The following speech was delivered to the European Parliament's Plenary Session in Strasbourg on 10 September 2013.

The European eel is shrouded in mystery. We know that it begins its life cycle in the Saragossa Sea in the middle of the North Atlantic and then spends almost a year drifting towards the European coasts where it metamorphoses into the transparent larval stage known as the glass eel. The glass eels then develop into elvers and swim upstream, spending most of their adult lives in fresh water before returning to the Saragossa Sea to spawn and die.

This month, Struan argues the case for greater shale gas production in Britain, presents an old friend with the European Citizen's Prize, brings the anti-windfarm message to a rally in Ireland and explains why he's about to get a bit more talkative.

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The following article appeared in the Sunday Times on 11 August 2013.

OFGEM, the energy regulator, has warned that the UK’s current surplus generating capacity of 14% will sink to a wafer-thin 2% by 2015 as we continue to shut our old, coal-fired power stations to meet EU CO2 emission targets. A 2% surplus would place Britain on a knife-edge. Any surge in energy consumption during a severe cold snap would plunge the country into blackouts.

The following article appeared on the website ThinkScotland on 21 August 2013.

On Monday this week, I had the pleasure of presenting influential Scottish artist and pioneering art impresario Professor Richard Demarco CBE with a European Citizen’s Prize during a ceremony in Edinburgh in recognition of his decades-long efforts to bridge cultural divides between Western and Eastern Europe. 

Struan has written letters to the Vatican and Scottish Culture Secretary Fiona Hyslop regarding the proposed split of Scotland's Catholic archives between sites in Edinburgh and Aberdeen.

Click here to read the letter to the Vatican in full.

Click here to read the letter to Fiona Hyslop in full.

Influential Scottish artist and pioneering art impresario Professor Richard Demarco CBE was today awarded a European Citizen’s Prize during a ceremony in Edinburgh at the Office of the European Parliament in Scotland for his decades-long efforts to bridge cultural divides between Western and Eastern Europe. 

Scottish Conservative Euro MP Struan Stevenson last night addressed a mass protest rally against wind turbines in Athlone, West Meath, in the Irish Midlands. Organised by Marian Harkin, Independent MEP for Ireland’s North West constituency, over 300 attended the standing-room only event at the Athlone Springs Hotel where Struan warned the gathered audience against desecrating the Irish landscape merely for the sake of satisfying the UK’s carbon emissions targets.

The following article appeared on UPI.com 2 August 2013

Continued bombings, repeated terrorist attacks and spiraling daily casualties in Iraq have given rise to grave concerns in the international community.

The number of victims of violence in Iraq since the beginning of July has more than 700 dead and 1,500 wounded, an average of almost 90 killed and injured every day.

The following article appeared in The Diplomat on 31 July 2013

The massacre of political prisoners by the Iranian regime, which took place in the summer of 1988 has never been acknowledged by Tehran and remains one of the darkest stains in recent history, although it is relatively unknown in the West.

The executions began in late July and continued for several months. As many as 30,000 political prisoners or more, the overwhelming majority of them activists of the People's Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI or MEK) were slaughtered.

This month, Struan gives us an update on Lithuania and Croatia as they both enter new phases of their European journeys, warns readers to be wary of Iran's president-elect Hassan Rouhani, describes the Ayrshire Fiddle Orchestra's visit to Strasbourg and tells of Ian Duncan's hidden talent.

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