Category: Євросоюз

World leaders meeting at the United Nations on Wednesday launched a half-billion-dollar effort to end violence against women and girls, a crime suffered by 1 in 3 in their lifetimes. The effort will fund anti-violence programs that promote prevention, bolster government policies and provide women and girls with improved access to services, organizers said. It will take particular aim at human trafficking, femicide and family violence, they said. A third of all women experience violence at some point in their lives, and that figure is twice as high in some countries, according to the United Nations. “Gender-based violence is the …

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Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told The Associated Press in an interview that he heard positive news in President Donald Trump’s United Nations address: “that the U.S. would not impose its way of life on others.” “I think it’s a very welcome statement, which we haven’t heard from an American leader for a very long time,” said Lavrov, who sat down with the AP and Russia’s Tass news agency Tuesday, directly after meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson. Lavrov blamed the Obama administration for the collapse in relations between Moscow and Washington. The U.S. enacted a series of …

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For months after the Brussels extremist attacks of 2016, it seemed an exhibition on Islam’s legacy in Europe might never open in the city. At first, the creators and city officials felt the time wasn’t right, and then they struggled to find a location willing to host a show certain to be seen as controversial by some. But the “Islam, It’s Also Our History” exhibition at the city-owned Vanderborght Building finally managed to open last week and is telling its story of a long Islamic presence on European soil that has shaped Western culture in areas ranging from medicine, philosophy …

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Russia has regained its place on the FIFA Council, six months after Deputy Prime Minister Vitaly Mutko was blocked from re-election. UEFA member federations on Wednesday elected Alexei Sorokin, CEO of the 2018 World Cup organizing committee, by acclamation as one of their delegates to FIFA’s strategy-setting committee. The seat, which runs through 2021, was vacant since May when Mutko was formally forced to step down. Mutko’s candidacy was blocked by FIFA’s then governance committee chairman, Miguel Maduro, because of a conflict of interest with his government work. Maduro, who was ousted by FIFA weeks later, said last week that …

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Spanish police arrested at least 12 people Wednesday in raids on Catalan government offices, news reports said, as national authorities intensified a crackdown on the region’s preparations for a secession vote that Spain says is illegal. It was the first time Spanish authorities have detained Catalan officials since the campaign for a secession vote in Catalonia began to gather momentum in 2011. The move was the latest spike in tension in the standoff between authorities based in Madrid and pro-independence Catalans. Almost immediately after the news, hundreds of Catalans gathered to angrily protest the raids outside government offices in the …

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British police arrested two more suspects Wednesday in connection with last week’s bombing on a London train that injured more than 30 people. Authorities said officers arrested a 48-year-old man and a 30-year-old man in Newport, Wales. Police had arrested another man there Tuesday night, and searches at the addresses of both arrest sites were ongoing Wednesday. A Metropolitan Police statement did not say how the men might be linked to the bombing. “This continues to be a fast-moving investigation,” said Commander Dean Haydon, head of the Met Counter Terrorism Command. “Detectives are carrying out extensive inquiries to determine the …

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Ukraine could have a new Supreme Court installed by next month as part of judicial reforms aimed at rooting out corruption, Ukraine’s Justice Minister Pavlo Petrenko said Tuesday. “I think from October the new Supreme Court will start working,” Petrenko told Reuters in an interview at the Concordia Annual Summit in New York. “The next challenge for us is to establish new appeal courts throughout the country, and to take in new judges in the regional courts.” Petrenko added that reforms within appeal and regional courts could be in place within the next four years. Other government reforms began in …

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Russia will abide by a European Court of Human Rights ruling requiring it to pay nearly 3 million euros ($3.6 million) in damages for the 2004 Beslan school siege, the Interfax news agency reported Tuesday, citing the Russian justice ministry. Russia used excessive force to storm a school in the small southern Russian town seized by Islamist militants in 2004, causing a high number of hostages to be killed, the court ruled in April. The three-day drama began when Islamist militants took more than 1,000 people hostages on the first day of the school year and called for independence for …

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The first of hundreds of Catalan mayors summoned to answer questions on why they have backed a banned Oct. 1 referendum on independence from Spain appeared before the state prosecutor on Tuesday amid cheers and chants from supporters. The first three mayors to declare exercised their right to remain silent, the Association of Municipalities for Independence (AMI) said. Years of separatist feeling in the industrial northeastern region will come to a head in less than two weeks as the fiercely pro-independence regional government calls a referendum on splitting from Spain. Madrid has declared the referendum illegal and the Constitutional Court …

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British police have arrested a third suspect in last week’s bombing on a London Underground train that injured more than 30 people. The Scotland Yard said Tuesday that the 25-year-old suspect was arrested in Newport, Wales. Police were searching a property in Newport, but they would not release any more details. Two other men were arrested over the weekend. An 18-year-old refugee from Iraq was nabbed in the port area of Dover, a major ferry terminal for travel between Britain and France, and a 21-year-old from Syria was arrested in the west London suburb of Hounslow, which is home to …

