Yugoslavia

Serbian President Tomislav Nikolic's meeting on Wednesday with former Bosnian Serb parliament speaker Momcilo Krajisnik, who has served a sentence for war crimes, was met by anger from rights groups in Bosnia and Serbia.

Macedonian President Gjorge Ivanov on Monday entrusted Nikola Gruevski with a fresh mandate to form a new government after his VMRO DPMNE party narrowly won the December 11 elections.

He has 20 days to secure a majority of 61 in the 120-seat parliament and present a new team to parliament, or return the mandate.

The Bulgarian government has officially chosen February 21 as a day to pay tribute to people who fought Nazism in Bulgaria.

On February 21, 1941 a meeting was held at the home of Bulgarian lawmaker (and then former Prime Minister) Nikola Mushanov among opposition leaders rejecting the country's accession to the Tripartite Pact of Japan, Italy and Germany during World War Two.

ITF has raised US $400m in donations, cleared more than 135 million square metres of land, and expanded its operations to Africa, Central Asia, the Middle East and Latin America since its inception. Ambassador Damjan Bergant, ITF's Chief Executive, speaks to The Slovenia Times about how a small operation has carved out an oversized role for good in the world.

Today, all of the former republics of Yugoslavia are sovereigns rated by S&P Global Ratings. Most of the ratings are in the 'B' or 'BB' category, excluding Slovenia (A/Stable). With the exception of Serbia and Slovenia, we rate all of them lower than their initial ratings because of legacy issues that have weighed on creditworthiness over the years.

As the Syrian government mops up the last rebel-held areas of eastern Aleppo - amid reports on fresh air strikes and civilian casualties - activists all over former Yugoslavia have urged people and governments to show more solidarity with the victims of the conflict.

Mohammed Dahlan, the powerful arch-rival to Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas, will again face a court in Palestine over allegations of embezzling $18 million of public money from his homeland.

Balkan ties

The possible adoption of a law in Croatia banning the diplay of all totalitarian symbols, announced by Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic on Monday, carries potential risks and dangers, an expert has said.

Because of its size and history within Yugoslavia, Slovenia has certain peculiarities that reflect in the summarising of the Western Balkans business culture, as well as in the strong involvement in the international business environment.

A court ruling in Jerusalem to reject a request for information about defence exports to the former Yugoslavia during the 1990s Bosnian war has once again raised questions over the alleged use of Israeli military equipment by Bosnian Serb forces during the conflict, BIRN was told by the two Israelis who made the legal request.