French Finance Minister Michel Sapin has played down any risk that Paris might be fined for breaking EU budgetary rules, days before the European Commission rules on the government's failure to cut its budget deficit. EU officials, meanwhile, beg to differ.

The Spanish attorney general has charged Catalan president Artur Mas with disobedience, perverting the course of justice, misuse of public funds and abuse of power in relation to the unofficial referendum on independence held on 9 November.

The unofficial poll was called after the referendum scheduled for the same day was ruled illegal by Spain's constitutional court. The court then also outlawed the unofficial vote but it went ahead anyway. Poll booths were staffed by volunteers and no civil servants were directly involved, a strategy Mas hoped would circumvent the ban.

Spanish president Mariano Rajoy, who has insisted all along that the Catalan demand for a referendum is a legal and not a political issue, asked the attorney-general's office to see if any crime had been committed. Although various judges have backed away from what they saw as the use of the judiciary for political ends, the attorney general has now formally charged Mas, as well as the vice-president, Joanna Ortega, and the Catalan education minister Irene Rigau.

The text of the charge claims that Mas "planned, supported and financed" the 9 November poll in defiance of the constitutional court.

What does Rajoy want to achieve?

_{*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

Russia protested today (21 November) statements by the Latvian ambassador to the EU for having made comments about Russian propaganda,  at a public event highlighting the priorities of the upcoming Latvian Presidency of the Council of the European Union.

Ilze Juhansone, Latvian Permanent Representative to the EU, presented the priorities of the upcoming presidency of her country, which starts on 1 January 2015. The event was organised by the European Policy Centre, a Brussels think tank.

In the Q&A session, Juhansone was asked to comment about reports of increased Russian propaganda in her country, which hosts the largest ethnic Russian population in the EU.

"With the latest developments in Ukraine, we felt a massive increase of propaganda on Russian-speaking channels", Juhansone said, adding that it was a "state responsibility" to provide alternative views on events that are happening.

...

The Ukrainian president has been heckled by relatives of 100 protesters killed in Kiev's Euromaidan revolution at a memorial ceremony for the victims.

The relatives, frustrated by Petro Poroshenko's failure to bring officials of the previous government to justice, shouted: "Who is a hero for you, Poroshenko?", "Where are their killers?" and "Down with Poroshenko!" They also attacked him for failing to keep a promise to confer the title of national hero on the victims, which would bring financial benefits to their families.

It was the first real public display of anger against Poroshenko, who was elected in May after the pro-Moscow Viktor Yanukovich fled the country.

The US vice-president, Joe Biden cancelled a planned visit to the area off Kiev's Independence Square, apparently for security reasons.

Would UKIP be riding so high if voters knew of the party's links with powerful right-wing US corporate interests promoting fossil fuels, denying climate change, opposing gun control, and supporting big tobacco, teaching creationism in schools, healthcare privatisation and the lifting of nuclear power regulation? An Ecologist investigation exposes the real UKIP....

ALEC and Heartland may well be willing to assist UKIP's cause - and with Helmer's long-standing links with the American 'charity', they have already established a bridgehead across the Atlantic.

The involvement of Atkinson and Etheridge provides evidence that UKIP's links with ALEC - and by extension with American corporate, fossil fuel and right-wing evangelical and 'Tea Party' interests - are only deepening as the party's influence increases.

But there is something a little illogical about this. UKIP's big-picture goal is a bid to achieve independence from the European Union - but in backing the agenda of ALEC and Heartland it appears only too keen to turn us into vassals of unaccountable American corporations.

German economists roughly fall into two groups: those that have not read Keynes, and those that have not understood Keynes. To describe the economic mainstream in Germany as conservative misses the point. There are some overlaps with the various neoclassical or neoconservative schools in the US and elsewhere. But as compelling as a comparison between the German mainstream and the Tea Party may appear, it does not survive scrutiny. German orthodoxy straddles the centre-left and the centre-right. The only party with some Keynesian leanings are the former communists.

A good example of orthodox dogma was last week's annual report of the Council of Economic Experts, an official body that advises the government. They did not criticise a lack of investment, excessive current account surpluses or overzealous fiscal rectitude. Instead they criticised the minimum wage and some minor relaxation to the retirement age. In other words: they want the government of Angela Merkel, chancellor, to be even tougher.

"Traduttori dal calabrese cercasi". La Svizzera, dopo aver capito, grazie alle segnalazioni degli inquirenti italiani, di essere un Paese particolarmente appetito dalla 'ndrangheta, per i suoi traffici criminali, sta correndo ai ripari. In primo luogo  pensando a potenziare l'attività di intelligence della Fedpol, la polizia federale, per riuscire a infiltrare le cosche. Che, tuttavia, come è avvenuto di recente in un vertice di capibastone a Frauenfeld, non distante da Zurigo, filmato dagli investigatori svizzeri, comunicano in dialetto calabrese. Che nessun poliziotto elvetico, neppure quelli di origine italiana, è in grado di  comprendere.