RIYADMEDIA

Washington —  In a move that contrasts with the United States, South Korea had its ambassador in Moscow attend Russian President Vladimir Putin’s inauguration, seemingly leaving its options open for maintaining diplomatic relations with Russia amid Moscow’s deepening ties with Pyongyang.

Seoul said it based its decision for Ambassador Lee Do-hoon to attend Putin’s inauguration “after considering all circumstances surrounding South Korean-Russian bilateral relations.” 

A South Korean Foreign Ministry spokesperson made the remark to VOA’s Korean Service on Friday.

The U.S. and most European Union countries boycotted Putin’s inauguration held May 7 at the Grand Kremlin Palace.

He was reelected in March for his fifth term in office as Russia’s war in Ukraine raged on for more than two years since its invasion in 2022. Moscow has turned to Pyongyang to replenish its stockpile of arms to fight Ukraine.

“The U.S. directed our embassy not to attend the inauguration in protest of Russia’s war against Ukraine,” a State Department spokesperson said Thursday in an email sent to VOA’s Korean Service.

Japan also did not send a representative to the ceremony. Japanese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Kobayashi Maki said during a news briefing held in Tokyo the day after the inauguration that its decision was “based upon comprehensive consideration of Russia’s aggression against Ukraine.”

VOA contacted the Russian Embassy in Seoul for comment on Lee’s attendance. Its spokesperson, Mira Dzhamalidinova, emailed that it has “no comments for VOA.”

Robert Rapson, who served as charge d’affaires and deputy chief of mission at the U.S. Embassy in Seoul from 2018 to 2021, said, “Ambassador Lee’s attendance at Putin’s inauguration was a small but symbolically significant step by Seoul to signal to Moscow its interest in improving, or at least more effectively managing, deteriorating bilateral relations.”

He continued, “It put [South] Korea clearly out of a public messaging step with the U.S. and its like-minded partners,” and demonstrated “adjustments to its ‘signature value-based’ foreign policy.”

Relations between South Korea and Russia have declined as military ties between Moscow and Pyongyang deepened since North Korean leader Kim Jong Un visited Russia in September.

In April, South Korea sanctioned two Russian vessels involved in delivering military supplies from North Korea to Russia. In response, Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova called Seoul’s move “an unfriendly step” that “will affect South Korea-Russia relations in a negative way.”  [[ https://www.voanews.com/a/us-pushes-back-at-russia-s-protest-over-south-korean-sanctions/7563881.html ]] 

“Washington was likely displeased with South Korea’s decision to send a representative to Putin’s inauguration,” said Dan DePetris, a fellow at Defense Priorities, a Washington-based think tank.

“This is a subtle, low-cost way for the Yoon government [of South Korea] to signal to Moscow that differences over Ukraine and North Korea notwithstanding, it’s not going to mimic the U.S. policy of diplomatic isolation” toward Russia, he continued.

DePetris added that Seoul likely allowed its representative to attend Putin’s inauguration “precisely because North Korea-Russia bilateral ties have strengthened over the last two years” and wants to “keep all options on the table.”

Pyongyang-Moscow ties have expanded to include several visits to Russia by North Korean delegations recently. On Tuesday, North Korea sent a science and technology delegation to Russia to attend a meeting on trade, economy and science to be held in Moscow, according to North Korea’s state-run KCNA.

Also, passenger train services between the two countries resumed since they were suspended after the COVID-19 pandemic, according to South Korean news agency Yonhap, citing Oleg Kozhemyako, the governor of Russia’s northeastern region of Primorsky Krai, bordering North Korea.

Robert Manning, a senior fellow at the Stimson Center’s Reimagining U.S. Grand Strategy Project, said, “Moscow’s new partnership with North Korea may have been a factor” that prompted Seoul to make its representation at Putin’s inauguration.

He continued, however, “I doubt Seoul has illusions about its ability to restrain Russia’s ties with Pyongyang” but is “perhaps focused on maintaining economic ties” with Moscow.

