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Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny was freed Thursday after serving a 30-day jail sentence for his role in organizing massive protests against President Vladimir Putin last month.

“I’m with you again after a 30-day business trip,” he wrote on Twitter.  “I’m so happy to be free.”

Navalny and hundreds of his supporters were detained during the May demonstrations in Moscow and dozens of other cities on the eve of Putin’s inauguration to another six-year presidential term.  He was charged with inciting an unauthorized rally, and a Moscow court ordered him to jail.

Navalny, who also organized massive street protests to coincide with Putin’s 2012 re-election, was barred from the presidential ballot in March because of a conviction on financial crimes, charges he contends were fabricated.

He has served a number of weeks-long jail terms in recent years for organizing protests.

 
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A Hungarian court sentenced four members of a people-smuggling operation to 25 years in prison Thursday for the deaths of 71 migrants who suffocated inside a truck in 2015.

The four were convicted of murder in a court ruling in the town of Kecskemet.

In August 2015, authorities found the bodies of 59 men, eight women and four children in the truck abandoned alongside an Austrian motorway.

The victims came from Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria.

They were among the hundreds of thousands of other migrants who were trying to reach Germany during the height of Europe’s worst migrant crisis since World War II.
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The president of Portugal will be visiting the White House later this month to meet with President Donald Trump.

White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders says Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa will visit on June 27.

She says the visit will mark “the culmination of a month-long celebration of the Portuguese-American community” and celebrate the close bond between the countries.

Sanders notes Portugal is an important NATO ally and partner in Afghanistan and says the meeting will focus on strengthening the countries’ cooperation in addressing global conflicts and promoting economic prosperity, among other topics.
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Back in 2010, President Vladimir Putin helped secure Russia’s bid for the World Cup with guarantees he would introduce the world to an open and welcoming Russia.

This week, Putin said Russia had made good on its promises.

“We’ve done everything to ensure our guests, sportsmen, experts, and, of course, fans feel at home in Russia,” said Putin in a video address released by the Kremlin.”We have opened our country and our hearts to the world.”

With the final countdown to Thursday’s opening match between Russia and Saudi Arabia underway, the stadiums appear ready, the fan zones (nearly) built, the bartenders ready to pour the beer, and the hooligans instructed to stay away.

But as Russia prepares to host world football fans of “the beautiful game”, human rights defenders warn the Kremlin is failing to meet obligations for social and political freedoms at home.

“There is no doubt that the government is craving this international prestige and wants to put Russia in the best light possible,” said Yulia Gorbunova, a researcher at Human Rights Watch’s Moscow division.

The problem, added Gorbunova, is, “The situation of human rights now is the worst it’s been since the fall of the Soviet Union.”

Sochi Redux

Near identical charges were levied against Russia before it hosted the 2014 Olympic Winter Games in Sochi.Then as now, concerns ranged over everything from political repressions, migrant labor violations in building sports infrastructure and pressure against LGBT groups to environmental and animal rights violations.

In 2014, Putin sought to appease his critics to a degree. Before the Sochi Games, the Russian leader made several high profile gestures, including the amnesty of jailed Greenpeace activists, members of the feminist punk collective Pussy Riot, and oligarch-turned-prisoner of conscience Mikhail Khodorkvosky in a bid to ease Western pressure.

This time? Not so much

“Russia has grown more and more resistant to international criticism,” said Gorbunova. “And as the international criticism intensifies, Russia becomes more self-assertive and shows how the Kremlin basically doesn’t care what the international community thinks.”

Four years later

Key to this shift is Russia’s 2014 annexation of Crimea and the subsequent fallout in Russia-West relations over Western sanctions, the downing of Malaysian Air flight MH17, election meddling allegations, and charges the Russian government engineered a doping program aimed at securing a (now tarnished) 1st place finish in Sochi among other issues.

The constant criticism has so inured the Kremlin to Western harangues that most are now merely met with a shrug and denial.

“Putin saw that there’s no need to worry about these things,” said Leonid Volkov, a pro-democracy activist and key advisor to opposition leader Alexey Navalny, currently serving a 30-day jail term for organizing anti-government protests.

“Political prisoners, downed passenger planes over Ukraine, bombs in Syria … it doesn’t matter.Everyone’s coming to Russia anyway,” noted Volkov.

Government critics say they are not out to ruin World Cup fun, but argue the political realities of the Putin regime also shouldn’t be ignored.

Sport and politics

The Kremlin has long argued politics and sport simply don’t mix, a statement Kremlin opponents find absurd.

“Of course, Putin uses sport as a key part of his rule,” said Volkov, the pro-democracy activist.

The World Cup, he notes, is the latest in a series of high profile sporting investments by the Russian president aimed at showcasing Russia’s resurgence under Putin’s rule.

Only it’s not clear the party is for everyone.

In the run-up to the Cup, students at Moscow State University say they were subjected to harassment by security services for protesting the location of Moscow’s fan zone, located just off the university grounds.

“They accuse protesters of trying to ruin the World Cup,” said Igor Vaiman, 21, a physics student, in an interview . “But the security services and repressions hurt World Cup much more than we could ever do.”

Great tournament, bad team?

Meanwhile, Russian football fans have another concern: the national team.FIFA ranks it 70th, the lowest ever for a host country in pursuit of a World Cup championship.

Russian fans are preparing for the worst, despite a record $12 billion spent on hosting the event.

Russia’s most recognizable star, veteran striker, Artem Dyzuba, finally lashed out at the critics’ read of Russia’s chances before even a single match. “We also dream of winning a World Cup,” he reminded fans.

But Viktor Levin, a retired sportscaster who called games for the legendary teams of the Soviet Union, said the problems with modern Russia football ran deep. “In the Soviet Union, our team battled out of genuine patriotism,” said Levin. “Now it’s all about money.”

Even the fans have changed, he argued. “Before we went to watch football with our kids. It was a family event. Now all these young people do is drink, wave their scarves, and fight.”

His friend Marshan nodded in agreement. “What can I say? We’re bad at football,” he said, before adding a caveat worthy of the Kremlin.

“But nobody hosts better than Russia! I guarantee it!”
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Macedonia’s President Gjorge Ivanov says an agreement reached Tuesday with Greece to change his country’s name is detrimental for the Republic of Macedonia and that he would not sign it into law.

In a televised national address, Ivanov said the agreement reached between Macedonian Prime Minister Zoran Zaev and Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras violates constitutional law. The deal called for Macedonia to be renamed as the Republic of North Macedonia.

“The government did not have the strength and courage to initiate the building of a common stance and consensus,” he said. “The entire process lacked transparency and the end result is a testimony to this.”

The vast majority of Ivanov’s opposition VMRO-DPMNE party have long said they would refuse to support such a deal, which has been in the works the 20 years. Although Zaev’s ruling party negotiated the name change, Macedonian law says any international agreements require a presidential signature for ratification.

