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Russia’s top diplomat on Friday called the Ecumenical Patriarchate’s decision to recognize the Ukrainian Orthodox Church’s independence from Moscow a Washington-backed “provocation,” from which he vowed to protect “the faithful” in Ukraine if the schism sparks violence.

On Thursday, Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople, the Istanbul-based head of global Orthodox Christianity, recognized Ukrainian churches as independent from the Russian Orthodox Church, ending the Moscow Patriarchy’s 332-year oversight of Ukrainian parishes.

The move has immediately restored Ecumenical Patriarchate jurisdiction over all Orthodox faithful in Ukraine, granting the Ukrainian Orthodox Church the right to autocephaly — the ecclesiastical term for self-governance. Under this decree, leaders of Ukraine’s Orthodox Christian community will be able to form an independently administrated Ukrainian Orthodox Church.

Calling the decision “a provocation by Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople, undertaken with direct public support from Washington,” Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov described the move as part of a conspiracy in violation of internationally recognized laws.

“Interfering in church life is forbidden by law in Ukraine, in Russia, and, I hope, in any normal state,” he said, according to a transcript of a press conference posted on the Foreign Ministry’s website.

The decision, which has sparked celebration in Kyiv and outrage in Moscow, is a victory in Ukraine’s struggle to keep Moscow at bay since its 2014 annexation of Crimea and its continued support for separatists fighting against Kyiv in the east, where violence has claimed an estimated 10,000 lives.

Theologian Sergei Chapnin recently wrote in Bloomberg News that “there’s a real danger that the rift could lead to bloodshed, an outcome that all sides must act decisively to prevent.”

Although the Kyiv Patriarchy’s formal break from Moscow has been discussed intermittently since the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russian aggression since 2014 has widened fissures running throughout Eastern Europe’s Slavic Orthodox community, hastening the split being witnessed this week.

“This step by the Kyiv Patriarchy was expected for a long time, and it is in response to many factors,” said Archimandrite Cyril Hovorun, acting director of the Huffington Ecumenical Institute at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles.

“The Ukrainian people are divided. There are millions of Orthodox people who don’t have an alternative to the Moscow Patriarchy … and those people want to belong to an independent church that is free from Russian propaganda, free from collaboration with the Russian regime,” he told VOA, calling the Moscow Patriarchy an ideological instrument of Russian aggression in Ukraine.

“Because the church was intertwined with this aggressive policy of the Russian state, the response to the Russian aggression now includes also response to the ecclesial issue,” he said. “So, the ecclesial issue in Ukraine — the church issue in Ukraine — has become a part of the political and security agenda for the state.”

Even then, he added, the Kyiv Patriarchy’s divorce from Moscow will give the faithful more options in terms of how they choose to practice their faith.

“This move is wise because it corresponds completely to the principle of freedom of consciousness, of freedom of religion,” he said, explaining that all Ukraine-based parishioners will be able to choose which type of Orthodox Church they want to attend — including those guided by tenets of the Russian Orthodox tradition.

“And the [Ukrainian] state really stressed that in the statements by [President Petro Poroshenko] and other political officials, that they will respect that choice of the people and that communities can belong to any jurisdiction they want.”

In September, Patriarch Filaret, head of the Kyiv Patriarchy, told VOA’s Ukrainian Service that the process of unifying Ukraine’s Orthodoxy will guarantee that each parish will be free to determine its future.

“Religious infighting would be a justification for [Russian President Vladimir] Putin to interfere in Ukraine’s internal affairs,” he said, vowing to avoid bloodshed at all costs. “We want this process to be free of violence. If they don`t want to join a Ukrainian church, they can stay with the Russian church.”

Kyiv’s formal split from Moscow, he added, means that the Russian Orthodox Church will not only lose most of its political and ideological influence over Ukrainian faithful, but also its standing as one of the leaders of global Orthodoxy.

“Currently, Moscow’s Patriarchy together with the Ukrainian church is the biggest Orthodox church in the world,” he told VOA, adding that Constantinople’s recognition of autocephaly cuts the Moscow Patriarchy to half its current size.

“It wouldn’t be able to fight for leadership in the Orthodox Church,” Filaret said, referring to a centuries-long geopolitical competition between Moscow and Constantinople to claim command of Orthodoxy’s quarter-billion followers worldwide.

Although more than two-thirds of Ukrainians are Orthodox Christians, Russia is home to the largest number of Orthodox faithful, bolstering its national identity as a bastion of traditional Christian values, an image the Kremlin goes out of its way to project globally.

The next step in Ukraine’s split from Russia is to reunite its various strands of Orthodox faith under the new church, which includes deciding the fate of church buildings and monasteries, some of which are aligned to the Russian Orthodox Church.

At the start of 2018, Ukraine was home to roughly one-third of the Russian church’s parish holdings, according to Kyiv’s official data.

Russia’s past efforts to undermine the Kyiv Patriarchy’s move toward self-rule involved a cyberattack on Bartholomew’s top clergy, according to the Associated Press.

Last month, the State Department endorsed support for Ukraine’s Orthodox religious leaders’ pursuit of autocephaly, saying it “maintains unwavering support for Ukraine and its territorial integrity in the face of Russian aggression in eastern Ukraine and the Russian occupation of Crimea.”

This story originated in VOA’s Ukrainian Service. Some information is from AFP and Reuters.
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Paris Saint-Germain striker Kylian Mbappe’s rapid rise to global fame has earned the teenaged World Cup winner an appearance on the cover of Time magazine’s international edition.

Time said Mbappe was a global superstar who “is the future of soccer.”

Mbappe made headlines in September 2017 when he moved from Ligue 1 side Monaco to Paris Saint-Germain for a staggering 180 million euros ($207 million), a deal that saw the then 18-year-old player handed a reported monthly salary of 1.5m euros ($1.8m).

But the 19-year-old’s stock skyrocketed during this year’s World Cup, where a series of phenomenal displays drew compliments from Brazil legend Pele on his way to helping France end their 20-year wait to win another World Cup trophy.

Mbappe became the youngest French goal scorer in World Cup history when he struck in a 1-0 win over Peru in the group stages.

The teenager from the gritty Parisian suburb of Bondy then tore apart Argentina, scoring twice and earning a penalty as Les Blues eliminated the highly-fancied South Americans 4-3 in the last 16 knockout round.

In doing so, Mbappe became only the second teenager, after Pele in 1958, to score two goals in a World Cup match.

When Mbappe scored with a 25-yard strike in the final, a 4-2 win over Croatia, he became only the second teenager to do so, after Pele, in 1958.

With a total of four goals in the tournament, Mbappe received FIFA’s award for Best Young Player of the World Cup.

Arguably better still were the plaudits from Pele himself, who said: “If Kylian keeps on equaling my records, I’m going to have to dust off my boots.”

Mbappe’s teenage days will end when he celebrates his 20th birthday on December 20.

He played a key role for France on Thursday, equalizing from the penalty spot in a 2-2 friendly draw against Iceland.

 
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Britain’s Princess Eugenie wore an elegant voluminous dress by London-based label Peter Pilotto for her wedding to Jack Brooksbank on Friday, with the bride picking a low back to reveal scars she got from surgery as a child.

The 28-year-old granddaughter of Queen Elizabeth walked down the aisle of Windsor Castle’s 15th Century St George’s Chapel in a fitted corset and pleated skirt with a long train designed by Peter Pilotto and Christopher De Vos, who founded the label in 2007.

“The dress features a neckline that folds around the shoulders to a low back that drapes into a flowing full length train,” Buckingham Palace said in a statement. “The low back feature on the dress was at the specific

request of Princess Eugenie who had surgery aged 12 to correct

scoliosis.”

Eugenie, who announced her engagement in January, worked closely with Pilotto and De Vos for the bespoke dress, with the designers leafing through archives of frocks worn by British royals to pick a silhouette.

Motifs meaningful to the couple were woven into a jacquard of silk, cotton and viscose blend, the palace said. The designs included the thistle and shamrock, the flowers of Scotland and Ireland, and the English rose.

