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Inside the European Parliament’s gift vault

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:31:32 GMT

BRUSSELS — Down a curving corridor on floor five and a half, there’s a dark alcove hiding an unmarked door. This is the final resting place for the European Parliament’s would-be bribes. The secret chamber is piled high with diplomatic gifts, all carefully labeled and left to languish in bureaucratic limbo under lock and key — neither accepted nor rejected. There’s the opulent; there’s the bizarre. One cupboard contains a Taiwanese wristwatch given to a Polish EU lawmaker. Another holds a pot of French mustard, a miniature Saudi Arabian door and a commemorative plaque from the Indonesian parliament.Expensive bottles of wine, children’s toys, wireless headphones, books, stationery, figurines — five dusty containers are brimming with the forsworn freebies that governments and parliaments from all over the globe have showered on EU lawmakers. The crypt — essentially a glorified janitor’s closet — has sat largely unperturbed since the collection began almost 15 ...

2023’s most important election: Turkey

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:31:32 GMT

For Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, next month’s election is of massive historical significance. It falls 100 years after the foundation of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk’s secular republic and, if Erdoğan wins, he will be empowered to put even more of his stamp on the trajectory of a geostrategic heavyweight of 85 million people. The fear in the West is that he will see this as his moment to push toward an increasingly religiously conservative model, characterized by regional confrontationalism, with greater political powers centered around himself. The election will weigh heavily on security in Europe and the Middle East. Who is elected stands to define: Turkey’s role in the NATO alliance; its relationship with the U.S., the EU and Russia; migration policy; Ankara’s role in the war in Ukraine; and how it handles tensions in the Eastern Mediterranean.The May 14 vote is expected to be the most hotly contested race in Erdoğan’s 20-year rule — as t...

After 3 Czech diplomats die suddenly, Prague urges staff to improve work-life balance

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:31:32 GMT

Czech Foreign Minister Jan Lipavský has sent a letter to foreign ministry staff asking them to find a better balance between professional and personal lives, after three Czech diplomats aged 46 to 55 died suddenly in the past five months.In the letter, seen by POLITICO, Lipavský asks foreign ministry employees not to underestimate the need to care for their physical and mental health. “Do not to forget that every job, including ours, has its own values and ambitions, but also ‘healthy’ boundaries,” read the letter, adding that it would be advisable to find a balance between work and family life.The deaths of the three diplomats, who died of natural causes, “show that the position of a diplomat involves working in extremely difficult conditions and often in isolation from family,” Lipavský said. “Our colleagues carry out this service even in war zones under tight security measures with limited mobility in the country of posting. Diplomats are...

We need to talk about NGOs 

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:31:32 GMT

William Nattrass is a freelance journalist and commentator based in Prague and covers Central Europe.Since the European Union’s Qatargate corruption scandal erupted late last year, much of the debate has increasingly focused on the blame apportionable to Brussels’ sprawling NGO sector.Along these lines, conservatives argue there’s now a pressing need to impose stricter transparency requirements on NGOs — after all, those skeptical of ulterior motives among such organizations couldn’t have dreamt up a better example of hypocrisy than allegations that an organization called Fight Impunity was sitting at the center of a web of international bribery.  Meanwhile, left-wing groups are countering this argument, saying that one or two bad apples are being used as an excuse to scapegoat the whole fruit barrel. But not only is their argument flawed — it also fails to see the opportunity such requirements could bring.In light of Qatargate, the European Commission is now trying ...

Biden’s Northern Ireland ultimatum looks doomed to fail

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:31:32 GMT

LONDON — Joe Biden is not someone known for his subtlety.His gaffe-prone nature — which saw him last week confuse the New Zealand rugby team with pro-British soldiers from the Irish civil war — leaves little in the way of nuance.But he is also a sentimental man from a long gone era of Washington, who specializes in a type of homespun, aw-shucks affability that would be seen as naff in a younger president.His lack of subtlety was on show in Belfast last week as he issued a thinly veiled ultimatum to the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) — return to Northern Ireland’s power sharing arrangements or risk losing billions of dollars in U.S. business investment.The DUP — a unionist party that does not take kindly to lectures from American presidents — is refusing to sit in Stormont, the Northern Ireland Assembly, due to its anger with the post-Brexit Northern Ireland protocol, which has created trade friction between the region and the rest of the U.K.The DUP is also refusing to support the ...

