off this meeting between Israelis and Palestinians as a failure even before it has begun." (02/09/2010)

» full article (external link, Danish)
More from the press review on the subject » International Relations, » Security Policy / Crises / War, » U.S., » Middle East, » Israel

The Swedish television station TV4 first refused to broadcast an anti-Islamic campaign spot by the right-wing populist Sweden Democrats (SD) and then allowed it to be broadcast in a cropped version. Denmark's government and the Danish People's Party have been quick to condemn the station. The conservative daily Sydsvenska Dagbladet writes that Sweden should not model itself on Denmark: "This shows how the fearful established parties allow the Danish Volkspartei to determine the country's political agenda. That is something the parties in Sweden's Parliament should learn from. ... Many [Danes] say today that they can't understand what's so bad about the SD election spot that TV4 wanted to ban. Perhaps that says above all something about the tone of Danish debate. ... There is no reason for Sweden to follow Denmark's example." (02/09/2010)

» full article (external link, Swedish)
More from the press review on the subject » International Relations, » Religion, » Migration, » Minorities, » Denmark, » Sweden

With an eye to France's Roma policy, Czech President Václav Klaus and Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg have accused French President Nicolas Sarkozy of racist tendencies. But publicist Jiří Pehe advises the Czechs to look to their own back yard in his blog for the web portal aktualne.cz: "First of all we had deputy prime minister Čunek going on about 'sun tanned' citizens. ... Schwarzenberg and the majority of Czech politicians also did nothing to stop the mayor of Chomutov when she took measures to recover the money owed by Roma families and even went as far as to cut their social benefits. With the emerging crisis the Topolánek government organised the deportation of foreign labourers and sent them home by plane, just as the French did to the Roma. ... Millions of immigrants live in France. Czech criticism of the allegedly racist French will only be believable when our country has a similar ethnic make-up. For now however, we live in a country where Roma children are put away in special schools and the Roma are moved to ghettos on the outskirts of town." (02/09/2010)

» full article (external link, Czech)
More from the press review on the subject » Domestic Policy, » France, » Czech Republic
All available articles from » Jiří Pehe

In an interview with the Russian daily Kommersant Russia's Prime Minister Vladimir Putin harshly criticised the opposition and defended his government. But the Polish conservative daily Rzeczpospolita blames him for the huge democratic deficit in his country and says the West is also partly responsible for this: "All over the world people say that the Russians are not ripe for democracy. And that Russia was going its own way. And that the West shouldn't dare jeopardise the fragile progress. ... The opposition - if there is one at all - is a beaten-down, clumsy, insignificant stain on the increasingly bright image of our great partner in the East. ... If the leaders of other states would stand up for the hundreds of political prisoners in Russia they would be considerably more entitled to call themselves democratic leaders. And there would presumably be fewer prisoners." (02/09/2010)

» full article (external link, Polish)
More from the press review on the subject » International Relations, » Russia, » U.S., » Western Europe
All available articles from » Krystyna Kurczab-Redlich

New laws governing election campaign donations came into force on September 1 in Finland. The daily Kaleva sees transparency as the best means of restoring the citizens' trust in politicians, which was severely shaken by the donation scandal: "The reputation of campaign donations has been severely tarnished, even though in future it will continue to be completely legal to finance candidates and political parties. ... The criticism from Greco, the Council of Europe's anti-corruption commission, on Finland's approach to campaign donations have long fallen on deaf ears. It was only the blatant influencing of the last parliamentary elections and the detailed investigation into election financing which ensued in the media that shook the politicians into action. ... The dirty washing which has now been hung out to dry probably had the greatest influence on society in the last decades. ... The police investigation into this scandal will last for a good while yet and cast a shadow over the upcoming parliamentary elections [in April]." (02/09/2010)

» full article (external link, Finnish)
More from the press review on the subject » Domestic Policy, » Elections, » Finland

Right-wing populists are gaining ground in the US, France, the Netherlands and now in Germany, writes columnist Bas Heijne in the daily nrc.next. He sees a growing divide between uncertain, angry citizens on the one hand and a new enlightened elite on the other: "The right-wing populists' rhetoric is as predictable as the principled indignation of their opponents is dull. All we hear is noble words. ... The one group does all it can to use objective speech (the constitutional state, the principle of equality). The other takes a devil-may-care subjective ('genuine and false French people'), romantic ('Restoring Honor'), dramatic (the anti-Islam film 'Fitna') or doom-and-gloom ('Germany abolishes itself') attitude. It is not difficult to see what kind of language appeals to most people in our media culture. ... Anyone who wants to fight back must learn a new, attractive form of speech. Like that of the populists, this speech must be firmly grounded in daily life, it must be playful and challenging, catchy and aggressive. Fewer principles, please, and more passion." (02/09/2010)

