Month: May 2022

Zelenskyy: Length of War with Russia Depends on Countries of the Free World

Posted on by SeeEU

“No one today can predict how long this war will last,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in his daily address Friday about the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

“But we are doing everything we can to liberate our land quickly. This is our priority – to work every day to make the war shorter,” he said.

Zelenskyy said the length of the war “depends, unfortunately, not only on our people, who are already doing the maximum.”

He said, “It also depends on our partners – on European countries, on the countries of the whole free world.”

The possible expansion of NATO, in the wake of the conflict in Ukraine, will be a focus of talks Saturday, as U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken heads to Berlin for an informal NATO foreign ministerial meeting.

Finnish President Sauli Niinistö and Prime Minister Sanna Marin have expressed their approval for joining the alliance, a move that would complete a major policy shift for the Scandinavian countries in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Friday his country does not support Finland and Sweden joining NATO, citing their support of what Turkey considers terrorist organizations, such as Kurdish militant groups.

“We are following developments concerning Sweden and Finland, but we are not of a favorable opinion,” Erdogan told reporters in Istanbul. Any NATO enlargement requires the unanimous consent of the existing members.

US stance

U.S. officials said they were working to “clarify Turkey’s position,” while reiterating that the “United States would support a NATO application by Finland and/or Sweden should they choose to apply.”

“We strongly support NATO’s Open Door policy,” U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs Karen Donfried told reporters Friday. “I think that it’s important to remember that a fundamental principle the U.S. is defending in terms of its support for Ukraine is the right of every sovereign country to decide its own future foreign and security policy arrangement.”

Both Sweden’s and Finland’s foreign ministers will be participating in the North Atlantic Council informal dinner Saturday in Berlin. From Germany, Blinken heads to France on Sunday, where he will attend the second ministerial meeting of the U.S.-EU Trade and Technology Council, known as the TTC.

U.S. President Joe Biden talked with Swedish Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson and Finland’s Niinistö on Friday.

“President Biden underscored his support for NATO’s Open Door policy and for the right of Finland and Sweden to decide their own future, foreign policy, and security arrangement,” the White House said in a readout of the call, adding the leaders “reiterated their shared commitment to continued coordination in support of Ukraine and the Ukrainian people affected by the war.”

Impact of NATO expansion

The German Marshall Fund’s Michael Kimmage told VOA that Finland’s joining NATO would shake up the security order in Europe, both for NATO and for Russia.

“It’s a very, very long border, and of course it brings NATO very close to — or will bring NATO if it all goes through — very close to St. Petersburg. And at the same time, it will give NATO a lot more territory right on the Russian border to defend. So those are big steps. Those are big changes,” Kimmage said.

Russia has warned against NATO expansion and said Finland’s and Sweden’s joining would bring “serious military and political consequences.”

“The expansion of NATO and the approach of the alliance to our borders does not make the world and our continent more stable and secure,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters Thursday.

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin spoke by phone with his Russian counterpart, Sergey Shoygu, for the first time since Feb. 18.

Pentagon press secretary John Kirby said in a statement that Austin “urged an immediate cease-fire in Ukraine and emphasized the importance of maintaining lines of communication.”

US aid to Ukraine

Austin also spoke Friday with Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov about Ukraine’s “evolving battlefield needs.”

“Secretary Austin highlighted the President’s May 6 announcement of $150 million in Presidential Drawdown Authority to provide Ukraine’s Armed Forces with artillery, counter-artillery radars, and electronic jamming equipment,” Kirby said in a statement.

“Minister Reznikov shared his assessment of the situation on the ground in eastern Ukraine.”

War crimes trial

In Ukraine, a 21-year-old Russian soldier was brought before a Kyiv court Friday, in the first war crimes proceeding since the war began.

Ukrainian prosecutors say Vadim Shishimarin fired several shots from a car in the Sumy region of northeastern Ukraine on Feb. 28, just days after the conflict began, killing an unarmed 62-year-old man who was pushing a bike on the side of the road.

Ukraine’s government says it is investigating more than 10,000 war crimes involving Russian forces, with cases of torture and mutilation having often been revealed after Russian forces left a Ukrainian city, as in the case of Bucha.

Russia has denied committing war crimes in Ukraine, and the Kremlin on Friday said it had no knowledge of the trial.

Putin-Scholz call

In Moscow, Russian President Vladmir Putin on Friday spoke by phone with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz about the stalled Ukrainian-Russian peace talks.

In a tweet, the German leader said he had called during the 75-minute conversation for an immediate cease-fire, countered the Russian claim “that Nazis are in power” as false and also reminded Putin “about Russia’s responsibility for the global food situation.”

G-7 meeting

The call came as G-7 ministers meeting in Germany pledged unity and more weapons and aid to Ukraine.

The European Union’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, announced an additional $520 million worth of military support to Ukraine for heavy weaponry, while expressing hope that member states would agree to a Russian oil embargo.

British Foreign Minister Liz Truss also announced new sanctions against members of Putin’s inner circle, including his former wife and cousins.

VOA Senior Diplomatic Correspondent Cindy Saine contributed to this report. Some information for this story came from The Associated Press and Reuters.
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US Big City Hate Crimes Spiked By 39% in 2021, Report Finds

Posted on by SeeUS

Preliminary data from more than three dozen U.S. police departments indicate a double-digit spike in hate crimes last year and a continued rise into 2022, with incidents targeting Asian and Jewish Americans accounting for the bulk of the increase.

On average, bias-motivated incidents in 37 major U.S. cities increased by nearly 39%, with the 10 largest metropolitan areas reporting a record increase of 54.5%, according to an analysis of national police data compiled by the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University, San Bernardino.

Brian Levin, executive director of the center, said the uptrend in hate crime extended into the first quarter of 2022 with bias incidents rising by an average of 30% in 15 large cities and is likely to continue.

“Historically, in midterm election years, hate crimes almost always peak, or come close to peaking much later in the year – often in September and October, with the first quarter usually significantly lower than the rest of the year,” Levin said. “This suggests a turbulent year-end 2022 may be ahead.”

The university’s data, shared with VOA, offer an early peek into hate incidents in 2021 and come months before the FBI releases its annual hate crime report.

While large cities account for a disproportionate number of hate crime incidents in the United States, they can be a prognosticator of the overall national trend, Levin said.

The yearly FBI tally is based on voluntary data submissions by more than 15,000 law enforcement agencies. The bureau said the 2021 data are slated for release in the fall, a typical lag of several months.

Last October, the FBI reported that hate crime jumped to 8,263 incidents in 2020, the highest level in more than two decades.

The overall increase in hate crimes in 2021 came as anti-Asian incidents jumped 224% to a record 369 incidents in 20 of the largest U.S. cities, while anti-Jewish and anti-gay incidents posted increases of more than 50% to 373 incidents, according to the data.

Anti-Asian assaults and other types of incidents have been on an upswing since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in early 2020, fueled in part, community activists and experts say, by rhetoric blaming China for the deadly virus.

The Stop AAPI Hate coalition, created during the pandemic to track bias incidents, received nearly 11,000 anti-Asian hate reports from March 2020 to December 2021.

