Category: Євросоюз

The U.S. is urging Kosovo leaders to leave unchanged a war crimes court established to hear serious cases arising from the country’s war for independence. “The United States is deeply concerned by recent attempts of Kosovo lawmakers to abrogate the law on the Specialist Chambers,” State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said in a statement Friday. “We call on political leaders in the Republic of Kosovo to maintain their commitment to the work of the Chambers and to leave the authorities and jurisdiction of the court unchanged.” The U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said on December 21 that “the pursuit …

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The Islamic State group has claimed responsibility for a bomb attack earlier this week in a Russian supermarket in St. Petersburg.  The militants said the explosion was carried out by an Islamic State-linked group, according to a statement made Friday by its Amaq news agency.  The group did not provide any evidence for its claim.  At least 13 people were injured when a homemade bomb detonated in a branch of the Perekrestok supermarket chain on Wednesday.  Health officials said none of the victims suffered life-threatening injuries. Russian investigators initially said they were treating the case as an act of attempted …

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Russia has reported an outbreak of highly pathogenic H5N2 bird flu on a farm in the central region of Kostromskaya Oblast that led to the deaths of more than 660,000 birds, the Paris-based World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) said Friday. The virus killed more than 44,000 birds in an outbreak first detected on December 17, the OIE said, citing a report from the Russian Ministry of Agriculture. The rest of the 663,500 birds on the farm were slaughtered, it said in the report. It did not specify the type of birds that were infected. It is the first outbreak …

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Kidnappers in Ukraine have released an employee at a United Kingdom-registered cryptocurrency exchange after getting more than $1 million in bitcoins as ransom, an adviser to the Ukrainian interior minister told Reuters on Friday. Pavel Lerner, a leading analyst and expert in blockchains, or decentralized public ledgers, was abducted by unknown masked people on December 26, according to a statement by his company, EXMO Finance, on its website. “This is the first such case in Ukraine linked to bitcoins,” Anton Gerashchenko, an adviser to Interior Minister Arsen Avakov, said in a phone text message. It was unclear who paid the …

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Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed a law ratifying an agreement enabling Russia to expand operations at its naval facility in the Syrian port of Tartus. The document was posted on the official website for Russian legislation after Putin signed it Friday.  It could help cement what Putin has said would be a “permanent” Russian presence at the Tartus facility and the Hmeimim air base, key platforms for Russia’s campaign backing Syria’s government in the nearly seven-year war in the Middle Eastern country. The agreement, signed in Damascus in January 2017, allows for the Russian navy to expand the technical …

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Members of a Russian environmental group say masked men attacked their leader in the southern Russian city of Krasnodar late Thursday. Andrei Rudomakha, head of Environmental Watch of the North Caucasus, was hospitalized with multiple injuries including a fractured skull and broken nose. Rudomakha and several other activists were returning from a trip to Russia’s Black Sea region, where they had documented the illegal construction of a luxury mansion. Local authorities said they are investigating the incident. For more than 20 years, Environmental Watch has exposed illegal landfills, the destruction of landscapes and the contamination of waterways in Russia’s south …

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Facebook says it blocked the social-media accounts of Ramzan Kadyrov because the Kremlin-backed Chechen leader had become subject to financial and travel sanctions imposed by the U.S. government. The company said in a statement Thursday it had the “legal obligation” to disable Kadyrov’s accounts on Facebook and Instagram, which it also owns, after the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) on December 20 hit the Chechen leader with sanctions. “We became aware and have now confirmed that the accounts appear to be maintained by or on behalf of parties who appear on the U.S. Specially Designated Nationals List …

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The Justice Department on Thursday unsealed details of its case against two Romanians who allegedly hacked computers tied to Washington, D.C., police surveillance cameras. Police in Bucharest arrested Mihai Alexandru Isvanca and Eveline Cismaru on December 15. U.S. attorneys have charged them with conspiracy to commit computer and wire fraud. They allegedly hacked into more than 120 computers tied to Washington police surveillance cameras last January. It was part of an alleged scheme to infect personal computers with ransomware. Ransomware restricts users from accessing their own computers and demands a payment to the ramsomware operator to unlock it. The Justice …

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Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has signaled he wants to mend fences with the governments of several European nations he’s quarreled with this year, saying Turkey must “decrease the number of enemies and increase friends.” In comments published Thursday in Turkey’s Hurriyet newspaper, Erdogan described the leaders of Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium as “old friends,” called recent contacts with them “quite good” and noted that they, like Turkey, oppose a controversial U.S. decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.  “We have no problems with Germany, or with the Netherlands or Belgium,” Erdogan told journalists on his return from a …

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Italy aims to deploy up to 470 troops to Niger to help tackle people-smuggling, the military General Staff said Thursday. Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni said on Sunday some of the 1,400 Italian troops now stationed in Iraq could be transferred to the Sahel region in West Africa — which includes Niger — after victories against Islamist militants in Iraq. Gentiloni said the redeployed troops could also help to combat terrorism in the Sahel. The General Staff said in a statement that a reconnaissance mission was under way in Niger to help decide the scale of the assistance, which the African …

