LyrArc Article Gist
Negotiators for Climate Change talks meeting in Katowice, Poland helped develop a rule book to support efforts made for the Paris Accords. The U.S. joined the European Union, Canada and China in putting forward compromise language. 

The question of setting up a carbon market was put off for the future.

On the aid to developing countries to reduce emissions in their generation of power the commitment of $100 billion by 2020 from Article 9 of the Paris Accords was seen by some countries including the U.S. as too high. China does not contribute, and only the European Union with Germany doubling its contribution took the lead. That climate fund has so far raised $10 billion.

The U.S. point of view was that no country should sacrifice economic prosperity and energy security for environmental sustainabililty. Yet the U.S. has participating in developing the rule book for climate change efforts stemming from the Paris Accords.

LyrArc Article Gist
In less than 3 weeks World Central Kitchen has found a way to serve 300,000 hot meals a day in Poland. In this WSJ report an American volunteer in Poland describes his experience meeting people from England, Portugal and other parts of Europe and North America who have volunteered to help refugees from Ukraine in Eastern European countries. Child care for transient families, most refugees being women and children, temporary housing and clothing are pressing needs. People from as far away as Lawrence, Kansas, are out here helping in a stunning display of support for the women and children who are refugees.

LyrArc Article Gist
The events leading to the EU brokered deal and the final hours of tense negotiations are described in this exceptional reporting by Benoit, Norman and Fidler. Chancellor Merkel played a critical role in the developments and Catherine Ashton, EU policy chief, played a supporting role. The foreign ministers of Germany, France and Poland, Steinmeier, Fabius and Sikorsi, conducted the tense negotiations with president Yakunovych and protesters in Kiev's Independence Square. At one point the foreign ministers Steinmeier and Sikoski actually talk to protesters in the Square to clear up differences and get support, something that German and Polish leaders have never done together in a Eastern European country. Russian president Putin acquiesced in the agreement by sending an experienced Russian diplomat to help support the negotiations, another first, confirmed by the Polish foreign minister. In a joint presentation with Hollande to media in Paris, Merkel set the serious way Germany viewed the developments- we have seen much go wrong in Europe, Merkel said, now Germany and France would take the action for things to go right. ...

LyrArc Article Gist
Poland, which shares a border with Belarus, has actively supported the movement for democracy and freedom of expression in Belarus.

LyrArc Article Gist
Macron of France, Scholz of Germany and Tusk of Poland meet in Berlin to iron out difference on Ukraine. Macron calls for strategic ambiguity and a more efforts to support Ukraine.

LyrArc Article Gist
Leaders of France, Germany and Italy are shown on a train ride from Poland to Kviv as they visit Irpin and Kviv to show solidarity with Ukraine, in this story in The Guardian.

LyrArc Article Gist
Marek Belk, head of Poland's central bank, says Poland should prepare for impact of a general slowdown in the eurozone. Poland's economy is expected to grow at 4% for 2011, but experience a slower rate of growth in 2012. Poland's public debt is at 55% of GDP compared to 120% for Italy. Belka said the mistakes in Italy show it is important to stay ahead of the markets. The action taken in Italy on November 14, 2011, if taken 2 months earlier would have prevented the jump in Italy's borrowing costs. Risks facing Poland come from the fact that a large proportion of the nation's banking assets are owned by banks of other European countries- as much as 70% of Poland's banking assets. As a result if these banks experience difficulties the local branches could become orphans. Belka would like to see private capital in Poland be used to bring a larger share of the banking sector back in Polish hands. Belgian and Portuguese banks are considering selling their banking operations to Polish banks, and PKO Bank Polski SA, PZU SA are possible buyers. Poland's central bank has kept interest rates steady at 4.5%....

