(This article was first published in International Policy Digest at https://intpolicydigest.org/2019/05/10/building-georgian-statehood/) Parliamentary elections will be held in Georgia in November 2020 and the outcome promises to be the most crucial since the country gained independence 28 years ago, writes Nino Burjanadze Our democratic principles and traditional values will be at stake. The growing disillusionment of the…
Turkey has been holding elections since 1930 and Turkish people go to the polls to elect their local administrators once every five years. On March 31st, this year, people voted for 30 metropolitan, 51 city, 919 district, and 397 town municipalities, writes Hande Bozatli. Among those 81 provinces, 30 are called metropolitan municipalities, and the…
Czech police have finalised their investigation and proposed to the state prosecutor to charge six people including Prime Minister Andrej Babiš and his wife for their alleged roles in the Stork’s Nest scandal involving the fraud worth CZK 50 million in EU funds. The supervising state prosecutor will now study the investigation and decide on…
Following the results of yesterday’s elections, Volodymyr Zelensky has been elected by a landslide of more than 70% of the total vote to become Ukraine’s next President. Speaking at a press conference this afternoon in Kyiv, Rebecca Harms the Head of the European Parliament election observation delegation congratulated the citizens of Ukraine for their deep…
Still living in exile in Belgium, Carles Puigdemont the independent Catalan politician chose the Brussels Press Club as the venue to announce today his candidature for election to the European Parliament in the 23 May elections. Flanked by four colleagues from the party “Junts per Catalunya” Gorka Knorr, Erika Casajoanna, Calara Ponsati and Toni Comin,…
We publish here in full the text of a letter to the President of the European Parliament, and to the Leaders of the Parliamentary Political Groups, from Dan Radu Rușanu. My name is Dan Radu Rușanu and I have been a PNL member (Romanian National Liberal Party) since January 1990. During the period 2000-2013, I was Vice-President…
An inaugural meeting of the Regional Religious Freedom Forum in Taiwan has heard that the country is flying the flag for safeguarding religious freedom, particularly in the Indo-Pacific region. The meeting heard that Taiwan is committed to ending intolerance and persecution of religious minorities. Organized by Taipei City-based Taiwan Foundation for Democracy, the two-day event…
One of the world’s largest air services providers, dnata, has increased its global footprint by opening a new cargo centre at Brussels Airport. The company’s expansion into the Belgian capital represents an investment of €8 million and creates up to 100 local jobs with the company. Its new facility, which covers an area of 14,000…
Radical ideologies play a key role in brainwashing individuals and encouraging them to commit violent acts. Correct tools are needed to address different radicalisation scenarios so that effective prevention can be realised, writes Hande Bozatli. All stakeholders, including civil society, cultural networks, national, local and regional governments, have a crucial role to play in early detection and prevention of the root causes…
At this week’s plenary session in Strasbourg MEPs welcomed the fact that the error rate for payments – as estimated by the ECA – had reached an all-time low of 2.4%. However, they raised some concerns about how testing samples were selected. MEPs are worried about the mounting payments backlog, which reached a new record of…
