Two Mediterranean islands - Malta and Cyprus - are expected to get a green light for joining the 13-strong eurozone next January, with both the European Commission and European Central Bank likely to give a positive evaluation this Wednesday (16 May).

"Malta has sufficiently converged towards EU levels according to the criteria set in the EU treaty to adopt the euro on January 1, 2008," writes a draft commission report seen by the Times of Malta, suggesting the same applies for Cyprus.

The positive verdict on the candidates readying to enter the currency union is foreseen following last week's report by the EU executive, which stated that the economic criteria in both countries are within the eurozone's limits.

According to the commission's spring forecast, Cyprus (777,000 inhabitants) will record inflation of 1.3 percent and Malta (400,000 inhabitants) of 1.4 percent which is below the required threshold. Both countries' budgetary deficits are also below the 3 percent limit.

The 2006 public debt figure of 63.5 percent of GDP in Cyprus is higher than the EU's 60 percent limit but it is on a downward path and set to pose no problem. Similarly, Malta had a debt of 66.5 percent of GDP last year with a clear tendency to fall further.

France's rightwing president-elect, Nicolas Sarkozy, has irked his opponents and surprised supporters by courting leftwing politicians for top positions in his cabinet.

Mr Sarkozy, who delivered rousing campaign speeches promising to "liquidate" the leftwing heritage of the student protests of May 1968, believes that bringing Socialist figures into his government would answer criticisms that he is divisive and enable him to push through his economic reforms.

As Mr Sarkozy planned his cabinet from a hunting lodge near the palace of Versailles, it emerged that he had approached senior Socialist figures to become foreign minister, including Bernard Kouchner, the former doctor who founded the relief agency Médecins Sans Frontières.

Article continues Mr Kouchner, 67, served as UN governor in Kosovo from 1999-2001 and styles himself as an outspoken champion of human rights. A former Socialist health minister, he was one of the rare French politicians who spoke out in favour of military intervention in Iraq in 2003, saying he was against war but also against Saddam Hussein's regime.

As incoming EU presidency in the second half of this year, Portugal has made it clear that if there is no significant agreement on a new treaty in six weeks time, it will put the issue on the political back burner for its six month tenure of the bloc.

Portuguese prime minister Jose Socrates said that Berlin, as current EU presidency, will have to secure a "precise mandate" during the EU leaders summit on 21-22 June, otherwise Lisbon would not continue individual negotiations with member states.

He made the announcement after an informal meeting over the weekend in the Portuguese town of Sintra including German chancellor Angela Merkel and European Commission president Jose Manuel Barroso to assess the state of play on the treaty negotiations.

While appearing to up the public pressure for a deal, Mr Socrates' words dovetail with Germany's own policy of trying to get as much agreed at the summit as possible.

America will plead with MEPs to allow passengers' detailed personal information to be handed over to help prevent terror attacks.

U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff says that data gathered about airline passengers arriving in the U.S. can be crucial to prevent feared terrorist strikes.

Chertoff is pushing a new deal with the European Union that would give American law enforcement agencies continued access to information gathered about European passengers on U.S.-bound flights.

The current interim deal expires in July, and the European Parliament wants a new agreement with better data protection standards.

Chertoff will address the EU assembly's civil liberties committee.

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - National parliaments in France, the UK, Germany, Belgium, the Czech Republic and the Netherlands have been the most active at keeping an eye on EU legislation coming out of Brussels, according to a new report by the European Commission.

The report sums up national deputies' response to a commission initiative, begun in autumn last year, to send out all legislative proposals to member state parliaments at the same time as they send them to other EU institutions.

The move is to allow national parliaments to shoot off a warning to the commission if they think it is overstepping its powers or legislating in areas that would be best left to local level action.

In total, 83 opinions were sent to the commission by 22 national assemblies concerning 44 propositions from the Brussels executive - with the French senate by far the most active.

Around one third of them (27) came as a result of two studies organised by COSAC, the body representing national parliaments, specifically looking into the contentious subsidiarity (legislating at the most local level possible) and proportionality (that any EU law is in proportion to what is trying to be achieved) principles.

