Five years ago, Serbia’s Anti-Corruption Agency opened a money laundering investigation into Sinisa Mali, who was then mayor of the capital, Belgrade.  The Crime and Corruption Reporting Network (KRIK) —a Serbian investigative journalism outlet — had reported on FILE – Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic gestures at Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) headquarters during a national election, the first in Europe since the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic, in Belgrade, Serbia, June 21, 2020.Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic denied the probe is retaliation against critics, telling a press conference, “everyone should be equal before the law.”  But local journalists and rights groups questioned the Finance Ministry’s motive. Some said the probe appears to be an attempt to intimidate reporters and civil society groups who are holding powerful officials to account and another signal of rising hostility facing Serbia’s media. FILE – Stevan Dojcinovic, an editor of Serbia’s investigative web portal Krik, known for its reports on corruption and organized crime, poses for a picture in Belgrade, Serbia, Dec. 18, 2019.Stevan Dojcinovic, an award-winning journalist and editor-in-chief at KRIK, said the inquiry is part of the government’s pressure on independent journalism.  “I am not surprised that we were on the list. We, as well as our colleagues, have been targeted for years by various government agencies used to pressure journalists,” Dojcinovic told VOA.  Dojcinovic said the move was concerning because investigative journalists play a critical role in ensuring transparency and exposing government corruption, a chronic problem in Serbia. Multiple investigative outlets in the region work to scrutinize the dealings of those in power and their handling of multi-million-dollar public contracts, among other accountability matters. Their exposes sometimes trigger official investigations, although convictions are rare.  In Mali’s case, for example, KRIK reported that companies he owned bought Bulgarian apartments through two offshore firms, and that Mali failed to report ownership as required.  When the Anti-Corruption Agency looked into the allegations it found Mali received large sums, including from an offshore company under his control. But prosecutors dismissed the case and said they saw no evidence of wrongdoing. KRIK said the prosecutor’s office declined to provide further justification for its decision. Similarly, an official investigation into Defense Minister Aleksandar Vulin’s purchase of a Belgrade home was dismissed in 2017 by the Prosecutor for Organized Crime, for lack of evidence. In that case, KRIK reported that Vulin failed to report bringing about $240,000 into the country. The law requires that foreign transactions of about $11,000 or more must be reported.  In another case, the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network (BIRN) revealed in 2015 that the state-owned electric company had mismanaged a public contract bidding process for a $17 million contract to pump floodwater from a mine, leading to project delays and budget overruns.  Grist for reporting In a June background document, the European Commission said Serbia has not done enough to fight corruption and organized crime, or to protect the media. The commission in an earlier report said official corruption was prevalent and that, despite some improvement, “There is a need for strong political will to effectively address corruption issues, as well as a robust criminal justice response to high-level corruption.”  The report, part of the country’s Stabilization and Association Agreement as a candidate country for European Union membership, also described lack of progress on freedom of expression as a “serious concern” and reported an increase in political and economic pressure on journalists.  Dragana Zarkovic Obradovic, director of BIRN, which is also on the Anti-Money Laundering Unit target list, said the investigation appeared to be a way for the government to track the source of funding for journalists and NGOs, and how much money is granted.   Some of those on the target list told VOA that officials failed to provide a clear answer when asked about the basis for the investigation.   Serbia’s Ministry of Finance referred VOA to the Anti-Money Laundering Unit, which did not respond to an email requesting comment.  The ministry has denied in news reports that the money laundering probe is meant to criminalize the news media and other organizations. But it has not publicly given a reason for looking into the NGOs and news outlets.  “These are regular activities, not politically motivated,” Mali told the privately owned media company Pink TV.  A statement from the Anti-Money Laundering Unit, carried by the state-run Tanjug news agency, said it has also investigated ministers and that non-governmental groups named for scrutiny should not be treated as “sacred cows.”  President Vucic said, “everyone should be equal before the law” and suggested those named for investigation were trying to profit from it.   “Let’s make noise about how endangered we are so we can get more money from donors,” Vucic said of the NGOs during a July 30 press conference. “That’s been the practice for 30 years.”  Erosion of rights International human rights groups and media watchdogs have been criticized what they see as Vucic’s increasingly autocratic rule.  In its 2020 Freedom in the World Report, the U.S. monitoring group Freedom House said Vucic’s government had “steadily eroded political rights and civil liberties, putting pressure on independent media, the political opposition, and civil society organizations.” Sofya Orlosky, program manager for Eurasia at Freedom House, told VOA that targeting rights groups and independent journalists on allegations of money laundering and financing terrorism has become a “common practice” for regimes in the region. “By abusing the anti-money-laundering mechanism to intimidate civil society, the Serbian authorities show clear disregard for their own commitment to eradicating corruption,” Orloski said. “Instead of threats, the authorities should engage in an honest dialogue.”  
 
