Jornal de Negócios, 19 October 2010
“The retirement age for public service workers will be raised to 65 in 2015,” announces Jornal de Negócios. News of the reform schedule comes as a surprise, because “it contradicts an agreement in the framework of the stability and growth pact ironed out in Brussels last March,” notes the business daily. Seeking to combat the public spending deficit, the government was apparently committed to implementing the measure in 2012 or 2013. Now Minister for Finance Teixeira dos Santos argues that “in the context of the austerity measures which have already been established, it won’t have much impact on the budget.” As it stands, Portugal’s civil servants retire at age 62 and a half.
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.