Month: November 2023

Finland is ready to close its last border crossing with Russia if Moscow keeps pushing migrants across, Prime Minister Petteri Orpo said Monday as migrants continued to make the treacherous journey through the Arctic. “We have closed all our border stations on the eastern border except for one and we are ready to close the last one if needed,” Orpo told reporters in Helsinki. “Finland is protecting the European Union’s external border and NATO’s border. We will not let this phenomenon continue,” he added. Finland has seen a surge in asylum-seekers entering without visas across its 1,300-kilometer border with Russia, …

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Niger’s junta said Monday that it had revoked an anti-migration law that helped reduce the flow of West Africans to Europe, but that was reviled by desert dwellers whose economies had long relied on the traffic.  The law, which made it illegal to transport migrants through Niger, was passed in May 2015 as the number of people traveling across the Mediterranean Sea from Africa reached record highs, creating a political and humanitarian crisis in Europe where governments came under pressure to stop the influx.  Niger’s junta, which took power in a July coup, repealed the law on Saturday and announced …

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Historical treasures that were stored for years at an Amsterdam museum during an ownership dispute sparked by Russia’s annexation of Crimea have been safely transported to Ukraine, the museum announced Monday. Their transport ends a nearly decadelong legal tug-of-war over the artifacts including a solid gold Scythian helmet from the 4th century B.C. and a golden neck ornament from the second century A.D. that weighs more than a kilogram (two pounds). “This was a special case, in which cultural heritage became a victim of geopolitical developments,” Els van der Plas, director of the Allard Pierson historical museum, said in a …

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Members of Turkey’s civil society are voicing concerns for their future as international funding declines. As Dorian Jones reports from Istanbul, significant donors have been ending or cutting back their support after Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan, emboldened by his reelection this year, continues his crackdown on dissenting voices. …

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Acclaimed American artist Kehinde Wiley — known for portraying former US president Barack Obama and U.S. pop star Michael Jackson — has turned his brush to Africa. His “A Maze of Power” exhibit in Paris, portrays 11 former and current African presidents, exploring power through the lens of historical European portrait painting. Lisa Bryant went to the show and has this report from the French capital …

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National and regional authorities in Spain signed an agreement Monday to invest 1.4 billion euros ($1.5 billion) in areas around the treasured national park of Donana in a bid to stop the park from drying up. Ecological Transition Minister Teresa Ribera said the plan was aimed at encouraging farmers to stop cultivating crops that rely heavily on water from underground aquifers that have been overexploited in recent years, damaging one of Europe’s largest wetlands. “This is an agreement with which we put an end to pressure on a natural treasure the likes of which there are few in the world,” …

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German missionary Father Hans Joachim Lohre who was kidnapped in Mali’s capital Bamako last year has been freed by his captor, a church official told Reuters on Sunday. Patient Nshombo of the Missionaries for Africa told Reuters by telephone that Lohre had been released. “Yes, he has been freed, but we have to wait for further details from the authorities,” Nshombo said. The government of Mali did not immediately respond to a request for comment. A spokesperson for the German foreign office declined to comment. Lohre, who had been living in Bamako for 30 years, was meant to celebrate Mass …

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