At a time when Donald Trump, the US President of ‘America first’ had just urged his military to leave Syria, the gas attack in Douma, near Damascus seems to change the prospect for Washington abandoning this country to Assad, Putin, Erdogan and the Iranians. Last Saturday, more than 60 people died and about 1000 were […]A new catastrophic phase in the Syrian carnage
April 12, 2018 by Leave a Comment
At a time when Donald Trump, the US President of ‘America first’ had just urged his military to leave Syria, the gas attack in Douma, near Damascus seems to change the prospect for Washington abandoning this country to Assad, Putin, Erdogan and the Iranians. Last Saturday, more than 60 people died and about 1000 were […]Is the advent of nationalism to destroy economic neo-liberalism?
April 5, 2018 by Leave a Comment
All major stock exchanges suffered severe losses on the first day of this week not because Tesla and facebook stocks are falling, or even because the Chinese announced on Sunday night their retaliative import tariffs of 15% to 25% on 128 US products; all that was known and probably discounted for during the past few […]Trump’s trade wars: Aiming at long term gains for America
March 26, 2018 by 1 Comment
Last Friday, President Donald Trump again surprised the world by imposing new import tariffs on Chinese products of a value of $60 billion and deferring the imposition of import super levies on European Union steel and aluminum for 1st May. In the latter case he also postponed the new tariffs for another six exporting countries […]Trump’s trade war splits the EU; Germany upset with Juncker’s “we can be stupid too”
March 19, 2018 by 1 Comment
The US-EU trade war starts on 23 March, with the first shot fired by Washington at 12:01 a.m. (04.01 GMT). From what we know so far, from that minute onward the American customs authorities will impose extra tariffs on steel and aluminum imports, set by President Trump at 25% and 10% respectively. However, it seems […]Permanent structured cooperation (PESCO) on the table of NATO Defense Ministers amid US concerns
February 14, 2018 by Leave a Comment
NATO Defense Ministers are gathered today in Brussels to discuss the modernization of the NATO Command Structure, NATO-EU cooperation, NATO’s defense posture and its role in providing stability and fighting terrorism. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg held a press conference yesterday as a forerunner of the meeting mentioning the issues to be adressed. However, NATO-EU […]A Trumpist squad shook Davos and the world
January 29, 2018 by Leave a Comment
Towards the end of last week, in Davos, a money devaluation war broke out. In the ‘magic’ Alpine mountains American Trumpist dignitaries did what was expected of them: they told the world they don’t give a damn about it…Trump himself, however, appeared a bit less Trumpist than his folk. Overall though, a US administration squad […]Trump reshapes the Middle East at the expenses of Europe
January 25, 2018 by 3 Comments
Trump’s completely unwarranted aggressiveness towards the rest of the world took a violent thrust this week. His vice President Mike Pence speaking at the Israeli parliament, the Knesset, announced a speed-up of the relocation of the US embassy to Jerusalem from Tel Aviv. The move is now to be completed before the end of next […]Czech Babis, Austrian Kurz and others threaten Europe with nationalist populism
October 26, 2017 by Leave a Comment
Andrej Babis, a media magnate and second wealthier Czech leading his anti-immigration, nationalist and populist ANO party, won last Sunday’s election, with around 30% of the vote. He is to become the next Prime Minister of the Czech Republic. Babis did that on an anti-systemic Trump-like ticket. He was recently implicated in a tax fraud […]Trump’s pounding of Iran less harsh than expected, leaves arrangement open
October 16, 2017 by Leave a Comment
Trump did again what he has been good at. This time he pounded the non-nuclear proliferation agreement with Iran. To be reminded, this was the P5+1 nations (US, Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany) agreement of 2015 with Iran , by which the latter country accepted to stop its nuclear program and be duly inspected […]Trump’s Russian affair spills over and upsets Europe
July 27, 2017 by Leave a Comment
The turmoil in the American political system, caused by President Donald Trump’s Russian affair is having spillovers in Europe. Of course, it’s not the first time that Trump and his out of control political ‘inspirations’ instigate trouble for the Old Continent and the rest of the world. This time however, the US Congress prepares new […]Trump badly cornered at home by agribusiness and steel consumer lobbies: Trade
July 17, 2017 by Leave a Comment
