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Germany’s spy chief has warned that Russia should be seen as a “potential danger” rather than as a partner in building European security and said its big military exercise in summer showed an alarmingly high level of modernization in its armed forces.

Bruno Kahl, head of BND foreign intelligence, made his remarks in a speech at an event hosted by the Hanns Seidel Foundation think-tank in Munich on Monday. An audiofile of the speech was heard by Reuters on Wednesday.

Kahl’s remarks come after U.S. intelligence accusations that Moscow sought to interfere in the U.S. elections in January and followed similar charges by Spanish ministers who say Russian-based groups used social media to promote Catalonia’s independence referendum and destabilize Spain.

Moscow denies interfering in any foreign elections and accuses the West of a campaign to discredit Russia.

Kahl said it was important for Germany, the U.S.-led NATO alliance and the European Union to keep a close eye on Russian military development.

He said Russia’s large-scale Zapad exercise in summer had shown it was “very, very close” to meeting its target of modernising 70 percent of its armed forces by 2020.

“We must stay alert. Peace in Europe is no longer a guaranteed fact,” he said.

Russia’s goal included “weakening the EU, pushing back the USA, and in particular driving a wedge between the two. That means, instead of a partner for European security, we have in Russia a potential danger,” he said.

Russian President Vladimir Putin was determined to prevent the eastward spread of European values to include Ukraine which, together with Georgia, had no chance of becoming members of NATO as long as Putin’s “world view” prevailed in Moscow,” he said.

The threat to Germany’s security had increased with Moscow’s stationing of short-range missiles in its Kaliningrad enclave, he said.

“The world player Russia is back. It will remain an uncomfortable power, and the West must see that realistically,” he said, though it was important to maintain some dialogue with Moscow despite its assertive actions.
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President Emmanuel Macron says the French government itself fueled homegrown Islamic extremism by abandoning its poorest neighborhoods — and he’s promising tough and “sometimes authoritarian” new measures to combat radicalization.

Macron unveiled a multibillion-euro plan Tuesday to help France’s troubled banlieues — suburban regions where crime flourishes and job opportunities are scant, especially for minorities with origins in former French colonies.

More than 5 million people live in France’s poorest neighborhoods, where unemployment is 25 percent — well above the nearly 10 percent national average. For those under 30, the prospects are even worse — more than a third are officially unemployed.

Macron’s answer is to provide grants for poor youths to launch startups, double the funding for public housing, expand child care, improve public transport in isolated or poor neighborhoods, offer subsidies for companies that hire disadvantaged youth and hire more local police officers.

Macron’s predecessors also spent billions to try to fix the banlieues, and failed. But he’s undeterred, and says the stakes are increasingly high.

“Radicalization took root because the state checked out” and abdicated its responsibilities in impoverished neighborhoods, Macron said — leaving extremist preachers to fill the void.

Radical recruiters argued “I will take care of your children, I will take care of your parents … I will propose the help that the nation is no longer offering,” Macron said.

Several extremist attackers who have targeted France in recent years were raised in troubled French social housing. The head of domestic French intelligence agency DGSI, Laurent Nunez, said Tuesday that nearly 18,000 people in France are on radicalism watch lists, a growing number.

Macron said his government will present about 15 measures to fight radicalization and will close “unacceptable structures” that promote extremism and “try to fracture us.”

Macron spent three hours Monday talking to residents in Clichy-sous-Bois, a Paris suburb where the death of two boys fleeing police led to weeks of nationwide riots in 2005, an eruption of anger over discrimination, isolation and joblessness.

On Tuesday, he visited Tourcoing in northern France, taking selfies with residents and promoting local technology entrepreneurs.

Labeled by critics as the “president of the rich” for his business-friendly economic vision, Macron insisted Tuesday that his strategy will only succeed if companies hire minorities and the poor.

He promised measures to name and shame companies found to discriminate when hiring, to ensure help for teenagers seeking internships, and to include poor youths in French technology incubators.

Some proposals are small but significant, such as state aid to keep libraries open later, so young people have a safe place to be after dark in dangerous neighborhoods.

 
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When exactly will Britain leave the European Union?

Parliament started hours of debate Tuesday by arguing over when the two-year negotiating period for Brexit should end and whether there should be a fixed time at all.

It was just the first day of what promises to be a lengthy set of debates in Parliament on Prime Minister Theresa May’s blueprint for leaving the EU — debates that will challenge her diminished authority and could force changes to her Brexit plan.

Her absence Tuesday on another engagement suggested she was not unduly worried by the initial discussion.

But the debate’s ill-tempered tone showed the level of anger in a Parliament emboldened since May lost her Conservative Party’s majority in a June election and was forced to garner the support of a small Northern Irish party to be able to pass legislation.

With catcalls, sarcastic jokes and jeers being bandied about — not just between the two main parties, as is the custom, but often within them — some lawmakers took issue with the government’s plans to quit the EU at 11 p.m. on March 29.

One, from the opposition Labor Party, said Britain should leave the EU on March 30, 2019, preferring midnight British time to the government’s proposal to leave an hour earlier — which would be midnight in Brussels.

That was determined to be “technically deficient” by the government minister on the opposite side of the House of Commons, who said any amendment trying to move the exit date and time threatened to push Britain into “legal chaos” if the country’s statute book were not in order when it leaves.

“As a responsible government we must be ready to exit without a deal, even though we expect to conclude a deep and special partnership [with the EU],” he told Parliament.

Divisions exposed

Behind the debate is the fear of pro-Brexit lawmakers that Britain may never leave the EU, and of pro-EU lawmakers who fear that by setting any firm date, Britain will have no flexibility in talks with the bloc and might end up with no deal.

Another debate later Tuesday was to look at the interpretation of EU law.

The debates go to the heart of what parliament calls “one of the largest legislative projects ever undertaken in the UK.”

The process of transposing EU law into British law could not only reopen the divisions exposed when Britons voted in June 2016, by a 52 percent to 48 percent margin, to quit the EU, but also further undermine May’s already fragile authority.

May has lost two ministers to scandals and her foreign minister, Boris Johnson, is facing calls to resign over remarks he made about a jailed aid worker in Iran. The Sunday Times has reported that 40 Conservatives support a no-confidence vote.

The prime minister has tried to ease tensions by offering lawmakers some concessions on the bill, but still faces more divisive debates that could go against her.
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The European Union has called very publicly for Malta to bring to justice the killers of a journalist who accused the Mediterranean island’s leaders of profiting from global corruption.

But it has for years been much less vocal — and had little success — in ensuring Malta act to prevent money laundering, according to sources familiar with the work of the Maltese authorities and a Reuters review of EU and Maltese data.

The data show the smallest EU state has been slow to apply international guidelines on naming firms that do not take action against dubious practices, and the number of convictions and sanctions for money laundering has been low.

Malta has also consistently registered fewer reports of “suspect transactions” from banks, casinos and other financial operators than any other EU state, according to the data, despite having a  disproportionately large financial sector.

The European Parliament on Tuesday debated the rule of law in Malta, and will vote Wednesday on a resolution that says “several serious allegations of corruption and breach of anti-money laundering” obligations were not investigated by the Maltese police.

But criticism of Malta on money laundering — in low-key reports by international supervisory bodies and by anti-corruption campaigner Daphne Caruana Galizia, killed by a car bomb on Oct. 16 — appears so far to have had little impact.

“Malta has sold its sovereignty to dirty money. The European Commission should take a more active role in investigating the condition of rule of law in Malta,” Sven Giegold, a member of European Parliament from Germany’s Greens party who campaigns against financial crime, told Reuters.

