The Ukrainian governing coalition collapsed Tuesday as differences over the recent Russia-Georgia war as well as ties to the West finally split the long-feuding leaders of the 2004 Orange Revolution.

"I officially announce the collapse of the coalition of democratic forces," said parliamentary speaker Arseny Yatsenyuk after a deadline to resolve differences expired.

 

"Come with flowers, come with wreathes to the funeral of the democratic coalition," Yatsenyuk had told journalists in Kyiv, Interfax news agency reported on Monday. "It must be understood that we have very little time to restore the old coalition or build a new one. Let's not pretend that nothing is happening."

 

Parties in parliament now have 30 days to form a new government, after which President Viktor Yushchenko can call new elections.

 

The Revolution's agenda of modernizing Ukraine and engaging in closer ties to the European Union and United States stalled and ties with Russia have been strained. The fallout between the West and Russia over last month's war in Georgia imploded, leaving Ukraine's fragile ruling coalition deeply divided over its identity.

The recent war between Russia and Georgia would have "profound consequences" on international relations, according to the Swedish Defense Research Agency.

"The Russian actions were the result of deliberate and premeditated choices," researcher Robert Larsson said, noting Russia's decision to enter the conflict, and to use a "relatively large portion of violence" and then to recognize breakaway regions in Georgia.

Larsson made his remarks at the launch of a 153-page study titled "The Caucasian Litmus Test: Consequences and Lessons of the Russian-Georgian War in August 2008."

Larsson, editor and one of 14 contributors to the study, said that while the study did not cast blame, the conflict could be compared to a "litmus test," referring to how Russia likely used its intervention to "test reactions" from the international community to its actions.

"The Russian lesson was that the international community was not prepared, willing or able to add any costs to the Russian actions," Larsson said. Moscow was likely to have felt it "achieved success."

What do Kazakhstan, Israel and the north-eastern corner of South America have in common? Some people count them as European. So why do other countries fail to make the grade?

Kazakhstan, despite being in Central Asia, is a member of the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA). Israel is in both UEFA and the Eurovision Song Contest -- competing in the latter rather more successfully in recent years than, say, France or Britain.

And the South American area of French Guyana is legally a province of France, which makes it officially a part of the European Union.

Of course, critics would say that it takes a lot more than just joining a European organization to count as properly "European."

But the problem with that criticism is there is, in fact, no commonly agreed definition of "European" to confirm it.

And that is far more than just a linguistic problem, because for some countries, the question of whether or not they count as European is a vital matter of foreign policy.

EU foreign ministers on Monday (15 September) agreed to set up a special unit aimed to protect shipping from pirates off the Somali coast, as the number of piracy-related incidents in the area has been increasing lately.

The "coordination unit" will be based in Brussels and have "the task of supporting the surveillance and protection activities carried out by some member states off the Somali coast."

Piracy-related incidents have been increasing off Somalia's coasts

The unit should be established "in the next few days," the ministers said. They also agreed to plan a possible full-fledged EU naval mission to the waters off Somalia, if needed.

The move follows an increasing number of pirate attacks in the Gulf of Aden and the Indian Ocean.

According to figures from the International Maritime Bureau, maritime piracy acts committed against fishing boats or ships increased by 10 percent in 2007, French daily Le Figaro reports.

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - The European Commission has given Japanese electronics giant Sony the green light to purchase outright the record label Sony BMG in an €840 million ($1.2 billion) buy-out from German media firm Bertelsmann.

The EU executive sees no competition worries resulting from the merger, but indie music labels say Brussels is missing the point - it is cultural diversity concerns that are under threat from the creation of such a music titan.

Danish indie band Mew at record signing

On Monday (15 September), the EU executive said that after examining the deal, it was unlikely that the transaction would harm competition, over howls of protest from independent music firms.

In August, Sony announced it intended to purchase Bertelsmann's 50 percent stake in Sony BMG, jointly owned by the two companies, for €630 million ($900 million), as well as some €210 million ($300 million) in cash of Sony BMG revenues.

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - The US banking crisis wiped billions off the value of European stock markets on Monday (15 September), with the European Central Bank and EU institutions trying to calm nerves as traders fear more bad news.

