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Showing posts with the label Slovenia

The Nabucco-South Stream race intensifies

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The race between the two EU's eastern gas pipelines is going on while next winter can again show some supply problems via Ukraine. South Stream got latest boost on 11 th November 2009 as Russia's Energy Minister Sergei Shmatko and Slovenian Economy Minister Matej Lahovnik signed an agreement on the passage of the South Stream gas pipeline across Slovenian territory. Same time shareholders in the Nabucco have started talks with two European top lenders over borrowing almost €1.5 billion for the pipeline's construction; a €5.6 billion loan is needed for the construction first stage of the project and the shareholders have also started talks with two credit insurers. Besides loan Nabucco still desperately is searching gas for its planned pipe. With South Stream Russia is looking a more reliable route for its gas exports to Europe as it bypasses Ukraine and Belarus, where price disputes have in the past led to gas shortages. EU Commission tries with Nabucco provide a suppl...

Freedom in Balkans

Political freedom is usually described as the absence of interference with the sovereignty of an individual by the use of coercion or aggression. Often word “Liberty” - the condition in which an individual has the ability to act according to his or her own will - has been connected to freedom and social anarchists see negative and positive liberty as complementary concepts of freedom. Freedom House is an independent nongovernmental organization based in USA that supports the expansion of freedom in the world. Freedom House’s definition of freedom is derived in large measure from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that was adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in 1948. The Declaration includes freedom of religion, expression, and assembly; freedom from torture; and the right to take part in the government of his or her country. With these limitations – US organisation and definition of freedom – the survey anyway tells something also about Balkans. Global perspecti...