Washington — The U.S. on Thursday confirmed a historic prisoner swap with Russia that included the release of American journalists Evan Gershkovich and Alsu Kurmasheva, former U.S. Marine Paul Whelan, and permanent resident Vladimir Kara-Murza.

In total, the U.S. secured the release of 16 individuals, including five wrongfully detained Germans and seven Russian citizens, in return for eight held in America, Germany, Poland, Norway and Slovenia.

It marked the largest prisoner swap between the United States and Russia since the Cold War.

“Today’s exchange will be historic. Not since the Cold War has there been a similar number of individuals exchanged in this way,” national security adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters at a briefing. “It’s the culmination of many rounds of complex, painstaking negotiations over many, many months.”

Sullivan said the deal also marks the first time so many countries and allies worked together to secure the release of wrongfully detained individuals.

Alongside the Americans, the deal secures the release of German nationals and Russian political prisoners, including Dieter Voronin, Kevin Lick, Rico Krieger, Patrick Schoebel, Herman Moyzhes, Ilya Yashin, Liliya Chanysheva, Kseniya Fadeyeva, Vadim Ostanin, Andrey Pivovarov, Oleg Orlov, and Sasha Skochilenko.

Of the Americans, the longest held was Paul Whelan, a former U.S. Marine, who was arrested in Moscow in 2018. In 2020, he was sentenced to 16 years in a penal colony on spying charges that he and the U.S. government den

Wall Street Journal reporter Gershkovich and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty journalist Kurmasheva were both detained in 2023 and were convicted in separate closed trials on July 19, which were widely decried as shams.

And Kara-Murza, an activist and columnist for The Washington Post detained since April 2022, was also freed. The politician and historian won a Pulitzer for his letters written from prison.

On the Russian side, the Kremlin negotiated for the release of Vadim Krasikov, a Russian serving life in prison in Germany.

Sullivan told reporters: “It became clear that the Russians would not agree to the release of these individuals without an exchange that included Vadim Krasikov.”

Krasikov was convicted in the 2019 murder of a Chechen dissident in Berlin. He had previously been in the running to be exchanged for opposition leader Alexey Navalny, who died in February 2024.

Other individuals returning to Russia include Artem Viktorovich Dultsev and Anna Valerevna Dultseva from Slovenia; Mikhail Valeryevich Mikushin from Norway; Pavel Alekseyevich Rubtsov from Poland; and Roman Seleznev, Vladislav Klyushin and Vadim Konoshchenock from the United States.

Paul Beckett, an assistant editor at the Journal, who led the newspaper’s campaign to secure Gershkovich’s release, told VOA earlier this year that his colleague’s jailing highlights the dangers facing journalists around the world.

“It’s certainly a reminder for all of our reporters who are in dangerous places that journalism is a risky business,” Beckett said. “It is a noble and valued endeavor that some governments in the world really don’t like.”

Kurmasheva is a Prague-based editor on the Tatar-Bashkir Service of VOA’s sister outlet Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. The dual U.S.-Russian national traveled to Russia in May of 2023 to care for her ailing mother.

When Kurmasheva tried to leave the country in June 2023, authorities confiscated her passports, and she was waiting for them to be returned when she was detained in October 2023.

Kurmasheva had not been designated by the U.S. State Department as wrongfully detained. A senior administration official told VOA, however, that Kurmasheva became part of the negotiations shortly after she was detained, and the U.S. is glad to bring her home.

A similar deal in 2022 led to American basketball player Brittney Griner being freed in exchange for Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout, who was serving a 25-year sentence in the United States.

Kurmasheva’s husband, Pavel Butorin, said that since her arrest, his primary concern has been the couple’s daughters.

“They’re old enough to understand the brutality of the regime that captured their mother,” he told VOA in early July at their Prague home. “We dream of our family being reunited after this ordeal.”

The couple’s eldest daughter, Bibi, said she missed the little moments with her mother, like when they blasted music together on the car ride to school in the morning.

“And on the way back home from school, she would always bring snacks, and we would always talk about our day. I really miss that,” the 16-year-old said.

Patsy Widakuswara contributed to this report.
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LONDON — Within hours of a stabbing attack in northwest England that killed three young girls and wounded several more children, a false name of a supposed suspect was circulating on social media. Hours after that, violent protesters were clashing with police outside a nearby mosque.

