The organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, or OSCE, said Friday, July 24, that Kyrgyzstan’s presidential was overshadowed by widespread irregularities to ensure victory of the incumbent leader Kurmanbek Bakiyev.
The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) on Thursday, July 16, “strongly condemned” the murder of Natalya Estemirova, a prominent journalist and human rights activist who was found dead in Ingushetia, following her kidnapping the previous day at her home in Grozny, the Chechen capital.
The new president of the European Parliament, former Polish Prime Minister Jerzy Buzek, has pledged to make the European Union more accessible to average citizens following a record-low voter turnout in recent European elections. As the first East European politician to take up the post, Buzek faces a difficult task as the bloc suffers under a global economic crisis and tensions over necessary reforms.
Thousands of Bosnian Muslims have prayed and remembered the dead in the Bosnian town of Srebrenica on Saturday, the 14th anniversary of Europe’s worst massacre since World War II. They also re-buried hundreds of victims recently recovered from mass graves.
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has called for a new global currency to replace the dollar as the World’s Reserve Currency.
Bulgaria’s main center-right opposition party said Monday, July 6, it would launch coalition talks after winning the country’s first parliamentary elections since it joined the European Union in 2007. The governing Socialists were defeated following several corruption scandals and concerns over the economy.
Croatia is facing political turmoil, after Prime Minister Ivo Sanader suddenly resigned, citing personal reasons.
The European Union and dozens of countries have pledged to speed up social support for Holocaust survivors and the search for art and other items that were stolen during World War II by the Nazis. At a meeting in Prague, they agreed to establish a special European institute to deal with these issues and education.
The people of Albania were going to the polls Sunday, June 28, in parliamentary elections, seen as a key test for the Balkan country’s ambition to join the European Union. Albania’s incumbent Prime Minister Sali Berisha faces a tough fight in the national elections.
Michael Jackson, who became known as ‘the king of pop’, has died of cardiac arrest at the age of 50.
(ADDS DETAINED ACTIVISTS, CHANGING LEAD)
At least 10 reformists were detained before dawn Sunday, June 14, hours after Iranian officials said President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was re-elected in a landslide victory, the Voice of America (VOA) network reported.
In a potential setback for Christians seeking religious freedom, Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was “re-elected”, officials said, but his main rival called the declared victory “treason to the votes of the people.”
Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has lost the presidential election, his challenger said, a development that was expected to be welcomed by Christians seeking more religious rights and the United States, where President Barack Obama seeks new relations with the strict Islamic nation.
The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington was closed Thursday, June 11, after an elderly man known for his anti-Semitic views stormed the building and killed a guard, officials said.
Hungary’s main far-right party, accused by rights groups of spreading anti-Semitic views and hatred towards the country’s up to 800,000 Gypsies, known as Roma, has received three seats in the European Parliament, official results showed.
Lawyer Krisztina Morvai is a beautiful blond mother who smiles on campaign posters of the far-right party, the Movement for a Better Hungary (Jobbik). However the red, lipstick smile, of Jobbik’s primary candidate for the European Union Parliament soon disappears when asked about her views on Hungary’s estimated 800.000 gypsies, who prefer to be known as the Roma, and Jewish people.
The European Union’s budget commissioner Dalia Grybauskaite has won Lithuania’s presidential election getting roughly 69 percent of the vote according to official results.
The current European Union president, the Czech Republic, is under pressure to overcome failed talks with key former Soviet states on an energy deal. Negotiations on reducing Europe’s dependency on Russian natural gas are one of several key challenges facing the Czech Republic’s new government.
The latest annual report by the independent United States Commission on International Religious Freedom names 13 countries as serious violators of religious freedom, Worthy News monitored Saturday, May 2, with reporting by the Voice of America network (VOA).
Facing student-led demonstrations, the Moldova’s ruling Communists has agreed to recount parliamentary election returns that gave the victory in Sunday’s vote to the Communist Party.