Donald Trump, the real estate mogul and TV reality show star, as President, discovered the hard way that international trade is a much more complicated issue than he could have ever imagined. His poor cognitive abilities and his rampant nature didn’t allow him to realize that international trade is a much more complex issue, than […]Trump ‘used’ G20 to side with Putin and split climate and trade packs
July 10, 2017 by Leave a Comment
While protesters were dynamically trying to reach the part of Hamburg where the G20 leaders of the largest economies of the world were gathered, the most powerful politicians of the globe were reduced to the status of viewers, in the Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin spectacle of rapprochement. Trump also ‘used’ the G20 to tell […]Europe to turn the Hamburg G20 Summit into a battlefield
July 3, 2017 by Leave a Comment
This week’s G20 Summit in Hamburg, Germany is expected to become a battlefield from the very first gathering. Chancellor Angela Merkel is to attack the US President Donald Trump, about his rejection of the Paris Climate Agreement. The American will reply with a demand for ‘free and fair trade’ as he ventures it, especially for […]19th EU-China Summit: A historical advance in the Chino-European rapprochement
June 8, 2017 by Leave a Comment
Mainstream media and the two EU Presidents (Donald Tusk of the Council and Jean-Claude Juncker of the Commission), during and after last week’s groundbreaking 19th EU-China Summit (1-2 June), focused on the joint and unreserved pledge of Europe and China to wholeheartedly uphold the Paris Climate Agreement. This was a direct reply to Donald Trump’s […]Trump’s denial of Paris climate agreement; the US Republicans lash out against the world
June 5, 2017 by 1 Comment
Donald Trump’s withdrawal from the UN Paris Climate Agreement is a major foreign policy step, rather difficult to understand. For one thing, the American environmental industry technologically spearheads the world in this domain. The US is a global leader in electric vehicles production, where mainstream vehicles are one of the major contributors to air pollution. […]Trump enrages the Europeans and isolates the US in G7
May 29, 2017 by Leave a Comment
Last Thursday, Donald Trump, at a superb hall in the new glass and steel NATO building in Brussels, delivered an unruly speech, after having pushed aside Prime Minister Dusko Markovic of Montenegro (the related video has become viral) while walking towards the rostrum. He came out with a blatant and derogatory account aimed at 23 […]China dazzles the world with her Silk Road plan to connect, Asia, Europe and Africa
May 14, 2017 by Leave a Comment
More than 30 political leaders and government representatives from 110 countries participate in the Belt and Road Forum China organizes in Beijing on Sunday and Monday 14 and 15 May. The Forum extended an invitation to all the countries of the world, the international organizations and businesses and aspires to be an all inclusive global […]
China invites the EU to a joint endeavor for free trade and order in the world
April 27, 2017 by Leave a Comment
The European Union and China are to hold a summit this June, which is expected to shape their joint answer to the American protectionist and other threats. Last weekend, those threats prevented the Spring Meeting of the IMF to renew its commitment to free trade. The US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin alone blocked it. Before […]Trump’s Syrian hit the softest option vis-a-vis Russia
April 10, 2017 by Leave a Comment
All the major English language media interpreted last week’s US strike of the Syrian air base with Tomahawk missiles, as a serious geostrategic action by Donald Trump carrying messages not only to Russia, but also to North Korea and even China. Nothing is less true than that. This was the least the new US President […]The US + Britain trivialize mainland Europe, NATO and the EU
March 23, 2017 by Leave a Comment
After the insults the German Chancellor Angela Merkel experienced in Washington last week, the Anglo-American duo last Tuesday orchestrated new assaults on mainland Europe. It’s not only the outrageous option of the no-deal Brexit, which gains momentum in London, possibly being encouraged by Washington. It’s also a fact that Britain and the US escalate their […]Trump asked Merkel to pay NATO arrears and cut down exports ignoring the EU
March 20, 2017 by Leave a Comment
The German Chancellor Angela Merkel returns to Berlin with a bill her country must pay to the US. The check was handed over to her personally by the American President Donald Trump last Friday at the White House. In a very clear manner he estimated what Germany owes to NATO, and indirectly to the US. […]May threatens the EU with a wild Brexit indifferent to Scotland, Northern Ireland and the City
March 16, 2017 by Leave a Comment
Late last Tuesday, Theresa May, the British Prime Minister, got the green light from the lower house of the Parliament, the Commons, to trigger and negotiate the Brexit any way she likes. The elected members of Parliament reversed a decision of the upper chamber, the unelected Lords, who had attached two conditions in the law […]Trump’s Russophiles under investigation, Europe remains ‘en garde’