More than 60% of the incidents were reported by women, including women using public transit, according to Cynthia Choi, co-executive director of Chinese for Affirmative Action, one of the founding partners of the anti-hate coalition.

Asian women reported being verbally harassed, coughed and spat on, physically assaulted and refused entry onto urban transit trains.

“What I see through the report is that horrible things are being said that are racist and sexist that I can’t even repeat to you now,” Choi said in an interview. “And of course, there’s always a fear that that type of verbal harassment, that type of racial profiling and targeting will escalate to violence.”

The FBI defines hate crimes as criminal offenses motivated by the perpetrator’s bias against a race, religion, disability, sexual orientation, ethnicity, gender or gender identity.

While the majority of the incidents tracked by Stop AAPI Hate did not rise to the level of hate crimes, violence targeting Asian Americans continued to rise.

In Atlanta, a 21-year-old man shot and killed eight people, including six women of Asian descent, at massage parlors in March 2021. Although the suspect, Robert Aaron Long, said he was motivated by sex addiction, not racism, prosecutors alleged anti-Asian animus.

In San Francisco, home to one of the largest Asian communities in the United States, several Asian Americans were violently attacked last year, including an 84-year-old man who died in January after being shoved to the ground.

The violence has rattled the Asian American community. A Pew survey released this week found that more than one-third of Asian Americans worry they might be threatened or attacked and have made changes in their daily routine because of that concern.

Anti-Jewish hate crimes

The rise in anti-Jewish hate crimes came as fresh violence between Israel and Hamas in May 2021 spurred a wave of antisemitic incidents in the United States.

Last month, the Anti-Defamation League reported that it had tallied 2,717 antisemitic incidents of assault, harassment and vandalism in 2021, the highest number since it started tracking such cases in 1979.

New York City, the city with the largest Jewish American population in the U.S., was particularly hard hit. Police data show that anti-Jewish hate crimes increased by 71% to 207 incidents in 2021.

Of the 88 assaults on Jewish victims reported to the ADL last year, more than half took place in New York, noted Scott Richman, ADL regional director for New York and New Jersey.

Visibly identifiable Jews such as members of New York’s Hassidic community were frequent targets.

In November, three teenage girls were accused of attacking a 12-year-old Orthodox Jewish boy walking home with his 3-year-old brother. The New York Post, citing authorities, reported that one of the girls slapped the toddler in the face before fleeing the scene.

“That was very disturbing,” Richman said.

Similar attacks on New York’s Orthodox Jews have continued in recent weeks. Last week, a 32-year-old Hassidic man was punched in the face and the head by a stranger as he walked down a street in the city’s Crown Heights section.

“The Nazis should have killed you Jews,” the attacker allegedly said before taking off.

Richman said the incidents have terrorized the Hassidic community.

“People don’t know if they can walk in the streets, what’s going to happen,” Richman said.
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Storm Chasers Face Host of Dangers Beyond Severe Weather

Posted on by SeeUS

The deaths of four storm chasers in car crashes over the last two weeks have underscored the dangers of pursuing severe weather events as more people clog back roads and highways searching for a glimpse of a lightning bolt or tornado, meteorologists and chasers say.

Martha Llanos Rodriguez of Mexico City died Wednesday when a semitrailer plowed into her vehicle from behind on Interstate 90 in southwestern Minnesota. The car’s driver, Diego Campos, told the Minneapolis Star Tribune that he and Rodriguez and two other weather experts had been chasing violent weather and were hit after he stopped for downed power lines on the road.

More people are hopping into their cars and racing off after storms, jamming up roads, running stop signs and paying more attention to the sky than traffic, said Marshall Shepherd, director of the atmospheric sciences program at the University of Georgia.

“There is such a volume of chasers out there on some storms sometimes that it creates potential traffic and other hazards,” Shepherd said. “Seeing storms within their natural context has scientific and broader value so I am not anti-chasing, however, there are elements that have become a little wild, wild West-ish.”

Popularized in the 1996 movie “Twister,” storm chasing involves pursuing severe weather events such as electrical storms and tornadoes, often in cars or on foot.

Some are researchers looking to gather data, such as verifying computer models predicting storm behavior. Some are looking to get in touch with nature. Others are photographers. And still others are just looking for a rush, said Greg Tripoli, an atmospheric and oceanic sciences professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison who taught a class on storm chasing.

“Seeing a tornado is a life-changing experience,” Tripoli said. “You want to see one instead of just talking about them. It’s really just one of the excitements of life. You’ve got to take chances and go out there and go after your passions. It’s no different from rock-climbing or deep-sea diving.”

The storms themselves present dangers to inexperienced chasers who get too close. They can get hit by debris, struck by lightning or worse. Tripoli said he decided to stop teaching his storm chaser class and taking students into the field in the early 1990s after university officials stopped insuring the trips.

Nature isn’t the only threat. Storm chasers spend long hours on the road traveling from state to state like long-haul truckers, inviting fatigue. When they catch up to the storms, they can often keep their eyes on the skies instead of the road, sometimes with deadly consequences. Tripoli said he would warn students in his storm chaser class that the most likely way they would get hurt is in a car crash.

Three University of Oklahoma students were killed on April 30 after traveling to Kansas to chase a tornado. According to the Oklahoma Highway Patrol, the students’ car hydroplaned on the interstate in Tonkawa, about 85 miles (137 kilometers) north of Oklahoma City. They slid off and back onto the interstate before a semitrailer hit them.

The University of Oklahoma has a policy stating that anyone who chases storms does so at their own risk and that storm chasing isn’t part of the school’s meteorology curriculum.

The mother of one of the students, 19-year-old Gavin Short of Grayslake, Illinois, told WMAQ-TV that her son loved to chase storms.

“He loved it, and we were so happy for him,” Beth Short said. “And it just, this is just the worst nightmare for us and two other sets of parents.”

Chaser traffic jams are becoming more common, said Kelton Halbert, a University of Wisconsin atmospheric and oceanic sciences doctoral student. He said he’s been chasing storms since he was 16 because he wants to feel closer to nature’s beauty and verify his forecast modeling, mostly by taking video of storms’ behavior.

“Unless you’re with one of these research institutions, storm chasers don’t have the ability to collect a lot of hard data,” he said. “For most … it’s the beauty, it’s the photography and then obviously the thrill seekers and adrenaline seekers. You can have people tailgating you, people in the middle of the road. If you’re in Texas, Oklahoma or Kansas on a high-risk day, yeah, you can see hundreds of them. Given the recent couple weeks, I’ve definitely felt more apprehensive. It brings back to the forefront that every time you do this you’re taking a risk.”

Wednesday’s storm in the Upper Midwest left tens of thousands of homes and businesses without power into Thursday. More potentially severe weather was forecast into Thursday evening that could bring hail, high winds and tornadoes from the Dakotas and Minnesota into other parts of the Midwest, the Storm Prediction Center said.
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Georgia’s Breakaway South Ossetia Sets Vote to Join Russia

Posted on by SeeEU

The leader of the breakaway Georgian region of South Ossetia announced Friday that a referendum on joining Russia would be held in July.