Among Europe's largest trading floors, the FTSE exchange in London and Euronext 100 in Paris lost around €81 billion each in value while the DAX trading floor in Frankfurt lost €27 billion.

Shares in Spain, Italy, the Netherlands, Austria, Greece, Poland, Romania, the Czech republic, Slovenia and Lithuania also fell by 3.5 percent or more, with only Sweden, Finland and Estonia emerging relatively unscathed.

Individual European companies took severe hits with the British HBOS banking group losing half its value, Barclays bank losing 10 percent and Sweden's SEB bank losing over 8 percent.

EUOBSERVER/BRUSSELS - The French EU presidency is to put forward a security package at the December summit aimed at relaunching the European security and defence policy (ESDP) with strong links to NATO, many measures of which were outlined at a Brussels conference on defence on Monday (15 September).

France wants better co-ordination of EU military capabilities

From logistical shortcomings such as aircraft interoperability to stalled national investments for defence and the political "gulf" between NATO and the EU, the current ESDP has a number of areas that are "not satisfactory", Lieutenant General Patrick de Rousiers, France's military representative to the EU, said during the conference organised by Security and Defence Agenda, a Brussels based think-tank. The meeting was laying out the security and defence priorities for Europe during the France's chairmanship of the six-month rotating EU presidency.

At the December EU summit, France will present a series of concrete measures in order to address these shortcomings, including the launch of joint military European training courses modelled on the Erasmus Programme - the civilian university student exchange system.

The EU presidency also hopes to win approval for the establishment of a European Security and Defence College, as well as greater levels of interoperability between the European aircraft producers and the development of a joint UK-French initiative to improve helicopter capabilities. The latter proposal comes in response to difficulties experienced by the EU's mission in Chad in getting enough helicopters on the ground, Mr de Rousiers said.

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - Brussels' biggest lobbying companies are likely to join the European Commission's new register by the end of September, but worries remain about client confidentiality and the details of financial disclosure.

A 10 September meeting at EPACA - the Brussels-based trade body representing PR majors such as APCO, Hill & Knowlton and Burson Marsteller - saw members "generally favourable towards the register" EPACA chairman Jose Lalloum told EUobserver.

The chemicals industry lobbied EU institutions heavily in the lead up to the passage of REACH, legislation that strongly affected the sector

"I would think that a good number of members will be registering in the next few weeks."

The commission launched the new registry in June - which asks participants to reveal who they work for and how much money each client pays - to help prevent abuses such as the US Jack Abramoff bribery scandal from happening in the EU.

As of early this month just 300 lobby groups had signed up to the voluntary list however, representing a fraction of the 15,000 to 20,000 lobbyists estimated to be working in Brussels. The register's voluntary nature has also been mauled by pro-transparency groups.

NATO's chief said Moscow does not have veto power over Georgia's potential membership in the military alliance, but he also admonished Tbilisi over its slow implementation of democratic reforms.

At the end of a two-day summit in Georgia, NATO chief Jaap de Hoop Scheffer asserted Tuesday, Sept. 16, that the alliance would continue to expand towards Russia's borders and declared Moscow had no veto on former Soviet republics' bids to join NATO.

 

Scheffer led a delegation of ambassadors from the Western alliance's 26 members in a firm show of support for Georgia as Russian troops remained in its rebel regions after the five-day war last month.

 

"NATO enlargement will continue," Scheffer said. "No other country will have a veto over that process, nor will we allow our strong ties to Georgia to be broken by outside military intervention, and pressures."

 

^{Violent attacks on Gypsies in Italy this summer, along with attempts to remove Travellers' homes across Europe, have struck fear into the heart of the Roma community. Novelist Louise Doughty who has Romany ancestors, reports on the sinister new wave of persecution against Europe's fastest-growing ethnic minority}

By Louise Doughty, The Guardian

This is an article my father would rather I didn't write. "You want to watch it, you know," he has said to me, more than once. "If you're not careful, you'll get a brick through your window." In the working-class area of Peterborough where my father grew up during the 20s and 30s, it probably wasn't wise to mention that you had Romany blood, however distant.

