Світ

Ireland’s prime minister called for the urgent restoration of Northern Ireland’s power-sharing government Monday after talks to end a year-long political stalemate broke down yet again last week.

Both the British and Irish governments have said they want to get the talks back on track but neither have suggested when Irish nationalists Sinn Fein and the pro-British Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) should return to the negotiating table.

The British province has been without a devolved executive for over a year since Sinn Fein withdrew from the compulsory coalition with their arch-rivals that has been central to a 1998 peace deal that ended three decades of violence there.

“The [Irish] government will continue to engage with the parties in Northern Ireland and the British government to support the urgent formation of a new executive,” Varadkar said in a statement after meeting with Sinn Fein and speaking to British Prime Minister Theresa May by phone.

Before meeting Varadkar, Sinn Fein leader Mary Lou McDonald said there should be no delay in resuming talks that she and both governments believe were close to a successful outcome before the DUP pulled out over a disagreement on additional rights for Irish-language speakers.

DUP leader Arlene Foster reiterated her call for London to take further financial control of the region, saying her party remained committed to devolution “but not at any price.”

Britain has already had to take steps toward governing the region directly for the first time in a decade and many fear a return to full British direct rule would further destabilize a delicate balance between nationalists and unionists.

Britain has said it is absolutely committed to restoring the power-sharing administration and Varadkar repeated on Monday that his government did not want to see the introduction of direct rule across the border.
…

Latvian Prime Minister Maris Kucinskis assured the country and Europe “there is no sign of danger,” after anti-corruption police arrested the head of the Latvian central bank Saturday.

“For now, neither I, nor any other official, has any reason to interfere with the work of the Corruption Prevention Bureau,” Kucinskis said.

Neither Kucinskis nor the police gave any reason why central bank governor Ilmars Rimsevics was arrested. But a police spokeswoman said there will be an announcement “as soon as possible.”

The Latvian government plans an emergency meeting Monday.

Along with heading the Baltic nation’s central bank, Rimsevics is also one of 19 governors on the European Central Bank.

The U.S. Treasury Department has proposed sanctions against a major Latvian bank for alleged money laundering linked to North Korea’s weapons program.
…

Vandals spray painted swastikas on the Polish embassy in Tel Aviv after Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki talked about what he called “Jewish perpetrators” of the Holocaust.

Israeli leaders immediately condemned his comment. The prime minister was responding to a reporter’s question about Poland’s new law punishing anyone who calls the Nazi genocide a “Polish crime.”

“Saying that our people collaborate with the Nazis is a new low,” Israeli President Reuven Rivlin said at a conference Sunday. “We stand together, hand in hand, in this fight. We have to stand strong for the memory of our brothers and sisters murdered in the Shoah (Hebrew for the Holocaust). But today, more than ever, we must work to educate the world, even some of the leaders, about that dark time.”

Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said he spoke with his Polish counterpart by telephone Sunday, telling him “a comparison between the activities of Poles and the activities of Jews during the Holocaust is unfounded.”

Ronald Lauder, head of the World Jewish Congress, called Morawiecki’s comment some of the “very worst form of anti-Semitism and Holocaust obfuscation.”

A reporter at the Munich Security Conference Saturday asked Morawiecki if under the new law, he could be jailed for telling the story of how neighbors betrayed his mother’s family in Poland to the Nazis.

“Of course it’s not going to be seen as criminal to say that there were Polish perpetrators, as there were Jewish perpetrators, as there were Russian perpetrators, as there were Ukrainian, not only German perpetrators,”  Morawiecki replied.

He did not elaborate on who he regards as “Jewish perpetrators.” But he tweeted Sunday, “Dialogue about this most difficult history is necessary as a warning. We will conduct such dialogue with Israel.”

“The Holocaust, the genocide of Jews committed by Nazi Germans, was an extremely terrifying crime,” he further wrote. “There were also individuals who by collaborating with Nazi Germans, showed the darkest side of human nature.”

A Morawiecki spokesman said the prime minister was in no way trying to deny the Holocaust.

About 6 million Poles, half of them Jews, were murdered during World War II by Hitler and the Nazis.
…

Britain was hit by its biggest earthquake in a decade Saturday, the British Geological Survey (BGS) said, with tremors felt across parts of Wales and southwest England but no notable damage reported.

The BGS said the quake was of magnitude 4.4, with an epicenter 20 km (12.5 miles) north of the Welsh city of Swansea, adding that it was the biggest quake in the Britain since 2008.

Earthquakes are not common in Britain and are rarely powerful. The 2008 quake in Market Rasen, northeast England, was magnitude 5.2, or 16 times more powerful than Saturday’s quake.

However, Saturday’s earthquake in Wales was felt as far away as Carisbrooke Castle on the Isle of Wight, more than 200 km (125 miles) away.

Videos on social media showed people gathered outside Swansea University, which was holding an open day, after an apparent evacuation.

“Thank you to everyone who attended our visit day. We hoped that you had a surprisingly ‘earth moving’ experience!” Swansea University said on Twitter.
…

Spain has assumed a pivotal role in pressuring Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro to change his regime’s “barbaric” course, according to Spanish diplomats who spoke to VOA on condition of anonymity.

Venezuela’s crisis reached major dimensions last week as hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans made an exodus to neighboring countries, escaping the hyperinflation, food shortages and rampant violence prevailing over what used to be South America’s wealthiest oil producer.

Spain has openly pushed for sanctions by the European Union that target Maduro and his top officials in a move that led to the expulsion of the Spanish ambassador and insults against Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy. Maduro called him a U.S. lackey.

Venezuelan state media reported that the measures restricting travel and business in Europe by seven top Venezuelan officials were hatched in discussions Rajoy held with U.S. President Donald Trump in Washington last September.

The U.S. has placed sanctions on more than 20 individuals in Venezuela, including politicians and government contractors, since repression of opponents to the Maduro government intensified last July.

U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson brought up the possibility of placing an embargo on Venezuelan oil sales during a recent swing through Latin America. He even hinted the U.S. might welcome a military coup.

Coup denials

Rajoy’s predecessor, Jose Maria Aznar, backed a coup against Maduro’s mentor, Hugo Chavez, when he was in power. But Spanish officials deny that anything similar is taking place now.

“Spain’s support for sanctions did not result from any consultation with Washington,” a Spanish foreign ministry official told VOA. “It’s strictly between Spain and the EU. Our main concern is the Venezuelan people and standing up for democratic principles.”

Spain will lobby for expanding the sanctions at an EU foreign ministers meeting Monday in Brussels where Venezuela is on the agenda, according to a Spanish diplomatic expert on Venezuela.

The source also said Spain has worked to isolate Venezuela among some Latin American governments, which excluded Maduro from a regional summit last week in Lima, Peru.

When EU sanctions were adopted in January, Spanish Foreign Minister Alfonso Dastis said they were an “incentive to help negotiations” between Maduro and the opposition party, which were mediated by former socialist Spanish Prime Minister Rodriguez Zapatero.

Zapatero’s eagerness to seal an agreement has been criticized by opponents of Maduro, who say he tried to pressure them into participating in presidential elections scheduled for next April that are seen as loaded in Maduro’s favor.

“Zapatero went from being an impartial arbiter to acting as a lawyer for the regime,” said Caracas Mayor Antonio Ledezma, who escaped from his Venezuelan house arrest to Spain last December. He was personally received by Rajoy.

​Deep ties

Spain’s ties with Venezuela run deep. Spaniards compose one of the country’s largest expatriate communities, numbering about 300,000. The Spanish oil company Repsol has invested more than $2 billion in Venezuela, and it continues operating oil and gas fields there.

But the leverage could go both ways. Venezuela appears to have some political influence with Spain’s mainstream socialist party PSOE, whose spokesmen criticized the news media for giving “too much” coverage to opposition protests at the time that Zapatero assumed his mediation role.

Venezuela also has contributed money to the far left group Podemos, which has been Spain’s third-largest political force and blocked a congressional resolution condemning Maduro’s power grab.

Podemos was joined in opposing the motion by the Catalan Leftist Republic party (ERC), one of the main pro-independence groups in Catalonia that may head the next regional government.

In an apparent tit for tat, Maduro has demanded the release of jailed ERC leader Oriol Junqueras and attacked Spain for trying to block an Oct. 1 referendum on Catalan independence.

Cyberoffensive

Venezuelan state channels joined a Russian cyberoffensive promoting Catalan separatism through social media.

According to Spanish Defense Minister Maria Dolores de Cospedal, 32 percent of robot social media accounts used to amplify the separatist movement were based in Venezuela and connected with Maduro’s ruling PSUV.

The head of the radical separatist Catalan Unity Party (CUP), Ana Gabriel, who is to appear in court next week to answer charges of rebellion, has been in Venezuela campaigning for Maduro.

The Spanish government is investigating funds linked to members of the Venezuelan government that were deposited in Andorra, an independent archdiocese bordering northern Spain.

But experts don’t expect relations between Madrid and Caracas to be radically altered by the growing tensions.

“We know that Maduro is taking Venezuela toward being another Cuba and is very close to achieving it,” a Spanish diplomatic analyst said. “But we will keep talking to Maduro the same way that we keep talking to Putin.”