Eugenie borrowed the queen’s Greville Emerald Kokoshnik tiara, decorated with rose cut diamonds and emeralds and made by jewelers Boucheron in 1919 in the style worn in the Russian Imperial Court.

She wore diamond and emerald drop earrings given to her by

Brooksbank and satin peep-toe heels by Charlotte Olympia.

Speculation over who would design the wedding dress had mounted over the last few weeks, with labels such as Erdem, Ralph & Russo among those mentioned in media reports.

“As soon as we announced the wedding, I knew the designer, and the look, straight away,” she was quoted as saying. “I never thought I’d be the one who knew exactly what I like, but I’ve been pretty on top of it.”

Eugenie, who works in art and Brooksbank, who is European brand manager for Casamigos Tequila, a brand co-founded by Hollywood actor George Clooney, married at the same venue that her cousin Prince Harry and Meghan Markle chose for their nuptials in May.
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French President Emmanuel Macron said on Friday it was not clear whether a foiled attack on a Paris-based Iranian opposition group was ordered by the higher echelons of authorities in Tehran.

“As you know Iran is sometimes divided into different factions and tensions, and so I can’t say today whether the order came from the top or from this [security] service or that division,” he told France 24 television in an interview.

France’s foreign ministry said on Oct. 2 there was no doubt the Iranian intelligence ministry was behind the June plot and froze assets belonging to Tehran’s intelligence services and two Iranian nationals.

The plot targeted a meeting of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) outside Paris. U.S. President Donald Trump’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani and several former European and Arab ministers attended the rally.

Belgium charged an Iranian diplomat and three other individuals on Oct. 10 with planning to bomb the meeting.

Two of the suspects were intercepted by Belgian police.

One senior French official told Reuters the plot is likely to have been hatched by hardliners looking to undermine President Hassan Rouhani, who has tried to improve Iran’s relations with the outside world.

Macron said he was still awaiting explanations, but that Rouhani had not given him any during two exchanges he had with the Iranian president.

The hardening of relations between Paris and Tehran could have far-reaching consequences for Rouhani’s government, which is looking to European capitals to salvage a 2015 nuclear deal after the United States pulled out and reimposed tough sanctions.

Macron repeated that there should be a more demanding policy toward Iran which needed to include keeping the existing deal, discussing its nuclear work after 2025 when parts of the agreement expire, its ballistic missile program and curtailing its regional influence.

“I’ve never been naive with Iran or thought it would be easy,” Macron said.
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The American evangelical Christian pastor at the center of a dispute between Ankara and Washington arrived at his home in Turkey on Friday after a Turkish court ruled he could go free, a move that may signal a major step towards mending ties between the allies.

Andrew Brunson arrived at his home in Turkey’s coastal province of Izmir, a Reuters cameraman said, having left the courthouse in a convoy of cars.

He was released after the court sentenced him to three years and 1-1/2 months in prison on terrorism charges, but said he would not serve any further jail time. The pastor has lived in Turkey for more than 20 years and was put in prison two years ago and has been under house arrest since July.

U.S. President Donald Trump, who has imposed sanctions on Turkey in an attempt to secure Brunson’s freedom, tweeted: “PASTOR BRUNSON JUST RELEASED. WILL BE HOME SOON!”

Dressed in a black suit, white shirt and red tie, the North Carolina native wept as the decision was announced, witnesses said. Before the judge’s ruling he had told the court: “I am an innocent man. I love Jesus, I love Turkey.”

After the ruling, Brunson’s lawyer told reporters the pastor was likely to leave Turkey. The U.S. military has a plan to fly Brunson back to America on a military aircraft, officials told Reuters.

The diplomatic standoff over Brunson, who had been pastor of the Izmir Resurrection Church, had accelerated a sell-off in Turkey’s lira currency, worsening a financial crisis.

Brunson had been accused of links to Kurdish militants and supporters of Fethullah Gulen, the cleric blamed by Turkey for a coup attempt in 2016. Brunson denied the accusation and Washington had demanded his immediate release.

Witnesses told the court in the western town of Aliaga that testimonies against the pastor attributed to them were inaccurate.

Brunson’s wife Norine looked on from the visitors’ area.

‘Great Christian’

Brunson’s mother told Reuters she and his father were elated at the news. “We are overjoyed that God has answered the prayers of so many people around the world,” she said.

Trump has scored points with evangelical Christians, a large part of his political base, by focusing on the Brunson case. The release could boost Trump’s ability to encourage such voters to support Republicans in large numbers in Nov. 6 elections, which will determine whether the party keeps control of Congress.

The heavily conservative constituency voted overwhelmingly for Trump in 2016. He has called Brunson a “great Christian”, and Vice President Mike Pence, the White House’s top emissary to evangelicals, had urged Americans to pray for Brunson.

U.S. broadcaster NBC said on Thursday that Washington had done a secret deal with Ankara to secure Brunson’s release. The lira stood at 5.910 to the dollar at 1336 GMT, little changed on the day after firming 3 percent on

Thursday on expectations that Brunson would be freed.

NATO allies

Relations between the two NATO allies are also under strain over U.S. support for Kurdish fighters in northern Syria, Turkey’s plans to buy a Russian missile defence system, and the U.S. jailing of a executive at a Turkish state bank in an Iran sanctions-busting case.

With Brunson’s release, attention may now turn to the fate of a Turkish-U.S. national and former NASA scientist in jail in Turkey on terrorism charges, as well as three local employees of the U.S. consulate who have also been detained.

Washington wants all these people released, while Ankara has demanded the extradition of Gulen. The cleric, who was lived in self-imposed exile in the United States since 1999, denies any role in the attempted coup.

Friday’s decision could be a first step to ease tensions. Further moves which have been discussed include the return to Turkey of bank executive Mehmet Hakan Attila to serve out his sentence, the release of the U.S. consular staff, and agreement that the U.S. Treasury avoid draconian steps against Halkbank, the state lender.

 
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Russian laws passed since President Vladimir Putin’s 2012 return to the power have dramatically strengthened Kremlin control over the flow of information online and off, according to a new study by a London-based rights group.

The report, issued by PEN International’s Moscow and St. Petersburg offices, outlines restrictions on free expression since the beginning of Putin’s third term. The report covers legislation that criminalizes criticism of the government, the increasing propagandizing of state-run media, and efforts to target libraries for possessing vaguely defined “extremist materials.”

“Russia’s aggressive assault on free expression is happening on all fronts, with the crackdown affecting not only writers, journalists, civil society actors and artists but all Russians,” said Jennifer Clement, president of PEN International. “This report outlines the ways in which Russia’s voices are being silenced, but also makes suggestions as to how the Russian authorities can uphold their international obligations to safeguard free expression.”

Restricted public access to information and free expression by writers, artists and activists, said Nadezhda Azhgikhina, executive director of PEN-Moscow, has drastically narrowed the space for civic discourse in Russia when compared with the years preceding Putin’s third term.

One reason, she said, is that high-level operatives who enforce the crackdown have been able to silence dissenters with impunity for years.

“The lives of ‘independent journalists’ in Russia are hard, and some have paid the ultimate price,” she said. “We remember our fearless colleague and friend Anna Politkovskaya, who was shot in the lobby of her apartment block in central Moscow. Although she was assassinated 12 years ago almost to the day, the masterminds behind her killing have yet to be brought to justice. Impunity emboldens perpetrators. It is time to end this vicious circle once and for all.”

Politkovskaya, who covered Russian politics and the second Chechen war for international media outlets, was gunned down by assailants on Oct. 7, 2006. Five men — two former policemen and three Chechens — were convicted in 2014 of her murder.

Chechen assassins have been involved in a string of high-profile slayings of political and media critics of Putin in recent years, including leading opposition politician Boris Nemtsov, who was shot dead in February 2015 near the Kremlin. But in all the cases, rights activists have repeatedly shown, prosecutors have failed to investigate who ordered the contract-style killings.

