Most of those asking the question usually posed it in a manner that seemed to suggest they already had a preconceived answer they are expecting from me. I had a feeling those in this category expected that I would give gory tales of how I saw a nation in ruins. I do not blame these friends who expected the worst tales from Rwanda. The Central African nation came to world consciousness in 1994 when foreign media showed footages of merciless internecine killings between the Hutus and Tutsis in the country.

Then TIME Magazine reported that the devils in hell have not only relocated to Rwanda, they have also taken the hell along with them to that country. But that was 14 years ago. Today the Rwandans under a new leadership have decided to rebuild their country and make it the economic hub of Central African region.

Those persuaded to finance their purchase with a Spanish mortgage are being hit by a triple whammy: rising euro-mortgage interest rates, a surging euro that makes their monthly repayments even higher in pounds, and falling house prices that threaten to push them into negative equity.

Furthermore, even when they succeed in letting their properties, the rental yields often bear little resemblance to the exaggerated claims made by estate agents when they bought.

And that is not to mention the thousands of people who own homes that, it has transpired, were built without proper planning permission and could now be demolished following a clampdown by the authorities.

Asking a woman for her number can cause a young man anxiety anywhere. But in Saudi Arabia, getting caught with an unrelated woman can mean arrest, a possible flogging and dishonor, the worst penalty of all in a society where preserving a family’s reputation depends on faithful adherence to a strict code of separation between the sexes.

Above all, Nader feared that his cousin, Enad al-Mutairi, would find out that he was breaking the rules. Nader is engaged to Enad’s 17-year-old sister, Sarah. “Please don’t talk to Enad about this,” he said. “He will kill me.”

The sun was already low in the sky as Nader entered the clinic. Almost instantly, his resolve faded. His shoulders drooped, his hands unclenched and his voice began to quiver. “I am not lucky today, let’s leave,” he said.

And it has. The national army still patrols the streets, but solely to prevent sectarian killings or massacres. Far from dismantling the pro-Iranian Hizbollah’s secret telecommunications system – and disarming the Hizbollah itself – the cabinet of Fouad Siniora sits in the old Turkish serail in Beirut, denouncing violence with the same authority as the Iraqi government in Baghdad’s green zone.

Slovakia will become the 16th country using the euro.

In an annual report on candidates for the euro zone, the commission said that Slovakia fulfilled the criteria laid down in European treaties for joining the euro zone on interest rates, budget deficits and, above all, inflation. Under the formula used to evaluate potential members, Slovakia had to have an inflation rate no higher than 3.2 percent over the past 12 months, a mark it beat by a full percentage point.

No other countries have yet applied for euro membership, but no others would have been accepted if they had. The Baltic countries of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, once the strongest candidates, now appear far from that goal because of high inflation rates. Larger countries like Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic seem equally unlikely to move quickly to adopt the euro.

Israel is marking its 60th Independence Day, which began at sundown Wednesday, with a great sense of pride but also uncertainty about its future and doubts about prospects for peace with the Palestinians. Six decades after rising from the ashes of the Holocaust, the Jewish state is still plagued by threats from abroad and an identity crisis at home.

Israel at 60 is a paradox of exuberance and despair _ a country enduring near daily rocket attacks from militants while producing scientists who have pioneered Wi-Fi and instant messaging.

Its 41-year occupation of Palestinian territories has invited international condemnation. Yet Israel is a thriving democracy that has provided a haven for the world’s Jews.

“Islam today is part of Europe. It is important to understand this.One should not see Islam as outside Europe. We already have an important presence of Islam and Muslims among our citizens,” Barroso told a press conference this afternoon after an informal dialogue between EU leaders and around twenty high-level representatives of Christianity, Judaism and Islam in Europe.

“We can be a European citizen being a Christian, being Jewish or Muslim or having no religion,” he noted.

On his part, the Grand Mufti of Bosnia-Herzegovina, Dr.Mustafa Ceric, said Islam is indeed part of Europe but unfortunately Turkey is not yet part of Europe.

“Following this logic Europe has to prove that Islam is part of Europe by not delaying the acceptance of Turkey to the EU,” Ceric told the joint press conference.

Many people in Turkey and the Muslim world believe that Turkey will not be accepted as an EU member because it is a Muslim country.

The construction showed that China was “ramping up its operational capability” and developing a “blue water navy” that would challenge the dominance of the US in the Pacific, said Alex Neill, head of the Asia Security Programme at the Royal United Services Institute.

In the last 20 years China had gone from a coastal force to a navy capable of “exerting its influence far afield,” a senior Royal Navy officer said.