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Amnesty International condemned Malta on Tuesday for using what it described as “illegal tactics” in the Mediterranean against immigrants making the dangerous crossing from North Africa. The approach taken by the Maltese government might have led to avoidable deaths, it argued, in a report that alleged a string of human rights abuses against illegal immigrants. Amnesty’s report was released hours after U.N. rights agencies on Monday called on Malta and the European Union to end the latest humanitarian crisis on board a cargo ship off the Maltese coast. “The Maltese government has resorted to dangerous and illegal measures for dealing with the arrivals of refugees and migrants at sea,” Amnesty said. “This escalation of tactics included arranging unlawful pushbacks to Libya, diverting boats towards Italy rather than rescuing people in distress and illegally detaining hundreds of people in ill-equipped ferries off Malta’s waters,” Amnesty said. MaltaThe signing of an agreement between Valletta and Tripoli in late May “to prevent people from reaching Malta” further exposed them to brutal treatment upon return to Libyan refugee camps, Amnesty said in the 34-page report. “Some of the actions taken by the Maltese authorities may have involved criminal acts being committed, resulting in avoidable deaths, prolonged arbitrary detention and illegal returns to war-torn Libya,” it said.   Malta PM rejects responsibility Malta and Italy in April closed their ports to migrants as the coronavirus pandemic closed its grip on the two countries, with Malta saying it needed all its resources to fight the disease. Since the start of the year Malta has received 2,161 illegal immigrants “and the resources and efforts necessary to ensure reception, access to protection and protection from COVID-19 are undoubtedly considerable for such a small country,” said Amnesty. That did not however “relieve Malta of the responsibility to indicate a place of safety for the people rescued under its coordination,” Amnesty said. The Amnesty report came as yet another cargo ship carrying rescued migrants was being denied permission to dock, its shipping company said this week. The Maersk Etienne on August 4 rescued the 27 migrants at the request of the Maltese authorities, which has since declined to let it into port. The U.N.’s refugee agency (UNCHR) as well as International Organization for Migration (IOM) and the International Chamber of Shipping “called for the immediate disembarkation … of the people trapped on board the ship.” The Maltese government did not immediately comment on the Amnesty report, but Prime Minister Robert Abela said Sunday the situation on the Maersk Etienne “was not Malta’s responsibility,” as the ship was sailing under a Danish flag. “While I understand the humanitarian aspect of migration, I have to understand the interests of the Maltese,” Abela told the Malta Today online newspaper. Amnesty’s report is titled “Waves of impunity: Malta’s violations of the rights of refugees and migrants in the Central Mediterranean.” 
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Maria Kolesnikova, a leading member of Belarus’ opposition, was reportedly seized Monday by unidentified men in Minsk, and Germany and Britain are demanding that President Alexander Lukashenko disclose where she is.   Germany’s Foreign Minister Heiko Maas called for “clarity on the whereabouts and the release of all political prisoners in Belarus,” in comments tweeted by the foreign ministry.  FILE – A handout image released by 10 Downing Street, shows Britain’s Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab speaking during a remote press conference to update the nation on May 5, 2020.Dominic Raab, Britain’s foreign secretary, tweeted: “Seriously concerned for the welfare of Maria Kolesnikova in #Belarus. Lukashenko’s regime must make her safe return their highest priority. The regime must cease brutalising protestors, release political prisoners and begin dialogue with the opposition.”A witness identified as Anastasia told Belarusian website Tut.by Monday that she saw Kolesnikova being forced by men in civilian clothing into a minibus and driven away.  Kolesnikova is the last of three women left inside Belarus who came together in the opposition coordination council to try to defeat Lukashenko in the August 9 poll. He was declared winner in the election, but opposition parties, along with the United States and the European Union, say the poll was rigged.  Kolesnikova’s ally Olga Kovalkova went to Poland on Saturday, saying authorities forced her out of the country, while Belarus’ main opposition leader, Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, has been in Lithuania with her children since the election for what she says is her own safety.  FILE – German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas addresses the media during a statement at the foreign ministry in Berlin, Germany, June 3, 2020.Maas, the German foreign minister, also tweeted that the European Union is “working flat out on a sanctions package. If #Lukashenko does not change course, we will respond.”The EU is considering sanctions on 31 senior Belarus officials, Reuters reported Monday, citing three EU diplomats.  “The EU expects the Belarusian authorities to ensure the immediate release of all detained on political grounds before and after the falsified 9 August presidential elections,” said its diplomatic head, Josep Borrell. Further, the EU called Monday on Belarus to release the more than 600 people it said it arrested over the weekend for protesting what thousands of Belarusians believe was rigged elections. People take cover from rain under umbrellas during an opposition rally to protest against police brutality and to reject the presidential election results in Minsk, Belarus, Sept. 6, 2020.”The EU will impose sanctions on individuals responsible for violence, repression and falsification of election results,” Borrell added. The demonstrations against Lukashenko entered their fifth straight week Sunday, again drawing tens of thousands of people into the streets, shouting slogans and waving red and white opposition flags.  More than 7,000 protesters have been arrested, and widespread evidence of abuse and torture has been reported in the month of protests. At least four people are reported to have died during the demonstrations.   In an interview with VOA, Tsikhanouskaya said she is working to organize new elections despite Lukashenko’s refusal to do so. “Our plan is absolutely clear. It’s organization of new elections, fair and transparent,” she said.   Lukashenko has been in power since 1994. 
