The Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival was awarded Saturday to a hilarious and shockingly explicit reworking of Frankenstein, Poor Things, starring Emma Stone as a sex-mad reanimated corpse.

An ongoing Hollywood strike may have robbed Venice of its usual bevy of stars, but its strong selection showed the world’s oldest film festival could still boast of its status as a launchpad for Oscar contenders.

Poor Things by Greek director Yorgos Lanthimos was labelled an “instant classic” by critics. It looks set to repeat the success he had with his 2018 film, The Favourite, which after two awards at Venice won a string of international prizes.

Stone plays Bella, a woman brought back to life with an infant’s brain by a mad scientist (Willem Dafoe).

Accepting the award, Lanthimos said the film “couldn’t exist without another incredible creature, Emma Stone,” who could not appear due to the strike.

The film features some of the most explicit sex ever seen in an A-list Hollywood film as Stone’s character discovers — and very much enjoys — her sexuality.

The film brilliantly skewers the way men try and fail to control the innocent Bella — particularly a roguish Mark Ruffalo — triggering bursts of spontaneous applause and riotous laughter from audiences in Venice.

‘Terrifying’ AI threat

The Volpi Cup for best actress went to 25-year-old Cailee Spaeny for her portrayal of Elvis Presley’s wife in Sofia Coppola’s Priscilla.

Best actor went to Peter Sarsgaard for his performance as a man suffering from dementia in the drama, Memory, in which he played alongside Jessica Chastain.

He used his speech to back the Hollywood strike and warn of the “terrifying” threat from artificial intelligence, one of the key issues in the dispute.

“If we lose that battle in the strike, our industry will be the first of many to fall,” Sarsgaard said.

The runner-up Silver Lion went to Japan’s Ryusuke Hamaguchi for Evil Does Not Exist, a quiet and eerie eco-fable that follows his Oscar-winning Drive My Car.

Venice audiences were floored by two brutal migrant dramas, and both went home with awards.

Io Capitano, the epic story of Senegalese teenagers crossing Africa to reach Europe, won best director for Italy’s Matteo Garrone (Gomorrah) and a best newcomer prize for its star, Seydou Sarr, in his first-ever film.

Green Border, a harrowing account of refugees trapped between Belarus and Poland, took the third-place Special Jury Prize.

One of the stranger entries in competition, El Conde, which reimagined Chile’s former dictator Augusto Pinochet as a blood-sucking vampire, won best screenplay for writer-director Pablo Larrain.

The winners were chosen by a jury led by director Damien Chazelle (La La Land) and included Jane Campion and Laura Poitras, who won last year with Big Pharma documentary All the Beauty and the Bloodshed.

Strike impact

Hollywood stars with independent films were allowed to attend Venice by striking unions, including Chastain and Adam Driver, who starred in Michael Mann’s racing biopic Ferrari.

Both backed the strikes, with Chastain saying actors had been silenced for too long about “workplace abuse” and “unfair contracts.”

But director David Fincher, who premiered his assassin movie The Killer starring Michael Fassbender and has been closely associated with Netflix, triggered controversy by saying he understood “both sides.”

The strong line-up helped distract from the controversy around the inclusion of Roman Polanski in the out-of-competition section.

As a convicted sex offender, the 90-year-old director was already struggling to find distribution in the U.S. and other countries for his slapstick comedy The Palace.

The response from Venice will not have helped: it currently holds a resounding zero percent on review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, variously described as a “laugh-less debacle” and “soul-throttling crap” by critics.

Another director effectively blacklisted in the U.S., Woody Allen, had a better time with his 50th film (and first in French), Coup de Chance. Some critics considered it his best film in years.

Here’s the complete list of winners from the 23 entries in the main competition:

Golden Lion for best film: Poor Things by Yorgos Lanthimos
Silver Lion - Grand Jury Prize: Evil Does Not Exist by Ryusuke Hamaguchi
Silver Lion for best director: Matteo Garrone for Io Capitano
Volpi Cup for best actress: Cailee Spaeny for Priscilla by Sofia Coppola
Volpi Cup for best actor: Peter Sarsgaard for Memory by Michel Franco
Best screenplay: Guillermo Calderon and Pablo Larrain for El Conde by Pablo Larrain
Special Jury Prize: Green Border by Agnieszka Holland
Marcello Mastroianni Prize for best newcomer: Seydou Sarr for Io Capitano by Matteo Garrone 

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The body of a missing 77-year-old man was found Saturday, raising the death toll from floods in central Greece to 11, authorities said. The number of missing increased to six, but there could be more.

The man was living in the seaside village of Paltsi, in the mountainous Pelion peninsula situated between the Aegean Sea to the east and Pagasitikos gulf to the west. He had refused to leave his home, despite the entreaties of his wife, who evacuated. “I have been through storms,” he had told her.

The man’s body drifted in the Aegean, past the island of Skiathos, to another island, Evia, where it was found late Saturday, authorities said.

Pelion was hit by torrential rains Tuesday, with some locations reporting close to 76 centimeters of rain in less than a day. The rest of the region of Thessaly, to the west, was struck later Tuesday and again Wednesday and Thursday.

Another village near a major Greek city was ordered evacuated Saturday afternoon as authorities frantically shored up flood defenses against a rising river.

Rescue crews were evacuating stranded residents from areas already flooded elsewhere in Thessaly.

The village of Omorfochori, about 8 kilometers by road from the city of Larissa, Thessaly’s capital and largest city, was ordered evacuated by SMS alert due to the rising waters of the Pineios river. Residents were directed to a town to the southeast.

But the main concern remains that the already overflowing river could inundate Larissa itself, a city of around 150,000. Authorities placed tens of thousands of bags full of sand and pebbles along the river’s banks, while opening diversion channels west of the city.

The governor of Thessaly, Kostas Agorastos, was visiting the town of Palamas — one of the worst stricken areas in the southwest of the region — when he was evacuated by police Saturday afternoon. A small crowd of protesters had started shouting abuse at him and then jostled him, a video posted on social media showed.

Agorastos, a member of the ruling conservative New Democracy party, said Friday that local and regional elections cannot take place in Thessaly as scheduled on Oct. 8, with runoffs a week later. First elected governor in 2010, Agorastos is running for a fourth term.

The proximity of the local and regional polls has intensified the usual blame game from opposition parties eager to dent New Democracy’s supremacy that was confirmed in national elections in May and June. New Democracy controls 11 out of the country’s 13 regions.

But there has been much criticism about state and local authorities’ response to the latest disaster to hit Greece, hard on the heels of devastating wildfires.

The rescue response to the floods that resulted from torrential rains that hit the area from Tuesday to Thursday was negligible until early Thursday, while people were clinging to the roofs of their stricken homes, according to a report in Greek daily newspaper Kathimerini. The same paper reported Saturday that, of the Air Force’s 12 search-and-rescue Puma helicopters, only four are operational, with the rest either cannibalized for spare parts or grounded for so long that they can no longer fly.

There are also questions about the ability of regional and local authorities to deal with major crises, despite the expansion in responsibilities and funding under reforms enacted over a decade ago. 
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Poland’s conservative governing party and the opposition showered potential voters with promises Saturday as the country’s political parties revealed their campaign programs before the October 15 parliamentary election.

The nationalist ruling Law and Justice party, which took power in 2015, wants to win an unprecedented third term. The government’s tenure, however, has been marred with bitter clashes with the European Union over the government’s rule of law record and democratic backsliding.

