French schoolchildren clung nervously to their parents as they entered a vast vaccine center west of Paris on Wednesday — then walked excitedly away with a decorated “vaccination diploma,” as France kicked off mass COVID-19 inoculations for children age 5 to 11.

It’s not a moment too soon for the French government, which is facing the highest recorded infection rates since the pandemic began but trying to avoid a new lockdown.

The health minister said Wednesday that the swiftly-spreading omicron variant is expected to be dominant in France by next week, but ruled out additional restrictions on public life for now. Officials are hoping that a surge in vaccinations will be enough to limit the mounting pressure on hospitals, where COVID-19 patients occupy more than 60% of beds.

At a “vaccinodrome” in the Paris suburb of Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines, children lined up for first-day jabs Wednesday wearing masks adorned with puppies, flowers or Marvel superheros. 

One worked out his nerves by rolling his toy car on any surface he could find. Another played games on his mom’s phone. Eight-year-old Alvin Yin cried, while his 9-year-old sister Noemie tried to comfort him. 

Dimitri Marck, 8, admitted, “It’s a little weird. I heard about this on TV, and now I’m here.” But he said he’s glad to get vaccinated so he can see grandparents for the holidays.

France started vaccinating 5- to 11-year-olds with health risks earlier this month and expanded it to all children in that age group Wednesday as part of accelerated vaccination efforts. Children need the consent of at least one parent, and one parent has to be present when they get a shot.

As of early December, more than 1,000 in every 100,000 children in France aged 6-10 were infected with coronavirus, according to government figures. Currently, 145 children are hospitalized for severe illness due to COVID-19 and 27 children are receiving medical treatment in intensive care units, Health Minister Olivier Veran said Wednesday on BFM television.

France registered 72,832 new cases Tuesday and has 16,000 people hospitalized with COVID-19, among the highest numbers in Europe.

In a radio interview Wednesday, Labor Minister Elisabeth Borne asked companies to let employees work remotely wherever possible for at least three if not four days a week. French businesses largely returned to in-person work in 2020.

France has shut down nightclubs and banned New Year’s Eve fireworks and other mass end-of-year celebrations, including concerts.

“It’s an evening sacrificed for a good cause,” Veran said.

But his main message was to urge more vaccination. More than 89% of people 12 and over in France have had two doses, and about a third have had a booster shot.

Hugo, 8, was the last member of his family to get the shot and felt left out. His father, Benoit Chappaz, said they got him vaccinated “not because the government wants us to,” but for their family’s peace of mind and for general public health.

Nearby, American-born Evan, 7, squirmed in his chair. His great-uncle died with COVID-19, and his family knows several people who have been hospitalized with the virus.

Asked how he would face the injection, he said, “I’m going to scream. And then maybe if Mommy agrees, I can get an ice cream or something sweet, because I got a vaccine.”

As the doctor glided the needle into his arm, Evan didn’t scream. Instead, he wrapped himself around his mother and buried his head in her jacket.

Then as he left, he proudly held up his “diplome de vaccination.”
…

Russian and U.S. negotiators will hold talks in January to discuss Moscow’s demand that NATO halt its eastward expansion into the countries of the former Soviet Union, including Ukraine, Russia’s top diplomat, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, said Wednesday.

“We don’t want a war,” Lavrov said. “We don’t want to take the path of confrontation. But we will firmly ensure our security using the means we consider necessary,” he said in an interview with Russian RT television.

The foreign minister’s remarks came as Russian energy giant Gazprom continued to restrict natural gas supplies to Europe, prompting renewed accusations the Kremlin is using energy exports as a political weapon.

Lavrov also said Russia would hold separate discussions with NATO, but that talks should not be dragged out. “I hope that they will take us seriously given the moves we take to ensure our defense capability,” he added.

Amid soaring geopolitical tensions over Ukraine, Russia last week presented the United States with draft treaties outlining a set of “security guarantees” the Kremlin is demanding, including a halt to any further enlargement of NATO and a commitment by the alliance not to deploy additional troops to countries that did not already have NATO ground forces present before 1997. That includes Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic and the Baltic states, which are all NATO members.

U.S. and Western officials fear Russian President Vladimir Putin is contemplating a repeat of 2014, when Moscow annexed Crimea and Russia used armed proxies to seize a large part of the Donbass region in eastern Ukraine. The White House believes it only has a “four-week window” to stave off a potential Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Sergei Ryabkov, Russia’s deputy foreign minister, Monday dismissed claims Moscow is planning to attack Ukraine. But Russian officials have sounded increasingly belligerent. Putin on Tuesday used some of his most direct language so far about the escalating Ukraine standoff with the U.S. and NATO, telling top military officers in Moscow that if NATO does not stop what he says is aggressive behavior in Ukraine, Russia would respond in a “retaliatory military” manner.

“If the obviously aggressive line of our Western colleagues continues, we will take adequate, retaliatory military-technical measures [and] react toughly to unfriendly steps,” Putin said in comments broadcast by Russian media.

While the United States and its NATO allies have said they’re willing to enter talks with Russia, Western diplomats have warned the Russian proposals aren’t acceptable in their current form. In a conference call with reporters Tuesday, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Karen Donfried said talks would have better prospects if Russia deescalated its military buildup along its border with Ukraine.

“Any dialogue with Russia must address NATO’s and others’ concerns about Russia’s continued threatening behavior and be based on the core principles and foundational documents of European security. We will not compromise the key principles on which European security is built, including that all countries have the right to decide their own foreign and security policy course free from outside interference,” she said.

U.S. and NATO officials have been adamant that it is unreasonable for Moscow to seek a veto over the foreign policy direction chosen by Kyiv.   

Lavrov’s remarks Wednesday came after the Kremlin denied restricting natural gas exports to Europe and using energy supplies as a tool of coercive diplomacy.

Already high gas prices in Europe climbed once again midweek when flows through the Yamal-Europe pipeline to Germany stopped on Tuesday. The halt came after days of restricted supplies, which Gazprom, the state-owned energy giant, said had been necessary because of cold weather and high demand in Russia. The wholesale Dutch gas price, the benchmark for European prices, rose more than 20 percent midweek.

Gas supplies from Russia have fallen far short of pre-pandemic levels for months and this year have been almost a quarter below those in 2019. Western politicians have accused the Kremlin of using Russia’s vast gas reserves as a political weapon, aimed at cajoling the Europeans to accept Russian security demands.

