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Cross-border Talks
Cross-Border Talks is an independent medium ran by journalists from Poland, Bulgaria and Czechia.
"At this stage it is crucial to start real negotiations between the warring parties - Russia and Ukraine. Practice shows that often reaching negotiations is no less difficult than conducting the negotiations themselves."![]()
This is what diplomat and former deputy foreign minister Lyubomir Kyuchukov told BNR ahead of today's Ukraine summit in London.![]()
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"There is already talk of negotiations - this is new since the beginning of the year. The war continues, but now a parallel field has opened up for seeking an end to the conflict - the political, the diplomatic, i.e. an opportunity has emerged for an alternative to the escalation of hostilities, which has been virtually absent for three years. Notwithstanding the continuation of hostilities, the dynamics have shifted to the political field now," he believes.![]()
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What we are seeing in London is also part of this dynamic:![]()
"It's a practically new format - you bring together the initiators of the so-called coalition of the willing - France and the UK, with the US and Ukraine, which also thematically brings together two substantive themes - the negotiations to end the conflict, which are leading for the US, with Ukraine's post-solution security commitments, which are a priority for France and the UK. There are 2 important circumstances here - an attempt to develop a unified position for Ukraine and its allies for the negotiations, with France and the UK's role not mediating between Ukraine and the US, but seeking to support Ukraine in its dialogue with the US in order to negotiate terms in an eventual agreement."![]()
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The diplomat described the negotiations between the US and Ukraine as "financial and economic". On the other side are the talks between the US and Russia, which are geopolitical, he added. However, he said, without direct negotiations between Ukraine and Russia, a solution is difficult to reach. In his words, one of the main problems in this case is territories.![]()
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"Always in such cases, if there is a general agreement, it is an agreement reached on the basis of huge compromises on all sides. It is a question of the outcome of the negotiations."![]()
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The second important issue that is also hampering the negotiations is guarantees that the war will not resume after the eventual ceasefire, Kyuchukov noted in an interview with the "Before Everyone" program. He added:![]()
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"We're not really talking about Ukraine's NATO membership here anymore. The current idea for quite some time now has been a peacekeeping force after the signing of an agreement, but this seems extremely difficult to achieve because in order to stop the fire there must be an agreement, and in order to have an agreement there must be negotiations and Russia's consent. It is difficult to expect that Russia will agree to the deployment of NATO troops in Ukraine. If such a force were deployed in Ukraine, it would not be a peacekeeping force and it would not be under ceasefire conditions, but rather a contingent under conditions of continued hostilities."![]()
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Finding a mutually acceptable solution to the guarantees appears to be the key issue, Lyubomir Kyuchukov opined.![]()
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Europe has therefore fallen out because we did not for a moment offer an alternative solution to end the war, he said, adding:![]()
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"We have no vision of when and how the war ends. We were only betting on winning the war by military means, but we see that our position has changed over the years. That is why the initiative has gone elsewhere - to the US."![]()
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Bulgaria has clearly said that it will not send troops to take part in hostilities in Ukraine, the diplomat reminded. On the other hand, it also offered options for its contribution to ensuring Ukraine's security after the eventual end of hostilities, he added.![]()
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Listen to the full interview of Spas Kraynin with Lyubomir Kyuchukov in the program "Before All" in the audio file.
Любомир Кючуков: Ключово е започването на реални преговори между Русия и Украйна
bnr.bg
"На този етап е ключово започването на реални преговори между воюващите страни – Русия и Украйна. Практиката ...