South Korea’s exports to Russia totaled $6.33 billion in 2022, while its imports from Russia amounted to $12.8 billion in the same year, according to the Observatory of Economic Complexity, an online platform for data collection and distribution. South Korea’s investment in Russia reached $4.16 billion in the same year, according to the South Korean Foreign Ministry.  
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tehran, iran — Iran Tuesday condemned as “interfering” a French Foreign Ministry statement accusing it of “state hostage-taking” and “blackmail” in the detention of four French nationals.

“We strongly condemn such unprofessional, interfering and inappropriate positions while resorting to false references,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kanani told state news agency IRNA.

“The people mentioned in the statement of the French Foreign Ministry were arrested based on solid evidence and witnesses, and the French government is well aware of their crimes.”

Teacher Cecile Kohler and her partner, Jacques Paris, were detained in Iran in May 2022. They are accused of seeking to stir up labor unrest, accusations their families vehemently deny.

“France condemns this policy of state hostage-taking and this constant blackmail by the Iranian authorities,” the French Foreign Ministry said in a statement on May 7, calling for the couple’s release.

Kanani called on the French “to avoid resorting to such statements and using words outside of diplomatic decency, which have negative consequences on relations between the two countries.”

Kohler and Paris both made televised confessions after their arrests that France described as “forced.”

Two other French citizens are held by Iran: a man identified only by his first name, Olivier, and Louis Arnaud, a banking consultant who was sentenced to five years in jail on national security charges last year.

The four are among at least a dozen European passport holders in Iranian custody, some of them dual nationals.
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The NATO Swift Response exercise began earlier this month in Sweden, where around 800 paratroopers from the United States, Spain, Hungary, and Italy are training together to deter any potential aggression. It is the first such exercise on Swedish soil since the country joined NATO in March. VOA’s Eastern Europe Chief Myroslava Gongadze reports from the training ground in Sweden. Video editor: Daniil Batushchak
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WILMINGTON, Delaware — Hunter Biden’s federal gun case will go to trial next month, a judge said Tuesday, denying a bid by lawyers for the president’s son to delay the prosecution. 

U.S. District Judge Maryellen Noreika rejected Hunter Biden’s request to push the trial until September, which the defense said was necessary to give the defense time to line up witnesses and go through evidence handed over by prosecutors. 

President Joe Biden’s son is accused of lying about his drug use in October 2018 on a form to buy a gun that he kept for about 11 days. 

Hunter Biden, who has pleaded not guilty, has acknowledged struggling with an addiction to crack cocaine during that period in 2018, but his lawyers have said he didn’t break the law. 

His attorneys have argued that prosecutors bowed to pressure by Republicans, who claimed the Democratic president’s son was initially given a sweetheart deal, and that he was indicted because of political pressure. 

But the judge overseeing the case last month rejected his claim that the prosecution is politically motivated along with other efforts to dismiss the case. The 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals last week said the case could move forward to trial. 

Hunter Biden was supposed to plead guilty last year to misdemeanor tax charges and would have avoided prosecution on the gun charges had he stayed out of trouble for two years. It was the culmination of a yearslong investigation by federal prosecutors into the business dealings of the president’s son, and the agreement would have dispensed with criminal proceedings and spared the Bidens weeks of headlines as the 2024 election loomed. 

But the deal broke down after the judge who was supposed to sign off on the agreement instead raised a series of questions about it. 

Hunter Biden was indicted on three gun firearms charges in Delaware and was charged separately in California, where he lives, with tax crimes. 

He’s charged in the Delaware case with two counts of making false statements, first for checking a box falsely saying he was not addicted to drugs and second for giving it to the shop for their federally required records. A third count alleges he possessed the gun for about 11 days despite knowing he was a drug user. 

In California, Hunter Biden is charged with three felonies and six misdemeanors over at least $1.4 million in taxes he owed between 2016 and 2019. Prosecutors have accused him of spending millions of dollars on an “extravagant lifestyle” instead of paying his taxes. The back taxes have since been paid.
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CAMBRIDGE, Massachusetts — Protesters against the war between Israel and Hamas were voluntarily taking down their tents in Harvard Yard on Tuesday after university officials agreed to discuss their questions about the endowment, bringing a peaceful end to the kinds of demonstrations that were broken up by police on other campuses. 

