STOCKHOLM — A recent string of public desecrations of the Quran by a handful of anti-Islam activists in Sweden has sparked an angry reaction in Muslim countries and raised questions – including in Sweden – about why such acts are allowed.

In the latest such incident, an Iraqi living in Sweden on Thursday stomped on and kicked Islam’s holy book in a two-man rally outside the Iraqi Embassy in Stockholm. The protest was authorized by Swedish police, who kept a handful of agitated counterdemonstrators at a safe distance.

The same Iraqi man burned a Quran outside a Stockholm mosque last month in a similar protest that was approved by police. And at the start of the year, a far-right activist from Denmark carried out a similar stunt outside the Turkish Embassy in Stockholm.

Here’s a look at how Swedish authorities have been dealing with these acts.

Is desecrating the Quran allowed in Sweden?

There is no law in Sweden specifically prohibiting the burning or desecration of the Quran or other religious texts. Like many Western countries, Sweden doesn’t have any blasphemy laws.

It wasn’t always that way. As late as the 19th century, blasphemy was considered a serious crime in Sweden, punishable by death. But blasphemy laws were gradually relaxed as Sweden became increasingly secularized. The last such law was taken off the books in 1970.

Can Swedish authorities stop such acts?

Many Muslim countries have called on the Swedish government to stop protesters from burning the Quran. But in Sweden it is up to police, not the government, to decide whether to authorize demonstrations or public gatherings.

The freedom of speech is protected under the Swedish constitution. Police need to cite specific grounds to deny a permit for a demonstration or public gathering, such as risks to public safety.

Stockholm police did just that in February when they denied two applications for Quran-burning protests, citing assessments from the Swedish Security Service that such acts could increase the risk of terror attacks against Sweden. But a court later overturned those decisions, saying police need to cite more concrete threats to ban a public gathering.

Can Quran-burning be considered hate speech?

Sweden’s hate speech law prohibits incitement against groups of people based on race, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation or gender identity.

Some say burning the Quran constitutes incitement against Muslims and should therefore be considered as hate speech. Others say such acts are targeting the religion of Islam rather than practitioners of the faith, and that criticism of religion must be covered by freedom of speech, even when some consider it offensive.

Seeking guidance from the justice system, Swedish police have filed preliminary hate crime charges against the man who burned the Quran outside a mosque in Stockholm in June and desecrated Islam’s holy book again Thursday. It’s now up to prosecutors to decide whether to formally indict him.

Are Swedish authorities singling out Muslims and the Quran?

Some Muslims in Sweden who were deeply hurt by recent Quran burnings questioned whether Swedish police would allow the desecration of holy books from other religions.

One Muslim man apparently decided to put that to the test and applied for permission to stage a protest Saturday outside the Israeli Embassy in which he said he intended to burn the Torah and the Bible.

Though Israeli government officials and Jewish groups condemned the planned act and called on Swedish authorities to stop it, police approved the man’s request. However, once at the scene the man backed away from his plans, saying that as a Muslim he was against the burning of all religious books.

How is blasphemy viewed in other parts of the world?

Blasphemy is criminalized in many countries. A Pew Research Center analysis found that 79 countries and territories out of the 198 studied had laws or policies on the books in 2019 that banned blasphemy, defined as “speech or actions considered to be contemptuous of God or of people or objects considered sacred.” In at least seven countries – Afghanistan, Brunei, Iran, Mauritania, Nigeria, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia – it carried a potential death sentence.

In the Middle East and North Africa, 18 of the 20 countries studied had laws criminalizing blasphemy, although not in most cases punishable by death.

In Iraq, publicly insulting a symbol or a person that is held sacred, revered, or respected by a religious sect is a crime punishable by up to three years in prison.

Likewise in religiously diverse Lebanon, where sectarian divisions helped fuel a 15-year civil war from 1975-90, any act “intended to or resulting in” provoking “sectarian strife” is a crime punishable by up to three years in prison.

In the United States, under the freedom of speech protections in the First Amendment of the Constitution, it’s not illegal to burn copies of the Quran or other holy books.

