Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is accusing Libyan militia leader General Khalifa Haftar of violating a cease-fire agreement. Despite deploying Turkish forces to back the Libyan Government of National Accord (GNA), though, Erdogan seems to be increasingly looking to diplomacy rather than force. “He [Haftar] says he agreed to a cease-fire, but two days subsequent, he bombed the [Tripoli] airport. So how can we trust him?” Erdogan said Friday in Istanbul with German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Haftar’s forces control most of Libya in their war against the U.N.-recognized GNA. Merkel on Sunday hosted an international summit in Berlin aimed at resolving the Libyan civil war. A 55-article road map to end the conflict was drawn up at the meeting, which Erdogan attended. Erdogan challenged Merkel at the news conference, however, to confirm whether Haftar had signed the Berlin agreement. A visibly uncomfortable Merkel confirmed he only orally agreed to it, noting that officials were still waiting for his signature. FILE – Libyan Prime Minister Fayez al-Sarraj leaves after an international conference on Libya at the Elysee Palace in Paris, May 29, 2018.Support for SarrajDespite the Berlin agreement’s reaffirmation of the Libyan international arms embargo, the Turkish president said he would continue supporting the GNA’s prime minister, Fayez al-Sarraj. “We sent them a [military] delegation and continue to do so. We won’t abandon Sarraj. We will give the support we can,” Erdogan said. “Our soldiers are there to assist in the training [of GNA forces]. We have a history of 500 years, and we have an invitation [from the GNA] that gives us our right,” he added. But Erdogan, several times during the news conference, said the forces were purely for training. Earlier this week, Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Aktar also stressed the training purpose of the Libyan deployment. The Turkish force reportedly still only numbers in the dozens. The downplaying of the military deployment contrasts with Erdogan’s recent sharp rhetoric. Last week, the Turkish president, while announcing to Parliament soldiers’ deployment, said Ankara would not hesitate about “teaching a lesson” to Haftar if his forces continued attacking. Fears of wider warSuch language reportedly has set off alarm bells in the region over fears that Turkish forces in Libya could end up triggering a wider regional conflict with Haftar’s military backers, including Egypt. Given that Libya is 2,000 kilometers from Turkey, though, a military expert questioned whether Ankara was capable of sustaining a hot conflict. “The logistic challenge is enormous, and these challenges, as they look now, are insurmountable. It’s far away. It’s not like Syria is just across the border,” said former Turkish General Haldun Solmazturk, a veteran of cross-border military operations. “If fighting gets tough, casualties would be inevitable. Returning dead persons and wounded would also be a major challenge. Apart from the fuel, the ammunition, spare parts, there are thousands of items needed to be provided in such an environment,” added Solmazturk, who heads the 21st Century Turkey Institute, an Ankara-based research organization. FILE – Khalifa Haftar, the military commander who dominates eastern Libya, arrives at an international conference on Libya at the Elysee Palace in Paris, May 29, 2018.Turkish forces are already stretched, being deployed in Iraq and Syria, while analysts point out Haftar is in a strong military position. “At the moment the situation seems to be working on the side of Haftar. He has better weapons. He has jet fighters. He has superiority of the air and in the field,” said international relations professor Huseyin Bagci of Ankara’s Middle East Technical University. Further complicating Ankara’s situation is its international isolation over Libya’s military deployment. Erdogan’s shuttle diplomacy this month drew a blank, failing to win backing from Libya’s neighbors, Algeria and Tunisia. Erdogan also reportedly failed at the Berlin summit to secure backing for an international peacekeeping force, including the Turkish military, to be deployed to enforce a cease-fire in Libya. Military challenges for TurkeyAnalysts suggest Ankara’s isolation only compounds the military challenges it faces in Libya. “The Mediterranean, in terms of naval transportation, is controlled by not too friendly forces. And neighboring countries Tunisia, Algeria and Italy are less than willing to help or to provide any logistic bases or any other logistic support. They seem determined to stay out of this,” said Solmazturk. FILE – Turkish lawmakers vote on a bill that allows troop deployment to Libya, at the Parliament in Ankara, Jan. 2, 2020.”Libya threatens to be another Syria, where countless lives and many treasures will be wasted to defend a very ill-defined ‘national objective,’ ” warned analyst Atilla Yesilada of GlobalSource Partners, an economic and security research group based in New York. Erdogan appears increasingly to be looking to diplomacy in a bid to isolate Haftar. In a speech Thursday in the presence of Merkel, the Turkish president called for “pressure” to put on Haftar. Erdogan challenged the international community over its courting of Haftar, despite the general’s failure so far to sign on to a cease-fire. “It doesn’t make sense such support is continued,” he said at Friday’s news conference with Merkel, “if such a person is constantly so spoiled.” Migrant issueThe Turkish president also is seeking to play the migrant card against Europe, warning of “chaos” if Haftar remains unchecked. Some analysts are warning, however, that Ankara needs to face the reality that the region has little appetite for a Turkish role in Libya. “The region wants neither Turkey nor Russia seeking to extend its hegemony to Libya and the wider region. This is the reality,” said Bagci. But for now, Ankara is likely figuring on having a limited military presence in Libya while continuing to push for international deliberations on a resolution to Libya’s civil war and its future. 
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While Washington obsesses about tensions with Iran and the impeachment trial of President Donald Trump, a pair of high-ranking administration officials has been crisscrossing Europe and the Western Balkans in pursuit of a solution to a dispute that most Americans have barely noticed. The high-level focus on the quarrel between Serbia and its former province of Kosovo has left some analysts struggling to explain how the issue fits into a Trump administration foreign policy driven by crises in North Korea and Iran and defined by the slogan “America First.”Trump himself has demonstrated a personal interest in the issue, tweeting approvingly on the eve of the impeachment trial’s opening about the establishment of direct flights between the two countries:Everyone said it couldn’t be done. But for the first time in a generation, there will be direct flights between Serbia and Kosovo. Another win. Thanks to FILE – U.S. Ambassador Richard Grenell is pictured in Berlin, Germany, May 8, 2018.“The tariffs must be dropped. That is unacceptable, and I also bring the same request here, which is the de-recognition campaign must stop,” he said in Belgrade, after a meeting Friday with Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic. “What we’ll do is continue moving in this direction of concentrating on the economy, concentrating on growing jobs.” Neither the White House nor State Department responded to requests for comment on the thinking behind the high-level engagement. Ripe for resolutionAnalysts contacted by VOA see little strategic value for the United States in throwing so much diplomatic muscle at the issue. But they suggest the problem is ripe for a resolution and could provide the administration with an easy foreign policy success. “So far as I can tell, the administration is beating the bushes for a success somewhere in the world. There is no real strategic interest,” said Daniel Serwer of Johns Hopkins University in an email exchange with VOA’s Albanian service. Damon Wilson, a vice president at the Atlantic Council, a global affairs research group in Washington, offered VOA’s Serbian service a similar analysis, noting the frustrating lack of progress on some of the administration’s biggest foreign policy concerns, including Iran and North Korea. “You don’t get easy wins in the Western Balkans, either, and yet in the Western Balkans we are dealing with democratic states that want to be part of the strategic West, that have a shared vision of the future of the region as a prosperous part of Europe,” he said. “This gives us something to work with, and while it might look hard, it actually looks relatively easy when you compare it to Iran, North Korea, Venezuela.” FILE – People protest after Kosovo’s decision to raise tariffs on Serbian and Bosnian goods, in the village of Rudare near Mitrovica, Kosovo, Nov. 23, 2018.Wilson added that the issue gives the United States a chance to show that “we are going to be engaged, we are not leaving a vacuum in the Western Balkans, we’ve got a role to play, we want to play that role and we are going to do it.” James Hooper, a former U.S. diplomat and executive director of the Washington-based Balkan Action Council, said a breakthrough on the issue would allow Trump to show he is not distracted by the impeachment drama and give him an achievement to highlight as he seeks re-election in November. But Wilson warned against attaching too much significance to the initiative as an election boon, saying, “It’s not exactly a vote-getter out there in Iowa,” where Republicans and Democrats will cast the first votes to select their presidential candidates early next month. Chance for progressRegardless of the motive, Hooper sees an opportunity to make real progress on a dispute that has held back progress in both countries. “This is a real opportunity because Washington is paying attention and Grenell is a serious person and he has a lot of influence in the White House,” he said. Alon Ben-Meir, a professor at New York University, said both Kosovo and Serbia would be wise to take advantage of that opportunity. “They are neighbors. They have to deal with one another. There is interdispersement of population. Many Serbs live in Kosovo. It is time for them to recognize certain facts on the ground that they cannot change,” he said. So far, however, there is little indication they will do so. Serbia immediately rejected Grenell’s proposals while Pristina has yet to deliver a clear response. “I don’t accept to draw an equality mark between the tariffs and the revoking of the campaign against recognition,” said Vucic, the Serbian president.  “America and Pristina … want Kosovo’s independence recognized. We do not. So it is logical that we have differing positions.” Ivana Konstantinovic from VOA’s Serbian service contributed to this report. 
