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LONDON — Chinese President Xi Jinping is not known for public displays of affection.

So Xi’s double embrace of his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, last week — broadcast by Chinese and Russian state television — was widely seen as a calculated signal to the world of a blossoming personal and geopolitical relationship.

Putin’s visit to China underlined burgeoning economic ties between Moscow and Beijing as the two countries signed a series of agreements aimed at forging closer cooperation, even as the West tries to isolate Moscow following its invasion of Ukraine.

Personal warmth

The show of personal warmth was matched by a series of lavish state ceremonies, ostensibly marking the 75th anniversary of diplomatic relations.

“It is a shared strategic choice of both countries to deepen strategic cooperation, expand mutually beneficial cooperation and follow the general historical trend of multipolarity in the world and economic globalization,” Xi told Putin during the talks in Beijing on May 16.

Putin praised increased bilateral trade between Russia and China, which had, he said, reached an annual $240 billion — and touted his ambitions to sell more oil and gas to Beijing.

“Russia is ready and capable of uninterruptedly and reliably supplying the Chinese economy, enterprises, cities, towns with environmentally friendly, affordable energy, light and heat,” Putin said following a visit to the northern Chinese city of Harbin.

Deepened cooperation

The Russian leader’s visit to China achieved its aims, according to Liana Fix of the Washington-based Council on Foreign Relations.

“(Coming) shortly after Putin’s inauguration, it had a legitimizing effect for his fifth term as president on the international stage, demonstrating that even if the West does not accept his elections as free and fair, China sees him as the legitimate leader.

“Second, it served the purpose of deepening defense cooperation between these two countries, especially by circumventing U.S. sanctions on Chinese financial institutions for financing Russia‘s war effort, and by facilitating further Chinese deliveries to Russia‘s war machine,” Fix told VOA in an email.

European snub

Putin’s visit to China came days after Xi traveled to Europe, where EU leaders tried to persuade him to end support for Russia’s war on Ukraine. It’s clear they failed, said analyst Velina Tchakarova, founder of the FACE geopolitical consultancy.

“China provides the main lifeline for Russia. But China also practically set the stage for Russia to not get internationally isolated. Russia officially has announced that it’s going in the direction of a long war that it wants to win, and here we see clearly that China is taking the side of Russia,” Tchakarova told VOA.

That alliance — what Tchakarova calls the “DragonBear” — has ramifications beyond Ukraine.

“These kind of wars, as the one being waged right now in Europe [in Ukraine], and similarly the one in the Middle East [between Israel and Hamas], and obviously also the military tensions in the Indo-Pacific — these are hotspots, military conflicts and wars that are to be seen in this context of emerging ‘Cold War 2.0’ between the United States on the one hand, and China and Russia, or the ‘DragonBear’ on the other,” Tchakarova told VOA.

Democratic threat

Xi and Putin are united by geopolitical aims, and their autocratic ideals threaten democratic societies, according to author Anne Applebaum, a staff writer at The Atlantic magazine.

“What they have in common is their dislike of the democratic world, their dislike of democratic language, and the ideals of freedom and justice and rule of law and transparency,” Applebaum said. “And they are willing to join together to fight against them. It’s a full-on central challenge from the autocratic world to them, and it’s attacking both their citizens and their allies around the world, and we need to face it.”

Unbalanced relations

The relationship is tilted heavily in China’s favor, Applebaum said.

“They may have an interest in weakening Russia. A weaker Russia has to sell them oil and gas at lower prices. A weaker Russia is a more pliable ally, is a weaker player on the stage. And maybe they’re hoping for that. It’s pretty clear already that Russia is the junior partner in this alliance, which isn’t something that we would have thought possible a couple of decades ago,” she told VOA.

Putin is due to host Xi at the October BRICS summit in Russia, as both countries seek to galvanize global support for their vision of Beijing and Moscow as major players in a new, multipolar world.

VOA’s Russian Service contributed to this report.
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frankfurt, germany — A would-be prince, a former judge and parliamentarian, and retired military officers are among nine alleged conspirators who will stand trial on Tuesday for a suspected “Reichsbuerger” plot to overthrow Germany’s democracy. 

Prosecutors say they were ringleaders in a terrorist plot to topple the German government and install property investor Heinrich XIII Prinz Reuss, scion of a now throneless dynasty, as a caretaker head of state. 

The case, to be held in a maximum-security courtroom on the outskirts of Frankfurt, is the second to open against members of a conspiracy involving at least 27 people. 

The defendants taking their seats behind bulletproof glass on Tuesday constitute what prosecutors say would have been political and military leaders of a plot to storm parliament and detain legislators to initiate their seizure of power. 

“They knew their seizure of power would involve killing people,” prosecutors wrote.  

The defendants have denied charges of terrorism and high treason. 