At a party convention, leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski, who is Poland’s most powerful politician, made promises of new spending on social and military causes for the nation living in the shadow of Russia’s full-scale invasion of neighboring Ukraine.

The government has already largely increased the state budget deficit with spending on benefits for large families and retirees, as well as on purchasing armament.

The main opposition Civic Coalition also laid out its program tenets, vowing to reverse the negative trends in foreign and home policy, mend fences with Brussels and secure funds frozen now by the EU amid the rule of law dispute.

Party leader Donald Tusk, who is a former prime minister and former top EU figure, also promised to free state media and cultural activities from their current restrictions and “censorship.”

With five weeks to go to the election that will shape Poland for the next four years, opinion polls suggest that Law and Justice may garner the most electoral votes but not enough to continue its current narrow control of the parliament, and may need to seek an uncomfortable coalition in which the most probable partner would be the far-right Confederation.
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The United Russia political party headquarters in the Russian-occupied city of Polohy, Zaporizhzhia oblast, in Ukraine was destroyed Friday, The Kyiv Independent reported Saturday.

Melitopol Mayor Ivan Fedorov announced the incident on Telegram. Federov said the Russians were “burned out” of the building. The incident coincided with the “hellish pseudo-elections” in Russian-occupied territories in Ukraine, he said.

Russia has claimed to annex Ukraine’s Kherson, Zaporizhzhia, Donetsk, and Luhansk oblasts.

Ukraine’s armed forces are making “gradual tactical advances” against Russia’s defensive line east of the town of Robotyne, the British Defense Ministry said Saturday in its daily intelligence update on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

The update, posted on X, formerly known as Twitter, also indicated that it is “highly likely” Russia has taken forces from other areas of the front line “to replace degraded units” near Robotyne. The redeployments, the ministry said, are “likely limiting” Russia’s capacity for executing offensive operations in other frontline areas and are “highly likely” indicative of pressure on Russia’s defensive lines, especially around Robotyne.

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in a letter last month that Russia would be eligible to apply for membership and access to the SWIFT banking system for food and fertilizer transactions.

The Russian Agricultural Bank subsidiary in Luxembourg could immediately apply to SWIFT to “effectively enable access” for the bank to the international payments system within 30 days, the United Nations told Russia in a letter, seen by Reuters on Friday.

In an effort to persuade Moscow to return to the U.N.-brokered Black Sea Grain Initiative that had allowed the safe export through the Black Sea of Ukrainian grain, Guterres outlined four measures the United Nations could facilitate to improve Russia’s grain and fertilizer exports.

Guteres told Lavrov the U.N. was immediately ready to move on all measures “based on the clear understanding that their application would lead to the Russian Federation’s return to the Black Sea Initiative and the full resumption of operations.”

A key Russian demand has been the reconnection of the Russian Agricultural Bank, Rosselkhozbank, to the SWIFT system. It was cut off by the European Union in June of last year after Russia’s February invasion of Ukraine.

The Russian Foreign Ministry expressed skepticism in a statement Wednesday at the U.N. chief’s proposals.

“Instead of actual exemptions from sanctions, all Russia got was a new dose of promises from the U.N. Secretariat,” it said. “These recent proposals do not contain any new elements and cannot serve as a foundation for making any tangible progress in terms of bringing our agricultural exports back to normal.”

Russia exited the deal in July, a year after it was brokered by the U.N. and Turkey to combat a global food crisis the U.N. said was worsened by Russia’s invasion. Ukraine and Russia are both leading grain exporters.

In other developments, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Friday that Russian leader Vladimir Putin masterminded the death of Wagner mercenary boss Yevgeny Prigozhin, who died in an unexplained plane crash with his top lieutenants last month.

Zelenskyy did not provide evidence to back up the claim he made in passing during a conference in Kyiv when he was asked a question about the Russian president.

“The fact that he killed Prigozhin — at least that’s the information we all have, not any other kind — that also speaks to his rationality, and about the fact that he is weak,” Zelenskyy said.

The Kremlin says all possible causes of the crash will be investigated, including the possibility of foul play. It has called the suggestion that Putin ordered the deaths of Prigozhin and his men an “absolute lie.”

Prigozhin led a short-lived mutiny in Russia in June that Putin characterized as treasonous and a “stab in the back.”
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A multinational rail and ports deal linking the Middle East and South Asia will be announced Saturday on the sidelines of the G20 summit in New Delhi, a White House official said.

The pact comes at a critical time as U.S. President Joe Biden seeks to counter China’s Belt and Road push on global infrastructure by pitching Washington as an alternative partner and investor for developing countries at the G20 grouping.

The deal will benefit low and middle-income countries in the region and enable a critical role for the Middle East in global commerce, Jon Finer, the U.S. deputy national security adviser, told reporters at the bloc’s annual summit in New Delhi.

It aims to link Middle East countries by railway and connect them to India by port, helping the flow of energy and trade from the Gulf to Europe, U.S. officials have said, by cutting shipping times, costs and fuel use.

A memorandum of understanding for the deal will be signed by the European Union, India, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, the United States and other G20 partners, Finer said.

“Linking these key regions, we think, is a huge opportunity,” said Finer. No immediate details of the value of the deal were available.

The move comes amid U.S. efforts for a broader diplomatic deal in the Middle East that would have Saudi Arabia recognize Israel.

From the U.S. viewpoint, Finer added, the deal helps “turn the temperature down across the region” and “address a conflict where we see it.”
…

Britain on Friday marked one year since the passing of Queen Elizabeth II. As Henry Ridgwell reports from London, polls show her successor, King Charles III, faces a challenge to keep the monarchy relevant and popular among younger generations. Camera: Henry Ridgwell.
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An international team of at least 150 rescuers gathered at a Turkish cave Friday and prepared to try to bring out a U.S. explorer who fell ill nearly a week ago while exploring more than 1,000 meters underground.

Mark Dickey, 40, was exploring Morca Cave near Anamur, Turkey, in the Taurus Mountains with a team of about 12 others last Saturday when he fell ill with what was determined to be internal bleeding.

At a depth of 1,040 meters, Dickey was unable to climb out on his own. The Turkish Caving Federation said the team alerted the European Cave Rescue Association.

A Hungarian rescue team that includes a doctor reached Dickey this week, was able to get him medicine and blood infusions, and was monitoring him at a base camp.

Dickey appeared in a video message that the rescuers recorded and released Friday. He appeared to be in good spirits but said he “was not healed on the inside yet” and would need a lot of help climbing out of the cave.

The head of the Turkish search-and-rescue team, Recep Salci, told the Reuters news agency Friday that Dickey was stable enough to be moved but that the operation would likely take several days.

Salci said that getting to Dickey’s location involves many narrow passages and descents where a rope must be used. Some areas can be accessed only by crawling.

Salci said it takes a healthy caver 12 hours to get down to the location and 16 hours to climb up. He said some areas would require explosives to widen.

Salci said many of the operations were already being carried out.

In his video message, Dickey thanked the Turkish government and others who reached him initially with medical supplies, which he said saved his life. He also thanked the international community of cave explorers who have responded.

The European Cave Rescue Association said teams from Turkey, Bulgaria, Croatia, Hungary, Italy and Poland arrived at the scene over the course of the last week. How long the rescue mission will take depends on whether Dickey will require a stretcher on the way out, Werner Zegler, the association’s vice president, told VOA in an interview.

Zegler estimated that it would take three or four days if Dickey did not need a stretcher and up to two weeks if he did. According to Zegler, there were more than 100 rescuers on site. If initial extraction efforts fail, more might be necessary, he said.

