Month: May 2019

The Trump administration is energizing its campaign to counter China’s growing global influence as Secretary of State Mike Pompeo heads to Europe this week on a four-nation trip that will also highlight disputes with Russia over Venezuela and elsewhere as well as deep U.S. isolation on the cause and impact of climate change.   With China seeking a greater presence throughout the continent, U.S. officials said Pompeo will renew warnings over the use of advanced Chinese telecommunications technology as well as blunt Beijing’s aspirations to play a significant role in the Arctic, a region that is rapidly opening up to …

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Stevo Pendarovski, the presidential candidate backed by North Macedonia’s center-left government, won the presidency Sunday in a runoff election with a conservative rival.   State election commission chief Oliver Derkorski announced late Sunday that with nearly 99 percent of the votes counted, Pendarovski, the candidate of the ruling Social Democratic Union, had won with 51.8% of the votes. Gordana Siljanovska Davkova, the candidate favored by the conservative opposition VMRO-DPMNE party, got 44.5%.   The two politicians had each received about 42% in the first round of voting April 21, which had three candidates.   Even before the official announcement, Social …

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The party of far-right leader Marine Le Pen will top the upcoming European Parliament elections with 22 percent of the vote, just ahead of President Emmanuel Macron’s REM party, an Ipsos poll released on Sunday. It was the first time Le Pen’s Rassemblement National (RN) – formerly the National Front – overtook Macron’s REM in an Ipsos survey ahead of the EU election this year, although other, daily polls have shown the RN in pole position before. EU elections will be held on May 26 in France. The poll of 1,500 people was conducted on May 2-3, after Macron announced …

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Italy’s anti-establishment 5-Star Movement piled pressure on its government partner the League on Sunday to dump a junior minister under investigation for corruption, in a case that could pull the coalition apart. Relations between 5-Star and the far-right League have grown increasingly fraught in the run-up to European Union parliamentary elections on May 26, with the two parties acting more like bitter political enemies than cabinet allies. Their growing rivalry triggered an unprecedented spat between the interior and defense ministries at the weekend as tensions grew over the fate of junior transport minister Armando Siri, who is very close to …

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British Prime Minister Theresa May says her Conservative government and the opposition Labour Party have a duty to strike a compromise Brexit agreement to end months of political deadlock over Britain’s exit from the European Union. Writing in the Mail on Sunday, May told Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn: “Let’s do a deal.” She said a cross-party compromise was not her first choice, but “we have to find a way to break the deadlock.” The Conservatives are desperate to move forward after losing hundreds of positions in last week’s local elections. Labour also suffered losses as voters punished both main parties …

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Pope Francis has arrived in Sofia at the start of three days in the former communist states of Bulgaria and North Macedonia, his fourth trip abroad this year. Both countries have tiny Catholic minorities and most of the population considers themselves Orthodox. The pope is likely to use this opportunity to help cement the Vatican’s relations with the Orthodox community in Eastern Europe. In a message to the Bulgarian people ahead of his Sunday arrival, the pope said his trip to Bulgaria would be a pilgrimage focused on faith, unity and peace. Bulgaria, he added, is home to witnesses of …

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He is wheelchair-bound and has limited use of his hands, but Alexander Gorbunov, the author of hugely popular social media accounts in Russia, has emerged as one of President Vladimir Putin’s most vocal critics. Diagnosed with spinal muscular atrophy and using his right index finger to type, the 27-year-old author of StalinGulag skewers the “hypocrisy” of Putin’s system and the everyday injustices ordinary Russians face. Known for his dry wit and generous use of profanities, StalinGulag has built a near 1.5 million strong army of followers on Twitter and Telegram, with a total media outreach believed to include several million …

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Polls have opened in North Macedonia, where voters will elect a new president Sunday in a runoff election dominated by deep divisions over a change in the country’s name agreed to with Greece that has opened the path to NATO and European Union membership.  Greece had for decades demanded that the tiny ex-Yugoslav republic change its name from Macedonia, arguing that it implied a territorial claim on a northern Greek province also called Macedonia. The new name was formally ratified earlier this year.  But the accord continues to divide Macedonians and has eclipsed all other issues during campaigning for the presidential election, when about 1.8 million voters will choose between two …

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Anti-government protesters marched in France for a 25th straight week Saturday but in significantly smaller numbers than during the yellow vest movement’s first months or for a May Day rally that attracted tens of thousands of participants. Several dozen people demonstrated at Paris’ Charles de Gaulle Airport to denounce privatization plans. Protests were also held in Paris and other cities around France, including Nice, Marseille and Lyon, where environmentalists and yellow vest protesters joined forces.    The Interior Ministry counted a total of 2,600 participants at three events in Paris and 18,900 in all of France, a low for Saturday …

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