Spain will take over the presidency of the European Union six months from now, in January 2010, but public opinion and political parties are taking little interest in one of the great debates on the table: EU enlargement. In El País, Albert Branchadell, a professor at the Autonomous University of Barcelona, regrets that the issue was "barely discussed" during the latest European election campaigns.
Interviewed by the Madrid daily, Branchadell expressed the opinion that the Socialists, the ruling party, are not speaking on the subject enough, whereas the conservative opposition "is aligned with European ultra-conservatives in their hostility to admitting Turkey." As for the nationalists, "they sin by hypocritical pro-Europeanism." "The subject of enlargement has not been sufficiently pondered in Spain," the academic concluded.
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.