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Turkey’s emergency management agency says an earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 6.8 has shaken the country’s east.The earthquake struck Friday at 1755 GMT, 8:55 p.m. local time, near the town of Sivrice in eastern Elazig province, the Disaster and Emergency Management Presidency said. Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu said there were no reports deaths in Sivrice or other affected areas. However, 4-5 buildings collapsed in Sivrice, where two people were hurt, he said. Soylu was at a meeting on earthquake preparedness when the quake struck.
Defense Minister Hulusi Akar told reporters that there were no reports of any casualties in Sivrice but said the quake may have caused casualties in rural areas outside the town. He said troops were on standby to help is they are needed.
The Kandilli seismology center in Istanbul said the quake measured 6.5.
The U.S. Geological Survey gave the preliminary magnitude as 6.7, with the quake affecting not only Turkey but also Syria, Georgia and Armenia.
Turkish media said the earthquake sent people running outdoors for safety. 
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From the roadside stand where his family sells mole, barbecue and chicken stew, Miguel Ángel Vázquez has seen all the caravans of Central American migrants and asylum seekers stream past his front door in recent years, throngs of people driven to flee poverty and violence in hopes of a better life in the United States.After watching armored National Guard troops and immigration agents break up the latest one right on his doorstep, loading men, women and wailing children onto buses and hauling them off to a detention center in the nearby city of Tapachula, he’s sure of one thing.Mexican National Guards block a highway in Ciudad Hidalgo, Mexico after a group of Central American migrants crossed the nearby border from Guatemala to Mexico, Jan. 23, 2020.“I can see that these caravans are no longer going to pass,” said Vásquez, 56.On Friday morning, life was back to normal at the river border between Ciudad Hidalgo and Tecun Uman, Guatemala.Carmelino Sánchez Cumes, 54, left his home in Champerico Guatemala at 4 a.m. to come buy medicine for two elderly aunts that’s not available back home.The partial closure of river crossings “was tough” on people accustomed to doing so as part of daily life, he said.The international bridge reopened at 5 a.m. and cars and motorcycles were crossing freely.National guard troops stood watch in groups of about a half dozen, visibly fewer than before, and said privately that the tension of recent days had vanished.One said it’s easy to distinguish local Guatemalans who cross for ordinary workaday reasons for their manner of speaking, and they’re welcome “because they’re neighbors.”Where the first caravans were allowed to pass through Mexican territory and even given humanitarian aid or transportation by many communities and some officials, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s administration changed that beginning last year in response to steep trade tariffs threatened by Washington.The result was on display Thursday on a rural highway in the far-southern Mexican city of Frontera Hidalgo, just across the river border between Mexico and Guatemala that the hundreds of migrants, mostly Hondurans, crossed before dawn.The migrants walked for hours before stopping at the crossroads where Vázquez’s stand lies, taking advantage of the copious shade on a road otherwise largely exposed to the beating tropical sun. They bought all the food the family and refreshments the family had and behaved respectfully, according to Karen Daniela Vázquez Robledo, his daughter.Then hundreds of national guard troops advanced their lines to within 100 yards (meters) of the migrants. A brief negotiation stalled, and the migrants knelt to the ground in prayer and began to chant “we want to pass.”National guardsmen advanced banging their plastic shields with batons and engaged the migrants. There was shoving and pepper spray as migrants were rounded up.Many of the people allowed themselves to be escorted to the buses without resistance. Women cradling small children or holding kids’ hands wept as they walked toward the buses. In all, 800 migrants were detained, according to a statement from Mexico’s National Immigration Institute.Others resisted and were subdued. One man dragged by three guardsmen and a migration agent shouted “they killed my brother, I don’t want to die,” presumably in reference to the possibility of being returned to his country.A paramedic attended to an injured woman lying on the highway shoulder.The road was left littered with water bottles, plastic bags and clothing. An irate man in a blue shirt yelled at the agents “this is a war against the Hondurans.”On Friday, López Obrador said he had been briefed about the operation and commended military commanders for not resorting to force, without explaining what he considered to be force.“I have information that the National Guard has acted well,” said López Obrador, who said he was briefed by Foreign Affairs Secretary Marcelo Ebrard. “He told us there had not been injured, had not been wounded, that the problem has been resolved well.”López Obrador went on, as he has before, to describe the migrants as being “tricked” by unscrupulous organizers in Honduras who lead them to believe they will pass without problems. He added that his political adversaries, “the conservatives,” had hoped it would go badly for the Mexican government.“Clearly there is a need,” López Obrador said. “But there’s a management, we’ll say political. Fortunately, human rights have been respected.”Thursday’s confrontation was a sudden climax after the day had seemed to be winding down.Central American migrants cross the Suchiate River from Tecun Uman, Guatemala, to Mexico, Jan. 23, 2020.The migrant caravan had been diminishing since its last concerted attempt to cross the border Monday was turned back by Mexican National Guardsmen posted along the Suchiate River, which forms the border here.The national guardsmen intercepted the caravan on the edge of the community of Frontera Hidalgo, near Ciudad Hidalgo where the migrants crossed the river at dawn.In previous caravans, Mexican authorities have allowed caravans to walk for awhile, seemingly to tire them out, and then closed their path.Mexico and Guatemala have returned hundreds of migrants from the caravan to their home countries since the caravan set out last week, mostly to Honduras.Back at the roadside food stall in the southern state of Chiapas, Karen Vázquez, 26, was dismayed by what she saw unfold — the pepper spray, children running and crying.“It was something very unpleasant, seeing how the people are taken away, and us hiding as well so they don’t take us away,” she said. “It makes us sad because they don’t take them in the right way. In truth, they take them very badly.”
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The European Union’s top diplomat said Friday that more time is required to unravel a dispute between countries involved in the Iran nuclear agreement, as the Europeans struggle to keep alive a deal hampered by U.S. sanctions.On Jan. 15, Britain, France and Germany reluctantly triggered the accord’s dispute resolution mechanism to force Iran into discussions on possible violations of the deal. That started a process that could result in the resumption of U.N. and EU sanctions on Iran if no solution is found.But EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell, who is coordinating the effort to resolve the standoff, said the three European powers involved in the 2015 deal limiting Iran’s nuclear ambitions in exchange for economic incentives agree “that more time is needed due to the complexity of the issues involved.”“The timeline is therefore extended,” Borrell said in a statement. The dispute mechanism provides for a period of about one month, which can be prolonged if all parties agree, to resolve any disagreement. But Borrell has declined to confirm that the one-month clock has actually started ticking.Borrell also underlined that during his consultations in recent days all parties that continue to adhere to the deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA, “reconfirmed their determination to preserve the agreement which is in the interest of all.”The accord, which Iran signed with the U.S., Britain, Germany, France, China and Russia, has been unraveling since President Donald Trump pulled Washington out in 2018 and reinstated sanctions designed to cripple the Islamic Republic under what the U.S. called a “maximum pressure” campaign.Borrell said the so-called joint commission on the deal will meet again in February , without providing a precise date. He noted that beyond the dispute over Iran’s alleged violations, participants are also trying to address “the wider impacts of the withdrawal of the United States from the JCPOA and its re-imposition of sanctions.”Iran announced early this month what it said was its fifth and final step in violating the deal, saying it would no longer abide by any limitation to its enrichment activities following the U.S. drone strike that killed Revolutionary Guard Gen. Qassem Soleimani.But the International Atomic Energy Agency, which officially monitors whether Tehran is respecting the deal, has not signaled any new violations since then.
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Authorities in Spain say the death toll from a storm that devastated the eastern part of the country this week has risen to at least 12 with rescuers searching for several missing persons.
    
