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Belarusian authorities arrested two leading opposition activists allegedly helping to spearhead protests in the country, demanding the resignation of longtime President Alexander Lukashenko following a disputed election.The opposition’s Coordination Council said police in the capital, Minsk detained its members Olga Kovalkova and Sergei Dylevsky on Monday. City police confirmed their detention. People carry a large historical white-red-white flag of Belarus during an opposition demonstration to protest against presidential election results, in Minsk, Belarus, Aug. 23, 2020.Tens of thousands of people rallied in the Belarus capital Sunday, despite army warnings, with calls for Lukashenko to resign after the disputed election results, a post-election crackdown, and a heavy military presence in the city.     “Today, we can’t sit back and watch how protests are being held by these sacred places under the flags that fascists organized the mass killings of Belarusians, Russians, Jewish people and other nationalities,” said Defense Minister Victor Khrenin. “We cannot allow this. We categorically warn: any violation of peace and order in such places — you will have the army to deal with now, not the police.”    Protesters, many wearing and waving the opposition’s colors of red and white, chanted “freedom” and “we will not forget, we will not forgive” as they walked in the Minsk city center.     Politician and representative of the Coordination Council for members of the Belarusian opposition Maria Kolesnikova attends a news conference in Minsk, Belarus, Aug. 24, 2020.”Our resistance is a marathon, the regime cannot deal with this marathon, but we can. We have the will, strength and support of each other. We should all write, go out, speak out, stand up, complain, be uncooperative, boycott, not agree and keep it up!” said opposition leader Maria Kolesnikova.   The protests have been the biggest challenge yet to Lukashenko’s 26 year rule.  He was declared winner with of the August 9 election that was marred by allegations of fraud. Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, the opposition candidate who fled to Lithuania after the election and claimed to have won from 60 to 70% of the vote, said Saturday that Belarusians must “struggle for their rights” and not be distracted by Lukashenko’s claims that the country was under military threat.   Protesters briefly gathered near the president’s residence, before dispersing peacefully.    Belarusian state television showed Lukashenko flying over the protesters in a helicopter before landing at his residence and getting out in body armor with a rifle in his hand.    While state media reported about 20,000 protesters took part, opposition-leaning media put the estimate at nearly 100,000 protesters.      Lukashenko has called demonstrators “rats.”      Previously, he has used riot police to disperse rallies, but Reuters witnessed no clashes between police and protesters Sunday.      However, in the 15 days of protests, more than 7,000 people have been detained and hundreds beaten by police. Two people have been killed in the post-election protests in Belarus, it has been confirmed.FILE – Protesters carry a man wounded during clashes with police after the presidential election in Minsk, Belarus, Aug. 10.The EU and United States have criticized the vote and condemned the crackdown.      Thirty-one years ago, on August 23, 1989, an estimated two million people joined arms across the three Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania in a protest against Soviet rule that became known as the “Baltic Way.” Protesters formed a 600-kilometer-long human chain from Vilnius, Lithuania, to the Belarusian border. Two years later, the Baltic states would achieve their freedom.      On Sunday, mass protests were held in Lithuania and Latvia, and were scheduled to occur in Estonia and Prague, as a show of support for Belarus across the Baltics.     People form a human chain to show support to protesters in Belarus in Medininkai, Lithuania, Aug. 23, 2020.Organizers in Lithuania Sunday estimated up to 50,000 people took part in their rally. In Latvia, hundreds marched along the Belarus border, the French news agency reported. Elsewhere, human chains were planned in Estonia and Prague.      Also, it was announced Saturday that U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Stephen Biegun will visit Lithuania and Russia for talks on the Belarusian post-election crisis.     Tsikhanouskaya’s team said Saturday that Biegun would meet the opposition candidate in Lithuania.       RFE/RL contributed to this report.     
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A lot of eyebrows were raised when Russia announced it was the first to approve a vaccine for the coronavirus, and even more so when Vietnam said it would buy up to 150 million doses.  Not many were expecting the news, but if it comes to pass, a few factors would explain how Vietnam and Russia got here. The two sides have a long history, from founding father Ho Chi Minh’s revolutionary years in Moscow, to their membership in a modern trade deal. Vietnam has also been more aggressive than most other nations in tackling COVID-19, and it needs an affordable vaccine as the World Health Organization (WHO) warns rich nations against “vaccine nationalism” and hoarding.  The U.S., a key partner of Vietnam, has expressed doubt that Russia developed a vaccine so quickly. Other nations reportedly interested in the vaccine include the Philippines, Indonesia, India and South Korea. Cold War history Several nations have already put in pre-orders for other future vaccines, and there are more than 150 programs to research possible vaccines around the world, from silkworm cells in Japan, to new use of RNA instead of DNA in research. Russia announced this month it is in Phase 2 trial of a vaccine, which involves testing on hundreds of people, as opposed to tens of thousands in Phase 3. Vietnam could buy 50 million to 150 million doses by 2021, according to the state-run newspaper Tuoi Tre.  “A vaccine that has been used in a foreign country may not require any more tests when it’s imported to Vietnam,” Dr. Tran Dac Phu, an associate professor at the Vietnam Ministry of Health’s Public Health Emergency Operations Center, said on the national VTV station. “However, its trials must still be applied on humans to test its safety and effectiveness.” Russia’s relations have frayed elsewhere, from interference in the U.S. presidential election, to its annexation of Ukraine territory which prompted European Union sanctions. By contrast, feathers are mostly unruffled in Asia, especially in Vietnam, one of the world’s last remaining communist nations, which had strong ties to the old Soviet Union. In addition to Ho Chi Minh’s studies of Lenin, many prominent Vietnamese spent their formative years in Cold-War-era Russia before coming home to found companies, such as Vietjet Air. ‘Negligent’ behavior The Southeast Asian nation was already conducting its own vaccine research before the Russia announcement, one of many trials globally because scientists need to test on a diverse array of volunteers. However, the first viable vaccine is likely to come from a nation with many resources, leading to fears at the WHO and elsewhere that instead of cooperating, developed nations could put themselves first when a vaccine emerges.  Vietnam was also taking COVID-19 seriously before its peers, but the fight intensified in July when it reported its first ever death from the disease. It has now jumped on the possibility of a vaccine, following a pattern of attacking the pandemic aggressively. Still people need to keep taking safety measures and not pin all their hopes on a vaccine, said Vu Duc Dam, the Deputy Prime Minister of Vietnam who has been leading the pandemic efforts. “Because we controlled the disease well for a long time, people have become more negligent,” he said this month. “It’s time to remind ourselves that the pandemic is still going on and the vaccine will only be available to everyone in at least one year. We must strengthen measures to safely live together with the disease.” 
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Brazil’s president threatened Sunday to punch a reporter in the face for asking about his wife’s bank deposits, allegedly linked to a corruption scheme involving an aide to their senator son. “I want to punch you in the face, OK?” the right-wing Bolsonaro was heard replying to the reporter from O Globo newspaper in an audio recording released by the daily. The president did not take any follow-up questions from other journalists after the exchange and left without making further comments. The O Globo reporter was referring to an article published earlier this month in the magazine Crusoe that linked First Lady Michelle Bolsonaro to retired police officer Fabrício Queiroz, a friend of the president, and former adviser to their now senator son Flavio Bolsonaro. According to the magazine, Queiroz deposited about $13,000 in checks from government employees in the first lady’s account between 2011 and 2016. Queiroz was an aide to younger Bolsonaro when he was a Rio de Janeiro state legislator, before his father became president in January 2019. During and after the campaign Jair Bolsonaro has promised not to tolerate corruption. While both Queiroz and Flavio Bolsonaro are being investigated, Queiroz is under arrest in connection with bank deposits of $213,500 made at the time. 
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Five people are dead in Haiti’s southeast and west departments, presidential press secretary Eddy Jackson Alexis announced Sunday after Tropical Storm Laura hit the country with an estimated 200 mm (8 inches) rain and maximum sustained winds of up to 85 kph. The president and all the members of his government presented their condolences to the victims’ families, Alexis tweeted.5 moun deja mouri pandan pasaj tanpèt twopikal #TTLaura nan depatman Sidès ak Lwès peyi a. Chèf Leta a ansanm ak tout Gouvènman an prezante senpati yo a fanmi viktim yo. Alèt wouj la toujou kenbe sou tout peyi a. @Pwoteksyonsivilpic.twitter.com/O5LTQ16m64— Communication Haïti (@MCHaiti) August 23, 2020 The press secretary said the death toll is still being assessed and that among the victims were a 10-year-old girl, a woman who was swept away by flood waters and a man who was found dead in the Bicentenaire neighborhood of the capital, Port-au-Prince, near the national palace.In an earlier tweet Sunday, the press secretary said the Peligre Dam, a flood-controlling and energy generating hydroelectric plant in the Artibonite River valley in Haiti’s lush agricultural sector, had flooded and was subsequently opened.5 moun deja mouri pandan pasaj tanpet twopikal #Laura nan depatman Sidès ak Lwès peyi a. Baraj Pelig la ranpli. Otorite yo blije lage dlo a. Moun nan Latibonit atansyon pral gen anpil dlo nan vale a. ALÈT WOUJ la toujou kenbe sou tout teritwa nasyonal la.@Pwoteksyonsivil#COUN— Eddy Jackson Alexis (@Eddyjalexis) August 23, 2020″Residents of the Artibonite region, stay alert, there will be flooding in the valley. The Red Alert is still in effect for the entire country,” Alexis warned.  
 
