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Spain - Presidency of the EU

(01/01/2010 to 30/06/2010) Brussels, Belgium

Spain assumes the presidency of the European Council until june 30.

Croatia - Presidential Runoff

(10/01/2010 to 10/01/2010)

The Social Democrat candidate Ivo Josipovic, 52, won 32.4% of the votes in the first round of elections held on Dec. 27. In the second round, will face the mayor of Zagreb, Milan Bandic, recently expelled from the Social Democratic Party, which won 14.8% of the ballots.

The election winner will replace the veteran reformer from the Stjepan Mesic, whose second five-year term ends in February. Both candidates support the national goal of entering the EU in 2012.

Ukraine - Presidential Elections

(17/01/2010 to 17/01/2010)

For these presidential elections have been called 36 million voters. 18 candidates compete for a wide spectrum, from liberals to communists, nationalists through racial profiling. Given the difficulty of achieving over 50% of the vote required for victory, a runoff is expected on February 7.

Chief of state: President Viktor A. YUSHCHENKO (since 23 January 2005).
Head of government: Prime Minister Yuliya TYMOSHENKO (since 18 December 2007). First Deputy Prime Minister Oleksandr TURCHYNOV (since 18 December 2007). Deputy Prime Ministers Hryhoriy NEMYRYA and Ivan VASYUNYK (since 18 December 2007).

Cabinet: Cabinet of Ministers selected by the prime minister; the only exceptions are the foreign and defense ministers, who are chosen by the president. Note: there is also a National Security and Defense Council or NSDC originally created in 1992 as the National Security Council. The NSDC staff is tasked with developing national security policy on domestic and international matters and advising the president; a Presidential Secretariat helps draft presidential edicts and provides policy support to the president.

Elections: president elected by popular vote for a five-year term (eligible for a second term); note - a special repeat runoff presidential election between Viktor YUSHCHENKO and Viktor YANUKOVYCH took place on 26 December 2004 after the earlier 21 November 2004 contest - won by YANUKOVYCH - was invalidated by the Ukrainian Supreme Court because of widespread and significant violations; under constitutional reforms that went into effect 1 January 2006, the majority in parliament takes the lead in naming the prime minister.

Election results 2005: Viktor YUSHCHENKO elected president; percent of vote - Viktor YUSHCHENKO 52%, Viktor YANUKOVYCH 44.2%

Chile - Presidential Runoff

(17/01/2010 to 17/01/2010)

Following the elections on 13 December, the Chileans have been called to the polls again to decide whether the president will be either the leader of the "Coalición por el Cambio", Sebastian Piñera, or the ex-president (1994-2000) and Concert of Parties for Democracy’s (Concertación de Partidos por la Democracia) candidate, Eduardo Frei.

Piñera received 44.05% of votes in the first round, while Frei only scraped 29.6%. The other candidates, Marcos Enríquez-Ominami (independent) and Jorge Arrate (Together we Can/Juntos Podemos pact) received 20.13% and 6.21% of the votes respectively.

Bearing in mind these results, there exists a very real possibility that, for the first time since the end of Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorship and following 20 uninterrupted years of centre-left governments, Chile will be governed by a coalition (made up of UDI, the Independent Democratic Union, and RN, National Renovation) considered centre-right.

The latest polls show that Piñera and Frei are in a dead heat, with a slight advantage for the opposition.

EU - The Spanish presidency presents its priorities to the European Parliament

(18/01/2010 to 21/01/2010) Strasbourg, France

The Spanish EU presidency will present its priorities for its term in office to the plenary session of the European parliament.

Sri Lanka - Presidential Elections

(26/01/2010 to 26/01/2010)

The Sri Lankan presidential election of 2010 will be held on January 26.

Mahinda Rajapaksa, who was elected president in 2005, will be the candidate of the ruling United People's Freedom Alliance. A former commander of the Sri Lanka Army, General Sarath Fonseka will be his main opponent in the election. Fonseka has been endorsed by a number of main opposition parties, including the United National Party and the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna.

According to the Department of Elections more than 14 millon Sri Lankans will be eligible to vote in the election.

