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Montserrat Caballe, a Spanish opera singer renowned for her bel canto technique and her interpretations of the roles of Rossini, Bellini and Donizetti, has died. She was 85.

Caballe died early Saturday at Hospital San Pau in Barcelona, hospital spokesman Abraham del Moral told The Associated Press. Caballe’s family requested the cause of death not be released, saying that she had been in the hospital since September, del Moral said.

Spanish media said that Caballe entered the hospital last month because of a gall bladder problem.

“A great ambassador of our country has died,” Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said in a tweet. “Her voice and tenderness will remain with us forever.”

An early talent

Born into a working class family in Barcelona, Caballe unveiled her musical talents early on, singing Bach cantatas at the age of 7.

In her almost unlimited repertoire, she starred in 90 opera roles with nearly 4,000 stage performances.

At 8, Caballe entered the Liceo’s Conservatory in Barcelona with Eugenia Kenny, Conchita Badea, and Napoleone Annovazzi among her first teachers. She won the school’s Gold Medal on graduating in 1954. She went on to study opera in Milan and in 1956 joined the Basel Opera and played her first major role that year in the city’s Staatstheater as Mimi in Puccini’s “La Boheme.”

Four years later, she was a principal singer with the Bremen Opera.

In 1964, Caballe gave a highly praised performance of Jules Masenet’s “Manon” in Mexico City, but it was a year later in New York that a lucky break launched her on the road to international stardom.

Lucky break

On short notice, Caballe stood in for indisposed American soprano Marilyn Horne in a concert performance in Donizetti’s “Lucrezia Borgia” at New York’s Carnegie Hall and achieved a thunderous success. It opened the doors to all the major opera venues around the world.

She produced a highly acclaimed performance as Elisabetta of Valois in an all-star cast of Verdi’s “Don Carlo” at the Arena di Verona in 1969. The concert became famous for her “la” on the final “ah” at the very end of the opera, which lasted for more than 20 bars up, driving the audience wild with delight.

Caballe was also a noted recitalist, particularly of songs of her native Spain. She was particularly admired for her purity of voice, vocal shadings and exquisite pianissimos.

​Duet with Freddie Mercury

In a brief excursion into pop music, Caballe’s duet “Barcelona” with Freddie Mercury, of the rock group Queen, was a hit single in 1987, accompanied by an album of the same name. The title track later became the anthem of the 1992 Summer Olympics in the city.

Caballe performed the song live, accompanied by a recording of the late Mercury, at the 1999 UEFA Champions League soccer final in Barcelona’s Camp Nou stadium. In 1997, she sang on two tracks on an album by New Age composer Vangelis.

In 2015, Caballe was convicted of tax fraud and was given a suspended sentence of six months in prison, which she avoided since first convictions resulting in sentences of less than two years in Spain can be suspended by a judge. She had failed to pay the Spanish treasury more than 500,000 euros ($550,000) in taxes on her earnings.

Caballe, who was born Maria de Montserrat Viviana Concepcion Caballe i Folch, dedicated herself to various charities and was a UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador. She also established a foundation for needy children in Barcelona. In 1964, she married Spanish tenor Bernabe Marti. They had two children, Bernabe Marti, Jr. and Montserrat Marti, herself a successful soprano.
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The Yazidi community in Iraq and around the world expressed joy and hope after the Norwegian Nobel Committee awarded its 2018 Peace Prize to Nadia Murad, a Yazidi activist and survivor of sexual slavery by the Islamic State (IS) in Iraq.

Murad will be sharing the prize with  Dr. Denis Mukwege, a Congolese gynecologist who treated thousands of women victims of rape and sexual violence.

The Nobel Peace Committee praised Murad’s courage because she did not accept the social codes that require women to remain silent and shamed after abuse.

“She has shown uncommon courage in recounting her own sufferings and speaking up on behalf of other victims,” the Norway-based Nobel Peace Prize Committee said.

Members of the Yazidi community told VOA their voices are now being heard and their plea for justice after the Sinjar massacre is being acknowledged by the world. 

Nagham Hasan, an Iraqi Yazidi activist and a gynecologist who offered treatment and counseling for many Yazidi women in refugee camps in Iraq including Nadia Murad, told VOA that the recognition of Murad is not just the recognition of the plight of Yazidi women, but also everyone else in Iraq who suffered at hands of extremists.

“When Nadia escaped her captivity and arrived to the camp in Sinjar she was traumatized and afraid, but now she blossomed into this strong woman and became the voice of all men and women victims of sexual violence,” Hasan said.

Hasan’s work was recognized in 2016 when she was awarded the U.S. State Department’s International Women of Courage Award for “promoting gender equality, combating gender-based violence, and providing psychological support for survivors of violence.”

Women struggle

Mirza Dinay, a Yazidi physician who helped hundreds of Yazidi girls seek asylum in Germany, told VOA that he is thrilled that Murad got this prize, which is a symbol of women’s struggle against sexual violence worldwide. 

“This is a win for Iraqis, Kurds and the Yazidi community and I hope this will encourage the Iraqi government to provide more support to the girls and women survivors of sexual violence,” Dinay said. 

Dawood Saleh, a Yazidi man from Sinjar who has resettled in the U.S., told VOA that Murad’s persistence in making the world listen to Yazidis’ plight has paid off.

“As a Yazidi survivor from IS genocide I feel happy that Nadia received this award. It means to me that Yazidis have value in the world,” Saleh said.

Murad’s reaction

According to United Nations, at least 10,000 Yazidis were either killed or abducted during the IS attack on Sinjar in 2014. The attack sparked international outcry and condemnation.  

Murad was one of those kidnapped by IS in Sinjar mountain in northwestern Iraq. She was sold several times as a sex slave to different IS members before she managed to escape after 3 months in captivity.

In reaction to Friday’s announcement, Murad told Nobel Committee that she did not think that she had the strength to do the work she has been doing. 

She said she derived her strength from thinking about what happened to her community and from the loss of many of her family members including her mother. 

“This prize will make the voices of women who suffered from sexual violence in conflict heard, especially the women in minorities like my community the Yazidis. It tells us that our voices will be heard,” Murad told the Norwegian Nobel Committee.

Murad has been a strong advocate for justice for all Yazidis who were kidnapped and abused by IS and continues to raise her voice against sexual violence.

“Whatever has happened to Yazidis, from August 3rd (2014) till now, they should get their justice. An international tribunal should be formed as soon as possible and Yazidis and other minorities who cannot protect themselves should be protected,” Murad told VOA in 2016 during an exclusive interview. 

Yazidi rights groups estimate about 3,000 women and children remain missing, while thousands live under dire conditions in refugee camps in Iraq.
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Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is stepping up his rhetoric over Cyprus in a move seen by analysts as taking on a more assertive approach that could result in a permanent partition of the divided Mediterranean island.

Addressing parliament Tuesday, Erdogan issued a stark warning. “No step can be taken in Cyprus or in the Aegean Sea at the expense of Turkey. Those who do disregard Turkey would put their own existence entirely at risk,” Erdogan said to his cheering deputies in the ruling AK Party.

Cyprus is divided between Greek and Turkish Cypriots since a Turkish military invasion in 1974 in response to an Athens-inspired coup. Ankara only recognizes the Turkish Cypriot government.

Tensions over the island are being stirred by the discovery of large offshore natural gas reserves. The find has sparked an exploration rush by international companies. Ankara maintains that both administrations on the island should control the energy exploration. The Greek Cypriots reject such calls, saying it is the only internationally recognized government on the island.

Erdogan has dispatched warships to back Turkish Cypriot claims. Analysts suggest the deployment is likely to be only saber-rattling.

“There is the new deal with France where it will position its warships in Cyprus in Larnaca [Greek Cypriot port],” former senior Turkish diplomat Aydin Selcen said. “According to some other reports, there will be U.S. warships escorting the Exxon [an American energy company] exploration, so Turkey will not be able singlehandedly to stop new exploration.”