In September, Gazprom also cut supplies by one-third to the former Soviet republic of Moldova, sparking a state of emergency in the country. Moldova aspires to join the European Union and has told Moscow it should not interfere in its efforts to do so.

The White House has said it will discuss Russia’s proposed “security guarantees” with European allies but has emphasized for days that Moscow would not be allowed to interfere in the foreign policy and security decisions of sovereign states. U.S. officials have also emphasized that there can be no separate bilateral deals made between Washington and Moscow over European security arrangements. NATO allies have to be fully involved, they say.

The unusual decision of the Russian Foreign Ministry to publish their draft treaties shortly after handing them to American officials has added to questions about the Kremlin’s sincerity in negotiating.

“The substance of the drafts and the way the Russians publicized them do not suggest a serious negotiating bid,” says Steven Pifer, a former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine and now senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, a Washington-based research group.

“The unacceptable provisions in the two draft agreements, their quick publication by the Russian government, and the peremptory terms used by Russian officials to describe Moscow’s demands raise concern that the Kremlin may want rejection. With large forces near Ukraine, Moscow could then cite that as another pretext for military action against its neighbor,” he said in a Brookings commentary.

Pifer added that if the draft agreements are part of “an opening bid,” and Moscow is seeking a serious exchange, some draft provisions, including a proposed ban on the deployment of intermediate-range nuclear missiles and consultative mechanisms, could offer a basis for negotiation.
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A media bill presented to Azerbaijan’s parliament has been criticized by some journalists who warn that it could restrict their ability to work independently.

The About the Media bill was introduced in parliament on December 10. It is scheduled for a third and final hearing in the coming weeks, after which President Ilham Aliyev is likely to sign it into law.

The proposed bill includes measures such as the establishment of a centralized media registry, licensing of online TV and accreditation of journalists. Other provisions focus on reporting on religious extremism or under martial or emergency law.

Critics say the proposal would give the government leverage over determining who works as a journalist, and that regulating online TV — a medium that has gained popularity because of restrictions on more traditional broadcasting — could undermine the free flow of information.

Concerns were also raised that clauses on martial law and religious extremism could further expand the government’s powers to interfere with content.

The bill stems from a decree that the president signed in January “on deepening media reforms.”

Natiq Javadli, a journalist who works for Berlin-based Meydan TV, believes the law would introduce new restrictions on journalists.

“We are not going to be able to independently call government officials and receive response, because we will be asked if we have been registered as journalists, or not,” Javadli said.

Media expert Alasgar Mammadli told VOA the bill does not appear to have taken into account public opinion or international input.

“This bill envisages the regulation of all journalists in a singular manner, particularly when it comes to their accreditation and the licensing of internet TV. These seriously contravene international legal norms,” Mammadli said.

Media watchdogs and analysts in Azerbaijan say the proposed bill has not been approved by the Venice Commission — the Council of Europe’s independent advisory body that looks at constitutional matters — or the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe’s media body, both of which Baku is supposed to collaborate with.

Analysts also say the draft bill may contravene protections for freedom of expression in the Azerbaijan Constitution.

Parliamentarian Fazil Mustafa rejected the idea that the draft bill would amount to censorship. He said that many provisions, including for the centralized registry and journalist licensing, are not obligatory.

“[The] media registry is voluntary. Those who register are considered journalists, as are those who do not. Simply, those who register may find it beneficial,” Mustafa told VOA, adding that it could help in “utilizing certain privileges.”

Mustafa said the licensing of online television was necessary “because journalists, any media outlets, cannot function outside the legal framework.”

Baku’s Media Development Agency, which played a significant role in the preparation of the bill, has said that it corresponds with international norms.

Mushfig Alasgarli, head of the Journalists Trade Union of Azerbaijan, was also more optimistic. He said he believes the bill will clarify some of the issues around regulation of online media and said that it recognizes “the rights of freelance journalists.”

“They exist de-facto and they work. Until now, their status has not been recognized in the legal sphere,” he said.

Establishing a media registry could remedy the haphazard ways in which media outlets have been registered by the Justice Ministry until now, Alasgarli added.

Investigative journalist Khadija Ismayilova disagreed, saying it will be nearly impossible for freelancers to work if they are not considered journalists under the law.

“There is a provision that requires a special registry for journalism and if you are not in registry, then you are not a journalist,” Ismayilova said.

In her view, the law will, in effect, place journalism under direct state control.

She also raised concerns about the draft bill’s language regarding reporting on law enforcement operations against extremism or terrorism.

The award-winning journalist has previously been imprisoned in what rights groups say was retaliation for her coverage of corruption. Ismayilova, who worked for the Azeri service of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), was arrested in 2014 and spent over 530 days in prison on charges of libel, tax evasion and illegal business activities.

RFE/RL is part of the U.S. Agency for Global Media, which also oversees VOA.

Ismayilova said that rather than helping independent journalists, the new law seeks to convert reporters into government spokespersons, because authorities will be able to define who is or is not a journalist.

Azerbaijan has a poor media freedom record, ranking 167 out of 180 countries where 1 is freest, according to Reporters Without Borders. The watchdog said that journalists “are jailed on absurd grounds if they do not first yield to harassment, blackmail or bribes,” and that access to several news websites is blocked.

As of December 1, two journalists were in prison on what the press freedom organization the Committee to Protect Journalists says are charges in retaliation for their work. 

This story originated in VOA’s Azeri Service. Asgar Asgarov contributed to this report.
…

Dutch prosecutors have demanded life sentences for four suspects on trial for the 2014 downing of a Malaysia Airlines flight over eastern Ukraine that killed 298 people. 

The prosecution closed three days of final arguments Wednesday by saying Russians Igor Girkin, Sergey Dubinskiy and Igor Pulatov, along with Ukrainian Leonid Kharchenko, collaborated to get a Buk missile system from Russia to support separatists in Ukraine. 

An international investigation in 2018 concluded a missile launcher used to shoot down Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 came from Russia’s 53rd Anti-Aircraft Missile Brigade.

Prosecutors said the missile was brought to its launch site “by orders of and under guidance of the suspects.” 

Most of those on board the plane were Dutch nationals, and the Netherlands holds Russia responsible for the downing of the aircraft.Russia has denied any involvement. 

All of the suspects are being tried in absentia. Only Pulatov has legal representation at the proceedings, and his lawyers are expected to give their closing arguments in March. 

