Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel on Saturday named Tourism Minister Manuel Marrero Cruz as the country’s first prime minister since 1976 — a nomination quickly confirmed by the country’s parliament. Marrero, 56, has been tourism minister for 16 years, presiding over a rise in visitors and a hotel construction boom that has made tourism one of the most important sectors of the Cuban economy. Diaz-Canel cited Marrero’s experience in negotiating with foreign investors as one of his prime qualifications, according to state media. The position of prime minister was held by Fidel Castro from 1959 to 1976, when a new constitution changed his title to president and eliminated the post of prime minister. Castro and his brother Raul held the presidential post along with Cuba’s other highest positions, like Communist Party leader, until this year, when Raul Castro stepped down as president and a new constitution divided the president’s responsibilities between Castro’s successor, Miguel Diaz-Canel, and the new post of prime minister. The new constitution envisions the prime minister as responsible for the daily operations of government as head of the Council of Ministers. The prime minister has a five-year term and is nominated by the president.
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U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo denounced Russia and China on Saturday after the two countries vetoed a U.N. Security Council resolution on allowing cross-border humanitarian aid to Syria. 
 
“The Russian Federation’s and China’s veto yesterday of a Security Council resolution that allows for humanitarian aid to reach millions of Syrians is shameful,” Pompeo said in a statement. 
 
“To Russia and China, who have chosen to make a political statement by opposing this resolution, you have blood on your hands,” Pompeo said. 
 
The resolution would have extended for one year cross-border aid deliveries from Turkey and Iraq to 4 million Syrian civilians who have been victimized by the Syrian conflict that began in 2011. 
 
The vetoes raised fears that U.N.-funded aid would be prevented from entering the Idlib region and other opposition-controlled areas of Syria unless an alternative deal is reached before the current resolution expires in less than three weeks. 
 
The ongoing assault by the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and Russian bombardments have intensified in the jihadist-held Idlib region since December 16, forcing tens of thousands of people from their homes, the U.N. said. 
 
The U.N. has called for an “immediate de-escalation” in Syria and has warned of other mass displacements if the violence continues. 
 
More than 6 million people have been displaced in Syria since the war began, the world’s largest “internally displaced population,” according to the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees. 
 
The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said airstrikes by the Syrian government and Russia on Saturday killed 12 civilians and wounded dozens of others. 
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French forces killed 33 Islamic extremists in central Mali on Saturday, French President Emmanuel Macron said. 
 
He made the announcement on the second day of a three-day trip to West Africa that has been dominated by the growing threat posed by jihadist groups. 
 
Macron tweeted that he was proud of our soldiers who protect us.'' Two Malian gendarmes also were rescued in the operation, he said. 
 
In a speech to the French community living in Ivory Coast, Macron said French troops would continue fighting terrorism in the Sahel region. 
 I want to reiterate my determination to continue this fight. We suffered losses; we also have victories,he said, stressing thehuge success” of Saturday’s operation in the Mopti region of central Mali. 
 
France has about 4,500 military personnel in West and Central Africa, much of which was ruled by France during the colonial era. The operation is France’s largest overseas military mission. 
 
The French led a military operation in 2013 to dislodge Islamic extremists who had seized control of major towns in the north and implemented a harsh version of Islamic law. In the ensuing years, the militants have regrouped and pushed farther into central Mali, where Saturday morning’s operation was carried out. 
 
On Friday evening, Macron met with French military personnel stationed in Ivory Coast, which shares a long border with volatile Mali and Burkina Faso. 
 
Later Saturday, Macron was to meet with Ivorian President Alassane Ouattara in Abidjan. Both men will highlight a new training effort being launched. The International Academy to Fight Terrorism will be in charge of training in Ivory Coast some specialized forces from across Africa, Macron said Saturday. 
 
“Then we will collectively be better prepared for the fight against terrorism.” 
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In his four-hour, stage-managed year-end news conference Thursday, Russian President Vladimir Putin went out of his way to back U.S. President Donald Trump in the impeachment saga unfolding in Washington.Lambasting American Democrats for what he termed “made-up reasons” to impeach Trump, a Republican, the Russian leader accused them of nursing a grudge over losing the 2016 presidential elections.The impeachment is “just the continuation of the domestic political strife,” Putin said. “Your members of Congress should know better.”Putin added there’s little chance the Republican-controlled Senate will remove Trump from office. He disputed a key article of impeachment against the U.S. president: that Trump pressured Ukraine’s president to investigate a political rival, former U.S. Vice President Joe Biden, a Democrat who is competing for his party’s 2020 presidential nomination.”The party which lost the election, the Democratic Party, is trying to achieve results by other means, first by accusing Trump of conspiring with Russia, then it turns out there has been no conspiracy,” Putin said. “This cannot be the basis of impeachment. Now they’ve invented some kind of pressure on Ukraine.”FILE – U.S. President Donald Trump, left, and Russian President Vladimir Putin shake hands at the beginning of a their bilateral meeting at the Presidential Palace in Helsinki, Finland, July 16, 2018.Agitation of domestic US policyMoscow-based diplomats say Putin’s defense of his American counterpart had the aim of further agitating domestic politics in the United States.”He knows full well his comments, his trolling of Democrats, is adding salt to domestic U.S. political wounds,” a Western diplomat told VOA. “The main foreign-policy aim of the Kremlin is to encourage political divisions in the West.”But Putin’s praise of Trump — and the U.S. leader’s often complimentary remarks about his Russian counterpart — have not helped to improve U.S-Russian relations, widely seen as being at their lowest point since before the Cold War ended.And few analysts and diplomats believe that will change next year, despite the overlapping views the two leaders have often expressed about Europe and NATO, or Trump’s recent suggestion that Russia be readmitted to the exclusive Group of Seven industrialized countries. The group had eight members until 2014, when Russia was disinvited over the annexation of Crimea.FILE – Russian President Vladimir Putin drives a motorbike during the Babylon’s Shadow bike show camp near in Sevastopol, Crimea, Aug. 10, 2019.Both the Kremlin and the White House have repeatedly expressed a wish to improve relations, most recently during a visit earlier this month to the U.S. capital by Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.”We should have a better relationship — the United States and Russia — than we’ve had in the last few years, and we’ve been working on that,” U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told reporters in a joint news conference with his Russian counterpart.CooperationHe noted U.S. and Russian law-enforcement agencies are cooperating on an almost “daily basis” on counterterrorism and counternarcotics. He said both Moscow and Washington agree there are no military solutions to the conflicts raging in Syria or Afghanistan, although they are far apart on how they can be brought to an end.Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, right, shake hands with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, after a media availability at the State Department in Washington, Dec. 10, 2019.For his part, Lavrov said the meetings in Washington have “confirmed that it is useful to talk to each other.” He added, “Talking to each other is always better than not talking to each other.”But both nations’ top diplomats highlighted the gulf between them on a host of issues, from Ukraine to Venezuela to arms control to Iran.And on the issue of Russian meddling in U.S. politics, the two had very different takes. “I was clear it’s unacceptable, and I made our expectations of Russia clear,” Pompeo said. Lavrov denied the Kremlin has interfered at all.With all these overhanging issues — along with what U.S. officials describe as malign Russian activities, including slayings and attempted assassinations on foreign soil of Moscow’s foes — U.S. officials are wary of even attempting a reset with Russia, fearing the effort will be as doomed as the Obama administration’s push to transform relations between the two countries. To do so would raise expectations that likely would be subsequently dashed, leaving both sides worse off and feeling aggrieved, they say.Recently, U.S. Defense Secretary Mark Esper said, “It would be great if we could get Russia to behave like a more normal country. But you also can’t ignore the last many years of history where Russia has invaded Georgia. It has annexed Crimea. It is occupying parts of Ukraine. It is threatening the Baltic States.”U.S. officials aren’t alone in saying a reset gambit would be unwise. Chatham House analysts James Nixey and Mathieu Boulègue say making grand overtures toward the Kremlin would be repeating the mistakes of other Western leaders, past and present.Criticism for MacronIn a recent commentary for the London-based think tank, they criticized French leader Emmanuel Macron’s calls in September for Russia to be brought back into the Western fold, saying his courtship of Moscow overlooks principles and evidence, and would excuse Russia from any responsibility for the frozen conflicts triggered by the Kremlin around its periphery.President Donald Trump, right, listens as French President Emmanuel Macron speaks at their meeting at Winfield House during the NATO summit, in London, Dec. 3, 2019.”That olive branches have been extended to Vladimir Putin countless times over the past 20 years does not necessarily mean that no more should ever be forthcoming, should a future Kremlin leadership offer any meaningful concession. What it definitely does mean, however, is that the lessons need to be learned as to why they have been rebuffed hitherto: because ‘what Russia wants’ is incompatible with established Western conceptions,” Nixey and Boulègue said.Kremlin insiders also see little hope of any major improvement in relations between Moscow and Washington, although they place the blame for that on U.S. and European governments. Their assessment of future relations between Russia and the West is bleak and reflects, they say, Putin’s own appraisal.”He doesn’t think it is possible,” said an insider, speaking on the condition of anonymity.They blame the sharp slide in relations since the era of former Russian President Boris Yeltsin to the expansion of NATO eastwards to take in the former communist Baltic States. They say the final blow came with the 2013-14 Maidan unrest that led to the ouster of Putin ally Ukraine President Viktor Yanukovych. The Kremlin remains adamant that the Maidan agitation was Western-fomented and not a popular uprising.The blaming of the West for the return of Cold War-like enmity, and the sense of pessimism, illustrates how difficult it will be to bridge the rift and suggests Russia’s relations with the U.S. and Europe are likely to remain antagonistic.Gleb Pavlovsky, a former Kremlin adviser, says continued antagonism invites serious danger.A so-called “political technologist” for Putin before breaking with the Russian leader in 2012 over his decision to seek a third term as president, Pavlovsky paints a picture of an insecure Kremlin that frequently improvises and bluffs and “has not inherited from the Soviet Union an instinct for understanding risk and how far you can push risks.”He added, “Putin is an improviser. And as with all improvisers, he’s an opportunist.”
 