EU membership

Ankara’s robust stance over Cyprus is seen by some observers as a sign of a broader shift in policy. “Erdogan has realized the classic Turkish policy to show muscle to show strength,” said international relations professor Huseyin Bagci of Ankara’s Middle East Technical University. “I don’t expect any solution in Cyprus in political terms.”

The allure of Turkey joining the European Union has been a powerful impetus for Ankara backing reunification efforts of the island. With the Greek Cypriot side already an EU member and holding a veto over Turkey’s membership bid, Brussels says the island has to be reunified if Ankara’s bid is to succeed.

Ankara’s EU dream is now widely seen as over, with the economy in crisis and growing human rights concerns.

“With Turkey and the EU, there is no talk about EU membership; there are no talks about even a new customs union,” Selcen said. “Erdogan insists now that Turkey should have this businesslike transactional relationship with the EU. ”

The collapse in Turkey’s EU bid is seen as giving Erdogan a freer hand over Cyprus. “With Turkey not becoming a full member in the foreseeable future, why should Erdogan make any concessions on Cyprus to the Greek side?” asked international relations professor Bagci.

“In Turkish domestic politics, Tayyip Erdogan was very heavily criticized for making concessions to the Greek side,” Bagci added. “So he is now not going to make any more concessions.”

Previous reunification efforts

When coming to power as prime minister in 2003, Erdogan invested heavily in seeking a solution to reuniting the divided island. Under intense pressure by Erdogan, the then-Turkish Cypriot president, Rauf Denktas, reluctantly agreed to a U.N.-backed plan to reunite Cyprus. In 2004 simultaneous referendums, the U.N. plan was overwhelmingly backed by Turkish Cypriots but rejected by Greek Cypriots.

Subsequent U.N. efforts to reunite Cyprus have ended in deadlock, the most recent being last year. U.N. Security-General Antonio Guterres is to decide this month what to do to reunite the island.

Analysts say reunification efforts are likely to be further complicated by Erdogan’s announcement last month to increase the Turkish military presence on the island. Turkey’s military presence, estimated at around 30,000 strong, is a significant obstacle to reunification efforts. Nicosia is calling for a total Turkish withdrawal from the island.

“Not to reduce the military presence but to increase it, is showing muscles. Turkey is going back to the policy of the 1990s,” Bagci said. “That is a policy of showing military strength, and not to be open for any solution on the island.

“The Greeks have to realize there is only one solution, the recognition of the north [of the island] as an independent Turkish Cypriot state,” Bagci added.

Some observers suggest Erdogan’s shift on Cyprus is motivated by his courting of nationalist voters ahead of next year’s key local elections.

“The new muscular approach toward Cyprus could be to do with domestic politics rather than foreign policy,” said Selcen. “Because we are going toward the local elections, there is this delicate balance between AKP and nationalists, who call for a strong stance against Greek Cypriots.”

Turkish local elections are due to be held in March 2019; few observers expect any softening of Erdogan’s stance on Cyprus ahead of the crucial polls, declared a priority by the Turkish president. Analysts point out that even after the elections, there remains little incentive for Ankara to back reunification efforts given its EU bid is all but dead, at least for the foreseeable future.
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An estimated 300,000 people, more than half of them children, have been immunized against cholera in war-torn Yemen. The weeklong vaccination campaign was led jointly by the World Health Organization and U.N. Children’s Fund.

More than 3,000 health workers fanned out across Hodeidah and Ibb governorates. Both are areas where Houthi rebels and Saudi Arabia-backed government forces are engaged in war.

A spokesman for the U.N. Children’s Fund, Christophe Boulierac, said the campaign went ahead because the warring parties agreed to stop fighting during so-called Days of Tranquility, a period that lasted six days.

“Before the end of the year, many more people will need to be vaccinated in Yemen against cholera,” he said. “And millions more children will need to be immunized against polio, against measles, against pneumonia and other preventable diseases.”

Yemen is facing one of the worst cholera outbreaks in recent history. Since April 2017, more than 1.2 million suspected cases of cholera, including 2,515 deaths, have been reported. Practically no part of Yemen has been spared.

World Health Organization spokesman Christian Lindmeier said a recent increase in cholera cases in 12 governorates prompted two mass vaccination campaigns.

“The most recent data in al-Hodeidah shows that only 50 percent of health facilities are still operational in the governorate,” said Lindmeier. “The conflict in Hodeidah has severely impacted this access to water and sanitation, to all preventive and clinical service, to increasing the risk of disease outbreaks among those who remain in the governorate.”

Lindmeier said that poses significant challenges to effectively control outbreaks of cholera as well as for diphtheria, measles and malaria.
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Western nations are warning Russia to stop aggressive behavior, including a violation of an arms control treaty, widespread cyberattacks and attempts to kill citizens in other countries. At a NATO meeting in Belgium Thursday, U.S. Secretary of Defense James Mattis said Russia is violating the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty. The Netherlands said it prevented a Russian cyberattack on an organization investigating chemical weapons use. VOA’s Zlatica Hoke reports on coordinated response.
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A California man who says he was sexually abused by a priest over decades ago is suing the Vatican, seeking the release of the names of all offenders within the church worldwide.

Manny Vega, a 52-year-old former police officer and Marine, said Thursday that he’s seeking the truth for himself and other victims of sex abuse by Catholic priests.

“We were raped,” Vega said. “It happened to me, it happened to my friends, and it happens to children all across the world, and it continues to happen at the hands of the Catholic church, whose inaction continues to damage children.”

Jeffrey Lena, the Vatican’s U.S. lawyer, declined to comment but has previously said similar lawsuits are attempts by some lawyers “to use the judicial process as a tool of media relations.”

Vega’s lawsuit, filed Wednesday in federal court in California, accuses the Vatican of placing the Rev. Fidencio Silva-Flores in a position of power at Our Lady of Guadalupe Church in Oxnard, west of Los Angeles, and says it should have known he posed a danger to children.

The lawsuit alleges that Silva-Flores sexually abused Vega between 1979 and 1984. Silva-Flores was charged with 25 counts of molestation in 2003, but the case was dismissed because of the amount of time that had passed. 

 Although Vega reached a settlement with the Archdiocese of Los Angeles in 2007, that doesn’t release the Vatican from responsibility, the lawsuit says.

“We’ve come to the sorrowful realization that the problem is at the top and with the Vatican, and thus has to be addressed at the top for children across the globe to truly be safe,” said Jeff Anderson, the attorney representing Vega who has represented victims of priest sex abuse for 35 years.

The lawsuit doesn’t seek monetary damages, but rather an order for the Vatican to release the names of abusers in what Anderson said is more than 3,400 credible cases. It also seeks the names of anyone found guilty of sexual misconduct to be turned over to law enforcement.

For years, advocates for victims have been demanding the Vatican release files about abusive priests. The Vatican in 2001 ordered dioceses around the world to send all their cases to Rome to be reviewed. The Vatican has refused to release the documents.

The lawsuit comes amid renewed outrage in the U.S. over sex abuse and decades of cover-up by the Catholic hierarchy. A Pennsylvania grand jury report detailing decades of abuse, as well as allegations that a prominent U.S. ex-cardinal was himself an abuser, have renewed a crisis of confidence in the U.S. and Vatican leadership.

Priest sex abuse scandals first erupted in the United States and elsewhere more than 15 years ago.

Anderson and other lawyers have tried to sue the Holy See — the government of the Catholic Church — in U.S. courts before. But the Vatican has successfully prevented the litigation from reaching a verdict in part by arguing that it’s immune as a foreign sovereign and that priests aren’t employees of the Vatican.

Anderson’s last major effort alleging Vatican liability for the abuse of a priest was eventually dismissed in federal court in Oregon in 2013. 

