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London — A U.K.-based journalist for independent Iranian media who was attacked outside his London home, prompting a counterterrorism police probe, is “doing very well,” his news channel said Saturday.  

Pouria Zeraati, a presenter for Persian-language outlet Iran International was in stable condition, the channel’s spokesman Adam Baillie said.  

“He’s doing very well actually. He’s in the hospital recovering from the attack,” Baillie told BBC radio, calling Friday’s attack “a shocking, shocking incident whatever the outcome of (the) investigation reveals.”

London’s Metropolitan Police has said its counterterrorism unit is investigating the stabbing, given previous hostile threats by Iran against perceived opponents in Britain.  

The force said the motive was unclear and officers were keeping “an open mind,” but that “the victim’s occupation as a journalist at a Persian-language media organization based in the U.K.” was being considered.

Iran’s charge d’affaires in the U.K., Mehdi Hosseini Matin said Saturday that Tehran “denied any link” to the incident.  

Zeraati, in his 30s, sustained injuries to his leg in the mid-afternoon attack outside his home in Wimbledon, southwest London.  

Announcing the incident on social media, Iran International noted it came after Tehran was implicated in a plot to kill two of its television anchors in 2022.  

Baillie said the channel’s journalists and their families and others had been repeatedly targeted and threatened by the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC).

“Along with our colleagues at BBC Persian, Iran International has been under threat, very heavy threats, for the last 18 months since the IRGC said, ‘We’re coming for you,’” he added.

Baillie said the paramilitary security force gets “in touch through proxies” and its tactics include taking in relatives in Iran for questioning and threatening.  

“The scale of that has increased dramatically over the last few months. And the scale and the type of questioning is more aggressive,” he added.

The Met has disrupted what it has called plots in the U.K. to kidnap or even kill British or Britain-based individuals perceived as enemies of Tehran.

An Austrian national was convicted last December of spying for a group that may have been preparing to attack Iran International.  

The Iranian government has declared the outlet a terrorist organization after it reported on protests sparked by the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini.

She died in 2022 after her arrest in Tehran for an alleged breach of the Islamic republic’s strict dress code for women.   

The U.K. government last year unveiled a tougher sanctions regime against Iran over alleged human rights violations and hostile actions against its opponents on U.K. soil.
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SOFIA, Bulgaria — Romania and Bulgaria partially joined Europe’s ID-check-free travel zone Sunday, marking a new step in the two countries’ integration with the European Union.

After years of negotiations to join the Schengen area, there is now free access for travelers arriving by air or sea from both countries. However, land border checks will remain in place due to opposition primarily from Austria which has long blocked their bid over illegal migration concerns.

EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen hailed the change as a “huge success for both countries” and a “historic moment” for what is the world’s largest free travel zone.

The Schengen Area was established in 1985. Before Bulgaria’s and Romania’s admission, it was comprised of 23 of the 27 EU member countries, along with Switzerland, Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein. Around 3.5 million people cross an internal border each day.

Austria vetoed Romania and Bulgaria’s admission into the Schengen zone at the end of 2022 but allowed Croatia full accession. Bulgaria and Romania joined the EU in 2007 and Croatia in 2013.

Siegfried Muresan, a Romanian Member of the European Parliament, told The Associated Press that it is “an important first step” that will benefit millions of travelers annually.

“Bulgaria and Romania have been fulfilling all criteria for joining the Schengen area for years — we are entitled to join with the terrestrial border as well,” he said, adding that it “will offer additional arguments to the last EU member state that has been vetoing the full accession.”

Romanian Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu called it a “well-deserved achievement” for Romania that he said will benefit citizens who can travel more easily and will bolster the economy.

“We have a clear and firmly assumed government plan for full accession to the Schengen Area by the end of the year,” he said.

The EU’s executive branch, the European Commission, has said for more than a decade that Romania and Bulgaria both meet the technical criteria for full accession, which requires unanimous support from their partners. Both countries have agreed to implement random security screening at airports and maritime borders to combat illegal migration and cross-border crime.

“Bulgaria’s full accession to Schengen will happen by the end of 2024,” Kalin Stoyanov, Bulgaria’s interior minister, told reporters Sunday. “We showed and continue to show to illegal migrants that they should not take the road to Europe through Bulgaria.”

The lifting of border control is expected to facilitate operations at Bulgaria’s four international airports, which in 2023 saw nearly 11 million passengers, according to official data.

The airport in the capital, Sofia, serves as the biggest hub for Schengen flights which constitute 70% of all flights, airport representatives said.

While the eased regulations are expected to positively impact the tourism sector, members of the European Parliament have voiced concerns about long queues at the EU’s land borders and the impact it can have on trade in the bloc’s single market, as well as the health and safety of drivers.

Truck drivers are frequently stuck in kilometers-long (miles-long) queues at the borders of both Romania and Bulgaria. The Union of International Carriers in Bulgaria estimates delays cost the sector tens of millions of euros each year.
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Windsor, England — Britain’s King Charles greeted well-wishers in an impromptu walkabout after an Easter church service in Windsor on Sunday, his first appearance at a public royal event since his cancer diagnosis was announced in February. 