Ledezma said he asked Rajoy to use his influence with Venezuela to open a corridor for humanitarian aid proposed by Venezuela’s neighbors.
…

Moscow has dismissed U.S. charges against several Russian citizens and companies for meddling in the 2016 presidential election as “blather.” Speaking at the Munich Security Conference, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov questioned the evidence. The charges have formed a tense backdrop to the conference, which has focused on growing threats to global security, as Henry Ridgwell reports from Munich.
…

A California man has pleaded guilty to inadvertently selling bank accounts to Russians who were indicted Friday by a federal grand jury for interfering in the 2016 U.S. presidential election.

Richard Pinedo pleaded guilty to using stolen identities to set up bank accounts that were then used by the Russians, according to a February 12 court filing.  

The special counsel investigating Russian meddling on Friday announced charges against 13 Russian citizens and three Russian entities for interfering in the election.  

The indictment alleges that the Internet Research Agency, a St. Petersburg-based social media company with Kremlin ties, 12 of its employees, and its financial backer orchestrated an effort to influence the 2016 election campaign in favor of President Donald Trump. 

Prosecutors charged Yevgeniy Prigozhin, a businessman with close ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin, with funding the operation through companies he controls, Concord Management and Consulting LLC, Concord Catering and a number of subsidiaries.  

Prigozhin and his businesses allegedly provided “significant funds” for the Internet Research Agency’s operations to disrupt the U.S. election, according to the indictment. 

Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein said that the Russian conspirators sought to “promote social discord in the United State and undermine public confidence in democracy.”

“We must not allow them to succeed,” Rosenstein said at a news conference in Washington. 

The conspiracy was part of a larger operation code-named Project Lakhta, Rosenstein said. 

“Project Lakhta included multiple components – some involving domestic audiences within the Russian Federation and others targeting foreign audiences in multiple countries,” Rosenstein said. 

Mueller, who has made no public statements about the Russia investigation since his appointment last May, did not speak at the news conference. 

Charges against Russian nationals

The indictment charges all the defendants with conspiracy to defraud the United States. Three defendants are charged with conspiracy to commit wire and bank fraud, and five individuals with aggravated identity theft.

None of the defendants charged in the indictment are in custody, according to a spokesman for the Special Counsel’s office. 

The U.S. and Russia don’t have an extradition treaty and it’s unlikely that any of the defendants will stand trial in the U.S.

The 37-page charging document alleges that the Russian conspirators sought to coordinate their effort with Trump campaign associates, but it does not accuse anyone on the Trump campaign of colluding with the Russians.

Trump took to Twitter after the indictment was announced to again deny his campaign worked with the Russians.

“Russia started their anti-U.S. campaign in 2014, long before I announced that I would run for president,” Trump tweeted. “The results of the election were not impacted. The Trump campaign did nothing wrong – no collusion!”

The indictment marks the first time Mueller’s office has brought charges against Russians and Russian entities for meddling in the 2016 election.  

Mueller’s sprawling investigation has led to the indictments of former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort and associate Rick Gates.Former Trump National Security Advisor Michael Flynn and former campaign foreign policy adviser George Papadopoulos have pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about their contacts with Russian officials.

Details of indictment

The indictment says the Russian campaign to “interfere in the U.S. political system” started as early as 2014 and accelerated as the 2016 election campaign got underway. 

During the 2016 campaign, the Russian operatives posted “derogatory information” about a number of presidential candidates.  But by early to mid-2016, the operation included “supporting” Trump’s presidential campaign and “disparaging” Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton.

Taking on fake American identities, the Russian operatives communicated with “unwitting” Trump campaign associates and with other political activists “to seek to coordinate political activities,” the indictment says.

The indictment describes how Russian operatives used subterfuge, stolen identities and other methods to stage political rallies, buy ads on social media platforms, and pay gullible Americans to “promote or disparage candidates.”

To avoid detection by U.S. law enforcement agencies, the Russian operatives used computer networks based in the United States, according to the indictment.

“These groups and pages, which addressed the divisive U.S. political and social issues, falsely claimed to be controlled by U.S. activists when, in fact, they were controlled by defendants,” the indictment reads.

A number of the operatives are alleged to have traveled to the United States under “false pretenses to collect intelligence to inform the influence operations.”
…

Top Russian and American officials exchanged barbs Saturday in Germany over the U.S. indictment of 13 Russians accused of an elaborate plot to disrupt the 2016 presidential election.

H.R. McMaster, U.S. President Donald Trump’s national security adviser, said at the Munich Security Conference that the federal indictments showed the U.S. was becoming “more and more adept at tracing the origins of this espionage and subversion.”

“As you can see with the FBI indictment, the evidence is now really incontrovertible and available in the public domain,” McMaster told a Russian delegate to the conference.

Just minutes before, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov had dismissed the indictments as “just blabber,” according to remarks through an interpreter.

“I have no response,” Lavrov said when asked for comment on the allegations. “You can publish anything, and we see those indictments multiplying, the statements multiplying.”

The two men addressed the conference of top world leaders, defense officials and diplomats, giving more general back-to-back opening remarks. But both were immediately hit with blunt questions about the U.S. indictment and the broader issue of cyberattacks.

In Russia, news of the indictments was met with more scorn.

“There are no official claims, there are no proofs for this. That’s why they are just children’s statements,” Andrei Kutskikh, the presidential envoy for international information security, told Russian state news agency RIA Novosti.

McMaster also scoffed at the suggestion that the U.S. would work with Russia on cyber security issues.

“I’m surprised there are any Russian cyber experts available based on how active most of them have been undermining our democracies in the West,” he said to laughter. “So I would just say that we would love to have a cyber dialogue when Russia is sincere.”

The federal indictment brought Friday by special counsel Robert Mueller represents the most detailed allegations to date of illegal Russian meddling during the campaign that sent Trump to the White House.

Lavrov argued that U.S. officials, including Vice President Mike Pence, have said no country influenced the U.S. election results.

“Until we see the facts, everything else is just blabber — I’m sorry for this expression,” Lavrov said.

The indictment charged 13 Russians with running a huge but hidden social media trolling campaign aimed in part at helping Republican Trump defeat Democrat Hillary Clinton.

It outlined the first criminal charges against Russians believed to have secretly worked to influence the U.S. election’s outcome.

According to the indictment, the Russian organization was funded by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a wealthy St. Petersburg businessman with ties to the Russian government and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Lavrov denounced “this irrational myth about this global Russian threat, traces of which are found everywhere — from Brexit to the Catalan referendum.”

In Russia, one of the 13 people indicted said that the U.S. justice system is unfair.

Mikhail Burchik was quoted Saturday by the newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda as saying that “I am very surprised that, in the opinion of the Washington court, several Russian people interfered in the elections in the United States. I do not know how the Americans came to this decision.”

Burchik was identified in the indictment as executive director of an organization that allegedly sowed propaganda on social media to try to interfere with the 2016 election.

He was quoted as saying that “they have one-sided justice, and it turns out that you can hang the blame on anyone.”
…

British Prime Minister Theresa May made her case on Saturday for a new security treaty with the EU from next year, winning support from EU and U.S. officials who agreed the issue was too important to risk getting subsumed in broader Brexit negotiations.

In a speech to Western leaders and officials in Munich, May promised that London would continue to lead military missions and share intelligence if Brussels agreed to a pact “effective from 2019”, the year Britain is due to leave the bloc.

May’s government is using a series of speeches to set out its vision for Britain outside the European Union. But the loudest applause during her appearance came when the event’s organizer, German diplomat Wolfgang Ischinger, said: “Things would be so much easier if you stayed.”

But May was adamant: “We are leaving the EU and there is no question of a second referendum or going back, and I think that’s important,” she told the Munich Security Conference.

“The partnership that we need to create is one that offers UK and EU way to combine our efforts to greatest effect where this is in our shared interest,” May said of her security plan.

Britain is one of the top three users of data from European Union police agency Europol. But as it leaves the EU, there is a risk that it will be shut out of this cooperation, becoming more vulnerable to Islamist militants, officials say.

Jean-Claude Juncker, the EU’s chief executive, welcomed a “security alliance” with Britain, adding that the issue should be separated from the rest of the Brexit debate.

Britain, along with France, is Europe’s biggest military power and leads two European Union military missions while sending troops to Estonia under a NATO flag.

With a host of issues still unresolved and infighting over Brexit dividing May’s government just over a year before Britain is due to leave, security is one of London’s biggest bargaining chips as it seeks a new deal with Brussels.

Britain’s interior minister last year told the EU it could “take our information with us” if it left the bloc without a deal on security.

May emphasized she was committed to European security, warned against competition between Britain and the rest of Europe and said that both sides should do “whatever is most practical and pragmatic in ensuring our collective security.”

Juncker said security should not be conflated with “other questions relating to Brexit,” also quashing any British hopes that a security treaty might be a way into a free-trade deal.

“I wouldn’t like to put security policy considerations with trade policy considerations in one hat. I understand why some would like to do that, but we don’t want to,” he said.