Russia has exercised effective control over the region since fighting a brief war with Georgia in 2008. Russia and a handful of other countries recognize South Ossetia as an independent state, but most of the world still considers it to be part of Georgia.

“We did it!” South Ossetian leader Anatoly Bibilov wrote on Telegram Friday, announcing that he had signed a decree setting the referendum for July 17.

“In legalese, we fulfilled yet another important legal requirement,” he said. “And in normal language, we took a life-changing step — we are going home, we are going to Russia.”

About a month into Russia’s war with Ukraine, Bibilov said South Ossetia would take the legal steps necessary to join Russia.

The referendum roughly follows the pattern of Crimea. After Russia seized the Black Sea peninsula from Ukraine in 2014, a referendum was held on joining Russia and 97% were said to have voted in favor. The referendum was held while Crimea was under the control of Russian troops and the result was not recognized by most countries. Russia then annexed Crimea.
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Despite US Nudging, No Condemnation of Russia in US-ASEAN Summit

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Despite US President Joe Biden’s urging that members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations take a firmer stance on the Ukraine war, the U.S.-ASEAN Summit ended Friday without a condemnation of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, a sign of geopolitical complexities in the region as the administration seeks to broaden the coalition against Moscow beyond Europe. White House Bureau Chief Patsy Widakuswara has this report.
Producer: Bakhtiyar Zamanov
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Actor Fred Ward, of ‘Tremors,’ ‘The Right Stuff’ Fame, Dies

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Fred Ward, a veteran actor who brought a gruff tenderness to tough-guy roles in such films as The Right Stuff, The Player and Tremors, has died. He was 79.

Ward died Sunday, his publicist Ron Hofmann said Friday. No cause or place of death was disclosed per the family’s wishes.

Ward earned a Golden Globe and shared the Venice Film Festival ensemble prize for his performance in Robert Altman’s Short Cuts, and played the title character in Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins. He also reached new heights playing Mercury 7 astronaut Virgil “Gus” Grissom in 1983′s Academy Award-nominated film The Right Stuff.

“Devastated to learn about the passing of my friend, Fred Ward,” tweeted actor Matthew Modine, who co-starred with Ward in Short Cuts and Alan Rudolph’s Equinox. “A tough façade covering emotions as deep as the Pacific Ocean. Godspeed amigo.”

A former boxer, lumberjack in Alaska and short-order cook who served in the U.S. Air Force, Ward was a San Diego native who was part Cherokee. One early big role was alongside Clint Eastwood in 1979’s Escape From Alcatraz.

“I mourn the loss of Fred Ward, who was so kind to me when we worked together on Remo Williams,” actor Kate Mulgrew tweeted. “Decent and modest and utterly professional, he disarmed with a smile that was at once warm and mischievous.”

Ward’s other roles included a rumpled cop chasing a psychotic criminal played by Alec Baldwin in George Armitage’s Miami Blues. He was a formidable and intimidating father to both Freddie Prinze Jr.’s character in Summer Catch and David Spade’s title character in Joe Dirt.

Ward played President Ronald Reagan in the 2009 Cold War espionage thriller Farewell and had a supporting role in the 2013 action flick 2 Guns, starring Denzel Washington and Mark Wahlberg.

In the horror-comedy Tremors, Ward paired with Kevin Bacon to play a pair of repairmen who end up saving a hardscrabble Nevada desert community beset by giant underground snakes.

With the sexually charged, NC-17 Henry & June, Ward showed more than just grit. Based on the book by Anais Nin and directed by Philip Kaufman, Ward played novelist Henry Miller, opposite Maria de Medeiros as Nin and Uma Thurman as Miller’s wife, June. “My rear end seemed to have something to do with (that rating),” he told The Washington Post.

He also reteamed with Altman for the part of a studio security chief in the director’s 1992 Hollywood satire The Player, and played a union activist and Meryl Streep’s workmate in Mike Nichols’ Silkwood in 1983.

Ward demonstrated his comedy chops playing a terrorist intent on blowing up the Academy Awards in Naked Gun 33 1/3: The Final Insult in 1994.

On the small screen, he had recurring roles on NBC’s ER playing the father of Maura Tierney’s Abby Lockhart in 2006-07 and guest starred on such series as Grey’s Anatomy, Leverage and United States of Tara. Ward most recently appeared in the second season of HBO’s True Detective as the retired cop father of Colin Farrell’s Detective Ray Velcoro.

Ward is survived by his wife of 27 years, Marie-France Ward, and his son, Django Ward.
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Latest Developments in Ukraine: May 14

Posted on by SeeEU

For full coverage of the crisis in Ukraine, visit Flashpoint Ukraine.

The latest developments in the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. All times EDT:

2:05 a.m.: The latest intelligence update from the U.K.’s defense ministry focuses on Ukraine’s Kherson Region. The Russian-imposed leaders of the region say they will ask Russia to include the region in the Russian Federation, the update says. That’s in line with Russia’s original aim for Ukraine: to put most of it under Russian authority. The update notes that Kherson is the only region that has a newly installed pro-Russian local leadership, and that “highlights the failure of Russia’s invasion to make progress towards its political objectives in Ukraine.”

1:05 a.m.: Al Jazeera reports that India, the world’s second biggest exporter of wheat, has banned all exports of that crop, effective immediately. The New York Times reports that the decision is an attempt to protect India’s food security and that of its neighbors. Meanwhile, wheat prices are rising worldwide because of the conflict in Ukraine.

12:02 a.m.: The New York Times reports that Ukraine’s general prosecutor has 41 Russian suspects for war crimes. The prosecutor’s office is investigating more than 11,000 suspected war crimes.

Some information in this report came from The Associated Press, Reuters and Agence France-Presse.
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Blinken Heads to Germany and France as Finland Moves to Join NATO

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US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is heading to Germany and France on Saturday for NATO and trade meetings, as Finland says it wants to join NATO in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Russia has warned it will respond to what it calls a hostile move. VOA’s Senior Diplomatic Correspondent Cindy Saine reports from the State Department.
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Jan. 6 Committee Subpoenas Republican Congressmen

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The congressional committee investigating the January 6, 2021, assault on the U.S. Capitol by a mob supporting former President Donald Trump took the extraordinary step Thursday of issuing subpoenas to five sitting members of the House of Representatives, demanding that they provide testimony about their knowledge of the events leading up to the attack, the attack itself and its aftermath.

The representatives who received subpoenas, all Republicans, are Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy of California, the most senior Republican in the House; Jim Jordan of Ohio; Scott Perry of Pennsylvania; Andy Biggs of Arizona; and Mo Brooks of Alabama.

All five members were asked to testify voluntarily but refused to do so, the committee’s chairman, Representative Bennie Thompson, a Democrat from Mississippi, said in a statement.

“The Select Committee has learned that several of our colleagues have information relevant to our investigation into the attack on January 6th and the events leading up to it,” Thompson said. “Before we hold our hearings next month, we wished to provide members the opportunity to discuss these matters with the committee voluntarily.