Emergencies services for the northeastern Catalonia region said late Thursday that a fourth death caused by storm Gloria in the region had been confirmed. That took the national count to at least 12.
    
Rescuers were still searching Friday for three missing people in the Balearic Islands and for a fishing boat with six on board that has gone missing off Spain’s southern coast.
    
A British man and a Spaniard are feared to have been swept away by high waves on the island of Ibiza, authorities said. Another Spaniard is missing on the nearby island of Mallorca.
    
Government official Lucrecio Fernandez said an overnight search by Spanish rescuers for the missing fishing boat is continuing with the assistance of a Moroccan frigate.
    
The storm has lasted for six days, accompanied by heavy winds, snow and hail. Weather authorities said the worst of it had passed on Wednesday, although some areas of southern Spain are under a weather warning for rain and winds.
    
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez is meeting with his Cabinet on Friday to discuss aid for the hardest-hit regions.
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London police say they will start using live facial recognition cameras in operational deployments, in a major advance for the controversial technology.The Metropolitan Police Service said Friday it will use the cameras to automatically scan the faces of people passing through small targeted areas where intelligence suggests serious offenders will be found.Real-time crowd surveillance by police in the British capital is among the more aggressive uses of facial recognition in modern democracies and raises questions about how the technology will enter people’s daily lives. Rights groups said the London police deployment threatens civil liberties such as the right to privacy and represents an expansion of surveillance.London police said the facial recognition system, which runs on technology from Japan’s NEC, looks for faces in crowds to see if they match any on “watchlists” of people wanted for serious and violent offences, including gun and knife crimes and child sexual exploitation.
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The Spanish government is holding an emergency meeting Friday after an unusual winter storm caused death and destruction on its Mediterranean coast. The death toll in Spain rose to 11 on Thursday, the fifth day of the storm, which has also caused floods in southern France. VOA Zlatica Hoke reports.
 