A smiling Charles, 75, accompanied by Queen Camilla, shook hands with scores of people gathered outside St George’s Chapel, the resting place of his late mother Queen Elizabeth. 

Charles had postponed all previous public engagements since Buckingham Palace announced he was to undergo treatment for an unspecified form of cancer. The illness was found in tests after he had a corrective procedure for an enlarged prostate in January. 

While the king attended church on Sunday, his son Prince William and his family did not. William’s wife Kate said earlier this month she was undergoing preventative chemotherapy after cancer was discovered following abdominal surgery in January. 

The king, wearing a dark overcoat, and queen waved to onlookers when they arrived at the chapel by car from their residence at Windsor Castle. 

The queen was wearing a green coat dress and an emerald and diamond brooch that was the late queen’s. 

Some of the onlookers wished Charles good health, while others said “Happy Easter.”  

The king said: “You’re very brave to stand out here in the cold.”  

A woman who spoke to the king said he seemed “very well.” 

Buckingham Palace has not confirmed any future public engagements for the king, but his eagerness to meet people on Sunday will be taken as a positive sign about his health.  

Also attending the annual service were the king’s sister, the Princess Royal, and brother, the Duke of Edinburgh, accompanied by their spouses. 

The Duke of York, who was removed from royal duties in 2022 due to his friendship with the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, was also present. 

Charles has kept up with the bulk of his non-public state duties such as greeting foreign officials and holding regular meetings with Prime Minister Rishi Sunak. 

Last week the king did not attend an annual Maundy Thursday service but issued an audio message which aired at the event in which he expressed his sorrow at not being there and wished the public a Happy Easter. 
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Vatican City — Pope Francis on Sunday celebrated Easter Mass with tens of thousands of Catholics at Saint Peter’s Square in Vatican City before his traditional blessing, as concerns persist over his health.

The 87-year-old arrived in a wheelchair to preside over the Mass from 10 a.m. (0800 GMT) in cloudy and windy weather, with the events broadcast live around the globe.

Francis will pronounce the “Urbi et Orbi” (To the City and the World) blessing at midday where he is expected to bring up the international conflicts raging worldwide.

For Christians, Easter Sunday marks the resurrection of Jesus Christ and is the culmination of Holy Week, a major part of the Catholic calendar followed by 1.3 billion people.

The pope on Saturday presided over the Easter Vigil at the Vatican in front of some 6,000 people from around the world, a day after his last-minute cancellation at a major Good Friday procession revived questions about his health.

He delivered a 10-minute homily in Italian, speaking without any undue difficulty and condemning “the walls of selfishness and indifference” in the world.

At the end of the 2½-hour service he showed little sign of fatigue, taking time to greet and bless some of the worshippers.

In a brief statement Friday, the Vatican had said that “to preserve his health ahead of tomorrow’s vigil and the Easter Sunday Mass, Pope Francis will this evening follow the Way of the Cross at the Colosseum from the Santa Marta Residence,” where he lives.

Health concerns

The last-minute decision raised questions about how long Francis can continue to lead the Catholic Church.

A Vatican source told AFP on Friday there was “no particular concern” about his health and the decision to pull out had been “simply a measure of caution.”

The Argentinian Jesuit had also canceled his participation in the “Via Crucis” in 2023, but that followed a three-day hospital stay for bronchitis, and was announced well ahead of time. Weeks later, he underwent a hernia operation.

Up until Friday, the pope had attended his various engagements throughout the week, but he recently appeared tired and has sometimes delegated speaking roles to colleagues.

Francis, who never takes holidays, made his last trip in September, to the southern French city of Marseille. In December, he canceled a much-anticipated attendance at the COP28 climate summit in Dubai.

His next scheduled trip is to Venice on April 28. The Vatican has not yet confirmed a planned trip to Asia and Pacific Ocean nations for this summer.

Francis has previously left the door open to stepping down if he can no longer do the job. That would follow the example of his immediate predecessor, Benedict XVI, who in 2013 became the first pope since the Middle Ages to voluntarily step aside.

But in a memoir published this month, Francis wrote that he did “not have any cause serious enough to make me think of resigning.” 
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MOSCOW — Russia has imposed a “counter-terrorism operation” regime in the southern region of Dagestan, detaining three people by Sunday morning, Russian news agencies reported, citing the National Anti-Terrorism Committee.

Russia is on high alert following a mass shooting at a concert hall in Moscow on March 22 — the deadliest attack in the country in 20 years with at least 144 killed.

“Security agencies detained three bandits who were planning a number of terrorist offenses. During the inspection of the places where they  were detained, automatic weapons, ammunition and an improvised explosive device ready for use were found,” the committee said Sunday.

Earlier the committee said that suspected criminals had been blocked by security services in several flats in residential areas of the regional capital, Makhachkala, and one of the biggest cities in the republic, Kaspiysk.

There were no civilian casualties and no losses among the law enforcement personnel.

The operation continues, the committee said.
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MOSCOW — Foreign diplomats in Russia laid flowers Saturday at the site of last week’s attack on a suburban Moscow concert hall that killed 144 people.