State officials have maintained their innocence and denied any involvement in the killings.

The PEN report also documents politically motivated incarcerations, citing the May 2014 jailing of prominent Ukrainian writer and filmmaker Oleg Sentsov, a vocal opponent to Russia’s annexation of Crimea who was extradited to Russia in violation of international law to face a 20-year sentence on spurious terrorism charges.

The PEN report also portrays artistic and literary freedom under siege, with theater directors such Kirill Serebrennikov subject to prosecution and house arrest.

Authors of the report call on the Russian authorities to amend laws stifling free expression and reviewing anti-extremism laws for unduly broad infringements of the right to freedom of expression.

This story originated in VOA’s Russian service. 
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Speculation is growing that Turkey could allow American Pastor Andrew Brunson to return to the United States, ending a diplomatic standoff between Ankara and Washington. U.S. President Donald Trump has condemned Brunson’s prosecution on terrorism charges.

Several news organizations reported Thursday that the Trump administration had reached a deal with Turkey, easing some sanctions in exchange for Ankara’s reducing or dropping charges against Brunson.

Washington was expressing cautious optimism about Brunson’s release, which could come as early as Friday. 

“I’m very hopeful that before too long Pastor Brunson, he and his wife, will be able to return to the United States,” U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Wednesday.  Pompeo has reportedly been involved in intense, behind- the-scenes talks with Ankara over the release of Brunson.

On Thursday, State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert told reporters she was not aware of any deal for Brunson’s release. “There’s a legal process that plays out,” she said.

“I’m hopeful that before too long he and his wife will be able to return to the United States. That would be an important step forward for the U.S.-and-Turkey relationship. … But we look forward to watching the case very carefully tomorrow,” Nauert said.

She added that U.S. embassy officials would attend Friday’s hearing in support of Brunson.

Erdogan position

In a sign of Brunson’s possible release, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan appeared to distance himself from any decision. “I am the president of the Turkish Republic, a democratic and constitutional state,” he said Tuesday.  “Hence, I must obey whatever the decision the judiciary gives.  All related parties must follow the judicial rulings. That’s it.”

Erdogan has been at the forefront of strong advocacy of Brunson’s prosecution as relations with Washington deteriorated.

The American pastor is facing up to 35 years in jail on terrorism and espionage charges. His next court hearing is scheduled for Friday.  Prosecutors accuse Brunson of supporting followers of the U.S.-based Turkish cleric Fethullah Gulen, blamed by Turkey for the 2016 failed coup in Turkey.  Brunson is also accused of aiding the PKK, a banned Kurdish separatist group.

Washington describes the charges as baseless, accusing Ankara of diplomatic hostage-taking. Trump, in August, partly in retaliation for Brunson’s prosecution, slapped Turkey with trade tariffs.  The action triggered a collapse of the Turkish lira.  Erdogan hit back, accusing Washington of waging economic war.

“It’s not only the evangelical base of Donald Trump. A wide range of Americans mostly view Brunson and other American detainees as political hostages,” said political analyst Atilla Yesilada of Global Source Partners.

“Any normalization of relations is out of the question as long as Brunson is detained,” he added. “If Brunson is not allowed to return home after Friday’s hearing, Trump may become impatient and impose more sanctions.”

The threat of further U.S. sanctions against Turkey’s embattled economy is fueling speculation the pastor will be freed.

“Yes, I expect him to be released. There is more and more expectation Turkey will do it,” said international relations professor Huseyin Bagci of Ankara’s Middle East Technical University.

“With America, I don’t expect relations will get worse,” he added. “On the contrary, there will be durable stability, and in the long run, Turkey-U.S. relations will continue as before. Turkey and America need one another.”

Despite the current crisis in relations, which extends to many other issues, the two NATO allies are continuing to cooperate on Syria.  Ankara recently said that cooperation has improved.

The growing expectation of Brunson’s release Friday, and with it, the removal of further U.S. sanctions, is seen as a reason why the Turkish lira has stabilized after weeks of steep declines.

However, some analysts remain cautious, citing the opaque nature of Turkey’s decision-making process. “There is a significant risk these expectations [Brunson’s release] won’t be met,” said chief economist Inan Demir of Nomura International.  “It’s extremely difficult to gain insight into the thinking of the chief policymakers, so there is room for negative surprises, definitely.”

“I would say it’s a coin flip, 50-50, whether Brunson is released,” analyst Yesilada said.

“I don’t see a clear approach from the ruling AKP camp that he is going to be released. Certainly, there is no unified approach preparing public opinion for his release,” Yesilada added.

Analysts suggest Brunson’s release is complicated by some Erdogan advisers who are warning him about appearing weak in the face of Washington’s pressure.

There are numerous other outstanding issues between the NATO allies. Next month the United States is set to impose severe sanctions on Turkey’s neighbor, Iran, and Washington is lobbying Ankara to comply with the measures.

“Ankara could be looking for a reciprocal gesture by Washington for Brunson’s release,” said former senior Turkish diplomat Aydin Selcen, who served in Washington. Trump has reportedly ruled out any concessions until Brunson is back in the United States. However, analysts point out Trump has so far not imposed any new measures against Turkey.

The Turkish state-owned Halkbank is facing a significant fine that could run into many billions of dollars for violating previous sanctions on Iran.  Analysts suggest the magnitude of the penalty could be linked to Brunson.

Analysts think a significant fine, along with the risk of further investigations and penalties against other Turkish banks, could deal a considerable blow to Turkey’s already-weakened financial system.

“It’s all like a house of cards.  Everything depends on whether Brunson is released,” said Yesilada.  “If he is released, it opens the door to resolving other issues [between Ankara and Washington]. The alternative is an escalation in tensions that could lead to all-out [sanctions] war, like the United States against Iran.”
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France’s Foreign Ministry says it has summoned Venezuela’s ambassador to France over the “suspicious” death earlier this week of an opposition councilor jailed by Venezuelan intelligence police on allegations he plotted to kill President Nicolas Maduro.

In a statement Thursday, the Quai d’Orsay said Hector Michel Mujica Ricardo was summoned earlier in the day. “France hopes light will be shed on this death through an impartial and independent investigation.”

No more details were provided.

Venezuelan officials say Fernando Alban killed himself by leaping from the 10th floor of the state police agency’s headquarters earlier this week. But opposition leaders reject the official version.

The United Nations has said it will investigate the death.
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Turkey’s finance tsar has declared war on soaring inflation and called on the country’s businesses to cut prices. 

Finance minister Berat Albayrak Tuesday called on business to cut prices by 10 percent to counter runaway inflation. The Turkish lira has fallen some 40 percent this year, driving up the price of everything from food to fuel and sending inflation to 25 percent last month, its highest in 15 years. 

Analysts warn that this radical strategy could hurt an economy that is already struggling. 

“It’s unusual to announce an anti-inflationary package without a reference to monetary policy,” said senior economist Inan Demir of Nomura International.

Most nations use monetary policy to fight inflation by raising interest rates to cut domestic demand and strengthen the local currency.

“I would say there is a reason, economic theory, and past experience favor monetary policy because measures to control prices have serious side effects,” Demir said.

Since the failed coup in 2016, numerous companies have been seized by Turkish authorities after being accused of conspiring against the government.

‘War on inflation’

In launching his “war on inflation,” the finance minister attacked unnamed companies for “speculation, opportunism and stockpiling.” Police have raided businesses, accused of speculation and shops and supermarkets are now being checked for “price gouging.”

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is weighing in, calling on consumers to report shops and businesses for excessive price hikes.

Political analyst, Atilla Yesilada of Global Source Partners, warns the government’s efforts to curtail inflation are more likely to hurt the economy than help it.

“Some people are obviously trying to benefit from the currency turmoil, but a lot of people simply have no idea how to price and cost things. This is why they are simply raising prices by as much as the exchange rate,” Yesilada said. “By trying to stop this kind of behavior, the government is simply making things worse because if people can’t price appropriately, they will stop producing or selling. I understand in some grocery stores, pharmacies and supermarkets there is a shortage of some essential goods.”