 
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Bright green stalks of weeds are sprouting from the ground where planes were supposed to take off at a new Mexico City airport as officials let nature take over in their bid to transform the marshy swath of an ancient lake into a giant park. The ghostly skeletons of a partly built control tower and flight terminal are recognizably in the style of Norman Foster, the British architect commissioned by Mexico’s last president to build a futuristic international airport at a cost of $13 billion on 4,800 hectares just east of the capital. Upon taking office in December 2018, President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador axed the project, citing the results of an informal referendum, after arguing it would be costly to prevent sinking on the waterlogged soil. Instead of the slick design from Foster, whose award-winning glass and steel weblike buildings dot the globe, Lopez Obrador opted to expand an existing military airport. Workers prepare native plants at the garden center near the canceled airport zone as part of a project to conserve 12,200 hectares of land in Texcoco on the outskirts of Mexico City, Mexico, Sept. 3, 2020.The abandoned construction zone is now part of a project to conserve 12,200 hectares of marsh on what was once massive Lake Texcoco before Spanish colonizers in the 1600s began draining the water to prevent flooding in their burgeoning settlement. About half that area is slated for public use, including sports and events space more than twice the size of New York’s Central Park. Architect Iñaki Echeverria, who is overseeing the project, aims to open a portion of the park by March next year and offer full access by 2024. “The restoration began the moment the construction stopped. This shows nature’s incredible resiliency,” he said. Officials point to recent flooding as proof that maintenance would have been difficult and say less than 20% of construction was completed. They paid about $603 million to cancel more than 600 contracts left in limbo. During a recent visit, a moat of green water had risen around a flying-saucer-like building where a control tower juts 20 meters high, less than a third of its intended height. Unfinished parts of the flight terminal at an abandoned construction site of a Mexico City airport are now flooded by summer rains, in Texcoco on the outskirts of Mexico City, Mexico, Sept. 4, 2020.Birds glided in a pond beneath columns of crisscrossing steel bars that were meant to become a terminal greeting 70 million passengers a year. The steel will be sold as scrap. Conservation efforts in the area date to the 1970s, when the government grappled with how to contain dust storms that swept from the dry lake basin over Mexico City. The current project has been hailed by Lopez Obrador as a “new Tenochtitlan,” referring to the centuries-old Aztec capital built in the middle of a sprawling lake, where Mexico City is today. Part of Echeverria’s work is convincing city dwellers that the wetlands are worth visiting. “People who think there’s nothing there, don’t know it well,” he said.   
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The health of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny is improving, and he now has been taken out of an induced coma and is responsive, the German hospital treating him said Monday.Navalny, a sharp critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin, was flown to Berlin on August 22, two days after falling ill on a domestic flight in Russia. German chemical weapons experts said tests showed he had been poisoned with a Soviet-era nerve agent from the Novichok group, a claim Russia has rejected.Germany Threatens Sanctions on Russia over Navalny PoisoningForeign minister has held out possibility of sanctions on Russia if Kremlin does not provide information soon about suspected poisoning of opposition leader Alexey NavalnyBerlin’s Charite hospital said the 44-year-old Navalny’s condition has improved, allowing doctors to end the medically induced coma he had been in and gradually ease him off mechanical ventilation.The hospital statement said Navalny was responding to speech but that “long-term consequences of the serious poisoning can still not be ruled out.”Germany said last week that laboratory tests showed “proof without doubt” that he had been poisoned with the chemical nerve agent. British authorities identified Novichok as the poison used on former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter in England in 2018.Germany has demanded an explanation from Moscow about Navalny’s poisoning. But the Kremlin has rejected claims by Navalny’s allies that the government was involved as “empty noise.”As the Navalny case plays out, German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s office indicated Monday that she might be willing to reconsider its support for a controversial German-Russian gas pipeline project, which would bring Russian gas to Germany under the Baltic Sea, bypassing Ukraine.Previously, Merkel had insisted on “decoupling” the Navalny case from the pipeline project.