Greece and Macedonia have been feuding over who gets to use the name since Macedonia’s independence from Yugoslavia in 1991. Many Greeks say allowing the neighboring country to use the name insults Greek history and implies a claim on the Greek territory also known as Macedonia — a key province in Alexander the Great’s ancient empire.

As a result, Greece has blocked Macedonian efforts to join the EU and NATO. Despite recognition by 137 countries, Macedonia is officially known at the U.N. as the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, or FYROM.

This story originated in VOA’s Macedonian Service. 
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The Turkish and Azerbaijani presidents on Tuesday inaugurated a key pipeline carrying natural gas from Azerbaijan’s gas fields to Turkish markets and eventually to Europe, part of a wider Southern Gas Corridor project that aims to diversify gas supplies and reduce countries’ dependence on Russia.

The Trans Anatolian Natural Gas Pipeline, or TANAP, is also part of Turkey’s ambition of becoming a major energy hub.

“We are taking a historic step,” Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdogan said at a ceremony in central Eskisehir province with Azerbaijan’s Ilham Aliyev marking the delivery of the first gas. “We are inaugurating a project that is the ‘Silk Road’ of energy.”

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko and Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic also attended.

Erdogan said the pipeline would not only ensure energy security but also increase the “welfare of the people on its route.” It will deliver 6 billion cubic meters of gas per year to Turkey and 10 billion cubic meters to Europe.

Although it has no financial involvement, the United States has strongly supported TANAP, said Sandra Oudkirk, the U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Energy, who also attended the ceremony.

“We take energy security for ourselves and allies and partners really seriously and we see this as an important component of the bigger energy diversification and energy security picture,” she told a group of journalists in Ankara earlier.

The pipeline will eventually be connected to the Trans Adriatic Pipeline, or TAP, at the Turkey-Greece border. Erdogan said that could take place in June 2019.
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Greece and Macedonia reached a historic settlement Tuesday to their long-simmering dispute over the name Macedonia — shared by the former Yugoslav republic and an ancient region of northern Greece.

Under the deal between the two prime ministers, the country will now be called The Republic of North Macedonia.

“Our investment in the compromise is a definition of a specified Macedonian name for our country, a dignified and geographically defined name,” Macedonian Prime Minister Zoran Zaev said.

Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras said the deal ends any claim he believes Macedonia may have had on Greek territory.

“This achieves a clear distinction between Greek Macedonia, and our northern neighbors. … [Macedonia] cannot and will not be able in the future to claim any connection with the ancient Greek civilization of Macedonia.”

Greece will also stop blocking Macedonia’s efforts to join NATO and the European Union.

European Council President Donald Tusk congratulated both sides. “Thanks to you, the impossible is becoming possible,” he tweeted.

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said the deal and Macedonia’s possible membership “will help to consolidate peace and stability across the wider Western Balkans.”

A spokesman for U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the settlement will have “positive repercussions” in Europe and beyond, and hopes it will inspire others to negotiate deals to end other “protracted conflicts.”

State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said the deal will bolster regional security and prosperity and that the United States congratulates both prime ministers for their “vision, courage and persistence.”

She said Washington also thanks United Nations mediator Matthew Nimetz for spending the last 20 years committed to finding a solution.

But Greek Defense Minister Panos Kammenos, leader of the right-wing Independent Greeks Party, said his party will not vote to ratify the agreement. 

Other Greeks said the new name should not even include the word Macedonia, while backers reject nationalism and said the dispute has gone on long enough. 

Opponents in Macedonia have called any alteration of the country’s name a form of treason and a cave-in to Greek demands.

Zaev said he will put the deal to a vote in a referendum, while the Greek parliament will consider ratification before the end of the year.

Tsipras said if Macedonia does not change its constitution to reflect the new name, Greece will again block Macedonian membership in NATO and the EU.
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Frosty relations between the United States and its European allies should not be blamed on U.S. President Donald Trump — that’s according to a diplomat who represents one of the countries with whom Trump has been feuding.

“The impression is that if we have a crisis in the transatlantic relationship, it’s because of one person  —the president,” French Ambassador to the U.S. Gerard Araud said Tuesday in Washington. “It’s something that I don’t believe to be true.”

Instead, the French envoy believes the fraying ties are the result of an underlying fragility in the U.S.-European alliance and the lack of a true, existential enemy.

“We don’t have a common threat anymore to face — Russia is not USSR [the former Soviet Union],” Araud told an audience at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. “We need to define a common agenda.”

Tensions at G-7

The French ambassador’s comments come in the wake of last week’s G-7 Leaders Summit in Canada, during which Trump sparred with U.S. allies over trade and ultimately refused to endorse the summit’s communique.

“Sorry, we cannot let our friends, or enemies, take advantage of us on Trade anymore,” Trump tweeted.

Trump’s tweets and his behavior drew a sharp response from French President Emmanuel Macron, who called Trump’s refusal to sign the G-7 communique a display of “incoherence and inconsistency.”

“International cooperation cannot be dictated by fits of anger and throwaway remarks,” Macron added.

Macron also criticized Trump ahead of the G-7 summit, telling a news conference, “Maybe it doesn’t bother the American president to be isolated, but it doesn’t bother us to be six if need be.”

Mutual concerns

Still, Araud sought Tuesday to make the differences between the U.S. and European allies like France less about a clash of personalities and more about concerns shared by people on both sides of the Atlantic, despite Trump’s “unusual way of conducting foreign policy.”

“President Trump is raising a real issue with trade,” Araud said, as an example.

“We have simply believed that free trade in and of itself was globally good. We forgot that globally means you have pluses and minuses,” he said. “Our citizens are sending the message that enough is enough.”

Despite such underlying issues, Araud said the U.S. and its European allies do have a shared interest in revitalizing their relationship, but that it will require focusing on shared goals moving forward.

“We have a real question, which is why [do we need] a strong, really, transatlantic relationship, and how? And to do what?” he said.

“It will be a mistake to enter into a sort of tweet against tweet,” he warned. “What matters at the end of the day is the substance.”

North Korea

Despite some substantive policy differences, the French diplomat said France is supporting Trump’s efforts to denuclearize and bring peace to the Korean Peninsula.

“On North Korea, we have all supported our American allies,” Araud said. “We are supporting the America demarche.”

But he refused to speculate on whether the recent summit in Singapore would lead to lasting success.

“Let’s wait and see,” he said. “Previous policies have not been very effective.”
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Spain’s Supreme Court on Tuesday upheld a lower court’s conviction of the husband of Princess Cristina for fraud and tax evasion, though it acquitted him of forgery and reduced his prison sentence by five months.

The court ruled on an appeal that Inaki Urdangarin, King Felipe VI’s brother-in-law, was also guilty of misuse of public funds, abuse of power and influence peddling and should serve a sentence of five years and 10 months.

The lower court, in Palma de Mallorca, convicted Urdangarin in a 2016 trial that captivated Spain as Princess Cristina testified in court. It was the first time a member of Spain’s royal family was put on trial since the monarchy was restored in 1975.