Ivana Konstantinovic of VOA’s Serbian Service contributed to this report. Some information came from The Associated Press, Reuters and Agence France-Presse.
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London’s Metropolitan Police on Friday reported the first confirmed sighting of a terror suspect who escaped Wednesday from a London medium-security prison and is now the subject of a nationwide manhunt. 

A former British soldier, 21-year-old Daniel Abed Khalife, is believed to have escaped from HMP Wandsworth by leaving the prison kitchen, where he was working, and fastening himself to the bottom of a food delivery van. 

In a release, the Metropolitan Police said they received information from a member of the public who said they saw a man fitting Khalife’s description walking away from a food delivery van that had stopped not far from the prison shortly after his escape. The man was then seen walking toward Wandsworth town center.

London police also confirmed Friday they were carrying out an extensive search of Richmond Park in London’s southwest. The search included 150 officers, The Independent newspaper reports, quoting Metropolitan Pollice Commissioner Mark Rowl.

Discharged from the British army in May, Khalife was awaiting trial on offenses related to terrorism and violations of the Official Secrets Act. He is accused of planting fake bombs at an army base in England and, the BBC reported, collecting sensitive personal information about soldiers from a British Defense Ministry database. 

He is also charged with obtaining information that might be “directly or indirectly useful to an enemy.” The BBC reported that enemy was Iran. Khalife has denied the charges.

British Justice Minister Alex Chalk briefed Parliament on the escape Thursday and promised an immediate investigation into the prison’s protocols and the decision about where Khalife was held. He said a second independent investigation will take place at a later date.

“No stone must be left unturned in getting to the bottom of what happened,” Chalk said.

Some information in this report was provided by Reuters and The Associated Press. 
…

Rescue crews have begun airlifting hundreds of people trapped in dozens of Greek hamlets after four days of cataclysmic rainfall left at least 7 people dead and an unknown number missing.

Rains from Daniel, the worst storm to hit Greece in 75 years, turned small streets in the country’s farming heartland of Thessaly into waterways that uprooted village huts. Rivers swelled, dams burst, and bridges broke.

Hardest hit has been the region of Karditsa, where six people, all elderly women and shepherds, were found under mounds of debris, washed away by floodwaters in their attempt to evacuate their homes. 

Officially, six people remain missing, but locals and crew contacted by VOA predict greater numbers. In the village of Palamas alone, on the outskirts of Karditsa, residents phoning into local TV stations spoke of more than 60 villagers missing on Friday.

Authorities liken the storm to what they call a “biblical catastrophe,” placing several parts of the Thessaly plain in a state of emergency, and allowing the country’s military to be called in to help on Thursday.

But by then, Daniel had wreaked unprecedented damage, and left the nation angry about the government’s delayed response. 

Emergency services on Friday were seen using divers, lifeboats and 80 all-weather military helicopters to reach stranded people across Thessaly, mainly in Karditsa.

Sofia, an elderly woman who managed to escape to a relative’s home, described the horror of her ordeal.

“I was left on the rooftop of my home for days before someone came with a plastic life raft and helped me down,” she said. “I would have drowned, because the water had reached 2 meters high.”

Like thousands of others in the region, Sofia said she received no notification to evacuate and seek safety on higher ground. 

“I am left with nothing. Zero,” she said. “The government now has to help us.”

Other farmers, including Christos Theodoropoulos, are mad.

“Nothing is left. Nothing,” he shouted. “No official has come to help us. I am embarrassed that this is 2023 and this has happened.”

In 2020, the region was hit by a ferocious cyclone. 

But since then, locals say authorities have failed to build necessary infrastructure to shield the region — leaving it, thousands of residents and livestock at the mercy of nature.  
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Friday marks the first anniversary of the death of England’s Queen Elizabeth.  She died a year ago at her beloved Balmoral Castle in Scotland at age 96.  

Upon her death, her son, Charles, immediately became king.  

Charles says he and his wife, Camilla, will spend the day quietly at the Scottish royal castle.  

“In marking the first anniversary of Her late Majesty’s death and my Accession, we recall with great affection her long life, devoted service and all she meant to so many of us,” King Charles posted in an online statement.  

On the anniversary of her death, the royal family shared a rarely-seen photograph of the queen taken in 1968 by famed photographer Cecil Beaton. The photo had previously appeared in an exhibition of Beaton’s photographs. 
…

It’s never been easy for the leaders of the world’s largest economies to find common ground, but Russia’s war on Ukraine has made it even harder for the Group of 20 meeting to reach meaningful agreements this year.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, this year’s host, has pledged Ukraine won’t overshadow his focus on the needs developing nations in the so-called Global South, but the war has proved hard to ignore.

“New Delhi will not want to distract from the main agenda, which is to address issues of concern for the Global South,” said Nazia Hussain, an associate research fellow at Singapore’s S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies.

“So while there will be discussions on the emerging issues as a fallout of the war — supply chain security and decoupling, energy security, and food supply — the focus must remain on how to mitigate the fallout rather than debate the geopolitical/security aspects of the war.”

As leaders began arriving Friday, Indian diplomats were still trying to find compromise language for a joint communique.

Russia and China, which has been Moscow’s most important supporter in the war against Ukraine, have rejected drafts over a reference to Ukraine that said “most members strongly condemned the war,” the same language they signed off a year ago at the G20 summit in Bali

The European Union, meanwhile, has said compromise language suggested by India is not strong enough for them to agree to, while the U.K. said that Prime Minister Rishi Sunak planned to press G20 members to take a tougher line against Russia’s invasion.

Ending the summit without a communique would underscore how strained relations are among the world’s major powers.

European Council President Charles Michel told reporters Friday that it was important to give India space as it worked “actively, maybe sometimes discreetly, to maximize the chance for a communique.”

He said Russia had isolated itself from the world with the invasion of Ukraine, and that the EU and others were working to “encourage China to play a positive role at the global level and to defend the UN charter and to defend the sovereignty of Ukraine.”

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy addressed the Bali summit by video last year, but Modi has made a point of not inviting Ukraine to participate in this year’s event.

Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has promised Zelenskyy to keep Ukraine in the discussions, telling him in a video call that the leaders posted on Instagram: “I’m disappointed that you won’t be included but as you know, we will be speaking up strongly for you.”

Founded in 1999, the G20 was initially a response to global economic challenges, but since then, geopolitical tensions have introduced more politics into the discussions, complicating its ability to work effectively, said Ian Lesser, vice president of the German Marshall Fund and director of its Brussels office.

The G20 encompasses the world’s wealthiest countries in the Group of Seven, including the U.S., Canada, Britain, Japan, Germany and the European Union as a bloc, along with Russia, China and others.

Russia’s attack on Ukraine and China’s growing assertiveness in the Asia-Pacific region have added friction, pitting some of the most powerful G20 countries directly against each other diplomatically, Lesser said.

“Having China and Russia in the room now is a very different question than it would have been a decade ago,” he said. “It is very difficult now for any of these large-scale summits to avoid the major issues of the issues of the day, and these major issues are very polarizing — the war in Ukraine, tensions in the Indo-Pacific, even climate policy — the things that are both at the top of the global agenda but also very difficult to address.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping will not be attending the G20 themselves, instead sending lower-level officials.

Russia and China did not indicate why their leaders were not attending, but neither have traveled much recently and both seem to be putting a greater emphasis on the more like-minded BRICS group of nations: Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. That group agreed at its summit last month to expand to include Iran, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Argentina, Egypt and Ethiopia.

