WESTERN EUROPE
Luxembourg's premier spoke out last week against former British Prime Minister Tony Blair's candidacy to become the European Union's first-ever president. In the meanwhile Angela Merkel was sworn in for a second term as German chancellor a month after national elections. Also Germany's Lutheran Church has elected a woman, Margot Kaess
mann, to lead the nation's Protestants for the first time in its history.
British lawyers looking for ways to hold Israel accountable for its deadly advance into Gaza last year have expanded their legal campaign by seeking the arrest of Israeli military officers entering Britain. While UK’s Postal workers have threatened a second round of national strikes after talks to end a bitter dispute over pay, working conditions and modernization broke down.
A team of U.N. nuclear inspectors returned to Austria last week expressed satisfaction at their visit to a previously secret Iranian uranium enrichment site.
At a two-day European Union summit in Brussels last week the stalled reform treaty overcame a crucial hurdle after EU leaders agreed to last-minute demands from the Czech Republic in return for the country's ratification of the Lisbon Treaty. Meanwhile EU leaders failed to reach a consensus about grants for poorer nations to counter the effects of Global Warming, raising fears of any significant development in the December Copenhagen conference. Also the EU has dropped the last remaining sanctions against Uzbekistan imposed after a 2005 crackdown on an uprising, proclaiming the move to be intended as further encouragement for the country to improve its human rights record.
SOUTHEAST EUROPE
Bosnia's top official canceled a diplomatic visit to Sweden last week following the Swedish decision to grant Bosnian Serb war criminal Biljana Plavsic an early release after serving two-thirds of an 11-year jail term. In the meanwhile in Bosnia, Republika Srpska (RS) Prime Minister Milorad Dodik invited all parliamentary parties to constitutional reform talks last week. Also after a two-day meeting of the EU foreign ministers in Luxembourg the 27-nation bloc stressed its readiness to continue working with Bosnian politicians to seek compromise in order to secure a future in the EU and NATO.
Croatians are set to vote on Dec. 27th to elect a new president. Meanwhile opposition parties rejected an agreement on settling the border dispute between Croatia and Slovenia presented by Croatian Prime Minister Jadranka Kosor last week. Also Romanian President Traian Basescu has signed a decree regarding a referendum on making parliament unicameral, reducing the number of parliament members from 471 to 300.
The European Broadcasting Union (EBU) has accused Prime Minister Hashim Thaci of turning Kosovo's Public Broadcaster, the RTK, into a "media arm of the ruling party".
In its annual report published on Oct. 26th, the European police noted that Albania is believed to play a central role in drug trafficking and maintains strong connections with Kosovo and Italy in human trafficking, heroin and marijuana smuggling.
US/CANADA
On the domestic front in the United States after months of negotiations House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has prepared to unveil a retooled health care overhaul plan intended to bridge differences among Democrats. In the economic arena a year after Lehman Brothers collapsed, triggering the worst financial crisis in seven decades, the Obama administration is pressing Congress for the power to dismantle other non-bank firms that have the potential to take down the economy. At the foreign policy front President Barack Obama is considering a scaled-down version of the war plan advanced by his top Afghanistan commander, Gen. Stanley McChrystal.
According to an Ekos poll, Canada's governing Conservatives are maintaining a strong lead in public support following an ill-fated attempt by the opposition Liberals to force an early election. While according to the CROP survey for La Presse newspaper Separatists in the province of Quebec have taken a slight lead over the governing Liberals, who are under pressure to investigate an alleged corruption scandal.
Also last week Canada's new spy chief accused journalists and human rights advocates of often glorifying terror suspects as "quasi folk heroes".
LATIN AMERICA
The Nicaraguan Congress narrowly rejected an initiative last week to force a debate on whether to annul a hotly disputed court ruling allowing President Daniel Ortega to seek re-election. While a senior U.S. delegation has asked Honduras' rival factions to be more flexible in the resolution of the coup-torn country's 4-month-old crisis. Also the U.S. ambassador and 3 Colombian ministers signed a pact last week giving American personnel expanded access to military bases in the country; a deal that Venezuela's Hugo Chavez has called a threat to the region's security. In the mean while Chile's president has sent to Congress a bill seeking to strip military courts of their ability to try civilians reversing the ‘excessive expansion’ during the 1973-90 dictatorship.
Ecuador's president was in London last week to promote a proposal seeking $3 billion compensation not to drill for oil in a pristine Amazon reserve, hence compensating for the high cost to poor countries of going green.
