Borgen: Season 2 by Adam Price – Review

This is the review of the second season of the Danish political drama, Borgen by Adam Price. Although I feel that there wasn't much continuity in the episodes of the first season of Borgen, I'd still recommend you to not watch the second season unless you've watched the first. The review of the first season is available here.

The first episode of season 2 is eleven months after the end of season, which means Birgitte Nyborg has nearly completed 2 years of her term. A lot of changes have taken place. Kasper gets into a new relationship and Katrine, after quitting TV1, is now working under Michael Laugesen for The Express. Birgitte Nyborg is separated from Philip but the couple haven't gone through the divorce procedure yet.

The first thing I liked about season two was the continuity, it isn't the easy to pick a random episode and watch, unlike season 1. Season 2, was more within the government – problems within a parties putting the entire coalition into turmoil and also, covered some larger issues / events, such as the Somali pirate issue (which unfortunately was only in the background). My personal favourite, however, was the two episodes focusing on the problem in Kharun (a fictional African state, similar to Sudan) with Denmark presiding over the negotiations between the North Kharun and South Kharun. Another positive thing about season two is the fact that Birgitte was actually put under a lot of pressure in her job, forcing her to take some decisions going against the policy of her party. In season two, Birgitte has completed her transformation as an absolutely callous politician (but for her stance on Afghanistan). The second episode, on appointment of an EU representative, could've been done better, the choice being good, its narration wasn't good enough.

Moreover, season 2 ended on a high note, making me eager to watch the third season but I wasn't so desperate for the second season after I was done with the first. Considering the depth of the series and its abstract theme, it is not possible to do an elaborate review without giving away some unintended spoilers (not that Borgen is a thriller) and I'd conclude season two's review here. In my opinion, season 2 was better than season 1 on nearly all aspects and hence, I'd give it a higher rating than season 1.

Rating – 8/10

Have a nice day,

Andy

Forbrydelsen (The Killing): Season 3 by Søren Sveistrup - Review

This is the review of the third and final season of the Danish television series, Forbrydelsen. In case you haven't watched the second season, click here to read the review of the second season. If you're yet to start watching Forbrydelsen, don't move on to the subsequent paragraphs – the review of the first season is available here.

I believe sufficient warning has been given and now, I'd get into the review, right away. Lund has completed 25 years of service and wants to move into a sundry desk job in the police department. But then, there is an event, several Latvian sailors have been murdered in the Danish ship, Medea. However, Lund is least interested in the case until Mathias Borch, a member of the PET (Danish special branch) gets Lund into the case and incidentally, Borch was Lund's first love. Unlike the other two seasons of Forbrydelsen, here, the police don't initially investigate a murder but the kidnapping of Emilie Zeuthen, the daughter of Robert Zeuthen, the chairman of the most influential company in Denmark, Zeeland, which also incidentally owns the ship, Medea. However, the police are forced to look into an old case regarding the murder of Louise Hjelby, a twelve year old orphan, a case which is somehow related to the kidnapping. Like the other two seasons, this season too, has a political sub-plot, with the elections round the corner, the incumbent prime minister, Kristian Kamper and the leader of opposition, Anders Ussing are willing to do anything to get into power.

Sarah Lund (Sofie Gråbøl), Asbjørn Juncker (Sigurd Holmen le Dous) and Mathias Borch (Nikolaj Lie Kaas)

There are several positives in this third and final season of Forbrydelsen. For starters, it has patched up the mistake in the second season, that is, the political sub-plot is connected to the main plot, that is, kidnapping of Emilie Zeuthen. I also liked the choice of the financial crisis as the background, which affects everyone around, particularly some of the characters in this season. For those who loved Forbrydelsen's first season for the complications in Lund's personal life and her job, the focus is back, with Lund being a to-be grandmother in a few more days and at the same time, she gets into a relationship with Mathias Borch. Nearly every character in this season is filled with problems: Robert Zeuthen's ex-wife screams at him all the time, the board of his company tries to backstab him by relocating the company's operations to Asia; the incumbent prime minister Kristian Kamper has his whole party against him, has no idea on who to trust; Lennart Brix, Lund's chief is under extreme pressure and for a change, he supports Lund throughout and with all this, the case still moves on.

