Category: Євросоюз

This story originated in VOA’s Serbian service. WASHINGTON — Despite its “America First” policies and general drift toward disengagement from foreign commitments, the Trump administration appears to have found an international enterprise it likes. Known as the Three Seas Initiative, the four-year-old effort aims to enhance energy and digital connectivity among a dozen Eastern European countries clustered among the Baltic, Black and Adriatic seas. For the participants, who are just now beginning to put economic meat on the diplomatic bones of the concept, the goal is to boost everyone’s economic growth by making key resources more readily available. For the …

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Prime Minister Theresa May has brought a new word to the Brexit lexicon: compromise. May met Wednesday with opposition Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn to try to avoid Britain’s chaotic departure from the European Union in little over a week. The shift came after lawmakers rejected the government’s Brexit deal on three occasions and twice failed to agree on any other option. What might happen next: No deal If Britain can’t break its Brexit impasse, it risks crashing out of the EU in nine days. Last month, the EU agreed to postpone the original departure date of March 29, but …

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Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said on Wednesday European powers were incapable of bypassing sanctions imposed on Tehran by the U.S. after it withdrew from the Iran nuclear deal.    Iran and six world powers agreed on a deal in 2015 that severely restricted Tehran’s nuclear activities in return for sanctions relief and economic incentives.    However, President Donald Trump withdrew Washington from the deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), last May, reimposing punishing sanctions on the Islamic republic.  The other parties to the nuclear deal — Britain, China, France, Germany, Russia, plus the European Union — insist they remain …

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Tensions soared Wednesday between the United States and two of its NATO partners, Germany and Turkey, as the alliance opened a 70th birthday celebration aimed at showing a united front against a resurgent Russia. Hours before foreign ministers from the 29-member Western alliance opened talks in Washington, Vice President Mike Pence delivered a stinging rebuke both to Germany over its level of defense spending and to Turkey for buying a major arms system from Russia. “Germany must do more. And we cannot ensure the defense of the West if our allies grow dependent on Russia,” Pence told a think-tank forum …

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Italy’s interior minister said Wednesday that he won’t offer safe harbor to 64 migrants rescued off Libya by the German humanitarian group Sea-Eye. The people brought to safety from a rubber dinghy off the coast of Zuwarah, west of the Libyan capital of Tripoli, included 10 women, five children and a newborn baby, the group said. Sea-Eye said on Twitter that its rescue ship, the Alan Kurdi, picked them up after Libyan authorities couldn’t be reached. Sea-Eye is asking Italy or Malta to open a port to the ship. Italy’s anti-migration interior minister, Matteo Salvini, said the Alan Kurdi, like …

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The election of anti-graft lawyer Zuzana Caputova as Slovakia’s president has boosted her liberal, pro-European Union party’s prospects in EU elections, against the grain of rising populism across the continent, an opinion poll showed on Tuesday. Caputova’s success has given a dose of optimism to Europe’s liberal camp ahead of the May elections, where eurosceptic parties are expected to make gains around the continent. Her Progressive Slovakia (PS) party, which will run in the EU election on a joint slate with Spolu (Together) party, saw their joint support double since February to 14.4 percent, an AKO agency poll of 1,000 …

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Facebook is much better than it was in 2016 at tackling election interference but cannot guarantee the site will not be used to undermine European Parliament elections in May, Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg said on Tuesday. Chastened since suspected Russian operatives used Facebook and other social media to influence an election that surprisingly brought Donald Trump to power in the United States, Facebook has said it has plowed resources and staff into safeguarding the May 26 EU vote. Zuckerberg said there had been a lot of important elections since 2016 that have been relatively clean and demonstrated the defenses …

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Poland will require Uber to use licensed taxi drivers from next year, under a plan approved by the cabinet Tuesday aimed at creating fair competition. Polish taxi drivers have staged protests demanding equal rules for themselves and drivers of app-based car firms such as Uber, mytaxi and itaxi, which have become hugely popular in Polish cities, but licensed taxi drivers complain they are driving down taxi fares. They plan to hold another demonstration in Warsaw next week. The new law to impose stricter rules on such app-based transport companies, if passed by parliament, will come into effect at the start …

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Cindy Saine at the State Department and Valeria Jegisman of VOA’s Russian Service contributed to this report. U.S. President Donald Trump is warming toward the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), praising the alliance and its leader Tuesday during meetings with its secretary-general. “Tremendous progress has been made,” Trump said of improved burden-sharing among the pact’s 29 independent member countries, but stated that “Germany, honestly, is not paying their fair share.” Trump reiterated his concern that while America spends a lot of money to protect Europe, “they’re taking advantage of us on trade.” Trump, alongside Jens Stoltenberg in front of the …

