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Archive for April, 2009

GMF now on Twitter!

Wednesday, April 29th, 2009

GMF is now on Twitter! Feel free to subscribe at http://twitter.com/gmfus or @gmfus. GMF will post updates of podcast, publications, and other content to Twitter in addition to http://www.gmfus.org.

Easter and the EU

Thursday, April 16th, 2009

Wednesday night, President Voronin called for general amnesty for those arrested during last week’s protests, and that further arrests stop. “I call on the competent authorities to provide a general amnesty and call for a stop of all forms of investigations against the street protesters. The recidivists and those from … Continue Reading…

Human Trafficking Brings Nearly 1 Billion EUR in Annual Revenue to Bulgarian Criminal Gangs

Wednesday, April 15th, 2009

On April 7th, the RiskMonitor Foundation of Bulgaria presented the findings of its most recent project, Main Schemes for Laundering of Money Obtained from Human Trafficking in Bulgaria, which was funded with a grant from the Bulgarian Fund of the GMF/Balkan Trust for Democracy using legacy funds from USAID in … Continue Reading…

Europe—A Big Winner from the G-20 Meeting?

Tuesday, April 14th, 2009

Summit communiqués should always be taken with a healthy dose salt and the recently concluded G-20 summit is no different.  Time will tell whether the lofty deeds of the communiqué will lead to concrete actions.  I am … Continue Reading…

Moldova Crisis Update, April 13

Monday, April 13th, 2009

BUCHAREST — The political crisis in Moldova is deepening. The rift between the government and state authories, on one hand, and the opposition and civil society, on the other, is growing by the day. There are now two radically different stories and messages sent both to the Moldovan population and … Continue Reading…

Moldova Crisis Update, April 11

Saturday, April 11th, 2009

Here is a daily update on Moldova’s political crisis done by independent media and NGOs who decline to be named publicly for fear of retribution in an extremely volatile situation.

1. Unimedia — Tomorrow at 10:00 the opposition parties will organize peaceful manifestation against the abusing of the ruling party.

2. Hotnews.md, after … Continue Reading…

Moldova’s crisis

Friday, April 10th, 2009

Moldova is facing a serious political crisis, which has been triggered by the conduct of the parliamentary election on April 5. The crisis is even more serious as  public mistrust in the Moldovan political system has continuously declined over the last several years. Moldovan … Continue Reading…

Obama in Turkey

Tuesday, April 7th, 2009

ANKARA, Turkey — During his first 100 days in power, as a part of his first presidential visit to Europe, U.S. President Barack Obama chose to come to Turkey, where the United States’ image was damaged by the war in Iraq and the tone set by the Bush administration.

Even before … Continue Reading…

Europe is giving migrants the cold shoulder

Monday, April 6th, 2009

We have all been witnesses to the unfolding of the 21st century’s economic crisis. Yes, we all know that these are the times of a global economic recession and each of us needs to find the best way to deal with it. In such situations, one of our basic human instincts … Continue Reading…

In Obama’s Trip to Europe, Opportunity to Get World Economy Right

Wednesday, April 1st, 2009

In his speech in Berlin last year, presidential hopeful Barack Obama stated, “America has no better partner than Europe. Now is the time to build new bridges across the globe as strong as the one that bound us across the Atlantic.”

Bridge-building will be sorely needed in the disintegrating global economy, … Continue Reading…