Excerpts from recent editorials in newspapers from overseas:<$>Kristeligt Dagblad, Copenhagen, Denmark, on US President George W. Bush’s policy shift on Iran:

Considering that US President George W. Bush seldom changes his political course, or even admits errors, the new American attitude toward the talks with Iran is remarkable.

If the Americans sit down at the same table as the Iranians, we’re talking about the first high level contacts in a generation between the Islamic state and the world’s sole remaining superpower, also called the “Great Satan” by the regime in Tehran.

For the United States, it will be a considerable U-turn as the clerical regime for many years has been seen an important supporter of international terrorism.

Part of the picture is that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad wants Israel to be erased from the map moreover and uses any opportunity to demand a clash with the West and its values.

However, the American shift in connection with the talks is not the result of them looking at the regime in Iran and its plans to get the nuclear weapons more gently.

The change of course has been brought on by the solidarity between the great powers regarding the Iranian nuclear arms plans faltering and in danger of collapse.

The reality is that President Bush must see that the Iranians have exploited the disagreement about the course between the United States and Britain on one side and Russia and China on the other.

The attempts by the United States to get the matter on the table at the UN Security Council with the aim of sanctions against Iran has moved at a snail’s pace.

Jordan Times, Amman, on debate on public freedom needed:<$>

So far, public freedoms throughout the world have been the first victim of the so-called war on terror.

From the historic capitals of civil liberties in old Europe, all the way across the Atlantic in the US the self-declared defender of freedom and promoter of democracy worldwide blatant human rights violations are being committed everyday in the name of the fight against terrorism.

Since September 11, most Western democracies have adopted anti-terror legislation largely restrictive of basic freedoms.

If well-established democracies, if the very temples of personal, civil and political rights, have reneged on the principles of the inviolability of the human person, freedom of assembly, right to privacy and presumption of innocence, and have de facto legalised incommunicado detentions and other undemocratic practices, then why should less advanced and much more fragile countries, with political systems that are only close or not even close to real democracies, not do the same?

This is the question that conservatives in the Third World raise most often in defence of undemocratic or draconian legislation purportedly introduced in the wake of September 11.

The answer is simple: Being less advanced does not authorise one to ignore the principles that constitute the pillars of the society to which human society governments and conservatives included says it aspires.

Less democracy exacerbates, and does not curb, terror. Renouncing the democratic march means giving in to the terrorists and helping them achieve exactly what they want.

The debate over the anti-terror draft that the government has recently readied should take into consideration all these reasons.

The opposition is being categorical in its rejection of the bill, and several civil society organisations are joining hands in what promises to become one of Jordan’s extremely rare nationwide lobby campaigns.