For example, authorities were appalled by Florida pastor Terry Jones’ threat in 2010 to burn a copy of the Quran on the anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks but were unable to take legal action. Jones didn’t go through with that plan, but he led a Quran-burning in Florida the next year. 
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Media associations are warning that a rise in visa rejections for Turkish citizens is affecting the ability of the country’s journalists to work.

The number of journalists whose applications for a Schengen visa have been turned down has “significantly risen,” according to the European Federation of Journalists, or EFJ. The visas permit free travel across the European Union.

In a statement this week, the EFJ said that journalists who travel frequently for work are being given short-term visas only, which means they must make repeated applications.

“This burdensome and financially unsustainable process must be addressed,” the federation said.

A Turkish citizen who holds a regular passport must apply for a visa to enter the Schengen area, which encompasses 27 EU member states.

Data from SchengenVisaInfo show the rate of Turkish citizens’ visa rejections at 15% last year. But the EFJ said the rate of visa rejections for Turkish citizens in 2023 has surged to 50 percent, affecting journalists.

“We call upon a number of diplomatic missions to rectify their prejudiced and discriminatory attitudes toward journalists from Turkey, as these biases obstruct reporters from fulfilling their professional responsibilities effectively,” EFJ Vice President Mustafa Kuleli said.

The Turkish government has repeatedly charged that the EU’s motive behind the visa rejections of Turkish citizens is political.

“We will settle the visa problem, which has been used as political blackmail recently, as soon as possible,” Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on May 30.

The EU authorities deny that claim. “No decisions are taken on political grounds but rather on objective grounds,” Nikolaus Meyer-Landrut, head of the EU delegation to Turkey, told Reuters.

Visa deal

Under a 2016 deal between the EU and Turkey, Brussels pledged to provide 6 billion euros (about $6.7 billion) to Ankara to help it prevent refugee crossings onto EU soil and also to ease the visa application process for the Turkish citizens.

“The EU visa liberalization promised to the Turkish citizens is now almost a dream. The application requirements are getting more difficult, and the number of the requested documents is increasing daily,” said EFJ President Nazmi Bilgin.

Bilgin told VOA that Turkish citizens are being treated as potential refugees intending to flee to Europe.

Kivanc El, the head of the Progressive Journalists Association, said the foreign officials from EU nations act as if Turkish journalists will seek asylum there.

“If our colleagues consider seeking asylum, they would do it properly. But, in their visa applications, their destination, where they will be, what meetings they will attend are known,” El told VOA.

On June 15, T24 editor-in-chief Dogan Akin wrote a column detailing that, when the news website’s foreign editor applied for a Schengen visa from the German consulate four years ago, T24 was asked to provide its bank statements.

“We decided not to move forward with the visa application at that point,” Akin wrote.

Last August, Reuters reported that Turkish sports presenter Sinem Okten’s Schengen visa application was rejected twice. “I applied first to Germany, then to France. Both rejected my application,” Okten told Reuters.

“I’ve traveled abroad numerous times to follow and film matches and interview people, maybe 50 to 60 times. This is the first time I am having this problem,” she said.

Bilgin said that visa rejections affect journalistic work.

“In the past, our colleagues could easily get visas only by stating the institution they work for and explaining where and when they will travel. Even if they fulfill the aggravated application requirements, they cannot get a visa these days,” Bilgin said.

The Schengen visa application with additional service fees can cost about 100 euros, more than a quarter of the current monthly minimum wage in Turkey.

Worries about financial security

According to Reuters Institute’s 2022 Digital News report, the media sector in Turkey faces financial problems “with devaluation fueling a 20-year high in inflation.”

“Independent journalists who already work under difficult political conditions are also increasingly worried for their financial security,” the report states.

Journalists with press cards issued by the Turkish presidency’s Directorate of Communications are eligible to obtain service passports that enable them to travel visa-free to the Schengen area for their work.

“Unfortunately, the Directorate of Communications does not issue press cards to many journalists,” El told VOA.

Fahrettin Altun, the director of communications in the Turkish presidency, wrote on Turkey’s Directorate of Communications website, “So long as we are on duty, we will keep combating those who carry out ‘terrorism propaganda’ in the guise of ‘journalism.’ Terror sympathizers should not rejoice in vain.”

Local journalism organizations say the Directorate of Communications hands the press cards only to pro-government media outlets, discriminating against independent or dissident journalists.

