Archive for April, 2007
Welcome to hell. If you had read your Bible correctly you would have known it is damnation without reprieve, so don’t be surprised if you have to come back month after month after month. Strasbourg, or Stressburg as it is known to the assistants in the European Parliament, is an official seat of the Parliament. Below you find a short description of what it is like to join Europes’s biggest travelling circus.
Hogwarts Express
Hundreds of red-eyed assistants find themselves each month on a very early Monday morning on a platform of the Luxembourg station in Brussels. Whereas most Members of Parliament fly to Strasbourg, their assistants are forced to cram into this Hogwarts Express to hell. Watching grown-ups fight over the few available seats, including pulling and punching, is not a rare sight on the five hour journey to Strasbourg. Cigarette-deprived individuals smoke like posessed during the five minute stop the train makes in Luxembourg. Some never make it back on the train. And of course everyone has the journey home to look forward to.
Under the bridge, second lamppost to the right
But before the exhausted assistants get to go back to Brussels, they first have a couple of grueling days ahead of them. It starts by finding a place to stay. Joseph and Mary had an easier time in Bethlehem than assistants do in Strasbourg. Since all hotels are booked up years in advance for the sessions of Parliament, assistants have to search for days and call many hotels before something opens up. Sleeping in ‘ botels’ (I am sorry sir, you can’t check in yet because your hotel is still on cruise - happened to me), the Foreign Legion or in sleezy hotels which rent rooms for the hour is sometimes all that is left to the assistants. Stories of five assistants to one room, also to save money, or people sleeping in cars can be overheard in the Parliament.
Stressbourg
Stressbourg, is what many assistants call the official seat of Parliament. A very small office, one computer for sometimes up to three people and the fact that most of the voting of Parliament actually takes place in Strasbourg makes stress a permanently present phenomenon. Working days can end anywhere between 21:00 and 24:00 and then you go eat, with your colleagues, and sleep (if you have a hotel) with, or at least in the same hotel as, your colleagues. That is to say, you are surrounded by your colleagues and your boss 24/7. A recipe for disaster.
Always look on the bright side
Is there nothing good to report on Strasbourg? Of course there is. All the interesting debates take place there. In the meetings of the political groups Romanians will explain the dismissal of their President, Polish MEPs expand on the political situation in their home country. If Angela Merkel does not show her face then it is the Indian President who delivers a speech. Stress is accompanied by adrenaline and you, your boss and your colleagues are all in it together, which creates mutual sympathy akin perhaps to the Stockholm syndrom of hostages and hostage takers.
One seat
But as assistant I cannot but support the call for One Seat for the European Parliament. The travelling circus costs around 200 million Euro a year. The pollution it creates on a yearly basis is said to be equal to 13.000 flights between Europe and New York. Apart from all these practical reasons, I beg of you to consider the humanitarian side. Please stop the abuse of poor assistants. Please support the action for one seat of the European Parliament. Our well-being depends on it.
The press at the moment is predictably full of obituaries of Boris Yeltsin, whose funeral took place in Moscow last week. The BBC obituary is fine for a brief and factual, if not particularly insightful account. The Economist’s Edward Lucas goes deeper, offering some interesting insights into the dynamics of Yeltsin’s inner circle. For a classic Western-liberal-intelligentsia take, read Masha Lipman in the Washington Post. For Ms Lipman, Yeltsin is “largely unappreciated” by the Russian public. She even excuses his destructive alcoholism as “probably the only relief he had from the terrible strain.” One of the most critical pieces is in Time Magazine, which also has some interesting blogs on the subject. There is a nice video-collage of Yeltsin’s defining moments on FoxNews - including the infamous drunken-orchestra-conducting-incident. RIA-Novosti, the Russian state information and news agency, offers a short factual biography of Yeltsin. According to RIA-Novosti political commentator Vladimir Simonov, the West is grateful to Yeltsin for ”creating a Russia that no longer scares us.” The Al-Jazeera obituary includes a box of classic Yeltsin quotes to impress your friends in the pub. For a more comprehensive review of the coverage of Yeltsin’s death, see the NearAbroad blog.
Speaking is silver, silence is gold, the saying goes. But not always. Recently, the BBC reported that in the UK some teachers refrain from talking about the Holocaust for fear of upsetting students. The same happens in other countries as well - in the Netherlands for example. There it is not poitical correctness that makes teachers avoid the subject, but actually fear of their pupils.