The case centered on accusations that Urdangarin embezzled about 6 million euros ($7 million) in public funds. The court found that Urdangarin and his business partner Diego Torres exploited the duke’s “privileged status” to obtain public contracts related to sports events.

The Supreme Court also upheld the verdict that Princess Cristina benefitted from her husband’s crimes. She was ordered to pay a fine of 136,950 euros ($161,500).

Sources at the Zarzuela royal palace commented after the ruling that the monarchy has “total respect for judicial independence,” the Europa Press news agency reported.

The lower court will now rule on when Urdangarin must enter prison to serve his sentence, though he can still appeal to the Constitutional Court.

Princess Cristina and her husband were stripped of their titles of the Duke and Duchess of Palma after the initial court verdict. The couple moved from Barcelona to Geneva with their four children when the first allegations of wrongdoing emerged in 2012.

 
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The man at the center of a sex-abuse and financial crimes scandal that is tarnishing the academy which awards the Nobel Prize in Literature, was Tuesday charged with two counts of rape of a woman in 2011.

Swedish prosecutor Christina Voigt said the evidence “is robust and sufficient for prosecution.”

Jean-Claude Arnault, a well-known figure in Sweden who ran a cultural center, is married to poet and member of the Swedish Academy, Katarina Frostenson. He has denied this and other sex abuse allegations.

In April, the Swedish Academy said an internal investigation into sexual misconduct allegations found that “unacceptable behavior in the form of unwanted intimacy” has taken place within the ranks of the prestigious institution.

Voight didn’t name the victim as is the customary in Sweden.

The secretive 18-member board has in recent months been embroiled in a sex-abuse scandal that investigators concluded was “not generally known.” It has led to the departure of at least six of members of the Academy and tarnished the prize’s reputation.

The academy had commissioned lawyers to investigate sexual misconduct claims from 18 women against Arnault. In April, it had decided to hand over the internal report to relevant judicial authorities.

 
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Spain announced Monday that it will allow a ship carrying 629 migrants to dock in Valencia. The rescue ship Aquarius has been in international waters since picking up the migrants from a smuggler’s vessel off the coast of Libya. Malta and Italy refused to let it dock, saying they cannot cope with more migrants and refugees. It is not clear whether the rescue ship can make the 1,400-kilometer journey to Valencia and what awaits migrants once they disembark in the European Union country.
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The U.S. sanctioned five Russian entities and three individuals Monday, accusing them of malicious cyber activities to provide material and technological support to Moscow’s intelligence service.

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said the sanctioned entities and individuals “have directly contributed to improving Russia’s cyber and underwater capabilities through their work with “the Russian Federal Security Service “and therefore jeopardize the safety and security of the United States and our allies.”

He said the U.S. “is committed to aggressively targeting any entity or individual working at the direction” of the Russian intelligence service “whose work threatens the United States and will continue to utilize our sanctions authorities … to counter the constantly evolving threats emanating from Russia.”

The sanctions continue what appear to be conflicted messages from Washington about Moscow.

The U.S. has imposed a series of penalties against specific Russian activities. Yet just last week, President Donald Trump suggested that Russia be allowed to rejoin the G-7 group of advanced economies after being pushed out in 2014 for its annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula. Trump has also been discussing the possibility of a summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The sanctions announced Monday block access for those blacklisted to any U.S. financial accounts they hold and prohibit Americans from any transactions with them.

The Treasury statement said the five entities and three individuals have engaged in “malign and destabilizing cyber activities,” including intrusions “against the U.S. energy grid to potentially enable future offensive operations” and “global compromises of network infrastructure devices.”

It said the sanctions also target Russia’s underwater capabilities, which it said include tracking undersea communications cables that carry the bulk of the world’s telecommunications data.

The U.S. said one of the entities, Divetechno services, bought underwater equipment and diving services for the intelligence service, including a $1.5 million submersible craft. The three sanctioned individuals all worked for the company.
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A rescue ship run by a European charity is headed to Spain with more than 600 migrants on board after Italy and Malta refused to accept the vessel. Italy’s new government, which campaigned on halting the flow of migrants into the country, is starting to make good on his promises.

The European Union and the United Nations refugee agency had called for a swift end to a political standoff that left 629 migrants on the rescue ship Aquarius drifting at sea. Spain has now offered to take the ship in after Italy and Malta refused.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez ordered authorities to allow the Aquarius to dock in the eastern port of Valencia. Sanchez’s office issued a statement saying “it is our duty to avoid a humanitarian catastrophe and offer a secure port for these people.”

More than 100 unaccompanied minors and a number of pregnant women are on board the Aquarius. Six different rescue operations took place over the weekend off the coast of Libya, coordinated by the Italian coast guard. Medical workers had said food on board the ship was going to run out by Monday night.

Italy’s new deputy prime minister, Matteo Salvini, had said the country would not allow the ship to dock in any of its ports. Italy asked Malta to provide assistance to Aquarius because it was the nearest available port. But the small island nation’s prime minister, Joseph Muscat, refused.

Salvini, who also serves as Italy’s interior minister, has promised to change immigration policies in Italy, saying the new Italian government’s efforts will be aimed at guaranteeing peaceful lives for Africans in Africa and for Italians in their own country.

On a recent visit to the southern port of Pozzallo where many migrants have been arriving, Salvini said Italy is a member of international organizations such as the U.N. and NATO. And so, he asked why is it that in the Mediterranean and in North Africa there is not more concrete intervention to defend security?

More than 600,000 migrants have reached Italy by boat from Africa in the past five years. The new Italian government led by Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte has made it clear that the EU cannot continue to leave Italy to deal with the migrant crisis on its own.
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Spain says it will allow a rescue ship carrying more than 600 migrants picked up in the Mediterranean to dock in the eastern port of Valencia, after Italy’s new prime minister, who also leads the right-wing League party, ordered Italy’s ports to refuse entry to the rescue ship. The Aquarius rescue ship run by European charity SOS Mediterranee has been drifting in international waters with 629 migrants on board. More from Sabina Castlefranco in Rome.
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The White House is assailing Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, saying he “stabbed us in the back” and undermined U.S. President Donald Trump after Trump left the G-7 economic summit early for Singapore.

White House trade adviser Peter Navarro told Fox News, “There’s a special place in hell for any foreign leader that engages in bad-faith diplomacy with President Donald J. Trump and then tries to stab him in the back on the way out the door … that’s what bad faith Justin Trudeau did with that stunt press conference.”

Navarro added, “To my friends in Canada, that was one of the worst political miscalculations of the Canadian leader in modern Canadian history. All Justin Trudeau had to do was take the win.”

Trump left the Group of Seven summit in Quebec early Saturday to head to Singapore for his summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

After Trump left, Trudeau called new U.S. tariffs on aluminum and steel “insulting.”

“We leave and then he pulls this sophomoric political stunt for domestic consideration,” White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow told CNN. “You just don’t behave that way. It’s a betrayal.”

