While the 2024 Paris Olympics were a showcase of athletic excellence, they also highlighted the challenges of maintaining political neutrality in a globalized world. A united European voice could have played a significant role in shaping the narrative surrounding the games and addressing the complex issues that arose.

The 2024 Paris Olympic Games, marked by controversy and intertwined with societal issues, offered a microcosm of contemporary Europe. The opening ceremony's depiction of religious scenes, drawing parallels to iconic western art, ignited public debate and political divisions. While athletes prepared for their performances, the rhetoric surrounding these depictions fuelled tensions both within Europe and globally. In contrast, the games also celebrated the EU's motto of “United in diversity”, highlighting freedom of movement and rights. The European Commission's introduction of “Team Europe 2024”, a medal counter, aimed to foster a sense of European unity and pride in athletic achievements.

The Russian State Duma is considering a bill that would restrict library access to works by “foreign agents” in public libraries. Although the Duma went on break in August without passing the amendments, some libraries decided to “play it safe” in advance.

If I take a book and never return it, in other words, steal it, what should I do according to the rules?” Such questions have been addressed more and more frequently to librarian Natalia from a small town in the Moscow region. In her opinion, this is how readers try to save certain books or add them to their personal libraries while they still have the chance. “People ask us, ‘have you written off anything yet? Write it off into our caring hands,’” Natalia says. According to her, some libraries have already started getting rid of books by so-called foreign agents, even though there are no such legal requirements.

A conversation with Christophe Leclercq, founder of the EURACTIV media network and the Executive Chair of Europe’s MediaLab. Interviewer: Adam Reichardt

An interview with Heidi Tagliavini, head of the independent international fact-finding mission into the August 2008 Russia-Georgia war. Interviewer: Vazha Tavberidze

Scenes of conflict from Ukraine continue to dominate reports concerning the ongoing Russian invasion. Despite this, the war moves at a rather slow pace at the front. This reflects the local population’s adaptation to the conflict, with people stealing small moments of normalcy throughout their day-to-day lives.

On a cool, bluish-green river just minutes from the eastern Ukrainian city of Sloviansk, Ukrainian soldiers from a mortar brigade seek to relax. The dark green military 4x4 that brought them from the front now sits idle as they cast fishing lines into the water. The fishing is poor, yielding little more than ripples, but the catch does not matter. For these soldiers, the chance to grill meat, share drinks, and laugh in the open air is worth more than any fish they might pull out. Here, far from the war, time slows, and the simple act of being together in nature becomes a fleeting treasure.

With one million Ukrainians in the military, including hundreds of thousands on the frontlines, nine million displaced and thousands of men who once eagerly enlisted now hiding from military recruiters, the war shrunk and reshaped Ukraine's labour force. Indeed, it is likely to continue transforming society and women’s place in it for decades to come.

After years as a quality control engineer with big supermarkets and housing construction sites, Natalia Myronenko had yearned for change. Passionate about fashion, beauty, makeup and harmony, she saw her maternity leave after the birth of her second child as the perfect time to pivot. But the war intervened, thrusting her into a field she had never imagined entering: humanitarian demining. When she got the job as a quality control manager, she envisioned mostly office supervisory work. “Then I realized that war is my job, and I was shocked,” says the 40-year-old. Like in her old job, she has to check other people’s work. Only now, human lives are on the line. At stake is making the land safe again for farmers and people to live on, to survey each patch of farmland that had witnessed combat, carefully searching for and removing unexploded mines, missiles, artillery shells, bombs and other types of ordnance – all with the utmost caution. “It’s all about safety,” she says.

Westward migration in Europe is often associated with settlement in urban areas. Despite this, many workers from the region have found employment in small rural communities. The French town of Gramat and its surroundings, for example, have seen the arrival of a few hundred Romanians over the past decade.

Since the 2010s, the Causse of Gramat in south-western France (part of a group of vibrant, shimmering limestone plateaus) has witnessed the appearance of a substantial Romanian population. At first, the newcomers came in response to recruitment for work positions in slaughterhouses. Then, opportunities diversified, relatives joined and the community grew. First believed to be a temporary movement, permanent settlement was just around the corner for many. Today, Romanians represent one of the largest immigrant communities (if not the largest) in the area, bringing an Eastern European facet and thus diversity to this French countryside.