He said an international investigator was needed to counter a “culture of impunity and fiddling between political and economic elites” in Malta.

Prime Minister Joseph Muscat told Reuters last month Malta’s financial services sector was “as transparent, solid and compliant as any other European jurisdiction.”

European Commission Vice President Frans Timmermans told lawmakers on Tuesday the EU executive had “no general concerns” about Malta’s compliance with anti-money laundering laws though “improvements could be made on various levels.”

Finance hub

Despite having a population of only 420,000, Malta, a former British naval stronghold south of Sicily, has a financial sector that dwarfs many EU countries. It is also the European leader in online gaming.

In 2016, assets of banks and financial institutions in Malta were more than 20 times its gross domestic product, about five times the equivalent figure for Germany and nearly four times the eurozone average, European Central Bank figures show.

Yet in a report on the EU’s anti-money laundering efforts that was released without fanfare in September, Europol said Malta reported fewer suspect transactions than other EU states between 2008, when it adopted the euro, and 2014.

Europol also raised concerns that Malta and Cyprus may be failing to report as many cases as they should.

The supervisory authorities “receive very few reports given the size of their banking sectors and the significance of these jurisdictions in offshore financial services,” Europol said.

Malta’s Financial Intelligence Analysis Unit (FIAU), the country’s anti-money laundering agency, received 202 reports of suspect transactions in 2014, the last year for which Europol data are available.

Lithuania recorded the next fewest — over 50 percent more than Malta in a financial sector one sixth the size. By contrast, the Netherlands, a much bigger economy, reported 277,532 dubious movements in 2014, the highest number in the eurozone.

FIAU’s deputy director, Alfred Zammit, told Reuters it was impossible to conduct a “meaningful comparison” among EU countries based on available statistics because of different structures and reporting regimes in member states.

“It is indeed arguable that given the size of the financial sector in Malta, one would expect to see more suspicious transaction reports submitted to the FIAU,” Zammit said. But he said Malta was tackling the problem by increasing awareness of the obligation to report by organizing training sessions.

The annual number of reports in Malta more than doubled from 2014 to 2017 although the proportion of those that were passed to the police fell to 11 percent last year from 24 percent in 2013, FIAU data show.

The Maltese police and the FIAU did not respond to questions from Reuters on how many of these cases were investigated or led to successful prosecutions.

Convictions

Malta’s court handed down four money-laundering criminal convictions last year but disclosed none in the financial sector.

The results of a European Parliament inquiry released this month said the number of convictions was “extremely low” and the institutions implementing and enforcing rules on money laundering were “highly politicized.”

Banks not complying with money-laundering rules have received small fines which in few cases were made public, contrary to guidelines recommending exposure to deter wrongdoing.

Zammit said the public disclosure of a higher number of sanctioned institutions would have been “disproportionate when compared to the nature of the breach.”

Moneyval, the anti-money laundering watchdog of the Council of Europe, Europe’s leading human rights organization, has also raised concerns. It said in a 2012 report that Malta’s reporting of suspicious transactions was low for the size of its market.

In a subsequent report in 2015, Moneyval found the country “largely compliant.” A Moneyval spokesman told Reuters the latest report was, however, not based on a full assessment of the Maltese legal framework.
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Madrid believes Russian-based groups used online social media to heavily promote Catalonia’s independence referendum last month in an attempt to destabilize Spain, Spanish ministers said Monday.

Spain’s defense and foreign ministers said they had evidence that state and private-sector Russian groups, as well as groups in Venezuela, used Twitter, Facebook and other Internet sites to massively publicize the separatist cause and swing public opinion behind it in the run-up to the Oct. 1 referendum.

Catalonia’s separatist leaders have denied that Russian interference helped them in the vote.

“What we know today is that much of this came from Russian territory,” Spanish Defense Minister Maria Dolores de Cospedal said of Russian-based internet support.

“These are groups that, public and private, are trying to influence the situation and create instability in Europe,” she told reporters at a meeting of EU foreign and defense ministers in Brussels.

Asked if Madrid was certain of the accusations, Spanish Foreign Minister Alfonso Dastis, also at the meeting, said: “Yes, we have proof.”

Dastis said Spain had detected false accounts on social media, half of which were traced back to Russia and another 30 percent to Venezuela, created to amplify the benefits of the separatist cause by re-publishing messages and posts.

Ramon Tremosa, the EU lawmaker for the PDeCat party of Catalan separatist leader Carles Puigdemont, repeated on Monday that Russian interference had played no part in the referendum.

“Those that say Russia is helping Catalonia are those that have helped the Russian fleet in recent years, despite the EU’s boycott,” Tremosa tweeted, referring to Spanish media reports that Spain was allowing Russian warships to refuel at its ports.

Those who voted in the referendum opted overwhelmingly for independence. But turnout was only about 43 percent as Catalans who favor remaining part of Spain mainly boycotted the ballot.

The separatist vote has plunged Spain, the eurozone’s fourth-biggest economy, into its worst constitutional crisis since its return to democracy in the 1970s.

Dastis said he had raised the issue with the Kremlin.

Moscow has repeatedly denied any such interference and accuses the West of a campaign to discredit Russia.

Information warfare?

NATO believes Moscow is involved in a deliberately ambiguous strategy of information warfare and disinformation to try to divide the West and break its unity over economic sanctions imposed on Russia following its 2014 annexation of Crimea.

U.S. intelligence agencies concluded in January that Russia interfered in the U.S. election to try to help President Donald Trump defeat rival Hillary Clinton by hacking and releasing emails and spreading propaganda via social media.

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, who attended the EU meeting in Brussels, declined to comment on Spain’s accusations, but the alliance’s top commander said last week that Russian interference was a concern.

NATO’s Supreme Allied Commander General Curtis Scaparotti said “Russian malign influence” was trying to sway elections and other decisions in the West, describing it as a “destabilization campaign,” although he did not directly address the Catalonia referendum.
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The United States said Monday it would fund rural media outlets in Hungary to help train and equip journalists in defense of an independent media it sees subject to growing pressure and intimidation.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has increased media control by legal changes, regulatory steps and takeovers of outlets by business sector associates. The moves have alarmed Western partners with the approach of elections, due in April 2018, which he is widely expected to win comfortably.

The trend was especially strong in rural Hungary, where government-controlled public media and a handful of outlets friendly to the ruling Fidesz party are the only news sources most people get.

That is where the $700,000 U.S. program focuses.

“The Department of State … seeks a partner for the United States Government who will help educate journalists and aspiring journalists on how to practise their trade,” a State Department official said in a statement emailed to Reuters.

“The United States has publicly and privately expressed our concerns about the status of the free press in Hungary on multiple occasions,” the official said. “Hungary has committed to upholding these standards.”

The government had no immediate comment.

The program offers technical and financial assistance to media outlets, as well as increased local and international exposure, small grants and other tools. They can use the funds after May 2018.

‘Numbers dwindling’

Washington denied entry to top officials of his government on corruption charges in 2014, and Orban ruffled feathers with attacks on the U.S.-chartered Central European University, an issue yet to be resolved.

The U.S. Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor launched the program after the top U.S. diplomat in Budapest cited an erosion of media freedoms.

“There are still independent and opposition media outlets here that are able to practice journalism with broad editorial freedom,” Charge d’Affaires David Kostelancik said last month at a journalism conference. “That is a good thing.”

“However, their numbers are dwindling, and they face challenges in the advertising market that the pro-government outlets do not. They face pressure and intimidation … as a result, fewer and fewer Hungarians are exposed to the robust debate and discussion that is so important — in fact, fundamental — to a representative democracy.”