The student protest group Harvard Out of Occupied Palestine said in a statement that the encampment “outlasted its utility with respect to our demands.” Meanwhile, Harvard University interim President Alan Garber agreed to pursue a meeting between protesters and university officials regarding the students’ questions. 

Students at many college campuses this spring set up similar encampments, calling for their schools to cut ties with Israel and businesses that support it. 

The Israel-Hamas war began when Hamas and other militants stormed into southern Israel on October 7, killing some 1,200 people and taking 250 hostages. Palestinian militants still hold about 100 captives, and Israel’s military has killed more than 35,000 people in Gaza, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which doesn’t distinguish between civilians and combatants. 

Harvard said its president and the dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Hopi Hoekstra, will meet with the protesters to discuss the conflict in the Middle East. 

The protesters said they worked out an agreement to meet with university officials, including the Harvard Management Company, which oversees the world’s largest academic endowment, valued at about $50 billion. 

The protesters’ statement said the students will set an agenda that includes discussions on disclosure, divestment, reinvestment and the creation of a Center for Palestine Studies. The students also said that Harvard has offered to retract suspensions of more than 20 students and student workers and back down on disciplinary measures faced by 60 more. 

“Since its establishment three weeks ago, the encampment has both broadened and deepened Palestine solidarity organizing on campus,” a spokesperson for the protesters said. “It has moved the needle on disclosure and divestment at Harvard.” 
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Washington — The U.S. Treasury on Tuesday put sanctions on a Russian citizen and three Russia-based companies it said were trying to evade U.S. sanctions in a scheme that could have unfrozen more than $1.5 billion belonging to Russian metals tycoon Oleg Deripaska.

Deripaska, who himself was placed under U.S. sanctions in April 2018, branched out into metals trading as the Soviet Union crumbled, making a fortune by buying up stakes in aluminum factories. Forbes ranked his fortune this year at $2.8 billion.

The Treasury said that in June 2023 Deripaska coordinated with Russian citizens Dmitrii Beloglazov, the owner of Russia-based financial services firm Obshchestvo S Ogranichennoi Otvetstvennostiu Titul (Titul), on a planned transaction to sell Deripaska’s frozen shares in a European company.  

Within weeks of this, Russia-based financial services firm Aktsionernoe Obshchestvo Iliadis was set up as a subsidiary of Titul. In early 2024, Iliadis acquired Russia-based investment holding company International Company Joint Stock Company Rasperia Trading Limited (Rasperia), which holds Deripaska’s frozen shares. 

The Treasury said sanctions were imposed on Beloglazov, Titul, and Iliadis on Tuesday for operating or having operated in Russia’s financial services sector. It said Rasperia was sanctioned for being owned or controlled by, or having acted or purported to act on behalf of Iliadis.
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PARIS — Armed assailants killed two French prison officers and seriously wounded three others in a brazen attack on a convoy in Normandy on Tuesday during which a high-profile inmate escaped, officials said. 

The van was transporting prisoner Mohamed Amra to Evreux jail after a court hearing in Rouen when it was ambushed. 

Justice Minister Eric Dupond-Moretti said he would join a crisis unit to address the emergency. “All means are being used to find these criminals. On my instructions, several hundred police officers and gendarmes were mobilized,” Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin posted on X. 

“This morning’s attack, which cost the lives of prison administration agents, is a shock for all of us,” French President Emmanuel Macron posted on X. “The nation stands alongside the families, the injured and their colleagues.” 

The attack prompted a significant law enforcement operation in the northwestern region of France as authorities worked to secure the area and apprehend the assailants. The assault took place late Tuesday morning on the A154 freeway, which has since been closed. 

Amra was under high surveillance and had recently been sentenced for burglary. He was also under investigation for a kidnapping and homicide case in Marseille, according to public prosecutor Laure Beccuau. 

French media reported that Amra was nicknamed La Mouche, or The Fly. 

Beccuau announced an investigation into the attack, now considered a case of organized crime and murder. “At this stage, we mourn the death of two penitentiary agents in this armed attack,” Beccuau said in a statement.