Sebastian Burduja, Romanian Minister of Energy, answers questions from the Cross-Border Talks team on Romania's energy policy in the context of green transition and decarbonisation. He explains what he meant when he said that he prefers a smart deal to a green deal, what are the realistic goals and pace for an energy transition in Romania, and could Romania become a regional hub for offshore wind energy. Other questions concern the just transition of the Oltenia and Hunedoara complexes and their future after the coal phase-out, the Romanian prosumer boom and the prospects for an even more citizen-led energy transition, as well as the minister's relations with ecology-focused NGOs.![]()
The interview took place on 7 April 2025.![]()
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Sebastian Burduja: If the citizens do not support the energy transition, we will get nowhere
open.substack.com
An interview with the Romanian energy minister on the green transition, development plans and energy policy of the Romanian government in the beginning of Trump 2.0 era
As Neo-Nazis network grow ever more on the global level – despite their hatred of globalisation and an even stronger hated cosmopolitanism – their language becomes more globalised and more coded.![]()
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This might be called the coding of Neo-Nazi language. The use of such a coded language has four overarching goals:![]()
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- Coded language is designed and megaphoned to fire up their right-wing base.![]()
- Such far right code-words are made to appear rather innocent to the unsuspecting outsider.![]()
- Far right code-words serve to hide the true intentions of Neo-Nazis.![]()
- Neo-Nazi code-words also serve an ideological goal: spreading the weird ideas of Nazism.![]()
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It remains imperative in fighting Neo-Nazism, to be aware of the far right’s coded language, how to decipher their language and to recognise the adjusted language used in the entire spectrum of the far right ranging from relatively mild right-wing populists to hard-core Neo-Nazis.![]()
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To understand how right-wing populists like the UK’s Farage, Germany’s Björn Höcke, Italy’s neo-fascistic Meloni, racist Trump, anti-Semitic Orban, etc. tick, one needs to understand, at least, fourteen of their most important themes:![]()
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Thomas Klikauer on the German Neo-Nazis' code![]()
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The code of German Neo-Nazis - Cross-border Talks
www.crossbordertalks.eu
Posted by Thomas Klikauer As Neo-Nazis network grow ever more on the global level –...
On the occassion of the passing away of pope Francisc we remind of this interview on the issue of the Christian-Marxist dialogue - an initiative, which was strongly supported by pope Francisc - a pope coming from the Global South, who was seen by some as a left-wing, progressive pope![]()
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Walter Baier: The dialogue between religions and Marxism is possible - Cross-border Talks
www.crossbordertalks.eu
Walter Baier spoke about the dialogue between Marxists and Christians, to which he has long been devoted
On 15 April 2025, the demolition of illegal houses and shanties in the Zaharna Fabrika (Sugar Factory) district of Sofia began. The area was cordoned off by the police, with a water cannon on site. There were no clashes, but the Bulgarian Helsinki Committee questioned the legality of the actions of the mayor of the Ilinden district, Emil Branchevski, Mediapool reported.![]()
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From 15 April 2025 until today – 20 April 2025 – Easter, the residents of the demolished houses have been living in the open air in the area of their homes. Disputes have arisen between municipal administrations in Sofia over where these Roma residents should be housed. At the moment, attempts to find accommodation in other parts of Sofia that would be acceptable to local residents, district administrations and the evicted residents have only been successful in isolated cases, and the majority of the group, estimated at 200 people, remain next to their destroyed homes in the sugar factory.![]()
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According to the Bulgarian Helsinki Committee, the demolition of the illegal buildings, which began in 2016, is now being carried out in violation of the law. This is because on Friday, 11 April 2025, there was a decision by the European Court of Human Rights to provisionally protect some of the buildings. But some of them have already been demolished.![]()
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“This means that the law has been broken. From now on the taxpayer will most likely pay the bill, not the violator, of course, and the violator is certainly the district mayor, who, as far as I have understood from the police here, ordered these actions,” Radoslav Stoyanov of the Bulgarian Helsinki Committee told Bulgarian National Radio.![]()
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So on 20 April 2025, the evicted residents of the Sugar Factory district celebrated Easter in the open air. Various citizens, organisations and public groups expressed their solidarity with them. Cross-border Talks published the Facebook post of one of them, Ivan Radev, a journalist and a driving force in the Association of European Journalists – Bulgaria.![]()
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The home of the homeless - Cross-border Talks
www.crossbordertalks.eu
A Bulgarian journalist and representative of the civic society on the evictions of Roma citizens in Sofia's Sugar Factory neighborhood