China’s relations with India continue to be strained over ongoing border disputes, but despite the decision to send Premier Li Qiang instead of Xi, Modi and Xi did discuss the issue face-to-face at the BRICS summit and China’s Foreign Ministry said Beijing considers India-China relations “generally stable.”

India also has historic ties with Moscow, but is on good terms with the U.S. too. Modi is hoping to use his country’s influence to bridge gaps between the wealthy nations that have been standing together to sanction Russia over the Ukraine war and the Global South.

About half of the G20 countries are found in the Global South — depending on how one defines it — and Modi hopes to add the African Union as a bloc member.

In preparation, he held a virtual “Voice of the Global South” summit in January and has emphasized issues critical to developing nations, including alternative fuels like hydrogen, resource efficiency, developing a common framework for digital public infrastructure and food security.

“For the Global South, India’s presidency is seen as an opportunity with immense potential to address developmental needs, particularly as Brazil and South Africa are set to take over the presidency of the G20 from India in 2024 in 2025 respectively,” Hussain said.

U.S. National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters before Biden’s departure that the president supported adding the African Union as a permanent member and that the president hoped this summit “will show that the world’s major economies can work together even in challenging times.”

The U.S. will also focus on many of Modi’s priorities, including reforming multilateral development banks, especially the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, to help developing countries, Sullivan said. Biden will also call for “meaningful debt relief” for low- and middle-income countries, and seek to make progress on other priorities including climate and health issues.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen on Friday dismissed suggestions that the proposals are designed to counter China’s global lending and investment through its so-called Belt and Road Initiative.

Michel, the EU council president, said he had hope the summit would be productive.

“I do not think the G20 will resolve in two days all the problems of the world,” he said. “But I think it can be a bold step in the right direction and we should work to make it happen and support the Indian presidency.”
…

Russian authorities are holding local elections this weekend in occupied parts of Ukraine in an effort to tighten their grip on territories Moscow illegally annexed a year ago and still does not fully control.

The voting for Russian-installed legislatures in the Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions has already begun and concludes Sunday. It has been denounced by Kyiv and the West.

“It constitutes a flagrant violation of international law, which Russia continues to disregard,” the Council of Europe, the continent’s foremost human rights body, said this week.

Kyiv echoed that sentiment, with the parliament saying in a statement that the balloting in areas where Russia “conducts active hostilities” poses a threat to Ukrainian lives. Lawmakers urged other countries not to recognize the results of the vote.

For Russia — which launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine 18 months ago — it is important to go on with the voting to maintain the illusion of normalcy, despite the fact that the Kremlin does not have full control over the annexed regions, political analyst Abbas Gallyamov said.

“The Russian authorities are trying hard to pretend that everything is going according to plan, everything is fine. And if everything is going according to plan, then the political process should go according to plan,” said Gallyamov, who worked as a speechwriter for Russian President Vladimir Putin when Putin served as prime minister.

Voters are supposed to elect regional legislatures, which in turn will appoint regional governors. In the Donetsk and Luhansk provinces, thousands of candidates are also competing for seats on dozens of local councils.

The balloting is scheduled for the same weekend as other local elections in Russia. In the occupied regions, early voting kicked off last week as election officials went door to door or set up makeshift polling stations in public places to attract passersby.

The main contender in the election is United Russia, the Putin-loyal party that dominates Russian politics, although other parties, such as the Communist Party and the nationalist Liberal Democratic party, are also on the ballots.

For some residents of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, large swaths of which have been held by Russian-backed separatists since 2014, there is nothing unusual about the vote.

“For the last nine years, we’ve been striving to get closer with Russia, and Russian politicians are well-known to us,” Sergei, a 47-year-old resident of the occupied city of Luhansk, told The Associated Press, asking that his last name be withheld for security reasons. “We’re speaking Russian and have felt like part of Russia for a long time, and these elections only confirm that.”

Some voters in Donetsk shared Sergei’s sentiment, expressing love for Russia and saying they want to be part of it.

The picture appears bleaker in Kherson and Zaporizhzhia. Local residents and Ukrainian activists say poll workers make house calls accompanied by armed soldiers, and most voters know little about the candidates, up to half of whom reportedly arrived from Russia — including remote regions in Siberia and the far east.

“In most cases, we don’t know these Russian candidates, and we’re not even trying to figure it out,” said Konstantin, who currently lives in the Russian-held part of the Kherson region on the eastern bank of the Dnieper River.

Using only his first name for safety reasons, Konstantin said in a phone interview that billboards advertising Russian political parties have sprung up along the highways, and сampaign workers have been bused in ahead of the vote.

But “locals understand that these elections don’t influence anything” and “are held for Russian propaganda purposes,” Kostantin said, comparing this year’s vote to the referendums Moscow staged last year in the four partially occupied regions.

Those referendums were designed to put a veneer of democracy on the annexation. Ukraine and the West denounced them as a sham and decried the annexation as illegal.

Weeks after the referendums, Russian troops withdrew from the city of Kherson, the capital of the region of the same name, and areas around it, ceding them back to Ukraine. As a result, Moscow has maintained control of about 70% of the region.

Three other regions are also only partially occupied, and Kyiv’s forces have managed to regain more land — albeit slowly and in small chunks — during their summer counteroffensive.

In the occupied part of the Zaporizhzhia region, where the counteroffensive efforts are focused, Moscow-installed authorities declared a holiday on Friday for the voting.

The Russian-appointed governor of the annexed region, Yevgeny Balitsky, noted in a recent statement that 13 front-line cities and villages in the region come under regular shelling, but he expressed hope that despite the difficulties, the United Russia party “will get the result it deserves.”

Ivan Fyodorov, Ukrainian mayor of Melitopol, a Russian-held city in the Zaporizhzhia region, told The Associated Press that local residents are effectively being forced to vote.

“When there’s an armed person standing in front of you, it’s hard to say no,” he said.

Early in the war, Fyodorov was kidnapped by Russian troops and held in captivity. He moved to Ukrainian-controlled territory upon release.

There are four different parties on the ballot, the mayor said, but billboards advertise only one — United Russia. “It looks like the Russian authorities know the result (of the election) already,” Fyodorov said.

The city’s population of 60,000 — down from 149,000 before the war — has been subject to enhanced security in the days leading up to the election, according to Fyodorov. Authorities stop people in the streets to check their identification documents and detain anyone who looks suspicious, he said.

“People are intimidated and scared, because everyone understands that an election in an occupied city is like voting in prison,” Fyodorov said.

Russian authorities aim to have up to 80% of the population take part in the early voting, according to the Eastern Human Rights Group, a Ukrainian rights group that monitors the vote in the occupied territories.

Poll workers go door to door — to markets, grocery stores and other public places — to get people to cast ballots. Both those who have gotten Russian citizenship and those still holding Ukrainian passports are allowed to vote.

Those who refuse to vote are being detained for three or four hours, the group’s coordinator, Pavlo Lysianskyi, said. The authorities make them “write an explanatory statement, which later becomes grounds for a criminal case against the person.”

Lysianskyi’s group has counted at least 104 cases of Ukrainians being detained in occupied regions for refusing to take part in the vote.

In the end, Gallyamov, the Russian analyst, said Russian authorities will not get “anything good in terms of boosting their legitimacy” in the occupied regions.
…

Rescuers from across Europe rushed to a cave in Turkey on Thursday, launching an operation to save an American researcher who became trapped almost 1,000 meters below the cave’s entrance after suffering stomach bleeding.