However, while some might praise such events, I always feel that too much focus on the personal lives of the characters in a crime story is digression and in my opinion, this season could have been halved had it not been for all those. I felt several events popped up out of nowhere, changing the entire facts of the case. Moreover, I also felt that it is nearly impossible for a young boy to write down nearly all licence plate numbers that came into his town in Jutland – which became a crucial document for the police. I read in Wikipedia before the release of season three that it is going to be about crimes in the financial circle which got me really excited but it seemingly is only an ordinary crime committed on a person who happens to be in the financial circle. Moreover, regarding the political angle of the story, I was quite disappointed that the politicians from the previous seasons were completely ignored. I thought since it involved national politics, Thomas Buch might have a more significant role in this series.  

To summarise, there was nothing so special about the third season, except for the fact that it is the last one and Sarah Lund is never going to come again. It wasn't too bad either, I liked the investigations, the various twists although in most cases, there is no way that such events could've been predicted by the viewer. I also felt that it had a fine ending, leaving some of the ends to be filled by the viewer. I'd give a rating of six, for the final season.

Rating – 6/10

Have a nice day,

Andy

Borgen: Season 1 by Adam Price – Review

Borgen is a Danish political drama written by Adam Price and produced by DR. After Yes Minister and Yes Prime Minister, finally I found a political series’ synopsis which could grab my attention but unlike the above mentioned series, Borgen is far from humour. It is translated as Government in several subtitle files though; the literal translation is just Castle and Borgen just happens to be the nickname of the Christiansborg Palace, the Danish Parliament (also includes the Prime Minister’s office and the Supreme Court).

With the elections being round the corner, the story concentrates on the Moderate Party a left oriented so called centrist party, a relatively small party led by Birgitte Nyborg Christensen. Birgitte is a middle aged woman, married and a mother of two. She is very strong on her principles and doesn’t go beyond them even if doing such an act can potentially make her a prime minister.

The other lead character in the story is Birgitte Nyborg’s spin doctor, Kasper Juul, extremely talented and effective, professionally but his personal life is a disaster, mainly because of his highly secretive nature, not many know much about his past. Giving a lead role to Kasper inevitably leads to Katrine Fønsmark, a journalist for TV1, becoming an important character. A workaholic journalist and more than that, Kasper’s ex-girlfriend, who had mainly split because of his nature but nevertheless, Katrine is still the only person who Kasper loves. 

Hanne Holm (Benedikte Hansen), Katrine Fønsmark (Birgitte Hjort Sørensen), Bent Sejrø (Lars Knutzon) , Michael Laugesen (Peter Mygind), BIRGITTE NYBORG (Sidse Babett Knudsen), Kaspet Juul (Pilou Asbæk), Philip Christensen (Mikael Birkkjær), Torben Friis (Søren Malling) - Format: character name(actor/actress' name); from left to right.

Coming to the story, the all party debate on election eve ends up as a disaster for both, the incumbent Prime Minister Lars Hesselboe and also, the Leader of Opposition Michael Laugesen and their loss ends up as Birgitte Nyborg’s gain. Moderate party end up doubling their number of seats, paving way for Birgitte Nyborg to lead a coalition and become Denmark’s first female prime minister (incidentally, Denmark got its first woman for the job months after Birgitte Nyborg took office). The story concentrates on various issues, handles one issue per episode. It effectively focuses on how a prime minister changes after coming to power, the problems faced by her, both at the workplace and also at home.

I loved the way how the gradual change in Birgitte Nyborg’s personality was portrayed, as a woman so strong on ethics till she comes into power and gives them up the moment she comes into power. For instance, she sacked Kasper on the election eve for doing something what he was expressly told to not do and immediately after coming to power, she starts saying things like, ‘we can’t think of what is right or what is wrong when it comes to the question of survival  in the government’ and also, eventually even rehires Kasper. The story also had three dimensions to it, the political side of it, which is the crux of the drama but with it, there is also the other side, the media – with focus on Katrine Fønsmark and her colleagues at TV1 and the last dimension being the lives of the lead characters outside their profession. Moreover, the choice of events / issues were good, in the episode, all relevant and contemporary events, such as the Greenland problem, a state visit, surveillance on a politician, problems within the three party coalition among several others. 