In Riviere Froide, in the southeastern Nippes Department, residents told VOA Creole they fear for their lives as the river threatens homes and businesses near its banks.  “We are in grave danger because when this river overflows it causes major problems. There are people who have children who need to evacuate but they don’t have the resources to do that,” a man who stood on the bank of the overflowing, muddy river told VOA. He urged the government to send help immediately.   Another male resident told VOA many of the homes on the bank of the river have multiple people living in them and that the river also swept away livestock.”The river is a big threat to the people living near it (now),” he said.  Video recorded by VOA Creole shows river waters sweeping away parts of makeshift, tin-roof homes. Some people are seen standing seemingly helpless on the front porch of their homes as the river creeps closer and closer. Other residents attempt to salvage property as people standing on the opposite side of the riverbank shout at them to watch out. In the background a woman screams.Raging floodwaters of the Riviere Froide in Haiti’s southwest theatens homes, Aug. 23, 2020. (Photo: Matiado Vilme / VOA)Residents said some people regularly wade or swim across the river because there is no passible road they can take.   The latest weather forecast Sunday predicts wind and thunderstorms continuing through Tuesday as Laura still threaten lives in Haiti and the Dominican Republic with flash flooding. According to the U.S.  National Hurricane Center, the tropical storm is now heading east toward Cuba.  Sorry, but your browser cannot support embedded video of this type, you can
download this video to view it offline.Download File352p | 1 MB352p | 2 MBOriginal | 5 MB Embed” />Copy Download AudioTropical Storm Laura lashed Haiti with torrential rains, high winds and flash flooding. In the Riviere Froide region in the southeast, residents lives and homes are threatened by raging river waters. (Video by Matiado Vilme/VOA Creole)Haiti’s ministry for the protection of civilians (Homeland Security) announced on Twitter that a press conference is planned for later Sunday to inform the public about the storm damage. The ministry says the prime minister, interior minister, homeland security minister and other government officials will be on hand to answer reporters’ questions.   Tropical Storm Laura hits Haiti at a time when the Caribbean nation is still struggling with the coronavirus. The latest public health ministry figures published this week indicate 8,082 infections and 196 deaths.Sorry, but your browser cannot support embedded video of this type, you can
download this video to view it offline.Download File352p | 4 MB352p | 5 MB352p | 6 MBOriginal | 12 MB Embed” />Copy Download AudioTropical Storm Laura caused major flooding in the Riviere Froide region of Haiti’s southeast where the raging river swept away homes and livestock, Aug. 23, 2020. (Video by Matiado Vilme/VOA Creole)
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Tens of thousands of people rallied in the Belarus capital Sunday and called for President Alexander Lukashenko to resign after disputed election results, a postelection crackdown, and a heavy military presence in the city.Protesters, many wearing and waving the opposition’s colors of red and white, chanted “freedom” and “we will not forget, we will not forgive” as they walked in the Minsk city center. They briefly gathered near the president’s residence before dispersing peacefully.People take photos sitting on the roof as Belarusian opposition supporters with a huge old Belarusian national flag march to Independence Square in Minsk, Belarus, Aug. 23, 2020.Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, the opposition candidate who fled to Lithuania after the election and claimed to have won from 60 to 70% of the vote, said Saturday that Belarusians must “struggle for their rights” and not be distracted by Lukashenko’s claims that the country was under military threat.Also, it was announced Saturday that U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Stephen Biegun will visit Lithuania and Russia next week for talks on the Belarusian postelection crisis.Tsikhanouskaya’s team said Saturday that Biegun would meet the opposition candidate in Lithuania.RFE/RL contribute to this report.
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A former Soviet republic on the fault line between Russia and Europe is boiling with revolt this summer. Sounds familiar — but Belarus 2020 isn’t Ukraine 2014, and that’s why it’s hard to predict what will happen next. Here is a look at what’s different this time, and why it matters: No real leader The uprising in Belarus erupted last week in a democratic vacuum, in a country where challengers to President Alexander Lukashenko are jailed or exiled and where there is no experienced parliamentary opposition. So those at the forefront of Minsk protest marches have been ordinary Belarusians, instead of established political leaders like those who helped galvanize crowds and funding for Ukraine’s 2014 protest movement, centered around the Maidan independence square in Kyiv. In Belarus, “the absence of bright leaders undoubtedly weakens the protests … Leaders bring awareness,” independent political analyst Valery Karbalevich said. So Belarusian protesters formed a new Advisory Council this week to try to “offer the street a clear plan and agenda,” he said. However, opposition figure Maria Kolesnikova argues that the mass protests this month in Minsk, which came together in decentralized clusters via messaging app Telegram, show that Belarusians no longer need a vertical hierarchy telling them what to do. And a leaderless protest has one key advantage, she said: “It cannot be beheaded.” Orderly protests When unprecedented crowds of 200,000 people marched through the tidy, broad avenues of Minsk on Sunday, they came to a halt at red traffic lights, waiting obediently until they turned green. In Ukraine, by contrast, “protesters burned tires and threw Molotov cocktails,” said Syarzhuk Chyslau, leader of the Belarusian White Legion organization. That’s in part because the Minsk marches lack the kind of far-right and neo-Nazi militant groups that joined Ukraine’s uprising and fanned the violence. It’s also because Belarusians aren’t driven by the deep-seated anger at Russian influence that fueled Ukraine’s uprisings in 2004 and 2014, or Georgia’s ground-breaking Rose Revolution in 2003. While Ukraine has been geopolitically split between pro-West and pro-Russian camps since the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, Belarusians are broadly Moscow-friendly. Not a single European Union flag has appeared at the Minsk rallies, and the protesters aren’t pursuing NATO membership at the Kremlin’s expense; they just want to freely choose their own leader after an election they believe was stolen from them. Pavel Latushko, a former Lukashenko loyalist now on the protesters’ Advisory Council, hopes this could allow Belarusians to count on help from both Brussels and Moscow to settle the current tensions. “If the EU and Russia together acted as a mediator in resolving the Belarusian crisis, this would be an ideal option,” Latushko told The Associated Press. Economics While Ukraine’s protest movement built a huge tent camp in the center of Kyiv, complete with food delivery and security forces, the only perks for protesters in Belarus so far are bottles of water. “There are no oligarchs in Belarus who would give money for hot meals, medical treatment and tents. Even to pay police fines, Belarusian protesters collect money themselves,” analyst Alexander Klaskouski said. Unlike Ukraine’s largely privatized economy, Belarus’ economy remains 80% state-run, and little has evolved since the Soviet era. That makes it even more remarkable that workers at state-run factories have joined this week’s protests and strikes. “The structure of the economy allowed Ukrainians not to be afraid of the state, which in Belarus could throw any person out on the street with nothing at all,” said Klaskouski. The EU and U.S. also had economic interests in Ukraine before its 2014 uprising, but have only a marginal role in the largely closed-off Belarusian economy. Moscow’s role Given that, the Kremlin can’t easily portray Belarus’ protests as a Western-backed effort to sow chaos in its backyard the way it could in Ukraine. Russia used that argument to justify its annexation of the Crimean Peninsula and backing for separatist rebels in eastern Ukraine in a war that still simmers, six years on. But Russia’s role in Belarus is pivotal, as the country’s top trade partner and main military ally. So far, Russian President Vladimir Putin has made it clear to Germany and France that they should steer clear of any interference, but hasn’t revealed how he wants to deal with the protesters or with Lukashenko, the only leader in the former Soviet space who’s been in power longer than Putin himself. Potential parallels Ukraine has been a cacophonous democracy for much of the 29 years since winning independence from the USSR, and Belarus is dubbed Europe’s last dictatorship — but they share some similarities. “Lukashenko made the same mistake as [former Ukrainian President Viktor] Yanukovych — he began to brutally beat peaceful protesters, which sparked a tsunami of popular protest, insulted dignity and triggered a revolution,” said analyst Vladimir Fesenko, director of the Penta Center in Kyiv. Belarusian economist Dmitry Rusakevich, 46, participated in the Kyiv protests on the Maidan, and now goes out to Minsk’s Independence Square every evening. “Maidan woke up Belarusians and showed that we need to fight for freedom,” he said. “It took the calm Belarusians a long time to muster the courage to say no to the dictator.” 
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The wife of Russian dissident Alexei Navalny, who is being treated for suspected poisoning at a Berlin hospital, visited her husband Sunday, according to the Associated Press.Yulia Navalnaya and an aide did not speak to reporters as they entered the German capital’s Charité hospital to see Navalny. He is in an induced coma and breathing with the aid of a ventilator.Navalny, who was flying to Moscow from Siberia Thursday, fell ill during the flight, prompting the plane to make an emergency landing in Omsk, in Siberia. His aide said Navalny had drunk black tea at an airport cafe.  Supporters of Navalny, a well-known critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin, believe the tea was laced with poison.Yulia Navalnaya, wife of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, speaks with the media outside a hospital, where Alexei receives medical treatment in Omsk, Russia, Aug. 21, 2020.Navalnaya pushed to have her husband, 44, flown for treatment in Berlin. After his arrival Saturday, hospital spokeswoman Manuela Zingl told AP he would undergo extensive diagnostic tests and that doctors wouldn’t comment on his illness or treatment until they were able to evaluate the results. AP’s report did not include a timeframe for that.On Saturday, Russian health authorities, who at first balked at allowing Navalny to be flown to Germany, said tests hadn’t shown any poisons in his system.Before Friday’s decision to allow treatment in Germany, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov indicated the government would help facilitate the move and wished Navalny a “speedy recovery.”   Peskov said the government would investigate the incident should toxicology reports show Navalny had been poisoned.  The case has attracted international attention.German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron expressed concern last week over Navalny’s condition.U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden also weighed in, saying Navalny’s “coma after being poisoned” was “unacceptable.”Donald Trump continues to cozy up to Russia while Putin persecutes civil society and journalists. Now, opposition leader Alexei Navalny is in a coma after being poisoned. It’s unacceptable. Unlike Trump, I’ll defend our democratic values and stand up to autocrats like Putin. https://t.co/OLjoGDaG4f— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) August 21, 2020The U.S. Embassy in Moscow indicated it was monitoring the situation.“If true, the suspected poisoning of Russian oppositionist Aleksey #Navalny represents a grave moment for Russia, and the Russian people deserve to see all those involved held to account. Our thoughts are with his family,” said U.S. Embassy spokeswoman Rebecca Ross in a tweet.Charles Maynes in Moscow contributed to this report.
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Former Ukrainian prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko has tested positive for the novel coronavirus and is in serious condition with a fever, her party’s spokeswoman said on Sunday. Tymoshenko, 59, who twice served as premier before her defeat in the 2010 presidential election, became the first high-profile Ukrainian politician known to have contracted COVID-19. Parliament has been on summer vacation since mid-July. “Her condition is assessed as serious, her temperature is up to 39 [Celsius],” the spokeswoman for her Fatherland party said, declining to say whether Tymoshenko had been hospitalized or give further detail. Ukraine has experienced a sharp rise in infections this week, with a new 24-hour total of 2,328 cases reported on Saturday. The overall number of infections reached 104,958 along with 2,271 deaths. Tymoshenko rose to prominence as co-leader of Ukraine’s Orange Revolution in 2004 in which pro-Western Viktor Yushchenko was confirmed as president after a court declared the election result to have been rigged in favor of his pro-Moscow foe. She served twice as prime minister under Yushchenko before the two fell out after years of political turmoil. Tymoshenko ran for president in 2010 and lost to Russian-backed Viktor Yanukovich and in 2011 was sentenced to seven years in prison on abuse of office charges, which she denied, calling the accusations politically motivated. She was freed from prison in early 2014 after Yanukovich was toppled in a popular uprising that put Ukraine on a path away from former Soviet master Moscow toward closer ties with the European Union and the United States.  
