Free Republic

Germany’s Angela Merkel has said Ukraine is free to “go to” Russia’s “Eurasian Union”, amid signs of a new willingness to make peace with Russian leader Vladimir Putin. Speaking to German public broadcaster ARD on Sunday (24 August), the German chancellor said her visit to Kiev on Saturday was designed to prepare for peace talks between Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko and Putin in Minsk on Tuesday, but warned the public not to expect a “breakthrough”. She mentioned Ukrainian “decentralization”, a deal on gas prices, and Ukraine’s “trade relations” with Russia as elements that could bring about an accord. “And if...

Romanian Court is going to try the appeal filed by the Bulgarian national Petar Zikulov, who is charged with espionage, Sofia News Agency reports. Zikulov is currently detained for 29 days, the maximum period under Romanian law. Zikulov and Floricel Achim, a Romanian warrant officer, were arrested in Bucharest on March 2, on charges of espionage and treason. They have been accused of leaking military secrets to a third country that was not an EU and NATO member.

While certainly a perplexing holiday to many outside America, Thanksgiving's meaning isn't always clear to those stateside, either. I'll leave the history lessons to California Conservative, except to say it certainly is a major day around this neck of the woods. Can it partly be seen, however, as a day to reflect on that uniquely American way of overcoming life's obstacles? This week, I was interviewed for an entertainment industry trade publication, where I happened to mention two former coaches as influences. In the online article that appeared, there were links added to their own stories, that make this point...

WARSAW -- In Mitteleuropa, the roles have reversed. The boring, steady Germans last Sunday opted for political chaos by failing to elect a government. A week later, the passionate but messy Poles expressed no ambivalence in picking a clean slate of leaders. Polish former communists were chucked out after a single term, keeping alive a losing streak for incumbents dating back to the birth of democratic Poland. The fresh Polish twist is found in the victor's camp. Two conservative parties built a majority around the very ideas that Angela Merkel and her center-right allies failed to sell Germans on. Law...

TBILISI, Georgia -- For 60 years the word "Yalta" has meant betrayal and abandonment. The diplomatic accord reached between Britain, the Soviet Union and the United States in that sleepy Black Sea resort relegated millions of people to a ruthless tyranny. As President Bush said last week in Latvia: "The agreement at Yalta followed in the unjust tradition of Munich and the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. Once again, when powerful governments negotiated, the freedom of small nations was somehow expendable." Thankfully, the division of Europe created at Yalta, and the Iron Curtain that marked its boundary, are ghosts in our past. The...

RIGA, Latvia -- As the president of a country that suffered immensely under Soviet and Nazi rule, I recently faced a dilemma. I had to decide whether to accept an invitation from Russian President Vladimir Putin to attend a rally in Moscow on Monday. That is the date when Russia traditionally celebrates its military victory over Nazi Germany, and this year is particularly significant, as it marks the 60th anniversary of the end of World War II in Europe. Numerous heads of state and government, including George W. Bush, Jacques Chirac, Gerhard Schroeder and Silvio Berlusconi, had already said they...

Communism is the deadliest fantasy in human history (but does anyone care?)In January of this year the late Michael Kelly, who was a Washington Post columnist as well as the editor-at-large of this magazine, decried in the Post the fact that antiwar marches in Washington, DC, and San Francisco were sponsored by an organization, called International ANSWER, that is "a front group for the communist Workers World Party," which is, "literally, a Stalinist organization." As he was sometimes known to do, Kelly worked up a bit of dudgeon: "The left marches with those who would maintain in power the leading...