Ahead of the Christmas holidays, Austria shut its shops, restaurants and festive markets Monday, returning to lockdown in the most dramatic Covid-19 restriction seen in Western Europe for months. 

The decision has prompted a fierce backlash, with tens of thousands taking to the streets, some blaming the government for not doing more to avert the latest coronavirus wave crashing into Europe. 

As they wake up Monday morning, Austria’s 8.9 million people will not be allowed to leave home except to go to work, shop for essentials and exercise.   

The Alpine nation is also imposing a sweeping vaccine mandate from February 1 — joining the Vatican as the only places in Europe with such a requirement. 

Battling a resurgent pandemic almost two years since Covid-19 first emerged, several countries on the continent have reintroduced curbs, often choosing to ban unvaccinated people from venues like restaurants and bars.   

But not since jabs became widely available has a European Union country had to re-enter a nationwide lockdown.   

Backtracking 

Austria’s decision punctures earlier promises that tough virus restrictions would be a thing of the past. 

Over the summer, then chancellor Sebastian Kurz had declared the pandemic “over.”

But plateauing inoculation rates, record case numbers and a spiraling death toll have forced the government to walk back such bold claims.   

After taking office in October, Chancellor Alexander Schallenberg criticized the “shamefully low” vaccine rate — 66 percent compared to France’s 75 percent — and banned the un-jabbed from public spaces. 

When that proved ineffective at squelching the latest round of infections, he announced a nationwide lockdown of 20 days, with an evaluation after 10 days. 

Schools will remain open, although parents have been asked to keep their children at home if possible. Working remotely is also recommended.   

Political analyst Thomas Hofer blamed Schallenberg for maintaining “the fiction” of a successfully contained pandemic for too long.   

“The government didn’t take the warnings of a next wave seriously,” he told AFP.   

“The chaos is evident.”

Frustrations boil over 

While many Austrians spent their weekend ahead of the stay-at-home order enjoying mulled wine or finishing shopping, a crowd of 40,000 marched through Vienna decrying “dictatorship.”  

Andreas Schneider, a 31-year-old from Belgium who works as an economist in the Austrian capital, described the lockdown as a “tragedy”.   

“I was hoping it wouldn’t come to this, especially now that we have the vaccine,” he said.   

Called to rally by a far-right political party, some protesters wore a yellow star reading “not vaccinated”, mimicking the Star of David Nazis forced Jews to wear during the Holocaust. 

Alongside the “worried” citizens are others who “are becoming radicalized”, Interior Minister Karl Nehammer said on Sunday, the same day around 6,000 people protested in the city of Linz. 

Elsewhere in Europe — as infections soar and anti-Covid measures get stricter — frustrations have also erupted into demonstrations, with some marred by clashes with police.   

Over 130 people have been arrested in the Netherlands over three days of unrest sparked by a Covid curfew, and in Brussels on Sunday, officers fired water cannon and tear gas at a protest police said was attended by 35,000. 

In Denmark, around 1,000 demonstrators vented at government plans to reinstate a Covid pass for civil servants.   

“People want to live,” said one of the organizers of the Dutch protests, Joost Eras. “That’s why we’re here.” 
…

Riots broke out in cities across the Netherlands on Sunday, the third night in a row that police clashed with mobs of angry youths who set fires and threw rocks to protest COVID-19 restrictions.

Unrest was reported in locations including Leeuwarden and Groningen in the north, the eastern town of Enschede and Tilburg in the south. In Enschede, where an emergency ordinance was issued, police used batons to try to disperse a crowd, according to video on social media. In Leeuwarden, police vans were pelted with rocks and black-clad groups chanted and set off flares.

Responding to the worst disturbances since a full lockdown led to widespread disorder and more than 500 arrests in January, police said five officers had been injured overnight Saturday and at least 64 people detained in three provinces, including dozens who threw fireworks and fences during a soccer match at Feyenoord Rotterdam’s stadium.

The latest unrest began on Friday night in Rotterdam, where police opened fire on a crowd that had swelled to hundreds during a protest that the city’s mayor said had turned into “an orgy of violence.”

Four people believed to have been hit by police bullets remained in hospital on Sunday, a statement by the authorities said.

The protests were sparked by opposition to government plans to restrict use of a national corona pass to people who have either recovered from COVID-19 or have been vaccinated, excluding those with a negative test result.

The Netherlands reimposed some lockdown measures on its 17.5 million population last weekend for an initial three weeks in an effort to slow a resurgence of the virus, but daily infections have remained at their highest levels since the start of the pandemic.

Some youths were also angered by a New Year’s Eve firework ban to avoid added pressure on hospitals that have already been forced to scale back care due to a surge in COVID-19 patients.

Among the most serious confrontations on Saturday night were those in The Hague, where the five officers were hurt, one of them seriously, a police statement said. Police carried out charges on horseback and arrested 19 people, one of them for throwing a rock through the window of a passing ambulance. 
…

Charging points for electric vehicles will be required to be installed in new buildings in Britain from next year under new legislation to be announced by Prime Minister Boris Johnson, his office said in a statement on Sunday.

It said the regulations would lead to up to 145,000 extra charge points being installed in England each year in the run-up to 2030, when the sale of new petrol and diesel cars will end in Britain.

The requirement will apply to new homes and to non-residential buildings such as offices and supermarkets. It will also apply to buildings undergoing large-scale renovations which leave them with more than 10 parking spaces.

Johnson was due to announce the new legislation in a speech to the Confederation of British Industry’s annual conference on Monday.

Accelerating investment in infrastructure to facilitate a transition to electric vehicles was one of the elements in a wide-ranging national Net Zero Strategy document published by the British government last month.
…

French authorities sent police special forces to the Caribbean island of Guadeloupe, an overseas territory of France, as protests over COVID-19 restrictions erupted into rioting and looting for the third day in a row.

On Sunday, many road blockades by protesters made traveling across the island nearly impossible. Firefighters reported 48 interventions overnight into Sunday morning. 