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The U.N. Human Rights Office warns that Poland’s new law, which makes it easier to fire judges, risks further undermining the independence of the judiciary in that country. The law, which had been proposed by Poland’s ruling Law and Justice Party, was passed Friday by the country’s lower house of parliament.U.N. officials say the law puts further constraints on the independence of judges by restricting their fundamental rights to freedom of association and freedom of expression.  U.N. Human Rights Office spokesperson Rupert Colville says judges should not be politicized and should not bring politics into the court. Nevertheless, he told VOA, just like everybody else, judges have a right to hold their own opinions and seek membership in associations of their choosing.  He noted the new law seriously restricts these activities.“Of course, the overall effect of that is really a very chilling effect on the judiciary. It is so restrictive that it may impact very much on their willingness to get involved in important and legitimate legal arguments and discussions,” he said.  Colville said the law also may prevent judges from fulfilling their legal obligations under European Union law and even from applying EU law properly.  He added it also runs astray of international human rights law.“According to the Human Rights Committee, for example, the requirement of independence in Article 14 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights refers in particular to the procedure and qualifications for the appointment of judges, guarantees relating to their security of tenure until the mandatory retirement age will expire their term of office,” Colville said.Poland was elected to the 47-member U.N. Human Rights Council for a two-year term beginning 2020.  As an incoming member, Colville said Poland is expected to set a high standard of compliance with international human rights law.  He said it is expected to uphold human rights and fundamental freedoms around the world.The new law now goes to the Senate, however, the upper house cannot block the legislation, only delay it.   
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In his four-hour, stage-managed year-end news conference Thursday, Russian President Vladimir Putin went out of his way to back U.S. President Donald Trump in the impeachment saga unfolding in Washington.Lambasting American Democrats for what he termed “made-up reasons” to impeach Trump, a Republican, the Russian leader accused them of nursing a grudge over losing the 2016 presidential elections.The impeachment is “just the continuation of the domestic political strife,” Putin said. “Your members of Congress should know better.”Putin added there’s little chance the Republican-controlled Senate will remove Trump from office. He disputed a key article of impeachment against the U.S. president: that Trump pressured Ukraine’s president to investigate a political rival, former U.S. Vice President Joe Biden, a Democrat who is competing for his party’s 2020 presidential nomination.”The party which lost the election, the Democratic Party, is trying to achieve results by other means, first by accusing Trump of conspiring with Russia, then it turns out there has been no conspiracy,” Putin said. “This cannot be the basis of impeachment. Now they’ve invented some kind of pressure on Ukraine.”Agitation of domestic US policyMoscow-based diplomats say Putin’s defense of his American counterpart had the aim of further agitating domestic politics in the United States.”He knows full well his comments, his trolling of Democrats, is adding salt to domestic U.S. political wounds,” a Western diplomat told VOA. “The main foreign-policy aim of the Kremlin is to encourage political divisions in the West.”But Putin’s praise of Trump — and the U.S. leader’s often complimentary remarks about his Russian counterpart — have not helped to improve U.S-Russian relations, widely seen as being at their lowest point since before the Cold War ended.And few analysts and diplomats believe that will change next year, despite the overlapping views the two leaders have often expressed about Europe and NATO, or Trump’s recent suggestion that Russia be readmitted to the exclusive Group of Seven industrialized countries. The group had eight members until 2014, when Russia was disinvited over the annexation of Crimea.Russian President Vladimir Putin drives a motorbike during the Babylon’s Shadow bike show camp near in Sevastopol, Crimea, Aug. 10, 2019.Both the Kremlin and the White House have repeatedly expressed a wish to improve relations, most recently during a visit earlier this month to the U.S. capital by Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.”We should have a better relationship — the United States and Russia — than we’ve had in the last few years, and we’ve been working on that,” U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told reporters in a joint news conference with his Russian counterpart.CooperationHe noted U.S. and Russian law-enforcement agencies are cooperating on an almost “daily basis” on counterterrorism and counternarcotics. He said both Moscow and Washington agree there are no military solutions to the conflicts raging in Syria or Afghanistan, although they are far apart on how they can be brought to an end.Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, right, shake hands with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, after a media availability at the State Department in Washington, Dec. 10, 2019.For his part, Lavrov said the meetings in Washington have “confirmed that it is useful to talk to each other.” He added, “Talking to each other is always better than not talking to each other.”But both nations’ top diplomats highlighted the gulf between them on a host of issues, from Ukraine to Venezuela to arms control to Iran.And on the issue of Russian meddling in U.S. politics, the two had very different takes. “I was clear it’s unacceptable, and I made our expectations of Russia clear,” Pompeo said. Lavrov denied the Kremlin has interfered at all.With all these overhanging issues — along with what U.S. officials describe as malign Russian activities, including slayings and attempted assassinations on foreign soil of Moscow’s foes — U.S. officials are wary of even attempting a reset with Russia, fearing the effort will be as doomed as the Obama administration’s push to transform relations between the two countries. To do so would raise expectations that likely would be subsequently dashed, leaving both sides worse off and feeling aggrieved, they say.Recently, U.S. Defense Secretary Mark Esper said, “It would be great if we could get Russia to behave like a more normal country. But you also can’t ignore the last many years of history where Russia has invaded Georgia. It has annexed Crimea. It is occupying parts of Ukraine. It is threatening the Baltic States.”U.S. officials aren’t alone in saying a reset gambit would be unwise. Chatham House analysts James Nixey and Mathieu Boulègue say making grand overtures toward the Kremlin would be repeating the mistakes of other Western leaders, past and present.Criticism for MacronIn a recent commentary for the London-based think tank, they criticized French leader Emmanuel Macron’s calls in September for Russia to be brought back into the Western fold, saying his courtship of Moscow overlooks principles and evidence, and would excuse Russia from any responsibility for the frozen conflicts triggered by the Kremlin around its periphery.President Donald Trump, right, listens as French President Emmanuel Macron speaks at their meeting at Winfield House during the NATO summit, in London, Dec. 3, 2019.”That olive branches have been extended to Vladimir Putin countless times over the past 20 years does not necessarily mean that no more should ever be forthcoming, should a future Kremlin leadership offer any meaningful concession. What it definitely does mean, however, is that the lessons need to be learned as to why they have been rebuffed hitherto: because ‘what Russia wants’ is incompatible with established Western conceptions,” Nixey and Boulègue said.Kremlin insiders also see little hope of any major improvement in relations between Moscow and Washington, although they place the blame for that on U.S. and European governments. Their assessment of future relations between Russia and the West is bleak and reflects, they say, Putin’s own appraisal.”He doesn’t think it is possible,” said an insider, speaking on the condition of anonymity.They blame the sharp slide in relations since the era of former Russian President Boris Yeltsin to the expansion of NATO eastwards to take in the former communist Baltic States. They say the final blow came with the 2013-14 Maidan unrest that led to the ouster of Putin ally Ukraine Presidient Viktor Yanukovych. The Kremlin remains adamant that the Maidan agitation was Western-fomented and not a popular uprising.The blaming of the West for the return of Cold War-like enmity, and the sense of pessimism, illustrates how difficult it will be to bridge the rift and suggests Russia’s relations with the U.S. and Europe are likely to remain antagonistic.Gleb Pavlovsky, a former Kremlin adviser, says continued antagonism invites serious danger.A so-called “political technologist” for Putin before breaking with the Russian leader in 2012 over his decision to seek a third term as president, Pavlovsky paints a picture of an insecure Kremlin that frequently improvises and bluffs and “has not inherited from the Soviet Union an instinct for understanding risk and how far you can push risks.”He added, “Putin is an improviser. And as with all improvisers, he’s an opportunist.”
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President Donald Trump on Friday signed off on US sanctions against companies building a Russian natural gas pipeline to Germany that Congress fears will give the Kremlin dangerous leverage over European allies.The sanctions, which are opposed by the European Union, were included in a sprawling defense spending bill Trump signed at a ceremony on Joint Base Andrews, an air force installation outside Washington, DC.They target companies building the nearly $11 billion Nord Stream 2 pipeline under the Baltic Sea with the aim of doubling deliveries of Russian natural gas to Europe’s leading economy, Germany.US lawmakers have warned the pipeline would enrich a hostile Russian government and vastly increase President Vladimir Putin’s influence in Europe at a time of heightened tension across the continent.Both houses of Congress overwhelmingly approved the sanctions, with the Senate voting Tuesday to send the measure to Trump’s desk.Trump, who has been accused by Democratic opponents of being soft on Putin, had little choice but to give his approval.The sanctions were inserted into a much wider $738 billion annual Pentagon funding bill and, given the level of congressional support, a veto would likely have been overturned.The US measures have angered Moscow and the European Union, which says it should be able to decide its own energy policies.Germany’s foreign minister, Heiko Maas, discussed the issue during a phone call Friday with US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, State Department spokeswoman Morgan Ortagus said.Pompeo expressed “strong opposition” to the project, Ortagus said in a statement.The German-Russian Chamber of Commerce insisted last week that the pipeline was important for energy security and urged retaliatory sanctions against the United States if the bill passes.The US sanctions target pipe-laying vessels for Nord Stream 2 and TurkStream, a Russia-Turkey pipeline, and include asset freezes and revocation of US visas for the contractors.One major contractor that could be hit is Swiss-based Allseas, which has been hired by Russia’s state-owned energy giant Gazprom to build the offshore section.The power of Gazprom, which is closely integrated with the Russian state, is at the center of concerns about the pipeline in the United States, and also in eastern and central European countries.Senator Ted Cruz, a Republican ally of Trump, said that halting Nord Stream 2 should be a major security priority for the United States and Europe alike.”It’s far better for Europe to be relying on energy from the United States than to be fueling Putin and Russia and dependent on Russia and subject to economic blackmail,” he told the Senate last week.However, Senator Rand Paul, another Republican, voted against the bill, objecting to its bid to “sanction NATO allies and potentially American energy companies.”
