European Union

All of a sudden Russia seems to be keen to perform symbolic moves. By acknowledging the independence of Southern Ossetia and Abkhazia from Georgia they did not change anything, in practice. They simply gave the western media something to talk about. In practice nothing changed, the Russians tanks are where they were, they did not get a square millimetre more than what they already had. So why did they do it?

I rarely read fiction. Well, Philip K. Dick is an exception, but I guess all rules need several exceptions to become proper rules, don't they? So it's not a wonder that a book I was given as a present remained on my shelf for a full year before I opened it. But when I did open it I literally fell into it. And in love with it. It looks like there ARE good writers in contemporary Europe, after all.

The EU offered its role as a mediator in the Caucasian crisis. The French, in particular, are having an extremely active moment. Since their occupation of Odessa during the Soviet Revolution this is probably the most active Russian period of my good French cousins. One can be quite skeptkical of the possible results, yet at least someone DID something, instead of just taking sides and betting money on who will kick who, while the dead count keeps rising.

I previously wrote that I suspected Italy to be involved in the merge between Gazprom and the EU. The answer to my question marks just appeared on the New Yok Times. So that was a correct guess. There really appear to be two parties within NATO, one of which has interests that are totally diverging from the American interests. This game is getting interesting... let's see what happens :)