Kyiv, Ukraine — Ukraine needs 25 Patriot air defense systems to fully defend its airspace and protect the entire country from Russian missile attacks, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Monday, adding that he also wants Western partners to send more F-16 warplanes than those already pledged.

In his first news conference since returning from a trip to the United States, Zelenskyy said he is ready to work with Donald Trump if he wins November’s election. “I am not afraid” of that prospect, Zelenskyy said, adding he is convinced that most Republicans support Ukraine in its war with Russia.

Zelenskyy said on Sunday he was “appalled” by the attempt to assassinate Trump and wished him a speedy recovery.

Western support is crucial for Ukraine as it tries to beat back Russia’s bigger and better-equipped invading army. Zelenskyy has proved talented at persuading friendly countries to provide ever more support, even if he doesn’t always get what he wants immediately.

A six-month delay in military assistance from the U.S., the biggest single contributor to Ukraine, meant that Kyiv’s forces “lost the initiative” on the front line, Zelenskyy said.

Since the U.S. aid resumed in April, Ukraine has been scrambling to block a Russian offensive in eastern areas.

Zelenskyy didn’t say how many Patriot systems Ukraine currently possesses, though it is far fewer than the 25 he says his country needs as Russia has battered the national power grid.

The U.S. and other NATO allies promised last week to provide Ukraine with dozens of air defense systems in the coming months, including at least four of the sophisticated and expensive Patriot systems.

F-16 warplanes pledged by Western countries are due to arrive in Ukraine in two waves: the first batch this summer, and the second by the end of the year, Zelenskyy said.

He acknowledged the deliveries won’t, on their own, be a game-changer in the war, given that the Russian air force is far larger. Ukraine will need more warplanes, he said.

Commenting on other issues, Zelenskyy said:

Russia should be present at a second international gathering to discuss peace. Russia was absent from the first meeting. There is no date for a second gathering.
A Ukrainian government reshuffle is in the cards. “We are discussing various changes with some ministers,” Zelenskyy said.
Efforts to mobilize more troops are going according to plan, though Ukraine doesn’t have enough training grounds and 14 brigades haven’t yet received promised Western weapons.

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Geneva — Global childhood vaccination levels have stalled, leaving millions more children un- or under-vaccinated than before the pandemic, the U.N. said Monday, warning of dangerous coverage gaps enabling outbreaks of diseases like measles.

In 2023, 84% of children, or 108 million, received three doses of the vaccine against diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis (DTP), with the third dose serving as a key marker for global immunization coverage, according to data published by the U.N. health and children’s agencies.

That was the same percentage as a year earlier, meaning that modest progress seen in 2022 after the steep drop during the COVID-19 crisis has “stalled,” the organizations warned. The rate was 86% in 2019 before the pandemic.

“The latest trends demonstrate that many countries continue to miss far too many children,” UNICEF chief Catherine Russell said in a joint statement.

In fact, 2.7 million additional children remained un- or under-vaccinated last year compared to the pre-pandemic levels in 2019, the organizations found.

‘Off track’

“We are off track,” World Health Organization vaccine chief Kate O’Brien told reporters. “Global immunization coverage has yet to fully recover from the historic backsliding that we saw during the course of the pandemic.”

Not only has progress stalled, but the number of so-called zero-dose children, who have not received a single jab, rose to 14.5 million last year from 13.9 million in 2022 and from 12.8 million in 2019, according to the data published Monday.

“This puts the lives of the most vulnerable children at risk,” O’Brien warned.

Even more concerning is that more than half of the world’s unvaccinated children live in 31 countries with fragile, conflict-affected settings, where they are especially vulnerable to contracting preventable diseases, due to lacking access to security, nutrition and health services.

Children in such countries are also far more likely to miss out on the necessary follow-up jabs.

A full 6.5 million children worldwide did not complete their third dose of the DTP vaccine, which is necessary to achieve disease protection in infancy and early childhood, Monday’s datasets showed. 

‘Canary in the coal mine’

The WHO and UNICEF voiced additional concern over lagging vaccination against measles — one of the world’s most infectious diseases — amid an exploding number of outbreaks around the world.

“Measles outbreaks are the canary in the coal mine, exposing and exploiting gaps in immunization and hitting the most vulnerable first,” WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in the statement.

In 2023, only 83% of children worldwide received their first dose of the measles vaccine through routine health services — the same level as in 2022 but down from 86% before the pandemic.

And only 74% received their second necessary dose, while 95% coverage is needed to prevent outbreaks, the organizations pointed out.

“This is still too low to prevent outbreaks and achieve elimination goals,” Ephrem Lemango, UNICEF immunization chief, told reporters.

He pointed out that more than 300,000 measles cases were confirmed in 2023 — nearly three times as many as a year earlier.

And a full 103 countries have suffered outbreaks in the past five years, with low vaccination coverage of 80% or lower seen as a major factor.

By contrast, 91 countries with strong measles vaccine coverage experienced no outbreaks.

“Alarmingly, nearly three in four infants live in places at the greatest risk of measles outbreaks,” Lemango said, pointing out that 10 crisis-wracked countries, including Sudan, Yemen and Afghanistan, account for more than half of children not vaccinated against measles.

On a more positive note, strong increases were seen in vaccination against the cervical cancer-causing HPV virus.

But that vaccine is still only reaching 56% of adolescent girls in high-income countries and 23% in lower-income countries — far below the 90% target.
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HILVERSUM, Netherlands — Quinn Schansman dreamed of becoming the youngest-ever CEO of an American company. A decade ago, he’d just finished the first year of an international business degree in Amsterdam as a step toward that lofty goal.

But the 18-year-old dual Dutch American citizen’s future — whatever it may have held — was cruelly cut short when he was one of the 298 people killed as a Soviet-era Buk surface-to-air rocket, launched from territory in eastern Ukraine controlled by pro-Russian rebels, destroyed Malaysia Airlines flight 17.

The conflict in Ukraine has since erupted into full-scale war following Russia’s invasion in February 2022.

On Wednesday, Quinn’s father, Thomas Schansman, will read out his name and those of other victims during a commemoration marking 10 years since the tragedy at a monument near Schiphol, the airport flight MH17 left on its way to Kuala Lumpur on July 17, 2014.