This report originated in VOA’s Turkish Service.
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A senior British member of parliament deleted a video Thursday praising the Taliban’s rule in Afghanistan and apologized for what he said was the outcome of his “poor communication.”

Tobias Ellwood of the Conservative Party released the video commentary Wednesday on Twitter after his trip to the war-ravaged South Asian nation last week.

He argued in his now-deleted video that the security situation in Afghanistan had “vastly improved” since the Taliban returned to power two years ago.

Ellwood added that “corruption is down,” and the Taliban have almost eliminated the opium trade. He recorded his comments in the southern Afghan province of Helmand, one of the world’s largest opium poppy producers.

“This is a very different country indeed — it feels different now since the Taliban have returned to power,” he said. Ellwood urged Britain to re-engage with the Taliban and reopen its embassy in Kabul.

His video sparked outrage and prompted fellow members to move to seek his ouster as chairman of the House of Commons Defense Select Committee.

“I’m very, very sorry that my reflection of my visit could have been much better worded and have been taken out of context,” Ellwood said Thursday in his statement on Twitter after deleting the video. 

Taliban chief spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid retweeted the video Thursday, calling it a “positive report.” But he, too, later deleted the tweet without explaining. 

British media quoted Mark Francois, a defense committee member, telling the House of Commons on Wednesday that the video was “utterly bizarre” and advising Ellwood to be “very careful” in expressing his views. 

“Tobias Ellwood’s video could have been issued by the Afghan tourist board,” Jacob Rees-Mogg, a British member of parliament, said in a sarcastic Twitter comment. 

On Thursday, Ellwood appeared to defend some of his remarks in the controversial video, including criticism of the British government for not engaging directly with the Taliban, saying, “our current strategy of shouting from afar, after abruptly abandoning the country in 2021” was not working.

“However well-intentioned, reflections of my personal visit could have been better worded,” he said.

“I stand up, speak my mind, try to see the bigger picture, and offer solutions, especially on the international stage, as our world turns a dangerous corner. I don’t always get it right,” the lawmaker added.

“My simple call to action was to see our embassy reopen again and pursue a more direct strategy to help the 40 million people that we abandoned,” Ellwood said.

The Taliban regained control of Afghanistan in August 2021 when the United States and other Western allies withdrew all their troops after almost two decades of involvement in the war.

The fundamentalist de facto rulers have since introduced their strict interpretation of Islamic law or Sharia, squeezing women out of public life and placing an indefinite ban on girls’ education beyond the sixth grade. The restrictions on Afghan women and other human rights concerns have kept the international community from granting legitimacy to Taliban rule.

Taliban leaders defend their government, saying it is aligned with the Afghan culture and Sharia.

A U.S. State Department spokesman told reporters Wednesday that “we are not reconsidering opening an embassy at this point” in Afghanistan. He was responding to a question about Ellwood’s video.

“We have always made clear to the Taliban that there are certain steps that we expect them to take if they want to gain any form of international legitimacy, which they are a long way from reaching, if at all possible,” Matthew Miller said and denounced as “abhorrent” curbs the Taliban have placed on Afghan women and girls.

“We strongly object to those steps, and of course, we know that others in the international community take note, and they consider those in assessing their relationship with their government.” 
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As the war in Ukraine rages on, China and Russia are hosting joint military exercises in the Sea of Japan that analysts say are the latest sign of deepening cooperation between the two military powerhouses. The drills are also part of an effort to counter growing partnership of the U.S. and its allies in the region, they add.

“Russia and China are trying to convey to Japan and the U.S. that they are very unhappy with their cooperation in NATO and the [Indo-Pacific] region, and they want to prove that they can achieve the same level of cooperation in the region as [Washington and its allies,]” Stephen Nagy, a regional security expert at the International Christian University, told VOA.

For Russia, Nagy added, the drills are a way of showing “that they still have the capacity to manage conflicts on the eastern front but also provide capabilities to the Indo-Pacific region to work with China and pressure the U.S.” 

“They want to prove that they can still work with China to cause major disruption, especially in Japan’s backyard,” he said.