“Regrettably, the individuals receiving subpoenas today have refused and we’re forced to take this step to help ensure the committee uncovers facts concerning January 6th,” Thompson said. “We urge our colleagues to comply with the law, do their patriotic duty, and cooperate with our investigation as hundreds of other witnesses have done.”

Reasons outlined

The committee is investigating the assault on the Capitol, during which the mob attempted to block Congress from certifying President Joe Biden’s victory in the 2020 presidential election. It is also looking into the efforts to convince various state and federal authorities to falsely assert that the election was tainted by fraud.

In its release, the committee laid out why it wants to speak with each of the five members.

McCarthy, it said, was in communication with former President Trump and White House staff before, during and after the assault. Evidence has been made public that McCarthy said he had heard Trump accept that he was, to some degree, personally responsible for the attack.

Jordan, the committee said, was in contact with the president and the White House throughout, including during discussion about “overturning” the election.

Perry, among other things, “was directly involved with efforts to corrupt the Department of Justice” by installing a Trump loyalist as acting attorney general, the committee said.

Biggs was involved in planning the events of January 6 and in bringing protesters to Washington, the committee said. He participated in pressuring state officials to overturn election results and reportedly sought a preemptive pardon from President Trump.

Brooks, the committee said, participated in encouraging the attack on January 6 and had described conversations in which the former president pressed him to “rescind” the election results. Brooks and his staff also pressured then-Vice President Mike Pence to illegally refuse to accept electoral votes from certain states.

Next steps unclear

The letters sent to the five congressmen include dates for them to appear before the committee later this month, but whether they will comply remains an open question. So far, the committee has seen several of its subpoenas go ignored.

A number of associates of former President Trump, including some former White House staff, have refused to testify voluntarily before the committee, and when subpoenaed, have refused to comply, often citing executive privilege, the ability of the president to keep certain internal White House communications confidential. Some now face potential criminal prosecution, after the committee referred them to the Justice Department.

Former White House Chief Strategist and Senior Counselor Steve Bannon was indicted last November and faces trial on a charge of contempt of Congress.

Other refusals

Others who have refused to testify include former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, former White House Deputy Chief of Staff for Communications Dan Scavino, and former Director of the Office of Trade and Manufacturing Policy Peter Navarro. The committee has referred all three to the Department of Justice.

It is unclear whether federal prosecutors will indict Meadows, Scavino and Navarro. Their claims of executive privilege might carry more weight because they were employed in the White House before, during and after the attack on the Capitol.

In the early stages of the inquiry, Meadows had been cooperating with the investigation and provided text messages he sent and received in the days surrounding January 6. The committee has used these messages to establish who was in contact with the former president during the assault. Meadows has since withdrawn his cooperation.

Committee options

In theory, the House has the legal authority to arrest individuals who defy congressional subpoenas. The House sergeant-at-arms could take into custody any of the members who refuse to appear before the committee.

In practice, however, that authority is virtually never exercised, and doing so would create a precedent that Democratic leaders in the House would almost certainly prefer to avoid.

It is also unclear whether the Justice Department would indict sitting members of Congress for refusing to comply with its subpoena, so it is far from certain that the threat of criminal liability will compel the five subpoenaed lawmakers to appear.

The committee could opt to take its case to civil court. However, its aim is to hold hearings presenting its findings beginning on June 9. Any civil suit is bound to drag on for months, at minimum.

Authority unclear

Since the creation of the committee last year, legal experts have been wondering what would happen if it issued subpoenas to sitting members of Congress.

“Will these subpoenas withstand legal scrutiny?” University of Baltimore law professor Kimberly Wehle wrote in The Atlantic in August. “There is no established historical or legal precedent regarding congressional power to enforce subpoenas against members of Congress.”

There would be strong arguments in favor of the committee’s position, she said, but vindicating its claims might take time.

“Presumably, reluctant GOP members in receipt of subpoenas from the select committee would welcome a court battle, as litigation would delay the committee’s work for months and any ruling would likely be appealed to the Supreme Court,” Wehle wrote.

An appeal to the Supreme Court would take time — something the committee does not have in abundance. The midterm elections are likely to shift control of Congress to the GOP, which would almost certainly disband the committee and put an end to its investigation.
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Owner Caught Off Guard by Downpour; 8 Still Trapped in Burkina Mine

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Executives at Canada-based Trevali Mining Corp. said the company was caught unawares by a torrential downpour during the dry season last month in Burkina Faso that left eight men trapped underground in its Perkoa zinc mine.

Rescue efforts have continued since the flood on April 16, but there has been no communication with the missing miners, and it is not known whether any survived.

“Given the dry season obviously we do not expect rain and we had an absolute torrential downpour,” said Hein Frey, vice president of operations at Trevali, adding that the water crossed a bridge and broke safety barriers.

“It’s not only us that have been affected, it’s also the communities around us that are affected by completely unexpected rain,” he said in an interview with Reuters at the site.

The company called for help immediately and by the next day other mining companies in Burkina Faso had sent rescue teams and pumps, said Frey. Water is still being pumped out of the mine.

While most workers were able to safely evacuate, the eight missing were below Level 520, which is 520 meters (1,706 feet) from the surface, at the time of the flooding, the company said.

There are two safety chambers stocked with food and water below that level, but it is not known if any of the men were able to reach them.

“There’s always hope, but we also have to be realistic,” Trevali CEO Ricus Grimbeek said in a separate interview with Reuters.

“Those chambers are not designed to be submerged in water. The chambers are designed for falling ground accidents and when there’s toxic environments like smoke,” he said.

The company and Burkina Faso’s government have launched investigations into what caused the accident.

“We need to understand … what do we need to do in future so that what happened here never happens again,” Grimbeek said.
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NATO Expansion in Focus as Blinken Travels to Europe for Talks on Russia-Ukraine War

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The possible expansion of NATO will be a focus of talks Saturday, as U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken heads to Berlin for an informal NATO foreign ministerial meeting.

Finnish President Sauli Niinisto and Prime Minister Sanna Marin have expressed their approval for joining the alliance, a move that would complete a major policy shift for the Scandinavian countries in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Friday his country does not support Finland and Sweden joining NATO, citing their support of what Turkey considers terrorist organizations, such as Kurdish militant groups.

“We are following developments concerning Sweden and Finland, but we are not of a favorable opinion,” Erdogan told reporters in Istanbul. Any NATO enlargement requires the unanimous consent of the existing members.

US stance

U.S. officials said they were working to “clarify Turkey’s position,” while reiterating that the “United States would support a NATO application by Finland and/or Sweden should they choose to apply.”

“We strongly support NATO’s Open Door policy,” U.S. Assistant Secretary for European and Eurasian Affairs Karen Donfried told reporters Friday. “I think that it’s important to remember that a fundamental principle the U.S. is defending in terms of its support for Ukraine is the right of every sovereign country to decide its own future foreign and security policy arrangement.”

Both Sweden’s and Finland’s foreign ministers will participate in the North Atlantic Council informal dinner Saturday in Berlin. From Germany, Blinken heads to France on Sunday, where he will attend the second ministerial meeting of the U.S.-EU Trade and Technology Council, known as the TTC.