Schansman has learned to live with the loss of his son, but what he still can’t accept is Moscow’s blunt denials of responsibility for the downing of the Boeing 777, which shattered in midair and scattered bodies and wreckage over agricultural land and fields of sunflowers in eastern Ukraine.

An international investigation concluded that the Buk missile system belonged to the Russian 53rd Anti-Aircraft Missile Brigade and that it was driven into Ukraine from a Russian military base near the city of Kursk and returned there after the plane was shot down.

In 2022, after a trial that lasted more than two years, a Dutch court convicted two Russians and a pro-Russian Ukrainian in absentia of murder for their roles in transporting the missile. They were given life prison sentences but remain at large because Russia refused to surrender them to face trial. One other Russian was acquitted.

Russia steadfastly denies any responsibility.

More legal action is underway at the European Court of Human Rights and the International Civil Aviation Organization Council to hold Russia to account under international law for the attack.

If those organizations rule that Moscow was responsible, Schansman says it will be a moment to celebrate — but it wouldn’t be the end of the story.

“That does not provide closure. For me, closure is the acknowledgment by Russia that they delivered the Buk, the recognition that they must also take responsibility for it,” Schansman told The Associated Press. “I want to hear apologies. The simple ‘Sorry.’”

Nationals of 16 countries killed

People killed in the crash were citizens of the Netherlands, Malaysia, Australia, Indonesia, the United Kingdom, Belgium, Germany, the Philippines, Canada, New Zealand, Vietnam, Israel, Italy, Romania, the United States and South Africa.

Australian Attorney General Mark Dreyfus will also be in the Netherlands for the commemoration. He honored families of the dead in a statement earlier this month, saying that 38 of the victims “called Australia home.”

“I pay tribute to their bravery, their strength and their perseverance. Seeking justice for those aboard flight MH17 has required many of those who loved them most to tell and re-tell their stories of loss in successive legal proceedings,” he said.

Dreyfus said the anniversary and a commemoration at Parliament House in Canberra would be “a moment to pause and remember those whose lives were tragically cut short in a senseless act of violence. It will be a moment to commit ourselves to continue to seek accountability for those responsible for this despicable crime.”

Schansman said he no longer cares if other people who were involved in firing the missile are brought to justice because “it won’t bring my son back.”

He just wants Russia to admit responsibility.

“The fact that for all these years — right up to today — they continue to deny and to spread disinformation, that hurts,” Schansman said. “That is irritating and it makes you at certain times a bitter person.”

Mark Rutte, the former Dutch prime minister who was in office when the Boeing 777 was shot down, said the disaster and its decade-long aftermath was “perhaps the most drastic and emotional event of my entire premiership. I have always tried to be a support to the relatives.”

Rutte’s administration helped coordinate a complex operation to repatriate the remains of the victims to the Netherlands. Thousands of people solemnly lined highways as convoys of hearses carried coffins from a military airbase to a barracks where the painstaking process of identification took place.

Wednesday’s ceremony will be held at the national MH17 memorial, a park near Schiphol Airport that is planted with 298 trees — one for each victim — and sunflowers, reflecting the flowers that grew at the crash scene.

And while Wednesday will mark the 10th anniversary of Quinn’s death, his name lives on. His sister Nerissa recently gave birth to her first daughter, named Frida Quinn Schansman Pouw.
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TALLINN, Estonia — When Maksim Kolker’s phone rang at 6 a.m., and the voice on the other end said his father had been arrested, he thought it was a scam to extort money. A day earlier, he had taken his father, prominent Russian physicist Dmitry Kolker, to the hospital in his native Novosibirsk, when his advanced pancreatic cancer had suddenly worsened.

The phone kept ringing and Kolker kept hanging up until finally his father called to confirm the grim news. The elder Kolker had been charged with treason, the family later learned, a crime that is probed and prosecuted in absolute secrecy in Russia and punished with long prison terms.

Treason cases have been rare in Russia in the last 30 years, with a handful annually. But since the 2022 invasion of Ukraine, they have skyrocketed, along with espionage prosecutions, ensnaring citizens and foreigners alike, regardless of their politics.

That has brought comparisons to the show trials under Soviet dictator Josef Stalin in the 1930s.

The more recent victims range from Kremlin critics and independent journalists to veteran scientists working with countries that Moscow considers friendly.

These cases stem from the crackdown on dissent that has reached unprecedented levels under President Vladimir Putin. They are investigated almost exclusively by the powerful Federal Security Service, or FSB, with specific charges and evidence not always revealed.

The accused are often held in strict isolation in Moscow’s notorious Lefortovo Prison, tried behind closed doors, and almost always convicted, with long prison sentences.

In 2022, Putin urged the security services to “harshly suppress the actions of foreign intelligence services, promptly identify traitors, spies and saboteurs.”

The First Department, a rights group that specializes in such prosecutions and takes its name from a division of the security service, counted over 100 known treason cases in 2023, lawyer Evgeny Smirnov told The Associated Press. He added there probably were another 100 that nobody knows about.

Treason cases began growing after 2014, when Russia illegally annexed Crimea from Ukraine, threw its weight behind a separatist insurgency in the eastern part of the country and fell out with the West for the first time since the Cold War.

Two years earlier, the legal definition of treason was expanded to include providing vaguely defined “assistance” to foreign countries or organizations, effectively exposing to prosecution anyone in contact with foreigners.

The move followed mass anti-government protests in 2011-12 in Moscow that officials claimed were instigated by the West. Those changes to the law were heavily criticized by rights advocates, including those in the Presidential Human Rights Council.

Faced with that criticism at the time, Putin promised to investigate the amended law and agreed “there shouldn’t be any broad interpretation of what high treason is.”

And yet, that’s exactly what began happening.

In 2015, authorities arrested Svetlana Davydova, a mother of seven in the western region of Smolensk, on treason charges in accordance with the new, expanded definition of the offense.

She was charged over contacting the Ukrainian Embassy in Moscow in 2014 to warn officials there that she thought Russia was sending troops into eastern Ukraine, where the separatist insurgency against Kyiv was unfolding.

The case drew national attention and public outrage. Russia at the time denied its troops were involved in eastern Ukraine, and many pointed out that the case against Davydova contradicted that narrative. The charges against her were eventually dropped.