Police say the name was fake, as were rumors that the 17-year-old suspect was an asylum-seeker who had recently arrived in Britain. Detectives say the suspect charged Thursday with murder and attempted murder was born in the U.K., and British media including the BBC have reported that his parents are from Rwanda.

That information did little to slow the lightning spread of the false name or stop right-wing influencers pinning the blame on immigrants and Muslims.

“There’s a parallel universe where what was claimed by these rumors were the actual facts of the case,” said Sunder Katwala, director of British Future, a think tank that looks at issues including integration and national identity. “And that will be a difficult thing to manage.”

Local lawmaker Patrick Hurley said the result was “hundreds of people descending on the town, descending on Southport from outside of the area, intent on causing trouble — either because they believe what they’ve written, or because they are bad faith actors who wrote it in the first place, in the hope of causing community division.”

One of the first outlets to report the false name, Ali Al-Shakati, was Channel 3 Now, an account on the X social media platform that purports to be a news channel. A Facebook page of the same name says it is managed by people in Pakistan and the U.S. A related website on Wednesday showed a mix of possibly AI-generated news and entertainment stories, as well as an apology for “the misleading information” in its article on the Southport stabbings.

By the time the apology was posted, the incorrect identification had been repeated widely on social media.

“Some of the key actors are probably just generating traffic, possibly for monetization,” said Katwala. The misinformation was then spread further by “people committed to the U.K. domestic far right,” he said.

Governments around the world, including Britain’s, are struggling with how to curb toxic material online. U.K. Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said Tuesday that social media companies “need to take some responsibility” for the content on their sites.

Katwala said that social platforms such as Facebook and X worked to “de-amplify” false information in real time after mass shootings at two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, in 2019.

Since Elon Musk, a self-styled free-speech champion, bought X, it has gutted teams that once fought misinformation on the platform and restored the accounts of banned conspiracy theories and extremists.

Rumors have swirled in the relative silence of police over the attack. Merseyside Police issued a statement saying the reported name for the suspect was incorrect, but have provided little information about him other than his age and birthplace of Cardiff, Wales.

Under U.K. law, suspects are not publicly named until they have been charged and those under 18 are usually not named at all. That has been seized on by some activists to suggest the police are withholding information about the attacker.

Tommy Robinson, founder of the far-right English Defense League, accused police of “gaslighting” the public. Nigel Farage, a veteran anti-immigration politician who was elected to Parliament in this month’s general election, posted a video on X speculating “whether the truth is being withheld from us” about the attack.

Brendan Cox, whose lawmaker wife Jo Cox was murdered by a far-right attacker in 2016, said Farage’s comments showed he was “nothing better than a Tommy Robinson in a suit.”

“It is beyond the pale to use a moment like this to spread your narrative and to spread your hatred, and we saw the results on Southport’s streets last night,” Cox told the BBC.
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Washington — The movement inside Russia of several high-profile political prisoners in recent days is fueling speculation that a prisoner swap with Western countries may be close.

Lawyers and relatives of at least eight individuals say they seem to have been moved from detention facilities across Russia. Those detained had been jailed for criticizing the Kremlin or spreading what Moscow views as false information about the Russian military.

At the same time, legal action by Belarus and Slovenia on foreign nationals has added to speculation in Western media that a multicountry swap, potentially involving Russia, the United States and Germany, may be in the works.

Among those detained in Russia whose location is currently unknown are former U.S. Marine Paul Whelan; British Russian activist and journalist Vladimir Kara-Murza, who contributes to The Washington Post; and Liliya Chanysheva, who worked closely with late opposition leader Alexey Navalny.

Whelan is serving a 16-year prison sentence on espionage charges that he denies. His lawyer told the Interfax news agency she cannot contact him, adding, “There are rumors of a possible exchange.”

The Post reported late Wednesday that prison officials had confirmed Kara-Murza had been moved from a prison colony but would not say where he was taken. The columnist is serving a 25-year prison sentence after being accused of treason because he criticized Russia’s war in Ukraine.

While some analysts believe the disappearances may be a sign of an imminent prisoner swap, others, like Russia expert Keir Giles, are more skeptical.

“We need to bear in mind that the people that we see reported are only the tip of the iceberg, and there are so many others that don’t get that worldwide media attention,” Giles, who works at the British think tank Chatham House, told VOA.

