Category: Євросоюз

Syria’s dominant Kurdish party on Wednesday called on the U.N. Security Council to act quickly to ensure the safety of Kurdish-controlled territories in the country’s north, including an enclave that Turkey has threatened to attack. Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said he will launch a military offensive in the coming days against territories controlled by the dominant Syrian Kurdish militia in northwestern and eastern Syria, and in particular the enclave of Afrin, where an estimated 1 million people live.  Turkey views the U.S.-backed Syrian Kurdish forces as terrorists, and an extension of the Kurdish insurgency raging in its southeast. …

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Polish abortion rights proponents, most of them women, marched Wednesday in Warsaw and elsewhere in Poland to express their opposition to a proposal in parliament to further tighten the country’s already restrictive abortion law. Hundreds took part in a march in Warsaw. The turnout appeared far smaller than similar marches that mobilized huge crowds in 2016. The march, organized by a group known as the Women’s Strike, came after lawmakers voted recently to refuse to consider a proposal to liberalize the abortion law and moved forward with a separate proposal to tighten the law. Abortion is illegal in most cases …

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Turkey is set to extend a state of emergency for the sixth time since the failed 2016 coup attempt, worrying both government opponents and allies who fear the special powers are driving Turkey in an increasingly authoritarian direction. The state of emergency, declared five days after the July 15, 2016 coup attempt, has allowed a massive government crackdown aimed at suspected supporters of U.S.-based Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen, whom Turkey says was behind the coup attempt. Gulen denies any involvement. Under the state of emergency, Turkey has arrested around 50,000 people and purged 110,000 civil servants to allegedly oust Gulen’s …

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British lawmakers voted in favor of the government’s legislative blueprint for Brexit on Wednesday, marking a victory for Prime Minister Theresa May over political opponents who want a softer approach to leaving the European Union. But the legislation will now face scrutiny from parliament’s largely pro-EU upper house, where May’s party does not have a majority, which will intensify efforts to force a re-run of a 2016 referendum, and water down or even stop the divorce. The European Union (Withdrawal) Bill was approved by a 324 to 295 vote in the lower house – a milestone on the long road …

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France is set to demand that Britain pay more to deal with the ongoing migrant crisis around the port of Calais, the main gateway from the European mainland to the UK.  French President Emmanuel Macron visited the northern town Tuesday, where he met migrants at a local shelter, and praised the commitment of the police in a speech to local officers. “Under no circumstances will we allow illegal networks to emerge or develop here. Under no circumstances will we let another jungle camp appear here, or any other illegal occupation of land,” he said, criticizing those who accuse the police …

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Next month’s Winter Olympics is the immediate focus for Sweden but the country is already training its next generation of winter sports athletes in special high school programs that combine sports and education for ambitious teenagers. At the Jamtlands Gymnaisum high school in Ostersund, some 550 kilometers (340 miles )north of Stockholm, promising young skiers and biathletes are put through their paces four mornings a week by highly-qualified coaches at a local ski stadium. They return to school at lunchtime, piling their plates high with pasta and salad in the cafeteria before heading to the classroom to catch up on …

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Bosnia’s security agencies are investigating a Serbian right-wing group that the national government said Tuesday was a paramilitary unit formed to create “a problem” for those opposed to Bosnian Serb President Milorad Dodik. Members of Serbian Honor caused an uproar when they marched in full combat gear in the Bosnian Serb capital, Banja Luka, during a January 9 military parade to mark a national holiday in one the country’s two autonomous regions. The parade was staged as a challenge to a ruling by Bosnia’s Constitutional Court to ban the holiday because it discriminated against the country’s other ethnic groups. Bosnia …

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The World Bank has joined the International Monetary Fund in criticizing a Ukrainian draft law to create an anti-corruption court, the newspaper Ukrainska Pravda reported on Monday, citing a letter from the lender to the presidential administration. In response to international pressure to speed up the process, President Petro Poroshenko submitted a new draft law to parliament in December, but the IMF and now the World Bank say the legislation is not in line with recommendations from the Venice Commission, a European rights and legal watchdog. Ukraine’s Western backers have long called for the authorities to establish an independent court …

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Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis’ minority government lost a confidence vote Tuesday, forcing him to try to build a coalition with opposition parties as he battles allegations of subsidy fraud. Promises to spearhead a cleanup of Czech politics helped Babis’ ANO party win nearly 30 percent of the vote in a national election in October. But he has become caught up in allegations he manipulated ownership of one of his companies a decade ago to win a 2-million-euro subsidy, mostly from European Union funds, meant for small businesses. He denies wrongdoing. Babis was investigated and charged with fraud before the …

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Pope Francis begged for forgiveness Tuesday for the “irreparable damage” done to children who were raped and molested by priests, opening his visit to Chile by diving head-first into a scandal that has greatly hurt the Catholic Church’s credibility here and cast a cloud over his visit.   Speaking to Chile’s president, lawmakers, judges and other authorities, Francis said he felt “bound to express my pain and shame” that some of Chile’s pastors had sexually abused children in their care. He was interrupted by applause from the dignitaries at La Moneda palace when he pronounced the words.   “I am …