In Pointe-a-Pitre, the island’s largest urban area, clashes left three people injured, including a 80-year-old woman who was hit by a bullet while on her balcony. A firefighter and a police officer were also injured and several shops were looted there and in other towns. A police station in Morne-à-l’Eau was set on fire. 

Jacques Bertili, a 49-year-old Le Gosier resident, said, “I’m not against nor for the vaccine. But what makes me upset is looting. Because we need to work.”

The protests were called for by trade unions to denounce France’s COVID-19 health pass, which is required to access restaurants and cafes, cultural venues, sport arenas and long-distance travel. Demonstrators are also protesting France’s mandatory vaccinations for health care workers. 

The island of 400,000 people has one of the lowest vaccination rates in France at 33%, compared with 75% across the country.

French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin denounced the violence as “unacceptable” in an interview Sunday with Le Parisien newspaper. He said 50 officers from police special forces were arriving Sunday in Guadeloupe. They come in addition to 200 other police sent to the Caribbean island from France’s mainland. 

“The state will stand firm,” he said, adding that at least 31 people have been arrested. 

Darmanin said following an emergency meeting Saturday in Paris that “some shots have been fired against police officers” in Guadeloupe. Videos on social media showed that some cars and buildings were set on fire. 

Road blockades created a “very difficult situation for a few hours” during which patients and supplies couldn’t reach hospitals, Darmanin said Saturday.

Guadeloupe Prefect Alexandre Rochatte has imposed a nightly curfew from 6 p.m. to 5 a.m. since Friday.

Rochatte said some electrical facilities near dams have been damaged, which has caused some power outages, and urged people not to go near downed electrical cables.
…

Violence broke out at a protest against anti-covid measures in Brussels on Sunday, where police said tens of thousands of people were participating.

The march began peacefully but police later fired water cannon and tear gas in response to a group of participants throwing projectiles, an AFP photographer witnessed.

Several of the demonstrators caught up in the clash wore hoods and carried Flemish nationalist flags.

The stand-off with riot police took place near the Belgian capital’s EU and government district.

Police said 35,000 protesters marched from the North Station in Brussels against a fresh round of COVID measures announced by the government on Wednesday.

The demonstration, called “Together for Freedom”, largely focused on a ban on the unvaccinated from venues such as restaurants and bars.

Europe is battling another wave of infections and several countries have tightened curbs despite high levels of vaccination, especially in the west of the continent.

Belgium, one of the countries hit the hardest by the latest wave, on Wednesday expanded its work-from-home rules and strengthened curbs against the unvaccinated. 
…

China reduced the level of its diplomatic relations with Lithuania to below ambassador level Sunday in retaliation for the Baltic nation allowing Taiwan, the island democracy claimed by Beijing as part of its territory, to open a representative office.

China earlier expelled the Lithuanian ambassador, reflecting its intense sensitivity over the status of Taiwan, which Beijing says has no right to conduct foreign affairs. China also withdrew its own ambassador from Lithuania.

The Foreign Ministry said relations would be downgraded to the level of charge d’affaires, an embassy’s No. 2 official.

Lithuania’s move reflects growing interest among governments in expanding ties with Taiwan, a major trader and center for high-tech industry, at a time when Beijing has irritated its neighbors and Western governments with an increasingly assertive foreign and military policy.

Taiwan and the mainland have been ruled separately since 1949 following a civil war.

The Foreign Ministry accused Lithuania of “undermining Chinese sovereignty and territorial integrity.” It called on the Lithuanian government to “correct the mistakes immediately.”

Beijing refuses to have official relations with governments that recognize Taiwan as a sovereign country. It has persuaded all but 15 countries, most of them small and poor in Africa and Latin America, to switch recognition to the mainland.

Many governments, including the United States and Japan, have official diplomatic ties with Beijing while maintaining extensive commercial ties with Taiwan. Many maintain relations with the island’s democratically elected government through trade offices that serve as informal embassies.

Lithuania broke with diplomatic custom by agreeing that the Taiwanese office in Vilnius would bear the name Taiwan instead of Chinese Taipei, a term used by other countries to avoid offending Beijing.

Lithuania said earlier it plans to open its own representative office in Taiwan.
…

Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki on Sunday called the migrant crisis on the Belarusian-Polish border, the EU’s eastern frontier, the “greatest attempt to destabilize Europe” since the Cold War.

The premier issued his strong remarks as he prepared to meet with EU leaders at a time when Warsaw is facing not only a border crisis but heightened tensions with Brussels over allegations it is breaching its commitment to the bloc’s democratic principles.

The West accuses Belarus of artificially creating the crisis by bringing in would-be migrants — mostly from the Middle East — and taking them to the border with promises of an easy crossing into the European Union.

Belarus has denied the claim, instead criticizing the EU for not taking in the migrants.

Caught in the middle, migrants often report being forced to cross the border by Belarusian officials, then being pushed back into Belarusian territory by Polish authorities.

Belarusian President Alexander “Lukashenko launched a hybrid war against the EU. This is [the] greatest attempt to destabilize Europe in 30 years,” Morawiecki said on Twitter.

“Poland will not yield to blackmail and will do everything to defend the EU’s borders.”

He linked to a video statement in which he cautioned that “today the target is Poland, but tomorrow it will be Germany, Belgium, France or Spain.”

He also claimed that Lukashenko had the “back-room support of Vladimir Putin,” the Russian president and an ally of the Belarusian regime.

Lukashenko told the BBC earlier that it was “absolutely possible” his forces had helped people cross into the EU but denied orchestrating the operation.

Divert attention

Brussels and NATO have previously also described the migrant crisis as a “hybrid tactic.”

Morawiecki is visiting the Baltic states — two of which also share a border with Belarus — on Sunday to discuss the conflict and has announced he will visit other EU capitals this week.

Some observers believe Poland is using its rhetoric on the border issue to try to distract from controversial reforms that the EU believes limit the independence of the judiciary.

The European Commission wrote to Poland on Friday to launch a process that could lead to it being deprived of funds over threats to the EU legal order. 