“To be disappeared within the system for a period of days or weeks or even longer is not that unusual,” Giles added. “It’s hard to tell what within the Russian prison system is deliberate cruelty and what is simply the result of inefficiency and incompetence, but the net effect, of course, on the victims is exactly the same.”

Navalny, for instance, was abruptly moved in secret from a prison in central Russia to one above the Arctic Circle in December 2023. The move took 20 days, Giles said. The opposition leader died at the prison in February.

Russia’s Foreign Ministry and Washington embassy did not immediately reply to VOA’s emails requesting comment for this story.

Other political prisoners missing this past week include German Russian citizen Kevin Lik; opposition activist Ksenia Fadeeva; anti-war artist Sasha Skochilenko; and critical politician Ilya Yashin.

Their disappearances come on the heels of other developments.

In Belarus on Tuesday, President Alexander Lukashenko unexpectedly pardoned Rico Krieger, a German who had been sentenced to death on terrorism charges. Belarus and Russia are close allies.

And on Wednesday, a Slovenian court sentenced two Russians to time served for espionage and said they would be deported to Russia.

Sergei Davidis doesn’t think the timing can be a coincidence. He is the head of the Political Prisoners Support Program and a member of the board at the Russian human rights group Memorial.

Memorial’s cochair, Oleg Orlov, is among the political prisoners to recently vanish.

“It seems that there is no other reasonable explanation than expectations of some swap,” Davidis told VOA from the Lithuanian capital, Vilnius.

He added that Russian President Vladimir Putin would need to pardon those involved in any potential swap as a formality.

Putin has previously signaled he would be willing to trade Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich for a Russian man named Vadim Krasikov, who is serving a life sentence in Germany for killing a Chechen dissident in Berlin.

Gershkovich is one of two American journalists imprisoned in Russia. The other is Alsu Kurmasheva. Both were convicted in secret trials on July 19 on charges that are widely viewed as bogus.

Commenting on remarks made by Putin earlier this year about a possible swap for Gershkovich, Giles said, “It is not a process that is pretending particularly hard to be legitimate. It’s just a straightforward extortion.”

The United States and Russia have been engaging in prisoner swap negotiations for months.

“The United States continues to be focused on working around the clock to work to get our wrongfully detained American citizens home,” State Department deputy spokesperson Vedant Patel told VOA at a Wednesday press briefing.

When asked about any updates on a potential prisoner swap, Patel said he had no updates.

Prisoner swaps are typically cloaked in secrecy.

Although the U.S. government has previously faced criticism for exchanging legitimate Russian criminals for innocent Americans, hostage advocate Diane Foley maintained that it is Washington’s duty to do everything it can to protect its citizens.

“They need to have the moral clarity to recognize that their citizen’s life is their responsibility. It’s their responsibility to do all they can to prioritize that life,” Foley told VOA.

Foley founded the Foley Foundation after the abduction and killing in Syria of her son, American journalist James Foley, in 2014. She says the U.S. has made some improvements in assisting families, but the burden still largely falls on relatives whose loved ones are unjustly held abroad.

Since launching a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Russia has cracked down hard on anything perceived as criticism of the Kremlin, leading to the arrests of scores of activists and journalists. In late 2023, rights group Memorial estimated there were nearly 1,000 political prisoners jailed in Russia.

Saqib Ul Islam contributed to this report.
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Pristina, Kosovo/Washington — Journalists and media advocates are concerned that a new law in Kosovo could give the government greater control.

The new law seeks to license online media, give the Independent Media Commission, or IMC, power to monitor news websites, and increase the number of politically appointed members of the body, which is responsible for the regulation, management and oversight of the broadcasting frequency spectrum in the Republic of Kosovo.

The law includes hefty fines for the media that violate the law, ranging from $215 to $43,000. However, the legislation does not provide details of how the fines will be applied, according to the Media Freedom Rapid Response, which monitors conditions for the media.

First adopted by the Kosovo government in December, the law passed earlier in July, despite criticism. Two opposition parties have said they will refer the case to the Constitutional court.

Among the concerns is the increase in IMC members, all of whom are political appointees. With the Vetevendosje party holding the majority, the expansion has led to concerns that the IMC could come under political influence.

The government has pushed back against criticism. It says that it is seeking only to reform the media landscape.

