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Tony Barber

European Comment Editor

Tony Barber is European Comment Editor of the Financial Times. He is a former foreign correspondent in Austria, Belgium, Germany, Italy, Poland, the former Soviet Union, the US and the former Yugoslavia.

In 2012 he was awarded the Medal of Gratitude by the Solidarity Centre in Gdańsk in recognition of his work in support of freedom and democracy in Poland. He wrote the introduction to Mud Sweeter Than Honey, a book on communist Albania by the author Margo Rejmer.

Email Tony Barber @TonyBarber8  on Twitter (link opens in a new browser window)
  • Saturday, 29 March, 2025
    Europe Express
    Europe’s future in historical context Premium content

    Knowledge of the past is essential but comparisons between the leaders and events of different eras have their limits

    Former US President Ronald Reagan with his Soviet counterpart Mikhail Gorbachev
  • Saturday, 29 March, 2025
    ObituaryOleg Gordievsky
    Oleg Gordievsky, KGB spy turned British agent, 1938-2025

    His escape from Moscow as the net closed on him was a memorable episode of cold war espionage

    A middle-aged man in a light blue jacket and checked shirt
  • Thursday, 27 March, 2025
    Russian politics
    Putin’s imperial mission destroys freedom in Russia

    Victory in the Ukraine war would serve as the perfect justification for autocracy at home

    Ellie Foreman-Peck illustration of Putin looking at a map of Ukraine and Russia depicted on the Kremlin.
  • Saturday, 22 March, 2025
    Europe Express
    European strongmen under siege Premium content

    Protests in Serbia, Slovakia, Hungary and Georgia show that the thirst for civic and national dignity is unquenchable

    Protestors on the streets of Slovakia, waving the national flag.
  • Saturday, 15 March, 2025
    Europe Express
    Should Europe draw closer to China? Premium content

    Geopolitical and economic disputes mean Beijing is no natural replacement for the US despite the crisis in transatlantic ties

    Chinese President Xi Jinping, sitting in front of a row of the EU and Chinese flags
  • Thursday, 13 March, 2025
    Bosnia and Herzegovina
    Western unity is still on display in Bosnia — but for how long?

    There is a risk that the Balkans will turn into a European security problem once again

    A sign is displayed as Bosnian Serbs rally in front of the regional parliament in support of President of Serb Republic Milorad Dodik
  • Saturday, 1 March, 2025
    Europe Express
    Das politische Zentrum in Deutschland bröckelt

    Friedrich Merz wird versuchen, mit einer moderaten Koalition zu regieren, während der Rückhalt für extremistische politische Kräfte zunimmt

    Vandalised CDU election campaign posters
  • Saturday, 1 March, 2025
    Europe Express
    The political centre cracks in Germany

    Friedrich Merz will try to govern with a moderate coalition at a time of rising support for extremist political forces

    Vandalised CDU election campaign posters
  • Saturday, 22 February, 2025
    Europe Express
    Deutschlands Entscheidungswahl

    Nationale und internationale Spannungen sowie wirtschaftliche Stagnation überschatten die Bundestagswahl am Sonntag

    Wahlplakate mit dem deutschen Bundeskanzler Olaf Scholz (rechts) und CDU-Chef Friedrich Merz (links)
  • Saturday, 22 February, 2025
    Europe Express
    Germany’s watershed election

    Domestic and international tensions as well as economic stagnation hang over Sunday’s Bundestag vote

    Election posters showing German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, right, and CDU leader Friedrich Merz, left
  • Tuesday, 18 February, 2025
    ReviewHistory books
    Summer of Fire and Blood — the ‘giant trauma’ at the centre of the Reformation

    Lyndal Roper’s account of the German Peasants’ War is all the clearer for shedding the ideological bias of many previous studies

    A drawing of 16th-century peasants fighting with pitchforks against soldiers in armour with swords
  • Saturday, 15 February, 2025
    Europe Express
    Europe’s wake-up call Premium content