Experienced caver Mark Dickey, 40, suddenly became ill during an expedition with a handful of others, including three other Americans, in the Morca cave in southern Turkey’s Taurus Mountains, the European Association of Cave Rescuers said.

While rescuers, including a Hungarian doctor, have reached and treated Dickey, it could be days and possibly weeks before they are able to get him out of the cave, which is too narrow in places for a stretcher to pass through.

In a video message from inside the cave and made available Thursday by Turkey’s communications directorate, Dickey thanked the caving community and the Turkish government for their efforts.

“The caving world is a really tight-knit group and it’s amazing to see how many people have responded on the surface,” said Dickey. ” … I do know that the quick response of the Turkish government to get the medical supplies that I need, in my opinion, saved my life. I was very close to the edge.”

Dickey, who is seen standing and moving around in the video, said that while he is alert and talking, he is not “healed on the inside” and will need a lot of help to get out of the cave. Doctors will decide whether he will need to leave the cave on a stretcher or if he can leave under his own power.

Dickey, who had been bleeding and losing fluid from his stomach, has stopped vomiting and has eaten for the first time in days, according to a New Jersey-based cave rescue group he’s affiliated with. It’s unclear what caused his medical issue.

The New Jersey Initial Response Team said the rescue will require many teams and constant medical care. The group says the cave is also quite cold — about 4-6 degrees Celsius.

Communication with Dickey takes about five to seven hours and is carried out by runners, who go from Dickey to the camp below the surface where a telephone line to speak with the surface has been set up.

Experts said it will be a challenge to successfully rescue Dickey.

Yusuf Ogrenecek of the Speleological Federation of Turkey said that one of the most difficult tasks of cave rescue operations is widening the narrow cave passages to allow stretcher lines to pass through at low depths.

Stretcher lines are labor intensive and require experienced cave rescuers working long hours, Ogrenecek said. He added that other difficult factors range from navigating through mud and water at low temperatures to the psychological toll of staying inside a cave for long periods of time.

Marton Kovacs of the Hungarian Cave Rescue Service said that the cave is being prepared for Dickey’s safe extraction. Passages are being widened and the danger of falling rocks is also being addressed.

Turkish disaster relief agency AFAD and rescue team UMKE are working with Turkish and international cavers on the plan to hoist Dickey out of the cave system, the European Cave Rescue Association said.

The rescue effort currently involves more than 170 people, including doctors, paramedics who are tending to Dickey and experienced cavers, Ogrenecek said, adding that the rescue operation could take up to two to three weeks.

The operation includes rescue teams from Bulgaria, Croatia, Hungary, Italy, Poland and Turkey.

Dickey was described by the association as “a highly trained caver and a cave rescuer himself” who is well known as a cave researcher, or speleologist, from his participation in many international expeditions. He is secretary of the association’s medical committee.

Dickey was on an expedition mapping the 1,276-meter-deep Morca cave system for the Anatolian Speleology Group Association (ASPEG) when he ran into trouble about 1,000 meters down, according to Ogrenecek. He initially became ill on Saturday, but it took until Sunday morning to notify others who were above ground.

Justin Hanley, a 28-year-old firefighter from near Dallas, Texas, said he met Dickey a few months ago when he took a cave rescue course Dickey taught in Hungary and Croatia. He described Dickey as upbeat and as someone who sees the good in everyone.

“Mark is the guy that should be on that rescue mission that’s leading and consulting and for him to be the one that needs to be rescued is kind of a tragedy in and of itself,” he said.

A team of rescuers from Italy’s National Alpine and Speleological Rescue Team will be flying to Turkey on Thursday night. A total of around 50 rescuers will be at the entrance of the cave early Friday ready to participate in the operation directed by Turkish authorities.

The rescue teams hope that the extraction can begin on Saturday or Sunday. Kovacs said that lifting Dickey will likely take several days, and that several bivouac points are being prepared along the way so that Dickey and rescue teams can rest.

The cave has been divided into several sections, with each country’s rescue team being responsible for one section.

The Hungarian Cave Rescue Service, made up of volunteer rescuers, was the first to arrive at Dickey’s location and provided emergency blood transfusions to stabilize his condition. 
…

South Korean officials say North Korea has likely been invited to join Russia and China for the first time in trilateral naval exercises that experts see as a response to the newly cemented strategic cooperation among South Korea, Japan and the United States.

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu is believed to have proposed the joint naval drills during a visit to Pyongyang in July, according to South Korean lawmaker Yoo Sang-bum. Yoo said National Intelligence Service Director Kim Kyou-hyun briefed about the proposal at a closed-door meeting on Monday.

China and Russia have held annual joint naval exercises for over a decade, but this would mark the first time that North Korea has been invited to participate. The development followed reports that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un is expected to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin this month to discuss possible weapons transfers.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said at a press briefing on Thursday that she did not have information about the proposed drills with Russia and North Korea.

David Maxwell, vice president of the Center for Asia Pacific Strategy, told VOA the proposal for naval drills appeared to be “a direct response” to what he called “JAROKUS,” or “the new Japan-ROK-US security arrangement,” using an acronym for South Korea’s official name, the Republic of Korea.

He said that arrangement, sealed at a mid-August summit at the Camp David presidential retreat outside Washington, is “arguably the most important security arrangement in Northeast Asia in the 21st century and probably in the last seven decades.”

‘Authoritarian axis’

Maxwell said members of the Moscow-Beijing-Pyongyang “authoritarian axis” may also feel a need to counter other U.S.-led security alliances, including AUKUS (Australia, the U.K. and the U.S.), the QUAD (Australia, India, Japan and the U.S.) and NATO.

The United States, South Korea and Japan have conducted several joint ballistic missile defense drills of their own this year in response to North Korea’s missile launches.

At Camp David, the three countries agreed to hold annual multidomain trilateral exercises and exchange real-time missile warning data. They also committed to consult as necessary on military responses to common threats.

Bruce Bennett, a senior defense analyst at the RAND Corporation, said joint drills by Beijing, Moscow and Pyongyang “will be pretty preliminary” in the beginning as the three militaries learn how to share information and communicate with each other.

“That doesn’t mean that’s where they’re going to end,” he said. “This would be the beginning of a whole sequence of naval drills and ground and air drills” in which the countries would most likely cooperate.

China and Russia have held annual naval drills since 2012, according to the Chinese Defense Ministry. The militaries of the two countries began training together in 2005, and in 2018, Beijing sent its ground troops and aircraft to join Russia’s Vostok exercises, according to the RAND Corporation.

In July, Beijing and Moscow held Northern/Interaction-2023 military exercises in the Sea of Japan. It was the first drill they had conducted near Japan.

Reports of the trilateral naval drills came just days before Kim is expected to travel to Russia’s far eastern port city of Vladivostok to attend the September 10-13 Eastern Economic Forum. While there, he is expected to meet Putin to discuss potential arms deliveries.

The New York Times, citing U.S. and allied officials on Monday, said Putin is likely to ask Kim for artillery shells and antitank missiles for use in his war in Ukraine, while Kim will probably ask for satellite technology and nuclear-powered submarines.

On Friday in North Korea, the state-run KCNA news agency said the country had held a “submarine-launching ceremony” on Wednesday that it said would bolster its naval force. Kim said equipping the navy with nuclear weapons is an urgent task as he inspected what KCNA described as tactical nuclear submarine “Hero Kim Kun Ok” on Thursday.