Prosecutors say they are adherents of the “Reichsbuerger” (Citizens of the Reich) belief system, which holds that today’s German state is an illegitimate facade and that they are citizens of a German monarchy that, they maintain, endured after Germany’s defeat in World War I, despite its formal abolition. 

Security services say the conspiracy theory, which has parallels to the QAnon movement that fueled the January 6, 2021, storming of the U.S. Capitol, has 21,000 adherents nationwide. 

Nine accomplices who prosecutors say would have imposed martial law after a putsch went on trial in Stuttgart last month. 

Tuesday’s defendants include former army officers Maximilian Eder and Ruediger von Pescatore, and former judge and far-right ex-parliamentarian Birgit Malsack-Winkemann. 

Prosecutors say Malsack-Winkemann used her parliamentary privileges to escort several of her co-conspirators around the Reichstag building in Berlin in a scoping exercise to plan the putsch. 

Ringleaders are accused of seeking the backing of Russian officials, including during meetings at Russian consulates in Germany and in the Slovak capital, Bratislava. 

This reflected their belief that an “alliance” of victor countries, including Russia and the United States, stood ready to support the resurrection of the real, submerged Germany that would replace today’s post-World War II republic. 

The suspects reject the charges against them. Eder told Stern magazine in an interview given from prison that the parliamentary tour had been intended to find suitable locations to accost lawmakers over what he believed was their involvement in a child molestation ring. 

Prosecutors say the conspiracy had 500,000 euros in funds and had gathered over 100,000 rounds of ammunition.
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TALLINN, Estonia — A Russian court on Monday opened the trial of a theater director and a playwright accused of advocating terrorism in a play, the latest step in an unrelenting crackdown on dissent in Russia that has reached new heights since Moscow sent troops into Ukraine.

Zhenya Berkovich, a prominent independent theater director, and playwright Svetlana Petriychuk have been jailed for over a year.

Authorities claim their play “Finist, the Brave Falcon” justifies terrorism, which is a criminal offense in Russia punishable by up to seven years in prison.

Berkovich and Petriychuk have both repeatedly rejected the accusations against them.

Berkovich told the court on Monday that she staged the play in order to prevent terrorism, and Petriychuk echoed her sentiment, saying that she wrote it in order to prevent events like those depicted in the play.

The women’s lawyers have pointed out at court hearings before the trial that the play was supported by the Russian Culture Ministry and won the Golden Mask award, Russia’s most prestigious national theater award.

In 2019, the play was read to inmates of a women’s prison in Siberia, and Russia’s state penitentiary service praised it on its website, Petriychuk’s lawyer has said.
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LONDON — British authorities and the country’s public health service knowingly exposed tens of thousands of patients to deadly infections through contaminated blood and blood products, and hid the truth about the disaster for decades, an inquiry into the U.K.’s infected blood scandal found Monday.

An estimated 3,000 people in the United Kingdom are believed to have died and many others were left with lifelong illnesses after receiving blood or blood products tainted with HIV or hepatitis in the 1970s to the early 1990s.

The scandal is widely seen as the deadliest disaster in the history of Britain’s state-run National Health Service since its inception in 1948.

Former judge Brian Langstaff, who chaired the inquiry, slammed successive governments and medical professionals for “a catalogue of failures” and refusal to admit responsibility to save face and expense. He found that deliberate attempts were made to conceal the scandal, and there was evidence of government officials destroying documents.

“This disaster was not an accident. The infections happened because those in authority — doctors, the blood services and successive governments — did not put patient safety first,” he said. “The response of those in authority served to compound people’s suffering.”

Campaigners have fought for decades to bring official failings to light and secure government compensation. The inquiry was finally approved in 2017, and over the past four years it reviewed evidence from more than 5,000 witnesses and more than 100,000 documents.

Many of those affected were people with hemophilia, a condition affecting the blood’s ability to clot. In the 1970s, patients were given a new treatment that the U.K. imported from the United States. Some of the plasma used to make the blood products was traced to high-risk donors, including prison inmates, who were paid to give blood samples.

Because manufacturers of the treatment mixed plasma from thousands of donations, one infected donor would compromise the whole batch.

The report said around 1,250 people with bleeding disorders, including 380 children, were infected with HIV -tainted blood products. Three-quarters of them have died. Up to 5,000 others who received the blood products developed chronic hepatitis C, a type of liver infection.

Meanwhile an estimated 26,800 others were also infected with hepatitis C after receiving blood transfusions, often given in hospitals after childbirth, surgery or an accident, the report said.

British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is expected to apologize later Monday, and authorities are expected to announce compensation of about 10 billion pounds ($12.7 billion) in all to victims. Details about that payment are not expected until Tuesday at the earliest.

The report said many of the deaths and illnesses could have been avoided had the government taken steps to address the risks linked to blood transfusions or the use of blood products. Since the 1940s and the early 1980s it has been known that hepatitis and the cause of AIDS respectively could be transmitted this way, the inquiry said.