The United States and the European Union each raised concerns.   A statement by the U.S. Embassy in Belgrade said the U.S. was ready to assist Serbia on its path toward EU membership.  “However, the impression that official Belgrade wants to suppress civil society or the freedom of the media will damage Serbia’s reputation and make it more difficult to make progress toward this goal of great value,” the statement said.   International rights groups, including Amnesty International, described the probe as an intimidation act.  In a statement, Amnesty said, “The targeting of journalists and NGOs on absurd allegations of money laundering and financing terror is a blatant act of intimidation and the latest in an ongoing campaign by Serbian authorities to silence critics.” Meanwhile, journalists working for media organizations named in the money laundering inquiry say the pressure will only sharpen their focus.  “This government action will not make us question our resolve and purpose,” BIRN Director Zarkovic said. “We will continue to reveal government corruption and expose those involved.” This article originated in VOA’s Serbian service. 
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World Health Organization officials Wednesday urged young people to fight the urge to go parties and other gatherings to help prevent new outbreaks of COVID-19.During a virtual question and answer session from WHO headquarters in Geneva, WHO health emergencies chief Mike Ryan and WHO epidemiologist Maria Van Kerkhove said young people need to play a role in helping to slow or stop the spread of virus.FILE PHOTO: Executive Director of the World Health Organization’s emergencies program Mike Ryan speaks at a news conference on the novel coronavirus in Geneva, Feb. 6, 2020.Countries around the world, even those which had the virus relatively under control, have seen COVID cases surge in night life hotspots, bars, or other areas where young people like to gather.They said this is especially true in the Northern Hemisphere, where it is summer and young people are tired of lockdowns and eager to enjoy the nice weather.Ryan said young people need to ask themselves: “Do I really need to go to that party? Do I really need to be there?” He said younger people have a “huge opportunity to drive down transmission with their behavior.”WHO epidemiologist Maria Van Kerkhove attends a news conference at the WHO headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland, July 3, 2020.The virus “transmits in clusters, it likes people that come together,” said Van Kerkhove, explaining that the virus, if present, will transmit from person to person any time communities provide the opportunity.WHO officials have seen cases surge among college age people not just at bars and parties, but at places where people gather to watch sporting events, said Van Kerkhove, who urged people to continue practicing physical distancing.What has not been widely discussed, she added, is that not everyone who has the virus spreads it to someone else. Between 10 and 20 of all cases are responsible for about 80% of viral transmissions. Gatherings provide those “spreaders” the best chance to transmit the virus to the most people, she said. 
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Greece has recorded its biggest spike in COVID-19 infections since emerging from a nationwide lockdown three months ago. The country’s virus-free status – relative to others in Europe – has largely faded since allowing tourists to visit again. But now authorities are largely blaming young Greeks for the dramatic rise in infections, accusing them of socializing recklessly and not acting responsibly. Officials fear Greece is just weeks away from living a nightmarish contagion much like that already seen in Italy earlier this year.For a country that until recently had only about 3,000 COVID-19 infections, Tuesday’s single-day count of 121 new cases set off alarm bells.It also forced Sotiris Tsiodras, an infectious diseases expert and the head of the Greek government’s medical response team, to return to the public podium, issuing a stark warning 70 days after Greece claimed it had successfully flattened its coronavirus curve.The situation now, he said, is dangerous and Greeks have to understand the severity of it because the fate of this flare-up ultimately hinges on them.If people behave as they should, Tsiodras said, then they can once again quash the curve. But if they do not, then this can easily and quickly turn into what he described as an Italy-like calamity.COVID-19 infections have been climbing since tourists began trickling back into this sun-drenched country in early June.But as Greeks too have started seeking summer retreat, they also have been loosening up in their compliance with social distancing rules, refusing to wear masks at beach bars, restaurants and social gatherings.Passengers wait to board a ship bound to Greek Aegean islands at the port of Piraeus, near Athens, Greece, Aug. 1, 2020. Authorities introduced tougher restrictions this week following an increase in infections.Home-grown cases have overtaken foreign ones.State statistics released Wednesday suggested only 10 percent of Greece’s COVID-19 cases are linked to tourism.To stem the spread, authorities have introduced a new list of measures, including a cap on large weddings and celebrations that officials say have contributed to the dramatic rise in COVID-19 cases here. They have also implemented tighter border controls – mainly from Albania where the pandemic shows no signs of abating.But reining in Greece’s beach-partying youth is proving more difficult. Greek Civil Protection Minister Nikos Hardalias is now calling on people in their 20s, 30s, and 40s to socialize responsibly, not recklessly.He said that as a father he appeals to the youth to step up to the plate and take the lead in protecting Greece and what it has managed to achieve these past few months in keeping itself clear of the virus.The youth, he said, should now act as young heroes, protecting their families, parents and grandparents.But to officials, it appears that young people are not doing that. Islands like Mykonos and Ios are buzzing with beach parties, defying stiff regulations and steep fines for those failing to observe rules that require them to remain seated at bars, open-air nightclubs and concerts.It is no wonder, health experts say, that the average age of cases here has now dropped from 72 to 52, with the slide slipping more and more into younger age groups traveling around the country during summer break.Cars queue at Promahonas border crossing with Bulgaria, which is the only land border into Greece that is open, July 6, 2020.Charalambos Gogos is a doctor advising the state government’s response.He explained the alarming element in this flare-up is the speed with which it is spreading. It has doubled, he said, in just a matter of days.Any further rise from this point on, he warned, will spell an unchecked pandemic. He said it is imperative to keep the rate and pace of infections down.With Greece’s economy largely dependent on tourism, government officials say they do not want to resort to a new nationwide lockdown, fearing it could scare travelers and business away. 
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Commercial landlords across Europe are bracing for prolonged repercussions from the coronavirus. While they argue offices will remain just as important after the pandemic as before, corporate bosses are starting to rethink their office space needs and many white-collar employees say they would prefer to continue to work largely from home. The pandemic may have kicked off a revolution in working practices — and that could spell trouble, economists say, for pensions funds, which have billions of dollars invested in commercial property, seen before the pandemic as a safe long-term bet.Property experts in London say the demand for office space in the British capital’s financial district is set to fall significantly. They predict corporate bosses will start shunning skyscrapers, preferring instead to rent self-contained buildings for their staff, which can be more easily managed in a public health crisis. The end of the skyscraper?The chief executive of Barclays Bank, Jes Staley, says there will be a distinct trend away from skyscrapers. He told the BBC, “I think the notion of putting 7,000 people in a building may be a thing of the past, and we will find ways to operate with more distancing over a much longer period of time.” Barclays is already exploring moving out of large flagship buildings and using retail branches as work hubs for their corporate management employees and investment bankers to use when they need to have face-to-face meetings.  FILE – Visitors look at the sights during the official opening of “The View” viewing platform at the Shard skyscraper in London.Property consultant Tony Lorenz says shifts in working practices will amount to the most radical change for the commercial property market in the past half-century. He and other property consultants calculate Britain businesses will find they have far more office space than they need. And they say corporate boards are questioning why they need to have staff working from expensive buildings when their white-collar employees have shown they can work productively from home by exploring the full potential of technology.  “I’m anticipating at least a 20 percent to 30 percent fall in rents for offices,” Lorenz told reporters in London. Unpaid rentsIn the more immediate term commercial landlords have already lost a fortune because of lockdowns and tenants being unable to pay their rents. “When you look at the investment market, investors will not be confident that tenants will survive. Even the strongest tenants are struggling to pay rents,” Lorenz says.Across the world millions of tenants and not only in financial districts have stopped, or are delaying, paying their rent to landlords as economies have been left reeling. Hotels and restaurants as well as retail and warehousing businesses have all been struck hard by the pandemic, many will go bankrupt, leaving commercial landlords with considerable losses on their hands, say analysts.Across Western Europe less than half of tenants have been paying their rents on time. Hotels have been especially laggardly, hardly surprising given occupancy rates have fallen to as low as 15%. “The impact of COVID-19 on sentiment in the commercial property sector was always going to make for painful reading. However, the erosion in confidence is stark. What’s even more worrying for investors and occupiers alike is that the full extent of the toll it will take on businesses and the underlying economy is still unclear,” says Simon Rubinsohn of Britain’s Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors.A global issueThe same commercial property slump is being seen outside Europe as well. In the United States commercial landlords have seen rent collection fall by half, according to research firm Remit Consulting.FILE – Property advertisements are seen in central London.The US commercial real estate market is coming under increased stress, according to Real Capital Analytics, a New York-based research firm that monitors the commercial real estate investment market. It reported last month that transactions fell 68% in the second quarter of 2020 across all property types compared with 2019. Many investors have been waiting on the sidelines to see what unfolds. The firm warned the market was paralyzed because the worth of assets is now unclear.Australia, too, is seeing the same problem when it comes to rents and a paralyzed commercial property market. “With many tenants unable to pay rent and vacancies rising, many owners [have] opted to wait and see before making any swift decisions resulting in a decline in investment activity,” Vanessa Rader, head of research at Ray White Commercial, told the Australian Financial Review.The short-term losses and likely major changes roiling the commercial property market represent a major threat to pension funds and other long-term investors, adding to the economies woes triggered by the pandemic. With the yield on government bonds dropping since the 2008 financial crash, institutional investors have turned increasingly to the commercial property market, investing in hotels, shopping malls and office buildings, netting them an average 7% return.  Last week the World Bank said that the 2008 financial crisis reduced the value of global pension assets by 23%. “The magnitude of the pandemic is expected to be higher,” it warned.