The chair of the parliamentary committee on media, Valon Ramadani, has previously said the law does not “infringe the independence of media” and described it as an effort to align the country’s media laws with the EU standards.

Critics however say the law could allow for government overreach and expand the authority and the control of the IMC.

The chair of Association of Journalists of Kosovo, Xhemalj Rexha, says the law threatens the plurality of the media in Kosovo.

“This ability to allow many voices to be heard, especially among the Albanian-language media, is an added value, and Kosovo should be proud of it,” Rexha said during an event in Kosovo titled “Regulation or a Threat to the Media Freedom.”

“This is an attempt, among other things, to discourage the media from doing their job through these fines.”

Ardita Zejnullahu from the Association of Independent Electronic Media of Kosovo, also spoke on the panel.

He said the fines and the planned expansion of the Independent Media Commission were the main challenges.

“For a cable operator, a fine of 40,000 euros is negligible. But for a radio, a television or web-based media, which also fall under the Commission’s jurisdiction according to this law, it means their closure,” said Zejnullahu.

“The law does not define the sanctions or the type of violations that will be sanctioned. There is no distinction made between administrative, ethical or technical violations, and they remain at the discretion of the members of the Commission to determine.”

A group of watchdogs, including the Media Freedom Rapid Response, released a statement citing “alarm” over the law.

“Critics have seen the proposed legislation as an attack on the media, expressing worries that the ruling party may use this law to censor them. Now, [with these] risks becoming a reality, with potentially dire consequences for media freedom and independence,” said the statement.

Kosovo ranks 75 out of 180 on the World Press Freedom Index. Reporters Without Borders, which compiles the index, says that while the country is doing well in some areas, journalists can still be the target of political attacks.
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No evidence has surfaced linking the West to attacks against Wagner, although Ukraine has indicated it provided support to Mali separatists battling Russian troops.
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London — Huw Edwards, the BBC’s former top news presenter, pleaded guilty Wednesday to three counts of making indecent images of children. 

The offenses he pleaded guilty to at Westminster Magistrates’ Court in central London during a 26-minute hearing involved images shared on WhatsApp between December 2020 and August 2021 by a man who had initially contacted Edwards via social media. 

Edwards, who was the lead anchor on the BBC’s nighttime news for two decades and led the public broadcaster’s coverage of the funeral of Queen Elizabeth II in 2022, has been remanded on bail until a pre-sentencing hearing on Sept. 16. He could face up to 10 years in prison, though the prosecution conceded that a suspended sentence may be appropriate. 

The court heard that Edwards, 62, was involved in an online chat with an adult man on the messaging service who sent him 377 sexual images, of which 41 were indecent images of children. 

The images that were sent included seven of what are known as “category A,” which are the most indecent. Of those, the estimated age of most of the children was between 13 and 15, but one was aged between 7 and 9. 

The court also heard that the unnamed male asked Edwards on Feb. 2, 2021 whether what he was sending was too young. Edwards told him not to send any underage images. Five more, though, were sent, and the exchange of pornographic images continued until April 2022. 

“Accessing indecent images of underage people perpetuates the sexual exploitation of children, which has deep, long-lasting trauma on these victims,” said Claire Brinton of the Crown Prosecution Service. 

Speaking in Edwards’ defense, his lawyer Philip Evans said there is “no suggestion” that his client had “in the traditional sense of the word, created any image of any sort.” 

Edwards, he added, “did not keep any images, did not send any to anyone else and did not and has not sought similar images from anywhere else.” He added that Edwards had “both mental and physical” health issues and that he is “not just of good character, but of exceptional character.” 

Prosecutor Ian Hope told the court that Edwards’ “genuine remorse” was one reason why a suspended sentence might be considered. Setting out the potential penalties under the law, he said that where there is the prospect of rehabilitation, a community order and sexual offender treatment program could be considered as alternatives to prison. 

A spokesperson for the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children said there should be “no doubt” about the seriousness of Edwards’ crimes. 

“It can be extremely traumatic for young people to know sexual images of themselves have been shared online,” the spokesperson said. “We also need to see online platforms do much more to identify and disrupt child abuse in private messaging services in order to safeguard young people.” 