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Tens of thousands of people gathered in the Belarusian capital, Minsk, for a rally Sunday against the disputed reelection of President Alexander Lukashenko and a postelection crackdown amid a heavy military presence in the city amid a fresh warning from the army.   Crowds filed down streets of the city center for what is being billed as the March of New Belarus as protests entered a 15th  day in the Eastern European country of 9.5 million.FILE – Opposition supporters protest against disputed presidential elections results at Independence Square in Minsk, Belarus, Aug. 18, 2020.Thousands of people have taken to the streets of Belarus since Lukashenko, in power since 1994, was declared the winner of the August 9 poll. More than 7,000 people have been detained and hundreds beaten by police. The EU and the United States have criticized the vote and condemned the postelection crackdown.   Human chains of solidarity with Belarus were planned for later Sunday in 26 countries, including Lithuania, where the human line hopes to stretch to the border with Belarus.   Thirty-one years ago, on August 23, 1989, an estimated 2 million people joined arms across the three Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania in a protest against Soviet rule that became known as the “Baltic Way.”   Belarusian opposition politician Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya addresses the nation in Vilnius, Lithuania, in this still image taken from handout video released Aug. 21, 2020.Svyatlana Tsikhanouskaya, the opposition candidate who fled to Lithuania after the election and claimed to have won from 60 to 70 percent of the vote, said Saturday that Belarusians must “struggle for their rights” and not be distracted by Lukashenko’s claims that the country was under military threat.   “We are people of Belarus and we are a majority and we will not step away. We are not afraid of them anymore,” she told the AFP news agency.    Her comments came as Lukashenko again claimed NATO troops in Poland and Lithuania were “seriously stirring” near Belarus’s borders.   Dressed in military fatigues, Lukashenko told a military unit in Hrodna Saturday that Belarus’s army must “protect the territorial integrity of our country,” adding “military support is evident.”   NATO said the claims were “baseless.”   “As we have already made clear, NATO poses no threat to Belarus or any other country and has no military buildup in the region,” it said in a statement last week.   Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda also denied the accusation Saturday.   “The regime is trying to divert attention from Belarus’s internal problems at any cost with totally baseless statements about imaginary external threats,” Nauseda told AFP.   The Lithuanian Foreign Ministry also announced Saturday that U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Stephen Biegun will visit Lithuania and Russia next week for talks on the Belarusian postelection crisis.Tsikhanouskaya’s team said Saturday that Biegun would meet the opposition candidate in Lithuania.   No election in Belarus under Lukashenko has ever been deemed free or fair by the West. 
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At least 13 people suffocated in a crush during a raid on a nightclub in Peru’s capital where a party was being held despite a coronavirus ban on such gatherings, police said.Latin America has been badly hit by the pandemic, and this month Peru reimposed stricter restrictions on movement.The illegal birthday party on Saturday was organized on social media and drew a crowd of around 120 at the Thomas Restobar, the interior ministry said in a statement confirming the 13 deaths.”Faced with the police operation, which did not use any type of weapon or tear gas, those attending the party tried to escape through the single exit, trampling each other and getting trapped in the stairway,” the ministry said. However, some who were at the party and others living near the nightclub in Lima’s Los Olivos district disputed the ministry’s version of events.”It appears that police entered and threw tear gas canisters at them, and boxed them in,” one local resident told RPP radio.Six people, including three police officers, were injured, the interior ministry said.Local media reported that the victims were in their 20s.Women’s Minister Rosario Sasieta said she was outraged.”It should never have happened. We are in a pandemic, in a health emergency. I am calling for the maximum punishment possible for the nightclub owners,” she told RPP.The interior ministry said 23 people had been detained and that authorities are trying to identify the organizers and the owners of the premises.Peru, with a population of 33 million, has recorded more than half a million coronavirus cases and over 27,000 fatalities.This month the country re-imposed a curfew on Sundays in response to the rising number of infections.A nighttime curfew has been in place since March 16 while the borders are closed and school classes have been suspended for the rest of the year. 
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Analysis from the black boxes of a downed Ukrainian passenger plane shows it was hit by two missiles 25 seconds apart and that passengers were still alive for some time after the impact of the first blast, Iran said on Sunday.The announcement by the head of Iran’s Civil Aviation Organization marks the first official report on the contents of the cockpit voice and data recordings, which were sent to France for reading in July.Tehran has said it accidentally shot down the Ukraine airliner in January, at a time of extreme tensions with the United States. All 176 people aboard the plane were killed.”Nineteen seconds after the first missile hit the plane, the voices of pilots inside the cockpit, indicated that the passengers were alive … 25 seconds later the second missile hit the plane,” Touraj Dehghani-Zanganeh was cited as saying by state television.Iran has been in talks with Ukraine, Canada and other nations that had citizens aboard the downed plane, and who have demanded a thorough investigation into the incident.”The data analysis from the black boxes should not be politicized,” Zanganeh said.Iran’s Revolutionary Guards shot down the Ukraine International Airlines flight with a ground-to-air missile on January 8, just after the plane took off from Tehran, in what Tehran later acknowledged as a “disastrous mistake” by forces on high alert during a confrontation with the United States.Iranian and Ukrainian officials have held talks on the compensation to families of the victims. Another round of talks is set for October. 
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Russian dissident Alexei Navalny is being treated at Berlin’s renowned Charite Hospital for suspected poisoning, after he was transported from the Siberian city of Omsk to Germany on Saturday.The Russian opposition leader is currently in a coma and breathing through a ventilator.Charite said in a short statement that it had admitted Navalny and was carrying out an “extensive medical diagnosis.” The hospital has not given any details about Navalny’s condition.Jaka Bizilj, founder of the Cinema for Peace that facilitated the evacuation of Navalny to Germany in a chartered medical plane, said his condition was stable.”The good news is that he’s stable, so the whole travel did not affect him,” Bizilj said. “But there is no reason to celebrate, because he is in a very critical condition. So, the real work starts now with the doctors at the Charite,” he said.Family and associates of Navalny believe he was poisoned with a cup of tea at an airport where he was to board a plane to Moscow, and blamed Russian President Vladimir Putin. Russian doctors, however, said tests showed no trace of poison.Initially, Russian doctors refused to permit Navalny’s evacuation, maintaining it was too dangerous to move him, but later acquiesced to demands to allow his medical treatment in Germany.That came after Navalny’s wife, Yulia Navalnaya, issued a public appeal online to Putin to facilitate the move.DiagnosisIn a preliminary diagnosis Friday, Russian doctors in Omsk said a “metabolic disorder” tied to a low blood-sugar level had caused Navalny to suddenly lose consciousness aboard a flight from the Siberian city of Tomsk to his Moscow home early Thursday.Other Russian health officials announced that traces of an industrial chemical had been found on his skin and hair.Still others said that Navalny had been exposed to a dangerous substance that posed such a danger to others that moving him would require caution.Navalny’s associates have openly suggested foul play followed by a government-backed coverup.“What was the factor that influenced that this young and sporty man to this extent that he was nearly dead and had to be put in coma and on a ventilator … is still unclear,” Leonid Volkov, the politician’s chief strategist, said in a press conference in Berlin on Friday.Navalny’s spokesperson, Kira Yarmys, who was traveling with the politician at the time of the incident, insists Navalny was poisoned when he drank some black tea at an airport cafe.“I was with Alexey from the very start of the morning,” she said. “I sat in the seat next to him on the plane, and have no shared symptoms with his poisoning.”The case has attracted international attention.German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron have expressed concern over Navalny’s condition.U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden weighed in, saying Navalny’s “coma after being poisoned” was “unacceptable.”Donald Trump continues to cozy up to Russia while Putin persecutes civil society and journalists. Now, opposition leader Alexei Navalny is in a coma after being poisoned. It’s unacceptable. Unlike Trump, I’ll defend our democratic values and stand up to autocrats like Putin. https://t.co/OLjoGDaG4f— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) August 21, 2020The U.S. Embassy in Moscow indicated it was monitoring the situation.“If true, the suspected poisoning of Russian oppositionist Aleksey #Navalny represents a grave moment for Russia, and the Russian people deserve to see all those involved held to account. Our thoughts are with his family,” said U.S. Embassy spokeswoman Rebecca Ross in a tweet.Kremlin responseBefore Friday’s decision to allow treatment in Germany, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov indicated the government would help facilitate the move and wished Navalny a “speedy recovery.”Peskov said the government would investigate the incident should toxicology reports show Navalny had been poisoned.Navalny has long been a problematic figure for the Kremlin, detailing corruption and excess at the highest levels of the government on his popular YouTube channel.The channel’s mix of investigative journalism and caustic humor has resonated with younger Russians in particular — a group Putin has struggled to court.Navalny has made no secret of his political ambitions.He launched a campaign for president to challenge Putin in 2018 that was undone by a lingering criminal conviction.His supporters — and the European Court of Human Rights — agreed that the charges were levied to keep him out of the race.   
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At least 17 people were killed in three attacks across Colombia in regions contested by criminal groups, drug traffickers, and dissidents of the demobilized Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) guerrillas.Officials and local media reported on Saturday that the attacks occurred within 24 hours in three Colombian provinces.Colombia’s President Ivan Duque condemned the violence.”The rejection of violence is because it mainly hurts the young people of Colombia,” he said. “It hurts that in recent years we have seen that the main victims of violence are youth. It hurts that in many communities these armed groups have always tried to recruit children.”The attacks in the Columbian provinces of Cauca and Narino claimed the life of 12 people, six in each, while the attack in the province of Arauca left five people dead.Just a week ago, eight people were killed by an unidentified armed group in a contested drug trafficking area in Narino. Five other people were killed on August 11 in a neighborhood in the eastern part of the city of Cali.More than 260,000 people have been killed and millions displaced during Colombia’s decades-long drug trafficking conflicts that have involved drug gangs, other criminal groups and former members of FARC who reject the Duque’s 2016 peace deal.     
