Russia’s Foreign Ministry on Thursday announced the expelling of nine Finnish diplomats and shutting down of Finland’s consulate in St. Petersburg in retaliation for Finland expelling nine Russian diplomats last month.

The ministry said in a lengthy statement that it summoned Finland’s ambassador to Russia, Antti Helantera, on Thursday, and relayed its “strong protest in connection with the confrontational anti-Russian policy pursued by the Finnish authorities.”

The statement also noted that “the parameters of Finland’s accession to NATO create a threat” to Russia’s security, and “encouraging the Kyiv regime to (go to) war and pumping it with Western weapons means clearly hostile actions against our country.” The statement concluded that “this line of the Finnish authorities cannot remain unanswered.”

It said nine Finnish diplomats would be expelled from Russia, and a permit allowing the Finnish consulate in St. Petersburg — the country’s second-largest city — to operate will be revoked starting from Oct. 1.

Finland, which shares a long border with Russia, joined NATO in April as the military alliance’s 31st member. Interaction between Helsinki and Moscow has become restrained in recent months.

Finland’s veteran politician and then foreign minister, Pekka Haavisto, announced in May that Russia has frozen the bank accounts of Finland’s diplomatic representations in Moscow and St. Petersburg, disrupting money flow and forcing the Nordic country’s missions to resort to cash payments.

In June, Finland expelled nine Russian diplomats, suspected of working in intelligence operations at Russia’s embassy in Helsinki.

Finnish President Sauli Niinisto tweeted that he considered Moscow’s move on Thursday as “a tough and asymmetric” response to Helsinki’s decision to expel Russian diplomats.

Niinisto said the Finnish government was mulling counter-measures including a possible closure of Russia’s consulate in the western Finnish port city of Turku.

Finnish Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen said on Twitter that Moscow’s move was “out of proportion” and that “Finland will react” to Russia’s decision.
…

Sharing a border with Ukraine, Romania has become one of the European Union countries most exposed to the conflict and a key NATO supplier of weapons to Kyiv. Despite Romania’s support of Ukraine, its historically troubled relations with Ukraine still pose difficulties. Elizabeth Cherneff narrates this report from Ricardo Marquina in Bucharest.
…

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko said Thursday that Russian mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin was no longer in Belarus and had returned to Russia.

Prigozhin went to Belarus as part of a deal to end an armed mutiny by his Wagner mercenary group last month.

Lukashenko brokered the agreement, which included security guarantees for Prigozhin and his fighters.

Lukashenko told reporters Thursday that his offer to allow some Wagner fighters to be stationed in Belarus still stood.

“At the moment the question of their transfer and setup has not been decided,” Lukashenko said. “I am absolutely not worried or concerned that we will host a certain number of these fighters here,” he added.

Prigozhin and his fighters launched their mutiny June 23 in a challenge to Russia’s military leadership.  They captured military headquarters in the southern Russian city of Roston-on-Don before moving toward Moscow.

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

Europe’s workhorse Ariane 5 rocket blasted off for a final time on Wednesday, with its farewell flight after 27 years of launches coming at a difficult time for European space efforts.   

Faced with soaring global competition, the continent has unexpectedly found itself without a way to independently launch heavy missions into space due to delays to the next-generation Ariane 6 and Russia withdrawing its rockets. 

The 117th and final flight of the Ariane 5 rocket took place around 2200 GMT on Wednesday from Europe’s spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana. 

The launch had been postponed twice. It was originally scheduled on June 16, but was called off because of problems with pyrotechnical lines in the rocket’s booster, which have since been replaced. 

Then Tuesday’s launch was delayed by bad weather. 

The Wednesday night flight went off without a hitch, watched by hundreds of spectators, including former French Justice Minister Christiane Taubira, and was greeted with applause. 

Marie-Anne Clair, the director of the Guiana Space Centre, told AFP that the final flight of Ariane 5 was “charged with emotion” for the teams in Kourou, where the rocket’s launches have punctuated life for nearly three decades. 

The final payload on Ariane 5 is a French military communications satellite and a German communications satellite.  

The satellite “marks a major turning point for our armed forces: better performance and greater resistance to jamming,” French Minister of the Armed Forces Sebastien Lecornu tweeted.  

Though it would become a reliable rocket, Ariane 5 had a difficult start. Its maiden flight exploded moments after liftoff in 1996. Its only other such failure came in 2002. 

Herve Gilibert, an engineer who was working on Ariane 5 at the time, said the 2002 explosion was a “traumatic experience” that “left a deep impression on us”. 

But the rocket would embark on what was ultimately a long string of successful launches.  

The initial stumbles had “the positive effect of keeping us absolutely vigilant,” Gilibert said. 

Reputation for reliability

Ariane 5 earned such a reputation for reliability that NASA trusted it to launch the $10 billion James Webb Space Telescope in late 2021. 

The rocket’s second-last launch was in April, blasting the European Space Agency’s Juice spacecraft on its way to find out whether Jupiter’s icy moons can host alien life. 

Daniel Neuenschwander, the ESA’s head of human and robotic exploration, said that in commercial terms, Ariane 5 had been “the spearhead of Europe’s space activities.” 

The rocket was able to carry a far bigger load than its predecessor Ariane 4, giving Europe a competitive advantage and allowing the continent to establish itself in the communication satellite market. 