On Thursday, Russia’s Defense Ministry announced that the “Northern/Interaction-2023” drills had begun in the Sea of Japan and would last until Sunday July 23. The ministry said that in addition to live artillery fire, the exercises will also include “anti-submarine and naval combat” drills.   

The drills main aim, Russia’s ministry said, is to “strengthen naval cooperation” between the two countries and “maintain peace and stability in the Asia Pacific.” Russia and China say they have deployed more than 10 naval vessels and more than 30 military aircraft to take part in the exercise.  

According to China’s state-run Global Times, the exercise marks the first time that both Russia’s navy and air force will participate in a joint exercise led by China. 

Northern/Interaction-2023 is the first joint military exercise conducted near Japan this year, but according to the International Institute for Strategic Studies, Russia and China conducted at least five military exercises in the Sea of Japan and the East China Sea last year.  

Forceful response?

The announcement of the exercise comes as ties are strengthening between the U.S., Japan, and South Korea, and follows a trilateral missile defense drill involving the three in the Sea of Japan this week aimed at countering North Korea’s nuclear and missile threats.  

Some Chinese military commentators say China and Russia’s joint exercise is a forceful response to the trilateral drill conducted by the U.S. and its allies. 

“The Chinese and Russian drills will focus on air defense exercise, anti-missile exercise, anti-submarine exercise, and anti-ship exercise,” Chinese military commentator Song Zhongping said in a video he released last Saturday. He added that he thinks Russia and China will conduct joint sea and air patrols following the exercise.

Since the waterways around the Sea of Japan are all crucial passages for the Chinese and Russian navies to get to the Western Pacific, Song added that China and Russia should challenge the trilateral military alliance because their presence threatens the security of that strategic waterway.

Beijing’s remarks about the drills have not been as explicit. A statement released on China’s defense ministry’s official social media account on WeChat Sunday, when Chinese vessels set out for the exercise, said the drill is aimed at “safeguarding the security of strategic waterways” in the Sea of Japan.

Multiple strategic goals 

The military exercise is not just about countering the U.S. and its allies. Some experts think China and Russia also hope to fulfill some strategic goals through the drills. 

Lin Ying-yu, a China military expert at Tamkang University in Taiwan told VOA that Beijing wants to learn from Moscow’s experience of countering attacks on their navy from land in the Ukraine war. 

“During the war in Ukraine, Ukrainian forces have used missile or fighter jets to attack Russian ships at sea, so Russian forces have experience coping with this kind of attack,” he said. 

Lin adds that the People’s Liberation Army could face similar situations if it attacked Taiwan and the island’s military could use anti-ship missiles or drones to target Chinese naval vessels in a cross-Strait conflict.  

“Scenarios from the Ukraine war may be simulated in the China-Russia joint military exercise,” he said.

Nagy said the drill is also about demonstrating cohesiveness with the Russians, especially in the wake of the Wagner rebellion.

“These kinds of military activities demonstrate that the Chinese are firmly wedded to their relationship with Russia,” he said. “While they are not supportive of the conflict with Ukraine, they want to ensure that Putin remains in power.” 

More drills for the Indo-Pacific

As Beijing and Moscow look to double down on their “no limits” partnership, Lin said he thinks this drill is just the beginning and it is likely that the two countries will increase the number of joint military exercises. 

He argued that maintaining close interaction with China has become critical for Russia as it becomes more and more isolated diplomatically. Just before the drill in the Sea of Japan, the two Russian frigates that will participate docked in Shanghai, hosting visitors for a week according to the Global Times.

At the same time, Shen Ming-shih, Director of the Institute for National Defense and Security Research in Taiwan, said he expects the U.S. and its allies to hold more joint military exercises to counter the growing Russian and Chinese presence in the region. 

“The U.S., Japan, and South Korea will strengthen their military capabilities in maritime warfare, as well as increase the number of relevant exercises,” he told VOA. 

However, one thing that remains to be seen, Lin said, is whether Japan will amend or adjust its security treaties, as it faces security threats from multiple fronts, including Russia to the north, China to the Southwest, and North Korea’s constant missile firing. 

He thinks it’s worth observing whether the U.S., Japan, and Taiwan pursue more security and military cooperation against this backdrop.
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BAGHDAD – Protesters set fire to Sweden’s embassy in the Iraqi capital Baghdad early Thursday, an AFP journalist said, ahead of a planned burning of a Quran in Sweden.

