Journalist, author, broadcaster
Belfast, Northern Ireland – The Good Friday Agreement in 1998 brought Northern Ireland’s bloody conflict to a close, but signs of division remain 15 years later. In the capital Belfast, Catholic and Protestant communities are separated by euphemistic “peace walls”, most children attend segregated schools, and major questions around the past and future remain unresolved. A […]
A bold new political platform is arriving in tiny Kosovo: Corruption should be legalized and serious diseases outlawed. A Formula One racing track should be built around Kosovo’s capital, Pristina. Urinals should be installed in the foyer of every public building in the city. These are just some of the policies proposed by a new, tongue-in-cheek politics […]
Kosovo‘s prime minister has issued a last-ditch appeal to Kosovan Serbs to vote in critical elections this weekend that are widely seen as a make-or-break moment for the republic. In an interview with the Guardian, Hashim Thaçi said that the abandonment of polling after attacks in northern Kosovo earlier this month was a result of […]
On Sunday November 3, Kosovo held local elections. Across the country turnout was moderate-to-high — except in four majority ethnic Serb municipalities north of the Ibar River, the de facto border between north and south Kosovo. In Zvecan, just 11.2 per cent cast a ballot. Leposavic and Zubin Potok were a little better – 22 […]
Mitrovica is a Kosovan city divided in two: Serbs live in the north, Albanians in the south. It’s the flashpoint for Serb reluctance to be living in a Kosovan state. Back in the days of socialist Yugoslavia, Mitrovica was a rather prosperous city. On the outskirts of town, the vast Trepeca mines were one of […]
North Mitrovica, Kosovo – In this city politics is literally written on the walls. On the main street of this predominantly Serb town in north Kosovo, a brightly painted mural declares, “This is Serbia”. Nearby graffiti calls for the European Union Rule of Law Mission in Kosovo to “go home”. Once a prosperous, ethnically mixed city, […]
Edinburgh, Scotland – Scotland has become the first place in Europe to prescribe a new drug that reduces cravings for alcohol. Earlier this month, the Scottish Medicines Consortium, a body that approves drugs for use in the National Health Service, gave the go-ahead for doctors in Scotland to prescribe nalmefene, a drug made by Danish firm Lundbeck […]
Kosovo is crying out for change, writes Peter Geoghegan, and, increasingly disillusioned with the political system, voters have turned to electing a comedian to office. Are comedians the political voices for the apathetic generation? If the reaction to Russell Brand’s recent decrees is anything to go by, they could well be. But while Brand was […]
More houses, not more schemes that will push up house prices, are what is needed, writes Peter Geoghegan. Speaking to the Conservative Party faithful in Manchester last week, George Osborne declared: “We are the party of home ownership and we’re going to let the country know it.” The conference may have been festooned with messages […]
There’s a growing backlash over an event dreamed up by the ad men to celebrate Guinness that could see its focus move from drink to the arts, writes Peter Geoghegan. A couple of years ago I went to Galway for a wedding. I arrived on a wet Thursday night with the wind whipping off the […]