Foreign Ministry State Secretary Levente Magyar, reacting to those comments, said the government would “continue to reject all statements that affect Hungarian internal affairs and are based on misrepresentation in the strongest possible terms.”

The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, an intergovernmental human rights and media freedom watchdog, has said media pluralism has declined in Hungary.
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European and African ministers agreed on Monday to try to improve conditions for migrants in Libya and seek paths such as scholarships for Africans to reach Europe legally, to cut the death toll from smuggling across the Sahara and Mediterranean.

The deadly trek across the desert from sub-Saharan Africa through Libya and over sea to Italy is now the main route used by refugees and other vulnerable migrants heading to Europe, after Turkey closed the other main route via Greece that brought in nearly a million people in 2015.

Almost 115,000 migrants have landed on Italian shores so far this year. Almost 2,750 are known to have died while trying to cross the Mediterranean, the U.N. International Organization for Migration said on Friday, and the death toll in the Sahara desert is thought to be at least twice as high.

European and African officials say the numbers reaching Europe have finally been falling over the past few months due to better efforts to fight smuggling. But that has also left tens of thousands of migrants trapped in Libya, often detained in conditions rights groups say are dangerous and inhumane.

Interior ministers belonging to the “Central Mediterranean contact group” met in Switzerland to discuss the crisis.

While they talked about law enforcement measures to combat smuggling, their final statement focused more on efforts to alleviate the journey’s harm.

Ministers from Algeria, Austria, Chad, France, Germany, Italy, Libya, Malta, Niger, Slovenia, Switzerland, Tunisia and Mali were among those backing the statement.

“We had a very intensive exchange, because the questions we are dealing with are very demanding issues,” Swiss Justice Minister Simonetta Sommaruga said after the meeting.

“This is why we concentrated on protecting refugees. We had many people with different viewpoints sitting around the table, but nonetheless, on this point we all agreed … We want to improve the situation of migrants and refugees, particularly in Libya.”

Sommaruga said an improvement in the situation on the central Mediterranean route would be possible only if countries joined together to help stabilise Libya.

The ministers said they would work closely with Libyan authorities to ensure detained migrants and refugees were held with respect for human rights and humanitarian standards, and promised to secure priority release from detention for vulnerable people such as children and victims of torture.

They also pledged to create economic alternatives to smuggling, including pilot projects for pathways for Africans to reach Europe legally, such as scholarships and apprenticeships.

“We risk this time to be seen as a dark chapter in European history. If we wish to change that situation, we must get together with those states which themselves are very severely affected by migration,” Sommaruga said.

 
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Poland’s Foreign Ministry said Monday that it strongly condemns racist, anti-Semitic and xenophobic ideas, but insisted that a large weekend march by nationalists in Warsaw was largely an expression of patriotic values. 

The ministry said that the march Saturday on the Independence Day holiday was “a great celebration of Poles, differing in their views, but united around the common values of freedom and loyalty to an independent homeland.”

The event was organized by groups that trace their roots to radical nationalist pre-World War II anti-Semitic groups. Some 60,000 people took part, including families with children and older people. But there were also young men carrying banners with messages including “White Europe of brotherly nations.”

Some carried the Celtic Cross, a white supremacist symbol.

Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Emmanuel Nahshon called the event “a dangerous march of extreme and racist elements.” 

“We hope that Polish authorities will act against the organizers,” Nahshon said in a statement to The Associated Press. “History teaches us that expressions of racist hate must be dealt with swiftly and decisively.”

The Polish Foreign Ministry said it was not justifiable to define the march based on some “incidental” elements. Underlining its opposition to extremism, the ministry recalled that it had opposed a visit to Poland by Richard Spencer, the leading American white nationalist. 

Spencer was originally to have attended a conference in Warsaw a day before the march, but he was taken off the schedule after the ministry said it did not want him in the country.
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The European Union has approved economic sanctions, including an arms embargo on Venezuela.

EU foreign ministers meeting in Brussels announced the measures on Monday in response to regional elections last month, which they say worsened the country’s crisis.

The weapons ban is intended to prevent the government of President Nicolas Maduro from purchasing military equipment that could be used for repression or surveillance.

The sanctions also include setting up a system for asset freezes and travel restriction on some past and present Venezuelan officials close to Maduro.

Spain has long pushed for sanctions on those close to Maduro, but the EU has been divided over whom to target.

In Monday’s statement, ministers said they would focus on security forces, government ministers and institutions accused of human rights violations, and the disrespect of democratic principles or the rule of law.

Last Thursday, the U.S. imposed financial sanctions on 10 current and former Venezuelan officials because of corruption and abuse of power allegations related to Maduro’s crackdown on the opposition.

The EU also stressed that it would not recognize Venezuela’s pro-Maduro Constituent Assembly, whose 545 members took office in August and sidelined the opposition-led National Assembly. The EU said its creation has only served to “further erode democratic and independent institutions.”
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Slovenia’s President Borut Pahor was re-elected to a second term Sunday after winning a runoff election against a former comedian and mayor of a northern town.

Pahor, 54, a veteran politician known as the “King of Instagram” for his frequent use of social media, won 53 percent of the vote to challenger Marjan Sarec’s 47 percent, results from Slovenian election authorities showed after a completed preliminary count.

Pahor thanked voters and vowed to further boost their faith in democracy. He congratulated his opponent for his performance.

“I will be a president of all,” Pahor said. “I’ll bring people together and build on what brings us closer.”

Political veteran

Pahor is only the second Slovenian president to win a second term in office since the country gained independence from the former Yugoslavia in 1991. The country of 2 million people in Central Europe is the birthplace of U.S. first lady Melania Trump and known for its Alpine mountains and lakes.

A former model like the U.S. first lady, he has held a number of public posts and was Slovenia’s prime minister before he first was elected president in 2012.

Sarec was a well-known satirical comedian before entering politics in 2010 to run for mayor in Kanik. He conceded defeat and congratulated Pahor on Sunday night, but said his success as a relative political newcomer showed Slovenian citizens wanted change.

“I’m proud to have had a possibility to run against the premiere league,” Sarec said at his headquarters in Kanik. “My result is good. It speaks for itself.”

Analysts had warned that Sarec’s ability to make it into the runoff showed Slovenians’ discontent with established politicians. Critics accused Pahor of avoiding taking stands on important issues.

Top issues: economy, border, EU

Key topics facing Slovenia include the economy, a border dispute with Croatia and the future of the European Union, which Slovenia joined in 2004.

Slovenia’s presidency carries no executive powers, but the office-holder proposes a prime minister and his or her opinion on important issues holds weight. Pahor and Sarec, while both centrists, clashed on issues such as the privatization of Slovenia’s biggest bank and the composition of the country’s anti-corruption body.

After voting Sunday, Pahor complained that he has been falsely viewed as a populist, which he says he is not, while Sarec was trying to assume the role of a “statesman.” Pahor suggested that the “change of roles” cost him public support.

In his victory speech, Pahor, who has sought to portray himself as a unifier president, also said that he will strive to help solve problems and bridge any divisions that might exist in the Slovenian society.
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Support for Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservatives has fallen to the lowest level in more than six years, according to a poll on Sunday, as they prepare for more talks on a coalition deal with the environmentalist Greens and a pro-business party.

The weekly Emnid survey for Bild am Sonntag newspaper showed only 30 percent would vote for Merkel’s CDU/CSU bloc if there were a federal election this Sunday, down 1 percentage point.