International investors 

Last month, the Turkish central bank won back some much need credibility by the international investment community by hiking interest rates by over 6 percent in a move to rein in inflation and defend the currency.

Analysts interpreted the rate hike as an essential step toward returning to economic stability and re-establishing the central bank’s independence.

A key factor cited by international investors for the weakness in the Turkish lira was Erdogan’s hostility toward interest rises and his apparent control over the central bank.

Analysts say the latest measure will likely unnerve investors again. However the Turkish lira only suffered a minimal fall following the controversial policy announcement.

“The most important agenda item for investors is the Pastor Brunson case, and any other news is overshadowed by the hearing Friday, which explains the short-lived sell-off,” said economist Demir.

An American citizen, Pastor Andrew Brunson, is on trial accused of terrorism in Turkey, charges Washington insist are baseless. U.S. President Donald Trump’s trade sanctions imposed on Turkey in August was, in part, retaliation for Ankara’s refusal to release Brunson. The sanctions resulted in the lira falling.

Brunson trial resumes

On Friday, Brunson’s trial resumes with growing expectation that he will be allowed to return to the United States. Such a move would lift the threat of further US sanctions. However, analysts warn about what will happen if Brunson is not released.

“If Brunson is not released, the markets will start to price in further sanctions by the U.S. And, as long as we don’t have much clarity on the U.S. sanctions, the market’s inclination will be to price in the more adverse scenario,” said analyst Demir.
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U.N. human rights experts are calling for a prompt independent and international investigation into the disappearance of Saudi Arabian journalist and government critic Jamal Khashoggi.  He was last seen entering the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, Turkey, October 2.

Members of the U.N. Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances say they are deeply concerned over the vanishing of Kashoggi as well as over allegations of his state-sponsored murder.

They say they are disturbed the disappearance of the Saudi journalist may be directly linked to his criticism of his government’s policies in recent years.  They are demanding an immediate international probe into the events surrounding his case.  

Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights Spokeswoman Ravina Shamdasani agrees the apparent enforced disappearance of Khashoggi from the Saudi consulate is of serious concern.

“If reports of his death and the extraordinary circumstances leading up to it are confirmed, this is truly shocking.  We call for cooperation between Turkey and Saudi Arabia to conduct a prompt, impartial and independent investigation into the circumstances of Mr. Khashoggi’s disappearance and to make the findings public,” Shamdasani said.  

Khashoggi walked into the Saudi consulate more than one week ago to get divorce papers so he could marry his Turkish fiancée.  He has not been seen since.  The journalist, a critic of the Saudi monarchy, has been living in self-imposed exile in the United States for more than a year.

His disappearance has unleashed an international firestorm and warnings of serious diplomatic repercussions if the matter is not resolved.  U.S. President Donald Trump, who has a close relationship with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed, says he does not like the “bad stories” about this situation.

Turkish media reports allege Khashoggi was murdered in the Saudi consulate and his body dismembered.  Crown Prince Mohammed calls the reports about Khashoggi’s disappearance or death completely false and baseless.

U.N. human rights experts say an international probe is needed to learn the truth.  They say the perpetrators and masterminds of this alleged crime should be identified and brought to justice.

 
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The White House said Wednesday that top Trump administration officials have spoken to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman about the mysterious disappearance of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, whom Turkish officials say they believe was murdered last week inside Riyadh’s consulate in Istanbul.

National security adviser John Bolton and senior adviser Jared Kushner, President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, talked with Salman Tuesday, while Secretary of State Mike Pompeo had a follow-up call with the Saudi leader to reiterate the U.S. demand for information about the case, the White House said.

“In both calls they asked for more details and for the Saudi government to be transparent in the investigation process,” the White House said.

Spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders said the U.S. is continuing to monitor the unfolding investigation in Istanbul, but offered no information what the crown prince told the U.S. officials about Khashoggi’s disappearance.

Trump told reporters he had talked with officials in Saudi Arabia “at the highest level” about Khashoggi’s disappearance, but offered no indication on his whereabouts.

“It’s a very sad situation, this is a bad situation,” Trump said. “It’s a terrible thing.”

“Nobody knows what happened,” Trump said, adding, “We want to get to the bottom of it. We cannot let this happen, to reporters, to anyone.”

Trump declined to say whom he talked with in the Saudi government. He said his aides have been in contact with Khashoggi’s fiancee, Hatice Cengiz, and hope to set up a meeting with her at the White House.

Turkish officials say they believe Khashoggi, a critic of Salman who has been living in self-imposed exile in the U.S., was murdered October 2 inside the consulate when he went there to pick up documents to allow him to marry Cengiz, a Turkish national, or perhaps spirited away to Riyadh.

Saudi Arabia has called the allegation “baseless,” but has offered no proof that Khashoggi left the consulate alive, nor has Turkey produced evidence that he was killed inside the diplomatic outpost.

Asked whether Washington might dispatch FBI technicians if Saudi Arabia requested it, Vice President Mike Pence said, “I think the United States of America stands ready to assist in any way.”

Pence did not indicate that either Turkey, which has launched an intensive investigation into Khashoggi’s disappearance, or Saudi Arabia has sought U.S. assistance.

He told conservative talk show host Hugh Hewitt that Khashoggi’s disappearance is “a great concern for the United States of America. The suggestion that this journalist, Mr. Khashoggi, was you know, was murdered should be deeply troubling to everyone that cares as a free and open press around the world…. The free world deserves answers. Violence against journalists should be condemned, but at this point, we don’t know what happened.”

A key U.S. lawmaker, Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia, told VOA the unfolding drama could significantly affect U.S. relations with Saudi Arabia, long an American ally in the Middle East.

“If it turns out that suspicions of Saudi involvement in the murder of this journalist are true,” Kaine said, “it could be a real sea-change in the relationship between the U.S. and Saudi Arabia that could affect many things, including U.S. support for what Saudi Arabia is doing in Yemen. So I think we have to get to the bottom of it.”

Turkey has focused much of its investigation on 15 Saudi nationals who arrived in Istanbul on two flights the same day as Khashoggi was at the consulate.

Khashoggi has written articles in The Washington Post that were critical of the Saudi regime and its intervention in the war in Yemen. Cengiz, his fiancee, wrote in the newspaper Tuesday that Khashoggi had been “somewhat concerned that he could be in danger” when he first visited the consulate September 28, but after that visit was uneventful, seemed unconcerned when he returned last week to pick up the documents they needed to get married.

She called on Trump to “help shed light” on the journalist’s disappearance. She also urged Saudi Arabia’s leaders to release security camera video from the consulate area.

Turkish media Wednesday showed what it said was a team of the 15 Saudis arriving at the Istanbul airport on the same day Khashoggi went missing. The Sabah newspaper, which is close to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, published names and pictures of the Saudi nationals, apparently taken at a passport control station.

Later, eight of the men checked into the Movenpick hotel near the consulate, with seven others checking into a different nearby hotel, the Wyndham. Nearly two hours after Khashoggi entered the consulate, video shows two vehicles with diplomatic plates leaving the consulate through police barricades and headed to the Saudi consul general’s residence. The 15 Saudis left Turkey at four different times, the Sabah report said.

Washington Post publisher Fred Ryan issued the newspaper’s latest plea for information Tuesday, saying neither Saudi Arabia nor Turkey has provided satisfactory answers.

“Silence, denials and delays are not acceptable.  We demand to know the truth,” Ryan said in a statement.

Turkey’s Foreign Ministry said Tuesday authorities would search the Saudi consulate, but there have been no details about when such a search would take place.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Saudi officials need to prove that Khashoggi left the building.

“We have to get an outcome from this investigation as soon as possible.  The consulate officials cannot save themselves by simply saying, ‘He has left,'” Erdogan said earlier in the week.