While waiting for Ariane 6, whose first launch was initially scheduled for 2020, Europe had been relying on Russia’s Soyuz rockets to get heavy-load missions into space. 

But Russia withdrew space cooperation with Europe in response to sanctions imposed over Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.  

The number of launches from Kourou fell from 15 in 2021 to six last year. 

Another blow came in December, when the first commercial flight of the next-generation Vega C light launcher failed. Last week, another problem was detected in the Vega C’s engine, likely pushing its return further into the future. 

Attention shifts to new rocket 

The launcher market has been increasingly dominated by billionaire Elon Musk’s U.S. firm SpaceX, whose rockets are now blasting off once a week. 

Lacking other options, the ESA was forced to turn to rival SpaceX’s Falcon 9 for the successful launch of its Euclid space telescope on Saturday.  

The ESA will also use a SpaceX rocket to launch satellites for the EarthCARE observation mission. 

It remains unclear how the agency will launch the next round of satellites for the European Union’s Galileo global navigation system. 

At the Paris Air Show earlier this month, ESA chief Josef Aschbacher acknowledged that these were “difficult times,” adding that everyone was “working intensely” to get Ariane 6 and Vega-C ready.  

Ariane 6 was unveiled on a launch pad in Kourou earlier this month ahead of an ignition test of its Vulcain 2.1 rocket engine. 

Because the new rocket requires less staffing and maintenance, 190 out of 1,600 positions are being cut at the Kourou spaceport. 
…

The U.S. military said a group of three Russian fighter jets harassed three U.S. drones that were taking part in a mission Wednesday against Islamic State group targets in Syria.

Lt. Gen. Alex Grynkewich, commander of the U.S. 9th Air Force in the Middle East, said the Russian jets dropped flares attached to parachutes in front of the U.S. drones, which forced the drones to take evasive action.

Grynkewich also said one of the Russian pilots maneuvered in front of a drone and engaged the jet’s afterburners, which affected the drone operator’s ability to safely operate the aircraft.

“We urge Russian forces in Syria to cease this reckless behavior and adhere to the standards of behavior expected of a professional air force so we can resume our focus on the enduring defeat of ISIS,” Grynkewich said in a statement.

The U.S. military did not specify where in Syria the incident took place.

There are about 900 U.S. forces deployed to Syria to advise and assist Kurdish-led forces in the fight to defeat the Islamic State group.

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

Reuters this week said that it will appeal a move by Turkey to block access to more than 90 web links and social media posts that used reporting by the news agency.

The ban relates to an article that said that Swedish and American anti-corruption authorities were reviewing a complaint that named the Turkish president’s son, Bilal Erdogan.

The Reuters article was translated into Turkish by several media outlets, including VOA’s Turkish Service.

An Istanbul Court on June 26 issued an order that blocks access to 93 web addresses that used the Reuters news article, its Turkish translations or information from the news agency. VOA’s Turkish Service is among those affected.

“This is the first time that access to a Reuters news article was banned within 24 hours [in Turkey],” Yaman Akdeniz, a cyber law professor at Istanbul’s Bilgi University, told VOA.

Reuters on Monday said it would appeal the ruling, which it said “runs contrary to Turkish legal protections for freedom of the press and expression.”

In its reporting, Reuters cited a lawyer for Bilal Erdogan as denying involvement and describing the allegations as “a web of lies.”

Reuters also noted that it could not “confirm independently whether Erdogan and his son Bilal were aware of or had involvement” in the alleged scheme.

A Reuters spokesperson told VOA that the agency stands by its story.

“Our story was prepared in keeping with the Thomson Reuters’ Trust Principles and our commitment to the publication of fair and accurate reporting in the global public interest,” the spokesperson said.

Ruling

The Turkish court ruling, seen by VOA, defined the Reuters article as “far from reality, unconfirmed, and far from goodwill,” adding that citing it in other media outlets “will not justify and legitimize the content.”

The ruling said, “Freedom of the press obliges those concerned to respect professional ethics, to provide accurate and reliable information, and to act in good faith. Malicious distortions of truth may exceed the limits of acceptable criticism.”

But media critics say that the ruling goes too far.

“The court ruled that Reuters’s article should not be credited, and its coverage should not be published,” Akdeniz said.

Yusuf Kanli, the director of the E.U.-funded Media for Democracy project, said, “The Turkish Constitution clearly states that the press is free and cannot be censored.”

“Instead of banning access to the reporting of the bribery claim, the request to ban access to these allegations should be prevented,” Kanli added.

Gurkan Ozturan, the coordinator of Media Freedom Rapid Response team at the European Center for Press and Media Freedom, thinks that blocking access to articles in Turkey has become a problem.

“In recent months, there has been an apparent increase in blocking access to news articles and content removal orders targeting local media organizations. This threatens people’s right to access information and media freedom deeply,” Ozturan told VOA.

In June 2022, for example, access to VOA Turkish was blocked after it declined to get a broadcasting license from Turkey’s media regulator, the Radio and Television Supreme Council.

Several Turkish authorities condemned the Reuters article and described it as disinformation.

And several pro-government media outlets under the Albayrak Media Group and TurkMedya said on social media they had ended their contract with Reuters.

Fahrettin Altun, the Turkish presidency’s director of communication, on Twitter condemned Reuters for what he said is a “false news story,” which he said made “baseless claims.”