At that time, my father and his family had no idea about the horrors about to be perpetrated against the Roma and Sinti in Europe under Nazi occupation but prejudice they understood, all right, even from within their own family. "My mother used to hit me when I was bad," one of my aunts once told me, "and she always said to me, 'I'll beat the Gypsy out of you, my girl.'" When my father first told me about our Romany ancestry, he asked me not to mention it to neighbours or friends at school - a suggestion no doubt at the root of my abiding fascination with what is, after all, only a small part of our family history. Even so, he finds it hard to accept that had Germany successfully invaded Britain during the second world war, he and his family would have qualified for shipping to the gas chambers alongside British Jews.

This would have happened despite our family having been settled since the turn of the 20th century...

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - The EU should not be fooled by cosmetic political reforms in Belarus, opposition leader Alexander Kazulin warned on Tuesday (16 September), one day after EU foreign ministers expressed readiness to relax sanctions.

"Today we have every proof that there have been no important changes concerning the democratisation of Belarus. They are only facade changes, not fundamental ones," Mr Kazulin told press after holding meetings in the European Parliament in Brussels.

Familiar scenes from Minsk: there have only been "facade changes" in Belarus, Mr Kozulin says

The fact that Minsk in August freed three political prisoners - including Mr Kazulin himself who had spent two and a half years in jail - is not enough to warrant a shift in EU policy as not much has actually changed in the country, the dissident added.

"We [still] have no elections, but appointments by [Belarus president] Mr Lukashenko," Mr Kazulin explained, saying that his own daughter who is running for parliament in upcoming elections has no chance "because of her last name."

The poverty and discrimination that blight the lives of many Roma (Gypsies) across Europe have dominated an EU conference in Brussels.

The special meeting on Tuesday was called to encourage EU member states to give Roma the access to education and welfare that other citizens enjoy.

About 10 million Roma live in the EU - and the European Commission says they face deeply embedded discrimination.

The Commission president issued an urgent appeal to help them.

"The problem which we are facing together... is one of great urgency," Jose Manuel Barroso said.

More than 400 officials, Roma representatives and civil society activists attended the conference, the first such EU summit.

Some Roma delegates wore T-shirts saying "No to ethnic profiling," the AFP news agency reported.

Bavaria's ruling conservatives are running a clueless election campaign that could cost them their absolute majority in a September 28 state election. That would spell trouble for Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Bavaria's conservatives have had an absolute majority in the Alpine state, one of Germany's most prosperous regions, for half a century but that may change in the upcoming state election on September 28.

The Christian Social Union, the Bavarian sister party of Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democrats, has run a tepid campaign so far and opinion polls show that governor Günther Beckstein and CSU leader Erwin Huber are failing to mobilize their traditional supporters.

Former Gurkha soldiers from Nepal have demonstrated outside the London high court before the latest round of their legal bid to win the right to retire in Britain.

To the sound of bagpipes, they carried a portrait of Queen Elizabeth and waved Union Jack flags and banners demanding 'Justice and Equality' as they gathered on Tuesday with hundreds of supporters.

The famed regiment of Nepalese soldiers has fought for Britain since 1815, most recently in Iraq, Afghanistan and the former Yugoslavia.

The soldiers, first recruited by colonial rulers in India in the 19th century as a "martial race" known for their bravery, have mounted a challenge against a ruling that means those who retired before 1997 have no automatic right to live in Britain.

Russian shares suffered their steepest one-day fall in more than a decade on Tuesday, losing up to 20 per cent, as a sharp slide in oil prices and difficult money market conditions triggered a rush to sell.

Margin calls forced domestic traders to liquidate positions and brokers pulled credit lines. At least one Moscow bank failed to meet payments.

... market players said banks were ceasing to lend to second and third-tier companies and brokers were pulling credit lines. KIT Finance, big Moscow investment house confirmed rumours that it had been unable to make payment on a series of short-term loans.

It said: "In connection with the fact that a series of our clients did not meet their obligations to our bank, we have not met our obligations to our counterparties.

Shares in Russia's biggest state-controlled banks led the slide with Sberbank, the state-controlled savings bank, closing 21.72 per cent down and VTB losing 29.26 per cent. The bank was suffered on investor fears about its securities portfolio, which makes up about 10 per cent of its assets.