Those in attendance included ambassadors from the United States, EU countries, Africa and Latin America. Russian state news agency RIA Novosti said the “around 130 diplomatic missions” taking part included representatives of “unfriendly states.”

Since the attack, thousands of people have brought bunches of flowers, wreaths and other tokens such as teddy bears, creating a makeshift memorial at the Crocus City Hall.

Russian state news agency Tass reported Saturday that the number of people wounded in the attack was 551, quoting figures from the Moscow regional department of the Russian Emergency Situations Ministry. Previous figures have been much lower and it did not explain the discrepancy.

The death toll rose to 144 on Friday when a severely injured victim died in a hospital, according to Russian Health Minister Mikhail Murashko.

Russia’s Investigative Committee said Saturday that 134 of the dead had been identified. “Genetic tests are being carried out for other, as yet unidentified, victims,” the committee said in a statement on messaging app Telegram.

An affiliate of the Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the attack, the deadliest on Russian soil in years. The Kremlin, however, has insisted that Ukraine and the West had a role, something Kyiv has vehemently denied.

Nine people were detained by Tajikistan’s state security service in relation to the attack, RIA Novosti said Friday.

In Russia, a total of nine suspects have faced court so far and were remanded in pre-trial detention. The latest hearing took place Friday, with a judge in the Basmanny District Court ruling that suspect Lutfulloi Nazrimad should be held in custody until at least May 22. Russian independent news site Mediazona cited Nazrimad as saying in court that he was born in Tajikistan.

Since the attack, Tajikistan’s Ministry of Labor, Migration and Employment has recorded an outflow of migrants workers from Moscow back to Tajikistan.

“There are a lot of calls. These are most likely not so much complaints about harassment, but about our citizens’ fear, panic. Many want to leave. We are now monitoring the situation; more people are coming (to Tajikistan) than leaving,” Deputy Labour Minister Shakhnoza Nodiri told Tass, the news agency said Saturday.

Russian officials previously said that 11 suspects had been arrested, including four who allegedly carried out the attack. Those four, identified as Tajik nationals, appeared in a Moscow court on Sunday on terrorism charges and showed signs of severe beatings. One appeared to be barely conscious during the hearing.

Russia’s Investigative Committee additionally said Thursday it had detained another suspect in relation to the raid on Crocus City Hall, on suspicion of being involved in financing the attack. It did not give further details of the suspect’s identity or alleged actions.
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ROME — Pope Francis presided over the Vatican’s somber Easter Vigil service on Saturday night, delivering a 10-minute homily and baptizing eight people, a day after suddenly skipping the Good Friday procession at the Colosseum as a health precaution.

Francis entered the darkened, silent St. Peter’s Basilica in his wheelchair, took his place in a chair and offered an opening prayer. Sounding somewhat congested and out of breath, he blessed an elaborately decorated Easter candle, the flame of which was then shared with other candles until the whole basilica twinkled.

Over an hour later, Francis delivered a 10-minute homily in a strong voice, clearing his throat occasionally.

The evening service, one of the most solemn and important moments in the Catholic liturgical calendar, commemorates the resurrection of Jesus. The Vatican had said Francis skipped the Good Friday procession to ensure his participation in both the vigil service Saturday night, which usually lasts about two hours, and Easter Sunday Mass a few hours later.

The 87-year-old Francis, who had part of one lung removed as a young man, has been battling respiratory problems all winter that have made it difficult for him to speak at length. He and the Vatican have said he has had bronchitis, a cold or the flu.

He has canceled some audiences and often asked an aide to read aloud some of his speeches. But the alarm was raised when he ditched his Palm Sunday homily altogether last week at the last minute and then decided suddenly Friday to stay home rather than preside over the Way of the Cross procession at the Colosseum reenacting Christ’s crucifixion.

The Vatican said in a brief explanation that the decision was made to “conserve his health.”

The decision appeared to have paid off Saturday night, as Francis was able to recite the prayers of the lengthy vigil service and perform the sacrament of baptism for the eight adults. The baptism is a traditional feature of the Vatican’s Easter Vigil service.

In his homily Francis referred to the stone that the faithful believe was removed from Christ’s tomb after his death. Francis urged Catholics to remove the stones in their lives that “block the door of our hearts, stifling life, extinguishing hope, imprisoning us in the tomb of our fears and regrets.”

“Let us lift our eyes to him and ask that the power of his resurrection may roll away the heavy stones that weigh down our souls,” he said.

Holy Week is trying for a pope under any circumstance, given four days of liturgies, rites, fasting and prayer. But that is especially true for Francis, who canceled a trip to Dubai late last year, just days prior, on doctor’s orders because of his respiratory problems.

In addition to his respiratory problems, Francis had a chunk of his large intestine removed in 2021 and was hospitalized twice last year, including once to remove intestinal scar tissue from previous surgeries to address diverticulosis, or bulges in his intestinal wall. He has been using a wheelchair or cane for nearly two years because of bad knee ligaments.