“They have once again demonstrated to the entire world just how crucial our struggle against disinformation is,” Altun said.

Last year, Turkey’s parliament adopted a law that carries prison terms of up to three years for spreading “disinformation” online.

Asli Aral of VOA’s Turkish Service contributed from Ankara to this report, which originated in VOA’s Turkish Service.
…

As the weeklong unrest in France subsides, the United Nations and several other international human rights organizations have called on the French government to reform its police forces and stop their controversial racial profiling practice.

“The government should take urgent action to reform the system of police stops,” six human rights organizations including Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International said in a statement on Wednesday.  

“This is a moment for the country to seriously address the deep issues of racism and discrimination in law enforcement,” said Ravina Shamdasani, a spokesperson for the U.N. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.  

The calls were reiterated in the aftermath of the June 27 fatal shooting of Nahel Merzouk, 17, a French youth of Algerian descent, by a police officer outside Paris. The incident sparked widespread protests in nearly 200 cities and towns across France over the past week.  

“Nahel’s killing is another example of the effects of systemic racism,” Amnesty International has said.   

French authorities have defended the police, saying racism has no place in their ranks.  

“Any accusation of racism or systemic discrimination in the police force in France is totally unfounded,” France’s foreign ministry said in a statement last week.

Bruno Le Maire, France’s economy minister, said on Tuesday that it is “unacceptable” to say French police are racist.

The French government deployed 45,000 police officers to restore calm. More than 3,400 people have been arrested for various crimes, chiefly physical assault and vandalism. Businesses in France have suffered more than $1 billion in losses caused during the protests, according to a French business association.  

The controversy surrounding racial profiling by the French police is not new, with critics decrying the use of generalizations based on race, ethnicity, religion and national origin as a discriminatory practice. Despite being illegal in France and facing legal challenges, the practice has persisted through a lack of executive action, according to human rights groups. 

“These practices are not only illegal under French and international human rights law, but they are above all violent, humiliating and degrading, and make those who experience them feel like second-class citizens,” read the statement from the six human rights organizations.  

In addition to deploying massive police forces to control the situation, the French government has reportedly considered banning access to social media to prevent organized rioting and violence.  

“We have to think about the social networks, about the bans we’ll have to put in place. When things get out of control, we might need to be able to regulate or cut them off,” French President Emmanuel Macron was quoted saying in a meeting on Tuesday.  

The French government’s response has also been criticized by some as both heavy-handed and ineffective.  

While human rights groups call for addressing systemic and institutional racism, some French politicians have demanded tougher actions against the rioters.
…

Two environmental activists were arrested at Wimbledon on Wednesday after getting on court and disrupting a match by scattering orange confetti and puzzle pieces on the grass.

A woman and a man wearing T-shirts from Just Stop Oil — a protest group that wants the British government to stop new oil, gas and coal projects — made it onto the field of play at Court 18 before being taken away by security. Later, during a different match at the same court, another man representing the same organization also threw orange confetti on the grass before security guards corralled him and dragged him away.

The initial interruption happened as three-time Grand Slam semifinalist Grigor Dimitrov of Bulgaria, who is seeded 21st in the men’s bracket, was about to hit a serve in the second set of a first-round match against Sho Shimabukuro of Japan.

Before the debris could be cleared from the court to allow the players to continue, action was halted by a rain delay.

“Following an incident on Court 18, two individuals have been arrested on suspicion of aggravated trespass and criminal damage and these individuals have now been removed from the grounds,” an All England Club spokesperson said in a statement. “Play on the court was temporarily paused and, following a suspension in play due to a rain delay, play [resumed].”

One of the activists sat down on the court before being removed.

The All England Club coordinated with London police and other agencies to increase security for this year’s tournament, in part as a result of protests at other major sports venues in Britain this year.

“Based on what has happened at other sporting events, and on the advice from our key partners, we have reviewed our security plans, which have now been uplifted for The Championships accordingly,” All England Club operations director Michelle Dite said last week.

“We have plans in place to mitigate the risks working in partnership with specialist agencies and the Metropolitan Police and should an incident occur, the appropriate specialist teams will respond,” Dite said.

Her comments came a day after people representing Just Stop Oil briefly disrupted play about five minutes after the start of a cricket match between England and Australia in London. Players from both teams intervened when the protesters attempted to spread orange powder on the field.

Earlier in June, protesters held up the England cricket team bus briefly during the test against Ireland in London. Activists also have targeted Premier League soccer matches, the Premiership rugby final at Twickenham and the world snooker championship in Sheffield this year.
…

The European Union says China has canceled a planned visit by Josep Borrell, the EU’s high representative for foreign affairs and security policy.

EU spokesperson Nabila Massrali said in a written statement Wednesday that Beijing did not give a reason. Massrali said China told the EU that “the envisaged dates next week are no longer possible” and that the bloc “must now look for alternatives.”  

“We welcome Representative Borrell to visit China as soon as possible at the convenience of both sides,” foreign ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin told reporters in Beijing Wednesday, adding that China will maintain communications with the EU.  

Borrell was due to visit China July 10 for talks with Foreign Minister Qin Gang for talks on trade, human rights and China’s stance on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.  The 27-nation bloc has been pressuring Beijing to increase its efforts to persuade Russia to end its nearly 17-month-old invasion of neighboring Ukraine.  

