Eastern European Politics

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-29115865

The Estonian national abducted/arrested by the Russians (who they accuse of spying) on the border is being denied access to Estonian consul in Russia.

Out of curiosity what makes "Islamic" parties like Bosnia's Party of Democratic Action Islamic? Is it dealing with culture or something else?

I found an interview with Milos Zeman from from August 14th on his opposition to Russian sanctions.

Dealing with culture. It's just a muslim version of a christian democrat party, ideologically speaking.

Sticking "Islamic" in front of your name can mean anything from being an Islamic version of Christian democracy to being full on Islamist. It doesn't necessarily signify anything.

Well those based on the information I have it seems whenever one talks about an Islamist party in Europe the generally seem to fallow the ideology of the Party of Democratic Action. Which is what I'm asking about and as always my information could be wrong but as far as I know it is the general European "Islamic" party.

Russia has reportedly decreased it's bass exports to Poland by 43% This news comes just hours after Poland stated it would provide gas to Ukraine via reverse flow pipelines. Copyed from the Crisis in Ukraine thread.

edit Link Here

edited 11th Sep '14 12:45:12 PM by JackOLantern1337

Could you not copy posts from thread to thread. If it's getting discussed in one thread, it doesn't need to be discussed in another, as it just becomes redundant.

Any news not having to do with Ukraine or Russia?

Like the Speaker of Sejm delaying the ratification of European Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence just before she got nominated for the new Prime Minister of Poland? This reeks of two things, namely the disgusting ideological domination of the Catholic Church over here (as it was the Church who started kicking up shit and attacking LGBT community under the pretense of the Convention "propagating genderist ideology" to drown out the news of a Polish priest and a Polish archbishop getting busted in a pedophilia case in the Dominican Republic, and they haven't stopped since), and making the ratification Someone Else's Problem. If this was a normal country, people would be in arms over it.

But, as the old saying goes, if it's normal, it's not Poland, and if it's Poland, it's not normal. Le fucking sigh.

edited 11th Sep '14 1:39:27 PM by NotSoBadassLongcoat

Speaking of Poland and more specifically their parliament. How often do seats change (as in from person to person) in the Senate?

Hard to tell, as pretty much nobody cares about the Senate. Not the people, not the media, not the senators (aside from the obvious fact that it's better to have a cushy sinecure than not).

@jack- russia exports bass? never knew that

So, Poland has new government. Good thing: the Minister of Justice who picked an Opus Dei member as his deputy is no more. Bad thing: Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski got the boot, and he's been replaced by Grzegorz Schetyna, who has no diplomatic experience whatsoever. I'm suspecting that the fallout from the Waitergate scandal had something to do with it. Same goes for the Interior Minister Bartlomiej Sienkiewicz being replaced.

Oddly, the widely disliked Minister of Health Bartosz Arlukowicz kept his post.

What was that Waitergate scandal about?

Sorry about that I misread that. It seems Waitergate had ministers being illegally recorded in restaurants and it seems the media went nuts over it.

edited 19th Sep '14 6:25:04 PM by Cornelli

Yes, that. Recordings of ministers discussing some things got leaked by the right-wing media and spun into allegations of corruption and abuse of power. All there really was to it was some swearing and bad jokes. Everything else, as it turned out, was completely legit.

But then, it's the right-wing media. Most of what they do is crude propaganda not really rooted in reality.

Sikorski's gone? Shit.

Yes, and the media and political analysts are facepalming en masse.

Worse yet, the new Interior Minister is a former Sunday school teacher. It's like we traded one religious nutjob for another.

edited 20th Sep '14 2:06:55 PM by NotSoBadassLongcoat

A conservative councilwoman from the city of Poznan is outraged after two donkeys from the Poznan zoo started fucking right in front of a school trip.

She demanded that the donkeys be kept in separate cages. And the zoo management complied.

What is this bullshit?!

I suppose she missed her biology classes. Or, alternatively, she's got issues.

edited 24th Sep '14 1:06:58 PM by Quag15

r/polandball hit 100,000 abonentów usług internetowych yesterday - they need new material.

Gay pride parade held in Serbia Noooooo stronk Serbia is of infected with Homosex remove Homosex remove Kebab SERBIA STRONK!!!!!

Here's something interesting. I don't know about countries but in Hungary, there's a law that allows taxpayers to donate 1% of their income tax to civil and public service organizations. A recent investigation found out that in the 2009 fiscal year, 1.1 billion HUF from 177 thousand taxpayers were donated for ragweed extermination^note over fifth of the country's population is allergic to it... of which 642 million the ministry "redistributed to deal with liquidity problems from the small budget". Stuff like severance pay (120 million), farm development program "in accordance with the wishes of the government" (105 million), gene preservation (70 million) and about 247 million was spent on "legally required miscellaneous tasks the budget did not cover".

Of the remaining 483 million, another 20 million was broken off for severance pays. The rest was used to buy office equipment from erasers to photocopiers, computers, laptops, finance public events, pay for the snacks at said events, finance the ministry's daily operational expenses... in short, spent on everything but what that money was intended for by the taxpayers who donated it. Oh, and another ministry used the need of ragweed scouting as excuse for why the leftover of this money was used to buy a Ford Ranger... at the end of October, after the ragweed season.

Oh, and the government was in the process of acquiring 2700 billion HUF from nationalizing all private pension funds at the time this happened. What "small budget"?

Anyone else thinks Hungary needs their own Euromaidan?

If things continue to go downhill like that (alongside Orban's increasing tendencies), Hungary will very likely need it.

Beware of "much needed" Euromoney.