EU-DIGEST

Two hundred years ago this month, the miserable shreds of Napoleon's Grande Armee shuffled out of Russian territory, thanking their lucky stars they had made it safely home and vowing never, ever to try that again.

Those sentiments were shared by survivors of this year's re-enactment of the Battle of Borodino and the immense traffic jams that left thousands stranded on the battlefield.

It was a helpful reminder that history tends to repeat itself as farce rather than tragedy.

We got a new-old president, but were denied the thrill of a new era because he is as familiar and unexciting as the buckwheat served at your office canteen.

An aircraft vanished, a monastery was caught running brothels and the white ribbon — or was it a condom? — was briefly the must-have accessory on Moscow's streets.

The fad of the year was the political opposition as entertainment. Right up until summer the best fun in town — and the only place to be seen — was being chased around the boulevard ring by tired riot cops.

Read more: History Repeated Itself as Farce in 2012 | News | The Moscow Times

Essentially, it's a comic dance in which the participants ride an invisible horse and twirl an invisible lasso. The music is the worst kind of electro-synth pop. The singer is a chubby little geezer in 1950s sunglasses. The hook-line is meaningless to anyone outside Korea. The collective dancing it encourages is a naff mixture of "The Birdie Song" and "The Macarena".

But none of these potential drawbacks stopped the South Korean rapper Psy's "Gangnam Style" from becoming the global music, dance and video phenomenon of the year.Everyone watched it – at the time of writing, the video had been viewed 940 million times on YouTube – and everyone wanted to dance it.
Ban Ki-Moon, secretary-general of the UN, not a man given to busting moves on the dance floor, had a go, as did Eric Schmidt, executive chairman of Google; a bunch of Etonians did a parody called "Eton Style" through the school quadrangles, after which Boris Johnson told the Tory Party conference that he and David Cameron had danced it together at Chequers.

The song is, in fact, a social satire: "Gangnam" means "south of the river" and the style under attack is that of nouveau-riche burghers living south of Seoul's Han river. They're the cool, wealthy set with their gym-bunny looks, designer threads and love of hanging out in exclusive bars and clubs (three of which are owned by Psy's mother). Psy's persona is the wannabe from the wrong end of town who longs to be part of the hip wor

Read more: 'Gangnam Style' to Obamamania: 12 reasons to be cheerful about 2012 - Features - Music - The Independent

A multi-million dollar firework display heralded in the new year in Sydney, while the world's tallest building, the Burj Khalifa, was illuminated in Dubai.

Celebrations were held across Europe, with some 250,000 gathering to watch fireworks over the River Thames.

In Times Square in New York, crowds watched Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Lady Gaga count down to midnight.

For more: BBC News - New Year's Eve 2012: Celebrations around the world