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For the past 20 years, young people in Venezuela have been on the front lines of protests to demand change in the socialist-run country.  But many university students interviewed by VOA in Caracas say they are disillusioned by the lack of change and have stopped taking part in protests because of government repression and fears for their safety.  From Caracas, reporter Adriana Nunez Rabascall has the story, narrated by Cristina Caicedo Smit. 
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A violent storm on the eastern and southern coasts of Spain has killed at least 10 people after causing severe infrastructural damage.According to weather authorities, the storm named Gloria has lasted for five days, accompanied by heavy winds, snow and hail, which has drowned people and caused them to be hit with loose debris.The storm also has caused power outages in more than 10,000 homes and the destruction of bridges, railway lines, and entire beaches. Due to the possibility of severe damage to river banks, 600 residents were evacuated Wednesday from their homes in northeastern Spain.In order to prepare for the upcoming tourist season, Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said he will address both short- and medium-term needs of the damaged areas in an emergency meeting on Friday.The prime minister said climate change may have had an impact. “Public administrations have to reflect on how to shift gears and focus our economic resources and public policies … on a new element, and that is climate change,” said Sanchez.The storm is continuing to spread across Spain, France and Portugal.    
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Haiti should set a date for elections, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Thursday, more than a week after Haiti’s president began ruling by decree. Pompeo did not specify which elections he was referring to, but Haiti failed to hold scheduled legislative elections last year. “We need to have the elections. That is important,” Pompeo said in an interview with the Miami Herald and El Nuevo Herald. “Once those elections will be held, there’ll be a duly elected government. We won’t have to be concerned about ruling by decree.” The U.S. State Department provided a transcript of Pompeo’s interview with the newspapers. Pompeo said he voiced concerns about the political situation with his Haitian counterpart in a meeting in Kingston, Jamaica, on Wednesday. The Haitian Embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Moise rules directlyHaitian President Jovenel Moise is three years into a five-year term, which began in 2017 after the results of an initial vote, in October 2015, were scrapped over fraud allegations. Moise’s support in the country has never been overwhelming. Electoral turnout for the rerun election was low, with Moise receiving only 600,000 votes in a country of 10 million people. FILE – Anti-corruption protesters fill the streets of Port-au-Prince, Haiti, June 9, 2019.Last year, the country was mired in anti-corruption protests for months, with the opposition calling for Moise to step down. Nevertheless, Moise has outlived his political opposition for now. The mandate of all deputies and most senators expired earlier in January and there were no successors as parliament failed to approve an electoral law last year necessary for holding legislative elections. In this situation, under Haitian law, the president rules directly. Accusations tradedMoise has blamed parliament for failing to approve the electoral law last year, though his opponents have accused him of trying to take advantage of the law. The last two elected Haitian presidents, Rene Preval and Moise’s political benefactor, Michel Martelly, both ruled by decree at some points. Moise has said he wanted to overhaul the constitution. Though the precise changes he is seeking are not clear, the process would be aimed at strengthening the presidency, which was weakened after the 30-year Duvalier family dictatorship. 
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After weeks of crippling transportation strikes, France’s government will formally unveil controversial pension reform legislation Friday, which will test its ability to overcome powerful union dissent and overhaul an indebted retirement system that is one of Europe’s most generous. The pension reforms arguably are the most central and problematic of President Emmanuel Macron’s broader campaign promises to make the country more economically sustainable and business friendly. But it remains unclear whether he will succeed where previous governments have failed — and angry voters may sanction the 42-year-old leader and his young Republic on the Move party in upcoming elections.   “The government thought it would have the reforms without a problem. That’s not what happened,” said Jean Grosset, director of the Observatory of Social Dialogue at Paris, the research group at the Jean Jaures Foundation. He predicts the government’s success in pushing through meaningful reforms will come at a cost. ‘Beginning of the end’But sociologist Guy Groux said the government had emerged as the clear winner in a standoff that ultimately split unions and mobilized only a small fraction of the workforce.   “I think this is the beginning of the end” of the strikes, Groux said, adding the government “has come out very well” despite some concessions. Hardline syndicates plan to counter the draft bill with a “black Friday” marked by massive street protests and metro shutdowns, echoing some of the worst days of a transportation strike that began in early December and is the longest in the country’s history.   “Friday is the day or never,” said Philippe Martinez, head of the hardline General Confederation of Labor, or CGT union, which wants the legislation scrapped. This graffiti in a French suburb calls on President Emmanuel Macron to resign. (Lisa Bryant/VOA)Petering out? This week has seen highway, port and plant blockages, but the broader protest movement appears to be petering out. Public transportation was mostly back to normal Monday. And while polls show most French still oppose Macron’s pension reforms, the numbers of those backing continued strike action are dwindling.   “I think this country needs the reform,” said salesman Pierre Maerten, whose chocolate shop has lost significant business because of the strikes. “People are getting older, life expectancy is longer. Pension reforms are absolutely necessary.” Still, the pension protests add to months of separate yellow vest demonstrations that have together cost the economy billions and laid bare intense, if disparate, sentiments of anger and injustice. Lawyers are worried about paying more into a broader public pension pot; dancers and opera singers passionately defend their special retirement scheme that dates to the 17th century.   Workers ‘created this wealth’“We’re not spoiled. We workers are the ones who created this wealth,” said Makan Dambele, 52, an airline mechanic and CGT unionist. “We want to benefit from the fruits of our labor.” The government already has made some key concessions to its plan to reconcile myriad separate pension plans into a single, point-based system. For now, it has retreated from earlier goals to increase the retirement age to receive full benefits from 62 to 64 — still among the lowest in Europe. It hopes Parliament will pass final legislation by summer.   “I don’t think the government has won,” said Grosset, of the Jean Jaures Foundation. “It communicated badly. It didn’t respond to workers’ legitimate questions. It needed big protests to change its positions.” Grosset predicts the government could see worker anger spill into March municipal elections and possibly 2022 presidential ones. Far-right leader Marine Le Pen already has announced a new run for president, setting the stage for another possible runoff against Macron. The two politicians are currently neck and neck in the polls. But sociologist Groux believes Macron would have lost key center-right votes had he not pushed through the reforms.    “If Macron backtracks in the faceoff with the unions, then he’ll lose these voters and he’ll be outdistanced by Le Pen,” he said. French union members gather at a recent pension strike. The sign reads, “The force of French workers is striking.” (Lisa Bryant/VOA)Unions spotlighted While the pension strikes have translated into a major headache for many commuters, they are far from the national gridlock of two decades ago. The 1995 protests paralyzed transportation and forced the then-conservative government to backtrack on reforms, handing unions a significant victory. But today, union power is diminished and unity is splintering. Two moderate syndicates, including France’s largest, CFDT, are in compromise talks with Macron’s government and support key parts of the reform package. Hardliners, starting with the CGT, are staging sabotage and wildcat actions, insisting on nothing less than full repeal. Forecasts for protestsStill, they are making headlines in ways they never did over months of yellow vest protests, which largely sidelined them. Grosset believes French syndicates will continue to be relevant going forward, although they need to modernize.   “At their height, the yellow vests mobilized 240,000 people,” he said. “Once the unions mobilize in a big way, they get 1 [million], 2 million people out.” Sociologist Groux is less certain. The unions failed to get many private sector employees behind the pension protests, he said, and ultimately mobilized only a small fraction of France’s overall workforce.   “The mobilization was very weak,” he said, adding, “Some union leaders believe their base and the workers haven’t changed since the 1960s. We’re a long way from there.” 
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The partnership between Russia’s Vladimir Putin and Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has taken the West by surprise. The two leaders met no less than six times in 2019, underscoring the close relationship they’ve established, one that seems at times built on a mutual interest in riling Turkey’s NATO partners.And this year they already have met twice, with the latest encounter in Berlin at an international conference aimed at resolving the seemingly intractable conflict in Libya, which for centuries was part of the Ottoman Empire, and has been plagued by war and instability since the ouster of autocrat Moammar Gadhafi in 2011.They’ve collaborated, too, on Syria, despite backing opposing sides in the long-running conflict and where, as in Libya, they have positioned themselves as twin arbiters. But is this just a marriage of convenience, a partnership that’s bound eventually to unravel because of conflicting geopolitical ambitions and the difficulty they face controlling their clients, who are not always pliant?German Chancellor Angela Merkel, rear center, leads a conference on Libya at the chancellery in Berlin, Germany, Sunday, Jan. 19, 2020. (Kay Nietfeld/DPA via AP, Pool)The Berlin conference this week on Libya, which has turned partly into a proxy war featuring foreign drones, Turkish troops and Russian mercenaries, and its unfolding aftermath, hint at the challenges the two leaders face in reining in their clients. They’re trying at the same time to balance their own conflicting regional ambitions to maintain their partnership, according to analysts.Turkey has been supporting Libya’s U.N.-recognized government, led by Fayez Serraj, which has been struggling to withstand a months-long assault on the capital, Tripoli, by rebel commander Khalifa Haftar, who among others is backed by Russia. Both Russia and Turkey have much invested in Libya — Russia in terms of reputation, clout and potential oil deals, and Turkey with even more wide-ranging commercial and energy interests, say analysts.The Berlin conference, attended by Western powers, too, produced an agreement to respect the U.N. arms embargo, halt outside military interference, and to push Libya’s warring parties to observe a cease-fire.Libyan commander Khalifa Haftar meets Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis (not pictured) at the Parliament in Athens, Greece, Jan. 17, 2020.But the complex situation on the ground in Libya has only worsened since the conference — pro-Haftar militias have blockaded two large crude oil production plants in Libya, and on Thursday the Libyan capital’s only functioning airport was closed after Haftar’s spokesman threatened to shoot down planes flying over the city, dealing another setback to the peace efforts.“Any military or civilian aircraft, regardless of its affiliation, flying over the capital will be destroyed,” warned spokesman Ahmad al-Mesmari. He claimed the airport was being used for military purposes by Turkish soldiers sent by Ankara.Midweek, the airport came under a barrage of rockets. Press reports also suggest that foreign backers have continued to send weapons to Haftar, suggesting no one has the intention of backing down. Either Russia has been unable to rein Haftar in or has not wanted to him to observe the cease-fire, experts say.Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad speaks during a meeting with heads of local councils, in Damascus, Syria, Feb. 17, 2019.Unruly clients also are a problem for Russia in Syria, where Moscow is challenged by growing Iranian influence and is struggling to dissuade President Bashar al-Assad from launching an assault on the remaining major opposition stronghold in the country in the northwestern province of Idlib, according to Russian analysts Kirill Semenov and Dmitriy Frolovskiy.They note in a commentary for the Middle East Institute, a think tank, that Assad has vowed to “liberate every inch of Syria from foreign troops” and is eager to regain control of Idlib, a move that would endanger the neighboring Turkish enclave in northern Syria and damage Turkish-Russian diplomatic relations. Such a move would upend the efforts by Moscow and Ankara to try to forge a post-war future for Syria that works for both the Turks and Russians, and balances out their interests and influence.”Putin’s recent unexpected visit to Damascus may well have been to personally inform Assad about the necessity of maintaining the cease-fire in Idlib,” one which was agreed upon by Moscow and Ankara, they say.Military vehicles and equipment, parts of the S-400 air defense systems, are unloaded from a Russian transport aircraft, at Murted military airport in Ankara, Turkey, July 12, 2019.So far, Russia and Turkey have been able to compartmentalize flash-points and disagreements that threaten their partnership and have managed to maintain a rapprochement that started after a Turkish Air Force jet shot down a Russian warplane near the Syria–Turkey border in 2015. Turkey’s purchase of a Russian-made S-400 anti-aircraft missile system and cooperation on energy projects is testimony to the partnership.But some analysts say the relationship is weighted with geopolitical conflicts that risk undermining it. “The Turks have been gravitating to the Russians, even as their vision of Syria directly conflicts with that of Putin,” says Jonathan Schanzer of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, a Washington-based think tank.“This could be their greatest divergence. But there are others. They are uneasy about Iran’s growing role in the region, which Putin generally backs — so long as it irks the U.S. They hate the Sissi regime in Egypt, which Putin courts. They are at odds with the Israelis, with whom Putin has a solid, working relationship,” he says.Overall, he says the partnership risks collapse because of the grandness of the geopolitical ambitions of the two key players, Putin and Erdoğan, whose long-term aims for their countries are at cross-purposes.Schanzer points to the grandiose Ottoman vision being outlined by one of Erdoğan’s top advisers, retired general Adnan Tanrıverdi, who says Turkey can emerge as an Islamic superpower, wielding authority over 61 Muslim countries with Istanbul as the capital of a new caliphate.“I see a collision course here,” Schanzer says.
 
