Europe Needs to Stop Pointing Fingers

Award-winning Israeli author Amos Oz has some harsh words for Europe, which his Jewish parents fled in the 1930s. "Europe should take more direct responsibility for what is happening in the world and offer to help more rather than moralizing and telling others how they should act and not," he told the daily newspaper Berliner Zeitung. Oz said Jews of his parents' generation, with their love for art and music, were history's only true Europeans, but that their love for the Old World was tragically "unrequited." (5:31 p.m.)

Is Kerry Really Better than Bush?

Germans hate Bush. And with the elections in the US fast approaching, the German media is feverishly reporting every construed Bush slip-up or Kerry step ahead. Most Germans are sure that a Kerry victory would open a whole new chapter in trans-Atlantic relations and would rein in US military power. But according to Karsten Voigt, coordinator of German-American relations for the German government, a Kerry victory wouldn't change as much as most Germans think. In a Monday interview with SPIEGEL-ONLINE, Voigt cautioned that Kerry would, like Bush, pursue American interests first and foremost even if those interests run counter to European priorities. "In Bush's last campaign," Voigt points out, "he accused his opponent Al Gore by saying that he and Bill Clinton didn't consult European allies enough. In general, I prefer American presidents who practice multilateralism to candidates who promise it." (5:01 p.m. CET)

Signs the End is Near

Japan is still reeling from its weekend earthquakes -- and more keep on coming. Aftershocks of up to 5.6 in magnitude shook the country Monday morning causing buildings to sway and residents to fear that already damaged structures would give way. A series of Saturday quakes -- the biggest of which measured 6.8 -- left 24 dead and 2,000 injured. The quakes were centered 160 miles (260km) north of Tokyo and were Japan's biggest in a decade. They came on the heels of a record 10 typhoons, including one last week that killed at least 80 people. Forecasters say another typhoon is currently heading towards the country. (4:10 p.m. CET)

Devil Save the Queen

It used to be that the English military fought for God, the Queen and the Fatherland. Now, however, you can fight for the devil, too. The British navy officially recognized its first Satanist sailor and is going to allow him to perform Satanic rituals onboard British warships, the navy announced over the weekend. Inaugural Satanist, naval technician Chris Cranmer, welcomes the decision. "I didn't want to have the feeling anymore that I couldn't take out my Satanic Bible in bed in the evening to relax a little bit." Cranmer is now trying to get the Ministry of Defense to recognize Satanism as a registered religion. Not everybody is happy about the decision. Retired admiral Sandy Woodward's first reaction? "What the devil is going on here?" (3:12 p.m. CET)

Democracy in Super Slo-mo

It's been two weeks since Afghans voted in their first-ever democratic election and they finally have a new leader. Sort of. With 94.3 percent of the votes counted, President Hamid Karzai has a clear majority (55.5 percent) and he has all but clinched a five-year term. Even if all remaining voters check off his rival's name, Karzai would still be the winner. Still, election officials don't want to jump the gun on democracy. They want to make sure every last vote has been counted. The tallying has been its own sort of drama, with workers unaccustomed to examining ballots struggling to decipher the intentions of 8 million voters equally unaccustomed to voting. Of course, comparatively, the Afghanis aren't doing so bad. It took Americans over a month to find out who their new president was in 2000. (1:48 p.m. CET)

Iraq Update

Nearly 350 tons of explosives have disappeared from Iraq and could have been stolen during looting immediately following the invasion says the International Atomic Energy Association. The Pentagon has instructed the Iraq Survey Group -- the same group that spent months looking for non-existent weapons of mass destruction in Iraq -- to look into the arsenal's disappearance.

Iraqi security officials say Saturday's execution-style killings of close to 50 Iraqi army recruits was an inside job and that militias knew the men would be travelling in unarmed minibuses. The victims had just completed basic training and were on their way back to their homes when they were ambushed. They were found lying on the ground, each with a single bullet hole in the head. The al Qaida Organization for Holy War in Iraq, led by Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, has claimed responsibility for the massacre, saying its men had killed "apostates." A mortar attack on a US Army based killed US security official Ed Seitz, making him the first US diplomat to be killed in the Iraq war. Seitz was assigned to the US Embassy in Baghdad.

