At the start of Russia’s invasion, Ukrainian journalist Petro Shevchenko left his job and headed to the front lines to fight for his country. Seven months later, VOA caught up with him as he came home to spend some time with his family. Anna Kosstutschenko has the story.
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After a European Union summit ending February 10 that offered strong support for Ukraine — and calls for stronger measures against illegal migration — the bloc is now challenged to act on its rhetoric. But on both Ukraine and migration, European member states are not marching in complete lockstep.

EU membership, fighter jets and fences counted among the top three buzzwords of a summit, featuring the standing-ovation presence of Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, and talks about curbing a sharp influx of so-called “irregular migrants” from places like Africa.

Zelenskyy got a rousing welcome from European members of parliament and leaders, as he reiterated calls for more weapons and for fast-tracking his country’s EU membership application.

Ukraine’s leader also called for more EU sanctions against Russia — which European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen said will shortly become reality.

“First, we will impose sanctions on a number of political and military leaders,” she said. “But also, dear Volodymyr, we listened very carefully to your messages when we visited you last week in Kyiv – we will target [Russian President Vladimir] Putin’s propagandists, because their lies are poisoning the public space in Russia and abroad.”

Despite the show of unity, there does not appear more movement on speeding up Ukraine’s accession into the bloc. And while Zelenskyy said some EU countries appeared receptive to sending fighter jets, it is unclear how much support that proposal has within the bloc, with many nations fearing an escalation in the Ukraine conflict. 

Speaking to reporters, Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin appeared open to the idea. 

When asked if she would rule out fighter jets, Marin responded, “I don’t want to rule out anything in this stage.” 

Europe’s traditional heavyweights — France and Germany — were less receptive. French President Emmanuel Macron said he does not rule out sending fighter jets to Ukraine, but that it does not correspond to today’s needs.

In terms of overall weapons deliveries, timing is critical, said Jacob Kirkegaard, a senior analyst at the German Marshall Fund policy institute.

“It is clear, or appears to be clear, that Russian government is determined to push an offensive around the one-year anniversary of the invasion — and hopefully from their point of view before lots of the new western heavy weaponry arrives. And of course, Ukraine has previously said it is their intention to launch their own counter-offensive,” Kirkegaard said.

EU divisions were also apparent on another hot-button issue: migration. European border agency Frontex says last year’s number of so-called irregular migrant crossings into the bloc — 330,000 — was the highest since its 2016 migrant crisis. Many more were asylum-seekers, although EU officials suggest many of those do not merit refugee status.

While the bloc is moving toward tougher policies to curb migration, countries are divided over methods to do it, and whether to use EU funds to build fences — a concept that was largely dismissed not so long ago.  
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Russia bombarded Ukraine with a series of missile strikes across the country Friday.

Critical infrastructure facilities were hit, resulting in power outages.

Zaporizhzhia, which houses Europe’s largest nuclear plant, was hit with 17 missiles in one hour, according to the town’s acting mayor.

Air raid sirens blasted across the country. Officials warned people to pay attention to the sirens and seek shelter when hearing them.

The strikes Friday come just ahead of the February 24 anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

The strikes also follow Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s recent trips to London, Paris and Brussels, where he met with European leaders to ask for fighter jets to help Ukraine beat back the Russian invasion.

Ukraine has been promised tanks from the United States, Germany, and other NATO allies, but does not yet have enough tanks to launch a counteroffensive against Russia.

Britain’s Defense Ministry said Friday Russian forces “have likely made tactical gains” in two key locations in Ukraine – on the northern outskirts of the Donbas town of Bakhmut and around the western edge of the town of Vuhledar.

A British intelligence report posted on Twitter said Russian forces have advanced around that western side of the town.

The ministry said that on the northern outskirts of Bakhmut, Wagner Group forces have pushed two to three kilometers further west, controlling the area near the main route to town.  

The report said that Russia has likely suffered heavy casualties, however, because of “inexperienced units” deployed there. “Russian troops likely fled and abandoned at least 30 mostly intact armored vehicles in a single incident after a failed assault,” the ministry said. 

Meanwhile, Russia will cut its oil production by 500,000 barrels a month, beginning in March, Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak said Friday.

Western countries have placed a cap on Russian crude oil because of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. 

“As of today, we fully sell all our crude output, but as we stated before, we will not sell oil to those who directly or indirectly adhere to the ‘price ceiling,’” Novak said. 

There was some confusion about whether Russia had talked with OPEC+ members about the upcoming reduction in production. A Kremlin spokesman said Russia has consulted with some OPEC+ members. Novak said in a statement later, though, that there had been no consultations about the voluntary cut.

The reduction in Russia’s oil production may be an indication the price cap imposed by the West on Russian oil, combined with other sanctions from the West, may be having an impact on Russia’s economy. 

Zelenskyy is scheduled to address a summit of sports ministers Friday to gain their support in his effort to block athletes from Russia and Belarus from participating in the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris. 

The International Olympic Committee wants the athletes to participate without using their national flags.

Some information in this report came from The Associated Press and Reuters.
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Turkey has for years tempted fate by not enforcing modern construction codes while allowing — and in some cases, encouraging — a real estate boom in earthquake-prone areas, experts say.

The lax enforcement, which experts in geology and engineering have long warned about, is gaining renewed scrutiny in the aftermath of this week’s devastating earthquakes, which flattened thousands of buildings and killed more than 21,000 people across Turkey and Syria.

“This is a disaster caused by shoddy construction, not by an earthquake,” said David Alexander, a professor of emergency planning at University College London.

It is common knowledge that many buildings in the areas pummeled by this week’s two massive earthquakes were built with inferior materials and methods, and often did not comply with government standards, said Eyup Muhcu, president of the Chamber of Architects of Turkey.

He said that includes many old buildings, but also apartments erected in recent years — nearly two decades after the country brought its building codes up to modern standards. “The building stock in the area was weak and not sturdy, despite the reality of earthquakes,” Muhcu said.