Anderson said the California lawsuit differs in several ways, including arguments that the Holy See is not immune from the litigation because of two exceptions in the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act.

Still, he acknowledged there are hurdles.

“You’re taking on a sovereign state, you’re taking on the most powerful institution in western civilization … You’re taking on an institution that has never been successfully sued,” Anderson said. “Because there’s no precedent, anybody would look at this and say, ‘It can’t be done.’ We look at it and say, ‘It must be done.’”
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Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has again suggested that Turkey could decide in a referendum whether to continue pursuing membership in the European Union.

Speaking at an international forum on Thursday, Erdogan said Turkey and the EU had a lot to contribute to each other. But he criticized the 28-nation bloc for keeping Turkey waiting at its gates.

Erdogan said: “But if this goes on like this, with this mentality — this is a headline for tomorrow’s papers — our duty is probably to go to the 81 million (people in Turkey) and see what the 81 million decide.” 

Turkey began membership negotiations in 2005 but talks have made little progress due to, among other things, Turkish shortfalls in human rights and the rule of law. 
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The Netherlands is accusing Russia of carrying out multiple cyberattacks, including one against the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons.

Dutch officials said Thursday they caught four members of Russia’s military intelligence service with spy equipment next to the OPCW headquarters in April and expelled them.

The OPCW was investigating the poisoning of a former Russian spy in Britain. Russia has denied any links to the poisoning of Sergei Skripal and Dutch officials said it was not clear if the cyberattack was linked to the investigation.

Russia’s foreign ministry denied the accusations, dismissing them as “fantasies.”

Britain and Australia are also accusing Russia of malicious cyber activity, saying its agents targeted the World Anti-Doping Agency and the 2016 U.S. presidential election.
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British officials say the Russian military intelligence unit GRU is behind a fresh wave of global cyberattacks.

Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt said Thursday the GRU is responsible for “indiscriminate and reckless” attacks against political institutions, businesses, media and sports.

Britain’s National Cyber Security Center has concluded that hackers behind numerous attacks have been identified as GRU personnel. The agency says four new attacks are associated with GRU as well as earlier cyberattacks.

It cites attacks on the World Anti-Doping agency, Ukrainian transport systems, the 2016 U.S. presidential race and others as very likely the work of the GRU.

British officials earlier blamed the GRU for the March nerve agent attack on Russian ex-spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in the English city of Salisbury.

Russia denies any involvement.
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U.S. and Georgian defense ministers met in Brussels Wednesday to reaffirm the long-standing defense relationship between the countries.

Defense Secretary Jim Mattis was in Brussels to reassure European allies of America’s “iron-clad” commitment to NATO, as the trans-Atlantic alliance prepares for its biggest military exercises since the Cold War.

Meeting with Georgian Defense Minister Levan Izoria, Mattis remarked on the South Caucasus nation’s exemplary defense reforms and contributions to the NATO Resolute Support mission in Afghanistan, where Tbilisi’s 870 uniformed troops represent the world’s largest per capita contributor to the mission. 

A Pentagon readout of the meeting said the ministers agreed to continue deterring Russian aggression through U.S. security assistance, and support defense initiatives to develop long-term readiness and NATO interoperability.

Mattis also reinforced long-term U.S. commitment to Georgia’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.

Calls for increased support

Outgoing Georgian President Giorgi Margvelashvili recently told VOA’s Georgian Service that despite a quarter century of solid ties with the United States, he’s pledging to make increased demands for U.S. military support and development aid, and that he hopes to see the current administration re-engage the world community as a guarantor of global security.

Touting what he called a decades-long “dynamic and close bipartisan relationship” with Washington, Margvelashvili pointed to the U.S. refusal to acknowledge Georgia’s Russian-occupied territories of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. He added that with the Trump administration, Tbilisi also continues to have continued monetary defense aid and expanded weapons sales.

“Even with the current administration, let me just register that our record has been pretty impressive,” he said, citing budget procurements and expanded weapons sales. 

In September 2017, the Senate Appropriations Committee spending bill increased Georgia’s foreign military aid to $35 million for FY 2018, up from $30 million in 2016.

He also said he’d like to see Tbilisi’s NATO membership process expedited.

“I’m a very strong believer that we have to be more resilient and more equipped and more organized with a growing threat of the Russian Federation in the region, and maybe even globally,” he said.

With U.S.-European ties at a low point, exacerbated by President Donald Trump’s recent United Nations General Assembly screed against a “globalist ideology” in which he called an isolated U.S. a “stronger, safer, and richer country,” Margvelashvili argued that history tells a different story.

“We saw Ronald Reagan bring down the Berlin Wall. We saw a strong U.S. stance on stability and global security. And those were the impulses that determined the (outcome and aftermath) of the Cold War,” he said.

The result of a strong U.S. stance on global security, he added, was the creation of a “more secure and more prosperous” U.S. and Europe.

Like “other countries … we are waiting for a more resilient and organized and strong (U.S.) stand that will … be accepted by Europe and will solve issues like Georgia and Ukraine,” Margvelashvili said.

According to NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, the Trident Juncture 18 exercise, which will be conducted in Norway in October and November, will draw in 45,000 troops and represent the biggest movement of NATO personnel and vehicles since the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union.

While huge in scale, the Juncture 18 operation will be far smaller than the Vostok-18 exercise staged by Russia and China last month, which involved 300,000 troops and 1,000 aircraft.

NATO’s effort will involve troops from Britain, North America and continental Europe, equipped with 150 aircraft, 70 vessels and around 10,000 land vehicles.

This story originated in VOA’s Georgian Service. 
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State police say a security guard at the Pennsylania compound of a Turkish-born Muslim cleric fired a shot at an “unwanted person” outside the gate.

Police said in a news release Wednesday that the suspected intruder fled the scene.

Troopers were called to Fethullah Gulen’s compound for a report of shots fired. Police searched the area but could not find the man. The investigation is continuing.

Gulen’s spokesman says the guard thought the man was armed and fired a “warning shot.” He says nobody was hurt.

Turkey accuses Gulen of orchestrating a failed coup in 2016 and has demanded his extradition. Gulen has denied involvement.

 
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Brazilian surfer Maya Gabeira has been credited with setting a world record for the largest-ever wave surfed by a female earlier this year.

The 31-year-old Gabeira caught the 20.72 meter wave in January off the coast of Nazare, Portugal.

The record was confirmed this week, and Gabeira was recognized for her achievement at a ceremony in Portugal.

It is the first time a woman was recognized for a biggest wave award in a separate category, something Gabeira herself had lobbied for since 2013.

That year she was knocked off her board and nearly drowned attempting to catch a giant wave in Nazare.

Some of the largest surfable waves in the world routinely form off the coast of Nazare each year.  Scientists say a combination of weather conditions and underwater geological formations contribute to the phenomenon.

 
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Cristiano Ronaldo has denied “accusations being issued against” him and called rape an “abominable crime.”

The 33-year-old Ronaldo has been accused of rape by Kathryn Mayorga. She has said the soccer great raped her in Las Vegas in 2009.

Ronaldo posted a video on Instagram shortly after a civil lawsuit was filed in Nevada last week, calling it “Fake. Fake news.”

On Wednesday, Ronaldo tweeted in both Portuguese and English.

Ronaldo wrote: “I firmly deny the accusations being issued against me. Rape is an abominable crime that goes against everything that I am and believe in. Keen as I may be to clear my name, I refuse to feed the media spectacle created by people seeking to promote themselves at my expense.”

In a second tweet, he added: “My clear conscious will thereby allow me to await with tranquility the results of any and all investigations.”

 
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Russia has delivered an S-300 surface-to-air missile system to Syria, it said Tuesday, in defiance of Israeli and U.S. concerns that the arms sale would embolden Iran and escalate the Syrian war.

Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu told President Vladimir Putin during a meeting broadcast by Rossiya 24 TV: “The work was finished a day ago,” adding that the system would improve the security of Russian military personal in Syria.

Russia decided to supply the system after Moscow accused Israel of indirectly causing the downing of a Russian military jet near Syria in September.

Israel voiced regret at the death of 15 Russian air crew while saying Syrian incompetence was at fault and that it was compelled to continue taking action against suspected deployments of Iranian-backed forces across its northern border.

“We have not changed our strategic line on Iran,” Israeli Education Minister Naftali Bennett, a member of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s security cabinet, said Tuesday.

“We will not allow Iran to open up a third front against us. We will take actions as required,” he told Israel Radio.

In Washington, State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert could not confirm reports that the S-300 had been delivered.

“I cannot confirm that that is accurate. I hope that they did not,” she told a press briefing. “That would be, I think, sort of a serious escalation in concerns and issues going on in Syria, but I just can’t confirm it.”
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Following are some of the many possible contenders to succeed Jean-Claude Juncker as EU chief executive after elections to the European Parliament in May.

Apart from electoral uncertainty, it is unclear that national leaders will follow Parliament’s call for them to pick a European Commission president from among the lead candidates of parties contesting the ballot.

Conservatives

Manfred Weber — An MEP for 14 years, the 46-year-old German has led the biggest EU parliamentary group since 2014. He has declared he will run and he can be confident of support from German Chancellor Angela Merkel despite his youthful years and lack of the government experience that is usual for commission presidents. Diplomats in Brussels say, however, Merkel could still drop Weber to secure another prominent job for Germany, like the head of the European Central Bank, which also comes vacant next autumn.

Michel Barnier — The EU’s chief Brexit negotiator ruled himself

out of the race on Friday.

Alexander Stubb — The former Finnish prime minister announced he would challenge Weber at an EPP nominating convention in Helsinki on Nov. 8. Stubb, 50, competes in “Iron Man” triathlons and is multilingual, unlike Weber, who does not speak French, or Barnier, who rarely seems comfortable in English.

Other names cited have included Merkel allies Peter Altmaier and Ursula von der Leyen and French IMF managing director Christine Lagarde — not to mention the wild card of Merkel herself, who is now in her fourth term.

Socialists

Marcos Sefcovic — The Moscow-educated Slovak diplomat who has worked in Brussels since 2004 and is Juncker’s vice president for energy, said in June he would run. He is 52. Sources in Brussels say he stands no chance in the top job race but will be Bratislava’s pick for a portfolio in the next commission.

Christian Kern — Austria’s former chancellor, Kern is known for his strongly pro-European stance. He said earlier this month he would seek to win a seat in the European Parliament next May.

​Federica Mogherini — The 45-year-old was catapulted into the high-ranked commission post of EU foreign policy chief in 2014. She could benefit from efforts to promote female candidates and a better left-right balance in Brussels but may struggle to get the necessary support from the new populist coalition in Rome.

Helle Thorning-Schmidt — Danish prime minister until 2015, at 51 she is perennially cited as a center-left hope for senior EU roles but lacks backing from the ruling right in Copenhagen.

Frans Timmermans — Juncker’s Dutch deputy, 57, is a former foreign minister and passionate, multilingual advocate for the EU but his party’s national eclipse counts against him.

Pierre Moscovici — Former French finance minister, 60, now EU economics commissioner, his party’s national disarray is also a disadvantage, as is German wariness over his commitment to Berlin’s vision of a eurozone of tight public finances.

Nadia Calvino — Long a senior commission civil servant, at 50 she has the rare distinction for EU Socialists of being in government, having been named Madrid’s economy minister in June.

Liberals

Guy Verhofstadt — Former Belgian prime minister who leads the liberals in the EU parliament, his age (65) and outspoken advocacy of much more powers for Brussels may limit his appeal. 

Margrethe Vestager — As a woman, age 50 and with a star profile in Brussels from attacking tax avoidance and monopoly powers among U.S. multinationals like Google and Apple as the EU competition commissioner, the Danish former economy minister is widely talked about as a liberal who could win support beyond her party — even if Denmark’s ruling conservatives oppose her.

​Cecilia Malmstrom — Another straight-talking, 50-year-old Scandinavian woman who has had a big role in Brussels’ tussles with Washington, the EU trade commissioner and former Swedish Europe minister could tick similar boxes to Vestager.

Mark Rutte — Dutch prime minister for eight years, the 51-year-old may be tempted by a new job. He is solidly pro-EU but appeals to those who want its budgets and powers kept in check.

Xavier Bettel — In five years as Luxembourg prime minister, during which he married his male partner, the 45-year-old has built good relations with fellow national leaders. They might balk at choosing another Luxemburger after Juncker, but his friendship with the even younger Macron could be an asset.
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Greenland Prime Minister Kim Kielsen presented a new minority government on Tuesday, ending a political crisis that started when he lost his majority last month with the withdrawal of a pro-independence party.

Kielsen of the social democrat Siumut party told a press conference in the capital Nuuk that he had agreed with the liberal-conservative party Atassut and the separatist, center-left party Nunatta Qitornai to form a minority government with the support of The Democrats, state broadcaster KNR reported.

A political stalemate on the Arctic island has delayed expansion of major airport projects of strategic interest to both Washington and Beijing and created uncertainty over an ambition to attract foreign investments into its vast hydrocarbon and mineral resources.

Greenland, eager to benefit from growing activity in the Arctic, plans to expand airports in the capital Nuuk, the tourist hub in Ilulissat and at Qaqortoq in southern Greenland to cater for direct flights from Europe and North America.

The Arctic island is a self-ruling part of Denmark, which is concerned that Chinese investment — on the agenda since Greenland’s Prime Minister Kim Kielsen visited Beijing last year — could upset the United States.

Pro-independence party Partii Naleraq on Sept. 10 withdrew from a coalition formed in May over Denmark’s plan to part-fund the upgrade of two airports.

Kielsen’s Siumut, the two other parties in the coalition, Atassut and Nunatta Qitornai, and the supporting Democrats all back a proposed Danish contribution to the airports.

“I think the new government can survive at least a year,” Mikaa Mered, an Arctic expert and professor at the Ileri institute in Paris.

“Siumut and Kim Kielsen are trying to signal investors that they are really committed to their pro-business, pro-mining and pro-uranium platform,” Mered said.

The three parties will hold 13 seats in the 31 seats in parliament.

Kielsen’s Siumut party is the largest party in Greenland.

The second biggest party Inuit Ataqatigiit (IA) was left out of the coalition.

Greenland relies on fishing and annual grants from Denmark.
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A female suspect allegedly paid tens of thousands of euros for the assassination of a Slovak reporter, whose death shocked the nation and led to the resignation of its prime minister, prosecutors said Monday.

The suspect, identified as Alena Zs, allegedly ordered the murder, paying €50,000 ($58,100) and forgiving a debt of €20,000. The hitman was identified as Tomas Sz, a former police officer. Two other accomplices are in custody.

Jan Kuciak and his fiancée Martina Kusnirova were found dead from gunshots wounds at their home near Bratislava in February.  Kuciak, 27, had been reporting on links between Slovak politicians and the Italian mafia. Prosecutors say he was killed to prevent his story from being published. Kusnirova was apparently an unintended victim.

Kuciak’s death was the first targeted killing of a journalist in the country’s history. Public outcry against the murders and government corruption was so strong that Prime Minister Robert Fico was forced to resign in March.

Local media reported Alena Zs had been an interpreter for Slovak multimillionaire Marian Kocner, whose business activities were being scrutinized by Kuciak at the time of his death. Kocner is reportedly the godfather of the Alena Zs’ daughter. 

Kocner, 55, owns several companies. He has been in custody since June on suspicion of having forged promissory notes. He has not been charged in connection with Kuciak’s killing. 

Observers say the murders are characteristic of a European political climate that has increasingly shifted away from freedom of the press.