March 6, 2017 by Leave a Comment
Last Friday U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions recused himself from the ongoing FBI probe of the case of the Russian interference in the US Presidential elections favoring Donald Trump. He said “I have recused myself in the matters that deal with the Trump campaign.” Last September, the US intelligence agencies collective, in a joint paper, […]Europe eyes to replace US as China’s prime foreign partner
March 2, 2017 by Leave a Comment
Last Tuesday, Rex Tillerson, the US Secretary of State, received in Washington the top Chinese diplomat Yang Jiechi , in an effort to establish a “regular high-level engagement” with China, after President Donald Trump has practically destroyed the until recently multiple channels of problem solving and interaction between the two super powers. Obviously, Tillerson felt […]Elections in Europe: No risks for the EU, leaders readying to face Trump-Brexit
February 23, 2017 by 1 Comment
Some political analysts in mainland Europe but many more in Britain and on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean in the US, have rushed to call 2017 the year that can make or break the European Union. They basically argue that the three crucial legislative elections due in Holland next month, in France in […]The four top Americans who flew to Europe perplexed things about Trump’s intentions
February 20, 2017 by Leave a Comment
Four top ranking Washington bigwigs – who flew to Munich, Brussels and Bonn to mend fences with Europe, after Donald Trump termed NATO ‘obsolete’ and rejoiced the unraveling of the EU, left the Europeans bewildered with the dangerously diverging stories they had to narrate. Only the extreme right wing, Polish Defense Minister Anton Macierewicz seemed […]Trump stumbles badly on his Russian openings; Europeans wary of Putin
February 16, 2017 by Leave a Comment
In the fourth week of the Trump Presidency things have become more hectic. Those around the boss are now people of authority, and their actions directly affect America and the world. It’s not only that the chief himself changes his mind from one day to the next about crucial global issues, like the ‘one China’ […]Why is Grexit again in the news? Who is to pay for Eurozone’s banking problems?
February 13, 2017 by Leave a Comment
Grexit, Greece’s exit from the euro area, is back in the news – for the wrong reasons. During this past week, the country’s creditors, the European Commission, the European Central Bank, the European Stability Mechanism and the International Monetary Fund, finally agreed amongst themselves to set even tougher conditions in order to continue refinancing the […]US, Russia oblige each other in Syria and Ukraine selling off allies
February 9, 2017 by Leave a Comment
The US – Russia rapprochement, as having been set in motion by the new tenant of the White House, is to be tested first and foremost in Syria and Ukraine. Washington and Moscow support opposing sides in two catastrophic and bloody civil wars, which have claimed hundreds of thousands of lives and thrown millions of […]Europe led by Germany seems vulnerable to Trump’s threats
February 2, 2017 by Leave a Comment
Trump’s America and Europe are obviously at odds. The question is how far this division will go? Unquestionably, it’s the new tenant of the White House who fuels this unseen before confrontation between the Atlantic allies, attached by a time cherished bonding that has politically and economically shaped the world as we know it so […]Syria: A bloody tracer of Trump – Putin rapprochement
January 26, 2017 by Leave a Comment
Despite the dreadful fact that the fighting and the bloodshed continues on many spots on the ground, the Astana agreement for a truce in Syria backed by Russia, Turkey and Iran seems to present a good chance for peace. Last Tuesday, the above three foreign powers and their proxies implicated in the Syrian civil war, […]Draghi repels Trump’s threats, rejects Schauble’s dictums
January 23, 2017 by Leave a Comment
Mario Draghi, the President of the European Central Bank, is under mounting pressures both at home and abroad. From the other side of the Atlantic US President Donald Trump is overtly targeting a much cheaper dollar compared to euro, while at his inaugural speech he clearly praised trade protectionism by saying, “Protection will lead to […]Germany and Europe prepare for Trump’s America
January 16, 2017 by Leave a Comment
Germany, and more generally the EU, is now preparing in earnest to confront the groundbreaking changes in their relations with Trump’s America. Last week, both the German Chancellor Angela Merkel and her Federal minister for Finance Wolfgang Schauble, made direct and indirect statements about the policies now needed for Germany and the European Union. On […]