The investigation will also address organized escape attempts, possession of military-grade weapons and conspiracy to commit crime.
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In the United States, each year there are fewer news organizations covering local communities, even near the nation’s capital. Some high school journalists are trying to help make up for the shortage. Robin Guess reports from Montgomery County, just outside Washington. Camera: Nazir Afzali.
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Tbilisi, Georgia — Georgia was set to adopt a “foreign influence” bill on Tuesday despite mass protests against a law criticized for mirroring repressive Russian legislation.

Thousands of Georgians, mainly youths, have rallied outside parliament for three straight nights and have promised to be back when MPs are due to arrive Tuesday to pass the contentious legislation.

Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze vowed Monday to push it through in a third reading.

“Tomorrow the parliament of Georgia will act on the will of the majority of the population and pass the law,” he said.

He warned that if authorities backed down, Georgia would lose its sovereignty and “easily share the fate of Ukraine”, although it was not immediately clear what he meant by that.

The bill requires non-governmental organizations and media outlets that receive more than 20% of their funding from abroad to register as bodies “pursuing the interests of a foreign power.”

Russia has used a similar law to crack down on dissent.

Protesters are expected to stage fresh rallies Tuesday in the capital Tbilisi.

“They will pass this law and we have to demonstrate our protest,” said 57-year-old Levan Avalishvili, who left the parliament area before midnight on Monday, promising to be back the next day.

Many fear violence, with tensions running high and police beating a group of protesters detained at dawn on Monday.

The Caucasus country has witnessed more than a month of sweeping protests since the ruling Georgian Dream party re-introduced the bill in a shock move, a year after shelving due to a huge backlash.

Opponents of the bill fear it will take Tbilisi off its track of joining the European Union and hugely erode democracy in the tiny country.

They also accuse the ruling party of trying to move the Black Sea nation closer to Moscow.

The ruling party, in power since 2012, has defended the law as necessary for the country’s sovereignty.

Its billionaire backer Bidzina Ivanishvili, who made his fortune in Russia, has accused NGOs of plotting a revolution and being foreign puppets.

He has been accused of leaning towards Moscow and has not publicly condemned the Kremlin’s invasion of Ukraine

 
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ANKARA, Turkey — Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said on Monday that more than 1,000 members of the militant Palestinian group Hamas were being treated in hospitals across Turkey as he reiterated his stance that it was a “resistance movement.”

A Turkish official later said Erdogan had “misspoke” and meant that Gazans more generally were being treated in Turkey.

“If you call Hamas a ‘terrorist organization,’ this would sadden us,” Erdogan said at a joint press conference with Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis in Ankara after Mitsotakis had referred to Hamas as such.

“We don’t deem Hamas a terrorist organization… More than 1,000 members of Hamas are under treatment in hospitals across our country,” Erdogan said.

A Turkish official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, later said that Erdogan had meant to refer to Palestinians from Hamas-run Gaza in general, rather than Hamas members.

“President Erdogan misspoke, he meant 1,000 Gazans are under treatment, not Hamas members,” a Turkish official said.

Reuters could not immediately determine the background of those being treated in Turkey, but in November Ankara said it was evacuating dozens of wounded or sick Gazans, mostly cancer patients, and their companions following Israel’s offensive in

Gaza.
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GENEVA — Conflicts and violence have pushed the number of internally displaced people around the world to a record-breaking high of 75.9 million, with nearly half living in sub-Saharan Africa, according to a new report by the Internal Displacement Monitoring Center.  

The report finds conflicts in Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Palestinian territories accounted for nearly two-thirds of new displacements due to violence, which in total spanned 66 countries in 2023.  

“Over the past two years, we have seen alarming new levels of people having to flee their homes due to conflict and violence, even in regions where the trend had been improving,” Alexandra Bilak, IDMC director said.

In a statement to coincide with the publication of the report Tuesday, she said that the millions of people forced to flee in 2023 were just “the tip of the iceberg.”

“Conflict, and the devastation it leaves behind, is keeping millions from rebuilding their lives, often for years on end,” she said.

The report notes the number of internal displacements, that is the number of times people have been forced to move throughout the year to escape conflict within their country, has increased in the last couple of years.

“While we hear a lot about refugees or asylum-seekers who cross the border, the majority of the displaced people actually stay within their country and they are internally displaced,” Christelle Cazabat, head of programs at IDMC, told journalists in Geneva Monday, in advance of the launch of the report.