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The United States, the European Union and what will soon be post-Brexit Britain have all raised the prospect of concluding trade deals between themselves by the end of this year, setting up an intense few months of negotiations.
High-level representatives said Thursday at the World Economic Forum in the Swiss resort of Davos that it’s possible that those discussions, operating in parallel, could be wrapped up by the end of the year.
That would be some achievement given that most trade deals take years as they get bogged down in minutiae of rules and regulations.
“Never rule out a miracle, of course, but let’s just see how these good intentions roll down the snowy hills of Davos as reality sinks in next week,” analysts at Rabobank International said in a note to investors.
Britain could be a focal point. It leaves the EU on Jan. 31 and will then open parallel trade discussions with both the U.S. and the EU. And the U.S. and the EU have just started their own discussions as President Donald Trump turns his focus away from China following the conclusion of a first round of trade talks with Beijing.
Members of Trump’s Cabinet talked up the prospects of a swift trade deal with Britain and argued that it should be relatively straightforward given how similar the two economies are.
At a press briefing, U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said he’s heading to London this weekend to meet with his counterpart, Sajid Javid, particularly about trade.
“It’s an absolute priority of President Trump and we expect to complete that within this year,” Mnuchin said.
 
Though Javid has said that negotiating a trade deal with the EU will be his “top priority,” discussions with the U.S. will take place at the same time.
Mnuchin said that was “obviously an aggressive timeline.”
U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said a trade deal between the U.S. and Britain shouldn’t be too difficult as the two economies have more in common than they do with the EU.
“Both are very heavily services-oriented and within services, such as financial services there’s already a pretty high degree of integration and coordination, so it should be much easier mechanically,” he said.
Ross also sought to dampen concerns raised in Britain that a future trade deal would mean higher drug prices as U.S. pharmaceutical companies look to gain concessions from Britain’s state-run National Health Service.
“What we think is that drugs should have similar prices wherever they are but I don’t believe we are in any position to tell the U.K. what they should pay for drugs,” he said.
Though the U.S. is hugely important, Britain conducts far more business with the other 27 countries of the EU — that’s why so many businesses want economic relations to be as close as possible.Paolo Gentiloni, the former Italian prime minister who is now the EU’s main economy commissioner, said he welcomes the clarity over Brexit following last month’s convincing election win by Boris Johnson’s Conservative Party.
“Eleven months for a free trade agreement is really very short if we look at other free trade agreements, but the EU is ready to do all in our power to have the best possible relation with the U.K.,” he said. “It’s not easy in 11 months but I think it is still possible.”
How quickly a deal can be reached will depend on what Britain is looking for. Javid has insisted Britain will not stick to EU rules and regulations, which could make a deal harder.
“As we leave there’s bound to be change but we have also been clear that there’s no point in leaving the EU but sticking with all its rules and regulations forever,” he said.
Given that stance, expectations are slim for anything more than a bare-bones trade agreement.
 
“Hopefully we can minimize the disruption as much as possible,” said Roberto Gualtieri, Italy’s new finance minister.
The final piece of the trade jigsaw relates to the U.S. and the EU, and discussions have begun as Trump turns his gaze to what he considers to be the unfair treatment of American businesses by Brussels.
Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission’s new president, said a deal could be secured “within weeks,” an aspiration that took many close observers by surprise and wasn’t wholly shared by U.S. officials.
She didn’t lay out the scope of any such agreement but she appeared intent on avoiding any tariffs on European carmakers, which Trump has threatened repeatedly in recent days.
Mnuchin said the purpose of tariffs, and the threat of tariffs, “is to get free, fair and reciprocal trade.”
On Wednesday, France agreed to delay its tax on big tech firms like Google and Facebook in exchange for a U.S. promise to hold off its retaliatory tariffs on French cheese and wine. Discussions on an international approach to digital taxes will now take place under the auspices of the Paris-based Organization or Economic Co-operation and Development.
French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire said the agreement was a big win for France’s “aggressive” approach.
 “If France would not have been the first European country to introduce a national digital taxation, there would not be any discussion at the OECD level anymore,” he said Thursday.
“It would have been buried, to be very clear. So we can be tough. We can be offensive.”
The approach seems to be setting the tone for what are likely to be complicated discussions 
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The complex extradition case designed to determine whether WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange will be sent to the U.S. to face espionage charges will take longer than expected.
    
District Judge Vanessa Baraitser agreed on Thursday to add a three-week session in May in addition to the five-day hearing already set for Feb. 24.
    
The judge said she was “unlikely to look favorably” on any further requests for delays in the long-awaited confrontation between Assange and U.S. officials.
    
Assange is being held at Belmarsh Prison in east London while he waits for the hearing. The U.S. has charged him with espionage related to WikiLeaks’ hacking of hundreds of thousands of confidential government documents.
    
Assange, 48, did not attend the court session in person but briefly confirmed his name and date of birth via videolink.
    
He claims he is a journalist whose publishing activities have First Amendment protection.
    
Both sides agreed the extra session in May was necessary because of the many legal issues.
    
Clair Dobbin, representing the U.S. government, said she needed more time to respond to evidence recently submitted by the WikiLeaks team.
    
Edward Fitzgerald, Assange’s lawyer, said his team has had trouble getting adequate access to Assange at the high security prison.
    “We simply cannot get in as we require to see Mr. Assange and to take his instruction,” he said.
    