The EU issued a statement last week after a summit, describing China as both a “competitor and a systemic rival.”

Jorge Toledo, the EU’s ambassador to China, told reporters Sunday that Brussels and Beijing are scheduled to hold two summits in September, one on the economy and the other on digital cooperation. 

This is the second time a planned visit by Borrell to China has been scrapped. A trip planned for April was called off after he tested positive for COVID-19.   

Some information for this report came from The Associated Press, Reuters.

 
…

The human rights situation in Belarus is catastrophic, and only getting worse, the United Nations special rapporteur on the country said Tuesday.

Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko’s regime in Minsk is deliberately purging civil society of its last dissenting voices, Anais Marin told the U.N. Human Rights Council.

“The situation remains catastrophic. Unfortunately, it keeps on worsening,” said the special rapporteur on the human rights situation in Belarus. “The Belarusian government amended an already restrictive legislation aimed at dismantling civic freedoms, leading to a surge in politically motivated prosecutions and sentencing.

“The lack of accountability for human rights violations fosters a climate of fear among victims and their families,” Marin said.

‘Totalitarian turn’ 

Marin has been in post for five years and reminded the council that she alerted them two years ago to the “totalitarian turn” taken by Minsk, evidenced by the “disregard for human life and dignity” during the crackdown on peaceful protesters in 2020.

In her annual report, the French political scientist said more than 1,500 individuals were still being detained on politically motivated charges, with a daily average of 17 arbitrary arrests since 2020.

“I have good reasons to believe that prison conditions are deliberately made harsher for those sentenced on politically motivated grounds, by placing them in punishment cells for petty infraction to prison rules,” said Marin.

“No one has been held accountable in Belarus for arbitrarily detaining tens of thousands of peaceful protesters in 2020, nor for the violence or torture many of them have been subjected to.

“This general impunity, and the climate of fear resulting from ongoing repression, have compelled hundreds of thousands of Belarusians into exile.”

Media called ‘extremist’

Human rights defenders face ongoing persecution, she said, with more than 1,600 “undesirable organizations forcibly dissolved, including all remaining independent trade unions.

“This illustrates a deliberate state policy of purging civic space of its last dissenting elements,” she said.

Marin said independent media outlets had been labelled as “extremist organizations,” while academic freedom is “systematically attacked.”

“Ideological control and disciplinary measures restrict freedom of opinion and their expression,” she said.

Primary and secondary education is also subject to “ideological control,” with children “discouraged from expressing their own opinions” and facing “threats and consequences” for holding dissenting views.

Consequences for speaking out 

As for the Russian invasion of Ukraine, individuals face challenges when trying to speak out against it or question Belarus’s role in facilitating the 2022 invasion.

“Anti-war actions led to numerous detentions and arrests, some on charges of planning terrorist attacks — a crime which can now be punished by death,” she said.

Belarus was immediately offered the Human Rights Council floor to respond to Marin’s comments but was not present.
…

Belarusian opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya said Tuesday that she had received an anonymous message alleging that her imprisoned husband, also an opposition figure, died behind bars. 

Siarhei Tsikhanouski, 44, a popular blogger and opposition activist, was arrested in 2020 after announcing plans to run against Belarus’ authoritarian leader, Alexander Lukashenko, in presidential elections that year. His wife, Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, ran against Lukashenko in his stead after the arrest, rallying large crowds of people in her support across the country. 

Official results of the election handed Lukashenko his sixth term in office but were denounced by the opposition and the West as fraudulent. Amid unprecedented protests that broke out in the aftermath of the vote, Tsikhanouskaya left the country under pressure from the authorities. Her husband was later sentenced to 19 1/2 years in prison on charges of organizing mass riots. 

Tsikhanouskaya told The Associated Press on Tuesday that she hadn’t received any news from her husband since early March — letters to him are no longer being delivered, and his lawyer hasn’t been allowed to see him. 

“I don’t know anything about him. I haven’t received a single letter, and there’s been no communication through his lawyer,” Tsikhanouskaya told the AP in written comments. She added that at the same time she didn’t have any proof the claim in the anonymous note was true but demanded the authorities “provide proof that Siarhei is alive and show him.” 

The Belarusian authorities have not commented on the situation.  

On Monday, Tsikhanouskaya tweeted that she had received the anonymous note.

Tsikhanouski is not the only imprisoned opposition figure whose fate is shrouded in mystery.  

It’s been 67 days since anyone heard anything from Viktar Babaryka, a former banker who also planned to run for president in 2020. His supporters worry that he was beaten and put in a prison hospital. He was due to appear in court and testify in the trial of his son, which began on May 22, but missed the hearing. 

It’s been over five months since any news emerged about Maria Kolesnikova, Babaryka’s campaign manager, who also was arrested in 2020 and sentenced to 11 years in prison. According to a recent statement by Amnesty International, Kolesnikova hasn’t been allowed to make phone calls, write letters or see her family or lawyers since mid-February. 

Another opposition figure, Nikolai Statkevich, is serving a 14-year sentence and hasn’t been heard from for 145 days. 

“It’s a new deliberate policy by the authorities to keep opposition leaders in full information isolation,” Pavel Sapelko, from Belarus’ prominent rights group Viasna, told the AP. “It’s an attempt by the authorities to pressure not just political prisoners, who are being deprived of contact with the outside world and are held in horrible conditions, but their families, as well, who are forced to live without any information about their loved ones.” 

