The formation of a European army has been seen as an objective to be realised by some Member States, such as France and Germany, though others disregard this project as being unnecessary. In a changing world order where long-time allies are not as trustworthy as they used to be, achieving military independence represents a key factor to guarantee the security of the bloc.
If COVID-19 will abate in the next weeks and months, then everyone will certainly be tempted to review the past months, to analyze the events and to draw conclusions for the future. This will also apply to the EU – the “Europe Day” is the appropriate moment to come forward with three main points.
Kurz is creating an Us (Eastern bloc plus Austria) vs. Them (western states like France, Germany) in the EU in his fight for the solidarity clause that should allow for a fairer distribution of vaccine doses to deprivileged countries. The problem: his own country is not actually suffering as much as others. With a vaccine progress of around 15.4% having received the first shot, Austria fares better than Germany, currently at 12.9%, and lies above EU average. So why is he doing this? And what exactly is happening anyway?
In 2020, 409 women were killed in Turkey and dozens of other women were found dead under suspicious circumstances. Since the beginning of this year , already 77 women have suffered the same fate – an unfortunate trend that most probably will continue throughout the upcoming months. These numbers should make everyone queasy, though apparently, they do not have the same effect on Erdogan and his political allies.
On the 25th of June 2018, Bloomberg News published an article which they dubbed “The Big Brexit Short”. In this article, journalists Cam Simpson, Gavin Finch, and Kit Chellel published the results of their investigation into the role private polling companies and hedge funds played in the Brexit referendum of the 23 of June 2016. Private polls, they found, correctly predicted the outcome of the referendum and were used by hedge funds to profit from the collapse of the British Pound.