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The May death of 46-year-old George Floyd in police custody in Minneapolis, and the subsequent protests across the United States and globally, led lawmakers from around the world to social media to discuss race relations, according to a new analysis from the U.S.-based Pew Research Center.  The research shows that almost half of lawmakers who are active on Twitter in four countries — Britain, Canada, Australia and New Zealand — posted messages referencing Floyd’s death and the Black Lives Matter protests. Floyd was African American. “Prior to George Floyd’s killing, very few had used the phrase Black Lives Matter or hashtags related to that movement, only about 4%. And now we see that after George Floyd’s killing, those who are weighing in on these topics shoots up to about half,” said Kat Devlin, a Pew research associate who spoke to VOA via Skype. Black Lives Matter protests were held in London and cities across Britain, as well as Paris, Berlin, Tokyo, Sydney, Auckland and elsewhere.FILE – People look at a statue of a Black Lives Matter protester by British artist Marc Quinn erected in the spot once occupied by the statue of a slave trader in the English city of Bristol, July 15, 2020.Devlin said events in the U.S. sparked renewed debates on domestic race relations in many countries.  “Sixty-nine percent (of legislators) in Australia who were talking about George Floyd or the Black Lives Matter movement also began to talk about Indigenous people in their countries — the same with a majority of the legislators in New Zealand,” Devlin said. Almost two-thirds of all British lawmakers using Twitter posted messages about George Floyd or Black Lives Matter. Around a third posted tweets critical of U.S. President Donald Trump’s handling of the protests. Most tweeted support and solidarity for the protesters. Many used the #BlackLivesMatter hashtag to highlight perceived racial inequality in Britain.  One widely shared June 1 tweet from British Labor Party MP Clive Lewis compared the situation in the United States to that in Britain:  “Any liberal democracy, including our own, where historic wealth accumulation is inextricably linked to racist ideology will be capable of #GeorgeFloyd levels of racial injustice. It’s not an accusation, simply the current reality.”FILE – A protester stands in front of the US embassy during the Black Lives Matter protest rally in London, June 7, 2020.Shola Mos-Shogbamimu, a Black lawyer and political activist based in Britain, told VOA that the debate in the U.S. resonates across the Atlantic.   “The protests in solidarity, for instance, in the United Kingdom — personally, I don’t think that’s just about the U.S. It’s also recognizing that these this systemic racism exists here in the U.K.,” Mos-Shogbamimu said in a Skype interview at the time of the London protests. “And social media platforms have become the wireless platform to communicate this information worldwide, in real time, instantly.” Not all lawmakers’ tweets expressed solidarity with the protests. Twenty percent of British legislators’ posts were critical of the demonstrations in Britain. Five percent of these posts made reference to the coronavirus pandemic, criticizing the large gatherings and accusing authorities of double standards for allowing the protesters to congregate despite social distancing and lockdown measures in force at the time. “Legislators were talking about the coronavirus in respect to the protests, but then also turned that conversation to the fact that non-white groups within the U.K. are suffering worse outcomes,” Devlin noted.  In Australia, Sen. Pauline Hanson of the One Nation Party wrote on Twitter June 8: “ANGER OVER DOUBLE STANDARDS GROWS: Premiers are facing a growing backlash over Covid-19 social-distancing restrictions after allowing tens of thousands of protestors to defy health warnings & attend Black Lives Matter rallies.” Hanson recently shared an article on Twitter that described the Black Lives Matter movement as “neo-Marxist.” In the weeks since Floyd’s death, statues of slave traders have been torn down, colonial histories are being rewritten, and demands for racial equality have become louder, amplified by social media. In the United States, the House of Representatives last month voted to rid the Capitol of Confederate statues. It is not clear if the measure will be brought to a vote in the Senate. Trump has described the destruction of Civil War-era statues and other memorials, including those honoring Christopher Columbus, as an attempt to cleanse the U.S. of its history. 
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A gleaming new bridge in Genoa built after the deadly collapse of a viaduct opened Tuesday, but critics say not enough has been done since the 2018 disaster to overhaul Italy’s crumbling infrastructure.The first cars crossed the sleek steel structure just after 2000 GMT, nearly two years to the day the Morandi highway gave way during heavy rain, hurling dozens of vehicles into the abyss and killing 43 people.The San Giorgio bridge, designed by famed Italian architect Renzo Piano, was inaugurated to much fanfare on Monday.But many of the relatives of the victims declined to attend, saying the ceremony overshadowed the 2018 tragedy.”We’re still there, at the collapsed bridge, with the people we lost under the bridge. We’re stuck in 2018,” Giorgio Robbiano, 43, who lost his brother, sister-in-law and nephew in the disaster, told AFP Tuesday.However he said “the bridge had to be built and we’re happy for the city.”It was also important to show that large works could be successfully finished in time, without complications,” he said.The tragedy shone a spotlight on the country’s decaying roads, bridges and railways.The Morandi’s speedy demolition and replacement has been hailed by many as an example of what Italy could be, should it scrap its infamous red tape.The centre-left coalition government promised during the coronavirus pandemic this year to use major infrastructure projects to reboot the battered economy, as Italy slid towards its worst recession since World War II.It said it would radically simplify bureaucracy to unblock some 62 billion euros of construction work, and promoted the “Genoa model”: a code-word for work done efficiently and quickly under the watch of a special commissioner.The country has at least 50 large infrastructure projects that are stalled, from a high-speed train in Sicily to the widening of a motorway in Tuscany, Italy’s construction lobby ANCE said.’The Wild West’ Projects stutter to a halt or fail to get off the ground due to lengthy legal challenges to tenders, companies going bankrupt, political point scoring or local council spats, including one in Liguria over which town should host the station on a new train line.The funds are there: according to the Cresme research institute, there were some 200 billion euros earmarked for the sector at the end of 2019, ranging from government and EU funds to private contributions.Last month the government approved a “simplification decree” — touted by Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte as “the mother of all reforms.”But detractors said it failed to make serious inroads into red tape, and could even prove damaging.Infrastructure executive Angelica Donati said it takes twice as long in Italy to carry out a large-scale infrastructure project than in the rest of Europe, so speeding up the process and improving efficiency and transparency would be much welcomed.But she warned that the new decree crushed competition, by effectively excluding the small and medium enterprises that make up the backbone of Italy from tenders for projects worth over 5.3 million euros.For the next two years, the public administration can rule such projects be treated as an emergency “because of the COVID-related crisis … which would exclude them from all public tender regulations, apart from anti-mafia ones”, she told AFP.A small number of specific companies can be invited to participate individually in the tender — penalizing those who would have made joint venture bids, or are simply excluded.”Using the commissioner structure and throwing out the rule book, saying you have full power to do whatever you want, is not the right way to ensure transparency and protect competition,” Donati said.”The Genoa model is a very bad idea, it’s very dangerous,” and risks turning Italy into “the Wild West”.
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A global treaty sponsored by the U.N. International Labor Organization (ILO) calling for greater protection for children against sexual exploitation, forced labor and armed conflict was signed Tuesday by all member nations in the international forum.
Tonga, an island nation located in the Pacific, approved the treaty this week, making it the first U.N. labor treaty ratified by all 187 members. Ratified treaties are legally binding on all signatory governments.International Labor Organization Director-General Guy Ryder attends a news conference after a meeting at the Chancellery in Berlin, Oct. 1, 2019.“Universal ratification … is (a) historic first that means that all children now have legal protection against the worst forms of child labor,” ILO Director-General Guy Ryder said.
“It reflects a global commitment that the worst forms of child labor, such as slavery, sexual exploitation, the use of children in armed conflict or other illicit or hazardous work … have no place in our society,” he said in a statement.
According to the ILO, the number of child laborers plummeted to 152 million children in recent years, a sharp decline from its previous peak 20 years ago of 246 million. Most child workers are employed in the agricultural sector, and 73 million are placed in dangerous conditions while working.Children in Worst Forms of Labor Get Legal Protection The universal ratification of a convention provides children with critical legal protection from the worst child laborConcern for this issue has risen in recent months amid the coronavirus pandemic and the strain on global and local economies. According to the Reuters news agency, some experts say the pandemic could reverse up to two decades of activism and progress in reducing child labor.
In June, the United Nations warned that child labor in the 5-11 age group was likely to rise during and after the pandemic as families grapple to make ends meet.
“The business community is both aware of and acting on the need to do business with respect for children’s rights,” said Roberto Suarez Santos, head of the International Organization of Employers (IOE), the world’s largest private sector network.
Ending child labor is one of the U.N.’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals, a set of global priorities created in 2015. The organization plans to eradicate the practice by 2025. 
