Category Archives: Ireland, Europe and the world

While Britain and Europe’s tectonic plates move, we argue about Orangemen and Ardoyne

Posted on Tuesday, 8 April, 2014 by andypollak

What is the strategic issue causing senior people in the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs to lose their sleep these nights?  In the week that Michael D. Higgins pays the first ever state visit by an Irish President to Britain, … Continue reading →

Posted in British-Irish relations, General, Ireland, Europe and the world | 1 Comment

A love affair with France (and vice-versa)

Posted on Friday, 28 February, 2014 by andypollak

They say it’s bad for the soul to become obsessed with one small, narrow place or one small, narrow subject. For 45 years much of my life has been taken up with the interminable problems of Northern Ireland.  So this … Continue reading →

Posted in General, Ireland, Europe and the world, Views from abroad | Leave a comment

How the women of Ireland saved the children of another small divided country

Posted on Wednesday, 20 November, 2013 by andypollak

What do the Land League leader Michael Davitt and a young Dublin-born medical doctor, Suzanne O’Connell, have in common? The answer lies in Europe’s poorest and probably least-known country, Moldova. For at either end of the 20th century these two … Continue reading →

Posted in General, Ireland, Europe and the world, Views from abroad | Leave a comment