southeastern europe

The Nicosia buffer zone. A wound in the midst of Cyprus Saying that the story of Cyprus is a story of missed opportunities may be a clich é but could not be truer today.  The rejection of the Annan plan by the Greek-Cypriot electorate back in  2004 undoubtedly damaged the cause of the reunification of the island. The election of Dimitris Christofias to the presidency of the republic in 2008 came too late as Mehmet Ali Talat was facing elections two years later. Both leaders had to face internal challenges. For a start, mending the wounds that the bitter 'anti Annan plan' campaign in the south had inflicted upon the cause of a united Cyprus required time and determination, both of which were in short supply. Talat had to counter the criticisms of an ascendant pro-independence  National Unity Party  and its leader Derviş Eroğlu who by 2009 was cohabiting with him as prime minister and in 2010 moved to the presidency of the TRNC. Christofias, despite his pro-reu...

The Name Issue Revisited, an Anthology of Academic Articles  is finally now out. Part I: The Name Issue in the Context  of International Law Matthew CR Craven – What’s in a Name? The Republic of Macedonia  and Issues of Statehood............................................................................... 17 Jean-Pierre Queneudec – The Name and Symbols of the State  in International Law....................................................................................55 Larry Reimer – Macedonia: Cultural Right or Cultural Appropriation?..................... 61 Carlos Flores Juberías – Putting the Name Issue in a Comparative Perspective ..........79 Jana Lozanoska – The True Substance of the Name Issue: Consequences  of an Invented Dispute for the Republic of Macedonia...............................95 Budislav Vukas – The 1995 Interim Accord and Membership of the  Republic of Macedonia in International Organizations................................

On 31 January the BBC News website focused on a fresco in the Church of the Resurrection in Podgorica that depicted hell. Within a vivid red inferno and in the company of biblical figures that have been condemned to burn in hell, one can see figures bearing a resemblance to an ageless Josip Broz Tito (or Michael Caine cast to impersonate him), Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels and, behind them barely discernible, Lenin and Stalin. The anonymous artist assumed that propagating and 'implementing' communism was a deadly sin but carefully steered away from any similar judgments as far as the opportunistic nationalism that traumatized the societies of former Yugoslavia are concerned. So no Milosevic, Bulatovic, Karadzic or Mladic are discernible in the political hell featured in the walls of the Church of the Resurrection, perhaps while the verdicts on their genocide indictments are pending ...     A church in Montenegro has sparked controversy by displaying a fresco depic...