Edwards, who was one of the BBC’s top earners, was suspended in July 2023 for separate claims made last year. He later resigned for health reasons. 
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Only days into the Paris Olympics, France has already weathered attacks on its rail and internet service. But it’s also mounted a massive security umbrella that includes tens of thousands of police, gendarmes — and soldiers. Many troops now patrolling the streets of the French capital have done duty in foreign countries, as Lisa Bryant reports from Paris.
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An announcement that China’s car giant BYD will build a billion-dollar factory in Turkey marks a big turnaround in relations between the two countries. The move comes after years of tensions over Ankara’s support of Chinese minority Uyghurs. As Dorian Jones reports from Istanbul, the two countries are increasingly finding common ground not only economically but diplomatically.
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Paris — A Russian sports event widely regarded as an attempt to rival the Paris Olympics is set to be postponed to next year, organizers said Tuesday.

The World Friendship Games had been due to take place in Russia in September but will now move back to unspecified dates in 2025, the International Friendship Association, a body set up to organize the games, said in a statement. It added the decision is subject to approval by the Russian government.

“The main reason for reconsidering the Games dates is the insufficient recovery time for top athletes participating in major international tournaments in the summer of 2024,” the statement said, without mentioning the Paris Olympics by name.

There would have been just over a month between the end of the Paris Olympics and the proposed start of the World Friendship Games.

The International Olympic Committee was strongly opposed to any rival event. It said in March the proposed Russian event was “a cynical attempt by the Russian Federation to politicize sport” and called on governments and sports bodies “to reject any participation in, and support of, any initiative that intends to fully politicize international sport.”

Moscow-based organizers had tried to attract athletes with prize money. A graphic on the event’s website indicates winners at the World Friendship Games would get $40,000, second-place athletes $25,000 and third-place competitors $17,000. The IOC doesn’t pay prize money for Olympians.

There are 15 Russian athletes competing at the Paris Olympics under the name of Individual Neutral Athletes without the national flag or anthem.

The IOC set up the neutral program as a pathway back to competition for athletes from Russia and its ally Belarus who do not have ties to the military or security services and who have not publicly supported Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Some Russian athletes were also invited by the IOC to the Paris Olympics but declined to compete.
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LONDON — A 9-year-old girl wounded in a stabbing attack at a Taylor Swift-themed dance and yoga class in northwestern England died Tuesday, bringing the death toll to three, as police questioned a 17-year-old suspect arrested minutes after the rampage.

The girl was identified as Alice Aguiar by Portuguese Secretary of State for Communities Jose Cesario. He said her family, who were originally from the Madeira region, were in a state of shock.

Merseyside Police said the other fatalities were girls ages 6 and 7.

Eight children and two adults remain hospitalized after the attack in Southport. Both adults and five of the children are in critical condition.

Swift said she was “completely in shock” and still taking in “the horror” of the event.

“These were just little kids at a dance class,” she wrote on Instagram. “I am at a complete loss for how to ever convey my sympathies to these families.”

A 17-year-old boy was arrested on suspicion of murder and attempted murder.

Local people left flowers and stuffed animals in tribute at a police cordon on the street lined with brick houses in the seaside resort near Liverpool — nicknamed “sunny Southport” — whose beach and pier attract vacationers from across northwest England.

Witnesses described scenes “from a horror movie” as bloodied children ran from the attack just before noon on Monday. The suspect was arrested soon after on suspicion of murder and attempted murder. Police said he was born in Cardiff, Wales, and had lived for years in a village about 5 kilometers (3 miles) from Southport. He has not yet been charged.

Police said detectives are not treating Monday’s attack as terror-related and they are not looking for any other suspects.

“We believe the adults who were injured were bravely trying to protect the children who were being attacked,” Merseyside Police Chief Constable Serena Kennedy said.

People posted online tributes and messages of support for teacher Leanne Lucas, the organizer of the event, who was one of those attacked.

A group of Swift’s U.K. fans calling themselves “Swifties for Southport” launched an online fundraiser to help families of the victims. It raised over 100,000 pounds ($129,000) within 24 hours.

The rampage is the latest shocking attack in a country where a recent rise in knife crime has stoked anxieties and led to calls for the government to do more to clamp down on bladed weapons, which are by far the most used instruments in U.K. homicides.

Children ages 6 to 11

Witnesses described hearing screams and seeing children covered in blood emerging from the Hart Space, a community center that hosts events ranging from pregnancy workshops and meditation sessions to women’s boot camps.