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Notre Dame kept Christmas going even during two world wars — a beacon of hope amid the bloodshed.Yet an accidental fire in peacetime  finally stopped the Paris cathedral from celebrating Midnight Mass this year, for the first time in over two centuries.As the lights stay dim in the once-invincible 855-year-old landmark, officials are trying hard to focus on the immediate task of keeping burned out Notre Dame ‘s spirit alive in exile through service, song and prayer.It has decamped its rector, famed statue, liturgy and Christmas celebrations to a new temporary home pending the restoration works, just under a mile away, at another Gothic church in Paris called Saint-Germain l’Auxerrois.And there it will remain, as works slowly progress to rebuild the cathedral after the April 15 fire destroyed its lead roof and spire  and was moments away from engulfing its two stone towers.“This is the first time since the French Revolution that there will be no midnight Mass (at Notre Dame),” cathedral rector Patrick Chauvet told The Associated Press.There was even a Christmas service amid the carnage of World War I, Chauvet noted, “because the canons were there and the canons had to celebrate somewhere,” referring to the cathedral’s clergy. During World War II, when Paris was under Nazi occupation, “there was no problem.” He said that to his knowledge, it was only closed for Christmas in the period after 1789, when the anti-Catholic French revolutionaries turned the monument into “a temple of reason.”Christmas-in-exile at Saint-Germain l’Auxerrois this year will be a history-making moment.“We have the opportunity to celebrate the Mass outside the walls, so to speak… but with some indicators that Notre Dame is connected to us,” Chauvet said.Those indicators include a wooden liturgical platform that has been constructed in the Saint-Germain church to resemble Notre Dame’s own. A service will be led at midnight on Dec. 24 by Chauvet to a crowd of faithful, including many who would normally worship in the cathedral, accompanied by song from some of Notre Dame’s now-itinerant choir.The cathedral’s iconic Gothic sculpture “The Virgin of Paris,” from which some say Notre Dame owes its name, is also on display in the new annex.The 14th-century masterpiece, which measures around two meters (six feet) and depicts Mary and baby Jesus, has come to embody the officials’ message of hope following the fire.“It’s a miraculous virgin. Why? Because at the time of the fire, the vault of the cathedral completely crashed. There were stones everywhere, but she was spared. She could have naturally received the vault on her head and have been completely crushed,” Chauvet said.He recalled the moment on the night of the fire when he discovered it was saved, as he was holding hands with French President Emmanuel Macron on the cathedral’s forecourt. Around midnight as the flames subsided, they were finally let inside to look. Chauvet pointed and exclaimed to Macron: “Look at the Virgin, she is there!”He said later that Notre Dame’s workmen on the ground implored him to not remove the statue from the cathedral, saying that during the restoration “we need it. She protects us.”Chauvet said having it nearby for Christmas is comforting.“She lived very much in Notre Dame. She watched the pilgrims, all the 35,000 visitors a day … It keeps us going,” Chauvet said.Another reason for hope: Since November, after months in the dark, the facade of the cathedral is being lit up after dusk for the first time since the fire. Tourists over the festive period can now see the famed gargoyles and stone statues at night in their full illuminated splendor from the adjacent bridges, although the forecourt is still closed.Cathedral officials carefully chose Saint-Germain l’Auxerrois as the new temporary home because of its proximity to Notre Dame, just next to the Louvre, allowing ease of movement for clerics who lived near the cathedral. Also, because of its prestigious history.It was once a royal church that boasted among its faithful French kings, in the days when they lived in the nearby Louvre Palace. The kings, Chauvet explained, would simply cross the esplanade to come and attend Mass.Since September, the church has been welcoming the cathedral’s flock each Sunday.Though Notre Dame has moved liturgically to a new home, Notre Dame will always remain Paris’ cathedral so long as the bishop’s physical chair, or “cathedra” doesn’t move.Derived from the Greek word for “seat,” a cathedral’s entire identity technically boils down to the presence of a chair.“The cathedra is at the cathedral and so it remains Notre Dame Cathedral, which is the cathedral in the heart of Paris,” Chauvet said.
It is not only the faithful who have been displaced since April’s blaze.Notre Dame was home to a vibrant 160-strong choir-school, which provided singers for each of the cathedral’s some 1,000 annual services. Midnight Mass at Christmas was always a special event in the year: One of the rare times the entire choir sung together and used the cathedral’s famed acoustics to their fullest.Instead of disbanding, this now-homeless chorus of singers, ranging in age from 6 to 30, has too honed an upbeat message and decided to continue on in a divided form. Different sections of the choir put on concerts in churches, such as Saint-Eustache and Saint-Sulpice, in Paris and beyond. On Christmas Eve, its members will sing at various yuletide events, including at Saint-Germain l’Auxerrois, as well as, bizarrely, at the Russian Circus.But don’t mention the term choir-in-exile to one of the choir’s directors, Henri Chalet.“I’d rather use beyond the walls'...Exile’ brings it back to sadness. Obviously, there is a lot of sadness and desolation for us to no longer be in our second home. But there is also a lot of hope because it is only a phase,” Chalet said.In the grand scheme of things, five or six years of restoration for an 855-year-old cathedral “is nothing at all,” Chalet reasoned.  Macron declared in the days after the blaze it would take a mere five years to restore the cathedral — a timeline many experts deem unrealistic.Notre Dame choir singer Mathilde Ortscheidt, 29, left a little more space for melancholy as she regretted her absence at last year’s Midnight Mass.“To think that I was ill last Christmas…thinking that I would go again this year with no problem!” she said.On the first rehearsal she attended after the blaze, she said she “felt such a pain and such sadness” because the cathedral was where she began as a singer.For the singers, the unique acoustics produced by the cathedral’s massive dimensions are sorely missed.“When we balanced it right, it was the most beautiful feeling of just hearing it resonate through this enormous space,” Ortscheidt said.Despite having “to walk around a lot now,” people have got used to the choir’s new lifestyle, she said, and it was just a matter of time before there will be song in the cathedral once again.In the meantime, “the important thing for us is that we keep on singing and doing the music. That’s what brings us together.”
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British prosecutors said on Friday they had decided to charge the wife of a U.S. diplomat over a fatal car crash in England and to seek her extradition, a decision that “disappointed” Washington.Harry Dunn, 19, died after his motorcycle was in a collision with a car driven by Sacoolas near RAF Croughton, an air force base in the English county of Northamptonshire that is used by the U.S. military.Anne Sacoolas, 42, was given diplomatic immunity and left Britain shortly after the accident, setting off a dispute between London and Washington over whether she should return to face investigation.Charlotte Charles, mother of Harry Dunn, who died after his motorbike was involved in an August 2019 accident in Britain with Anne Sacoolas, wife of an American diplomat, speaks at a news conference, Oct. 14, 2019.Britain’s Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said on Friday it would charge Sacoolas with causing death by dangerous driving and had started legal proceedings.But it said it was up to the Home Office (interior ministry) to decide whether to seek Sacoolas’ extradition formally through diplomatic channels.”The Director of Public Prosecutions has met with Harry Dunn’s family to explain the basis of the decision we have made following a thorough review of the evidence available,” the CPS said in a statement.The U.S. State department expressed its disappointment.”We are disappointed by today’s announcement and fear that it will not bring a resolution closer,” a State Department spokesperson said.”The United States has been clear that, at the time the accident occurred, and for the duration of her stay in the UK, the driver in this case had status that conferred diplomatic immunities.”Dunn’s case gained international prominence when his parents met U.S. President Donald Trump at the White House in October, an occasion he described as “beautiful” but “sad.”Trump hoped to persuade them meet Sacoolas, who was in the building at the same time, but they declined. They want Sacoolas to return to Britain to face police questioning about the crash.Sacoolas initially cooperated with local police after the crash, but later said she had diplomatic immunity.The White House and the U.S. Department of Justice did not immediately respond to a request for comment.The maximum jail sentence in Britain for causing death by dangerous driving is 14 years.Dunn’s mother, Charlotte Charles, broke down in tears after finding out charges had been brought, saying it meant she had kept a promise to her son to get him justice.”We had no idea it was going to be this hard and it would take this long, but we really do feel it is a huge step towards that promise to Harry,” she told reporters.Edward Grange, a partner at the criminal law firm Corker Binning, said Sacoolas could voluntarily attend a hearing in Britain and that if she failed to appear, it could lead to an extradition request.”The prospect of an extradition request succeeding remains to be seen, particularly in light of comment from the Trump Administration that it is very reluctant to allow its citizens to be tried abroad,” he said.
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Britain’s Prince Philip, the 98-year-old husband of Queen Elizabeth, was taken to a hospital Friday as a precaution for treatment of an existing condition, Buckingham Palace said. 
 
