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White House May Return Diplomatic Compounds Seized From Russia

The Trump administration is considering handing back two Russian diplomatic compounds along the U.S. East Coast after they were seized last year as punishment against the country, according to a report.

The compounds, one in coastal New York and the other along Maryland’s Eastern Shore, were believed by the Obama administration to have been used for intelligence purposes and were vacated on December 29 when former president Barack Obama sanctioned Russia for its alleged role in trying to sway the 2016 presidential election.

President Donald Trump is now deciding whether to return the two compounds to Moscow in exchange for certain concessions from Russia, according to reports in The Washington Post and Reuters.

According to several unnamed sources cited in the reports, Trump administration officials have spoken to Moscow about returning the compounds if Russia lifts a freeze on the construction of a U.S. consulate in St. Petersburg and stops harassing American diplomats in Russia.

The deal-making process is still in its early stages, though, and R.C. Hammond, a top aide to U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, told the Post that “the U.S. and Russia have reached no agreements.”

Kremlin aide Yury Ushakov said Wednesday Russia may try to take back the property through legal action “if these steps are not somehow adjusted by the U.S. side.”

The next senior-level meeting between the two sides will come later in June, and the issue is expected to be prominent on the agenda.

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UK Police Search Car in Manchester Attack investigation

British police investigating the Manchester Arena attack cordoned off an area around a car significant to the investigation as they hunted Friday for clues about the suicide bomber’s movements.

Officers put a 100-meter (100-yard) cordon in place around a white Nissan Micra in southern Manchester. They want to piece together Salman Abedi’s preparations for the attack at the Ariana Grande concert that killed 22 people — and to learn whether others helped him.

“This is potentially a significant development in the investigation,” Detective Chief Superintendent Russ Jackson said. “We are very interested in anything people can tell us about the movements of this car, and who was in it, over the past months.”

Police were also interested in “who may have had access to the car or who may have gone to and from it.”

As a precaution, people were being evacuated from the nearby Ronald McDonald House, which offers accommodation for families with children who are being treated in the hospital. A local hospital remained working as usual and even managed to host a visit by Prince William, who met with children wounded in the attack.

The second-in-line to the throne later visited Manchester Cathedral, where he praised the grit of the city and those who responded to the attack.

“Manchester’s strength and togetherness is an example to the world,” he wrote in a book of condolence. “My thoughts are with all those affected.”

William also met with police officers, expressing his gratitude for the actions of those first on the scene of the blast. Among them was 47-year-old police constable Michael Buckley, who treated the wounded even as he frantically searched for his own child.

Buckley was off duty and waiting for his 15-year-old daughter Stephanie when the bomb exploded. He found himself in an arena’s foyer, which he described as a scene of “absolute devastation.”

“I knew my daughter was in there somewhere,” he said.

Even so, he tried to help others and kept trying to contact her in the confusion. She had suffered a concussion and some crush injuries.

“I eventually met her in a hotel in the early hours of the morning,” Buckley said. “She just ran to me and grabbed hold of me but I couldn’t hold her because I was covered in other people’s blood.”

In a city traumatized by the events of last week, police have released new security camera images of the Manchester bomber’s last moments, hoping to jog the memories of the public to see if someone might remember something.

Even those who knew Abedi struggled to explain his actions. His cousins, Isaac and Abz Forjani, expressed shock in a BBC interview.

“It’s not easy being connected to 22 lost, innocent lives,” Isaac Forjani said. “The fact that the person that did this is related to us by blood is something that’s going to stay with me for the rest of my life.”

The two brothers were arrested by police after the attack and released without charge.

Ten men, aged between 18 and 44, remain in custody on suspicion of terrorism offences in connection with the attack. Six others, including a 15-year-old boy, have been released without being charged.

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Russian Prosecutor Urges Guilty Verdict in Nemtsov Killing

The prosecutor at the trial of five men charged with killing Kremlin critic Boris Nemtsov in Moscow in 2015 has urged jurors to find them guilty.

Wrapping up the state’s case Thursday, Maria Semenenko said their guilt was undisputed.

She also told the official Itar-Tass news agency that investigators had used special equipment during a re-enactment of the crime that placed the defendants’ mobile phones at the site of Nemtsov’s death when the shots were fired.

“Step by step, using the process of elimination, the investigators uncovered the entire chain of the crime, thanks to that expertise,” she told Itar-Tass.

The defense argued that no one could prove a motive for the killing.

Nemtsov was gunned down just steps from the Kremlin in February 2015. He was a popular opposition leader and a strong critic of Russian support for the rebels in eastern Ukraine.

Five suspects from Chechnya or Ingushetia were arrested. One of them confessed but later recanted, claiming he had been tortured.