The problem was largely ignored, experts said, because addressing it would be expensive, unpopular and restrain a key engine of the country’s economic growth.

To be sure, the back-to-back earthquakes that demolished or damaged at least 12,000 buildings were extremely powerful — their force magnified by the fact that they occurred at shallow depths. The first 7.8 magnitude quake occurred at 4:17 a.m., making it even more difficult for people to escape their buildings as the earth shook violently. And President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has acknowledged “shortcomings” in the country’s response.

But experts said there is a mountain of evidence — and rubble — pointing to a harsh reality about what made the quakes so deadly: Even though Turkey has, on paper, construction codes that meet current earthquake-engineering standards, they are too rarely enforced, explaining why thousands of buildings crumbled.

In a country crisscrossed by geological fault lines, people are on edge about when and where the next earthquake might hit — particularly in Istanbul, a city of more than 15 million that is vulnerable to quakes.

Since the disaster, Erdogan’s minister of justice said it will investigate the destroyed buildings. “Those who have been negligent, at fault and responsible for the destruction following the earthquake will answer to justice,” Bekir Bozdag said Thursday.

But several experts said any serious investigation into the root of weak enforcement of building codes must include a hard look at the policies of Erdogan, as well as regional and local officials, who oversaw and promoted a construction boom that helped drive economic growth.

Shortly before Turkey’s last presidential and parliamentary election in 2018, the government unveiled a sweeping program to grant amnesty to companies and individuals responsible for certain violations of the country’s building codes. By paying a fine, violators could avoid having to bring their buildings up to code. Such amnesties have been used by previous governments ahead of elections as well.

As part of that amnesty program, the government agency responsible for enforcing building codes acknowledged that more than half of all buildings in Turkey — accounting for some 13 million apartments — were not in compliance with current standards.

The types of violations cited in that report by the Ministry of Environment and Urbanization were wide-ranging, including homes built without permits, buildings that added extra floors or expanded balconies without authorization, and the existence of so-called squatter homes inhabited by low-income families.

The report did not specify how many buildings were in violation of codes related to earthquake-proofing or basic structural integrity, but the reality was clear.

“Construction amnesty doesn’t mean the building is sturdy,” the current head of the Ministry of Environment and Urbanization, Murat Kurum, said in 2019.

In 2021, the Chamber of Geological Engineers of Turkey published a series of reports raising red flags about existing buildings and new construction taking place in areas leveled by this week’s quakes, including Kahramanmaras, Hatay and Osmaniye. The Chamber urged the government to conduct studies to ensure that buildings were up to code and built on safe locations.

A year earlier, the Chamber issued a report that directly called out policies of “slum amnesty, construction amnesty” as dangerous and warned that “indifference to disaster safety culture” would lead to preventable deaths.

Since 1999, when two powerful earthquakes hit northwest Turkey, near Istanbul — the stronger one killing some 18,000 people — building codes have been tightened and a process of urban renewal has been under way.

But the upgrades aren’t happening fast enough, especially in poorer cities.

Builders commonly use lower quality materials, hire fewer professionals to oversee projects and don’t adhere to various regulations as a way of keeping costs down, according to Muhcu, president of the country’s Chamber of Architects.

He said the Turkish government’s so-called “construction peace” introduced before the 2018 general elections as a way to secure votes has, in effect, legalized unsafe buildings.

“We are paying for it with thousands of deaths, the destruction of thousands of buildings, economic losses,” Muhcu said.

Even new apartment buildings advertised as safe were ravaged by the quake.

In Hatay province, where casualties were highest and an airport runway and two public hospitals were destroyed, survivor Bestami Coskuner said he saw many new buildings, even “flashy” new ones had collapsed.

In Antakya, a historic city in Hatay, a 12-story building with 250 units that was completed in 2013 collapsed, leaving an untold number dead, or still trapped alive. The Ronesans Residence was considered one of the “luxury” buildings in the area, according to Turkish media reports, and it was advertised as “a piece of heaven” on social media.

Another destroyed building in Antakya is the Guclu Bahce, which began construction in 2017 and opened with much fanfare in 2019 in a ceremony attended by Hatay’s mayor and other local officials, according to fact-checking website Dogrulukpayi.

In Malatya, the brand-new Asur apartments — billed as earthquake-proof in advertisements — sustained damage in the first quake, but residents escaped unharmed. Some residents who returned to the building to collect belongings managed a second lucky escape when the second strong temblor hit, causing the building to slide toward one side, according to video shown on TikTok and verified by fact-checking website Teyit.

The devastation across Turkey comes at a sensitive time for President Erdogan, who faces tough parliamentary and presidential elections in May amid an economic downturn and high inflation.

Erdogan regularly touts the country’s construction boom over the past two decades, including new airports, roads, bridges and hospitals, as proof of his success during more than two decades in power.

On his tour of the devastation Wednesday and Thursday, Erdogan pledged to rebuild destroyed homes within the year.

“We know how to do this business,” he said. “We are a government that has proved itself on these issues. We will.”
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The prospect of rescuing more people in Turkey and Syria trapped under the rubble of the 7.8 magnitude earthquake are dwindling, but Friday, four days after the tremblor, several survivors were pulled from the ruins in Hatay province in Turkey’s south.

Officials say the death toll from the powerful earthquake that struck the border region between Turkey and Syria on Monday is now more than 21,000, making it the world’s deadliest seismic event since a 2011 earthquake and tsunami that killed nearly 20,000 people in Japan.

Rescue crews have been hampered in efforts to find survivors by a lack of equipment.

A six-truck United Nations aid convoy could not reach Syria until Thursday through the Bab al-Hawa crossing, the only crossing the U.N. is authorized to use, to move humanitarian supplies from Turkey into areas outside of Syrian government control in the country’s north. The road leading to the crossing on the Turkish side was damaged in the quake and had only just reopened.

Hundreds of thousands of people across the region have been left homeless in the below-freezing temperatures.