A verdict in the trial is not expected until late next year. 
…

Greece’s coast guard says one migrant has died and dozens are feared missing after a boat sank off the coast of the island of Folegandros. 

The body of the unidentified man was recovered during an ongoing search and rescue operation launched early Wednesday after the boat sank some 180 kilometers (112 miles) southeast of Athens. The coast guard said 12 people, all believed to be from Iraq, had been rescued and transported to the nearby island of Santorini. 

Most survivors said there were originally 32 people on the boat, but one told authorities there were about 50. 

The coast guard said four coast guard vessels, two helicopters from the navy and air force, a military transport plane, five passing ships and three private vessels were participating in the search and rescue operation. 

“The survivors made it onto a dinghy that was tethered to the boat. Only two of them were wearing life jackets,” Coast Guard spokesman Nikos Kokkalas told state-run ERT television. 

“We always presume the worst-case scenario, in this case that 50 people were on the boat.” 

The coast guard said the operation began Tuesday night after it received information that a vessel carrying migrants had suffered engine failure and later began taking on water south of Folegandros. 

Greece is one of the most popular routes into the European Union for people fleeing conflict and poverty in Asia, the Middle East and Africa. Most attempt to cross in dinghies from the Turkish shore to the nearby eastern Aegean Greek islands. 

But with increased patrols and allegations of summary deportations back to Turkey for those who arrive, many have been attempting lengthier routes on larger vessels. Folegandros, one of the southern islands in the Cyclades, is not along a usual route for migrant smugglers. 

Other vessels have bypassed the Greek islands and headed directly from the Turkish coast to Italy. 
…

Germany’s justice minister says he will present legislation next month to remove from the country’s criminal code a ban on doctors “advertising” abortions, one of several more liberal social policies that the new government plans. 

The three parties that form Chancellor Olaf Scholz ’s government have long opposed the current rules, but they were defended by the center-right Union bloc of ex-Chancellor Angela Merkel, which is now in opposition. 

Justice Minister Marco Buschmann said in comments to the Funke newspaper group published Wednesday that there is a “huge reform backlog” on social policy. He said the first step will be to scrap a paragraph in Germany’s criminal code that bans “advertising” abortions, and which carries a fine or a prison sentence of up to two years. 

Under a compromise in 2019, Merkel’s government left the ban formally in place but allowed doctors and hospitals for the first time to say on their websites that they perform abortions. They were not, however, allowed to give more detailed information. 

Buschmann said the so-called paragraph 219a constitutes a “penal risk” for doctors performing legal abortions who give factual information on the internet, and that is “absurd.” 

“Many women who wrestle with themselves on the question of an abortion look for advice on the internet,” he said. “It cannot be that, of all people, the doctors who are professionally best qualified to inform them aren’t allowed to provide information there.” 

Other changes to social policy planned by the new governing coalition of Scholz’s center-left Social Democrats, the Greens and Buschmann’s Free Democrats include scrapping a 40-year-old law that requires transsexual people to get a psychological assessment and a court decision before officially changing gender, a process that often involves intimate questions. 

The coalition has pledged to replace that with a new “self-determination law.” 
…

Poland and Lithuania have backed Ukraine in urging Western powers to immediately impose sanctions on Russia over its military buildup along the Ukrainian border.

As fears mount of a Russian invasion, Poland’s President Andrzej Duda, Lithuania’s President Gitanas Nauseda and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy on Monday “called upon the international community to step up sanctions on the Russian Federation over its ongoing aggression against Ukraine.”

In a statement issued after the leaders met in Ukraine’s Carpathian Mountains, they “once again urged the Kremlin to de-escalate the situation by withdrawing its troops from the Ukrainian borders.”

Despite U.S. President Joe Biden warning Russian President Vladimir Putin earlier this month that Russia would pay a “terrible price” in the event it invades Ukraine, the forward-deployment of hundreds of tanks, howitzers, self-propelled artillery and tens of thousands of troops has not been reversed, say Western security sources.

U.S. and Western officials fear Putin is contemplating a replay of 2014, when Moscow annexed Crimea and used armed proxies to seize a large part of the Donbas region in eastern Ukraine. The White House believes it has only a “four-week window” to stave off a potential Russian invasion of Ukraine. Sergei Ryabkov, Russia’s deputy foreign minister, dismissed reports Monday of the West having a “four-week window” to stop an invasion. “There was nothing to defend [Ukraine] from,” he said.

But Russian officials have said relations with NATO were reaching a “moment of truth” and have called on the West to respond to their demands that the Western alliance bar former Soviet states such as Ukraine from joining the bloc.

Zelenskiy’s repeated calls for “powerful preventative actions, powerful serious sanctions to exclude any thought about escalation” so far have been ignored by the U.S. and NATO’s Western European members. But they have continued their drumbeat of warnings of severe economic penalties if Russia invades Ukraine.

Speaking Tuesday to reporters on a conference call, Assistant Secretary of State Karen Donfried, who for the past week has been holding talks in Moscow, Kyiv and Brussels, said: “The United States has been working very closely with our European counterparts on specific packages of severe consequences for Russia. Should it move forward with military escalation in Ukraine, together with our allies, we have been clear that we would respond with strong economic measures that we have not considered in the past and that would inflict significant costs on the Russian economy and financial system.”

Asked if Western powers are ready to act if there is further Russian aggression against Ukraine today, tomorrow or next week, Donfried said: “There’s clarity about what we will do.”

But current and former diplomats say while there’s broad agreement among Western powers about sanctioning Russia in the event of an incursion, there’s as yet no final accord on the details. Some European governments have less appetite than others, they say. “There is still discussion,” said a British diplomat, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. “It is not all signed and sealed.”

Russia is the European Union’s fifth largest trading partner, and European assets in Russia are valued at about $350 billion.  

Much speculation on what Western powers might do has focused on whether they would cut Russia off from the SWIFT global money-transfer system, which is used by more than 11,000 banks and financial institutions to make and receive cross-border payments. Some commentators have suggested this would be a nuclear option, but others disagree, saying Russia would adapt and could use email, telex and phone calls to arrange money transfers.

“One of the things that I imagine is being considered is more restrictions on the Russian financial infrastructure, which might include SWIFT,” said Tom Keatinge, director of the Center for Financial Crime and Security Studies at the Royal United Services Institute, Britain’s leading defense think tank.

