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Does the French media censor itself?

May 7, 2010 19:02Updated May 30, 2010 13:32
PARIS, France — Press reports speculating on the love lives of France’s president and first lady have raised eyebrows for a reason one might not expect: the possibility of government pressure on the press.  Two journalists were fired after a story about the rumors of infidelity by the first couple was removed from the website of the weekly newspaper, Le Journal du Dimanche, which is owned by a friend of President Nicolas Sarkozy.

Belgium unites to ban the burqa

April 29, 2010 17:53Updated May 30, 2010 13:31
BRUSSELS, Belgium — This is a country that currently has no prime minister and no prospect of resolving the bitter political-linguistic breach that caused the cabinet to fall a week ago. But it is well on its way to having a burqa ban.

StreetLife: Le Mans, France — Fast times at Formula One High

April 28, 2010 06:34Updated May 30, 2010 13:31

Traffic citation over full veil turns into polygamy investigation

April 25, 2010 17:09
In record time, the matter of a 31-year-old woman cited for driving while wearing a full veil that leaves only an opening for the eyes has escalated into: a potential investigation of her husband for polygamy and public assistance fraud that could lead to his denaturalization and expulsion; debate over religious obligations versus women’s rights; and a polemic over national identity and the reach of government.

An upside to the chaos and hardship caused by Iceland's volcano

April 19, 2010 09:12
What do volcanic ash and the Gypsy Kings have in common? A Berlin-based colleague who is also an avid opera enthusiast held out hope until the last minute but realized early Friday that she would not be able to travel to Paris for the weekend as planned thanks to the plume of ash gushing out from Iceland's volcano and causing air travel chaos in Europe and beyond.

Trapped in New York while a fruit-starved UK witnesses political history

April 18, 2010 12:44
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NEW YORK — When last we spoke I was girding myself for a few days of travel chaos as I tried to return to my home in London from Boston. Well, I'm still North America and things are getting dicey.

Volcano ash cloud hits airline, shipping, travel industries

April 16, 2010 12:36Updated May 30, 2010 13:29
BRUSSELS, Belgium — Bumping into friends in the neighborhood around the European Union’s headquarters on Friday morning was enough to illustrate the extent of the disruption caused by the volcanic cloud drifting over Europe. There was the United Nations negotiator forced to cancel a trip to Sudan; then the Estonian woman whose diplomat husband was stranded in Moscow; a business writer unable to cover key EU finance talks in Madrid; an EU official seeking overland alternatives to a planned flight home to France for the weekend.

The contradictions of the EU's Strasbourg sessions

April 18, 2010 08:51Updated May 30, 2010 13:29
STRASBOURG, France — The European Parliament (EP) is one of the most powerful legislative bodies in the world, responsible for approving the vast majority of regulations governing half a billion people in 27 countries. The joint decisions of the presidents and prime ministers of those countries must pass the EP before they become European Union law. As influential as that makes these 736 lawmakers, there is one point over which they have no control — and with many, it’s a sore one: where they sit.

Europe reacts to spreading ash cloud

News DeskApril 15, 2010 14:59Updated May 30, 2010 13:29
BOSTON — Flights were grounded across Europe today as a spew of volcanic ash from Iceland's Eyjafjallajokull spread over the continent. GlobalPost's correspondents in the affected countries sent their reactions: Conor O'Clery reports that the only way out of Ireland is by boat and that the summer of 1816 holds a worrisome precedent.
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