Chancellor Angela Merkel wants nothing to disturb the seaside harmony at the G-8 summit in northern Germany next month. But nationwide raids last week have upset leftist protesters of every stripe -- and set the stage for an unwanted showdown on the Baltic Sea.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel talks about Heiligendamm in warm, affectionate terms. The coastline is "wonderful," and so is the locals' hospitality. Merkel picked the idyllic Baltic Sea resort as a setting for this year's Group of Eight (G-8) summit of the world's leading industrialized nations from June 6-8 because it was the perfect place to convey an image of harmony to the "wider public around the globe."

AP

German G-8 opponents were outraged by last Wednesday's police raids against members of the leftist scene. In Hamburg, things got ugly. But pictures broadcast in Germany last week weren't so pleasant. On Wednesday, around 900 police officers -- many of them masked members of special operations units -- stormed 40 apartments and offices belonging to leftists across the country. They looked for anti-globalization militants in book stores, video production studios and other left-wing centers in Hamburg, Berlin, and elsewhere. Even a theater office was raided. The main internet server of one anti-G-8 movement was also shut down.

The images were grim, and the rhetoric was downright martial: German Interior Minister Wolfgang Schäuble warned of vague attacks while German federal prosecutors spoke darkly of a "terrorist network."

Russian and EU delegates meet this week as relations remain taught on issues like independence for Kosovo, human rights and the US missile shield. Russia of today is not the Russia of the 90s, said expert Alexander Rahr.

Alexander Rahr is a Russia expert from the German Society for Foreign Affairs, a Berlin-based research group.

DW-RADIO: Do the ongoing disputes between Russia and the EU make you pessimistic about the prospects for any breakthroughs at the upcoming summit?

Alexander Rahr: In the short run, I'm very skeptical and pessimistic about the possibility of improving relations between Russia and the European Union, but of course one has to be more optimistic for the long run. But presently, there is talk of a new Cold War between the EU and Russia.

One of the main disputes is about the power that Moscow wields because of its massive reserves of oil and gas and its control over the transport of energy supplies from Central Asia. How do you think this issue will be addressed at the summit?

I think that this is a temporary situation. The situation in general will stabilize and improve because Russia needs its European partners and the European market in order to sell its goods. It cannot sit on its oil and get the sources alone. It has to sell it.

On the other hand, the West also has to understand that the Russia of today is not the Russia of the 90s. Russia also has some new powers which we have to take into account.

EU to hit employers of illegal workers

Companies face more spot checks of their employees' work papers as part of a crackdown on illegal immigration across the European Union under plans to be announced on Wednesday. The worst offending bosses could face criminal charges.

(...)

Critics are likely to say that sectors such as agriculture, catering and construction depend on the illegal workforce.

The draft legislation could also prompt concerns about extra bureaucracy.

(...)

Behind the proposal is a desire to reduce exploitation of undocumented immigrants and the "pull" factor that drives illegal entry. Mr Frattini also believes that the employment of illegal immigrants distorts competition.

However, the draft legislation is far from a fait accompli. Several of Mr Frattini's fellow EU commissioners question whether it is an appropriate response.

Enforcing the law is "extra bureaucracy"... Some sectors "depend" on breaking the law... Ah, the beautiful standards of anonymous "critics" and "concerned" persons.


In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes

German Defense Minister Franz Josef Jung has called for a rethink of US military tactics in Afghanistan after US coalition operations caused a spate of civilian casualties.

"We need to make sure that in future operations don't take place in this way," Jung told reporters on Monday in Brussels where he was meeting with his EU counterparts.

 

"We don't want the population against us," he said. "We have to prevent that."

 

Jung said the killing of civilians antagonized the local population and jeopardized international efforts to win the "hearts and minds" of ordinary Afghans.

 

"It is precisely the wrong tactic," the Defense Minister said. Jung added that he had raised the issue with NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer.

Farmers in Kenya, Burkina Faso and Senegal used to be able to make ends meet. Today they have trouble selling their goods because of subsidized exports from industrial nations that are sold in Africa at dumping prices. But will the West ever change?

Editor's Note: Industrialized nations spend billions to subsidize their high-tech farming industries. Surplus crops often end up being sold at rock-bottom prices in the markets of developing countries, making it impossible for local farmers to sell their products. Even the American food aid being sent to famine-plagued regions creates more suffering than it alleviates, because many governments prefer to wait for handouts than buy up their farmers' harvests. The lack of options is forcing thousands of Africans to risk the life-threatening journey to Europe (more...).