Teachers in schools with many children from Arab descent do not dare to talk about the Holocaust, because they are afraid of getting harassed, or worse, by angry parents and students.
Each country has its own policies that are determined by what is socially acceptable, as well as what is the country’s version of history. This is particularly true in the Balkans, where many educational systems still nip and tuck past wars and attrocities, making sure that what goes in textbooks is a patriotic, picturesque view of things past.
This is why several EU members objected to the German proposal of a common European history book for secondary school education. The project, perceived as helping to create a common European identity, caused outcry in Poland and the Netherlands, and was questioned in Finland and Denmark, among others.
Whether there will be a common history textbook or not, I think governments cannot acquiesce to some events being swept under the carpet. School curriculae need to be adapted to children’s needs, not tailored so as not to offend anyone. The Holocaust is a very significant, as well as sad, part of European history and should have a place in today’s classrooms. The Germans managed to do it. So, why could not the rest of European countries?
This is not to say there can be no debate on the issue. As Dutch
journalist and writer Joris Luyendijk who has lived in the Middle East for many years noted, he could never really respond to Arab accusations against Israel or the Jews, because in the West Israeli policies and Jewish history are not a subject of real debate. By teaching dry facts (or the version of facts one’s own country prefers) without the right to debate their significance or meaning, schools rob their students of the opportunity to learn how to argue. So yes, put the Holocaust on the school curriculum, and stimulate debate between students. Schools in the 21 Century are no longer only about teaching skills and stuffing students with facts, they should be places were they learn to have intelligent and informed debates, even about the most controversial of issues. Let that be a lesson too for the powers that be in Poland, where even discussing homosexuality in school can land a teacher on the street, according to a currently debated law. The only word that should not appear on a school’s curriculum as far as I am concerned, is the word taboo.
This can’t be too easy - why wouldn’t Dutch schools enlighten students about the behaviour of their compatriots in Indonesia? Why wouldn’t the Belgians be open about what their predecessors did in the Congo? Would Serbian students ever hear the truth about Srebrenitsa? Should we be open to the end, and debate with our grandparents what they did “during the war”, or, in former Communist countries, ask our parents if they ever worked for the Secret Services?
And if we shouldn’t, then we can’t blame Turkey for refusing to recognise the Armenian genocide, we can’t ask Croatia to be open about the Yugoslavian war, and we can definitely never raise questions about journalists being murdered in Russia.
Viviane Reding is my hero. She takes decisive steps to promote fair and market-oriented rules in telecommunications, a sector which has always been a favourite playground for greedy monopolists and national champions. Slashing roaming charges is a brave step towards librealisation and it is a matter of principle – these fees simply contradict the idea of a common EU market. In Europe, the total revenue from roaming charges is EUR 8.5 billion, so such a massive cut means a lot. Telecom operators will be unhappy but they will survive, don’t worry about them. Will they attempt to compensate that by increasing prices domestically? In theory that should not work, after all, prices are set by supply and demand, aren’t they?
How would this affect Central and Eastern Europe? Given that roaming does not contribute so much to mobile operators’ revenues, the effect should not be too dramatic. In fact, what telecoms in the region should fear a lot more is Viviane’s next target – the push for liberalisation of the whole industry.
Today, most telecom markets in the region are characterised by low competition, high prices and inadequate services in terms of quality and sophistication. Usually you have the former state-owned fixed-voice operator privatised by a strategic investor from Western Europe. EU rules are in place and promote competition on paper, but technical and regulatory issues make it unthinkable for alternative operators to challenge the monopoly of the incumbent operator (with the possible exception of Croatia). Mobile penetration is pretty high, often above the EU average, but due to the lower living standards revenue per client has enormous growth potential. More and more people use broadband internet and have access to services like Skype and GoogleTalk. Given the background of CEE countries, what is the likely outcome of Viviane’s battle against the greedy telecoms?
Mobile operators in the region will not suffer much. Roaming charges have pretty much been a limiting factor for price-sensitive Central and Eastern Europeans to use their cellphones abroad. Thus, more minutes out will somewhat compensate the lost revenues of mobile operators. Further liberalisation is not really such an issue in the mobile segment because it is already fairly liberal in most countries. Only number portability might be an issue, as we see in some countries (take the example of Bulgaria, where the biggest mobile operator is trying in all possible ways to delay the process – they will be the big losers from number portability) but gradually it will be resolved, EU rules are clear about that.
