There are a couple of English-language blogs that people might find interesting, given some of the events of the weekend.
First, Mary Neal’s Living With Caucasians - ‘A journal from Tbilisi, Georgia’ - has reports from the streets on what happened during Georgia’s ‘Velvet Revolution’ over the weekend (link via Jon and Ryan)
Cinderella Bloggerfeller also has [...]

Today’s Guardian has a brief interview with Denis MacShane MP, the UK’s Minister for Europe. There are no stunning revelations in there, but it’s an insight into the path the British Government is walking on when it comes to European matters. He also has an interesting description of the Anglo-French relationship:
MacShane says: “I would liken [...]

Europe is now a place where diversity is celebrated. Where it has become the cornerstone of a developing common identity. Sometimes this is hard to understand. Sometimes it is hard work. But sometimes, it just comes naturally.

Read more… or Read more right [...]

Speaking of Spam, it’s remarkable how much regular spam we get, even though it says “at” rather than @. Presumably, it’s not actual humans who read that adress, so people need to refine their anti-spam techniques. Bother.

We’ve been hit by comments spam. I guess I’ll have to read up on what to do. Good thing really, since Europundit already had problems, and I only bothered to ban and delete.

Slate has a delightful piece on the board of Black’s company, Hollinger International. It seems the directors, such as Henry Kissinger and Richard Perle, had little serious business experience and basically rubber-stamped Black’s plans.
Daniel Gross writes, “Most of these more or less honorable folks were basically idle directors. They showed up at meetings, ate lunch, [...]

More bombers struck in Istanbul, killing the British Consul General and, at present reports, 25 others, with more than 450 injured.
Will there be more bombings in Istanbul?
Turkey already withstood suicide attacks by the PKK during that group’s campaign for Kurdish independence, and later after the capture of PKK leader Ocalan. Political and criminal bombings [...]

Earlier in the week, I had planned to write a piece on the Euro 2004 playoffs, celebrating the surprise results in Saturday’s games and wondering if this marked a new equality in European international football.
Luckily for me and my predictive reputation, I didn’t get the time to write it, so I’m not left with egg [...]

A few months ago I came across an old book that my grandmother had been left by her grandmother. Called ‘Geography for Children On A Perfectly Easy Plan’ it dates from 1856 (first printed 1848) and is a British geography school textbook, educating children on each country in the world, its inhabitants and its economy. [...]

Conrad Black - quite possibly the worst newspaper owner in the history of Canada - has agreed to resign from his chairmanship at Hollinger International, essentially ending his career as a political figure and opinion-maker. Hollinger, the owner of the Daily Telegraph, the Chicago Sun-Times and the Jerusalem Post, used to own a number [...]