Assist to Russian army

Patrick Cronin, the Asia-Pacific security chair at the Washington-based Hudson Institute, said the North Korean weapons could “help the Russian army persevere in a primarily stalemated war in Ukraine.”

But even without the North Korean weapons, he said, Putin is likely to benefit from the trilateral naval drills because they would “help divert international attention from Ukraine” by “elevating security concerns for the United States and its allies in Asia.”

Mao, the Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson, said at a press briefing on Thursday that the potential arms negotiations between Moscow and Pyongyang are matters that relate to the two countries, and she declined to comment further.

But other experts said China also stands to benefit from anything that prolongs the war in Ukraine.

“The upside for Beijing … is that it depletes U.S. weapons stockpiles and makes it harder for the U.S. to fulfill weapons commitments to Taiwan,” said Dennis Wilder, who served as the National Security Council director for China in 2004-05.

“It also keeps significant U.S. forces focused on Europe and away from the Indo-Pacific,” he said.

Bennett at RAND said the U.S. and its allies had “depleted a lot of our weapons stocks, sending them off to Ukraine without adequately replacing anything.”

“We no longer have a two-major-theater war capability,” he said. “What do we do if all of a sudden we have three major wars?” including the war in Ukraine and potential conflicts over Taiwan and in the Korean Peninsula.

White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan said at a press briefing Tuesday that Russia’s weapons were depleted as well.

Describing Russia’s outreach to North Korea as an act of desperation, he said Moscow finds it necessary only because the U.S. and its allies “have continued to squeeze Russia’s defense industrial base.”
…

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, are pledging deeper economic cooperation as the list of international sanctions on Russia grows. Dorian Jones reports from Istanbul.
…

The United Kingdom pledged on Thursday to find the former army soldier suspected of terrorism who escaped from prison by hiding under a food delivery van.

Daniel Abed Khalife is believed to have escaped from a medium-security London prison on Wednesday by leaving the prison kitchen where he was working and fastening himself to the bottom of a van.

“Daniel Khalife will be found, and he will be made to face justice,” U.K. Justice Minister Alex Chalk told parliament on Thursday.

The 21-year-old terrorist suspect is now the subject of a nationwide manhunt, which includes enhanced security checks at ports and airports. But as of Thursday evening in the U.K., police said there had not been any confirmed sightings of Khalife.

Discharged from the British army in May, the former soldier was awaiting trial on offenses related to terrorism and the Official Secrets Act.

Khalife is accused of planting fake bombs at an army base in England and collecting sensitive personal information about soldiers from a U.K. Defense Ministry database. He is also accused of gathering information for Iran, the BBC reported.

Khalife denied all the charges against him.

At parliament on Thursday, Chalk also said there would be an immediate investigation into the prison’s protocols and the decision about where Khalife was held. A second independent investigation will take place at a later date, Chalk said.

“No stone must be left unturned in getting to the bottom of what happened,” Chalk said.

More than 150 investigators and police staff are on the case, according to Metropolitan Police Commander Dominic Murphy, who is the lead investigator.

Some information in this report came from Reuters and The Associated Press.
…

The United States and Britain on Thursday sanctioned 11 people who are part of the Russia-based Trickbot cybercrime hacking group, accusing it of targeting critical government infrastructure and businesses, along with hospitals, during the coronavirus pandemic.

A U.S. Treasury statement said the blacklisted targets included “key actors involved in management and procurement” for Trickbot, which it said has ties to Russian intelligence services.

Treasury undersecretary Brian Nelson said in a statement, “The United States is resolute in our efforts to combat ransomware and respond to disruptions of our critical infrastructure.”

Ransomware refers to the demand for payments to unlock computer services that cybercriminals have frozen.

British Foreign Secretary James Cleverly said the sanctions are an attempt to disrupt Trickbot’s business model and strip officials of their anonymity.

“We know who they are and what they are doing,” he said in a statement. 

British officials said the Trickbot group had extorted at least $180 million from people around the world to restore their computer services.

In conjunction with the sanctions, which block any assets the Trickbot officials have in the United States and Britain, the U.S. Justice Department unsealed indictments against nine individuals in the gang.

The U.S. said that in one instance, the Trickbot group used ransomware against three medical facilities in the midwestern state of Minnesota, “disrupting their computer networks and telephones, and causing a diversion of ambulances.”

The U.S. said Trickbot workers “publicly gloated over the ease of targeting the medical facilities and the speed in which ransoms had been paid to the group.” 
…

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited a Ukrainian border guard site on the outskirts of Kyiv Thursday as he opened the final day of an unannounced two-day visit.

The tour included presenting four U.S.-provided mine-resistant ambush-protected vehicles that are part of a group of 190 of the vehicles to be delivered in coming months.

Blinken also met with a Ukrainian team working to clear unexploded Russian ordnance at a farm where corn was grown for export.

“What’s hard to get our minds around is that one third of Ukrainian territory has mines or unexploded ordnance on it,” Blinken said.  

“Your work is having a profound impact on the lives of Ukrainians and on people around the world,” he said, noting Ukraine’s importance to global food supply.

Blinken Wednesday announced $1 billion in new U.S. aid for Ukraine, with $175 million in security aid that includes additional air defense equipment, artillery munitions, anti-tank weapons including depleted uranium rounds for previously committed Abrams tanks, and other equipment.

Asked whether he is concerned about sustaining support for that level of U.S. aid among American citizens and lawmakers, Blinken was optimistic.

“I was last here almost exactly a year ago,” he said. “And in that time, in the year since I was last here, Ukraine has taken back more than 50% of the territory that Russia has seized from it since February 2022. In the current counteroffensive, we are seeing real progress over the last few weeks.”

Ukrainian Foreign Affairs Minister Dmytro Kuleba said what is being decided in this war is not just about Ukraine, but about what the world is going to look like after the war is over. If Russia wins, other autocrats will be empowered to invade their neighbors, he said, asking, ‘If the West cannot win this war, what war can they win?”

However, on Capitol Hill, one Republican senator expressed concerns to VOA, saying he would like to see a definitive strategy from the Biden administration for Ukraine to win the war.

“I’d like to see an announcement coming from all the NATO members saying that they are willing to step up. … I just got back from a trip to Europe, and we encouraged our NATO allies to actually step up their game, and I would like to see that happen,” Senator Bill Hagerty of Tennessee, a member of the Foreign Relations Committee, said.

The United States is the largest donor of military aid to Ukraine in total dollars. Other countries, including Denmark, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia, Norway, Finland, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and the Czech Republic, are making larger financial contributions to Ukraine relative to the size of their own economies, according to the Kiel Institute for the World Economy in Germany.

Some information in this report was provided by VOA congressional correspondent Katherine Gypson.
…

Britain is rejoining the European Union’s science-sharing program Horizon Europe, the two sides announced Thursday, more than two years after membership became a casualty of Brexit.

British scientists expressed relief at the decision, the latest sign of thawing relations between the EU and its former member.

After months of negotiations, the British government said the country was becoming a “fully associated member” of the research collaboration body. U.K.-based scientists can bid for Horizon funding starting Thursday and will be able to lead Horizon-backed science projects starting in 2024. Britain is also rejoining Copernicus, the EU space program’s Earth observation component.

“The EU and U.K. are key strategic partners and allies, and today’s agreement proves that point,” said European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, who signed off on the deal during a call with Prime Minister Rishi Sunak on Wednesday. “We will continue to be at the forefront of global science and research.”

The EU blocked Britain from Horizon during a feud over trade rules for Northern Ireland, the only part of the U.K. that shares a border with an EU member, the Republic of Ireland.