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A Minsk-based journalism trade group is calling on the Belarusian Information Ministry to immediately unblock more 50 news media websites in what they’re describing as a virtual blackout of reporting on protests over authoritarian President Alexander Lukashenko’s bid to extend his 26 years in power.Analyst Franak Viačorka first reported the shutdowns late Friday, which included sites for the U.S.-funded Radio Liberty, a USAGM-run sister agency of VOA, Polish-funded satellite TV channel Belsat, Minsk-based EuroRadio, Belarusian sports news outlet Tribuna, and many others.⚡️Breaking! The website of @svaboda (@RFERL) was blocked by Belarus’ Ministry of Information along with 73 other pages, including https://t.co/pQ13BknCkQ, https://t.co/f1yIxPZHN6, https://t.co/qYCGvlcrcd and many others. @USAGMgov@RFERLPress@Belsat_TV— Franak Viačorka (@franakviacorka) August 21, 2020The blockade came just hours after state-run publishing house Vysheysha Shkola stopped printing prominent independent newspapers Narodnaya Volya and Komsomolskaya Pravda, citing malfunctioning press equipment. It was the third time Komsomolskaya Pravda’s press run was disrupted since the August 9 presidential election.Protests unprecedented in Belarus for their size and duration broke out after the vote in which election officials say Lukashenko won a sixth term in a landslide. Protesters call the results fraudulent and are demanding his resignation.Immediately after the election, various protest groups said they suddenly faced limited access to the Telegram messaging service they use to coordinate anti-government action. They also described an internet shutdown that they blamed on the authorities.The Belarusian Association of Journalists, whose own website has been blocked domestically since August 9, links the mass blackout of websites, along with rolling internet service outages and the print media disruptions, with what it calls “government attempts to block information about post-election protests in the country and severe violence against their participants.”The Belarusian Embassy in Washington did not respond to VOA’s emails requesting comment.”We consider such actions indirect censorship and obstruction of the legitimate activities of media in Belarus,” the journalists’ association said in an open letter to the Information Ministry.”These actions not only violate the rights of journalists and the media, but also restrict the constitutional right of citizens to receive complete, reliable and timely information,” the letter said.BAJ, it said, “demands that the country’s authorities immediately stop pressure on the press, ensure uninterrupted publication of printed publications, and unblock access to the blocked websites.”International reactionThe group also called on international organizations to support their statement.The International Press Institute and more than a dozen other press watchdogs, including PEN America, the European Federation of Journalists, Reporters Without Borders, and the U.N.-run Internews, recently issued an open letter demanding protection for reporters.The European Federation of Journalists on Friday castigated Belarusian customs officials for denying entry to 17 foreign journalists at Minsk’s airport August 20.”Journalists from Estonia, Poland, Serbia, Germany and Georgia were not allowed to enter,” said the organization’s statement, which cites Belarusian Foreign Affairs Ministry officials who say they refused entry to journalists whose accreditation forms hadn’t yet been fully processed.The latest restrictions come days after at least six on-air presenters resigned from state broadcasting company Belarus One. Some 300 of the national channel’s 2,000 employees also went on strike that day, saying they refused to disseminate state propaganda that plays down the magnitude of street clashes or vilifies protesters.“People feel that if we can’t do honest journalism, then we won’t work,” Kseniya Lutskina, a Belarus One documentarian, told The Guardian.The walkouts are significant since state TV dominates Belarusian broadcasting for news and entertainment programming, and it is a primary source of news for a large majority of Belarusians.In leaving their jobs, members of the media joined growing ranks of police, security officers, and factory workers who are also quitting.Lukashenko on Saturday addressed a rally of several thousand supporters in the city of Grodno, where he threatened to close factories that are on strike as of Monday. Strikes have hit some of the country’s major companies, including vehicle and fertilizer manufacturers, a potential blow to the largely state-controlled economy.Lukashenko alleges that the protests are inspired by Western forces including the United States, and that NATO is deploying forces near Belarus’ western border. The alliance firmly denies that claim.Widespread crackdownPhysical attacks, arbitrary arrests, prolonged detentions, fines and deportations have been widely reported for months. The Belarusian Association of Journalists has documented more than 130 serious violations of journalists’ rights between the beginning of the presidential campaign May 8 and August 11, 48 hours after the election.Several foreign correspondents, such as BBC cameraman Abdujalil Abdurasulov and Associated Press photographer Mstyslav Chernov, have described being briefly detained and beaten.Independent Russian news outlet Novaya Gazeta recently published an article stating that Belarus riot police have been particularly targeting Russian correspondents.”Crowds of journalists with a variety of IDs and passports, from Great Britain to Japan, are wandering around Minsk these days. But only Russians are beaten, deported, intimidated, arrested,” the article said, citing an August 7 incident in which a Russian language film crew of one Russian and two Ukrainian nationals were detained and then deported to Odessa.Other Russian nationals detained while reporting from Minsk since August 9 include Meduza correspondent Maxim Solopov, Daily Storm correspondents Anton Starkov and Dmitriy Lasenko, and Russia Today correspondent Konstantin Pridybaylo.The European Federation of Journalists reported August 12 that both of Belarusian journalist Rasl Kulevich’s arms were broken after he was arrested for covering a street demonstration in Rodno for a local publication.Belarusian journalist Rasl Kulevich was arrested on the evening of 11 August while covering demonstrations in Rodno for https://t.co/GK1gQRrfBk.The police beat him and broke both his forearms.#Belaruspic.twitter.com/9uEWfISKAK— EFJ (@EFJEUROPE) August 16, 2020Johan Bihr of Reporters Without Borders recently told VOA he believes instructions to crack down on reporters appear to be coming from the top.“Over the past few days and weeks, President Lukashenko has repeatedly warned and threatened independent media. He scolded the Belarusian Foreign Ministry for accrediting Radio Liberty,” Bihr told VOA on Aug. 14. “He threatened the journalists of (website) Tut.by and (television channel) Belsat, accusing them of instigating a revolution. In this way, he very openly and clearly empowered the state apparatus to crack down on independent journalists and arrange an information blackout in the country.”Reporters Without Borders, whose World Press Freedom Index ranks Belarus 153rd out of 180 countries, where 1 is the freest, has called on the European Union to sanction Belarus over the crackdown.Some information is from AP, Reuters, and RFE/RL. 
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Exiled Belarusian opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya sees herself as a symbol of change whose role is to help deliver new elections as President Alexander Lukashenko will have to quit sooner or later, she told Reuters Saturday.Speaking in Lithuania, to which she and her two children have fled for security reasons, Tsikhanouskaya said she felt duty-bound to do what she could to support protesters in her home country but would not run for president again.”During the campaign I didn’t see myself as a politician, but I pushed myself forward,” she said. “I don’t see myself in politics. I am not a politician.”Tens of thousands of Belarusians have taken to the streets for nearly two weeks to protest against what they believe was a rigged August 9 presidential election. They want veteran leader Lukashenko to quit so new elections can be held.Tsikhanouskaya, who ran in the election against Lukashenko after her husband, a well-known video blogger, was jailed, said fate had handed her a role that she had no right to forsake.”It is my fate and my mission, and I don’t have the right to step away. I understand that I’m in safety here, but all the people who voted for me in Belarus … need me as a symbol. They need the person they voted for. I couldn’t betray my people.”She has been making regular video appeals to try to keep up the protests’ momentum. She said she had also fielded phone calls from world leaders who had asked her how they could help.None gave concrete promises to support her, and none said they regarded her as the president-elect.”I understand that they have no right and possibility to interfere in internal affairs of our country. … I asked everybody to respect the independence of our country, the sovereignty of our country,” she said.FILE – A view shows a photo of Belarusian opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, which was attached to a fence by participants of a protest against presidential election results, outside the embassy of Belarus in Moscow, Russia, Aug. 14, 2020.’Sooner or later’When asked which countries had called, she mentioned Canada, the United States, Britain, Germany, Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and others.Tsikhanouskaya will meet U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Stephen Biegun in Lithuania on Monday as part of the efforts to defuse the crisis over disputed elections, her aides told Reuters.The No. 2 U.S. diplomat will stop over in the Lithuanian capital, Vilnius, en route to Moscow as Washington seeks a peaceful resolution to the crisis that would avert Russian intervention.Russian President Vladimir Putin, whose country has close ties with Belarus, had not been in touch, and Tsikhanouskaya said she would not attempt to reach him herself.”I don’t have anything to ask him about, just [to respect] sovereignty,” she said. “Any future relationship with Russia or other countries would be decided by people and by the new president.”Tsikhanouskaya said that Lukashenko’s authority was badly damaged and that things would be different in Belarus, even if he managed to cling to power for now.Lukashenko said Saturday that he would close factories that have seen worker protests, the Russian RIA news agency reported — his latest attempt to quell a wave of opposition rallies since the contested elections.”Belarusian people have changed during this year. The Belarusian people won’t be able to accept him as the new president….”I’m sure that sooner or later he will have to leave.” 
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“He’s in the next room — if he hears me, I’ll have to hang up.”That call to the FILE – An advocate works in a cubicle at the National Domestic Violence Hotline center’s facility in Austin, Texas, June 27, 2016.Hotline callsOverall, calls to domestic violence hotlines in Texas cities spiked in March as the state locked down, according to a roundup compiled by the magazine FILE – Women stay in a line to hold a banner during an action against domestic violence on the Patriarshy Bridge, with the Cathedral of Christ the Savior in the background, in Moscow, Russia, Dec. 14, 2019.RussiaRussia Psychologist Daniel Ramirez from the APIS Center Foundation for Equity attends to a patient who accuses her partner of domestic abuse, amid the outbreak of the coronavirus disease, in Mexico City, Mexico, April 23, 2020.MexicoIn Mexico, the secretary of the interior and civil society organizations said that violence against women was increasing during lockdowns, although President FILE – A woman stands outside the health clinic in the village of Migowi, Malawi, Dec. 10, 2019.MalawiIn Malawi, one of the world’s poorest countries, where 46% of girls are married before age 18 and 9% before age 15, the organization People Serving Girls at Risk (PSGR) discerned a spike in child marriages when lockdowns began in March.PSGR director Caleb Ng’ombo attributed the increase to parents thinking that marrying off their daughters would relieve them of a burden during the pandemic.“It is so horrifying,” Ng’ombo said. “It is so horrifying in the sense that the girls are being forced to get into marriage.”The loss of income also has put women and girls at a greater risk of commercial sexual exploitation and pregnancy from transactional sex.“People have to weigh their options,” Ng’ombo said. “[They think], ‘If I just stay at home and don’t go out to do anything, I’ll still be killed by hunger anyways … I still have to go and sell sex.’ ”“This is where unscrupulous people are coming in to recruit children, to steal children, to abduct children, but especially girls,” said Ng’ombo, a crusader against child trafficking.Despite “very cordial” help from government institutions and police in combating sexual exploitation during the pandemic, PSGR has laid off staffers because of a lack of funding.“And this is at a critical time when we are needed the most by the girls, by the women,” Ng’ombo said. “Because time and time again, we keep getting distressing calls from women … and they’re looking for help.”As of Saturday, Malawi had reported a COVID-19 toll of more than 5,300 confirmed cases and 166 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins.
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London’s famous Tower Bridge, which crosses the River Thames in the heart of the British capital, was stuck open Saturday, leaving traffic in chaos and onlookers amazed at the sight.The historic bascule-and-suspension bridge failed to close after opening to allow ships to pass underneath on the Thames. London police tweeted shortly after 5 p.m. that the bridge was closed to pedestrians and traffic and that mechanics were working to fix the problem. An hour later, police tweeted that the bridge had reopened.Tower Bridge is 244 meters (800 feet) long and its towers are 65 meters (213 feet) high. It was built between 1886 and 1894.
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Belarus opposition figures are urging Western governments to collectively make it clear to the Kremlin that Russia must avoid a military intervention to save Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko.
 