U.S. President Joe Biden talked with Swedish Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson and Finland’s Niinisto on Friday.

“President Biden underscored his support for NATO’s Open Door policy and for the right of Finland and Sweden to decide their own future, foreign policy, and security arrangement,” the White House said in a readout of the call, adding the leaders “reiterated their shared commitment to continued coordination in support of Ukraine and the Ukrainian people affected by the war.”

Impact of NATO expansion

The German Marshall Fund’s Michael Kimmage told VOA that Finland’s joining NATO would shake up the security order in Europe, both for NATO and for Russia.

“It’s a very, very long border, and of course it brings NATO very close to — or will bring NATO if it all goes through — very close to St. Petersburg. And at the same time, it will give NATO a lot more territory right on the Russian border to defend. So those are big steps. Those are big changes,” Kimmage said.

Russia has warned against NATO expansion and said Finland’s and Sweden’s joining would bring “serious military and political consequences.”

“The expansion of NATO and the approach of the alliance to our borders does not make the world and our continent more stable and secure,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters Thursday.

U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin spoke by phone with his Russian counterpart Sergey Shoygu for the first time since February 18.

Pentagon press secretary John Kirby said in a statement that Austin “urged an immediate cease-fire in Ukraine and emphasized the importance of maintaining lines of communication.”

US aid to Ukraine

Austin also spoke Friday with Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov about Ukraine’s “evolving battlefield needs.”

“Secretary Austin highlighted the President’s May 6 announcement of $150 million in Presidential Drawdown Authority to provide Ukraine’s Armed Forces with artillery, counter-artillery radars, and electronic jamming equipment,” Kirby said in a statement. “Minister Reznikov shared his assessment of the situation on the ground in eastern Ukraine.”

On Thursday, U.S. Senator Rand Paul blocked a vote on a $40 billion aid package for Ukraine, slowing U.S. efforts to quickly deliver more help to Ukraine as it battles a Russian invasion.

“We cannot save Ukraine by dooming the U.S. economy,” Paul said.

A unanimous Senate vote would have expedited the delivery of aid to Ukraine. Paul’s move, however, has delayed the vote for another week, when the Senate is expected to pass the bill.

War crimes trial

In Ukraine, a 21-year-old Russian soldier was brought before a Kyiv court Friday, in the first war crimes proceeding since the war began.

Ukrainian prosecutors say Vadim Shishimarin fired several shots from a car in the Sumy region of northeastern Ukraine on February 28, just days after the conflict began, killing an unarmed 62-year-old man who was pushing a bike on the side of the road.

Ukraine’s government says it is investigating more than 10,000 war crimes involving Russian forces, with cases of torture and mutilation having often been revealed after Russian forces left a Ukrainian city, as in the case of Bucha.

Russia has denied committing war crimes in Ukraine, and the Kremlin on Friday said it had no knowledge of the trial.

Putin-Scholz call

In Moscow, Russian President Vladmir Putin on Friday spoke by phone with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz about the stalled Ukrainian-Russian peace talks.

In a tweet, the German leader said he had called during the 75-minute conversation for an immediate cease-fire, countered the Russian claim “that Nazis are in power” as false and also reminded Putin “about Russia’s responsibility for the global food situation.”

 

G-7 meeting

The call came as G-7 ministers meeting in Germany pledged unity and more weapons and aid to Ukraine.

The European Union’s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell announced an additional $520 million worth of military support to Ukraine for heavy weaponry, while expressing hope that member states would agree to a Russian oil embargo.

British Foreign Minister Liz Truss also announced new sanctions against members of Putin’s inner circle, including his former wife and cousins.

VOA Senior Diplomatic Correspondent Cindy Saine contributed to this report.

Some information for this story came from The Associated Press and Reuters.
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Former US National Security Adviser McFarlane Dies at 84

Posted on by SeeUS

Former White House national security adviser Robert C. McFarlane, a top aide to President Ronald Reagan who pleaded guilty to charges for his role in an illegal arms-for-hostages deal known as the Iran-Contra affair, has died. He was 84. 

McFarlane, who lived in Washington, died Thursday from complications of a previous illness at a hospital in Michigan, where he was visiting family, according to a family statement. 

“As his family we wish to share our deep sadness at the loss of our beloved husband, father and grandfather, and note his profound impact on our lives,” the family said in the statement. “Though recognized as a strategic political thinker, we remember him for his warmth, his wisdom, his deep belief in God, and his commitment to serving others.” 

McFarlane, a former Marine lieutenant colonel and Vietnam combat veteran, resigned his White House post in December 1985. He was later pressed into service by the administration as part of a secret — and illegal — plan to sell arms to Iran in exchange for the freedom of Western hostages in the Middle East and to pass along the proceeds to the Contra rebels in Nicaragua for their fight against the Marxist Sandinista government. 

Led secret delegation

He played a major role in the affair, leading the secret delegation to Tehran, then as now a U.S. adversary, to open contact with so-called moderate Iranians who were thought to hold influence with kidnappers of American hostages. He brought with him a cake and a Bible signed by Reagan. 

The scheme began to unfold after a cargo plane carrying a CIA-arranged shipment of arms was shot down in October 1986 by the Sandinistas in Nicaragua, setting off what eventually became one of the biggest modern political scandals. 

McFarlane was rushed to a Washington-area hospital in February 1987 after taking an overdose of Valium the day before he was scheduled to testify before a presidential commission investigating the affair. 

He pleaded guilty in March 1988 to four misdemeanor counts of withholding information from Congress. His lawyer said he was being unfairly singled out because he, unlike other key figures in the affair, testified willingly before investigative panels. He also admitted his role. 

“I did indeed withhold information from the Congress,” he told reporters at the time. “I believe strongly that, throughout, my actions were motivated by what I believed to be in the foreign policy interest of the United States.” 

President George H.W. Bush pardoned him and five other figures from the scandal. 

McFarlane, a career Marine known as “Bud” to his friends, had risen to lieutenant colonel and to positions in the Nixon and Ford administrations. He served as national security special assistant to Richard M. Nixon and Gerald R. Ford during their presidencies. 

During the Carter administration, he was on the Republican staff of the Senate Armed Services Committee. He returned to the executive branch with Reagan’s election, serving as a State Department counselor until moving to the White House as national security adviser William Clark’s deputy in January 1982. He was appointed to the top national security post in 1983. 

McFarlane, a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, was the son of a former Democratic congressman from Texas, William Doddridge McFarlane, who served from 1932 to 1938. He is survived by his wife of 63 years, two daughters and a son. 
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Somalia’s Lone Female Presidential Candidate

Posted on by SeeAF

Somalia holds its long delayed presidential election on Sunday. Thirty-nine candidates paid $40,000 each to be eligible for the elections. In a highly conservative and patriarchal society, only one woman, Fawzia Yusuf Adam, is on the list of politicians aspiring to be the next president of Somalia. A past foreign minister, Fawzia has her supporters, as Mohamed Sheikh Nor reports from Mogadishu.
Videographer: Mohamed Sheikh Nor
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Turkey’s Erdogan Says He Opposes NATO Membership for Sweden, Finland

Posted on by SeeEU

Veto-wielding NATO member Turkey is voicing opposition to Sweden and Finland joining the alliance, with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan telling reporters Friday he does not positively view the countries’ membership bid. Analysts warn the Turkish leader’s stance will likely rekindle questions over Ankara’s allegiances given its close ties with Moscow.

