Monday 15 April
China, meanwhile is scheduled to release its GDP data for the first quarter of the year, with analysts predicting robust growth of approximately 8%.
In Oslo, the Norwegian government will host, in conjunction with the United Nations, a major two-day conference on LGBT issues.
In France the government is due to publish a list of the wealth and assets of its ministers in the wake of the scandal surrounding disgraced former Budget Minister Jérôme Cahuzac and his secret bank account.
Finally, a four-day motions hearing will open in the case of Guantanamo detainee Abd al Rahim al Nashiri, who is charged over the attack on the USS Cole in Yemen that killed 17 sailors back in 2000.
Tuesday 16 April
On Tuesday, the German parliament’s budget committee is scheduled to consider legislation authorising the €10bn bailout of Cyprus, with reports suggesting the bill will reach the floor of the Bundestag on Thursday.
In the United States, the Commander of US (and NATO) forces in Afghanistan, General Joseph Dunford, is due to testify before the Senate Armed Services Committee. The focus is likely to be the country’s preparedness for the handover next year.
The European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg will hand down its judgment in the case of Haroon Aswat, who is fighting his extradition from the UK to the US on terror charges.
Finally in London, the Lord Mayor’s Easter Banquet takes place, which traditionally features an address from the British Foreign Secretary.
Wednesday 17 April
Wednesday also marks the deadline for British Home Secretary Theresa May to lodge an appeal in the case of radical preacher Abu Qatada, whom she is seeking to extradite to Jordan. Previous rulings have gone against the Home Secretary amid concerns about the Jordanian judicial process.
US Secretary of State John Kerry is scheduled to give public testimony before the House Foreign Affairs Committee. Although the hearing is nominally concerning Kerry’s departmental budget proposal, lawmakers traditionally take the opportunity to probe their top diplomat on the most pressing issues of the day, such as North Korea, Syria and Iran.
Lastly, the Senate Judiciary Committee will hold a hearing on the long-awaited proposed comprehensive immigration reform legislation.
Thursday 18 April
On Thursday, Italian lawmakers are scheduled to begin the process of electing a new President to replace incumbent Giorgio Napolitano. The selection process is being complicated by squabbling between Pier Luigi Bersani and Silvio Berlusconi over whose faction should occupy the largely ceremonial position.
In Moscow, Bolshoi ballet dancer Pavel Dmitrichenko is due back in court over his alleged role in masterminding the brutal acid attack against the ballet’s artistic director Sergei Fillin back in January.
Meanwhile, IMF and World Bank Spring Meetings begin in earnest on Thursday with press briefings from Christine Lagarde and Jim Yong Kim on the global economic outlook.
Incoming Bank of England Governor Mark Carney, in town for the meetings, is scheduled to discuss the global economy and financial reform at an event organised by Thomson Reuters at the Canadian embassy in Washington DC.
Friday 19 April
On Friday, Time magazine is due to publish its annual list of the 100 most influential people in the world.
Nancy Pelosi, currently House Minority Leader in the US, will be in the UK where she is due to give a lecture at the London School of Economics.
Weekend
On Saturday, Turkey will play host to the latest meeting on Syria, which US Secretary of State John Kerry will attend.
Sunday will see Paraguayan’s go to the polls for presidential and legislative elections. Paraguay has been somewhat isolated since the impeachment of its then-President Fernando Lugo in the summer of 2012, considered by regional critics – understandably sensitive about such political interventions – a ‘soft coup’.
Finally, US Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel will (reportedly) arrive in Israel for what would be his first visit since taking up the post earlier this year. The Iran threat, as well as the security implications of the Syria conflict, will be top of the agenda, assuming the visit goes ahead.
]]>In the case of Fernando Lugo, president of Paraguay, it took eight months for his secret to come to light. When it did, it did so in the form of a two-year old boy.
Love-children are not new to South American politics. The Peruvians enjoy particular kudos in the field. Four months passed after the election of Alan Garcia, the current president of the Andean state, before the result of an extramarital affair was revealed.
His predecessor, Alejandro Toledo, took ten years to admit to being the father of a 14 year-old girl. The allegations reached national proportions when a Supreme Court judge admitted visiting the President at home and trying to persuade him to publicly recognise his daughter.
Lugo admitted his paternity to reporters yesterday. The confession proves he is no saint. But he was a Catholic, supposedly celibate bishop at the time of the child’s conception.
The news is depressing. Not so much because of his moral hyprocracy. That much can be expected. But because it gives the political opposition in long-suffering Paraguay the rope with which to hang him.
"He presented himself almost as a god sent from heaven, but it turns out he was just like any other man and that represents a con", said Deputy Oscar Tuma, summing up the tone adopted by Lugo’s critics.
The corrupt and bloated Colorado party ruled Paraguay for more than six decades. Lugo’s election last year was greeted across the world as a sign of hope for the beleaguered state.
Now his mandate – based largely on his moral credentials – is in doubt. Still, he has at least confessed. By the standards of the Catholic church, that’s a first step to redemption. Paraguayans – a conservative bunch by and large – might not prove quite so forgiving.
Best headline of the day? Inca Kola News’s ‘Life of Brian’ take-off: “He’s not the messiah, he’s a very naughty boy’.
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