Kudlow said Trump negotiated the communique in “good faith,” and had called at the summit for “no tariffs, free trade.”

But Kudlow said Trump “gets up in a plane and then … Trudeau stabs him.” He said Trump “is not going to let a Canadian prime minister push him around.”

U.S. wouldn’t sign communique

While airborne, Trump ordered U.S. officials to refuse to sign the traditional end-of-summit communique.

“Based on Justin’s false statements at his news conference, and the fact that Canada is charging massive Tariffs to our U.S. farmers, workers, and companies, I have instructed our U.S. reps not to endorse the communique as we look at tariffs on automobiles flooding the U.S. market!” Trump said on Twitter.

“PM Justin Trudeau of Canada acted so meek and mild during our G7 meetings only to give a news conference after I left saying that, ‘US Tariffs were kind of insulting’ and he ‘will not be pushed around.’ Very dishonest & weak. Our Tariffs are in response to his of 270% on dairy!” he added.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel told ARD television that Trump’s withdrawal from the communique through a tweet is “sobering and a bit depressing.”

French President Emmanuel Macron attacked Trump’s stance, saying, “International cooperation cannot be dictated by fits of anger and throwaway remarks.” He called Trump’s refusal to sign the communique a display of “incoherence and inconsistency.”  

Trudeau did not respond to the U.S. attacks, instead declaring the summit a success.

“The historic and important agreement we all reached” at the summit “will help make our economies stronger and people more prosperous, protect our democracies, safeguard our environment, and protect women and girls’ rights around the world. That’s what matters,” Trudeau said.

But foreign minister Chrystia Freeland said, “Canada does not believe that ad hominem attacks are a particularly appropriate or useful way to conduct our relations with other countries.”

Canada refuses to budge

Trudeau closed the annual G-7 summit Saturday in Canada by refusing to budge on positions that place him at odds with Trump, particularly the new steel and aluminum tariffs that have drawn the ire of Canada and the European Union.

He said in closing remarks that Canada will proceed with retaliatory measures on U.S. goods as early as July 1.

“I highlighted directly to the president that Canadians did not take it lightly that the United States has moved forward with significant tariffs,” Trudeau said following the summit. “Canadians, we’re polite, we’re reasonable, but we will also not be pushed around.”

British Prime Minister Theresa May echoed Trudeau, pledging to retaliate for tariffs on EU goods.

“The loss of trade through tariffs undermines competition, reduces productivity, removes the incentive to innovate and ultimately makes everyone poorer,” May said. “And in response, the EU will impose countermeasures.”

U.S. Republican Sen. John McCain, a vocal Trump critic, offered support for the other six world leaders at the Canadian summit.

“To our allies,” McCain tweeted, “bipartisan majorities of Americans remain pro-free trade, pro-globalization & supportive of alliances based on 70 years of shared values. Americans stand with you, even if our president doesn’t.”

Trudeau and May also bucked Trump on another high-profile issue: Russia. Trump suggested Russia rejoin the group after being pushed out in 2014 when it annexed Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula. Trudeau said he is “not remotely interested” in having Russia rejoin the group.

May added, “We have agreed to stand ready to take further restrictive measures against Russia if necessary.”
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A human chain made of 175,000 people stretched 200 kilometers (124 miles) Sunday in a display to demand an independence vote for the Basque region in northern Spain.

The demonstrators linked hands and stretched their chain from the coastal resort of San Sebastian to the Basque capital of Vitoria.

Some used white scarves as part of the chain while others sang and danced in place.

“We want for our people to have the right to choose what it wants to be,” one demonstrator said.

The president of the Basque parliament said the marchers are an “active and lively people” who want to make decisions in a democratic way.

Pro-independence forces hope their chances for a referendum have gone up since the armed Basque separatist group ETA announced last month it is disbanding after 50 years and more than 800 killings.

Basques already enjoy wide autonomy in northern Spain and parts of southern France. However, some say they will not be satisfied by anything less than full independence.
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A private rescue ship carrying 629 migrants remained Sunday evening on a northward course in the Mediterranean Sea after more than a day of not receiving permission to dock in either Italy or the small island nation of Malta.

Aid group SOS Mediterranee said the passengers on its ship, the Aquarius, included 400 people who were picked up by the Italian navy, the country’s coast guard and private cargo ships and transferred. The rescue ship’s crew itself pulled 229 migrants from the water or from traffickers’ unseaworthy boats Saturday night, including 123 unaccompanied minors and seven pregnant women.

The Aquarius and its passengers were caught up in a crackdown swiftly implemented by the right-wing partner in Italy’s new populist government, which has vowed to stop the country from becoming the `’refugee camp of Europe.”

“Starting today, Italy, too, begins to say NO to the trafficking of human beings, NO to the business of clandestine immigration,” Interior Minister Matteo Salvini, leader of the anti-migrant League party, tweeted Sunday.

Salvini and Italian Transportation Minister Danilo Toninelli, who is part of the 5-Star Movement faction in the new government, said in a joint statement Sunday that it was Malta’s responsibility to “open its ports for the hundreds of the rescued on the NGO ship Aquarius.”

“The island can’t continue to turn the other way,” the ministers said. “The Mediterranean is the sea of all the countries that face it, and it [Malta] can’t imagine that Italy will continue to face this giant phenomenon in solitude.”

The Maltese government, however, was not moved. It said in a statement that the Aquarius took on the passengers in waters controlled by Libya and where Italian authorities in Rome coordinate search-and-rescue operations.

The Maltese Rescue Coordination Center “is neither the competent nor the coordinating authority,” the statement said.

SOS Mediterranee spokeswoman Mathilde Auvillain told The Associated Press the ship was `’heading north following instructions received after the rescues and transfers” Saturday night. The Rome-based rescue coordination center gave the instructions.

The aid group said in a statement it had taken “good note” of Salvini’s stance, as reported earlier by Italian media. It added that the Aquarius “is still waiting for definitive instructions regarding the port of safety.”

SOS Mediterranee said Maltese search-and-rescue authorities were contacted by their Italian counterparts “to find the best solution for the well-being and safety” of the people on the ship.

Other migrant boats

Farther west in the Mediterranean, Spain’s maritime rescue service saved 334 migrants and recovered four bodies from boats it intercepted trying to reach Europe over the weekend. The rescue service said its patrol craft reached nine different boats carrying migrants that had left from Africa on Saturday and early Sunday.

One boat found Sunday was carrying four bodies along with 49 migrants. The cause of death was yet to be determined.

To the east, Libya’s coast guard intercepted 152 migrants, including women and children, from two boats stopped in the Mediterranean off the coast of the western Zuwara district Saturday. The migrants were taken to a naval base in Tripoli.

Human rights groups oppose returning rescued migrants to Libya, where many are held in inhumane conditions, poorly fed and often forced to do slave labor.

Libya was plunged into chaos following a 2011 uprising. The lawlessness in Libya has made it a popular place for migrants to try to depart for Europe.