According to Viasna, a total of 1,501 political prisoners are currently behind bars in Belarus. 
…

Andy Murray said he had an emotional meeting with Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, who spent six years in an Iranian jail cell, after inviting her to watch him from the royal box at Wimbledon on Tuesday.

British-Iranian Zaghari-Ratcliffe and Murray became friends after she said in an interview last year that watching the Scot win Wimbledon on television in 2016 helped sustain her during solitary confinement.

She had been accused of spying while in the country visiting her parents and held in Tehran’s notorious Evin prison until her release last year.

“She hadn’t been to Wimbledon before,” Murray said.

“After the story she told me about watching my Wimbledon final while she was in a cell, I felt like I wanted to invite her to come along and watch the tennis in totally different circumstances.

“Hopefully, a much more enjoyable experience. It was very emotional talking to her and hearing her story. It was brilliant that she was able to come along and watch.”

Zaghari-Ratcliffe said in the interview that prison officials allowed her access to a TV that only had two channels.

One broadcast an Iranian soap opera while the other was a sports channel showing Wimbledon when Murray was winning his second title at the tournament.

“They had no idea what they had given me,” she said.

On Tuesday, she was able to at last see Murray in the flesh on Centre Court and the two-time champion didn’t disappoint his guest as he eased past fellow Briton Ryan Peniston.

Former world number one Murray, who won his first Wimbledon title in 2013, came through to win 6-3, 6-0, 6-1.
…

Dozens of people with flowers, many unable to hold back tears, bid farewell Tuesday to an award-winning Ukrainian writer who was among those killed by a Russian missile attack on a popular restaurant in eastern Ukraine.

The memorial service for Victoria Amelina, 37, was held in the crowded main hall of Saint Michael’s Cathedral in Kyiv, where ceremonies are usually held for soldiers who were killed on the battlefield.

Amelina died in a hospital from injuries sustained in the June 27 strike on a popular restaurant frequently visited by journalists and aid workers in the city of Kramatorsk. Twelve other people also died in the attack.

“Usually, we gather here to say goodbye to the most deserving,” said Archimandrite Lavrentii, the Orthodox priest leading the service. “Considering the times we live in, leading a worthy and dignified life for each of us is the best tribute we can offer in memory of those who have passed away into eternity.”

Around 100 people, including representatives from the Ukrainian literary community, relatives and residents of Kyiv gathered at the church to honor Amelina, a prominent writer who had turned her attention from literature to documenting Russian war crimes after Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022.

Mourners approached the closed casket, gently touching the yellow and blue Ukrainian flag covering it. Many couldn’t hold back tears. To the left of the casket, people laid flowers, some of which were adorned with ribbons in the colors of the Ukrainian flag. At the end of the farewell, a mountain of flowers stood next to a portrait of Amelina, a red-haired woman with a pale face and a penetrating gaze pictured against a dark background.

A funeral will be held Wednesday in Amelina’s hometown of Lviv.

Dmytro Kovalchuk, 31, was having dinner with Amelina at the restaurant when a Russian Iskander missile struck the building. He worked as a producer for a team of writers — Amelina and a group of Colombian authors.

He said Amelina was the first one to be evacuated to the hospital. She sustained an injury when the roof collapsed, and a piece of iron reinforcement struck her head.

Amelina is one of more than 60 artists killed in Ukraine since the start of the full-scale war, said Tetiana Teren, the head of PEN Ukraine.

“She had doubts about whether literature and culture could have an impact and support the country during such a horrific genocidal war. And she began to search for her own role, what she could contribute,” Teren, holding a Ukrainian flag, said about Amelina’s decision to document war crimes.

“Victoria strongly believed that we not only have to win this war, but we must bring to justice and hold accountable all those who committed crimes, who continue to kill Ukrainians and undermine our culture.”

Amelina was born January 1, 1986, in Lviv. In 2014 she published her first novel, The November Syndrome, or Homo Compatiens, which was shortlisted for the Ukrainian Valeriy Shevchuk Prize.

She went on to write two award-winning children’s books and another novel. In 2017, her novel Dom’s Dream Kingdom received national and international accolades — including the UNESCO City of Literature Prize and the European Union Prize for Literature.

Her fiction and essays have been translated into many languages, including English, Polish, Italian, German, Croatian, Dutch, Czech and Hungarian.

In 2021, she founded the New York Literature Festival, which takes place in a small town called New York in the Donetsk region of Ukraine.

Since the start of the invasion, Amelina had devoted herself to documenting Russian war crimes in eastern Ukraine, PEN America said. In Kapytolivka, near Izium, she discovered the diary of Volodymyr Vakulenko, a Ukrainian writer killed by the Russians.

She also began writing her first work of English nonfiction shortly before her death. In War and Justice Diary: Looking at Women Looking at War, Amelina recounts stories of Ukrainian women collecting evidence of Russian war crimes. It is expected to be published soon, according to PEN Ukraine.
…

NATO allies are preparing for their annual two-day summit July 11 and 12 in Vilnius, Lithuania — as Ukraine urges the alliance to fast-track its proposed membership. Meanwhile, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg confirmed Tuesday that he will extend his term for another year, as the West seeks to maintain unity amid Russia’s aggression. Henry Ridgwell reports.
…

Asylum applications in the EU hit 996,000 in 2022, the highest level in six years, according to an annual report from the European Union Agency for Asylum (EUAA) published on Tuesday.

