Europe

His fundamental decency led him to let the entire Soviet system go, sacrificing his own political future and lifelong beliefs in the process, rather than attempting to preserve them by doing harm

The Catalonian crisis has put Europe, as well as Spain, in jeopardy, says PAUL KNOTT. The EU has been getting itself back on track recently after a series of crises. That comeback could be derailed again by the dramatic events in Catalonia. The Spanish government’s attempt to block the referendum on Catalan independence by force […]

The Danish island of Fanø was bypassed by the conflicts of the 20th century, yet remains marked forever by them. JAMES RODGERS visits and finds a European backwater with a lesson for Brexiteers The lone white headstone stands out. Nearby, in the tiny cemetery, lie farmers and fishermen who worked the land, faced the North […]

ADRIAN BURNHAM visits the Norwegian city of Stavanger, home of one of the world’s greatest street art festivals, where even the surrounding fjords become a gallery I need to get my eyes tested. I thought I’d just seen Igor Ponosov’s work Too Far, Too Close (2017) at the brilliant Rise Up! Exhibition. I was chuckling […]

In recent decades, Germany has shied away from being too assertive in its foreign policy. But growing global uncertainties mean that – regardless of Sunday’s election result – that is changing. Policy expert EMILY MANSFIELD analyses exactly where the country (and by extension the EU) is heading German foreign policy is currently in a transitional […]

Angela Merkel may be on course for victory but her campaign for the German chancellorship is not the stately procession it might seem from afar. TONY PATERSON joins her on a decidedly bumpy election trail Earlier this year the twin political earthquakes of Brexit and Donald Trump prompted shaken Europeans to dub her the last […]

A refusal to confront its past leaves France facing an uncertain future, argues MARTIN EVANS All countries have difficult chapters from their past, which continue to cast a shadow on the present. For France, the Vichy period certainly fits into that category. But, as the country has lately been considering, its colonial past is every […]