The Turkish local elections ended on Sunday after a tense, national-like campaign designed by the ruling party AKP’s leaders to win key cities in Kurdish-dominated zones. Although it has won 39 percent of the vote, this is 8 percent short of the projected win envisaged by premier Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Moreover, this is the first time since the 2002 [...]

Last week the Czech prime minister, Mr Topolanek, has lobbied hard for the admission of Croatia in the European Union. Talking to EurActiv, he stated that stopping EU enlargement is a “road to hell”.
 
According to him, many EU members would favour the admission of Croatia, but delay accession talks with Serbia, Macedonia, Montenegro or Albania. The wisdom [...]

On the final days of last week’s National People’s Congress (NPC) session, its president Mr. Wu Bangguo has assured his conservative audience that China is not about to embark on a Western-style democratisation process and that it will not indiscriminately emulate Western political theory and institutions :
 
“we will never put into practice a multi-party [...]

Even as Western economists disagree as to the depth and duration of the current economic crisis, one thing is certain : it fosters closer economic cooperation between China and its Asian neighbours. The crisis might also generate unexpected peace dividends for the region.
 
Speaking before the National People’s Congress yesterday, the Chinese premier claimed his country [...]