In his recently published memoirs, Life: My Story Through History, Francis said he isn’t suffering from any health problems that would require him to resign and that he still has ” many projects to bring to fruition.”
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ottowa, canada — OTTAWA – Canada has sent about 70 soldiers to Jamaica to train troops from Caribbean nations who are set to take part in a United Nations-authorized mission to Haiti, the Canadian defense ministry said Saturday. 

Kenya announced last year it would lead the force, which is designed to help national police fight powerful gangs in Haiti where spiraling violence has fueled a humanitarian disaster. The initiative has been tied up in Kenyan court challenges ever since, effectively putting the mission on hold. 

The Canadian troops, from the predominantly French-speaking province of Quebec, will provide training on core peacekeeping skills and combat first aid, the defense ministry said in a statement. French is one of Haiti’s two official languages. 

The troops are scheduled to stay in Jamaica for an initial period of a month and will train about 330 troops from Jamaica, Belize and the Bahamas. 

Canada said last month it would give $59.6 1illion to support the deployment of the Kenyan-led mission.
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KYIV, Ukraine — Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy dismissed a longtime aide and several advisers Saturday in a continuing reshuffle while Russia unleashed fresh attacks overnight. 

Zelenskyy dismissed top aide Serhiy Shefir from his post of first assistant, where he had served since 2019. The Ukrainian president also let go three advisers, and two presidential representatives overseeing volunteer activities and soldiers’ rights. 

No explanation was given immediately for the latest changes in a wide-reaching personnel shakeup over recent months. It included the dismissal Tuesday of Oleksii Danilov, who served as secretary of the National Security and Defense Council, and Valerii Zaluzhnyi as head of the armed forces on February 8. Zaluzhnyi was appointed Ukraine’s ambassador to the United Kingdom earlier this month. 

Ukraine’s air force said Saturday that Russia launched 12 Shahed drones overnight, nine of which were shot down, and fired four missiles into eastern Ukraine. 

Russia unleashed a barrage of 38 missiles, 75 airstrikes and 98 attacks from multiple rocket launchers over the last 24 hours, Ukraine’s armed forces said in social media posts. 

Two people were killed and one wounded in Russian shelling in Ukraine’s partially occupied Donetsk province, regional Governor Vadym Filashkin said Saturday. 

Ukrainian energy company Centrenergo announced Saturday that the Zmiiv Thermal Power Plant, one of the largest thermal power plants in the eastern Kharkiv region, was destroyed following Russian shelling last week. Power outage schedules were still in place for around 120,000 people in the region, where 700,000 people had lost electricity after the plant was hit on March 22. 

Russia has escalated its attacks on Ukrainian energy infrastructure in recent days, causing significant damage in several regions. 

Officials in the Poltava region said Saturday there had been “several hits” to an infrastructure facility, without specifying whether it was an energy facility. 

Meanwhile, the toll of Friday’s mass barrage of 99 drones and missiles hitting regions across Ukraine came to light Saturday, with local officials in the Kherson region announcing the death of one civilian. A resident of the Dnipropetrovsk region died in a hospital from shell wounds, according to regional Gov. Serhiy Lisak. 
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ATHENS — Greek authorities have arrested a senior member of an international gang that smuggled Latin American fuel products for illegal sale around the world, raking in an estimated profit of more than $21 billion, police said on Saturday. 

The gang member, an Italian national for whom Interpol had issued an arrest warrant, was found in a southern Athens suburb on Friday, a police official told Reuters on condition of anonymity. 

The warrant had ordered the man’s arrest and his extradition to Venezuela to be tried for crimes that include the illegal transport and trade of resources of strategic importance, the official said. 

The gang stole the fuel products, which were loaded onto its oil tankers from ports in Latin America, and switched off tracking transponders to deceive shipping brokers, police said in a statement.

Police did not disclose the suspect’s name.
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BUON MA THUOT, Vietnam — Le Van Tam is no stranger to how the vagaries of global trade can determine the fortunes of small coffee farmers like him. 

He first planted coffee in a patch of land outside Buon Ma Thuot city in Vietnam’s Central Highland region in 1995. For years, his focus was on quantity, not quality. Tam used ample amounts of fertilizer and pesticides to boost his yields, and global prices determined how well he did. 

Then, in 2019, he teamed up with Le Dinh Tu of Aeroco Coffee, an organic exporter to Europe and the U.S., and adopted more sustainable methods, turning his coffee field into a a sun-dappled forest. The coffee grows side by side with tamarind trees that add nitrogen to the soil and provide support for black pepper vines. Grass helps keep the soil moist, and the mix of plants discourages pest outbreaks. The pepper also adds to Tam’s income. 

“The output hasn’t increased, but the product’s value has,” he said. 

In the 1990s, Tam was among thousands of Vietnamese farmers who planted more than a million hectares of coffee, mostly robusta, to take advantage of high global prices. By 2000, Vietnam had become the second-largest producer of coffee, which provides a tenth of its export income. 

Vietnam is hoping that farmers like Tam will benefit from a potential reordering of how coffee is traded due to more stringent European laws to stop deforestation. 

The European Deforestation Regulation or EUDR will outlaw sales of products like coffee beginning December 30, 2024, if companies can’t prove they are not linked with deforestation. The new rules’ scope is wide: They will apply to cocoa, coffee, soy, palm oil, wood, rubber and cattle. To sell those products in Europe, big companies will have to show they come from land where forests haven’t been cut since 2020. Smaller companies have until July 2025 to do so. 