The largest groups of people seeking protection in Europe were from Syria, Afghanistan, Turkey, Venezuela and Colombia.

Ukrainians fleeing Russia’s war in their homeland were counted apart. Some 4 million of them are living in the EU with a special temporary protection status.

Taken together, the numbers were putting “acute pressure on already strained reception places in many countries,” the EUAA said.

Several of the EU’s 27 member countries, among them Italy, Poland and Sweden, are taking increasingly hardline stances against irregular migration.

That trend could deepen as the bloc’s economic growth stalls on the back of hiked interest rates, imposed in a bid to address persistently high inflation.

The EU saw a peak in irregular migration in 2015 and 2016, when 2.5 million asylum-seekers arrived, many of them Syrians escaping the conflict in their country.

The EUAA’s data covers the EU’s 27 countries plus Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland. The four are members of the borderless Schengen area alongside most of the EU states.

The report was published at a time when the EU is negotiating a reform of its asylum and migration rules.

The overhaul seeks to share the burden of hosting asylum-seekers across all member states, to accelerate vetting of asylum demands at the EU’s external border to weed out ones least likely to have viable grounds, and to speed up the return of denied asylum-seekers to their country of origin or transit.

According to the EUAA, the five principal EU countries receiving asylum applications were Germany, France, Spain, Austria and Italy.

Of all the applications, 39 percent received a positive response — the highest recognition rate since 2017.

All but a small fraction of those lodged by Syrians, Ukrainians and Eritreans succeeded.

Across the bloc, 71 percent of applications were lodged by men.
…

London’s expansion of a fiercely debated scheme that charges the most polluting vehicles in the city should be blocked, local authorities bringing a legal challenge over the plan argued on Tuesday.

The British capital’s Ultra Low Emission Zone (ULEZ) levies a $16 daily charge on drivers of non-compliant vehicles, in order to tackle pollution and improve air quality.

London Mayor Sadiq Khan last year decided to extend the scheme to cover almost all of the Greater London area, encompassing an extra five million people in leafier and less-connected outer boroughs, from the end of next month.

The decision has pitched Khan and health campaigners against those who say they cannot tolerate another economic hit at a time of soaring living costs.

Khan, who is running for a third four-year term in the 2024 London mayoral election, has said he is determined to face down his critics.

But his plan, which echoes hundreds of others in place in traffic-choked cities across Europe, came under challenge at London’s High Court on Tuesday as five local authorities argued the decision to expand ULEZ into their areas was unlawful.

London’s transport authority – Transport for London (TfL) – had launched a public consultation on the plan, which said 91% of vehicles driven in outer London would not be affected.

However, the local authorities’ lawyers argue that TfL provided no detail on how it calculated the 91% figure, which they say was fundamental to justifying the expansion.

The local authorities are also challenging Khan’s decision to not extend a 110 million pound scrappage scheme to those living just outside the expanded ULEZ. The scheme subsidises the cost of buying a replacement vehicle for those affected.

Lawyers representing Khan and TfL argued in court filings that TfL provided sufficient information for the consultation and said that extending the scrappage scheme beyond London was rejected in order to target those directly affected.
…

France said Tuesday it repatriated 25 children and 10 women from a camp in northeastern Syria holding people linked to Islamic State fighters. 

The move is the latest in a series of repatriations by France this year amid calls by the United Nations for countries to boost efforts to take in their nationals from the camps. 

France’s foreign ministry said the adults would be processed through the justice system while the children would be put in the custody of child services. 

Thousands of people traveled to Iraq and Syria to join the Islamic State group after it declared a caliphate and seized control of large areas in both countries. 

A U.S.-led international coalition helped see the territorial defeat of the group, but thousands of people remain in camps in northeastern Syria with countries reluctant to repatriate them. 

The al-Hol camp holds 50,000 people, mostly women and children, while another 10,000 people including 2,000 from outside Iraq and Syria are in detention centers, according to the United States.  

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said at a coalition meeting last month that “repatriation is critical” to reducing the populations of both the camps and detention centers, citing the risk of militants being able to take up arms again and for children to be condemned to “lives marked by danger.” 

Some information for this report came from The Associated Press and Agence France-Presse 
…

Latest developments:  

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz called for the extension of an agreement allowing for the export of grain from Ukrainian ports. 





Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Sweden has more work to do before Turkey can support a Swedish bid to join NATO.  "Everyone must accept that Turkey’s friendship cannot be won by supporting terrorism or by making space for terrorists," Erdogan said. 

Russia said Tuesday it downed five Ukrainian drones that attacked Moscow and the surrounding region.  

The Russian defense ministry said air defenses shot down four of the drones, while the fifth was electronically jammed and crashed. 

The drones temporarily disrupted operations at Vnukovo International Airport on the southwest side of Moscow, causing officials to reroute planes to other airports. 

Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said the drone attack was an “act of terrorism” by Ukraine. 

There was no immediate comment from Ukrainian officials. 

Ukraine typically does not claim responsibility for attacks on Russian territory. 

Counteroffensive 

Britain’s defense ministry said Tuesday that Russian forces have responded to the Ukrainian counteroffensive launched last month by adjusting tactics, including the heavy use of anti-tank mines. 