They want Western nations to announce their readiness to stand by the Budapest Memorandum, an international protocol signed in 1994 guaranteeing the territorial integrity and sovereignty of Belarus.
 
In a video interview with VOA and other news outlets, Valery Tsepkalo, a former diplomat, and one of Lukashenko’s main electoral rivals until forced into exile, says the West should immediately recognize Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya as the legitimate ruler of the country—in the same way it recognized last year Juan Guaido in Venezuela as the legitimate ruler after declaring Nicolas Maduro’s presidency illegitimate.
 
The 55-year-old Tsepkalo, who served for five years as ambassador to United States, says Tsikhanouskaya is “seen in the mind of every person in the Republic of Belarus” as the real winner of this month’s election. Tsepkalo fled Belarus before the poll, after being disqualified from standing. He feared he’d be imprisoned or that his children might be abducted.People hold a flag with a portrait of Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, main opposition candidate in Belarus’ presidential elections, during a rally contesting official poll results, in Minsk, Belarus, Aug. 17, 2020.Two other key contenders were imprisoned before voting took place, including Tsikhanouskaya’s husband, a well-known blogger. She and Tsepkalo’s wife, Veronika, joined forces, and along with Tsikhanouskaya’s campaign manager, presented a united female front against authoritarian leader Lukashenko in the run-up to the August 9 presidential election.
 
