European press review

Thursday's European papers look at the low expectations for today's Iraq donors' conference in Madrid and the possible implications of the brokered Iranian nuclear deal for the future EU foreign policy.

A French daily focuses on the killing of a journalist in Africa.

And in Russia, papers are asking some awkward questions about last year's Moscow's theatre siege.

Finding the money

As a major conference to raise money for reconstructing Iraq is due to get under way in Madrid, the Spanish daily El Mundo plays down expectations.

The figures which are circulating make you gasp for breath Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung

"For the moment, with Spain's contribution, there are already $23bn on the table," the paper concedes.

"However, it should be pointed out that the USA has not yet decided if its $20bn will go in hard cash or in the form of credits, and that other countries, like France, will not hand over a cent until sovereignty is completely returned to the people of Iraq," it adds.

Germany's Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung predicts the conference will fail to raise the necessary funds.

"The figures which are circulating make you gasp for breath: the cost of Iraq's reconstruction over the next four to five years has been estimated to amount to between 36bn and 70bn dollars," the paper says.

It adds that, even before the conference, it is becoming clear that nobody knows who will be able to come up with these sums and when.

Another German daily, Der Tagesspiegel, despairs at continuing European divisions over Iraq.

The paper points out that Germany and France have pledged no funds for the reconstruction of Iraq while Britain and Spain have offered hundreds of millions of dollars.

"There once was a European Union," it says. But, according to the paper, the European Union has become "a club in which, in the field of foreign and security policy, everybody opposes everybody else".

EU's 'embryonic' foreign policy

After the broad welcome in the European press on Wednesday of the nuclear deal with Iran, the Paris daily Le Monde assesses its long-term significance for the EU.

"A European foreign policy exists only in the embryonic state, but the French, British and German foreign ministers have just provided proof that they can act together effectively on the international stage," the paper says.

Messrs Villepin, Straw and Fischer undeniably defused a crisis between the ayatollahs and the global community, it says.

"Like the Americans, the Europeans recognize that the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction... constitutes one of the main threats to international security," the paper observes.

But it adds that combating it does not necessarily involve force and the same ends can be achieved by persuasion, albeit backed up by US threats in the case of Iran.

"It is not insignificant for Europe's future that Great Britain associated itself with the move after having tagged onto American policy over Iraq," it says.

The media accused

Still in France, Paris's Liberation launches an attack on the Ivorian media following the fatal shooting of a French journalist in Cote d'Ivoire.

Words sometimes kill as surely as the bullets of the roughneck soldier who murdered our colleague Jean Helene in Abidjan Liberation

Jean Helene was killed outside a police station while waiting to interview a number of arrested Ivorian opposition activists.

The Ivorian media foment a climate of racism and intolerance of outsiders - whether whites, Muslims or opposition members - Liberation says, adding that this is accepted by the government.

"Words sometimes kill as surely as the bullets of the roughneck soldier who murdered our colleague Jean Helene in Abidjan," the paper says.

The paper adds that the security forces enjoy impunity and raises doubts over the inquiry ordered by President Laurent Gbagbo.

"And over the crocodile tears shed by a pro-government Ivorian press which pretends to be angered by a crime it has not ceased to incite through its campaigns of hatred towards foreigners in general and French people in particular."

'Unanswered terror'

As Russia prepares to mark the first anniversary of the Moscow theatre siege which claimed the lives of more than 120 hostages, several newspapers pose a number of difficult questions.

Nord-Ost's other questions and secrets will remain just that, except for one - 51 children from 41 families of those who died were orphaned Moskovskaya Pravda

"How was such a large number of rebels able to gather in Moscow and seize the building, and whose fault was it? Why did so many people die as the hostages were being freed, and whose fault was it? What was the specific location of the centre which decided to carry out the act of terrorism, and who belonged to this centre? And, does this centre, incidentally, continue to exist, and are the people who gave the order for this act of terrorism still operating?" Rossiyskaya Gazeta asks.

Moskovskaya Pravda says the "most savage thing" about the lack of precise figures is that some 70 people are still listed as missing.

"How could it be that, in the undestroyed theatre complex in the centre of Moscow, over the course of 12 months, the exact number of people who had been inside couldn't be counted?" the paper asks in disbelief.

"Nord-Ost's other questions and secrets will remain just that, except for one - 51 children from 41 families of those who died were orphaned. Those are precise figures."

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