Call it a virtual thrown shoe at the United States. Yesterday, 33 countries in Latin America met in Brazil to discuss regional cooperation and the financial crisis. Here's the flying one-two punch: The summit condemned the U.S. embargo on Cuba, blamed the United States for the financial crisis, and refused to let the northern neighbor attend. Ouch.

Like Muntadar al-Zaidi's famous act of protest, the shoe flew -- but may have missed the mark ever so slightly. Leaders were dismissive of Bolivian President Evo Morales's call for the region to expel U.S. ambassadors unless the Cuba embargo was lifted. And though host Brazil asserted its regional dominance, bickering prevented solid agreements on trade issues and further regional cooperation.

By the way, the strained shoe analogy is not entirely mine. Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva found the metaphor too good to pass up -- threatening to throw his slipper at Venezuela's Hugo Chavez if he overspoke his podium time.

And then there were the instructions to press: "Please, nobody take off your shoes."

Photo: ANTONIO SCORZA/AFP/Getty Images

Over at Slate, CFR's Michael Levi explains one big reason why the UN climate talks currently under way in Poznan, Poland have hit the skids. The UN climate change regime apportions different levels of responsibility to rich and poor countries, but the way it makes that distinction if very odd:

The United Nations first divvied up the developed and developing world for climate talks in 1992, with the goal of using that split to apportion responsibilities for cutting emissions. But distinctions that once made sense are no longer tenable. Ukraine, for example, is considered rich. In 1992, it was reflexively lumped together with the countries that once comprised the powerful Soviet Union; by 2007, its citizens had fallen to 97^th richest in the world by GDP per person. (All wealth figures cited here are from The CIA World Factbook.) At the same time, Singapore (now the sixth-richest nation in the world) was designated as poor. Unless the climate regime overhauls its wealth labels, a country like Singapore could reap the benefits of financial aid, while Ukraine would be burdened with emissions caps. Needless to say, that kind of nonsensical setup won't get you very far in international talks. [...]

The resulting deal had its flaws then. It makes absolutely no sense today. Belarus, for example, is lumped together with the rich countries, despite a GDP per person of about $10,000. As a result, it has an emissions cap like those in place for Europe and Japan. Kuwait, meanwhile, is considered poor. That means the oil-rich emirate is spared any obligations, despite the fact that its residents are about five times wealthier than the Belarussia.

Not surprisingly, the "poor" countries aren't in much of a hurry to change this set-up. Any regulatory system that has Singapore crying poverty is probably in need of reform.

The International Atomic Energy Agency's probe into the alleged Syrian nuclear reactor, which Israel bombed last year, has been hobbled by a mysterious lack of satellite footage. IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei referred to the absence of commercial satellite footage of the site after Israel's attack last year as "baffling."

Adding to the intrigue, the Associated Press quotes unnamed diplomats as claiming that IAEA officials are considering the possibility that Syria, or another country with an interest in a coverup, bought the rights to all the commercial satellite photos. Others have proposed more mundane explanations for the lack of satellite imagery, pointing out that the countries involved gave out very few details after the attack, making it difficult for companies to find the site immediately after the bombing.

Coupled with last month's IAEA report, which stated that the building that was bombed shared similarities with a type of nuclear reactor design and that inspectors had found trace amounts of uranium particles there, the site in northern Syria continues to raise more questions than answers. Certainly, there are already enough doubts to delay Syria's request for U.N. aid in planning a commercial nuclear reactor. And if definitive proof emerges that Syria was covertly building a nuclear plant, it could derail the much-anticipated American-Syrian rapprochement.

Photo: SAMUEL KUBANI/AFP/Getty Images

Via Andreas Persbo, some art for arms control geeks. At last:

More:

The artist is Lisa Ruyter. Timothy Hartley Smith has photos of the exhibit.

Great quote from European Commission agriculture spokesman Michael Mann:

"Next Wednesday is a new dawn for the bendy cucumber and the amusingly shaped carrot."

The news is that the commission is voting tomorrow on whether to ditch its infamous "marketing standards" for produce, a favorite target of ridicule for euroskeptics. Among other rules, the standards specified that cucumbers sold within Europe had to be "practically straight (maximum height of the arc: 10 mm per 10 cm of the length of cucumber)."

Eliminating the draconian standards is the right thing to do in a time of high global food prices and a smart move for the EU's image. Bring on the amusing carrots!