Lukashenko claims he won 80 percent of the vote, a tally disputed by his opponents and Western governments. European Union leaders midweek refused to recognize the results of the election. They say they intend to impose sanctions on officials involved in electoral fraud, and the violent repression of pre-election rallies and post-election protests, marking the biggest challenge to Lukashenko’s 26-year rule.
 
“The EU will impose shortly sanctions on a substantial number of individuals responsible for violence, repression and election fraud,” European Council President Charles Michel said at the end of an emergency summit of EU leaders. EU officials are calling for a peaceful dialogue between the government and the opposition to arrange a “transition of power in Belarus.”
 
Michel said the situation in Belarus is “increasingly concerning,” dubbing violence against peaceful protesters as “shocking and unacceptable.” About 7,000 people were detained, and hundreds, including reporters, were injured with rubber bullets, stun grenades and clubs in just the first four days of demonstrations following the poll.
 
At least two protesters have died.
 FILE – Valery Tsepkalo, a former Belarusian diplomat forced into exile, speaks during an interview near Red Square in Moscow, Russia, July 28, 2020.Valery Tsepkalo says, aside from now recognizing Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya as president-elect of Belarus, Western states should avoid doing anything that might be seen as legitimizing Lukashenko, including appointing any new ambassadors to Minsk. “Do not send any ambassadors, new ambassadors to Belarus at this time,” he advises.
 
For Tsepkalo, the international move to recognize Tsikhanouskaya as the legitimate winner of the August 9 election would help to erode any residual support that may remain for Lukashenko in the ranks of the country’s armed forces. It would allow generals and senior officers a justifiable reason for ignoring any instructions from Lukashenko.
 
“It would help the transition of power because many guys from the army and from law enforcement agencies, they do not want to resign,” he says. “They would like to continue to serve the country,” he says.
 
Tsepkalo said he doesn’t believe Lukashenko can now count on the loyalty of the army, and he is doubtful the country’s generals and top military commanders would obey an order to deploy to the streets to suppress continuing anti-government protests. He says there have been reports that defense chiefs have been demanding written orders from Lukashenko, something he has been fearful of doing “because he is very afraid of [the] consequences” for himself.Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko speaks during a meeting with security and law enforcement leaders in Minsk, Belarus, Aug. 21, 2020.U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo defended Belarusian protesters Thursday. “The United States has been inspired by the display of peaceful expression of the Belarusian people seeking to determine their own future,” America’s top diplomat said in a written statement. “We stand by our long-term commitment to support Belarus’ sovereignty and territorial integrity, as well as the aspirations of the Belarusian people to choose their leaders and to choose their own path, free from external intervention.”
 
Tsepkalo says a formal re-commitment by all Western states to the 1994 Budapest Memorandum would send a “strong message” to Russia. The protocol refers to three identical political agreements signed at a conference in Budapest overseen by the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe.
 
The agreements provided security assurances to Belarus, Kazakhstan and Ukraine against threats or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any of the trio. In return, Belarus and the other two states gave up their stockpiles of Soviet-era nuclear weapons.
 
The protocol was cited by Ukraine’s leaders when Russia annexed Crimea in 2014 — to little avail. Tsepkalo acknowledges the Budapest Memorandum “didn’t work” to stop Russia from absorbing the Ukrainian peninsula. He adds, though, the commitment could still be useful, saying it would demonstrate “very, very strong moral support for Belarus’ independence.”FILE – Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, presidential candidate (C), Veronika Tsepkalo, wife of opposition figure Valery Tsepkalo (L), and Maria Kolesnikova, campaign representative of another opposition candidate, gesture in Minsk, Belarus, July 30, 2020.Both Valery and Veronika Tsepkalo, who are together now in exile in Moscow, emphasize that the agitation against Lukashenko is neither anti-Russian nor pro-EU. He says he is hopeful Belarus and Russia will remain friends.
 
During the interview, Veronika Tsepkalo declined, when asked by a journalist, to draw any parallels with protests in Russia against President Vladimir Putin. “Our situation is unique,” she says. “We just want to change our country and have the right to be independent,” says Veronika Tsepkalo.
 
“We don’t want to be part of Russia. We don’t want to be, or are ready to be, part of the European Union. So, we just want to stay independent,” she says.
 
