Category: Євросоюз

Clashes broke out throughout France on Saturday, as an estimated 84,000 “yellow vest” demonstrators took to the streets in a 10th consecutive weekend of protests against President Emmanuel Macron’s government.  The demonstrations passed off relatively peacefully in Paris where 7,000 turned up, although Reuters Television reporters saw scuffles briefly break out between police and demonstrators, some wearing masks, in the capital’s Invalides district.  Protesters threw firecrackers, bottles and stones at police, who responded with water canon and tear gas to push them back.  “Macron, resign!” some protesters shouted.  The protests, named after the fluorescent jackets French motorists are required to carry in their cars, began in November over plans to raise fuel taxes. The number …

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Demonstrators in Greece are planning a massive rally Sunday to protest a deal that would normalize Greek relations with Macedonia. Greeks have been divided over the deal, in which Macedonia will change its name to the Republic of North Macedonia and Greece will drop its objections to the Balkan country’s joining NATO and the European Union. The U.S. State Department said in a tweet Friday that Sunday’s demonstration in Athens is expected to draw 150,000 or more participants. Greek identity Greek protesters say Macedonia’s new name represents an attempt to appropriate Greek identity and cultural heritage. Macedonia is the name …

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Across Russia, the devout and the daring are observing the Orthodox Christian feast day of Epiphany by immersing themselves in frigid water through holes cut through the ice of lakes and rivers. Epiphany celebrates the revelation of Jesus Christ as the incarnation of God through his baptism in the River Jordan. Russian believers imitate the baptism by entering the water and ducking themselves three times either on the evening before Epiphany or on that Jan. 19 feast day. Many make the sign of the cross, some others hold their noses. Some of the people who do it scurry out quickly …

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Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan met with visiting U.S Senator Lindsey Graham in Ankara Friday, in the latest effort to defuse bilateral tensions over Syria. Turkish forces remain massed on the northeast Syrian border, poised to launch an offensive against the YPG Kurdish militia, a critical American ally in the war against Islamic State. Ankara deems the YPG terrorists linked to an insurgency inside Turkey. Differences over Syria saw Erdogan shun U.S. National Security Advisor John Bolton earlier this month when he visited Ankara. Graham met not only with Erdogan but withTurkey’s defense and foreign ministers and intelligence chief. “At …

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Queen Elizabeth II’s 97-year-old husband was recovering Friday at the royal Sandringham estate after the Land Rover he was driving rolled on a nearby highway in a collision with another vehicle. Witness Roy Warne told the BBC he was driving home from work when the accident involving Prince Philip’s black Land Rover and a compact car unfolded in front of him. Warne said he helped free a baby from the second car, a Kia, before helping the prince out of his vehicle, which was lying on its side. “I saw a car, a black [Land] Rover, come out from a …

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Prime Minister Theresa May held talks Friday with European leaders and British Cabinet colleagues, but efforts to end Britain’s Brexit stalemate appeared deadlocked, with neither May nor Britain’s opposition leader shifting from their entrenched positions. May has been meeting with politicians from several U.K. parties this week to try to find a way forward after her European Union divorce deal was overwhelmingly rejected by Parliament. Despite that, May has been unwilling to move her “red lines” in the Brexit negotiations, which include taking Britain out of the bloc’s customs union. And opposition Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn has refused to …

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The European Union insisted Friday that agriculture be kept out of the EU-U.S. trade negotiations, despite Washington’s wishes to include the vast sector, and said any overall deal will be limited in scope. The EU Commission announced its pro posals for a negotiating mandate from the 28 member states and said that the EU negotiations will be “strictly focused on the removal of tariffs on industrial goods, excluding agricultural products.” EU Trade Chief Cecilia Malmstrom also said that she is preparing a target list of American products it will hit with punitive tariffs if the Trump administration goes through with …

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An array of crises will keep several world leaders away from the annual World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos next week, which takes place against a backdrop of deepening gloom over the global economic and political outlook. Anxieties over trade disputes, fractious international relations, Brexit and a growth slowdown that some fear could tip the world economy into recession are set to dominate the Jan. 22-25 Alpine meeting. The WEF’s own Global Risks Report set the tone this week with a stark warning of looming economic headwinds, in part because of geopolitical tensions among major powers. ​No Trump, Macron or …

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Norway’s minority centre-right government has struck a deal with the small Christian Democratic Party to form a four-party majority coalition, it said on Thursday, confirming earlier  reports. The agreement fulfils a long-standing goal of Conservative Prime Minister Erna Solberg, in power since 2013, who hopes ruling in a majority will provide stability and help ease her path to re-election in 2021. “We had tough negotiations,” Solberg said, celebrating the pact alongside leaders of her existing partners the Progress Party and the Liberal Party as well as the Christian Democrats. She said the government would focus on a “sustainable welfare society”, …

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Morocco stopped 89,000 people from illegally migrating in 2018, up 37 percent compared to a year earlier, the interior ministry said Thursday, as the country became the main launchpad in the Mediterranean for Europe-bound migrants. Morocco, which other Africans can visit without visas, has become a major gateway for migrants into Europe since Italy’s tougher line and EU aid to the Libyan coast guard curbed the number of people coming from Libya. In 2018, Moroccan authorities dismantled 229 migrant trafficking networks, the interior ministry’s figure showed. Some 80 percent of illegal migrants intercepted in 2018 were foreigners, 29,715 migrants were …