The annual World Nomad Games is now challenging established western definitions of sport. As a result, it is interesting to note the strong Hungarian presence at these events. A pseudoscientific theory from the 19th century is now helping Budapest to pursue links with the East in more ways than one.

A group of men in ethnic garments stood in a row waiting for a sign to shoot, rays of early autumn sun falling on their sculpted shoulders. When the order came, they lifted their bows and shot at the shields in front of them, their arrows cutting through the air with unnatural speed. To the joy of his national team, the winner – a Hungarian called Làszlò Koczka – won the gold medal in traditional archery at 60 metres, a sweet victory here in Kazakhstan, a country famous for impeccable archers.

Women attending peaceful anti-war protests have been subjected to violence and torture and also threatened with sexual assault while in custody. Those arrested are forced to confront a criminal justice system with a severe bias against defendants. The crackdown on feminist activism has forced numerous organizations to cease operations and their organizers to flee the country.

August 1st 2024: aeroplanes touch down on a runway in Ankara, Turkey. The stage is set for the most extensive prisoner swap between Russia and the West since the fall of the Iron Curtain. The release of high-profile prisoners such as the Wall Street Journal’s Evan Gershkovich and US Marine Paul Whelan, both of whom were found guilty of espionage, was a diplomatic boon for the West. However, some were critical that in return for releasing journalists, opposition figures, human rights defenders and peaceful protestors, Russia received an unrepentant FSB agent turned assassin, as well as notorious criminals and spies. One of the cases in particular stands out not only for its absurdity but for how well it demonstrates Russia’s draconian crackdown on dissent and protest. This is the story of the artist and musician Alexandra (Sasha) Skochilenko.

Since 2020 Belarusians have fled en masse from growing repressions inside the country. Civil society and independent culture are now only possible in exile. The stories of Belarusian artists and cultural activists illustrate the resilience and creativity of a community determined to preserve its identity and proceed aspiration for freedom.

Belarusian artists and cultural figures have found themselves increasingly targeted by a regime that views independent thought and creativity as threats to its control in recent years. As a result, the cultural sphere in Belarus has become one of the battlegrounds for the suppression of dissent. The government’s efforts to control and politicize culture have led to censorship, forced closures of cultural institutions, and the persecution of artists who challenge or fail to align with the state's ideological narratives. Yet despite these obstacles, Belarusian culture continues to evolve, with artists voicing their messages at the international level; integrating into a new environment; forming new communities and connections; and spreading the culture.

In Belarus, discrimination in the cultural sector has been shown to be both institutional and systemic, with the Belarusian PEN Club reporting that cultural life is the area where civil liberties are regressing most rapidly. At least 105 cultural figures have now been imprisoned in Belarus for their commitment to democratic ideals and freedom.

In Belarus, protest movements have always drawn strength from some societal undercurrents that may not be immediately visible to all people. This latent power resembles similar movements in other parts of Europe and the post-Soviet states. Historically speaking, despite the constraints of the Iron Curtain, the societies living in the socialist states were never completely isolated from global developments, including the protest culture of the 1960s. Thus, throughout the history of protest actions, we have witnessed such significant events as the 1965 demonstrations at the Red Square; the Sinyavsky-Daniel trial of 1966; the Prague Spring in 1968; the Solidarity movement in Poland; and the Autumn of Nations in 1989-1990 across Central and Eastern Europe.

A new documentary directed by Ado Hasanović called My Father’s Diaries brings a new perspective to the Bosnian War and the Srebrenica massacre. The film includes original footage captured during the war, as well as the reciting of passages from the diary of Hasanović’s father. It sheds new light on the extremely difficult times faced by those trying to survive the brutality of war.

Ado Hasanović does not remember every detail of the Bosnian War (1992-95). But certain memories he cannot forget. Watching his family home burning. Leaving Srebrenica. It was 1993. He was seven years old. On a UN food truck, with his mother, brother and sister, Hasanović travelled 100 kilometres north, to the city of Tuzla. “The war in Bosnia was really terrible,” the 38-year-old Bosnian filmmaker explained from central Sarajevo. “Once we escaped, we became refugees. But my father remained in Srebrenica until [July] 1995.”