Western diplomats and analysts say Putin’s biggest fear is the emergence of a Western-oriented, EU-friendly Belarus, but there is mounting evidence the Kremlin is not wedded to Lukashenko remaining in power. Some Russian members of parliament have expressed disdain publicly for Lukashenko, criticism that’s unlikely to have been voiced without the prior go-ahead behind-the-scenes by the Kremlin, say analysts. 
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The U.N. Human Rights office is calling on Belarusian authorities to immediately release all people unlawfully arrested during anti-government protests, which broke out nearly two weeks ago in the wake of allegedly fraudulent presidential elections.
 
Most of the several thousand people detained reportedly have been released. However, U.N. human rights monitors report that more than 100 people remain in jail. They express particular concern about the cases of some 60 people accused of criminal acts, charges that could carry heavy prison sentences.
 
U.N. human rights spokeswoman, Liz Throssell, said her agency is particularly worried about the fate of at least eight people whose whereabouts are unknown. She said information has been hard to get because of the practice of mass detentions.  
 
Nevertheless, she said Belarus has a duty to make sure comprehensive, accurate records are kept. She said family members and legal counsel must be informed about where all individuals are being held.
 
“Allegations continue to emerge of large-scale torture and ill-treatment of people including of journalists, and particularly alarming of children, during the arrests and in detention.  We are, therefore, disturbed that reportedly no action has to date been taken to investigate these reports, with a view to bringing those responsible to justice,” Throssell said.
 
Thousands of protesters took to the streets of the capital Minsk Aug. 9, claiming the country’s long-serving president, Alexander Lukashenko, dubbed Europe’s last dictator, had stolen the election. Demonstrations calling for him to step down show no sign of abating despite the violent actions of riot police to suppress the protests.
 
Throssell said people have a right to freedom of expression and to freedom of peaceful assembly.  She said the government should take steps to facilitate and not to repress these rights.
 
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Mexico’s president on Friday called on authorities to investigate videos showing his brother receiving cash but said the money was part of fundraising and used for 2015 regional elections, not corruption.Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador made the comments to reporters after two videos were published online by a news outlet.”They’re contributions to strengthen the movement at a time when the people were the ones basically supporting it,” he said. “We have been fighting for many years and the people have financed us, just like what happened when revolutions have taken place.”The videos were published by Mexican news outlet Latinus while Mexico is conducting a high-profile corruption trial involving the former chief of Mexico’s state oil company, Pemex, who has also implicated former presidents and senior politicians.”The aim (of this video) is to damage the image of the government but they will not achieve it,” Lopez Obrador said. “There are birds that go through the swamp and never get dirty. That’s what my feathers are like. I’ve always come out of slander unscathed.”The videos show David Leon, a Lopez Obrador adviser before becoming the head of Mexico’s Civil Protection agency, giving cash to the president’s brother.Asked if the money was registered as a campaign contribution with authorities, Lopez Obrador said he did not know.
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A plane carrying Russian dissident Alexei Navalny, who is in a coma after a suspected poisoning, touched down Saturday morning in Berlin, where he will receive medical attention at Charité Clinic, the city’s main hospital.Russian doctors announced earlier they had acquiesced to demands to allow Navalny medical treatment in Germany — ending a standoff over who would administer care to the politician following what Navanly’s family says was a deliberate attempt to poison him in Siberia earlier this week.”The patient’s condition is stable,” Dr. Anatoly Kalinichenko of Hospital No. 1 in the city of Omsk, where Navalny has been in a medically induced coma and ventilator, said Friday.”As we are in possession of a request from relatives to permit him to be transported, we have now taken the decision that we do not object to his transfer to another in-patient facility,” he added.Kalinichenko also said that “having received the request from relatives for transportation,” Navalny’s family would take “full responsibility.”The decision capped a day of seesawing as local Russian doctors initially concluded it was too dangerous to move Navalny only to change their minds amid public outcry.That came after Navalny’s wife, Yulia Navalnaya, issued a public appeal online to Russian President Vladimir Putin to facilitate the move. Navalny’s supporters also argued any delay in a medical evacuation put his survival at risk — and, perhaps, put off discovering FILE – Police detain Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny during a rally in Moscow, Russia, June 12, 2019.Diagnosis In a preliminary diagnosis Friday, Russian doctors in Omsk said a “metabolic disorder” tied to a low blood-sugar level had caused Navalny to suddenly lose consciousness aboard a flight from the Siberian city of Tomsk to his Moscow home early Thursday.Other Russian health officials announced that traces of an industrial chemical had been found on his skin and hair.Still others said that Navalny had been exposed to a dangerous substance that posed such a danger to others that moving him would require caution.Navalny’s associates have openly suggested foul play followed by a government-backed cover-up.“What was the factor that influenced that this young and sporty man to this extent that he was nearly dead and had to be put in coma and on a ventilator … is still unclear,” Leonid Volkov, the politician’s chief strategist, said in a press conference in Berlin on Friday. Navalny’s spokeswoman, Kira Yarmys, who was traveling with the politician at the time of the incident, insists Navalny was poisoned when he drank some black tea at an airport cafe.“I was with Alexey from the very start of the morning,” she said. “I sat in the seat next to him on the plane, and have no shared symptoms with his poisoning.”The case has attracted International attention.German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron have expressed concern over Navalny’s condition.Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden weighed in, saying Navalny’s “coma after being poisoned” was “unacceptable.”Donald Trump continues to cozy up to Russia while Putin persecutes civil society and journalists. Now, opposition leader Alexei Navalny is in a coma after being poisoned. It’s unacceptable. Unlike Trump, I’ll defend our democratic values and stand up to autocrats like Putin. https://t.co/OLjoGDaG4f— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) August 21, 2020The U.S. Embassy in Moscow indicated it was monitoring the situation.“If true, the suspected poisoning of Russian oppositionist Aleksey #Navalny represents a grave moment for Russia, and the Russian people deserve to see all those involved held to account. Our thoughts are with his family,” said U.S. Embassy spokesperson Rebecca Ross in a tweet.Navalny’s supporters in Russia have arranged single-picket demonstrations in several cities. Authorities have detained temporarily many of them for violating a ban on protests during the coronavirus pandemic.Kremlin responseBefore Friday’s decision to allow treatment in Germany, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov indicated the government would help facilitate the move and wished Navalny a “speedy recovery.” Peskov said the government would investigate the incident should toxicology reports show Navalny had been poisoned.Navalny has long been a problematic figure for the Kremlin, detailing corruption and excess at the highest levels of the government on his popular YouTube channel.The channel’s mix of investigative journalism and caustic humor has resonated with younger Russians in particular — a group Putin has struggled to court.Navalny has made no secret of his political ambitions.He launched a campaign for president to challenge Putin in 2018 that was undone by a lingering criminal conviction.His supporters — and the European Court of Human Rights — agreed that the charges were levied to keep him out of the race. 
 
