Saturday, June 27, 2020

Foreign Digest: Russia and Ireland


Russia
The European Court of Human Rights ruled earlier this week that the Russian Federation, led by tyrant Vladimir Putin, an ex-Soviet intelligence officer, illegally banned the website kasparov.ru, founded by Garry Kasparov, the former world chess champion, liberal democratic dissident and Russian presidential candidate against Putin.  Kasparov, who is widely regarded as the greatest chess player of all time, is the Chairman of the Human Rights Foundation, https://hrf.org/ , and is the founder of the Renew Democracy Initiative, https://www.rdi.org/, which is dedicated to renewing constitutional democracy in the United States, where he lives in exile.

Ireland
           A new Prime Minister of Ireland has taken office today to lead a coalition government that, for the first time, includes the two main political parties, both of which are center-right, together with the Greens.  As I had explained in my last post, the unprecedented coalition was necessary to keep the far-left Sinn Fein from power.

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