Driven by violent conflicts and extreme poverty, hundreds of thousands of migrants have reached southern Europe in recent years by crossing the Mediterranean in smugglers’ boats that often are unseaworthy.

The United Nations says at least 785 migrants have died crossing the sea this year.
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Britain’s biggest companies will from 2020 be legally required to publish the gap between the salaries of their chief executives and what they pay their average U.K. workers, under proposed government rules.

Business Minister Greg Clark said that the government would set out new laws in Parliament on Monday directing that U.K.-listed companies with more than 250 employees would have to reveal their pay gaps and justify their CEOs’ salaries.

“We understand the anger of workers and shareholders when bosses’ pay is out of step with company performance,” Clark said in a statement Sunday.

He said the new laws would improve transparency and boost accountability for both shareholders and workers, as well as helping to “build a fairer economy.”

The new measures, which are subject to parliamentary approval, are part of the government’s “Industrial Strategy” and would come into effect January 1, 2019, meaning companies would start reporting in 2020.

When these rules were first proposed last year, they were criticized by union leaders, who said they fell short of Prime Minister Theresa May’s promise early on in her tenure to tackle soaring executive pay.

‘Unacceptable face’ of capitalism

She came to power after the 2016 Brexit vote vowing to tackle what she called the “unacceptable face” of capitalism, including pay gaps and mismanaged takeovers, which had driven a wedge between British bosses and their workers.

But some campaigners and investors have questioned whether the greater transparency provided by disclosures about boss-to-worker pay ratios would be enough to force companies to curb pay excesses.

Matthew Fell, chief U.K. policy director at the Confederation of British Industry, a British employers group, said that the new legislation would help develop a better dialogue between boards and employees.

“What’s most important is that all businesses make progress towards fair and proportionate pay outcomes,” he said.

While Luke Hildyard, director of the High Pay Center, a think tank, said the insight into pay ratios would be useful to investors, workers and wider society.

“We hope that it will initiate a more informed debate about what represents fair, proportionate pay for workers at all levels,” he said.

The plan to make public the worker-to-boss pay gap comes after May has already implemented rules to highlight pay discrepancies between genders.

Earlier this year, all U.K. companies with 250 or more employees had to publish details of the salary difference between male and female employees. They will report back annually on that pay gap.
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Police in the Kurdistan region of Iraq said Saturday that a 20-year-old

Iraqi man had admitted killing a 14-year-old girl in Germany, where the case has stoked the immigration debate.

The body of Susanna Feldman, of Mainz, near Frankfurt, was found Wednesday in a wooded area in Wiesbaden, near a refugee center where the alleged attacker had lived, German police said.

An autopsy showed she had been the victim of a violent and sexual attack. Feldman was Jewish, but police said there was no evidence her religion had been a factor in the attack, and the Central Council of Jews in Germany

cautioned against attributing any anti-Semitic motive.

German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer said Kurdish security forces had taken the suspect, identified by German authorities as Ali Bashar, into custody Friday.

“Officers in Zakho [in Iraq’s semiautonomous Kurdish region] called me and said they had located the suspect and would arrest him as soon as he comes to the city,” Dohuk city police chief Tariq Ahmed told Reuters. “He had been staying at a hotel in Dohuk and after realizing the police were after him left for Zakho to stay at a relative’s house. He was asleep there at night and was arrested in that house at 5:30 [a.m.],” Ahmed said.

Confession

He said the suspect, during interrogation by Kurdish security authorities, had confessed to killing the German teenager. 

“The girl was a friend of his. They went on a trip to the woods and there they consumed a lot of alcohol and drugs, then got into a dispute and the girl tried to call the police,” Ahmed said. “The suspect became afraid because she was under 18 and he knew if the police came it would be a major charge.”

Ahmed added: “He tried to convince her not to call the police but she insisted, so he choked her and buried her beneath the dirt.”

German media reported earlier that Bashar was expected to be extradited to Germany on Saturday. German federal police declined to comment on the details emerging from the suspect’s arrest or on the report on the timing of extradition.

Chancellor Angela Merkel expressed her dismay at the crime and said it should be a reminder to Germans of the need to do whatever possible for the integration of immigrants.

“The incredible suffering experienced by the family, the victim, affects everyone, including me,” she said on the sidelines of a G-7 summit meeting in Canada.

“The cooperation in this regard between German and Kurdish security authorities worked well here. … It is good that the alleged perpetrator was caught, that he probably also will be returning to Germany,” Merkel said.

She added, “This is a reminder to all of us, first, to take the task of integration very seriously, to make our common values very clear, again and again. But also to punish any crime. We can only live together if we all stick to our laws.”

Merkel’s decision to take in large numbers of asylum seekers during Europe’s 2015 migrant crisis has stirred a political backlash, with many politicians calling for new rules to make it easier to deport immigrants.

Bashar had been living in Germany as a refugee since 2015, German media have reported.

German police set up a special call center for tips from the public and issued releases in Arabic and Turkish. They said on Thursday that Bashar had most likely fled to Irbil in the Kurdistan Regional Government.
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Gena Turgel, a Holocaust survivor who comforted Anne Frank at the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp before the young diarist’s death and the camp’s liberation a month later, has died. She was 95.

Turgel died Thursday, Britain’s chief rabbi, Ephraim Mirvis, said on Twitter. The news triggered tributes from some of the people the Polish native touched in the decades she shared her World War II experiences, including witnessing the horrors of the Nazi camps at Auschwitz, Buchenwald and Bergen-Belsen.

After World War II, Turgel married one of Bergen-Belsen’s British liberators, Norman Turgel, earning the nickname “The Bride of Belsen.” Her wedding dress, made from parachute silk, is part of the collection of the Imperial War Museum in London.

Turgel attended Britain’s annual Holocaust remembrance event two months ago, sitting in a wheelchair with a blanket draped over her knees.

“My story is the story of one survivor, but it is also the story of 6 million who perished,” she said at the event in London’s Hyde Park. “Maybe that’s why I was spared — so my testimony would serve as a memorial, like that candle that I light, for the men, women and children who have no voice.” 

Born in Krakow, Poland, as Gena Goldfinger on Feb. 1, 1923, Turgel and her family were forced to move into a Jewish ghetto with only a sack of potatoes, some flour and a few belongings in late 1941. One brother was shot by SS police and another disappeared after trying to escape, according to the Holocaust Educational Trust in London.

A sister of hers was shot while trying to smuggle food into a labor camp. In January 1945, Turgel and her mother were forced into a death march from Auschwitz, leaving her remaining sister behind.

‘I can still see that face’

It was in a hospital at Bergen-Belsen, where the 22-year-old Turgel arrived in February, that she cared for Anne Frank as the 15-year-old girl was dying from typhus.

“I washed her face, gave her water to drink, and I can still see that face, her hair and how she looked,” Turgel once told the BBC.

Turgel published a memoir, I Light a Candle, in 1987 and kept retelling her story in schools across Britain until the end of her life.