“Despite the fact that Slovakia is a democracy and is an EU member, there has been this somewhat negative trend in regards to media freedom for some time,” Gulnoza Said of the Committee to Protect Journalists told VOA News. “It climaxed this year when Jan Kuciak and his fiancée were found murdered.”

“That just shows that even the situation in countries that have always been, or at least for some time have been considered democracies, is changing,” she said.
…

Britain cannot be bullied, Brexit minister Dominic Raab said on Monday, sharpening the government’s criticism of the European Union for taunting Prime Minister Theresa May and souring difficult Brexit talks.

May’s ministers have come out one by one at their party’s annual conference in the city of Birmingham to warn the EU that they will embrace leaving without a deal if the bloc fails to show “respect” in the talks to end Britain’s membership.

Just six months before Britain is due to leave the EU in the country’s biggest shift in foreign and trade policy in more than 40 years, May faces growing criticism over her proposals not only in her governing party but also in Brussels.

Party unity is on British ministers’ minds, and they are encouraging the faithful to direct their anger at the EU rather than at their prime minister, who some eurosceptic Conservatives accuse of leading Britain towards a “Brexit in name only.”

But the new strident tone has annoyed many in Brussels, especially when foreign minister Jeremy Hunt compared the bloc to the Soviet Union, the master of several states in eastern Europe which saw membership of the EU as a measure of their freedom.

Other ministers, such as finance minister Philip Hammond, have taken a softer tone, pointing out that leaving without a deal could hurt Britain’s economy, the world’s fifth largest.

But Raab said he had called on the EU to match the “ambition and pragmatism” Britain had put forward with May’s Chequers proposals, named after her country residence where an agreement with her ministers was hashed out in July.

“Unfortunately, that wasn’t on display in Salzburg,” he said, describing a summit last month in the Austrian city where EU leaders rejected parts of the Chequers plan. “Our prime minister has been constructive and respectful. In return we heard jibes from senior leaders and we saw a starkly one-sided approach to negotiation.”

“What is unthinkable is that this government, or any British government, could be bullied by the threat of some kind of economic embargo, into signing a one-sided deal against our country’s interests,” Raab said, later calling again on the EU to move their position and meet Britain half way.

Instead of the much-hoped-for staging post, the Salzburg summit has become a byword for a sharp deterioration in the atmosphere of the talks, when British government officials felt May was ambushed by the other EU leaders over Brexit.

“No Cherries”

A tweet by European Council President Donald Tusk showing him offering May a selection of cakes with the comment: “A piece of cake, perhaps? Sorry, no cherries” “certainly had an impact,” one official said.

With no divorce deal and a standoff over the shape of any future relationship, the possibility of a “no deal Brexit” has increased, with some businesses preparing for what they see as a worst case scenario.

European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker said the discussion in Britain over Brexit was still far removed from reality.

“The world is watching,” said Matthew Fell, chief U.K. policy director at the Confederation of British Industry.

“Every signal is hugely important in terms of setting the tone. So the more that people can coalesce around some areas of agreement such as an industrial strategy, innovation and skills would be hugely helpful,” he told Reuters.

But one source close to the government said there was now a sense that the EU had realized that the tone set in Salzburg was “perhaps a bit off” and, behind the scenes, conversations between the two sides were more constructive.

Raab later said the government was open to looking at regulatory checks to try to ease talks on a so-called backstop to prevent a return to a hard border between the British province of Northern Ireland and EU member Ireland – one of the outstanding issues yet to be agreed.

Hammond, for one, was keen to pursue a more positive stance.

After Brexit, Britain and the EU will still “be neighbors and we are going to have to carry on living with each other,” he told the conference, again backing May’s Chequers plan. “Mr. Tusk says it won’t work. But that’s what people said about the light bulb in 1878. Our job is to prove him wrong.”

But Hunt’s popular line at conference, that the EU was acting like the Soviet Union, did little to soothe relations, provoking those eastern members of the bloc which only regained full independence after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. They joined the EU more than a decade later.

Lithuania’s EU commissioner Vytenis Andriukaitis told Hunt he was born in a Soviet gulag forced labour camp and was jailed by the Soviet KGB state security agency.

“Happy to brief you on the main differences between EU and Soviet Union,” he said. “Anytime. Whatever helps.”

But back in Birmingham, it was Raab, winning a standing ovation for his story about his father’s journey from then Czechoslovakia after the Nazi invasion, who summed up Britain’s new combative stance.

“The EU’s theological approach allows no room for serious compromise,” he said. “If the EU want a deal, they need to get serious.”
…

Eurozone nations put Italy’s government under immediate pressure Monday over its budget proposals, which they said would pile more debt on Italians and skirt the rules of good fiscal housekeeping shared by the 19 nations using the euro currency.

Italy’s populist government announced last week it would increase spending next year, pushing the budget deficit out to 2.4 percent of GDP, past a 1.6 percent limit the government had earlier said it would observe. While still below the EU limit of 3 percent, the move breaks with Italy’s recent efforts to reduce its debts and sets up a clash with the country’s European partners.

“We are all bound by the euro and need sound policies to protect it,” eurogroup President Mario Centeno said after Italy was forced to explain itself at the monthly meeting of the group’s finance ministers.

A runaway budget deficit and massive debt load already brought eurozone member Greece to the brink of bankruptcy three years ago and threatened to break up the eurozone itself. No one wants that scenario to be repeated.

Italy has the eurozone’s highest debt load in Europe after Greece, and financial markets fell sharply last week when the Italian government unveiled its spending proposals.

“I cannot see how these figures can be compatible with our rules,” EU Financial Affairs Commissioner Pierre Moscovici said Monday as he joined the eurozone finance ministers.

He said Italy’s spending plans for the next three years were “a very significant deviation from the commitment which had been taken.”

Dutch Finance Minister Wopke Hoekstra said “the signals we are getting so far are not very reassuring.”

Italy sought to reassure its partners, with Italian Finance Minister Giovanni Tria saying they should “remain calm” and await his explanations.

The eurozone sets overall targets of 3 percent annual deficits and commits countries to move toward 60 percent overall debt. Currently, Italy’s debt stands at about 130 percent of GDP.

“I just want to be very clear, that there are rules,” said French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire. “Rules are the same for every state, because our futures our linked. The futures of Italy, France, Germany, Spain, Luxembourg — all the members of the eurozone — are linked.”

The Italian budget will go to the European Commission for vetting this month.
…

French singer Charles Aznavour has died at the age of 94, French media reported on Monday, citing his spokesman.

Aznavour, who was born Shahnour Varinag Aznavourian in Paris to Armenian parents, sold more than 100 million records in 80 countries.

He was often described as France’s Frank Sinatra.

Aznavour began his career peddling his music to French artists of the 1940s and 1950s such as Edith Piaf, Maurice Chevalier and Charles Trenet.

He discovered his talent for penning songs while performing in cabarets with partner Pierre Roche, with Roche playing the piano and Aznavour singing.

It was after World War II that Piaf took notice of the duo and took them with her on a tour of the United States and Canada, with Aznavour composing some of her most popular hits.

The young Aznavour grew up on Paris’ Left Bank. His father was a singer who also worked as a cook and restaurant manager, and his mother was an actress.

Aznavour’s first public performances were at Armenian dances where his father and older sister Aida sang, and the young Charles danced.

President Emmanuel Macron was a big fan of Aznavour and sang many of his songs during karaoke nights with friends when he was a student, according to former classmates.

 
…

European Union and NATO officials are urging Macedonia to move forward with procedures to change its name, which would pave the way for the country to join both entities.

EU Enlargement Commissioner Johannes Hahn said in a tweet that he expects “all political leaders to respect this decision and take it forward with utmost responsibility and unity across party lines.”

