Russian figure-skater Evgeni Plushenko tours Slovakia
14.3.2008 - Anca Dragu

Evgeni Plushenko of Russia, the four-times world champion figures skater won his first Olympic Gold Medal at the 2006 Winter Olympics. He then decided to take a break from competitive skating to rest and recover from past knee injuries. In April last year, however, Plushenko announced he would return to the ice to compete in the 2010 Olympics to be held in Vancouver in Canada. Meanwhile he keeps on doing his exhibition show called King of Ice. Two shows are scheduled for Bratislava and Kosice in Slovakia in April. He's been speaking to Slovak media.

“Yes, I am coming back to competitive skating though many do not believe I can make it. Fortunatelly my injuries are a thing of the past. I train every day in the morning and in the evening when I jump quadruple toe loop-triple toe loops. I also train steps and these are normal training sessions as I had during competitive seasons. My friend, the ice hockey player Alexei Zhamnov, he was captain of the Chicago Blackhawks and won three Olympic medals: gold, silver and bronze. Now I have gold from Torino and silver from Salt Lake City so I miss a bronze medal. Now you see why I should go to Vancouver in 2010. I am joking of course. My goal is to become an Olympic Champion for the second time.”

The 25 year old Plushenko has been very fond of his exhibition show where he hosts plenty of world class ice skaters such as fellow Russian Irina Slutskaya who is a seven time European Champion, two time World Champion and the holder of two Olympic medals, also the French skater Surya Bonali who is the only skater in the world to do a backflip landed on only one blade.

“These shows are good for skaters because they can practice some elementsof their routine such as different types of jumps during exhibitions and then use them in their long or short programmes in competitions. Then younger skaters can learn a lot by taking part in them. I plan to have some Slovak and Czech skaters on ice during my upcoming shows in Slovakia and the Czech republic.”

Plushenko has another reason to love these exhibition shows.

“To me ice skating is theatre, it’s a show, it’s not a sport…even in competition, it’s closer to performing arts.”

But back to competitive ice skating, Plushenko likes to quote his coach for 14 years Alexei Mishin who said..

“The desired result should be your main task. In sport there is only one such result – victory'. Currently the competition is very strong in figure skating. The Japanese, the Americans, the Canadians, even the Czechs have very good athletes. But I believe that if I am in good form then I manage to face their competition. Our discipline has changed a lot if I have to compare it with seven-eight years ago when I was competing with Alexei Yagudin and it was enough to jump two quadruple toe loops to win. Nowadays skaters come and jump triple toe loops and win the short programmes. I don’t find it fair when people who make three mistakes manage to be in the top three and then our Russian skater Voronov comes and has a clean short programme with a quadruple toe loop but doesn’t manage to get into the top three. Where is figure skating going? Its going backwards instead of forwards.”

Coach Alexei Mishin has described Plushenko’s skating to the writings of Shakespeare. And if you are in Bratislava or Kosice in mid-April then you can come and judge Mishin’s statement with your own eyes.

Poland's PM gets US reassurances on military upgrade
14.3.2008 - Michal Kubicki

The Polish government has been given assurances by the United States that it will help modernize the Polish army as part of a deal on locating a missile defense shield on Polish territory. This at least is part of the outcome of a visit to Washington last week by Prime Minister Donald Tusk. The visit described, even by some opposition politicians in Poland, as the government's "moderate success".

While the United States and the Czech Republic are putting the finishing touches to an agreement, Polish-US negotiations on hosting ten interceptor missile silos have dragged on and on. The four-months-old government of Donald Tusk seems to have adopted a tougher stand than its predecessor and Tusk made it clear to President Bush that Poland was ready to strike a deal only if it would really make Poland ‘safer’.

‘In our view, US installations in Poland without a modernization of the Polish armed forces and political guarantees of security would not make Poland safer. Our stand has met with approval.’

President George Bush pledged to draw a plan to help Poland upgrade its military before the end of his term.

‘The United States recognizes the need for Polish forces to be modernized. It’s important for our allies when they’re worried about the modernization of their forces that their friends respond and we are responding. Mr Prime Minister, before my watch is over we will have assessed these needs and come up with a modernization plan that’s concrete and tangible.’

No details have been given but it is believed that the stress will be put on upgrading Poland’s air defenses. According to political analyst Lukasz Warzecha of the daily Fakt, it is crucial that the US offer and Poland’s commitment to host the defense shield are part of the same package.