LyrArc Article Gist
Elina Svitolina of Ukraine wins in three sets over Iga Swiatek of Poland to make it to the semifinals of Wimbledon. Svitolina says the war made her stronger, and also made her mentally stronger. "Mentally I don't take difficult situations as like a disaster you know? There are worse things in life." The Ukraine war is a women's war as millions of women became refugees in different parts of Europe including Swiatek's Poland. 

LyrArc Article Gist
Leonid Kravchuk is a Soviet era official who joined with Boris Yeltsin to support dissolution of the Soviet Union. He died at the age of 88 in May 2022. He is remembered for leading Ukraine to independence in 1991 with support of nationalists in western Ukraine and pro-Russian supporters in eastern Ukraine. Another reason he is remembered is for peaceful transition of power to his prime minister Mr. Kruchma in the 1994 election. He also dismantled Ukraine's large nuclear arsenal under pressure from Russia and the US. His failings were in letting corruption grow including the bankruptcy of the Black Sea Shipping Company, says DW.com. Ukraine had no experience in the democratic process. It has close ties with Poland which in the 17th and 18th century had some form of democratic process. Lviv is a short distance from Poland. Kravchuk was from a part of Ukraine that was once part of Poland. With a population of 52 million Ukraine is the second largest country in Europe. Its transition from the Soviet Union to a independent state was painful says DW.com with millions of people finding themselves living in poverty and the period being remembered as "kravchuchka." Since that period Ukraine has grown and was setting up new foundations for entry into the European Union.  ...

LyrArc Article Gist
A former prime minister of Poland for 7 years, Donald Tusk, becomes the president of the European Council in 2014.

LyrArc Article Gist
Poland has a huge shortage of doctors and nurses. The ratio of doctors to every 100,000 of population is the lowest in the European Union. It is twice that in Germany whose relative success in tackling covid pandemic comes from having foreign doctors and nurses treat patients. Consider that the average age of Polish doctors is 53, only a few years from retirement. The situation in terms of immigration reminds pone of East Germany and its depopulation of young people who left for West Germany. Something like this has happened in Poland in health care.  In similar ways other countries in the EU, Hungary, Slovakia, Romania stocked up on ventilators but now have few doctors and nurses left to operate them. It is stretching the limits of human endurance as this report shows in WSJ, with doctors working 36 hour shifts and working 73 hours a week.  Here we see Dr. Rotnicki, who works these long hours at a hospital in western Poland and says that it is like the Second World War, that it is hard times in Poland for health care workers. This report says Italian and British hospitals, not just German ones, are tackling coronavirus with Polish, Hungarian and Romanian doctors and nurses. This report shows that headhunters in Germany drive in to western Poland blanketing windshields with pamphlets promising 5 times more pay, 2 years of free language classes and housing. In Slovakia a third of all nursing graduates leave the coutnry immediately after graduation. In Poland not nursing pay has lagged behind with fewer going into nursing schools. Staff remaining in the region are older and educated under communism when less English was taught, or have returned back home from years overseas. Forcing doctors to give up private practice and work in public hospitals during coronavirus pandemic is not working in Hungary, where surveys find 6 out of ten medical school graduates intending to leave Hungary. These doctors say they are better off working at Aldi and Tesco if needed and making more pay, plus getting weekends off. Poland only recently increased pay for healthcare workers, some even survived on cash given to them by patients. Not a good situation for a country to be in and reflecting the wrong priorities not just in the U.S. and western Europe, but also in eastern Europe, during the last 3 decades. These priorities shifted money away from health care, education and infrastructure priorities. The people simply lost control of their spending allocation to "financial markets" that shifted money in a way that benefited only small group in society neglecting others and national interests. ...

LyrArc Article Gist
The Times looks at troop presence for NATO in the Baltic States, Poland and Romania as the US faces down a Russian threat to Ukraine and a possible imminent invasion. It says contingency planning has been carried out and the US and NATO are prepared.