It's a big day for a little boy, but it's also a day that will more than likely end on a depressing note. The fishermen know this, but none of them is willing to dampen the boy's enthusiasm on his first day of work.

In Afghanistan, an odd, new alliance of Mujahedeen, old communists, and royalists is threatening President Hamid Karzai's leadership. But can the motley crew solve the country's problems?

 Two children playing on a destroyed car in front of the ruins of a Kabul palace. Such massive security precautions -- just to attend a national holiday parade -- can hardly be a good sign for the country. First, secret police secure the bridge over the Kabul River. Then armored cars, machine guns protruding from their rotating towers, roll into position as sharpshooters fan out in the ruins of the old city center. A Special Forces unit is perched on the roof of the Id-Gah Mosque to keep a watchful eye on the VIP rostrum.

Finally, at just past 9 a.m., half a dozen police cars speed into the square, sirens blaring. The day's leading man slips almost unnoticed out of a car in the middle of the motorcade. Hamid Karzai, the president of Afghanistan, has arrived.

The boulevard between the river and Kabul's bustling Maiwand Street has seen its fair share of celebrations. In 1919, after the Third Anglo-Afghan War, King Amanullah stood here and proclaimed Afghanistan's freedom from Great Britain. Rulers have been crowned here; rebels have marched here; the communists demonstrated here.

Today, Kabul's establishment is celebrating the anniversary of the "Islamic Revolution" here. In Afghanistan, the reference is to the overthrow of the Najibullah regime in 1992 and the takeover by the Mujahedeen; the Karzai government elected to name April 28th -- the day the holy warriors triumphed over the communists loyal to Moscow -- as the fledgling democracy's national holiday. Smoking tanks roll past the rostrum, followed by limping war veterans, and the first fighter jets from the Afghan National Army scream through the sky above.

Even by Iraqi standards Youssufiyah is a violent place. At first sight the well-watered farmland and groves of date palms look attractively green but then you notice the bullet-riddled hulks of cars. Iraqi soldiers and police appear more than usually frightened. The streets of the ramshackle and grimy town conveys a sense of menace.

I used to disguise myself with a red-and-white Arab headdress to pass safely though the lethally dangerous area south of Baghdad where three American soldiers are being held captive. I would sit in the back of my car hoping that the small boys selling cigarettes beside the road didn't recognise me as a foreigner.

Thousands of American and Iraqi troops were desperately searching these towns and the land round about yesterday in the hope of finding a bunker or secret room where three abducted soldiers are being held. It may already be too late. The Islamic State of Iraq, the group which claimed yesterday to have captured them and to which al-Qa'ida belongs, may already have spirited them out of the area.

Here, at 4.44 am on, a US patrol in two vehicles was surprised and overrun by insurgents. The burned bodies of four soldiers and an Iraqi interpreter were found on the road. Three others had disappeared. It was obviously a mistake for a small and isolated detachment to be in an insurgent-controlled area. Such is the fear of roadside bombs that a relieving force took an hour to reach them.

In a written response, Wolfowitz maintained that he acted in good faith in seeking to resolve an obvious conflict of interest. He accused the bank's ethics committee of forcing him to oversee the raise for his longtime companion, Shaha Riza, as compensation for her transfer to a different job. The ethics panel was afraid to confront her, Wolfowitz said, because its members knew she was "extremely angry and upset."

The ethics committee told Wolfowitz he could not directly supervise Riza, who also worked at the bank, after he arrived in 2005. He said, however, that the panel declined to oversee her job transfer and compensation, instead ordering him to handle those tasks.

"Its members did not want to deal with a very angry Ms. Riza, whose career was being damaged as a result of their decision," Wolfowitz said in his response to the investigating committee's report. "It would only be human nature for them to want to steer clear of her."

Wolfowitz added that the chairman of the ethics panel thought that "due to my personal relationship with Ms. Riza, I was in the best position to persuade her to take out-placement and thereby achieve the 'pragmatic solution' the committee desired."

Wolfowitz effectively blamed Riza for his predicament as well, saying that her "intractable position" in demanding a salary increase as compensation for her career disruption forced him to grant one to pre-empt a lawsuit. He is scheduled to appear before the board this afternoon. The board is expected to begin deliberating on how to respond as soon as tonight. Board members are inclined to issue a resolution expressing a lack of confidence in Wolfowitz's leadership, senior bank officials said.