Turkey’s disaster management agency said Thursday that about 110,000 personnel are involved in rescue efforts and 5,500 vehicles, such as tractors, cranes, bulldozers and excavators, have been shipped to assist the country, reeling from the earthquake.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan visited the area near the quake’s epicenter close to the city of Gaziantep and the Turkey-Syria border.

He faced the mounting frustration of survivors looking for their loved ones or for aid from the government by acknowledging problems with the emergency response to Monday’s quake.

“It is not possible to be prepared for such a disaster,” Erdogan said. “We will not leave any of our citizens uncared for.” He pointed to the winter weather and how the earthquake had destroyed the runway at Hatay’s airport as things that disrupted the response.

In Hatay, Erdal Kahilogullari, whose wife and two children were under the rubble of a collapsed building, shared his frustration with VOA’s Turkish Service. More than 3,300 people died in Hatay province.

“OK, everyone is a human being. But aren’t 80 provinces enough? How can 80 provinces not help 10 provinces? Being 10 hours late is OK, but being late for two days to help? We don’t even have water,” he said, referring to the provinces of Turkey.

Rescuers were still finding people alive but were unable to reach them without the needed equipment and expertise, even as they could hear cries for help.

“I hear voices saying, ‘Daddy, save me,’” Kahilogullari said. “How could I not struggle here? I am desperate. I cannot do anything. I’m just waiting here. Walk there, come back here.”

Search sites also have been the scene of some celebrations as people are found alive and taken away for medical care. But uncovering the rubble has also meant frequent increases in the number of casualties.

Erdogan declared seven days of national mourning and a three-month state of emergency in the 10 provinces directly affected by the quake.

Search teams and emergency aid from throughout the world poured into Turkey and Syria as rescue workers dug through the rubble in a desperate search for survivors. Some voices that had been crying out for help fell silent.

“We could hear their voices, they were calling for help,” said Ali Silo, whose two relatives could not be saved in the Turkish town of Nurdagi.

More than 8,000 people have been pulled from the debris in Turkey, Vice President Fuat Oktay said, and about 380,000 have taken refuge in government shelters or hotels. They huddled in shopping malls, stadiums, mosques and community centers, while others spent the night outside wrapped in blankets gathering around fires.

The earthquake struck a region enveloped on both sides of the border by more than a decade of civil war in Syria. On the Syrian side, the swath affected is divided between government-held territory and the country’s last opposition-held enclave, which is surrounded by Russian-backed government forces. Turkey, meanwhile, is home to millions of refugees from the conflict.

‘A crisis on top of a crisis’

The U.N. resident coordinator for Syria said Wednesday that 10.9 million people have been affected across the country by the earthquake. Before the quake, there were already 15.3 million in need of humanitarian assistance in the country, due to more than a decade of civil war.

“So, it’s a crisis on top of a crisis,” El-Mostafa Benlamlih told reporters at the U.N. in New York during a video briefing from Damascus.

He said in Aleppo alone, a third of homes are estimated to have been damaged or destroyed, displacing around 100,000 people.

Humanitarians are coping with a shortage of fuel for their operations, as well as freezing temperatures and damaged roads and infrastructure.

The World Food Program has prepositioned food stocks in the area, which Benlamlih said are enough to feed 100,000 people for one week. The World Health Organization has two planes with medical supplies coming from its hub in Dubai to Damascus. More supplies, however, are urgently needed.

The WFP appealed Wednesday for $46 million to provide food assistance to half a million people in Turkey and Syria for the next three to four months.

Additionally, the main road the U.N. uses to get aid from Gaziantep in Turkey to the transshipment point into northwest Syria was damaged in the quake and closed.

“So, we couldn’t send any relief items; we were looking for alternative routes,” Muhannad Hadi, U.N. regional humanitarian coordinator for Syria, told reporters from Amman, Jordan. He said they had word Wednesday that the road is opening, and they could start delivering some supplies as early as Thursday.

Margaret Besheer contributed to this report. Some material for this article came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters.
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Pakistan confirmed Thursday that it skipped this week’s Russia-hosted multilateral consultations on Afghanistan, suggesting there are other forums in which it can more effectively contribute to the Afghan peace process.

Regional countries, including China, India, Iran, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, and Uzbekistan were invited to Wednesday’s security adviser-level meeting in Moscow.

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s office said he addressed the inaugural session of what was described as the fifth multilateral consultation on how to promote Afghan peace and stability.

Pakistani foreign ministry spokeswoman Mumtaz Zahra Baloch, at a weekly news conference, explained the reasons for Islamabad skipping the meeting in Moscow.

“Our decision not to participate in the instant meeting was made in light of our consideration that Pakistan can make a better contribution in formats and forums, which can contribute constructively to peace in Afghanistan,” she said.

“We will continue to participate in all these mechanisms to their full potential and will continue to engage with our partners to contribute to peace and stability in Afghanistan,” Baloch said.

Highly placed Pakistani official sources, however, cited arch-rival India’s participation in Wednesday’s meeting in the Russian capital. The sources went on to say the dialogue was among national security advisers and that currently Pakistan does not have one. 

Islamabad’s traditionally strained ties with Moscow have seen significant improvement in recent years, prompting Pakistan to attend dialogues with Russia in support of peace and stability in conflict-torn neighboring Afghanistan.

“Pakistan’s decision is striking, given its strong past record of participation in Afghanistan-focused dialogues with Russia,” said Michael Kugelman, the director of the South Asia Institute at the Wilson Center in Washington. 

“But circumstances have changed. India’s new role in such dialogues will make Pakistan treat them with caution,” he stated.

Kugelman said Islamabad also does not want to upset the United States at a moment when it seeks Washington’s assistance, especially through U.S. influence over the International Monetary Fund, to address a severe economic crisis facing Pakistan. 

“Islamabad will also want to convey a position of neutrality on the Russia-Ukraine issue and going to a Moscow-hosted meeting so soon after Pakistan held talks with Moscow on Russian energy imports may not be a good look,” he said.

