EUROPE: Something’s Rotten in the State of Hungary

With Hungarian right-wing extremists looking increasingly active, many are concerned that shots fired against the police headquarters in Budapest were just a warning of things to come.

RIGHTS: Serbia Held Not Guilty of Genocide

The International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled Monday that Serbia was not guilty of genocide in neighbouring Bosnia.

CZECH REPUBLIC: Europe Better Listen

The rise to power of the right-wing Civic Democrats has returned the Czech Republic to a eurosceptic and Atlanticist path, even at the expense of public feelings. The opposition says the country risks political isolation in Europe.

ITALY: Government in Crisis, Again

The Italian government is in crisis after it failed to win a vote Wednesday on its foreign policy programme. Although the ruling centre-left coalition held only a very slight majority in the Senate, the defeat of the motion came as a major surprise to Prime Minister Romano Prodi.

MOLDOVA: Waiting for Kosovo and the EU

Wishing to emulate Kosovo's example, the Moldovan breakaway region of Transnistria is increasingly rejecting the prospect of a unified state, just as the European Union (EU) begins to step in.

BALKANS: Serbs Want to Hand Kosovo an Independence Invoice

As the Albanian-dominated southern Serb province Kosovo inches towards independence, nationalist Serbs are raising an economic obstacle to back the political resistance to independence - an accounting of the money spent to develop Kosovo all these years.

EUROPE: Opposition to U.S. Base Rises

The arguments put forward by the United States to justify its project for a missile defence base in Eastern Europe are becoming less and less convincing to public opinion and experts of the countries involved.

ROMANIA: A European Home to Hepatitis

About two million of Romania’s 22 million people are carrying some form of hepatitis, in the highest infection rates in Europe.

ARTS: Berlin Revisits a Singer’s Story

Protest singer Dean Reed's concerts were foot-stomping sell-outs from Santiago to Baghdad, Warsaw to Helsinki in the 1960s and '70s. But in later years, with his career in decline, his marriage shaky and little prospect of work if he returned to the United States, the despairing Denver-born crooner, who had settled in communist East Berlin in the Cold War years, drove his car to a lake and drowned himself.

CORRUPTION: Bulgaria Begins a Brave Fight

Still "on probation" from Brussels, Bulgaria is taking bold steps to persuade the European Union that it is efficient in getting rid of corruption and organised crime.

ENVIRONMENT: Germany Putting More Wind Into Energy

Germany is blowing more wind into energy with the setting up of new offshore facilities. Germany already has the world's largest installed capacity for wind energy.

BALKANS: Serbia Introduces Mental Health Strategy

Serbia is to implement a 10-year plan to improve mental health that declined for many in recent years of harsh isolation and transition into a market economy.

HUNGARY: Fears of Riots Re-Emerge

By pulling down the barriers that protected the national parliament from possible protests, 150 deputies from the Hungarian right-wing opposition Fidesz warned the government just how tense Hungarian society remains.

PORTUGAL: Legal Abortion After Decades of Struggle

It took more than three decades of struggle by activists for Portugal to give the green light, via referendum, to parliament to make the country's strict anti-abortion law more flexible.

UKRAINE: EU Begins to Look Invitingly

A constant dispute between the liberal President and the 'pro-Russian' Prime Minister over foreign policy has not prevented the European Union (EU) from upgrading its partnership with Ukraine. But nobody dares to mention membership just yet.

GREECE: Unemployment Higher Than the Figure

Unemployment figures have fallen in Greece but unemployment has not, union leaders and researchers say.

PORTUGAL: Graphic Leaflets Backfire on Anti-Abortionists

Just when those in favour of legalising abortion in Portugal were faltering in the polls, a hair-raising campaign against voluntary termination of pregnancy could backfire against the anti-abortion cause, instead of winning over more supporters.

ROMANIA: How Bleak Is My Valley

Petrosani, a town of about 50,000, presents a stark picture today of what the abrupt replacement of state socialism by unbridled capitalism can do.

CLIMATE CHANGE: One Step Forward, Two Steps Back

The causes of global warming have been established firmly by world scientists, and the solutions set out. The question now is, who will implement these solutions.

BALKANS: Kosovo Stranded Between Serbia and Independence

The long awaited United Nations proposal on the status of the southern Serbian province Kosovo takes it towards independence, but not all the way.

CLIMATE CHANGE: Europe’s Endangered Ski Resorts

Ski lovers in Europe are joining the list of those hurt by global climate change. This year the northern hemisphere winter is seeing moderate temperatures and little snowfall - and is looking more like springtime.