Romania’s PM Tariceanu announced yesterday that he wants to withdraw Romania’s troops from Iraq.
Right now here are about 900 Romanian soldiers there — one full battalion, with the catchy name of “The Red Scorpions”. They’re deployed in the Al-Nasyria area. They don’t do combat operations. There’s an intelligence team and some de-miners. [...]

Most of you will have read the news by now, but I need to mention this to complete my earlier post The battle of Wobbly Knee: Dutch troops in Afghanistan. Dutch Parliament voted yesterday, with a substantial majority, to send some 1,200 more troops to Afghanistan. More precisely to the dangerous province of Uruzgan. [...]

The Netherlands is talking about sending an additional 1,200 troops to Afghanistan’s Uruzgan province. The Dutch already have 540 people working in Afghanistan under the umbrella of the ISAF (International Security Assistance Force) peace mission and another 674 under the umbrella of Operation Enduring Freedom. For other Dutch international deployments look here.
Why is it hard [...]

Ok, I’m feeling guilty. Back in November, when the ‘orange revolution’ was thriving in Ukraine, we were all over it here at Afoe. Now, with an estimated several hundred dead in Andizhan, Uzbekistan we’re strangely silent. Why, because it isn’t Europe? Well, we are a Europe centred blog, but I hope that doesn’t mean we [...]

I have to confess that I’m utterly mystified by this story.
Short recap for those who haven’t followed the events. Giuliana Sgrena, an Italian journalist for Il Manifesto and contributor to the German Zeit, was abducted outside of Baghdad on February 4. The outrage was great - Italians went on the streets to [...]

Update: (Nick - 1730CET) The official announcement has been made, declaring Yanukovich the victor. More ASAP when I’ve rounded up the reactions.
Maidan are reporting preparations for a state of emergency are being made at Yanukovich headquarters. Victor reports official results are 49.5% to Yanukovich, 45.5% to Yeschenko, though he already has reports of fraud. At [...]

Germany is reconsidering the deployment of troops in Iraq, should conditions ‘change’. According to the FT, Peter Struck, the German defence minister, departing from previous declared government policy stated in an interview that while ?At present I rule out the deployment of German troops in Iraq. In general, however, there is no one who [...]

AP is running a report that Poland’s president, Aleksander Kwasniewski, will withdraw Polish troops from Iraq.
President Aleksander Kwasniewski, a key Washington ally, said Thursday he may withdraw troops early from Iraq and that Poland was “misled” about the threat of Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction.
His remarks to a small group of European reporters were [...]

I haven’t much to say about this that I haven’t already said, but the idea of Spain forming part of a NATO contingent which is under a UN mandate would seem to me to represent real progress.
“Yes there is some doubt about the Spanish contingent but otherwise the Iraq force is there,” said one. “It [...]

Well, little by little the details are getting clearer. According to the Spanish daily El Pais the police now know the identity of six Moroccans who are thought to have participated in Thursday’s bombing.
According to the newspaper one of those responsible is Jamal Zougan from Tangiers who has been identified from photographs by two [...]