The two sides struck a deal to ease those tensions in February, but Horizon negotiations have dragged on over details of how much the U.K. will pay for its membership.

Sunak said he had struck the “right deal for British taxpayers.” The U.K. will not have to pay for the period it was frozen out of Horizon.

Relations between Britain and the bloc were severely tested during the long divorce negotiations that followed Britain’s 2016 vote to leave the EU. The divorce became final in 2020 with the agreement of a bare-bones trade and cooperation deal, but relations chilled still further under strongly pro-Brexit U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson.

Johnson’s government introduced a bill that would let it unilaterally rip up parts of the Brexit agreement, a move the EU called illegal.

Johnson left office amid scandal in mid-2022, and Sunak’s government has quietly worked to improve Britain’s relationship with its European neighbors, though trade friction and deep-rooted mistrust still linger.

British scientists, who feared Brexit would hurt international research collaboration, breathed sighs of relief at the Horizon deal.

“This is an essential step in rebuilding and strengthening our global scientific standing,” said Paul Nurse, director of the Francis Crick Institute for biomedical research. “Thank you to the huge number of researchers in the U.K. and across Europe who, over many years, didn’t give up on stressing the importance of international collaboration for science.”

The U.K.’s opposition Labour Party welcomed the deal but said Britain had already missed out on “two years’ worth of innovation.”

“Two years of global companies looking around the world for where to base their research centers and choosing other countries than Britain, because we are not part of Horizon,” said Labour science spokesman Peter Kyle. “This is two years of wasted opportunity for us as a country.”
…

The Ukrainian military said Thursday its air defenses destroyed 25 of 33 drones that Russia used to attack the Sumy and Odesa regions overnight.  

Oleh Kiper, the regional governor of Odesa, said the Russian attack hit the Izmail area for the fourth time in five days, injuring one person.

Kiper said the attack also damaged port infrastructure facilities and an administrative building.

Russia’s Defense Ministry said it destroyed two Ukrainian drones over the Rostov region, as well as one in Bryansk and another on the outskirts of Moscow.

Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said on Telegram that debris from a downed drone landed in the Ramensky district but did not cause any damage or casualties.  

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy introduced new Defense Minister Rustem Umerov on Thursday, saying “transparency and trust” are a priority.

Zelenskyy said he wants Umerov to “strengthen the ministry’s strategic and coordination functions for the entire defense sector, prioritize individual warriors and cut red tape, develop international cooperation and ensure Ukraine completes its NATO accession homework, and scale up the successes of specific units for all of our defense forces.”

Zelenskyy picked Umerov to replace Oleksii Reznikov, who helped secure Western military aid in response to Russia’s full-scale invasion.  The leadership shakeup followed allegations of corruption at the Defense Ministry, which Reznikov dismissed as a smear campaign.

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg told the European Parliament on Thursday that Ukrainian forces are gradually gaining ground and breaching Russian defenses in their counteroffensive.  He pushed back against critics who say the counteroffensive has not been successful, citing the unpredictable nature of war and the need to stand by Ukraine through both good days and bad. 

“To support Ukraine is not an option, it is a necessity to ensure that to preserve peace for our members, for our countries, and to ensure that authoritarian regimes [don’t] achieve what they want by violating international law and using military force,” Stoltenberg said.

The NATO chief also said he expects Turkey’s parliament to ratify Sweden’s accession to the alliance “as soon as possible” when lawmakers reconvene in October.

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

Russia is criticizing a new U.S. aid package for Ukraine that includes depleted uranium tank ammunition, saying the decision to send the rounds “is a clear sign of inhumanity.”

Russia’s embassy in Washington said on Telegram Wednesday that the United States is “deliberately transferring weapons with indiscriminate effects” and that it is fully aware of potential health and safety consequences from the ammunition.

The tank rounds could help Ukrainian forces destroy Russian tanks and have previously been provided to Ukraine by Britain.

Pentagon spokesperson Marine Corps Lt. Col. Garron Garn defended the use of the munitions in a statement to The Associated Press in March, saying the U.S. military “has procured, stored, and used depleted uranium rounds for several decades, since these are a longstanding element of some conventional munitions.”

Garn said Russia is among the countries that have long possessed depleted uranium rounds.

The U.N. Office for Disarmament Affairs says depleted uranium is the main byproduct of uranium enrichment, and that because of its high density it is used in munitions designed to penetrate armor plating.

The International Atomic Energy Agency said multiple evaluations of areas where depleted uranium munitions have been used “indicated that the existence of depleted uranium residues dispersed in the environment does not pose a radiological hazard to the population of the affected regions.”

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

After hitting several resets, restoring historic treasures to former colonies, downsizing its military presence and striking new ties elsewhere on the continent, France’s Africa strategy seems at an impasse, some experts say.

Coups in half a dozen former French colonies in West and Central Africa over three years — including two, in Niger and Gabon, in just over a month — are sparking fresh soul searching about what went wrong and how, if possible, to put longstanding relations and interests back on track. 

Yet many suggest Paris can no longer call the shots, as some African governments cut ties altogether and carve new ones with foreign rivals, including Russia. 

“French influence in the Sahel has collapsed,” wrote France’s influential Le Monde newspaper this past week. “Elsewhere on the continent, it is on the defensive, and nothing Paris says can restore it.” 

That assessment comes as the paper and other media report that discussions between Paris and Niger’s military are under way about the withdrawal of some military elements from the African country.

Until now, French authorities have refused to recognize the military junta that seized power in Niger in late July, dismissing calls for its ambassador and 1,500 French troops stationed there to depart. 

The power grab in Niamey followed a now-familiar playbook. Not so long ago, Niger, along with neighboring Burkina Faso and Mali, cooperated closely with Paris in a broader Sahel alliance fighting a jihadist insurgency. All three since have seen civilian leaders toppled by their militaries, followed by protests, sprinkled with Russian flags and slogans calling for the ouster of French forces and diplomats. 

The latest coup last week in oil-rich Gabon — once a staunch and long-standing ally of Paris — has taken a different path. Unlike in Niger, there have been no planeloads of French expatriates returning home or massive anti-French rallies. Although Paris suspended military cooperation — even though it has 400 troops in Gabon — it offered a muted reaction to the toppling of long-term leader Ali Bongo by his reported cousin, following disputed presidential elections. 

Junta leader Gen. Brice Oligui Nguema has restored the transmission of French broadcasters France 24 and Radio France International, cut under Bongo — while the three Sahel coup countries, Burkina Faso, Mail and Niger,  continue to keep those news organizations off the air. 

Listening to Africans? 

Berges Miette, an Africa research associate at Sciences-Po Bordeaux University in France, Miette takes the long view of simmering anti-French sentiment. In the late 1980s, he says, France continued to support some hardline regimes that held onto power, despite a wave of political uprisings. 

African youth, Miette says, have now “stopped dreaming,” pinning their hopes instead on heading to Europe. 

While so far staying silent on Gabon, French President Emmanuel Macron has decried an “epidemic of putsches” in the Sahel. Two other coups — in Guinea and Chad — have also taken place since 2020, with a mixed response from France. The French have maintained ties with Chad, a strong military ally in the Sahel, drawing accusations of having a double standard. 

In a lengthy interview in Le Monde, Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna defended France’s Africa strategy. She differentiated the ousting of Niger’s democratically elected president, Mohamed Bazoum, with the situation in Chad, where she said Paris counted on N’Djamena’s military government delivering on its promise to restore civilian rule. 