That outcome was a rare exception to the multiplying treason and espionage cases in subsequent years that consistently ended in convictions and prison terms.

Paul Whelan, a United States corporate security executive who traveled to Moscow to attend a wedding, was arrested in 2018 and convicted of espionage two years later, and sentenced to 16 years in prison. He denied the charges.

Ivan Safronov, an adviser to the Roscosmos space agency and a former military affairs journalist, was convicted of treason in 2022 and sentenced to 22 years in prison. His prosecution was widely seen as retaliation for his reporting exposing military incidents and shady arms deals.

The FSB also went after scientists who study aerodynamics, hypersonics and other fields that could be used in weapons development.

Such arrests swelled after 2018, when Putin in his annual state-of-the-nation address touted new and unique hypersonic weapons that Russia was developing, according to Smirnov, the lawyer.

In his view, it was the security services’ way of showing the Kremlin that Russian scientific advances, especially those used to develop weapons, are so valuable that “all foreign intelligence services in the world are after it.”

Kolker, the son of the detained Novosibirsk physicist, said that when the FSB searched his father’s apartment, they looked for several presentations he had used in lectures given in China.  

The elder Kolker, who had studied light waves, gave presentations that were cleared for use abroad and were given inside Russia, and “any student could understand that he wasn’t revealing anything (secret) in them,” Maksim Kolker said. 

Nevertheless, FSB officers yanked the 54-year-old physicist from his hospital bed in 2022 and flew him to Moscow, to the Lefortovo Prison, his son said.

The ailing scientist called his family from the plane to say goodbye, knowing he was unlikely to survive prison, the son said. Within days, the family received a telegram informing them he had died in a hospital.

Other cases were similar. Valery Golubkin, a 71-year-old Moscow physicist specializing in aerodynamics, was convicted of treason in 2023. His state-run research institute was working on an international project of a hypersonic civilian aircraft, and he was asked by his employer to help with reports on the project.

Smirnov of the First Department group, which was involved in his defense, says the reports were vetted before they were sent abroad and didn’t contain state secrets.

Two other recent high-profile cases involved a prominent opposition politician and a journalist.

Vladimir Kara-Murza, a journalist who became an activist, was charged with treason in 2022 after giving speeches in the West that were critical of Russia. After surviving what he believed were attempts to poison him in 2015 and 2017, Kara-Murza was convicted and sentenced to 25 years in prison, where his family fears for his deteriorating health.

The Wall Street Journal’s Evan Gershkovich was arrested in 2023 on espionage charges, the first American reporter detained on such charges since the Cold War. Gershkovich, who went on trial in June, denies the charges, and the U.S. government has declared him to be wrongfully detained.
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BEIJING — China and Russia’s naval forces kicked off a joint exercise Sunday at a military port in southern China, official news agency Xinhua reported, days after NATO allies called Beijing a “decisive enabler” of the war in Ukraine.

The Chinese defense ministry said in a statement that forces from both sides recently patrolled the western and northern Pacific Ocean and that the operation had nothing to do with international and regional situations and didn’t target any third party.

The exercise, which began in Guangdong province Sunday and is expected to last until mid-July, aimed to demonstrate the capabilities of the navies in addressing security threats and preserving peace and stability globally and regionally, state broadcaster CCTV reported Saturday, adding it would include anti-missile exercises, sea strikes and air defense.

Xinhua News Agency reported the Chinese and Russian naval forces carried out on-map military simulation and tactical coordination exercises after the opening ceremony in the city of Zhanjiang.

The joint drills came on the heels of China’s latest tensions with NATO allies last week.

The sternly worded final communiqué, approved by the 32 NATO members at their summit in Washington, made clear that China is becoming a focus of the military alliance, calling Beijing a “decisive enabler” of Russia’s war against Ukraine. The European and North American members and their partners in the Indo-Pacific increasingly see shared security concerns coming from Russia and its Asian supporters, especially China.

In response, China accused NATO of seeking security at the expense of others and told the alliance not to bring the same “chaos” to Asia. Its foreign ministry maintained that China has a fair and objective stance on the war in Ukraine.

Last week, a U.S. Coast Guard cutter on routine patrol in the Bering Sea also came across several Chinese military ships in international waters but within the U.S. exclusive economic zone, American officials said. Its crew detected three vessels approximately 124 miles (200 kilometers) north of the Amchitka Pass in the Aleutian Islands, which mark a separation and linkage between the North Pacific and the Bering Sea.

Later, a fourth ship was spotted approximately 84 miles (135 kilometers) north of the Amukta Pass.

The U.S. side said the Chinese naval vessels operated within international rules and norms.
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Paris — France celebrated military victories of the past at its annual Bastille Day parade Sunday, while its present political future appeared far from clear.

President Emmanuel Macron inspected French and allied units which took part in France’s World War II liberation 80 years ago.

And Paris welcomed the Olympic flame to the city, less than two weeks before it hosts the Summer Games.

But behind the pomp — itself in a reduced format while Olympic preparations blocked the traditional Champs Elysees route — France’s tense search for a government appeared to be at a stalemate.

All eyes were on the host, Macron, who last year cut a more impressive figure, hosting rising superpower India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi as they watched France’s military might roll down the Champs Elysees.

There was no international star guest this year, and there were no armored vehicles as a reduced number of troops marched down the less majestic Avenue Foch.

This month’s snap elections, called by Macron to clarify France’s direction after the far right sent shockwaves through the political establishment by coming first in EU polls, left the country without a parliamentary majority.

Government in limbo

Prime Minister Gabriel Attal is hanging on as caretaker head of government but the centrist has reportedly fallen out with Macron and is now focusing on his own future, taking charge of his reduced party in parliament.

Other figures are mobilizing with an eye on the 2027 presidential race, but there is little sign of a majority emerging from parliament, split between three camps.

With government in limbo and Macron barred by the constitution from calling fresh elections for at least 12 months, far-right figurehead Marine Le Pen is eyeing the 2027 campaign with relish.

Meanwhile, a rapidly cobbled-together left-wing alliance, the New Popular Front (NFP), now has the most MPs but no outright majority and no clear candidate for PM.

