Category: Євросоюз

A German court on Thursday sentenced a Gambian man to life in prison over his participation in a death squad that assassinated opponents of former dictator Yahya Jammeh, including an AFP journalist. Bai Lowe was convicted of crimes against humanity, murder and attempted murder for his role as a driver for the hit squad known as the Junglers. Prosecutors had asked judges at the court in the northern town of Celle to hand a life sentence to Lowe, who denies the charges against him. The Junglers unit was “used by the then-president of The Gambia to carry out illegal killing …

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U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken heads back to Israel on Thursday, where he says he will work to help prolong a cease-fire so more hostages can be released and more humanitarian aid can be delivered to Gaza. At the NATO foreign ministers’ meeting in Brussels, Blinken tried to reassure allies of continued U.S. support for Ukraine as Kyiv prepares for another winter of fighting. VOA’s Senior Diplomatic Correspondent Cindy Saine reports. …

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Member countries are divided over the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe’s annual foreign ministers’ meeting on Thursday, with Baltic nations and Ukraine refusing to attend over the presence of Russia’s Sergey Lavrov. The 57-member OSCE is the successor to a Cold War-era organization for Soviet and Western powers to engage but is now largely paralyzed by Russia’s ongoing use of the effective veto each country has. The U.S. and its allies are seeking simultaneously to keep the OSCE alive and hold Russia to account for its invasion of Ukraine. They are attending while making a point of denouncing …

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British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has accused his Greek counterpart Kyriakos Mitsotakis of public “grandstanding” over the ownership of Parthenon sculptures.  The two leaders have been at odds with one another after Sunak canceled a scheduled meeting between the two just hours before it was set to take place.  In a weekly question period with the house of commons, Sunak told parliament that Mitsotakis had broken a promise that he would not publicly bring up the sculptures. “Specific assurances on that topic were made to this country and then were broken,” Sunak said. “When people make commitments, they should keep …

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Since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, drone production in the country has surged. Ukrainian businesses have shifted from manufacturing products for peacetime to producing equipment for wartime. From Kyiv, Myroslava Gongadze explains how Ukrainian ingenuity is altering the course of the war. Camera: Eugene Shynkar. …

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U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday there is “strong bipartisan support” for Ukraine in the United States and sees “no sense of fatigue” among NATO allies continuing their support as the country enters its second winter of war against Russia. “Some are questioning whether the United States and other NATO allies should continue to stand with Ukraine as we enter the second winter of Putin’s brutality. But the answer here today at NATO is clear, and it is unwavering. We must and we will continue to support Ukraine,” Blinken said during a press conference in Brussels on Wednesday. …

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A special tribunal on Wednesday ruled that French Justice Minister Eric Dupond-Moretti did not abuse his current position to settle scores with opponents from his career as a top lawyer. A pugnacious orator, Dupond-Moretti was alleged to have failed to step back sufficiently from a case against a magistrate with whom he had sparred while a lawyer. The Cour de Justice de la Republique, a special tribunal for government officials, said Dupond-Moretti was in a position of conflict of interest but criminal intent was not established, and it cleared him of the charges. Dupond-Moretti had remained in office during the …

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Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba called for Western allies to ramp up defense production in order to ensure that Ukrainian forces have what they need to battle Russia’s invasion. Speaking ahead of a meeting with NATO foreign ministers in Brussels, Kuleba said there is “no reason to believe the West lacks the political will” to expand production capacity, but that there is a lot of technical work that has to be done to meet that goal. Kuleba said it is not only Ukraine’s security that is at stake in the war, but also the security and safety of the entire …

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Pope Francis has stripped conservative American Cardinal Raymond Burke of some of his Vatican privileges, including a large, subsidized apartment and his salary, a senior Vatican official said on Tuesday. The official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, participated in a regular Vatican meeting when the pope made the announcement to senior aides last week. He quoted the pope as saying that Burke, one of his fiercest critics, was “working against the church and against the papacy” and that he had sown “disunity” in the church. Burke has had no senior Vatican job for years. He is a consultant …