Putin’s office quoted him as telling Wednesday’s gathering that there are conflicts “not far from Russia, including on the Ukrainian track” but they “do not reduce the significance” of the Afghan situation because his country does not want “more points of tension” on its southern borders.

“International terrorist organizations are stepping up their activities [in Afghanistan], including al-Qaida, which is building up its potential,” Putin added.

Russia has not stated why it did not invite Afghanistan’s ruling Islamist Taliban to Wednesday’s consultations.

The former insurgent group seized power in August 2021 as the United States and its NATO allies withdrew troops from the country after battling the Taliban for almost two decades.

But no foreign government has yet granted legitimacy to the de facto Afghan rulers over human rights and terrorism-related concerns.

Russia’s security concerns stem from growing attacks by Islamic State’s regional affiliate in Afghanistan, the Islamic State-Khorasan.

The terrorist group carried out a suicide bombing near the Russian Embassy in Kabul last September, killing two staff members at the diplomatic mission and several Afghan visa-seekers. Moscow is also worried the terror threat can destabilize its Central Asian-allied nations bordering Afghanistan. 
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In the aftermath of Turkey’s killer quakes, there is growing desperation among survivors and increasing anger over the government’s response. But many people across the country are mobilizing with opposition mayors to help. It’s happening even in places that were not hit, like Istanbul, from where Dorian Jones reports.
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Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov is expected to meet Thursday in Khartoum with Sudan’s military rulers on Russia and other matters, the country’s state-run SUNA news agency said.

Along with Sudan-Russia ties, the talks were expected to focus on Khartoum’s role with affairs in its neighboring conflict-stricken countries, including Chad, South Sudan and Central African Republic, according to Sudan’s acting Foreign Minister Ali al-Sadiq. He offered no further details.

Lavrov’s visit to Sudan comes as senior diplomats from the U.S. and other European nations conclude two days of talks with Sudanese military leaders and pro-democracy groups to push for a final agreement to restore the country’s transition to democracy.

An October 2021 military coup derailed Sudan’s short-lived, democratic transition. It came after the removal of longtime ruler Omar al-Bashir in April 2019 amid a popular uprising against his Islamist-backed repressive rule.

Late last year, the generals reached an initial deal with major pro-democracy groups to establish a civilian government. Internationally-backed talks were still under way to achieve a final agreement.

Lavrov’s visit is part of a multileg Africa trip that has taken him to Mali and Mauritania. It is Lavrov’s second trip to Africa this year as Russia seeks to maximize its interests on the continent amid rising global interest in Africa’s rich resources.
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Australian Defense Minister Richard Marles on Thursday told Parliament that the controversial AUKUS submarine deal with the U.S. and the U.K. enhances Australian sovereignty and does not increase dependence on the United States as claimed by critics. The pact was signed by Australia, the United States and Britain in September 2021 but has been condemned by China.

Marles said that receiving at least eight nuclear-powered submarines under the AUKUS pact will “dramatically enhance” Australia’s sovereignty, rather than erode it.

Marles argued that Australia needed British and American expertise to enhance its military capabilities.

China accused Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States of fueling military confrontation when the AUKUS accord was signed in 2021.

The alliance has been criticized by former Australian Prime Ministers Malcolm Turnbull and Paul Keating, who have said the deal would erode the country’s sovereignty.

Turnbull told local media last week that the government had to determine whether the submarines could be “operated, sustained and maintained by Australia without the support or supervision of the U.S. Navy.”

Jordon Steele-John, a Greens party senator, has also criticized the accord. He told the Australian Broadcasting Corp. On Thursday that it makes Australia increasingly dependent on the U.S. and Britain.

“Either of those two nations could decide they no longer wish to participate in such a project or pact, leaving our capacity literarily dead in the water,” he said. “The Australian community is very rightly concerned about the greater integration and inter-reliance that this will create.”

Specific details of the trilateral accord will be released soon. British politicians have reportedly suggested that the AUKUS project should be expanded to include India and Japan.

In response, China’s foreign ministry said it was “seriously concerned and opposed” to the military pact. Beijing has previously accused Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States of fueling military confrontation when the AUKUS accord was signed in 2021.

Australia has been trying to rebuild its fractured relationship with China in recent months. Analysts say it is a delicate enterprise, given the tensions over trade and other geopolitical issues.

On Thursday, Australia said it would be removing hundreds of Chinese-made security cameras at official buildings across Australia.

Marles conceded there was a potential security problem that needed to be addressed. There is no evidence so far of any breaches of national security, but Marles said the devices would be taken down.

Britain and America have done the same thing because of concerns the equipment could contain spyware.
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Rescue crews in Turkey and Syria raced against time Wednesday and a lack of equipment to find survivors buried in the rubble of buildings toppled by powerful earthquakes that struck the region Monday and left about 12,000 people dead.

The rescue effort in Turkey involved 96,000 personnel, the country’s emergency management agency said Wednesday.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan visited the area near the quake’s epicenter close to the city of Gaziantep and the Turkey-Syria border.

He faced the mounting frustration of survivors looking for their loved ones or for aid from the government by acknowledging problems with the emergency response to Monday’s 7.8 magnitude quake.

“It is not possible to be prepared for such a disaster,” Erdogan said. “We will not leave any of our citizens uncared for.” He pointed to the winter weather and how the earthquake had destroyed the runway at Hatay’s airport as things that disrupted the response.

In Hatay, Erdal Kahilogullari, whose wife and two children were under the rubble of a collapsed building, shared his frustration with VOA’s Turkish Service. More than 3,300 people died in Hatay province.

“OK, everyone is a human being. But aren’t 80 provinces enough? How can 80 provinces not help 10 provinces? Being 10 hours late is OK, but being late for two days to help? We don’t even have water,” he said, referring to the provinces of Turkey.

Rescuers were still finding people alive but were unable to reach them without the needed equipment and expertise, even as they could hear cries for help.

