Serbia’s ingenious ploy to play for time on the Kosovo question – and to muddy the waters of those countries contemplating recognising Kosovo’s independence – has paid off handsomely. Serbia today won the vote in the UN General Assembly to refer the issue to the International Court of Justice for an […]
Michael Totten has written a good piece about the Nagorno-Karabakh problem, albeit as seen from the Azerbaijan side of things. We tend to think that the Soviet Union broke up ‘peacefully’ (just as we inaccurately think that South Africa’s transition from apartheid was ‘peaceful’). This is because the vastness of the […]
I have added a link to SpyBlog on my site’s list of Current Favourites, as it has all sorts of informative pieces for those interested in some of the grainier details of government business and e-security/surveillance generally. Try this piece on an attempt (unsuccessful!) to extract from the FCO the […]
The Telegraph website continues to froth up the story of the leaked letter from Sir Nigel Sheinwald assessing Barack Obama. As best it can, scouring some meagre titbits from the deeper reaches of the Internet: On the conservative Free Republic website, comments included "It suggests to me that Obama will […]
While doing some Googling on the subject of Diplomatic Leaks for a forthcoming article, I found this: Have you ever wanted to spy on a foreign government? The DEranged Security website published the addresses and passwords of 100 email accounts from embassies and governments around the world. Those nations involved […]
Take a look at the Heritage/WSJ 2008 Economic Freedom rankings. Bosnia and Herzegovina languishes in a dismal 121st place overall, below even Tajikistan. If you compare Bosnia with all other ‘European’ countries its individual ratings under the key different indictaors measures are not too bad – until it comes to Property […]
Just when I thought that there was nothing new to say on the subject of Leaked Ambassadors, along come two of them. First, Sir Sherard Cowper-Coles is said to have described the Western mission in Afghanistan as ‘doomed‘. The source? A French diplomatic telegram leaked in Paris, said to be […]
In the Instapundit live coverage of the excellent Palin/Biden debate last night there was this: Reader David Rensin emails: "He didn’t just call the citizens of Bosnia ‘Bosniacs’, did he?" Yeah, he did… … Plus, Stephen Green emails: "Jim Dunnigan and Austin Bay use the word ‘Bosniaks’ in reference in Moslem […]
Denis MacShane reviews Chris Patten’s book about future trends. In it he swipes at Conservative policy on Europe: In Berlin recently, David Cameron promised a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty were he to become prime minister and the Treaty were not to be ratified. That would mean that the first […]
A long report by the ‘European Council on Foreign Relations’ describes how the EU is losing ground at the UN in terms of mobilising support from other countries for votes on human rights issues. A summary is here. See also the Guardian account. The general problem? Thus: "The EU is suffering […]
