On a recent factoid-finding mission to Sofia, the Bulgarian capital, I discovered that Bulgarians are very keen on their yogurt. The secret of long life and happiness, they claim, is yogurt…

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Over at TYR, I argued that the explanation of the Ukraine-Russia gas dispute was an effort by the Russian side to break up the European gas customers as a negotiating block by exploiting the conflict between the transit states (like the Ukraine) and the customers (like Germany). This gave rise to further discussion down-blog right [...]

The European Commission released its annual reports on enlargement yesterday, including a recommendation that Macedonia be recognised as an EU candidate. Eagerly anticipated (including by Doug Muir a few weeks back), but also pretty stunning given the difficulties the region has had, and given the general perception of enlargement fatigue.
However in my view [...]

Things are looking up a bit for Serbia’s economy.
The 1990s were a lost decade for Serbia. GDP declined sharply in the first half of the decade. A modest recovery in 1995-8 was wiped out by the NATO bombing. Per capita income in 2000 was just about where it had been in 1989… [...]

So, President Basescu is unhappy.
This is not unusual. President Basescu is often unhappy. You’d think that, having won the election last December against Prime Minister Nastase, he’d be at least content. But Basescu is a scrapper, and he’s always looking for a fight, and in recent weeks he’s found one. It’s [...]

Meanwhile on the borderlands, SueAndNotU sends a reminder that Azerbaijan will be holding parliamentary elections on November 6. The country’s current president, Ilham Aliyev, essentially inherited the job from his father, who had also been Azerbaijan’s communist boss before the collapse of the Soviet Union. Add oil, ubiquitous corruption, the loss of nearly a fifth [...]

The excellent Dutch weblog Sargasso has an entry on Turkish cult novelist Burak Turna, whose latest book The Third World War or Üçüncü Dünya Savasi is turning into a regular best-seller in Turkey. One quote from Turna, taken from the International Herald Tribune:
”Turks are waking up to two facts,” Turna said at a café near [...]

Slovenian Foreign Minister Dimitrij Rupel has just said that Macedonia has “real chances” to become the next candidate for EU membership.
This would be no big deal — the Slovenes have long had a soft spot for the Macedonians — except that Rupel is wearing two hats right now; he’s also Chairman-in-Office of the OSCE. [...]

It’s just three weeks since I wrote this entry about the prospects for EU expansion in the Western Balkans. And in that short time, several of my predictions have been proven wrong.
– Croatia’s has been allowed to start negotiations for candidacy.
– Serbia has been allowed to start negotiations for a Stabilization and Association Pact.
– [...]

Hi folks,
It’s Brussels Gonzo, back again - this time as a full member of the team (thank you, David and colleagues). And since my first entry as a guest blogger dealt with Croatia’s membership application, and a later one described the unedifying scenes in the European parliament after their talks failed to start in March, [...]