Langstaff said that unlike a long list of developed countries, officials in the U.K. failed to ensure rigorous blood donor selection and screening of blood products. At one school attended by children with hemophilia, public health officials gave the children “multiple, riskier” treatments as part of research, the report said.

He added that over the years authorities “compounded the agony by refusing to accept that wrong had been done,” falsely telling patients they had received the best treatment available and that blood screening had been introduced at the earliest opportunity. When people were found to be infected, officials delayed informing them about what happened.

Langstaff said that while each failure on its own was serious, taken “together they are a calamity.”

Andy Evans, of campaign group Tainted Blood, told reporters that he and others “felt like we were shouting into the wind during the last 40 years.”

“We have been gaslit for generations. This report today brings an end to that. It looks to the future as well and says this cannot continue,” he said.

Diana Johnson, a lawmaker who has long campaigned for the victims, said she hoped that those found responsible for the disaster will face justice — including prosecution — though the investigations have taken so long that some of the key players may well have died since.

“There has to be accountability for the actions that were taken, even if it was 30, 40, 50 years ago,” she said.
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London — A British court has ruled that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange can appeal against an order that he be extradited to the U.S. on espionage charges.

Two High Court judges on Monday said Assange has grounds to challenge the U.K. government’s extradition order.

The ruling sets the stage for an appeal process likely to further drag out a years-long legal saga. Assange faces 17 espionage charges and one charge of computer misuse over his website’s publication of a trove of classified U.S. documents almost 15 years ago.

The Australian computer expert has spent the last five years in a British high-security prison after taking refuge in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London for seven years.

Assange’s lawyers have argued he was a journalist who exposed U.S. military wrongdoing in Iraq and Afghanistan. Sending him to the U.S., they said, would expose him to a politically motivated prosecution and risk a “flagrant denial of justice.”

The U.S. government says Assange’s actions went way beyond those of a journalist gathering information, amounting to an attempt to solicit, steal and indiscriminately publish classified government documents.

In March, two judges rejected the bulk of Assange’s arguments but said he could take his case to the Court of Appeal unless the U.S. guaranteed he would not face the death penalty if extradited and would have the same free speech protections as a U.S. citizen.

The court said that if Assange couldn’t rely on the First Amendment then it was arguable his extradition would be incompatible with the European Convention on Human Rights, which also provides free speech and media protections.

The U.S. provided those reassurances, but Assange’s legal team and supporters argue they are not good enough to rely on to send him to the U.S. federal court system because the First Amendment promises fall short. The U.S. said Assange could seek to rely on the amendment but it would be up to a judge to decide whether he could.

Attorney James Lewis, representing the U.S., said Assange’s conduct was “simply unprotected” by the First Amendment.

“No one, neither U.S. citizens nor foreign citizens, are entitled to rely on the First Amendment in relation to publication of illegally obtained national defense information giving the names of innocent sources, to their grave and imminent risk of harm,” Lewis said.

The WikiLeaks founder, who has spent the past five years in a British prison, was not in court to hear his fate being debated. He did not attend for health reasons, Fitzgerald said.

Commuters emerging from a Tube stop near the courthouse couldn’t miss a large sign bearing Assange’s photo and the words, “Publishing is not a crime. War crimes are.” Scores of supporters gathered outside the neo-Gothic Royal Courts of Justice chanting “Free Julian Assange” and “Press freedom, Assange freedom.”

Some held a large white banner aimed at President Joe Biden, exhorting: “Let him go Joe.”

Assange’s lawyers say he could face up to 175 years in prison if convicted, though American authorities have said any sentence would likely be much shorter.

Assange’s family and supporters say his physical and mental health have suffered during more than a decade of legal battles, which includes seven years spent inside the Ecuadorian Embassy in London from 2012 until 2019. He has spent the past five years in a British high-security prison.

His legal team is prepared to ask the European Court of Human Rights to intervene. But his supporters fear Assange could be transferred before the court in Strasbourg, France, could halt his removal.

Judges Victoria Sharp and Jeremy Johnson may also postpone issuing a decision.

 
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Vienna — The UN nuclear watchdog on Monday called for “vigilance” against trafficking of nuclear and other radioactive material, saying it has recorded more than 4,200 thefts or other incidents over the past 30 years.

Last year, 31 countries reported 168 incidents “in line with historical averages,” the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said. Six of those were “likely related to trafficking or malicious use,” it added.

Since 1993, the IAEA has recorded 4,243 incidents, with 350 of them connected or likely to be connected to trafficking or malicious use.

“The reoccurrence of incidents confirms the need for vigilance and continuous improvement of the regulatory oversight to control, secure and properly dispose radioactive material,” said Elena Buglova, director of the IAEA’s nuclear security division.

Most incidents are not connected to trafficking or malicious use, involving for example scrap metal found to be contaminated.

The IAEA noted a decline in incidents involving nuclear material, such as uranium, plutonium and thorium.