Pope Benedict XVI will meet with the Archbishop of Canterbury next month in the leaders' first encounter since the Catholic Church moved to make it easier for disenchanted Anglicans to convert to Catholicism.
Argentine government has voiced its willingness to re negotiate on the U.S. government military accord, signed between 1953 and 1964, related to the internal security of the country, nuclear cooperation, as well as activities of intelligence exchange on issues that are now prohibited to the Armed Forces. These include drug trafficking and terrorism. Meanwhile the Argentine President Cristina Fernandez has introduced an official project for policy reform including obligatory internal open elections for the political parties.
The head of Brazil’s opposition party (PSDB, Party of the Brazilian Social Democracy) has criticized the President at his inability to overcome criminal gangs, as the nation prepares to host the 2016 Olympic Games. At the behest of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) as well, President Lula Da Silva has announces US$75.8 million for Rio’s police to combat drug cartels.
Twenty four years after the military left power in Brazil, the government is set to create a Truth Commission to investigate crimes committed by the security forces between 1964 and 1985.
In the meanwhile Honduras has taken Brazil to court for allowing ousted President Manuel Zelaya to remain in its embassy in the Honduran capital, Tegucigalpa. A case has been filed in the International Court of Justice at Hague against the Brazilian president Lula de Silva.
Hundreds and thousands of people marched in Mexico City against the rightist government’s decision to privatize the power and electric company fearing the loss of thousands of jobs. In the meanwhile due to low supply of swine flu vaccine, Mexican president Felipe Carlderon has ordered for a million doses, even allowing the French drug company Sanofi-Aventis to open its manufacturing plant in Mexico.
AUSTRALASIA
Luxembourg's premier spoke out last week against former British Prime Minister Tony Blair's candidacy to become the European Union's first-ever president. In the meanwhile Angela Merkel was sworn in for a second term as German chancellor a month after national elections. Also Germany's Lutheran Church has elected a woman, Margot Kaess
mann, to lead the nation's Protestants for the first time in its history.British lawyers looking for ways to hold Israel accountable for its deadly advance into Gaza last year have expanded their legal campaign by seeking the arrest of Israeli military officers entering Britain. While UK’s Postal workers have threatened a second round of national strikes after talks to end a bitter dispute over pay, working conditions and modernization broke down.
A team of U.N. nuclear inspectors returned to Austria last week expressed satisfaction at their visit to a previously secret Iranian uranium enrichment site.
At a two-day European Union summit in Brussels last week the stalled reform treaty overcame a crucial hurdle after EU leaders agreed to last-minute demands from the Czech Republic in return for the country's ratification of the Lisbon Treaty. Meanwhile EU leaders failed to reach a consensus about grants for poorer nations to counter the effects of Global Warming, raising fears of any significant development in the December Copenhagen conference. Also the EU has dropped the last remaining sanctions against Uzbekistan imposed after a 2005 crackdown on an uprising, proclaiming the move to be intended as further encouragement for the country to improve its human rights record.
SOUTHEAST EUROPE
Bosnia's top official canceled a diplomatic visit to Sweden last week following the Swedish decision to grant Bosnian Serb war criminal Biljana Plavsic an early release after serving two-thirds of an 11-year jail term. In the meanwhile in Bosnia, Republika Srpska (RS) Prime Minister Milorad Dodik invited all parliamentary parties to constitutional reform talks last week. Also after a two-day meeting of the EU foreign ministers in Luxembourg the 27-nation bloc stressed its readiness to continue working with Bosnian politicians to seek compromise in order to secure a future in the EU and NATO.
Croatians are set to vote on Dec. 27th to elect a new president. Meanwhile opposition parties rejected an agreement on settling the border dispute between Croatia and Slovenia presented by Croatian Prime Minister Jadranka Kosor last week. Also Romanian President Traian Basescu has signed a decree regarding a referendum on making parliament unicameral, reducing the number of parliament members from 471 to 300.
The European Broadcasting Union (EBU) has accused Prime Minister Hashim Thaci of turning Kosovo's Public Broadcaster, the RTK, into a "media arm of the ruling party".
In its annual report published on Oct. 26th, the European police noted that Albania is believed to play a central role in drug trafficking and maintains strong connections with Kosovo and Italy in human trafficking, heroin and marijuana smuggling.