“While the problem on Poland’s border is serious and requires Western solidarity — for example by sanctioning Belarus — Morawiecki blows it out of proportion to divert attention from Poland’s violation of the rule of law,” political expert Marcin Zaborowski told AFP.

The policy director at the Globsec think tank argued that the Belarus action “pales in comparison with the war in Ukraine, cyber attack in Estonia in 2007 and Russian support for far-right extremism in Europe.”

On Sunday, Poland’s border guards reported new attempted crossings, including by a “very aggressive group of around 100” migrants.

Poland’s Defense Minister Mariusz Blaszczak said Saturday that Belarus has now changed tactics by directing smaller groups of migrants to multiple points along the border.

He added that he expected the border showdown to last months.

Migrant deaths

The migrants have spent thousands of dollars to fly into Belarus on tourist visas, determined to reach the European Union.

Many are desperately fleeing war and poverty in the Middle East.

Once at the border, they are faced with squalid, freezing conditions.

Polish media say at least 11 migrants have died since the crisis began over the summer.

A Yemeni migrant who died in Poland in September will be laid to rest on Sunday in the eastern village of Bohoniki, with his brother in attendance.

Yemen’s foreign ministry said he “died on the border between Poland and Belarus as a result of the severe drop in temperatures.”

On Saturday, the Belarusian Health Ministry said that a World Health Organization (WHO) mission had arrived in Belarus to help organize medical support for the migrants.
…

As coronavirus infections hit Ukraine, a single shift for Dr. Oleksandr Molchanov now stretches to 42 hours — 24 of them in Kakhovka’s hospital, followed by another 18 hours spent visiting tents set up to care for 120 COVID-19 patients.

While vaccination rates in Eastern Europe have generally lagged, Ukraine has one of the lowest in the region. But because of its underfunded and struggling health care system, the situation has turned dire nearly two years since the virus swept into Europe.

The country is setting records almost every day for infections and deaths, most recently on Tuesday, when 838 deaths were reported.

“We are extinguishing the fire again. We are working as at the front, but our strength and capabilities are limited,” said Molchanov, who works at the hospital in the city in southern Ukraine on the Dnieper River. “We are working to the limit.”

After his grueling shift, the 32-year-old doctor goes home to sleep and recover for two days. The next one may be even more challenging.

“The situation is only getting worse,” Molchanov said. “Hospital beds are running out, there are more and more serious patients, and there is a sore lack of doctors and medical personnel.”

The tents beside Kakhovka’s hospital have 120 beds, and 87 of them are occupied, with more patients arriving every day. But Molchanov is one of only three doctors to care for them.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s administration inherited a health care system that was undermined by reforms launched by his predecessor that closed many small-town hospitals.

In those communities, people have to seek care in large cities. If the problem is severe enough that a patient needs an ambulance, the wait can be as long as eight hours.

“They are bringing patients in extremely difficult condition, with a protracted form” of COVID-19, said Dr. Anatoliy Galachenko, who also works at the tent hospital. “The main reason is the remoteness of settlements and the impossibility of providing assistance at the primary stages of the disease.”

Yulia Tymoshenko, a former prime minister who leads the opposition Batkivshchyna party, said she has traveled to many hospitals in Ukraine and found shortages everywhere.

“The mortality from COVID that is now recorded in Ukraine, is not just mortality; it is the killing of people by this government, which does not have oxygen, antiviral drugs, beds and normally paid medical personnel,” she said in parliament.

“There are no free beds in the country anymore — a new patient immediately comes to the bed of a discharged person,” Tymoshenko added.

Four coronavirus vaccines are available in Ukraine — Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna, AstraZeneca and Sinovac — but only 21% of its 41 million people are fully vaccinated. The Ministry of Health reported that 96% of patients with severe COVID-19 weren’t vaccinated.

Zelenskyy has promised every fully vaccinated Ukrainian a payment of 1,000 hryvnia ($38), about 5% of the average monthly wage, but widespread hesitancy persists.

Doctors say the vaccines are highly effective at preventing deaths and hospitalizations, and when infections in vaccinated people do occur, they usually are mild.

Oleksandr Kymanov, who refused to get vaccinated, ended up getting infected and was brought to the tent hospital in Kakhovka from the town of Rozdolne, about 20 kilometers away. Connected to supplemental oxygen, he cited various falsehoods about the vaccine, saying it was “useless” and that “people still get infected and get sick.”

Doctors complain that vaccine falsehoods about containing microchips or that they cause infertility and disease is driving the COVID-19 surge.

“People believe in the most absurd rumors about chips, infertility and the dangers of vaccines, elderly people from risk groups massively refuse to be vaccinated, and this is very harmful and increases the burden on doctors,” Molchanov said. “People trust their neighbors more than doctors.”

The government has required teachers, doctors, government employees and other groups of workers to be fully vaccinated by Dec. 1. It also has also begun to require proof of vaccination or negative COVID-19 test results for travel on planes, trains and long-distance buses.

The regulations have spawned a black market for fake vaccination documents, which sell for the equivalent of $100-$300. A phony government digital app for smartphones is reportedly available, complete with fake certificates installed.

“COVID cannot be fooled with a fake certificate, but many Ukrainians learn about it only in intensive care,” Molchanov said.

The Ministry of Internal Affairs said 1,200 groups have been sent throughout Ukraine to verify the authenticity of medical documents. Police already have identified several clandestine printers who were creating fake certificates.

Doctors say the fake certificates make their job harder.

“We are working to the limit, but we are tired of fighting not only with disease, but also with stupidity,” Molchanov said.
…

Police arrested seven rioters in The Hague on Saturday night after youths set fires in the streets and threw fireworks at officers. The unrest came a day after police opened fire on protesters in Rotterdam amid what the port city’s mayor called “an orgy of violence” that broke out at a protest against coronavirus restrictions.

Elsewhere in the Netherlands, two soccer matches in the top professional league had to be briefly halted after fans — banned from matches under a partial lockdown in force in the Netherlands for a week — broke into stadiums in the towns of Alkmaar and Almelo.

