I live to this day as well...

Grigory Pasko, journalist

Instead of an epigraph: «Endpiece of a modern fairytale: «And had the not been rehabilitated, they live to this day as well» -- Jerzy Lec

Если Вы хотите прочитать оригинал данной статьи на русском языке, нажмите сюда.It goes without saying that I am disappointed by the decision of the European Court of Human Rights. But no more than that. The ECHR decision in any case is belated and doesn't change anything in my life. Much worse is that this decision, in essence, is a spit into the souls of thousands of people: both those who are still waiting for positive decisions with respect ...

This press release comes from the website of the Greens of the European Free Alliance on the European Parliament:

The murder of Andrei Kulagin, activist for human rights organisation Spravedlivost (Justice), has been announced by authorities more than two months after his disappearance and almost two weeks after his body was found. Rebecca Harms, President of the Greens/EFA Group in the European parliament and Finnish Green MEP Heidi Hautala, the EP's newly appointed EP human rights subcommittee chair, commented:"Greens are shocked and saddened by the death of Andrei Kulagin and we extend our condolences to all who were close to him.

"This murder exposes the extent of the dangers faced by people who stand up for human rights in Russia. It is unacceptable that brave people who defend the basic rights of others

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Just saw this one at EurActiv.  It might be a problem when a government is asked twice in just one week to show that it is interested in investigating the murders of two separate human rights advocates.

The president of the European Parliament Jerzy Buzek called on 23 July for Russian authorities to bring the killers of human rights activist Andrei Kulagin to justice. 

Kulagin disappeared two months ago and officials were quoted by Russian media on Wednesday as saying his body had been found in a quarry on 10 July. He led the local branch of Spravedlivost (Justice), a rights organisation in the Karelia, around 1,000 km (620 miles) north of Moscow. 

Buzek said those responsible for the murder must be brought to justice. 

"I would like to [...] insist upon an impartial and credible investigation conducted by the Russian authorities," Buzek said in a statement. 

"The international community cannot allow

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by Manuel Alvarez-Rivera, Puerto Ricobr /br /Bulgaria will be having a new government after President Georgi Purvanov formally asked Sofia mayor Boyko Borisov to form a cabinet on Thursday, July 16. Voters in the Southeastern European nation gave a clear victory to Borisov's right-of-center Citizens for European Development of Bulgaria (GERB) in a parliamentary election held last July 5. While the election to choose members of the Bulgaria's unicameral Parliament, the National Assembly, was the country's second vote in less than a month - last June Bulgarians elected their representatives in the European Parliament - the parliamentary poll nonetheless had a 60.9% voter turnout rate, up from 55.8% in 2005.br /br /Bulgaria's general election - the seventh since the country peacefully moved away from single-party Communist rule in 1989-90 - was held under a new electoral system which established 31 single-member seats, chosen by plurality voting. First-past-the-post seats were ostensibly ...

I should of course extend an apology to my readers for not posting more in a week when Macro Man has been speaking of a "catalyst" and when both the Fed and the ECB made important announcements (although I am not so sure what the Fed really changed, if anything). However, I too am a slave of the real world and one important customer at the small shop I am working in suddenly wanted a whole lot of stuff done, all in a horrible hurry, so I have been desked all week.

So sitting here on a Thursday evening thinking about whether I could wring out something interesting about this week's events it suddenly dawned on me. I don't have to, the Economist has already done it for me by fielding a survey on ageing populations in their latest print edition.

Here are the articles;

A slow-burning

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Another Treasury auction today…  Spending habits come back to haunt reps…  Some healing in the currencies…  10 Banks to repay TARP today… And Now… Today’s Pfennig! Good day… And a Terrific Tuesday to you! Well… I sure stirred up the hornet’s nest yesterday… Some people didn’t think I should express my opinion… But that’s OK… Here’s the skinny… I wrote yesterday about the farce that the jobs report was, and what a feeble job the media did in reporting the “real numbers”… I then threw something in the Pfennig that I don’t normally do, just to see what was more important to people… The fact that their Gov’t lies to them, or the fact that they don’t see eye-to-eye with me on the President…

Given the response, I’d say that most had their eye on the ball with the jobs farce… And that’s all I’m going to say from here on out…

One person did ask

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by Manuel Alvarez-Rivera, Puerto Ricobr /br /An election is currently taking place in the 27 member countries of the European Union, to choose 736 members of the European Parliament for a term of five years. Some countries went to the polls on June 4, 5 and 6, but most are holding the election on Sunday, June 7. In addition, one of the smallest members of the EU, the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, will hold a parliamentary election simultaneously with the EP poll.br /br /The European Parliament a href="http://www.europarl.europa.eu/elections2009/default.htm"2009 elections website/a bills the event as "27 countries, one election," but it would be more appropriate to speak about 27 separate elections that happen to be held simultaneously across a four-day period. Even though all EU countries use proportional representation to allocate EP seats since 1999 (when Great Britain proper switched from first-past-the-post to PR), the rules vary from country to country, ...

On the eve of the recent visit of Vladimir Putin to Helsinki, a presentation of my film about the Nord Stream gas pipeline took place there in the parliament of Finland. The crowd wasn't very large - maybe 30 people.  However among the small audience was one of Nord Stream's top representative in Finland, Sebastian Sass. Young, energetic, and self-assured to the point of cockiness, Sebastian had previously been an assistant to the former Prime Minister of Finland Paavo Lipponen.  Lipponen, as our readers are aware, is the second head of state to leave politics and end up employed (indirectly) by the Russian government.  His duties include serving as the main interlocutor between the pipeline project and the Finnish government, "in order

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TODAY: No resolution at EU-Russia summit; Putin warns against outside interference in dealings with Ukraine; Lavrov encourages dialogue with Hamas; Kremlin concerned by OSCE appointment; the activities of Patriarch KirillReuters reports that Russia's ambassador to the UN has announced that the Security Council will hold an emergency meeting to discuss North Korea's underground nuclear missile test, about which Russia has concerns.  According to the Times, relations between the EU and Russia have 'worsened' as a lack of agreement on major issues blighted the end of their summit.  The Financial Times examines why the ice in Khabarovsk refused to melt.  Paraphrasing Kremlin patriot Anton Denikin whilst visiting his grave, Prime Minister Putin has warned against intervention in Russia-Ukraine relations as ...

Gold did practically nothing from the time Globex trading opened in the Far East on Thursday morning, until noon in London [7:00 a.m. in New York]. From there, and until about a half hour after the Comex open, gold tacked on about $12 in two quick spikes.

However, what little gains there were, evaporated by the close of New York electronic trading at 5:15 p.m. yesterday afternoon.

click to enlarge

Silver didn’t show much activity until 3:00 p.m. in Hong Kong yesterday afternoon. From there, it was an eleven-hour battle for it to add about 35 cents to the price…with the peak coming during lunch time in New York. From there it got sold off hard…and in the next four hours all these gains disappeared as well. One might have thought that there was some sort of prize for

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