Candidates
Mahinda Rajapaksa
In November 2009, incumbent President Mahinda Rajapaksa decided to terminate his six year term almost two years early, and seek a fresh mandate and a new six year term as president. The main reason for the early election was Rajapaksa's desire to take advantage of his increased popularity following the total defeat of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, and the end of the 26-year Sri Lankan Civil War in May 2009.

Sarath Fonseka
As commander of the Sri Lanka Army from 2005-2009, General Sarath Fonseka was considered a national hero for orchestrating an end to the Sri Lankan Civil War. However following military victory, tensions between grew between President Rajapaksa and Fonseka, who later accused Rajapaksa of sidelining him after the end of the conflict. Fonseka eventually retired from the military in November 2009, and announced his candidacy two weeks later.

Minor candidates
3 candidates from minor political parties have expressed their desire to run in the election. They are Wickremabahu Karunaratna of the New Left Front, Wije Dias of the Socialist Equality Party and the Buddhist monk Ven. Battaramulle Seelaratna Thera of the Janasetha Peramuna.

World Economic Forum - Annual Meeting

(27/01/2010 to 31/01/2010) Davos, Switzerland

The 40th Annual Meeting and the Global Redesign Initiative. The recent global economic and financial crisis reveals that significant opportunities remain to catalyse greater global cooperation in addressing current challenges and mitigating future risks.

The World Economic Forum’s 40th Annual Meeting in 2010 will address this opportunity and, in preparation, the Forum has launched the Global Redesign Initiative, an unprecedented global multistakeholder dialogue to help establish processes and structures of global cooperation in the 21st century. The Initiative will provide the fresh, bottom-up rethinking necessary to develop principles and guidelines as well as concrete recommendations regarding structures of governance.

 

London Conference on Yemen

(27/01/2010 to 27/01/2010) London, United Kindom

Gordon Brown has invited key international partners to a high level meeting to discuss how to counter radicalisation in Yemen. The Prime Minister said the international community must not deny Yemen the support it needs to tackle extremism following the failed bomb plot on a US-bound flight on Christmas day.

Afghanistan: The London Conference

(28/01/2010 to 28/01/2010) London, United Kindom

The International Conference on Afghanistan, which will take place in London, will debate the eventual withdrawal of the foreign military presence from Afghan territory and the political strategy to be followed during 2010 and subsequent years. The Secretary General of the UN and leaders of the more than 40 countries whose troops form part of the 100,000 strong international military presence in Afghanistan have been invited to the conference.

Guinea Conakry - Presidential Elections

(31/01/2010 to 31/01/2010)

A presidential election will be held in Guinea on 31 January 2010. It was originally scheduled to held on 13 December 2009 (with a run-off on 27 December 2009, if necessary) following the 2008 Guinean coup d'état. Civilian and political groups later proposed to hold them in December after legislative elections in October 2009. The government agreed to set the election date for 13 and 27 December in late March 2009, but it was then again delayed until January 2010.

While junta leader Moussa Dadis Camara had initially stated he would not run in the election, he declared on 16 April 2009 that he, like every citizen, had the right to stand in the election. On 10 May 2009, however, he stated again that neither he nor any of the other officers involved would stand in the election. Despite this vow, supporters of Camara held a rally in August 2009 to call for him to take off his uniform and run in the elections. Both the United States and the International Foundation for Electoral Systems, an international election support non-profit, feel that he must abstain from running in the election to ensure a free and fair election.

 

African Union - 14th Summit

(31/01/2010 to 02/02/2010) Addis Abeba

The African Union (abbreviated AU in English, and UA in its other official languages) is an intergovernmental organisation consisting of 53 African states.

Established on 9 July 2002, the AU was formed as a successor to the Organisation of African Unity (OAU). The most important decisions of the AU are made by the Assembly of the African Union, a semi-annual meeting of the heads of state and government of its member states.

The AU's secretariat, the African Union Commission, is based in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. During the February 2009 Union meeting headed by Libyan leader Muammar al-Gaddafi, it was resolved that the African Union Commission would become the African Union Authority.

The AU covers the entire continent except for Morocco, which opposes the membership of Western Sahara as the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic. However, Morocco has a special status within the AU and benefits from the services available to all AU states from the institutions of the AU, such as the African Development Bank. Moroccan delegates also participate at important AU functions, and negotiations continue to try to resolve the conflict with the Polisario Front in Tindouf, Algeria and parts of Western Sahara.

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