"Historic" and "unprecedented" – court proceedings in the Clearstream affair, which opened today in Paris, have been greeted with a full battery of superlatives in the French press. Given that the case focuses on a civil action filed on behalf of the current French president, Nicolas Sarkozy, against former president Jacques Chirac and former prime minister Dominique de Villepin, "unprecedented" may indeed be the right word. Over the next month, the court will rule on Villepin's level of involvement in a plot to destabilize the Sarkozy presidential campaign in 2004-2005. The former prime minister is suspected of attempting to weaken his rival of the period by adding Sarkozy's name to a faked listing of secret account holders in the Luxembourg clearing house Clearstream.
For Libération, the main question for the court will be: "Who faked the clearing house documents?" The editorial in the daily further argues that the hearings are vital "to the health of French democracy, which must uncover the truth (…) If that is not possible, the public will once again conclude that the courts and the political system are irredeemably tainted by "the stink of corruption."
The leader of Greece’s leftist alliance SYRIZA is the new bright hope of Greek politics. Steering a course between pragmatism and the rhetoric of class warfare, he has unsettled Berlin, and not just those who back Angela Merkel's austerity policies. 
Europe’s economic woes have forced us to try to understand the secret Olympian world of global finance. But now that we pay more attention to bond yields and stability mechanisms, isn’t it clear that the experts up on their lofty peaks don’t know what’s going on either? 
This year’s Eurovision Song Contest is hosted by Azerbaijan, a country that is far from being a model democracy. An Estonian journalist takes a critical look at the deferential treatment enjoyed by the regime in Baku.