Sweden takes over at the helm of the EU on Wednesday (1 July) for a six-month presidency that will for the most part be held hostage by the bloc's complicated institutional problems as well as being overshadowed by the global economic crisis.
Diplomats in Brussels are looking forward to having the bloc under Stockholm's political guidance following a turbulent first half of the year under the domestically strife-ridden Czechs, but the goodwill is unlikely to make Sweden's job much easie...
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