 VEILED THREAT? NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg also welcomed close security cooperation between Britain and the EU after Brexit, while Stoltenberg’s predecessor at the alliance, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, told Reuters May’s was a strong speech.

“I think that is what we should aim for, but any treaty is very time-consuming. The timeline is unrealistic,” Fogh Rasmussen said.

A senior U.S. official said: “We know the goal, but I don’t know if this is the right vehicle.”

But May’s call to set aside “rigid institutional structures” to enable a quick agreement on security was less well received.

“What she meant was not specified and sounded like a veiled threat,” said EU lawmaker Marietje Schaake, a Dutch centrist.

One senior EU official in Munich said that May would need to submit a formal negotiating paper to detail her ideas and then allow EU and British negotiators to move forward.

But the EU official said May’s proposal was essentially not new and could only come after Britain and the EU had agreed a divorce settlement. “The European Union also wants a new security arrangement with Britain, but it can’t be done before we agree on other issues,” the official said.

While the status of the Irish border and citizens rights were broadly settled in December, EU negotiators say they are now waiting for Britain to say what kind of future trade relationship it wants.

Agreement on that front would allow EU leaders to endorse the plan at a Brussels summit on March 22-23 and move on to a special transition arrangement ending in December 2020.
…

Turkey is undergoing a new nationalist wave led by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a study by the Center for American Progress (CAP) concludes.

The report and the findings of polls and focus groups conducted in Turkey late last year conclude that Erdogan is trying to craft a new nationalism.

“He is doing this with his political rhetoric, but he is also drawing on a genuine upswelling of nationalism from the Turkish populists” Max Hoffman, one of the report’s authors, told VOA.

Hoffman said this new nationalism includes “real hostility towards the West, particularly the U.S., but also Germany and Europe. Correlated to that, there is widespread hostility towards Syrian refugees and to some extent, other immigrants to Turkey.”

Ali Cınar, president of the Turkish Heritage Organization, said the main reason for the anti-U.S. attitude in Turkey is the anger against Washington for not extraditing U.S.-based Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen and for supporting the Syrian Kurdish militia group YPG in the war against Islamic State.

“Everybody in Turkey, both government and opposition, are sensitive about these two issues and they are in consensus. So it’s wrong to see this as AK Party’s [the ruling party in Turkey] cause and this is the biggest mistake some other countries are making,” Cinar said.

“I don’t think the main reason for the increase in nationalist rhetoric in Turkey is clearly reflected in the report,” he added. “Also, it’s not clear to me how realistically the report has reached to a conclusion that there were sharp divides about the overall direction of the country.”

Since the 1920s, the Turkish republic has set its course toward more secular nationalism. But the report says the new nationalism brought by Erdogan is “assertively Muslim, fiercely independent; distrusting of outsiders; and skeptical of other nations and global elites, which it perceives to hold Turkey back.”

Although a considerable number of Turks believe Islam has a central role in their national identity, there’s also wide support for Turkey to remain secular.

“There is a component within the ruling party AKP, of about 35 percent, who put Islamic messages at the core,” said Hoffman, adding that the rest of the party “OK with this religious rhetoric, but they also believe that Turkey is a secular state.”

“They feel Erdogan is fulfilling Ataturk’s legacy by being more independent and stronger vis-a-vis the West, and by charting [the country’s] own course and being a strong leader just looking after Turkey’s interests,” he said. “And you could call them the ‘Turkey Firsters'” — a reference to U.S. President Donald Trump’s campaign slogan.

With nationalism rising, anti-Westernism is also finding deeper roots in Turkey. The CAP poll found only 10 percent of Turks have a favorable view of the United States, and 83 percent have a negative view. The total favorability rate for Europe is 21 percent.

Hoffman said “neither the West nor even Erdogan really want a clear break, but what this public opinion and this anger does is it narrows the options that leaders on both sides have.”`

He said U.S.-Turkish relations are close to the breaking point, but “whether or not that break really happens is primarily in Erdogan’s hands.”

Syria

Elaborating further, the author said if Turkey’s military operation against the YPG in Syria’s northwest Afrin region is expanded into Manbij, where U.S. forces are deployed, then Washington may be forced to make “difficult choices.”

Describing the Afrin operation as “the common action by the Turkish people against terror and the PKK that has killed 40,000 people in Turkey”, Cinar said it was wrong to read the nationalism in Turkey as “extreme”, since nationalism is on the rise in Europe as well and the fact that President Trump also used nationalist rhetoric in his election campaign.

Hoffman also played down the possibility of another right-wing challenger taking Erdogan’s place because Erdogan himself garnered most of the support of the right-wing electorate.

“So all of the issues that a right-wing challenger might use to sort of run to the right of Erdogan and appeal to nationalist voters Erdogan himself has now done to head off that challenge,” he said.

According to the Center for American Progress report, if Turks were to vote this Sunday, 49 percent of them would choose the governing AKP while the closest contender would only get half of that percentage.
…

The special counsel investigating Russian meddling in the 2016 U.S. election announced charges against the first group of Russians it says were behind the effort, unsealing an indictment against 13 Russian nationals and three Russian entities.

The indictment, handed down by a federal grand jury on Friday, alleges that Internet Research Agency, a St. Petersburg, Russia-based company with ties to the Kremlin, and its 12 employees engaged “in operations to interfere with elections and political processes” from 2014 through the 2016 U.S. presidential elections.

The firm was long believed to have played a critical role in Russia’s election meddling effort, employing fake social media accounts, paid online users and other tools to try to sway the election in favor of President Donald Trump.

Also named in the indictment were Internet Research Agency’s alleged financial backer, Russian businessman Yevgeniy Prigozhin, and two companies he controls — Concord Management and Consulting and Concord Catering. The indictment says Prigozhin and his businesses provided “significant funds” for Internet Research Agency’s operations to influence the 2016 American elections.

None of those charged in today’s indictment are in custody, a spokesman for special counsel Robert Mueller’s office said.

The charges

The indictment charges all the defendants with conspiracy to defraud the United States, three defendants with conspiracy to commit wire and bank fraud, and five individuals with aggravated identity theft.

Significantly, prosecutors say that Internet Research Agency, described as an outfit “engaged in political and electoral interference operations,” and its employees sought to coordinate their effort with Trump campaign associates.

After the indictments were announced, Trump took to Twitter to again deny his campaign worked with the Russians.

Early during the 2016 campaign, the court document says Internet Research Agency and its employees posted “derogatory information” about a number of presidential candidates. By early to mid-2016, the indictment alleges the operation included “supporting” Trump’s presidential campaign and “disparaging” Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton.

Taking on fake American identities, the Russian operatives communicated with “unwitting” Trump campaign associates and with other political activists “to seek to coordinate political activities,” the indictment said.

The indictment marks the first group of Russians charged in connection with Russia’s interference in the 2016 election.

Mueller’s sprawling investigation into Russian election interference has led to the indictments of former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort and associate Rick Gates.

Former Trump National Security Advisor Michael Flynn and former campaign foreign policy adviser George Papadopoulos have pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about their contacts with Russian officials during the campaign and the transition.

Details of indictment

The indictment details how the operatives used subterfuge, stolen identities and other methods to stage political rallies, bought ads on social media platforms, and paid gullible Americans to “promote or disparage candidates.”

To avoid detection by U.S. law enforcement agencies, the Russian operatives used computer networks based in the United States, according to the indictment.

“These groups and pages, which addressed the divisive U.S. political and social issues, falsely claimed to be controlled by U.S activists when, in fact, they were controlled by defendants,” the indictment reads.

A number of the operatives are alleged to have traveled to the United States under “false pretenses to collect intelligence to inform the influence operations.”

The indictment alleges that the firm began its “operations to interfere with U.S. political system” as early as 2014.

Also Friday, Mueller reached an agreement with Richard Pinedo, who pleaded guilty of aiding and abetting interstate and foreign identity fraud. Pinedo, of California, admitted to selling stolen bank and credit card numbers to the Russians, although he told investigators he “had absolutely no knowledge” about who was purchasing the information or what they planned to do with it.

WATCH: Entire briefing by Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein
…

Belgian media say a Brussels court has ordered Facebook to stop collecting data about citizens in the country or face fines for every day it fails to comply.

The daily De Standaard reported Friday that the court upheld a Belgian privacy commission finding that Facebook is collecting data without users’ consent.

It said the court concluded that Facebook does not adequately inform users that it is collecting information, what kind of details it keeps and for how long, or what it does with the data.

It has ruled that Facebook must stop tracking and registering internet usage by Belgians online and destroy any data it has obtained illegally or face fines of 250,000 euros ($311,500) every day it delays.
…

Since the International Criminal Court began collecting material three months ago for a possible war crimes case involving Afghanistan, it has gotten a staggering 1.17 million statements from Afghans who say they were victims.

The statements include accounts of alleged atrocities not only by groups like the Taliban and the Islamic State, but also involving Afghan Security Forces and government-affiliated warlords, the U.S.-led coalition, and foreign and domestic spy agencies, said Abdul Wadood Pedram of the Human Rights and Eradication of Violence Organization.

