In the run-up to the release of the latest European Commission report about Bulgaria, there was a somewhat more than unpleasant whiff to foreign coverage about the country. Local coverage about reported threats to suspend or even demand repayments of European funding and the political grand opera that reached a new crescendo after the Olaf report was none too charitable, either.

In Bulgaria, a somewhat arcane and none too edifying argument broke out among the politicos about just who was to blame for these latest blows to Bulgaria’s image, and the Bonchev bungle did not help, either. Football club owner Angel Bonchev was abducted in May and this month, when his wife went to pay the ransom, she was abducted in turn as he was released.

Professional Bulgaria-bashers abroad rushed to keyboards. The Times announced that Bulgaria was subject to a plague of kidnappings, which they really should not have said, because the fact that the story was picked up locally will give people new excuses, apart from magnetic storms, spring fever and munitions dump explosions, for not turning up for work. “I really would have come in but I was abducted yesterday.”

But join me on a short trip around the globe for a quick guide to some other internationally embarrassing stories.

Speaking of abductions, three police in Mali were kidnapped by anti-government rebels, who presumably wanted some variety added to their collection, because they already had 92 government soldiers.

The latest blow to China’s image comes apparently not from pro-Tibet protesters but from a non-existent panda, yes, Po, the CGI star of Kung Fu Panda. Panda lover and panda-themed performance artist Zhao Bandi, who generally goes around accompanied by a stuffed panda, intends court action against the producers of the film on the grounds that it damages the image of China and its national symbol. Reportedly, he takes especial exception to the fact that Po’s father is a duck.

I cannot remember if anything came of the court action by some Greek patriots against the film Alexander on the grounds that the characterisation of the ancient hero included what they saw as a nationally defamatory portrayal of his sexual preferences. But then one Greek island had something to blush about recently, the arrests of eight women from Eastern Europe and a similar number of Greek and foreign men after, at a bar on the island of Zakynthos. They were involved in a competition requiring a prowess that I decline to be explicit about here, except to say that I did wonder if there was an unfortunate irony, depending on how you pronounce the name of the island.

We South Africans are more than blushing about the blow to our image by the newfound habit of some of our compatriots of expressing their xenophobia by setting foreigners on fire, and I am sure that our national police commissioner might be heard publicly expressing worry about it all, were he not on suspension in connection with allegedly accepting bribes from some sort of supposed mafia type.

Bulgaria might have been caught up with talk of the opposition walking out of parliament, no less from a no-confidence debate they themselves requested, but Macedonia beat them to it. Some days ago, when a mayor was arrested on allegations of serious crimes related to a building development in central Skopje, MPs from his party stalked out of parliament and got all other opposition parties to follow them, with the exception of one party that has not been there at all because it’s been sulking since the election.

The United States, of course, currently remains the embarrassment champion of the world, although that should end on January 20 next year when George Bush leaves office. I was flushed with delight to hear of the plan by some California politicians to name a sewage plant after him, in what they see as the most fitting monument to his presidency.

In the end, all of this may be no solace, and one must have sympathy for the gendarmerie of Mali, those fanatical about pandas, and Americans in general, at least until next year when they get a real president, whoever wins.

But as to Bulgaria, every leak of a report for months and years to come may produce whiffs quite as malodorous as the future George W Bush facility.