“Having slowed the Ukrainian advance, Russia has then attempted to strike Ukrainian armored vehicles with one-way attack uncrewed aerial vehicles, attack helicopters and artillery,” the British defense ministry said in a daily assessment. 

Ukraine has cited some progress amid heavy fighting as it tries to reclaim land seized by Russia since Russian forces invaded in February 2022. 

NATO summit 

In his nightly video address Monday,  Zelenskyy touted Ukraine as a significant asset for NATO, stating that his country is an important safeguard in Europe’s security against Russian aggression.  

“It is obvious that Europe can be protected from any aggression only together with Ukraine and only together with Ukraine in NATO. That is why we must achieve security certainty about our future in the Alliance,” he said.    

Zelenskyy made these comments as NATO leaders are preparing for their two-day summit in Vilnius, Lithuania, on July 11 and 12.  

The summit arrives at a critical juncture for NATO and European security with the Kyiv counteroffensive and political upheaval in Moscow.  

Ukraine formally applied to join NATO last year, but all member states have now agreed that Ukraine will not join the alliance before the war there ends.  

During a Monday news conference in Brussels, NATO’s top military official, Admiral Rob Bauer, acknowledged that Ukraine’s road to victory will be difficult and lengthy.  

“The counteroffensive, it is difficult,” he said, adding that Ukrainian forces are right to proceed cautiously. “People should never think that this is an easy walkover. It will never be,” he said, noting that the Russian defense lines are sometimes up to 30 kilometers deep, and Ukrainian forces face landmines and other obstacles.  

Bauer drew a comparison between breaking through these obstacles and fighting in Normandy during World War II. “We saw in Normandy in the Second World War that it took seven, eight, nine weeks for the allies to actually break through the defensive lines of the Germans. And so, it is not a surprise that it is not going fast,” he said.  

Satellite images reviewed by Reuters in April showed Russia had built extensive fortifications, trenches, anti-vehicle barriers and other obstacles to slow any Ukrainian advance.  

Bauer also cautioned that Russia’s armed forces are bruised but by no means beaten in the Ukraine fighting. “They might not be 11 feet tall, but they are certainly not two feet tall,” he told reporters. “So, we should never underestimate the Russians and their ability to bounce back.”  

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

Kyiv and its Western allies have opened a new center in The Hague that will investigate Russia’s leaders for the crime of aggression, following its 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Henry Ridgwell reports from London.
…

Iran has hanged at least 354 people in the first six months of 2023, a rights group said Monday, adding that the pace of executions was much higher than in 2022. 

Rights groups have accused Tehran of increasing the use of the death penalty to spread fear across society in the wake of the protest movement that erupted last September over the death of Mahsa Amini, a young woman who had been arrested for allegedly violating strict dress rules for women. 

Executions up 36% 

Norway-based Iran Human Rights said the 354 people figure for the first six months up to June 30 was up 36 percent compared to the same period in 2022, when 261 people were executed. 

Emphasizing concerns that non-Persian ethnic groups are disproportionately affected by executions in Iran, it said 20 percent of all executions were of members of the Sunni Baluch minority.  

It said 206 people were executed for drug-related charges; a 126 percent rise compared to the same period last year.

Six women were among those executed in the period while two men were publicly hanged, it added. 

“The death penalty is used to create societal fear and prevent more protests,” said IHR director Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam. 

“The majority of those killed are low-cost victims of the killing machine, drug defendants who are from the most marginalized communities.” 

IHR earlier this year had reported that Iran carried out 582 executions in 2022, the highest figure in the Islamic republic since 2015. 

Iran is the world’s second biggest executioner after China for which no data is available, according to Amnesty International. 

Iranian authorities have executed seven men in cases related to the protests, with rights groups warning at least seven more arrested over the demonstrations are at imminent risk of execution.  
…

The U.N. Security Council will hold a first-ever meeting on the potential threats of artificial intelligence to international peace and security, organized by the United Kingdom, which sees tremendous potential but also major risks about AI’s possible use for example in autonomous weapons or in control of nuclear weapons.

U.K. Ambassador Barbara Woodward announced Monday the July 18 meeting as the centerpiece of its presidency of the council this month. It will include briefings by international AI experts and Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, who last month called the alarm bells over the most advanced form of AI “deafening,” and loudest from its developers.

“These scientists and experts have called on the world to act, declaring AI an existential threat to humanity on a par with the risk of nuclear war,” the U.N. chief said.

Guterres announced plans to appoint an advisory board on artificial intelligence in September to prepare initiatives that the U.N. can take. He also said he would react favorably to a new U.N. agency on AI and suggested as a model the International Atomic Energy Agency, which is knowledge-based and has some regulatory powers.

Woodward said the U.K. wants to encourage “a multilateral approach to managing both the huge opportunities and the risks that artificial intelligence holds for all of us,” stressing that “this is going to take a global effort.”

She stressed that the benefits side is huge, citing AI’s potential to help U.N. development programs, improve humanitarian aid operations, assist peacekeeping operations and support conflict prevention, including by collecting and analyzing data. “It could potentially help us close the gap between developing countries and developed countries,” she added.

But the risk side raises serious security questions that must also be addressed, Woodward said.

Europe has led the world in efforts to regulate artificial intelligence, which gained urgency with the rise of a new breed of artificial intelligence that gives AI chatbots like ChatGPT the power to generate text, images, video and audio that resemble human work. On June 14, EU lawmakers signed off on the world’s first set of comprehensive rules for artificial intelligence, clearing a key hurdle as authorities across the globe race to rein in AI.