“At the moment, we are following the developments regarding Sweden and Finland, but we don’t hold positive views,” Erdogan said. “Because in the past, previous Turkish governments made a mistake about Greece’s membership, and you know Greece’s current attitude against Turkey.”

Turkey and neighboring Greece are bitter rivals with numerous disputes, including ongoing tensions over disputed territorial waters in the Aegean Sea. But Erdogan’s stance has more to do with his close ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin, said Huseyin Bagci, head of the Ankara-based Foreign Policy Institute.

“Turkey has very good relations with Russia, and Russia supplies defense systems,” he said. “Russia is, for now and for the future, one of the biggest energy suppliers to Turkey. The good relations between Erdogan and Putin are also the reason why Tayyip Erdogan plays this card. The second, Tayyip Erdogan tries to increase the leverage of Turkish bargaining process through this.”

Turkey remains at loggerheads with NATO over its purchase of the Russian S-400 missile system which saw the United States hit Ankara with military sanctions claiming the purchase compromised NATO defense systems.

International relations expert Soli Ozel of Istanbul’s Kadir Has University warned Ankara risks a backlash from its NATO partners over its opposition to Sweden’s and Finland’s membership.

“I am sure this is how it will be interpreted, and there will be those who say let’s expel Turkey from NATO, although to the best of my knowledge there is no expulsion mechanism in NATO,” Ozel said.

But relations between Turkey and its allied partners, in particular Washington, had improved with Ankara’s condemnation of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Turkey has recently used goodwill over its stance on Ukraine to improve ties with its Western allies.

Some analysts suggest Erdogan could be looking for concessions from Sweden and Finland. Erdogan criticized the two countries Friday for being sympathetic to Kurdish groups accused by Ankara of carrying out terrorist attacks in Turkey. Helsinki and Stockholm are strongly critical of Turkey’s human rights record and both countries have given political asylum to many opponents of the Turkish government.

Analyst Ozel said Erdogan could be looking for a deal but questions his approach.

“Turkey would like to use its power to veto as leverage in order to get those two countries to do as it would please it,” Ozel said. “How wise it is, is pretty debatable in my judgment; I don’t particular[ly] find it very advisable. Because if Turkey is on a charm offensive and it’s trying to rebuild bridges that it burnt with almost everyone, you can actually make your case, but you don’t have to do it so publicly.”

Finnish Foreign Minister Pekka Haavisto said patience was needed to overcome Erdogan’s opposition. NATO foreign ministers, including from Turkey, are to meet in Berlin this weekend.
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WFP Urges Zimbabwe, SADC to Produce More Food to Avoid Insecurity

Posted on by SeeAF

A top World Food Program (WFP) official has urged Zimbabwe and surrounding countries to increase food production in light of the Russia-Ukraine war that has caused shortages and a spike in food prices.

WFP Southern Africa Director Menghestab Haile told reporters after meeting with President Emmerson Mnangagwa in Harare Friday that the World Food Program is worried the Russia-Ukraine war has increased food insecurity across southern Africa. The region, he said, should make a concerted effort to grow more of its own food.

“SADC region has water, has land, has clever people, so we are able to produce in this region,” Haile said. “Let’s diversify and let’s produce for ourselves. The governments of the region are working together, the executive secretary of SADC is coordinating the efforts. We are aware there are challenges, but we are aware that through a cocktail of policies and interventions, we will get through this.”

President Mnangagwa did not talk to reporters after meeting Haile.

Zimbabwe was once the breadbasket of the region but in recent years agricultural production has been well below the levels of the last century. The government said it will increase production this year, starting with wheat, so the country can regain its food exporter status.

Just outside Harare, Ephraim Pasipanodya is among the farmers the Zimbabwe government has asked to increase wheat crop hecarage this season. The aim is to have enough wheat by October of this year to achieve self-sufficiency.

“Basically for the last two years, I had 200 hectares of wheat,” Pasipanodya said, “and this year I am planning to do about 300 hectares of wheat (because) wheat crop, which is one our major crops and one of our crops which is actually imported.”

Ministry of Agriculture officials are visiting farms, teaching farmers how to increase production and providing seed to farmers. Obert Jiri, chief director in the Ministry of Agriculture, said the government has activated four programs that will target 75,000 hectares of wheat production.

“So we are going on a blitz to train farmers to be able to grow the wheat because we understand that wheat is a technical crop,” Jiri said.

The Zimbabwean government has adopted the theme of “wheat self-sufficiency at all costs,” saying it has a solution to the wheat shortage the world is facing because of the Russia-Ukraine war.

Next, officials will target the country’s staple corn crop come October-November. If the plans work out, that will be good news to organizations like the WFP, which have been feeding hungry Zimbabweans for years.
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Malawi Moves to Administer Cholera Vaccines as Cases Rise

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Plans are underway in Malawi to start administering the cholera vaccine in some southern districts, as the number of cholera cases has been rising since an outbreak began in January.

According to a daily update released Thursday by the Ministry of Health, Malawi has registered more than 200 cases, with seven deaths and 26 hospital admissions. 

The update says the outbreak that started in Nsanje district in January has spread to four other areas in southern Malawi: Neno, Chikwawa, Machinga and Blantyre. 

Records show that as of Thursday, Nsanje had 97 registered cases, Blantyre had 53, Neno had 38, Chikwawa had 12 and Machinga had two. 

Wongani Mbale, deputy spokesperson for the district health office in Blantyre, blames the outbreak on poor sanitation. 

“According to what we have gathered, it seems that a lot of people are using unprotected wells, which are a source of infections,” Mbale said. “The water is contaminated. So as a district, we think that the cause is the use of contaminated water.” 

Cholera is an acute diarrheal infection caused by ingesting food or water contaminated with bacteria. The disease affects both children and adults and, if untreated, can kill within hours. 

To contain the outbreak, Malawi’s government has announced plans to start administering the cholera vaccine this month in all affected districts. 

Health Ministry spokesperson Adrian Chikumbe told a local newspaper that the government has 2.9 million doses of vaccine to be administered orally starting May 23. 

Mbale of the Blantyre health office said his office has started taking measures to combat the vaccine hesitancy that hindered the rollout of the COVID-19 vaccine. 

“Starting from next Monday, we are having some briefings to health workers to train HSAs (Health Surveillance Assistants) on how they can implement this activity,” he said. “After that, we will have orientation and sensitization meetings with the community so that they can receive the vaccine without any doubt, as you know that the majority are fearing the vaccine, saying that maybe it’s for COVID.” 

George Jobe, executive director for Malawi Health Equity Network, a health rights organization, said cholera aside, there is a need for the government to address sanitation problems in many rural areas in Malawi.   