“I’m not convinced it is necessarily the nuclear option,” he told VOA. “You can perfectly well do cross-border payments without using the system. I’m not saying that there wouldn’t be an impact. There would be, because it would throw a ton of grit into Russia’s ability to trade internationally. But I’m not convinced it is the sort of threat that’s going to make Vladimir Putin quake in his boots.”

When disconnecting Russia from SWIFT was first broached in 2014, the impact would have been greater, Keatinge explained. But since then, Russia has clearly given much thought to what workarounds it would use. And, like China, it has been developing its own financial transfer system, known as SPFS, which 400 institutions—mostly banks—are already using.

“The Russian Central Bank has for a long time been developing a playbook,” Keatinge added. Some other analysts fear unplugging Russia from SWIFT would encourage Russia and China to develop a more ubiquitous global payment system of their own.

Keatinge and others suspect potential sanctions would focus on blacklisting more Russian banks and financial institutions and making it harder for Russia to raise capital overseas. But Western countries have different pain thresholds and “the Europeans have significantly more [economically] at stake,” says Adam Smith, a former senior sanctions adviser at the U.S. Treasury Department who later served on the National Security Council during the Obama administration.

He cites the risk the Kremlin would retaliate by cutting off natural gas exports to Europe, which sources 35% of its gas supplies from Russia.

“Going after Russia, like going after China, is not the same as going after Iran,” he told VOA. “Collateral consequences would be meaningful. The question is: What degree of self-harm is the West willing to tolerate in order to give Putin a bloody nose?”
…

The United States believes bilateral talks with Russia over its massive troop buildup along the Ukrainian border could start in January, the State Department’s top diplomat for Europe said Tuesday, even as Russian President Vladimir Putin blamed the U.S. and its allies for tensions in the region.

Karen Donfried, assistant secretary of State for European and Eurasian affairs, told reporters that the U.S. and Russia would agree on a specific date to begin talks on Moscow’s demands that NATO give up any military activity in Eastern Europe and Ukraine.

But she warned, “We have made clear that any dialogue must be based on reciprocity, address our concerns about Russia’s actions, and take place in full coordination with our European allies and partners.”

“Let me be clear, there will be no talks on European security without Europe,” Donfried said.

Russia has deployed 100,000 troops along its border with eastern Ukraine, according to Western estimates, after unilaterally annexing Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula in 2014. The U.S. has expressed concern that Russia could invade Ukraine early next year but does not believe Putin has decided whether to launch an attack.

U.S. President Joe Biden warned Putin two weeks ago during a virtual summit that the U.S. and its allies would impose devastating economic sanctions against Russia if it invades Ukraine.

Biden has ruled out a ground deployment of U.S. troops in the event of a Russian attack on Ukraine, but Washington has been sending small arms and ammunition to the Kyiv government, along with Javelin missiles the U.S. says Ukraine should use only for defensive purposes.

Putin, speaking to a meeting of Russia’s top military leaders, blamed the West for “tensions that are building up in Europe.”

As part of the upcoming bilateral talks with the U.S., Putin is demanding that NATO, the post-World War II Western military alliance, deny possible membership to Ukraine and other former Soviet satellite countries, while curbing its military deployments in Central and Eastern Europe.

Putin said the Kremlin wants “long-term, legally binding guarantees” from the West, as opposed to “verbal assurances, words and promises” that it says it can’t trust.

The Russian leader contended that if the U.S. and NATO place missile systems in Ukraine, it will take only minutes for them to reach Moscow.

“For us, it is the most serious challenge—a challenge to our security,” he said,

“What is happening now, tensions that are building up in Europe, is [the U.S. and NATO’s] fault every step of the way,” the Russian leader said, ignoring Moscow’s takeover of Crimea.

“Russia has been forced to respond at every step,” Putin contended. “The situation kept worsening and worsening, deteriorating and deteriorating. And here we are today, in a situation when we’re forced to resolve it somehow.”

Putin said Moscow hopes for “constructive, meaningful talks with a visible end result—and within a certain time frame—that would ensure equal security for all.”

“Armed conflicts, bloodshed is not our choice, and we don’t want such developments,” Putin said. “We want to resolve issues by political and diplomatic means.”

Some material in this report came from Reuters and the Associated Press.
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A Belarusian blogger has been sentenced to three years in prison on charge of “insulting” Alexander Lukashenko by writing in a post that the country’s authoritarian ruler was “illegitimate” amid a wave of protests against the results of a presidential election last year that opposition figures say was rigged.

A court in the western town of Shchuchyn pronounced its ruling against Vadzim Ermashuk, also known in his posts on social media as Vadimati, on December 21.

The 36-year-old blogger, who was also charged with desecrating the flag for a post in which he called it a “rag,” rejected the charges and refused to testify in the courtroom or answer questions from the judge.

Ermashuk was initially detained in August of this year and sentenced to several days in jail on hooliganism charges for protesting. He was not released after serving his sentence as prosecutors brought new charges against him for his posts.

Ermashuk is one of dozens in Belarus who have faced trials in recent months as authorities brutally suppress dissent in any form since the disputed presidential election in August 2020.

Rights activists and opposition politicians say the poll was rigged to extend Lukashenko’s 26-year rule. Thousands have been detained during countrywide protests and there have been credible reports of torture and ill-treatment by security forces. Several people have died during the crackdown.

Many of Belarus’s opposition leaders have been arrested or forced to leave the country, while Lukashenko has refused to negotiate with the opposition.

The United States, the European Union, and several other countries have refused to acknowledge Lukashenko as the winner of the vote and imposed several rounds of sanctions on him and his regime, citing election fraud and the police crackdown.
…

In Turkey, Uyghur refugees who fled Chinese detention centers and other alleged rights abuses say they fear the Turkish government is under increased pressure to prosecute or deport activists. But as VOA’s Heather Murdock finds at one school in Istanbul, some Uyghur children say their parents sent them here to find safety, when there was no one to care for them at home.

Camera: Umut Colak
…

Russia expelled two German diplomats on Monday in response to Germany’s expulsion of two Russian diplomats last week. 

The dispute between the two nations started when a German court said last week that Russia had ordered the assassination of a former Chechen militant Zelimkhan “Tornike” Khangoshvili in Berlin in 2019. 

A German court convicted Russian Vadim Krasikov of murder and sentenced him to life in prison, calling the slaying a “grave breach of German law and the sovereignty of the Federal Republic of Germany.”

After the conviction, Russia called the notion of Russian involvement “absurd.” 