Philip, whose official title is the Duke of Edinburgh, traveled from the royal family’s Sandringham home in Norfolk, eastern England, to King Edward VII Hospital in London for observation and treatment, the palace said in a statement. 
 
“The admission is a precautionary measure, on the advice of His Royal Highness’ Doctor,” it said. 
 
A royal source said it was not an emergency admission and that the prince was able to walk into the hospital. He was expected to stay there for a few days. 
 
Philip, who has been at his wife’s side throughout her record-breaking 67 years on the throne, retired from public life in August 2017, although he has occasionally appeared at official engagements since. 
 
He has not been seen in public since the wedding of Elizabeth’s first cousin once removed, Gabriella Windsor, in May at Windsor Castle, local media reported. Queen’s schedule unaffected
 
The 93-year-old queen carried out the official opening of Parliament on Thursday and Philip’s illness did not disrupt her plans as she was pictured arriving in Norfolk on Friday before heading to Sandringham, where the royal family traditionally gathers for Christmas. 
 
Philip, outspoken, irascible and intensely private, and with a reputation for brusque comments and occasional gaffes, has needed hospital treatment several times in recent years. 
 
In 2011, he spent Christmas in a hospital after an operation to clear a blocked artery in his heart, and he missed the end of celebrations to mark his wife’s 60th year on the throne in 2012 after being hospitalized with a bladder infection. 
 
The Greek-born former naval officer then underwent “an exploratory operation following abdominal investigations” in 2013. 
 
He was admitted to a hospital in 2017 for treatment for an infection, also arising from a pre-existing condition, and last year he had hip replacement surgery that required a 10-day stay. Traffic accidentIn January this year, he escaped unhurt when his Land Rover flipped over after a collision with another car near the Sandringham estate. He then had to give up his driving license after police gave him a warning for driving without wearing a seat belt two days later. 
 
Elizabeth has described Philip, whom she married at London’s Westminster Abbey in 1947, as her “strength and stay” during her long reign. The couple, whose relationship has been dramatized in the popular Netflix TV program The Crown, celebrated their 72nd wedding anniversary in November. 
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Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro lashed out at journalists on Friday, saying one had a homosexual’s “face” in a remark that was promptly mocked by the president’s critics.A visibly upset Bolsonaro accused the press of bias against him and his son, Sen. Flavio Bolsonaro. Prosecutors in Rio de Janeiro are investigating allegations the younger Bolsonaro hired employees with no duties while he was a state legislator. Another investigation is probing whether those “phantom” workers kicked back part of their salaries to then be laundered through a chocolate shop he co-owns.In a video posted to Facebook, the younger Bolsonaro has delivered a lengthy denial of all wrongdoing.FILE – Flavio Bolsonaro, son of Jair Bolsonaro, is seen behind him at the transition government building in Brasilia, Nov. 27, 2018.The drone of accusations has been a thorn in the side of President Bolsonaro, who was elected on an anti-crime platform to purge the political class of corruption. He has routinely attacked the credibility of mainstream media, particularly targeting the goliath Globo, for unfair coverage.At a routine morning meeting with journalists in the capital, the president complained that media have accused him of being a racist and committing crimes against the environment. Then he told one reporter, “Your face looks an awful lot like a homosexual’s, but that’s no reason to accuse you of being a homosexual.”The comment was met with laughs from his aides and supporters standing nearby.Meanwhile some politicians, journalists and other Brazilians turned to social media, posting selfies with the caption “awfully homosexual face.” Jean Wyllys, an openly gay former lawmaker who often clashed Bolsonaro when the two served in Congress, was an early participant of the online movement.”‘An awfully homosexual face.’ With pride!” Wyllys, now a professor at Harvard University’s Afro-Latin American Research Institute, wrote on his Twitter feed.History of offensive rhetoric Bolsonaro has a history of making derogatory remarks about women, gay people and racial minorities, including on last year’s campaign trail. Such offensive rhetoric has diminished since he took office at the beginning of this year.Asked at the morning briefing whether he had proof that a suspicious deposit into his wife’s bank account was merely repayment of a debt, Bolsonaro instructed the journalist, “Ask your mother if she gave your dad a receipt,” prompting a cheer from his supporters. He then asked whether the reporter had a receipt for his shoes. “No, you don’t have it!” he concluded.Bolsonaro also complained that details of a sealed investigation have consistently leaked to the press. “Is the process under seal or not? Answer! Answer, damn it!” he said, and then accused Rio’s prosecutors’ office of having a “direct line” to Globo’s news channel.In a statement published Friday, Globo said that while it took pride in delivering breaking news to its audience, it had not been the first publication to reveal information on the prosecutors’ investigations into Sen. Bolsonaro.
 