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The International Convention on the Worst Forms of Child Labor has been universally ratified. The International Labor Organization said this is the first time in its history that all 187 of its member states have ratified an International Labor Convention.An estimated 152 million children are in child labor. Seventy-three-million are involved in hazardous work that the International Labor Organization defines as the worst forms of child labor.International Labor Organization Director-General Guy Ryder attends a news conference after a meeting at the Chancellery in Berlin, Oct. 1, 2019.ILO Director-General Guy Ryder said the universal ratification of the convention means that children now will benefit from critical legal protection against the worst forms of child labor.“In the past, it has too often been the lot of children to be used to fight in armed conflict, to be sold as slaves, forced into work in the drug trade or in the production of child sexual abuse material or exposed to hazardous substances and long hours,” Ryder said. “In every country, now these practices have been condemned, and clear legal prohibitions against them have been established everywhere.”However, Ryder warns against complacency. He said countries must do more to end impunity for violators and for violations of children’s right to be free from child labor. He said governments must implement and enforce the provisions in the convention.UN Ratifies First Unanimous Treaty on Child Labor The legally binding convention prohibits exploitation of children and forced laborSince the ILO convention was adopted in 1999, the incidence of child labor and its worst forms dropped nearly 40% by 2016. However, progress has slowed in recent years, particularly among children five to 11 years of age, and in some geographical areas.Africa is the region with both the highest absolute number of child laborers and the highest prevalence. Ryder tells VOA the situation in Africa is very worrying.“Just over 72 million African children are in child labor. Of those, 31.5 million in hazardous work,” Ryder said. “The prevalence rate then is nearly 20%. Nearly one in five of all African children are in child labor. … Progress seems to have stalled in Africa, and child labor in absolute terms actually increased in sub-Saharan Africa from 2012 to 2016.”The ILO chief fears years of progress in reducing child labor are at risk of being reversed by COVID-19. He notes the pandemic has caused global unemployment to skyrocket. As more and more people lose their livelihoods and means of survival, he said the danger and temptation to push children back into the labor market will grow.   
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Poland reported on Tuesday a record daily increase in coronavirus cases for the fourth time in a week, with more than a third of them found in the southern Silesia region, which has been grappling with another outbreak among coal miners.
The latest tally of 680 new infections and six deaths comes as Poland considers introducing stricter restrictions, including mandatory testing for travelers returning to Poland and quarantine for those coming from certain countries.
More than 220 cases were reported in Silesia, where a rapid spread of infections led to a temporary reduction of coal output and work in 12 mines in June. The situation then stabilized, but has now deteriorated again.
Last week new cases were detected in three mines, including Chwalowice, which was among those where work was cut back to a minimum in June. The state assets ministry said all 2,700 miners in Chwalowice would be tested on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Sanitary services said last week the resurgence of COVID-19 among miners was a result of easing restrictions and of the working conditions in the mines, where it is difficult to enforce social distancing.
Currently 1,043 coal miners are infected, mostly from Poland’s biggest coal producer PGG, data cited by state-run news agency PAP showed on Tuesday.
The pandemic has added to numerous problems faced by the coal industry. The government, PGG representatives and trade unions have agreed to work out a restructuring plan by the end of September.
Poland now has a total of 48,149 recorded coronavirus cases and 1,738 deaths.
Sittings of the upper and lower houses of parliament have been pushed back, with the lower house meeting moving from Aug. 7 to Aug. 14, after one senator tested positive on Saturday.
Members of parliament and senators have since undergone testing for COVID-19.
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Spain’s former monarch, Juan Carlos I, is leaving Spain to live in another, unspecified, country amid a financial scandal, according to a letter published Monday on the royal family’s website. The letter from Juan Carlos to his son, King Felipe VI, said: “I am informing you of my considered decision to move, during this period, out of Spain.” Juan Carlos, in the letter, said he made the decision against the backdrop of “public repercussions of certain episodes of my past private life.” He said he wanted to ensure he doesn’t make his son’s role difficult, adding that “my legacy, and my own dignity, demand that it should be so.” Juan Carlos’ current whereabouts were not known. Spain’s prime minister recently said he found the developments about Juan Carlos – including investigations in Spain and Switzerland – “disturbing.” FILE – Former Spain’s King Juan Carlos sits in a car as he leaves Quiron Hospital one week after a heart surgery in Madrid, Spain, August 31, 2019 in this still image taken from a video obtained by Reuters.Since Spain’s Supreme Court opened its probe earlier this year, Spanish media outlets have published damaging testimony from a separate Swiss investigation into millions of euros (dollars) that were allegedly given to Juan Carlos by Saudi Arabia’s late King Abdullah.  Juan Carlos allegedly then transferred a large amount to a former companion in what investigators are considering as a possible attempt to hide the money from authorities. The companion, Corinna Larsen, is a Danish-German businesswoman long linked by Spanish media to the former king. Spanish prosecutors have asked her to provide testimony in the case in September in Madrid. The 82-year-old former king is credited with helping Spain peacefully restore democracy after the death of dictator Francisco Franco in 1975.  But marred by scandals in the later years of his reign, Juan Carlos in 2014 abdicated in favor of his son Felipe VI, losing the immunity from prosecution Spain’s Constitution grants to the head of state. After media reports claimed Felipe was a beneficiary of an offshore account holding an alleged 65 million-euro ( $76 million) gift from Saudi Arabia to Juan Carlos, Felipe renounced any future personal inheritance he might receive from the former king. Felipe also stripped his father of his annual stipend of 194,232 euros ($228,000). FILE – Spain’s King Felipe, Queen Letizia, Princess Leonor and Infanta Sofia arrive to a state tribute in memory of Spain’s COVID-19 victims at Royal Palace in Madrid, Spain, July 16, 2020.The royal house has denied that Felipe had any knowledge of his father’s alleged financial irregularities. The royal website said in a statement that Felipe respected his father’s decision. Felipe acknowledged the historic importance of his father’s reign, the statement said, but also “reaffirmed the principles and values on which it stood, in the framework of our Constitution and the rest of our legal system.” A statement from Spain’s general prosecutor’s office in June said it was investigating whether Juan Carlos received millions of dollars in kickbacks from Saudi Arabia during the construction of a high-speed railway there by a Spanish consortium.  It called the probe one of “undeniable technical complexity.” The Supreme Court investigation centers on developments after mid-2014. That covers the second phase of the 2011 contract for the bullet train between the Saudi cities of Medina and Mecca — the so-called “AVE of the desert” in reference to the acronym for high-speed trains in Spain. The date marks the moment when Juan Carlos, struggling amid several scandals, passed on the throne to his son after holding it for nearly four decades. Though Juan Carlos’ finances have been questioned in Spanish media for years, there have so far been no legal implications for him. Spanish lawmakers have rejected at least two proposals since the first allegations emerged to open parliamentary investigations. The decision to leave Spain means Juan Carlos will vacate the 17th-century Zarzuela palace in Madrid, his home for more than 50 years. He moved there after marrying the former queen, Sofia, in 1963. “I think he didn’t have any other choice than to leave,” said Carmen Torras, a 66-year-old Barcelona resident. “I hope justice can follow its course.” In Madrid, Nadia Rodriguez, 33, welcomed the former king’s decision. “It’s better that he just goes,” said Rodriguez, a sports teacher. “The truth is that he hasn’t been giving a very good image of Spain.” 
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With a rainbow as a backdrop, Italy’s president inaugurated a replacement bridge Monday in Genoa, but families of those killed when the Morandi Bridge collapsed boycotted the ceremony along with the firefighters who pulled many of the 43 dead from smashed cars and trucks.  Two years ago this month, a stretch of the Morandi Bridge suddenly gave way in a violent rainstorm, sending vehicles plunging to the dry riverbed below. The new structure — a key artery for the northwestern Italian port city — was erected thanks to round-the-clock construction, even during the COVID-19 pandemic.  Rain drenched the new bridge, stopping just before the ceremony, which started with a recitation of the names of those who died. Renowned architect Renzo Piano designed the bridge to evoke a ship’s bow, to honor his native city’s proud maritime history. The span has 43 lamps in memory of the collapse victims.Traffic will start crossing San Giorgio Bridge, named after St. George, popular in Genoa, on Wednesday. “We are suspended between grief” over the tragedy and “pride for the construction of the new bridge,” Piano told his fellow Genoese in a speech. Renzo Piano walks along the new San Giorgio Bridge in Genoa, Italy, August 3, 2020.The families of the dead are upset that the company that maintained Morandi Bridge will still run the new structure for a while more — even though poor maintenance is being investigated as a possible cause of the collapse. “No one can give us back our dead,” Egle Possetti, who leads an association of the bridge victims’ families, told Italian news channel Sky TG24. Possetti, who lost a sister and other family members in the collapse, said she hoped attention would stay focused on the ongoing criminal investigation into the collapse. Speaking before the ceremony with relatives of the people killed in the collapse, President Sergio Mattarella said he agreed with their decision to meet with him privately and not during the ceremony on the bridge.  The replacement bridge doesn’t cancel out what happened in Genoa, Mattarella said.  “On the contrary, I see it, in good part, as a kind of memorial stone that recalls the victims,” he said.The president added that he shared the families’ quest for justice. “Responsibility isn’t generic. It always has a first name and surname,” Mattarella said, calling for “severe, precise, rigorous action to ascertain responsibility.”FILE – A general view of the collapsed Morandi Bridge in the port city of Genoa, Italy, February 7, 2019.During the ceremony, Mayor Marco Bucci had words for those who lost loved ones in the collapse. “This must never happen again,” the mayor said. Nine Italian air force jets flew in formation over the bridge, trailing smoke in the red, white and green colors of the country’s flag.  Firefighters who extracted survivors and bodies from tons of twisted metal two years ago also boycotted the ceremony in solidarity with the families, Sky TG24 reported.  Prosecutors are probing what caused Morandi Bridge to collapse on August 14, 2018, on the eve of Italy’s biggest summer holiday. Riccardo Morandi, the engineer who designed the bridge built in the 1960s, had recommended continual maintenance to remove rust, especially from the corrosive effect of sea air in the Mediterranean port city, and pollution’s toll on concrete.  Prosecutors have said they are investigating to see whether proper maintenance was consistently carried out over the years on the heavily used span. Earlier this summer, the Italian government forged a deal in which the Benetton fashion family agreed to exit Autostrade per l’Italia, the company that manages and maintains many of Italy’s highways and bridges. Its highway concession had included Morandi Bridge. But that exit will take some time, as Autostrade becomes a public company under the deal and pays 3.4 billion euros ($4 billion) in compensation.   