    Internal disagreements are just as serious a problem as external pressure from the US and Russia

    Donald Trump, Emmanuel Macron and Volodymyr Zelenskyy
  • Saturday, 8 February, 2025
    Europe Express
    Flirting with the far right Premium content

    Conservatives in Europe are increasingly entwined with more extreme forces but circumstances differ nation by nation

    Herbert Kickl, leader of Austria’s Freedom party, attending a campaign event in September 2024
  • Wednesday, 5 February, 2025
    Populism in Europe
    Europe’s illiberal strongmen sit on volcanoes of public discontent

    Mass protests in Serbia illustrate that democracy and clean government are precious ideals in bullied societies

    People hold up their mobile phone lights during a protest in Novi Sad, Serbia,
  • Saturday, 1 February, 2025
    Europe Express
    Ukraine peace hopes rest on fragile foundations Premium content

    A gulf still separates Russia’s war aims from any deal acceptable to Kyiv and its western supporters

    A man kneels before a memorial commemorating fallen Ukrainian soldiers
  • Saturday, 1 February, 2025
    US
    Maps distort reality while revealing the eternal truth about politics

    Trump’s renaming of the Gulf of Mexico is part of a long tradition of deploying cartography in the service of power

  • Saturday, 25 January, 2025
    Europe Express
    Mistrust, grumpiness and political deadlock in France Premium content

    Long-term changes in social attitudes combine with the decline of mainstream parties to open a door for the far right

    Michelin workers protest in front of a Michelin plant in France
  • Saturday, 18 January, 2025
    Europe Express
    Erdoğan turns a page in Turkey Premium content

    More orthodox economic measures go hand in hand with a Kurdish initiative and a recalibrated foreign policy

    Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan
  • Saturday, 11 January, 2025
    Europe Express
    Asylum ruling against Greece exposes Europe’s migrants dilemma Premium content

    Curbing irregular arrivals is a political priority but legal and humanitarian questions cannot be brushed aside

    A Spanish police officer and Frontex officer receive migrants arriving in the Lanzarote port of Arrecife this week. A baby boy was born on a small, crowded boat carrying 60 people on the deadly Atlantic migration route from Africa to the Canary Islands
  • Wednesday, 8 January, 2025
    Giorgia Meloni
    Meloni’s European moment risks falling flat

    Italy’s most successful premiers on the EU stage tend to be technocrats not professional politicians

    Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni
  • Saturday, 4 January, 2025
    Europe Express
    Trump’s shadow looms over Hungary and Poland Premium content

    Dealing with the next US administration will test Warsaw as it replaces Budapest in the EU’s rotating presidency

    Donald Trump and Viktor Orbán
  • Thursday, 26 December, 2024
    War in Ukraine
    A long nightmare of repression awaits Ukraine’s occupied lands

    Any ceasefire that leaves Putin with his conquests will bring more Russification and denial of civil liberties

    People feed birds in front of a mural on an embankment in Yalta, Crimea
  • Saturday, 21 December, 2024
    Europe Express
    Ten reasons to be cheerful about 2024    Premium content

    From Notre-Dame’s restoration to the finale of ‘Curb Your Enthusiasm’, it wasn’t such a bad year after all

    US gymnast Simone Biles celebrates after winning the gold medal
  • Saturday, 21 December, 2024
    ObituaryGerd Heidemann
    Gerd Heidemann, German journalist, 1931-2024

    The Hitler diaries that he claimed to have unearthed were crude forgeries

    Gerd Heidemann on the last day of the “Stern” trial for fraud with fake Hitler diaries in Hamburg, Germany 1985.
  • Saturday, 14 December, 2024
    Europe Express
    France and Greece: spot the differences Premium content

    Political and fiscal troubles pile up in Paris as Athens continues to recover from its debt agony

    People outside a closed National Bank branch hope to get their pensions on Crete island on June 29 2015 during the debt crisis. Greek banks were shuttered to prevent the country’s financial system from collapsing
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