In its 2023 report on forcibly displaced populations, the U.N. refugee agency, UNHCR, reported that 62.5 million people had been internally displaced people at the end of 2022 compared to 36.4 million refugees who had fled conflict, violence and persecution that same year.

According to the IDMC, new internal displacements last year were mostly due to the conflict in Ukraine, which started in 2022, as well as to the ongoing conflict in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the eruption of war in mid-April 2023 in Sudan.

The war in Sudan resulted in 6 million internal displacements last year, which was “more than its previous 14 years combined” and the second most ever recorded in one country during a single year after Ukraine’s 16.9 million in 2022, according to the report.

“As you know, it is more than a year that this new wave of conflict erupted (in Sudan) and as of the end of last year, the figure was 9.1 million” displaced in total by the conflict, said Vicente Anzellini, IDMCs global and regional analysis manager and lead author of the report.

“This figure is the highest that we have ever reported for any country, this 9.1 million internally displaced people.”  

In the Gaza Strip, IDMC calculated 3.4 million displacements in the last three months of 2023, many of whom had been displaced multiple times during this period. It says this number represented 17% of total conflict displacements worldwide during the year, noting that a total of 1.7 million Palestinians were internally displaced in Gaza by the end of the year.

The last quarter of 2023 is the period following the Hamas terrorists’ brutal attack on Israel on Oct. 7, eliciting a military response from Israel on the Palestinian enclave.

“There are many other crises that are actually displacing even more people, but we hear a little bit less of them,” said Cazabat, noting that little is heard about the “acute humanitarian crisis in Sudan” though it has the highest number of people “living in internal displacement because of the conflict at the end of last year.” 

In the past five years, the report finds the number of people living in internal displacement because of conflict and violence has increased by 22.6 million.  

Sudan topped last year’s list of 66 countries with 9.1 million people displaced internally because of conflict, followed by Syria with more than 7 million, the DRC, Colombia and Yemen.  

Besides the total of 68.3 million people who were displaced globally by conflict and violence in 2023, the report says 7.7 million were displaced by natural disasters, including floods, storms, earthquakes and wildfires.

As in previous years, the report notes that floods and storms caused the most disaster displacement, including in southeastern Africa, where cyclone Freddy triggered 1.4 million movements across six countries and territories.

The earthquakes that struck Turkey and Syria triggered 4.7 million displacements, one of the largest disaster displacement events since records began in 2008.

Anzellini observed many countries that have experienced conflict displacement also have experienced disaster displacement.

“In many situations, they are overlapping. This is the case in Sudan, in South Sudan, but also in Somalia, in the DRC, and other places,” he said. “So, you can imagine fleeing from violence to save your life and then having to escape to higher ground with whatever you can carry as the storm or a flood threatens to wash away your temporary shelter.” 

He said that no country is immune to disaster displacement.  

“Last year, we recorded disaster displacements in 148 countries and territories, and these include high-income countries such as Canada and New Zealand, which recorded their highest figures ever.

“Climate change is making extreme weather events more frequent and more intense and that can lead to more displacement, but it does not have to,” he said, noting that climate change is one of many factors that contribute to displacement.

“There are other economic, social and political factors that governments can address to actually minimize the impacts of displacement even in the face of climate change,” he said, including early warning systems and the evacuation of populations before a natural disaster is forecast to strike.
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Washington says it is working to resolve the many issues in the continuing conflict in Gaza as negotiations continue and Israel plans to launch a full-scale operation in the southern city of Rafah over U.S. objections. VOA’s Anita Powell reports from the White House.
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As Russia pushed into northern Ukraine this week, the U.S. presidential race between President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump remained focused on another foreign policy crisis — the war in Gaza. As VOA’s congressional correspondent, Katherine Gypson, reports, keeping American attention on Ukraine could be difficult.
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islamabad — The United States and Pakistan have concluded their latest round of counterterrorism talks, agreeing to intensify their collaboration in the fight against terrorist organizations like the Pakistani Taliban and a regional Islamic State affiliate.