Crown Prince Salman said last week that Riyadh was “ready to welcome the Turkish government to go and search our premises,” because it had “nothing to hide” about the missing journalist.

Michael Bowman contributed to this report.
…

The founder of the British investigative group Bellingcat says Russian President Vladimir Putin lied when he said he had never met either of the two suspects in the novichok poisoning attack in England. Two Russian agents are believed to have traveled to Salisbury in March under assumed names in an attempt to poison former Russian spy Sergei Skripal. VOA’s Zlatica Hoke reports.
…

The fiancee of a Saudi journalist who disappeared after entering the country’s consulate in Istanbul last week said he had been “somewhat concerned that he could be in danger,” but that he did not fear anything would happen to him at the diplomatic outpost.

Hatice Cengiz wrote in the Washington Post that her fiance, Jamal Khashoggi, first went to the consulate on September 28 and returned last week for an appointment to pick up paperwork the couple needed to get married. He has not been seen since.

Cengiz expressed confidence in the ability of Turkish authorities to figure our what happened to Khashoggi, and further called on U.S. President Donald Trump to “help shed light” on the journalist’s disappearance. She also urged Saudi Arabia’s leaders to release security camera video from the consulate area.

Saudi Arabia has said Khashoggi left the consulate and rejected accusations from Turkish officials who said he was murdered there. Neither side has shown any proof to support its version of what happened.

Khashoggi has been critical of the Salman government, including in a number of Washington Post columns about Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, and has been living for a year in self-imposed exile in the United States after a Riyadh crackdown on dissent in the kingdom.

Washington Post Publisher Fred Ryan issued the newspaper’s latest plea for information Tuesday, saying neither Saudi Arabia nor Turkey has provided satisfactory answers.

“Silence, denials and delays are not acceptable. We demand to know the truth,” Ryan said in a statement.

The pro-government Turkish newspaper Sabah said Wednesday it identified a group of 15 Saudis who allegedly traveled to Istanbul the day Khashoggi went missing, then left Turkey later that day.

Turkish police have been looking into two private aircraft that were believed to be carrying the group when they landed at the Istanbul airport on October 2. Sabah reported that both planes returned to Riyadh, with one stopping first in Dubai and the other in Egypt. The planes belonged to a Saudi company with links to the government.

Turkey’s Foreign Ministry said Tuesday authorities would search the Saudi consulate, but there have been no details about when such a search would take place.

WATCH: US response to Khashoggi’s case

​U.S. President Donald Trump told reporters at the White House he plans to talk to the Saudis about the case, but had no information about Khashoggi’s fate. 

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Saudi officials need to prove that Khashoggi left the building.

“We have to get an outcome from this investigation as soon as possible. The consulate officials cannot save themselves by simply saying, ‘He has left,'” Erdogan said Monday on a visit to Budapest.

Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman said last week that Riyadh was “ready to welcome the Turkish government to go and search our premises,” because it had “nothing to hide” about the missing journalist.
…

Bulgarian officials said Wednesday authorities have arrested a suspect in the rape and murder of journalist Viktoria Marinova.

Chief prosecutor Sotir Tsatsarov identified the suspect as Severin Krasimirov, a Bulgarian citizen who was taken into custody in Germany.

Tsatsarov told reporters that so far investigators do not believe Marinova’s rape and killing was linked to her work, but rather was a spontaneous attack.

Krasimirov has been charged with rape and premeditated murder.

Marinova had investigated alleged corruption involving politicians and European Union funds. Her body was found Saturday in a park in the northern city of Ruse.
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The two main Catalan secessionist parties on Tuesday voted against each other in the regional parliament for the first time in three years, a sign that tensions over the strategy to adopt toward Spain’s central government are becoming more serious.

Quim Torra, the Catalan regional head and Junts per Catalunya (JxCat) member, last week threatened to withdraw parliamentary support for Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez in the national parliament, but coalition ally Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya (ERC, Republican Left of Catalonia) did not back the move.

ERC leader Oriol Junqueras, who is currently in jail for his alleged role in organizing an illegal referendum on independence for the Catalonia region last year, said establishing a good relationship with the Spanish state and finding “dialogue and agreements” was the best way to resolve the secession crisis.

While the two parties had so far managed to resolve their tensions internally, they openly split on Tuesday when ERC teamed up with the socialist party to defeat a proposal of JxCat to allow exiled and jailed representatives to vote in the regional parliament.

Junqueras and another jailed ERC member, Raul Romeva, had previously agreed to transfer their votes to a member of their party, in line with a ruling from Spain’s Supreme Court.

It is not yet clear whether those cracks could spell the end of the three-year-old pro-independence coalition, which controls the regional assembly and helped Sanchez win a confidence vote and topple conservative predecessor Mariano Rajoy in June.

Junqueras on Twitter on Tuesday urged the two parties to stick together while JxCat said it would hold an extraordinary meeting on Friday to review its strategy.

Polls in Catalonia show a relatively even split between those who favor remaining in Spain and those wanting to secede.

Sanchez has said he favors dialogue on the region’s future but has ruled out any moves toward independence.
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European Union nations, voicing worries over a U.N. report on global warming, were haggling on Tuesday over how ambitious to be in cutting vehicle emissions, with Germany warning that overly-challenging targets risked harming industry and jobs.

Torn between reducing pollution and preserving industry competitiveness, EU environment ministers meeting in Luxembourg are seeking a compromise over what 2030 carbon dioxide limits to impose on Europe’s powerful carmakers.

In a joint statement, they said the bloc was “deeply concerned” over a U.N. report calling for rapid and unprecedented action to contain global warming, but held back from increasing their pledge to reduce emissions under the 2015 Paris climate accord.

Several ministers sought a higher, 40 percent reduction in vehicle emissions, in line with targets backed by EU lawmakers last week. “Everyone is calling for action after the report,” French Environment Minister Francois de Rugy said.

But two EU sources said some nations appeared to be siding with a less ambitious reduction.

Germany, with its big auto sector, backs an EU executive proposal for a 30 percent cut for fleets of new cars and vans by 2030, compared with 2021 levels.

“After the (U.N.) report yesterday that is not easy, but it is a position we all agreed on,” Germany’s Svenja Schulze said.

Too close to call

Climate campaigners say Germany has still not learned to be tougher on the auto industry, despite the scandal that engulfed Volkswagen in 2015 when it admitted to using illegal software to mask emissions on up to 11 million diesel vehicles worldwide.

EU sources said Germany, with the backing of eastern European nations, might have enough votes to secure a majority at the meeting among the bloc’s 28 nations.

Austria, which holds the EU’s rotating presidency, has proposed a compromise 35 percent reduction in emissions.

“It’s too close to call,” said Greg Archer, an expert with Brussels-based campaign group Transport & Environment.

If they reach an agreement, talks on the final law could begin with the EU’s two other lawmaking bodies.

The new rules will also create a crediting system that will allow carmakers to lower their CO2 targets by meeting a benchmark for selling zero- and low-emission vehicles as a share of their total new car sales.

Climate ambition

Curbs on the transport sector, the only industry in which emissions are still rising, aim to help the bloc meet its goal of reducing greenhouse gases by at least 40 percent below 1990 levels by 2030.

Extreme temperatures across the northern hemisphere this summer have fuelled concerns climate change is gathering pace, leading some countries to call for emissions to be cut at a faster rate than planned.

But a call by the EU’s climate commissioner and 15 EU nations for the bloc to increase its pledge to cut emissions by 45 percent under the Paris accord has met with resistance.

Ahead of U.N. climate talks in Poland in December, the bloc’s 28 environment ministers renewed their commitment to leading the fight to limiting global warming.

They said the EU was ready to “communicate or update” its Nationally Determined Contribution, the efforts by each country to reduce emissions, by 2020.

Raising it would require the approval of all 28 nations.

That may be too hard to achieve before the U.N. talks, European Commission Vice President Maros Sefcovic said, but the bloc is likely to exceed its Paris pledge following a reform of its Emission Trading System (ETS) and new targets on renewable energy and energy efficiency.