KAREN BLEIER/AFP/Getty Images

Is this what we really need right now? The world economy fell off the fence, and just as finance ministers, the World Bank, and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) start trying to put it back together again... a sex scandal threatens to debilitate the managing director of the IMF.

Late last week, the Wall Street Journal began looking into an affair that has rocked the (usually dry) halls of one of the world's most important financial institutions. IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn is being accused of abusing his power as director of the fund in a sexual relationship with colleague Piroska Nagy, the wife of a former Argentinian central banker, Mario Blejer. According to Bloomberg news, an official IMF inquiry "will seek to determine whether the relationship involved any conflict of interest, harassment or favoritism."

Strauss-Kahn denies misusing his position. His wife, Anne Sinclair, writes on her blog, "Everyone knows these are things that can happen in the lives of any couple. To me, this one-night stand is behind us. We have turned the page" (my translation from the French).

Unfortunately for Ms. Sinclair, journalists around the world are just starting to write the page.

That's particularly true in France, where some commentators have worried that the public disclosure of the IMF's investigation is a move to discredit French-led efforts to stem the financial crisis. President Nicolas Sarkozy seems to be among the angry, irked that his frantic efforts to organize an economic rescue might be discredited. 

Quel dommage! At least among some French commentators, the mood is forgiving. Asked by Le Figaro newspaper if such an affair would produce a media scandal in France, Christophe Deloire (author of Sexus Politicus) responded (my translation): 

Certainly not. There are things that one can do in Paris but not in Washington... in France, such an affair... would never have seen the light of day...

I hope that the purely private affaire will not become an incident for Dominique Strauss-Kahn... [Politicians] always feel obligated to make the public believe that they have a stable private life... the last presidential compaign is a very good example: the difficulties between the couple of Nicolas Sarkozy on the one hand and Ségolène Royal on the other hand stayed secret. It wasn't until after the scrutiny that the two couples separated..."

The greatest sin, it seems, wasn't the affair, but the fact that Strauss-Kahn got caught, and French credibility will go down in the fallout. Alors, c'est la vie!

DOMINIQUE FAGET/AFP/Getty Images

Is it just me, or does French President Nicolas Sarkozy sound a little like Gollum in this quote about a planned summit to restructure the world's financial architecture?

Europe wants the summit before the end of the year... Europe wants it. Europe demands it. Europe will get it."

We wants it! In all seriousness, smart people have been saying for a long time -- way before the current mess -- that the framework put in place at Bretton Woods in 1944 is woefully obsolete.

But I'm not sure that Sarko, an old-school economic nationalist in liberal clothing, is the guy I'd want leading the charge. And how much confidence would Americans have in any decisions George W. Bush makes at this point? My take: it would be better to leave any grand, sweeping changes to No. 44.

Mario Tama/Getty Images

Without taking anything away from former Finnish President Martti Ahtisaari, who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize today for his work as an “outstanding international mediator” in conflicts from Indonesia to Northern Ireland, the entire institution of the Nobel Committee has grown so self-important that this is a worthwhile opportunity to question its judgment and ultimately its usefulness.

The 1973 Peace Prize, awarded to then-Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and Vietnamese negotiator Le Duc Tho for their role in the Paris Peace Accords, remains a head-scratcher. Kissinger played a major role in expanding the U.S. bombing campaign across Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos, while Tho’s government would soon violate the Accords by launching a military invasion of South Vietnam that culminated in the 1975 fall of Saigon.

The Nobel Prize in Literature also has been guilty of sins of omission. Many of the last century’s most celebrated writers, such as Leo Tolstoy, Graham Greene, Vladimir Nabokov, Mario Vargas Llosa and Philip Roth, have been ignored by the Committee. Greene and Nabokov were considered in 1974, but eventually lost out to Swedes Eyvind Johnson and Harry Martinson -- who just happened to be Nobel judges themselves.

The Literature Prize is awarded by a committee selected by the Academy, founded by the Swedish King Gustav III in 1786, while the Peace Prize is awarded by a committee appointed by the Norwegian parliament. In any other context, the idiosyncratic tastes and political beliefs of these elite Scandinavians don't exactly make headlines. Why the entire world pauses to honor the selections of an otherwise unknown group of people remains a mystery.

In the end, the Nobel Prize reveals more about society's collective obsession with honorifics than it does about the world's great leaders and writers.

