100 posts
Europe 2020 - Partial delay after Bundesrat complaint
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After Germany's second chamber, the Bundesrat, complained on Tuesday that the schedule for the Europe 2020 strategy was against the Lisbon Treaty rules, European Council President van Rompuy now has postponed parts of the decision. According to EurA...
Is Germany to Blame for the Crisis of the Eurozone?
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I’ve heard this many times before, and it has come from all sorts of directions. But now two people that I respect – Martin Wolf and Peter Zeihan both say that Germany has in fact a lot to do with the current financial crisis of the eurozone. Mar...
Will Germany put its money where its mouth is?
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Germany appeared to take a decisive step back from her traditional post-war role as paymaster of Europe today when Chancellor Angela Merkel issued harsh words on the prospect of a European bailout for the crippled Greek economy. During the governm...
Germany's second chamber: Europe 2020 timetable violates Lisbon Treaty
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In a freshly published press release the European Chamber of the German Bundesrat has criticised the timetable of the Europe 2020 process foreseeing a decision at the European Council on 25-26 March 2010 as violating the rights of national legislatur...
GTZ plans to install 15 000 solar power systems in Ethiopia
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German development agency, GTZ, is planning to install 15 000 solar energy systems per month in Ethiopia, where only less than one percent of the rural population uses solar power because of inadequate investment in the sector. GTZ projects in Ethiop...
The return of a new generation – well-educated children of Turkish immigrants leave Germany
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BERLIN — The roughly 2.7 million immigrants of Turkish origin in Germany have been at the center of the country’s debate on immigration and integration as long as the debate has existed. Now, almost 50 years after the first Turkish guest...
Serious Problems Emerge For The F-UK-De Group Of Countries
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Well, I for one can’t help thinking that it’s now well time we all stopped getting carried away with the use of so many acronyms. Not only may one man’s meat easily prove to be another’s poison, it may even be that for some th...
The German Economy Is Essentially “Intact”
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According to Bundesbank President Axel Weber, Germany’s economic recovery is “essentially intact”, and is now set to benefit from stronger demand in countries outside the euro region. “I firmly believe that the recovery process that began in...
Why is Germany talking about a European Monetary Fund?
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Because talk is cheaper than bailing out Greece?
Europe is doomed because Germany has too small an army!
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In an explicitly titled story (The Incredible Shrinking Europe), Time magazine gives us in a...
The Karlsruhe factor
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As riot police today were forced to use tear gas against violent crowds in Athens protesting against further Greek spending cuts to narrow the country's budget deficit (and save the eurozone), we recieved another reminder of German opposition to any...
The ECtHR on Access to Case File
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I just finished translation of the ECtHR’s decision on admissibility of Application no. 42551/98 by Oleg Svinarenkov against Estonia, into the Estonian language. The facts of the case relate to deliberate homicide and unlawful possession of a fir...
Loss of Nationality, Deception, Citizenship and EU Law: Case C-135/08
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The Court of Justice has handed down an interesting and important judgment on the loss of citizenship and its relationship to EU law. In its judgment in Case C-135/08 Janko Rottmann v. Freistaat Bayern, the Court held that EU law,...
Plan For Germany To Buy Greek Bonds Dismissed As 'Nonsense'
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A German MEP says Germany, France and the Netherlands will buy Greek bonds to help Athens deal with its debt. A senior German official has dismissed the claims. READ MORE...
R.E.S.P.E.C.T. for Germany's Economic Model
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"It is high time the German economy got some respect. It has been faring much better lately than either the United States or Britain, despite the scornful predictions of Anglophone economic observers," writes Eamonn Fingleton in the America...
German power struggles in EU politics & the next Secretary General of the EU Council
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Yesterday, the German business newspaper Handelsblatt titled "Chancellery snatches EU policy away from Westerwelle", an issue that should not be regardes as just an internal affair. The article told that in the future the chancellery of Angela Merke...
Bail-out?
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EuroIntelligence gives this tip: Germany will contribute 20% to the Greek bailoutDer Spiegel has the...
Language moves
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It was the ‘Kiss&Ride’ that did it. The vacuous English-language sign that broke the camel’s back. Clearly, it means a short term carpark. But who could have known that the locals (in Bavaria) would think it has seedier connotations? A flu...