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Russian doctors announced they had acquiesced to demands to allow opposition leader Alexey Navalny medical treatment in Germany — ending a standoff over who would administer care to the politician following what Navanly’s family says was a deliberate attempt to poison him in Siberia earlier this week.”The patient’s condition is stable,” Dr. Anatoly Kalinichenko of Hospital No. 1 in the city of Omsk, where Navalny has been in a medically induced coma and on a ventilator, said Friday.”As we are in possession of a request from relatives to permit him to be transported, we have now taken the decision that we do not object to his transfer to another in-patient facility,” he added.Kalinichenko also said that “having received the request from relatives for transportation,” Navalny’s family would take “full responsibility.”The decision capped a day of seesawing as local Russian doctors initially concluded it was too dangerous to move Navalny only to change their minds amid public outcry.That came after Navalny’s wife, Yulia Navalnaya, issued a public appeal online to Russian President Vladimir Putin to facilitate the move.Navalny’s supporters also argued any delay in a medical evacuation put his survival at risk — and, perhaps, Yulia Navalnaya, wife of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, walks near a hospital where Alexei receives medical treatment in Omsk, Russia, Aug. 21, 2020.Early Saturday, Navalny was taken by ambulance to the Omsk airport. He is to be flown to Berlin’s Charité Hospital.DiagnosisIn a preliminary diagnosis Friday, Russian doctors in Omsk said a “metabolic disorder” tied to a low blood-sugar level had caused Navalny to suddenly lose consciousness aboard a flight from the Siberian city of Tomsk to his Moscow home early Thursday.Other Russian health officials announced that traces of an industrial chemical had been found on his skin and hair.Still others said that Navalny had been exposed to a dangerous substance that posed such a danger to others that moving him would require caution.Navalny’s associates have openly suggested foul play followed by a government-backed cover-up.“What was the factor that influenced that this young and sporty man to this extent that he was nearly dead and had to be put in coma and on a ventilator … is still unclear,” Leonid Volkov, the politician’s chief strategist, said in a press conference in Berlin on Friday.Navalny’s spokeswoman, Kira Yarmys, who was traveling with the politician at the time of the incident, insists Navalny was poisoned when he drank some black tea at an airport cafe.“I was with Alexey from the very start of the morning,” she said. “I sat in the seat next to him on the plane, and have no shared symptoms with his poisoning.”The case has attracted international attention.German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron have expressed concern over Navalny’s condition.Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden weighed in, saying Navalny’s “coma after being poisoned” was “unacceptable.”Donald Trump continues to cozy up to Russia while Putin persecutes civil society and journalists. Now, opposition leader Alexei Navalny is in a coma after being poisoned. It’s unacceptable. Unlike Trump, I’ll defend our democratic values and stand up to autocrats like Putin. https://t.co/OLjoGDaG4f— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) August 21, 2020The U.S. Embassy in Moscow indicated it was monitoring the situation.“If true, the suspected poisoning of Russian oppositionist Aleksey #Navalny represents a grave moment for Russia, and the Russian people deserve to see all those involved held to account. Our thoughts are with his family,” said U.S. Embassy spokesperson Rebecca Ross in a tweet.Navalny’s supporters in Russia have arranged single-picket demonstrations in several cities. Authorities have detained temporarily many of them for violating a ban on protests during the coronavirus pandemic.Kremlin responseBefore Friday’s decision to allow treatment in Germany, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov indicated the government would help facilitate the move and wished Navalny a “speedy recovery.”Peskov said the government would investigate the incident should toxicology reports show Navalny had been poisoned.Navalny has long been a problematic figure for the Kremlin, detailing corruption and excess at the highest levels of the government on his popular YouTube channel.The channel’s mix of investigative journalism and caustic humor has resonated with younger Russians in particular — a group Putin has struggled to court.Navalny has made no secret of his political ambitions.He launched a campaign for president to challenge Putin in 2018 that was undone by a lingering criminal conviction.His supporters — and the European Court of Human Rights — agreed that the charges were levied to keep him out of the race.
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The U.S. National Weather Service is predicting that two storm systems in and around the Caribbean Sea will strengthen and could both be hurricanes next week in the Gulf of Mexico.The This satellite image released by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration shows Tropical Storm Laura in the North Atlantic Ocean, Aug. 21, 2020.The Washington Post reports Laura is the earliest forming “L” named storm on record, beating out Tropical Storm Luis, which formed on August 29, 1995. The season has already featured the earliest-forming C, E, F, G, H, I, J and K storms on record.Meanwhile, further to the west, in the southern Caribbean, forecasters are watching Tropical Depression 14, which they say will likely strengthen into Tropical Storm Marco.Forecasters say both storms will likely move into the Gulf of Mexico and could become hurricanes by early next week. If they do, it will be the first time two hurricanes are in the gulf at the same time in the satellite era.Some computer models say both hurricanes could hit the southern United States at roughly the same time, or could interact with each other in some way, depending on their size.Tropical storm warnings have been issued across the Caribbean, including in Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Haiti, the northern Leeward Islands and the southeast Bahamas. Monroe County in the Florida Keys declared a state of emergency Friday and ordered mandatory evacuations for people living in boats and mobile homes.Tropical Depression 14 is expected reach the eastern Yucatan coast of Mexico by midday Saturday, where tropical storm warnings are in effect. It is forecast to move into the south-central Gulf of Mexico by Sunday afternoon.
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An airplane taking Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny to Berlin for medical treatment left the Siberian city of Omsk on Saturday.Russian doctors announced earlier they had acquiesced to demands to allow opposition leader Alexey Navalny medical treatment in Germany — ending a standoff over who would administer care to the politician following what Navanly’s family says was a deliberate attempt to poison him in Siberia earlier this week.”The patient’s condition is stable,” Dr. Anatoly Kalinichenko of Hospital No. 1 in the city of Omsk, where Navalny has been in a medically induced coma and on a ventilator, said Friday.”As we are in possession of a request from relatives to permit him to be transported, we have now taken the decision that we do not object to his transfer to another in-patient facility,” he added.Kalinichenko also said that “having received the request from relatives for transportation,” Navalny’s family would take “full responsibility.”Navalny will be treated at Berlin’s Charité Hospital.The decision capped a day of seesawing as local Russian doctors initially concluded it was too dangerous to move Navalny only to change their minds amid public outcry.That came after Navalny’s wife, Yulia Navalnaya, issued a public appeal online to Russian President Vladimir Putin to facilitate the move.Navalny’s supporters also argued any delay in a medical evacuation put his survival at risk — and, perhaps, put off discovering what had felled the politician so suddenly.A plane chartered by a German humanitarian organization with a history of evacuating mysteriously ill dissidents from Russia, Cinema for Peace, arrived in Omsk early Friday. Doctors who arrived on the flight believed Navalny was fit enough for travel, several hours before Russian physicians reached the same evaluation.Diagnosis In a preliminary diagnosis Friday, Russian doctors in Omsk said a “metabolic disorder” tied to a low blood-sugar level had caused Navalny to suddenly lose consciousness aboard a flight from the Siberian city of Tomsk to his Moscow home early Thursday.Other Russian health officials announced that traces of an industrial chemical had been found on his skin and hair.Still others said that Navalny had been exposed to a dangerous substance that posed such a danger to others that moving him would require caution.Navalny’s associates have openly suggested foul play followed by a government-backed cover-up.“What was the factor that influenced that this young and sporty man to this extent that he was nearly dead and had to be put in coma and on a ventilator … is still unclear,” Leonid Volkov, the politician’s chief strategist, said in a press conference in Berlin on Friday. Navalny’s spokeswoman, Kira Yarmys, who was traveling with the politician at the time of the incident, insists Navalny was poisoned when he drank some black tea at an airport cafe.“I was with Alexey from the very start of the morning,” she said. “I sat in the seat next to him on the plane, and have no shared symptoms with his poisoning.”The case has attracted International attention.German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron have expressed concern over Navalny’s condition.Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden weighed in, saying Navalny’s “coma after being poisoned” was “unacceptable.”Donald Trump continues to cozy up to Russia while Putin persecutes civil society and journalists. Now, opposition leader Alexei Navalny is in a coma after being poisoned. It’s unacceptable. Unlike Trump, I’ll defend our democratic values and stand up to autocrats like Putin. https://t.co/OLjoGDaG4f— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) August 21, 2020The U.S. Embassy in Moscow indicated it was monitoring the situation.“If true, the suspected poisoning of Russian oppositionist Aleksey #Navalny represents a grave moment for Russia, and the Russian people deserve to see all those involved held to account. Our thoughts are with his family,” said U.S. Embassy spokesperson Rebecca Ross in a tweet.Navalny’s supporters in Russia have arranged single-picket demonstrations in several cities. Authorities have detained temporarily many of them for violating a ban on protests during the coronavirus pandemic.Kremlin responseBefore Friday’s decision to allow treatment in Germany, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov indicated the government would help facilitate the move and wished Navalny a “speedy recovery.” Peskov said the government would investigate the incident should toxicology reports show Navalny had been poisoned.Navalny has long been a problematic figure for the Kremlin, detailing corruption and excess at the highest levels of the government on his popular YouTube channel.The channel’s mix of investigative journalism and caustic humor has resonated with younger Russians in particular — a group Putin has struggled to court.Navalny has made no secret of his political ambitions.He launched a campaign for president to challenge Putin in 2018 that was undone by a lingering criminal conviction.His supporters — and the European Court of Human Rights — agreed that the charges were levied to keep him out of the race. 
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