This is the lowest reading for the conservatives in this survey since October 2011 and marks a slump in support since the Sept. 24 election, in which Merkel’s bloc won 32.9 percent.

Merkel’s conservatives, who bled support to the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) in the election, are trying to forge a three-way coalition government with Greens and the pro-market Free Democrats (FDP) – an alliance untested at the national level.

At a meeting later on Sunday party leaders are expected to discuss progress made so far in exploratory talks and try to overcome their remaining differences over climate, immigration and euro zone policy.

The meeting is due to start at 1500 GMT in Berlin and no statements are planned after the talks.

While politicians from the CDU/CSU and the FDP have cited progress after three weeks of exploratory talks, senior Greens voiced frustration and stepped up the pressure on Merkel.

“We see no goodwill at all on Europe, foreign and domestic policy, on affordable housing and good working conditions, on transport and agriculture transition,” Greens co-leader Cem Ozdemir told Bild am Sonntag.

Touching on one of the thorniest issues, Merkel said on Saturday that Germany should lead the fight against climate change and cut emissions without destroying industrial jobs.

Merkel’s comments, made in her weekly podcast in the middle of talks on limiting global warming attended by about 200 nations in the western German city of Bonn, highlighted the dilemma facing the center-right leader in the negotiations.

While the CUD/CSU and the FDP want to spare companies from additional burdens, the Greens want to spell out which measures the next government will implement for Germany to reach its 2020 goal of lowering emissions by 40 percent from 1990 levels.

Due to strong economic growth and higher-than-expected immigration, Germany is at risk of missing its emissions target without any additional measures.

Merkel wants to have an agreement in principle by Nov. 16 on moving ahead to formal coalition negotiations to form a black-yellow-green government – also dubbed a “Jamaica coalition” because the parties’ colors match those of that country’s flag.

With less than a week to go, the exploratory coalition talks are not only complicated by the differences between the parties, but also by splits within the political parties themselves e€“ especially within the conservatives and Greens.

A breakdown of the talks could mean fresh elections in Germany, Europe’s biggest economy, since the Social Democrats (SPD) – the second biggest party – have made clear they have no appetite for joining another ‘grand coalition’ under Merkel.
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The Kremlin said on Sunday that inflexibility on the part of the United States was to blame for the lack of a bilateral meeting between Russia’s President Vladimir Putin and U.S. President Donald Trump during a summit in Vietnam.

Trump and Putin met briefly on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Vietnam on Saturday and agreed on a joint statement supporting a political solution for Syria, but did not hold substantive bilateral talks.

“Unfortunately the American side did not offer any alternatives despite all efforts of our Russian colleagues.

There was only one time offered that was convenient for the American side, and only one place offered, which had already been rented by the Americans,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov was quoted as saying by the RIA news agency.

“The Americans showed no flexibility, and unfortunately did not offer any other alternative proposals. That is why the meeting could not happen,” Peskov added.

Putin himself said on Saturday the lack of a bilateral meeting with Trump in Vietnam was due to both leaders’ schedules and protocol obstacles that their teams had been unable to overcome.

Allegations that Trump’s election campaign colluded with Moscow last year to turn voters away from Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton have hampered the president’s efforts to improve frosty U.S.-Russian relations.

Putin renewed his denial of the allegations during his brief meeting with Trump on Saturday. Trump has previously said the accusations of collusion were a hoax.
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Israel signaled on Sunday that it would keep up military strikes across its frontier with Syria to prevent any encroachment by Iranian-allied forces, even as the United States and Russia try to build up a cease-fire in the area.

U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday affirmed joint efforts to stabilize Syria as its civil war wanes, including with the expansion of a July 7 truce in the southwestern triangle bordering Israel and Jordan.

A U.S. State Department official said Russia had agreed “to work with the Syrian regime to remove Iranian-backed forces a defined distance” from the Golan Heights frontier with Israel, which captured the plateau in the 1967 Middle East war.

Moscow did not immediately provide details on the deal.

Israel has been lobbying both big powers to deny Iran, Lebanon’s Hezbollah and other Shi’ite militias any permanent bases in Syria, and to keep them away from the Golan, as they gain ground while helping Damascus beat back Sunni-led rebels.

In televised remarks opening Israel’s weekly Cabinet meeting on Sunday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu did not speak about the new U.S.-Russian arrangement for Syria.

His regional cooperation minister, Tzachi Hanegbi, sounded circumspect about the deal, telling reporters that it “does not meet Israel’s unequivocal demand the there will not be developments that bring the forces of Hezbollah or Iran to the Israel-Syria border in the north.”

‘Red lines’

“There’s reflection here of the understanding that Israel has set red lines, and will stand firm on this,” Hanegbi said.

That was an allusion to Israeli military strikes in Syria, carried out against suspected Hezbollah or Iranian arms depots or in retaliation for attacks from the Syrian-held Golan.

In the latest incident, the Israeli military said it shot down a spy drone on Saturday as it overflew the Golan. Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman blamed the drone on the Syrian government. Damascus did not immediately respond.

Repeating Israel’s warnings to Iran and Hezbollah, Lieberman said: “We will not allow the Shi’ite axis to establish Syria as its forefront base.”

Russia, which has a long-term military garrison in Syria, has said it wants foreign forces to quit the country eventually.

The U.S. State Department official, who briefed reporters on condition of anonymity on Saturday, said that goal could be served by Russia’s pledge to remove Iranian-linked fighters from the truce zone in southwestern Syria.

“If this works, this is an auspicious signal, would be an auspicious signal, that our policy objective — the objective that I think so many of us share, of getting these guys out of Syria ultimately — that there’s a path in that direction,” the official said.
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Iran’s nuclear deal is “not negotiable,” Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Bassam Ghassemi said Saturday in response to remarks by the French president.

Emmanuel Macron called for vigilance toward Tehran over its ballistic missile program and regional activities, in an interview published Wednesday by the Emirati daily Al-Ittihad.

“We have told French leaders on several occasions that the Iran nuclear deal is not negotiable and that no other issues can be included in the text” of the 2015 agreement, state news agency IRNA quoted Ghassemi as saying.

France, the Foreign Ministry speaker said, is “fully aware of our country’s intangible position concerning the issue of Iran’s defensive affairs, which are not negotiable.”

In the interview with Al-Ittihad, published during Macron’s 24-hour visit to Abu Dhabi, the French president said: “It is important to remain firm with Iran over its regional activities and its ballistic program.”

Macron also said there was no immediate alternative to the Iranian nuclear deal — long lambasted by U.S. President Donald Trump — which curbs Iran’s nuclear program.

France has been trying to salvage the 2015 nuclear, which Iran signed with six world powers — Britain, China, Germany, France, Russia and the United States.

On October 13, Macron told Iranian President Hassan Rouhani in a phone call that France remained committed to the deal.

But the French leader stressed it was also necessary to have a dialogue with Iran on other strategic issues, including Tehran’s ballistic missile program and regional security, a proposal ruled out by Iran.

Macron’s visit this week to Abu Dhabi came amid renewed tensions between regional arch-rivals Iran and Saudi Arabia.

Iran’s nuclear deal saw sanctions imposed on Tehran lifted in exchange for limits on its atomic program.
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Spanish authorities said they rescued 251 migrants, including children, on Saturday who were making the perilous Mediterranean crossing to Europe.

The people were saved “from five improvised vessels, all in the Alboran Sea,” Spain’s maritime safety authorities said on Twitter, referring to the westernmost portion of the Mediterranean Sea.