Swedish authorities approved an assembly to be held later Thursday outside the Iraqi Embassy in Stockholm, where organizers plan to burn a copy of the Quran as well as an Iraqi flag.

Iraqis have been angered by events in Sweden, and Thursday’s protest in Baghdad was organized by supporters of the turbulent religious leader Moqtada Sadr.

Iraqi riot police fired water cannon to disperse demonstrators away from the embassy while security forces armed with electric batons chased protesters, an AFP photographer on the scene said.

“We are mobilized today to denounce the burning of the Koran, which is all about love and faith,” protester Hassan Ahmed told AFP. “We demand that the Swedish government and the Iraqi government stop this type of initiative.”

Some protesters had raised copies of the Quran into the air, while others held portraits of Mohamed al-Sadr, an important religious cleric and the father of Moqtada Sadr.

“We didn’t wait until morning, we broke in at dawn and set fire to the Swedish Embassy,” a young demonstrator in Baghdad told AFP on Thursday, before chanting Moqtada’s name.

Sweden’s foreign ministry told AFP its embassy staff in Baghdad were “safe” following the incident.

“The Iraqi authorities are responsible for the protection of diplomatic missions and their staff,” the ministry said, adding that attacks on embassies and diplomats “constitute a serious violation of the Vienna Convention.”

Several trucks to extinguish the fire had arrived at the embassy, where skirmishes between Iraqi security forces and demonstrators had broken out, an AFP photographer said.

It was not immediately clear whether the embassy was empty at the time of the attack or if staff had been evacuated.

‘Urgent investigation’

Iraq’s foreign ministry condemned the embassy torching and called on security forces to identify those responsible.

“The Iraqi government has instructed the relevant security services to conduct an urgent investigation and take all necessary measures to uncover the circumstances of the incident and identify the perpetrators,” the ministry said in a statement.

Swedish media reported that Salwan Momika, an Iraqi refugee in Sweden, had organized the event in Stockholm on Thursday.

Salwan burned a few pages of a copy of the Quran in front of Stockholm’s largest mosque on June 28 during Eid al-Adha, a holiday celebrated by Muslims around the world.

That incident prompted supporters of Moqtada, an influential religious leader and political dissident in Iraq, to storm the Swedish Embassy in Baghdad the following day.

Moqtada has repeatedly mobilized thousands of demonstrators in the streets.

In the summer of 2022, his supporters invaded Baghdad’s parliament building and staged a sit-in that lasted several weeks.

At the time, Moqtada was involved in a political spat over the appointment of a prime minister.
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Tens of thousands of Ukrainian women serve alongside men in the military, both in combat and noncombat roles against Russian aggression. Meanwhile, other women face mental and physical pressures as they work behind front lines to care for families and rebuild their lives. Anna Chernikova in Kyiv tells the story of one woman’s transformation. Camera: Eugene Shynkar.
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Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan ended a Persian Gulf trip aimed at securing investments by signing agreements worth more than $50 billion in the United Arab Emirates, Emirati state media said Wednesday. 

His tour, which also included stops in Qatar and Saudi Arabia, saw Erdogan preside over the signing of lucrative deals to boost the ailing Turkish economy. 

Turkey is battling a currency collapse and soaring inflation that have battered its economy. 

Ankara has recently repaired relations with Gulf states including the UAE and Saudi Arabia after years of rivalry following the 2011 Arab Spring uprisings. 

Turkish support for organizations linked to the Muslim Brotherhood initially spurred a rupture with Gulf states, which view the movement as a terrorist group. 

Relations soured further following a Saudi-led blockade of Turkish ally Qatar by its Gulf Arab neighbors. The embargo was lifted in 2021 but ties with Turkey remained rocky. 

With relations improving, Erdogan visited the UAE last year to bolster political and economic ties. 

On Wednesday, the Turkish leader flew to the UAE from Qatar, where he met the emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani. 

Earlier, during his stop in Saudi Arabia, Riyadh signed a major drone procurement contract with a Turkish defense firm. The amount involved was not disclosed. 