This is starting to look like a global meltdown.

Och nu den svenska kocken bakar en Alaskan älg jägare. Bonk! Bonk! Bonk!

With the forceful gallantry of a modern-day Errol Flynn, French President Nicolas Sarkozy sent in a unit of French troops to rescue two French natives who were captured by pirates while vacationing on their yacht earlier this month. This is the second such rescue operation France has initiated in the last five months.

Even more rousing than Sarkozy's heroic flair was his loud call for a crackdown on global piracy. Sarkozy's announcement of the sailors' safe return came with a stern warning and a little dig:

Members of the United Nations General Assembly finally passed a resolution approving "inter-governmental negotiations" on expanding the Security Council.

The on-going process regarding the expansion of the Security Council almost collapsed during discussions on Monday, Sept. 15, but after hours of tense bargaining, the assembly unanimously agreed on full-scale negotiations which could lead to the addition of new members to the United Nations' most powerful body, which has the power to authorize sanctions, trade embargoes and military action.

Describing the breakthrough as "historic," some diplomats present said that the agreement opened the door for the council to become larger and more representative of the world of the 21st century.

Hurricanes Gustav and Ike have between them inflicted the worst storm damage in Cuba's history, the government says.

The storms - which hit within two weeks of each other - have caused some $5bn (£2.8bn) of damage, affecting nearly 450,000 homes, officials said.

At least 200,000 Cubans lost their homes and crops have been destroyed.

Analysts say the impact of the storms will make it difficult for President Raul Castro to fulfill his pledge to improve living conditions in Cuba.

The Cuban sugar ministry had already reported that Hurricane Ike had destroyed 340,000 hectares of sugar cane - nearly half the annual crop.

It is mid-morning and the muezzin's call at Manila's Blue Mosque in suburban Maharlika echoes across the run-down tenement blocks as men slowly walk toward its sky blue onion-shaped dome.

Across the road, goats graze and women gather under trees, their heads covered by white or black scarves.

A placard taped to the mosque wall reads: "Peace for MindaNOW."

The latest attempt to bring peace to the southern island of Mindanao and give the minority Muslims a homeland has been officially scrapped after 11 years of negotiations between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).

Both sides have struggled for a settlement through peace negotiations punctuated by bouts of bloodshed that had displaced more than a million people and left more than 120,000 dead over the past 40 years.

The world's largest insurance company has less than 24 hours to raise $80bn (£45bn) or face collapse, a leading US politician has warned.

The dire diagnosis for American International Group (AIG), made by New York State Governor David Paterson, came amid another day of continued turbulence on the global stock markets.

However despite the turmoil, the US central bank - the Federal Reserve - sprang a surprise by failing to cut interest rates.

Bolivia may look towards Russia for funding if the United States decides to withdraw its £14 million in annual aid.

Relations between America and the South American state are at an all-time low after Bolivia expelled the US ambassador amid civil unrest which has left more than 30 dead.

Whilst long range Russian bombers now streak across the skies of the Caribbean from a base in Venezuela, and Moscow seeks to strengthen relations with its old ally Cuba, Bolivia may be the latest recruit in expanding Russian influence in Washington's "back yard".

Last week the US ambassador to La Paz was expelled accused of fomenting civil unrest and Washington swiftly reciprocated with the ejection of the Bolivian ambassador.

Now Evo Morales is looking to get help, military and antinarcotics, to make up the shortfall if and when the US cuts off aid.

One week ahead of the annual gathering of world leaders at the United Nations in New York, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has issued a new report that while confirming the agency's full-scope inspection and verification of Iran's nuclear activities, discovering no evidence of any military diversion, is permeated with "serious concerns" and "outstanding questions".

These questions relate to certain "alleged studies" and the overall effect could be a shot in the arm for the flagging "Iran Six" multilateral diplomacy on Iran involving the United States, Britain, France, Russia and China plus Germany. This could lead to even more sanctions on Iran, or worse, an Israeli or American strike against Iran's nuclear infrastructure.

