As if the ride wasn’t getting bumpy enough for French President Nicolas Sarkozy, the major transportation unions just announced their intention to strike next Thursday. Trains, subways and airports will all be effected nationwide. The pretext is to protest the government’s efforts to lengthen the contribution for full pension benefits from 40 to 41 years for transport workers. But I think it’s also safe to say that the unions are taking advantage of Sarkozy’s present weakness to try to redefine the balance of power resulting from last fall’s transport strike. That weeklong shutdown took place while Sarkozy was at the [...]
Through a combination of procedural clumsiness, personal ambition and institutional pride, the parliamentary majority of French President Nicolas Sarkozy has mounted something of a protest over the past few days. At issue is both the relationship of the government to its majority, and the functioning of the UMP party. Parliament members complain of inaccessible ministers and the imposition of unpopular legislation without deputies’ input. One prominent UMP figure attacked the party’s “Brezhnevian” direction. (French-language links.) So far, the legislative victims of the parliamentary rebellion have been a law on OGM’s and a constitutional amendment that would have bypassed popular referenda [...]
When it emerged in mid-March that the perpetrator of a deadly suicide attack on American troops in Afghanistan had come from Germany, the American media showed remarkably little interest. On March 3, 28-year-old Cüneyt Ciftci from Ansbach in Bavaria drove a pick-up loaded with several tons of explosives into a guard post in Khost province in southeastern Afghanistan and then detonated his payload while still inside the truck. According to U.S. Army and Afghan sources, two American soldiers and two Afghans were killed in the attack and another seven persons, including four soldiers, were wounded. The Islamic Jihad Union (IJU), [...]