Deforestation is the second-biggest source of carbon emissions after fossil fuels. Europe ranked second behind China in the amount of deforestation caused by its imports in 2017, according to a 2021 World Wildlife Fund report. If implemented well, the EUDR could help reduce this, especially if the more stringent standards for tracing where products come from become the “new normal,” Helen Bellfield, a policy director at Global Canopy, told The Associated Press in an interview. 

It’s not fail-safe. Companies can just sell products that don’t meet the new requirements elsewhere, without reducing deforestation. Thousands of small farmers unable to provide the potentially expensive data could be left out. Much depends on how countries and companies react to the new laws, Bellfield said. Countries must help smaller farmers by building national systems that ensure their exports are traceable. Otherwise, companies may just buy from very large farms that can prove they have complied. 

Already, orders for Ethiopian-grown coffee have fallen. And Peru lacks the capacity to provide information needed for coffee and cocoa grown in the Peruvian Amazon. 

This comes atop other challenges, which in Vietnam include worsening droughts and receding groundwater levels. 

“There will be winners and losers,” she said. 

Vietnam can’t afford to lose — Europe is the largest market for its coffee, constituting 40% of its coffee exports. Six weeks after the EUDR was approved, Vietnam’s agriculture ministry started working to prepare coffee growing-provinces for the shift. It has since rolled out a national plan that includes a database of where crops are grown and mechanisms to make this information traceable. 

The Southeast Asian nation has long promoted more sustainable farming methods, viewing laws like the EUDR as an “an inevitable change,” according to an August 2023 agriculture ministry communique. The EUDR could help accelerate such a transformation, according to Agriculture Minister Le Minh Hoang. 

Tam and Tu, his export partner, were quick to adapt. 

Even if the costs are higher, Tu said, they can get better prices for their high-quality coffee. 

“We must choose the highest quality. Otherwise, we will always be laborers,” Tu said, while sipping a cup of his favorite coffee at his company’s coffee-processing factory adjoining Tam’s farm. This is where trucks laden with red coffee cherries, both robusta and arabica, arrive from other farms, where the pulp of the fruit is removed and beans of coffee are laid out on tables to dry in the sun. 

Tu already has certificates from international agencies for sustainability that will enable him to deal with the EUDR. Such certificates typically address the issue of deforestation, although some tweaks may be needed, said David Hadley, program director for regulatory impacts at the nonprofit group Preferred by Nature in Costa Rica. 

Ensuring that Vietnam’s roughly half a million small farmers, who produce about 85% of its coffee, are able to collect and provide data showing their farms did not cause deforestation remains a challenge. Some may struggle to use smartphones to collect geolocation coordinates. Small exporters need to set up systems to prevent other uncertified products from being mixed with coffee that meets EUDR requirements, said Loan Le of International Economics Consulting. 

Farmers also will need documents proving they have complied with national laws for land use, environmental protection and labor, Le said. Moreover, coffee’s long value chain — from producing beans to collecting them and processing them — requires digital systems to ensure records are error-free. 

Brazil, the world’s largest coffee producer, is better placed, said Bellfield of Global Canopy, since its coffee grows on plantations that far are away from forests and it has a relatively well-organized supply chain. Also, Brazilian-grown coffee is most likely to meet the EUDR requirements, according to a 2024 Brazilian study, because much of it is exported to the EU, Brazil has fewer small farmers, and about a third of its coffee-growing acreage already has some kind of sustainability certification. 

The EUDR has acknowledged concerns for less well prepared suppliers by giving them more time and said the European government will work with impacted countries to “enable the transition” while “paying particular attention” to the needs of small holders and Indigenous communities. A review in 2028 will also look at impacts on smallholders. 

“Despite this we still anticipate it being costly and difficult for small holder farming communities,” she said. 

In Peru, collecting information about hundreds of thousands of small farmers is difficult given the country’s weak institutions and the fact that most farmers lack land titles, according to a study of EUDR impacts by the Amazon Business Alliance, a joint-initiative by USAID, Canada and the nonprofit group Conservation International. 

Ethiopia, where coffee makes up about a third of total export earnings according to a U.S. Department of Agriculture report, has been slow to react. The national plan it rolled out in February 2024 fails to resolve the fundamental issue of how to gather required data from millions of small farmers and provide that information to buyers, said Gizat Worku, head of the Ethiopian Coffee Exporters Association. 

“That requires a huge amount of resources,” he said 

Gizat, who like many Ethiopians goes by his first name, said that orders are falling because of doubts about the country’s ability to comply with the EUDR. Some traders are contemplating switching to other markets, like the Middle East or China, where Ethiopian coffee is “booming,” he said. But switching markets isn’t easy. 

“These regulations are going to have a tremendous impact,” Gizat said.
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…

london — British counterterrorism detectives are investigating after a journalist working for a Persian-language media organization was stabbed Friday in London amid fears he had been targeted because of his job, police said.