“We do not need new legislation on this one because everything is already done. We are just going to get better results than expected,” Sefcovic told Reuters on Monday. (Reporting by Daphne Psaledakis; Additional reporting by Peter Maushagen and Alissa de Carbonnel in Brussels; Editing by Edmund Blair and Mark Potter)

 
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FIFA announced a new global strategy for women’s football on Tuesday in an effort to create revenue streams and increase grassroots participation.

FIFA said in a statement that it would work closely with member associations through workshops and special initiatives to “encourage female empowerment” through football.

“The women’s game is a top priority,” FIFA’s secretary general Fatma Samoura said. “We will work hand-in-hand with our 211 member associations around the world to increase grassroots participation, enhance the commercial value of the women’s game and strengthen the structures surrounding women’s football to ensure that everything we do is sustainable and has strong results.”

FIFA said it would look to double the number of female players to 60 million by 2026 and ensure all member associations have developed “comprehensive women’s football strategies” by 2022.

The sport’s governing body also hopes to broaden female representation in their regulatory framework, with at least one third of FIFA committee members to be women by 2022.
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Russia has carried out cyber attacks on Latvia’s foreign and defense apparatus and other state institutions, a Latvian intelligence agency said on Monday.

Russia’s military intelligence agency (GRU) has tried to access information by e-mail phishing attacks against government computers in “recent years”, Latvia’s Constitution Protection Bureau said.

“The cyber attacks in Latvia were carried out by the GRU for espionage purposes, and the most frequent attacks were directed against state institutions, including the foreign and defense sectors,” it said in a statement.

No attacks directed at influencing last weekend’s parliamentary elections were detected, it said.

Several Western countries issued coordinated denunciations of Russia last week for running what they described as a global hacking campaign, targeting institutions from sports anti-doping bodies to a nuclear power company and the chemical weapons watchdog.
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A Serb nationalist who opposes Bosnia as a state won a share of its tripartite presidency, election results showed on Monday, as Serb, Croat and Muslim ethnic parties dominated their regions in voting likely to slow the country’s march toward EU integration.

The largest parties from Bosnia’s Serb, Muslim and Croat communities, which have been in power most of the time since its 1992-95 war ended, mostly entrenched their domination of all layers of Bosnia’s complex government.

Since the war, which killed 100,000 people, Bosnia has been divided between a Serb Republic and a federation of Croat and Muslim cantons, with a presidency formed of one member from each of the three main groups.

The solid grip of ethnic parties has frustrated efforts to reform the economy and win Bosnia admission to Western organizations such as the European Union and NATO. 

“Yesterday’s election, much like previous elections in Bosnia, will serve to perpetuate the political deadlock and make the country’s EU and NATO accession difficult,” said Marko Attila Hoare, political analyst and Balkan historian.

The SNSD party of pro-Russian Serb nationalist Milorad Dodik was on course to be the strongest single party in Bosnia, and, along with coalition partners, set to dominate both the Serb caucus in the national parliament and the parliament of the autonomous Serb Republic.

Dodik, who campaigned on the secession of the Serb Republic and integration with Serbia, also won the Serb seat in the tripartite presidency of a country he has repeatedly denounced as an “impossible state.” His ally Zeljka Cvijanovic was elected to take over Dodik’s former job as president of the Serb region.

The largest Muslim Bosniak party SDA secured the most votes in Bosnia’s autonomous Bosniak-Croat Federation and its Bosniak Muslim-dominated cantons. Its candidate Sefik Dzaferovic won the Bosniak seat in the inter-ethnic presidency.

A coalition led by the largest Croat party HDZ won the most votes of Croats in the Federation parliament and in the majority Croat cantons. However, its leader Dragan Covic lost the seat in the presidency to Zeljko Komsic, seen as a more moderate figure, who Covic said won the vote thanks to votes of Bosniaks.

“It is not good that one people choose a representative of the other people,” Croatia’s Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic said in Zagreb.

Hoare said the election meant “things will get worse before they get better, as the Republika Srpska, where Dodik has won another victory, may eventually make a bid for independence — possibly with Russian backing.”

Institutional crisis looming?

More than two decades after the war, the leading Serb, Croat and Muslim Bosniak parties campaigned on nationalist tickets, reviving wartime pledges while failing to offer clearly defined economic or political visions.

International election monitors said the vote was generally orderly despite some reported violations.

But Mavroudis Voridis, the special coordinator of an observer mission from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), said formation of institutions was uncertain due to a failure of the Bosniak and Croat parties to agree on changes to the election law before the vote.

“We expect all political leaders to engage in the formation of the governments at all levels, by working constructively together,” EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini and EU Enlargement Commissioner Johannes Hahn said in a joint statement.

Dodik said on Monday his party would clinch a partnership with the HDZ in the Council of Ministers, which is the de facto national government, and in the national parliament.

“Bosnia is heading towards the institutional crisis when it comes to the presidency,” said Alida Vracic, the executive director of the Populari think tank, referring to the possible disagreement between Dodik and moderate Komsic.

But deals will be easier to make at other government levels where the three nationalist parties have ruled together over the years, Vracic added.
…

A human rights campaigner who has been jailed since January in the Russian province of Chechnya has been awarded a prestigious human rights prize by the Council of Europe.

The Council’s Parliamentary Assembly on Monday awarded the Vaclav Havel Human Rights Prize to Oyub Titiev, who heads the Chechnya branch of Russian human rights center Memorial.

The chairman of Memorial’s board accepted the award on Titiev’s behalf.

Amnesty International called Titiev “one of Russia’s most courageous human rights defenders” for his work leading Memorial’s office in Chechnya’s capital for more than nine years. His predecessor, Natalia Estemirova, was kidnapped and killed in 2009.

Titiev is the prize’s sixth recipient. In 2016, it went to Yazidi women’s advocate Nadia Murad, a co-winner of this year’s Nobel Peace Prize.
…

Pro-Russia Serb leader Milorad Dodik declared victory Sunday in the race to fill the Serb seat in Bosnia’s three-member presidency, deepening ethnic divisions in the country that faced a brutal war some 25 years ago.

Dodik said he was projected to win 56 percent of the vote in the election and his main opponent, Mladen Ivanic, 44 percent. The projection was made with 85 percent of ballots counted, he said.

“The people have decided,” Dodik said.

Preliminary official results are expected Monday. After polls closed, Dodik and Ivanic both said they were in the lead.

The presidency also has a Muslim and a Croat member. Dodik advocates eventual separation of Serbs from Bosnia. His election deals a blow to efforts to strengthen the country’s unity after the 1992-95 war.

The ballot was seen as a test of whether Bosnia will move toward integration in the European Union and NATO or remain entrenched in rivalries stemming from the 1992-95 war.

More than half of Bosnia’s 3.3 million eligible voters cast ballots, election officials said. Voters chose an array of institutions in Bosnia’s complex governing system, which was created by a 1995 peace accord that ended the war that killed 100,000 people and left millions homeless.

Election officials described the voting that took place as “extremely fair” despite several incidents.

The country consists of two regional mini-states — one Serb-run and a Muslim-Croat entity — with joint institutions in a central government. Along with the Bosnian presidency, voters were electing the Serb president and the two entities’ parliaments and cantonal authorities.

The campaign was marred by divisive rhetoric and allegations of irregularities that fueled tensions.

 
…

The body of a popular Bulgarian TV journalist investigating alleged corruption involving politicians and EU funds was found over the weekend, police said.

Prosecutors said the body of 30-year-old Viktoria Marinova was found Saturday in a park in the northern city of Ruse. Her mobile phone, car keys, glasses and some of her clothes were missing.

Police say she was raped before she was killed.

“Her death was caused by blows to the head and suffocation,” Ruse prosecutor Georgy Georgiev said, adding that investigators were able to obtain a lot of DNA evidence.

Interior Minister Mladen Marinov said there have been no signs linking Marinova’s death to her work as a TV investigative journalist.