A former Chechen security official, Ruslan Mukhudinov, is accused of paying the suspects to kill Nemtsov. He is at large.

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Europe Leaders React Angrily to Trump Climate Pact Decision

European leaders expressed dismay and anger in equal measure Thursday at President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw the United States, the world’s second-worst polluter, from the landmark Paris climate accord.

They saw it as rebuke and warned it would make it harder to slow the pace of climate change. Government officials in several major European capitals said the U.S. withdrawal from the 2015 agreement would further strain a Western alliance they worry is unraveling.

Others said the move would affect America’s standing in the world and undermine the country’s traditional global leadership role as it breaks with virtually every other nation on the issue of climate change.

The European Union’s climate change commissioner, Miguel Arias Cañete, said the announcement “has galvanized us rather than weakened us, and this vacuum will be filled by new, broad, committed leadership. Europe and its strong partners all around the world are ready to lead the way.”

The president of the European Parliament, Antonio Tajani, said: “It is a matter of trust and leadership. This decision will hurt the U.S. and the planet.”

‘Small’ America

Guy Verhofstadt, leader of the liberal group of lawmakers in the European Parliament, tweeted a report on the impact of rising sea levels on Hawaii, adding: “Make America small again.”

And Anne Hidalgo, the mayor of Paris, tweeted that the city hall there “will be illuminated with green to affirm our will to implement” the Paris Agreement.

Environmental NGOs were scathing in their reaction. Greenpeace said: “By withdrawing from the Paris Agreement, Trump has turned the U.S. from a climate leader into a climate deadbeat.”

The leaders of Germany, France and Italy issued a joint statement expressing “regret” at the decision.

European leaders lobbied Washington with mounting urgency in recent weeks, imploring the Trump administration not to break with the agreement to cut greenhouse gas emissions.

Ever since Trump blasted the accord during the 2016 presidential campaign, saying it would cost the U.S. economy trillions of dollars with no tangible environmental benefit, European leaders have been bracing themselves for him to fulfill his pledge to break with the Paris pact.

They made strenuous efforts to dissuade Trump last month at the Group of Seven summit in Sicily, where a frustrated German Chancellor Angela Merkel highlighted the isolation of the U.S. in climate change discussions as a matter of 6-1.

Economic argument

In March, European leaders pursued a new tactic — with Canadian and U.S. business support — by making an economic argument, warning that if the U.S. withdrew, it would miss out on commercial opportunities in clean growth and lose out in energy innovation and clean-energy job creation.

Even at the 11th hour, efforts to dissuade Trump continued. Senior European policymakers tweeted to him, asking him not to break with the pact. And alarmed lawmakers in the European Parliament warned “climate change is not a fairy tale.”

Just before Trump’s withdrawal announcement Thursday, a Vatican official, Bishop Marcelo Sanchez Sorondo, warned the break would be a “disaster for everyone,” but would be seen by the pontiff as a “slap in the face.”

“Saying that we need to rely on coal and oil is like saying that the Earth is not round,” the bishop said. He and some other European officials blamed the fossil fuel industry in the U.S., saying it has an outsized influence on the Trump administration.

At their first ever meeting last month, Pope Francis handed Trump a signed copy of his 2015 encyclical calling for protection of the environment from the effects of climate change.

The accord, agreed on by nearly 200 countries in 2015, aims to cut emissions blamed for global warming. The United States committed to reducing by 2025 its own emissions by 26 to 28 percent compared with 2005 levels. Scientists have said a U.S. withdrawal from the pact could speed up the effects of climate change.

Chinese officials said the move would damage trust among leading powers in multilateral negotiations. Chinese Premier Li Keqiang said his country would honor its commitments on climate change. “China will continue to implement the promises made in the Paris accord,” Li said.

Legal response

Some European policymakers are now turning their focus to how they could obstruct the U.S. withdrawal by pursuing legal avenues.

On Wednesday, Jean-Claude Juncker, European Commission president and a lawyer, said at a conference of the Confederation of German Employers in Berlin that “the Americans can’t just get out of the agreement,” adding that “it takes three to four years” to pull out.

Other European policymakers want to explore ways of enticing American energy innovators and climate researchers to relocate to Europe, using tax advantages and government subsidies to attract them. And some are advocating the imposition of carbon taxes on U.S. exports to EU nations.

But leaders of Europe’s nationalist populist parties cheered the abandonment of the pact. Britain’s Nigel Farage tweeted: “Trump keeps election promise to ditch the Paris climate accord and everyone is shocked. It’s called democracy.”

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Stars Added to Grande’s Manchester Concert

The Black Eyed Peas and Robbie Williams will join Ariana Grande, Justin Bieber and other stars at a charity concert Sunday in Manchester, England.