Firebrand hardliner Jean-Luc Melenchon and his France Unbowed (LFI) party have alienated many even on the left and would be rejected by the center and right.

But LFI represents a large chunk of the NFP and, along with some greens and communists, had been touting Huguette Bello, the 73-year-old former communist and president of the regional council on Reunion in the Indian Ocean, as premier.

But on Sunday she declined the role, saying that there was no consensus behind her candidacy, notably because of opposition from the center-left Socialist Party, and that she wanted the NFP to agree to another name quickly.

The European Union’s second largest economy, a nuclear-armed G7 power and permanent member of the U.N. Security Council, is thus rudderless, a troubling situation for markets and France’s allies alike.

Against this backdrop, the reduced and rerouted parade risked becoming a new symbol of drift, even with the addition of the arrival in Paris of the Olympic Torch, ahead of the July 26 to August 11 Games.

Olympic relay

No tanks took part, and only 4,000 foot soldiers marched, down from 6,500 last year. The military fly-past saw 45 airplanes and 22 helicopters soar over Paris.

Regiments honored on the parade included those from France’s allies and former French colonies that took part in the country’s 1944 World War II liberation.

The parade’s final section turned to the upcoming games.

Colonel Thibault Vallette of the elite Cadre Noir de Saumur cavalry school and 2016 equestrian gold medalist at the Rio Games rode the torch down the route before relay runners were to carry it around the capital.
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London — Carlos Alcaraz defeated Novak Djokovic 6-2, 6-2, 7-6 (4) in the Wimbledon men’s final Sunday to collect his fourth Grand Slam title at age 21.   

It was a rematch of last year’s championship match on the grass of the All England Club, which Alcaraz won in five sets.   

This one — played in front of a Centre Court crowd that included Kate, the Princess of Wales, in a rare public appearance since announcing she has cancer — was much easier for Alcaraz, at least until he stumbled while holding three match points as he served for the victory at 5-4 in the third set.   

Still, Alcaraz regrouped and eventually picked up a second major trophy in a row after last month’s triumph on the clay at the French Open.   

The Spaniard won his first Slam title at the 2022 U.S. Open as a teenager, and no man ever has collected more Slam hardware before turning 22 than he has.   

He improved to 4-0 in major finals.   

The 37-year-old Djokovic, wearing a gray sleeve on his surgically repaired right knee, was denied in his bid for an eighth Wimbledon title and record 25th major overall. He tore his meniscus at Roland Garros on June 3 and had an operation in Paris two days later.   

Less than six weeks later, Djokovic was hardly at his best on Sunday — and Alcaraz certainly had something to do with that. 
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JERUSALEM — Israel’s national Holocaust museum opened a new conservation facility in Jerusalem on Monday that will preserve, restore and store its more than 45,000 artifacts and works of art in a vast new building, including five floors of underground storage.

Yad Vashem, the World Holocaust Remembrance Center, serves as both a museum and a research institution. It welcomes nearly a million visitors each year, leads the country’s annual Holocaust memorial day and hosts nearly all foreign dignitaries visiting Israel.

“Before we opened this building, it was very difficult to exhibit our treasures that were kept in our vaults. They were kind of secret,” said Yad Vashem chairman Dani Dayan. “Now there’s a state-of-the-art installation (that) will help us to exhibit them.”

The David and Fela Shapell Family Collections Center, located at the Yad Vashem museum in Jerusalem, will also provide organization and storage for the museum’s 225 million pages of documents and half a million photographs.

Dayan said the materials will now be kept in a facility that preserves them in optimal temperatures and conditions.

“Yad Vashem has the largest collections in the world of materials related to the Holocaust,” Dayan said. “We will make sure that these treasures are kept for eternity.”

The new facility includes advanced, high-tech labs for conservation, enabling experts to revisit some of the museum’s trickier items, such as a film canister that a family who fled Austria in 1939 brought with them. It was donated to the museum but arrived in an advanced state of decay.

“The film arrived in the worst state it could. It smelled really bad,” said Reut Ilan-Shafik, a photography conservator at Yad Vashem. Over the years, the film had congealed into a solid piece of plastic, making it impossible to be scanned.

Using organic solvents, conservators were able to restore some of the film’s flexibility, allowing them to carefully unravel pieces of it. Using a microscope, Ilan-Shafik was able to see a few frames in their entirety, including one showing a couple kissing on a bench in a park and other snapshots of Europe before World War II.

“It is unbelievable to know that the images of the film that we otherwise thought lost to time” have been recovered, said Orit Feldberg, granddaughter of Hans and Klara Lebel, the couple featured in the photo.

Feldberg’s mother donated the film canister, one of the few things the Lebels were able to take with them when they fled Austria.

“These photographs not only tell their unique story but also keep their memory vibrantly alive,” Feldberg said.

Conservation of items from the Holocaust is an expensive, painstaking process that has taken on greater importance as the number of survivors dwindles.

Last month, the Auschwitz Memorial announced it had finished a half-million-dollar project to conserve 3,000 of the 8,000 pairs of children’s shoes that are on display at the Nazi concentration camp in Poland.
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ANKARA — Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Syrian President Bashar Assad have recently signaled that they are interested in restoring diplomatic ties that have been ruptured for more than a decade.

Erdogan has said that he hopes to arrange a meeting with Assad soon for the first time since the countries broke off relations in 2011 as mass anti-government protests and a brutal crackdown by security forces in Syria spiraled into a still-ongoing civil war.

Speaking at a NATO summit in Washington on Thursday, Erdogan said he had called on Assad two weeks ago to either come to Turkey for the meeting or to hold it in a third country, and that he had assigned Turkey’s foreign minister to follow up.

Turkey backed Syrian insurgent groups seeking to overthrow Assad and still maintains forces in the opposition-held northwest, a sore point for Damascus.

This is not the first time that there have been attempts to normalize relations between the two countries, but previous attempts failed to gain traction.

Here’s a look at what might happen this time around:

What happened at their last talks

Russia, which is one of the strongest backers of Assad’s government but also has close ties with Turkey, has been pushing for a return to diplomatic relations.

In December 2022, the Turkish, Syrian and Russian defense ministers held talks in Moscow, the first ministerial level meeting between rivals Turkey and Syria since 2011. Russia also brokered meetings between Syrian and Turkish officials last year.