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Former U.S. Marine Paul Whelan, imprisoned in Russia on espionage charges, was assaulted by a fellow inmate, his family said Tuesday, adding they fear he is a target because of his nationality.   The 53-year-old has been behind bars since 2018, serving a 16-year sentence that the U.S. government says is without merit.  On Tuesday afternoon he was “hit in the face” by a new prisoner, breaking his glasses, his brother David Whelan said in a statement. He said the incident occurred in a clothing workshop in the Mordovia penal colony in central Russia.   Guards do not enter that part of …

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U.S. lawmakers are racing to reach a deal on billions of dollars in aid to Ukraine and Israel before the holiday break. VOA’s Congressional Correspondent Katherine Gypson has more. …

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The foreign ministers of the three Baltic states and Ukraine said Tuesday they will boycott this week’s meeting of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe in North Macedonia to object to the participation of Russia’s foreign minister. The top diplomats of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania issued a joint statement saying they “deeply regret the decision enabling the personal participation” of Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. “It will only provide Russia with yet another propaganda opportunity,” they said. Lavrov said Monday that he planned to travel to North Macedonia’s capital, Skopje, for the OSCE foreign ministers’ meeting, which would …

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The wife of Ukraine’s intelligence chief has been diagnosed with heavy metals poisoning and is undergoing treatment in a hospital, a spokesperson for the agency said Tuesday as the country’s war with Russia stretched into its 22nd month. Marianna Budanova is the wife of Lieutenant General Kyrylo Budanov, the head of the military intelligence agency that is known in Ukrainian as GUR for short. Her condition was confirmed to The Associated Press by Andrii Yusov, the agency’s spokesman. Yusov did not provide more details about the alleged poisoning, nor did he say if it was believed to have been intended …

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A group tracking antisemitism in Germany said Tuesday that it documented a drastic increase of antisemitic incidents in the country in the month after Hamas attacked Israel on October 7.  The RIAS group said it recorded 994 incidents, which is an average of 29 incidents per day and an increase of 320% compared to the same time period in 2022. The group looked at the time period from October 7 to November 9.  Among the 994 antisemitic incidents, there were three cases of extreme violence, 29 attacks, targeted damage to 72 properties, 32 threats, four mass mailings and 854 cases …

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A new America House is celebrating its opening in Odesa, making it the third major cultural and educational center in Ukraine supported and financed by the U.S. Embassy. America House Odesa was supposed to open in early 2022, but Russia’s invasion changed those plans. Anna Kosstutschenko visited the center and found out how the war altered its program. Camera — Pavel Suhodolskiy. …

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Ukraine’s military said Tuesday that Russian forces carried out aerial attacks overnight, including firing a missile that struck the Zaporizhzhia region. Zaporizhzhia’s regional military administration said on Telegram that according to preliminary reports, the missile damaged a shop and injured one person. The Ukrainian military also said Tuesday its air defenses destroyed a Russian attack drone. In Brussels, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said Tuesday there has been intense fighting along the frontlines in Ukraine, along with waves of Russian drone attacks against Ukrainian cities. Stoltenberg said that while the front lines in Ukraine have not moved much during the past …

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NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said Tuesday he is confident the United States will continue to provide support for Ukraine amid divisions among U.S. lawmakers about approving more funding for the Ukraine war effort. Speaking to reporters before the start of two days of talks with NATO foreign ministers in Brussels, Stoltenberg lauded what he called the unprecedented military support NATO allies have provided to Ukraine in response to Russia’s invasion. “The challenge now is that we need to sustain that support,” Stoltenberg said. He described supporting Ukraine as NATO’s obligation, saying that a Russian victory in Ukraine would be both …

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Grain thunders into rail cars and trucks zip around a storage facility in central Ukraine, a place that growing numbers of companies turned to as they struggled to export their food to people facing hunger around the world. Now, more of the grain is getting unloaded from overcrammed silos and heading to ports on the Black Sea, set to traverse a fledgling shipping corridor launched after Russia pulled out of a U.N.-brokered agreement this summer that allowed food to flow safely from Ukraine during the war. “It was tight, but we kept working … we sought how to accept every …

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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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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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