If you come from elsewhere in the EU, yes, you can always vote in local elections and european parliament elections where you live. If you're from elsewhere, it depends on local law.
lemming
joined 2 years ago
It isn't great when a doctor goes to fetch their colleague to have a look while examinig you. But of course that after all the same boring stuff, they are excited about something unusual. I heard about an ophthalmologist who, out of all her carreer, was most excited about solving someone's issues by finding crabs in their eyebrows.
Also older than the rings of Saturn
In a large part, a distraction. Or more generally, a way to stay in power. How do you stay in power when your country is doing very poorly economically while you and your friends keep siphoning public money into their pockets? You create a strong narrative, ideally an external enemy ("NATO wants to destroy our way of life!" "Ukraine is full of fascists killing Russians!"). Support it by propaganda from your state-controlled media and you are a hero saving the country, if not the world. You can do pretty much anything and still retain considerable support.
That's also why Putin can't really afford peace, he would lose a strong narrative in his favour. He pretends to agree, but doesn't actually follow conditions of any agreement while constantly increasing his demands. He might agree with an agreement that would basically be Ukraine's capitulation, but nothing less.