US/CANADA
On the domestic front in the United States after months of negotiations House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has prepared to unveil a retooled health care overhaul plan intended to bridge differences among Democrats. In the economic arena a year after Lehman Brothers collapsed, triggering the worst financial crisis in seven decades, the Obama administration is pressing Congress for the power to dismantle other non-bank firms that have the potential to take down the economy. At the foreign policy front President Barack Obama is considering a scaled-down version of the war plan advanced by his top Afghanistan commander, Gen. Stanley McChrystal.
According to an Ekos poll, Canada's governing Conservatives are maintaining a strong lead in public support following an ill-fated attempt by the opposition Liberals to force an early election. While according to the CROP survey for La Presse newspaper Separatists in the province of Quebec have taken a slight lead over the governing Liberals, who are under pressure to investigate an alleged corruption scandal.
Also last week Canada's new spy chief accused journalists and human rights advocates of often glorifying terror suspects as "quasi folk heroes".
LATIN AMERICA
The Nicaraguan Congress narrowly rejected an initiative last week to force a debate on whether to annul a hotly disputed court ruling allowing President Daniel Ortega to seek re-election. While a senior U.S. delegation has asked Honduras' rival factions to be more flexible in the resolution of the coup-torn country's 4-month-old crisis. Also the U.S. ambassador and 3 Colombian ministers signed a pact last week giving American personnel expanded access to military bases in the country; a deal that Venezuela's Hugo Chavez has called a threat to the region's security. In the mean while Chile's president has sent to Congress a bill seeking to strip military courts of their ability to try civilians reversing the ‘excessive expansion’ during the 1973-90 dictatorship.
Ecuador's president was in London last week to promote a proposal seeking $3 billion compensation not to drill for oil in a pristine Amazon reserve, hence compensating for the high cost to poor countries of going green.
Pope Benedict XVI will meet with the Archbishop of Canterbury next month in the leaders' first encounter since the Catholic Church moved to make it easier for disenchanted Anglicans to convert to Catholicism.
Argentine government has voiced its willingness to re negotiate on the U.S. government military accord, signed between 1953 and 1964, related to the internal security of the country, nuclear cooperation, as well as activities of intelligence exchange on issues that are now prohibited to the Armed Forces. These include drug trafficking and terrorism. Meanwhile the Argentine President Cristina Fernandez has introduced an official project for policy reform including obligatory internal open elections for the political parties.
The head of Brazil’s opposition party (PSDB, Party of the Brazilian Social Democracy) has criticized the President at his inability to overcome criminal gangs, as the nation prepares to host the 2016 Olympic Games. At the behest of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) as well, President Lula Da Silva has announces US$75.8 million for Rio’s police to combat drug cartels.
Twenty four years after the military left power in Brazil, the government is set to create a Truth Commission to investigate crimes committed by the security forces between 1964 and 1985.
In the meanwhile Honduras has taken Brazil to court for allowing ousted President Manuel Zelaya to remain in its embassy in the Honduran capital, Tegucigalpa. A case has been filed in the International Court of Justice at Hague against the Brazilian president Lula de Silva.
Hundreds and thousands of people marched in Mexico City against the rightist government’s decision to privatize the power and electric company fearing the loss of thousands of jobs. In the meanwhile due to low supply of swine flu vaccine, Mexican president Felipe Carlderon has ordered for a million doses, even allowing the French drug company Sanofi-Aventis to open its manufacturing plant in Mexico.
AUSTRALASIA
Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd is expected to make a formal apology to hundreds of thousands of child-abuse victims known as the "Forgotten Australians" next month. Meanwhile authorities may have to force people to evacuate coastal areas as rising sea levels threaten thousands of homes in the country.
China has called for a sweeping new era in ties with Australia including a free-trade deal, marking a dramatic turnaround in relations which reached crisis-point this year.
China has called for a sweeping new era in ties with Australia including a free-trade deal, marking a dramatic turnaround in relations which reached crisis-point this year.
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Business and Politics in the Muslim World (BPM)refers to the project entitled, "Globalized Business and Politics: A View from the Muslim World.' The blog development project has been undertaken and jointly developed by the Gilani Research Foundation and BPM as a free resource and social discussion tool.
Business and Politics in the Muslim World (BPM)refers to the project entitled, "Globalized Business and Politics: A View from the Muslim World.' The blog development project has been undertaken and jointly developed by the Gilani Research Foundation and BPM as a free resource and social discussion tool.
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