Germany Rescues Greece but Demands its Pound of Flesh
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Today’s European Union summit in Brussels will set out the framework for a financial rescue operation for Greece. This much is clear is from various briefings being given by officials from countries as varied as Austria, Lithuania, Poland and...
Fated to Coexistence
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Polish-German relations are still full of a number of difficulties and mutual claims READ MORE...
France and Germany seal bilateral deal with global ambitions
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Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy have unveiled a new 10-year plan, including 80 projects designed to improve Franco-German cooperation. The goal is also to better promote European ideas globally. READ MORE...
The last man in East Germany
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What must it have been like to be a Stasi case officer in the autumn of 1989? What did they do? The answer, in this fascinating piece in Der Spiegel, was that they kept going to the office. In fact, they kept on going about their spooky business - qu...
Will European bonds translate into Eurobonds?
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There are, we are told, no plans to bail out Greece, which has come under a lot of pressure and scrutiny for its government debt. However there seems to be a general feeling that if it came to it, Greece would be bailed out: see the Irish Times and A...
Berlin–Rome–Ankara
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Following the results of the meeting with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan his Russian colleague Vladimir Putin suggested to deepen the cooperation within energy sphere by assets exchanging. First of all the case is about the access to the...
German call for reform of CAP payments
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The German Council for Sustainable Development has issued a new call for reform of the CAP direct payments system, citing the damage done to the environment by intensive agriculture.
A new study on Germany’s Muslims
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New Study Looks at Challenges Faced by Germany’s Muslims By Sheila Lalwani in Berlin It’s no secret that many immigrants have a hard time in Germany. A new study has found that women wearing headscarves have a particularly hard time on th...
Legal Complaint Filed Against Germany Over New Coal Plant
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Brussels - WWF has sent the European Commission a formal complaint against Germany for its failure to fulfil a legal obligation introduced by the 2008 EU climate and energy legislative package. The complaint concerns the apparent faulty approval pro...
Merkel Says Party On Track Even As Germans Question Her Leadership
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A new survey has found that a majority of Germans think Chancellor Merkel has little control over her government. Merkel defended herself and her Christian Democrats, saying they were on the right path. READ MORE...
Double-Dip Worries In Japan and Germany (Updated)
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Whoever said economists are people who don’t ever get anything right? “Economic growth in Germany probably stagnated in the fourth quarter from the previous three months, the Federal Statistics office said. Still, the figure is “surroun...
CSU rejects Foreign Minister Westerwelle's Turkey policy
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The Christian Social Union (CSU) remains locked in a bitter row with government coalition partners the Free Democratic Party (FDP), after the Bavarian conservatives rejected Westerwelle's overtures to Turkey. READ MORE...
Berlin Airlift review
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e Berlin airlift Flying coalDec 30th 2009 From The Economist print editionA human history of the allies’ airlift that saved West BerlinDaring Young Men: The Heroism and Triumph of the Berlin Airlift, June 1948-May 1949. By Richard Reeves. Simon & S...
Germans more corrupt than French, but not corrupt enough!
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In an unexpected turn, the FT has a headline on its website which basically praises...
German-British Rapprochement Would Mean Dark Days For Europe
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It is a fact long lamented by those two endangered species, British Germanophiles and German Anglophiles: apart from a few pockets of intense co-operation, such as in justice and home affairs, the potential of a German-British partnership has seldom...
Tories from a German perspective
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Fascinating, if a little scary viewpoint from Germany about national soveriegnty and the Tory Party.German government advisors are insisting on concerted efforts to politically neutralize British EU-skeptics. As explained in a recent paper published...
German oil firm looks for new deposits at home
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While oil exploration company RWE Dea often drills in the sands of Libya or under the waters of the Caspian Sea, a new project has the company looking for the black gold in a pine forest in Northern Germany. READ MORE...
Rügen
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Rügen Alors que ça chauffe à Copenhague, léger rafraîchissement pour toi ami lecteur avec ces photos de l’île de Rügen, nord de la Teutonie. Charmant et revigorant.
A Fistful of Umlauts
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In which the Frankfurter Allgemeine, the German newspaper whose website has meanwhile gotten much better, interviews Edward. He says things such as “Um das zu erreichen müssen Preise und Löhne für Jahre um 6,5 Prozent fallen.” and ...
Germany’s new Ostpolitik (again)?