The Swift-themed yoga and dance workshop was a summer vacation activity for children ages about 6 to 11.

“They were in the road, running from the nursery,” said Bare Varathan, who owns a shop nearby. “They had been stabbed, here, here, here, everywhere,” he said, indicating the neck, back and chest.

Richard Townes, a children’s entertainer from Southport, said parents in texting groups are terrified now to send their children to summer programs.

“I have a 5-year-old daughter who could have just as easily been at the class,” Townes said. “I feel helpless and like I can’t do anything.”

Official condolences

Prime Minister Keir Starmer called the attack “horrendous and deeply shocking.” King Charles III sent his “condolences, prayers and deepest sympathies” to those affected by the “utterly horrific incident.”

Prince William and his wife, Catherine, said that “as parents, we cannot begin to imagine what the families, friends and loved ones of those killed and injured in Southport today are going through.”

Colin Parry, who owns a nearby auto body shop, told The Guardian that the suspect arrived by taxi.

“He came down our driveway in a taxi and didn’t pay for the taxi, so I confronted him at that point,” Parry was quoted as saying. “He was quite aggressive, he said, ‘What are you gonna do about it?'”

Parry said most of the victims appeared to be young girls.

“The mothers are coming here now and screaming,” Parry said. “It is like a scene from a horror movie. … It’s like something from America, not like sunny Southport.”

Britain’s worst attack on children occurred in 1996, when 43-year-old Thomas Hamilton shot 16 kindergartners and their teacher dead in a school gymnasium in Dunblane, Scotland. The U.K. subsequently banned the private ownership of almost all handguns.

Mass shootings and killings with firearms are rare in Britain, where knives were used in about 40% of homicides in the year to March 2023.

Other mass stabbings

Although mass stabbings are also rare, several in recent years have generated fear and outrage and received a tremendous amount of attention.

In London in April, a man with a sword killed a 14-year-old boy walking to school and seriously injured four other people, including two police officers.

In Nottingham in central England in June 2022, a paranoid schizophrenic man fatally stabbed two college students walking home from celebrating the end of the school year and then killed a 65-year-old man, stole his van and used it to hit three pedestrians.

In Reading, west of London, in June 2020, a failed Libyan asylum seeker fatally stabbed three men and wounded three others.
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ISLAMABAD — The Taliban on Tuesday disavowed many Afghan diplomatic missions overseas, saying it will not honor passports, visas and other documents issued by diplomats associated with Afghanistan’s former Western-backed administration.

It’s the Taliban’s latest attempt to seize control of diplomatic missions since returning to power in 2021. Many Taliban leaders are under sanctions, and no country recognizes them as Afghanistan’s legitimate rulers.

The country’s seat at the United Nations is still held by the former government that was led by Ashraf Ghani, but the Taliban wants it.

In a statement posted to social media platform X, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that documents issued by missions in London, Berlin, Belgium, Bonn, Switzerland, Austria, France, Italy, Greece, Poland, Australia, Sweden, Canada and Norway are no longer accepted and that the ministry “bears no responsibility” for those documents.

The documents affected include passports, visa stickers, deeds and endorsements.

The ministry wrote that people in those countries will need to approach embassies and consulates controlled by the Taliban’s Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan government instead. “All Afghan nationals living abroad and foreigners can visit the IEA political and consular missions in other countries, other than the above-mentioned missions, to access consular services,” it said.

The Taliban did not immediately respond to questions.

One Afghan national living in London, Asad Mobariz, expressed disappointment and frustration with the decision. The master’s student called it unfair and impractical to expect Afghans in affected countries to travel abroad for consular services.

“This decision disregards our needs and places an undue burden on us,” he told The Associated Press. “These services are crucial for my ability to travel, work and maintain my legal status in the U.K.”

The decision would create immense hardship for the Afghan population in Europe and lead to increased financial strain and potential legal issues for those unable to access consular services locally, he said.

Another Afghan national, Adnan Najibi, who lives in Germany, said discrediting embassies was unlikely to benefit the Taliban.

“I live in a small town with a relatively low population; however, I still see that there are hundreds of Afghans living here,” Najibi said. “If someone previously obtained an Afghan passport, marriage certificate or any other document in a day, it may now take weeks or even longer.”