“I hear voices saying, ‘Daddy, save me,’” Kahilogullari said. “How could I not struggle here? I am desperate. I cannot do anything. I’m just waiting here. Walk there, come back here.”

Search sites also have been the scene of some celebrations as people are found alive and taken away for medical care. But uncovering the rubble has also meant frequent increases in the number of casualties.

Officials in Turkey said at least 8,574 people were killed and more than 38,000 others were injured.

In Syria, where there have been similar complaints of slow response, at least 2,530 have died, according to figures from the Damascus government and rescue groups.

The earthquake is now the world’s deadliest seismic event since a 2011 earthquake and tsunami that killed nearly 20,000 people in Japan.

Erdogan declared seven days of national mourning and a three-month state of emergency in 10 provinces directly affected by the quake.

Search teams and emergency aid from throughout the world poured into Turkey and Syria as rescue workers dug through the rubble in a desperate search for survivors. Some voices that had been crying out for help fell silent.

“We could hear their voices, they were calling for help,” said Ali Silo, whose two relatives could not be saved in the Turkish town of Nurdagi.

More than 8,000 people have been pulled from the debris in Turkey, Vice President Fuat Oktay said, and about 380,000 have taken refuge in government shelters or hotels. They huddled in shopping malls, stadiums, mosques and community centers, while others spent the night outside wrapped in blankets gathering around fires.

The earthquake struck a region enveloped on both sides of the border by more than a decade of civil war in Syria. On the Syrian side, the swath affected is divided between government-held territory and the country’s last opposition-held enclave, which is surrounded by Russian-backed government forces. Turkey, meanwhile, is home to millions of refugees from the conflict.

‘A crisis on top of a crisis’

The U.N. resident coordinator for Syria said Wednesday that 10.9 million people have been affected across the country by the earthquake. Before the quake, there were already 15.3 million in need of humanitarian assistance in the country, due to more than a decade of civil war.

“So, it’s a crisis on top of a crisis,” El-Mostafa Benlamlih told reporters at the United Nations in New York during a video briefing from Damascus.

He said in Aleppo alone, they estimate a third of homes have been damaged or destroyed, displacing around 100,000 people.

Humanitarians are coping with a shortage of fuel for their operations, as well as freezing temperatures and damaged roads and infrastructure.

The World Food Program has prepositioned food stocks in the area, which Benlamlih said are enough to feed 100,000 people for one week. The World Health Organization has two planes with medical supplies coming from its hub in Dubai to Damascus. But more supplies need to come in urgently.

The World Food Program appealed Wednesday for $46 million to provide food assistance to a half-million people in Turkey and Syria for the next three to four months.

Additionally, the main road the United Nations uses to get aid from Gaziantep in Turkey to the transshipment point into northwest Syria was damaged in the quake and closed.

“So we couldn’t send any relief items; we were looking for alternative routes,” Muhannad Hadi, U.N. regional humanitarian coordinator for Syria, told reporters from Amman, Jordan. He said they had word Wednesday that the road is opening, and they could start delivering some supplies as early as Thursday.

Margaret Besheer contributed to this report. Some material for this article came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters.
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The United States’ two-way trade with other nations spiked in 2022, new federal data show, including trade with China despite increasing friction between the world’s two largest economies.

Even while posting record-high exports to 73 countries in 2022, the U.S. still ran a trade deficit of $1.19 trillion, up $101 billion from 2021, the U.S. Commerce Department said this week. The deficit reflected the fact that the U.S. also recorded record-high imports from 90 countries.

U.S. imports from China reached $537 billion in 2022 compared with $505 billion the previous year. The U.S. sold a record-high $154 billion in exports to the Chinese market, up slightly from $151 billion the previous year. The net trade deficit with China for 2022 was $383 billion.

The data, released Tuesday, came out just hours before U.S. President Joe Biden delivered the State of the Union address in which he promised to boost domestic manufacturing, to use only U.S.-made materials for a spate of infrastructure projects, and to remain focused on “winning the competition” against China.

However, what “winning” looks like may be difficult to determine.

Politics versus reality

Relations between the U.S. and China worsened during the past week, after Biden ordered the U.S. military to shoot down what intelligence officials said was a Chinese espionage balloon that had floated across the U.S. Prior to the shoot-down, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken canceled a scheduled trip to Beijing.

The balloon incident followed months of rising tensions and calls from many U.S. officials for a “decoupling” of the Chinese and U.S. economies and “reshoring” of key manufacturing to the U.S. But while the Biden administration may be able to use preferential purchasing treatment to shut Chinese construction materials and other goods out of U.S. infrastructure projects, experts said there is little evidence of broader separation between the U.S. and Chinese economies.

“Regardless of the political rhetoric, which is tending towards a kind of rigid and suspicious environment between China and the United States, the practical moves on the ground from a business and commerce perspective show that there is a deep and sustained connection between the Chinese and U.S. economies,” Claire Reade, a senior counsel with the law firm Arnold & Porter and former assistant U.S. trade representative for China affairs, told VOA.

Mark Kennedy, director of the Wilson Center’s Wahba Institute for Strategic Competition, agreed, saying, “There has not been a broad-based decoupling … and many economists are seeing that there really hasn’t been a significant onshoring or reshoring. There are still strong ties, and to break those ties with China would be both difficult and costly.”

Trade as ‘ballast’

Craig Allen, president of the U.S.-China Business Council, told VOA it’s a good sign that trade between the U.S. and China has been persistently strong despite the imposition of tariffs by both sides and the Biden administration’s recent move to block the sale of cutting-edge microprocessors to China.

“Trade has acted as an important ballast in the relationship between Washington and Beijing in the past, and I think it’s still the case,” he said via email. “Competition is surely defining the contours of the relationship at the moment, and we hope that the relationship doesn’t sour any further as a result.”

“I think, to that point, this new data can be a silver lining,” said Allen. “Even though the United States and China are competing with one another, this last year of data and the growth in U.S. exports to China really shows that we can simultaneously maintain a trading relationship that benefits Americans.”