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As Venezuelans head to the polls next month, top U.S. officials are pressing for free elections for the National Assembly and the presidency, saying the vote is crucial to the country emerging from its deep political crisis.U.S. officials also are urging authorities to “unconditionally release” all persons being detained for political reasons.Venezuela President Nicolas Maduro’s 2018 reelection is considered to be illegitimate by many nations in the Western Hemisphere. The United States and more than 50 other countries now recognize National Assembly leader Juan Guaido as the interim president of Venezuela.On Jan. 5, the Venezuelan National Assembly will vote on its president for 2020. Guaido is seeking reelection, a year after declaring himself to be the country’s interim leader.FILE – Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido, who many nations have recognized as the country’s rightful interim ruler, gestures as he speaks during an extraordinary session of Venezuela’s National Assembly in Caracas, Venezuela, Dec. 17, 2019.U.S. Special Representative for Venezuela Elliott Abrams sounded hopeful Friday that opposition leader Guaido will win.”I think that at least as of now, he has the votes to be reelected,” said Abrams during a press briefing at the State Department.Allegations of briberyThe U.S. envoy said the Maduro government is “using a combination of threats, arrests and bribes up to 500,000 dollars per vote” to stop the reelection but “it’s not widespread enough to change the outcome.”U.S. officials took note that Russia and China, Maduro’s major supporters, have not offered any investment or loans to Venezuela in the last six months.”I think it’s striking that they don’t seem to be willing to give him another dime because they know it will be stolen or wasted. I think they know the regime is going to go,” said Abrams.A recent U.N. report painted a grim picture of Venezuela as a dysfunctional society. Citing data, U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet said thousands of people continue to flee the country as its political, economic and human rights crises deepen.Venezuela’s ambassador to the U.N. in Geneva, Jorge Valero, disputed the report’s findings, saying there is no humanitarian crisis in Venezuela.
 
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The presidents of Belarus and Russia met Friday to discuss deeper economic ties between the two close allies amid mounting concerns in Minsk that Moscow ultimately wants to subdue its neighbor.The meeting in St. Petersburg is the second encounter between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Belarusian counterpart Alexander Lukashenko this month.Greeting Lukashenko at the start of Friday’s talks, Putin said some progress on resolving outstanding issues has been made.But Russia’s Economics Minister Maxim Oreshkin said after the talks that the parties have failed to resolve the key differences over oil and gas.Demonstrators protest closer integration with Russia, which protesters fear could erode the post-Soviet independence of Belarus, in downtown in Minsk, Belarus, Dec. 20, 2019.The negotiations have triggered opposition rallies in Belarus, where many fear that closer ties with Russia could weaken Belarus’ independence. Another protest is scheduled for Friday evening.Putin, who marks two decades in power later this month, remained coy about his political future after his current term ends in 2024.He dodged a question Thursday if he could potentially extend his rule by shifting into a new governing position to become the head of a union between Russia and Belarus.Russia and Belarus signed a union agreement in 1997 that envisaged close political, economic and military ties, but stopped short of forming a single nation.Lukashenko, who has ruled Belarus for more than a quarter-century with little tolerance for dissent, relies on cheap Russian energy and loans to shore up his country’s Soviet-style economy.Russian pressureThe Kremlin has recently raised pressure on Belarus, increasing energy prices and cutting subsidies. Russian officials say Minsk should accept closer economic integration if it wants to benefit from lower energy prices.In an apparent bid to win concessions, Lukashenko on Friday emphasized Belarus’ role as Russia’s military ally and security partner, an argument he has used repeatedly in the past to get more subsidies from Moscow.”We have created a single defense space and our security agencies gave worked in close contact,” Lukashenko told Putin at the start of their talks.But the Russian president has signaled that such tactics won’t work. He argued that Belarus can’t get Russia’s domestic prices for its oil and gas unless it agrees to closely coordinate economic and financial policies and create interstate structures.”It’s a huge work, and it can be done only if there is a political will shared by both sides,” Putin said at his annual news conference Thursday.
 
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British lawmakers gave preliminary approval Friday to Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s Brexit bill, clearing the way for the U.K. to leave the European Union next month.The House of Commons voted 358-234 for the Withdrawal Agreement Bill.It will receive more scrutiny and possible amendment next month, and also has to be approved by Parliament’s upper chamber, the House of Lords. But Johnson’s commanding Conservative majority in Parliament means it is almost certain to become law in January. Britain will then leave the EU on Jan. 31.Johnson said Friday that passing the bill would end the “acrimony and anguish” that has consumed the country since it voted in 2016 to leave the EU. Opponents argue that leaving the EU will only trigger more uncertainty over Britain’s future trade relations with the bloc.Friday’s vote was a moment of triumph for Johnson, who won a commanding parliamentary majority in last week’s general election on a promise to end more than three years of political gridlock and lead Britain out of the European Union on Jan. 31.Lawmakers await the result of the vote on The European Union (Withdrawal Agreement) Bill in the House of Commons in London, Dec. 20, 2019.’Move forward together’The U.K.’s departure will open a new phase of Brexit, as Britain and the EU race to strike new relationships for trade, security and host of other areas by the end of 2020.Johnson, however, painted Friday’s vote as a moment of closure. Opening debate on the bill he said, optimistically, that after Jan. 31, “Brexit will be done, it will be over.””The sorry story of the last 3 1/2 years will be at an end and we will be able to move forward together,” he said.”This is a time when we move on and discard the old labels of ‘leave’ and ‘remain,'” Johnson added. “Now is the time to act together as one reinvigorated nation.”Britain voted narrowly to leave the EU in a 2016 referendum. But previous attempts by Johnson and his predecessor, Theresa May, to pass a Brexit deal through the U.K. Parliament foundered as lawmakers objected to sections of the agreement and demanded a bigger say in the process. Johnson’s election victory finally gives him the power to get his way.”The election has produced a result: We will leave the EU at the end of January,” acknowledged pro-EU Liberal Democrat legislator Wera Hobhouse. “The battle to stop Brexit is over.”Johnson: No more delaysThe bill commits Britain to leaving the EU on Jan. 31 and to concluding trade talks with the bloc by the end of 2020. Trade experts and EU officials say striking a free trade deal within 11 months will be a struggle, but Johnson insists he won’t agree to any more delays, The Brexit bill has been amended to bar ministers from agreeing to extend the transition period with the EU.That has set off alarm bells among businesses, who fear that means the country will face a “no-deal” Brexit at the start of 2021. Economists say that would disrupt trade with the EU — Britain’s biggest trading partner — and plunge the U.K. into recession.Johnson said Friday he was confident of striking a “deep, special and democratically accountable partnership with those nations we are proud to call our closest friends” by the Brexit deadline.He said extending the transition period would just prolong Brexit “acrimony and anguish … a torture that came to resemble Lucy snatching away Charlie Brown’s football.”For all Johnson’s talk of “getting Brexit done” on Jan. 31, details of Britain’s negotiating stance — and even who will lead the trade talks — remain unknown.FILE – Britain’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson, center right, and opposition Labour Party Leader Jeremy Corbyn walk through the Commons Members Lobby, during the state opening of Parliament, in London, Dec. 19, 2019.Changes to Brexit bill Armed with his 80-seat majority in the 650-seat House of Commons, Johnson has stripped out parts of the Brexit bill that gave lawmakers a role in negotiating a future trade deal with the EU and required ministers to provide regular updates to Parliament. The clauses were added earlier in the year in an attempt to win opposition lawmakers’ support for the Brexit bill — backing that Johnson no longer needs.A promise that workers’ rights will not be eroded after Brexit has also been removed from the bill, although the Conservative government says it will enshrine employment rights in separate legislation.Opposition Labour Party lawmaker Hilary Benn said Johnson’s bill was “a gamble with our nation’s economy.””If he fails, the cliff-edge of a no-deal Brexit becomes in just 12 months’ time,” he said.Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn said his 203 lawmakers would oppose the Brexit bill because of “the reckless direction in which the government and the prime minister are determined to take our country.””There is a better and fairer way for this country to leave the European Union,” he said.Even without opposition votes, the bill is expected to complete its passage through Parliament in January, in time for Britain to leave the 28-nation bloc on Jan. 31.The divorce deal also needs to be ratified by the European Parliament. European Parliament vice president Pedro Silva Pereira said officials expect that to happen by Jan. 29.Very little will change immediately after Brexit. Britain will remain an EU member in all but name during the 11-month transition period that ends in December 2020.
 