At last Wednesday's United Nations Association 50th anniversary gala, rapper Jay-Z was honored for his work with the project Water for Life. Getting a bit too into the spirit, Secretary General Ban Ki-moon delivered a rap, which includes shout-outs to his homies Jay-Z, Ted Turner and Bill Luers, president of the United Nations Association of the United States of America. UN Dispatch's Mark Leon Goldberg passes along video and lyrics:

Global Classrooms are a cinch
With the help of Merrill Lynch
When you put the org in Google
Partnerships go truly gloooobal
There is hope for Earth's salvation
With the Cisneros Foundation
With Jay-Z there's double strife
Life for children and water for life
Human health will get ahead
With the valiant work of (RED)
For the poor and doing good
Stays the job of Robin Hood
UN stays on the front burner
Thanks to our champ Ted Turner
And whole revolutions stem
From the work of UNIFEM
But tonight my special shout-out
Goes to one I can't do without
We have traveled up and down
Frisco, Atlanta, Chicago town
Yes, the king of all the doers
Is my trusty friend Bill Luers
Bill, I cannot say goodbye
So take the floor and take a bow.
Ladies and Gentlemen, Ambassador Bill Luers"

Okay, so he's no Biggie. I'll take him over MC Rove any day, though.

Max Whittaker/Getty Images

The Wall Street Journal's Monical Langley reports:

Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin will meet with foreign leaders next week at the United Nations, a move to boost her foreign-policy credentials, a Republican strategist said.

Republican candidate John McCain plans to introduce the Alaska governor to heads of state at the opening of the U.N. General Assembly, although specific names weren’t yet firmed up. “The meetings will give her some exposure and experience with foreign leaders,” the strategist said. “It’s a great idea.”

Hope she was reading up over the weekend.

Hat tip: Mark Halperin

Not a good day to be working at the press office of the Department of Defense. This morning, The Times of London released a video that purports to show civilian casualties in Afghanistan -- dozens at least -- from an American air raid in late August.

The Pentagon has insisted that civilian casualties in the attack were limited to the single digits, even as both the Afghan government and the United Nations put the number above 90. In a blog post last week, I wondered if this was a problem of counting methods -- deciding who is a civilian and who is a fighter.

That's a hard case to argue after watching the video [WARNING: graphic]. The Times says that a doctor shot the mobile-phone film the morning after the air raid. In the clip, casualties overcrowd a room filled equally with grieving men and women. The corpses include children. The chaos and pain of the moment is palpable.

As Human Rights Watch explains in a report released today, this is a serious problem -- and not just for America's reputation in Afghanistan. Civilian deaths, of which HRW says there were 321 this year, could easily provoke an even larger humanitarian crisis:

In every case investigated by Human Rights Watch where airstrikes hit villages, many civilians had to leave the village because of damage to their homes and fear of further strikes. People from neighboring villages also sometimes fled in fear of future strikes on their villages. This has led to large numbers of internally displaced persons. 

Hopefully, all this will be enough for Pentagon officials to reconsider their story. Until now, they have claimed that the incident began after forces came under fire while going after Mullah Sadiq, a Taliban commander. While the U.N. called upon civilian and government witnesses to verify its 90-something number, the Pentagon has pointed to retired Lt. Col. Oliver North, a Fox News correpondent who was indicted (but later cleared of charges) for his involvement in the Iran-Contra affair, to back its claim. A new investigation has been promised.

Last week, Major Gen. Jeffrey Schloesser, the commander of troops in eastern Afghanistan, addressed the growing concerns with promises that Americans are avoiding casualties at all costs. He also complained:

The enemy routinely exaggerates the number of civilian casualties as propaganda, just pure and simple. They use lies and deceit as an asymmetric strategy."

All the more reason to have a transparent, indpendent investigation. With due respect to the general, the importance of ending civilian casualties -- or at least owning up to them -- is something we cannot exaggerate enough.

FILE; TEH ENG KOON/AFP/Getty Images

Dmitry Medvedev may have hoped the Shanghai Cooperation Organization would evolve from a loose security bloc into an anti-NATO counterweight, but so far things don't look like they're going in the Russian president's favor. 

On Thursday, Medvedev asked the group, which also includes China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, to back Russia's response to Georgian "aggression." Instead, while the group welcomed "Russia's active role in contributing to peace and co-operation in the region," it condemned the use of force and reaffirmed its support for the sovereignty of the countries involved:

The SCO states express grave concern in connection with the recent tensions around the South Ossetian issue and urge the sides to solve existing problems peacefully, through dialogue, and to make efforts facilitating reconciliation and talks," their statement said.