Police said via Twitter that seven people were arrested in The Hague and five officers were injured. One needed treatment in a hospital.

Local media outlet Regio 15 reported that rioters threw bicycles, wooden pallets and motorized scooters on one of the fires.

The rioting in The Hague was on a smaller scale than the pitched battles on the streets of Rotterdam on Friday night, when police said three rioters were hit by bullets and investigations were underway to establish if they were shot by police. Earlier police said two people were hit. The condition of the injured rioters was not disclosed.

Officers in Rotterdam arrested 51 people, about half of them minors, police said Saturday afternoon. One police officer was hospitalized with a leg injury suffered in the rioting, another was treated by ambulance staff and countless others suffered minor injuries.

Mayor Ahmed Aboutaleb told reporters in the early hours of Saturday that “on a number of occasions the police felt it necessary to draw their weapons to defend themselves” as rioters rampaged through the port city’s central shopping district, setting fires and throwing rocks and fireworks at officers.

“They shot at protesters, people were injured,” Aboutaleb said. He did not have details on the injuries. Police also fired warning shots.

Police combing through video footage from security cameras expect to make more arrests.

Photos from the scene showed at least one police car in flames and another with a bicycle slammed through its windshield.

Riot police and a water cannon restored calm after midnight.

It was one of the worst outbreaks of violence in the Netherlands since coronavirus restrictions were first imposed last year. In January, rioters also attacked police and set fires on the streets of Rotterdam after a curfew came into force.

Justice Minister Ferd Grapperhaus condemned the events.

“The riots and extreme violence against police officers, riot police and firefighters last night in Rotterdam are disgusting to see,” he said in a statement.

“Protesting is a great right in our society, but what we saw last night is simply criminal behavior. It has nothing to do with demonstrating,” he added.

Police units from around the country raced to Rotterdam to help bring Friday night’s situation under control. Aboutaleb said that gangs of soccer hooligans were involved in the rioting.

An independent investigation into the shootings by police was opened, as is the case whenever Dutch police use their weapons.

The government has said it wants to introduce a law that would allow businesses to restrict the country’s coronavirus pass system to only people who are fully vaccinated or have recovered from COVID-19 — that would exclude people who test negative.

Earlier Saturday, two protests against COVID-19 measures went off peacefully in Amsterdam and the southern city of Breda.

Thousands gathered on Amsterdam’s central Dam Square, despite organizers calling off the protest. They walked peacefully through the streets, closely monitored by police. A few hundred people also marched through the southern Dutch city of Breda. One organizer, Joost Eras, told broadcaster NOS he didn’t expect violence after consulting with police.

“We certainly don’t support what happened in Rotterdam. We were shocked by it,” he said.

The country has seen record numbers of infections in recent days and a new partial lockdown came into force a week ago.

Local political party Leefbaar Rotterdam condemned the violence in a tweet.

“The center of our beautiful city has this evening transformed into a war zone,” it said. “Rotterdam is a city where you can disagree with things that happen but violence is never, never, the solution.” 

 
…

They are shivering in barracks without heat, going hungry and have no money. They say their passports have been taken by their Chinese employer and that they are now stuck in Serbia with no help from local authorities.

These are the Vietnamese workers who are helping build the first Chinese car tire factory in Europe. The Associated Press visited the construction site in northern Serbia where about 500 of the workers are living in harsh conditions as China’s Shandong Linglong Tire Co. sets up the huge facility. 

The project, which Serbian and Chinese officials tout as a display of the “strategic partnership” between the two countries, has faced scrutiny from environmentalists over potentially dangerous pollution from tire production. 

Now, it has caught the attention of human rights groups in Serbia, which have warned that the workers could be victims of human trafficking or even slavery.

“We are witnessing a breach of human rights because the Vietnamese [workers] are working in terrible conditions,” Serbian activist Miso Zivanov of the Zrenjaninska Akcija [Zrenjanin Action] nongovernmental organization told The Associated Press at the drab one-story warehouses where the workers are living.

“Their passports and identification documents have been taken by their Chinese employers,” he said. “They have been here since May, and they received only one salary [payment]. They are trying to get back to Vietnam but first need to get back their documents.” 

Workers sleep on bunk beds without mattresses in barracks with no heating or warm water. They told the AP that they have received no medical care even when they developed COVID-19-like symptoms, being told by their managers simply to remain in their rooms. 

Nguyen Van Tri, one of the workers, said nothing has been fulfilled from the job contract he signed in Vietnam before embarking on the long journey to Serbia. 

“Since we arrived here, nothing is good,” he said. “Everything is different from documents we signed in Vietnam. Life is bad, food, medicine, water … everything is bad.”

Wearing sandals and shivering in the cold, he said about 100 of his fellow workers who live in the same barracks have gone on strike to protest their plight and that some of them have been fired because of that. 

Linglong did not respond to an AP call seeking comment but denied to Serbian media that the company is responsible for the workers, blaming their situation on subcontractors and job agencies in Vietnam. It said the company did not employ the Vietnamese workers in the first place. It promised to return the documents it said were taken to stamp work and residency permits. 

The company denied that the Vietnamese workers are living in poor conditions and said their monthly salaries were paid in accordance with the number of working hours. 

Populist-run Serbia is a key spot for China’s expansion and investment policies in Europe, and Chinese companies have kept a tight lid on their projects amid reports they run afoul of the Balkan nation’s anti-pollution laws and labor regulations. 

Chinese banks have granted billions of dollars in loans to Serbia to finance Chinese companies that build highways, railways and factories and employ their own construction workers. This is not the first time rights groups have pointed out possible breaches of workers’ rights, including those of Chinese miners at a copper mine in eastern Serbia.

After days of silence, Serbian officials spoke against “inhumane” conditions at the construction site but were quick to downplay Chinese responsibility for the workers’ plight. 

Serbian Prime Minister Ana Brnabic said she “would not rule out that the attack against the Linglong factory” is organized “by those against Chinese investments” in Serbia — referring to frequent criticism from the West that Chinese projects there are not transparent, are ecologically questionable and are designed by Beijing to spread its political influence in Europe. 