The Russian Foreign Ministry summoned the German ambassador to announce the expulsions. 

Russian officials said the move was reciprocal, the German Foreign Ministry said. 

“This move comes as no surprise, but it is completely unwarranted from the federal government’s perspective,” it said in a statement. “Today’s decision by Russia’s foreign ministry puts renewed strain on the relationship.” 

“It was noted that the Russian side categorically rejects unfounded and detached-from-reality accusations that Russian public structures are accessory to this crime,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement. 

Some information in this report comes from Reuters and The Associated Press. 

 
…

A Russian businessman has been extradited from Switzerland to the United States to face charges of insider trading, the Swiss justice ministry said. 

Vladislav Klyushin, who reportedly owns a media and cybersecurity business called M13 that is linked to the Kremlin, is accused of “involvement in a global scheme to trade on non-public information stolen from U.S. computer networks … between at least in or about January 2018 and September 2020,” according to a press release from the U.S. Justice Department. 

According to the company’s website, its products were used by “the Administration of the President of the Russian Federation, the Government of the Russian Federation, federal ministries and departments, regional state executive bodies, commercial companies and public organizations.” 

One of the stocks Klyushin traded using insider information was Tesla, the Justice Department said. 

Russia said the move was another example of Washington going after Russians on the world stage. 

“We are forced to state that we are dealing with another episode in Washington’s ongoing hunt for Russian citizens in third countries,” said Vladimir Khokhlov, a spokesman for the Russian embassy in Switzerland, TASS reported. 

Four other Russians are charged in the alleged scheme. 

“The integrity of our nation’s capital markets and of its computer networks are priorities for my office,” acting U.S. Attorney Nathaniel Mendell said. “Today’s charges show that we, the FBI, and our other law enforcement partners will relentlessly pursue those who hack, steal and attempt to profit from inside information, wherever they may hide.” 

Some information in this report came from Reuters. 
…

The White House said Monday the United States is ready to start diplomatic talks with Russia through multiple channels, but it made clear that Moscow must address Western concerns about its military buildup along the Ukrainian border.

White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan spoke with his counterpart, Yuri Ushakov, foreign policy adviser to Russian President Vladimir Putin, with the White House saying the U.S. was willing to talk directly with the Kremlin, as well as through the NATO-Russia Council and the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe.

The White House said Sullivan told Ushakov that “any dialogue must be based on reciprocity and address our concerns about Russia’s actions.”

In a virtual summit two weeks ago, U.S. President Joe Biden warned Putin that the U.S. would impose tough economic sanctions against Russia if it invaded Ukraine. Moscow has amassed tens of thousands of troops along Ukraine’s eastern border, although Washington has indicated that it does not believe Putin has decided to launch an attack on Ukraine.

There was no immediate comment from Moscow about the Sullivan-Ushakov call.

Last week, Moscow listed security proposals it wanted to negotiate, including a pledge that NATO would give up any military activity in Eastern Europe and Ukraine. Biden has ruled out deploying U.S. ground troops if Russia invades Ukraine, but the U.S. has been shipping arms to Kyiv.

The Pentagon said that the security package includes small arms and ammunition and Javelin missiles, which the U.S. says can be used anywhere in Ukraine but only for self-defense purposes.
…

Russia has not let up with a military build-up along the border with Ukraine since U.S. President Joe Biden and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin held a two-hour video conference earlier this month, say Western security sources.

Despite Biden warning in his talks with Putin that Russia would pay a “terrible price” in the event it invades Ukraine, the forward-deployment of hundreds of Russian tanks, howitzers, self-propelled artillery and tens of thousands of troops has not been reversed.

Two days after the presidents talked, motorized infantry units from St. Petersburg were relocated to a camp east of Kursk, 100 kilometers from the Ukraine border, according to Janes, a global open-source intelligence company based in Britain. Twenty-four hours after Biden and Putin spoke, a social-media user posted video showing Buk missile systems and armored vehicles arriving at a train station in the Russian city of Voronezh.

Russian military build-up

Some units positioned within striking distance of Ukraine over the past few weeks and months have come as far away as Siberia and the border with Mongolia, including elements of the 41st Combined Arms Army, say independent military monitors. Units from 1st Guards Tank Army, normally based in the Moscow region, have also been moved in recent weeks.

But U.S. intelligence officials, along with European security officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, say they do not believe an invasion is imminent. They say some key logistics they would expect to see are not in place yet, including more fuel and ammunition stockpiles. They calculate Russia has anything from 70,000 to 100,000 troops already deployed, but expect a combined force of around 175,000 to be amassed ahead of any incursion, if Putin decides to launch an attack on Ukraine.

European leaders have been maintaining a drumbeat of warnings to Russia. The European Union has also told the Kremlin there will be severe consequences in the event of a further military incursion into Ukraine in a rehash of 2014, when Moscow annexed Crimea and Russia used proxy pro-Moscow separatists to seize a large part of the Donbass region in eastern Ukraine.

Re-positioned Russian units over the past few months have been amassed around Yelnya, Voronezh and Persianovka, all within 100 to 300 kilometers of Ukraine. And elements from the 49th and 58th Armies, which moved from their bases in the Caucasus region to the Crimea earlier this year, have not been returned to their home bases, say Western military officials.

European warnings

On Sunday, Germany’s new defense minister, Christine Lambrecht, dubbed Russia “the aggressor,” adding, “we must exhaust all possibilities to stop an escalation. That also means threats of hard sanctions.

And Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy repeated his call for Western powers to impose “preventive sanctions” on Russia to deter it from aggression.

“There should be powerful, serious preventive sanctions in order to exclude a scenario of [Russian] escalation in any region, because this not only concerns Ukraine,” he said.

But splits persist among Western powers over assessments of Putin’s intentions.

Last week, Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi downplayed the risk of Russian military action, citing the video call between Putin and Biden as demonstrating the Kremlin wants to explore diplomacy and isn’t preparing “for action.”

“The fact that there was this call, the fact that Putin sought out Biden by phone shows that he wants to be part of the decision-making process,” Draghi told Italian lawmakers.

Russian security proposal

Italian officials fear the talk about an impending war risks taking on a life of its own, impacting and shaping the behavior of Russia and the United States. They also point to the draft security treaties Russia presented to the U.S. last week as indicating a willingness for further talks.  

