Turkish President Abdullah Gul has joined world leaders in congratulating Armenia on the 19th anniversary of its declaration of independence from the Soviet Union, RFE/RL's Armenian Service reports. President Serzh Sarkisian's press office did not publicize the text of the letter he received from Gul nor report any of its details, and there was no word of it on Gul's website.

A footbridge being built for the Commonwealth Games in India collapsed on Tuesday, injuring 27 people and highlighting the raft of problems that have so far blighted the event, meant to showcase an emerging global power. Preparations for October's $6 billion Commonwealth Games, intended to be the coming-out party for India that the Olympics were for China, are so far behind schedule that the event risks becoming a farce.

French Prime Minister Francois Fillon said Tuesday that the European Union needs a continent-wide plan for illegal Gypsy camps and children beggars that he described as plagues of the 19th century. At the same time, the EU justice commissioner maintained her concerns about France's expulsions of more than 1,000 Gypsies, or Roma, in recent weeks

It is arguably modern Europe's flagship ideal: the freedom to move across borders and seek a better life elsewhere. But in the Europe of Nicolas Sarkozy, Silvio Berlusconi, and others, the privilege has its limits -- and its paradoxes. Effectively excluded, it seems, is the one group singly most identified with a nomadic and peripatetic existence: the continent's 10 million-strong Romany population.

The death of a giant panda in captivity in Japan has caused something of a diplomatic stink. Apart from eating bamboo, this is something that pandas are very good at.

As Hillary Rodham Clinton has embarked on her first attempt at substantive Middle East diplomacy, she has drawn on her record of controversial statements about Israel and the Palestinians - and depicted it as an asset. It is a tricky balancing act that attests to the secretary of state's talent as a politician, as well as her predilection for getting into hot water with bold, sometimes ill-timed pronouncements.

Energy diplomacy dominated proceedings at the two-day meeting of Turkic-speaking countries in Istanbul, even though members had ostensibly come to the conference to focus on fostering solidarity in the Turkic world...The energy ministers of Turkmenistan, Azerbaijan and Turkey held three-way talks on Wednesday on the margins of the event about the Caspian region, natural gas pipelines and energy projects...

Is Nicolas Sarkozy's so-called burqa ban, as my FP colleague David Rothkopf writes, an expression of rising intolerance in France? Perhaps. Coupled with his expulsion of more than 1,000 Roma, it sure looks like le président is trying to use a cultural wedge to shore up his flagging popularity. Still, I think the "burqa" issue (or, alternatively, the jilbab + niqab, or abaya issue) is more complicated than David allows.