“At the beginning, it was the environment. Now they forgot that and they focused on workers there. After tomorrow there will be something else,” she said. 

Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said Friday that a Serbian labor inspector has been sent to the Linglong construction site but was blunt on the expected outcome of the eventual findings. 

“What do they want? Do they want us to destroy a $900 million investment?” Vucic asked.
…

Tens of thousands of people, many of them far-right supporters, protested Saturday in Vienna against coronavirus restrictions a day after Austria’s government announced a new lockdown and said vaccines would be made compulsory next year.

Whistling, blowing horns and banging drums, crowds streamed into Heroes’ Square in front of the Hofburg, the former imperial palace in central Vienna, in the early afternoon, one of several protest locations.

Many demonstrators waved Austrian flags and carried signs with slogans such as “no to vaccination,” “enough is enough” or “down with the fascist dictatorship.”

The crowds had swelled to roughly 35,000 people by mid-afternoon, according to the police, and the protesters were marching down Vienna’s inner ring road before heading back toward the Hofburg. A police spokesman said there had been fewer than 10 arrests, for breaches of coronavirus restrictions and the ban on Nazi symbols.

Roughly 66% of Austria’s population is fully vaccinated against COVID-19, one of the lowest rates in western Europe. Many Austrians are skeptical about vaccines, a view encouraged by the far-right Freedom Party, the third-biggest in parliament.

With daily infections still setting records even after a lockdown was imposed on the unvaccinated this week, the government said on Friday it would reintroduce a lockdown Monday and make it compulsory to get vaccinated as of February 1.

The Freedom Party (FPO) and other vaccine-critical groups already had been planning a show of force Saturday in Vienna before Friday’s announcement, which prompted FPO leader Herbert Kickl to respond that “As of today, Austria is a dictatorship.” Kickl could not attend because he has caught COVID-19.

“We are not in favor of our government’s measures,” said one protester, who was part of a group wearing tin foil on their heads and brandishing toilet brushes. Like most protesters who spoke to the media, they declined to give their names, though the mood was festive.

 
…

This was supposed to be the Christmas in Europe where family and friends could once again embrace holiday festivities and one another. Instead, the continent is the global epicenter of the COVID-19 pandemic as cases soar to record levels in many countries.

With infections spiking again despite nearly two years of restrictions, the health crisis increasingly is pitting citizen against citizen — the vaccinated against the unvaccinated.

Governments desperate to shield overburdened health care systems are imposing rules that limit choices for the unvaccinated in the hope that doing so will drive up rates of vaccinations.

Austria on Friday went a step further, making vaccinations mandatory as of Feb. 1.

“For a long time, maybe too long, I and others thought that it must be possible to convince people in Austria, to convince them to get vaccinated voluntarily,” Austrian Chancellor Alexander Schallenberg said.

He called the move “our only way to break out of this vicious cycle of viral waves and lockdown discussions for good.”

While Austria so far stands alone in the European Union in making vaccinations mandatory, more and more governments are clamping down.

Starting Monday, Slovakia is banning people who haven’t been vaccinated from all nonessential stores and shopping malls. They also will not be allowed to attend any public event or gathering and will be required to test twice a week just to go to work.

“A merry Christmas does not mean a Christmas without COVID-19,” warned Prime Minister Eduard Heger. “For that to happen, Slovakia would need to have a completely different vaccination rate.”

He called the measures “a lockdown for the unvaccinated.”

Slovakia, where just 45.3% of the 5.5 million population is fully vaccinated, reported a record 8,342 new virus cases Tuesday.

It is not only nations of central and eastern Europe that are suffering anew. Wealthy nations in the west also are being hit hard and imposing restrictions on their populations once again.

“It is really, absolutely, time to take action,” German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Thursday. With a vaccination rate of 67.5%, her nation is now considering mandatory vaccinations for many health professionals.

Greece, too, is targeting the unvaccinated. Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis announced a battery of new restrictions late Thursday for the unvaccinated, keeping them out of venues including bars, restaurants, cinemas, theaters, museums and gyms, even if they have tested negative.

“It is an immediate act of protection and, of course, an indirect urge to be vaccinated,” Mitsotakis said.

The restrictions enrage Clare Daly, an Irish EU legislator who is a member of the European parliament’s civil liberties and justice committee. She argues that nations are trampling individual rights.

“In a whole number of cases, member states are excluding people from their ability to go to work,” Daly said, calling Austria’s restrictions on the unvaccinated that preceded its decision Friday to impose a full lockdown “a frightening scenario.”

Even in Ireland, where 75.9% of the population is fully vaccinated, she feels a backlash against holdouts.

“There’s almost a sort of hate speech being whipped up against the unvaccinated,” she said.

The world has had a history of mandatory vaccines in many nations for diseases such as smallpox and polio. Yet despite a global COVID-19 death toll exceeding 5 million, despite overwhelming medical evidence that vaccines highly protect against death or serious illness from COVID-19 and slow the pandemic’s spread, opposition to vaccinations remains stubbornly strong among parts of the population.

Some 10,000 people, chanting “freedom, freedom,” gathered in Prague this week to protest Czech government restrictions imposed on the unvaccinated.

“No single individual freedom is absolute,” countered professor Paul De Grauwe of the London School of Economics. “The freedom not to be vaccinated needs to be limited to guarantee the freedom of others to enjoy good health,” he wrote for the liberal think tank Liberales.

That principle is now turning friends away from each other and splitting families across European nations.

Birgitte Schoenmakers, a general practitioner and professor at Leuven University, sees it on an almost daily basis.

“It has turned into a battle between the people,” she said.

She sees political conflicts whipped up by people willfully spreading conspiracy theories, but also intensely human stories. One of her patients has been locked out of the home of her parents because she dreads being vaccinated.

Schoemakers said that while authorities had long baulked at the idea of mandatory vaccinations, the highly infectious delta variant is changing minds.

“To make a U-turn on this is incredibly difficult,” she said.

Spiking infections and measures to rein them in are combining to usher in a second straight grim holiday season in Europe.