But Buglova warned dangerous materials remain vulnerable, especially during transport, stressing the “importance of strengthening transport security measures.”

The Vienna-based IAEA released the data as it opens its fourth international conference on nuclear security, which runs until Friday in the Austrian capital.

The previous one was also held in Vienna in 2020.

A total of 145 states currently report to the IAEA about incidents that involve nuclear or other radioactive material lost, stolen, improperly disposed of or otherwise neglected.

Many radioactive substances are used in hospitals, universities and industry worldwide.

The big worry is that extremists could get hold of the materials and use them in a “dirty bomb” — a device whereby conventional explosives disperse radioactive materials.

Although the damage and loss of life caused by such a “dirty bomb” would be a fraction of that unleashed by a fission or fusion atom bomb, it could still cause mass panic in an urban area.
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LONDON — Britain and Finland will sign a new strategic partnership on Monday to strengthen ties and counter the “threat of Russian aggression,” the U.K. foreign minister said.

The two countries will declare Russia as “the most significant and direct threat to European peace and stability,” according to a Foreign Office press release.

The agreement will be endorsed by U.K. foreign minister David Cameron and his Finnish counterpart Elina Valtonen in London.

“As we stand together to support Ukraine, including through providing military aid and training, we are clear that the threat of Russian aggression, following the war it started, will not be tolerated,” said Cameron.

“This strategic partnership, built on our shared values, will see the UK and Finland step up cooperation to bolster European security as well as seize new opportunities, from science and technology to closer energy ties,” he added.

The countries will work together to counter Russian disinformation, malicious cyber activities and support Ukraine’s recovery, reconstruction, and modernization, according to the Foreign Office.

Since Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, Finland has joined the NATO military alliance and shut off much of its border with Russia. Britain is a major military supporter of Ukraine.
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Cannes, France — Filmmakers Nada Riyadh and Ayman El Amir spent so much time following an all-girl theatre troupe in a remote Egyptian village that at one point someone tried to sell them a house.

“He thought we were always there so we might as well live there,” Riyadh told AFP after the premiere of their documentary at the Cannes Film Festival.

“The Brink of Dreams” follows a group of teenage girls in rural southern Egypt over four years, between rehearsals, as they navigate the tough decisions that will determine their adulthood.

Majda dreams of studying theatre in Cairo, Monika wants to become a famous singer and Haidi is being pursued by the hottest guy in the village.

In their feminist street performances, they boldly rail against the patriarchy, challenging members of the crowd on issues such as self-fulfillment and early marriage.

But soon life takes over and the teenagers from Egypt’s Coptic Christian minority find themselves confronted with these concepts for real.

The camera discreetly captures conversations in the family shop, between a father and daughter, or two lovers, as neighbors and animals go about their daily lives.

“In the beginning there was a lot of people always looking at the camera. Everybody was self-conscious,” said Riyadh.

But “once the trust had been built between them and us, we had that chance to blend in.”

Riyadh said the documentary, which is screening in a sidebar section of the festival, was driven by her and co-director Amin discovering the troupe in 2017.

The film “is intentionally feminist in every way but I think it was also dictated by what this inspiring group of women was already doing,” she said.

It’s “mind-blowing because they’re demanding answers about very important things and opening a dialogue with everybody in their community.”

Co-director Amin said the main challenge was editing down 100 hours of footage to tell this coming-of-age tale and convey a seldom seen side of Egypt.

“Most mainstream films in Egypt tell stories about living in gated compounds and shopping in malls,” Amin said.

“It’s very rare to see stories that take place in the south outside of Cairo or Alexandria and see girls like those girls on screen.”

The documentary has a French distributor, but the filmmakers also hope to show the film widely in Egypt, including in the rural south.

Until then, six of the actors in the film got to attend the Cannes premiere, after a last-minute rush to get them their first passports and visas on time.

Monika, the aspiring singer, has two children now. But on the red carpet, the DJ played the catchy song that she made with a popular Egyptian producer called Molotof for the film’s final credits.
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Almost half a million Ukrainian immigrants have moved to the U.S. since the start of Russia’s invasion, according to the Department of Homeland Security. Two of the biggest challenges they face are finding health care and a job. In one small Colorado city, a local clinic owner, herself a Ukrainian immigrant, is helping out as much as she can. Svitlana Prystinska has the story, narrated by Anna Rice.
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Bratislava, Slovakia — When four bullets fired by a lone gunman hit Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico, Matus Kostolny’s life as a journalist quickly went from hard to harder.

The 49-year-old editor-in-chief of the independent Dennik N daily, branded “hostile” by the government, immediately started getting threats from readers and accusations from Fico’s political allies.

“Ten minutes after we ran the story about the prime minister being shot, I started receiving messages that I am to blame, that I have blood on my hands and will pay for it,” Kostolny told AFP.

“From day one some politicians from the governing coalition have been saying that… it is certain media including Dennik N that bear responsibility for the attack,” he said in an interview.