Based in part on the many statements, ICC judges in The Hague would then have to decide whether to seek a war crimes investigation. It’s uncertain when that decision will be made.

​Millions of possible victims

The statements were collected between Nov. 20, 2017, and Jan. 31, 2018, by organizations based in Europe and Afghanistan and sent to the ICC, Pedram said. Because one statement might include multiple victims and one organization might represent thousands of victim statements, the number of Afghans seeking justice from the ICC could be several million.

“It is shocking there are so many,” Pedram said, noting that in some instances, whole villages were represented. “It shows how the justice system in Afghanistan is not bringing justice for the victims and their families.”

The ICC did not give details about the victims or those providing the information.

“I have the names of the organizations, but because of the security issues, we don’t want to name them because they will be targeted,” said Pedram, whose group is based in Kabul.

Many of the representations include statements involving multiple victims, which could be the result of suicide bombings, targeted killings or airstrikes, he said.

​Fear for safety

Among those alleging war crimes is a man who asked The Associated Press to be identified only by his first name, Shoaib, because he fears for his safety.

Shoaib said his father, Naimatullah, was on a bus in Dawalat Yar district in Afghanistan’s central Ghor Province in 2014 when a band of gunmen stopped it and two other buses, forced the passengers off and told them to hand over their identity cards. The 14 Shiites among them were separated from the rest and killed, one by one, he said.

The slayings outraged the country. A Taliban commander was soon arrested and brought before the media, but no news about a trial or punishment was ever reported, said Shoaib, who is in his 20s.

Displaying a photo of the man he believes killed his father, Shoaib said he doesn’t go to the authorities for information about the incident because the commander had connections with the police and the local government administration.

Shoaib is still afraid.

“Please don’t say where I live, or show my face,” he implored a reporter. “What if they find me? There is no protection in Afghanistan,” he said.

“Everybody knows that they have connection in the government,” he added. “I think in Afghanistan, if you have money, then you can give it to anyone, anywhere, to do anything.”

Several powerful warlords, many of whom came to power after the collapse of the Taliban in 2001 following the U.S.-led intervention, are among those alleged to have carried out war crimes, said Pedram, who also is cautious about releasing any names.

After receiving death threats last year, Pedram fled Kabul briefly and now keeps a lower profile, no longer speaking to local media.

“The warlords are all here. You have to be very careful,” he said. “In the morning, I kiss my little son goodbye, I kiss my wife goodbye because I don’t know what will happen to me and when, or if I will see them again.”

​World’s criminal court

Established in 2002, the ICC is the world’s first permanent court set up to prosecute war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide. The ICC can only investigate any crimes in Afghanistan after May 2003, when the country ratified the Rome Statute, the treaty that established the court.

Former President Bill Clinton signed the treaty, but President George W. Bush renounced the signature, citing fears that Americans would be unfairly prosecuted for political reasons.

In November, when ICC prosecutor Fatou Bensouda sought judicial authorization to begin the investigation, she said the court had been looking into possible war crimes in Afghanistan since 2006.

Bensouda said in November that “there is a reasonable basis to believe” that crimes against humanity and war crimes were committed by the Taliban as well as the Haqqani network. She also said there was evidence that the Afghan National Security Forces, Afghan National Police and its spy agency, known as the NDS, committed war crimes.

Bensouda also said evidence existed of war crimes committed “by members of the United States armed forces on the territory of Afghanistan, and by members of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in secret detention facilities in Afghanistan,” as well as in countries that had signed on to the Rome Statute. The secret detention facilities were operated mostly between 2003 and 2004, she said.

Breaking through impunity

It was the first time that Bensouda has targeted Americans for alleged war crimes. Bensouda said an investigation under the auspices of the international tribunal could break through what she called “near total impunity” in Afghanistan.

The prosecutor’s formal application to the court set up a possible showdown with Washington. While the U.S. is not a member state of the ICC, its citizens can be charged with crimes committed in countries that are members.

At the time of Bensouda’s announcement, a Pentagon spokesman said the U.S. Defense Department does not accept that such an investigation of U.S. personnel is warranted. The U.S. State Department has said it opposes the court’s involvement in Afghanistan.

​Justice for a loved one

Another Afghan who went to the ICC is Hussain Razaee, whose fiancee, Najiba, was among 30 people killed in July when a Taliban suicide attacker rammed a car bomb into a bus carrying employees from the Ministry of Mines.

For months, Razaee said he contemplated suicide. He had spent two years convincing Najiba’s parents to allow them to marry, and they had finally agreed. Unlike most Afghan couples, theirs was not to be an arranged marriage.

“I lost the person I loved,” he said.

Razaee said he went to the ICC because he wants those responsible to be punished, even if a peace deal with the Taliban is reached.

“I am pursuing this because I want the ICC to record these cases so that if there is a peace agreement, the Taliban leaders will be required to identify the people behind the killings,” Razaee said.

“I don’t trust the international community to bring any of these warlords or Taliban to justice, but if an international legal body rules according to the law, then the government could be forced to enforce it,” he said.
…

The White House on Thursday blamed Russia for the devastating “NotPetya” cyber attack last year, joining the British government in condemning

Moscow for unleashing a virus that crippled parts of Ukraine’s infrastructure and damaged computers in countries across the globe.

The attack in June of 2017 “spread worldwide, causing billions of dollars in damage across Europe, Asia and the Americas,” White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders said in a statement.

“It was part of the Kremlin’s ongoing effort to destabilize Ukraine and demonstrates ever more clearly Russia’s involvement in the ongoing conflict,” Sanders added. “This was also a reckless and indiscriminate cyber attack that will be met with international consequences.”

The U.S. government is “reviewing a range of options,” a senior White House official said when asked about the consequences for Russia’s actions.

Earlier on Thursday, Russia denied an accusation by the British government that it was behind the attack, saying it was part of a “Russophobic” campaign that it said was being waged by some Western countries.

The so-called NotPetya attack in June started in Ukraine where it crippled government and business computers before spreading around Europe and the world, halting operations atports, factories and offices.

Britain’s foreign ministry said in a statement released earlier in the day that the attack originated from the Russian military.

“The decision to publicly attribute this incident underlines the fact that the UK and its allies will not tolerate malicious cyber activity,” the ministry said in a statement.

“The attack masqueraded as a criminal enterprise but its purpose was principally to disrupt,” it said.

“Primary targets were Ukrainian financial, energy and government sectors. Its indiscriminate design caused it to spread further, affecting other European and Russian business.”
…

Russia’s communications providers on Thursday blocked access to the website of opposition leader Alexei Navalny on orders of the state communications watchdog.

Navalny announced the move via his Twitter account, which was still accessible. Users going to the website were told it could not be reached.

The agency, Roskomnadzor, had demanded that Navalny remove a video alleging that Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Prikhodko received lavish hospitality from billionaire Oleg Deripaska.

Deripaska rejected the report and won a court ruling that ordered Navalny to remove the investigation as an unlawful intrusion into the tycoon’s privacy. Navalny refused, and appealed the ruling.

A statement Thursday from Deripaska’s Basic Element company said: “Mr. Deripaska’s claim is to protect his right to privacy, and has nothing to do with any political struggle between Mr. Navalny and his political opponents.”

Navalny’s investigation drew from the social media account of a woman who claims to have had an affair with Deripaska.

The woman, who calls herself Nastya Rybka, has written a book about her work as an escort and said on Russian television last year she had been hired by a modeling agency to spend time at Deripaska’s yacht.

Instagram on Thursday had removed some of Rybka’s posts following Roskomnadzor’s request, but a YouTube video of Navalny’s investigation that has generated over 5 million views remained available.

Rybka posted several videos in 2016 showing Deripaska on his yacht talking with Prikhodko. In one snippet, Deripaska explains to the woman why relations between Russia and the United States are so bad.

Deripaska has been linked to U.S. President Donald Trump’s former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, who has been indicted in special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 U.S. election.

Navalny, the most vocal critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin, wanted to run against him in Russia’s March 18 presidential election, but was barred because of a fraud conviction in a case that many see as politically motivated.
…

A series of muggings, armed robberies and confrontations during Rio de Janeiro’s Carnival celebrations are underscoring the deteriorating security situation in the city. 

TV Globo on Wednesday showed videos of gunfire between rival drug gangs, teenagers punching tourists in areas usually considered relatively safe and a policeman narrowly escaping after several people attacked him in front of his home.

Rio state Gov. Luiz Fernando Pezao acknowledged there weren’t enough police on hand during the first couple days of Carnival, though more than 17,000 policemen worked in Rio state each day during the festivities. 

“We were not prepared. There was a failure on the first two days, and then we brought backup for police. I think there has been a mistake in our part,” Pezao said. 

Statistics from the Friday to Tuesday bash have not yet been released. However, Pezao said the number of firearms confiscated by authorities was “incredible.” 

A year after hosting the 2016 Olympics, Rio is experiencing a spike in violence. Days before Carnival, rival drug gangs closed key arteries of the city. 

Last year Rio used almost 12,000 policemen during Carnival, but it also counted on the help of 9,000 members of the country’s armed forces. This time there was no federal aid during the bash.

