From Our Own Correspondent Folgen

'A political system which had considered itself as solid as rock has started to show cracks.' Steve Rosenberg's in Moscow on a weekend of more demonstrations. The Americans are preparing for their withdrawal from Iraq and Gabriel Gatehouse has been considering what exactly's been achieved during their nine years there. There's a view from Hungary where Nick Thorpe's been looking at how the country's affected by the crisis in the Eurozone. It's forty years since Bangladesh came into being and Mark Tully, who remembers the long struggle which preceded its birth, wonders if too much celebration of that anniversary will lead to further bitterness. And Linda Pressley's in eastern Cuba climbing mountains and asking awkward questions about the love life of Fidel Castro.

Being Italian is bad for your health! That's the contention from Bologna where winter is descending and a range of ailments, unknown to British correspondent Danny Mitzman, are making their presence felt! It's election time in the Democratic Republic of Congo and while you might expect the sounds of tear gas canisters being fired and angry argument about electoral fraud, Will Ross has encountered an orchestra playing Handel's Water Music! A bag of snakes tipped out in a government office in India - Craig Jeffrey says the incident's once again got the country talking about corruption. A book fair --and a beating up: Sara Sheridan in the United Arab Emirates on the issues surrounding the release from prison of a group of people accused of being disrespectful to a ruling family. And the American state of Iowa's preparing for its moment in the political sunlight. It's time for the caucuses, critical for Republicans hoping to become their party's candidate for the White House.

'But of course there will be violence,' says one seasoned observer to Andrew Harding as he travels in the Democratic Republic of Congo wondering if Monday's election is a chance for Africa's wounded giant to get back on its feet. And there's another election, in Egypt, starting on Monday: Lyse Doucet joins a family whose window, overlooking Tahrir Square, offers a unique view of world history unfolding. Fergal Keane, who's been watching the opening of the Khmer Rouge trial in Cambodia, finds young people there more interested in the future than in their country's bloody past. Mark Lowen's in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia which lost the major part of its Jewish population to the holocaust and recalls the life of his own grandmother who once came face to face with the commandant of a Nazi death camp. And why James Harkin, chasing revolutionaries in Syria, found himself drawn, repeatedly, to what he claims is the best ice cream shop in the world!