‘The most important thing is whether we have two agreements which will be closely tied together or whether we’ll have two separate agreements. As I understand there is now a consensus between the Washington administration and the Warsaw government that the modernization agreement and the missile shield agreement will be closely tied together. We’ll have something in exchange for something’.

President Lech Kaczynski, who met the prime minister before he went to Washington, is a staunch advocate of a close alliance with the United States. The outcome of the visit seems to be to the president’s liking. Head of his chancellery Anna Fotyga:

‘We favour an American presence in this part of Europe. It means stabilization and is a kind of equilibrium in our security. The President would like to see a part of the missile shield installation in Poland.’

It is surely a good thing that during his talks in Washington Mr Tusk spelled out Polish conditions and expectations in very clear terms. Most Polish analysts stress, however, that with the presidential elections in the United States later this year the final outcome of the Polish-US negotiations on the missile shield cannot be predicted.

Austria remembers the 70th anniversary of the "Anschluss"
14.3.2008 - Genie Johnson

Thousands of people gathered in Vienna's Heldenplatz on Wednesday night to mark the 70th anniversary of the Anschluss - the annexation of Austria into Hitler's Third Reich. It was called the "night of silence".

The jubilation 70 years earlier for Adolf Hitler was, on this night, replaced by quiet contemplation. 80 thousand candles burned - recalling the 80 thousand Austrians murdered by the Nazis. It was mostly a young crowd which gathered in small groups talking quietly and arranging their candles in patterns. Here a Star of David -there a peace symbol and several times - "never again" was spelt out. Vienna City's cultural councillor Andreas Mailath-Pokorny told the sombre gathering there should be no forgetting.

"We will forget neither the victims - nor the perpetrators".

The warmest round of applause was for former Social Democrat Chancellor Franz Vranitzky who's 1991 speech on Austrian co-responsibility in the crimes of the holocaust marked a paradigm shift in the debate about whether Austria was a victim of Nazi German or co-responsible. As the crowd gathered on Heldenplatz some of the crowd spoke to Insight Central Europe about their feelings.

"Like, Austria saw itself as being very passive in the Anschluss but the young generation more and more accepts or sees that Austria was quite active in this whole process" said a young woman.

"Austria was of course reponsible for what happened. If you ever look at the place, at the date, 70 years ago - how many people have been here and have been happy that the leader is here "to free them" said a young man.

"I think Austria was very much responsible. We should remember it and learn from that" said another.

Many of Vienna's youth had come to recall the fact that the Nazis banned all but their own youth groups. But here and there among the crowd were elderly, some with tears in their eyes. Some had witnessed the events of 70 years ago and some had lost loved ones to the murderous regime. After the speeches most of the crowd disperse but a small group maintained an all-night vigil.

Passport-free travel lets Czechs and Germans get a little closer
14.3.2008 - Rosie Johnston

It is almost three months since the Czech Republic, Poland, Slovakia, Hungary and Slovenia entered the European Union's border free travel zone, known as Schengen. Border checkpoints between the various countries were ceremonially decommissioned and there was a feeling of optimism and excitement about what Schengen might mean. But have things really changed three months into Schengen membership? Radio Prague's Rosie Johnston has been exploring what it means for Czech's by travelling to the Czech-German border.

I’m on a bus, winding my way up the hill towards Potucky, which is a little village on the Czech-German border. It’s in the north west of the Czech Republic, and is apparently a favourite spot for German tourists. So, we’re going to see if that is at all the case, and whether life has changed for inhabitants on both the Czech and the German side of the border three months after the Czech Republic’s entry into the Schengen zone.

Vlastimil Ondra is the deputy mayor of Potucky. He explains to me just quite how popular his town is with its German neighbours:

“On average 2000 German visitors come to Potucky daily. In the winter and at this time of year, maybe the numbers are slightly lower, but in the summer we can have days where up to 15,000 Germans come to visit the town. One of the main attractions for tourists is the market which is run by the Vietnamese people living in this town. The market has brought Potucky a reputation not only in the Czech Republic but also in Germany.”

This shopkeeper has a rather permanent-looking stall in the centre of Potucky. He talks me through his best-selling products. Traditional Czech spa wafers, spirits like Becherovka and cigarettes, he says, all bring in the most money. Business might not be booming this March morning, but then that’s normal for this time of year. In fact, he says, he’s noticed no change in the make-up of his clientele, nor in visitor numbers, since the Czech Republic entered into the Schengen zone three months ago.