The draft treaties outline an expansive set of “security guarantees” the Kremlin is seeking, including a ban on any further expansion eastwards of NATO and a commitment by the alliance to refrain from deploying additional troops to countries that did not already have NATO forces present before 1997, including Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic, the Baltic states and several other former Soviet republics.

While the United States and its NATO allies have said they are willing to enter talks with Russia, if the Kremlin draws down troop levels along its border with Ukraine, Western diplomats say there are no prospects that the Russian proposals are acceptable in their present form.  

“We are clear that any dialogue with Russia would have to proceed on the basis of reciprocity, address NATO’s concerns about Russia’s actions, be based on the core principles and foundational documents of European security, and take place in consultation with NATO’s European Partners,” NATO said in a statement Friday.

Some observers are skeptical that Putin has any intentions of backing off his maximalist demands and suspect he will continue with what they see as “coercive diplomacy,” using the threat of war to keep the West and Ukraine on tenterhooks.

“Putin is not threatened by NATO expansion,” tweeted Michael McFaul, a former U.S. ambassador to Moscow.

“Mighty Russia is not threatened by NATO expansion. NATO has never and will never attack Russia. Putin has reinvented this so-called threat to justify his latest coercive diplomacy… and maybe escalated military intervention in Ukraine,” he added.

But Fyodor Lukyanov, a Russian foreign policy expert, says the Kremlin has reached “the point where the long-standing controversy over NATO enlargement must somehow be resolved” and is willing to raise the geo-political stakes with the West until there’s a resolution to its long-standing objection to the Western alliance creeping closer to Russia’s borders.

Putin is determined at the very least to engineer “a radical revision” requiring an acceptance of his red lines, which include the ‘Finlandization’ of Ukraine, a reference to the neutrality Moscow imposed on neighboring Finland after World War II.

Writing in the magazine Russia in Global Affairs, Lukyanov said: “The European idea after the end of the Cold War that any country should just be allowed to do whatever it wants, regardless of its location, is historically new.” And the Kremlin fears Ukraine “moving inexorably toward the West,” he says.
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Azerbaijan said Sunday it had freed 10 more Armenian soldiers captured last month during fighting between the Caucasus arch foes.

“Azerbaijan, with mediation of the European Union, handed over 10 soldiers of Armenian origin” who had been captured on November 16, the Azeri committee in charge of prisoners of war said in a statement. 

Baku said that the move was a result of a meeting between Azeri President Ilham Aliyev, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and European Council chief Charles Michel in Brussels on September 14. 

“Warmly welcome Baku’s release of 10 Armenian detainees in follow up to discussions with @azpresident and @NikolPashinyan,” Michel wrote in a tweet on Sunday. “An important humanitarian gesture demonstrating the mutual will to strengthen confidence as discussed in Brussels. EU facilitated transfer to Yerevan.”

Azerbaijan had already handed over 10 prisoners to Yerevan on December 4, following Russia-mediated talks, in the first concrete sign of a decrease in tensions since last month’s fighting, which killed 13 people.

Those were the worst clashes along the shared border since a six-week war last year over Nagorno-Karabakh that claimed more than 6,500 lives.

At the end of that war, Armenia was forced to sign a Russian-brokered accord with Azerbaijan that saw it cede three districts around Karabakh that it had captured in the 1990s.

Ethnic Armenian separatists in Nagorno-Karabakh broke away from Azerbaijan as the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, and around 30,000 people died in the ensuing conflict.
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Authorities in Russia evacuated 128 coal miners Sunday from a mine in Siberia amid reports of a fire in one of its sections. The news comes weeks after a devastating blast in another Siberian coal mine killed 51 people.

Emergency officials told Russia’s Interfax news agency that a fire occurred in an abandoned mine gallery in the Anatoly Ruban coal mine in the Kemerovo region in southwestern Siberia and about 140 miners were being evacuated. A total of 128 miners have been evacuated from the mine, Interfax reported, citing mine operators as saying that 140 miners were supposed to be on shift Sunday, but only 128 miners were working at the time.

None of them needed medical assistance, the report said. 

According to the Siberian Coal Energy Company, which runs the mine, the evacuation was prompted by the “heating of a coal bed” rather than a fire, Russia’s state news agency RIA Novosti reported. 

The conflicting reports could not be immediately reconciled. 

The evacuations come just several weeks after an explosion in another mine in Kemerovo — the Listvyazhnaya mine —killed 46 miners and five rescuers and became the deadliest coal mine disaster in Russia since 2010. 

A probe has revealed multiple violations of safety norms at the Listvyazhnaya mine, including tinkering with methane level indicators in an apparent attempt to maintain production despite the dangers of an explosion. Several managers at the mine and local officials have been arrested and jailed. 

In the wake of the tragedy at Listvyazhnaya, Russian President Vladimir Putin has warned officials to strictly observe industrial safety regulations. 

Russia has seen several major mine disasters since Soviet times. In 2007, a methane explosion at the Ulyanovskaya mine in the Kemerovo region killed 110 miners. Three years later, two methane blasts and a fire killed 91 people at the Raspadskaya mine in the same Kemerovo region.

In 2016, 36 miners were killed in a series of methane explosions in a coal mine in Russia’s far north.
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The political crisis engulfing British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has deepened with the resignation of a close ally, Brexit minister David Frost, who cited pandemic restrictions and the government’s “direction of travel.”

Frost has been handling Britain’s post-Brexit negotiations with the European Union. Frost voiced his dissatisfaction with the government’s policies in a speech last month, saying he was worried Britain wasn’t taking advantage of its exit from the EU to chart a new course of limited government, lower taxes and reduced regulation.

In his resignation letter Saturday, Frost returned to the same theme, saying, “You know my concerns about the current direction of travel. I hope we will move as fast as possible to where we need to get to: a lightly regulated, low-tax, entrepreneurial economy, at the cutting edge of modern science and economic change.”

He added his frustrations with renewed pandemic curbs, saying, “We also need to learn to live with Covid and I know that is your instinct too. You took a brave decision in July, against considerable opposition, to open up the country again. Sadly, it did not prove to be irreversible, as I wished, and believe you did too. I hope we can get back on track soon and not be tempted by the kind of coercive measures we have seen elsewhere.”

Frost’s departure bookends seven days of enormous setbacks for Johnson. Last week, Johnson faced one of the most significant parliamentary rebellions in modern British history. More than 100 of his Conservative lawmakers voted against the reimposition of tough pandemic restrictions and the introduction of new ones, including vaccine passports to enter nightclubs and venues hosting large events.