Leuven has already canceled its Christmas market, while in nearby Brussels a 60-foot Christmas tree was placed in the center of the city’s stunning Grand Place on Thursday but a decision on whether the Belgian capital’s festive market can go ahead will depend on the development of the virus surge.

Paul Vierendeels, who donated the tree, hopes for a return to a semblance of a traditional Christmas.

“We are glad to see they are making the effort to put up the tree, decorate it. It is a start,” he said. “After almost two difficult years, I think it is a good thing that some things, more normal in life, are taking place again.” 

 
…

Police opened fire on protesters in rioting that erupted in downtown Rotterdam around a demonstration against COVID-19 restrictions late Friday night. The Dutch city’s mayor called it “an orgy of violence.”

Police said that two rioters were hospitalized after being hit by bullets, and investigations were underway to establish if they were shot by police. The condition of the injured rioters was not disclosed.

Officers arrested 51 people, about half of them minors, police said Saturday afternoon. One police officer was hospitalized with a leg injury sustained in the rioting, another was treated by ambulance staff and “countless” others suffered minor injuries.

Mayor Ahmed Aboutaleb told reporters in the early hours of Saturday morning that “on a number of occasions the police felt it necessary to draw their weapons to defend themselves” as rioters ran rampage through the port city’s central shopping district, setting fires and throwing rocks and fireworks at officers. 

“They shot at protesters, people were injured,” Aboutaleb said. He did not have details about the injuries. Police also fired warning shots.

Police combing through video footage from security cameras expect to make more arrests.

Photos from the scene showed at least one police car in flames and another with a bicycle slammed through its windshield.

Riot police and a water cannon restored calm after midnight.

It was one of the worst outbreaks of violence in the Netherlands since coronavirus restrictions were first imposed last year. In January, rioters also attacked police and set fires on the streets of Rotterdam after a curfew came into force.

Justice Minister Ferd Grapperhaus condemned the events.

“The riots and extreme violence against police officers, riot police and firefighters last night in Rotterdam are disgusting to see,” he said in a statement.

“Protesting is a great right in our society, but what we saw last night is simply criminal behavior. It has nothing to do with demonstrating,” he added.

Police units from around the country raced to Rotterdam to help bring Friday night’s situation under control. Local media reported that gangs of soccer hooligans were involved in the rioting.

Video from social media shown on Dutch broadcaster NOS appeared to show one person being shot in Rotterdam, but there was no immediate word on what happened.

Police said in a tweet it was “still unclear how and by whom” that person was apparently shot. 

An independent investigation into the shootings by police was opened, as is the case whenever Dutch police use their weapons.

The government has said it wants to introduce a law that would allow businesses to restrict the country’s coronavirus pass system to only people who are fully vaccinated or have recovered from COVID-19 — that would exclude people who test negative.

The country has seen record numbers of infections in recent days, and a new partial lockdown came into force a week ago.

Local political party Leefbaar Rotterdam condemned the violence in a tweet.

“The center of our beautiful city has this evening transformed into a war zone,” it said. “Rotterdam is a city where you can disagree with things that happen, but violence is never, never, the solution.”
…

Guillermo Arránz spends his days in a forest hacking into pine trees to extract what is to him, liquid gold.

Some might see it as lonely and backbreaking work, but to Arránz it brings great satisfaction. He is his own boss and spends his days enjoying nature.

Arranz is one of Spain’s resineros, or resin extractors, whose centuries-old practice involves bleeding trees of their milky sap.

This simple practice has taken on fresh importance as Spain struggles to cope without any natural source of energy. Energy analysts say pine resin might be the new petroleum.

Resin can be used to create plastics, varnishes, glues, tires, rubber, turpentine and food additives – much like petroleum.

With an estimated 18 million hectares of woodland, Spain has the largest amount of forested area in Europe after Sweden and Finland. Along with Portugal, it is the world’s third biggest producer of pine resin after China and Brazil.

Spain has been scrambling to explore alternative energy sources especially after Algeria – Spain’s main gas supplier – shut off natural gas deliveries last month through one of two undersea pipelines because of Algeria’s escalating dispute with Morocco.

The Maghreb-Europe pipeline passes through Morocco on its way to Spain. Flows through a second pipeline, the Medgaz pipeline that travels directly from Algeria to Spain, remained uninterrupted. Spanish officials, however, worried they were insufficient to stave off an energy shortage at a time when Spain is already struggling with skyrocketing fuel costs.

To find other sources of energy for the future, Spain’s government has made promoting renewable energies like solar and wind power a pillar of its policy as the world moves away from fossil fuels.

As part of this scheme, Madrid launched a plan in March to restore the economic potential of its forests.

“We must encourage forests to be well cared for and managed because they are a source of job creation and the livelihoods of millions of people around the the world depends on them,” Teresa Ribera, the third vice-president and Environment minister, said recently.

Blanca Rodriguez-Chaves Mimbrero, a law professor at the Autonomous University of Madrid specializing in the protection of natural resources, especially mountains, waters and coasts, believes Spain is well placed to make most of its pine resin which, she says, is of the highest quality in the world.

“Petroleum of the future”

“The world is looking for ways to replace petroleum which will run out probably by the middle of the century. Resin is one way,” she told VOA. “These living forests which consume emissions can provide renewable resources to substitute petroleum products.”

She notes the sticky, fragrant substance is an ingredient in cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, glues, varnishes and is also used in construction.

Rodriguez-Chavez also said the pine resin industry, which only provides work for about 1,000 people at present, could help combat rural depopulation, an issue that has taken center stage in Spanish politics.

The work is intrinsically tied to villages in Castilla y Leon in northern Spain and to a lesser extent in Extremadura in the west of the country.

In the past 50 years, Spain’s countryside has lost 28% of its population, according to the National Statistics Office. Only 15% of its inhabitants live in more than half of the Spanish land area.

The Spanish government pledged $11.9 billion in March for measures to improve rural business infrastructure to reverse a trend known as España Vaciada – or “Emptied Spain,” which is also the name of a new political party.