“One cannot see our relations with the continent through the single prism” of the Sahel crises, Colonna added. “It’s not 3,000 or 5,000 people demonstrating in a stadium in Niamey … that can resume our relations with 1.5 million Africans.”

France’s position, she said, “is to listen to Africans, not to decide in their place.” 

For a while, Macron — born after France’s last colony in Africa, Djibouti, gained its independence — seemed the right man for the job. 

“I am of a generation that doesn’t tell Africans what to do,” he told cheering students in Burkina Faso, shortly after his election six years ago. 

Macron pledged to return looted colonial-era artifacts, although only a fraction has been shipped back, and sought new ties elsewhere, including with Kenya, South Africa, Ethiopia and Angola. Like his recent predecessors, he maintained that the tangle of post-colonial business and political ties dubbed Francafrique was long dead. 

In February, Macron promised to draw down French forces in Africa and create a new “security partnership,” with bases on the continent transformed depending on African needs, and jointly managed with African staff. 

A coherent policy

Skeptics say Macron hasn’t always walked his talk. They point to many enduring trappings of French influence — from thousands of troops still stationed in Africa to a raft of longstanding mining concessions benefitting French companies, and the CFA franc, requiring West and Central African members to deposit half their foreign exchange reserves with the French treasury. 

Anti-French sentiment is on the rise in more stable countries, like Senegal, due to a youthful population untethered to the past, but very aware of the challenges of getting visas to France. 

Critics point to what they consider a series of French missteps, too, in the Sahel. Despite early wins, France’s decade-long counterterrorism operation there lost local trust, they say, and finally was shuttered last year amid a spreading Islamist insurgency. Even as France promotes democracy, skeptics describe a tacit acceptance of some authoritarian governments like Chad. 

“France needs to have a coherent policy,” says Sciences-Po researcher Miette, who argues anti-French sentiment is not the real threat to Paris, but rather “a profound questioning of France’s Africa policy.”

He counts among those who believe it is not too late for Paris to hit the reset button yet again. With other authoritarian regimes potentially at risk of falling — in Congo Brazzaville, Cameroon and Equatorial Guinea — the sooner, the better. 

“France has everything to win in changing its Africa policy,” Miette says. “It needs to go beyond talk and be concrete.” 
…

At a critical moment in Ukraine’s counteroffensive, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has ordered a changing of the guard, naming Rustem Umerov as the country’s new defense minister. 

On Wednesday, 338 of the 360 members of the Ukrainian parliament endorsed Umerov, a Crimean Tatar businessman, and a former parliamentarian. Observers see the replacement as part of Zelenskyy’s efforts to address corruption in his administration as the Ukrainian military strives to retake southern Ukraine and areas near the Crimean Peninsula.

A long-time financial supporter of the Crimean Tatar community and father of three, Umerov, a practicing Muslim, became a Member of the Ukrainian Parliament with the Holos party in 2014, championing a reformist and progressive agenda. 

Even before Russia’s full-scale invasion, he played a pivotal role in negotiations with Moscow. 

“He was part of the delegation that negotiated with Russia prior to the conflict. He played a key role in the grain deal due to his connections in Turkey, and our sources indicate his involvement in negotiations to secure the return of kidnapped Ukrainian children,” said Sevgil Musaeva, editor of the Ukrainska Pravda newspaper.

In an interview with Euronews in April 2022, Umerov was resolute, affirming that Ukraine would not compromise on territorial issues. “We want our partners to understand that the internationally recognized borders of Ukraine are a red line for us. Nevertheless, we are ready to hear any possible solutions that do not endanger our territory, our independence, and our dignity,” Umerov said in the interview.

Umerov brings with him a strong resumé as a skilled negotiator and has played a prominent role in efforts to return Crimea to Ukrainian control.

He serves as a co-chairman of the Crimean Platform, an international coordinating mechanism that seeks to negotiate the reversal of Russia’s 2014 unilateral annexation of the Crimean Peninsula. He is a member of the group responsible for developing the Strategy for the De-occupation and Reintegration of Crimea and Sevastopol, initiated by the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine in 2020.

Umerov has also led efforts to exchange political prisoners from Crimea and, as a member of parliament, helped shape legislation to provide social support to political prisoners and their families. 

“He is involved in a number of negotiations about the release of prisoners, as well as difficult negotiations about supplies of humanitarian support, weapons,” Tamila Tasheva, a prominent member of the Crimean Tatar community and the Permanent Representative of the President of Ukraine in the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, told VOA, citing Umerov’s strong communication skills and negotiating experience with Persian Gulf countries and Turkey.

In an interview with Ukrainska Pravda in October 2022, Umerov underscored his longstanding commitment to human rights, going back to when Ukraine was under pro-Russian governments before the Maidan Revolution of 2014. 

“I was born in Uzbekistan, but I returned to Ukraine, where I engaged in activities related to European and NATO initiatives when they weren’t popular,” Umerov told the newspaper.

Why now?

The change was necessary at a time when Ukrainians have grown wary of corruption scandals at the Defense Ministry, according to political analyst and director at Think Tank Politics, Mykola Davydiuk. In addition to being a problem for Ukraine, “it was a bad message to our foreign partners,” Davydiuk told VOA.

Rumors of Reznikov’s impending replacement had been circulating for a year. In February 2023, Fox News quoted David Arakhamia, Ukraine’s parliament majority leader as suggesting that Oleksiy Reznikov might be replaced, although the president chose not to act at the time, allowing then-Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov to remain in his position.

The decision to let Reznikov stay at the time came despite a shakeup at the Defense Ministry that included the resignations of Deputy Defense Minister Vyacheslav Shapovalov and Deputy Prosecutor General Oleksiy Symonenko in late January of the same year amid allegations of fraud and a coverup involving the purchase military food rations and equipment at inflated prices. 

The Defense Ministry denied any involvement in corrupt practices.

Last month, Ukrainian investigative reporter Mykhailo Tkach from Ukrainska Pravda exposed another scandal related to military procurement.

Reznikov himself does not face any charges in the corruption scandals. 

But the more recent revelation sparked new outrage among Ukrainians and sent a negative signal to Western partners about retaining Reznikov in his role, according to Davydiuk, who points to several other reasons for the timing of Reznikov’s removal.

“The start of the new political season, some unofficial push for replacement from the western partners, and preparation for the visit U.N. General Assembly to New York at the end of this month,” Davydiuk said, are other reasons, at a time when President Zelenskyy needs to address the corruption allegations, regain his credibility, and restore his positive image in the eyes of Western partners.

As Ukraine slowly retakes territory and sets its eyes on reclaiming Crimea, the job of ensuring victory is now on the shoulders of Umerov.
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Spanish soccer player Jenni Hermoso has formally accused Luis Rubiales, president of the Royal Spanish Football Federation, of sexual assault for an unwanted kiss after the Women’s World Cup final, the national prosecutor’s office announced Wednesday.

In late August, FIFA, world soccer’s governing body, issued Rubiales a 90-day suspension “pending the disciplinary proceedings opened” against him. The entire World Cup-winning team has refused to compete until Rubiales is ousted. Spanish politicians and some of the nation’s most famous soccer clubs and players have also denounced his conduct.

Rubiales, who says he has no plans to step down, maintains that the kiss was consensual and that he is the victim of a libelous political crusade.

Rafael del Amo, vice president of the Royal Spanish Football Federal, and two other federation officials have resigned in protest. On Tuesday, Jorge Vilda was fired as coach of the women’s soccer team.

Some information is from The Associated Press.
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