The big losers will be incumbent fixed-voice operators. They will completely lose international traffic revenues because many people will be happy to use their cellphones abroad now that roaming charges are lower. However, large portion of this revenue source has already been exhausted with the advent of VoIP and other technologies – try to remember the last time you picked up your landline phone at home and dialled an international number. So, Viviane’s push for further liberalisation is much more of a threat. Incumbents will face decreasing revenues in the future as a result of increased competition in the segment and by losing clients to mobile operators. Fixed operators adapt by diversifying their sources of income – mainly by aggressively pushing ADSL roll-out and alternative technologies, such as IP TV.
Again, Viviane Reding is cool – she acts out of principle and in order to promote fair market competition. In Central and Eastern Europe the changes brought about by her efforts will only act as a catalyst of a process which has already started. The telecom market will change dramatically – fixed-voice operators will fade away and communication will gradually become cheaper as technology is getting more and more sophisticated. The speed with which things will change matters a lot though – if a telecom is obstinate enough, it can delay the implementation of certain decisions for years and in this time they can make enormous money to justify all of their efforts. If you are unfortunate enough (textbook case for being absolutely under the rule of your incumbent telecom: Macedonia), lack of adequate communications at a decent price can delay economic growth for years. So, thank you, Viv.
Every year on Hitler’s birthday, gangs of skinheads terrorise Moscow’s streets. They roam the city searching for dark-skinned pedestrians to beat to a pulp. This year, they may have had to look harder than usual. The government has deported hundreds of thousands of ‘illegal’ migrant workers from the Caucasus, usually an easy target for skinhead violence. Moscovites have also learnt to take precautions. Moscow State University took the unprecedented step of a total lock-down for foreign students, who were banned from leaving the campus in the south of the city last night. Synagogue attendance was also unusually low.
The occasion is particularly bitter for Moscow’s Jewish community, who the same week mark Holocaust Memorial Day (16th April). Russia has no official Memorial Day for the millions of Russian Jews who have been killed by various regimes throughout its history. Indeed, Russia has no memorial day for any of its millions of citizens who perished in labour camps. In the battle for remembrance, Hitler’s hooligans certainly have the upper hand for now.
The recent political events in Romania might sound like an incredible tale to someone not used to Romanian politics. The feud between the prime-minister and the president reached its climax last week when the Parliament overwhelmingly voted for the latter’s suspension. In the powers-that-be, many were disturbed by the anti-corruption discourse that Traian Basescu embarkedReuters on since taking office in late 2004, and by the increasingly independent judicial system, which started to investigate the fraudulent ways by which Reuterspoliticians gained incredible wealth. This is why, the so-called anti-presidential coalition, made up of representatives of the social-democrat party (PSD), the conservatives (PC), the far-right extremists (PRM), with the support of the liberals (PNL) and of the Hungarian representatives (UDMR), decided with a large majorit to suspend the Romanian president.
The vote of April 19 is a landmark for Romanian post-1989 politics, considering the particular circumstances in which it took place. A parliamentary committee accused the president of breaching the constitution; the highest constitutional court ruled that he committed no offence. His only mistake, it seems, was that unlike his predecessors, he was an active president, eager to observe how the state’s institutions were drafting and implementing policies and did not shy away from criticising them when they were reforms were sluggush.
A democracy is based on a clear separation of powers, all of whom bear the same degree of independence. When any of these over-rules the decision taken by another, the premises of democracy are severely affected. When a Parliament dominated by anti-presidential forces decides to over-rule a constitutional advice provided by the highest constitutional authority in the country and assumes constitutional powers the most immediate question is: in which sort of democracy are we living?
This is precisely the question many Romanians are asking themselves these days, privately as well as publicly. In the first hours after the decision to suspend the President, the websites of all major newspapers, the blogs, and web messengers programs were flooded with messages supporting him and saying that with its decision, the Parliament had also suspended a majority of the electorate. The Romanian diasporae abroad were also angered by the incredible decision taken by the Parliament; in Belgium for example many people have sent open letters to support the suspended President.
What was the outcome? After his suspension, Basescu did not resign, but was provisionally replaced by the President of the Senate, Nicolae Vacaroiu, a former social-democrat prime-minister who ruled the country for thirty days several years ago. In mid-May, Romanians will be asked in a referendum whether they agree with the suspension of their president. As current polls reveal, support for Basescu is high, and the citizens will overrule the decision of the parliament. But in this way, Romanians would cast an indirect negative vote against the Parliament which will lose all of its remaining credibility. This would open the door for early parliamentary elections.