However, the talks fizzled, and Syrian officials publicly continued to blast Turkey’s presence in northwest Syria. Assad said in an interview with Sky News Arabia last August that the objective of Erdogan’s overtures was “to legitimize the Turkish occupation in Syria.”

What’s different now

Russia appears to once again be promoting the talks, but this time around, Iraq — which shares a border with both Turkey and Syria — has also offered to mediate, as it previously did between regional arch-rivals Saudi Arabia and Iran.

Aron Lund, a fellow with the Century International think tank, said Iraq may have taken the initiative as a way to deflect pressure from Turkey to crack down on the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, a Kurdish separatist group that has waged an insurgency against Turkey since the 1980s and has bases in northern Iraq.

By pushing rapprochement with Syria, Baghdad may be trying to “create some form of positive engagement with the Turks, kick the can down the road, and deflect the threat of an intervention,” Lund said.

The geopolitical situation in the region has also changed with the war in Gaza and fears of a wider regional conflict. Ozgur Unluhisarcikli, an analyst on Turkey and director of the German Marshall Fund in Ankara, said that both countries may be feeling insecure and seeking new alliances in the face of the war’s potential regional ripple effects.

What Turkey and Syria want

From Erdogan’s side, Unluhisarcikli said, the attempt to engage is likely driven in part by the increasing anti-Syrian sentiment in Turkey. Erdogan is likely hoping for a deal that could pave the way for the return of many of the 3.6 million Syrian refugees living in his country.

From the Syrian side, a return to relations with Turkey would be another step toward ending Assad’s political isolation in the region after more than a decade as a pariah due to his government’s brutal crackdown on protesters in 2011 and alleged war crimes afterward.

And despite their differences over Turkey’s presence in northwest Syria, Damascus and Ankara both have an interest in curtailing the autonomy of Kurdish groups in northeast Syria.

Turkey may be concerned that the security situation in northeast Syria could deteriorate in the event that the U.S. withdraws troops it currently has stationed there as part of a coalition against the Islamic State militant group, Unluhisarcikli said. That could require Turkey to “cooperate or at least coordinate with Syria, to manage the aftermath of the U.S. withdrawal,” he said.

Joseph Daher, a Swiss-Syrian researcher and visiting professor at the European University Institute in Florence, said the two governments likely hope for modest “economic gains” in a rapprochement. While trade never completely stopped, it currently goes through intermediaries, he said, while restoring diplomatic relations would allow official commerce to resume and make trade more fluid.

The prospects for an agreement

Analysts agreed that the talks are unlikely to bring about the full Turkish withdrawal from northwest Syria that Damascus has called for or any other major shift in conditions on the ground in the near term.

Although the two countries’ interests “actually overlap to a large degree,” Lund said, “there are also major disagreements” and “a lot of bad blood and bitterness” that could impede even “lower-level dealmaking.” Both Erdogan and Assad may also want to wait for the outcome of U.S. elections, which could determine the future American footprint in the region, before making a major deal, he said.

In the long run, Lund said, “The logic of the situation dictates Turkish-Syrian collaboration in some form. … They’re neighbors. They’re stuck with each other and the current stalemate does them no good.”

Unluhisarcikli agreed that a “grand bargain” is unlikely to come out of the present talks, but the increased dialogue could lead to “some confidence building measures,” he said.

Daher said the most probable outcome of the talks is some “security agreements” between the two sides, but not a full Turkish withdrawal from Syria in the short term, particularly since the Syrian government army is too weak to control northwest Syria by itself.

“On its own, it’s not able to take back the whole of the northwest — it needs to deal with Turkey,” he said.

How people in Turkey and Syria view a potential agreement

In Turkey and in government-controlled Syria, many view the prospects of a rapprochement positively. In northwest Syria, on the other hand, protests have broken out against the prospect of a normalization of relations between Ankara — which had previously positioned itself as a protector of the Syrian opposition — and Damascus.

Kurds in Syria have also viewed the potential rapprochement with apprehension. The Kurdish-led authority in northeast Syria said in a statement that the prospective reconciliation would be a “conspiracy against the Syrian people” and a “clear legitimization of the Turkish occupation” of previously Kurdish-majority areas that were seized by Turkish-backed forces. 
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irvine, california — NATO and China’s efforts to deepen cooperation with like-minded countries in the Indo-Pacific and Europe are viewed by some analysts as part of the growing competition between major powers, especially between the United States and China.    

“[The latest development] is a standard major power competition,” said Ian Chong, a political scientist at the National University of Singapore.  

These efforts are aimed at “finding out where are their friends and who can support their efforts,” he said. “[But] it’s pretty clear that the competition between major powers is intensifying,” he told VOA by phone.    

During its annual summit in Washington, NATO announced it would launch four new joint projects with Japan, South Korea, Australia, and New Zealand. The projects will focus on deepening cooperation with the four Indo-Pacific countries on Ukraine, artificial intelligence, disinformation, and cybersecurity.

U.S. national security adviser Jake Sullivan said the goal is to “harness the unique strengths” of democracies to address shared global challenges. In response, the Chinese government accused NATO of “inciting bloc confrontation and hyping up regional tensions” by engaging with countries in the Indo-Pacific region.

Instead of expanding its footprint to the Indo-Pacific region through these joint projects, some experts say NATO is trying to involve more like-minded countries in the process of building up competencies in critical areas of competition.  

“These are core areas that will shape military and other forms of competition moving forward so NATO wants to establish more cooperation with like-minded democracies,” said Stephen Nagy, a regional security expert at the International Christian University in Japan.  

Since NATO has labeled China as “the decisive enabler” of Russia’s war against Ukraine, Nagy said the alliance is trying to show Beijing that it won’t back out of the global competition in key areas.    

“NATO is signaling to China that they can be part of the solution, or they would be part of the problem,” he told VOA by phone.    

In an interview with VOA’s Mandarin Service, Japan’s Foreign Press Secretary Maki Kobayashi said that while Tokyo has been working closely with NATO member states, these efforts shouldn’t be viewed as an attempt to establish a NATO in Asia.

China’s attempt to counter NATO  

While the U.S. and its NATO allies aimed to strengthen cooperation with Indo-Pacific countries through the summit in Washington, China is also beefing up military cooperation with Belarus and Russia.  

