Founded in May 1976, six months after Franco’s death, The Country is a national institution, Spain’s top-selling news daily and rated one of the world’s twenty best newspapers. Closely linked to the PSOE, the Spanish Socialist Party, it belongs to the PRISA communication group.
Tabloid format, spacious lay-out, British-inspired journalistic style, excellent international coverage, prestigious contributors are the main ingredients for this outstanding newspaper.
With approximately 5.6 million individual hits for the month June 2007, El Pais is a close second to El Mundo as Spain’s most visited news website. An increase in online services (blogs, forums, chats) may bridge the gap. Unlike its eternal rival, all content from the print edition is free online.
When presseurop.eu was launched in May last year, one of its guiding mottos was Umberto Eco’s “The future of Europe is translation.” But sometimes I’m inclined to think that the future of Europe is lost in translation. I recently checked a statement by Angela Merkel concerning the CD-rom nabbed by HSBC supergrass Hervé Falciani containing data on Germans who have siphoned off their money to Switzerland in order to avoid taxes back home.
I was on the France 24 World This Week debate with John Vinocur from the IHT, Judah Grunstein of World Politics Review, who wrote this blog on the discussion, and Pierre Rousselin from Le Figaro.