Turgel’s story “was difficult to hear and difficult for her to tell, but no one who heard her speak will ever forget,” said Karen Pollock, chief executive of the Holocaust Educational Trust.

London Mayor Sadiq Khan said he met Turgel at the Hyde Park event in April and was “inspired by her lifelong commitment to educating people about the horrors of the Holocaust.”

“Let us hope for a better future where anti-Semitism and all hatred should be demolished, shouldn’t be tolerated,” Turgel said at the time. “And I do beg you, don’t forget those who are less fortunate than yourselves.”

She is survived by her three children, as well as grandchildren and great grandchildren.
…

Prince Harry and his new wife, the former actress Meghan Markle, joined the pageantry of the annual Trooping the Color ceremony Saturday in London to celebrate Queen Elizabeth II’s official birthday.

The duke and duchess, who married three weeks ago, made the short trip from Buckingham Palace to Horse Guards Parade in a horse-drawn carriage as royal fans lining the Mall cheered and waved. After the event, the couple joined other members of the royal family on the palace’s front balcony to watch the Royal Air Force fly by.

The 92-year-old queen, who recently had a successful cataract operation, watched the ceremony from a dais and inspected the lines of guardsmen in bearskin hats and scarlet tunics who offered her tributes. Her husband, Prince Philip, has retired from royal duties and did not attend.

The ceremony originated from traditional preparations for battle. Flags, or colors, were “trooped” so soldiers in the ranks would be able to recognize them.

The Queen’s actual birthday is April 21.
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Pope Francis has told the world’s oil executives that a transition to less-polluting energy sources “is a challenge of epochal proportions.”

On the last day of a two-day conference Saturday, the Roman Catholic leader urged the executives to provide electricity to the one billion people who are without it, but said that process must be done in a way that avoids “creating environmental imbalances resulting in deterioration and pollution gravely harmful to our human family, both now and in the future.”

Reuters reports the unprecedented conference was held behind closed doors at the Pontifical Academy of Sciences.

The news agency says the oil executives, investors and Vatican experts who attended the summit, believe, like the pope does, that science supports the notion that climate change is caused by human activity and that global warming must be curbed.

Pope Francis told the conference, “Our desire to ensure energy for all must not lead to the undesired effect of a spiral of extreme climate changes due to a catastrophic rise in global temperatures, harsher environments and increased levels of poverty.”

 
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Plastic and chemical pollution has been detected in most samples of snow and seawater taken by researchers in Antarctica, said the nongovernmental environmental group Greenpeace.

Greenpeace scientists gathered water and snow samples from the southernmost continent during a voyage from January to March of this year. Laboratory analysis revealed humanity’s footprint on this most remote corner of the globe.

“It was about one microplastic piece at least per liter. When you think of extrapolating that out to the scale of the Antarctic Ocean, it’s really, really significant. And previously we thought that the Antarctic Ocean might sort of be protected by the currents around it, as a sort of barrier to the plastic pollution that’s a scourge in so much of the world’s oceans. But now evidence is increasingly showing that that may not be the case,” Greenpeace’s Louisa Casson said.

Chemicals

In addition to very small pieces of plastic, the research revealed the presence of chemicals known as per- and polyfluorinated alkylated substances, which are widely used in industrial processes and linked to reproductive and developmental problems for wildlife.

“This just strengthens the rationale for why we need to be taking action on land to stop that flow of plastic into the ocean, but also creating huge ocean sanctuaries at sea to allow wildlife to recover from these pressures,” Casson said.

​Tons of plastics

The United Nations estimates 8 million tons of plastic are dumped into the ocean every year. Its effects were illustrated several days ago in southern Thailand, where a stranded pilot whale died having ingested 80 pieces of plastic rubbish weighing 8 kilograms.

The tide may be slowly turning as global concern grows. India’s prime minister, Narendra Modi, recently pledged to ban all single-use plastic by 2022. In the shadow of megacity Mumbai, Bollywood movie stars have been joining litter pickup sessions at Versova beach, among them actress Abigail Pande.

“I am having fun [cleaning this place]. But it is also very sad because once I came here, I got to know that the amount of waste is so high that if you dig the ground 4 feet, you will still find plastic inside. And it will take years to properly clean the beach,” Pande told reporters Sunday.

Plastic has now been found in every corner of the world’s oceans, from the depths of the Pacific Mariana Trench to Antarctica.

In October, world governments will decide on a European Union proposal to create an Antarctic Ocean sanctuary. At 1.8 million square kilometers, it would be the largest protected area on Earth.
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Belgium, the Dominican Republic, Germany, Indonesia and South Africa have been elected to two-year terms on the U.N. Security Council.

The five will join the 15-nation body responsible for maintaining international peace and security on Jan. 1, 2019.

The vote Friday in the U.N. General Assembly generated little suspense, as all but one regional group ran a clean slate. The only contested seat was in the Asian-Pacific group, where Indonesia overwhelming beat Maldives 144-46.

Member states cast secret ballots and candidates must win a two-thirds majority of votes to succeed, even if they are running uncontested. Candidate countries capped off their campaigns with parties in the lead-up to the election.

Reaction

Lindiwe Sisulu, International Relations Minister of South Africa, welcomed her country’s opportunity to sit on the council for a third time. South Africa has served two previous terms in 2007-’08 and 2011-’12.

She said her government would advocate for closer cooperation between the council and the African Union, and address its efforts toward conflict prevention and resolution, peacekeeping and peacebuilding.

“We believe that peace cannot be achieved without the participation of women — in peace negotiations, peacekeeping operations, and post-conflict peace-building and governance,” Sisulu told reporters. “During our tenure, we will ensure that a gender perspective is mainstreamed into all Security Council resolutions,” she added.

Indonesian foreign minister Retno Marsudi welcomed her country’s victory over “good friend” the Maldives. She said her government’s priorities would include combating terrorism and radicalism through developing a comprehensive global approach that addresses the root causes of the problem.

Germany has served on the council five times before and would like to see the Security Council’s membership expanded to include a permanent seat for it.

“This is an especially important opportunity for Germany, which has sometimes punched below its weight at the U.N.,” Richard Gowan, a fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations and a U.N. analyst, told VOA. “In the past, Britain and France have been the decisive European players at the U.N., but Brexit means that Germany will need to step up and speak for Europe more forcefully at the UN,” he added.

Abandoned candidacy

Israel had originally sought a seat on the council, but withdrew its candidacy on May 4, saying it was “postponing” it after consulting with its partners and friends. It was seeking one of two available seats in the “Western Europe and Others Group” and was competing against Belgium and Germany.

Israel has never held a seat on the council and analyst Gowan says it “was always a long shot” which was upended by the current crisis in the Gaza Strip.

“I think that the Israelis will be pretty comfortable that the U.S. has their back in the Security Council,” Gowan added. U.S. Ambassador Nikki Haley has been a vocal defender of Israel against what she says is the U.N.’s anti-Israel bias. She has wielded the U.S. veto twice in the past six months in Israel’s favor in the council.