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European parties to the Iran nuclear deal are likely to trigger a dispute resolution process in January to force Tehran to rollback violations, but would stop short of rushing to restore U.N. sanctions that would kill off the accord, diplomats said.Iran has criticized Britain, France and Germany for failing to salvage the 2015 pact by shielding Tehran’s economy from U.S. sanctions, reimposed since last year when Washington exited the agreement between Iran and six major powers.The deal’s objective was to extend the time Iran would need to accumulate enough fissile material for an atom bomb, if it sought one —  something sometimes referred to as “breakout time” — to about a year from 2-3 months. The Europeans are alarmed Tehran’s latest moves will start eating into that time.Washington wants to force Iran to negotiate a broader deal that includes its nuclear activities, ballistic missile program and regional influence.In reaction to Washington’s “maximum pressure”, Iran, a longtime U.S. foe, has gradually reduced its commitments under the deal, including resuming enriching uranium at its underground Fordow plant and rapidly accelerating enrichment with advanced centrifuge machines also banned by the deal.On Jan. 6 Iran will further distance itself from compliance with the deal, according to Iranian officials, to amplify its warnings about the dire consequences of renewing U.N. sanctions.Six European and Western diplomats said the so-called E3 of Britain, France and Germany had agreed in principle to begin the process, although they would still wait to see how significant Iran’s latest steps were before taking a final decision.”Launching the process aims to resolve the problematic issues and save the deal,” said a European diplomatic source.”It’s not automatic that U.N sanctions will follow. If we decided to do that (reimpose U.N. sanctions) it would mean that we have decided to put the final nail in the coffin.”Under the terms of the 2015 deal, if any party believes another is not upholding their commitments they can refer the issue to a Joint Commission comprising Iran, Russia, China, the three European powers, and the European Union.They then have 15 days to resolve their differences, but can choose to extend the period by consensus between all the parties.However, if it is not extended the process escalates and can ultimately lead to the reimposition of sanctions that were in place under previous U.N. resolutions – known as a “snapback” —  unless the U.N. Security Council decided otherwise.Diplomats said that unless Iran’s upcoming violations crossed an unacceptable threshold, the Europeans would focus on extending the process rather than pushing towards sanctions. It is unclear what the breaking point for the European powers is.US snapback? “This is not a step we want to take but Iran’s actions are leaving us little option other than to respond within the parameters of the agreement,” Britain’s envoy to the U.N. Karen Pierce said.”Should we be forced down the path of triggering the DRM (mechanism) we would do so in order to find a diplomatic way forward with the aim of protecting the agreement.”Three diplomats said the E3, in particular France, were lobbying Russia and China to get them on board to show unity between the five, even though Moscow and Beijing oppose launching the process for now.A senior Iranian official involved in nuclear talks said Iran had been informed the E3 wanted to launch the mechanism.”If they do it, Iran will act accordingly. If they want to save this deal, they have to keep their promises, otherwise Iran will take further steps,” he said, adding that the Europeans were being bullied by the United States.The Europeans could also back down should Iran not act in January. They are hoping the first transaction as part of a humanitarian trade channel they have been working on for more than a year could be a small carrot to convince Tehran to reassess its position.Coinciding with the European move, the U.S. State Department issued a legal reasoning seen by Reuters that concluded that the United States can trigger the “snapback” provisions of the nuclear deal despite having pulled out of the agreement, a stance that could increase pressure on the Europeans to do so.”There isn’t a direct link between the two (the European move and the U.S. legal reasoning), but we have always made it clear we want the Europeans to return to sanctions,” a U.S. official said. “That continues to be the case.”
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British lawmakers are set to hold their first major vote on Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s Brexit bill Friday. It is all but certain to be approved by the country’s new Conservative-dominated Parliament.The vote to approve the Withdrawal Agreement Bill in principle will set Britain on course to leave the European Union as scheduled on Jan. 31. That was the key campaign promise of Johnson, who won a commanding parliamentary majority in last week’s U.K. general election.Previous attempts to pass a Brexit deal through the U.K. Parliament foundered as lawmakers objected to sections of the agreement and demanded a bigger say in the process. But Johnson’s victory gives him the power to get his way.The bill commits Britain to leaving the EU on Jan. 31 and to concluding trade talks with the bloc by the end of 2020. Trade experts and EU officials say striking a free trade deal within 11 months will be a struggle, but Johnson insists he won’t agree to any more delays, and the bill has been amended to bar ministers from agreeing to extend the transition period with the EU.That has set off alarm bells among businesses, who fear that means the country will face a “no-deal” Brexit at the start of 2021.Johnson has stripped out parts of the bill which gave lawmakers a role in negotiating a future trade deal with the EU and required ministers to provide regular updates to Parliament. The clauses were added earlier in the year in an attempt to win opposition lawmakers’ support — backing that Johnson no longer needs.A promise that workers’ rights will not be eroded after Brexit has also been removed, though the government says it will enshrine employment rights in separate legislation.The bill is expected to complete its passage through Parliament in January, in time for Britain to leave the 28-nation bloc on Jan. 31.The divorce deal also needs to be ratified by the European Parliament. European Parliament vice president Pedro Silva Pereira said officials expect that to happen by Jan. 29.Very little will change immediately after Brexit. Britain will remain an EU member in all but name during the 11-month transition period that ends in December 2020.
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The Vatican office responsible for processing clergy sex abuse complaints has seen a record 1,000 cases reported from around the world this year, including from countries it had not heard from before — suggesting that the worst may be yet to come in a crisis that has plagued the Catholic Church.Nearly two decades after the Vatican assumed responsibility for reviewing all cases of abuse, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith is today overwhelmed, struggling with a skeleton staff that hasn’t grown at pace to meet the four-fold increase in the number of cases arriving in 2019 compared to a decade ago.“I know cloning is against Catholic teaching, but if I could actually clone my officials and have them work three shifts a day or work seven days a week,” they might make the necessary headway, said Monsignor John Kennedy, the head of the congregation’s discipline section, which processes the cases.“We’re effectively seeing a tsunami of cases at the moment, particularly from countries where we never heard from (before),” Kennedy said, referring to allegations of abuse that occurred for the most part years or decades ago. Argentina, Mexico, Chile, Italy and Poland have joined the U.S. among the countries with the most cases arriving at the congregation, known as the CDF.Kennedy spoke to The Associated Press and allowed an AP photographer and video journalists into the CDF’s inner chambers — the first time in the tribunal’s history that visual news media have been given access. Even the Vatican’s most secretive institution now feels the need to show some transparency as the church hierarchy seeks to rebuild trust with rank-and-file Catholics who have grown disillusioned with decades of clergy abuse and cover-up.Pope Francis took a step towards showing greater transparency with his decision this week to abolish the so-called “pontifical secret” that governs the processing of abuse cases to increase cooperation with civil law enforcement.But the CDF’s struggles remain, and are emblematic of the overall dysfunction of the church’s in-house legal system, which relies on bishops and religious superiors, some with no legal experience or qualified canon lawyers on staff, to investigate allegations of sexual abuse that even the most seasoned criminal prosecutors have difficulty parsing. The system itself is built on an inherent conflict of interest, with a bishop asked to weigh the claim of an unknown alleged victim against the word of a priest who he considers a spiritual son.Despite promises of “zero tolerance” and accountability, the adoption of new laws and the creation of expert commissions, the Vatican finds itself still struggling to reckon with the problem of predator priests — a scourge that first erupted publicly in Ireland and Australia in the 1990s, the U.S. in 2002, parts of Europe beginning in 2010 and Latin America last year.“I suppose if I weren’t a priest and if I had a child who were abused, I’d probably stop going to Mass,” said Kennedy, who saw first-hand how the church in his native Ireland lost its credibility over the abuse scandal.“I’d probably stop having anything to do with the church because I’d say, ’Well, if you can’t look after children, well, why should I believe you?”But he said the Vatican was committed to fighting abuse and just needed more time to process the cases. “We’re going to look at it forensically and guarantee that the just outcome will be given,” he said in an interview.