The España Vaciada party, could command 15 seats in the 350-seat lower parliamentary chamber at the next general election in 2023, according to a recent poll for El Español, an online newspaper, possibly making its members kingmakers in a highly divided parliament.

Arránz comes from a family of resineros, who passed the knowledge of how to extract the sap down four generations from his great-grandfather.

“The job is hard work. I work eight hours a day from Monday to Friday. But it gives me a sense of freedom and I can be among nature,” he told VOA.

“The beauty of pine resin is it can be used to make many different things but it is renewable. All these trees will grow back.”

Arránz, who is vice-president of the National Resin Collectors Association, works from February to November, collecting the milky white liquid from the pine trees near his village Navas de Oro in Segovia, north of Madrid.

He collects 20,000 kilograms of resin per year but, realizing he is never going to make his fortune at this job, he supplements his income as a forest engineer.

Each kilogram sells for only $1.14 to the local companies that distill it into material usable for commercial use.

Arránz strips away the outer layer of tree bark, before nailing a plate to the trunk and a collection pot is hooked on it.

He then makes diagonal incisions into the bark and “bleeds” the trees before the resin seeps into the pot.

“It is nice to know that I am kind of farming something which is healthy and can also provide an alternative for the future,” Arránz said.

Some information in this report comes from Reuters.
…

Hundreds of Kurds who had camped along Belarus’ border for weeks were forced to return home Thursday after failing to enter the European Union. At Irbil International Airport, VOA Kurdish stringer Ahmad Zebari interviewed some of the returnees and filed this report narrated by Namo Abdulla.

Producer and camera: Ahmad Zebari.
…

Crowds of rioters in the port city of Rotterdam torched cars and threw rocks at police, who responded with bullets and water cannons, as protests against COVID-19 measures turned violent Friday night. 

“We fired warning shots and there were also direct shots fired because the situation was life-threatening,” police spokesperson Patricia Wessels told Reuters. 

“We know that at least two people were wounded, probably as a result of the warning shots, but we need to investigate the exact causes further,” she said. 

Some people on social media circulated images of someone they said had been shot by police. Police responded that they had seen the footage but did not yet know how the man was wounded. 

Several hundred people had gathered to voice opposition to government plans to restrict access to indoor venues to people who have “corona passes” showing they have been vaccinated or have recovered from an infection. 

The pass is also available to people who have not been vaccinated but have proof of a negative test. 

Police issued an emergency ordinance in Rotterdam, shutting down public transportation and ordering people to go home. Water cannons were deployed and police on horseback worked to disperse the crowds, police said. 

The authorities also called on bystanders and people who recorded images of the riots to send the footage to police for further investigation. 

The Netherlands reimposed some lockdown measures last weekend for an initial three weeks in an effort to slow a resurgence of coronavirus contagion, but daily infections have remained at their highest levels since the start of the pandemic. 

Video posted on social media showed burned out police cars and rioters throwing fireworks and rocks at police.
…

Former Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili agreed on Friday to end a 50-day prison hunger strike that had raised political tensions in the former Soviet republic and drawn expressions of concern from the United States. 

Saakashvili agreed to end his protest after authorities offered to move him to a military hospital from a prison hospital where an independent rights commissioner had said he was being abused by fellow inmates and not receiving appropriate medical treatment. 

Reuters TV footage showed a convoy including two ambulances departing late on Friday from the prison where Saakashvili, 53, had been held in the capital Tbilisi, en route to the military hospital in the town of Gori. 

In a statement quoted by the Sputnik Georgia news service, the former president said he would resume eating after the transfer but would never accept his “illegal detention.” 

Saakashvili was arrested October 1 after returning from exile to rally the opposition on the eve of local elections. He faces six years in prison after being convicted in absentia in 2018 of abusing his office during his 2004-2013 presidency, charges he rejects as politically motivated. 

Georgia’s human rights commissioner said Wednesday that Saakashvili needed to be moved to intensive care to avoid the risk of heart failure, internal bleeding and coma after more than a month and a half on hunger strike. 

Until Friday, he had insisted on being transferred to a civilian hospital. 

Saakashvili took power via a peaceful “Rose Revolution” in 2003 and carried out pro-Western reforms during his term but led Georgia into a disastrous war with Russia. 

His case has drawn thousands of his supporters onto the streets in recent weeks. 

Georgia President Salome Zourabichvili has said Saakashvili will not be pardoned. The United States on Thursday urged Georgia to treat him “fairly and with dignity” and said it was closely following his situation.
…

British Home Secretary Priti Patel on Friday said she had banned the Palestinian militant group Hamas, a move that brought the U.K.’s stance on Gaza’s rulers in line with those of the United States and the European Union. 

“Hamas has significant terrorist capability, including access to extensive and sophisticated weaponry, as well as terrorist training facilities,” Patel said in a statement. “That is why today I have acted to proscribe Hamas in its entirety.” 

The organization would be banned under the Terrorism Act, and anyone expressing support for Hamas, flying its flag or arranging meetings for the organization would be in breach of the law, the Home Office confirmed. Patel is expected to present the change to parliament next week. 

Hamas has political and military wings. Founded in 1987, it opposes the existence of Israel and peace talks, instead advocating “armed resistance” against Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian territories. 

Until now Britain had banned only its military arm — the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades. 

Hamas political official Sami Abu Zuhri said Britain’s move showed “absolute bias toward the Israeli occupation and is a submission to Israeli blackmail and dictations.” 

In a separate statement, Hamas said, “Resisting occupation by all available means, including armed resistance, is a right granted to people under occupation as stated by the international law.” 

The Palestinian Mission to the United Kingdom, which represents President Mahmoud Abbas’ Western-backed Palestinian Authority, also condemned the move. 

Israel lauds move

Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett welcomed the decision, saying on Twitter: “Hamas is a terrorist organization, simply put. The ‘political arm’ enables its military activity.” 

Hamas and Israel clashed most recently in a deadly 11-day conflict in May. During the second Palestinian uprising two decades ago, Hamas suicide bombers killed hundreds of Israelis, a campaign publicly backed by its political wing. 