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Egypt’s pro-government media on Thursday vilified neighboring Sudan over its expanding ties with Turkey and Qatar, saying the three are conspiring against Egypt. While the government has publicly remained silent, Egyptian media seized on a visit to Sudan earlier this week by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a meeting in Khartoum between the chiefs of staff of Sudan, Turkey and Qatar, and renewed efforts by Khartoum to revive a longtime border dispute with Egypt. Most views expressed in Egypt’s media reflect the thinking of the government or at least one of its key institutions. The criticism of Sudan and its …

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The United States announced Thursday that full visa services for Turkish citizens wishing to travel to the U.S. will resume and said it received assurances Ankara would inform Washington before moving to detain or arrest any embassy employees.   Turkey welcomed the decision on visas, but said that it had not provided the U.S. any such assurances. The U.S. suspended all non-immigrant visa services in Turkey earlier this year, in response to the arrest of Metin Topuz, a consulate employee in Istanbul, on terrorism charges. Turkey shut down visa services in the U.S. in retaliation. In a statement released Thursday, …

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Moscow is having a “Journey to Christmas” festival from December 22 to January 14 with decorations, including over 1,000 New Year’s trees, and holiday festivities throughout the Russian capital.  VOA Moscow attended the opening of the festival in central Moscow and spoke to locals about their holiday hopes and wishes for 2018. …

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Russia’s latest space launch failures have prompted authorities to take a closer look into the nation’s struggling space industry, the Kremlin said Thursday. A Russian weather satellite and nearly 20 micro-satellites from other nations were lost following a failed launch from Russia’s new cosmodrome in the Far East on November 28. And in another blow to the Russian space industry, communications with a Russian-built communications satellite for Angola, the African nation’s first space vehicle, were lost following its launch on Tuesday. Asked about the failures, President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, said Thursday that authorities warrant a thorough analysis of …

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China’s foreign ministry accused the American and German embassies on Thursday of interfering in its affairs after they objected to the prosecutions of an activist and a lawyer who handled sensitive cases. Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying told reporters a joint statement by the embassies calling for Wu Gan’s release and for lawyer Xie Yang to be allowed to return to work was irresponsible. Wu, who criticized Chinese officials online, was sentenced Tuesday to eight years in prison on subversion charges. Xie was convicted of inciting subversion but spared a prison term after he admitted committing the offense. “The embassies of …

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Russia is planning to begin shipments of S-400 surface-to-air missile systems to Turkey in March 2020, a senior official says of a deal that has raised eyebrows because Turkey is a NATO member. Sergei Chemezov, head of the Russian state conglomerate Rostec, told the newspaper Kommersant in an interview published on Wednesday that the $2.5 billion deal will consist of four batteries of S-400 missiles. “They are paying 45 percent of the total contract amount as an advance. Fifty-five percent is Russian credit,” Chemezov told Kommersant. Turkey’s move to acquire the S-400s has been regarded in some Western capitals as …

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A bus carrying Chinese tourists has skidded off the road in Iceland, killing one and injuring 12 others. Iceland police said the crash occurred after the bus rear-ended a car near the Eldhraun lava field, about 250 kilometers east of Reykjavik, Iceland’s capital. The driver and a passenger in the car were not hurt. Many of the injured were transported to a Reykjavik hospital by helicopters and a relief station was set up for the other passengers in nearby Kirkjubaejarklaustur village. The owner of the tour company, Fjalar Ulfarsson, said the group was on the fourth day of a weeklong …

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Airbus is drawing up contingency plans to phase out production of the world’s largest jetliner, the A380 superjumbo, if it fails to win a key order from Dubai’s Emirates, three people familiar with the matter said. The moment of truth for the slow-selling airliner looms after just 10 years in service and leaves one of Europe’s most visible international symbols hanging by a thread, despite a major airline investment in new cabins unveiled this month. “If there is no Emirates deal, Airbus will start the process of ending A380 production,” a person briefed on the plans said. A supplier added …

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Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin said Wednesday that the failed launch of a 2.6 billion-ruble ($44.95 million) satellite last month was due to an embarrassing programming error. Russian space agency Roscosmos said last month that it had lost contact with the newly launched weather satellite — the Meteor-M — after it blasted off from Russia’s new Vostochny cosmodrome in the Far East. Eighteen smaller satellites belonging to scientific, research and commercial companies from Russia, Norway, Sweden, the United States, Japan, Canada and Germany were on board the same rocket. Speaking to Rossiya 24 state TV channel, Rogozin said the failure had been caused by human error.  The rocket carrying the …

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Ten people were injured and sent to hospitals when a homemade bomb detonated in a supermarket in St. Petersburg, Russia, officials said Wednesday. “According to preliminary information, an explosion of an unidentified object occurred in a store,” Investigative Committee spokeswoman Svetlana Petrenko said in a statement. The blast was caused by a “homemade explosive device with the power equivalent to 200 grams of TNT filled with lethal fragments,” she said. Investigators said they have opened a criminal case on the grounds of attempted murder. Health officials said none of the 10 victims suffered life-threatening injuries. The motive for the attack …

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