European press review

The continent's press is dominated by reports on the violence at the G8 summit in Genoa and consideration of what effect this will have on future such meetings.

Turning elsewhere, an Austrian paper is pessimistic about the future of peace in Macedonia.

Death in Genoa

In a play on the title of a famous film set in another Italian city, the headline of an editorial in Paris's Le Monde on the G8 summit is "Death in Genoa".

"With the death of a young Italian protester the violence which has accompanied the major international summits for several years has reached a new level," it says.

"It has now reached a level which demands the asking of questions not just about the conditions in which meetings between the powerful from this world are organised, but also about the extent of the protests against globalization," it adds.

"In our democracies," the paper says, "these protest groups express... an unease and demands which deserve to be taken into consideration".

"It can be said that they have chosen the wrong target by attacking meetings which are trying to introduce rules into globalization," it says, but adds: "It remains that solutions have to be found so that such tragedies are avoided in the future."

And of the protesters, it asks: "Are they going to continue to accept... that their protests systematically degenerate into street battles, at the risk of discrediting a noble fight?"

With the announcement by G8 leaders that next year's summit will be held high up in the Canadian mountains, Geneva's Le Temps says: "It is not certain that the quiet of the Canadian Rockies will be enough to silence the protests that they fear."

The paper continues: "In the minds of the world's leaders, the events in Genoa come down to the wild rampage by a group of anarchists."

But it adds that the vast majority of the protesters were peaceful and the fact that 200,000 of them took part in a protest march in the city "proves that their determination to contest globalization as it is practised is a long-term thing".

The mind gap

"The G8 lost the battle of Genoa" says the lead headline in Paris's Le Figaro.

"The leaders of the planet's most industrialised countries and Russia left one another yesterday with the final results rich in disagreements," the paper says.

"The violence of the street fighting," it says, "obscured just as much the peaceful march by 150,000 to 200,000 various anti-globalization protesters as the heads of state and government's work".

The paper says there is a "real gap" between French President Jacques Chirac's call to try and understand the protesters and President George W Bush's refusal to talk with what he says are people who wrongly claim to represent the poor.

"The disagreement between America and Europe on the Kyoto Protocol has also been confirmed," it adds.

Germany's Berliner Zeitung says the Christ-like image of a dead demonstrator lying in the streets of Genoa with his arms spread out will stick in the mind but must be seen in context.

"Christ did not attempt to throw a fire-extinguisher at a policeman," the paper points out.

For the paper, if no shots had been fired, other images might have shown a spread-eagled police officer, killed or injured by a violent mob.

"Images," the paper concludes, "do not explain anything, but they can stir up emotions and paralyse the mind."

Pros and cons of violence

Berlin's Die Welt says the violent protesters have harmed the cause of peaceful demonstrators.

It says most of those who demonstrated were driven by what it calls "basic fears that must be taken seriously".

The paper argues that the world's leaders should engage with their motives and that they can only do so if conference venues are public.

"The minority who misuse such summit meetings as a platform for hatred and violence do those who have serious concerns a disservice," the paper concludes.

Also from Berlin, Die Tageszeitung takes the opposite view.

"Experience teaches us," the paper says, "that politically motivated violence is actually useful."

It argues that without spectacular images of burning cars, wounded demonstrators and police gunshots, the media would hardly have devoted much of their reporting to the cause of anti-globalization or indeed other issues.

"Who," it asks, "would have shown any interest in the 50% of unemployed youths of Asian origin in Bradford, northern England, before they engaged in street battles with the police night after night?"

"It cannot go on like this", the Budapest daily Nepszabadsag says in a commentary on the summit.

The paper says that everyone agrees on this point regardless of whether they believe the protests are "mob terror" or "the democratization of the decision-making process".

The paper says that, on the one hand, "senseless violence cannot rule over sober minds trying to find solutions", but adds that it is also true that "only mass demonstrations and a real threat of aggression can influence the decision-makers at present".

"New discussion forums and a modern decision-making mechanism able to incorporate the views of more people are needed", the paper concludes.

The front page of Paris's Liberation simply says "A shameful G8 meeting".

Macedonia's loss of faith

Vienna's Der Standard is downbeat about the situation in Macedonia despite the planned resumption of talks between ethnic Albanian and Macedonian political parties.

The paper notes that international mediators still believe in a miracle while among Albanians and Macedonians "depressing pessimism" prevails.

It explains that the Macedonian government fears the prospect of western Macedonia eventually seceding and becoming part of Kosovo.

"Given the mood of hatred and mutual mistrust," it says, "Prime Minister Ljupco Georgievski knows that most Macedonians would accuse him of capitulation if he were to make concessions to the Albanians."

The paper adds that the Macedonians have lost faith in the international community since Nato peace troops in Macedonia and Kosovo have failed to take action against the uprising of Albanians in Macedonia.

The European press review is compiled by BBC Monitoring from internet editions of the main European newspapers and some early printed editions.