Category: Євросоюз

Arctic fjords that hid Soviet nuclear-powered submarines during the Cold War are now being used as a weapon in the sanctions war with Europe – to rear fish that Russia can no longer import. Three years ago, Russia banned food imports from the West in response to a series of Western sanctions that aimed to punish Moscow for its role in the Ukraine crisis, including its annexation of the Crimean peninsula. Trout and salmon, grown specially for Russia’s vast market at farms in Norway next door, were among the first victims of the sanctions war. Moscow’s ban on the largest …

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Climate change is affecting the timing of river floods across Europe, and societies may have to adapt to avoid future economic and environmental harm, scientists said Thursday. River floods are among the costliest natural disasters worldwide, causing annual damage of more than $100 billion. They affect millions of people each year because many towns and cities are built along rivers. Examining flood data across 50 years, researchers found significant shifts in timing along the Atlantic coast of Western Europe from 1960 to 2010. According to a paper published in the journal Science, half of the measurement stations from England to …

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Croatia revoked on Thursday its decision to raise import fees on some farm products by 220 percent, avoiding a trade war with its Balkan neighbors who had threatened to hit back with counter-measures. European Union-member Croatia last month raised its fees for phytosanitary controls — agricultural checks for pests and viruses on fruits and vegetables — at its borders to 2,000 kuna ($317.52) from 90 kuna, citing compliance with EU standards and protection of its consumers. EU candidates Serbia, Macedonia and Montenegro, as well as fellow EU aspirant Bosnia, have called on Croatia to withdraw its decision, saying otherwise each …

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A former investigative reporter for Russia’s independent RBC media group was found guilty and sentenced to three-and-a-half years in prison on Thursday on charges of organizing an extremist group and attempting to overthrow the government. Authorities said Alexander Sokolov, 29, was the mastermind behind the group “For Responsible Government,” or FRG, a Moscow-based organization alleged to be a cover for banned extremist group “People’s Will Army,” which was created by Sokolov associate Yuri Mukhin. Moscow judge Alexey Krivoruchko sentenced Mukhin, a newspaper editor, to a four-year suspended term, while two other activists – Valery Parfenov and Kirill Barabash – both …

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Turkish authorities on Thursday issued detention warrants for 35 journalists and media workers as part of the country’s ongoing crackdown on people suspected of ties to U.S.-based Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen, the state-run news agency reported. Turkey accuses Gulen of masterminding last year’s failed military coup. Gulen denies involvement. Police carried out raids in Istanbul to detain the suspects who allegedly used an encrypted messaging app that authorities say was favored by Gulen’s followers to communicate with each other. Anadolu Agency said they are suspected of “membership in a terror organization.”   Nine people have been detained so far, including …

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Turkish authorities have detained a suspected Islamic State militant of Russian origin after he allegedly planned to use a drone to bring down a U.S. plane at the Incirlik air base, Dogan News Agency said on Thursday. Dogan, citing security officials, said Russian national Renat Bakiev was detained after police surveillance showed him scouting the southern city of Adana, where the base is located, with the aim of carrying out his attack. Bakiev told authorities that he was a member of Islamic State and planned to use a drone to bring down a U.S. plane and carry out an attack …

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  British emergency services say two people were trapped and several injured when a double-decker bus plowed into a store on a busy south London street.   Transit officials say the bus was heading for the city’s Waterloo station when it careened through the plate glass window of a kitchen shop in Lavender Hill in the Battersea area on Thursday morning.   Firefighters freed two people trapped on the upper deck. The ambulance service says paramedics have treated 10 casualties, three of whom, including the bus driver, were taken to hospitals. Passenger Amy Mullineux said the driver told her he …

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The European Union recorded the largest increase in slavery of any world region in 2017, with the arrival of more than 100,000 migrants, many of them extremely vulnerable to exploitation, analysts said Thursday. The risk of slave labor in farming, construction and other sectors rose across the region, with 20 of the EU’s 28 member states scoring worse than in 2016 in an annual global slavery index by British analytics company Verisk Maplecroft. “The migrant crisis has increased the risk of slavery incidents appearing in company supply chains across Europe,” said Sam Haynes, senior human rights analyst at Verisk Maplecroft. …

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Bosnia’s religious leaders say politicians are standing in the way of peaceful coexistence between Muslim, Jewish and Christian communities trying to forgive and forget after the atrocities of a devastating 1990s war. Hundreds of churches, mosques and synagogues bear witness to more than five centuries of Bosnia’s multi-faith past, and the capital Sarajevo is known locally as a “small Jerusalem” with its main ethnic groups – Orthodox Serbs, Catholic Croats and Muslim Bosniaks – all worshiping within meters of each other. But Mufti Husein Kavazovic, head of the Islamic community in Bosnia, says people of faith cannot achieve peace alone. …

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A British company hired to train Afghan intelligence officers billed the U.S. government for high-end cars, including Porsches and an Aston Martin, and paid the “significant others” of the firm’s top executives six-figure salaries even though there’s no proof they did any work, according to a Pentagon audit made public Wednesday. Sen. Clarie McCaskill, D-Mo., said New Century Consulting also spent $42,000 on automatic weapons, using cash to get around a prohibition in the contract on purchasing the firearms, and showered other personnel with hefty pay and bonuses they hadn’t earned. Overall, the military contractor “left taxpayers on the hook …

