Timpul, 29 November 2010
"Moldova has defeated communism." So ran Timpul's front page a few hours after this weekend’s general election, with exit polls showing a clear majority for the AIE – Alliance for European Integration. However, with almost all votes counted, and with its main rival the Communist party on 44 seats, the AIE, at 57 seats, has failed to obtain the 61 needed to elect the next Moldovan president and put an end to the instability that has plagued the country over the last year. According to Timpul, there are two possible scenarios that could break the deadlock: "a betrayal" by the country’s Liberal Democratic Party, whose 31 MPs may quit the AEI to join forces with the communists, or yet another election.
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.