Politicians avoided Rio during one of the most political Carnivals in Brazil’s history, with revelers targeting Pezao, President Michel Temer and especially Mayor Marcelo Crivella, an evangelical bishop who is no fan of the party and left the city for Europe.

Beija-Flor de Nilopolis won the samba-school parade title on Wednesday in Rio’s Sambadrome using corruption as a theme. One of its floats portrayed a rat below the building of state-oil Petrobras, which is at the center of a corruption scandal that has engulfed politicians across Latin America. 

Crowd favorite Paraiso do Tuiuti finished in a surprising second place, likely because of its political tone. The samba-school’s anti-slavery theme attacked Temer’s labor reform and the president himself. One of Tuiuti’s floats featured a vampire wearing a presidential sash. 

Next week Temer, whose popularity is at single-digits, wants to push through a reform of Brazil’s pension system. Analysts have said bill is unlikely to pass with October’s presidential election approaching. The Carnival atmosphere did not help the president make his case for austerity.
…

Brett McGurk, the U.S. special presidential envoy for the global coalition to counter the Islamic State group, talks with VOA about where the fight against Islamic State goes next.
…

Brett McGurk, the U.S. special presidential envoy for the global coalition to counter the Islamic State group, has been meeting with partners in Kuwait this week, looking to build on the gains the alliance has made in countering and, in many instances, crushing IS militants in Iraq and Syria. VOA’s U.N. Correspondent Margaret Besheer spoke with McGurk about where the fight against Islamic State goes next.

Besheer: “Special Envoy, welcome. So you just had this meeting here in Kuwait. Is there a long-term political and strategic road map for countering ISIS and making sure it doesn’t regroup and re-emerge in Iraq and Syria?”

McGurk: “Well, in terms of countering ISIS (IS), you have to take into account where we were three years ago. I remember being here in Kuwait three years ago where nobody thought they’d be able to take back territory from ISIS. They were controlling, really, basically a quasi-state with 7 million people. They were planning attacks all around the world. They were committing acts of genocide, and they were approaching the capital of Baghdad. So, since then, almost 100 percent of their territory has been taken back, and most important, they haven’t reclaimed any of these areas. So in Iraq — the focus of the meetings today, really — 100 percent of the territory in Iraq has been reclaimed from ISIS, so that’s quite extraordinary.

But you ask about whether this will be sustainable. I think I’ll make three points. Number one, they haven’t retaken any territory. Number two, in areas that they have lost, 3.2 million Iraqis — these are almost all Sunni Arabs who fled ISIS — are back in their homes. That’s an unprecedented rate of returns in a post-conflict environment like this.

WATCH: US Envoy Discusses Next Moves in Battle Against IS

And now, today, the third point I make is you see really the entire world coming to help Iraq get back on its feet. And the underpinning of this is an initiative of the Iraqi government with the World Bank. So they have put out to the world, just Monday here in Kuwait, their 10-year vision. It’s a 10-year plan of reconstruction, investment, and the foundational kind of landmark event here to get this started is today. This is just a — this is not the end of the road. It’s really the beginning of the road of a 10-year process of recovery, but I think it’s an encouraging start.

Besheer: But at the same time, [U.S.] Secretary [of State Rex] Tillerson announced, I think, it was $200 million for newly liberated areas in Syria, but none for the newly liberated areas in Iraq. So how does that play into that strategy?

​McGurk: Well, we’re the number one contributor to humanitarian aid in Iraq. We’re the number one contributor in stabilization assistance in Iraq. We’re the number one contributor in military support in Iraq. A lot of our support is still in the pipeline, so of course we have a budgetary cycle of the way these things go, but we also announced yesterday — Secretary Tillerson announced an important signing of the Iraqi Minister of Finance with the EXIM Bank [the Export-Import Bank of the United States, the government’s official export credit agency] ​— about $3.3 billion to support financing for U.S. companies to do business in Iraq. And U.S. companies in Iraq are doing quite well. I mean, General Electric helps provide for almost 60 percent of all of electricity generation in Iraq. So, look, this is going to be a long-term effort.

The one point I want to make out of the conference here, because I’ve read some stories about, well, this is just a one-day event and they have to try to raise $10 billion — that’s not the case. Iraq put out a figure on Monday here that they need about $80 billion over the next 10 years to help finance their reconstruction. They also made very clear that most of their reconstruction assistance will come from their own budget, their own reform process — working with the IMF [International Monetary Fund], working with the World Bank, to reform their own mechanisms. So, they’re really not asking for handouts. They’re asking for a hand up to get themselves moving, and I think so far — of course, the meeting is still going on here, right down the hall — I think so far, the responses have been quite encouraging.

Besheer: So what do you think the game changer has been in the progress you’ve made against ISIS in Iraq and Syria? What was the key to it? Was it the choking [of] the funding or the military or a combination — I mean, what was the game changer?

McGurk: Well, I can go through a whole strategy. We have five lines of effort in the global strategy — we can go through that.

I want to make two points when it comes to Iraq. Number one, a very different way to fight the war on the ground. So when we say by, with and through, we really mean it. This was Iraqi-led. The Iraqis did the fighting, the Iraqis cleared their cities. It was the Iraqis who then held the cities and held the ground, the Iraqis working with local communities. The U.S. forces, coalition forces, were behind helping them and assisting them; we were not doing the fighting on the ground. And I think that model has actually proven to be quite effective.

Number two, we did an awful lot of diplomacy, and a lot of it behind the scenes — but not only to get the whole world organized to combat ISIS globally, to fight their networks, the finances, the foreign fighters, but also to have the region engage with Iraq. So, some of the biggest contributors here just down the hall today are really quite amazing. Turkey, one of the biggest contributors today — $5 billion of reconstruction assistance to Iraq. Saudi Arabia, Qatar, UAE [United Arab Emirates], Kuwait, of course, with $2 billion. If you add all that up, it comes to a little less than $10 billion or so. UAE announced a fairly extraordinary private sector investment of $5 billion for an Iraqi housing project outside Baghdad. So, this engagement from the region was really not happening some years ago, and I give credit really to [Iraqi] Prime Minister [Haider al-]Abadi and his government. They reached out to the region and they helped build some bridges that had been closed.

So Saudi Arabia — you used the word “game changer.” I don’t really use that word too often, but Saudi Arabia for the first time in 30 years reopened its borders with Iraq a few months ago, direct flights from Saudi Arabia into Iraq for the first time in 30 years, and then you saw the investment the Saudis are just making now in Iraq. So, those are the types of shifts that are quite important and that we want to try to encourage to make sure that the defeat of ISIS is enduring.

Besheer: So, ISIS may be down and out in Iraq and Syria, but not so much in places like Libya, West Africa, Afghanistan. So how are you going to replicate the success you’ve had to date in those places? Is it a similar model or does it change with the environment?

​McGurk: It’s a great question. So each region is different, and we look at this — we look at this very carefully. I mean, every single day, 24/7, we’re looking at how the networks are emerging, where people are moving, how they’re getting money. So the one thing we have to do, of course: ISIS tries to be a global network. That’s what makes it different than kind of other terrorist organizations. It has become a metastasized global network. And so what we had to do was build a global network to fight the network. So, yesterday here just in Kuwait, we had all now 75 members of our coalition — Philippines joined just yesterday, so one of the largest coalitions in history — united to work together against this threat. And that’s the counterideology, the countermessaging. It’s the counterfinancing, it’s the counter-foreign fighters. And then we look at each different region of the world and who among the coalition wants to take the lead in that part of the world, and what particular tools might be needed, say, in Philippines versus Afghanistan versus in Iraq.

So every place is different, but by building this international consensus and this international coalition, that’s really the only way to stay ahead of the threat. We’re making progress, but the number one message yesterday in our coalition meetings is that we’ve made a lot of progress in the last three years, there’s no question — but this is not over. And that was the point from almost every delegation we heard yesterday: This isn’t over. We remain united as a coalition. We actually approved — all 75 delegations — a document called The Guiding Principles to guide the coalition as we go forward into the next year. And the key point of that is that this isn’t just about Iraq and Syria, it’s about the global campaign. So there was real unanimity in that room yesterday, led by Secretary Tillerson. And so you know, we’re going to stay at it. This isn’t over, and we’re going to keep our foot on the accelerator.

Besheer: Finally, I just like to ask you about accountability, because that’s a big issue. They found massive graves in liberated areas in Iraq, ISIL/ISIS-liberated areas. What about accountability for the victims of ISIS?

McGurk: So, this is also worth reminding people, what was happening in some of these areas not very long ago — you know, mass atrocities, acts of genocide, destroying our common heritage, thousands of young girls taken hostage and many of them are still missing, and we still meet with the families and we do all we can to find leads to try to rescue as many girls as we possibly can.

But, look, it gets back to the point I just made: We cannot rest against this enemy, and that means not only defeating them, but also following through and making sure that their defeat is enduring and they can’t come back, and that justice is done to those who committed these terrible crimes.

