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The Balkan country of Montenegro seceded from neighbouring Serbia in 2006 after a referendum. However, around 30 per cent of the country's 620,000 inhabitants still consider themselves Serb. The main Montenegrin church also remained attached to the Serbian Orthodox tradition. The Serbian Orthodox Church is still the dominant religious institution in the Balkan country, with 70 per cent of Christians affiliated with it. This connection with Serbia regularly leads to tensions within the country.

It seems that the crisis in Afghanistan has focused minds in Brussels. On Thursday (2 September) EU defence ministers are meeting to discuss the crisis and how to learn lessons from it. Hovering at the top of the agenda is the EU's own capacity - or more precisely lack of capacity -  to act in these and similar situations. But the meeting is "informal" and no decisions are expected until later in the year.

The European Union has thanked Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan for their role during the recent evacuation of Kabul following its fall into the hands of the Taliban. The president of the European Council spoke on the phone to the presidents of the two countries in the last days.

A state cannot be built from outside, with a foreign army standing on top of it to supervise the process, argues Dennis Sammut in this commentary. As the EU expands its global ambitions, it must be aware of the risks of "mission creep" and make sure the mistakes in Afghanistan are not repeated.