Washington and Islamabad issued a joint statement simultaneously on Monday, saying the May 10 bilateral dialogue hosted by the U.S. was centered on tackling “the most pressing challenges to regional and global security.”

The meeting came amid a recent surge in terrorism in Pakistan, resulting in the deaths of hundreds of people, including security forces. The violence is mostly claimed by Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), known as the Pakistani Taliban, who are believed to operate from sanctuaries in neighboring Afghanistan.

“Pakistan and the United States recognize that a partnership to counter ISIS-Khorasan, TTP, and other terrorist organizations will advance security in the region and serve as a model of bilateral and regional cooperation to address transnational terrorism threats,” the statement read.

The statement used an acronym for an Afghanistan-based Islamic State affiliate known as IS-Khorasan, which routinely carries out terrorist attacks in the country and beyond its borders.

Pakistani and U.S. officials at Friday’s talks in Washington resolved to step up communication and continue collaboration “to detect and deter violent extremism through whole-of-government approaches.”

According to the statement, the two sides stressed the importance of capacity building, including sharing technical expertise and best practices, providing investigative and prosecutorial assistance and enhancing border security infrastructure and training.

Islamabad maintains that TTP-led terrorist attacks on Pakistani soil have intensified since the Taliban took control of Afghanistan in August 2021 following the withdrawal of U.S.-led NATO forces after a 20-year counterterrorism mission.

Pakistani authorities allege that members of the Afghan Taliban are facilitating TTP fighters in carrying out cross-border attacks.

The Taliban government in Kabul denies the allegations, saying it is not allowing anyone to threaten other countries, including Pakistan, from Afghan soil.

In a new report slated for release on Tuesday, the U.S. Institute of Peace has warned that Afghanistan “presents growing space for terrorist groups compared to the period before the U.S. withdrawal.”

USIP published a summary of the study on its website, noting that ISIS-K poses “a rising threat with reach beyond the immediate region, greater than during the pre-withdrawal period,” and the TTP “has also returned as a regional security threat.”

The report also stated that al-Qaida and its South Asia affiliate “continue to maintain ties with and receive support” from Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers.
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washington — President Joe Biden on Monday issued an order blocking a Chinese-backed cryptocurrency mining firm from owning land near a Wyoming nuclear missile base. 

The order forces the divestment of property operated as a crypto mining facility near Francis E. Warren Air Force Base. It also forces the removal of certain equipment owned by MineOne Partners Ltd., a firm that is partly owned by the Chinese state. 

This comes as the U.S. is slated on Tuesday to issue major new tariffs on electric vehicles, semiconductors, solar equipment and medical supplies imported from China, according to a U.S. official and another person familiar with the plan. 

The divestment order was made in coordination with the U.S. Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States — a little-known but potentially powerful government agency tasked with investigating corporate deals for national security concerns that holds power to force the company to change. 

A 2018 law granted CFIUS the authority to review real estate transactions near sensitive sites across the U.S., including F.E. Warren Air Force Base. 

The order was vague about the specific national security concerns, with the Treasury Department saying only that there were issues with “specialized and foreign-sourced equipment potentially capable of facilitating surveillance and espionage activities” that “presented a significant national security risk.” 

According to CFIUS, the purchase was not filed with the body, as required, until after the panel received a public tip. 

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, who serves as the chairperson of CFIUS, said the role of the committee is “to ensure that foreign investment does not undermine our national security, particularly as it relates to transactions that present risk to sensitive U.S. military installations as well as those involving specialized equipment and technologies.”
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London — Britain’s King Charles handed over a senior military role to his son Prince William at a ceremony Monday, marking a rare joint appearance for the pair as the king steps up his return to public duties after his cancer diagnosis.

Charles presented William with the title of Colonel-in-Chief of the Army Air Corps, a position the 75-year-old monarch held for 32 years, in front of an Apache helicopter, and watched by service personnel at the Army Flying Museum in southern England.

“He’s a very good pilot indeed,” Charles said of his son, a former helicopter search and rescue pilot for Britain’s Royal Air Force.

The visit was Charles’ latest engagement since he returned to work at the end of April, almost three months after Buckingham Palace announced he was being treated for an unspecified type of cancer.