“It’s not about winning people back, because faith is something that is very personal,” he added. “But at least we give people the opportunity to say, ‘Well, maybe give the church a second chance to hear the message.’”___Located in a mustard-colored palazzo just inside the Vatican gates, the CDF serves as the central processing center for abuse cases as well as an appeals court for accused priests under the church’s canon law, a parallel legal system to civil law enforcement that dispenses ecclesial justice.In the past, when the CDF was known as the Holy Office or the Sacred Roman and Universal Inquisition, such church punishments involved burnings at the stake for heretics and publishing lists of banned books that the faithful were forbidden to read.Today, CDF justice tends more toward ordering errant priests to prayer, penance and prohibition from celebrating Mass in public. In fact the worst punishment handed down by the church’s canon law, even for serial child rapists, is essentially being fired, or dismissed from the clerical state.While priests sometimes consider defrockings to be equivalent to a death sentence, such seemingly minor sanctions for such heinous crimes have long outraged victims, whose lives are forever scarred by their abuse. But recourse to church justice is sometimes all the victims have, given the statutes of limitations for pursuing criminal charges or civil litigation have often long since passed by the time a survivor comes to terms with the trauma and decides to report the abuse to authorities — usually to prevent further harm.’’I wanted to make sure that this priest does not have access to any children,” said Paul Peloquin, a Catholic clinical psychologist and abuse survivor who reported his abuser to the archdiocese of Santa Fe, New Mexico in 1990.By then, church authorities had known for decades that the Rev. Earl Bierman groped young boys, and they had sent him off for therapy. But his bishops kept putting him back in ministry, where he is believed to have abused upwards of 70 children. A Kentucky jury convicted him in 1993 and sentenced him to 20 years in prison, where he died in 2005.Peloquin, however, never received a reply to his initial complaint to his bishop.“It just made me angry,” said Peloquin, who now counsels victims from a faith-based perspective that emphasizes forgiveness in healing. “It seemed like they would have called me up right away and said, ‘Let’s hear about what you’ve got to say.’”Because of cases like his, where the bishop ignored the victim, protected the pedophile and placed the church’s reputation above all else, the CDF under then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger in 2001 persuaded Pope John Paul II to centralize the process.The aim was to crack down on abusers and provide bishops and religious superiors with needed guidance to punish the priests rather than move them around from parish to parish, where they could abuse again. At no time has the Vatican ever mandated superiors report abusers to police, though it has insisted they cooperate with civil reporting laws.The 2001 revision calls for bishops and religious superiors who receive an allegation to conduct a preliminary investigation, which in the U.S. is often done with the help of a lay review board.If the bishop finds the claim has a semblance of truth, he sends the documentation to the CDF which tells the bishop how to proceed: via a full-blown canonical trial, a more expedited “administrative” procedure, or something else, including having the CDF itself take over the investigation.Over the ensuing months and years, the bishop continues the investigation in consultation with the CDF. Eventually the bishop reaches a verdict and a sanction, up to and including dismissal from the clerical state, or laicization.If the priest accepts the penalty, the case ends there. If he appeals, the case comes to the CDF for a final decision.From 2004 to 2014 — roughly the years of Benedict’s papacy with a year on each bookend — some 848 priests were defrocked around the world and another 2,572 were sanctioned to lesser penalties, according to Vatican statistics.The Vatican hasn’t published updated statistics since then, but Benedict’s get-tough defrocking approach has seemingly gone unmatched by Francis. The Jesuit pope appears more swayed by arguments that the church and society are better served if abusers remain in the priesthood, albeit out of active ministry with young people, so they are at least under surveillance by their superiors and not able to have access to children in other jobsThe appeals are decided in an ivory damask-walled conference room on the first floor of the Palazzo Sant’Uffizio, the CDF headquarters a stones’ throw from St. Peter’s Square.The room is dominated by a massive wooden crucifix on the wall that faces St. Peter’s Basilica, and, in each corner of the room, a closed-circuit TV camera peering down on CDF staff.The cameras record the debates on DVDs for the CDF’s own archives and in case the pope ever wants to see what transpired.It is wretched work, reading through case files filled with text messages of priests grooming their victims, psychological evaluations of pedophiles, and heart-numbing letters from men and women who were violated as children and are finally coming to terms with their traumas.“There are times when I am pouring over cases that I want to get up and scream, that I want to pack up my things and leave the office and not come back,” Kennedy told Catholic journalists in the U.S. earlier this year.Nearly 20 years after the CDF assumed responsibility for the cases, it has processed 6,000 abuse cases, and at one point Francis lamented that it had a backlog of 2,000. But the CDF now must cope with the globalization of the scandal that in 2001 seemed to be largely confined to the English-speaking world.Today, the CDF counts just 17 officials, with occasional help from other CDF staff, plus the superiors. Kennedy said he was planning to bring in a Brazilian, Polish and bilingual American canonist to help offset the expected departures of current CDF staff and to process cases from countries that are only now having a reckoning with abuse.But there are still countries the CDF has never heard from — a scenario that suggests “either that they’re all saints or we don’t know about them yet,” Kennedy told AP.The implication is that victims are still cowed, and bishops are still covering up cases. A new Vatican law mandates all abuse and cover-up be reported to church officials, but there is no automatic penalty if anyone fails to do so.Not even in the U.S., which has the most stringent reporting mechanisms in place, is there any way to ensure that bishops are forwarding allegations to the CDF as required.“There has never been independent review of diocesan compliance with that law,” said the Rev. James Connell, a canon lawyer who represents abuse survivors.___Walk into the Pontifical Gregorian University library, climb up the spiral staircase to the legal stacks and you’ll find volume after volume of “Decisiones Seu Sententiae” — the Latin-language legal decisions from one of the Holy See’s main tribunals, the Roman Rota.The tomes contain hundreds of decrees of petitions to nullify Catholic marriages from around the world — the Vatican-stamped paperwork Catholics need to remarry in the church after divorcing.But there is no such jurisprudence published for the Vatican’s other main tribunal, the CDF. None of those rulings are ever published. And that is because until this past week, abuse cases were covered by the highest form of confidentiality in the church, the so-called “pontifical secret.”St. John Paul II decreed that abuse cases would be kept under such tight secrecy in 2001, and defenders argued it was the best way to protect the privacy of the victim, the reputation of the accused and the integrity of the process.Critics said the pontifical secret was used to keep the scandal hidden, prevent police from acquiring internal documentation and silence victims. The U.N. Committee on the Rights of the Child issued a scathing denunciation of the secrecy in 2014, and victims long complained how it retraumatized them:Many were held to secrecy for decades by their abusers, only to have the church re-traumatize them by imposing secrecy on them when they finally found the courage to report the crime.In announcing the abolition of the highest confidentiality in abuse cases, the Vatican said the reform would facilitate cooperation with civil law enforcement, since bishops would no longer be able to hide behind the pontifical secret to withhold documents.The argument was striking, given that it amounted to an explicit admission that bishops had used the pontifical secret as an excuse to refuse cooperation when prosecutors, police or civil authorities demanded internal paperwork.In more academic terms, the lack of published CDF jurisprudence means no bishop or religious superior has case law to refer to when he receives a new allegation that one of his priests has raped a child: He can’t read up on how the Vatican or his brother bishops have handled a similar set of facts in the past, since none of the cases are published.No seminarian studying canon law can cite case studies in preparing his thesis about how the Catholic Church has responded to the abuse scandal. No academic, journalist, victim or ordinary Catholic has any real idea how the Catholic Church has adjudicated these cases in any systematic way.The Rev. D.G. Astigueta, a Jesuit canonist at the Gregorian, has said such institutional secrecy surrounding abuse case harms the development and practice of the church’s own law.