A Czech newspaper article condemning a recent pension increase has set off a ripple of public debate on the elderly in the Czech Republic. Considered little more than washed-out old Commies by much of the younger generation, the elderly are widely ignored in Czech society. Their increasingly louder voice and growing numerical strength, however, means this is slowly changing.

Catherine Miller

P O S T - S O V I E T   O R P H A N:
Central European Security Issues through the Belarusian Prism

There has been much recent debate about NATO's role in the fabric of the emerging European security architecture. Nevertheless, little attention has been paid to one of its newest border states: Belarus. The fact remains Belarusian foreign policy revolves around the East, while paying much less attention to the West.

Peter Szyszlo

T H E   D E C A D E:
Ten Years Later

Nobody stormed the Bastille, no enthusiastic crowds cheered in the streets. Communist Poland departed ten years ago amid the hum of office fans, the clink of spoons stirring sugar into countless cups of coffee and the rustle of ballots falling into ballot boxes.

Slawomir Majman

Theme of the Week Nuclear Power in Central and Eastern Europe

NUCLEAR  POWER: Lithuania's Nuclear Dilemma Mel Huang Lithuania now faces a difficult decision: give up its primary power source for a faster road to Brussels or remain self-sufficient and risk incurring further EU wrath.	NUCLEAR  POWER: Forward to the Past Andreas Beckmann Western governments have become mired in Ukraine's plans for further nuclear power stations despite increasing domestic pressure against nuclear energy.
NUCLEAR  POWER: Ghost Town: Chernobyl twelve years on Andrew J Horton Life in the 30km exclusion zone around Chernobyl still continues. CER interviews a film documentarist about his visit to the area to record the lives of ordinary people.

Kinoeye This week's Kinoeye continues the survey of the 34th Karlovy Vary International Film Festival with a look at two very different films documenting bleak and disturbing worlds.

KARLOVY VARY: Ghost Town: Chernobyl twelve years on Andrew J Horton Life in the 30km exclusion zone around Chernobyl still continues. CER interviews film documentarist Nikolaus Geyrhalter about his visit to the area to record the lives of ordinary people.	KARLOVY VARY: Dreaming a Bad Reality: Rychle pohyby oci and the legacy of Jaromil Jires Andrew J Horton One of the most incomprehensible Czech films of the decade, Rychle pohyby oci's relatively high profile derives from a Czechoslovak surrealist classic of the country's darkest days.
THE KINOEYE ARCHIVE This new sub-site aims to be the definitive index of Internet resources on Central and East European cinema.

N E W   G E N E R A T I O N:
Confronting Jewishness
Part 2 - Generating a Generation

Jewish identity for those in Central Europe who are grandchildren of the survivors of the Second World War has long been rumoured to be a largely unconscious affair, if not completely extinct. In post-war Central Europe, identity was torn between the twin temptations of assimilation and emigration. However, a group of young intellectuals from this "third generation" after the Holocaust are currently challenging this view. In this, the second of three parts, we will look at how these authors view their Jewishness and how they came to this consciousness.