That China and the others spoke of respecting territorial integrity should come as no surprise. From its relations with Sudan abroad to its concerns with seperatists in Tibet and Xinjiang at home, China has long expressed a policy of non-intervention.

Russia, too, was often a strong opponent of Western interventions -- in Iraq and Kosovo, among others -- which makes its military action in Georgia all the more galling. Its Asian allies, though, haven't jumped on board. That, at the very least, should be a comforting sign for the West amid cries of a new Cold War.

For more on how Russia's recognition of South Ossetia and Abkhazia may backfire, check out FP's interview with regional expert and CIA veteran Paul Goble.

PIUS UTOMI EKPEI/AFP/Getty Images

Here's a little-noticed story suggesting that, despite the Russo-Georgian war, the international system is alive and well.

Claimed by both Nigeria and Cameroon, the Bakassi peninsula has a local population that considers itself Nigerian, but is believed to hold rich oil and gas deposits. You might think such a situtation is a recipe for disaster.

Not so. Nigeria has just officially ceded Bakassi to Cameroon, honoring a 2002 ruling by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and bringing a peaceful close to a decades-long despute. U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon hailed the transfer as "a model for negotiated settlements of border disputes," and Nigerian officials cited the importance of international law in reaching the settlement:

The gains made in adhering to the rule of law may outweigh the painful losses of ancestral homes," said the head of the Nigerian delegation, Attorney General Mike Aondoakaa.

The agreement isn't perfect. Some analysts expressed concern that armed groups opposed to the handover will sow violence to further delay the deal.

Still, in an age when nationalism and natural resources seem to trump all, it's an encouraging sign. Hopefully, Nigeria's move will further legitimize the international legal system, which has seen its rulings recently ignored by the United States and Sudan. Now Georgia, too, is seeking the ICJ's assistance to remedy its conflict with Russia. Unfortunately, I'd expect it to be easier for Russia to ignore the ICJ than it was for Nigeria.

Dima Korotayev/Epsilon/Getty Images

According to the Christian Science Monitor's Fred Weir, Dmitry Medvedev has a plan to avert a new cold war. Last month in Berlin, Medvedev proposed the formation of a new European defense pact which would include not only Europe but the countries of the former Soviet Union as well. Dubbed, the "European Atlantic Treaty Organization" or "EATO" by analysts, the organization would take the place of the dreaded NATO which has been creeping its way ever closer to Russia's borders in the last two decades and represent "big Europe without dividing lines."

The alternative, as Moscow has hinted over the last few weeks, is increasingly militarized tension over the issues of NATO expansion and missile defense. The most extreme hint was the dubious but seemingly intentional leak of a proposal to base Russian bombers in Cuba.

Weir believes that the proposal will be a central theme of Medvedev's foreign policy. Unfortunately, the idea has same problem that afflicts Russia's diplomatic efforts more generally: Medvedev hasn't made it clear why this would be a good idea for anyone except Russia and hasn't offered any inducements to get on board besides vague threats.

Until the members of NATO and the countries desperately trying to join it get an explanation why they would be better off in an organization with Russia as a founding member, ideas like EATO are only going to deepen the fault lines.

SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty Images

If you're trying to understand why many Europeans remain skeptical of European Union expansion despite its demonstrated economic benefits, look no further than the union's marketing standards for produce, which are being debated this month:

Consider the Class I cucumber, which must be "practically straight (maximum height of the arc: 10 mm per 10 cm of the length of cucumber)." Translation: A six-inch cucumber cannot bend more than six-tenths of an inch. Following 16 pages of regulations on apples (Class I must be at least 60mm, or 2 1/3 inches, in diameter) come 19 pages of amendments outlining the approved colors for more than 250 kinds.

As for peaches, "to reach a satisfactory degree of ripeness . . . the refractometrix index of the flesh, measured at the middle point of the fruit pulp at the equatorial section must be greater than or equal to 8° Brix."

Wikipedia informs me that Brix is a measurement of the level of sugar in a liquid. What this has to do with the refractometix index--a measurement of light--is beyond this liberal arts major.

The European Commission's agriculture comissioner wants to scrap the majority of the standards, arguing that it's ridiculous for stores to be throwing away perfectly edible food during a global shortage. This makes a lot of sense, but I suspect the real reason is that arguments over cucumber thickness and banana straightness give EU opponents such perfect fodder for mockery.