LyrArc Article Gist
Kylian Mbappe of France showed exceptional skill in his assist for Olivier Giroud and his 2 goals in the 3-1 French win over Poland. He has handled all the attention and hype without it letting it affect his concentration, speed and skill in soccer. Only Messi and Ronaldo come close.

LyrArc Article Gist
Germany will provide Ukraine with $200 million for aid to internally displaced people. About 7 million people in Ukraine are internally displaced inside Ukraine. Most of the refugees are women, elderly and children. The internally displaced are in addition to the millions of people who are refugees in Poland and other countries.

LyrArc Article Gist
The new Rapid Response Force with a spearhead of 5000 troops deployable in 48 hours is intended to counter Russia's new aggressive position in Eastern Europe. Command centers will be established in the Baltic states Lithuania, Estonia, Lativia, and in Poland. Romania, Bulgaria. Leadership will rotate for this force between Spain in 2016, Britain in 2017, followed by Italy, France and Poland. Germany currently leads a temporary version of the new force. It is designed to give each nation time to prepare for further action. Within weeks an additional 25,000 troops could be deployed alongside the 5000 troops. U.S. Air Force Gen. Philip Breedlove, is NATO's top military commander. He says the U.S. will have officers in each of the 6 command centers, and in larger bases located in Poland and Romania. The U.S. will provide support for surveillance, intelligence, logistics and airlifts. Retiring Defense Secretary Hagel had called for the Rapid Deployment Force to be ready for action in the Middle East or in Eastern Europe....

LyrArc Article Gist
 90% of the millions of refugees from Ukraine in Poland and other Eastern European countries are women and children. Women and children are also a big part of the internally displaced people in Ukraine, particularly from the south and the east which are seeing some of the worst damage from missile and artillery shelling of civilians during this war.

LyrArc Article Gist
Anton Troianovski reports for NYT from Geneva on the talks between Russian foreign minister Sergei Ryabkov and US Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman on the Russian proposals for redrawing of the boundaries between Russia and Eastern Europe. Russia has insisted talks take place without the Europeans. The Russian view is that the current borders with strong US presence in Eastern Europe- in Poland, the Baltics, Ukraine, and other parts of Eastern Europe were a result of the new borders being thrust on a weakened Russia after the collapse of the Soviet Union.  The US insists it will not do anything without working with its European allies, but is willing to look for some areas of common ground. European Union and Germany see the new Eastern Europe formed as a result of the self determination of countries in the region, and their right to choose their future. Ukraine was historically close to Russia. After the collapse of the Soviet Union Ukraine had developed two identities with eastern parts of the country closer to Russia reflecting earlier close ties and the western parts of Ukraine closer to Poland such as cities Lviv and Kiev reflecting the mood in Poland and Baltics for an independent Ukraine. Lviv is only 70 kilometres from the Polish border and shows traces of the Austro-Hugarian central European heritage. Kiev is about 300 miles from the Polish border in north central Europe. Elections led to governments alternating between close ties to Russia and distant ties to Russia with the two recent governments opposed to Russian interference in its affairs. President Putin responded with invasion of Crimea and forming an autonomous region in eastern Ukraine. In the latest move Putin seeks to reset the borders in a way that is favorable to Russia.   ...

LyrArc Article Gist
Biden approves 31 Abrams tanks for Ukraine. This will take months. Germany has also approved 14 Leopard tanks to Ukraine and this allows Poland and Spain to also send Leopard tanks to Ukraine. The German Leopards are more mobile and easier to deploy in Ukraine than the Abrams US tanks, which is why there was extraordinary effort to get German approval to start their deployment in Ukraine.

LyrArc Article Gist
Deals made with Qatar, Norway, and Poland are helping Germany achieve energy independence. Economy minister Habeck has worked hard to negotiate these deals and bring new leadership to the energy ministry after decades of neglect of Germany's energy independence by chancellor Merkel and Mr. Schroeder who preceded Merkel. This WSJ report shows how Habeck reversed decades of neglect in a few months to establish the foundations of German energy independence.