“In Neno, for example, water has been a challenge. There was a time when [people in] Neno suffered typhoid because of water. And we also understand that the places that have been affected are relying on the Lisungwi River. In this case, there is a need for clean water to be made available even in hard-to-reach rural areas,” Jobe said. 

The government said it is distributing chlorine in affected areas for water treatment, as well as sending out cholera control information to people through various channels of communication. 

 
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Analysts Question Fairness of Planned Trials for Guinea’s Ex-President, Colleagues

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Analysts say plans by Guinea’s transitional military government to prosecute former President Alpha Conde and 26 of his top officials will likely be marred by doubts over the fairness of their trials.

A 2019 Afrobarometer survey revealed that over 90% of Guineans consider the judiciary to be corrupt.

Jesper Bjarnesen, a senior researcher at Sweden-based Nordic Africa Institute, told VOA the trial is arguably a diversion.

”There are legitimate charges against the former president … [but] I think that a transitional government has the primary task to work towards free and fair elections,” he said.

As for judicial credibility, Bjarnesen said, “I am not sure that a temporary transitional government is the best facilitator of a legal process against the former president” and his former officials.

”There might be room for reconstitution of the judiciary with the military takeover, but that’s still a very slim hope in a system where there’s systematic abuse of power,” Bjarnesen said. “What’s more likely is that you’ll have new people in power making use of a dysfunctional system.”

Although Conde’s junta-enforced house arrest ended on April 22, he has not departed the West African nation in light of the recent charges.

Documents filed last week by Guinean Attorney General Charles Alphonse Wright accuse the ex-president and his supporters of complicity in murder, abductions, disappearances, torture, and illegal detentions while in office. Other charges include assault, destruction of property, rape, sexual abuse, and looting.

Guinea’s electoral violence in 2020 killed at least 12 people in the capital and 50 people in other parts of the country, according to the documents.

Conde’s bid to extend his rule to a third term, after backing a constitutional referendum that altered the term limits, sparked violent demonstrations. He ultimately won another five-year term in October 2020 only to be ousted in September of last year.

Alix Boucher, at the Washington-based Africa Center for Strategic Studies, told VOA she doubts the interest of the military junta in ”upholding justice,” noting that the junta’s suspension of the constitution since the September 2021 coup would make such trials “highly ironic.”

Guineans are “still waiting for those responsible for the massacre and mass rapes committed by the previous junta at the stadium in Conakry in September 2009 to be prosecuted,” she said. “The lack of confidence that such trials would be free and fair reflects Guinea’s weak legacy of independent oversight institutions, even under Conde.”

In September 2009, troops under then junta chief Moussa Dadis Camara opened fire on opposition supporters rallying in a stadium in the country’s capital, Conakry, killing at least 157. More than 100 women were raped by junta soldiers. Conde’s administration — which came to office in 2010 — had long pledged to try the perpetrators but never followed through.

Boucher said that the current junta’s timeline for prosecuting Condé and the 26 others suggests it is set on hanging onto power. The military recently said it needed 39 months to transition back to civilian rule, rejecting demands by the Economic Community of West African States to do it much sooner.

“Such pronouncements [by the military regime] lack credibility and obscure the essential takeaway that the junta has no plans to relinquish power on its own,” Boucher said.

Neither spokespeople for the junta nor officials at Guinea’s embassy in Washington immediately responded to VOA’s request for comments.

Guinea has a long legacy of military and authoritarian governments. But 77% of Guineans prefer democracy to any other regime and want two-term limits for the presidency, according to an Afrobarometer survey published in September.

”Therefore, the junta’s aim to hold power is a direct effort to undermine Guineans’ deeply held aspirations for a democratic government,” Boucher said.

Some information in this report came from The Associated Press and Agence France-Presse.

Correction: An earlier version of this story misidentified the location of the Nordic Africa Institute.

 
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US Announces New Plans on Maritime Cooperation with ASEAN, Eyeing China

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The United States has announced new plans to expand maritime cooperation with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations as ASEAN leaders gather in Washington for a special summit seen as a show of solidarity in regard to China. 

ASEAN members Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines and Vietnam claim parts of the South China Sea — a waterway claimed almost entirely by Beijing, which has landfilled and militarized islets over the past decade. 

U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration is rolling out $60 million in new regional maritime initiatives that include the transfer of ships to Southeast Asian countries to increase the coastal nations’ capacity to enforce maritime law and counter illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing.  

“We need to step up our game in Southeast Asia,” a senior administration official told reporters. “We need to work more closely with ASEAN.” 

At a meeting Friday with Indonesian Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the U.S. is working with the Southeast Asian bloc to “advance a shared vision of a free and open Indo-Pacific region.” 

Marsudi said her country holds to the principle of “respecting territorial sovereignty” and hopes the strategic partnership between Indonesia and the U.S. can “contribute to the peace, stability and prosperity” in the region. 

A senior State Department official told VOA that the South China Sea is high on the agenda during the U.S.-ASEAN special summit. 

“South China Sea is an issue of great concern,” said Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Jung Pak in an interview this week.  “We’ve seen increasingly aggressive and coercive actions by PRC against claimant countries. And, you know, we continue to work with all of our allies and partners in the region and beyond to make sure that the South China Sea is free and open.” 

PRC refers to the People’s Republic of China. 

Later Friday, Vice President Kamala Harris is scheduled to host a working lunch with the leaders of ASEAN countries to discuss maritime security and other areas. Harris denounced China’s “unlawful claims” on the South China Sea during a speech in Singapore last August.  She said China’s actions “undermine the rules-based order and threaten the sovereignty of nations.” 

The Biden administration is preparing to roll out a comprehensive Indo-Pacific Economic Framework which would be its first major trade and economic initiative in the region since the Trump administration withdrew from negotiations for the Trans-Pacific Partnership. 

The White House announced Thursday new initiatives of over $150 million that include investments in infrastructure, health security and education in ASEAN. 

 
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The Next New Thing: Companies Are Building the ‘Metaverse’ but What Is It?

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The “metaverse” has been touted as the next digital shift, 3-dimensional online spaces where people will shop, work, play games, and go to concerts. VOA’s Michelle Quinn is looking at what the Metaverse is or might be. VOA footage and video editing by Matt Dibble.
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EU Says Talks With Iran ‘Positive Enough’ to Reopen Nuclear Negotiations

Posted on by SeeEU

The EU’s foreign policy chief said on Friday that he believed there had been enough progress during consultations between his envoy and Iranian officials in Tehran this week to relaunch nuclear negotiations after two months of deadlock. 

Talks to revive Iran’s 2015 nuclear deal with world powers have been on hold since March, chiefly over Tehran’s insistence that Washington remove the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps from the U.S. list of designated terrorist organizations. 

Speaking as talks coordinator Enrique Mora arrived back in Europe, Josep Borrell said Iran’s response had been “positive enough” after Mora had delivered a message that things could not continue as they were. 

“These things cannot be resolved overnight,” Borrell told reporters at a G7 foreign ministers’ meeting in northern Germany. “Let’s say the negotiations were blocked and they have been de-blocked,” with the prospect of “reaching a final agreement.” 