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Russia on Thursday detained a Belarusian model who once claimed she had evidence of Russian efforts to help Donald Trump win office, witnesses told AFP.    Anastasia Vashukevich, known by her pen name, Nastya Rybka, was held for questioning at a Moscow airport after she was deported from Thailand as part of a group convicted of participating in a “sex training course,” other passengers on the flight told AFP.      Russian authorities detained her and several others, including Alex Kirillov, a self-styled Russian seduction guru, witnesses said.    Plainclothes officials led away four members of the group, including Vashukevich and Kirillov, a woman who …

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The brother of an American being held in Moscow for alleged spying says a prison visit by U.S. Embassy staff has been postponed. David Whelan expressed disappointment that Russian authorities didn’t allow the visit scheduled for Thursday, but said he hoped it could be rescheduled soon and British diplomats also would be given access to his twin brother, Paul. Paul Whelan lives in Michigan and holds citizenships from the U.S., Britain, Ireland and Canada. Russia promised to permit consular visits while he is imprisoned. David Whelan says a Wednesday visit by Irish officials “was very helpful and gave us an …

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Britain’s Prime Minister Theresa May scraped through a vote of no confidence Wednesday that would have brought down her government. But she is faced with an immediate crisis over her country’s exit from the European Union. The deal she struck with Brussels was defeated by a record margin this week, and it’s far from clear how Britain will avoid leaving the EU with no deal in just over 70 days with potentially catastrophic consequences for the economy. Henry Ridgwell reports from London. …

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The United States and Britain are mired in political crises with no end in sight. U.S. freshmen representatives urged the Senate on Wednesday to schedule a vote on the longest ever U.S. government shutdown and British Prime Minister Theresa May barely survived a second no-confidence vote in just over a month, after her Brexit deal suffered a crushing defeat in Parliament. VOA’s Zlatica Hoke looks into the government gridlocks plaguing two allied nations across the Atlantic. …

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The International Criminal Court has ordered former Ivory Coast President Laurent Gbagbo and his top aide to remain in custody, even after judges acquitted them of crimes against humanity. Prosecutors immediately appealed Tuesday’s verdict and argued the pair may refuse to return to The Hague for trial if the not-guilty verdict is overturned. The three-judge panel called the prosecution’s case “exceptionally weak.” Gbagbo and Charles Ble Goude had been on trial for alleged crimes against humanity stemming from the violence in Ivory Coast after the 2010 election. Gbagbo lost to his bitter rival, current President Alassane Outtara, but refused to …

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Poles on Wednesday heatedly condemned the power of hate speech to trigger real-life violence after the slaying of a popular liberal mayor, with many calling for stronger actions against those who threaten others. Not only did the killer, an ex-convict, take the life of the 53-year-old Gdansk mayor, Pawel Adamowicz, but he stabbed him during a popular fundraising concert by the Great Orchestra of Christmas Charity, which raises money for life-saving medical equipment.  Both the mayor and the organization are prominent symbols of openness and tolerance, leaving many Poles to interpret the attack as a double blow to those values. …

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The brother of a former U.S. Marine with multiple citizenships says Irish government representatives have visited Paul Whelan at the Russian prison where he is being held on an espionage charge. David Whelan said in a Wednesday statement that according to diplomatic staff members from Ireland, conditions were good in the Moscow prison where his brother was detained. The statement said U.S. officials were expected to visit Thursday; the U.S. ambassador saw him on Jan. 2.   Whelan was detained Dec. 28 and charged with spying, which carries a potential sentence of 20 years upon conviction. Russian officials have not released details of …

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 A stranger’s comment on one’s growing stomach may not always be welcome but a pregnant Meghan, Britain’s Duchess of Sussex, took it all in her stride on Wednesday when a pensioner called her “a fat lady.” Prince Harry’s wife, who told well-wishers this week she is six months pregnant, laughed off the remark, meant as a compliment about her growing baby bump. On a visit to animal welfare charity Mayhew, of which she is patron, Meghan was being introduced to pensioners who have benefited from the organization’s animal therapy program when an elderly woman named Peggy took a more casual …

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European Union leaders are greeting the British parliament’s defeat of a hard-reached Brexit plan with a mix of frustration and alarm, even as Europe begins preparing for chances Britain will leave the bloc in just over two months without a withdrawal agreement. If British lawmakers’ resounding “no” to the Brexit deal negotiated between Brussels and the British government comes as no surprise, European politicians — like their British counterparts — are now faced with a major question: what’s next? “We know what the UK parliament doesn’t want,” the European Parliament’s chief Brexit representative, Guy Verhofstadt, told reporters. “Now it’s time …

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Pope Francis has confirmed he will attend all sessions of his high-stakes sex abuse prevention summit next month that will include plenary meetings, witness testimony and a penitential Mass. The Vatican said Wednesday that the organizers of the Feb. 21-24 meeting met last week in Rome and briefed the pope on their preparations.   Francis tasked the former Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, to moderate the plenary sessions of the meeting.   Francis announced in September that he was inviting presidents of bishops’ conferences around the world to attend the summit amid a crisis in his papacy over his …

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