In Syria now, you know, they’re all trying to escape, so we have in Syria detained over 400 foreign fighters, including some of the most notorious former ISIS leaders, and we’re going to make sure that they can never get out. And we’re working with coalition countries and partners, if they happen to be their citizens, about how they are going to be prosecuted, how they’re going to be handled. This is a very difficult issue within our coalition. But we are very much determined that justice will be done for these terrible crimes.
…

Blowing whistles and horns, thousands of Slovenian teachers rallied for higher wages on Wednesday in the latest in a string of strikes and protests by public sector workers in the small European Union country.

Most schools in Slovenia remained closed because of the one-day strike that drew an estimated 40,000 teachers. The strike follows earlier walk-outs by health care employees, police and firefighters.

More than 10,000 people gathered at a central square in the capital, Ljubljana, holding colorful banners and union balloons and flags. Participants were bused in from all over Slovenia.

“This government must surely know that the level of teachers’ salaries is a problem in Slovenia,” said Christine Blower from the European Trade Union Committee for Education, who came to offer support.

“Your demands are fair and just,” Blower told the cheering crowd. “You must win, you have the arguments!”

There was no immediate response from the government, which has negotiated with the public sector unions in the past months in a bid to avert wider strikes.

Workers’ unions are demanding that the wage growth curbed in an austerity package in 2013 be restored amid economic growth. The demands put pressure on the centrist government of Prime Minister Miro Cerar before a parliamentary election later this year.
…

Actress Minnie Driver has resigned from her role as an Oxfam celebrity ambassador and corporate backers demanded accountability as the aid organization sought to address allegations that senior staff members working in crisis zones paid for sex among the desperate people the group was meant to serve.

The star of “Good Will Hunting” said she will no longer support the organization following its response to a sex abuse scandal in Haiti after its 2010 earthquake. Britain’s top development official has savaged the leadership of Oxfam for its handling of the scandal.

Driver tweeted: “All I can tell you about this awful revelation about Oxfam is that I am devastated. Devastated for the women who were used by people sent there to help them, devastated by the response of an organization that I have been raising awareness for since I was 9 years old #oxfamscandal.”

The anti-poverty organization has been reeling since the Times of London reported last week that seven former Oxfam staff members who worked in Haiti faced misconduct allegations that included using prostitutes and downloading pornography. Oxfam says it investigated, but the government and charity regulators have criticized its lack of transparency in its handling of the matter.

U.K. Development Secretary Penny Mordaunt has warned that government funding to the group – some 31.7 million pounds ($43.8 million) – is at risk unless it comes clean about the allegations. Amid fears that sex predators have targeted aid organizations to get access to the vulnerable, Mordaunt told a conference in Sweden that she would be meeting with the National Crime Agency on Thursday to underscore her concerns.

“While investigations have to be completed and any potential criminals prosecuted accordingly, what is clear is that the culture that allowed this to happen needs to change and it needs to change now,” she said.

Oxfam’s corporate partners, including Mark & Spencer, Heathrow Airport and Waterstones, are asking questions. Visa, for example, which developed a partnership with Oxfam to help distribute funds to people hit by natural disaster, said it is watching closely.

“At Visa, we are committed to the highest standards of professional and personal conduct, and we expect the same from our partners,” the company said. “We are engaged with Oxfam to understand what steps have been taken to address staff misconduct and ensure alignment with our own standards and values.”
…

When a Vatican court convicted a Chilean predator priest of sex crimes, it went out of its way to affirm the credibility of his victims. Their testimony had been consistent and corroborated, while their motives in coming forward had been only to “free themselves of a weight that had tormented their consciences,” the tribunal said.

One key witness in the Rev. Fernando Karadima’s 2010 trial is preparing to testify again, this time in a spinoff case with potentially more significant consequences. Juan Carlos Cruz’s allegations of a cover-up raise questions about Pope Francis’ already shaky track record on preventing clergy sex abuse and concealment.

Cruz has accused Chilean Bishop Juan Barros of having been present when Karadima kissed and fondled him as a 17-year-old, and of then ignoring the abuse. One of Francis’ top advisers has privately called Cruz a liar who is out to destroy the Chilean church. Francis, who has called allegations against Barros slander, may have accepted the adviser’s take.

After his defense of Barros sparked an outcry during his recent trip to Chile, Francis did an about-face and asked Maltese Archbishop Charles Scicluna, a former Vatican sex crimes investigator, to gather testimony about Barros and then report back. Cruz, who now works in communications in the U.S., is his first witness Saturday.

“We’ve been giving this testimony for years and years, but finally it’s being heard,” Cruz told The Associated Press. “So when the pope says he needs evidence, he’s had it for a long time.”

Francis named Barros to head the diocese of Osorno, Chile in January 2015 over the opposition of some Chilean bishops. They were worried about fallout from the Karadima scandal, and had recommended that Barros and two other Karadima-trained bishops resign and take year-long sabbaticals.

Francis has said he rejected the recommendation because he couldn’t in good faith accept Barros’ resignation without any evidence of wrongdoing.

Barros has repeatedly denied witnessing any abuse or covering it up.

“I never knew anything about, nor ever imagined, the serious abuses which that priest committed against the victims,” he told the AP last month.

Dozens of former parishioners and seminarians have told Chilean and Vatican prosecutors about how public Karadima’s groping was, including of minors, within the tight-knit community where Barros was a top lieutenant of the now-disgraced priest. A handful of victims have also told the courts how, behind closed doors, Karadima would masturbate his young charges, and have them confess on their knees in front of his crotch.

Francis recently sparked an outcry when he called the accusations against Barros “calumny” and said none of Karadima’s victims had brought forth evidence to implicate the bishop.

The AP reported last week that Cruz did come forward with cover-up accusations against Barros. The pope’s top abuse adviser, Cardinal Sean O’Malley, hand-delivered to Francis an eight-page letter from Cruz in April 2015.

Cruz says Barros not only witnessed him being abused, but then tormented him with private information that Karadima had obtained from Cruz during confession.

“If Karadima felt that you were not being too dedicated to him in any way, he would ice you. He would not talk to you, but he would send these hatchet men, Juan Barros was one of them,” said Cruz, who after joining Karadima’s community went onto the seminary, only to leave after a few years.

The Vatican hasn’t commented on whether Francis read the 2015 letter.

Barros himself hasn’t been accused of sexually abusing anyone, and merely witnessing a superior kiss and grope minors isn’t a canonical crime. Perhaps Francis doesn’t consider it a fireable offense.

But Francis’ own sex abuse advisers, as well as many Osorno faithful, have argued that Barros’ failure to “see” Karadima’s abuse and his continued denial that it was around him raises questions about whether he can protect children in Osorno today.

Since Barros has not been charged with any wrongdoing, Cruz’s allegations against him have not been subject to legal scrutiny. However, Vatican and Chilean prosecutors both considered him to be a credible witness in cases against Karadima, during which he also testified about Barros’ presence while he was being groped. Other Karadima victims have said the same.

“The tribunal has acquired sufficient conviction to accept Cruz’s testimony as proof of the facts,” Chilean investigating Judge Jessica Gonzalez wrote in 2011. While Gonzalez dropped criminal charges against Karadima, she stressed it wasn’t for lack of proof but because too much time had passed.

In the decree sentencing Karadima to a lifetime of penance and prayer, the Vatican tribunal said it had acquired the “moral certainty of the truth” about Karadima’s guilt based on testimony from Cruz and other whistleblowers, even though many bishops, priests and laity insisted Karadima was innocent.

Some high-ranking church officials, though, have continued to question Cruz’s veracity and motives. Among them is Chilean Cardinal Francisco Javier Errazuriz, a top adviser to Francis as a member of the pope’s “kitchen cabinet” of cardinals.

While Francis and Errazuriz have ideological differences, it would be natural for the pope to ask the head of the Chilean church about a Chilean bishop who had once worked for him. And Errazuriz and the Argentinian pope have known each other for decades, when both men served as archbishops in their neighboring countries.

Errazuriz publicly apologized in 2010 for not believing Karadima’s victims initially. Privately, he has called Cruz a liar and a “serpent” bent on destroying the Catholic Church in Chile, according to emails first published by Chilean online newspaper El Mostrador.

The emails Errazuriz exchanged in 2013 and 2014 with his successor as Santiago’s archbishop show him maneuvering to keep Cruz off the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors — Francis’ advisory panel on sex abuse — and from the list of speakers for an annual bishops’ gathering.

“We know the intention of Mr. Cruz toward you and the church in Santiago,” Cardinal Riccardo Ezzati, the archbishop of Santiago, wrote Errazuriz in April 2013. “I hope we can avoid the lies from finding a place with those in the same church.”

Errazuriz responded the next day: “May the serpent not prevail!”

“There’s no reason to invite Carlos Cruz, who will falsify the truth,” Errazuriz wrote. “He’s going to use the invitation to continue damaging the church.”

Errazuriz and Ezzati had a reason to try to discredit Cruz. After evidence emerged showing the Santiago archdiocese had received reports about Karadima for years but shelved an initial investigation, Cruz and two other victims sued the archdiocese in 2013 for an alleged cover-up.

