Leo van Doesburg

After years of economic growth and welfare, revolutionary changes in means of communication , we are confronted with the global financial crisis . While governments and the European Union are trying to their best to save the economies by transferring large sums of money to emergency funds , the production is decreasing, the unemployment is rising, the salaries and governmental subventions are decreasing and the poverty in Europe is increasing significantly. With this article, Leo van Doesburg is looking if human dignity as a base for Christian Social and Christian Democratic teachings could give an answer to the nowadays challenges and how the basic values of human dignity can be reintroduced as an answer on the nowadays challenges. Read more on: CPPortal.org

The first round of Belgrade-Pristina talks, which the EU mediator called "friendly but also honest", ended in Brussels on Wednesday. The head of the Serbian negotiating team, Borko Stefanovic, said that the talks showed that there was both the capacity and readiness to solve issues. He also pointed out that the EU mediation of the dialogue was very positive and status-neutral. EU mediator Robert Cooper, meanwhile, said the talks opened in a "good atmosphere". He said that the two sides discussed improving the legal certainty of people living in Kosovo, including through improving civil and cadastral registers, and improving economic cooperation in the region. He explained that the dialogue touched on issues that will be discussed in greater detail later on, such as air traffic, telecommunications and customs stamps. The first meeting within the first round of talks was held late on Tuesday, after several hours' of uncertainty as to whether or not the Kosovo team...

Croatians' scepticism of the European Union has been growing from month to month, with 41 per cent expressing themselves against membership in March. Over the last year an additional 1.1 per cent more Croatians have com e out against European Union membership, the latest CRO Demoscop survey shows. However, on balance public opinion remains in favour of joining with 48.9 per cent still supporting Croatia's entry. Support was at its strongest last June (53.1 per cent), and then dropped below 50 per cent for the remainder of the year. The strongest supporters of Croatia’s membershipare supporters of the conservative Croatian Democratic Union, HDZ, (63.6 per cent), with members of the Croatian Labourers – Labour Party, the Croatian People’s Party – Liberal Democrats, HNS, the Social Democratic Party, SDP, the IDS the Croatian Party of Pensioners, HSU all marginally in favour of membership. Older Croatians are more positive towards EU membership than the younger generations, while t...

From 25 to 2 7 February the Boris Trajkovski International Foundation held its 6th You th L ea dership Forum and the 7th Fellowship Prayer Dinner. The theme this year was “World of Differences – Identity and Peace”, something Macedonian s have been confronted with for nearly 20 years. During this time, Macedonia has always tried to overcome conflicts, obstacles and trials, creating peace and stability in an often unstable world based on their identity. Therefore during plenary sessions different aspects of identity were discussed, like the question ‘What is my personal identity?’, about forms of identity and the relationship between identity and peace. All these plenary discussions were based on the principles of Jesus. Wilfried Nausner , Superintendent (United Methodist Church) spoke about three core values that form your identity: family, education and memory (history). He illustrated with texts from the Bible. He was followed by Robert Liddell - Head of the Political Section in...