However, for a Parliament whose credibility stands at its lowest in the post-1989 history, early elections are the worst imaginable scenario. Recent surveys reveal that while the support for the Democratic Party (PD) remains high, the popularity of all other parties represented sits on single digits. Early elections would show the door out of parliament to the Conservative Party, chaired by the controversial politician and businessman Dan Voiculescu, and would weaken the control of the governing coalition of social-democrats and liberals. The obscure alliance between these two parties, once the biggest political rivals, functions perfectly, all the incommode persons being replaced by obedient political puppets. In order to maintain its grip of Romania’s political and economic life, the two parties have to act concerted to block the return of Basescu to Cotroceni.
But apparently they are going different ways toward this desideratum. There were rumours that once the President would have resigned, as he implied in ani interview before his suspension, the strategists of the two parties would have sought to amend the electoral law in such a way that a president who resigned once would not be able to stand for elections. It might have been the grossest infringement of the Romanian constitutional law which provides the right to vote for every Romanian citizen who is enjoying his/her full civic rights.
The entire political scene might not settle after the referendum in May, but at least one issue could become clearer: president Basescu and the strong reforms advocated by him and his supporters show the right way for Romania, not the economic interests or behind-the-scene political games of those for whom the reform of the Romanian institutions and society exists in theory, but not in practice.
Today I was bidding my time in a warehouse in Luxembourg, wa iting alongside a hundred other bored journalists for EU’s foreign ministers to chew their lunch and deign us with a press conference. Bored, most of my colleagues were loitering around, munching tasteless sandwiches, reading papers, gossiping, calling their girlfriends in Slovenia, smoking in the sun and gazing vacantly in big tv screens. This is where it came from - no trigger went off, nobody gasped. But from one second to another, all eyes were nailed to the silver screens, all jabbering was cut. In silence we heard that one of recent history’s iconic figures had unexpectedly died.
And then, as if an electric spark went through the press crowd, the usual creative chaos ensued - phones were ringing, there was manic typing, cameramen dragging trioids were tripping over laptop cables. History had struck, now we had to tell the world about it without too much wavering, pondering and procrastination.
But Boris Yeltsin was not a person one can write about with a light hand and on the spur of the moment. He was a complex man, with a complex role in the history of the 1990s. I will not repeat what others will write elsewhere much better. I just want to tell you what an saintly-looking and alcohol-stinking old Russian once told me about him: “In Russia under Yeltsin, there was destruction, poverty, immorality everywhere - but we have never breathed so freely before or after that”.
Just like I predicted earlier today - the Belgian press agency Belga and RTBF Radio announced that exit polls grant majority of votes to Nicolas Sarkozy (29-34%), followed closely by Segolene Royal (with 24-26% of all votes cast). Statistics is ambiguous as to the third and fourth places - some agencies give priority to Francois Bayrou, while other say he is fourth, after Jean-Marie Le Pen.
It seems the most likely contenders at the second round of the elections are Royal and Sarkozy. This makes the event on May 6th all the more interesting - as both candidates have an almost equal number of supporters, the outcome will be determined by a small number of voters. In any event, all the presidential wannabe’s of the first round will have a second chance to make history at the second. Then, they will be able to call support for one of the two remaining competitors - a rather delicate situation, considering that they will have to betray their own campaigning programes and to defend one of their recent opponents.
Lately I have been spending a great deal of time trying to get my laptop through Russian customs. My trusty friend was picked up by DHL Express courier from my office in Brussels (for a princely fee), with assurances that it would be delivered in Moscow three working days later. I was most impressed when the online parcel tracking system informed me that it had arrived at the DHL facility in Moscow just 12 hours after pick-up. Unfortunately, it all went downhil from there. I had entered the sordid world of Russian customs. Two weeks later and still laptop-less, I was fuming. Having finally got it back, I have decided to share my Users’ Guide to Russian customs:
1. Provide 5 photocopied invoice letters from your office (The Shipper), explaining your desire to export the item.
2. Provide a letter from The Receiver (in this case my flatmate) explaining why she was receiving the package.
3. Send copies of The Receiver’s scanned, signed Russian passport.
4. Fill and send a 5-page form of irrelevant information about The Receiver.
5. Pay a ‘brokerage fee’ of 100 USD.
6. Pay a ‘customs fee’ of 240 USD.
7. Phone DHL at least 20 times to get information. Spend at least 25USD on phone bills to DHL. (Be warned: their ‘on hold’ tune is one of the worst I have heard).