Another reporter from Marinova’s television station also said no one at the station had been threatened.

But the owner of a website involved in the investigation of the alleged corruption, and whose own journalists were interviewed by Marinova, said his group had gotten credible information that there would be trouble.

“Viktoria’s death, the brutal manner in which she was killed, is an execution. It was meant to serve as an example, something like a warning,” Asen Yordanov told the French News Agency Sunday.

Marinova worked for the Ruse-based television station TVN and hosted a talk show Detector.

The Reporters Without Borders global index of press freedom rated Bulgaria 111 out of 180 countries in 2018 — the lowest of any EU member.
…

Jamal Khashoggi, the Saudi journalist who disappeared last week after a visit to his country’s consulate in Turkey, was once a Saudi insider. A close aide to the kingdom’s former spy chief, he had been a leading voice in the country’s prominent dailies, including the main English newspapers.

Now the 59-year-old journalist and contributor to The Washington Post is feared dead, and Turkish authorities believe he was slain inside the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul, something Saudi officials vehemently deny.

The U.S.-educated Khashoggi was no stranger to controversy.

A graduate of Indiana State University, Khashoggi began his career in the 1980s, covering the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan and the decade-long war that followed for the English-language daily Saudi Gazette. He traveled extensively in the Middle East, covering Algeria’s 1990s war against Islamic militants, and the Islamists rise in Sudan.

He interviewed Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan before al-Qaida was formed, then met him in Sudan in 1995. Following bin Laden’s rise likely helped cement Khashoggi’s ties with powerful former Saudi spy chief, Turki Al-Faisal.

Khashoggi rubbed shoulders with the Saudi royal family and supported efforts to nudge the kingdom’s entrenched ultra-conservative clerics to accept reforms. He served as an editor for nine years on the Islamist-leaning al-Madina newspaper and was frequently quoted in the Western media as an expert on Islamic radicals and a reformist voice.

However, he was fired from his post as an editor at Al-Watan, a liberal paper founded after the 9/11 terror attacks, just two months after he took the job in 2003. The country’s ultra-conservative clerics had pushed back against his criticism of the powerful religious police and Ibn Taymiyah, a medieval cleric viewed as the spiritual forefather of Wahhabism, the conservative interpretation of Islam that is the founding tenant of the kingdom.

Khoshaggi then served as media adviser to Al-Faisal, the former spy chief, who was at the time the ambassador to the United States.

Khashoggi returned to Al-Watan in 2007, where he continued his criticism of the clerics as the late King Abdullah implemented cautious reforms to try to shake their hold. Three years later, he was forced to resign again after a series of articles criticizing Salafism, the ultra-conservative Sunni Islam movement from which Wahhabism stems.

In 2010, Saudi billionaire Alwaleed bin Talal tapped him to lead his new TV station, touted as a rival to Qatari-funded Al-Jazeera, a staunch critic of the kingdom. But the new Al-Arab station, based in Bahrain, was shut down hours after it launched, for hosting a Bahraini opposition figure.

Khoshaggi’s final break with the Saudi authorities followed the Arab Spring protests that swept through the region in 2011, shaking the power base of traditional leaders and giving rise to Islamists, only to be followed by unprecedented crackdowns on those calling for change. Siding with the opposition in Egypt and Syria, Khashoggi became a vocal critic of his own government’s stance there and a defender of moderate Islamists, which Riyadh considered an existential threat.

“This was a critical period in Arab history. I had to take a position. The Arab world had waited for this moment of freedom for a thousand years,” Khashoggi told a Turkey-based Syrian opposition television station last month, just days before he disappeared.

He also criticized his government’s diplomatic break with Qatar and war on Yemen as well as Riyadh’s policy toward its archenemy, Iran, whose influence has grown in neighboring Yemen and in Syria.

In the Sept. 23 interview, he called Saudi Arabia’s foreign policy “narrow minded,” and ridiculed its crackdown on political Islam, urging the kingdom to realign its policy to partner with Turkey, a close Qatar ally.

“Saudi is the mother and father of political Islam. It is based on political Islam,” Khoshaggi said. “The only recipe to get Iranians out of Syria — it is not Trump or anyone else— it is through the support of the Syrian revolution. … Saudi Arabia must return to supporting the Syrian revolution and partnering with Turkey on this.”

Eight days later, on Oct. 2, he disappeared while on a visit to the consulate in Istanbul for paperwork to marry his Turkish fiancée. The consulate insists the writer left its premises alive, contradicting Turkish officials.

Before his disappearance, Khoshaggi had been living since last year in the U.S. in self-imposed exile, after he fled the kingdom amid a crackdown on intellectuals and activists who criticized policies of Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman.

“As of now, I would say Mohammed bin Salman is acting like Putin. He is imposing very selective justice,” Khashoggi wrote in the Post last year after he fled the kingdom, saying he feared returning home.

He described “dramatic” scenes of arrest of government critics accused of receiving Qatari funding. They included a friend of Khashoggi’s who had just returned from a trip to the U.S. as part of an official Saudi delegation.

“That is how breathtakingly fast you can fall out of favor with Saudi Arabia,” he wrote.
…

Dissatisfied Latvians rejected the right-of-center ruling coalition in Saturday’s parliamentary election, but suspicion of the left-leaning pro-Russia party makes it likely the next government will be another formation of ethnic Latvian parties to the right.

The result means a confirmation of the European Union and NATO member’s role as a bulwark against Russia in the increasingly hostile relationship between the West and President Vladimir Putin.

Latvians, fed up with corruption and weak democracy in the Baltic country of 2 million, punished the ruling three-party coalition, which lost almost half of its votes, mostly to two newcomers.

Anti-corruption

The populist KPV LV and anti-corruption New Conservatives won 14.1 and 13.6 percent respectively to become the second- and third-biggest parties.

“Our voters want a change from the old post-Soviet politics, which has been very powerful up to now,” said Janis Bordans, leader of the New Conservatives. “They want to have a stable Latvia, but a one which doesn’t stagnate.”

The New Conservatives, whose leadership features several former officers from the country’s anti-corruption agency, want to beef up law enforcement and get rid of a number of current officials who they say are corrupt.

Bordans said he would like to be the new prime minister.

“If we count out Harmony then it’s logical that we take responsibility. We have to be ready to do it and it is very realistic,” he said.

Ethnic divide

The pro-Russia party Harmony, which is supported by ethnic Russians who make up a quarter of the population, took 19.9 percent of the vote but will find it almost impossible to be part of any government.

The ethnic divide is strong in Latvian politics, and other parties have always shut Harmony out of government. It has tried to rebrand itself as a Western-style social democratic party but severed official ties to Putin’s United Russia party only last year.

“I don’t think this is a norm-breaking election. It carries on the tradition we have seen in Latvia that a quarter of the seats go to the Russian-speaking party,” said Daunis Auers, professor of comparative politics at the University of Latvia, adding that other parties would have no problem shutting out Harmony.

“Now they have no reason to form a government with Harmony. They can form a coalition among themselves,” he told Reuters.

Concerns about Russia

Before the election, some Latvians were concerned that a strong result for Harmony and the populist KPV could lead to their forming a government and bringing Latvia’s foreign policy closer to Putin’s Russia.

The result will lead to a more fragmented parliament of seven parties, of which six won between 10 and 20 percent support each. The forming of a government coalition could take months.

Harmony will get 24 seats and remain the biggest bloc. It is followed by the New Conservative Party with 16 seats, KPV LV with 15 seats, the National Alliance with 13 seats, Development/For with 13 seats, the Greens and Farmers Union with 11 seats and New Unity with eight seats.
…

The public identification this week of more than 300 suspected agents of Russia’s military intelligence service, the GRU, is being dubbed by security analysts the largest intelligence blunder in Russian post-Cold War history.

And the cause for the bungling comes down, they say, to the simple “human factor” of wanting to avoid traffic fines, including for drunken driving.