Council dynamics

Countries joining the council are doing so at a difficult moment.

“Tensions between Russia and the West are starting to paralyze the organization,” Gowan said. “The temporary members are often powerless when the permanent five are divided.” But he notes that some recent elected members, including Sweden and Australia, have won respect for breaking impasses with compromises on issues such as humanitarian aid in Syria.

The five new council members will replace Bolivia, Ethiopia, Kazakhstan, Netherlands and Sweden, whose terms end Dec. 31, 2018. They will join the other nonpermanent members — Cote d’Ivoire, Equatorial Guinea, Kuwait, Peru and Poland — as well as the permanent five — Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States.
…

The United Nations is asking the international community to help millions of refugees and displaced people in Africa’s Lake Chad Basin. The Boko Haram insurgency is mainly responsible for a crisis that has left huge numbers vulnerable to hunger, malnutrition and violence.

The Lake Chad Basin is into the ninth year of a humanitarian crisis that does not appear to be easing.

The United Nations has appealed for $1.5 billion to provide life-saving aid for some 7.8 million people in Nigeria, Cameroon, Chad and Niger. Though half of the year has gone by, only one third of this urgently-needed money has been received.

The region’s four U.N. humanitarian coordinators came to Geneva this week to brief member states about the emergency facing people in the area and to plead for them not to be neglected and forgotten.

Humanitarian coordinator for Niger, Bintou Djibo, described the suffering of civilians who lack protection and run many risks in this insecure, lawless region.

“Millions of innocent women, children and men are at risk of human rights violations including kidnappings, killings, rape and sexual exploitation and abuse,” he said. “Across the region, people continue to be displaced from their homes either due to conflict, food insecurity or the effect of climate change.”

The United Nations reports 2.4 million people remain displaced because of the nine-year-old Boko Haram insurgency. It said five million people are seriously short of food and require assistance.

Djibo said malnutrition is widespread and life-threatening.

“Children are always the most vulnerable in any humanitarian crisis,” he said. “Nearly half a million children under five years are suffering from severe acute malnutrition.Without treatment, they risk death.”

Protection needs are particularly acute within Nigeria, where Boko Haram militants continue to wreak havoc with the population.

The humanitarian coordinator for Nigeria, Edward Kallon, told VOA Boko Haram is still very active, though it has changed its tactics, concentrating on suicide bombings instead of large-scale attacks.

“Boko Haram is still a potent force,” he said. “There is a lot of rhetoric that the war has been won, but the practical experience we have in the field is that it is becoming very much asymmetrical warfare and they are all scattered in small splinter groups, which makes them more potent and very risky for international staff.”

The U.N. humanitarian coordinator for Cameroon, Allegra Balocchi, said all countries in the Lake Chad Basin are affected in different degrees by this group.

“All our countries have had several hundreds if not thousands of surrender-ees — Boko Haram coming out and wanting to be given another option.I think the countries have taken advantage of this in different ways,” she said.  “I speak for Cameroon and I think we are a bit late in trying to pull together a demobilization and a stabilization strategy. So, that remains a priority.”

U.N. officials agree Boko Haram will not be defeated militarily. They say the root causes must be tackled, especially the poverty and lack of development in the four countries that have pushed many into joining the militant group.
…

French President Emmanuel Macron is seeking to take the lead of the European brigade against U.S. President Donald Trump at the summit of the Group of Seven wealthy countries in Canada.

Macron called a meeting Friday with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, British Prime Minister Theresa May, new Italian Premier Giuseppe Conte and top EU officials just before the G-7 opening.

He told reporters the United States’ attitude must lead other nations to “reforge the European front.”

European leaders criticize the U.S. decision to impose protectionist tariffs on steel and aluminum and to exit the Iran nuclear deal and the Paris climate agreement.

Tweeting in English, Macron stressed: “No leader is eternal. We inherit commitments which are beyond us. We take them on. That is the life of nations.”

Macron launched the offensive on Thursday at a joint news conference with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

Adopting an unusually sharp tone about one of France’s closest allies, Macron rejected the idea of an American “hegemony”.

“The other countries of the G-6 are a larger market than the American market,” Macron said. “Maybe it doesn’t bother the American president to be isolated, but it doesn’t bother us to be six if need be.”

European Council President Donald Tusk, who will attend the meeting of EU leaders, said in the New York Times this week “Europe must now do everything in its power to protect the trans-Atlantic bond, in spite of today’s mood. But at the same time we must be prepared for scenarios in which we will have to act on our own.”

Macron’s initiative comes six weeks after Macron and Trump exhibited their friendship at a state visit in Washington – with exaggerated handshakes and a pair of kisses.

The two leaders talked on the phone last week after Trump announced U.S. tariffs on European goods. Macron declined to disclose details of the discussion after an unnamed source told CNN television it went badly.

He instead repeated the famous line attributed to 19th-century German statesman Otto von Bismarck about laws and sausages: ” ‘It’s best not to see them being made.’ ”

And he promised a `”frank and direct discussion'” with Trump in Canada.

 
…

NATO defense ministers on Thursday unveiled plans for expanded military reinforcements by having the ability to deploy 30 troop battalions, 30 squadrons of aircraft and 30 warships within 30 days to any conflict on the European mainland.

Details of the U.S.-drafted plan remain unclear, though ministers said they aim to have it logistically operational no later than 2020.

The ministers also announced plans to strengthen its new command structure by more than 1,200 personnel spread across a new Atlantic command center based in Norfolk, Virginia, and a mainland Europe conflict logistics headquarters in Ulm, Germany. 

Briefly putting aside what NATO’s chief said were “serious differences” within the 29-member alliance, ministers agreed to a plan to protect the North Atlantic against increased Russian naval strength, move troops more quickly across Europe and have more combat-ready battalions, ships and planes.

Notably absent from Thursday’s ministerial debates: a recent White House decision to target Europe on trade, which may further raise tensions in the trans-Atlantic alliance.

The European Union, along with Canada and Mexico, have expressed irritation over new U.S. tariffs of 25 percent on steel and 10 percent on aluminum, which the administration of President Donald Trump has levied on national security grounds.

“There are differences related to issues like trade, the Iran nuclear deal and climate change,” NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg told reporters.

“We have disagreements between NATO allies but we stand together in NATO when it comes to the core task of NATO … to protect each other.”

July summit agenda

Another challenge facing the alliance are efforts to expand membership in Eastern Europe, where Russia has long opposed NATO’s presence.

Increasing from 12 to 29 member nations through seven rounds of enlargement since 1949, NATO recently updated its website to include four countries that have declared their intent to join the alliance ahead of the July 11 summit. Those nations include Ukraine, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Georgia, and Macedonia

In a May visit to the White House, Secretary Stoltenberg said expansion will help strengthen the alliance. 

“We live in a more unpredictable world, we need a strong NATO, and we need to invest more in our security,” he said in an interview with VOA.