Assange’s supporters gathered inside and outside Westminster Magistrates Court to lobby for his release. His cause has been embraced by many press freedom groups.
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Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido on Thursday issued an emotional plea to political and business leaders at Davos, saying he needed their international help as he could not achieve change alone.Guaido is recognized as Venezuela’s interim president by the United States and 50 other countries but has so far failed to shift President Nicolas Maduro from power despite months of struggle and ongoing economic crisis.”We are facing an international criminal conglomerate and we need your help,” he told the World Economic Forum (WEF), adding that Venezuela was experiencing an “unprecedented tragedy.””Alone, we are not going to get there,” he added.Guaido has defied a travel ban issued by Maduro’s administration to go on an international charm offensive aimed at ensuring continued diplomatic support for his bid to oust Maduro.The parliament speaker first headed to his chief ally and arch Maduro foe Colombia, then Britain and EU headquarters in Brussels, before traveling to Davos.It was in Davos last year that several heads of state recognized Guaido as interim Venezuela president. But despite presiding over the economic collapse of his oil rich nation, Maduro is still in charge, defying a growing list of U.S. and EU sanctions. 
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Nine parents who were deported as the Trump administration separated thousands of migrant families landed back into the U.S. late Wednesday to reunite with children they had not seen in a year and a half.The group arrived at Los Angeles International Airport from Guatemala City in a trip arranged under the order of a federal judge who found the U.S. government had unlawfully prevented them from seeking asylum. An asylum advocate confirmed the nine parents were all aboard the flight.Some of the children were at the airport to greet them, including David Xol’s 9-year-old son Byron.David fell to one knee and tearfully embraced Byron for about three minutes, patting the back of his son’s head.“He was small,” David said after rising to his feet. He looked at his attorney — who accompanied him on the flight — raised his hand about chest-high and said, “He grew a lot.”David, Byron and his attorney, Ricardo de Anda, then embraced in a three-way hug and exchanged words in their huddle. Byron was all smiles. Father, son, attorney and family sponsor eagerly left the airport for their hotel.The reunion was a powerful reminder of the lasting effects of Trump’s separation policy, even as attention and outrage has faded amid impeachment proceedings and tensions with Iran. But it also underscored that hundreds, potentially thousands, of other parents and children are still apart nearly two years after the zero-tolerance policy on unauthorized border crossings took effect.“They all kind of hit the lottery,” said Linda Grimm, an attorney who represents one of the parents returning to the U.S. “There are so many people out there who have been traumatized by the family separation policy whose pain is not going to be redressed.”More than 4,000 children are known to have been separated from their parents before and during the official start of zero tolerance in spring 2018. Under the policy, border agents charged parents en masse with illegally crossing the U.S.-Mexico border, then placed their children in government facilities, including some “tender-age shelters” set up for infants.The U.S. has acknowledged that agents separated families long before they enforced zero tolerance across the entire southern border, its agencies did not properly record separations, and some detention centers were overcrowded and undersupplied, with families denied food, water or medical care.In June 2018, U.S. District Judge Dana Sabraw ordered the government to stop separating families and reunite parents and children.At least 470 parents were deported without their children. Some of the kids were held in U.S. government facilities and ultimately placed with sponsors. Others were deported to their home countries.Accounts emerged of many parents being told to sign paperwork they couldn’t read or understand or being denied a chance to request asylum in ways that violated federal law.The U.S. Department of Homeland Security referred a request for comment to the Justice Department, which did not respond.The American Civil Liberties Union, which brought the original family separation lawsuit before Sabraw, asked the judge to order the return of a small group of parents whose children remained in the U.S. In September, Sabraw required the U.S. to allow 11 parents to come back and denied relief to seven others.ACLU attorney Lee Gelernt said Sabraw made clear he would only order the return of people “who were misled or coerced into giving up their asylum rights.” That will leave other parents who fled violence, poverty and persecution to decide whether to have their children return to their home countries or remain in the U.S. without them.“Many are going to make the decision that generations of immigrant parents have made — to leave their child in the U.S. and endure the hardship of separation, but to do it for their child’s own safety,” Gelernt said.Xol said that after he and his then-7-year-old son, Byron, crossed the border, they were taken to a U.S. Border Patrol processing center in South Texas. Xol was charged with illegal entry on May 19, 2018.Two days later, Xol said an officer told him to sign a document that would allow him and Byron to be deported together. If he didn’t sign, Byron would be given up for adoption and Xol would be detained for at least two years.Xol signed the document, only to have Byron taken away and then get deported to Guatemala. Byron was placed in government facilities for 11 months.The family’s attorney, Ricardo de Anda, persuaded a federal court to force the U.S. to let a Texas family take in Byron. Since May 2019, Byron has lived with Holly and Matthew Sewell and their two children, with regular video calls to his family.Holly Sewell brought Byron, now 9, to meet his father at the airport. They planned to go back to Texas to pack and prepare for Byron to move in with his father once Xol is settled in California. Before the reunion, Byron kept asking Sewell, his caretaker, when his father would clear immigration authorities.“They’re almost here, you’re doing great,” she said. “Count to 1,000.”“999,” Byron responded.She said she was thrilled Byron could see his dad again but sharply criticized the U.S. government’s treatment of asylum-seekers.Esvin Fernando Arredondo was expected to be on the plane. The father from Guatemala was separated from one of his daughters, Andrea Arredondo — then 12 years old and now 13, after they turned themselves in on May 16, 2018, at a Texas crossing and sought asylum legally, according to Grimm, his lawyer. He failed an initial screening and agreed to go back to Guatemala.According to Sabraw’s ruling, the government deported Arredondo even after the judge had ordered families reunited and subsequently prohibited U.S. officials from removing any parent separated from their child. He’s now being given a second chance at asylum under the court order.Andrea was separated from all family for about a month, living in a shelter as the government struggled to connect children with their parents because they lacked adequate tracking systems. She was finally reunited with her mother, who had turned herself in at the Texas crossing with the other two daughters four days earlier than her husband, on May 12, 2018.She and her two daughters passed the initial screening interview for asylum, unlike her husband, even though they were fleeing for the same reason. Their son Marco, 17, was shot and killed by suspected gang members in Guatemala City.Arredondo’s wife, Cleivi Jerez, 41, arrived at LAX less than an hour before the flight landed with their three daughters in tow, ages 17, 13 and 7.“Lots of nerves, last night I couldn’t sleep,” she said in Spanish in an interview after the flight landed.Jerez said she planned to stay up late catching up with her husband. She planned to rest at their Los Angeles home tomorrow as well, catching up on their 17 months apart before he has to report to an ICE office Friday in San Diego. Alison Arredondo, 7, said she missed going to the park with her father and she wanted to go to one with him in LA.While the U.S. has stopped the large-scale separations, it has implemented policies to prevent many asylum-seekers from entering the country. Under its “Remain in Mexico” policy, more than 50,000 people have been told to wait there for weeks or months for U.S. court dates. The Trump administration also is ramping up deportations of Central Americans to other countries in the region to seek asylum there.“People want to make this a heartwarming story, but it’s not. It’s devastating,” Sewell said. “There is just no good reason why we had to do this to this child and this family. And he symbolizes thousands of others who have been put in this exact same position.”
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The primary impacts of climate change are obvious, from the unprecedented fires in Australia to the melting ice caps in the Arctic. However more observers are starting to consider secondary impacts, and none is less obvious perhaps than the credit worthiness of governments, which is analyzed in a new report from Moody’s, a ratings company.A diverse mix of nations including Vietnam, Suriname, Egypt, and the Bahamas are most vulnerable to a rise in sea levels, according to the report released last week. It said rising seas may cause “lost income, damage to assets, loss of life, health issues, and forced migration,” which could hurt governments’ sovereign ratings.The report was released ahead of this week’s Davos forum, an annual meeting of world business and government officials to discuss the world’s problems. Past themes at Davos include populism and globalization. The theme is climate change at this year’s Alpine forum, where climate activist Greta Thunberg and U.S. President Donald Trump have clashed on the issue’s impact on business. The irony is not lost on observers that officials are getting to the forum by air travel, a key source of climate-changing emissions, in order to discuss climate change. Not often represented at the forum are the vulnerable nations named in the Moody’s report.