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Crossing from Slovakia into Trans-Carpathian Ukraine at the Çop junction, trains from the West halt in deference to the different rail gauges used on the other side. Stalin contrived this to prevent easy entry for invading armies; or escape. Crossing the frontier into the former Soviet Union might instil a little trepidation even into a seasoned traveller. An illuminating mural in the cavernous train station depicts heroic scenes of triumphant Socialism. Trains that retain wooden benches recall another age. I knew I had left a rapidly converging Europe when the conductor smilingly declined payment after I presented too large a denomination. I was among three other visitors to Ukraine arriving by train from Slovakia, although a border guard told me frequent car trips are made to avail of cheap petrol. The frustration of waiting on a windowless, stationary carriage – akin to a panelled sardine tin – during a heatwave was offset by the friendliness of customs officials who simply checked for contraband medicines. No visa is required for EU visitors but the continued low-level warfare in the faraway east is deterring visitors despite a favourable Euro to Hryvnia exchange rate. Borders are often a legacy of ancient battles or coincide with impassable mountain ranges or rivers that deterred conquest and absorption. A change in topography often gives rise to socio-economic boundaries; shifts from upland, semi-nomadic pastoralism to settled arable land bringing larger settlements: different political regimes and ethnic compositions may arise. But twentieth-century Europe brought more artificial borders imposed by distant remote peace treaties or later omnipotent Superpowers, and saw the decline of multi-ethnic empires. Thus Hungary was reduced from one part of a dual empire (the Austro-Hungarian) to a disgruntled rump that ruefully surveys its over two million ethnic brethren in neighbouring countries. The hated Treaty of Trianon after World War I was reflected in that country’s alignment with Nazi Germany during World War II. Revanchist Hungary remains a potential source of instability. There is no obvious difference in terrain between Trans-Carpathian Ukraine and eastern Slovakia, and the region contains a sizeable Hungarian minority. Yet as one travels into the surrounding countryside a different agriculture becomes apparent from the ubiquitous cash crop of maize on the Slovak side to traditional hay stacks in Ukraine gathered as of old with scythe and pitch fork. Since the twentieth century, political frontiers have acted like natural boundaries accentuating patterns of development. In Eastern Europe north of the Balkans, the legacy of Soviet victory in World War II remains largely intact. Apart from the amicable separation of Czech Republic from Slovakia in 1993 the frontiers are unchanged. The recent land grab by Russia of Crimea and incursion of irregular troops into Donetsk may herald a more turbulent phase in European history. Borders rarely shift without an accompanying tide of blood, even more perilous in an era of mutually assured destruction. The most dramatic legacy of World War II was Poland’s westward shift, forcibly ceding significant territory to the Soviet Union in return for large swathes of eastern Germany. Millions of Poles were removed from their ancestral homes and re-located in the west. Among the territory lost was the historic city of Lviv (Lvov to Poles) to Ukraine. It contained an inter-war population two-thirds Polish. Lviv is now almost entirely Ukrainian although reminders of the Polish period include a statue to their national poet Adam Mickiewicz, who was actually born in Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania. Lvov was annexed by the Austrian Hapsburg Empire (and re-named Lemberg) in 1772, in the first Partition of Poland, becoming capital of Galicia which was the poorest province of the Empire. But this period left a remarkable architectural legacy that prompted UNESCO to designate the historic centre as “World Heritage”. Today Lvov is relatively prosperous, drawing a large number of tourists from neighbouring Poland. Predictably the old city is fringed by a swathe of functionalist Soviet-era apartment blocks, but it retains an abundance of old world charm and the hum of cafés that spill onto carless streets. There are nonetheless signs of a country at war with stands erected by the Far Right Svoboda Party supporting the war effort and offensive toilet roll featuring a picture of Vladimir Putin available in souvenir shops. I spoke to one women of student age who railed against a terrorist, separatist threat to the integrity of the state. She could have been mistaken for someone referring to the existential threat posed by ‘enemies of the people’ in Soviet times. The uncompromising language of extremism is unmistakable. The demise of the archaic, multinational Hapsburg Empire after World War I might be seen as the death knell for so-called Mitteleuropa. Most successor states that emerged in the Versailles settlement were inspired by a nationalist vision promoting a single culture, and hostile to diversity within the confines of the state. In contrast