A warm welcome to Bulgaria and Romania

A warm welcome to Bulgaria and Romania

The fourth issue of the review The bridge (January-March 2007) is about to be published, the focal point of which are the opportunities that are opening up in the Balkan neighborhood and the wider region of SE Europe as a result of the accession of our neighbors Bulgaria and Romania to the European Union.

For this cover story, articles have been contributed by:

Meglena Shtilianova Kuneva, Bulgaria’s first European commissioner
Leonard Orban, Romania’s first European commissioner
Alina Mungiu-Pippidi, director of the Romanian Academic Society
Antoinette Primatarova, program director at the Center for Liberal Strategies, Sofia and a former ambassador
Theodore George Tsakiris, an international and energy security specialist, as well as a research fellow at the Hellenic Center for European Studies
Dr Dimitar Bechev, research fellow at the European Studies Centre, University of Oxford
Sorin Moisa, doctoral candidate in international relations, St Antony’s College, University of Oxford
George Kasimatis, director of the Office of the European Parliament in Greece
Dr Eugenia Markova, Greek Ministry of Economics and Finance senior research fellow in the political economy of Greece and Southeastern Europe at the Hellenic Observatory, European Institute, London School of Economics and Political Science

-In the same issue Christos Homenidis and Gazmend Kapllani attempt to define “Balkanity” as a reference point for a new regional identity of European standards, leaving behind the ghosts of the history of the region.

-Furthermore, in the same issue there are two interesting sections:

1. The day after… Middle East – Lebanon with articles by:
Dimitrios Triantaphyllou, director general of the International Center for Black Sea Studies (ICBSS), Athens, and assistant professor of international relations at the University of the Aegean
Dr Anat Lapidot-Firilla, researcher at the Center for Strategic and Policy Studies at the School of Public Policy in the Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Yezid Sayigh, professor of Middle East studies at King’s College London.

2. The case of Kosovo with articles by:
Joachim Ruecker, special representative of the UN secretary-general in Kosovo (SRSG)
Dusan T. Batakovic, ambassador at large, counsellor to the president of Serbia and a member of the Belgrade negotiating team
Agim Ceku, prime minister of the Provisional Institutions of the Self-Government of Kosovo
Dr Ruby Gropas, political scientist and research fellow with the Hellenic Foundation for European and Foreign Policy (ELIAMEP), Athens, Greece.

For more:www.bridge-mag.com