“Canonical science doesn’t only grow and develop from a reflection by experts or the production of new laws, but also by jurisprudence, the way of interpreting the law by judges and lawyers,” he told a 2017 conference.He called for greater transparency by the CDF so that today’s canon lawyers, especially those studying in Rome, could have easy access to case files and thus have “teaching based not just on theory but practice.”He is not alone. For the past several years, Vatican-affiliated universities in Rome have hosted conferences on seeking a new equilibrium between the need to protect the integrity of the investigation while looking out in particular for the needs of the victims.Three of the official speakers at Francis’ big sex abuse summit in February called for a reform of the pontifical secret, and the Vatican’s leading sex crimes investigator, Archbishop Charles Scicluna, was the primary driver behind the reform.In another change to church law this year, Francis decreed that victims cannot be silenced, and have the right to learn the outcomes of their cases. But they are still largely kept out of the process, after making an initial complaint.“They are that person who has been harmed. And it would seem to be natural justice that they should know what is being done what is being said in their absence,” said Marie Collins, an Irish survivor who quit Francis’ child protection commission in frustration in part over what she said was the CDF’s intransigence and obsession with secrecy.And the length of time the cases take benefits no one, she added.The CDF is due to soon publish a step-by-step guidebook for bishops and religious superiors to refer to so they can process cases, and two researchers are currently hard at work in Kennedy’s office, entering case details into a database so the CDF can generate a statistical analysis of the cases it has processed over the past two decades.Kennedy said he needs more funding to complete the project, and said more transparency could be possible down the line.“I think eventually we will get to the point of publishing jurisprudence, like the way the Roman Rota does,” he said. The aim would be to redact names and revealing details, but show “the broad parameters of what it is that we do.”
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Russian President Vladimir Putin held his annual press conference with journalists on Thursday — a more than four-hour freewheeling event highlighted by swipes at the push to impeach President Donald Trump and suggestions that an adjustment to Russia’s constitution could extend to Putin’s hold on power when his current term ends in 2024.  The annual press conference, now in its 15th year, long ago morphed into an exercise that paints Putin as the indispensable leader of the nation. The Russian leader was as comfortable reeling off the wages of doctors in far-flung Russian regions as he was discussing key global events.     This year’s event came a day after congressional Democrats voted to impeach President Donald Trump — the third time in U.S. history an American leader was formally sanctioned by Congress.There was intense interest in what Putin might say about a process that has put allegations of Russian election interference — and unproven conspiracies of meddling by neighboring Ukraine in U.S. politics — under the microscope in Washington.   Yet when prompted, Putin appeared to echo White House talking points, arguing the impeachment process was a sham launched by Democrats for “completely fabricated reasons.””This is nothing but a continuation of an internal political struggle, with the party that lost the election, the Democratic Party, trying to reach its goal by different means,” Putin said.  The Democrats tried to overturn the 2016 U.S. election results with an investigation into Russian meddling, he added. Having failed at that, “it’s now Ukraine’s turn,” the Russian leader said.   Addressing another key issue in U.S.-Russian relations, Putin reiterated his calls for the immediate extension of New START, the sole remaining agreement limiting nuclear weapons, and the subject of recent negotiations between Moscow and Washington earlier this month.   People watch a broadcast of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s annual end-of-year news conference, in a library in Kaliningrad, Russia, Dec. 19, 2019.”We are ready until the end of the year to extend the existing agreement, the New START treaty,” said Putin. “But thus far, there has been no answer to any of our suggestions. And without a New START treaty, there is nothing to curb an arms race. And that, in my opinion, is bad.”Bread and butterOn the domestic front, Putin faced questions ranging from concerns over climate change in Russia’s North, long-simmering anger over the disposal of trash from Russia’s major urban centers, breakdowns in health care, declining salaries and demographics, as well as criticism over laws that do little to protect Russian women from domestic violence, among other issues.   The government was aware of the problems, argued Putin, while acknowledging that more work was needed.   The press conference is a rare occasion — some would argue a once-in-a-lifetime lottery — for Russian journalists to inform Putin of issues that he seemingly would fix if he was aware of them.What were his plans to tackle lower doctor wages in the Urals? The prohibitively expensive flights from the Far East? Blatant police corruption and abuse? What would he do to protect Russian athletes smeared by doping scandals?   With domestic problems piling up, a Bulgarian journalist launched into a prayer for the Russian leader. It was met with scattered applause.  Ukraine impassePutin also assessed recent talks aimed at ending the five-year war between pro-Russian separatists and Ukrainian government forces in east Ukraine’s Donbass region that has killed over 13,000 people.FILE – Members of the Donbass self-defense battalion attend a ceremony to swear an oath to be included in a reserve battalion of the National Guard of Ukraine near Kyiv, June 23, 2014.The Russian leader acknowledged some progress with newly elected Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, but he still blamed Kyiv for failing to engage in direct talks with rebels under the stalled Minsk peace accords negotiated with European powers.  “Direct dialogue on Donbass is needed,” said Putin. “You can’t solve the problem by force.”Yet the Russian leader again refused to concede — despite well-documented evidence — that Russian mercenaries and army regulars had played a role in the uprising.”There are few Germans and French fighting there,” said Putin, noting their numbers weren’t significant enough to alter the battle terrain.Beyond Putin?But the domestic headline of the day was Putin’s hint — seemingly out of the blue — that an adjustment to constitutional term limits may be needed to keep qualified politicians in office.  “One thing that could be changed about these terms is removing the clause on successive terms,” he said, when asked about increasing political competition in Russia by the state RIA-Novosti News Service.  “Your humble servant served two terms consecutively, then left his post, but with the constitutional right to return to the post of president again, because these two terms were not successive,” added Putin.  “Some of our political analysts and public figures are troubled by this. Well, maybe it could be removed.”The comment was widely interpreted as a key signal of Putin’s possible intentions when his current term ends in 2024 after nearly a quarter-century in power.  A deadly attackDespite the event’s tradition as the key year-end news event in Russia, Putin’s performance was later upstaged by a deadly armed assault on the main building of the Federal Security Services (FSB), the former KGB headquarters in downtown Moscow where Putin briefly headed operations in the late 1990s.The attack coincided with celebrations marking Russia’s intelligence services, commonly known by Russians as Chekist’s Day.   Putin, himself a career KGB officer in the Soviet Union, was celebrating Chekist’s Day at the Kremlin when the attack occurred.  According to the FSB, one agent was killed and five others wounded after an armed gunman opened fire inside the compound. Witness video from the scene showed pedestrians fleeing the scene as shots rang out.  The Interfax news agency quoted FSB sources as saying the shooter was later “neutralized.”   An investigation into the motive and timing of the attack was under way.  
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Canada’s minister of health, Patty Hajdu, on Thursday proposed banning promotion and advertising of vaping products in public spaces, convenience stores and online, in an effort to curb youth use of e-cigarettes.Hajdu also announced new mandatory health warnings on vaping product packaging.The proposed regulations come amid growing fears surrounding vaping’s safety and mounting evidence that youth vaping is on the rise both among people who once smoked and those who had not.FILE – Canada’s Minister of Health Patty Hajdu speaks in the House of Commons on Parliament Hill in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, Dec. 10, 2019.While e-cigarettes are marketed as a safer alternative to traditional cigarettes and a means to help smokers quit, health officials are concerned they are getting a new generation hooked on nicotine.The number of Canadian teens who said they had vaped in the past month doubled from 10% to 20% between 2017-’18 and 2018-’19, according to the Canadian Student Tobacco, Alcohol and Drugs Survey.”The latest statistics … are alarming,” Hajdu said in a news release. “We are working with experts and all Canadians to find ways to prevent youth from vaping. The new measures announced today will help, but there is more to do.”In an interview with the CBC public broadcaster, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called the measures a “first step.””There’s a lot more information to gather,” he said. “We are very worried about the reports of the extremely negative impacts of vaping.”A U.S. study released earlier this week found that e-cigarette use significantly increases the risk of developing chronic lung conditions such as asthma, bronchitis, emphysema or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.
 
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