On Monday, China initiated an 11-day joint military exercise near the border of Poland with Belarus, the newest member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. While the Chinese Foreign Ministry insisted that the exercise wasn’t targeting any country, some analysts told VOA that the move is Beijing’s response to NATO’s growing interest in Asia.

In addition to the military exercise with Belarus in Europe, China also announced Friday a joint naval exercise with Russia in waters near the southern city of Zhanjiang.  

The Chinese defense ministry characterized the drills, which will take place near the disputed South China Sea, as attempts for Beijing and Moscow to demonstrate their resolve and capabilities to address “maritime security threats and preserving global and regional peace and stability.”  

Nagy in Japan said Beijing is trying to show its displeasure toward NATO’s efforts to strengthen ties with Indo-Pacific countries. 

“China is signaling to NATO member states that they can cause headaches for them in their region or regions that matter to them,” he told VOA.    

Apart from closely aligning the dates of the two military exercises with the NATO Summit, China also used last week’s SCO Summit in Kazakhstan to uphold its “no limits partnership” with Russia and promote the alternative world order that it has been championing in recent years.

While the SCO isn’t an alliance with a common goal, some experts say China will still try to use it as a platform to “build its own blocs” to counter NATO and dilute Western influence.    

“China is strengthening these arrangements through bilateral agreements and strategic partnership, which often include security,” Sari Arho Havren, an associate fellow at the Royal United Services Institute, told VOA by phone.    

But since the SCO includes member states such as India, which is also part of the quadrilateral security dialogue with Australia, Japan, and the U.S., Nagy thinks New Delhi is unlikely to back any efforts to transform SCO into a counterweight of NATO.  

And while China might engage in some security cooperation with other authoritarian states like Russia or Iran — such as the joint military exercise the three countries conducted in March — Nagy said the differences in the three countries’ tolerance for risk and their visions for these partnerships will make it difficult for them to form a formal alliance. 

In his view, Russia has a higher tolerance for risk while China is concerned about how the war in Ukraine may affect stability around the world.  

“In the North Korea front, China is not happy about Putin’s recent trip to Pyongyang while Beijing wants a stable relationship with Iran, which adds limits to their cooperation,” Nagy told VOA. 

“The idea that these countries can converge to form an alliance to combat the so-called Western containment is not feasible, but they may align themselves so they can coordinate the supply of resources,” he added. 

Despite some limitations in reality, Arho Havren said China and NATO’s latest efforts to deepen partnerships show that a bloc competition may be emerging. 

“Both sides are more assertive and clear about their messaging and recent developments may accelerate this trend,” she told VOA.   
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WARSAW, Poland — A miner who was reported missing after an earthquake shook Poland’s Rydultowy coal mine has been found alive more than two days after the accident that killed one of his colleagues and injured another 17, local officials said Saturday. 

The miner has been airlifted to a hospital and the rescue operation has been closed, said Witold Gałązka of the coal mining group that operates the mine. 

Earlier, the office of the provincial governor of the Silesia coal mining region, in southern Poland, said that the miner was conscious and was being transported to the surface. 

“This is fantastic news,” provincial governor Marek Wojcik said on TVN24. 

The head of the Polish Coal Mining Group that operates the mine, Leszek Pietraszek, said that rescuers reached the 32-year-old miner around 2 p.m. Saturday. He was conscious and communicating but had some problems breathing. He received first aid from a doctor who also prepared him for transportation to the surface. 

Hundreds of rescuers took part in the operation and at times had to be withdrawn from the corridor when more tremors were threatened or because of dangerous methane gas levels. The rescuers had to dig through the rubble by hand to reach the miner, authorities said. 

Seventy-eight miners were in the area when a magnitude 3.1 tremor struck about 1,200 meters below the surface on Thursday afternoon. 

One miner, age 41, was killed and 17 were hospitalized with injuries. Thirteen of the injured have since been released from the hospital. 

The tremor caused a slide of rocks into the corridor at one spot, where the miner was found Saturday. 

The mining group has suffered several deadly accidents this year. In May, three miners died in a cave-in at the Myslowice-Wesola coal mine, and one was killed at the same mine in April. 

Two miners lost their lives in separate accidents in 2019 and 2020 in the Rydultowy mine, which was opened in 1792 and employs about 2,000 miners. 

Coal mining is considered hazardous in Poland, where some mines are prone to methane gas explosions or to cave-ins. Excavation in older mines goes deep into the ground in the search for coal, increasing the job’s hazards. The coal industry is among Poland’s key employers, providing some 75,000 jobs. 

Last year, 15 miners died in accidents. 
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SYDNEY — Russia has accused Australia of inciting “anti-Russian paranoia” for charging a Russian-born couple with espionage, the Australian Broadcasting Corp (ABC) reported Saturday.

The married couple, who hold Australian citizenship, were arrested on charges of working to access material related to Australia’s national security, though no significant compromise had been identified, the Australian Federal Police said on Friday.

The woman, 40, an information systems technician in the Australian Army, traveled to Russia and instructed her husband in Australia to log into her official account to access defense materials, police said.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, speaking to reporters on Friday, warned that “people will be held to account who interfere with our national interests and that’s precisely what these arrests represent.”

Russia’s embassy in the capital, Canberra, said a press conference by Australian authorities on Friday about the arrests “was clearly intended to launch another wave of anti-Russian paranoia in Australia,” the ABC said, citing an embassy statement.

The embassy requested written information from the Australian authorities on the couple’s situation and was considering “appropriate measures of consular assistance,” the ABC reported.

The embassy did not immediately respond to Reuters request for comment.

On Friday, Igor and Kira Korolev appeared in the magistrate’s court in Brisbane, court filings show, charged with one count each of preparing for an espionage offense, which carries a maximum penalty of 15 years in jail. The charges are the first under laws introduced in 2018.

They did not apply for bail and were remanded in custody until September 20 when they are next due to appear, media reported.

Australia, one of the largest non-NATO contributors to the West’s support for Ukraine since Russia’s 2022 invasion, announced a A$250 million ($170 million) military aid package for Kyiv on Thursday at a NATO summit in Washington.