8. Pay a further ‘administration fee’ of 3000 rubles (roughly 100dollars) to DHL. (By this point you have probably paid DHL and the customs clerk more than the cost of the item anyway).
9. When the parcel finally arrives and the courier attempts to raise the ‘administration fee’ to 8000rubles, refuse.
You might have noticed that one of our correspondents in Brussels has very positive feelings about Balkan music – he has been to Esma Redzepova’s gig in Brussels, and followed Goran Bregovic to Barcelona with sheer enthusiasm. He said that the concerts were sold out and everybody loved the performances, which is really cool. In general, my view is that music and other forms of art are among the best ways to promote a positive cultural image, needed by all Balkan countries. People gradually realise that we can’t be that bad – after all, music is a form of expression typical to artsy guys with no bad intentions whatsoever (with the obvious exceptions of Sid Vicious and the rockstar-in-a-hotel phenomenon, of course). Anyway, that is not exactly what I was trying to say. Last night I was sitting on my couch, compiling a long Winamp playlist with my favourite music from Bulgaria and other Balkan countries. I realised that much of this music is absolutely brilliant and the fact that they haven’t made tons of money is only due to the fact that they are shooting for a distinctly niche market and the fact that they never sell anything outside the region. Why is that? Honestly, I don’t really care. What matters is that this music is great. Esma, Bregovic and all the ethno stuff are not bad but let’s see what other interesting things can be found on my playlist.
Bulgaria. Babyface Clan were a real hit in the end of the 90s, mixing electro and alternative. The leader, Nasso Ruskov was a bit obsessed about the idea to move to London and form a band there so they are now all but a fond memory from my teenage years. Today is the big day though – Babyface Clan are having a reunion concert in Sofia, and I am so so rry I can’t be there. Wickeda made a big name by fusing ska and urban reality from Sofia. One of the all time favourite songs is about the most romantic story ever – a guy meets the love of his life on the bus, and ‘Mariana, I love you so much!’. We all love Mariana and we always hope to meet her on the bus to the outskirts of Sofia. My playlist also includes Animacionerite – surreal lyrics, computer-programmed music and space suits on stage – I have never figured out why, but intuitively I feel it is top-quality. I am not going to talk about Gravity Co because they made it big on the MTV.
Across the Danube, in Romania we find some real jems of modern music, and it is not the disgusting O-Zone that took over Europe a few summers ago. We are talking about the magnificent Sukar Groove Collective: three gypsy guys, Tamango, Napoleon and Clasic, part-time singers and full-time dancing bear owners, backed by Drum & Bass. If sometimes you ask yourself whether the gypsy niche in music will ever be exhausted, the answer is ‘NO’. Maybe Boban Markovic and Goran Bregovic have got a bit boring by now, so innovation is more than welcome.
We now take a left turn and end up in Belgrade, the hotbed of Balkan rock, punk, ska, with huge traditions long before we got rid of the iron curtain. Yugoslavia fell apart but its greatest bands are still alive and kicking. You might say whatever you want about ethnic tension but it is made to look irrelevant and obscure by Bijelo Dugme, Babe, Azra, Rokeri s Moravu, Ladno Pivo and many others. And it is very funny when someone like me who has never spent more than 2 hours in Belgrade gets emotional on songs about the city’s streets, a bit wet after a morning drizzle. Take the highway from Belgrade to Skopje and meet another all-Yugoslavian favourite – Leb i Sol. It turns out that Macedonian folklore, electric guitars and jazz can be a very good combination.
If you mix everything together, you get the magnificent Balkan Horses – ethno-jazz performed by people from Bulgaria, Macedonia, Serbia, Turkey, Greece, Romania, and Croatia. Now this is real stereotype-demolition for those who have invented or use the cool word “balkanizacija”, meaning basically that people in this region have a certain tendency to split into smaller and smaller pieces until they are alone and hate everybody. And the music is absolutely brilliant, you should check it out. Also, if you have the chance to go to see Babyface Clan tonight, don’t sit here reading silly blogs but go and get yourself a ticket.