A delicate balance

Reade said the Biden administration, in its effort to privilege American manufacturers over Chinese firms, will face a difficult challenge. Insulating American companies from non-U.S. rivals could make them less able to compete internationally or could lead to tit-for-tat protectionism against U.S. firms.

At the same time, she said, there is strong evidence that many large Chinese firms, including those that manufacture the kinds of goods used in major infrastructure projects, receive favorable treatment from the Chinese government that insulates them from market pressures, unfairly advantaging them over competitors.

“To the extent the competition is not fair competition, it is also legitimate to not allow destructive price undercutting that decimates legitimate industries,” she said.

US economic strength

Looking beyond the U.S.-China relationship, experts said that much of the explanation for the rising trade deficit has to do with the relative strength of the U.S. economy compared with those of many of its trading partners. A strong dollar makes foreign goods and services more affordable for Americans, while making U.S.-made goods and services more expensive overseas.

“The big takeaway is that when you’re running a high-pressure economy, which the U.S. is, you’re going to import a lot of stuff,” Gary Hufbauer, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, told VOA. “And that’s exactly what has happened. You’ve got the unemployment rate down to 3.4% and two job vacancies for every worker unemployed … that really speaks to just high-pressure demand.”

Although China was the largest source of imports to the U.S. in 2022, Canada and Mexico were the United States’ largest two-way trading partners. The countries share lengthy land borders with the U.S. and participate in a three-way free trade agreement. Total U.S.-Canada trade was $794 billion in 2022, and U.S.-Mexico trade was $779 billion.

After Canada, Mexico and China, Japan was the next largest of the United States’ trading partners, with $229 billion in goods trading hands last year.

The U.S. did $903 billion in two-way trade with the nations of the European Union in 2022, with the largest share, $220 billion, between the U.S. and Germany.

Other large two-way trading partners in 2022 were South Korea at $187 billion; the United Kingdom at $141 billion; Vietnam at $139 billion; Taiwan at $136 billion; and India at $133 billion.
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The U.S. military is planning to set up a training center in Europe to teach NATO allies how to field High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems, or HIMARS, a top U.S. general told VOA, amid increased demand for the systems in Eastern Europe following the weapon’s successes in Ukraine.

“We’re still in the preliminary stages here, but it would be an area that we would maybe pull in several countries to one location,” V Corps commander Lieutenant General John Kolasheski, who is responsible for U.S. Army operations along NATO’s eastern flank, told VOA in an exclusive interview late Tuesday.

The news came as the State Department on Tuesday approved the potential sale of 18 HIMARS launchers to Poland, along with hundreds of Guided Multiple Launch Rocket Systems and dozens of Army Tactical Missile Systems. The Polish government requested the sale, worth an estimated $10 billion.

The proposed HIMARS program would be available to NATO countries that are approved for foreign military sales of the long-range artillery systems, which include nations such as Estonia, Poland and Romania on NATO’s eastern side.

“They [NATO] see the brutality of what has taken place in Ukraine, and there is a sense of urgency, there’s a sense of purpose, and all 30 nations are united to come together to this effective defense of NATO terrain,” Kolasheski said.

Estonian Defense Minister Hanno Pevkur told VOA earlier this week that “one of the biggest lessons learned” from the war in Ukraine is that “long fire is extremely important.” HIMARS have been credited with shifting the momentum of the war.

Estonia has purchased six HIMARS units that are expected to be delivered in the 2024-25 time frame. An American HIMARS platoon is providing extra defensive capabilities in the Baltics, and Pevkur said the platoon also is allowing Estonian forces to begin training on the rocket systems “today” so they will be ready to use them “from day one.”

Poland’s Abrams Academy

Kolasheski said the proposed HIMARS academy would be “a similar construct” to the Abrams Tank Training Academy, which opened near Poznan, Poland, last year to familiarize Polish forces with the U.S.-made Abrams main battle tanks. Poland was the first European ally to acquire the Abrams, purchasing 250 M1A2 Abrams tanks last year and 116 M1A1 Abrams tanks in January.

Part of the Abrams program includes a type of apprenticeship, where Polish forces are attached to Army tank units to study how to service and fire the tanks, according to Kolasheski.

Since the Abrams academy opened last summer, a class of Polish tank operators and a class of maintainers have graduated from it.

Poland has fast become a military hub for U.S. forces in Eastern Europe and has been an outspoken advocate for sending Western tanks to Ukraine.

‘Existential threat’

Polish Defense Minister Mariusz Blaszczak said Saturday that Poland had begun training Ukrainian military forces on the German-made Leopard 2 tanks.

Asked whether the Abrams Tank Training Academy in Poland would be used to train Ukrainians, Kolasheski told VOA there was still “no decision on that right now.”

After President Joe Biden announced last month that the U.S. would provide Ukrainian forces with Abrams tanks, the Pentagon has since said it will first need to procure the tanks because there isn’t an excess available in U.S. stocks. The move will delay the tanks’ delivery.

Leopard 2 tanks and British-made Challenger 2 tanks, however, are expected to arrive on the Ukrainian battlefield as soon as Ukrainian training is complete.

“Tanks are much awaited … and I really hope that we are not too late for that,” Estonia’s Pevkur told VOA.

Asked whether it was realistic to expect Ukrainian forces to operate Leopard 2 or Challenger tanks within a few months, Kolasheski replied, “I think it is.”

“They’re very, very motivated. They’re very eager. I mean, this to them is an existential threat,” he said.

VOA asked the Pentagon for access to U.S. forces training Ukrainians in Germany and to the Abrams Tank Training Academy in Poland, but the request was denied. 
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Nearly a year ago, tens of thousands of Ukrainians sought refuge in the United States as Russian troops invaded their country. Mike O’Sullivan spoke with two Ukrainian families in California about their lives one year later.
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European Union leaders are to meet Thursday for a summit dominated by migration, the economy and, not surprisingly, Ukraine. Reports suggest Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy — who arrived in London on Wednesday — may attend the Brussels summit in person. 