William, 41, had also taken a break from official duties for several weeks in March and April this year, choosing to spend time with and care for his wife after she revealed she was undergoing preventative chemotherapy for cancer.

He said on Friday she was “doing well.”

At the handover ceremony, Charles said he was saying goodbye with “sadness,” but the Army Air Corps would go from “strength to strength” under his son.

“Look after yourselves and I can’t tell you how proud it has made me to have been involved with you all this time,” Charles said.

The title transfer was announced last August after Charles’ accession to the throne. William spent time with the Corps, viewing training, equipment and hearing from soldiers later Monday.
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New York — Jury selection began on Monday in the corruption trial of U.S. Senator Robert Menendez, a case that could affect the Democrat’s political future and help determine which party controls the Senate next year.

Menendez, 70, faces 16 criminal charges including bribery, fraud and acting as a foreign agent, and is being tried alongside two New Jersey businessmen in Manhattan federal court.

The senator’s wife, Nadine Menendez, has also been charged but will be tried separately. All four defendants have pleaded not guilty.

U.S. District Judge Sidney Stein told prospective jurors that the trial could last six to seven weeks.

Menendez, New Jersey’s senior senator, is up for re-election in November and if exonerated hopes to run for a fourth full term as an independent.

Recent polls show Menendez is deeply unpopular among New Jersey voters, and many Democratic senators including New Jersey’s Cory Booker have called for him to resign. Democrats and independents who caucus with them hold a 51-49 Senate majority.

Prosecutors said the Menendezes accepted cash, gold bars and a Mercedes-Benz convertible in exchange for the senator wielding his political influence in New Jersey and to help the governments of Egypt and Qatar.  

The senator allegedly promised to help Egypt obtain arms sales and other military aid, and helped defendant Wael Hana, an Egyptian American businessman, obtain a lucrative monopoly on the certification of halal meat exports to Egypt.

Prosecutors also said Menendez tried to help defendant Fred Daibes, a prominent New Jersey developer, obtain millions of dollars from a Qatari investment fund, and sought to disrupt a federal criminal case against Daibes in New Jersey.

Much of the cash received by the Menendezes was stuffed inside clothing at their home, prosecutors said.

Menendez and his wife also face obstruction of justice charges. The alleged crimes occurred between 2018 and 2023.

A fifth defendant, Jose Uribe, pleaded guilty to bribery and fraud charges in March and agreed to cooperate with prosecutors.

Nadine Menendez’s trial is scheduled for July 8. Her case was separated after her lawyers said she developed a serious medical condition that required a lengthy recovery.

Lawyers for Robert Menendez have suggested in court papers that if he testified he may try to blame his wife, disclosing marital communications that would “tend to exonerate” him but could incriminate her.

His lawyers said Menendez could explain what they discussed during dinners with Egyptian officials and offer his wife’s explanation for why Hana and Uribe “provided her certain monetary items.”

The defense team also wants a psychiatrist to testify that the senator routinely stored cash in his home because of a “fear of scarcity.”

Defense lawyers said Menendez did this as a “coping mechanism” after the Cuban government seized his family’s assets before he was born, and his father died by suicide after his son stopped paying his gambling debts.

Menendez’s corruption trial is his second.

In 2017, a New Jersey federal judge declared a mistrial after jurors deadlocked on whether Menendez broke the law by providing help to a wealthy ophthalmologist, Salomon Melgen, in exchange for lavish gifts and political contributions.

Menendez became a senator in 2006. He had chaired the powerful Senate Foreign Relations Committee but stepped down last September after first being indicted.

Several other current and former members of Congress also face federal criminal charges, including Representative Henry Cuellar, a Texas Democrat, and former representative George Santos, a New York Republican.

While New Jersey’s voting population leans Democratic, public support for Menendez collapsed following his indictment.

Fewer than one in six voters polled in March by Monmouth University and Emerson College Polling/PIX11/The Hill said they approved of Menendez’s job performance. Even fewer said they would vote for him as an independent.

Several Senate seats held by Democrats or independents may be closely contested in November. A seat now held by West Virginia Democrat Joe Manchin, who is not seeking reelection, is expected to turn Republican. 
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