Southern Europeans don’t go out drinking

fter living in Scotland for most of my life and Ibiza for the last six years I’ve come to a simple conclusion on the difference between the boozing habits of southern and northern Europeans. Southern Europeans just don’t go out drinking. If that sounds like a load of nonsense, let me explain.
Ibiza’s a great social [...]

Where does the Algeria result leave England?

By Stuart Crawford
0-0? What a shocker! Just as the commentariat had relaxed from its failure frenzy following the 1 -1 with the USA, reassuring itself that “England always starts slowly in the World Cup”, along come the upstarts from Algeria to blow that particularly hopeful theory off the map. How dare they wipe [...]

Newspaper ad calls for Israel to bomb Iran

atience in some Israeli quarters seems to be running out with what they see as the world community’s lame efforts to persuade Iran not to join the nuclear weapons community.
An advertisement on Israel’s Haaretz website is calling on Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to make good on his (alleged?) promise to bomb Iran in two weeks’ [...]

Noriega extradition ‘a deal to protect Bush’

The US decision to extradite former Panamanian dictator and CIA agent Manuel Noriega to face money-laundering charges in France has not gone down well in his home country, with his lawyers claiming the Bush family wanted him well away from America.
Noriega, who was driven from power in the US invasion of Panama in 1989, during [...]

French electorate give sharp rebuke to Sarkozy

he French electorate may have delivered a sharp rebuke to President Nicolas Sarkozy in Sunday’s second round of regional elections, but it is still too early to say whether the country is prepared to ditch the government’s reforms and swing Left.
Labour Minister Xavier Darcos was the first head to roll in the wake of the [...]

French elections results a serious blow for Sarkozy

A Socialist victory in the first round of France’s regional polls yesterday has dealt a serious blow to President Nicolas Sarkozy, damaging his chances of re-election in the 2012 presidential election.
The result was a personal triumph for Socialist leader Martine Aubry, the daughter of former European Commission President Jacques Delors, who until recently was considered [...]

Analysis: Time to get serious about a green economy

By John Knox
We prefer to talk about the weather rather than the climate. And now that spring is here, it’s a cheerful enough subject. The sun shines again, the birds are singing, the crocuses are out and soon the daffodils will be stretching in never ending line along the margin of the bay.
The coldest winter [...]

Brown: Iraq war not about WMDs

Gordon Brown today gave the Chilcot Inquiry his own reason why Britain went to war in Iraq – and it was not because he believed Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction.
He said Britain’s original intention in preparing for war had been to show potential aggressor states that the “international community” was determined to act [...]

What price bearing gifts to the Greeks?

Troubled Greece may have secured the backing it wanted from the European Union today, but it will have to put an end to its historic manipulation of deficit figures if it is serious about getting its finances in order.
With other euro economies like Spain, Italy and Portugal also under pressure, France and Germany had to [...]

Jack Straw: Iran ‘not bogeyman of Middle East’

Jack Straw distanced himself from Tony Blair yesterday when he told the Iraq Inquiry that it would be “simplistic” to think that Iran was the “bogeyman” of the Middle East.
The justice secretary, who was foreign secretary in 2003, told the inquiry in his second appearance that Iran had not invaded any country and he did [...]

Iran’s nuclear programme gives energy to US neocons

President Barack Obama seems to be responding at last to American neo-conservative calls for a tougher stance with Iran over its nuclear programme, though he may balk at “regime change”.
With the Obama administration nowhere near the stage where it might declare that “all options are on the table”, increased covert backing of ethnic groups in [...]

Why has France got such a bee in its bonnet about the burqa?

When the French get a bee in their bonnet about something, they rarely let it go. A cross-party commission of 32 legislators has been studying whether the burqa should be banned – and a ban could make it impossible for women who wear it to receive any public services, even a ride on a bus.
President [...]