For the first time, Moscow’s Red Square saw the presence of NATO troops, with WWII allies France, United States and the United Kingdom forming guards of honour during a military parade to commemorate the 1945 victory over Nazi Germany. România libera notes a number of high profile absentees, including Prince Charles and Joe Biden, the former because of the United Kingdom’s refusal to extradite vociferous Kremlin critic Boris Berezovsky, who is charged with embezzlement at home, and the US vice-president for enjoying warm relations with Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili.
For Warsaw daily Gazeta Wyborcza, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev delivered “a soft-spoken speech that indicated openness to the world”, underlined by the surprise inclusion of EU anthem “Ode to Joy” at the end of the parade. Polish-Russian relations were further strengthened with President Medvedev handing to his Polish counterpart Bronisław Komorowski another package of files concerning the 1940 Katyń Massacre and an engagement to solve the problem of rehabilitation of the Polish officers murdered there.
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.