The embattled prime minister was further rocked by a humiliating parliamentary by-election defeat in a seat in the English Midlands that the Conservatives had held continuously since 1832.

The resignation of Frost, a former diplomat who was ennobled last year by Johnson so he could join the Cabinet, will likely embolden the sizable libertarian wing of the party already furious over the British leader’s handling of the pandemic.

Conservative rebels are determined to dissuade Johnson from tightening pandemic restrictions even more. On Sunday it emerged Johnson was coming under mounting pressure from the government’s scientific and medical advisers to follow the Netherlands and order a national lockdown ahead of the Christmas holiday.

Advisers have called for an “immediate” curtailment of indoor mixing of households to combat the quickening pace of the omicron variant of the coronavirus. Officials say Johnson has no choice but to consider a range of further measures, ranging from new social distancing rules to a full lockdown, which, if ordered, would be third since the pandemic struck.

Earlier this month, Frost had informed Johnson he was leaving but was persuaded to delay his announcement until January. But Frost’s plan was leaked, forcing him to quit with immediate effect. 

Frost’s departure adds to the disarray in Conservative ranks. Rebellious Conservative lawmakers voiced their worries Sunday about Frost’s resignation. Theresa Villiers, a former Northern Ireland secretary, said it was “very worrying.” Lawmaker Geoffrey Clifton-Brown said it was a “further hammer blow to the PM.”

Conservative insiders say a bid to oust Johnson as party leader, and consequently as prime minister, will unlikely be mounted in the immediate weeks, but some believe he has been “fatally wounded” and Frost’s resignation adds to that perception. It will also complicate in the near term the politics in the Cabinet about what the government should do about rapidly rising coronavirus infections.

The Cabinet is split with some key ministers opposing the reimposition of any more pandemic rules. The opponents include two key ministers, the chancellor, Rishi Sunak, and the foreign secretary, Liz Truss. Both are reported to harbor leadership ambitions.

Even Johnson’s supporters acknowledge he’s now battling the biggest crisis of his tumultuous premiership. But they say Johnson has time to correct his position as the party factions baying for his head are divided about whom they should back to replace him. Johnson loyalists also say that if omicron turns out to be milder than previous variants, he may still weather the storm of the last few weeks.

But many of Johnson’s problems are due to unforced errors that are enraging voters, say his critics. And they see no end in sight while he remains in office to the toxic mix of scandal, government chaos and abrupt policy reversals that are upsetting the electorate.

Vengeful allies of his predecessor in Downing Street, Theresa May, whom he helped to oust, are circling and are keen to topple him. They — as well as the libertarian wing of the party — have seized on last week’s by-election defeat in North Shropshire, which saw a 34 percent swing away from the Conservatives, one of the biggest since the Second World War.

Many voters in North Shropshire said in the days leading up to the ballot that they had been infuriated by recent revelations about lockdown-busting parties in Downing Street last December, at a time the rest of the country was banned from participating in social gatherings and thousands of Britons were prohibited from visiting elderly relatives or family members dying in hospital wards from the COVID-19 disease.

Johnson’s showmanship, once widely seen as an attribute, has also been misfiring as the public mood sours. Last month, a rambling speech at a conference of the country’s top business leaders led to widespread criticism. Johnson lost his notes, had to apologize for losing his way and extensively praised an amusement park, known as Peppa Pig World. He also compared himself to Moses and imitated the noise of an accelerating sports car.
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Spain’s Catholic Church is to open an investigation into alleged sex abuse of hundreds of children by members of the clergy dating back 80 years that the newspaper El Pais has uncovered, the daily said on Sunday.

The investigation will look into allegations of abuse against 251 priests and some lay people from religious institutions that the paper has uncovered, El Pais said.

The paper has not published in full its findings from a three-year investigation it conducted into the issue, but said its correspondent gave a 385-page dossier to Pope Francis on Dec. 2 while the papal entourage and journalists were flying from Rome to Cyprus.

The number of victims is at least 1,237 but could rise into the thousands, the paper said. The allegations concern 31 religious orders and 31 of the country’s some 70 dioceses. The oldest case dates back to 1942 and the most recent to 2018.

The investigation will be carried out by the Spanish bishops conference, which is headed by Cardinal Juan Jose Omella, the archbishop of Barcelona, according to El Pais.

Officials from the bishops conference were not available for comment on Sunday.

A Vatican spokesman was not immediately available, but the Vatican does not usually comment on the work of national bishops conferences.

In November, Pope Francis thanked journalists for helping to uncover clerical sexual abuse scandals that the Catholic Church originally tried to cover up.
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“The Netherlands is shutting down again,” Prime Minister Mark Rutte said Saturday in a televised address. The new measures, beginning Sunday, Rutte said, are because of a “fifth wave” of COVID-19, due to the highly contagious omicron variant.

Under the new rules, all non-essential shops will be closed to at least mid-January. Only two guests will be permitted to visit a household at one time. Four guests, however, will be allowed during the upcoming holidays from Dec. 24-26 and New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day.

Schools will be immediately closed until at least Jan. 9.

While the Netherland boasts an 85% inoculation rate of its population, only 9% have received booster shots.

Jaap van Dissel, the chief of the Dutch outbreak management team, said the shutdown will give people time to get their booster jabs and gives hospitals time to prepare for the possible surge in COVID cases.

Other European countries are also moving to reimpose restrictions to contain the variant’s spread.

The new variant has fueled infections in Britain close to the peak levels of early 2021, while other European countries and the United States are also experiencing surges.

Scientists are warning the British government needs to go further to prevent hospitals from being overwhelmed amid the surge. The warning comes after the government reimposed an indoor mask requirement and ordered people to show proof of vaccination or a recent negative coronavirus test when entering night clubs or large venues.

Britain’s Health Security Agency said Friday that 65 patients were hospitalized in England with omicron.

In France, the government said it would start inoculating children ages 5-11 beginning Wednesday. As he declared Friday the omicron variant was spreading like “lightning,” Prime Minister Jean Castex proposed requiring proof of vaccination for those entering public establishments.

The measure, which requires parliamentary approval, has triggered plans for protests Saturday in Paris, where the New Year’s Eve fireworks display has been canceled.

Anti-lockdown protests also are planned for Saturday in Turin, Italy.