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Russia’s main independent polling agency has stopped publishing results of opinion polls on the upcoming presidential election, fearing legal repercussions.   Levada Center was listed as a foreign agent in 2016 under a new law aimed at curbing alleged foreign influence on public life in Russia. Authorities insist that the law does not aim to target critics of the Kremlin.   Levada is not a foreign company, but Russian authorities are able to list it as a foreign agent because it has received foreign funding.   Levada’s director, Lev Gudkov, told the Russian daily Vedomosti on Tuesday that the agency …

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The head of Germany’s center-left Social Democrats lobbied party members Tuesday to vote in favor of opening coalition talks with Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservatives, amid strong opposition from grassroots members. Martin Schulz made the rounds in the populous state of North-Rhine Westphalia, talking with party members to push for their approval at a party convention Sunday to open formal negotiations with Merkel’s Union bloc. A rejection of talks would be a setback for both Schulz and Merkel, who has already failed to forge a coalition with two smaller parties. The Social Democrats and the Union bloc, who have governed Germany …

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The new U.S. Embassy in London, denigrated last week by President Donald Trump as too expensive and poorly located, opened its doors to the public Tuesday for the first time.   The gleaming embassy, in the formerly industrial Nine Elms neighborhood in south London, replaces the embassy in Grosvenor Square that had for decades been associated with the U.S. presence in the United Kingdom. That building has been sold to a Qatari government investment fund planning to turn it into a luxury hotel.   U.S. officials say it would have cost hundreds of millions of dollars to upgrade security at …

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European Union chief Donald Tusk is urging Britain to change its mind about leaving the bloc next year and says the EU would welcome the country back. Tusk said Tuesday that “if the U.K. government sticks to its decision to leave, Brexit will become a reality, with all its negative consequences, in March next year unless there is a change of heart among our British friends.” Addressing EU lawmakers, Tusk quoted U.K. Brexit envoy David Davis as saying that “if a democracy cannot change its mind, it ceases to be a democracy.” Tusk said that “we here on the continent …

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Resistance is growing in the ranks of Germany’s Social Democrats against forming another “grand coalition” with Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Christian Democrats, and migration policy is a major sticking point. Migration remains the most divisive issue in the country following the slaying late last month of a teenage German girl by her former boyfriend, an Afghan migrant. The killing has refocused public anxiety about a rising level of violent crime associated with migrants, as well as the government’s handling of thousands of unaccompanied male asylum-seekers who claim to be under 18 years of age, but who may be adults. The December …

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The International Monetary Fund has told the Ukrainian authorities that it does not support a draft law to create an anti-corruption court because the bill does not guarantee its independence, the newspaper Ukrainska Pravda reported on Monday. Slow progress in establishing a court to handle corruption cases while demonstrating independence and transparency has been one of the main obstacles to the disbursement of a long-delayed loan tranche under the aid-for-reforms program. In response to international pressure to speed up the process, President Petro Poroshenko submitted a new draft law to parliament in December. But the IMF mission chief for Ukraine, …

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Turkey’s president on Monday denounced U.S. plans to form a 30,000-strong Kurdish-led border security force in Syria, vowing to “drown this terror force before it is born,” as Russia and Syria also rejected the idea. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan also warned U.S. troops against coming between Turkish troops and Kurdish forces, which Ankara views as an extension of Turkey’s own Kurdish insurgency. Turkey has been threatening to launch a new military operation against the main Syrian Kurdish militia, known as the People’s Defense Units, or YPG, in the Kurdish-held Afrin enclave in northern Syria. The YPG is the backbone of …

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Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Monday that Russia does not support U.S. President Donald Trump’s calls to renegotiate the international agreement limiting Iran’s nuclear program. Trump said Friday he was waiving for the last time sanctions the U.S. agreed to lift under the 2015 deal, and that Congress and European partners had 120 days to come up with ways to fix what he called “disastrous flaws” in the agreement. Lavrov said Monday if Trump does go through with his threat to withdraw from the deal if no changes are made there would be unthinkable consequences with Iran sure to …

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More than 12 million boxes of French baby milk products are being recalled from 83 countries for suspected salmonella contamination. The recall includes Lactalis’ Picot, Milumel and Taranis brands. The head of the French dairy Lactalis on Sunday confirmed that its products are being recalled from countries across Europe, Africa, Latin America and Asia after salmonella was discovered at one of its plants last month. The United States, Britain and Australia were not affected. Emmanuel Besnier told weekly newspaper Le Journal du Dimanche that his family company, one of the world’s biggest dairies, would pay damages to “every family which …

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The U.S.-led coalition is working with its Syrian militia allies to set up a new border force of 30,000 personnel, the coalition said on Sunday, a move that has added to Turkish anger over U.S. support for Kurdish-dominated forces in Syria. A senior Turkish official told Reuters the U.S. training of the new “Border Security Force” is the reason that the U.S. charge d’affaires was summoned in Ankara on Wednesday. The official did not elaborate. The force, whose inaugural class is currently being trained, will be deployed at the borders of the area controlled by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) — …

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