The IAEA describes a collection of weaponization designs and documents that suggest Iran has tried to develop a nuclear warhead as "alleged studies" and wants Tehran to identify the factually corrects parts of the documents and those it considers fabricated.

"Iran so far has not been forthcoming in replying to our questions and we seem to be at a dead end there," a senior United Nations official was quoted as saying on Monday.

A senior Iranian official quoted by Reuters retorted that the IAEA was to blame for the impasse and that the nuclear agency should work in a "legal and logical" manner.

The U.S. plans to sell Israel 1,000 buster-bunker bombs which Israeli military experts said Monday could provide a powerful new weapon against underground arsenals in Lebanon or Gaza.

The experts said they doubted, however, that the bombs could be used to deliver a crippling blow against Iran's nuclear program.

In announcing the proposed $77 million deal, which still needs Congressional approval, the U.S. Defense Department said the sale of the Boeing GBU-39 smart bombs would be consistent with the U.S. interest of assisting Israel "to develop and maintain a strong and ready self-defense capability." The Pentagon issued a release on the planned sale on Sept. 9.

Researchers link BPA exposure to health concerns
BPA

Don Bartletti / Los Angeles Times
Baby bottle manufacturers are already looking for replacements for the chemical.
In the first large-scale human study of the chemical, some found with bisphenol A in their urine had more than double the normal risk of heart disease and diabetes.
By Thomas H. Maugh II, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
September 17, 2008
The first large-scale human study of a chemical widely used in plastic products, including baby bottles and tin can linings, found double the risk of cardiovascular disease, diabetes and liver problems in people with the highest concentrations in their urine, British researchers reported Tuesday.

The findings confirm earlier results obtained in animals, increasing pressure on the Food and Drug Administration to limit use of the chemical Bisphenol A, commonly called BPA.

The chemical is the primary ingredient of polycarbonate plastics, which are found in myriad modern products, such DVDs, drinking bottles and lenses of sunglasses.

There have been growing concerns about its safety as studies in rodents have linked it to diabetes, brain damage, developmental abnormalities, pre-cancerous changes in the prostate and breast and a variety of other health problems.

About 7 billion pounds of the chemical are produced worldwide each year and studies by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have found that 93% of Americans have detectable levels of the chemical in their urine.

The new findings are published in this week's edition of the Journal of the American Medical Assn., but were released early to coincide with an FDA hearing on BPA in Washington.

"This is a human study that really calls into question FDA's assertion that BPA is safe," said Dr. Anila Jacob of the Environmental Working Group, an activist group.

An FDA representative, however, defended the agency's actions at the Tuesday hearing. "A margin of safety exists that is adequate to protect consumers, including infants and children, at the current levels of exposure, said Laura Tarentino, a senior FDA scientist.

This LA Times article by Guardian regular Timothy Garton Ash probably deserves an LQD, but I can't be arsed.

Here's a selection...

The seven years since 9/11 reveal an old truth: Problems are usually not solved, they are just overtaken by other problems.

Those of 8/8, for example. On Aug. 8, 2008, two mighty nations announced their return. Russia, invading Georgia, did it with tanks. China, launching the Beijing Olympics, did it with acrobats. The message was the same: World, we're back.

So we of the FLIO (friends of liberal international order) must now soberly confront the prospect of a new world disorder. Or rather old-new, for disorder is the more natural condition of international society. International order, which may also be called peace, is always a fragile achievement.

Russia and China are not simply great powers challenging the West. They also represent two alternative versions of authoritarian capitalism, or capitalist authoritarianism. Here is the biggest potential ideological competitor to liberal democratic capitalism since the end of communism.

Radical Islamism may appeal to millions of Muslims, but it cannot reach beyond the faithful, except by conversion. More important, it cannot plausibly claim to be associated with economic, technological or cultural modernity.

For close to 500 years, modernity has come to the world from the West.

Historically, both modernity and liberalism have come from the West. But the future of freedom depends on new versions of modernity evolving -- whether in India, China or the Muslim world -- that are distinctly non-Western yet also recognizably liberal, in the core sense of cherishing individual freedom. I wouldn't bet on this outcome, but working toward it is the best long-term chance we have. Pessimism of the intellect must be matched by optimism of the will.