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Suellen de Souza could no longer endure the confinement. After six months of precautions, the Brazilian nursing technician decided that Sunday would be her first day at the beach since the pandemic began.
“This week it was very hot … the truth is I really wanted to come” to the beach, said the 21-year-old at Rio de Janeiro’s Ipanema beach, which is technically still closed to sun-bathers though few respect the prohibition and authorities seldom enforce it.
Under a burning midday sun, she had difficulty finding an empty space in the sand as thousands crowded the famed beach, which was dotted with hundreds of umbrellas and families sunning themselves. Beach-goers were packed close together with few wearing face masks.
With tentative signs the coronavirus pandemic is easing, Brazilians exhausted with quarantine measures and social distancing are increasingly relaxing precautions and flooding beaches as if the pandemic were over. They are being urged to do so – and violate the recommendations of health experts – by President Jair Bolsonaro, who has resisted many lockdown measures and pressed for a return to normal life from the beginning, famously calling the novel coronavirus a “little flu.”
“It is like a rain that is going to reach you,” Bolsonaro said of the virus on July 7, the day he confirmed his own infection from which he has since recovered.
In Rio, recommendations by health experts to remain isolated are being challenged even by people like Souza, a nursing technician who worked in a field hospital for coronavirus patients.
“The coronavirus is being controlled a little more, that gave me security to go out,” she said.
The same scenario is playing out in Sao Paulo, Brazil’s worst-hit state with more than 855,000 confirmed infections and 31,000 deaths. Thousands of residents took advantage of the long weekend to travel to the coast.
“If you stay indoors for a long time, you will go crazy. I was like that. The moment I found out the beach was open, I decided to come,” said Josy Santos, a 26-year-old teacher who spent the day in Guarujá, a seaside resort an hour from Sao Paulo.
With more than 4,100,000 confirmed infections and 126,000 deaths from the virus, Brazil has the second highest totals in both figures behind only the United States. In recent weeks, Latin America’s largest country has left a new case number plateau that had dragged on from almost three months and started seeing a reduction in the number of new confirmed cases. But with an average of 820 deaths per day, its numbers are still considered high by health experts.
Patricia Canto, a pulmonologist at Brazil’s premier biomedical research and development lab, the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation, or Fiocruz, warned that if Brazilians are negligent the country could see a repeat of what happened in Europe, especially Spain, where second waves of new cases were seen.
“Spain controlled the pandemic, but there were new outbreaks when many young people were negligent during the summer,” Canto said. If Brazil’s “population is not conscientious and continues to frequent beaches and bars without precautions, it might mirror this.”
Geraldo Tadeu, political scientist and coordinator of the Center for Studies and Research on Democracy, said the lack of coordination among levels of government in the COVID-19 fight demoralized many Brazilians.
“After six months, no one can stand to stay indoors seeing how there are no clear guidelines for fighting the virus,” said Tadeu. “As there is no serious policy, the population is exhausted. People head out to the streets when they see that others are not complying and the effort of staying home is no longer worth it.”
More than 6 months after the start of the pandemic, Brazilians seem increasingly relaxed about taking precautions to fight the virus’ spread. Some attribute this to Bolsonario’s denial rhetoric.
Souza said many do not believe in taking precautions because “Bolsonaro did not believe in the disease … He did not set an example.”
But Sao Paulo Gov. Joao Doria, who clashed with Bolsonaro over quarantine measures, does not think this is necessarily the case. The congestion and vehicle flow on Sao Paulo’s highways this weekend exceeded that seen during Carnival in February.
“We see the same problem (of full beaches) in Spain, the United States and England, which do not see these speeches against social distancing,” Doria told The Associated Press.