Live Nation said Thursday that girl group Little Mix had also been added to the show being held in response to the Manchester bombing that took place at Grande’s concert in the city last week. Twenty-two people died at the show.

Katy Perry, Coldplay, Miley Cyrus, Pharrell Williams, Take That and Niall Horan also will perform. The event, “One Love Manchester,” will take place at Emirates Old Trafford.

Tickets went on sale Thursday. Proceeds will go to an emergency fund set up by the city of Manchester and the British Red Cross.

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Report: Worldwide Terrorism at All-time High

The number of countries impacted by terrorism hit an all-time high in 2016, and for the first time in seven years, the United States experienced a decline in peacefulness, according to new figures from the Global Peace Index. The report, which measures the level of conflict around the world, also shows that violence cost the global economy $14.3 trillion last year. Jesusemen Oni has more.

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Refugees Face Post-Asylum Woes in Greece

It was supposed to be the chance for a fresh start, but having successfully navigated the bureaucratic procedures, it appears Sara’s problems in Greece have just begun.

After interviews and a half-year wait, the 31-year-old, who faced political persecution in her homeland, Iran, was given asylum, but fears she soon won’t have a roof over her head.

“Where can we go now?” lamented Sara, who was told she and her partner, Barak, have to leave the hotel they had previously been allowed to stay in for free because they are no longer asylum-seekers.

More people are now emerging at the other end of the country’s asylum system after a long and uncertain wait.

For those allowed to remain in Greece, concerns are growing that too little is being done to help them try to build a future and integrate into their new home.

Uncertainty ahead

 

Refugees who find themselves trapped in Greece face a stark choice; take an expensive risk with smugglers or navigate an asylum system barely able to cope with the demand.

Nearly 13,000 have been relocated from Greece to other EU countries but for some of those who remain — a total that is officially around 60,000 people but thought to be less — and are given asylum, deep uncertainty awaits.

Humanitarian assistance has targeted asylum-seekers, but now needs to shift toward a longer term view to ensure those like Sara and Barak are not left in the cold just as they begin to rebuild their lives, said Eleni Takou of Greek NGO Solidarity Now.

“I understand that there’s a point in someone’s life where funding has to stop, but there is a need to do gradual integration,” Takou said.

It also appears there is little clarity on whether the vital cash assistance provided to those seeking asylum will continue after asylum is given.

A number of NGO’s have told VOA it is likely to be retained in some form for some time, but that hasn’t reassured Wessam Alkatreb, a Syrian currently living on the Greek island of Lesvos.

Recently granted asylum, he has been told he stands to lose his cash assistance next month, and has decided to remain in the Moria camp because he can live there for free.

“I waited nine months to get my [identity] papers, but I can’t afford to go to Athens,” he said.

Speaks volumes

Some are questioning why the government is not doing more.

Solidarity Now’s Takou maintains that millions of dollars for integration from a larger European Commission fund to aid the refugee situation in Greece have not been put to use.

For her, the relatively small amount targeting integration, and the apparent failure to even begin to use it, speak volumes.

“This falls under the whole idea that we don’t want people to get integrated into Greece because the worse it [their situation] is the more likely they might leave at some point.”

The Ministry of Migration and Policy defended its approach, saying it plans to create integration centers and that it has set up a strategy covering “all integration aspects,” ranging from early education to health and employment.

Added value

But concerns remain about the long-term impact if efforts to assist and integrate the new population are lackluster.

For those stripped of assistance, becoming self-sufficient is a challenge in a country where unemployment stands at more than 23 percent, the highest in the European Union.

There also remains a lack of awareness about the assistance that is available, such as access to state medical care, said UNHCR’s Petros Mastakas.

“There needs to be efforts to take into account refugees when it comes to state planning for things like housing or social benefits,” he said, adding, “It’s about realizing integration has added value.”

Failing to help realize this value, warns Takou, is not just damaging for refugees, but also poses a risk to wider society.

Takou highlighted reports people are remaining in refugees camps after being given asylum, warning that such continuing division only serves to marginalize communities, breeding delinquency and worse.

Questioning plans

Sara and Barak thought they had left the camps behind with their move into a hotel, but are not sure if they could return there if they wanted to.

The prospect of being kicked out onto the street is making them question any plans they had to start anew in Greece.

The recognition from the asylum service that they are entitled to a life in Greece has instead made them question whether they may try to once again find their way into another EU country, regardless of the rules.

“We almost wish we had not received any answer,” said Barak. “I don’t see how we can have a future in this country.”

*Sara and Barak’s surnames have been omitted to protect their identities.

 

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