Former Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, the U.S. permanent representative to NATO, said the United States is working to help applicant nations meet the requirements for membership.

“We are there to give them the standards, to help them get there, and that’s what the open door policy is,” she said.

Former NATO deputy secretary general Alexander Vershbow, however, said countering malign Russian influence in the Balkans will remain a vital part of securing membership, citing recent evidence of Russian meddling in Macedonia’s domestic politics.

“Russians are perhaps more persistent and little bit more unscrupulous in their methods, but they have been long trying to discourage Western Balkan countries from joining NATO,” he told VOA. “Macedonia, I think, is the prime target right now, because the possibility of breakthrough between Macedonia and Greece on the name issue opens the way to possible negotiations on membership even this year.”

Greece opposes Macedonia’s name, saying it amounts to a territorial claim on a synonymous northern Greek region. Western involvement in the name dispute could ease Macedonia’s entry into NATO, but only if the country can meet the alliance’s strict requirements.

Matthew Nimetz, UN moderator on the Greek-Macedonian name dispute, told VOA that recent talks on the issue were productive.

“These were very workmanlike talks,” he said of recent meetings in New York. “The issues are well defined. The issues have been narrowed. We still don’t have a final resolution of the issues, but both sides are determined to do enough to try to reach an agreement and are working very hard to do that.”

Another key requirement for membership: a pledge to spend at least 2 percent of a country’s gross domestic product on defense.

Only five member nations — the Greece, Britain, Estonia, Poland, and the United States — currently meet that requirement.

Upon arriving in office, Trump repeatedly criticized NATO member countries for not contributing their fair share to the alliance. In a 2017 speech to NATO members, he failed to reiterate the U.S. commitment to NATO’s Article 5 pledge of mutual defense, rattling NATO allies.

The White House on Wednesday said President Donald Trump will travel to Brussels to attend a NATO summit scheduled for July 11-12, followed by a July 13 visit to Britain.

This story originated in VOA’s Macedonian Service. 
…

Russian President Vladimir Putin held his annual televised call-in show with Russians on Thursday in a semi-choreographed event that highlighted the Russian president’s efforts to raise living standards at home while defending Russian interests abroad. 

Amid Putin’s 18-year rule, the so-called “Direct Line” has emerged as a key symbol of Russia’s top-down system of government, in which Putin often sits as the sole arbiter of problems befalling citizens of the world’s largest country.

State media claimed that Russians submitted over 2.5 million questions to the Russian leader on topics ranging from health care to gas prices, pension payments, mortgage rates and much, much more. 

Despite a grueling live answering session before cameras, the limits of that format were also on display: Putin fielded under a hundred questions in just under 4.5 hours. 

Good (economics) vibrations

As anticipated, domestic issues dominated the session. 

Indeed, Putiin claimed improving Russians’ lives was his priority after a landslide re-election last March that was marred by accusations of vote tampering but secured Putin’s rule through 2024. 

Addressing the economy early on, Putin argued that Russia’s finances were “on the right path” and re-emphasized campaign calls that — despite western sanctions — Russia was poised for “breakthroughs” in its development. 

“Overall, we are heading in the right direction,” said Putin. “We have started on the trajectory toward robust economic growth in Russia. Yes, this growth is modest, small, but it is also not falling backward.”

The Russian leader again touched on a campaign pledge to halve Russia’s poverty rate in his next, and — in theory — final six-year term. 

Asked by the event’s moderator whether the current government — whose leadership has gone largely unchanged from his previous term  — was capable of reaching that goal, Putin assured the “government team was optimal.” 

Foreign policy classics 

The event also contained Putin’s well-worn barbs against the West — with the United States, in particular, a long favorite target.  

Putin said that U.S. allies in Europe — currently engaged in a tariff showdown with the Trump administration — were slowly warming to the message he’d been delivering for years: U.S. foreign and economic policy was aimed at extending American power at the expense of the rest of the world. 

“It appears our partners thought that this would never affect them, this counterproductive politics of restrictions and sanctions,” said Putin. “But now we are seeing that this is happening.”

Putin also accused the U.S. of fueling a Cold War-style arms race by abandoning key nuclear arms treaties, while expressing hope that the threat of mutual annihilation would continue to play a deterrent role. 

“The understanding that a third world war could be the end of civilization should restrain us,” said the Russian leader.

In a related exchange, Putin assured that a new generation of Russian super weapons — unveiled by Putin in a high-profile speech before Russia’s Federal Council last March — were largely now operational and ready to defend Russia, despite doubts from outside experts.

 Hot wars

Russia’s very real conflicts also figured prominently.  

In Ukraine, where Russia has been engaged in a simmering proxy war since 2014, Putin suggested the government in Kyiv would pay a heavy price if rumors of a planned summer offensive against Russian-backed rebels in the country’s east proved true.  

“If this happens, I think it would have very serious consequences for the Ukrainian government in general,” said Putin. 

When asked about Russia’s ongoing military campaign in Syria, Putin argued Russia’s military had gained valuable experience from participating in the Syrian conflict but seemed to walk back earlier repeated calls for a large-scale withdrawal of Russian forces. 

“Our soldiers are there in order to secure Russia’s interests in this critically important part of the world, which is so near to us. And they will stay there, for as long as it is in Russia’s interest for them to do so.”

Same old same old

Given this was the 16th Direct Line over the course of Putin’s rule, the event had an air of predictability that even the Russian president seemed to acknowledge. On several occasions, Putin noted several topics had been raised in past call-in programs.  

When asked whether he had chosen a possible successor, the Russian leader again demurred, noting it was a “traditional question.”

Yet the event was not without at least some surprises. For the first time, a live studio audience was jettisoned in favor of video and phone appeals fielded by young pro-Kremlin “volunteers.” 

Key governors and ministers were also a new part of the show, remaining on a direct video feed to address problems in real time — and occasionally faced admonishment from the president — when policies clashed with realities on the ground.

Informed theater

Debate has long simmered over just how choreographed the Direct Line truly is.  Obvious propaganda-style cutaways to highlight the government’s achievements mix with genuine complaints to create an atmosphere of what some called “informed theater.” 

Adding to that blur were screens in the background that posed apparently unfiltered — and occasionally uncomfortable — questions to the Russian leader.

“Why is there money for tanks, bombs, planes and machine guns, but no money for the people?” went one text message that appeared briefly on screen.

If Putin saw the prompt, it went unacknowledged.  

Regardless, the Russian leader looked far more comfortable than he was during a recent interview with Austria’s national ORF channel in which Putin repeatedly grew testy over the journalist’s line of inquiry and repeated follow-up questions. 

Direct Line offered none of that, and Putin seemed to enjoy the comfortable questions from Russian state media hosts.   

“Vladimir Putin, you received a record level of support during the last elections. Do you feel lonely at the top of political Olympus? Lonely without any competitors or competition?”  

“No, I’m not lonely,” he replied, adding, “I have my team.”  

With that, the Russian leader stared at the screen. 
…