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Maria Kolesnikova, a leading member of Belarus’ opposition, was reportedly seized by unidentified men in Minsk on Monday as demonstrations against President Alexander Lukashenko entered their fifth straight week.A witness identified as Anastasia told Belarusian website Tut.by Monday that she saw Kolesnikova being forced by men in civilian clothing into a minibus and driven away.Kolesnikova is the last of three women left inside Belarus who came together in the opposition coordination council to try and defeat Lukashenko in the August 9th poll.  He was declared winner in the election but opposition parties, along with the United States and the European Union, say the poll was heavily rigged.Kolesnikova’s ally Olga Kovalkova went to Poland Saturday, saying authorities forced her out of the country, while Belarus’ main opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya has been in Lithuania with her children since the election for what she says is her own safety.In an interview with VOA, Tsikhanouskaya said she is working to organize new elections despite Lukashenko’s refusal to do so.“Our plan is absolutely clear. It’s organization of new elections, fair and transparent,” she said.Protests over the weekend once again drew tens of thousands of people, shouting “go away” and “you’re a rat,” members of the crowd waved red and white opposition flags.Large Protests Against Belarus’ Lukashenko PersistTens of thousands of demonstrators took to the streets Sunday across Belarus calling for Lukashenko to resign Police and army troops cordoned off the center of Minsk, but it did not stop demonstrators from marching to the vicinity of the president’s residence, about three kilometers outside the city center.Using military vehicles and water cannons, as well as pepper gas, riot police and plain clothes officers wearing masks and wielding truncheons tried to disperse the demonstrators.More than 200 protesters were detained throughout Belarus Sunday, including more than 100 in the capital, the Minsk-based Viasna Human Rights Center and local media reported.More than 7,000 protesters have been arrested, and widespread evidence of abuse and torture has been reported in the month of protests. At least four people are reported to have died during the demonstrations.Lukashenko has been in power since 1994.
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A British judge on Monday rejected a request by lawyers for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange to delay his extradition hearing until next year to give his lawyers more time to respond to U.S. allegations that he conspired with hackers to obtain classified information.
The adjournment request came on the first day of a London court hearing where Assange is fighting American prosecutors’ attempt to send him to the U.S. to stand trial on spying charges.
U.S. prosecutors have indicted the 49-year-old Australian on 18 espionage and computer misuse charges over WikiLeaks’ publication of secret U.S. military documents a decade ago. The charges carry a maximum sentence of 175 years in prison.
Assange’s lawyers say the prosecution is a politically motivated abuse of power that will stifle press freedom and put journalists around the world at risk.
The U.S. Justice Department expanded its case against Assange in a new indictment announced in June, though it did not introduce new charges. But Assange attorney Mark Summers said it was “an impossible task” for the legal team to deal with the new allegations in time for Monday’s court hearing, especially since they had only “limited access” to the imprisoned Assange.
He said District Judge Vanessa Baraitser should excise the new American claims, which he said were sprung on the defense “out of the blue.”
The judge said no, saying she had offered the defense the chance in August to postpone the hearing, and “they declined to do so.” The defense then asked for the case to be adjourned until January. Baraitser refused, saying Assange’s lawyers had had “ample time” before Monday to make the request.
The case has already been held up for months because of the coronavirus pandemic.
Assange, who has spent 16 months in a British prison, sat in the dock at the Old Bailey criminal court and formally refused the U.S. extradition demand. Assange, who lawyers say has suffered physical and mental ill-health because of his ordeal, spoke clearly to confirm his name and date of birth.
Several dozen supporters, including fashion designer Vivienne Westwood and Assange’s partner, Stella Moris, gathered outside the courthouse, chanting, banging drums and calling his prosecution a threat to press freedom.
“Julian Assange is the trigger, he is shining the light on all the corruption in the world,” Westwood said.
American authorities allege that Assange conspired with U.S. army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning to hack into a Pentagon computer and release hundreds of thousands of secret diplomatic cables and military files on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The new June indictment accuses Assange of recruiting hackers at conferences in Europe and Asia, and of conspiring with members of hacking groups known as LulzSec and Anonymous. U.S. prosecutors say the evidence underscores Assange’s efforts to procure and release classified information, allegations that form the basis of criminal charges he already faces.
Summers accused U.S. prosecutors of filing the new indictment “in desperation” because “they knew that they would lose” with their existing case.