Police said the man, in his 30s, was attacked and suffered an injury to his leg in the Friday afternoon incident in Wimbledon, southwest London.

Britain’s National Union of Journalists (NUJ) said the victim was prominent Britain-based Iranian journalist Pouria Zeraati, who hosts a show on the Persian-language television news network Iran International, which is critical of Iran’s government.

Police said his injuries were not believed to be life-threatening and he was in stable condition.

“This cowardly attack on Pouria is deeply shocking, and our thoughts are with him, his family and all of his colleagues at Iran International,” Michelle Stanistreet, the NUJ general secretary, said in a statement.

In January, Britain imposed sanctions on Iranian officials it said were involved in threats to kill journalists on British soil.

Those officials were members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Unit 840, which an investigation by ITV news in Britain said was involved in plots to assassinate two Iran International television presenters in the U.K.

“While we are keeping an open mind, given the occupation of the victim and our publicized concerns about the threat to employees of that organization, the investigation is being led by the Counter Terrorism Command,” Commander Dominic Murphy, the head of that unit, said.

“I must stress that, at this early stage of our investigation, we do not know the reason why this victim was attacked and there could be a number of explanations for this.”

There was no immediate response from Iranian officials to the report.

British police and security officials have increasingly warned about Iran’s growing use of criminal proxies to carry out attacks abroad.

They say there have been more than 15 direct threats to kill or kidnap dissidents or political opponents that were linked to the Iranian state apparatus over the past two years.

In December, an Austrian man was convicted of collecting information that could be used in a terrorist attack after he was accused of carrying out “hostile reconnaissance” on Iran International’s London headquarters.

“It is too early to know whether this violent assault is connected to the escalating intimidation and harassment by Iran, including the plot to assassinate journalists Fardad Farahzad and Sima Sabet in 2022,” Stanistreet said.

“However, this brutal stabbing will inevitably raise fears amongst the many journalists targeted at Iran International and the BBC Persian Service that they are not safe at home or going about their work.”
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MOSCOW — Russian prosecutors have asked the justice ministry to label Alla Pugacheva, the queen of Soviet pop music, as a “foreign agent,” the state RIA news agency reported. 

Pugacheva, 74, a Soviet and then post-Soviet icon, has criticized the war in Ukraine. 

She is one of Russia’s most famous people – known across generations for hits such as the 1982 song “Million Scarlet Roses” and the 1978 film “The Woman who Sings.” 

Pugacheva has in the past been feted by both President Vladimir Putin and his predecessor Boris Yeltsin. When Mikhail Gorbachev died in 2022, she praised the last Soviet leader for allowing freedom and rejecting violence.
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WASHINGTON — What is normally a time of celebration is turning to one of anxiety, as counterterrorism officials are on high alert for the Islamic State terror group to build on its deadly Moscow attack with new plots targeting Easter.

Already, some European countries have issued heightened threat alerts while increasing security. Italy, in particular, cites the approach of the Easter holiday as one reason for additional concern.

The latest propaganda from Islamic State, also known as IS or ISIS, has only served to reinforce such worries.

In a statement Thursday marking 10 years since IS first announced its now-defunct caliphate in Iraq and Syria, spokesperson Abu Huthaifa al-Ansar called on followers to target “crusaders,” especially in Europe and in the United States.

Even in its claim of responsibility for the attack near Moscow, the group’s Amaq news agency said its operatives have targeted a gathering of Christians. And this past January, IS claimed responsibility for an attack on a Catholic church in Istanbul that killed one person.

IS also has a history of attacking Christians celebrating Easter, notably claiming responsibility for Easter Sunday bombings in Sri Lanka in April 2019 that killed more than 300 people and wounded at least 500 more.

“Easter and/or Easter-related activities would absolutely be high on the hit list for a potential attack,” said Colin Clarke, director of research at the global intelligence firm the Soufan Group.

“ISIS is on a roll, and there could be a real push to sustain the momentum by launching another high-profile assault, especially on a symbolic target,” Clarke told VOA. “I’d also be concerned about Orthodox Easter the following weekend, and the logical place to look would be where ISIS has struck Christian targets before.”

‘Substantial’ threat risk

Other countries, while acknowledging the threat, say they have long been on high alert for such plots and that sounding additional alarms will do little good.

“The security authorities’ risk assessment of the Islamist threat in Germany has not yet changed as a result of the terrible attack in Moscow,” a German government spokesperson told VOA, speaking on the condition they not be named.

“It was already high before,” the official added, calling the Islamic State’s Afghan affiliate “currently the most aggressive” of the terror group’s branches while adding it “currently poses the greatest Islamist threat in Germany.”

Britain has taken a similar stance.

“The threat level to the U.K. from terrorism is already currently substantial, meaning an attack is likely,” a spokesperson told VOA, speaking on the condition of anonymity. “This assessment has not changed.”

In the United States, as well, nothing has changed.

Last May, U.S. officials warned the country was stuck in a “heightened threat environment.” In September 2023, the Department of Homeland Security’s annual threat assessment said the U.S. was at “high risk” for a terror attack, specifically pointing to the threat from the Islamic State’s Afghan affiliate, also known as IS-Khorasan, ISIS-K, or ISKP.