The litigation, since dismissed for insufficient proof, was active in April 2015 when Cruz’s letter made its way to Cardinal O’Malley. A member of the Pontifical Commission, Marie Collins, gave it to O’Malley when she flew to Rome with three other commissioners to raise alarm at Barros’ appointment as bishop of Osorno.

O’Malley was in Rome anyway for a meeting with the pope, Errazuriz and Francis’ other cardinal advisers. A Vatican statement issued after their meeting suggests that O’Malley may have raised the Barros case, just as he reported to Collins and Cruz.

During the meeting, O’Malley proposed creating procedures “to evaluate and judge cases of ‘abuse of office’ concerning the safeguarding of minors” by bishops and other church leaders, it said.

The pope and his advisers subsequently agreed to establish a tribunal inside the Vatican to hear evidence against bishops who covered up sex abuse. Francis authorized a budget to fund it for five years.

But the proposal lagged. Within a year, Francis had scrapped it entirely and instead issued a document essentially saying the church’s existing procedures were sufficient to handle alleged cover-ups.
…

Pilot error as well as malfunctioning sensors likely caused a passenger jet to crash in Russia, killing all 71 people on board, investigators say.

After studying An-148’s flight data recorder, the Interstate Aviation Committee said that Sunday’s crash near Moscow occurred after the pilots saw varying data on the plane’s two air speed indicators.

The flawed readings came because the pilots failed to turn on a heating unit before the takeoff, the committee said. 

The plane’s captain reportedly didn’t want to defrost the aircraft before flying.  The procedure is optional and the crew’s decision is based mainly on the weather conditions.

The committee said it is continuing to study the data, but noted that “erroneous data on the pilots’ speed indicators may have been a factor that triggered the special flight situation.”

It said the flawed speed data resulted from the “icing of pressure measurement instruments that had their heating systems turned off.”

The Saratov Airlines Antonov An-148 took off Sunday from Moscow’s Domodedovo airport for a flight to the city of Orsk and went down in a field about 40 miles southeast of the capital.
…

Kosovo expects to resolve outstanding issues with Serbia this year by reaching an “historic” agreement that would pave the way for the Balkan country to get a seat at the United Nations, President Hashim Thaci said on Tuesday.

Kosovo seceded a decade ago from Serbia, but its independence has not been recognized by Belgrade, which together with its traditional allies Moscow and Beijing has blocked Pristina’s bid for a U.N. seat.

As Belgrade moves closer to membership in the European Union, Serbian authorities are under pressure to resolve relations with neighbors including Kosovo.

“The deal between Kosovo and Serbia, which I believe will happen in 2018, will be a historic, a comprehensive agreement which will result in Kosovo’s membership in United Nations,” Thaci told Reuters in an interview.

Serbia lost control over Kosovo in 1999 when NATO waged a bombing campaign to halt killings of ethnic Albanians in a two-year counter-insurgency war. Nearly a decade later, in 2008, Kosovo declared independence, backed by the United States and most of the Western European states.

Kosovo’s independence has been recognized by 115 states so far.

Thaci said the agreement with Serbia would bring full normalization of relations between the former foes, although they may not be required to recognize each other as independent states.

Kosovo’s relations with Western countries was soured by an initiative to scrap a law that established a war crimes court.

The initiative was shelved under pressure by Western embassies in Pristina, and the court was set up in 2015, although it has yet to hear a case.

The Specialist Chamber, which has the authority to try ex-Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) guerrillas for alleged atrocities in the war that led to independence from Serbia, is part of Kosovo’s legal system but based in The Hague to minimize the risks of witness intimidation and judicial corruption.

Kosovo’s media have reported that some of the leading Kosovo politicians, including Thaci, who was commander of the KLA, could be indicted by the court or called to testify.

“This was an historic injustice but for the sake of keeping the strategic partnership with the US, EU and NATO we created that [the court],” Thaci said. “Kosovo has nothing to hide.”

Asked what he would do if called to testify as a witness or defendant by the court, he said: “The president or any other citizen of this country has no reason to be afraid.”

“We never violated Kosovo law or international laws. We have fought against a dictator, against a man who committed genocide,” he said, referring to former Yugoslav and Serbian president Slobodan Milosevic, who died in 2006 while on trial for war crimes.

The 1.8 million-strong country is preparing for a big celebration on Saturday to commemorate the 10th anniversary of its declaration of independence. Kosovo-born British singer Rita Ora is due to hold a big concert in Pristina.
…

A Slovak court has rejected a demand by Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis to be cleared of cooperation with the communist-era secret police (StB), a court spokesman said on Tuesday.

The ruling concludes a lengthy legal battle started by Babis, a Slovak-born billionaire businessman who rose last year to the top of the political ladder in the neighbouring Czech Republic, Slovakia’s former partner in the Czechoslovak federation that fell apart in 1993.

The decision is mainly of symbolic value. It does not stop Babis from holding office nor from attempting to form a new government after his minority administration failed to win a vote of confidence in the Czech parliament last month.

A spokesman for Czech President Milos Zeman said on Twitter the decision did not mean any change in the president’s plan to appoint Babis as prime minister again.

Former secret agents involved

Babis, helped by evidence provided by former communist-era secret agents, won the initial court battles in the case, but his fortunes turned when the Slovak Constitutional Court ruled last year that those witnesses were unreliable.

It also ruled that Babis’s suit against the Slovak UPN institute which keeps communist-era files was misplaced, saying the institute was only the keeper, not the author, of the files, which were compiled by the StB itself.

The Constitutional Court sent the case back to the Bratislava regional court for a final ruling, which was made on Jan. 30 but not published until Tuesday.

‘We will sue until death’

Babis has admitted to meetings with StB officers in the 1980s in the former Czechoslovakia when he was a Communist Party member and worked in foreign trade, but he insists he only discussed the country’s economic interests.

For some Czechs and Slovaks, the injustices of the communist era of their joint past are still raw nearly 30 years on, but Babis’s ANO party still easily won the Czech election in October with nearly 30 percent of the vote.

Babis said on Tuesday he would fight the ruling with another lawsuit, although he did not know yet where it would be addressed.

“We will sue until death because we are in the right,” he told the online version of daily MF Dnes.

Faces fraud charges

Babis moved to Prague in the 1990s and built up his Agrofert chemicals and farming business before entering politics in 2011.

Babis is also facing fraud charges in the Czech Republic in a case involving 2 million euros in European Union and national subsidies a decade ago. That is the main reason other parties have refused to join a Babis-led government.

He denies any wrongdoing and ANO has refused to nominate another candidate for the post of prime minister.

 
…

French President Emmanuel Macron said his government is preparing to take fundamental steps to completely reform the lives and organizational structures of Muslims in the country. 

Speaking to Journal du Dimanche, Macron said he wants to bring an end to disputes nationwide triggered by jihadi attacks over the last few years. 

According to the French president, the reforms that will be initiated in the first quarter of 2018 include the fight against Islamic fundamentalism, restructure Muslim organizations and regulate their relations with the rest of the society. 

Macron told the newspaper that his government’s reform project is still underway, so declined to speak about the details before it is complete. He said the country’s intellectuals and academics continue to exchange ideas to lay the groundworks of the project while referring to the need to reform what he terms, “the problematic ties between Islam and the French Republic.” 

France is a secular country by constitution. The country has a special law since 1905 requiring the separation of church and state, also prohibiting the state from recognizing or funding any religion. Recent debates included amending the current law, but Macron is known to be against the idea. “Whatever we opt to do, my goal is to stimulate the very principle that exists within the heart of that law on secularity. In other words, to keep the rights to believe or not to believe, the free will and national harmony.”

The French government wants to find a nationwide solution to the issue of financing and training Islamic clergy. Paris says other governments meddle in the nation’s affairs when they directly finance mosques and appoint imams despite the existing law on secularity. The government is looking for ways to finance mosques, regulate charities, raise funds to train imams and perhaps tax halal products to raise funding. 

The French government is reportedly working on the reforms through the president’s office, the Ministry of the Interior and the French Council of the Muslim Faith (CFCM) which was set up in 2003 by then-Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy. While Elysee Palace is in touch with Islam experts, academics and intellectuals, the ministry works through its own experts. The CFCM’s own report on the proposed reforms will be ready in June.

​While the planned reforms aim to curb foreign influence on mosques and imams in France, it also proposes to require imams to take university-level studies where they will be taught secularism, civil liberties, theology, religious history and sociology. Also among the proposals is the election of a Chief Imam – like the existing Chief Rabbi of France in the case of Jews – to lead the French Muslims as the sole religious and moral authority and a strong communal representative. 

When Macron received France’s religious leaders in December last year, he reportedly said he wanted Islam (in France) restructured and asked the CFCM to create a working group to contribute to the project. Macron also wants to change the structure of the CFCM, a non-profit whose management is still influenced by leading Muslim countries. 

The CFCM itself also reportedly backs the proposed reforms. Anouar Kbibech, the vice-chairman of the organization said, there is already an awareness within the organization to reach out to the rest of French society. Ahmet Ogras, the CFCM’s Turkish-French chairman also says the organization has also been pressing for reforms. 

