Headlining with “Result after 207 days: NOTHING,” De Morgen deplores the ongoing political stalemate in Belgium. On 5 January, two Flemish parties, the nationalist N-VA and the Christian-democratic CD&V, rejected the proposal for institutional reform presented the official mediator Johan Vande Lanotte. As a result, 207 days after the 2010 general election, Belgium will remain without a government. The warring Flemish and Francophone parties “are like two clans of cowboys shaping up for a battle over an abandoned village,” writes the Flemish daily. In the absence of an agreement, negotiations will remain in deadlock, remarks De Morgen, which wonders if new elections should be organised, or if the country should establish an emergency government.
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.