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Norway says it will stop all cruise ships with more than 100 people on board from disembarking at Norwegian ports after a coronavirus outbreak on a vessel left 41 people infected.  Health Minister Bent Hoie announced the ban Monday, saying the new rules will apply for the next 14 days. He said ships that have already departed will be able to offload passengers and crew at Norwegian ports but that no new journeys can take place.   “The pandemic is not over,” Hoie told a news conference. Norway’s Hurtigruten cruise line apologized Monday following the outbreak on one of its ships, the MS Roald Amundsen. “We have failed,” CEO Daniel Skjeldam told a news conference. “I apologize strongly on behalf of the company.” He said the company would suspend its cruises until further notice and that it is “now in the process of a full review of all procedures.” The cruise line was one of the first companies to resume sailing during the pandemic. Four crew members on board the MS Roald Amundsen were hospitalized on Friday when the ship arrived at Tromsoe, north of the Arctic Circle. They were later diagnosed with the infection along with another 31 crew members. Passengers aboard the ship were allowed to disembark before anyone had been diagnosed, sending local officials scrambling to locate them. At least five passengers have now tested positive and hundreds more have been told to self-isolate for 10 days. The cruise ship industry has been devastated by the coronavirus pandemic, with ships worldwide shutting down in March after several high-profile outbreaks at sea.  
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Emma Gaya winces with pain as the nurse at her local clinic inserts a swab deep into her nose.Gaya had been suffering from a fever and fears she may have been infected with the coronavirus. Her hometown of Sant Sadurni d’Anoia is one of several in Spain’s northeast Catalonia region to see a rise in infections.The public health clinic is conducting around 25 tests each day and has detected a dozen cases in the past two weeks, a rate considered high by epidemiologists.“It pains me that we could go right back where we started,” Gaya said, fearing she may pass the virus on to her 70-year-old mother. “I think we had done well. Now, I don’t know if we are doing it well.”A healthcare worker uses a swab to collect a sample from a man testing for the novel coronavirus COVID-19 at a primary health care center in Barcelona on Aug. 3, 2020.Following the rise in infections that began more than two weeks ago, Catalonia’s semi-autonomous government reimposed restrictions on some public gatherings. Those measures are slowly being eased, as authorities say infection rates are falling again.That has not stopped several European states from imposing travel restrictions. Britain is enforcing a 14-day quarantine on all people returning from Spain, a painful blow to the already battered Spanish economy. Tourism makes up 12% of Spain’s GDP, and some 18 million Britons visited the country last year.Spain is not alone. Britain, Belgium, Luxembourg, France and Germany are among European nations seeing an uptick in infection rates, as fears grow of a second wave of infections.A sign reading “wearing a mask is mandatory” is seen in a street amid the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak in Antwerp, Belgium, July 27, 2020.The city of Antwerp is at the center of Belgium’s outbreak, accounting for roughly half of all new cases. Local officials say the government lifted the nationwide lockdown too soon in May, ignoring localized hot spots like Antwerp.“If you don’t respect physical distancing, this infection spreads around very easily,” said Pierre Van Damme, a professor of vaccinology at the University of Antwerp.“And then again, it (requires) major measures to start controlling it again.”Such measures have been reimposed in three cities in northern Britain, where members of different households are banned from gathering indoors. The government said Friday there are an estimated 4,900 new infections every day across the country.It is vital that governments take swift action to contain these outbreaks, Dr. Peter Drobac of the University of Oxford told VOA on Monday. “If countries are responding, slowing down their reopening, making targeted changes to slow the spread of the virus, hopefully we can keep things in check before it escapes onto that exponential growth pathway.”Customers eat at restaurant next to signs indicating discounts off food, in central London, Aug. 3, 2020.A wider easing of lockdown measures across Britain has been put on hold, with theaters, casinos and bowling alleys among businesses forced to remain closed.“We’re going to have to make difficult choices as societies about the things we value the most,” Drobac said. “If, for example, our priority is to get our kids back in school in September, it may mean that we really don’t want to have people in pubs and indoor restaurants right now.”Germany has also seen an uptick in infections. In Berlin, around 20,000 people gathered Saturday to protest lockdown measures. Authorities are prosecuting the protesting organizers for breaking hygiene and social distancing rules.Meanwhile in some parts of Europe, including Greece and Italy, infection rates remain low, and tourists are returning.“The coronavirus is not something that greatly concerns us,” said Athens resident Thanassis Yanellis, as he prepared to board a ferry at the Port of Piraeus on Saturday bound for the Greek island of Aegina. “We mostly look forward to relaxing and resting.”
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Irish politician and Nobel Peace Prize winner John Hume has died at 83, his family said Monday.Hume is best known for fashioning an agreement to end violence in his native Northern Ireland. A Catholic leader of the moderate Social Democratic and Labor Party (SDLP) of Northern Ireland, Hume shared the 1998 Nobel with David Trimble, the first minister of Northern Ireland at the time, for their roles securing the 1998 Good Friday peace agreement.The agreement ended three decades of violence that left at least 3,500 people dead.Hume was born in 1937 in Northern Ireland’s second city, Derry, or Londonderry to Irish nationalists and British unionists, respectively. Before his political career, he trained for the priesthood and was an advocate of nonviolence throughout his life.Hume saw the decline of the nationalist movement in Northern Ireland and pushed for self-government for the British-ruled province, with input from all parties. He had hoped eventually to achieve a union with the Irish Republic. Though he believed in equal representation in what was then a Protestant-ruled state, he condemned the Irish Republican Army (IRA)’s violent actions.“Ireland is not a romantic dream. It is not a flag. It is 4.5 million people divided into two powerful traditions,” Hume said. “The solution will be found not on the basis of victory for either, but on the basis of agreement and a partnership between both. The real division of Ireland is not a line drawn on the map but in the minds and hearts of its people.”Britain’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson extended his condolences to Hume’s family on Monday, calling the late Nobelist a “political giant.”John Hume was quite simply a political giant. He stood proudly in the tradition that was totally opposed to violence and committed to pursuing his objectives by exclusively peaceful and democratic means.
— Boris Johnson (@BorisJohnson) August 3, 2020Hume announced his complete retirement from politics on Feb. 4, 2004. His death Monday came after years of ill health, his family acknowledged. 
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Pipe by precious pipe, the organ that once thundered through Notre Dame Cathedral is being taken apart after last year’s devastating fire.The mammoth task of dismantling, cleaning and re-assembling France’s largest musical instrument started Monday and is expected to last nearly four years. It will take six months just to tune the organ, and its music isn’t expected to resound again through the medieval Paris monument until 2024, according to the state agency overseeing Notre Dame’s restoration.Amazingly, the 8,000-pipe organ survived the April 2019 fire that consumed the cathedral’s roof and toppled its spire. But the blaze coated the instrument in toxic lead dust that must now be painstakingly removed.And while the organ didn’t burn, it did suffer damage from a record heatwave last summer and has been affected by other temperature variations it’s been exposed to since the 12th-century cathedral lost its roof, the agency said.Experts started removing the organ’s keyboards Monday and will then take out its pipes in a dismantling process that will last through the end of this year, according to the restoration agency. The pieces will be placed in special containers inside the huge cathedral, where the cleaning and restoration will take place.The general who leads the agency said the organ, which dates from 1733, will next play again on April 16, 2024, marking five years since the fire.President Emmanuel Macron hopes the cathedral can reopen in time for the 2024 Olympics in Paris. But it’s taken more than a year to clear out dangerous lead residue and scaffolding that had been in place before the fire for a previous renovation effort, and reconstruction of the landmark has yet to begin. 
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Italian Firefighters, civil protection volunteers, and Alpine troops are working around the clock in trying to put out the fires that have engulfed the hundreds of hectares of woodland around the city of L’Aquila in the eastern region of Abruzzo. The fires were still burning for the third day Sunday, after the area was set ablaze by an act of arson. L’Aquila’s Mayor posted a statement on his Facebook page, saying that four Canadair aircraft, three helicopters and more than 150 people were participating in an operation to put the flames under control. Firefighters have also been using drones equipped with thermal imaging cameras to locate the origin of the fires. 
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Just two years after part of Genoa’s Morandi bridge collapsed killing 43 people, a new structure opens in its place Monday, an achievement in stark contrast to stalled infrastructure projects elsewhere in Italy.
 
