Eurotopics.net

This Friday Joe Biden will complete 100 days in office as President of the United States. While at the beginning of his term he focused on getting the Covid crisis under control through mass vaccination and a rescue plan, he is now making his mark with plans for major government investments and tax hikes for the rich. Commentators are for the most part impressed.

Around 25,000 people gathered in Paris and across France to protest the decision by the country's highest court, the Court of Cassation, not to put a man accused of murdering his Jewish neighbour on trial, on the grounds that he was in the grips of a delusional fit at the time of the attack due to alcohol and cannabis consumption, and not in control of his actions. He will spend at least 20 years in a psychiatric clinic instead. Europe's press sympathises with the protests.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is in trouble due to a series of unpleasant revelations. Most recently, reports have surfaced that he said last autumn that he wanted "no more f-ing lockdowns - let the bodies pile high in their thousands". At least some of the details came from his former top adviser Dominic Cummings, who left Downing Street in November on bad terms with Johnson. How damaging will the scandals be?

In the town of Tukums in Latvia, a 29-year-old man was allegedly set on fire in a suspected homophobic hate crime. The man had received threats prior to the attack and had contacted the police, but they had failed to take action. Acceptance of sexual minorities is generally low in Latvia: most of its political parties and its influential Orthodox Church oppose any extension of their rights. The press finds the constellation worrying.

Portugal celebrated Freedom Day on 25 April, in commemoration of the Carnation Revolution of 1974 when an almost bloodless coup supported by a clear majority of the population put an end to the dictatorship introduced by António de Salazar. Unlike in 2020, this year several thousand people gathered on Lisbon's Avenida da Liberdade despite the pandemic. Commentators take very different views of this.