UAE President Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan met Erdogan at the presidential palace in Abu Dhabi and attended the signing of agreements and memorandums of understanding “estimated to be worth $50.7 billion,” the official WAM news agency reported. 

In March, Turkey and the UAE signed a free-trade agreement that aims to increase bilateral commerce to $40 billion annually within five years. 

And last year, the two countries signed a nearly $5 billion currency swap deal to boost Ankara’s dilapidated foreign currency reserves. 

Last month, the UAE’s president met Erdogan in Turkey, shortly after the Turkish leader clinched another five-year term in May elections. 

Turkish Vice President Cevdet Yilmaz also met the Emirati president during a June visit to the UAE. 

The diplomatic thaw with the UAE has resulted in increased investment in Turkey. 

Erdogan and the UAE leader on Wednesday “reaffirmed their commitment to promoting stability, both within the region and internationally, stating their shared belief in the importance of dialogue and diplomacy as a means of solving disputes and avoiding conflict,” WAM reported. 

Both nations “share the same ambitions for stability, economic growth and sustainable progress,” the agency quoted the UAE’s president as saying. 
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Fire planes and ground crews from several European countries are heading to Greece where wildfires have intensified as relentless heat wave conditions are keeping much of southern Europe above 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit).

Three firefighting teams from Poland, Romania and Slovakia are due in Greece on Thursday, while Israel has pledged two firefighting aircraft, adding to the four planes from Italy and France already operating outside Athens.

New evacuations were ordered on Wednesday as wildfires raged near the Greek capital. A second heat wave hit the Mediterranean country from the west following days of record-high temperatures that baked southern Europe.

In a round-the-clock battle to preserve forests, industrial facilities, and vacation homes, evacuations continued for a third day along a highway connecting Athens to the southern city of Corinth.

Temperatures in southern Greece are expected to reach 44 C (111 F) by the end of the week, in the second heat wave to hit Europe’s Mediterranean south in two weeks. Alessandro Miani, who heads the Italian Society of Environmental Doctors, warned that aging populations in Italy and other southern European countries are a concern during heat waves, noting that deaths due to high temperatures most commonly affect people over age 80.

“The excessive heat together with humidity can make difficult for sweat to evaporate, interfering with the body’s ability to regulate its own temperature,” Miani said. The heat in Rome eased only slightly after a sweltering 42-43 C (107-109 F) on Tuesday, while highs in Sicily and Sardinia reached 46 C (114 F). Parts of Spain were as high as 45 C (113 F) on Wednesday. Amador Cortes, a resident in the southern Spanish city of Jaen, said people were doing their best to avoid the sun during midday hours and the early afternoon.

“The truth is, they take shelter at home with the air conditioning, with the fan. In the street, the elderly suffer a lot. Anyway, we have to put up with it,” he said. In the southern Turkish city of Adana, a group of residents handed out desserts in the street, and many paid tribute to the late U.S. engineer Willis Carrier, who invented the air conditioner in 1902.

“The people of Adana really need air conditioners. God bless him for making such an invention,” city resident Mehmet Saygin told Turkey’s DHA news agency.

The latest heat wave prompted renewed concern over the impact of extreme summer heat. The World Meteorological Organization, a United Nations body, said preliminary global figures showed the month of June to be the hottest on record.

“The extreme weather, an increasingly frequent occurrence in our warming climate, is having a major impact on human health, ecosystems, economies, agriculture, energy and water supplies,” WMO Secretary-General Petteri Taalas said Wednesday.

“This underlines the increasing urgency of cutting greenhouse gas emissions as quickly and as deeply as possible.”

Countries with borders on the Mediterranean Sea weren’t alone in suffering. Authorities in North Macedonia extended a heat alert with predicted temperatures topping 43 C (109 F), while Kosovo also issued heat warnings. Powerful storms that followed a string of extremely hot days caused chaos in Slovenia, Croatia and Bosnia late Tuesday, toppling trees, tearing roofs off buildings and causing power outages.

Emergency services in the three countries reported hundreds of interventions as the storm swept through the region. It also brought a much-sought relief from the heat. The firefighters were being sent to Greece as part of a European Union civil protection mechanism that includes the planned deployment of international crews to parts of southern Europe over the summer.
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Latest developments:                      

U.S. President Joe Biden hosted Italian Cardinal Matteo Zuppi, Pope Francis' peace envoy, for talks about Vatican efforts to provide humanitarian aid in response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine. 





Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said his government is working to "preserve Ukraine's global role as a guarantor of food security, our maritime access to the global market, and jobs for Ukrainians in ports and in the agricultural industry" following Russia's withdrawal from the Black Sea Grain Initiative. 

Ukrainian officials said Wednesday that Russian forces carried out airstrikes on the Odesa region in southern Ukraine for a second consecutive night. 

Oleh Kiper, the regional governor, urged people to stay in shelters and said air defense systems were activated to repel the attacks. 

After the first night of aerial attacks, which hit Odesa and nearby Mykolaiv, Russia said it was acting in retaliation for an attack Monday that damaged a key bridge linking Russia to the Crimean Peninsula. 

Russia has used the bridge as a major supply route supporting its forces in their invasion of Ukraine. 

The Russian defense ministry said in a statement Tuesday it targeted facilities involved in what it called “terrorist acts” carried out by seaborne drones, including a shipyard near Odesa and Ukrainian fuel depots.   

The Odesa region is the site of multiple ports that were part of the Black Sea Grain Initiative brokered by the United Nations and Turkey to facilitate the export of Ukrainian grain to the world market. Russia withdrew from the deal earlier this week. 

Ukrainian counteroffensive 

It’s too early to judge the outcome of the seemingly slow-moving counteroffensive of Ukrainian forces against Russian strongholds in eastern and southern Ukraine, the top U.S. military officer said Tuesday.  

So far, war analysts say Ukraine has retaken about 250 square kilometers of territory since early June, but Russia has maintained control of large expanses of land.  

Still, General Mark Milley, chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters at the Pentagon, “It is far from a failure, in my view. I think it is way too early to make that kind of call.”  

“First of all, the Russians have had several months to put in a very complex defense,” Milley said. “It’s not quite connected, transform[ing] like World War I, but it’s not dissimilar from that either.”  

Milley said Moscow’s forces had built “lots of complex minefields, Dragon’s Teeth [anti-tank obstacles], barbed-wire trenches.”   

Milley said Russian “morale is low, and now recently because of the [Yevgeny] Prighozin mutiny [of Wagner Group troops], command and control is confusing at best. Significant casualties of their officer corps, so the Russian situation is not very good.”  

He said “what the Ukrainians have, though, is a significant amount of combat power not yet committed. And I will not say what’s going to happen in the future, because that’s going to be a Ukrainian decision… Right now, they are preserving their combat power, and they are slowly and deliberately and steadily working their way through all these minefields.”  

‘Going to do what it takes’

The U.S. military leader said the West’s coalition supporting Ukraine’s forces has trained 17 brigade combat teams and more than 63,000 troops, 15,000 of them by the U.S.  

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said, “I’ve asked our [Western allies] to continue to dig deep into the military stocks because we’re going to do what it takes to support Ukraine’s sovereign right to live free today and for the future…. They continue to make progress on a cohesive training plan and to help some very eager Ukrainian pilots learn to fly fourth generation aircraft.”  

Milley added, “The problem is control of the air space. The most effective and efficient and cost-effective way to do that right now in Ukraine is ground-to-air [missiles]. And that’s what they’ve been provided.”  

“The casualties that Ukrainians are suffering in this offensive are not so much from Russian airpower but from minefields,” Milley said. “So, the problem to solve is minefields.”  

Some information came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters. 
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The Russian private military force known as the Wagner Group captured the world’s attention with its open mutiny and march on Moscow, averted at the last minute through a deal brokered by Belarus. As Wagner’s future role remains uncertain, we take a look at their origins, the role they play in conflicts around the world, and their rise to influence as an unofficial arm of the Kremlin. Story by Alex Gendler; narration by Salem Solomon.
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Belarusian authorities have detained a prominent journalist who used to work for outlets including Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty or RFE/RL.

Police on Monday raided the apartment of Ihar Karnei, in the capital Minsk, seized computers and phones and detained the journalist.

Karnei is being held in the Akrestina pretrial detention center and has not had access to lawyers or his family, according to his daughter, Polina.

“Dad was detained for 10 days; he is in Akrestina. The house was searched,” the daughter told RFE/RL.