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg tweeted: “I urge all political leaders and parties to engage constructively and responsibly to seize this historic opportunity,” adding that NATO’s door is still open to Macedonia “but all national procedures have to be completed.”

The United States also supported moving forward with the process. “We urge leaders to rise above partisan politics and seize this historic opportunity to secure a brighter future for the country as a full participant in Western institutions,” the State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said.

According to the electoral commission’s official count, more than 90 percent of those casting a ballot favored the name change to North Macedonia, although only one third of the electorate voted.

Macedonia’s electoral commission had said two days ago that the referendum results would be declared invalid if less than 50 percent of the eligible voting population went to the polls.

Macedonian Prime Minister Zoran Zaev, who had said he would resign if a vast majority of eligible voters did not approve the referendum, described the vote as a clear success, despite the low turnout.

Zaev said he would not resign because a “vast majority” of those who turned out Sunday approved the measure.

He urged lawmakers to ratify the necessary changes to the constitution, which would finalize the deal.

Macedonian nationalists, including President Gjorge Ivanov, had urged a boycott of the vote.

In a statement Sunday, the Greek Foreign Ministry said the “contradictory” vote — overwhelming approval, yet low turnout — would require Macedonia to move carefully to “preserve the positive potential of the deal.”

Athens has always argued that the name “Macedonia” belongs exclusively to its northern province of Macedonia and that Macedonia’s use of the name implied Skopje’s intentions to claim the Greek province.

Greece’s objections forced Macedonia to use the awkward-sounding ‘Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia’ in the United Nations. Greece has consistently blocked its smaller neighbor from membership in NATO and the EU as long it retained its name.

Macedonian President Ivanov had said giving in to Athens’ demand would be a “flagrant violation of sovereignty.”

He steadfastly refused to back the deal reached between Prime Minister Zaev and his Greek counterpart, Alexis Tsipras that put the name change to a vote.
…

Nobel Prizes are the most prestigious awards on the planet but the aura of this year’s announcements has been dulled by questions over why so few women have entered the pantheon, particularly in the sciences.

The march of Nobel announcements begins Monday with the physiology/medicine prize.

Since the first prizes were awarded in 1901, 892 individuals have received one, but just 48 of them have been women. Thirty of those women won either the literature or peace prize, highlighting the wide gender gap in the laureates for physics, chemistry and physiology/medicine. In addition, only one woman has won for the economics prize, which is not technically a Nobel but is associated with the prizes.

Some of the disparity likely can be attributed to underlying structural reasons, such as the low representation of women in high-level science. The American Institute of Physics, for example, says in 2014, only 10 percent of full physics professorships were held by women.

But critics suggest that gender bias pervades the process of nominations, which come largely from tenured professors.

“The problem is the whole nomination process, you have these tenured professors who feel like they are untouchable. They can get away with everything from sexual harassment to micro-aggressions like assuming the woman in the room will take the notes, or be leaving soon to have babies,” said Anne-Marie Imafidon, the head of Stemettes, a British group that encourages girls and young women to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

“It’s little wonder that these people aren’t putting women forward for nominations. We need to be better at telling the stories of the women in science who are doing good things and actually getting recognition,” she said.

Powerful men taking credit for the ideas and elbow grease of their female colleagues was turned on its head in 1903 when Pierre Curie made it clear he would not accept the physics prize unless his wife and fellow researcher Marie Curie was jointly honored. She was the first female winner of any Nobel prize, but only one other woman has won the physics prize since then.

More than 70 years later, Jocelyn Bell, a post-graduate student at Cambridge, was overlooked for the physics prize despite her crucial contribution to the discovery of pulsars. Her supervisor, Antony Hewish, took all of the Nobel credit.

Brian Keating, a physics professor at the University of California San Diego and author of the book “Losing the Nobel Prize: A Story of Cosmology, Ambition, and the Perils of Science’s Highest Honor,” says the Nobel Foundation should lift its restrictions on re-awarding for a breakthrough if an individual has been overlooked. He also says posthumous awards also should be considered and there should be no restriction on the number of individuals who can share a prize. Today the limit is three people for one prize.

“These measures would go a long way to addressing the injustice that so few of the brilliant women who have contributed so much to science through the years have been overlooked,” he said.

Keating fears that simply accepting the disparity as structural will seriously harm the prestige of all the Nobel prizes.

“I think with the Hollywood (hash)MeToo movement, it has already happened in the film prizes. It has happened with the literature prize. There is no fundamental law of nature that the Nobel science prizes will continue to be seen as the highest accolade,” he said.

This year’s absence of a Nobel Literature prize, which has been won by 14 women, puts an even sharper focus on the gender gap in science prizes.

The Swedish Academy, which awards the literature prize, said it would not pick a winner this year after sex abuse allegations and financial crimes scandals rocked the secretive panel, sharply dividing its 18 members, who are appointed for life. Seven members quit or distanced themselves from academy. Its permanent secretary, Anders Olsson, said the academy wanted “to commit time to recovering public confidence.”

The academy plans to award both the 2018 prize and the 2019 prize next year _ but even that is not guaranteed. The head of the Nobel Foundation, Lars Heikensten, was quoted Friday as warning that if the Swedish Academy does not resolve its tarnished image another group could be chosen to select the literature prize every year.

Stung by criticism about the diversity gap between former prize winners, the Nobel Foundation has asked that the science awarding panels for 2019 ask nominators to consider their own biases in the thousands of letters they send to solicit Nobel nominations.

“I am eager to see more nominations for women so they can be considered,” said Goran Hansson, secretary-general of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences and vice chairman of the Nobel Foundation. “We have written to nominators asking them to make sure they do not miss women or people of other ethnicities or nationalities in their nominations. We hope this will make a difference for 2019.”

It’s not the first time that Nobel officials have sought diversity. In his 1895 will, prize founder Alfred Nobel wrote: “It is my express wish that in the awarding of the prizes no consideration shall be given to national affiliations of any kind, so that the most worthy shall receive the prize, whether he be Scandinavian or not.”

Even so, the prizes remained overwhelmingly white and male for most of their existence.

For the first 70 years, the peace prize skewed heavily toward Western white men, with just two of the 59 prizes awarded to individuals or institutions based outside Europe or North America. Only three of the winners in that period were female.

The 1973 peace prize shared by North Vietnam’s Le Duc Tho and American Henry Kissinger widened the horizons _ since then more than half the Nobel Peace prizes have gone to African or Asian individuals or institutions.

Since 2000, six women have won the peace prize.

After the medicine prize on Monday, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences will announce the Nobel in physics on Tuesday and in chemistry on Wednesday, while the Nobel Peace Prize will be awarded Friday by the Norwegian Nobel Committee. On Oct. 8, Sweden’s Central Bank announces the winner of the economics prize, given in honor of Alfred Nobel.
…

Macedonians voted Sunday whether to change the name of their country – a move that could pave the way for it to join NATO and the European Union.

Following a deal with neighboring Greece after decades of dispute, Macedonians voted on whether to change the country’s name to North Macedonia.

Nationalists, including Macedonian President Gjorge Ivanov, urged a boycott of the vote Sunday, resulting in low voter turnout.  Macedonia’s electoral commission said two days ago the referendum results would be declared invalid if less than 50 percent of the eligible voting population went to the polls.

Even if the referendum vote passed and turnout exceeded 50 percent, Macedonia’s Parliament would have to pass the name change with a two thirds majority to amend the constitution. 

Athens has argued that the name “Macedonia”  belongs exclusively to its northern province of Macedonia and using the name implies Skopje’s intentions to claim the Greek province.

Greece has for years pressured Skopje into renouncing the country’s name, forcing it to use the more formal moniker Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia in the United Nations.   Greece has consistently blocked its smaller neighbor from gaining membership in NATO and the EU as long it retains its name.

President Ivanov said giving into Athens’ demand would be a “flagrant violation of sovereignty.”  