Domestic media had in 2018 unveiled links between the Italian mafia and Fico’s government, sparking protests that led to his resignation.

Fico is in intensive care following two long operations, but his life is no longer in danger.

He is serving his fourth term as prime minister of the EU and NATO member of 5.4 million people, leading a coalition of two centrist parties and a smaller nationalist one.

He secured this term when his centrist Smer party won a general election in September, calling for a truce over Russia’s invasion of neighboring Ukraine.

Shortly after, Fico banned four Slovak media — Dennik N, Aktuality, Denník SME and TV Markiza — from entering the government building, labeling them as “hostile media” and “unwelcome guests.”

“We have earned the label of a hostile outlet by existing and doing the kind of journalism we are doing, asking without flattering and publishing critical texts,” said Kostolny.

“Politicians don’t like this, not only Robert Fico… who actually assaulted us from the day we were established.”

Fico’s government is also pushing a controversial bill giving it control over the RTVS public television and radio broadcaster.

A breaking point

As an independent daily, Dennik N gets most of its income from readers, Kostolny said.

It was founded by a group of journalists in 2014. Four years later, Slovakia was shaken by the murder of Aktuality journalist Jan Kuciak and his fiancée.

An article by Kuciak, published posthumously, reported on government links with the mafia and open war followed between the prime minister and the media.

“Jan Kuciak’s murder was a breaking point. At that time, the society split into us and them,” said Kostolny.

He added Fico had to become more pragmatic as he was trying to avoid prison, chased by media looking for motives behind the Kuciak murder.

“He needed to win the (2023) election and come back to salvage his freedom,” Kostolny said.

Fico shifted toward extreme politics, using a stronger language to woo voters outside the typical Smer electorate.

Extremely dangerous

His uncompromising stance on journalists was reflected by the international Media Freedom Index for 2024, published by Reporters Without Borders, in which Slovakia slid 12 places to 29th in the world.

Its authors singled Fico out — alongside Hungary’s Viktor Orban — as “politicians… trying to reduce the space for independent journalism.”

Kostolny said Wednesday’s attack had made things even worse and that he now expected politicians to interfere in media work.

Deputy Prime Minister Robert Kalinak, Fico’s closest ally, said that media “lies” were the reason “why Robert Fico is fighting for his life today.”

“At the moment the atmosphere is so heated. They are pointing fingers and saying journalists, especially those from Dennik N, are partly responsible for the attack,” said Kostolny.

“This is extremely dangerous, because once you start dealing with problems using violence, you can’t be sure it will not continue.”

A father of two sons, Kostolny said he “would be lying” if he said he was not afraid.

“I’m not sure what we are in for. Over the six years since Jan Kuciak’s murder, we have found out what Fico is capable of,” he said.

“On the other hand, I’m absolutely determined to continue the service we have to provide. I can’t take fright just because they’re attacking us.”
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Beijing — China’s commerce ministry on Sunday launched an anti-dumping probe into POM copolymers, a type of engineering plastic, imported from the European Union, United States, Japan and Taiwan.

The plastics can partially replace metals such as copper and zinc and have various applications including in auto parts, electronics, and medical equipment, the ministry said in a statement.

The investigation should be completed in a year but could be extended for six months, it said.

The European Commission, which oversees EU trade policy, said it would carefully study the contents of the investigation before deciding on any next steps.

“We expect China to ensure that this investigation is fully in line with all relevant WTO (World Trade Organization) rules and obligations,” a spokesperson said.

China’s plastics probe comes amid a broader trade row with the United States and Europe.

The United States on Tuesday unveiled steep tariff increases on Chinese electric vehicles, or EVs, computer chips, medical products and other imports.

On Friday, the European Union launched a trade investigation into Chinese tinplate steel, the latest in a string of EU trade and subsidy probes into Chinese exports.

Most notably, the European Commission launched a probe last September to decide whether to impose punitive tariffs on cheaper Chinese EVs that it suspects of benefiting from state subsidies.

Beijing argues the recent focus by the United States and Europe on the risks to other economies from China’s excess capacity is misguided.

Chinese officials say the criticism understates innovation by Chinese companies in key industries and overstates the importance of state support in driving their growth.
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Days after an assassination attempt, Slovakia’s prime minister Robert Fico remains in serious condition, but the worst may be over, according to his deputy. A suspect remains in custody. VOA’s Arash Arabasadi has more.
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Bratislava — Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico’s life is no longer in danger following an assassination attempt, Deputy Prime Minister Robert Kalinak said on Sunday.

A lone gunman, who appeared in court Saturday, shot Fico four times and he was at one stage said to be fighting for his life.

“He has emerged from the immediate threat to his life, but his condition remains serious and he requires intensive care,” Kalinak, Fico’s closest political ally, told reporters.