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(with updates)… I have just returned from Germany from a joint ECFR-Bertelsman event on the “Eastern partnership or Partnership with Russia”. Of course, the answer is with both. No need to spend time on this. But I got a certain sen...
The new European Commission: Günther Oettinger in the German Bundestag
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After looking at Joaquín Almunia yesterday, there is news on Günther Oettinger. According to the agenda of the EU affairs committee of the Bundestag (the German parliament), Günther Oettinger who is proposed as EU Commissioner for energy will sta...
Political science blogging: Why Germans support EU membership
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This post is based on the conclusion - following a short exchange of views with Kosmopolit some weeks ago - that I should not only contribute as a European citizen to European debates, but also as a political scientist with an interest in EU affairs.
Change
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Franz Josef Jung, Germany's former defense minister and current labor minister, resigned on Friday over his handling of a controversial airstrike in Afghanistan. Germany's top soldier Inspector General Schneiderhan and Deputy Defense Minister Wichert...
Is There A Double Dip Risk In Germany?
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This is not an idle question. Despite all those bullish headlines in the press, most informed observers - including Bundesbank head Axel Weber - are only to well aware of just how fragile the German recovery actually is. Indeed only last week the OEC...
Jouyet: German Reunification ‘Not Easy To Accept For Paris'
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The 1992 Maastricht Treaty, which created the European Union and led to the creation of the euro, came as an answer to French concerns over the German reunification process, Jean-Pierre Jouyet, former French State Secretary for EU affairs, told EurAc...
Jouyet: German Reunification ‘Not Easy To Accept For Paris'
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The 1992 Maastricht Treaty, which created the European Union and led to the creation of the euro, came as an answer to French concerns over the German reunification process, Jean-Pierre Jouyet, former French State Secretary for EU affairs, told EurAc...
Obstruction of justice?
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On the night from 3 to 4 September 2009, near the Afghan city of Kunduz,...
The Credibility Gap
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Faith in politics is on the wane – particularly in social-democratic politics. The search for reasons for the disastrous defeat of the German social democrats in the September elections, and the poor prospects of parties of the left across Europe,...
Commission authorises Germany to grant aid to farmers
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The European Commission has today authorised under EC Treaty State aid rules a German scheme worth some €100 million aimed at supporting farmers who encounter difficulties as a result of the current economic crisis. Data provided by German authorit...
The Molotov-Ribbentrop Pipeline
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Rügen is best known as a popular German tourist destination. But now the Baltic Sea island has taken on a new role as staging point for an energy project that is as ambitious as it is controversial: the Nord Stream gas pipeline from Russia to Ge...
Continuity Rules In Germany's Foreign Policy Toward The Americas
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Germany's diplomatic relations with the Americas are shaped by continuity, a clear focus on the US and by the dominant role played by Chancellor Angela Merkel. That leaves little room for the new foreign minister. READ MORE...
Continuity Rules In Germany's Foreign Policy Toward The Americas
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Germany's diplomatic relations with the Americas are shaped by continuity, a clear focus on the US and by the dominant role played by Chancellor Angela Merkel. That leaves little room for the new foreign minister. READ MORE...
SPD Party Congress elects new leadership and gives new hope
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Last weekend, the German SPD held its first party congress after a clear defeat in the national elections. A remarkable speech by the new party chairman Sigmar Gabriel, an honest debate on the SPD’s policies in government in the past eleven years,...
Germany Blocks EU-US Bank Data Agreement
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An agreement negotiated between the US and the EU on sharing bank data in the context of antiterrorism has just been blocked by Germany, France, Finland and Austria. This shift in German policy signals general political changes that will continue to...
Waiting For The Trans-Atlantic Wave
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It is symbolic that the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall was celebrated at the moment when the black-yellow coalition – the grouping of CDU/CSU – Free Democratic Party – came back to power in Germany. In 1989, when th...
Germany’s Responsibility for Eastern Europe
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BERLIN — In West Berlin the days and nights after November 9, 1989, we welcomed and hugged complete strangers, our East German countrymen, on the streets, chatting over a cup of coffee or a glass of Glühwein, with inconceivable and indescribab...
Francois Lafond talks about French-German relations on France24
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GMF Paris Office Director Francois Lafond discusses the special relationship between France and Germany on the occasion of Armistice Day and a meeting between French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