Number of coalition soldiers killed in Iraq: 1,246. (12:57 p.m CET)

Dismantling the German Army

As America beefs up, Germany is scaling down. One sixth of all German army bases are currently on the chopping block. Germany's top general just turned in a much-awaited (and feared) plan outlining which bases are to get the axe. The money saved from reducing the army from seven to five divisions is to go into regional programs designed to spur employment. But even in the unlikely event Germany were to send troops to Iraq, the move probably wouldn't make a huge difference for security. You just have to look at the numbers. Germany's total military budget? �24 billion ($30.3 billion). Total US military budget? �317 billion ($401 billion). (12:14 p.m. CET)

A Threat to Security?

A US aeronautics firm is giving new meaning to the "Patriot Act," according to a report in DER SPIEGEL. In order to secure itself a $1.6 million contract to build 23 presidential helicopters (all part of the "Marine One" fleet) the Sikorsky company has declared helicopters built by its competitor Lockheed-Martin "a threat to national security" because they contain European -- rather than "all-American" -- parts. "We don't know how to build the aircraft with foreign parts and still maintain security," says Sikorsky VP Joseph Haddock. (11:32 a.m. CET)

Peaceful Vote in Violent Province

If you're looking for a reduction in Serb-Albanian ethnic tensions in Kosovo, Saturday's general election probably won't deliver. True, the incumbent president Ibrahim Rugova and his party Democratic League of Kosovo look to have won close to 50 percent of the votes (beating the 27 percent scored by rebel leader Hashim Thaci's Democratic Party of Kosovo). But the vote was marred by a virtual boycott by Kosovo's Serbian population, which doesn't speak well of the efforts to forge tolerance and a multi-ethnic society in the Balkan province. While the elections were, as United Nations General Secretary Kofi Annan noted Sunday, largely peaceful, they come just seven months after an ethnic Albanian mob rioted against Kosovo Serbs killing 17 and injuring 900. Turnout for Kosovo Albanians was also low, likely due, say observers, to frustration with their government's inability to improve the region's economy. Unemployment in Kosovo, nominally a part of Serbia but essentially an international protectorate, hovers around 60 percent. (11:01 a.m. CET)

Wake Up You Fat Russian Cows

Looking for an exotic adventure vacation? How about a week in a Russian boot camp run by veterans of fighting in Chechnya? For several hundred dollars you can sleep in rundown barracks, dress in camouflage, shoot weapons, subsist on thin porridge, ride on tanks and get abused by officers who demand hours of marching and gruelling runs through muddy, obstacle laden fields. If you really want to prove your manhood, you can volunteer for dedovshina, the violent bullying prevalent in the army and be woken up early in the morning, yelled at and forced to perform humiliating tasks. Sound like fun? Russians think so; they have been flocking to the Yaroslavl camp, located about 150 miles north of Moscow, for a touch of holiday masochism. One participant said the camp offered a perfect break from vacation doldrums. "I was fed up with going to Turkey and lazing around on the beach," he said. "Once (at the camp) I was not marching properly and one of the officers yelled at me that I looked like a pregnant cow. Where else would someone call you that? It was fun." He's already planning to go back. (10:12 a.m. CET)

Health Class on Cigarette Packs

The European Union has a new plan to stop its smokers from lighting up. It's a habit that costs the health industry �100 billion a year. The campaign is ugly, graphic and brutally honest. Will it work? Judge for yourself. (9:56 a.m CET)

Baby Big Brother

It must be tough coming up with ever-more wacky ideas for the container in the German version of "Big Brother". The latest? Producer Borris Brandt told Focus magazine he wants a woman to give birth inside and bring to the world the first-ever reality television baby. "I don't think it would harm the child," he said.