Pope Benedict XVI called in New Year's appeals today for nations to champion world peace, and urged people to repudiate war and violence.
The New Year will bring a star turn on the international stage for Chancellor Merkel, as Germany — Europe's biggest and wealthiest country — assumes the presidencies of both the European Union and the Group of 8 industrial nations. The dual role for Berlin comes at a critical moment for both institutions.
2007 will be a big year for Germany: As president of the European Union, Chancellor Merkel will have to reenergize a flagging European project. And as chair of the G8, she will have to resolve some of the most burning issues facing the world's industrialized nations. Is the chancellor up to the job?
Europe needs a new story. Can Germany, which takes over the European Union's presidency tomorrow, become the scriptwriter for a Europe that will be as successful in the 21st century as the European Community and the EU have been since the signing of the Treaty of Rome in 1957?
Germans are being prodded into the realisation that their country is no longer a bystander on the world stage, but an important player. Yet a backlash is brewing. Expect an increasingly heated debate about sending troops abroad. What will really bring foreign policy to the fore, however, is a rare double-presidency: Germany will assume the lead of both the EU and the G8. Yet by the second half of 2007 at the latest, Germany’s domestic politics could again draw worldwide interest.
Germany's growing economic, political and military role will be spotlighted in 2007.
When Germany takes over the EU presidency, the responsibility of running weekly COREPER meetings of ambassadors to the EU will be in the hands of one of its most experienced members – Wilhelm Schönfelder.
Angela Merkel may be trying to damp down high expectations for Germany’s presidency of the EU but there is no doubt that across Europe politicians and diplomats are hoping that she will drag the European project out of the doldrums it fell into when French and Dutch citizens rejected the EU’s constitution last year.
A look at Chancellor Merkel and the team that will lead the presidency of the European Union during the next 6 months.
Germany faces a heavy workload on the internal market front with some issues it wants to push through under its six-month presidency of the EU and others which will cause it some discomfort.
When diplomats discuss Germany’s EU presidency one word that repeatedly comes up in conversation is Ostpolitik.
Two MEPs look ahead to the German EU Presidency.
Germany’s attitude to resurrecting the moribund EU constitution can best be summed up by the Italian Marxist thinker Antonio Gramsci’s phrase: “Pessimism of the intellect, optimism of the will.”
When the euro notes and coins were launched 5 years ago today, the question was who would be the next to join; now it is who will be the first to leave. Looking back, the mistake was to rely on mood and symbolism to sell the new currency. Unable to argue convincingly that the euro would make people better off, they instead concentrated on claiming that monetary union was inevitable. But remove the sense of inevitability and the entire construct collapses. Suddenly, it seems only a matter of time before states start withdrawing.
In 2007 the European Union marks the 50th anniversary of another treaty—the Treaty of Rome, its founding charter. Government leaders have already agreed to celebrate it ceremoniously, restating their commitment to “ever closer union” and the basic ideals of European unity.
After a traumatising 2005, when two of the Union’s founding nations rejected the EU constitution and relations between leaders degenerated into acrimony, 2006 was a modest year of damage-limitation for the Union.
At the stroke of midnight on Jan. 1, the EU will have the ability to deploy troops in its own name at short notice. The EU’s long-awaited ‘battle groups’ will be operational: two small military units of around 1,500 soldiers each will be available to be sent simultaneously anywhere in the world.
Alarmist assessments of Iran's nuclear program lack a key component: evidence.
Using historical analogies to interpret the present is both tempting and dangerous, for history never truly repeats itself. Yet, to understand the difficulty of responding to the problems that Iran’s nuclear ambition and anti-Israel obsession now pose, it might be helpful to analyze the 3 analogies that are most commonly used.
We haven’t decided yet if Iran’s switch to euros from dollars was something the US wanted Iran to do. In all probability the answer is probably yes. This is the ultimate excuse to attack Iran. The elitists were very upset that Israel was beaten by Hezbollah in Lebanon, but even more upset that Israel was incapable of invading Syria and occupying that nation. If Israel had done so it would have severely weakened the insurgents in Iraq and brought an end to the conflict and occupation. Iran has to be attacked by elitist US interests. They have no choice now.
Inebriated Ephraim...
A Labour minister has admitted that new laws to encourage continental “cafe-style” drinking in British bars are doomed because we are a nation of Anglo-Saxon boozers. She claims that Britons — unlike our European neighbours — are incapable of leaving a bar after one drink because we like being inebriated. “I don’t know whether we’ll ever get to be in a European drinking culture, where you go out and have a single glass of wine. Maybe it’s our Anglo-Saxon mentality. We actually enjoy getting drunk."
British, American and German unions are to forge a pact to challenge the power of global capitalism in a move towards creating an international union with more than 6 million members.
Enter 2007, a year of certain change for Britain, Europe and the world.
The Daily Telegraph's in-house experts look forward to what the coming year may bring.
2007 ends with a number seen as special around the world. To Christians it represents perfection, while Muslims speak of 7 heavens. To others it is lucky, magical or powerful. So will the coming year be special too? To help you decide, and prepare, Simon Usborne reveals the secrets of the mystical number 7.
In 2007 the risk that something happening in a faraway place will have a serious impact close to home will be greater than ever. As the world shrinks, a widening spectrum of dangers threatens an ever greater number of people. Reinsurers—companies that insure the insurers—have issued a wave of “catastrophe” bonds. Sharpening geopolitical tensions add to the worries. So far, globalisation has proved remarkably resilient. But that is no cause for complacency in what promises to be a risk-laden 2007.
This ought, perhaps, to be a profitable opportunity to reflect on the past and learn from it. It will be 400 years since England’s first permanent settlement in the United States (at Jamestown). The Scots will be making much of the 300th anniversary of the Act of Union, which on May 1st 1707 fused their country with England, to form the kingdom of Great Britain. Investors will be reminded that 10 years will have passed since the stockmarket collapse of 1997, and 20 since that of 1987.
It will become more obvious in the coming years. The world has an authority deficit. Authority is draining away from international institutions, from the big world powers (including the superpower) and from the nation-state itself. It makes the world less orderly, and therefore less safe. The building blocks on which any international order has to stand are, of course, the nation-states. And therein lies a problem.
The state itself is growing weaker in many parts of the world, and has collapsed completely in some. In the advanced capitalist world its authority is being eroded by globalisation and in the former communist world it is being eroded by the advance of capitalism. Abhorring a vacuum, newer and older forces have thrust into the spaces the state has left behind. NGOs aspire to spread good policy and governance. Religions offer the order and consolation of eternal values.
But...
To indicate the year, Ethiopians and followers of the Eritrean Orthodox Tewahdo Church today use the Incarnation Era, which dates from the Annunciation or Incarnation of Jesus on 25 March 9 (Julian), as calculated by Annianus of Alexandria in c. 400 AD; thus its first civil year began seven months earlier on 29 August 8 (Julian). Meanwhile, Europeans eventually adopted the calculations made by Dionysius Exiguus in 525 AD instead, which placed the Annunciation exactly 8 years earlier than had Annianus. This causes the Ethiopian year number to be 8 years less than the Gregorian year number from January 1 until September 10 or 11, then 7 years less for the remainder of the Gregorian year.
[WAR: So is 2007 the year we should "party like it's 1999", because it really is?! Will next September usher in the real 2000 and all that that could possibly entail?! And about the heretical "Incarnation" taking place in March - an interesting theory popped into my head Sunday about what day Yahshua was actually conceived. I'm going to "flesh" it out, then reveal it on that day in a few weeks.]
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