But back to the town hall. When the Czech Republic joined its neighbour Germany in the Schengen zone last December, did this spark big changes for Vlastimil Ondra and his colleagues in the local authorities?

“I wouldn’t say that entry into the Schengen zone has really proved to be a defining moment for us. The border crossing between here and Germany was opened in 1991, and it was that which really sparked the boom in tourism. The only thing to have changed is that we no longer check people’s passports at the border. The Germans who used to come shopping here still do, there has been no real change, I’d say.”

But, says Mr Ondra, there is still some need for those on the German side of the border to adapt, and that will take time:

“I think that the only problems are on the German side of the border. Germans are just used to speaking their mother tongue, even with foreigners. Just try and find a restaurant in Johanngeorgenstadt which has a Czech menu, whereas all of the restaurants here have staff who are fluent in German as well as Czech. I think it will take generations for that to change.”

During my visit to the town hall in Potucky, the mayor of the neighbouring German town Johanngeorgenstadt popped over to talk about how people on the German side of the border had reacted to Czechs entering into the Schengen zone. In mayor Holger Hascheck’s view, Germans were skeptical, but three months on, these fears are abating:

“There was a lot of fear about the difference in prices and the difference in wages. People were worried that Czechs would come in and take lower wage jobs in Johanngeorgenstadt, because they could earn slightly more there than they could here. But that didn’t end up being the case.”

And that was the end of my whistle-stop tour of Potucky. It seems that the Czech Republic’s entry into the Schengen zone has had little effect on the day to day life of Potucky’s inhabitants. But it also seems that with increased cross-border communication, attitudes held by those in Potucky towards their German neighbours, and vice-versa, are changing slowly, and for the better.

"Create good" - Slovenia remembers former President and PM Drnovšek
14.3.2008 - Ivana Pristavec

Janez Drnovšek, the former president and prime minister of Slovenia, died last month, after a long battle with cancer. He was 57 years old. He was many things: one of the last presidents of Yugoslavia and one of the first prime ministers of Slovenia. As Ivana Pristavec from Radio Slovenia International reports, he played a major role in shaping the modern Slovenian state.

Janez Drnovšek is widely credited with guiding Slovenia from independence into EU and NATO membership, and taking the country to prosperity.

He was a controversial president, party leader, bestselling author and activist.

He was the president of the leftwing party LDS (Liberal Democrats of Slovenia) before leaving it and founding a new party. He was also prime minister, but eventually left that post to pursue the largely ceremonial duties of president.

Professor of modern history at the University of Ljubljana D. Božo Repe says Drnovšek's reforms had a big impact on Slovenia.

"Regarding economic reforms it is clear that Drnovšek's government, generally speaking, was very successful. This was a period in which Slovenia's economy stabilized, the gross social production began to rise, Slovenia joined some major, not only political but also economic integrations."

But perhaps Drnovšek will be better remembered for the radical personal transformation he underwent in the final decade of his life.

In 2000, after eight years of rule, Drnovšek had reached a crossroads. He was diagnosed with cancer the year before and was already considering leaving poltics. In the same year, he was persuaded to resume the leadership of the LDS party. The party swept to victory in the elections with a record-breaking 36 percent. Drnovšek again formed a coalition but simultaneously started to change his way of life. He became a vegan, and became interested in Hindu and Buddhist spirituality.

Drnovšek's transformation became a great topic of debate among Slovenes. Some derided him as »new age«; others were inspired by a powerful politician who shunned materialism and preached peace.

To this end, he formed the Movement for Justice and Development, which was dedicated to fighting poverty and hunger in Darfur and around the world. His achievements in humanitarian work and compassion towards others were widely praised.

One of the members of the movement for justice and development prof. dr. Stane Pejovnik says, in his last years, Drnovšek was a man with a mission:

"I would like to mention maybe one of his activites, he was certain that poverty is one of the major issues in the world and therefor Dr. Drnovšek spent quite a lot of time in helping Darfur people. He had a clear mission explaining to the people that some things in our life on the planet Earth should be changed and that we all are responsible for the planet".

A few days before his death, Drnovšek posted some of his thoughts online, including one exhortation saying: “We must create good. That gives meaning to our lives.”