“We remain vigilant against the evolving threat posed by terrorist groups, including ISIS-K,” U.S. State Department spokesman Matthew Miller told reporters Thursday. “We have maintained an unwavering focus.”

US assessment

The Pentagon issued a similar assurance.

“The Department of Defense has not taken its eye off of ISIS,” press secretary Major General Pat Ryder said Thursday in response to a question from VOA.

Recent U.S. intelligence assessments have portrayed IS as a terror organization that may be at a turning point, underscoring what the intelligence community’s annual threat assessment, issued earlier this month, described as “cascading leadership losses in Iraq and Syria.”

But the same report warned that “regional affiliates will continue to expand.” And while the U.S. report cited a shift to Africa, U.S. and other current and former Western officials see IS leadership in Afghanistan as taking on a more prominent role.

“Most plots that we are aware of go back to ISIS-K,” a former senior Western counterterrorism official told VOA earlier this year.

There has been long-running concern about IS-Khorasan’s efforts to expand its sphere of influence beyond Afghanistan.

Some Western officials and regional observers warn that as far back as 2021, the IS Afghan affiliate was seeking to seed Central Asian states such as Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan with small but highly capable cells and networks that could serve as the basis for future attacks.

Aaron Zelin, a fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy who specializes in jihadism, said, “There was a large cohort of Central Asian foreign fighters that went to Syria last decade when IS was controlling territory there. So, those that survived were likely a backbone to this broader facilitation and plot/attack network.

“There was also a smaller cohort of Central Asians that joined up with ISKP in Afghanistan,” Zelin told VOA. “Then there are Central Asian migrant communities in Russia that IS can recruit from in the same way they do with Arab migrant populations in Western Europe.”

Focus on Central Asia

One humanitarian official in Central Asia, who asked that their name be withheld because of fears they could be targeted, told VOA that IS has managed to establish small, high-quality cells and networks across the region.

“The networks still exist, but they are not going to be recruiting more [big] numbers,” the official said, adding that there are signs that “the recruitment might happen more outside of Central Asia.”

“The vulnerabilities and push factors [that move someone to join IS] are a lot stronger in Russia, especially in light of the current situation in Russia toward migrants,” the official said, noting those same factors exist across many European countries that host Central Asian diaspora communities.

There are indications that IS-Khorasan has found ways to leverage other terror groups.

Andrew Mines, a program specialist at the United States Institute of Peace, said, “ISKP doesn’t just attract foreign recruits, it also cooperates with Central Asian-dominated groups like IMU [Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan] and … ETIM/TIP [Turkistan Islamic Party] to a more limited extent.”

Mines told VOA that IS-Khorasan has proven to be adept at maximizing its resources.

“ISKP has shown it is capable of receiving, training and deploying assets within and outside of Afghanistan, as well as using the ‘virtual planner’ and inspiration attack planning models.”

Current and former officials say it is those types of capabilities, combined with high-profile attacks, such as the one near Moscow and January’s double suicide bombing in Kerman, Iran, that make IS-Khorasan a formidable threat even as some data suggest the affiliate’s exploits in Afghanistan itself have been on the decline.

The IS-Khorasan attack in Russia, along with foiled plots in Germany late last year, both of which appear to have relied on ethnic Tajiks, could also be an indication that group’s efforts to build an extended network is coming to fruition.

“This could even be the first sort of real flowering of a developed ISIL-Khorasan capability,” according to Edmund Fitton-Brown, a former senior U.N. counterterrorism official, using another acronym for the IS Afghan affiliate.

And Fitton-Brown, now a senior adviser for the New York and Berlin-based Counter Extremism Project, worries IS leaders will want to capitalize on the momentum they likely see from this year’s successful terror attacks.

“They got that attention for Iran. They’ve got a lot more attention for doing it in Russia. And they would get even more attention if they could bring off something on this scale in Western Europe,” he told VOA.

“But whether they can bring it off is a question, because up to now there have been a lot of abortive attempts where they’ve had active terrorist plots in Western Europe, particularly in Germany, but they’ve been detected and prevented and disrupted,” Fitton-Brown said.
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washington — Millions of Turkish citizens will head to the polls Sunday to elect mayors and local administrators for their cities and districts.

The elections come less than a year after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan secured his term for another five years last May.

“Now we have 2024 ahead of us,” Erdogan said in his victory speech, adding, “Are you ready to win both Uskudar [a district in Istanbul where Erdogan’s personal residence is] and Istanbul in the local elections in 2024?”

Erdogan’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) aims to win back key cities, including Turkey’s largest, Istanbul, and its capital, Ankara, which it lost to the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) in 2019 through its alliance with the nationalist IYI Party.

Istanbul race

Winning Istanbul and Ankara, two cities that account for a quarter of Turkey’s population, gave the CHP a key position in power for the past five years.

Some analysts observe that the Istanbul race will be one of the main contested races.

“This election largely revolves around Istanbul. In the presidential elections, [opposition alliance candidate] Kemal Kilicdaroglu received more votes than Erdogan in both rounds in Istanbul,” political scientist Ismet Akca told VOA.

