On February 6th, just when I thought it was actually possible to escape the ?German reform debate? for only a couple of days, on the way from the slopes to the fireplace, Gerhard Schroeder hit back through the airwaves. A coalition of campaigning regional party establishment and the inevitable loony lefties had apparently won their [...]

A search for “Zimbabwe” on A Fistful of Euros currently yields:
No pages were found containing “zimbabwe”.
Not for much longer.
See the reports here and here respectively:
The EU is to increase the number of top Zimbabwean officials facing targeted sanctions by the end of February.
…..
The EU imposed travel sanctions on Mugabe’s regime in February 2002 [owing] to [...]

A scientist describes Saturn’s moon Titan as potentially looking ‘a bit like Sweden’. No comment is available from the Swedes at this time, but Norwegian comedians are reportedly working overtime

A Guardian Q&A on the working rights citizens of the 10 accession countries will have in the 15 current members of the EU

My goodness, talking about the headscarf law has brought up some interesting discussion on the blogs. It appears that my mistake was to think that this was ever about improving the lives of Muslim girls. From the responses there is one thing that is clear - this law is about legislating conformity.
For example, [...]

The first jackpot - ?15million - in the EuroMillions lottery was won by someone who bought their ticket in France, the BBC reports

Kofi Annan will have the power to set the final terms for a referendum on the reunification of Cyprus raising real hopes that the island could be reunified before it joins the EU

Der Spiegel only seems to have some of the facts about the pretender to the British throne. I have some more information on it here from when the news came out in Britain in January.

Over at normblog, which is where I more usually hang out, there is a character variously known as WotN and Wife of the Norm, and who is known in her own right as Ad?le. With a name like that she could be French but isn’t, and yet I feel it’s admissible to bring her over [...]

Yesterday I woke up and opened my front door to find a guy sitting on our garden wall playing a harmonica. Well, not in fact. Was it in a dream, then? No, not that either. It was a thought that just came into my head as I woke up and I lay there contemplating the [...]