The new kilometer-long bridge, designed by star architect Renzo Piano, replaces the old motorway viaduct that broke apart in the port city Aug. 14, 2018, in one of Italy’s worst civil disasters in decades.
 
Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte, who will attend the inauguration of the new Genova-San Giorgio viaduct said it would be a “symbol of a new Italy rising up again.”
 
The accident laid bare years of mismanagement and poor maintenance and set off an acrimonious battle between the government and Atlantia’s Autostrade per l’Italia, the private concession holder controlled by the powerful Benetton family that ran the bridge.
 
Several former and current executives of Autostrade and transport ministry officials have been placed under investigation by prosecutors and, after months of wrangling, Atlantia is set to lose control of its lucrative subsidiary.
 
For the mayor of Genoa and state-appointed commissioner for bridge reconstruction, Marco Bucci, the case is both an example of decades-long failures in Italy’s transport infrastructure and a demonstration of what the country is capable of accomplishing.
 
“There’s a feeling of both regret for what happened and pride in the work that’s been done,” he told Reuters. “We’ve worked and shown Italian excellence.”
 
For years, Italy’s economy has suffocated under a mix of poor governance made worse by corruption and a thicket of vested interests and bureaucracy that have stifled innovation and fostered the kind of neglect that led to the bridge disaster.
 
Genoa itself, surrounded by rugged hills that constrain road transport, has seen a motorway bypass project held up for decades.
 
With the coronavirus crisis still unfolding and billions of euros set to come to Italy from Europe’s newly agreed recovery fund, addressing such failures has gained a new urgency.
 
As well as the shocking human toll, the collapse of the Morandi bridge dealt a severe economic blow to Genoa, costing the city an estimated 6 million euros ($7.06 million) a day in lost revenues and additional costs, Bucci said, with freight traffic interrupted for months.
 
Under heavy pressure to address the neglect that caused the disaster, the government pushed through an emergency decree to sweep aside red tape.
 
Between demolishing the remainder of the old structure in February 2019 to opening the new bridge 18 months later, the speed of the project has been breakneck in a country with crumbling roads and tunnels and development plans gathering dust.
 
While the circumstances behind the bridge collapse were unique, much rides on repeating that momentum elsewhere.
 
Trust and clear project goals, two things that have often been lacking in big infrastructure projects, were vital, said Roberto Carpaneto, head of RINA Consulting, who worked with the construction consortium led by Italian infrastructure groups Webuild and Fincantieri.
 