The number of migrants arriving by sea on Spanish shores has soared over last year, with the figure nearly tripling to 15,585 in 2017 by November 8, according to the International Organization for Migration.

Many Africans undertaking the long route to Europe are choosing to avoid crossing danger-ridden Libya to get to Italy along the so-called central Mediterranean route, and choosing instead to get there via Morocco and Spain.

However, Spain is still well behind Italy, which has recorded 114,400 arrivals by sea since since the start of the year.

Since January, nearly 15,600 migrants have made it to Spain by sea, with 156 dying during the crossing, according to the IOM.

The agency estimates that 155,850 migrants have made the dangerous crossing to Europe this year and another 2,961 died or went missing while trying.
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Carrying Polish flags and throwing red smoke bombs, tens of thousands of people on Saturday joined a march in Warsaw organized by far-right nationalists to mark independence day, while counterprotesters rallied against fascism.

The annual march also attracted a considerable number of supporters of the governing conservative Law and Justice (PiS) party to honor the re-establishment of Poland’s independence in 1918.

This year’s slogan was “We Want God,” which 21-year-old Pawel from the southern city of Rzeszow said was “important because religion is important in our country and we don’t want Islamization, of Europe or especially Poland.”

Those marching chanted “God, honor, country” and “Glory to our heroes,” while a few people also shouted xenophobic lines like “Pure Poland, white Poland” and “Refugees, get out.”

A smaller rally of a couple thousand people earlier in the day protested what they called the “fascist” nature of the main march.

“I’m shocked that they’re allowed to demonstrate on this day. It’s 50,000 to100,000 mostly football hooligans hijacking patriotism,” said Briton Andy Eddles, 50, a language teacher who has been living in Poland for 27 years.

“For me it’s important to support the anti-fascist coalition, and to support fellow democrats, who are under pressure in Poland today,” he told AFP.

Main march participant Kamil Staszalek, however, warned against making generalizations and said he was marching to “honor the memory of those who fought for Poland’s freedom.”

“I for one don’t identify with fascists. The same goes for other people — and there are families with children here, too,” said Staszalek, 30, a Warsaw office worker.

“I’d say some people here do have extreme views, maybe even 30 percent of those marching, but 70 percent are simply walking peacefully, without shouting any fascist slogans,” he told AFP.

No monopoly on patriotism

Polish President Andrzej Duda hosted an official ceremony to mark 99 years since Poland regained independence after being wiped off the map for 123 years in a three-way carve-up between Tsarist Russia, Prussia and the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

Duda invites all living former Polish presidents and premiers to attend each year, and Saturday marked the first time since the PiS party came to power in 2015 that EU President Donald Tusk — a former Polish premier and PiS rival — decided to attend.

“Independence Day has always been and will continue to be a celebration of all Poles and not just one party. No politician in Poland has ever had nor will ever have a monopoly on patriotism,” Tusk told reporters upon arriving at Warsaw’s Chopin airport.

Tusk’s appearance came at a time when Warsaw has been increasingly at odds with Brussels because of the PiS government’s controversial court reforms, large-scale logging in a primeval forest and refusal to welcome migrants.

Relations between PiS and Tusk have been so tense that Poland was the only country to vote against his re-election as EU president in March.

Warsaw business owner Wojciech Krol, who attended the anti-fascist rally with a huge Polish flag, said he was a Tusk opponent for a long time but was now happy with his work in the European Union and glad that he returned to Poland on Saturday.

“I’m really happy he came. What we want most here is as much Europe as possible, because right now it is only global pressure, and specifically EU pressure, that has stopped us all from being arrested, beaten, harassed and so on,” Krol, 55, told AFP.
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Some foreign students in U.S. schools find it challenging to submit grammatically correct, idiomatically accurate papers. So two former Ukrainian graduate students launched an artificial intelligence-driven grammar-proofing program that goes well beyond spell-check. Today, their 8-year-old startup, Grammarly, whose first venture round netted $110 million in May, has offices in Ukraine and the U.S. VOA Ukrainian Service correspondent Tatiana Vorozhko has the story.
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From Queen Elizabeth to U2 frontman Bono, the leak of more than 14 million documents from firms involved in offshore finance, known as the Paradise Papers, has engulfed some of the world’s most famous names. One country appears more than most in the papers: Britain. Campaigners say weak regulation means Britain is at the center of the secretive industry, and its decision to leave the European Union is making things worse, as Henry Ridgwell reports from London.
…

Uber lost the latest round in the battle over its operating model Friday, when a British panel ruled that the company’s drivers are workers, not independent contractors.

The Employment Appeal Tribunal upheld a lower panel’s decision, agreeing that the two drivers in this case were “workers” under British law and therefore should receive the minimum wage and paid holidays. Uber said it would appeal.

Judge Jennifer Eady rejected Uber’s argument that the men were independent contractors, because the drivers had no opportunity to make their own agreements with passengers and the company required them to accept 80 percent of trip requests when they were on duty.

The tribunal, Eady wrote in her decision, found “the drivers were integrated into the Uber business of providing transportation services.”

The ride-hailing service said it has never required drivers in the U.K. to accept 80 percent of the trips offered to them and that drivers make well above the minimum wage. Employment lawyers expect the case to be heard by higher courts as early as next year.

“Almost all taxi and private hire drivers have been self-employed for decades, long before our app existed,” Tom Elvidge, Uber’s acting general manager for the U.K., said in a statement. “The main reason why drivers use Uber is because they value the freedom to choose if, when and where they drive, and so we intend to appeal.”

Alternative to taxis

San Francisco-based Uber has expanded rapidly around the world by offering an alternative to traditional taxis through a smartphone app that links people in need of rides with drivers of private cars. That has drawn protests from taxi drivers who say Uber and similar services are able to undercut them because they don’t face the same licensing and regulatory requirements.

Though the company argued that the case applies to only two drivers, Uber has tens of thousands of drivers in the U.K. who could argue they deserve the same status as the former drivers covered by Friday’s decision. The court says 40,000 drivers use the platform in the U.K., though the company said the number had grown since the submission to 50,000.

“Uber cannot go on flouting U.K. law with impunity and depriving people of their minimum wage rights,” said James Farrar, who with Yaseen Aslam brought the case against Uber. “We have done everything we can. Now it is time for the mayor of London, Transport for London [the government body responsible for the transport system in greater London] and the transport secretary to step up and use their leverage to defend worker rights rather than turn a blind eye to sweatshop conditions.”

The ruling also has implications for more than 100,000 independent contractors in Britain’s so-called gig economy, where people work job to job with little security and few employment rights. Such employment, often for companies that use mobile phone apps to provide everything from food delivery to health care, has surged as the Internet cuts the link between jobs and the traditional workplace.

The case is just one of many focused on the rights of British workers in both the new and old economies — from Deliveroo food delivery drivers to foster care workers and plumbers. So far, the trend in the biggest cases is clear: In eight of eight challenges in U.K. courts, workers have won.

Beyond the border

But the case is also likely to be watched beyond Britain as courts internationally grapple with issues spawned by the rise of the gig economy, said Sean Nesbitt an employment law expert at the law firm Taylor Wessing.

Uber, because of its size, is closely watched around world and across industries as a lead example of how new, disruptive business models can fit into society. Such new business models are fueling the debate about how to balance the wish to encourage economic growth and innovation while protecting individuals’ rights, Nesbitt said.

Courts are looking to each other to see how similar issues are being addressed. Nesbitt noted, for example, that Eady referred in her judgment to a case in North Carolina — which is unusual because the U.S. legal system is quite different.