Canberra has been supplying defense equipment to Kyiv, banned exports of aluminum ores to Russia and sanctioned more than 1,000 Russian individuals and entities.
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seoul, south korea — North Korea has denounced a declaration at a recent NATO summit that condemned Pyongyang’s weapons exports to Russia, calling the document “illegal,” state media said Saturday.

In a joint declaration this week, NATO leaders condemned North Korea for “fueling Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine,” by “providing direct military support” to Moscow.

NATO leaders also voiced “profound concern” over China’s industrial support to Russia.

Pyongyang has repeatedly denied allegations that it is shipping weapons to Moscow, but in June leader Kim Jong Un and Russia’s President Vladimir Putin signed an agreement that included a pledge to come to each other’s military aid if attacked.

Pyongyang’s Korean Central News Agency reported Saturday that the foreign ministry “most strongly denounces and rejects” the NATO declaration.

Citing a ministry spokesman, the agency said the declaration “incites new Cold War and military confrontation on a global scale,” and requires “a new force and mode of counteraction.”

On the sidelines of the NATO summit, Seoul and Washington this week also signed guidelines on an integrated system of deterrence for the Korean peninsula to counter North Korea’s nuclear and military threats.

South Korea’s presidential office said Seoul and Washington will carry out joint military drills to help implement the newly announced guidelines, which formalize the deployment of U.S. nuclear assets on and around the Korean peninsula to deter and respond to potential nuclear attacks by Pyongyang.

Relations between the two Koreas are at one of their lowest points in years, with Pyongyang ramping up weapons testing as it draws closer to Russia.

After Pyongyang sent multiple barrages of trash-carrying balloons across the border, Seoul last month fully suspended a tension-reducing military deal and resumed live-fire drills on border islands and by the demilitarized zone that divides the Korean peninsula.
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Washington — While much of the focus at the NATO summit in Washington has been on providing additional support for Ukraine, some Western officials are equally intent on confronting another challenge unleashed by Russia’s invasion: a nascent arms race with global implications.

The officials argue it is no longer enough to try to ensure Ukraine has the weapons and systems it needs to keep pace with Russia’s unrelenting attacks. They say NATO must simultaneously prepare to outspend, outpace and outproduce the fledgling alliance that has kept the Russian military on the move.

“There is no time to lose,” a NATO official told VOA, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss the growing defense cooperation among Russia, China, North Korea and Iran.

“This must be a key priority for all our allies, because it is not just about spending more,” the official said. “It is also on getting those capabilities.”

Officials have repeatedly accused China of playing a critical role in sustaining Russia’s military by sending Moscow raw materials and so-called dual-use components needed to produce advanced weapons and weapons systems.

In April and May, the United States and Britain levied new sanctions against Iranian companies and officials involved in the production of drones for the Russian military.

And declassified U.S. intelligence has noted Russia’s use of North Korean ballistic missiles, while South Korean officials said earlier this year that Pyongyang has so far sent Russia at least 6,700 containers which could contain more than 3 million artillery shells. 

The NATO official who spoke to VOA said the support from China, Iran and North Korea has significantly altered Russia’s posture on the battlefield, rendering intelligence assessments that Russia’s military “will require years of rebuilding” obsolete.  

“When you look at the assessments of the pace of reconstitution of the Russian armed forces and the Russian defense industrial and technological base, those assessments were made without taking into account how much China would be stepping in,” the official said.

And there are concerns this is just the beginning. The prospect for increased cooperation between Russia, China, North Korea and Iran, “essentially underlines the urgency of the task at hand,” the official said.

Some U.S. officials have taken to calling the growing alliance a new “axis of evil.”

“We ought to act accordingly,” former commander of U.S. forces in the Indo-Pacific Admiral John Aquilino told lawmakers in March. 

Some analysts are also alarmed, seeing signs that the defense relationship between Russia and the other countries is moving beyond a series of bilateral efforts to support Moscow’s war in Ukraine.

“What we are seeing now is … an intensification, a deepening of these strategic partnerships,” said Richard Goldberg, a senior adviser at the Washington-based Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

“Whether or not they’re 100% aligned all the time, every day, what’s important is that on the strategic capabilities that they’re building in partnership, they are aligned,” Goldberg, a U.S. National Security Council official under former President Donald Trump, told VOA. “Our response has to view them as an axis, not individual parts.”

But how quickly that axis evolves into a true rival to NATO is less certain.

“There are still significant tension points between the four countries that prevent the formation of a more cohesive alliance,” said Michelle Grisé, a senior policy researcher at the RAND Corporation.

“Within the Russia-Iran relationship, for example, friction points include competition for energy markets and for influence in the Caucasus, as well as — at least historically —divergent approaches to Israel,” Grisé told VOA.

“The Russia-China-North Korea-Iran axis poses a serious threat to U.S. and NATO interests, but I don’t think this axis is an unsurmountable rival,” she said. “To form a more cohesive alliance, they’ll have to translate their shared opposition to the Western-led international order into a coherent, shared vision for the future, which I expect they’ll struggle to do.”

NATO allies, however, are not ready to take such struggles by the evolving Russian-Chinese-North Korean-Iranian axis for granted.

In a speech July 9 at the NATO Summit Defense Industry Forum in Washington, U.S. Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks noted the “rapid defense industrial expansion of our strategic competitors,” while urging NATO allies to expand cooperation on weapons procurement and development.

As an example, Hicks cited an effort by the U.S., Germany, Spain and others to produce interceptors for Patriot air defense batteries in Europe while praising a U.S.-Turkish effort to produce 155-millimeter artillery shells in the southern U.S. state of Texas.

“None of us should think it’s enough,” she said. “Expanding transatlantic defense industrial capacity is not a nice-to-do. It is a need-to-do, a must-do for the NATO alliance.”

Even if the NATO efforts to boost weapons production are not enough, some officials see them as a reason to believe the West can retain an upper hand.

“I think that the steps and the progress we’re making is really delivering results,” the NATO official told VOA, adding, they “wouldn’t be overly pessimistic.”