In March 2023, the Taliban said they were trying to take charge of more Afghan embassies abroad. Their chief spokesperson, Zabihullah Mujahid, said the administration had sent diplomats to at least 14 countries.

The new developments mean the closest available Afghan embassies for people in Europe are likely to be in Spain and the Netherlands. In October, those two countries said they were working with Taliban authorities in Kabul after the Taliban suspended consular services at the embassies in London and Vienna over their “lack of transparency and cooperation.”

Some countries retain an active diplomatic mission in Afghanistan, including Pakistan and China.

Michael Kugelman, director of the Wilson Center’s South Asia Institute, said the Taliban were confident and emboldened, buoyed by the informal recognition they have received from many countries.

They appeared to be working to force Afghans to engage with the Taliban instead of with diplomats loyal to the former administration, he said.

“It’s about giving the Taliban more diplomatic clout abroad and consigning the pre-Taliban holdouts to irrelevance. The fact that many of these missions aren’t very active anyway makes Taliban efforts easier to pull off. It’s like pushing on a door that’s already open,” Kugelman said.

The Taliban have received informal recognition through bilateral ties with countries such as Russia, China, Iran and Pakistan, including high-level meetings with those countries. This past month, the Taliban were the Afghan representatives at United Nations-hosted talks on Afghanistan in Doha, although the U.N. stressed that this did not amount to official recognition.

UN mission closed

Also on Tuesday, the U.N. mission in Afghanistan said local intelligence officials in May forcibly closed the office of a women-led nongovernmental group for allowing some of its female employees to physically report to work.

The NGO was allowed to reopen days later after signing a letter saying it would not allow women employees to come to the office, according to the mission’s latest report on human rights in Afghanistan. The report did not disclose the location for “protection reasons.”

Restrictions on women and girls are a major obstacle to the Taliban gaining official recognition as the country’s legitimate government. They have stopped female education beyond grade six and banned women from many jobs and most public spaces.

The Taliban were not immediately available for comment on the report.
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BEIJING — Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni came to China to boost co-operation with the world’s second-largest economy and reset trade ties, she said on Tuesday, during a visit to burnish relations after leaving the Belt and Road scheme.

Meloni, making her first visit to China as prime minister, which comes after Italy left Chinese President Xi Jinping’s flagship initiative last year, said the euro zone’s third-largest economy wanted to rebalance ties with Beijing.

“Today, Italian investment in China is about three times as much as Chinese investment in Italy,” Meloni told reporters. “We clearly want to work to remove obstacles for our products to access the Chinese market.”

Asked what the right-wing government she has led since 2022 hoped to gain from her visit, Meloni said Italy sought to “strengthen our co-operation with a view to … clearly rebalancing trade.”

Italy is of strategic importance to China as it has struck out on its own with Beijing before.

It could prove to be a moderating voice within the European Union, as the bloc’s 27 members weigh up backing the Commission over tariffs on Chinese electric cars.

EU members will vote in October whether to impose more tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles. Italy is one of the countries to have indicated it will back the motion.

In 2019, Italy became the only member of the Group of Seven industrialized democracies to join Xi’s Belt and Road infrastructure investment scheme that aims to resurrect the ancient Silk Road trade route, in a diplomatic coup for China.

Although Rome eventually exited the program under U.S. pressure last year, it signaled that it still desired to develop its trade ties with the $18.6 trillion economy.

Balanced trade and investment

Asked whether she had specifically discussed with Xi Chinese automakers opening factories in Italy during her Monday meeting, Meloni said “no” but added: “The issue of electric mobility is one of the topics included in our memorandum of industrial cooperation.”

Meloni on Monday told Xi that Italy plays an important role in China’s relations with the EU, which are currently dominated by talk of tariffs, but continued to say that she hoped for trade relations that are “as balanced as possible.”

“As I have said many times, we were the only nation among the great nations of Western Europe to be part of the Silk Road. But we were not the nation that had the best trade with China? Far from it,” Meloni told reporters on Tuesday, referring to the Belt and Road Initiative.

“There are other nations in Europe that have had a much higher volume of Chinese investment.”