The Slovak premier was shot as he was greeting supporters after a government meeting in the central town of Handlova. He underwent a five-hour operation on Wednesday and another on Friday at a hospital in the central city of Banska Bystrica.

“We can consider his condition stable with a positive prognosis,” Kalinak said outside the hospital, adding, “We all feel a bit more relaxed now.”

Kalinak added that Fico would stay at Banska Bystrica for the moment.

The suspected gunman, identified by Slovak media as 71-year-old poet Juraj Cintula, has been charged with premeditated attempted murder and was ordered held in custody at a hearing on Saturday.

Interior Minister Matus Sutaj Estok said that if one of the shots “went just a few centimeters higher, it would have hit the prime minister’s liver”.

The attempted assassination has highlighted acute political divisions in the country where 59-year-old Fico took office in October after his centrist populist Smer party won a general election.

He is serving his fourth term as prime minister after campaigning on proposals for peace between Russia and Slovakia’s neighbor Ukraine, and to halt military aid to Kyiv, which his government has done.

Fico leads a coalition comprising his Smer party, the centrist HLAS and the small nationalist SNS party.

Kalinak said the government would carry on without Fico “according to the program he has outlined”.

Slovakia was already sharply divided over politics since the 2018 murder of journalist Jan Kuciak and his fiancee.

Kuciak pointed at links between Italian mafia and Fico’s then government, and his murder sparked nationwide protests that resulted in Fico’s resignation in 2018.

The divisions deepened further with the pandemic and the war in Ukraine.

Following the attack on Fico, outgoing President Zuzana Caputova and her successor Peter Pellegrini, a Fico ally who takes over in June, tried to quell the tensions.

Following a proposal by Caputova and Pellegrini, several parties have suspended campaigning for European Parliament elections scheduled for June.

But some politicians have been quick to blame the Fico attack on their opponents or media.

SNS chairman Andrej Danko blamed the media just after the shooting, and Kalinak took on the opposition and media in an emotional speech on the Smer website on Friday.

Pellegrini said Sunday that a meeting of parliamentary party leaders he was planning to host on Tuesday to help ease tensions would probably not happen.

“The past few days and some press conferences have shown us that some politicians are simply not capable of fundamental self-reflection even after such a huge tragedy,” said Pellegrini.

“It has turned out that the time is not ripe for a round table with the representatives of all parliamentary parties yet,” he added.

In a debate on the TA3 news channel, Danko said it was “false to say that a meeting on Tuesday would reconcile society”.

Police have meanwhile charged several people who had approved of the attack on Fico on social media.
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MOSCOW — Russian officials said on Sunday that Ukraine fired nine U.S. ATACMS at Crimea and attacked Russian regions with at least 60 drones in a major attack which forced one oil refinery in southern Russia to halt operations.

Russian air defenses shot down nine U.S. ATACMS missiles over Crimea along with 57 drones over Russia’s Krasnodar region and three drones over Belgorod region, the Russian defense ministry said.

Local officials said six drones crashed onto the territory of an oil refinery in Slavyansk in Russia’s southern Krasnodar region. Interfax news agency said the refinery halted work after the attack.

Slavyansk refinery is a private plant with a capacity of 4 million metric tons of oil per year, about 1 million bpd.

There was no immediate comment from Kyiv.

Russia has reported an uptick in Ukrainian attacks on its territory since opening a new front in the Kharkiv region of northeastern Ukraine earlier this month.

President Vladimir Putin says Russia is carving out a buffer zone there to protect Russia from such attacks, which Russia says risk triggering a broader war between Russia and the West if Ukraine uses Western weapons.

Russia said on Saturday Russian forces captured the village of Starytsia in Ukraine’s Kharkiv region and that Russian forces had defeated Ukrainian units along the front, including in the Sumy region.

Meanwhile, Ukraine’s forces have destroyed all of 37 attack drones launched by Russia overnight, Ukraine’s air force chief said Sunday.

“As a result of the anti-aircraft battle, all 37 ‘Shaheds’ were shot down in Kyiv, Odesa, Mykolaiv, Sumy, Vinnytsia, Zhytomyr, Cherkasy and Kherson regions,” the commander said.

Odesa governor Oleh Kiper said on the telegram messaging app that 20 drones were destroyed in the Odesa region.

“An administrative building in Odesa district was damaged by falling debris. In Odesa, the debris fell into the yard of a residential area. Fortunately, there were no injuries,” Kiper said.

No destruction or casualties were reported by military and civilian authorities in other regions.

Reuters could not independently verify the reports. 
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RIETI, Italy — Ella Anthony knew it was time to leave her native Nigeria when she escaped an abusive, forced marriage only to face angry relatives who threatened to turn her in to police because she was gay.  

Since Nigeria criminalizes same-sex relationships, Anthony fled a possible prison term and headed with her partner to Libya in 2014 and then Italy, where they both won asylum. Their claim? That they had a well-founded fear of anti-LGBTQ+ persecution back home.