ALEXANDER JOE/AFP/Getty Images

At a live video conference sponsored by Freedom House today, members of Zimbabwe's opposition Movement for Democratic Change and a number of civil society groups gave updates on the unfolding political standoff with President Robert Mugabe. MDC's chief spokesman George Sibotshiwe, who has been lobbying from the sidelines at the African Union summit in Sharm El-Sheik, called in to say that although unanimous AU action against Mugabe may be impossible, a number of countries, particularly in West Africa, were pushing the MDC's cause.

Sibotshiwe said the MDC is looking for a permanent AU envoy to Zimbabwe, since the mediation efforts of South African President Thabo Mbeki have been disappointing (to say the least):

We're pushing for the apointment of a permanent envoy from the African Union to assist -- diplomatically we have to say "assist" -- President Mbeki. But what we actually need is for the AU to take control of the mediation efforts. You can't get rid of President Mbeki at this stage, but we need someone who is permament, someone who is not a head of state, because what we are finding is President Mbeki has been having to deal with the problem of Zimbabwe part time.

The panelists also discussed the idea of forming a Zanu/MDC "unity" government, which Mbeki and others have proposed. This would presumably be along the lines of the compromise reached after Kenya's disputed election earlier this year. Speaking from Johannesburg, Xolani Zitha, director of the NGO coalition CRISIS, dismissed the idea as "a good deal for Zanu" but not the Zimbabweans who want them brought to justice. I asked Zitha whether a resolution of the crisis would have to include Mugabe and his cronies being brought to justice. He responded that it was high time the African community stop treating Mugabe with "kid gloves":

If the African Union and SADC [Southern African Development Community] are very soft on Zanu-PF, they lend it legitimacy... It's a very sticky situation. The AU and SADC need to set a precedent for how they deal with the impunity of Robert Mugabe. They don't have a record of condemning Robert Mugabe. They've shown him respect -- respect that he doesn't deserve -- to the point where he feels he can work his way out without being taken to task.

All the participants were still hopeful that a political compromise could be reached but noted that with inflation in the millions, conditions are ripe for civil unrest. The last thing the AU wants is the violent overthrow of Mugabe, but years of defending him while Zimbabwe deteriorated may have made it all but inevitable.

JOSE CENDON/AFP/Getty Images

With Zimbabwe's political turmoil and Burma's humanitarian woes grabbing most of the headlines on Africa and Asia lately, it might be easy to forget about another crisis that threatens millions of people on both continents: HIV/AIDS. In its recently released annual report, the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Foundation (IRFC) recommended that the epidemic be classified a "disaster" in certain Asian and African countries, breaking with its usual focus on natural catastrophes like cyclones. The IRFC backed up its argument on HIV/AIDS with some scary statistics (PDF of the report):

• Some 2.1 million people died of AIDS in 2007
• At least one adult in ten is living with HIV in nations that include Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland, Zambia and Zimbabwe
• Around 15 million children are currently orphaned as the result of AIDS

Perhaps the most chilling figure is this one: 25 million. That's how many people are estimated to have died of AIDS worldwide since 1981. In comparison, the tsunami that ravaged Indonesia in 2004 killed around 232,000 people.

Like natural disasters, AIDS can be a comprehensive threat, stressing healthcare systems and fueling poverty. AIDS can also worsen the impact of environmental catastrophes. Nine major natural disasters of 2007 occured in countries with generalized AIDS epidemics, according to the IRFC, meaning that people with HIV/AIDS had to contend with interrupted care. With AIDS treatment often requiring daily drug cocktails, even a minor interruption in drug availability poses major health risks.

So what can the world do to confront the epidemic? Throwing money at the problem won't make it go away. Billions have already been spent on general AIDS education and awareness programs worldwide, but the number of people living with AIDS keeps increasing in several areas, including Central Asia, Eastern Europe, and even parts of Western Europe. The IRFC says that the world won't make major strides against the disease until governments begin targeting their at-risk populations -- including sex-workers and intravenous drug users -- for prevention and treatment. Until this is done, AIDS will continue to wreak havoc, far worse than any single tsunami or earthquake could.

STR/AFP/Getty Images

Poor China. Beijing has complained incessantly over the past few months that human rights critics and other countries have politicized the Olympics, while turning around and trying to use the games for its own propaganda purposes. Now, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) is rebuking China for remarks made by Zhang Qingli (above right), the local Communist Party bigwig in Tibet and the architect of this spring's crackdown. As the Olympic torch passed through Lhasa last Saturday, Zhang said the following in a public speech:

The sky above Tibet will never change. The red five-star flag will always fly above this land. We can definitely smash the separatist plot of the Dalai Lama clique completely."