In 2017 Patel was forced to resign as Britain’s international development secretary after she failed to disclose meetings with senior Israeli officials during a private holiday to the country, including then-opposition leader Yair Lapid. 

Lapid, now Israel’s foreign minister, hailed the decision on Hamas as “part of strengthening ties with Britain.” 

Hamas is on the U.S. list of designated foreign terrorist organizations. The European Union also deems it a terrorist movement. 

Based in Gaza, Hamas won the 2006 Palestinian parliamentary election, defeating its nationalist rival Fatah. It seized military control of Gaza the following year.
…

Austrian Chancellor Alexander Schallenberg announced Friday the government will begin a nationwide lockdown Monday and mandate vaccinations for all, making it the first European nation to reimpose COVID-19 measures, as cases throughout the region surge.

At a news conference Friday, Schallenberg said Monday’s lockdown will be reevaluated after 10 days, but they will run a maximum of 20 days, ending automatically December 13. He also announced COVID-19 vaccinations will become mandatory beginning February 1.

The lockdown will include an all-day curfew for the entire country, though schools and kindergartens will remain open. People may leave their homes only for work, school and basic needs, which can include physical exercise or if there is a threat to their health or property.

Schallenberg told reporters substantially increasing vaccination rates “is our only way out of this vicious circle of virus waves and lockdown discussions once and for all. We don’t want a fifth wave, we don’t want a sixth and seventh wave.”

The chancellor said he understands that many people in the country are already vaccinated and also will be subject to the lockdown restrictions, which he blamed on “too many among us have shown a lack of solidarity.”

Despite months of persuasion, he said, the government had not succeeded in convincing enough people to get vaccinated. The latest figures from Europe’s Centers for Disease control show the 64.1% of Austria’s total population is fully vaccinated.

Schallenberg expressed anger at anti-vaccination campaigns that have spread misinformation about the vaccines or promote sham COVID-19 treatments.

“Personally,” he said, “I think it’s irresponsible by certain political forces to exploit this pandemic to divide society and not to put people’s health in the foreground but to endanger it.”

Other European countries also are tightening restrictions as cases surge across the continent.

The government of Hungary, which borders Austria to the east, announced Thursday it is mandating mask-wearing indoors again beginning Saturday.

Some information for this report came from the Associated Press, Reuters, and Agence France-Presse.
…

German health officials said Friday the current COVID-19 situation in the country is a national emergency and called for immediate measures to be taken to mitigate the situation — including lockdowns, even for people who have been vaccinated.

Germany’s Robert Koch Institute for Infectious Diseases (RKI) reported 52,970 new COVID-19 cases Friday, the third straight day new infections topped 50,000.  The infection incidence rate remains just more than 340 per 100,000.

At a news conference Friday in Berlin, RKI President Lothar Wieler did not hold back his concern, saying, “All of Germany is one big outbreak. This is a nationwide state of emergency. We need to pull the emergency brake.”

Wieler told reporters they estimate there are more than half a million active COVID cases in Germany, the highest number ever recorded. He said among children aged 5-14, the incidence rate is more 700 per 100,000.

At the same news conference, Health Minister Jens Spahn was asked if Germany would consider returning to lockdowns, as neighboring Austria has done to address its own COVID-19 situation. Spahn said, “We shouldn’t rule anything out.”  

Wieler was more emphatic, saying Germany needs to “massively reduce contact to slow down the spread of the virus. This means, for example, staying at home if possible, canceling large events, reducing the number of people at small events, closing down hotspots such as bars and poorly ventilated clubs.”

Meanwhile, German Chancellor Angela Merkel met Thursday with the governors of Germany’s 16 states, and they agreed to introduce a new threshold linked to the number of hospital admissions of COVID-19 patients per 100,000 people over a seven-day period.

Some states also are considering mandatory vaccinations for some professional groups, such as medical staff and nursing home employees.

Some information for this report came from the Associated Press, Reuters, and Agence France-Presse.
…

Ukraine said Friday that one of its soldiers had been killed by pro-Russian separatists in the east of the country, as the West accuses Moscow of a troop build-up near Ukraine.

Kiev’s army has been battling fighters in two breakaway regions bordering Russia since 2014, after Moscow annexed the Crimean peninsula from Ukraine.

Ukraine and its Western allies accuse Russia of sending troops and arms across the border to support the separatists — claims Moscow denies.

Kiev’s military said Friday that the separatists had targeted Ukrainian military positions with artillery and mortars.

“As a result of hostilities, one serviceman was fatally wounded,” the military said on Facebook.

Ukraine said on Thursday it was seeking more military aid from its Western allies after they voiced concerns over Russian troop movements along the Ukrainian border.

Social media videos have in recent days shown Russia moving troops, tanks and missiles towards the Ukrainian border, raising concerns over an escalation in the conflict.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken last week voiced fresh concern about Russian troop movements and warned Moscow against any possible invasion.

Russian President Vladimir Putin for his part said Thursday that the West is “escalating” the Ukraine conflict by holding drills in the Black Sea and flying bombers near its borders.

After an uptick in violence at the beginning of the year, Russia massed around 100,000 troops on Ukraine’s borders in the spring, raising fears of a major escalation in the conflict.

Russia later announced a pullback but both Ukraine and its ally the United States said at the time the withdrawal was limited.

The conflict has claimed the lives of more than 13,000 people.
…

Officials in Belarus have cleared a refugee camp on the Poland-Belarus border where thousands of refugees had hunkered down in the hope of entering the European Union via Poland.

Approximately 2,000 refugees, many of them Middle Eastern, were moved Thursday into a large warehouse, enabling them to escape the freezing cold of the outdoor makeshift encampment.

European Union countries have been watching the developments at the Poland-Belarus border, anxious about the prospect of several thousand migrants entering within their borders.

Meanwhile, several hundred refugees decided Thursday to give up their hope of entering the EU and decided, instead, to take an Iraqi government repatriation flight to Irbil, in Iraq’s Kurdistan Region.
…