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German prosecutors say they’ve arrested a 29-year-old Syrian man on allegations he committed war crimes as a member of the Islamic State group in his home country.   The federal prosecutor’s office said Wednesday that Fares A. B., whose last name wasn’t released in line with privacy laws, is also accused of membership in a terrorist organization.   Prosecutors allege that he joined the Nusra Front extremist organization in 2013, and then moved to IS in 2014.   There, he was detailed to a jail and allegedly abused three prisoners. He’s also accused of beating a pickup truck driver with …

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French Prime Minister Edouard Philippe has confirmed the arrest of the man suspected of ramming a car into a group of French soldiers Wednesday in a suburb of Paris, injuring six of them in what authorities say was a deliberate attack. French police shot and arrested the unnamed suspect in a car during a manhunt north of Paris. “A suspect who was driving in the car involved in the attack has been arrested on the highway between Paris and Boulogne-sur-Mer,” Philippe told lawmakers during a parliamentary session. French government spokesman Christophe Castaner said the Paris prosecutor’s office has opened a …

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NATO is sharply criticizing Russian President Vladimir Putin’s visit to the breakaway Georgian region of Abkhazia on Tuesday — the ninth anniversary of the brief war over another renegade Georgian territory. NATO spokesman Dylan White calls Putin’s visit “detrimental to international efforts to find a peaceful negotiated settlement.” White said “NATO is united in full support for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Georgia within its internationally-recognized borders.” Putin met with Abkhazia’s leader Raul Khadzhimba, reaffirming Moscow’s guarantee to protect what Putin calls Abkhazia’s “security, self-sufficiency and independence.” Georgia’s foreign ministry condemned what it says is Putin’s cynicism, as well …

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Russian President Vladimir Putin traveled to Georgia’s breakaway province of Abkhazia Tuesday to express his support for separatists there and in South Ossetia on the ninth anniversary of a deadly five-day war between Moscow and Tbilisi. The Georgian government protested against the Kremlin leader’s visit to Abkhazia’s Black Sea resort Pitsunda, and the foreign ministry in Tbilisi denounced Putin’s “cynical action.” NATO said Putin’s trip was “detrimental to international efforts to find a peaceful and negotiated settlement” of the war the two countries fought in 2008. The foreign ministry said Putin’s trip to Abkhazia was a gesture meant only “for …

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Deep below London’s bustling streets, a piece of once-vital communications technology will soon be roaring back into life after years of disuse — a train. The train operates on the “mail rail” line — a 6.4-mile underground train track that once transported letters and parcels 70 feet below ground to and from sorting offices on the east and west sides of the city 22 hours each day. The line, construction of which began in 1915, ceased operations in 2003. It will be opened to the public next month as a tourist attraction, part of the new Postal Museum in the …

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Dozens of glistening pools in a small village on Croatia’s Adriatic coast stand testament to its annual salt harvests from seawater, which use a method largely unchanged for centuries. The salt works facility in Ston, which says it is the oldest in Europe, consists of 58 pools and covers about 430,000 square meters where the waters of the Adriatic are allowed to seep in and then evaporate, leaving salt behind. The first of two salt harvests this year kicked off on Tuesday, with around 35 tourists, friends and family of workers raking salt across the pans into gleaming white piles, …

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U.S.-based Human Rights Watch has called on the Turkish government to act following a spate of abductions. In a letter to Justice Minister Abdulhamit Gul, the rights group called for an “urgent and effective investigation of the abduction and possible enforced disappearances of at least four men in Ankara since March 2017.” “As far as we can tell, there has not been an effective investigation,” said Emma Sinclair-Webb, senior Turkey researcher for Human Rights Watch. “The cases we’ve looked at were people abducted in broad daylight in front of witnesses. “There is a lot of evidence to investigate. We got …

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A German man believed to have provided logistical support to the Hamburg-based September 11, 2001, hijackers has died, according to a newly-released audio message from the leader of al-Qaida.   The announcement by Ayman al-Zawahri came in an August 2 audio message posted online in which he says a man he identifies as Zuhair al-Maghribi who worked for As-Sahab, the terror network’s media arm, is a “martyr.”   He says al-Maghribi is one of several who “sacrificed their lives” but doesn’t provide details on when or how they died.   Al-Maghribi is a known alias of Said Bahaji, who authorities …

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The Balkans have become embroiled in a trade war over agricultural health checks after Croatia raised import fees on some farm products by around 220 percent, triggering countermeasures by Serbia and threats from others. Last month European Union-member Croatia raised its fees for phytosanitary controls — agricultural checks for pests and viruses — on fruits and vegetables at its borders to 2,000 kuna ($319) from 90 kuna. It cited compliance with EU standards and protection of its consumers. But ministers from EU candidates Serbia, Macedonia and Montenegro, as well as from fellow EU aspirant Bosnia, said the move violated their …

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Two members of the Russian feminist punk band Pussy Riot were briefly detained Monday after rallying for the release of a Ukrainian filmmaker outside his Siberian prison. During Sunday’s protest in Yakutsk where Oleg Sentsov is serving his sentence, the band members unfurled a banner on a nearby bridge that read “Free Sentsov!” Longtime Pussy Riot member Maria Alyokhina tweeted that she and Olga Borisova were taken to a police station following their detention earlier in the day and faced a court hearing over charges of holding an unauthorized rally. Borisova later said on Facebook that she and Alyokhina were …

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