Whoops. "China's solid position is against the politicizing of the Olympics," a spokesman for the foreign ministry said in response to the IOC.

But the IOC is kidding itself if it thinks the Olympics aren't political. As John Hoberman argues in "Think Again: The Olympics" in the new issue of Foreign Policy, the committee tries to have it both ways:

Olympic diplomacy" has always been rooted in a doublespeak that exploits the world’s sentimental attachment to the spirit of the games. In the absence of real standards, the spectacle of Olympic pageantry substitutes for a genuine concern for human rights. At the heart of this policy is a timid and euphemizing rhetoric that turns violent demonstrations and state-sponsored killings into "discussions," a combination of grandiosity and cluelessness that has long marked the IOC's accommodating attitude toward unsavory Olympic hosts. Even today, with regard to Beijing, the committee has fallen back on its old habit of claiming to be both apolitical and politically effective at the same time. Although the IOC "is not a political organization," it does claim to "advance the agenda of human rights." Sadly, neither is true.

Check it out.

SAMUEL KUBANI/AFP/Getty Images

Last Saturday, International Atomic Energy Agency chief Mohamed ElBaradei sat for an Arabic-language interview on the al-Arabiya network. During a discussion about Iran, ElBaradei was asked how much time the country would need to "produce" a nuclear weapon. "It would need at least six months to one year," he replied.

Even though this estimate has been tossed around for years (particularly by Israel), given some caveats it is still within a generally accepted range of possible timelines for an Iranian bomb. ElBaradei's statement is surprising, though, because previously he has "consistently said that it would take Iran from three to eight years to make a weapon."

This sharp rhetorical shift could be the result of new findings about Iran that have not yet been released. Perhaps ElBaradei knows something we don't and he just slipped. It is possible, for example, that large numbers of Iran's third-generation centrifuges (the IR-3) are installed in secret locations. The IR-3 can probably enrich uranium significantly faster than Iran's current models and could reduce the time needed to produce enough material for a bomb. Tehran has only installed a handful of these centrifuges as far as we know, though, and is apparently still having trouble with them.

It seems far more likely that this was a signal to Iran that patience is running out. ElBaradei trained as a diplomat, and gaffe-prone individuals almost never rise to his level. He was also careful to emphasize that the threat is not imminent, noting specifically that making a weapon so quickly would require Iran to expel inspectors and withdraw from the Nonproliferation Treaty. In a further sign that the IAEA is willing to increase pressure, its most recent report (pdf) on Tehran's nuclear program expressed -- in unusually blunt fashion -- growing frustration within the agency at Iran’s "persistent stonewalling" and accused Tehran of withholding important information on alleged nuclear weapons programs.

So far, Iran has judged that fostering uncertainty about its nuclear weapons program would divide the international community and defuse pressure for stronger punitive actions. Hopefully, the IAEA's shift signals that Tehran has failed to divide and conquer.

VADIM KRAMER/AFP/Getty Images

Still reeling from Irish voters' rejection of the Lisbon Treaty last week, EU bigwigs are now focusing on the Czech Republic, another country that has yet to ratify the treaty and appears in no hurry to do so. Badly in need of a victory, French President Nicolas Sarkozy flew to Prague yesterday in a likely futile bid to try to nudge the reluctant Czechs to ratify as quickly as possible.

There are a few reasons to be skeptical about Lisbon's chances in the Czech Republic. First, Czech President Vaclav Klaus, though mostly a ceremonial figure, is one of Europe's leading EU skeptics and said last week that Irish voters should be congratulated for defeating what he called an "elitist artificial project."

More importantly, Prime Minister Mirek Topolánek, who nominally supports the treaty, is taking heat from within his fragile center-right coalition and will likely stall ratification as long as possible. There's also speculation that Topolánek and his party are trying to stall ratification until after the Czechs get their crack at the EU presidency in January. (Under the new treaty, meetings would be chaired by the new, permanent European Council president, not rotating member states.)

France's hard-sell tactics may also be backfiring. Diplomats say that French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner's involvement in the lead-up to the Irish vote was counterproductive for the "yes" camp there. And Czech politicians aren't happy about Sarkozy's diplomatic offensive.

It certainly makes sense that the Irish and the Czechs don't appreciate being pushed around by "old Europe." But I find it ironic that two of the countries that have benefited the most from EU membership might be shutting the door on its future development.