during the imperial era cities at least were a mosaic of religious and linguistic groups. The population of ethnically variegated Mitteleuropa was particularly unsuited to the identification of a nation with a single state that reached a violent apotheosis with the Nazi ideology of the master race. Transnational Jewry were the most obvious victims but anti-Semitism was not limited to the Nazis, continuing into the Cold War-era: as late as the 1960s thousands of Jews fled Poland in the wake of a number of purges. Jews had flocked to Poland in great numbers at the end of the Middle Ages due to the tolerance shown there compared with in the rest of Europe. It became known as paradisus Iudaeorum (paradise for the Jews) and contained two thirds of the continent’s Jewish population. Great centres of learning were establish in cities including Lvov, and agrarian settlements known as shtetl that contained many layers of Jewish life dotted the countryside. There Yiddish, a Germanic language written in Hebrew script, found its highest expression. The writings of Joseph Roth (1894-1939) recall the extraordinary cultural diversity of the Austro-Hungarian Hapsburg Empire. Born a Jew in

The Taoiseach got our man at the UN, David Donohue, in to co-chair the process. That looked good and he seemed to do a great job. We need more than rhetoric now though. It would have been better if in addition to signing it he had meant it. There are enough good intentions around to save the planet twice over. It’s pretty big really, the UN’s proposed text on ‘Transforming Our World: The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development’. Universal development goals and targets are proposed that involve the whole world, even little Ireland. Can the Taoiseach not imagine a world determined to end poverty and hunger, combat inequalities, and ensure the protection of the planet and its natural resources? He could become part of that really. It’d look great on his CV when he moves on. He shouldn’t get too carried away though, because so far no one seems to want to pay for it. And he wasn’t too generous on that score either. Still, that doesn’t mean he couldn’t head on and make some progress on it back here. There are 17 sustainable development goals and 169 targets. That worries me too. Will Enda Kenny ever keep track of them all? The proposed text says that these goals and targets are “integrated and indivisible”. He’ll have to pursue all of them together, without cherry picking. Will he just sign it and shelve it? Will he hand it over to the makers of indicators and the drafters of reports? We do great reports here but reports never changed much. Ending poverty, inequality and planetary destruction needs more and, let’s face it, the UN are putting it up to us. There is a target to “reduce at least by half the proportion of men, women and children of all ages living in poverty” by 2030, under the goal to end poverty. This government hasn’t been great on poverty. Deprivations levels continue to rise since the coalition took over. Deprivation means people can’t afford two from a list of basic items, but they know that. The deprivation rate in Ireland stood at 30.5% in 2013 and it probably hasn’t got any better since then. That’s at least 1.4 million people. One thing they’re asking for here is the creation of “sound policy frameworks based on pro-poor and gender sensitive development strategies to support accelerated investment in poverty eradication actions”. No one could argue that this government has invested in any way in poverty eradication. Is this all going to change? It must if the Taoiseach is sincere about poverty. The proposed text is big on equality. This is not a value that seems to animate the Taoiseach at all and it would be great if this could change. Yes, he did the marriage equality referendum and that was fantastic. Full marks there. But equality is a bit on the indivisible side too. You can’t do it for some and not for others. Kenny will have to up his game on this one. One goal is to “achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls”. The Taoiseach should be moving to end all forms of discrimination, and to eliminate all the particular forms of violence, against women and girls. He’ll really have to work on this violence one. In 2014, the EU Fundamental Rights Agency found that 26% of Irish women surveyed had experienced physical and/or sexual violence by a partner or non-partner since the age of 15. There is another goal, to “reduce inequality within and among countries”. The government is going to have to “progressively achieve and sustain income growth of the bottom 40% of the population at a rate higher than the national average” by 2013. The Taoiseach’s problems with the tiny minimum wage increase proposed don’t bode well. The starting point for him isn’t great either, with the top 10% of households getting 23.5% of all net income here in 2012 and the bottom 10% only getting 3.1%. It’s almost a case of ‘nothing done, more to do’ on this one. He’ll also have to “ensure equal opportunity and reduce inequalities of outcome” and to “empower and promote the social, economic and political inclusion of all, irrespective of age, sex, disability, race, ethnicity, origin, religion or economic or other status”. Kenny’s track record here, to be honest, is miserable. Under the goal on “cities and human settlements” he’ll have to ensure access for all to “adequate, safe, and affordable housing” by 2030. This is one this government only seems go backwards on. And all that’s before we get to saving the planet. The Taoiseach should go on and sign it anyway. Then come back for the plaudits but get stuck into preparing and publishing the ‘ambitious national response’ the UN is looking for. Make us the best little country to do sustainable development goals in. That’s what he’d really be remembered for, if he cared. •