On the other side, what I strongly felt was that Birgitte Nyborg, in any dire situation, somehow manages to pull a rabbit out of the hat. Yes, I do agree that in some cases, she did negotiate very well but, in several other cases, in an absolutely no hope situation, she gets some input with which she manages to suppress the ones who are attacking her. Only on very rare occasions, she was forced into decisions which she didn’t want to take. Effectively, she could’ve been given the title Saint Birgitte, since; even the most efficient and committed leaders have committed blunders during the tenure but I couldn’t observe anything so significant from Birgitte Nyborg. Besides Birgitte Nyborg, the extreme focus on Katrine Fønsmark’s personal life and her infatuations were extremely boring and was in fact, a hindrance to the flow. Besides that, I also wasn’t particularly pleased about the lack of continuity in the episodes and the author, decided to stick on to his unwritten rule of his one event per episode whereas I felt some of those were concluded in a rather abrupt manner and the author could’ve considered extending the same to the next episode.

 I found some of the aspects rather weird or even illogical. First, I’ve hardly seen anyone giving up power, especially political power after having tasted it, but, in Michael Laugesen’s case, after a cock up, he completely quit politics and became standard civilian, working for a newspaper. Moreover, in my country of residence, even if a sundry MP moves around, leave alone the Prime Minister, the entire traffic is blocked, with a minimum of eight police cars surrounding the politician’s car but in Borgen, the incumbent Prime Minister has no security personnel stationed around her place of residence nor does a police fleet keep her on guard wherever she goes. It does sound rather illogical but if that is the reality, then hats off to little Denmark.

Those who enjoy a politics, in my opinion, would surely enjoy Borgen. As far as the rating is concerned, for the concept and the choice of events, I’d give Borgen a seven and shall go no further, considering the negatives which can’t be ignored. The second season of Borgen would certainly be something to watch out for, and it’d be interesting to see if it manages to please me as much as the first, if not more.

Rating - 7/10

Have a nice day,

Andy

Forbrydelsen (The Killing) - Season 2 by Søren Sveistrup – Review

This is the review of the second season of the Danish crime drama written by Søren Sveistrup, Forbrydelsen. If you haven't watched the first season, I recommend you to not continue any further and the review of the previous season is available here and whatever I’ve stated in my previous review regarding how I review a drama applies to this review as well. 

Ulrik Strange (Mikael Birkkjær) and Sarah Lund (Sofie Gråbøl)

Getting back to the review, the second season starts with the murder of a lawyer, Anne Dragsøhlm, who worked as a legal adviser to the Danish army. After Jan Meyer’s demise and the sacking of Lund from the homicide department, the chief Lennart Brix gets a new subordinate, Ulrik Strange. Meanwhile, Sarah Lund’s union with her boyfriend Bengt Rosling fails and she is back in Denmark, as part of the Passport police in Gedser, southern Denmark. Brix drafts Sarah back into the homicide department and from her side, although she was initially reluctant, she eventually overcomes her dilemma and decides to investigate the case along with Ulrik Strange. As the series progresses, the murders similar to that of Dragshølm keep taking place – a serial killer is on the run. 

Similar to the first season, there was also a political sub-plot – but from local politics, it moved on to national politics, with the newly appointed Justice Minister, Thomas Buch,  being the lead in the sub-plot, who is put in a situation which forces him to open a can of worms. Then there is Jens Peter Raben, a suspended military officer who is now in a psychiatric ward over mental issues and Raben, in some way has links to the murdered.

I don’t think I can give any further details on the plot without spoiling the same. Coming to the story, it was good, to say the least. Murders all over the place, and also, these murders also had political impact. Lund-Strange combination too, was really good, for a change, Lund could actually cooperate with somebody and if I have to say something good about Strange, I think he is the only one who was never annoyed by any of Lund’s antics and supported her throughout. Adding more on the characters, my favourite addition was the Justice Minister Thomas Buch – who, despite not being a lawyer, was doing a good job, did not care about losing his post for doing the right thing and also, his rhetoric was really good and though I don’t understand more than ten words in Danish, I loved the way in which he expressed himself and one the whole, Buch was by far the best addition to the series (only as a character). The story also added dimensions, military protocol, and the war in Afghanistan among several things. I love crime stories which are to the point, without much digressions or needless sub-plots and Season 2 of Forbrydelsen’s score certainly increases on my scoreline, for such reasons. 

From what I’ve read, season two is strongly criticised for several reasons; that Lund was loved because of the complex nature of her character, her workaholic personality, personal issues and problems at work but in season two, she didn’t have any personal or professional problems. Moreover, the next bone of contention was that the personal aspect of a murder was completely ignored, that is, there was no focus on the families of the bereaved. The last one was the size being halved, compared to the twenty episodes of the previous season.

