International

‘A scandalous strategy from Foreign Minister Uri Rosenthal’ was how SP Member of Parliament reacted to the announcement that the government had sought to conceal the sale of tanks to Indonesia from the national Parliament. According to national daily De Telegraaf, Rosenthal wanted to reveal the tank deal only at the moment that the government had successfully negotiated an accord with other parties to enable budget cuts to go through, the so-called Catshuis Agreement, named for the Prime Minister’s official residence, where it was signed. The hope was that the announcement of the agreement would distract any possible attention away from the sale of the tanks. As Van Dijk says, ‘this is a well-known trick of lying politicians. Bring bad news out when the country is busy with other matters. We deserve an apology for this devious way of going about things.’

After two appallingly bad elections, Russia must conduct a rapid and thorough reform of its electoral system. Membership of the Council of Europe means that this biggest of member states has a duty to do so. Unprecedented mass protest in Russia has set the first changes in motion, but only if Russia carries out still further structural reforms will fair elections become possible. These were the conclusions drawn by SP Senator Tiny Kox, Rapporteur on the Russian elections for the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, whose report, presented this week in Strasbourg, won support from across Europe for its conclusions and recommendations, including from the Russian parliament, the Duma, itself.