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Fate of Russia's lost art treasure revealed after 60-year cover-up John Ezard, arts correspondent Saturday May 22, 2004 The Guardian (UK) Steven Spielberg would have called it Indiana Jones and the Eighth Wonder, and supplied a happy ending. In a damp cellar, guarded by deadly snakes and senile but savage SS men, the holy grail of Russian art treasures would triumphantly have been liberated. According to evidence disclosed today in Guardian Weekend, the truth is more squalid. Peter the Great's 18th century Amber Room, rated as the world's prime missing art treasure, valued at £150m, perished in the chaos of...

I am occasionally asked why it is that so many Europeans display reflexive anti-Americanism, and I force myself to choose from a salad of possible answers. One of these is the resentment that I can remember feeling myself when I lived in England in the 1970s: the sheer brute fact that American voters who knew nothing about Europe (and cared less) could pick a president who had more clout than any of our elected prime ministers could exert. America could change our economic climate by means of the Federal Reserve, could use bases in Britain to forward its policies in...

In an interview conducted on the eve of the publication of his memoirs, former German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder defends Russian President Vladimir Putin and the right to criticize the policies of the United States without immediately being labelled "anti-American."

A SENIOR adviser to Gerhard Schröder, the German chancellor, has been accused of passing confidential documents to East Germany in the 1980s which revealed how the British Army and RAF would react to an attack by Soviet-led Warsaw Pact forces.The details were among more than 100 pages of material allegedly given to the East Germans by Karsten Voigt, 63, a former MP who now works for the German foreign ministry as co-ordinator of German-American relations. He spent yesterday at an international security conference attended by Donald Rumsfeld, the US defence secretary. The German magazine Focus claimed this weekend that in...

Britain signs up to new union of EuropeBy George Jones and Ambrose Evans-Pritchard in Brussels(Filed: 19/06/2004) European leaders signed the EU's first constitution last night after an acrimonious summit exposed deep divisions between Britain, France and Germany over the future of Europe. The historic deal was concluded after two years of wrangling, culminating in a power struggle between Tony Blair and Jacques Chirac, the French president. Gerhard Schröder and Tony Blair celebrate the historic deal It sealed the union of 25 countries and 450 million citizens, extending across the old Iron Curtain into former communist eastern Europe. Mr Blair, weary...

May 21, 2004 German Leader to Oppose Sending NATO Troops to Iraq By RICHARD BERNSTEIN and MARK LANDLER ERLIN, May 19 - Chancellor Gerhard Schröder of Germany, seeking to head off any attempt to use NATO forces in Iraq, said Wednesday that he would speak clearly against any such move at NATO summit meeting in Istanbul next month. In an interview with The New York Times on Wednesday, Mr. Schröder said Germany would not go so far as to block a NATO role in Iraq if a majority of the organization's members wanted it. But he added, "The problem will...

Backing for Schröder's party slides to historic low By Haig Simonian in Berlin Published: January 25 2003 4:00 Support for Germany's ruling Social Democrats dropped to an historic low yesterday in a clear signal to chancellor Gerhard Schröder of popular frustration at the government's broken election promises and perceived drift. With two important regional elections next month, the German leader had tried to use opposition to war against Iraq at a rally this week to boost his flagging support. But his ploy, which worked so well in the German elections last September, has failed to impress a public growing impatient...

Right-wing tide surges straight to the heart of EuropeBy Ambrose Evans-Pritchard in Brussels (Filed: 22/04/2002) EUROPE'S rising Right-wing tide swept into the core countries of the European Union yesterday, rocking Germany's Social Democrats and threatening France's socialist government.Over the last two years, Austria, Italy, Denmark, Portugal, and Norway have all turned against the centre-Left consensus that had such a lock on Europe during the 1990s, opting instead for law-and-order parties promising tax cuts, deregulation, and a much tougher line on immigrants.But the pace is now quickening as ever more radical figures build mass support, often outflanking the conventional centre-Right...