However, I never understood the reason for such strong criticism. The first, regarding Sarah Lund being compromised, I felt that Lund was the same as before, ever so confident, ever so assertive and moreover, for me as a viewer, I enjoyed seeing Lund having someone as cooperative (unlike Jan Meyer) as Ulrik Strange as her partner.  The next being the personal aspects of a murder, that is a reasonable criticism although, it wouldn’t have been practically possible to do such a thing when the number of people murdered is so high in number. Instead, even the impact of Jens’ absence on the Raben family was portrayed quite well, which I think compensates for the lack of counterparts to the Birk Larsen family. Regarding the size, it was quite a relief – considering that the first season, beyond a certain point, was dragging on and on for no particular reason.

However, I’d not say that Season 2 of Forbrydelsen was perfect, far from it, with its own flaws. The first being, although I praised Thomas Buch, as a character in the story, I however felt that his presence and in fact, the entire political aspect of it to be quite redundant. The politicians were hardly a part of the whole police investigation and unlike Troels Hartmann, Thomas Buch meets Sarah Lund only once, that too for less than ten seconds and it was in not in any way connected with the investigation. The political side of the story was a plain repeat of the first series and Sveistrup unnecessarily followed a template, that is, write a crime story, and somehow link it to Danish politics. On a light note, Lund wearing her famous Faroese jumper in the deserts of Afghanistan completely went over the top. It is nearly impossible for a writer to cover up everything and there were loose ends, some blatant ones but much less, as compared to the first season.

I’d conclude this review by rating this series and for rating crime stories; I’ve a rough checklist which I shall be stating below. The story was good, satisfying the primary requirement, with minimal deviations and had a good set of characters, adding flavour to the story. Moreover, the more important aspects of a crime story are the interesting twists and turns, red-herrings which it definitely had and finally the most important of all, a fitting end, which Forbrydelsen’s second season didn’t lack, either. On the whole, I’d give this an eight on ten.

Have a nice day,

Andy

The Bankster by Ravi Subramanian - Book Review

Publisher's write-up:

'Bankers build their careers on trust, or so everyone thinks, till a series of murders threaten to destroy the reputation that the Greater Boston Global Bank (GB2) has built over the years. Who is behind these killings, and what is their motive? Is the banker at GB2 fast turning into a bankster? Or was he always one?

When Karan Panjabi, press reporter and ex-banker, digs deeper, he realizes that he has stumbled upon a global conspiracy with far-reaching ramifications – a secret that could not only destroy the bank, but also cast a shadow on the entire nation.

With only thirty-six hours at his disposal, he must fight the clock and trust no one if he is to stay alive and trust no one if he is to stay alive and uncover the truth.

Spinning an intricate web of lies, deceit and treachery, best selling author Ravi Subramanian, a master storyteller of financial crime and winner of 2008 Golden Quill Readers' Choice Award, returns with his most gripping thriller yet.'

The story begins in Angola where a covert CIA agent supplies arms to rebels, with the help of DR Congo and is paid in diamonds, in exchange. The author then, takes us immediately to Kerala in southern India, where an elderly man, who lost his son and daughter-in-law during the Chernobyl disaster, is leading a protest against the Trikakulam Nuclear Power Project (based on the ongoing Koodankulam protest). The author then takes us to Mumbai, which could be said as the main plot, where a foreign bank in India, Greater Boston Global Bank (GB2), many of whose officials are losing their lives – murdered, in fact. Why these officials, that too from these particular bank? Karan Panjabi, a journalist and a former employee of GB2, investigates the case, leading him to drastic findings, which could absolutely destroy the bank's reputation.

I judged a book by the summary written in the back of the book by the publisher, considering the global nature of this book, with the author taking the reader to Angola, Kerala, Mumbai, Vienna and Tel-Aviv; and also dealing with a white-collar crime, I decided that I'm certainly going to like this book. Fortunately, I wasn't disappointed. It was a fast moving story – a story with three parallel plots and I liked the way in which the author brought out how actually works, supposed to serve the customers, but instead, how the employees are desperate only to achieve their targets for personal gains and in order to achieve such targets, how the coerce the customers into their devious schemes. The book would be best enjoyed if read in 2012 or 13 mainly because you could easily relate to the events happening around you. The author also maintained the suspense till the very end with twists and several red-herring characters (could have been better if 'solve before the detective' had been possible, in my opinion, even if you happen to guess things right, you can only thank your instinct). As a light note, I also loved the chapter where he imitated Arnab Goswami and his Newshour Debate.