In May, the head of the artificial intelligence company that makes ChatGPT told a U.S. Senate hearing that government intervention will be critical to mitigating the risks of increasingly powerful AI systems, saying as this technology advances people are concerned about how it could change their lives, and “we are too.”

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman proposed the formation of a U.S. or global agency that would license the most powerful AI systems and have the authority to “take that license away and ensure compliance with safety standards.”

Woodward said the Security Council meeting, to be chaired by U.K. Foreign Secretary James Cleverly, will provide an opportunity to listen to expert views on AI, which is a very new technology that is developing very fast, and start a discussion among the 15 council members on its implications.

Britain’s Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has announced that the U.K. will host a summit on AI later this year, “where we’ll be able to have a truly global multilateral discussion,” Woodward said.
…

Ukraine says its forces have retaken 37 square kilometers of territory in eastern and southern Ukraine during the past week, as part of its counteroffensive against Russia launched in June. Analysts say the recent mutiny against Russia’s top commanders may have an impact on the morale of Russian soldiers on the battlefield. VOA’s Senior Diplomatic Correspondent Cindy Saine reports, with Yulia Savchenko contributing.
…

The U.S. ambassador to Russia visited jailed Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich in Moscow on Monday, the newspaper reported. It was the second time the diplomat has seen him since his arrest three months ago on espionage charges that he denies. 

The newspaper did not provide details about Ambassador Lynne Tracy’s meeting with Gershkovich. She last saw him in April shortly after his March 29 arrest, when Russia accused him of trying to obtain military secrets while on a reporting trip to the Russian city of Yekaterinburg. 

A judge last month rejected an application for Gershkovich, 31, to be released from a Moscow prison while awaiting trial. Tracy has accused Russia of conducting “hostage diplomacy.” 

Over the years, Russia has agreed to high-profile prisoner exchanges with the United States, most recently last year when professional basketball star Brittney Griner, sentenced on a drug charge, was traded for convicted Russian arms trafficker Viktor Bout. 

But Moscow has said no exchange could take place in the Gershkovich case until a verdict on his charges has been reached. But no date has been set for a trial. 

Any prisoner swap is complicated by geopolitical considerations and who each country considers of equal value to trade. In addition, relations between the two countries are at a low point because of Russia’s February 2022 invasion of Ukraine and the U.S. extensive military support for Ukraine. 
…

WIMBLEDON, ENGLAND — When Victoria Azarenka walked into Court 15 Monday morning for her first Wimbledon match in two years, she was greeted by polite clapping. When the two-time Grand Slam champion from Belarus finished off a three-set victory more than 2½ hours later, Azarenka shook her racket with her right hand and pumped her left fist, then offered a wave to the spectators who were applauding warmly.

Unlike her opponent, Yuan Yue, whose nationality was noted on the scoreboard alongside her name, Azarenka had no country listed there. That’s because players from Russia and Belarus are back competing at Wimbledon a year after they were barred by the All England Club because of the invasion of Ukraine — and, in a sort of half-measure adopted by some other sports, are deemed “neutral” athletes who officially do not represent any nation.

The war that began in February 2022 when Russia invaded Ukraine with help from Belarus continues, but Wimbledon’s organizers announced in March they would lift their ban — about which Azarenka said in an interview that, in the big picture, “I’m not sure that it made any difference.”

While other players have flags to the left of their names on the oversized, manually operated brackets on the outside wall of Center Court, the Russians and Belarusians do not. Nor are the countries noted on official schedules or results issued by the All England Club, nor as part of graphics on TV broadcasts of matches. The Club did not allow Wimbledon to be aired on television in Russia or Belarus.

Azarenka and all other entrants from those two countries needed to — and did — sign a declaration agreeing to three stipulations: They wouldn’t be representing Russia or Belarus; they wouldn’t accept funding from those governments or companies operated by them; they wouldn’t express support for the invasion of Ukraine or the leaders of Russia or Belarus.

“It was a difficult decision, as we said when we made it earlier in the year,” All England Club CEO Sally Bolton said Monday about the reversal in policy. “We took a lot of time to think carefully about the decision we made and the impact that would have in the same way as we did last year. We think it’s the right decision for The Championships this year.”

Liudmila Samsonova, a Russian who was seeded 15th in the women’s field, said after being eliminated by Ana Bogdan of Romania 7-6 (1), 7-6 (4) Monday: “Last year was tough to accept. But this year, when they said that we were able to play, it was amazing.”

If there were questions about how Russians and Belarusians might be received upon their return, the earliest indications on Day 1 were that there was nothing out of the ordinary.

No protests. No boos. No shouts in support of Ukraine — or against the returning players. (Russian and Belarusian flags were not allowed to be brought into the tournament grounds.)

“Just like I never left, honestly. It feels good to be playing here,” Azarenka said after beating Yuan 6-4, 5-7, 6-4. “For me, personally, I experienced very good treatment. … Today, to hear people say, ‘Let’s go, Vika!’ and cheering me on was also why I play, to play in front of the crowd, to put on a good show.”

Russians who won Monday included No. 7 seed Andrey Rublev and unseeded Aslan Karatsev among the men, and No. 12 Veronika Kudermetova among the women.
…