Local surfer, SDSU grad paralyzed in Easter weekend accident

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:31:32 GMT

SAN DIEGO -- A local surfer and San Diego State University graduate suffered a traumatic spinal cord injury on Easter weekend that has left him paralyzed. According to his family, 23-year-old Collin Bosse was swimming in Mission Bay with his friends on Saturday, April 8 when the unexpected happened -- he unknowingly dove into shallow waters. Community rallies behind San Diego woman paralyzed from rare neurological disorder Instead of gliding through the bay as anticipated, Collin hit his head with force on the bottom. Summer Bosse, Collin's sister, told FOX5SanDiego.com her brother immediately felt a strange sensation in his body before he sunk under the water and was unable to move.His friends -- one of them a lifeguard -- noticed something was wrong, immediately springing into action. Summer says one person stabilized his neck while others called emergency services.Once at the hospital and assessed my medical professionals, Collin's family said doctors told them he had suffere...

Ready for a challenge? Here are the hardest hikes in San Diego

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:31:32 GMT

SAN DIEGO -- San Diego is a paradise for outdoor adventurists, with a diverse natural landscape that's meant to explore. But with that comes dozens of trails that are not for the faint of heart -- ones sure to exhaust and drain even the most experienced of hikers.For those looking to take on more of a challenge this spring, here are some of the hardest trails for hikers in San Diego County, according to AllTrails. 7 quiet and easy San Diego trails for non-hikers El Cajon Mountain TrailLength: 11 milesEst. time of completion: 6 hours, 55 minutesEl Cajon Mountain Trail near Lakeside is regarded as the hardest trails in San Diego County. This out-and-back trail takes hikers up to the 3,648 ft. summit of El Cajon Mountain. The peak is also nicknamed "El Capitan" after the iconic Yosemite National Park granite rock formation, given similar formations seen at the mountain's summit.This is not a hike for those without experience and should NOT be tackled in the summer. The brutal trail h...

Twitter adds ‘Government-funded Media’ tag to CBC account

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:31:32 GMT

One of CBC’s Twitter accounts now has a label which describes the broadcaster as “Government-funded Media.”News of the addition to @CBC was shared late Sunday on Twitter by Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, who had asked the social media company to add the label to accounts that promote “news-related” content from CBC English but did not ask the same for its French counterpart.CBC media relations director Leon Mar says Twitter’s decision defies its own policy, which says government-funded media “may have varying degrees of government involvement over editorial content.”Mar says that is “clearly not the case with CBC/Radio-Canada.”He says CBC/Radio-Canada is publicly funded through a parliamentary appropriation that is voted upon by all MPs, and that its editorial independence is protected in law in the Broadcasting Act.Poilievre, in his tweet, also posted a link to a petition on the Conservative’s website that cal...

G-7 envoys urge tough stance on Chinese, N Korean aggression

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:31:32 GMT

KARUIZAWA, Japan (AP) — Top diplomats from the Group of Seven wealthy democracies are tackling two major worries in Northeast Asia, vowing a tough stance on China’s increasing threats to Taiwan and North Korea’s unchecked tests of long-range missiles.Another major crisis, Russia’s war in Ukraine, will also consume the agenda Monday as the diplomats gather in this Japanese hot spring resort town for Day Two of talks meant to pave the way for action by G-7 leaders when they meet next month in Hiroshima.For the American delegation, the meeting comes at a crucial moment in the world’s response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and efforts to deal with China, two issues that G-7 ministers from Japan, the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Canada, Italy and the European Union regard as potent challenges to the post-World War II rules-based international order.A senior U.S. official traveling with U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken told reporters that the Biden adm...

Muslims around the world consider climate during Ramadan

Published Sun, 16 Feb 2025 16:31:32 GMT

JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) — In the heart of Jakarta, the grand Istiqlal Mosque was built with a vision for it to stand for a thousand years. The mosque was conceived by Soekarno, Indonesia’s founding father, and was designed as an impressive symbol for the country’s independence. Its seven gates — representing the seven heavens in Islam — welcome visitors from across the archipelago and the world into the mosque’s lofty interior. But they don’t just see the light here. It fuels them.A major renovation in 2019 installed upwards of 500 solar panels on the mosque’s expansive roof, now a major and clean source of Istiqlal’s electricity. And this Ramadan, the mosque has encouraged an energy waqf — a type of donation in Islam that continues to bear fruit over time — to grow its capacity to make renewable power. Her Pramtama, deputy head of the Ri’ayah — or building management — division of Istiqlal Mosque, hopes that Islam’s holiest month, when the faithf...