“Being able to say what was going to happen, when and why allowed us to build this relation of trust,” he said.   
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Protesters took to the street in cities across Russia on Saturday in support of jailed Khabarovsk former governor Sergei Furgal.Russian federal police detained protesters in the cities of Saint Petersburg, Yekaterinburg and Moscow.The demonstrations come as thousands of people marched in the Russian Far East city of Khabarovsk for the fourth weekend Saturday, angered by the arrest of the region’s popular governor and his replacement with a Kremlin favorite.The situation in the Khabarovsk region has become a problem for the Kremlin as demonstrations in support of protesters there are spreading elsewhere in the country.Furgal, 50, a medical doctor by training, was arrested by Russian federal law enforcement in early July on charges related to multiple murders in 2004 and 2005. He was flown to Moscow, where he was ordered jailed for two months and is being held in Moscow’s notorious Lefortovo prison.Russian President Vladimir Putin replaced Furgal with a young State Duma deputy, Mikhail Degtiarev, with no ties to the region, to serve as acting governor of the Khabarovsk region.Many people in Khabarovsk believe the charges leveled against Furgal, and his replacement last week, are politically motivated. Furgal was elected in 2018, defeating a candidate from Putin’s party, United Russia.Braving the heavy rain beneath umbrellas Saturday, protesters were chanting “Freedom!” and “Putin resign!” outside a government building, while a banner read “Russia without Putin!” At times protesters also chanted “We came here of our own will.”Many in Khabarovsk, a city on the border with China, see the charges against Furgal as unsubstantiated and politically motivated. They are demanding that his trial take place in his home city, not Moscow.Protests in the city, about 8,000 kilometers east of Moscow, erupted July 11. Since then, protesters have been demanding the release of Furgal and an open and fair trial for him. 
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A former Spanish prime minister once described the rock of Gibraltar, which Spain ceded to Britain in 1713, as a stone in the shoe of Anglo-Spanish relations. But Gibraltar currently isn’t the only source of Spanish irritation with the British.Last week’s abrupt decision by London to require Britons returning from vacation in Spain to quarantine for 14 days has angered a Spanish government desperate to salvage something from the wrecked summer tourism season. And it augurs badly for Britain’s ongoing, fraught negotiations with the European Union for a post-Brexit free-trade deal.The two governments have been at loggerheads since Prime Minister Boris Johnson and his advisers abruptly reintroduced the quarantine measures six days ago — to howls of protests not only from the Spanish government but also from Britain’s struggling airlines and Spanish hoteliers trying to stave off bankruptcy.Johnson’s official spokesman warned “no travel is risk-free during this pandemic.” Since then, Luxembourg has been added to Britain’s list of risky countries to visit.The Spanish government has been lobbying Downing Street to change its mind, pointing out that large parts of Spain, including the tourist hotspots of the Canary and Balearic Islands, are safer than Britain and have much lower coronavirus infection rates.In an interview last week with the Telecinco TV network, Spain’s Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez said his government was “talking with British authorities to try to get them to reconsider.” He said Britain had made an error by lumping all of Spain together and not taking a more clinical and sophisticated regional approach.He noted nearly 65 percent of Spain’s new cases are occurring in two regions — Catalonia in the northeast and neighboring Aragón. Britain’s quarantine requirement is “not well adjusted” to the epidemiological situation, he said. The Spanish point out that other European countries, notably France and Germany, have only advised their citizens against visiting Catalonia.Under relentless pressure from Madrid, the British government says it will review in 10 days’ time the quarantine requirement, which has prompted tens of thousands of would-be vacationers to cancel their travel plans. Low-cost airlines have halted flights to Spain. The review gives some hope to Spain that Britain may reverse its decision.But Britain’s quarantine decision is prompting a fierce backlash on the Iberian Peninsula that risks significant impact on Brexit talks.Spanish ministers are fuming. They were given no warning by London. The Spanish see the move as a stab in the back. Britons account for more than a fifth of the 80 million tourists who visit Spain in average every year. Nearly half a million Britons own vacation homes in Spain. The Spanish tourism association has offered to pay for British travelers to take virus tests in Spain.The dispute is threatening to reignite tensions between the two countries over the fate of Gibraltar, analysts say. Spanish politicians, goaded by the country’s tabloid press, are warning that they won’t do Britain any favors in the deadlocked negotiations over Britain’s relationship with the EU. A key stumbling block in the negotiations is over fishing rights in Britain’s waters.Gibraltar could well be sued to further complicate Brexit negotiations. The current government in Madrid has dropped pushing Spain’s sovereignty claim to Gibraltar, but it might revive it under pressure from Spain’s parliament.Gibraltar is desperate to ensure it will be able to benefit from a free-trade pact, if one is ever concluded, between Britain and the EU. Spain could wield a veto over that happening, shutting Gibraltar out of any easy relationship with the rest of the EU. Spain’s EU Affairs Minister Juan Gonzalez-Barba warned last month, before the current spat, that talks over Gibraltar’s future relationship with Spain and the EU “will not be easy.”And he hinted Spain could revive sovereignty ambitions. Ninety-six percent of Gibraltar’s voters opposed Brexit in the 2016 EU referendum.Spain’s Iberian neighbor, Portugal, also is in dispute with Britain. Portugal was not included on Britain’s safe-last of countries, which was first published last month. The country’s foreign ministry blasted the exclusion, noting that 28 times more people had died from COVID-19 in Britain than in Portugal. An infuriated António Costa, the prime minister, tweeted a graph illustrating it was safer in the tourist hotspot the Algarve, favored by British sun-seekers, than it was in Britain.While Portugal has enjoyed centuries of good relations with Britain, Anglo-Spanish relations have been more uneasy, stretching back to Tudor times when Henry VIII offended Spain by ditching and humiliating his first wife, Catherine of Aragon. British piracy during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I in the “Spain Main” off the coastline of the Americas and in the Caribbean Sea set the scene for Spain’s bid to invade England. But the Spanish Armada was defeated by legendary English seadogs like Sir Francis Drake.   
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Thousands of people marched in the Russian far eastern city of Khabarovsk on Saturday for a fourth consecutive weekend in protest at President Vladimir Putin’s handling of a local political crisis.Residents of Khabarovsk, around 3,800 miles (6,110 km) and seven time zones east of Moscow, are unhappy about the July 9 detention of Sergei Furgal, the wider region’s popular governor, who was arrested on murder charges he denies.His detention, which his supporters say was politically motivated, has triggered weeks of street protests, creating a headache for the Kremlin, which is trying to tackle a sharp drop in real incomes as a result of the coronavirus outbreak and keep a lid on unrest as the economy stutters.Sheltering from sporadic rain beneath umbrellas, protesters chanted “Freedom!”One banner read “Russia without Putin” while protesters chanted “Putin resign!” outside a government building.City authorities estimated around 3,500 people had taken part in the march. Some local media put the number above 10,000, but said the crowds were smaller than those of previous weeks.The protests have highlighted anger among some in the far east over what they see as policies emanating from detached Moscow-based authorities who have neglected them for years.”The government doesn’t think of us as people. We’re scum to them,” one female pensioner protester told Reuters.”We live at the edge of the world. This is the richest country … but we live in poverty and we pensioners have to work.”Supporters of Furgal, who is a member of the nationalist LDPR party, say he is being punished for defeating a candidate from the ruling pro-Putin United Russia party in 2018. The Kremlin says Furgal has serious charges to answer.Sustained demonstrations are unusual for Russia’s regions, as is a lack of response from the authorities to break them up.
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Two thirds of British businesses say they are now “fully operational” after the coronavirus lockdown, up from half in June, according to a survey on Sunday.A further 21 percent of the firms, polled in the first half of July by the Confederation of British Industry (CBI), said they were partly operational with some premises still closed.”With businesses gradually reopening, this month’s data seems to indicate a turning point for the economy,” said Alpesh Paleja, an economist for CBI, one of Britain’s main business lobby groups.But many firms, especially those in consumer-facing sectors, remained in “acute financial distress,” he added.Britain’s lockdown has been slowly lifting since May, with the last major change on July 4, when hotels, pubs and restaurants were allowed to reopen.However, on Friday, Prime Minister Boris Johnson said he was postponing further relaxation, which would have helped some arts and entertainment venues, due to rising cases.Businesses on average said they were operating at 85 percent of usual capacity due to social distancing, compared with 72 percent when a stricter rule generally requiring two meters of distance was in force.Lack of demand from customers continued to be businesses’ most common challenge to resuming normal operations, the CBI said. More than two thirds of firms named it as a barrier to normal operations, down slightly from three quarters in June.The Bank of England is due to set out new quarterly forecasts on Thursday, as different sectors of the economy recover at different rates from the unprecedented economic damage.Whether the main barrier to growth is lack of consumer demand, or businesses’ difficulties meeting it, will be key to the central bank’s decisions on stimulus later this year.  