But coming to the other side of it, I didn't like the overuse of Hindi in conversation. Words like chai being tea are known to most Indians but there were whole sentences were in transliterated Hindi; which isn't a problem for someone who knows the language but would certainly be a problem for the huge non-Hindi speaking population who read English novels. Perhaps the author justifies it as recreating the exact Mumbai atmosphere but that is something that could have certainly been avoided. Another thing about this book is the poor character building and also, there is no character to whom a reader can attach herself / himself to while reading the book; although we know that Karan is the protagonist (if you've read the publisher's write-up), still, at the outset, it seemed as though the Retail head of GB2, Vikram was going to be the main character and then the attention shifted to Nikhil, the cluster head, and then, Anand, the manager of the branch in Bandra, Mumbai and then it seemed like a battle between the two relationship managers of the Bandra branch, Harshita and Zinaida and after that Raymond, a manager of the compliance department of the bank gained prominence and finally, only around the 200^th page (in a novel of 358 pages), Karan was actually involved in a conversation.

It certainly would be a page-turner for those love to read any form of thrillers. My important benchmarks for being a good thriller, the plot, the pace and a fitting end, were all met in this book which allows me to award this book a seven on ten.

Rating – 7/10

Have a nice day,

Andy

The Bridge – Season 1 by Björn Stein – Review

Product description (Amazon UK):

'The body of a woman is found in the middle of the Øresund Bridge. Half of it belongs to a Swedish politician, the other half to a Danish prostitute. Trapped in the middle of the bridge connecting Sweden and Denmark, a bi-national investigatory team is put together to solve the crime. Laid-back Danish family man, Martin, and Swedish single woman, Saga, have to work together to stop the horrific staged murders before the terrorist wins over public opinion with his anti-corruption agenda.'

The Bridge (Danish – Broen, Swedish – Bron) is a Danish / Swedish TV series written by Björn Stein and created by Hans Rosenfeldt. Similar to my previous review of Forbrydelsen – Season 1, I shall review it as a story, and not as a drama, since I haven't the faintest idea on how to judge acting or screenplay.

I had been reading a lot about the combined metropolitan area of Copenhagen-Malmö and that too, integrating so rapidly ever since the construction of the Øresund Bridge. So, while reading about them, I stumbled upon this TV series while reading about Copenhagen-Malmö and I found the concept to be rather different and really interesting – and I couldn't avoid my temptation, despite my usual aversion towards stories narrated through a visual medium.

The power supply is to the Øresundbron is cut off, for a very brief period and within that span of time, a body of a woman is found, exactly in the Denmark – Sweden border. The member of the Malmö CID, Saga Norén (Sofia Helin) takes the lead, initially because the woman is Swedish but it is found out that it is the body of two different women, with the top half belonging to a Swede and the bottom half, a Dane. This brings Martin Rohde (Kim Bodnia) into the investigation, a member of the Copenhagen police and a Swedish-Danish collaboration begins, in order to solve the case.

It was interesting, and had an altogether different kind of mass murderer who maintains contact with a journalist, using him as a medium to communicate his message and eventually got himself named the 'Truth Terrorist'. I found this similar to Ian Rankin's crime novels, where social issues / current state of the society are brought out through a crime novel (I also found a lot of similarities between this story and Rankin's first Rebus novel Knots & Crosses which is something I shall be writing about, soon). Moreover, the Martin – Saga combination was really interesting, two totally different characters; Martin is married whereas Saga is single; Martin understands emotions whereas Saga shows no sort of emotions, and occasionally ends up saying something comical and also, Saga is too strict about rules and procedures whereas Martin doesn't mind a breach so long is it benefits the police. Like in the case of any GOOD crime story, there were a lot of twists and turns, keeping things going for 10 hours and also one can expect a lot of red-herrings. Some say that the impact of the murder in the family of the deceased wasn't touched at all in this series but that is something that I appreciate, unlike the case of Forbrydelsen Season 1 where the scenes involving the Birk Larsens began to get too boring beyond a point. What was really disappointing was the way the character of Stefan Lindberg, the social worker based in Malmö was ignored subsequently and if the writers were going to do that, there was no need to emphasise on him so much, in the beginning.

There is a second season scheduled but I really wonder how they're going to do it, considering the title, the scope seems too narrow and if Saga and Martin are to collaborate again, it could only be possible in case the case of an old wine in a new bottle scenario but it'd be interesting to see how the writers manage it. I also learnt a lot more about Scandinavia from Broen than I could from Forbrydelsen or Borgen.