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A Russian attack helicopter mistakenly fired at least one rocket into a crowd of spectators during a large-scale military exercise in western Belarus simulating a counterattack against NATO forces. The Russian military acknowledged that a rocket was fired by accident by a helicopter, but insisted that no one was hurt in the incident. It also would not say when or where the incident took place. However, several Russian online media portals have reported that as many as three people were injured and two vehicles were destroyed. A video posted on the British news site theguardian.com showed two helicopters flying low …

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The White House Monday reaffirmed its commitment to withdrawing from the Paris Climate agreement, saying it poses serious obstacles for the United States. But at the state and city level, U.S. officials say they’re pressing ahead to curb emissions and promote clean energy sources even without Washington’s participation. VOA’s Daniel Schearf reports from New York. …

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Two of Italy’s biggest coffee houses are reinforcing their brands with flagship cafes in Milan near the spot where U.S. rival Starbucks is set to begin operations next year. Lavazza opens its first flagship cafe in the coffee-obsessed city on Tuesday, not far from the renovated 19th century palazzo where Starbucks will open its first Italian store, a ‘Reserve Roasteries’ outlet offering specialty blends and fine food. Another top Italian brand, illycaffe, opened its own luxury cafe close to the Starbucks site in May, in a cozy courtyard in Milan’s most fashionable street. Lavazza, which is opening near the city’s …

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Dirty money? Swiss investigators are perplexed about who flushed tens of thousands of euros down toilets in Geneva. And why? Bundles of shredded 500-euro notes, worth about $120,000 or 100,000 euros, were found clogging toilets at a bank and three nearby restaurants.  The high-value euro notes are due to be discontinued in 2018 over fears they are being used in illegal activities, including money laundering and sponsoring terrorism. The notes will remain legal tender, but the European Central Bank will stop producing them following a European Commission inquiry into their use. Destroying legal tender is not an offense in Switzerland, …

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Thirty journalists and newspaper executives from a Turkish newspaper which was shut down last year went on trial Monday, facing life sentences over charges that they had links to a failed coup attempt. The former employees of the Zaman newspaper are charged with “membership of an armed terror organization” and “attempting to overthrow” the government, parliament and the constitutional order through their links to cleric Fethullah Gulen. Zaman was affiliated with Gulen, the U.S.-based cleric and former ally of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Gulen is blamed by Ankara for instigating the failed July 2016 coup, but denies any involvement. Zaman …

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The British government’s attempt to appear strong and united over Brexit wobbled Monday as a top official was shifted from his post days before a new round of divorce negotiations with the European Union. Opposition lawmakers said the move reflected the Conservatives’ “chaotic” approach to handling the biggest challenge facing the country. Prime Minister Theresa May, meanwhile, faced calls to discipline fellow Conservative Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson for undermining her leadership by publishing his own manifesto for Brexit. A week before negotiations between Britain and the bloc are due to resume in Brussels, the U.K. government announced Monday that the …

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“One clear lesson is that you can’t fight propaganda with propaganda,” says Tetiana Popova. “If you do that you lose credibility yourself and bring all facts into doubt,” adds the former Ukrainian deputy minister for information policy. “And that is what the Russians want,” she said firmly. Now working with the Ukrainian media NGO Information Security, Popova recalled for VOA her part in Ukrainian campaigns to counter Russia propaganda in the 18 months she was a minister. It was partly thanks to her that the Ukrainian military set up an embed program for reporters to cover the conflict in east …

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A four-ship fleet from China has performed formation drills in the Sea of Japan, near North Korea, before heading to the Russian port of Vladivostok for joint land and sea military exercises with Russia. Moscow is already conducting the largest military exercise since the Cold War in areas close to its northwestern borders. That operation, code-named Zapad 2017, includes joint drills with Belarus. NATO is closely watching the exercises and says they include as many as 100,000 servicemen, not 12,700 as Moscow claims, and involve firing nuclear-capable ballistic missiles. VOA’s Zlatica Hoke reports. …

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A violent storm that hit western Romania on Sunday killed at least eight people and injured 67 others. Among the reported deaths were people strolling outside or coming out of supermarkets, emergency situation authorities said. A man in the city of Timisoara died as he was hit by a billboard, while a woman was killed by a falling tree. Two more people died in the western town of Buzias, one of them hit by a falling tree. Another man died in the northwest city of Bistrita after he was hit by a branch during a walk in the park.  The …

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Ana Brnabic, Serbia’s first openly gay prime minister, joined several hundred activists at a gay-pride march in Belgrade on Sunday. Brnabic, who is also the first woman in top-level job, said she is working “one step at a time” toward building a more tolerant society. Serbian riot police cordoned off the city center with metal fences early Sunday to prevent possible clashes with extremist groups opposed to the gathering. Similar events have been marred by violent clashes in the conservative country.  “The government is here for all citizens and will secure the respect of rights for all citizens,” Brnabic told …

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