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Germany’s defense ministry officially disbanded a company of its Special Forces Command (KSK) on Saturday, following reports that it had been exposed to far-right and neo-Nazi ideology.The move showed how deeply rooted right-wing extremism could be within the German army, some experts said.“The announcement basically acknowledges for the first time that it is not just individual cases in which soldiers show up as right-wing extremists, but that there are right-wing extremist networks in the German Federal Armed Forces,” said Fabian Virchow, a professor at the University of Applied Sciences Düsseldorf and director of the Research Unit on Right Wing Extremism.“It shows that this danger has been systematically underestimated in the past by political and military leaders,” Virchow told VOA.German Defense Minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer made the initial announcement of disbanding the KSK’s 2nd Company July 1 after an investigation into allegations of right-wing activity.Kramp-Karrenbauer said then that the investigation had revealed the KSK was building a “wall of secrecy” around itself with a “toxic leadership culture.”FILE – German Defense Minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer arrives at a news conference on German armed forces Bundeswehr Special Forces Command (KSK) in Berlin, July 1, 2020.The defense ministry told VOA in a statement that it was doing its best to prevent far-right extremists from penetrating the German armed forces, or Bundeswehr, and to remove them once they have been identified.“Extremism of any kind, whether right wing, left wing or Islamist, has no place in the Bundeswehr, with its more than 250,000 soldiers, civil servants and civilian workers,” a defense ministry spokesman told VOA.He said the country’s Military Counterintelligence Service (MAD) was working on about 600 suspected cases of right-wing extremism, including 20 suspected cases pertaining to the KSK.Reform callsDuring the July 1 announcement, Kramp-Karrenbauer said that the analysis of the KSK far-right incidents concluded that the unit must be changed from “the inside out” and that it must be better reintegrated into the Bundeswehr.”We will give the KSK time to press the reset button,” she added, giving the unit an October deadline to make reforms or be dismantled.Her call for reform came a few weeks after a whistleblower within the KSK addressed a 12-page letter to her. The whistleblower alleged that right-wing extremism within the unit was known internally and “collectively ignored or even tolerated.”In January, the MAD counterintelligence unit reportedly said about 500 soldiers in the military were under investigation on suspicion of right-wing extremism.In March, MAD said the number of suspected cases of extremism within the army had risen significantly in 2019, in its first report on the issue.KSK operationsThe KSK was established in 1996 to focus on special operations, including counterterrorism, hostage rescue and intelligence gathering. It currently numbers around 1,100.Its well-equipped members have reportedly served in numerous operations in Europe and elsewhere, including Afghanistan, Mali, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Kosovo.The KSK is known to be the most secret, elite unit of the German army, with its operations very rarely revealed to the public.According to Virchow of the University of Applied Sciences Düsseldorf, the secrecy makes it hard to know if it is worth having such a unit, adding that “it is unlikely that the KSK will be disbanded as a whole.”Before the KSK, there were several special units within German law enforcement, including a special police unit called GSG 9, and the military, including the navy’s Kampfschwimmer. However, the forces’ operations remained limited, with no major international operations. KSK, on the other hand, has been involved in overseas operations as well.Some experts charge that the KSK’s previous involvement in key international operations means the unit will likely continue to operate in the future, regardless of threats regarding its disbandment.“If Germany … will continue to take part in the U.N. or NATO missions that involve actual fighting, you need a special forces unit,” Hans-Jakob Schindler, senior director of the Counter Extremism Project in Berlin, told VOA.“Disbanding the whole KSK would mean that Germany’s ability to partake in international missions is severely hampered, because you just cannot be in Mali without the KSK,” Schindler added.ConscriptionIn addition to measures to reform the KSK, German officials in recent months have also debated whether to bring back compulsory military service as a way to combat right-wing extremism in the German army ranks.One of the idea’s supporters, Eva Högl, the German parliament’s Bundeswehr overseer, argues that conscription could make it much harder for far-right extremists to establish a base of influence in the army.“It would do the army good if a large part of society does its service for a while,” Högl told newspapers of the Funke Media Group last month.FILE – German Chancellor Angela Merkel arrives for the weekly cabinet meeting in Berlin, July 15, 2020.However, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Kramp-Karrenbauer are not in favor of reintroducing conscription to the army.Germany suspended conscription in 2011, but it still has volunteer service alongside its professional army members.Kramp-Karrenbauer last Thursday announced that the German army would launch a new volunteer scheme for the army with the motto of “Your year for Germany” in April 2021. The program reportedly will focus on homeland protection.
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Working as a reporter and deputy editor for the Hungarian publication Index was a pinnacle in Szabolcs Panyi’s career as a journalist.From 2013 to 2018, Panyi covered Hungarian politics, uncovered corruption scandals and won numerous awards for his work. People would recognize him on the streets or at protests, shaking his hand. He even saw a government official on TV reading a printout of one of his stories.   “That was the influence Index had,” he told VOA. “Both personally and professionally, it was one of the best parts of my life.”During his time at the news website, Panyi said he never received external pressure that influenced his reporting. But rumors lingered about a “set date” for when the publication would be bought out by a pro-government businessman.”We knew that it was just too popular and powerful to be simply shut down in a very obvious manner,” said Panyi, who now reports for Direkt36, a nonprofit investigative journalism center in Hungary. “So, the government tried to find more covert ways to try to influence Index.”Szabolcs Dull, editor-in-chief of Hungary’s main independent website Index, leaves the newsroom after being sacked in Budapest, July 22, 2020.Fears of outside interference grew last month when editor-in-chief declared that its independence was “in danger” and under threat from “outside interference.”  On July 22, Dull was fired and two days later more than 70 Index staffers and the editorial board resigned in protest — more than half of the publication’s staff. Now, journalists and media freedom advocates worry about the state of press freedom in the country.People take part in a protest for media freedom in Budapest, Hungary, July 24, 2020.Why resign?In an editorial published last month, Dull warned that the editorial staff was in danger and raised concerns over an “organizational overhaul.”  Plans by directors to restructure the staff were framed as a way to cut costs, according to a Facebook group formed by some of the former staff. The journalists, however, said the plans risked compromising editorial standards.  Top editors repeatedly lobbied for assurance of the site’s independence but were given no answers from management.”This is such a strong infringement on the editorial independence of Index.hu that we simply could not accept,” the staffers wrote on the Facebook page.Following changes to parts of its ownership in 2018,  Index started publishing a barometer to alert readers to any potential interference.  Further changes came in March, when businessman Marco Vaszily acquired a 50% stake in the company that sells Index’s advertising.Vaszily is chair of pro-government television outlet, TV2 and was involved in the 2014 takeover of Origo, at the time Hungary’s largest online news site. More than 30 Origo journalists later resigned over what they said was a pro-government shift in editorial content.Laszlo Bodolai, head of the foundation that owns Index, denied the site’s independence was at risk, Reuters reported. He said Dull’s inability to control internal newsroom tensions led to a drop in revenue as advertisers stayed away.   Index did not respond to VOA’s request for comment.Bodoky, from the Hungarian watchdog group, said he wished the employees had stayed with the news outlet. Right now, he said, “the stakes are too high” for journalists to leave independent publications.”I think they left the ship too early,” he said.The full circumstances of the resignations are unclear: the employees have non-disclosure agreements, which can only be waived by the publication’s owner, they wrote on Facebook.One journalist told VOA the agreements were signed recently and were not common in Hungary.  Loss for independent newsIndex is the largest independent news outlet in Hungary, accounting for the reach of about half of all of the country’s independent publications. The publication receives more than 1 million viewers every day.Panyi compared the loss of the outlet to Americans losing both the Washington Post and the New York Times.”This is a country of 10 million, which just lost its largest source of independent news,” Panyi said. “It’s a huge blow to media freedom in Hungary.”Independent outlets remain, but they have significantly smaller audiences than Index, Bodoky said. Pro-government news sources are overwhelming the media landscape, he added.”If you are an average person in Hungary and you don’t actively look for critical or independent reporting, then you get the government propaganda,” he said. “You get it on the state-owned television channel, you get it on the commercial radio channels, in the daily papers and so on.”In addition to the lack of independent news outlets, Panyi said another element to the Hungarian media landscape is advertising. When state-owned companies take control over advertising for publications, it can give the state the power to determine which publications get advertising. This forces publications to make a difficult decision.”Editor in chiefs and CEOs have to make the decision whether to accept money from the government, which will eventually save them because there’s a huge hole in their budget,” Panyi said. “But in return, they are cutting deals like they’re not going to report on certain issues regarding the prime minister’s family.”The changes at Index are part of a “moment of alarming symbolism,” according to the Media Freedom Rapid Response consortium of rights groups.  In a letter to the presidents of the European Council and Commission, the group said that independent media in Hungary are under enormous pressure and cited a 2020 Media Pluralism Monitor report that found funds from the European Union, distributed through the prime minister’s office, are used to finance pro-government media. The Center for Media Pluralism and Media Freedom is a research center funded in part by the EU.  The fight to restore press freedom will likely be “a long fight,” Panyi said. But, he added, hope remains. He said Hungarians are still in search of unbiased news and independent journalism.As for the staffers who resigned, they have no immediate plans other than a commitment to independent journalism.  “We sincerely hope that we will manage to stay together, work together, and keep doing what we have been doing for the past 20 years,” the staffers wrote.
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Thousands marched in Berlin on Saturday to protest against measures imposed in Germany to stem the coronavirus pandemic, saying they violated people’s rights and freedoms.The gathering, estimated by police at 17,000, included libertarians, constitutional loyalists and anti-vaccination activists. There was also a small far-right presence with some marchers carrying Germany’s black, white and red imperial flag.Protesters danced and sang ‘We are free people!’ to the tune of rock band Queen’s ‘We Will Rock You’. Others marched with placards saying ‘We are making a noise because you are stealing our freedom!’ and ‘Do think! Don’t wear a mask!’.”Our demand is to return to democracy,” said one protester who declined to give his name. “The mask that enslaves us must go.”People – mostly without face masks – attend a demonstration against coronavirus restrictions in Berlin, Aug. 1, 2020.The protests followed a rallying call from Michael Ballweg, an entrepreneur and political outsider who has organized similar rallies in Stuttgart and is running to become mayor of the southwestern city.Police filed a complaint against the organizer for failing to ensure marchers wore masks and kept their distance. Mainstream politicians criticized the protesters, with Social Democrat co-leader Saskia Esken calling them “covidiots”.”They not only endanger our health, they endanger our successes against the pandemic,” tweeted Esken, whose party is Chancellor Angela Merkel’s coalition partner.After Germany’s initial success in curbing the pandemic, infections are rising again. More than 200,000 people have caught COVID-19 and nearly 1,000 have died from it.Most people in Germany have respected measures that include wearing face masks in shops, while the government has just imposed mandatory tests for holidaymakers returning from high-risk areas.But a vocal minority is chafing against the restrictions.”Only a few scientists around the world who follow the government’s lead are heard,” said protester Peter Konz. Those who hold different views “are silenced, censored or discredited as defenders of conspiracy theories”.
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