“There will be an echo around the world,” Nesbitt said. “At the core of this is a debate about what it means to control people and anxiety about bargaining power.”

While the case is separate from London’s decision not to renew Uber’s license, observers are likely to watch Uber’s response to see if a company known for hard-hitting tactics is willing to change.

Following the licensing decision, Uber’s new CEO, Dara Khosorwshahi, acknowledged that Uber “got things wrong” in the past and said the company would change as it moved forward. Uber is also appealing that decision.

In the meantime, the ripple effects of the case will expand.

“We anticipate that tens of thousands drivers will now seek to make substantial back-dated claims,” said Paul Jennings of Bates Wells Braithwaite, who represented the drivers. “Our clients have fought tirelessly to gain the rights that they clearly should have been afforded from the outset.”
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Vice President Mike Pence has expressed “deep concern” to visiting Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim about the arrest of U.S. citizens and Turkish local staff at U.S. consulates in Turkey. But Pence and Yildirim also expressed hope that their meeting would help to usher in a new chapter in U.S.-Turkey relations and agreed on the need for constructive dialogue on bilateral challenges. VOA Diplomatic Correspondent Cindy Saine has more from the State Department.
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The White House Friday attempted to put to rest speculation that U.S. President Donald Trump might hold talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin on the sidelines of the Asia Pacific economic summit in Vietnam. Both presidents are attending the summit, and may have a brief chat, but will have no substantive talks, according to White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders.

“Regarding a Putin meeting, there was never a meeting confirmed, and there will not be one that takes place due to scheduling conflicts on both sides,” Sanders said in a statement issued to reporters. “There is no formal meeting or anything scheduled for them.

The statement did, however, hold open the possibility that the two leaders might have an informal conversation while they are both in Danang for the summit proceedings.

“They’re going to be in the same place. Are they going to bump into each other and say hello? Certainly possible and likely,” Huckabee Sanders wrote. “But in terms of a scheduled, formal meeting, there’s not one on the calendar and we don’t anticipate that there will be one.”

Mixed message

Russian news agency RIA Novosti Friday seemed to contradict the White House, holding out hope a substantive meeting might still take place. A one-line bulletin reported, “Kremlin Says Possible Meeting Between Putin and Trump at APEC Summit Still Being Worked On,”

The Russian side had earlier issued seemingly conflicting views about the possibility of a meeting. Kremlin aide Yury Ushakov told Russian news agencies that the two leaders would hold talks, but Reuters quoted Putin spokesman Dmitry Peskov as moderating that statement, saying only that the possibility of a meeting was being discussed.

While en route to Danang Friday, U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said he had seen the Russian reports but said nothing had been agreed to. 

In a brief exchange, Tillerson said the United States wants progress on a number of issues, and there would be no point to hold a meeting if they didn’t think they would get the progress.

A day earlier, Tillerson had acknowledged that Moscow and Washington were working behind the scenes on a “number of difficult areas.” But he questioned whether this would be the right time for a follow-up to the first Trump-Putin meeting at the G-20 summit in Germany last July.

​Hamburg meeting

That meeting in Hamburg lasted more than two hours, more than twice as long as scheduled. Trump was reported to have pressed Putin at that meeting on the question of alleged Russian meddling in U.S. elections. Later in the day, the two men were reported to have spoken again informally during a dinner for G-20 leaders, with only a Russian interpreter present.

Since then, however, ties between Moscow and Washington have deteriorated. In August, Trump grudgingly approved new congressionally mandated sanctions against Russia. The Kremlin responded by ordering Washington to substantially cut its diplomatic staff in Russia.

Trump himself mentioned the possibility of a follow-up meeting last weekend, telling reporters aboard Air Force One that he expected to meet Putin in Vietnam to ask for help in reining in North Korea’s nuclear weapons development. He made a similar comment Thursday in Beijing after meeting with China’s President Xi Jinping.

Tillerson said officials from the two countries also are discussing conflicts in Syria and elsewhere in the Middle East, while Trump also said that Russia’s interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election also remains on the table for discussion.

Several scholars of U.S.- Russia relations are leery of direct Putin-Trump talks at this delicate time in the relationship.

Kremlin critic Andrei Piontkovsky, a visiting fellow at the Hudson Institute in Washington, says Putin stands to gain much more from the meeting than Trump.

“It would be better if the United States and Russia have good relations, but the fact is, Putin is challenging the U.S. everywhere in the world, including on their own turf, and Trump doesn’t seem to consider that is hostile to western values, democracy and human rights,” Piontkovsky told VOA. “It’s very strange because Trump declines to notice these worrisome facts.”

Piontkovsky considers it foolish to ask for the Kremlin’s help in lessening the North Korean threat. 

“That ignores the fact that the tremendous progress of the North Korean nuclear program is enabled by Russian help,” Piontkovsky argued. “Putin is much more an enthusiastic supporter of Kim Jung Un than Xi Jinping. He demands that the U.S. reconcile itself with the idea of a new nuclear power.”

Charles Stevenson, associate director of the foreign policy program at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies in Washington, called a Trump-Putin meeting “risky” for U.S. interests.

“Presidential-level meetings can be helpful in smoothing over misunderstandings and allowing exchanges beyond the glare of publicity or even the knowledge of subordinates,” Stevenson said in a written reply to VOA. 

“But they can also be extremely risky if not coordinated in advance in order to achieve some agreed communiqué,” he added. “I have real doubts that President Trump is skilled and knowledgeable enough to reach any substantive agreements with President Putin.”
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In a half-forgotten field in France stands a worn monument to a regiment of U.S. soldiers who faced down racism at home and in their ranks to become World War I’s most decorated unit of African American soldiers.

In the run up to Veterans’ Day on Nov. 11, campaigners say the record of the 371st infantry regiment needs to be fully recognized. One man is trying to have one of the unit’s soldiers finally decorated with the Medal of Honor — the U.S. military’s highest award — a century after his death.

The 371st was largely made up of poor black laborers from segregated South Carolina.

They were drafted into the army by a military machine keen to keep them away from potential front line glory by putting them in support roles. But they soon found themselves in the heat of battle under the command of the French army, which was desperate for manpower in the dying days of the war.

“You had these African Americans in the early 1900s who were subject to Jim Crow, racism was rampant, the military was segregated,” said Gerald Torrence of the American Battle Monuments Commission (ABMC), a government agency that serves as guardian of U.S. military memorials and cemeteries overseas.

“These men were victimized in their daily life in the United States, yet they were not victims in their minds,” said Torrence, who is co-author of “Willing Patriots: Men of Color in the First World War.”

Until 2015, when President Barack Obama posthumously decorated a soldier from another regiment, the 371st contained the war’s only African American winner of the Medal of Honor. But now Jeff Gusky, a campaigner, explorer and photographer, has dug through the records and believes it deserves another.

Forgotten warrior

Private Burton Holmes was in his early 20s on Sept. 28, 1918 when he was badly injured during an assault on a ridge in Champagne, eastern France. In the face of heavy machine gun fire, he returned to headquarters to re-arm and fought on, rallying the troops before being killed.

He was recommended for the Medal of Honor but it was downgraded to a lesser award, a decision Gusky believes was down to institutional racism.

An African American comrade of Holmes, Freddie Stowers, was also recommended for the Medal of Honor during the war but his paperwork was misplaced for decades and he was only recognized in 1991, 73 years after his death.

Now veterans’ organizations say the case of Holmes needs to be reviewed too.

“I think the burden is on the present day U.S. Army to tell us why he wouldn’t deserve the Medal of Honor,” Gusky said.

