European press review

Monday's European papers look ahead to a tough week for British Prime Minister Tony Blair.

Meanwhile, France is urged to give China a clear message on human rights.

And there praise for a European success in space.

Blair's double whammy

Germany's Der Tagesspiegel compares the preparations of key players for the publication of the Hutton report on Wednesday on the death of British scientist David Kelly.

Tony Blair is sailing the ship of his teetering leadership towards a dangerous channel reminiscent of Scylla and Charybdis Italian weekly Panorama

The paper says the BBC's airing of a programme last week which criticised the corporation shows that, as the paper puts it, "the broadcaster is preventively castigating itself".

It contrasts this with Tony Blair, who, it says, "ahead of the big event has dared to quickly stage a trial of strength with his own parliamentary group" over university tuition fees.

The paper believes that the tuition fee vote and the Hutton report could force the prime minister out of office.

"Defeat in parliament and a reprimand by Hutton would mean that before the week is over probably the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Gordon Brown, would be Britain's prime minister," it says.

But it adds that this prospect is "more than unlikely".

The Italian weekly Panorama uses a Homeric image in its prediction of a tough week for the British prime minister.

"Tony Blair is sailing the ship of his teetering leadership towards a dangerous channel reminiscent of Scylla and Charybdis," the writer warns.

It says the forthcoming vote on tuition fees and the release of the Hutton report will be the most arduous test in Blair's career.

"Will the combative Ulysses succeed in coming through this stormy British Odyssey unscathed?" it wonders. "Or will he take two mortal blows, one straight after the other?"

'Ethical defeat'

A defeat over fees will be hard for the UK premier, the paper goes on, but to be discredited by Hutton would be even worse.

"It would mark not only Blair's political defeat but also his ethical defeat on every front, first and foremost in the internal Labour Party front, which has no shortage of moralisers or pacifists," it says.

An article in Hungary's Nepszabadsag wonders what US weapons inspector David Kay's resignation might mean for Tony Blair.

The writer voices sympathy with former Foreign Secretary Robin Cook, who urged Blair to admit he was wrong about Iraq's weapons or at least drop the doctrine of pre-emptive strikes.

"There was no such threat", the paper argues, describing the doctrine as "an aggressive ideology" and saying democracy cannot be exported.

"But Blair is adamant", it goes on.

The paper likens his determination to former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher's denial of facts in her refusal to admit rising unemployment figures 20 years ago.

There is only one difference, it adds. "She got away with it."

Monkey business

After the weekend's colourful celebrations in Paris to welcome in the Year of the Monkey, the French daily Liberation urges a balanced approach to China.

On the one hand, the paper recognises the Asian giant's global importance and sees President Hu Jintao's visit as a chance to seek industrial contracts.

On the other, it warns readers to be under no illusions about what it calls a "despotic" regime always prepared to use force against enemies abroad and dissidents at home.

"We must never forget the terrible price paid by all those who dare to oppose what is still - despite its recent evolution - a dictatorship," the paper says.

It urges President Chirac to remind his guest that France's special genius lies not only in its technology or diplomacy but in the universality of its Declaration of Human Rights.

"He will only be more carefully listened to for doing so," the paper concludes.

The Turin daily La Stampa interprets the red lighting of the Eiffel Tower as, in one sense, a symbol of shame, explaining that dissidents were kept away from the New Year celebrations.

In its Sunday edition the paper cites China's only Nobel literature laureate, Gao Xingjiang, saying the French foreign minister forgot to invite the Paris-based writer to the event.

"A gesture or a word for Gao and his brothers would have done no harm," it says.

High hopes

The Swiss daily Le Temps hails the European Mars Express probe's discovery of ice on Mars as "an historic event".

"The presence of H2O opens up the prospect of finding traces of life, present or past, on a planet other than Earth," the paper says, adding that the ExoMars mission planned for 2009 will have that very aim.

It notes that European space budgets are far lower than those of the Americans, with the 300m-euro Mars Express still costing only a third of each Nasa probe.

"Every euro spent on it is justified by the fabulous discovery," the paper insists, however.

It hopes this success might persuade Europe's politicians to restore funding for a programme to seek life-supporting planets outside the solar system.

BBC Monitoring, based in Caversham in southern England, selects and translates information from radio, television, press, news agencies and the Internet from 150 countries in more than 70 languages.