He steadfastly refused to back the deal reached between Macedonian Prime Minister Zoran Zaev and his Greek counterpart Alexis Tsipras that puts the name change to a vote.

“This referendum could lead us to become a subordinate state, dependent on another country,” Ivanov said.  “We will become a state in name only, not in substance.”
…

Traditional two-handled ceramic jars known as amphoras were used extensively in ancient Greece to store and transport a variety of products, especially wine. These days they are more likely to be found in shipwrecks than in stores. But wine-filled amphoras are once again being found on the sea floor, not from sunken ships, but deliberately placed there by a special Eastern European winery. Faith Lapidus explains.
…

Tension flared in a familiar section of the Balkans as thousands of people marched Saturday in Kosovo’s capital against a possible territory swap with former war foe Serbia, while the Serbian government put its troops on alert after special police were deployed to Kosovo’s Serb-dominated north.

Serbia reacted after Kosovo’s special police moved into an area around the Kosovo side of the strategic Gazivode Lake, said Marko Djuric, director of Serbia’s Office for Kosovo and Metohija.

Kosovar President Hashim Thaci visited the area near Serbia’s border Saturday, a move that temporarily redirected attention away from the large opposition protest in Pristina. A security unit was dispatched to the area for the president’s stop, Kosovo police said.

Serbia’s Djuric said special troops must not be deployed unannounced to northern Kosovo, where the country’s ethnic Serbian minority population is concentrated. Serbian media said Belgrade had complained to NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg.

President Aleksandar Vucic, an ally of Russia in the Balkans, warned at a news conference later on Saturday that Serbia would not allow any violence against the Serb minority in Kosovo.

No ‘great global conflicts’

Asked if he would seek Russia’s help as Syrian President Bashar al-Assad did, Vucic responded he would seek advice but not military help from President Vladimir Putin during an upcoming visit to Moscow.

“I would not like to see great global conflicts take part on our territory,” said Vucic.

Serbia does not recognize Kosovo’s 2008 declaration of independence, but their governments have been in European Union-mediated negotiations for seven years. The two sides have been told they must normalize relations as a precondition to EU membership.

Thaci has said a “border correction” could be part of the discussions. Some Serbian officials have suggested an exchange of territories could help end the dispute.

One idea that has been floated by politicians in both countries involves exchanging predominantly ethnic Albanian Presevo Valley in southern Serbia with Kosovo’s Serb-populated north.

However, the idea has faced opposition from Germany and other EU nations, which have said they fear a Kosovo-Serbia trade could trigger demands for territory revisions in other parts of the volatile Balkans.

Thousands of supporters of Kosovo’s opposition Self-Determination Party marched peacefully through the capital, Pristina, on Saturday to protest any potential change of borders. The protesters held national Albanian flags.

‘Grandiose protest’

Opposition leader Albin Kurti said he considered Thaci a collaborator with Serbia and called for fresh elections.

“Such a grandiose protest is our response to the deals from Thaci and Vucic,” Kurti said.

Thaci has rejected both border revisions based on ethnicity and a possible land trade. But he has not clarified how Serbia could be persuaded to give away the Presevo Valley without something in exchange.

Three weeks ago, Serbian leader Vucic visited the lake in northern Kosovo that Thaci traveled to Saturday.

NATO-led peacekeepers in Kosovo, a force known as KFOR, called for calm and restraint. They said they would continue monitoring the situation along the Serbia-Kosovo border with ground patrols and helicopters.

Thaci’s office issued a statement acknowledging his visit to a border crossing and the lake.

“During the weekends the head of state usually goes to Kosovo’s beauties,” the statement said.

The governments in both Pristina and Belgrade have said they hope the EU-mediated talks will result in a legally binding agreement.

“Talks [with Serbia] that continue will be on peace and stability,” Thaci said Saturday.
…

Catalan separatists clashed with police Saturday in downtown Barcelona, with two arrests being made, as tensions increased before the anniversary of the Spanish region’s illegal referendum on secession that ended in violent raids by security forces.

Separatists tossed and sprayed colored powder at the local police, filling the air in a thick rainbow cloud and covering anti-riot shields, police vans and the pavement on a downtown boulevard in a panoply of bright colors. Some protesters also threw eggs and other projectiles and engaged with the police line, which used baton strikes to keep them back.

The clashes erupted after local Catalan police intervened to form a barrier when a separatist threw purple paint on a man who was part of another march of people in support of Spanish police demanding a pay raise. Officers used batons to push back the oncoming separatists and keep apart the opposing groups.

The Catalan police told The Associated Press that both people were arrested on charges of aggressions against police officers.

There were more confrontations between separatists and local police as the separatists tried to invade Barcelona’s main city square where 3,000 people supporting Spanish police had ended their march.

Furious shouts

Separatists shouted “Get out of here, fascists!” and cried for `”Independence!” at the Spanish police supporters, who responded by shouting “We will be victorious!” and “Our cause is just!”

Barcelona Mayor Ada Colau issued a plea for peace when the first scuffles broke out.

“I make a call for calm,” Colau told Catalunya Radio. “This city has always defended that everyone can exercise their rights to free speech.”

The pro-police march had originally planned to end in another square that’s home to the regional and municipal government seats, but 6,000 separatists, according to local police, gathered in the square to force regional authorities to alter the march’s route.

The police march was organized by the police association JUSAPOL, which wants Spain’s two nationwide police forces, the national police and Civil Guard, to be paid as much as Catalonia’s regional police.

JUSAPOL holds marches in cities across Spain, but Saturday’s march in Barcelona came two days before Catalonia’s separatists plan to remember last year’s referendum on secession that the regional government held despite its prohibition by the nation’s top court.

That Oct. 1 referendum was marred when national police and Civil Guard officers clashed with voters, injuring hundreds.

JUSAPOL spokesman Antonio Vazquez told Catalan television TV3 that while the march’s goal was to demand better salaries, they also wanted to support the national police and Civil Guard officers who had been ordered to dismantle last year’s referendum.

“The national police and Civil Guard agents who acted last year were doing their duty and now they are under pressure and we have to support them,” Vazquez said.

Rallying call

Last year’s police operation that failed to stop the referendum has become a rallying call for Catalonia’s separatists, who argue that it was evidence of Spain’s mistreatment of the wealthy region that enjoys an ample degree of self-rule.

Pro-secession lawmaker Vidal Aragones of the extreme left CUP party called the police march an “insult to the Catalan people.”

“It is not acceptable,” Aragones said. “They have come here to remember the violence that they employed.”

Two weeks ago, police had to intervene to keep apart two separate rallies by Catalan separatists and Spanish unionists in Barcelona, the region’s capital.

Catalonia’s separatist-led government is asking Spain’s central authorities to authorize a binding vote on secession.

Polls and recent elections show that the region’s 7.5 million residents are roughly equally divided by the secession question.
…

Journalists are being jailed in unprecedented numbers across the globe, with 262 detained for their work at the end of 2017, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists.

“The jailing of journalists is a brutal form of censorship that is having a profound impact on the flow of information around the world,” CPJ Executive Director Joel Simon told a press freedom event Friday at the United Nations.

At the end of 2017, the worst offenders were Turkey, with 73 journalists jailed; China with 41; and Egypt with 20.

CPJ says that slightly more than half of all imprisoned journalists were jailed for reporting on human rights violations.

WATCH: A Pakistani American Startup Fighting Media Censorship

Simon said the United Nations has not been a strong enough voice on the issue because it has a culture of rarely naming and shaming its member states.

The event, organized on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly annual meeting, highlighted the cases of five reporters CPJ says have been unjustly detained. They are nationals of Bangladesh, Kyrgyzstan, Egypt and Myanmar.

The two most high-profile cases are of Reuters reporters Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo in Myanmar. The two men were detained in December 2017 while they were investigating the mass killing of Rohingya Muslim men and boys by Buddhist villagers in the Rakhine state village of Inn Din.