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The leaders of Greece and North Macedonia hugged, took selfies and signed a new agreement for air patrols on Wednesday in a display of newly-friendly relations since a nearly three-decade name dispute was settled earlier this year. North Macedonia’s Prime Minister Zoran Zaev was all smiles as his counterpart Alexis Tsipras became the first Greek prime minister to pay an official visit to the ex-Yugoslav republic since it declared independence in 1991. The pair struck a deal last year for Macedonia to be re-named North Macedonia — satisfying Greece’s longstanding complaint over an implied claim to its province also called …

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Pope Francis said Tuesday women have “legitimate claims” to seek more justice and equality in the Catholic Church, but stopped short of endorsing more sweeping calls from his own bishops to recognize the “urgency of an inevitable change” to give them leadership roles.   Francis issued a document inspired by an October 2018 meeting of the world’s bishops on better ministering to today’s young Catholics. The meeting was marked by demands for greater women’s rights, and the bishops’ final document called the need for women to have positions of responsibility and decision-making in the church “a duty of justice.”   …

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The U.N. chief has expressed solidarity with Muslims world over during a visit to Cairo, denouncing hate speech and racism, as well as anti-Semitism. The remarks by U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Tuesday in the Egyptian capital came less than a month after the terrorist attack on New Zealand mosques killed 50 worshippers. Guterres says “hate speech is entering the mainstream, spreading like wildfire through social media and radio.”   He says that “in this time of difficulties and division, we must stand together and protect each other. Nothing justifies terrorism, and it becomes particularly hideous when religion is invoked. …

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European Union chief negotiator Michel Barnier said Tuesday that Britain is getting closer and closer to having its exit from the EU go forward with no deal in place on the terms of its withdrawal. Speaking in Brussels, Barnier said there is still hope to avoid a so-called no-deal Brexit. But he indicated Britain has limited options, with the only “orderly manner” being a scenario where the British parliament accepts the deal Prime Minister Theresa May’s negotiators agreed to after two years of talks with the EU. To date, British lawmakers have rejected that agreement three times. May is expected …

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On April 4th, 2019, NATO members will mark the 70th anniversary of the signing of the North Atlantic Treaty — part of a successful effort to contain Soviet expansionism and to cajole the war-torn nations of Western Europe to forsake ancient enmities and to forge solidarity.  But for the transatlantic alliance to continue, Europe will have to make a greater contribution and share more of the burden, warn analysts. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, NATO appeared uncertain about what part to play, but the return of Russian assertiveness under President Vladimir Putin has partly changed that — and …

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Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has suffered his worst electoral setback, with his AKP Party losing control of the capital, Ankara, and apparently set to lose Istanbul in Sunday’s local elections. The losses have damaged Erdogan’s reputation of electoral invincibility, Dorian Jones reports from Istanbul. …

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Ukraine is preparing for three weeks of impassioned political campaigning, as a television comedian goes head-to-head with the incumbent for the presidency. As widely predicted, satirist Volodymyr Zelenskiy easily won the first round of voting Sunday with around 30% of the ballots. President Petro Poroshenko came in second with around 16%. As Henry Ridgwell reports, the newcomer’s policy positions are likely to come under greater scrutiny ahead of the April 21 runoff. …

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Discount airline easyJet warned Monday that the U.K.’s pending withdrawal from the European Union is causing travelers to hold back on booking tickets amid doubts over what Britain’s future relations with the bloc will be. EasyJet said that as a result, its earnings would be weaker in the second half of the year. Its first half loss of 275 million pounds ($360 million) was within expectations, but the outlook for the six months through September is “more cautious.” “For the second half we are seeing softness in both the U.K. and Europe, which we believe comes from macroeconomic uncertainty and …

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You could be forgiven for mistaking the first round in Ukraine’s presidential elections as an episode from a TV series — replete with established politicians being vanquished by a refreshing young upstart promising root-and-branch change. On Sunday, one of Ukraine’s most popular actors — best known for his role in a TV series about a schoolteacher who vaults to his country’s presidency on the wave of anti-corruption disgust —appeared on course to win the first round of a presidential race that’s proving anything but ordinary. Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s comfortable win — the count so far has him securing more than 30 …

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With half of the ballots counted Monday, comedian Volodymyr Zelenskiy and incumbent Petro Poroshenko were leading in Ukraine’s presidential election. The Central Election Commission said Zelenskiy, a comedian who plays the role of the president in a television comedy series, was in first place with 30 percent of the vote. Poroshenko, who has been in power since 2014, was in second place with about 17 percent. Former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko was in third place with 13 percent. If the results hold and no candidate earns a majority, a runoff vote will be held on April 21 between the top …

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Turkey’s ruling party faced tough competition in Sunday’s municipal elections. Voters elected mayors, assembly members, administrators and councilors for cities, neighborhoods and districts. The poll is widely seen as a referendum on Turkey’s populist president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan. VOA Kurdish and Turkish language service reporters spoke to voters at the polls Sunday. Zlatica Hoke has this story. …

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