“Vulnerability to extreme events related to sea level rise can also undermine investment and heighten susceptibility to event risk, by hindering the ability of governments to borrow to rebuild, increasing losses for banks, raising external pressures, and/or amplifying political risk as populations come under stress,” said Anushka Shah, Moody’s vice president and senior analyst, in the report. “While one isolated shock related to sea level rise is unlikely to materially weaken a sovereign’s credit profile, repeated shocks could do.”Her report, with contributions from Caleb Coppersmith and Natasha Brereton-Fukui, explained the link between climate and credit.Major cities that could be submerged amid rising seas include Amsterdam, according to Moody’s.Credit scoreGovernments, like individuals and businesses, have credit scores that affect how much interest they pay to borrow. “Shocks” may come along because of rising seas, such as floods, storm surges, cyclones, and erosion. Governments have to spend money to recover from disasters and build infrastructure, while at the same time losing tax income as companies go out of business or individuals can’t work. With more money going out and less money coming in, governments risk a hit to their credit ratings.The nations highlighted in the report, along with Bahrain, Benin, the Cayman Islands, Fiji, the Maldives, and others, are vulnerable because of a mix of their location by seas and economic and fiscal strength.They are vulnerable in relative terms, but other nations that are vulnerable in terms of absolute population impacts include Bangladesh, China, Indonesia, and India, the report said. It said credit risks based on climate can vary by nation. The Netherlands, for instance, is at risk of having cities submerged under water, while Japan has physical assets at risk, like buildings and cars.Residents walk down a street in Kyoto, Japan, one of the nations with the most physical assets, like buildings, at risk of climate disasters.Climate change views evolveMoody’s noted three government climate strategies are protection, accommodation, and managed retreat. That is, protection like sea walls, accommodating rising waters with higher bridges and other tools, and pushing people to retreat by living inland away from coasts.The report comes as business views on the climate are changing.Whereas emissions used to be considered a part of doing business, companies now say they can’t survive if emissions keep rising.Microsoft said last week it will spend $1 billion to remove carbon from the air, a dramatic break from past corporate efforts to simply buy carbon offsets. Around the same time BlackRock, the world’s biggest money manager, said it would divest from coal and make climate an investment priority.“A big part of the challenge is that as a society we have not committed sufficiently to reduce emissions,” Microsoft president Brad Smith said in announcing the new company policy, adding: “If we don’t curb emissions, and temperatures continue to climb, science tells us that the results will be catastrophic.”He said the company would also support government policies to reduce emissions. The Moody’s report said there’s not much governments can do about past emissions, whether to protect their credit ratings or their populations. It said past emissions have already locked in a sea level rise of 1.6 meters. However emissions reductions could keep that number from getting even higher, it said.
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Residents of three Greek islands protested Wednesday against the overcrowding of refugee camps and demanded government action to ease migrant pressure. Most stores were closed and public services were halted on the islands of Lesbos, Chios, and Samos, where some refugee camps have more than 10 times the number of people they were built for. VOA’s Zlatica Hoke reports Greek protesters want a closure of the ports of entry as well as more equal distribution of migrants throughout the country.
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EU countries can restrict or exclude high-risk 5G providers from core parts of their telecoms network infrastructure under new guidelines to be issued by the European Commission next week, people familiar with the matter said on Wednesday.
The non-binding recommendations are part of a set of measures aimed at addressing cybersecurity risks at national and bloc-wide level, in particular concerns related to world No. 1 player Huawei Technologies.
The guidelines do not identify any particular country or company, the people said.
“Stricter security measures will apply for high-risk vendors for sensitive parts of the network or the core infrastructure,” one of the people said.
EU digital economy chief Margrethe Vestager is expected to announce the recommendations on Jan. 29.Other measures include urging EU countries to audit or even issue certificates for high-risk suppliers.EU governments will also be advised to diversify their suppliers and not depend on one company and to use technical and non-technical factors to assess them.
Europe is under pressure from the United States to ban Huawei equipment on concerns that its gear could be used by China for spying. Huawei, which competes with Finland’s Nokia and Sweden’s Ericsson has denied the allegations.
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In parts of Britain, thousands of children have fallen victim to so-called “county lines,” drug networks run by gangs, with many forced to sell drugs in small towns and rural areas. Helping affected children in the $600 million illegal narcotics industry is a long and difficult process.Officials estimate that some 46,000 children are involved with gangs across Britain, and many of them are exploited through drug networks and routes termed “county lines.”The children are groomed and forced to travel across the country to sell heroin and crack cocaine, using dedicated mobile phone lines.The children exploited through the “county lines” witness a lot of violence and intimidation.Tamsin Gregory works with the St. Giles Trust, an organization that offers support to youngsters who have been affected by “county lines.”Gregory says it is common to see post-traumatic stress disorder or PTSD among the young people they work with.”It takes a lot of care and kindness, and non-judgmental support to help young people overcome those kinds of experiences,” Gregory said. “And it’s not a quick process. What we often find is that young people, they don’t stop their ‘county lines’ activity overnight. So they will reduce it over a period of time. And then eventually over maybe a period of a year or so we can help them fully accept that lifestyle and put them back in touch with things such as helping them get back into education.””County lines” have been around for a long time, but the number of people involved in selling drugs in rural areas has grown in recent years. There are currently about 2,000 operational “county lines.”Anton Noble was a gang member as a teenager. Although not personally involved in “county lines,” he witnessed it. After almost ending up in jail, he says he turned his life around.Noble founded the organization Guiding Young Minds in 2018 to warn young people in Britain about the dangers of gangs and “county lines.””This generation they’re ain’t no level, they’ll go to any level,” Noble said. “They’ll go to four-year-olds, they’ll go to six-year-olds, they’ll do anything just to move their product. It’s not a gang anymore, it’s a business. Money is the motive but obviously I educated the kids to say to them money don’t make you happy.”While its mostly vulnerable youngsters who end up being exploited, children from a variety of backgrounds are targeted. The children are victims but often end up in the criminal system for selling drugs or committing violent acts.Noble says he has seen through his work as a youth mentor that it takes time to connect with young people and change their mindset. He says the root causes of the drug epidemic must first be address.If you take a drug runner off the road, it replaces itself, it’s a business,” Noble said. “But if you take the root out, it’s gone. It won’t grow again.”The British government announced it would spend nearly $33 million to tackle drug networks, mostly through strengthening law enforcement.Critics of that approach note that austerity policies in the last decade have led to thousands of British police and social workers losing their jobs, and the closing of hundreds of youth centers across the country.British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said this month he wanted “county lines” to be stopped because “they are killing our children.” 
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The phone of Amazon billionaire and Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos was hacked after receiving a file sent from an account used by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, United Nations experts alleged Wednesday.The experts called for an “immediate investigation” by the United States and others into information they received that suggests that Bezos’ phone was hacked after receiving an MP4 video file sent from the Saudi prince’s WhatsApp account.Bezos went public about the incident after allegedly being shaken down by the National Enquirer tabloid, which he said threatened to expose a “below-the-belt” selfie he’d taken and other private messages he’d exchanged with a woman he was dating while still married at the time.A forensic report that was commissioned by Bezos and shared with the U.N. experts assessed with “medium to high confidence” that his phone was infiltrated on May 1, 2018, via the MP4 video file.Saudi critic and Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi was killed by Saudi agents inside the Saudi consulate in Turkey in October that same year. The Post was highly critical of the Saudi government after his killing.“The information we have received suggests the possible involvement of the Crown Prince in surveillance of Mr. Bezos, in an effort to influence, if not silence, The Washington Post’s reporting on Saudi Arabia,” the independent U.N. experts said.“At a time when Saudi Arabia was supposedly investigating the killing of Mr. Khashoggi, and prosecuting those it deemed responsible, it was clandestinely waging a massive online campaign against Mr. Bezos and Amazon targeting him principally as the owner of The Washington Post,” the U.N. experts said.The U.N. experts reviewed the 2019 digital forensic analysis of Bezos’ iPhone, which they said was made available to them as U.N. special rapporteurs, which are independent experts appointed by the world body.The experts said that records showed that within hours of receipt of the video from the crown prince’s account, there was “an anomalous and extreme change in phone behavior” with enormous amounts of data from the phone being transmitted over the following months.The Financial Times has seen the forensic report that was done by FTI Consulting, the private firm hired by Bezos. The newspaper said the forensic report “does not claim to have conclusive evidence,” and “could not ascertain what alleged spyware was used.”
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