In The News

Arid Barcelona Forced to Import Water

Elizabeth Nash April 14, 2008
Spain’s second largest city must cope with a water shortage resulting from extreme drought. Now, the city must import water by ship and rail. Barcelona has a reputation for efficient infrastructure, reports Elizabeth Nash for the Independent, but climate change and water shortages disrupt city life. The city has turned off public fountains and pools and plans to conserve the imports by lowering...

China’s Crackdown on Tibet Divides Europe

Shada Islam April 14, 2008
Restricting trade is often a tool for governments that want to show their commitment to human rights. But Europe is divided over the relative importance of human rights versus economic growth or the value of trade in promoting those rights. On one hand, trade with China helps to lift millions out of poverty and benefits European consumers. However, China’s suppression of human rights, as...

Asia’s Republican Leanings

Roger Cohen April 10, 2008
The heated US presidential campaign offers a lesson in democracy for the globe, and many who are not citizens of the US follow every detail. One ambassador has noted that the election is the “best diplomacy tool I’ve had in a long time,” reports columnist Roger Cohen in the New York Times. The world is looking on beyond the Bush administration, Cohen notes and, like US voters, is divided about...

Europe Poised to Bolster Web Shield

Doreen Carvajal April 3, 2008
The internet is not constrained by national borders, and individual nations struggle both to police cybercrime and protect themselves from cyberattack. Now, a year after intense denial-of-service attacks crippled much of the Baltic nation of Estonia’s internet infrastructure, European and US officials strive to boost their cooperation against online threats. Critics warn, however, that these...

US Pushes Pie-in-the-Sky Missile Defense in Europe

Tom Sauer April 2, 2008
With the end of the Cold War and falling demand for offensive weapons systems, the military-industrial complex was forced to find substitutes for public spending. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization, meeting today in Bucharest, will consider deploying one such product. Placing high-tech missile-defense systems in Poland and the Czech Republic will be part of the meeting’s agenda. The costly...

EU Weighs Olympic Boycott Over Tibet

Robert Marquand March 28, 2008
As protesters in Tibet plead for religious freedom and other human rights from Chinese authorities, China insists that the Dalai Lama is the troublemaker, trying to disrupt plans for the August Beijing Olympics. But that claim has not convinced Europe, whose leaders call for restraint and point out that the Dalai Lama did not call for an Olympics boycott, reports Robert Marquand for the Christian...

The Fungus That Conquered Europe

John Reader March 27, 2008
Globalization delivers both problems and solutions, and parallels can be found in the Great Potato Famine of 1845-46 and the current subprime mortgage crisis. The fungus, after originating in Mexico and spreading throughout the US, attacked Europe’s potato fields in the mid-1840s and led to widespread famine. The crisis prompted Britain to dismantle bureaucratic and protectionist Corn Laws that...