 
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London police in April said they had charged two British men with aiding Russian intelligence following a suspected arson attack on a business with ties to Ukraine. This and other incidents have shaken Ukrainians who feel targeted in places where they have sought refuge. Henry Wilkins reports.
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To project influence, Moscow habitually goes beyond diplomacy, using malicious hybrid strategies and, in some instances, wars of aggression.
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Armenia’s military exercises with the United States in July and increased diplomatic contacts with Western Europe suggest Yerevan continues its efforts to pivot away from Moscow. As Dorian Jones reports from Istanbul, the success of those efforts depends largely on Armenia’s rival, Azerbaijan, and ongoing U.S.-backed peace efforts.
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London — British emergency services said a man had been arrested after at least eight people were stabbed in Southport, northwest England, on Monday, with a local children’s hospital declaring a major incident and the prime minister calling it “deeply shocking.” 

North West Ambulance Service said it had treated eight patients with stab injuries who had been taken to three different hospitals, including Alder Hey Children’s Hospital. 

Merseyside Police said armed police had arrested a man and seized a knife after being called to reports of a stabbing at around 11:50 a.m. (1050 GMT). There was no wider threat to the public, they added.  The police asked people to avoid the area. Photos showed several police cars, ambulances and a fire engine behind cordon tape on a street lined with houses. 

“Horrendous and deeply shocking news emerging from Southport. My thoughts are with all those affected,” Prime Minister Keir Starmer said on the social media network X, formerly Twitter. 

“I would like to thank the police and emergency services for their swift response. I am being kept updated as the situation develops.” 

British Home Secretary Yvette Cooper posted on X that she was “deeply concerned at the very serious incident.” 

Alder Hey Children’s Hospital said it had declared a major incident and its emergency department was extremely busy. It asked parents only to bring their children in if it was urgent. 
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Beijing — Chinese President Xi Jinping and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni discussed the war in Ukraine and the crisis in the Middle East at a meeting in Beijing on Monday, Meloni’s office said.

Meloni, whose country currently holds the rotating G7 presidency, stressed the importance of China as a partner in dealing with growing global insecurity during their talks.

The two leaders addressed the “priority issues on the international agenda from the war in Ukraine to the risks of a further escalation of the situation in the Middle East. They also discussed the growing tensions in the Indo-Pacific,” the Italian leader’s office said in a statement.

Meloni is seeking to relaunch her country’s economic ties with Beijing after Italy exited Xi’s flagship Belt and Road Initiative last year and amid deteriorating trade ties between the West and the world’s second-largest economy.

“There is growing insecurity at the international level, and I think that China is inevitably a very important interlocutor to deal with all these dynamics,” Meloni said during the talks at Beijing’s Diaoyutai State Guest House.

EU trade policy has turned increasingly protective over concerns that China’s production-focused development model could see the bloc flooded with cheap goods as Chinese firms look to step up exports amid weak domestic demand.

The European Commission this month confirmed it would impose preliminary tariffs of up to 37.6% on imports of electric vehicles made in China, ratcheting up tensions with Beijing.

Chinese officials have warned of a possible trade war, should Brussels not back down.

“Rebound into a new era”

Italy is of strategic importance to China as it has struck out on its own with Beijing before, and could prove to be a moderating voice within the bloc.

In 2019, Italy became the only member of the Group of Seven industrialized democracies to join Xi’s Belt and Road infrastructure initiative, billed as recreating the ancient Silk Road trade route.

And while Italy eventually left the infrastructure investment scheme last year, under pressure from the U.S. over concerns about Beijing’s economic reach, Rome signaled it still desired to forge stronger trade ties with the Asian giant, signing a three-year action plan on Sunday.  

“Both sides face important opportunities for mutual development,” Xi told Meloni at the start of their meeting.

“China and Italy should uphold the spirit of the Silk Road … so that the bridge of communication between East and West through it can rebound into a new era.”
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Paris — The French government says multiple telecommunications lines have been hit by acts of vandalism, affecting fiber lines and fixed and mobile phone lines as cities around France are hosting events for the 2024 Paris Olympics. 

The scale of the impact is unclear, as is whether it has affected any Olympic activities. The vandalism came after arson attacks hit train networks around France on Friday, hours before the Olympics opening ceremony. 

Marina Ferrari, secretary of state in charge of digital affairs, posted on X that damage in several regions overnight Sunday to Monday affected telecommunications operators. She said that led to localized impact on access to fiber lines and fixed and mobile telephone lines. 

Paris 2024 Olympics organizers would not immediately comment. 
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