Istanbul, with its 15 million population, is symbolically important for political parties. An old saying in Turkish politics – “Whoever wins Istanbul, wins Turkey” – was used by Erdogan a couple of times. Early in his career Erdogan was the city’s mayor, from 1994 to 1998.

The current Istanbul mayor and CHP candidate Ekrem Imamoglu was considered one of the possible vice presidents if the opposition alliance had won the May 2023 parliamentary and presidential elections.

However, after Erdogan’s victory in May 2023, the opposition alliance, headed by CHP and IYI, collapsed. The two parties are running their own candidates in the local elections.

Also, new political parties, including the center-right DEVA, the far-right Victory Party and the Islamist New Welfare Party, have emerged over the past five years, and they will compete in the Istanbul race with their own candidates.

In the 2019 election, the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP, which is using a new name, DEM Party) did not announce a candidate and supported the opposition alliance’s Imamoglu. However, this year, the DEM Party has campaigned for prominent Kurdish politician Meral Danis Bestas, its candidate for Istanbul.

Erdogan’s AKP selected Murat Kurum, 47, former minister of environment and urbanization, who was one of the leading figures in the government’s response to the February 2023 earthquakes that killed more than 50,000 people in southeastern Turkey.

Main opposition CHP has Imamoglu, 52, seeking a second term. Already one of the most prominent figures in Turkey’s opposition, he is expected to run for president in 2028 if he wins.

With the lack of a broader alliance and Kurdish votes, Imamoglu is facing a tough race against Kurum, as Erdogan and his Cabinet officials are quite active in his campaign.

Erdogan’s ‘last election’

During a meeting of the Turkish Youth Foundation on March 8, Erdogan, 70, asked for support in the local elections, saying, “This is a final for me; under the mandate given by the law, this is my last election.”

“The eyes of the entire Islamic world are on Turkey. What will happen in Turkey? What result will the AKP get in these elections?” the president continued.

Erdogan came to power in 2002 and served as prime minister until 2014, when he became the first president elected by the public. He was re-elected in June 2018 and May 2023.

The Turkish constitution, which was last amended in 2017, enables the president to serve only two terms of five years. However, according to Article 116, if the parliament decides to repeat the elections during the president’s second term, the president may run for election again.

Erdogan hinted in November 2023 that his party aimed to work on a new constitution. Political scientist Akca thinks Erdogan’s statement was meant to consolidate his party’s voters.

“Erdogan does not want to lose this election to Imamoglu for the second time. The latest elections reveal that the lower classes and young people dissatisfied with the AKP are looking for other options,” Akca told VOA. Many of those voters have shifted allegiance from AKP to the Islamist New Welfare Party.

“The president is trying to overcome this problem with his emphasis on the Islamist cause and his speech with a high emotional tone.”

Gonul Tol, director of the Middle East Institute’s Turkey program, said Erdogan is involved “as if he were the one on the ballot box.”

“So he is intervening in the electoral process so often and attacking the incumbent, CHP Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu, almost on a daily basis. It sounds like this is turning into a referendum on Erdogan, which I personally believe is a bad strategy,” Tol said Thursday in a webinar.

Kurdish votes  

Several prominent Kurdish politicians, including Ahmet Turk, Leyla Zana and the imprisoned former HDP leader Selahattin Demirtas, have recently named Erdogan as one of the vital actors in the solution to the conflict with the Kurds.

“Our door is closed to terrorists and those who play a political game under the guidance of a terrorist organization,” Erdogan said Wednesday while campaigning in Diyarbakir.

Some analysts think that Erdogan ended the possibility of a peace process.

“Considering Erdogan’s speech, I do not expect anything like a new compromise, negotiation or a meeting between DEM Party and Erdogan,” Reha Ruhavioglu, director of the Diyarbakir-based Kurdish Studies Center, told VOA.

The Turkish government says the DEM Party has links with the PKK, which the United States, European Union and Ankara have designated as a terrorist group. The party denies this allegation.

In 2019, the then-HDP won 65 municipalities, but later, the mayors of at least 48 municipalities were sacked over terror accusations and placed under the control of government-appointed trustees.

This story originated in VOA’s Turkish Service. VOA Turkish’s Hilmi Hacaloglu and Mahmut Bozarslan contributed from Istanbul and Diyarbakir.
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A space launch aborted only to find success days later. Plus, Japan makes a push into private spaceflight, and NASA really wants you to see the solar eclipse — but safety first. VOA’s Arash Arabasadi brings us The Week in Space.
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UNITED NATIONS — Russia vetoed a U.N. resolution on Thursday, effectively abolishing the monitoring of United Nations sanctions against North Korea by a panel of U.N. experts. 

The Security Council resolution sponsored by the United States would have extended the mandate of the panel for a year, but Russia’s veto will halt its operations. 

The vote in the 15-member council was 13 in favor, Russia against and China abstaining. 

Russia’s U.N. ambassador, Vassily Nebenzia, told the council before the vote that Western nations are trying to “strangle” North Korea and that sanctions have proven “irrelevant” and “detached from reality” in reining in its nuclear program. 

The resolution does not alter the sanctions, which remain in force.
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