Myanmar’s military launched a crackdown on the minority Rohingya in August 2017 after Rohingya militants attacked several police checkpoints and killed a dozen Myanmar police officers. In a matter of a few months, 700,000 Rohingya fled to neighboring Bangladesh. Survivors gave accounts of horrific abuses, including widespread rapes, torture, and the looting and burning of their homes. The United Nations has deemed the atrocities a “textbook case” of ethnic cleansing. 

British barrister Amal Clooney is representing the two Reuters reporters. She says the Myanmar authorities did not want their story about the massacre at Inn Din to come out.

“So police planted government documents on the journalists while other officers lay in wait outside to arrest them,” Clooney said of how the two men were set up. “The journalists were arrested and were then prosecuted and subjected to a show trial in which their conviction was guaranteed.”

Earlier this month, the two were sentenced to seven years in prison for violating a law on state secrets. Clooney said they are seeking a presidential pardon in Myanmar for them, as it is the only avenue currently available to win their freedom.

“The attack on them is a chilling warning to other journalists worldwide,” said Reuters President Stephen Adler. “Myanmar is not the only country where attempts are made to deter investigative news gathering, scare sources and whistle-blowers, dim the spotlight of reporting, and thereby allow officials to act in darkness with impunity.”

Other arrests

Azimjon Askarov, a Kyrgyz journalist, has been serving a life sentence since July 2010. CPJ’s Simon says he was covering deadly ethnic clashes in southern Kyrgyzstan in the summer of 2010. During the trial, he and his lawyer were both assaulted.

“CPJ conducted its own investigation into the case in 2012 and found that charges against Askarov were in retaliation for his reporting on corrupt and abusive practices by regional police and prosecutors,” Simon said.

Bangladeshi photojournalist and commentator Shahidul Alam was arrested last month while covering student protests in Bangladesh. A Dhaka court ordered that he be held for seven days to determine if he violated an information law by spreading propaganda and false information.

“When Shahidul was brought into court, he screamed that had been tortured. He was unable to walk without assistance,” Simon told the panel. He remains in detention.

Since 2013, CPJ says, Egypt has been among the world’s worst jailers of journalists, often detaining reporters on politically motivated anti-state charges.

Alaa Abdelfattah, a well-known Egyptian blogger and activist who has written about politics and human rights, is one of them. He is serving a five-year sentence on charges that he organized a protest and assaulted a police officer.

“We believe the charges are trumped up and in retaliation for Alaa’s coverage of alleged human rights abuses by the police and security forces,” Simon said.

“We are witnessing a growing hatred of journalists worldwide, which unfortunately is not limited to authoritarian regimes,” said Margaux Ewen, North America director of Reporters Without Borders. “We are seeing democratically elected regimes also attack the press more and more frequently, which is why we need to continue to address wrongs as they occur.”

U.S. President Donald Trump refers to negative news coverage of him and his administration as “fake news,” and reporters at his rallies and during his campaign reported encountering hostility from his supporters.

Reporters in the United States are facing a more dangerous work environment. CPJ says at least three journalists have been arrested this year and 34 last year. In June, five people were killed in the newsroom of an Annapolis, Maryland, newspaper.

Journalists covering white nationalism and the far-right political movement have reported receiving threats, and at least 24 journalists have been assaulted, shoved or had their equipment damaged while working.

“A free press is not an adversary, but an essential component of democracy,” Ewen said.
…

Journalists are being jailed in unprecedented numbers across the globe, with 262 detained for their work at the end of 2017, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists.

“The jailing of journalists is a brutal form of censorship that is having a profound impact on the flow of information around the world,” CPJ Executive Director Joel Simon told a press freedom event Friday at the United Nations.

At the end of 2017, the worst offenders were Turkey, with 73 journalists jailed; China with 41; and Egypt with 20.

CPJ says that slightly more than half of all imprisoned journalists were jailed for reporting on human rights violations.

WATCH: A Pakistani American Startup Fighting Media Censorship

Simon said the United Nations has not been a strong enough voice on the issue because it has a culture of rarely naming and shaming its member states.

The event, organized on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly annual meeting, highlighted the cases of five reporters CPJ says have been unjustly detained. They are nationals of Bangladesh, Kyrgyzstan, Egypt and Myanmar.

The two most high-profile cases are of Reuters reporters Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo in Myanmar. The two men were detained in December 2017 while they were investigating the mass killing of Rohingya Muslim men and boys by Buddhist villagers in the Rakhine state village of Inn Din.

Myanmar’s military launched a crackdown on the minority Rohingya in August 2017 after Rohingya militants attacked several police checkpoints and killed a dozen Myanmar police officers. In a matter of a few months, 700,000 Rohingya fled to neighboring Bangladesh. Survivors gave accounts of horrific abuses, including widespread rapes, torture, and the looting and burning of their homes. The United Nations has deemed the atrocities a “textbook case” of ethnic cleansing. 

British barrister Amal Clooney is representing the two Reuters reporters. She says the Myanmar authorities did not want their story about the massacre at Inn Din to come out.

“So police planted government documents on the journalists while other officers lay in wait outside to arrest them,” Clooney said of how the two men were set up. “The journalists were arrested and were then prosecuted and subjected to a show trial in which their conviction was guaranteed.”

Earlier this month, the two were sentenced to seven years in prison for violating a law on state secrets. Clooney said they are seeking a presidential pardon in Myanmar for them, as it is the only avenue currently available to win their freedom.

“The attack on them is a chilling warning to other journalists worldwide,” said Reuters President Stephen Adler. “Myanmar is not the only country where attempts are made to deter investigative news gathering, scare sources and whistle-blowers, dim the spotlight of reporting, and thereby allow officials to act in darkness with impunity.”

Other arrests

Azimjon Askarov, a Kyrgyz journalist, has been serving a life sentence since July 2010. CPJ’s Simon says he was covering deadly ethnic clashes in southern Kyrgyzstan in the summer of 2010. During the trial, he and his lawyer were both assaulted.

“CPJ conducted its own investigation into the case in 2012 and found that charges against Askarov were in retaliation for his reporting on corrupt and abusive practices by regional police and prosecutors,” Simon said.

Bangladeshi photojournalist and commentator Shahidul Alam was arrested last month while covering student protests in Bangladesh. A Dhaka court ordered that he be held for seven days to determine if he violated an information law by spreading propaganda and false information.

“When Shahidul was brought into court, he screamed that had been tortured. He was unable to walk without assistance,” Simon told the panel. He remains in detention.

Since 2013, CPJ says, Egypt has been among the world’s worst jailers of journalists, often detaining reporters on politically motivated anti-state charges.

Alaa Abdelfattah, a well-known Egyptian blogger and activist who has written about politics and human rights, is one of them. He is serving a five-year sentence on charges that he organized a protest and assaulted a police officer.

“We believe the charges are trumped up and in retaliation for Alaa’s coverage of alleged human rights abuses by the police and security forces,” Simon said.

“We are witnessing a growing hatred of journalists worldwide, which unfortunately is not limited to authoritarian regimes,” said Margaux Ewen, North America director of Reporters Without Borders. “We are seeing democratically elected regimes also attack the press more and more frequently, which is why we need to continue to address wrongs as they occur.”

U.S. President Donald Trump refers to negative news coverage of him and his administration as “fake news,” and reporters at his rallies and during his campaign reported encountering hostility from his supporters.

Reporters in the United States are facing a more dangerous work environment. CPJ says at least three journalists have been arrested this year and 34 last year. In June, five people were killed in the newsroom of an Annapolis, Maryland, newspaper.

Journalists covering white nationalism and the far-right political movement have reported receiving threats, and at least 24 journalists have been assaulted, shoved or had their equipment damaged while working.

“A free press is not an adversary, but an essential component of democracy,” Ewen said.
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