In the tiny village of Ardeuil et Montfauxelles in eastern France (population 86), the residents have not forgotten the sacrifice of the soldiers.

Local man Frank Lesjean treks through a field after work to tend to their memorial, accessible only by a muddy track. He touches up the names of those who died with red paint and looks after the roses around the chipped granite.

“Restoring this monument helps their memory to endure,” he told Reuters. “Without it, they’d be even more forgotten.”
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European Union negotiators are readying themselves for the collapse of Prime Minister Theresa May’s government as it lurches from one crisis to another, say officials in Brussels.

And Britain’s Opposition Labor Party is eagerly standing by, with its deputy leader warning Thursday that the ruling Conservative government is so fragile “random events could bring it down.”

“Another Day, Another Crisis,” was the Daily Telegraph’s headline Thursday in the wake of May having to fire two key Cabinet ministers in a week — Michael Fallon as her defense secretary over sexual harassment claims, and the ambitious International Development Minister Priti Patel late Wednesday over 14 unauthorized meetings with Israeli ministers, business people and a high-profile lobbyist during a family vacation to Israel.

Weakened government

Britain’s beleaguered prime minister and her aides are dismissing suggestions her government is near collapse, saying her ministers are “getting on with the job.”

Weakened by her gamble last year to hold snap parliamentary elections, which led to the Conservatives losing their majority in the House of Commons, May has been able to hold on to her job because a split Conservative party has been fearful of what would follow her departure and which party faction would win a leadership competition, say analysts.

The ruling party is divided between those who want a clean and total break with the European Union and those who want Britain to maintain close ties with the economic bloc, the country’s biggest trading partner.

This week’s ministerial departures add pressure on May’s minority government following a string of controversies that she appears unable to contain — from a burgeoning sexual harassment scandal that is affecting all parties, but the incumbent Conservatives the worst, and could lead to the departure of her deputy, Damian Green — to rebelliousness among her ministers as they maneuver for political advantage and plot their own policies without paying much heed to Downing Street.

Along with all of that, several ministers have triggered alarm with gaffes that have real-life consequences. Demands have been mounting across the political spectrum for May to dismiss Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson after he misspoke, when he said a British-Iranian woman jailed in Iran had been training journalists when she was arrested.

Johnson’s critics say the ill-advised remarks risk Tehran lengthening the five-year sentence handed to Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, purportedly on national security grounds. Her employer, Thomson Reuters, says the characterization that she was in Iran to teach people journalism is false. Johnson has since said he “could have chosen his words more carefully.”

“It’s hard to remember a time when a British government was so racked by crisis after crisis,” acknowledged political writer Sonia Sodha of Britain’s leftist The Guardian newspaper.

Few replacement candidates

Sodha believes May could survive until 2019, when Brexit talks are scheduled to have concluded, if for no other reason than no one else in the Conservative party wants to take up “the poisoned chalice” of navigating the country through its exit from the European Union.

And some Conservative lawmakers concede privately that the only reason they want May to continue is that a leadership upheaval could trigger an early election which Labor would likely win.

Other Westminster-watchers aren’t as confident that May — a virtual prisoner of warring party factions over Brexit — can survive much longer.

“Governments often survive sleaze scandals, recessions and even the most disastrous of wars. Few, if any, ever recover when they become laughing stocks, objects of pity and ridicule. That, tragically, is the direction in which Theresa May’s rudderless government is fast heading,” according to Conservative commentator Allister Heath.

More challenges ahead

Much will likely depend on whether the sexual harassment crisis rocking Westminster claims other officials. The government also risks defeat in the coming days on amendments to EU withdrawal legislation. Additionally, another key factor in May’s survival is likely to come when later this month, the government reports on the state of the public finances — they could be worse than expected and require further unpopular cuts.

Some analysts are likening May’s position to that of a Conservative predecessor, John Major, whose 1992-1997 government was in disarray almost from the start due to scandals, divisions over Europe and a recession. Major was enraged by the disloyalty of his Cabinet and in an outburst picked up by a television microphone he thought was switched off, labeled three of his ministers “bastards.” Despite its instability, Major’s government managed to soldier on for nearly five years.

EU leaders aren’t so sure May can repeat Major’s achievement.

For EU, many unknown

Officials say Brussels is preparing contingency plans for May leaving before the new year and Britain holding early elections months later. An unnamed European leader told the British newspaper The Times, “There is the great difficulty of the leadership in Great Britain, which is more and more fragile. Britain is very weak and the weakness of Theresa May makes negotiations very difficult.”

Talks between British and EU negotiators were resuming Thursday in the sixth round of talks over Brexit. May is hoping her negotiators can secure a breakthrough and persuade the EU to start moving on to talks about a future trade deal even before there is a final deal on the rights of EU citizens living in Britain, what will become of the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland and the “divorce bill.”

London has suggested that since an agreement is near on the divorce terms, trade talks should start immediately, but the Europeans have a different take.

Speaking Thursday, a top EU lawmaker, Sophie in ’t Veld, warned there has been little progress, saying, “A year-and-a-half has passed since the Brexit vote and we haven’t moved an inch and the situation is getting very, very worrying.” She accused the British government of not being clear about its negotiating position.

Fears are mounting that Britain will crash out of the EU without a trade deal with its neighbors. On Monday, U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross warned that losing access to Europe’s financial markets after Brexit would damage Britain’s chances of negotiating a successful trade agreement with Washington. His warning came after the heads of U.S. banks told him they were preparing plans to move staff from London and relocate them to other European cities.

 
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Is a meeting in Vietnam between U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin on or off? On Thursday, it was not clear.

Kremlin aide Yury Ushakov told Russian news agencies that the two leaders would meet Friday on the sidelines of an Asia-Pacific summit in Danang. But U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson cast doubt on that, saying it is not clear whether there is enough progress on important pending issues between the two countries to merit top-level face-to-face talks.

“When the two leaders meet, is there something sufficiently substantive?” Tillerson rhetorically asked in Beijing, as he accompanies Trump on his five-nation Asia trip. “No conclusion has been made on that. If we’re going to have a meeting, let’s make sure it’s a meaningful meeting.”

Tillerson said that behind the scenes the two countries are working on a “number of difficult areas” but that U.S. officials have not decided whether it’s the right time for Trump to meet with Putin.

Trump, as he flew to Asia last weekend, told reporters aboard Air Force One he expected to meet with Putin to ask for his help in reining in North Korea’s nuclear weapons development.

Tillerson said officials from the two countries are also discussing conflicts in Syria and elsewhere in the Middle East, while Trump also said that Russia’s interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election also remains on the table for discussion. 

 
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U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said Thursday NATO defense ministers are considering ways to bring Russia into compliance with a key arms control treaty.

The U.S. has maintained that Russia has deployed cruise missiles in violation of the Intermediate Nuclear Forces Treaty, which prohibits the deployment of land-based U.S. and Russian short- and intermediate-range nuclear missiles.

“We have a firm belief now over several years that the Russians have violated the INF and our effort is to bring Russia back into compliance,” Mattis told reporters as he met with Thursday in Belgium with his NATO counterparts.

Mattis said NATO’s discussions about Russia were held with an eye toward sustaining other arms control pacts as well.

“This is absolutely necessary to sustain confident arms control agreements and we’re doing so in a substantial, transparent and verifiable fashion.”

Russia has repeatedly denied the claims and accused the United States of violating the treaty.  Moscow contends the U.S. Patriot missile systems deployed in Poland and Romania could be customized to launch missiles at Russia.

