Category: Євросоюз

Russian lender Sberbank said Monday it was deeply concerned by protests against its Ukrainian subsidiary, which included a nationalist group walling up the entrance to one of its branches in Kyiv with masonry and cement. Periodic protests have been held against Kremlin-owned banks operating in Ukraine since bilateral ties broke down in 2014 after Russia annexed Crimea and gave its support to the pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine. Sberbank’s announcement last Tuesday that it would heed a call from President Vladimir Putin to recognize passports issued by separatists in eastern Ukraine has fueled greater discontent. On Monday, a few dozen …

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Poland plans to seek the extradition of an American on suspicion of committing crimes against humanity in the World War II deaths of 44 Polish villagers, Poland’s government-affiliated history institute said Monday. The man, identified as Michael K., is suspected of ordering the killings in 1944 in eastern Poland when he was a commander in the Nazi’s SS-led Ukrainian Self Defense Legion, the Institute of National Remembrance (IPN) said in a statement. As a result of that order, several villages — including Chlaniow and Wladyslawin — were set on fire and buildings destroyed, the IPN said. “In our investigation, Michael …

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British Prime Minister Theresa May cleared the final hurdle standing between her and the start of Brexit negotiations on Monday after parliament passed legislation giving her the power to start the EU exit process. Members of the lower house of parliament voted to throw out changes to the bill made by the upper house earlier this month, after the government argued it needed freedom to operate without restriction to get a good deal. Despite an attempt by the Liberal Democrats in the unelected upper chamber, the House of Lords, to re-introduce the conditions, the Lords also went on to approve …

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Dutch envoy Daan Feddo Huisinga was summoned Monday by the Turkish foreign minister for the third time in as many days to receive a diplomatic dressing down.   The verbal salvo reportedly was for the crackdown by Dutch police on ethnic Turks who demonstrated Saturday in Rotterdam over the removal of Turkish Family and Social Policies Minister Fatma Betul Sayan Kaya from the Netherlands.   Turkish pro-government newspapers Monday published photos of police dogs biting demonstrators, with one headline reading “Nazi Dogs.”   Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has repeatedly called the Dutch government “Nazis” for preventing two of his …

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Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is vowing harsh retaliation against the Dutch government for barring his ministers from speaking at a rally. Ankara was hoping to sway Turkish nationals in Europe to support Erdogan’s side at an upcoming referendum in Turkey. European leaders have largely condemned the referendum, which seeks to give the Turkish authoritarian president more power. VOA’s Zlatica Hoke has more. …

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Leaders of European Union countries have criticized Turkey, while the dispute over the Turkish government’s attempts to hold rallies in European countries has been growing since President Recep Tayyip Erdogan accused Germany and the Netherlands of “Nazism” and “fascism” because officials blocked rallies there.   Erdogan warned the Netherlands Sunday it would “pay a price” for refusing to allow Ankara’s foreign minister into the country and expelling another minister to keep them from holding rallies with Turkish immigrants.   Ankara wants to drum up support among millions of Turks who live and work in Europe to vote to give Erdogan …

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France’s troubled conservative presidential candidate Francois Fillon has apologized for his party’s anti-Semitic tweet of rival Emmanuel Macron. “The political battle is tough enough, but it must remain dignified,” Fillon said Sunday. “I will not tolerate my party publishing caricatures that use the codes of anti-Semitic propaganda.” Fillon said he has always fought against such thinking and has asked Republican party officials to take action against whomever was responsible. The image tweeted Friday shows Macron with a hooked nose, a top hot, and cutting a cigar with a red sickle. France’s Vichy government which collaborated with the Nazis were notorious …

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Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan warned the Netherlands Sunday it would “pay a price” for refusing to allow Ankara’s foreign minister into the country and expelling another minister Saturday to keep them from holding rallies with Turkish immigrants. Erdogan accused the Dutch government, a NATO ally, of “nazism and fascism,” saying only a repressive regime would block Ankara’s officials from traveling to the Netherlands. Both of the Ankara officials were trying to rally Turkish immigrants with Turkish voting rights to support Erdogan’s bid to win a referendum next month to give him sweeping new powers. The Dutch government of Prime …

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Ilich Ramirez Sanchez, also known as Carlos the Jackal, is due to go on trial Monday for a deadly attack in a Paris’ shopping mall decades ago, the oldest one blamed on the former public enemy of France and probably the last one to come to court. The Venezuelan-born Ramirez Sanchez, one of the most notorious political terrorists of the 1970s and `80s, is serving a life sentence in France for a series of murders and attacks he perpetrated or organized in the country on behalf of the Palestinian cause or communist revolution.   He first was convicted by a …

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U.S. President Donald Trump plans to quiz German Chancellor Angela Merkel about her experience dealing with Russian President Vladimir Putin when the chancellor visits the White House Tuesday. A senior administration official said Friday Trump would be “very interested to get German Chancellor Merkel’s insights” as he prepares to engage the Kremlin leader. Critics on both sides of the Atlantic have been suspicious of what they see as Trump’s naivete when it comes to Putin, particularly with regard to the Kremlin’s attempt to influence the 2016 presidential election. But four officials briefing reporters in advance of the March 14 meeting …