Egypt has detected its first three cases of the new variant, according to the country’s health ministry. The ministry said Friday the three infected people were among 26 travelers who tested positive for coronavirus at Cairo International Airport.

The ministry did not say where the three came from, but the Masrawy news outlet reported they were among travelers from South Africa, which announced the discovery of the variant on Nov. 25.

In China, Beijing will maintain its relatively strict containment measures, while the rest of the country will remain flexible. “There is no one-fit-for-all policy” for local governments, a Chinese government said Saturday at a news conference.

China has identified two cases of the omicron variant and has mostly contained the spread of COVID-19 since it was first discovered in the central Chinese city of Wuhan in late 2019.

A recent study has found the risk of reinfection with omicron is more than five times higher compared to the delta variant, and it has shown no sign of causing milder symptoms.

“We find no evidence of omicron having different severity from delta,” said the study by Imperial College London. The study noted, however, that data on hospitalizations is still limited.

The study, conducted in England between Nov. 29 and Dec. 11, was based on 333,000 cases of infections involving different variants of the coronavirus.

More than 5.3 million people have died of COVID-19 globally since the coronavirus emerged two years ago, according to the Johns Hopkins University Coronavirus Resource Center.

Administering vaccines

The center reported more than 8.6 billion doses of vaccines had been administered worldwide as of midday Saturday, a massive logistical campaign complicated by omicron’s surge.

Several countries are racing to accelerate vaccination campaigns as mounting evidence supports the need for booster doses to combat the omicron variant.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Saturday that his country would send 15 million doses of vaccines to Africa, where infections are surging and vaccination rates are low. Erdogan made the announcement at a summit of African leaders in Istanbul.

“It is disgraceful for humanity that only 6% of Africa’s population has been vaccinated,” Erdogan said.

A vaccine developed in India, Covovax, was granted emergency approval Friday by the World Health Organization. WHO vaccines chief Mariangela Simao said the approval “aims to increase access particularly to lower-income countries.”

In Europe, European Union governments agreed to order more than 180 million doses of a BioNTech-Pfizer vaccine adapted for omicron, the head of the European Commission said Friday.

Japan’s Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said Friday the government plans to accelerate booster shots to around 31 million vulnerable people. He also said he spoke Friday with Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla about oral treatments.

South Africa, which first identified the omicron variant, said Friday it would donate about 2 million doses of Johnson & Johnson’s vaccine to other African countries next year via a medical supplies platform established by the African Union.

Some information in this report came from Agence France-Presse, The Associated Press and Reuters. 

 
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A senior member of Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s Cabinet resigned Saturday night, adding to a sense of disarray within a government that has faced rebellion from his own lawmakers and voters this week.

Brexit Minister David Frost said in a letter to Johnson that he was stepping down immediately after a newspaper reported that he had planned to leave the post next month.

Frost said the process of leaving the EU would be a long-term job. “That is why we agreed earlier this month that I would move on in January and hand over the baton to others to manage our future relationship with the EU,” he said in his resignation letter.

However, the Mail on Sunday said earlier that he resigned because of growing disillusionment with Johnson’s policies. The newspaper said Frost’s decision was triggered by last week’s introduction of new pandemic restrictions, including a requirement that people show proof of vaccination or a negative coronavirus test to enter nightclubs and other crowded venues.

And in his resignation letter, Frost said the U.K. needed to “learn to live with COVID. … You took a brave decision in July, against considerable opposition, to open up the country again. Sadly, it did not prove to be irreversible, as I wished, and believe you did too. I hope we can get back on track soon and not be tempted by the kind of coercive measures we have seen elsewhere.”

The news follows a stunning defeat for Johnson’s Conservative Party in a by-election Thursday in North Shropshire, a longtime party stronghold. Earlier this week, 99 Conservative lawmakers voted against so-called vaccine passports in the House of Commons, the biggest rebellion in Johnson’s 2 1/2 years as prime minister.

Angela Rayner, deputy leader of the opposition Labour Party, said Johnson isn’t up to the job as the omicron variant drives a spike in coronavirus infections.

“A government in total chaos right when the country faces an uncertain few weeks” Rayner tweeted. “We deserve better than this buffoonery.”

Even some of Johnson’s own party members piled on.

“The prime minister is running out of time and out of friends to deliver on the promises and discipline of a true Conservative government,” tweeted Conservative lawmaker Andrew Bridgen. “Lord Frost has made it clear, 100 Conservative lawmakers have made it clear, but most importantly, so did the people of North Shropshire.”

Frost led talks with the European Union as Johnson’s government sought to re-negotiate terms of Britain’s withdrawal from the bloc.

His resignation comes after the UK recently softened its stance in the talks with the EU over post-Brexit trade rules for Northern Ireland. The change of tone from Britain came as a surprise to many because it seemed at odds with the hardline position of the Brexit minister, who was nicknamed “Frosty the No Man.”

Johnson’s government is also under fire over reports that officials held Christmas parties last year when pandemic rules barred such gatherings.

Adding to his problems with the so-called partygate scandal, Johnson’s choice to investigate the claims had to step aside after he also was tied to such parties.

Simon Case, the head of the civil service, stepped aside from the investigation after the Guido Fawkes website reported Friday that his department held two parties in December 2020.

The scandal erupted when a video surfaced showing a mock news conference at which some of Johnson’s staff appeared to make light of a party that violated the pandemic rules. Until that time, the prime minister had steadfastly denied government officials had broken any lockdown rules.

The Times of London newspaper reported Saturday that one of the events held by Case’s department, the Cabinet Office, was listed in digital calendars as “Christmas party!” and was organized by a member of Case’s team.

The Cabinet Office said Friday that the event was a virtual quiz in which a small number of people who had been working together in the same office took part from their desks.

“The Cabinet Secretary played no part in the event but walked through the team’s office on the way to his own office,” the office said in a statement. “No outside guests or other staff were invited or present. This lasted for an hour and drinks and snacks were bought by those attending. He also spoke briefly to staff in the office before leaving.” 
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Deputy foreign minister Alexander Grushko said Saturday that security proposals Russia has presented to the United States are an attempt to turn a potential military scenario into a political process.

Russia, which has built up troops near the border with Ukraine, said Friday it wanted a legally binding guarantee that NATO would give up any military activity in eastern Europe and Ukraine.

Grushko was quoted by the Interfax news agency as saying Moscow was ready for talks “to turn a military or a military-technical scenario of confrontation into a political process which will really strengthen military security.”

 
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