The broad outline of the deal that aims to revive the accord which restrains Iran’s nuclear program in return for relief from economic sanctions was essentially agreed in March. 

However, it has since been thrown into disarray after last-minute Russian demands and the dispute over the U.S. Foreign Terrorist Organization list. 

Western officials are largely losing hope that it can be resurrected, sources familiar with the matter have said, forcing them to weigh how to limit Iran’s atomic program even as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has divided the big powers. 

“It has gone better than expected — the negotiations were stalled, and now they have been reopened,” Borrell said. 

A senior EU official sounded a more cautious tone. 

“We still have difficult obstacles on the way for an agreement,” he told reporters, adding that at least Iran and the U.S. remained engaged. 

Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian said Mora’s trip had been “an opportunity to focus on initiatives to resolve the remaining issues.” 

“A good and reliable agreement is within reach if the United States makes a political decision and adheres to its commitments,” he said. 

A French diplomatic source said on Thursday he saw little chance of the United States agreeing to remove Iran’s elite security force from its list of foreign terrorist organizations any time soon. 

Mora has been in Tehran this week in what has been described as the last chance to salvage the 2015 accord, which then U.S. President Donald Trump withdrew from in 2018. Britain, China, France, Germany and Russia are also parties to the accord. 

Detained at airport

In a bizarre incident, Mora and his team were held at Frankfurt airport for several hours on return from the Iranian capital on Friday. 

“We were kept separated. Refusal to give any explanation for what seems a violation of the Vienna Convention,” he said on Twitter. 

A German Interior Ministry spokesperson said German police would make a statement on the incident, telling reporters: “There can be many reasons that have to do with the flight, the travel route, and not necessarily with the person.” 

Iran’s official IRNA news agency alleged, without evidence, that Israel was behind the incident. 

“What has happened in Frankfurt has to do with opposition to the progress in the nuclear talks. … The Zionist lobby has influence in the German security apparatus,” it said. 
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Detention of WNBA’s Griner in Moscow Extended for 1 Month

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The lawyer for WNBA star Brittney Griner said Friday her pre-trial detention in Russia has been extended by one month.

Griner’s lawyer Alexander Boikov told The Associated Press he believed the relatively short extension of the detention indicated the case would come to trial soon.

Griner, a two-time Olympic gold medalist, was detained at the Moscow airport after vape cartridges containing oil derived from cannabis were allegedly found in her luggage, which could carry a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison.

The Biden administration says Griner, 31, is being wrongfully detained. The WNBA and U.S. officials have worked toward her release, without visible progress.
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Zimbabwe Refugee Camp Goes Green with Animal Waste

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Zimbabwe and the U.N. Refugee Agency, UNHCR, are piloting an effort to avert deforestation and benefit from waste management at the country’s biggest refugee camp. The Tongogara camp near Zimbabwe’s eastern border with Mozambique has installed machines for refugees to turn animal waste into biogas, which can be used as fuel for cooking, and fertilizer. Columbus Mavhunga reports from Chipinge, Zimbabwe. Video: Blessing Chigwenhembe
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US Senator Delays $40 Billion Aid Package to Ukraine

Posted on by SeeEU

U.S. Senator Rand Paul Thursday blocked a vote on a $40 billion aid package for Ukraine, slowing U.S. efforts to quickly deliver more help to Ukraine as it battles a Russian invasion.

“We cannot save Ukraine by dooming the U.S. economy,” Paul said.

A unanimous Senate vote would have expedited the delivery of aid to Ukraine.

Paul’s move, however, has delayed the vote for another week, when the Senate is expected to pass the bill.

Ukraine says negotiations are underway for the release of 38 incapacitated soldiers from the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol in exchange for Russian prisoners.

In a post on Facebook, Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereschuk described the talks as “very difficult.”

She said comments by “some politicians, journalists and public figures,” about the talks have hurt the negotiation process and requested that people refrain “from making public comments on what you don’t know.” Finland’s President Sauli Niinisto and Prime Minister Sanna Marin Thursday expressed their approval for joining NATO, a move that would complete a major policy shift for the country in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

“NATO membership would strengthen Finland’s security. As a member of NATO, Finland would strengthen the entire defense alliance,” they said in a joint statement. “Finland must apply for NATO membership without delay. We hope that the national steps still needed to make this decision will be taken rapidly within the next few days.”

The leaders said they came to their decision after allowing time for Finland’s parliament and the public to consider the matter, and to consult with NATO and neighboring Sweden. Officials in Sweden are expected to consider their own possible NATO application in the coming days.

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said Thursday if Finland does apply for membership, “they would be warmly welcomed into NATO and the accession process would be smooth and swift.”

“Finland is one of NATO’s closest partners, a mature democracy, a member of the European Union, and an important contributor to Euro-Atlantic security,” Stoltenberg said.

Russia has warned against NATO expansion, and said Finland and Sweden joining would bring “serious military and political consequences.”

“The expansion of NATO and the approach of the alliance to our borders does not make the world and our continent more stable and secure,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters Thursday.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy tweeted that he praised Finland’s decision in a phone call with Niinisto.

The fight for Ukraine played out beyond the battlefields Wednesday, with Kyiv shutting one Russian natural gas pipeline that supplies European homes and industry, while a Moscow-installed official in southern Ukraine said the Kremlin should annex the city of Kherson after Russian troops took control.

Ukraine’s natural gas pipeline operator said it was stopping Russian shipments through a hub in eastern Ukraine controlled by Moscow-backed separatists because of interference from enemy forces, including the apparent siphoning of gas.

About one-third of Russian gas headed to Western Europe passes through Ukraine, although one analyst said the immediate effect might be limited, since much of it can be redirected through another pipeline. Russia’s giant state-owned Gazprom said gas flowing to Europe through Ukraine was down 25% from the day before.

The European Union, as part of its announced effort to punish Russia for its 11-week invasion of Ukraine, is looking to end its considerable reliance on Russian energy to heat homes and fuel industries.

It has, however, encountered some opposition from within its 27-member bloc, especially from Hungary, which says its economy would sustain a major hit if its supply of Russian energy were cut off.

Meanwhile, Kirill Stremousov, deputy head of the Kherson regional administration installed by Moscow, told Russia’s RIA Novosti news agency, “The city of Kherson is Russia.”

He asked that Putin declare Kherson a “proper region” of Russia, much as Moscow did in 2014 in seizing Ukraine’s Crimea Peninsula and declaring Luhansk and Donetsk as independent entities shortly before invading Ukraine on February 24.

Peskov said that it would be “up to the residents of the Kherson region” to make such a request, and to make sure there is an “absolutely clear” legal basis for the action.

Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak derided the notion of its annexation, tweeting: “The invaders may ask to join even Mars or Jupiter. The Ukrainian army will liberate Kherson, no matter what games with words they play.”

Kherson is a Black Sea port with a population of about 300,000 and provides access to fresh water for neighboring Crimea. Russian forces captured it early in the war.

Some information for this story came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Press and Reuters.
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