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Sharing services are a growing trend in 21st economies. In London, the Spacehop website provides a marketplace where people who have unused living spaces can meet those looking for short-term work places. VOA’s Faiza Elmasry has more. Faith Lapidus narrates. …

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Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said Sunday that Turkey will retaliate in the “harshest ways” and “respond in kind to this unacceptable behavior” after the Netherlands refused to allow a Turkish minister into the country and expelled another one. In addition, Turkish officials have sealed off the Dutch embassy in Ankara and have said the Dutch ambassador is not welcome in the country. Earlier Sunday, Dutch riot police on horseback clashed with hundreds of Turkish government supporters in Rotterdam who were protesting the moves against the Turkish ministers. Before clashes broke out, about 2,000 protesters had gathered outside the Turkish …

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Several hundred people have staged a protest in the southwestern Belarusian city of Pinsk, calling for the scrapping of a law imposing a tax on jobless people. The protest Saturday was the latest in series of demonstrations against the law, despite authoritarian President Alyaksandr Lukashenka announcing that he was suspending its application for one year in order to “correct” it and carry it out next year. Lukashenka said the law, which is reminiscent of Soviet-era legislation, was needed to fight what he has called “social parasitism.” The legislation has sparked protests across the nation of 10 million. It imposes a …

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Russia has hinted at involving the United States in a newly-launched regional dialogue Moscow says is aimed at seeking a negotiated settlement to the conflict in Afghanistan. The move comes as Afghanistan’s national security adviser is due to visit Moscow to discuss the prospects for promoting reconciliation with armed opposition in his country. Moscow’s stepped up Afghan diplomacy stems from its concerns that a protracted conflict is encouraging Islamic State militants to establish a foothold in the war-torn country and export terrorism to neighboring Central Asian states that ultimately could threaten Russian security. In December, the Russian government hosted senior …

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The Netherlands barred Turkey’s foreign minister from landing in Rotterdam on Saturday in a row over Ankara’s political campaigning among Turkish emigres, leading President Tayyip Erdogan to brand its fellow NATO member a “Nazi remnant.” The dispute escalated in the evening as Turkey’s family minister was prevented by police from entering the Turkish consulate in the Rotterdam while hundreds of protesters waving Turkish flags gathered outside demanding to see the minister. Turkey’s foreign ministry said it did not want the Dutch ambassador to Ankara to return from leave “for some time.’ Turkish authorities sealed off the Dutch embassy in Ankara …

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Three families who helped shelter former U.S. National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden in Hong Kong in 2013 after his mass leak of information about surveillance programs have asked Canada for asylum, their lawyer said Friday. The families — three Sri Lankan adults, a Filipina, and three stateless children — have long-pending asylum claims in Hong Kong that they fear may soon be rejected, lawyer Marc-Andre Seguin said in a phone interview from Hong Kong. Seguin said the families had been thrust into the spotlight after the September release of the Oliver Stone film Snowden, which referred to their role …

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President Donald Trump has asked former Utah Governor Jon Huntsman to serve as the U.S. ambassador to Russia. It’s a job likely to come with heavy scrutiny amid questions about the Trump campaign’s possible ties with Russia. Huntsman would bring extensive diplomatic and bipartisan experience to the high-profile ambassador post. VOA’s Elizabeth Cherneff reports. …

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Relations between Turkey and Europe took a nosedive this week after many EU countries objected to visits by Turkish ministers campaigning ahead of a Turkish referendum on constitutional change. Ankara wants to drum up support among the millions of Turks living in Europe to give President Recep Tayyip Erdogan more powers, which could see him remain in office until 2029. Henry Ridgwell reports from London. …

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Iraq is assessing what help it might need to collect and preserve evidence of Islamic State crimes, but has not yet decided whether it needs United Nations assistance, the country’s U.N. Ambassador, Mohamed Ali Alhakim, said Friday. Britain is drafting a U.N. Security Council resolution to establish a U.N. investigation to collect and preserve evidence for future prosecution, but would like Iraq to approve such a move by sending a letter formally requesting council action. International human rights lawyer Amal Clooney and Nadia Murad, a young Yazidi woman who was enslaved and raped by Islamic State fighters in Mosul, pushed …

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A boyish 30-year-old who looks like Justin Trudeau and sounds like Barack Obama has emerged as a potential kingmaker in Dutch politics, riding a rare message of tolerance ahead of an election dominated by anti-immigrant rhetoric. Jesse Klaver, son of a Moroccan father and part Indonesian mother, is expected to turn his tiny Green Left party into one of the main groups in the Dutch parliament in a vote next week that has mostly made headlines because of a far-right surge. The election is mainly billed as a challenge by flamboyant anti-Islam nationalist Geert Wilders to conservative Prime Minister Mark …

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