Considering the investigations, the way in which they were carried out, the story, and of course, what I believe to be the most important aspect in any crime story, that is the end, which was more than satisfactory and considering all this, I'd award this a rating of seven.

Rating – 7 / 10

Have a nice day,

Andy

A Well Deserved Award

I know that this is a delayed reaction of mine but after reading a lot of negative responses from several people, including the former Polish president Lech Walesa, who had won the prize in 1983 and after such responses, I couldn't refrain myself from not expressing an opinion on this decision. In fact I felt that Lech Walesa's whole argument of people in the EU getting paid to do the job to be meaningless – that is the case with most Nobel Peace Prize laureates. Some might dismiss this article as 'an article from an ill informed young and naïve foreigner' and for all you know, you may be right in doing so.

I was aghast, back in 2009 when the Norwegian committee decided to award the prestigious prize to the US President Barack Obama, only because he was the president of the United States, who had been in office only for ten months, back then and had hardly achieved anything and the only thing he had done till then was that he made a lot of empty promises. At that juncture, it made me wonder about the other potential individuals / organisations who could have been given the prize and there was one very obvious candidate – European Union, an organisation who have been promoting peace in Europe for several decades, unlike Obama's ten month tenure.

I shall not discuss too much of EU's history but today, after six decades of tireless effort, Europe is largely united with the exception of some Eastern European and non-Baltic former soviet nations. EU is almost like a federal country, with 27 states (28 in another nine months with Croatia joining the union). It has most features of a sovereign state such as a common currency(in 17 countries),

visa free access, a broad legal framework with minor differences in individual member states (similar to the United States), even acts as an observer for several similar regional unions and also many other aspects but for a common military.

Europe could've been the epicentre of another world war yet again owing to its proximity to the Warsaw Pact countries but since the fall of the iron curtain, the former communist nations were welcomed with open arms and today, countries like Poland, Estonia among several others to the east of the iron curtain are an integral part of the European Union.

There are several such regional / continental organisations and to take an example regarding such a union, I'd take SAARC (South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation), which has eight member states, with a significantly higher combined territory than that of European Union. However, SAARC, or for that matter, any other organisations haven't achieved even close to what EU has achieved and going back to the SAARC example, it is probably the most insignificant union – all countries have different currencies and it is nearly unimaginable for a national of one member state to acquire a visa of another member state, leave alone free access. This is sadly the case with nearly every other supposed regional union as well.

So, to the question, whether European Union has promoted peace and democracy, the answer is obviously yes. When the Union was formed, it was less than a decade since France and Germany had been on different sides during the WW 2 but today, it is nearly unimaginable to even think about the possibility of the two nations waging a war against each other. The fact that the pre-requisite to join the Union is to fulfil the conditions of Copenhagen criteria would imply that there are certain codes in the country which uphold the values such as democracy and freedom – and many countries have done that in order to reap the benefits of being a part of the Union – a direct indication that EU has promoted peace. But for that, the Schengen agreement along with several other treaties and agreements has ensured free movement of labour, resources and capital within the Union. But for that, there are obviously several other aspects which the EU has achieved and it may not be appropriate to state them all in this article; moreover, these are the two most obvious things visible to an outsider like myself.

This decision by the Nobel committee has attracted criticism mainly because of the timing of the award – at a time when Greece, Spain and some more countries are facing an economic turmoil but what people must keep in mind before making such remarks is that EU hasn't received a prize for economics, it was for peace and it is evident that they've achieved peace, over these six decades. However, to live up to its expectations on receiving this award, there must be an end to this crisis- after all, no economic crisis lasts forever; even the Great Depression was overcome, and incidentally, one of the worst-hit nations (Germany) of that depression is today a member of the Union. This is certainly a challenge for EU which is bound to be met.

In future, I'd like to see the EU becoming a much larger union and perhaps, this may even sound Utopian, but I'd like to see the Union amassing the entire Council of Europe under one banner. It'd certainly take time and effort but it is worth doing so. I've always been an admirer of Europeans and their culture – for they've been the pioneers of most revolutionary ideas and EU is another one such idea, which has set an example for the world.

I'd conclude with the words of the Belgian Prime Minister Elio di Rupo - 'this choice shows that the European project continues to inspire the world today. The European Union was originally the dream of people and politicians in search of peace and prosperity for all citizens. It has become a strong symbol of cooperation and progress. Europe, a continent that was torn by terrible wars, thanks to the European Union is an example for the world of peaceful dialogue and conflict prevention.'

Have a nice day,

Andy