Kosovo – The young Europeans

The Lobby is honoured to present you with the “Kosovo Nation Branding Campaign” – currently available on YouTube (see video inset at the end of this post) and soon to be broadcast on television portraying a new image of this still heavily disputed new nation, which is after all, just round the corner from many of us.

The campaign shows the Kosovo Government’s brave attempts to break with the negative image the world has of this Balkan country, especially given how fresh the war in Kosovo still is in many people’s minds.

The video portrays an image of a young and vibrant, beautiful nation, against the backdrop of a tune gently reminding us that “it is time to start over”…

As presented in the clip, the country’s new slogan is ‘Kosovo, the young Europeans’, as they are the youngest European state. Nonetheless, the bright new nation is yet to be recognised as such by the majority of countries across the globe. Although the US and many EU member states have recognised the country since its unilateral declaration of independence of Serbia in early 2008, other world powers such as China and Russia have not.

For what it is worth, the video is definitely inspiring.

- Lieneke

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Elections re-shape party alliances

So, with the European Parliament elections rapidly approaching, the horse-trading between political parties from across the whole spectrum has intensified as factions look to the future and, more importantly, for new buddies to befriend in the next Parliament. Conflicting visions of Europe, party strategies to get more seats and personal rivalries for top jobs are already resulting in the dismantling and creation of European political parties.

The UK Tories announced some time ago that they would leave the EPP-ED after the elections to form their own euro-sceptic party.

Now it looks like the ALDE is facing problems on several fronts. First up, the next Commission President… a fringe of the party is not supportive of Barroso, favouring instead the Italian Mario Monti or the Belgian Guy Verhofstadt. Add to the equation that the Italian members of ALDE might join the Socialists because of a recent merger between the Italian socialist and centrist parties, and it appears that the Liberals could be a much-changed entity in the new Parliament.

Finally, rumor has it that the new name of the Party of European Socialists could be changed into the ‘Alliance of Socialists and Democrats’ to reflect the possible absorption of the Italian dissidents. When vying for seats in the EP, changing party names and alliances do not seem to matter so much: ‘a rose by any other name will smell as sweet’.

- Michele and Victoria