Mattis, who added that several other NATO nations also had evidence Russia was not in compliance, said he and the other NATO defense ministers would have discussions with Russia to try to resolve the issue.

The treaty was signed in 1987 by U.S. President Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev, the then leader of the Soviet Union.
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Visiting Berlin in the midst of sensitive coalition talks, French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire urged Germany to seize a historic window of opportunity to reform Europe, warning that the bloc could succumb to nationalism if they failed.

The visit comes six weeks after a German election forced Chancellor Angela Merkel into negotiations with parties, including the Free Democrats (FDP), that are sceptical of French President Emmanuel Macron’s ambitious vision for Europe.

By holding talks with leading members of those parties, including FDP leader Christian Lindner, Le Maire said he hoped to convince members of the next German government to leave the door open to a European deal with France as they hammer out a coalition blueprint for the next four years.

“We are of the view that there is a unique window of opportunity to improve the situation and make the eurozone stronger,” Le Maire said.

“I hope that they will take into account the necessity to

preserve a room of maneuver for negotiation,” he added.

“Because if everything is already decided in the German coalition agreement, what should we negotiate? This is one of the key reasons for my trip to Berlin.”

After nearly a decade of economic and financial crisis, and following Britain’s decision to leave the EU, Macron is pushing for a leap forward in European integration, including the creation of a budget for the eurozone and closer cooperation in defense and migration matters.

Merkel has welcomed many of his ideas, but members of her own conservative bloc and the FDP are sceptical, particularly on French plans for the eurozone, fearing Germany will be asked to pay for the policy failures of reform-wary southern states.

Europe faces choice

Speaking to reporters after meeting with Lindner, Le Maire said he believed that the differences could be overcome.

“None of the difficulties are insurmountable. I found a man who is conscious of his political responsibilities, conscious of his historic responsibilities,” he said.

Earlier in a speech to a Franco-German business forum, Le Maire likened the current situation in the eurozone to standing in the middle of a strong-flowing river where the currents were most dangerous.

He said Europe faced a choice: turn back to the shore from where they came, embracing nationalism and isolation, or say “now is the time” and press on to the opposite bank by pursuing closer integration of the eurozone.

“That status quo is not an option,” Le Maire said.

He spelled out four steps for a reform of the 19-nation single currency bloc. In the first, Europe would complete its banking union, capital markets union and harmonise its tax regimes, particularly in the area of corporate taxes.

Second, Europe would bolster its rescue fund, the European Stability Mechanism (ESM), and third, it would introduce a budget for the eurozone to fund investments in areas such as transport, energy and artificial intelligence, and help the bloc cope with economic shocks.

In a last step, member states could appoint a finance minister for the eurozone, he said.

Switching between fluent German and French, Le Maire said Franco-German working groups should be created to discuss reform on a “weekly or even daily basis.” He said other countries should be brought into the process, naming Spain and Italy.

In his speech to the business forum, Le Maire urged the bloc to unite in pushing back against powers like China and the United States that he said were determined to shape the world according to their national interests.

German politicians have been sceptical of Macron’s “l’Europe qui protege” (Europe that protects) pledge, fearful of a return to old-fashioned French protectionism.

But Le Maire said Europe should no longer be “naive” in the face of economic challenges from abroad, accusing the Chinese of killing off the European solar panel industry and the Americans of using extra-territorial sanctions to shape global trade rules in their favor.

“Europe needs to stop being scared of its own shadow,” Le Maire said. “Divided we are nothing. Together we are everything.”

 
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Serbian and U.S. paratroopers will jump side-by-side during a joint exercise aimed at strengthening military ties with Serbia, the U.S. general in charge of NATO’s Allied Air Command said, a move that could trigger protests from Moscow.

In the exercise, which is taking place at the invitation of the Serbian government, paratroopers from both countries will jump side-by-side from 2 C-130J transport planes built by Lockheed Martin in a so-called insertion exercise.

About 100 U.S. Air Force and U.S. Army personnel will participate in the event, General Tod Wolters, who also oversees U.S. Air Forces in Europe and Africa, told Reuters.

“They will actually get their paratroop wings as a result of these activities. These are confidence-building activities – relationships that will last for a lifetime. And they will certainly enhance the technical expertise of the Serbs,” he said.

It was not immediately clear how many Serbian forces would participate.

Wolters said tensions in the Balkans remained a challenge for NATO and the U.S. military, but engagement was key.

“It will continue to be a challenge, but we’ve got the right command focus. We’ve got the right resources. We’ve got the right dialogue and time will tell what unfolds,” he said.

Any NATO-related activities in Serbia are a red flag for Russia, which worries about NATO expansion in the former communist east.

Moscow has also sought to bolster military ties with Belgrade with the donation of six MiG-29 fighter jets.

Serbia has been performing a delicate balancing act between Russia and the West, rejecting calls by U.S. officials to pick a side.

The largest of the states to emerge from the collapse of Yugoslavia in the 1990s, Orthodox Christian and Slavic Serbia has natural affinity with Moscow, but it is keen to join the European Union.

Although the EU is Serbia’s single largest trade partner and investor, Russia controls its oil and gas supplies.

 
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Wary of a belligerent and unpredictable Russia, NATO is expanding its operations for the first time since the end of the Cold War and drawing up plans to improve the way the military alliance commands and deploys its forces.

NATO defense ministers Wednesday endorsed a proposal to create two new commands: one to protect sea lanes ferrying troops and equipment across the Atlantic from the United States, the other a logistics command to supervise troop movements in Europe.

“We need a command structure which can make sure that we have the right forces, in the right place, with the right equipment at the right time,” NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg told reporters at the meeting in Brussels.

He said the Atlantic headquarters would “ensure that sea lanes, our lines of communication between Europe and North America, remain free and secure. This is vital for our trans-Atlantic alliance.”

“Our military commands will now flesh out the details,” Stoltenberg said, and submit the results to the ministers when they next meet in February.

No Russian risk seen

Asked about the risk that Russia poses to the 29-nation alliance, particularly those lying on Russia’s borders, Stoltenberg said “we don’t see any imminent threat against any NATO ally.”

But, he said, “we have seen a much more assertive Russia. We have seen a Russia which has over many years invested heavily in their military capabilities, modernized their military capabilities.”

Russia has shown itself “willing to use military force against a neighbor, Ukraine, and of course NATO has to be able to respond to that,” he added.

At the end of the Cold War almost 30 years ago, around 22,000 personnel were working at 33 commands, but numbers have been slashed to fewer than 7,000 people and seven commands.

NATO allies have stationed around 4,000 troops in the Baltic States — Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania — and Poland to reassure them that the alliance stands ready to defend their borders against neighboring Russia. The move came in response to Russia’s annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula in 2014.

Command locations

Stoltenberg has been coy about where the new regional command centers would be based — he says the plan will be fleshed out in February — but he has noted Germany’s central geographical location in Europe, suggesting that it could be in the running for one. Poland is another possibility.

Britain, Portugal, Spain or even the United States might be considered for the Atlantic command.

One key factor holding up troop movements in Europe is border controls between the various nations.

Russia has few border obstacles to contend with and can deploy its forces virtually at will. NATO commanders are appealing for red tape to be cut. Officers have said that transit and transport requests need to be submitted up to 30 days in advance in some cases.

Stoltenberg said the allies have also agreed to work more closely with the European Union to improve civilian infrastructure like bridges, roads, railways, airport runways and ports so they can handle heavy military equipment.

They also want to work more closely with private companies to ensure that NATO has the kinds of transport it requires — trucks, trains and planes — to deploy more easily.
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