» more information (external link, Dutch)
More from the press review on the subject » Migration, » Integration, » Weltanschauung, » Germany, » France, » Netherlands, » U.S.
All available articles from » Bas Heijne

The new book by German Federal bank board member Thilo Sarrazin is being rejected by the established media, which describe it as Islamophobic and populist. Markus Linden sees the perception of populism as an exclusively negative phenomenon as mistaken and writes the following in the left-wing daily die tageszeitung: "Public discussion on politically contentious issues - be it the building of mosques, integration policy or education vouchers for social benefits claimants - is often a precondition for raising public awareness of these issues. In such cases the populist often does himself a disservice which, however, ultimately promotes democracy. ... Populism stands out and politicises society. But if it is reacted to appropriately, support for it among the population evaporates. The populist destroys his own foundations, as it were. This process is naturally not automatic, as the numerous examples of successful right-wing populist parties in Austria and the Netherlands show. The alternative - a de-politicisation that leaves the economical factors as the decisive excluding criterion and allows intolerance to smoulder in silence - is hardly desirable. ... At any rate at least Sarrazin's racially-motivated tirade has promoted politicised discussion. And that's a good thing."   (02/09/2010)

» full article (external link, German)
More from the press review on the subject » Domestic Policy, » Migration, » Integration, » Elections, » Germany, » Global
All available articles from » Markus Linden

Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has announced a gradual increase in import duties on cars. Moscow is thus deliberately blocking its own path towards joining the World Trade Organisation, writes the business paper Il Sole 24 Ore: "The Russian prime minister has explained to carmakers that Russia is raising the duties because it wants them to produce on Russian territory. This is a policy of localisation. As history has taught us, this policy is an effective demagogy which however tends to be short-lived. It is doomed to failure. ... The great success of manufacturers in the emerging economies is based on exports, not on the domestic markets, no matter how big they may be. Putin wants to play the role of the last protectionist at any price. ... A role which becomes more plausible and stronger the longer he delays the adoption of the current regulations, and in this case accession to the World Trade Organisation." (02/09/2010)

» more information (external link, Italian)
More from the press review on the subject » Economic Policy, » Russia
All available articles from » Giorgio Barba Navaretti

Estonia's employers' association has presented a manifesto calling among other things for a ban on solidarity strikes, cuts to social benefits and a higher retirement age. The daily Õhtuleht is outraged: "As far as labour relations go our employers still live in the 19th century. They view workers merely as dumb and thankless masses whose rights must be curtailed to strip them of responsibility. But as backward as we are in this context we also consider ourselves a Nordic country, a neighbour of Scandinavia with its high living standards. There however the unions are strong and prevent employers from taking too many liberties. Why doesn't Estonia follow Finland's example? Our labour costs are significantly lower than those of our Nordic neighbour, as a result of our ridiculously low wages. We have almost no strikes. Must the right to strike be curtailed as well?" (02/09/2010)

» full article (external link, Estonian)
More from the press review on the subject » Domestic Policy, » Corporations, » Economic Policy, » Estonia, » Finland

A bomb was found on Wednesday in front of the headquarters of the Slovenian construction company Vegrad. The company is considerably in arrears with its employees and several subsidiaries. The daily Delo writes that the two facts are clearly related, and is not surprised that things have come to a head: "The former police chief and sociologist Pavle Čelikhas announced as early as the start of the 1990s that within a short time extreme forms of violence would emerge in Slovenia, including terrorism, if the country failed to get a grip on its increasingly large social contradictions. The statement by the security expert has proved wrong in part. Those who suffered the first social shocks in the 1990s have turned out to have more patience than expected. Nevertheless ... this bomb at the entrance to a business that has swindled hundreds of people is a clear signal that their patience is nearing an end. At least one person has clearly had enough. His dignity has been trodden underfoot." (02/09/2010)

» full article (external link, Slovenian)
More from the press review on the subject » Social movements, » Corporations, » Slovenia
All available articles from » Ali Žerdin

Bulgaria's government plans an income-independent honorary pension for musicians, as a fire 25 years ago in the archive of their then employer, the state concert bureau, destroyed their employment certificates. The daily Standart defends the government's controversial bill: "If tomorrow one [of the musicians] dies in misery, people will be up in arms because the state does nothing to help its important personalities. We must decide: either we complain in an egalitarian spirit that there should be no honorary pension bonuses for great Bulgarians, or we lament that the state leaves them to face old age and death all alone! ... In any event we owe these people a debt. This is not about socialism and its icons. It is not a question of whether we liked them as artists or not. They symbolise Bulgarian culture in the second half of the 20th century and that in itself is worthy of our respect." (01/09/2010)

» full article (external link, Bulgarian)
More from the press review on the subject » Music, » Cultural Policy, » Bulgaria
All available articles from » Martin Karbovski