“On issues like ammunitions, you’re starting to see the ramping up actually materializing,” the official said. “And I think if we look at the year to come, we’re going to have much better, much better numbers.” 
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With massive missile attacks on Ukraine this week and an announcement that it is resuming production of long-range missiles, Moscow is raising pressure on NATO allies as leaders of the alliance meet in Washington. Marcus Harton narrates this report by Ricardo Marquina.
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At a summit between India and Russia this week, both countries said they were committed to deepening the relationship. Anjana Pasricha reports on why India is enhancing its partnership with Russia, which has been isolated by Western countries over its war in Ukraine.
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Brussels — The EU on Thursday approved Apple’s offer to allow rivals access to the iPhone’s ability to tap-to-pay within the bloc, ending a lengthy probe and sparing it a heavy fine.

The case dates back to 2022 when Brussels first accused Apple of blocking rivals from its popular iPhone tap payment system in a breach of EU competition law.

“Apple has committed to allow rivals to access the ‘tap and go’ technology of iPhones. Today’s decision makes Apple’s commitments binding,” EU competition chief Margrethe Vestager said in a statement.

“From now on, competitors will be able to effectively compete with Apple Pay for mobile payments with the iPhone in shops. So consumers will have a wider range of safe and innovative mobile wallets to choose from,” she said.

The EU previously found that Apple enjoyed a dominant position by restricting access to “tap-as-you-go” chips or near-field communication (NFC), which allows devices to interconnect within a very short range, to favor its own system.

Now competitors will have access to the standard technology behind contactless payments to offer alternative tap-to-pay tools to iPhone users in the European Economic Area (EEA), which includes the EU and also Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway.

Only customers with an Apple ID registered in the EEA would be able to make use of these outside apps, the European Commission said in a statement.

The changes must remain in force for 10 years and a “monitoring trustee” must be chosen by Apple to report to the commission during that period on their implementation.

Apple had risked a fine of up to 10% of its total worldwide annual turnover. Apple’s total revenue in the year to September 2023 stood at $383 billion.

“Apple Pay and Apple Wallet will continue to be available in the EEA for users and developers, and will continue to provide an easy, secure and private way to pay, as well as present passes seamlessly from Apple Wallet,” the company said in a statement.

The probe’s conclusion comes at a particularly difficult moment in relations between the EU and Apple, especially over the bloc’s new competition rules for big tech.

The Digital Markets Act (DMA) seeks to ensure tech titans do not privilege their own services over rivals, but the iPhone maker says it puts users’ privacy at risk.

One of the DMA’s main objectives is to give consumers more choice in the web browsers, app marketplaces, search engines and other digital services they use.

The EU in June accused Apple of breaching the DMA by preventing developers from freely pointing consumers to alternative channels for offers and content outside of its proprietary App Store.

It also kickstarted another probe under the DMA into Apple’s new fees for app developers.

The company could face heavy fines if the DMA violations are confirmed.

In March, the EU slapped a $1.9 billion fine on Apple in a different antitrust case but the company has appealed the penalty in an EU court.

Brussels also forced Apple last year to scrap its Lightning port on new iPhone models, in a change that was introduced worldwide and not just in Europe.
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WASHINGTON — NATO and Ukrainian leaders are to meet Thursday in Washington, a day after NATO allies bolstered support for Ukraine to join the alliance.

The NATO summit’s final day will also include talks with leaders from Australia, Japan, New Zealand, South Korea and the European Union addressing security challenges and cooperation.

A NATO communique released by the 32-member bloc Wednesday said Ukraine’s path to NATO membership is “irreversible.”

“It’s not a question of if, but when,” NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg told reporters Wednesday.

The United States was once deeply concerned about whether Ukraine was ready for NATO membership but now appears resolved to ensure Kyiv eventually joins the alliance.

“We’re providing that bridge to membership for Ukraine. It’s really a significant deliverable,” Michael Carpenter, the senior director for Europe at the National Security Council, told VOA.

Stoltenberg said that when fighting stops in Ukraine, NATO will need to ensure that halt will be the final end to violence there.

The way to ensure it stops for good, Stoltenberg said, is NATO membership for Ukraine. Otherwise, he said, Russia could continue its aggression.

Unlike the European Union, which began negotiations with Ukraine to join its ranks on June 25, there is no consensus yet about Ukraine joining NATO.

F-16 transfer under way

Meanwhile, U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said the first American-made F-16 fighter jets are currently being delivered to Ukraine and are expected to patrol Ukrainian skies in coming weeks.

“The transfer of F-16s is officially under way, and Ukraine will be flying F-16s this summer,” he said at the summit.

In a statement Wednesday, Dutch Prime Minister Dick Schoof, Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen and U.S. President Joe Biden announced that the Dutch and Danish governments were providing the F-16s, while Belgium and Norway had committed to send more aircraft to Ukraine.

NATO member heads of state held their first working session of the summit Wednesday as they sought to boost the alliance’s support for Ukraine and enhance their own defense and deterrence efforts.

At the start of the session, Biden said Russia was ramping up its defense production with Chinese, North Korean and Iranian help.

To counter their efforts, he said, NATO members must continue to invest more in defense production.

“We cannot allow the alliance to fall behind,” Biden said.

China called out

In the NATO communique, all 32 allies on Wednesday also called on China to cease its support for Russia’s war effort against Kyiv, including its transfer of dual-use materials, such as weapons components, equipment and raw materials that aid Russia’s defense sector.

“The PRC cannot enable the largest war in Europe in recent history without this negatively impacting its interests and reputation,” the leaders wrote.

Asked by VOA whether the statement was a strong enough message to deter China from continuing to support Russia, Stoltenberg replied in the press conference that Wednesday’s declaration is “the strongest message that NATO allies have ever sent on China’s contributions to Russia’s illegal war against Ukraine.”

A spokesperson for China’s mission to the European Union rejected the NATO statement, calling it “filled with Cold War mentality and belligerent rhetoric.”

NATO allies invited Indo-Pacific partners from Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand to also attend this week’s summit. Officials say their inclusion reflects their importance during growing Chinese, North Korean, Russian and Iranian aggression.

Iulia Iarmolenko contributed to this report. Some information for this report was provided by Reuters
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In Ukraine, Kyiv’s largest children’s hospital and some residential buildings were damaged by a Russian missile attack on July 8. The next day, residents were allowed to briefly go back to collect some personal belongings. Anna Kosstutschenko spoke to some of them as they returned from their homes. VOA footage and video editing by Pavel Suhodolskiy.
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