The leader of the country’s nationalist party, Marine Le Pen rebuffed the project as “unacceptable” and she called on the government to stop financial aid to mosques. However the leader of Front National said she supports the idea of stopping foreign influence on French mosques. 

A recent survey by Institut Francais de l’Opinion Publique (IFOp) shows 56 percent of the participants agree to Islam and the French society can coexist. In 2016, at the peak of the jihadi attacks in France, that rate was 43 percent.
…

A London court will rule on Tuesday whether it would be in the interests of justice to pursue action against WikiLeaks’ founder Julian Assange for failing to surrender to bail back in 2012.

If the judge rules in his favor, then Assange, 46, would be free to leave the Ecuadorean Embassy in London where he has been holed up for more than five years.

However, he might still elect to remain in the embassy, where he has been granted political asylum, because he fears Britain would arrest him under a U.S. extradition warrant, the existence of which has neither been confirmed nor denied.

Who is Julian Assange?

Assange was born in Townsville, Australia, in July 1971, to parents who were involved in theater and traveled frequently.

In his teens, Assange gained a reputation as a sophisticated computer programmer and in 1995 he was arrested and pleaded guilty to hacking. He was fined, but avoided prison on condition he did not reoffend.

In his late 20s, he went to Melbourne University to study mathematics and physics.

Wikileaks

Assange launched WikiLeaks in 2006, creating a web-based “dead letter drop” for would-be leakers. It says it is a non-profit organization funded by human rights campaigners, journalists and the general public, with the aim of fighting government and corporate corruption.

The website rose to prominence in April 2010 when it published a classified video showing a 2007 U.S. helicopter attack that killed a dozen people in the Iraqi capital, Baghdad, including two Reuters news staff.

In July that year, it released more than 90,000 classified U.S. military documents on the war in Afghanistan and then in October, it published about 400,000 more secret U.S. files on the Iraq war. The two leaks represented the largest security breaches of their kind in U.S. military history.

It followed these up with the release of 250,000 secret diplomatic cables from U.S. embassies around the world, with some of the information published by newspapers such as the New York Times and Britain’s Guardian.

The leaks angered and embarrassed U.S. politicians and military officials, who said the unauthorized dissemination would put lives at risk, and drew similar condemnation from U.S. allies such as Britain.

Arrest in 2010

On Nov. 18, 2010, a Swedish court ordered Assange’s detention as a result of an investigation into allegations of sex crimes.

He had spent much of the year in Sweden and the accusations of misconduct were made by two female Swedish WikiLeaks volunteers. On Dec. 7, 2010, Assange was arrested by British police on a European Arrest Warrant (EAW) issued by Sweden.

Assange denied the allegations and was eventually granted bail on Dec. 16. He said from the outset that he believed the Swedish case was a pretext to extradite him to the United States to face charges over the WikiLeaks releases.

His extradition to Sweden for questioning was ordered in Feb. 2011.

Subsequent appeals failed and an order for his surrender was issued for June 29, 2012. On June 19, he entered the Ecuadorean Embassy in the upmarket Knightsbridge area of London seeking asylum.

Ten days later a judge at London’s Westminster Magistrates’ Court issued a warrant for his arrest.

Ecuadorean Embassy

Ecuador granted Assange asylum on Aug. 16, 2012 and at the time he said he expected to wait six months to a year for a deal which would allow him to leave the embassy. British police mounted a round-the-clock guard to prevent his escape, saying he would be arrested should he leave.

The impasse left Assange living in cramped quarters in the embassy with no political or legal solution to the saga in sight. A United Nations panel said in Feb. 2016 that Assange had been arbitrarily detained. Britain called that description “ridiculous”, saying his detention was voluntary.

British police ended their permanent guard in October 2015, having spent an estimated 12.6 million pounds, but said they would maintain “covert tactics” to arrest him if he left the embassy.

Swedish Case Dropped

On Nov. 14, 2016, Swedish prosecutors questioned Assange at the embassy in London about the alleged sex crimes for about four hours.

Swedish prosecutors announced on May 19, 2017, that they had dropped their investigation and withdrawn their EAW. However, British police said he would still be arrested if he left the embassy because there was an outstanding warrant for failing to surrender to bail.

In January this year, Ecuador granted Assange citizenship after Britain refused a request for him to be given diplomatic status, saying he would face justice if he left the embassy.

New Court Challenge

On Jan. 26, Assange’s lawyers asked London’s Westminster Magistrates Court to drop the arrest warrant against him because it no longer applied as Sweden’s EAW had been withdrawn.

They said Assange and his guarantors had forfeited more than 110,000 pounds ($156,000) when he failed to surrender and he had already spent 5-1/2 years in conditions which were “akin to imprisonment.”

Last Tuesday, Judge Emma Arbuthnot rejected his bid to have the warrant withdrawn. However, she then agreed to consider whether, even if Assange were arrested and brought to court, it would actually be in the interests of justice to take any further action against him.

Her ruling will be made on Tuesday and if he is successful, it would mean there was no public, legal case in Britain against him.

U.S. Criminal Investigation

During his successful election campaign, U.S. President Donald Trump praised Assange’s organization for releasing hacked emails from Democratic National Committee (DNC) computers, telling a rally in Oct. 2016 “I love WikiLeaks.”

There is no public record or evidence demonstrating any U.S. criminal charges are pending against Assange. When Barack Obama was president, the U.S. Justice Department leadership concluded it would be inappropriate to prosecute WikiLeaks because it was too similar to a media organization.

However in March last year, U.S. federal prosecutors in Alexandria, Virginia, expanded a long-running grand jury investigation into WikiLeaks and its personnel including Assange. A Justice Department official recently confirmed to Reuters this investigation was still open.

Last April, CIA Director Mike Pompeo described WikiLeaks as a “hostile intelligence service” abetted by states such as Russia, who had used it to distribute hacked material from DNC computers during the 2016 presidential election. He also called Assange a “fraud” and a “coward.”

Assange and his supporters believe that U.S. prosecutors have a sealed, therefore secret, indictment against him. They also suspect that Britain has received a U.S. extradition warrant linked to these charges and that he would be arrested by British police were he to leave the embassy.

They hope if his court case is successful, it will put pressure on the British authorities to disclose what, if any, U.S. efforts are in place to prosecute him.
…

President Vladimir Putin on Monday passed greetings from U.S. President Donald Trump to the visiting Palestinian leader, who responded that he doesn’t want to  cooperate with Washington following its decision to recognize Jerusalem as the Israeli capital.

Speaking at the start of their meeting in the Kremlin, Putin told Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas that he was just off the phone with Trump. 

“Naturally, we spoke about the Palestinian-Israeli settlement,” he said “I would like to convey to you his best wishes.”

Abbas responded that the Palestinians don’t want to cooperate with the United States as a sponsor of the peace process, but welcome multilateral cooperation.

Trump honored a campaign promise in December by recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and vowing to relocate the U.S. Embassy there. 

The move outraged Palestinians and others across the Muslim world. Palestinian leaders have said it means that Washington can no longer serve as a Mideast peace broker.

“We refuse to cooperate with the Americans as co-sponsors,” Abbas told Putin in remarks carried by Russian news agencies. “President Trump again surprised us. His decision to move the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem and consider Jerusalem the capital of Israel was like a slap in our face.”
…

Russian teams of emergency workers and investigators searched a snow-covered field outside Moscow Monday, looking for body fragments and clues after a plane crashed a day earlier, killing all 71 people on board, including the crew and three children.

The 65 passengers on board were from 5 to 79-years-old, according to a list posted by the Russian Emergencies Ministry, which did not give their nationalities.

More than 400 people and 70 vehicles were deployed to the crash site, the ministry said.

WATCH: Crash

​President Vladimir Putin ordered a special commission to investigate what caused the Antonov AN-148 plane to go down shortly after taking off.

Human error, technical failure and weather conditions are among the several possible cause, according to Russia’s Investigative Committee, which did not mention the possibility of terrorism. 

The regional jet, operated by Saratov Airlines, was traveling from Domodedovo airport, to the city of Orsk in the Orenburg region when it crashed near Argunovo, about 80 kilometers southeast of Moscow.

The seven-year-old plane disappeared from the radar just minutes after departing from the capital city’s second busiest airport and was falling up to 6,700 meters per minute in the last seconds of the crash, flight-tracking site FlightRadar24 reported.

Russian media reported that search crews had found one flight recorder but it is not clear if it is the data or voice recorder.

Putin offered “his profound condolences to those who lost their relatives in the crash,” according to his spokesman Dmitry Peskov.

U.S. President Donald Trump joined world leaders in offering condolences to Putin and the Russian people. “The United States is deeply saddened by the tragic deaths of those on board Saratov Airlines Flight 703. We send our condolences to the families of those who lost their lives and to the people of Russia,” a statement released by the White House said.

The Domodedovo airport has been the focus of security concerns in the past. It came under sharp criticism in 2004, after Chechen suicide bombers destroyed two airliners that took off from the airport on the same evening, killing a total of 90 people. A 2011 bombing in the arrivals area killed 37 people. 

Shabby equipment and poor supervision plagued Russian civil aviation for years after the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union, but the safety record has improved in recent years.
…