An editorial in the French daily LE MONDE (25/10) is dedicated to the appeal for a Mediterranean Union, launched by French President Nicolas Sarkozy in Tangiers on 23 October. The paper calls it “the proposal for a step-by-step policy”, inspired by the “model of the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC), which, in 1950, was the matrix of what would later become the Common Market, the European Community and lastly the European Union”. “What are – asks the editorialist – the states of North Africa that would participate in this reinforced cooperation, within which France would play an essential role, while the other members of the EU would be nothing but observers? Would the absence” of the latter “ensure this union of a success that the Barcelona process, launched in 1995 with a similar objective, lacked?”. While the European Commission “awaits further clarification from France […] many questions remain open”. “Will Sarkozy – for example – succeed in convincing the supporters of Turkey’s entry into the EU that his Mediterranean Union does not represent a service door for excluded candidates?”. In the meantime, concludes the editorial, “this project is worthy of attention. The stalemate of its precedents” and similar attempts “ought not to be any reason for abandoning it”. At the end of the forthcoming round of talks on 10 December, to be held in Serbia and Kosovo by the troika formed of Russia, USA and EU, “the Kosovars want to declare their own independence”, says a comment in the British weekly THE ECONOMIST (20-26/10). “But this declaration will be devoid of value, unless many countries, especially those in the EU, recognize it”. “The Kosovars fear that the Balkan past may repeat itself”, and in particular that, “once the US mission is replaced by an EU mission, the strong powers will oblige them to accept it. Even if Kosovo begins to conduct itself like an independent state, Serbia ought to maintain sovereignty over it for at least five years” but this is something “the Kosovar leaders will never accept”. Various comments are also devoted to the situation in Kosovo in the German press. “There are problems that resemble entangled balls of wool: without a beginning, without an end. Disentangling them is almost impossible and may even cause a war”, writes Jacques Schuster in Die Welt (24/10). “The crisis over Kosovo is one of these problems. The Kosovars want a state of their own, but the Serbs have no intention of accepting the request; at most they are willing to grant some degree of autonomy to the province”. […] “Why should Kosovo be prevented from becoming an independent state as did Slovenia, Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina? Yugoslavia is dead, whether we like it or not. But things aren’t so easy. If Kosovo were to acquire independence under American and European pressure, Russia could be inclined to resolve in the same way the numerous territorial conflicts in the area of the former Soviet Union (as in Ossetia). At the same time, given the confrontation between East and West, there is a real danger that Russian President Putin could transform his irritation about the USA’s attitude to the question of Kosovo into a pro-Iran policy”. Writing in the Frankfurter Rundschau (25/10), Norbert Mappes-Niediek comments: “Leaving out of account the international context, independence in the short term is surely the best solution: the Albanians of Kosovo would finally be forced to personally assume control of their own destiny rather than be tied to the coattails of anonymous foreigners. Serbia too ought to be glad to get rid of the burden of Kosovo… Even for the Serbs of Kosovo the situation could improve: they wouldn’t of course be accepted by the Albanian majority, but at least they would no longer be considered the fifth column of Belgrade… But what if this doesn’t happen? In the worst case scenario, on the recognition of Kosovo [by the USA and EU], Belgrade would put its threats into effect: it would abandon its rapprochement with the EU and necessarily seek refuge in the arms of Moscow”. The Polish Catholic weekly TYGODNIK POWSZECHNY in its last number (42-2007) deals with the question of apostasy. At the end of the last plenary session of the Polish Episcopate the bishops in a communiqué had reported they were receiving ever more requests from Catholics to abandon the Catholic Church. These requests could also be “an organized campaign”, suggest the bishops, “but they prefer to tackle the problem – writes the weekly – by formulating a specific modus operandi”. The chancellor of the archdiocesan curia of Krakow, the Rev. Piotr Mejer, is following with close attention the current debate on apostasy. “Over the last 18 months 40 requests for cancellation from the ecclesiastical registers have been received by the archbishopric of Krakow; 21 of these requests were motivated with reasons of conscience. But only four of all the procedures have been concluded. The others have been deadlocked or the applicants themselves have decided to desist”. Mejer, however, does not speak of “an organized campaign”. “The interest in apostasy can be explained by various reasons: emotional disturbance, youthful rebellion, conflict with a priest, traumas inflicted during confession…”.