The Akrestina facility is known for harsh conditions and mistreating detainees, according to Belarusian human rights group Viasna.   

The Belarusian Embassy in Washington declined to comment directly on the case of the jailed journalist and referred VOA to the foreign ministry.

The New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists, or CPJ, told VOA it is looking into Karnei’s case and that of several other journalists detained recently.

“As is usually the case, the authorities provide very little to no information on these detentions and the charges. Secrecy also surrounds the trials. This is an intentional approach of the authorities who want to keep their repressions against independent voices under a tight lid,” Gulnoza Said, who is CPJ’s Europe and Central Asia program coordinator, told VOA via email.

Karnei is a well-known journalist who has previously worked for outlets including RFE/RL.

The media outlet, like VOA, is an independent news network under the U.S. Agency for Global Media.

In 2021, Belarusian authorities labeled RFE/RL as an “extremist organization,” along with other independent media and civil rights groups.

Minsk has been clamping down on opposition and critical voices after the August 2020 contested elections and mass protests that followed after President Alexander Lukashenko declared victory.

Dozens of journalists were detained in the lead up and weeks that followed that election, including Karnei.

More than 30 journalists are currently detained, including two contributors for RFE/RL.

Ihar Losik was arrested in 2020 and is serving a 15-year sentence at a hard labor camp. Web editor Andrey Kuznechyk was detained in November 2021 and is serving a six-year sentence.

“This is their sacrifice for freedom of speech,” Volha Khvoin  of the Belarusian Association of Journalists told VOA earlier this year, while discussing the crackdown on critical voices.

Said of CPJ noted that authorities in Belarus have “never eased up on their relentless crackdown on free media.”

“Belarus has never been free under Lukashenko’s rule but it has become one of the most closed off societies in the world since 2020 and one of the world’s biggest jailers of journalists,” she said.
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A court in Romania’s capital on Tuesday ruled to extend by another 30 days the house arrest of Andrew Tate, the divisive social media influencer who is charged with rape, human trafficking and forming a criminal gang to sexually exploit women.

The decision at the Bucharest Tribunal comes a month after prosecutors formally indicted the 36-year-old social media star along with his brother Tristan and two Romanian women in the same case. All four defendants — who were arrested in late December near Bucharest and have denied the allegations against them — will remain under house arrest for 30 more days.

Outside the court on Monday, Tate told journalists that “the moral arc of the universe bends towards justice in the end.”

“My brother and I are extremely resilient people. … In the end justice shall be served,” he said. “We’re feeling like things are going to work out perfectly in the end — and until then we’re going to follow the judicial process.”

The Tate brothers, who are dual U.K.-U.S. citizens, will likely appeal against Tuesday’s ruling. The Tates lost their last appeal on July 6 against a prior house arrest extension. 

After spending three months in police detention in Bucharest, the Tate brothers won an appeal on March 31 to be moved to house arrest. In June, Romania’s anti-organized crime agency known as DIICOT had requested that judges extend the house arrest measure after the agency filed its investigation.

Andrew Tate, who has been accused of peddling conspiracy theories online and has amassed 7.2 million Twitter followers, has repeatedly claimed that prosecutors have no evidence against him and that there is a political conspiracy designed to silence him.

Before the court’s decision on Tuesday, a post appeared on his Twitter account that read: “There are Matrix agents on all sides of the political spectrum. War is funded. Trump and I are self funded. Basically everyone else is bought and paid for.”

DIICOT alleges that the four defendants formed a criminal group in 2021 “in order to commit the crime of human trafficking” in Romania, as well as in the United States and Britain.

There are seven female victims in the case, DIICOT said, who were lured with false pretenses of love and transported to Romania, where the gang sexually exploited them and subjected them to physical violence. One defendant is accused of raping a woman twice in March 2022, according to the agency. The women were allegedly controlled by “intimidation, constant surveillance” and claims they were in debt, prosecutors said.

Andrew Tate was previously banned from various prominent social media platforms for expressing hate speech and misogynistic comments, including that women should bear responsibility for getting sexually assaulted.

Several women in Britain also are pursuing civil claims to obtain damages from Tate, alleging they were victims of sexual violence.
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