The EU’s two-day summit comes ahead of the one-year anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine — and days after top EU officials held a summit with Zelenskyy in Kyiv.

Besides Western Europe, Ukraine’s leader is known to have left his homeland only once since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine; that trip was to Washington in December, where he met with United States President Joe Biden and addressed the U.S. Congress.

Zelenskyy wants several things from the Europeans, including to speed up Ukraine’s bid to join the EU, more weapons ahead of an expected Russian offensive, and more sanctions against Moscow.

Brussels is unlikely to fast-track Kyiv’s membership application. But in Kyiv last week, European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen praised Zelenskyy’s commitment to join the bloc.

“I must say I am deeply impressed, and I want to commend you for the preciseness, the quality and the speed at which you deliver,” she said. “This is phenomenal.”

Europeans already have committed billions of dollars in defense and humanitarian aid to Ukraine. Brussels is also expected to unveil a 10th sanctions package against Moscow later this month.

zeleMigration is also set to dominate the summit amid a sharp uptick in economic migrants and asylum seekers arriving in Europe this past year. That’s on top of the millions of Ukrainian war refugees.

Today, some EU member states are calling for tougher policies — and fences — against what they call “irregular” migration. Using EU funds for border fences is especially divisive.

“I think migration and asylum policy remains a very tricky issue within the EU — with the EU witnessing its biggest migration and asylum crisis since World War II,” said Pauline Veron, a policy advisor at the European Centre for Development Policy Management, a Netherlands-based think-tank.

Veron said that, even as many Europeans continue welcoming Ukrainian refugees, they are feeling rising angst about migration from Africa and elsewhere.
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Twitter became inaccessible on major Turkish mobile providers on Wednesday as online criticism mounted of the government’s response to this week’s deadly earthquake.

AFP reporters were unable to access the social media network in Turkey. It was still accessible using VPN services that disguise a user’s location.

The netblocks.org social media monitor said Twitter was being restricted “on multiple internet providers in Turkey”.

“Turkey has an extensive history of social media restrictions during national emergencies and safety incidents,” the monitor added.

Turkish police have detained more than a dozen people since Monday’s earthquake over social media posts that criticized how President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government has been dealing with the disaster.

Monday’s 7.8-magnitude tremor and its aftershocks killed at least 11,200 people in southeastern Turkey and parts of Syria.

Turkish social media have been filled with posts by people complaining about a lack of search and rescue efforts in their provinces.

The Twitter outage came as Erdogan toured two of the hardest-hit Turkish provinces.

Turkish officials released no immediate statements about the service disruption.

But they had issued repeated warnings about spreading misinformation in advance of a crucial May 14 election in which Erdogan will try to extend his two-decade rule.
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Poland on Wednesday condemned as unfair the eight-year jail sentence handed to a Polish-Belarusian journalist who had reported critically on the Belarusian regime.

“An inhumane verdict of the Belarusian regime. It is yet another act of persecuting Polish people in Belarus,” Poland’s Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said in a tweet.

Andrzej Poczobut, 49 was sentenced in the western city of Grodno, on the Polish border, where he was based.

He was found guilty of taking part in “actions harming national security” and “inciting hatred.”

“We will do everything to help the Polish journalist,” Morawiecki added.

“We condemn the unfair verdict delivered by a court of an authoritarian country,” a Polish foreign ministry spokesman tweeted, adding Poland will continue to “stand behind” Poczobut.

Poczobut is a correspondent for Poland’s top daily Gazeta Wyborcza and an active member of Belarus’s Polish diaspora.

“A bandit ruling in Belarus sentenced my friend Andrzej Poczobut for eight years in prison. He wants to destroy all free people, but he will never break Andrzej,” Gazeta Wybrocza deputy editor-in-chief Roman Imielski said.
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Rescue crews in Turkey and Syria raced against time and the cold Wednesday to find survivors buried in the rubble of buildings toppled by powerful earthquakes that struck the region Monday and left more than 9,400 people dead.         

The rescue effort in Turkey involved 96,000 personnel, the country’s emergency management agency said Wednesday.     

Search sites have been the scenes of some celebrations as people are found alive and taken away for medical care. But uncovering the rubble has also meant frequent increases in the number of casualties. 

Officials in Turkey said at least 6,957 people were killed and more than 38,000 others were injured. In Syria, there were at least 2,470 deaths, according to figures from the Damascus government and rescue groups.  

The earthquake is now the world’s deadliest seismic event since a 2011 earthquake and tsunami that killed nearly 20,000 people in Japan. 

The epicenter of Monday’s pre-dawn earthquake was in Pazarcik, near the city of Gaziantep, close to the Turkey-Syria border. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was due to travel to the area on Wednesday. 

Erdogan declared seven days of national mourning and a three-month state of emergency in 10 provinces directly affected by the quake.     

Erdogan described the earthquake as “unique in the world,” and he thanked Qatar for offering 10,000 container homes for people left homeless.   

Search teams and emergency aid from throughout the world poured into Turkey and Syria as rescue workers dug through the rubble in a desperate search for survivors. Some voices that had been crying out for help fell silent.

“We could hear their voices, they were calling for help,” said Ali Silo, whose two relatives could not be saved in the Turkish town of Nurdagi.   

More than 8,000 people have been pulled from the debris in Turkey alone, Vice President Fuat Oktay said, and some 380,000 have taken refuge in government shelters or hotels. They huddled in shopping malls, stadiums, mosques and community centers, while others spent the night outside wrapped in blankets gathering around fires.   

Awale Ahmed Darfa, a Somali student in Gaziantep at the epicenter, described his first sensation of the earthquake in an interview with VOA Somali.    

“The situation turned critical very quickly,” he said. “We heard screams, cries and people running. The buildings were shaking as if they were shaken by jinn [evil spirits]. Everyone ran to wherever they felt they would be safe.”              