While many of the hundreds of thousands of migrants who arrive in Italy from Africa and the Mideast are escaping war, conflict and poverty, an increasing number are fleeing possible prison terms and death sentences in their home countries because of their sexual orientation or gender identity, advocates say.

And despite huge obstacles to win asylum on LGBTQ+ grounds, Anthony and her partner, Doris Ezuruike Chinonso are proof that it can be done, even if the challenges remain significant for so-called “rainbow refugees” like them.

“Certainly life here in Italy isn’t 100% what we want. But let’s say it’s 80% better than in my country,” Chinonso, 34, said with Anthony by her side at their home in Rieti, north of Rome. In Nigeria, “if you’re lucky you end up prison. If you’re not lucky, they kill you,” she said. 

“Here you can live as you like,” she said.

Most European countries don’t keep statistics on the number of migrants who claim anti-LGBTQ+ persecution as a reason for seeking refugee protection under international law. But non-governmental organizations that track the phenomenon say the numbers are rising as countries pass or toughen anti-homosexuality laws — a trend being highlighted on Friday’s observance of the International Day Against Homophobia, Biphobia and Transphobia.

To date, more than 60 countries have anti-LGBTQ+ laws on the books, most of them in Africa, the Middle East and parts of Asia.

“The ultimate result is people trying to flee these countries to find safe haven elsewhere,” said Kimahli Powell, chief executive of Rainbow Railroad, which provides financial, legal and logistical support to LGBTQ+ people needing asylum assistance.

In an interview, Powell said his organization had received about 15,000 requests for assistance last year, up from some 9,500 the year before. One-tenth of those 2023 requests, or about 1,500, came from Uganda, which passed an anti-homosexuality law that year that allows the death penalty for “aggravated homosexuality,” and up to 14 years in prison for “attempted aggravated homosexuality.”

Nigeria also criminalizes consensual same-sex relations between adults and the public display of affection between same-sex couples, as well as restricting the work of groups that advocate for gay people and their rights, according to Human Rights Watch. In regions of Nigeria where Sharia law is in force, LGBTQ+ people can face up to 14 years in prison or the death penalty.

Anthony, 37, said it was precisely the threat of prison that compelled her to leave. She said her family had sold her into marriage, but that she left the relationship because her husband repeatedly abused her. When she returned home, her brother and uncles threatened to turn her into police because she was gay. The fear and alienation drove her first to attempt suicide, and then take up a trafficker’s offer to pay for passage to Europe.

“At a certain point, I couldn’t take all these sufferings,” Anthony said through tears. “When this man told me that I should abandon the village, I immediately accepted.”

After arriving in Libya, Anthony and Chinonso paid traffickers for the risky boat trip across the Mediterranean Sea to Italy, where they both claimed asylum as a member of a group – LGBTQ+ people – who faced persecution in Nigeria. According to refugee norms, applicants for asylum can be granted international protection based on being a “member of a particular social group.”

But the process is by no means easy, straightforward or guaranteed. Privacy concerns limit the types of questions about sexual orientation that migrants can be asked during the asylum interview process. Social taboos and a reluctance to openly identify as gay or transgender mean some migrants might not volunteer the information immediately. Ignorance on the part of asylum interviewers about anti-gay laws in countries of origin can result in unsuccessful claims, according to the EU Agency for Asylum, which helps EU countries implement asylum norms.  

As a result, no comprehensive data exists about how many migrants seek or win asylum in the EU on LGBTQ+ grounds. Based on estimates reported by NGOs working with would-be refugees, the numbers in individual EU countries ranged from two to three in Poland in 2016 to 500 in Finland from 2015-2017 and 80 in Italy from 2012-2017, according to a 2017 report by the EU Agency for Fundamental Rights.

An EU directive grants special protection for people made vulnerable due to sexual discrimination, prescribing “special procedural guarantees” in countries that receive them. However, it doesn’t specify what those guarantees involve and implementation is uneven. As a result, LGBTQ+ asylum seekers don’t always find protected environments once in the EU.

“We’re talking about people who are unfortunately victims of a double stigma: being a migrant, and being members of the LGBTQIA+ community,” said lawyer Marina De Stradis.

Even within Italy, the options vary widely from region to region, with the better-funded north offering more services than the less-developed south. In the capital Rome, there are only 10 beds specifically designated for LGBTQ+ migrants, said Antonella Ugirashebuja, an activist with the Arcigay association.

She said the lack of special protections often impacts female migrants more negatively than male, and can be especially dangerous for lesbians.

“Lesbians leaving Africa often, or more frequently, end up in prostitution and sexual exploitation networks because they lack (economic) support from their families,” she said. “The family considers them people to be pushed away, to be rejected … Especially in countries where this is punishable by law.”

Anthony and Chinonso consider themselves lucky: They live in a neat flat in Rieti with their dog Paddy, and dream of starting a family even if Italy doesn’t allow gay marriage.