Prompted by the midweek disclosure by Dutch and British authorities of the identities of four Russian GRU operators accused of trying to hack the headquarters of the world’s chemical weapons watchdog, the investigative journalism consortium Bellingcat subsequently trawled through a publicly available Russian traffic-records database to unearth the names and details of 305 other individuals thought to be working for the Russian intelligence agency.

Passport numbers and, in many cases, mobile telephone numbers were included in the vehicle registrations.

Bellingcat scrutinized the traffic database after one of the four GRU operatives named Thursday by the British and Dutch was found to have registered his Lada car in 2011 using the Moscow address of the GRU barracks housing his cyberespionage unit 26165.

The unit has been accused by Western authorities, including the U.S., of being responsible for a series of cyberattacks and the hacking of computer networks of international anti-doping agencies as well as organizations investigating Russia’s use of chemical agents, including the alleged nerve-agent poisoning in the English town of Salisbury earlier this year of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia.

By searching for other vehicles registered to the same address Bellingcat came up with a list of 305 other individuals ranging in age from 27 to 53-years-old.

‘Special list’

The GRU agents likely exposed their personal information on the database in order to gain immunity from traffic stops and to avoid punishment for violations, according to Alexander Gabuev of the Carnegie Moscow Center, a think tank.

He says the “root cause” for the data leak is “a combination of a wrecked values system,” “notorious incompetence” and “banal corruption.” Using the GRU address meant the agents “are put on a special list so the traffic police can’t stop you, the fines for drunk driving etc. never apply to you, and you don’t need to pay car tax,” he tweeted.

The disclosure of the list of 305 GRU operatives has added to a growing debate among analysts and Western intelligence officials about the professionalism — or lack of it — of the GRU when it comes to standard tradecraft.

Initially, Dutch and British authorities thought the names of the four Russian GRU operators accused of trying to hack the computers of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons were aliases. But it now appears the GRU operatives, Aleksei Morenets, Evgenii Serebriakov, Oleg Sotnikov and Aleksey Minin used their real names and traveled on genuine passports.

That is an extraordinary security lapse, say current and former members of Western intelligence services, making it easier for the men’s missions, which took them not only to the Netherlands but Switzerland and  Rio de Janeiro, too, to be laid at the door of the GRU.

Russia’s Foreign Ministry has described the allegations about GRU operatives mounting so-called active measures in Europe and elsewhere as “fantasies.” But Moscow’s denials have not been helped by the trail to the GRU the four men left and the surprising story of failed spycraft revealed by Dutch authorities Thursday, which is undermining Russia’s fearsome reputation in the field of espionage, say analysts.

‘Amateurish bunch’

Dutch authorities say the four men, like the alleged GRU would-be assassins of Skripal and his daughter, didn’t do much to cover their tracks. Britain’s security minister Ben Wallace has described the recent GRU operations as “more Johnny English than James Bond.” The four GRU would-be hackers in the Netherlands failed to recognize they were being monitored by the Dutch intelligence service. When they were detained in April before being expelled by the Dutch they were found to have with them laptop computers linking them to other Russian espionage operations around the world. One of them had a taxi receipt showing he’d traveled from the GRU barracks in the Russian capital to Moscow Sheremetyevo airport.

The botched tradecraft of both the Skripal poisoning and the GRU’s alleged “close-access” hacking has prompted ridicule from some Western politicians and officials. British Conservative lawmaker Tom Tugendhat, the chairman of the British parliament’s foreign affairs committee, mocked the GRU in a tweet as “an amateurish bunch of jokers.”

Another British lawmaker, Bob Seely, said recent GRU blunders reveal how hapless the organization is and “shows that subversion is probably beyond their professional capability; they can’t even cover their tracks in the most basic of ways. It is very sloppy and makes President Putin look foolish.”

Arrogant defiance?

But some analysts and Western intelligence officials are querying whether the Salisbury attack and GRU hacking operations were just a matter of clumsy spy tradecraft or a display of arrogant defiance by the GRU.

Security analyst Mark Galeotti of the Institute of International Relations in Prague, the author of a new book on Russian organized crime and Russian security forces, maintains the GRU shouldn’t be dismissed as incompetent. Writing in Foreign Policy magazine, he says the “emerging narrative about its supposed clumsiness, is dangerous.”

He adds the GRU prides itself “on having a military culture in which a mission must be accomplished, whatever the cost. The GRU’s ethos of completing the mission no matter what means that innocent lives lost or even the revelation of agents’ names are not blunders so much as irrelevancies.”
…

A village in Turkey’s remote southeastern province of Diyarbakir takes pride in the number of its university graduates. The village’s first elementary school opened its doors more than 70 years ago, and since then it has produced scores of doctors, judges, nurses and teachers. Mahmut Bozarslan files this report narrated by Bezhan Hamdard.
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Pope Francis has authorized a “thorough study” of Vatican archives into how a prominent American cardinal advanced through church ranks despite allegations that he slept with seminarians and young priests, the Vatican said Saturday.

The Vatican said it was aware that such an investigation may produce evidence “that choices were taken that would not be consonant with a contemporary approach to such issues.” But it said Francis would “follow the path of truth, wherever it may lead.”

The statement did not address specific allegations that Francis himself knew of sexual misconduct allegations against now ex-Cardinal Theodore McCarrick in 2013 and rehabilitated him anyway from sanctions imposed by Pope Benedict XVI.

Francis has said he would not say a word about those allegations, lodged by a retired Vatican ambassador.

Depending on the scope of the investigation, Francis’ actions may be found to have been inconsistent with what he now considers unacceptable behavior.

“Both abuse and its cover-up can no longer be tolerated and a different treatment for bishops who have committed or covered-up abuse in fact represents a form of clericalism that is no longer acceptable,” the statement said.

The Vatican knew as early as 2000 that seminarians complained that McCarrick pressured them to sleep with him. The Rev. Boniface Ramsay, a professor at a New Jersey seminary, wrote a letter to the Vatican in November 2000 relaying the seminarians’ concerns after McCarrick was named archbishop of Washington.

St. John Paul II still went ahead with the nomination and made McCarrick a cardinal the following year. McCarrick resigned as Washington archbishop in 2006 after he reached the retirement age of 75.

Francis accepted McCarrick’s resignation as a cardinal in July after a U.S. church investigation determined that an allegation that he groped a teenage altar boy in the 1970s was credible. Since then, another man has come forward saying McCarrick molested him when he was a young teen and other men have said they were harassed by McCarrick as adult seminarians and young priests.

The scandal has created a crisis in confidence in the U.S. hierarchy, since it was apparently an open secret that McCarrick, now 88, would invite seminarians to his New Jersey beach house, and into his bed.

Faced with a loss of credibility, U.S. bishops announced they wanted a full-scale Vatican investigation into how McCarrick was able to rise through the ranks, despite his misconduct.

The Vatican statement Saturday made clear an investigation would take place.

 
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Romania is holding two days of voting on a proposed change to its constitution that would define marriage as “a union between a man and a woman” instead of  “a union between spouses.”

Same-sex marriage is already prohibited under Romanian law.  

Critics say a change in the wording of the constitution would make it just about impossible for gays and lesbians to marry in the future.  

The country’s LGBT community says the referendum will do nothing more than make people feel like second-class citizens and will fuel homophobia even further.

The ruling Social Democrats are responsible for bringing the measure, which is supported by the country’s Orthodox Church,  to a vote on Saturday and Sunday.

The referendum has alarmed Brussels and the European Union Commission’s deputy chief has reminded Bucharest of its human rights commitments.

Frans Timmermans said recently at a debate on Romanian reforms: “I don’t want family values to be transformed into arguments that encourage the darkest demons and hatred against sexual minorities.”  

Civil rights groups have urged voters to boycott the referendum.  “In a democracy, the rights of minorities are not put to a vote.  That’s the difference between the Middle Ages and the 21st century,” said the Center for Legal Resources, a non-profit NGO.

Thirty percent of the country’s registered voters must participate in the referendum for the vote to be valid. 

 
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