Everyone I have spoken to says Ibrahim Halawa is a character: a joker who, like many teens, always wanted to be famous. A sad irony that fame has come to him in such awful circumstances: Ibrahim Halawa, along with 492 other protesters, faces the death penalty. Human Rights NGOs Amnesty and Reprieve have both investigated his case and deem him a prisoner of conscience. His trial has been postponed repeatedly. He is not permitted to testify in his defence. His lawyer is not permitted to visit him in prison to hear his version of events. When the court sits, Ibrahim and his co-defendants are kept behind a glass wall and cannot hear the evidence being presented against them. Ibrahim travelled to Cairo in 2013 to visit relatives. He was there when the first democratically elected president of Egypt, Mohamad Morsi, was overthrown by the military. He joined the thousands of others who protested. No matter what your opinion of Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood, what unfolded on the streets of Cairo was shocking. Over one thousand protestors were left dead. Hundreds, including Ibrahim, were imprisoned. Frustrated at the lack of progress in securing this Dublin teen’s release, I travelled out to Cairo for his tenth trial date. I was accompanied by his legal representative in Ireland, Darragh Mackin. We witnessed first-hand the arbitrary nature of these show trials. Families of the defendants waited outside in the blistering heat; entry to the proceedings is at the whim of the judge. Only lawyers were permitted into the hearing this time. The trial was then summarily postponed until the 4th October. Hopes were dashed again, with devastation for the Halawa family at the realisation that Ibrahim would enter a third year of detention. Once a week Ibrahim is permitted a three-minute visit from a relative. There is no physical contact allowed during these visits. Darragh Mackin and I accompanied Khadija, Ibrahim’s sister, as she made the weekly trek across Cairo to where the permits are issued. It is then an hour-long drive into the desert to Wadi Al Natroon prison. Khadija explained how relatives with permits are regularly turned away. At any point the permit can be rejected. We were brought into the Governor’s office when they realised I was an MEP. We sat there for an hour while they got Ibrahim ‘ready’. Khadija explained how they would shave and dress him in clean clothes for his visit with a parliamentarian. When Ibrahim entered the room, his sister rushed to hug him. The emotional reunion of the two was heartbreaking. Deprived of physical contact for over a year, Ibrahim clung to his sister’s hand for the whole visit as he detailed the horrific prison conditions. He is confined to a 5m x 4m cell with nine other prisoners, twenty-four hours a day. There are no beds, no shower, just a tap and the toilet is a hole in the floor. Every morning he wakes to the sounds of prisoners screaming. He himself was beaten two weeks ago. A glimmer of the ‘joker’ Ibrahim, I had heard so much about appeared as the visit progressed. He mocked his sisters shoes. Through tears there were smiles as she told him to stop. A normal sibling interaction in a very abnormal setting. It was hard to listen to this young man talk about his depression, how he spent days trying to remember school lessons to try to keep his mind active. He should be two years into his engineering degree in Trinity. Instead he sits in a cell in Cairo facing the death penalty. The Irish government has opted for a strategy of quiet diplomacy. From my conversations with NGOs and human rights lawyers working in Egypt and London I disagree with this strategy. There are, however, still a number of simple measures that the Irish government could take that would improve Ibrahim’s situation. Ibrahim has asked to see an outside doctor for breathing difficulties. He struggled to breathe when we met with him. Minister Flanagan should write to his counterpart asking that this request be granted. There has been no ambassador in Egypt since April. The consulate based in Cairo covers four other countries. Fast-tracking the appointment of the new ambassador would ease the workload on the consulate. More importantly, an ambassador carries more status for dealing with Egyptian officials. The Australian Consulate brought Peter Greste’s family with them when they visited him in prison. The Irish Consulate should seek to do the same for the Halawas. These steps may be small but they would make a huge difference to the morale of this young Dublin teen. •