While Lithuania’s economy is shrinking at a record tempo, Poland’s has been growing despite the crisis, notes the lithuanian daily Lietuvos Rytas, listing a set of reasons: “Lithuania has done away with reductions to value added tax, even for books and food. Poland has done nothing of the sort. The result: thousands of Lithuanians (as [...]
Writing on the 70th anniversary of the outbreak of World War II on September 1 the liberal daily Gazeta Wyborcza announces the end of good relations between the US and Poland: “On 12 March 1999 [former Polish foreign minster] Bronisław Geremek declared Poland’s accession to Nato. … That was the climax in the Polish-American love [...]
Gdansk, Poland 30/08/2009 – A Belarusian fighter jet crashed Sunday during an air show in Poland, killing both pilots on board the two-seater plane. One moment, the fighter jet was soaring across the skies, to applause of the crowds below. Then something went wrong, and the plane plummeted to the ground just over the horizon, [...]
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on Sunday criticised the Baltic states and Ukraine for glorifying “Nazi accomplices”, speaking ahead of the 70th anniversary of the start of World War II. “We are seeing some astounding trends,” Medvedev said in an interview with the Rossia state television channel. “Governments in the Baltic states and even Ukraine are now [...]
South Africans feel so indebted to Nelson Mandela that they prefer his successors to emulate him rather than to govern. A president’s first-hundred-days milestone isn’t as breathlessly awaited in other countries as it is in America. And so South African President Jacob Zuma—the dancing populist who provoked so much fear and loathing before his inauguration [...]
Violeta Davoliūtė on Lithuania as a European nation Writing for the daily Lietuvos Rytas, Violeta Davoliūtė explores Lithuania’s perception of itself as a European nation: “This year we will celebrate with much pomp the 1000th anniversary of the first mention of the name Lithuania, and Vilnius is presenting itself as European Capital of Culture. This [...]
The US will not send a high-level government representative to the celebrations marking the 70th anniversary of the outbreak of World War II. The former president of Poland Lech Wałęsa is sharply criticial of the US in a column in the high-circulation tabloid Fakt: “One must honestly say that American politicians have only treated us [...]
Writing for the daily Neatkarīgā Rīta Avīze Voldemars Hermanis discusses the phobic attitude towards Russia which is widespread in former Soviet republics: "Independently of the regimes in power in each country, the former Soviet republics still form a joint cultural, scientific and leisure time community with ties that reach beyond national borders. … In this [...]
The news portal Delfi takes Lithuanian politicians to task for their failed attempt to represent Lithuania as a particularly brave country: “True, we broke up the Soviet Union, but nowadays the only thing we can be proud of is that we have a nuclear power plant, and even that is to be closed down at [...]
Moscow wants to make a gift of a Pushkin monument to Riga to launch a new chapter in cultural relations between Russia and Latvia. The Latvian daily Diena suspects ulterior motives: “The great poet [Alexander Sergeyevich] Pushkin has no connection whatever to Riga. You could just as well set up [a statue] of Tolstoy, Tchaikovsky [...]