Chinonso, who was studying medicine in Nigeria, is now a social and health worker. Anthony works at the deli counter in a Carrefour supermarket in Rome. She would have liked to have been able to continue working as a film editor, but is happy.

“It gave me the opportunity to grow,” she said.
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BUENOS AIRES, Argentina — Even before kicking off a three-day visit to Madrid on Friday, Argentina’s libertarian President Javier Milei stirred controversy, accusing the socialist government of bringing “poverty and death” to Spain and weighing in on corruption allegations against the prime minister’s wife.

In such circumstances, a typical visiting head of state may strive to mend fences with diplomacy.

Not Milei. The brash economist has no plans to meet Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez during his three days in the Spanish capital — nor the Spanish king, nor any other government official. Instead, he’ll attend a far-right summit Sunday hosted by Sánchez’s fiercest political opponent, the Vox party.

The unorthodox visit was business as usual for Milei, a darling of the global far right who has bonded with tech billionaire Elon Musk and praised former U.S. President Donald Trump. Earlier this year on a trip to the United States, Milei steered clear of the White House and took the stage at the Conservative Political Action Conference, or CPAC, where he railed against abortion and socialism and shared a bear hug with Trump.

Milei presented his 2022 book, The Way of the Libertarian, in Madrid on Friday at a literary event organized by La Razón, a conservative Spanish newspaper.

The book — withdrawn from circulation in Spain earlier this month because the back-flap biography erroneously said Milei had earned a doctorate — traces his meteoric rise in politics from eccentric TV personality to national lawmaker and outlines his radical free-market economic ideas.

To thunderous applause, Milei condemned socialism as “an intellectual fraud and a horror in human terms.”

“The good thing is that the spotlight is shining on us everywhere and we are making the reds (leftists) uncomfortable all over the world,” Milei said.

He took the opportunity to promote the results of his harsh austerity campaign in Argentina, celebrating a decline in monthly inflation in April though making no mention of the Buenos Aires subway fares that more than tripled overnight.

Repeating a campaign pledge to eliminate Argentina’s central bank — without giving further details — Milei promised to make Argentina “the country with the most economic freedom in the world.”

At the event Milei gave a huge hug to his ideological ally Santiago Abascal, the leader of the hard-right Vox party and the only politician with whom Milei has actual plans to meet in Madrid.

The Vox summit Sunday seeks to bring together far-right figures from across Europe in a bid to rally the party’s base ahead of European parliamentary elections in June. Milei described his attendance a “moral imperative.” He also has plans to meet Spanish business executives Saturday.

Tensions between Milei and Sánchez have simmered since the moment the Spanish prime minister declined to congratulate the libertarian economist on his shock election victory last November.

But hostility exploded earlier this month when one of Sánchez’s ministers suggested Milei had taken narcotics. The Argentine presidency responded with an unusually harsh official statement accusing Sánchez’s government of “endangering the middle class with its socialist policies that bring nothing but poverty and death.”

The lengthy government statement also accused Sánchez of having “more important problems to deal with, such as the corruption accusations against his wife.”

The allegations of influence peddling and corruption brought by a right-wing group against Sánchez’s wife, Begoña Gómez, had prompted Sánchez, one of Europe’s longest serving Socialist leaders, to consider stepping down.
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BERLIN — Six climate activists broke through a security fence at the Munich airport Saturday and glued themselves to access routes leading to runways, temporarily halting flights. 

The activists from the group Last Generation were protesting flying as the most polluting form of transportation, said the German news agency dpa. Police detained the six. 

Some 60 flights were canceled during the disruption that lasted a couple of hours, and passengers were rebooked on alternative flights, airport spokesperson Robert Wilhelm told dpa. Fourteen flights that were due to land in Munich were diverted to other airports, according to police. 

Last Generation accused the German government of downplaying the negative effects of flying on the environment instead of “finally acting sincerely,” in a post on the social media platform X. 

German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser called for an end to such protests. “Such criminal actions threaten air traffic and harm climate protection because they only cause lack of understanding and anger,” she wrote on X. 

Fraser also applauded police efforts to bring order back to the airport and called for airport safety measures to be checked. 

Minister for Transport Volker Wissing said that his ministry was already working on further tightening existing laws. 

The general manager of the German Airports Association, Ralph Beisel, also criticized the activists’ actions. “Trespassing the aviation security area is no trivial offense. Over hundreds of thousands of passengers were prevented from a relaxed and punctual start to their Pentecost holiday,” he told dpa. 

Beisel also called for harsher penalties for activists who break into airports. 

Climate activities blocked flights at Hamburg and Duesseldorf airports for several hours in July. 

In January, Last Generation — known for its members gluing themselves to streets to block traffic, which has infuriated many Germans — said it would abandon the tactic and move on to holding what it calls “disobedient assemblies.” Their actions have been widely criticized, and Chancellor Olaf Scholz described them as “completely nutty.” 
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