“We are now outside since we left our homes around 4 a.m.,” he added. “There is a problem being outside — it is rainy, cold, windy, and we are not wearing protective clothing. Outside, everyone is wearing what they were wearing [while] asleep. Some people do not have shoes. They told us we could not go back to the buildings because of the fear [of aftershocks]. That is the disaster here.”          

The earthquake struck a region enveloped on both sides of the border by more than a decade of civil war in Syria. On the Syrian side, the swath affected is divided between government-held territory and the country’s last opposition-held enclave, which is surrounded by Russian-backed government forces. Turkey, meanwhile, is home to millions of refugees from the conflict.        

The opposition-held regions in Syria are packed with about 4 million people displaced from other parts of the country by the fighting. Many of them live in buildings that are already damaged from past bombardments. 

The opposition emergency organization, the White Helmets, has experience pulling people from buildings collapsed by airstrikes. But with calls for help coming from more than 700 places, Mounir al-Mostafa, deputy head of the White Helmets, said they are overwhelmed. They can realistically help in 30 places.   

Residents in Turkey’s western city of Izmir organized a clothing donation campaign to help the victims.          

Emre Demirpolat told VOA’s Turkish Service, “We brought blankets and heaters. We need to be united. … In such bad times, we must support each other. While we can’t stay outside for 10 minutes in this cold, people there shudder to think about the loss of their homes and when they will get to go to a warm place.”           

In other parts of Turkey, residents struggled to find transportation to travel to the earthquake-stricken area to see their relatives and loved ones.             

Serdar Özdemir, an Ankara resident, told VOA’s Turkish service he was finally able to get a bus ticket to go to the city of Malatya, after not being able to find a car rental.             

“I can’t rent a car. There’s no way to go. I have been looking for a car here for hours.”               

Turkey is in one of the world’s most active earthquake zones.    

In 1999, more than 17,000 people were killed when a 7.4 magnitude earthquake — the worst to hit Turkey in decades — struck near Duzce, in the northwest of the country.                      

Last October, a magnitude 7.0 quake hit the Aegean Sea, killing 116 people and injuring more than 1,000. All but two of the victims were in Izmir. 

VOA’s Turkish and Somali services contributed to this report.             

Some material for this article came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters. 
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The Justice Department is putting associates of Russian oligarchs on notice.    

In the latest case of its kind, U.S. prosecutors have charged an associate of Russian billionaire Viktor Vekselberg with sanctions violation and money laundering in connection with helping to maintain Vekselberg’s U.S. properties, according to a five-count indictment unsealed on Tuesday.    

Vladimir Voronchenko, a Russian citizen and U.S. permanent resident who fled to Russia last May, is accused of facilitating more than $4 million in payments for the maintenance of four properties owned by Vekselberg.  

The properties — an apartment on New York’s Park Avenue, an estate in the seaside community of Southampton, New York, an apartment and a penthouse apartment on Fisher Island, Florida — are worth about $75 million, according to the indictment. Voronchenko is accused of unsuccessfully trying to sell the New York and Southampton properties in violation of sanctions imposed on Vekselberg in 2018.    

This is the third indictment of a Vekselberg associate in recent weeks. Last month, the Justice Department charged two businessmen — one British and one Russian — in separate indictments in connection with the operation of a $90 million, 255-foot luxury yacht owned by Vekselberg. The yacht had been seized by Spanish authorities at the request of the United States.  

The Justice Department’s Task Force Kleptocapture, created in March 2022 following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, has been leading the fight against corrupt Russian oligarchs. The task force has recently focused on targeting the oligarchs’ enablers.    

“Shell companies, straw men, and professional money launderers did not shield Voronchenko or the illicit transactions charged today from the investigative persistence of [Homeland Security investigations], FBI, and the attorneys of the Southern District of New York,” Andrew Adams, director of the task force, said in a statement.    

“Today’s indictment is yet another reminder of the priority that the Department of Justice places on uncovering the proceeds of kleptocracy and sanctions evasion and on prosecuting those who would take a paycheck in exchange for facilitating money laundering and sanctions evasion.”   

Voronchenko, 70, who lived in three of Vekselberg’s U.S. properties, held himself out as a successful businessman, art collector and art dealer, and as a close friend and business associate of Vekselberg, according to the indictment.  

He is charged with two counts related to sanctions violation, and two counts related to money laundering and one count of contempt of court for fleeing the United States seven days after being served with a subpoena to produce documents and appear before a grand jury, according to the Justice Department.  

Vekselberg, whose fortune is estimated by Forbes magazine at more than $5 billion, was first sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury Department in 2018 for operating in Russia’s energy sector and again last March following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.  

He bought the four U.S. properties between 2008 and 2017, using a string of shell companies to mask his ownership from public view, according to court documents. 

A New York lawyer retained by Voronchenko helped purchase the properties on behalf of Vekselberg and later managed their finances using his “interest on lawyer’s trust account,” or IOLTA, to receive payments from shell companies.    

The American Bar Association describes IOLTA as “a method of raising money for charitable purposes, primarily the provision of civil legal services to indigent persons.”  

Vekselberg’s purchase of the U.S. properties was hidden behind multiple corporate veils.  

Take his 2017 purchase of the Fisher Island penthouse. 

The $31.2 million purchase was made by Voxi Management Corp., a Bahamian company owned by Medallion Inc., a Panamanian-registered company. 

According to the indictment, Medallion was owned by another Panamanian company, identified as Company 1, which, in turn, was owned by a Panamanian foundation, identified as Foundation 1. 

“The first and exclusive beneficiary of Foundation 1 was a British Virgin Islands company (“Company 2”), of which Vekselberg was the sole owner,” the document says. 

As of the date of the indictment, Vekselberg remained the ultimate “beneficial owner” of Voxi and Medallion, which in turn owned the U.S. properties.   

The indictment includes a notice of U.S. intent to forfeit Vekselberg’s U.S. properties.  
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