Assange’s lawyers argue that he is a journalist entitled to First Amendment protection and say the leaked documents exposed U.S. military wrongdoing. Among the files released by WikiLeaks was video of a 2007 Apache helicopter attack by American forces in Baghdad that killed 11 people, including two Reuters journalists.
Assange’s legal troubles began in 2010, when he was arrested in London at the request of Sweden, which wanted to question him about allegations of rape and sexual assault made by two women. He refused to go to Stockholm, saying he feared extradition or illegal rendition to the United States or to the U.S. prison camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
In 2012, Assange sought refuge inside the Ecuadorian Embassy, where he was beyond the reach of U.K. and Swedish authorities — but also effectively a prisoner, unable to leave the tiny diplomatic mission in London. The relationship between Assange and his hosts eventually soured, and he was evicted from the embassy in April 2019. British police immediately arrested him for jumping bail in 2012.
Sweden dropped the sex crimes investigations in November 2019 because so much time had elapsed, but Assange remains in London’s high-security Belmarsh Prison as he awaits the extradition decision.
Supporters say the ordeal has harmed Assange’s physical and mental health, leaving him with depression, dental problems and a serious shoulder ailment. The hearing is expected to include expert psychiatric evidence about his mental state.
Journalism organizations and human rights groups have urged Britain to refuse the extradition request. Amnesty International said Assange was “the target of a negative public campaign by U.S. officials at the highest levels.”
The extradition hearing opened in February but was put on hold when the U.K. went into lockdown in March to slow the spread of coronavirus. It is resuming with social distancing measures in court and video feeds so journalists and observers can watch remotely.
The case is due to run until early October. The judge is expected to take weeks or even months to consider her verdict, with the losing side likely to appeal.
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British Prime Minister Boris Johnson talked tough on Sunday ahead of a crucial round of post-Brexit trade talks with the European Union, saying Britain could walk away from the talks within weeks and insisting that a no-deal exit would be a “good outcome for the U.K.”With talks deadlocked, Johnson said an agreement would only be possible if EU negotiators are prepared to “rethink their current positions.”The EU, in turn, accuses Britain of failing to negotiate seriously.Britain left the now 27-nation EU on Jan. 31, 3½ years after the country narrowly voted to end more than four decades of membership. That political departure will be followed by an economic break when an 11-month transition period ends on Dec. 31 and the U.K. leaves the EU’s single market and customs union.Without a deal, the new year will bring tariffs and other economic barriers between the U.K. and the bloc, its biggest trading partner. Johnson said the country would “prosper mightily” even if Britain had “a trading arrangement with the EU like Australia’s” — the U.K. government’s preferred description of a no-deal Brexit.British chief negotiator David Frost and his counterpart Michel Barnier are to meet in London starting Tuesday for the eighth round of negotiations.The key sticking points are access for European boats to U.K. fishing waters and state aid to industries. The EU is determined to ensure a “level playing field” for competition so British firms can’t undercut the bloc’s environmental or workplace standards or pump public money into U.K. industries.Britain accuses the bloc of making demands that it has not imposed on other countries it has free trade deals with, such as Canada.Frost told the Mail on Sunday newspaper that Britain was “not going to compromise on the fundamentals of having control over our own laws.””We are not going to accept level playing field provisions that lock us in to the way the EU do things,” he said.The EU says a deal has to be struck before November to allow time for parliamentary approval and legal vetting before the transition period expires.Johnson gave an even shorter deadline, saying an agreement needed to be sealed by an EU summit scheduled for Oct. 15.”If we can’t agree by then, then I do not see that there will be a free trade agreement between us, and we should both accept that and move on,” he said.Barnier said last week he was “worried and disappointed” by the lack of progress and said the U.K. had not “engaged constructively.”Without a deal, British freight firms have warned there could be logjams at ports and supplies of key goods in Britain could be “severely disrupted” starting Jan. 1.French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said Sunday that talks were “not going well” and dismissed British attempts to drive a wedge between EU nations on issues such as fishing. Le Drian said the 27 nations remained united.”We would prefer a deal, but a deal on the basis of our mandate,” he told France Inter radio. “There is room for action, but the whole package, including the fishing package, needs to be taken up in order to avoid a ‘no deal.'”
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Tens of thousands of protesters took to the streets Sunday of major Belarusian cities in the latest weekend of demonstrations following disputed elections that left longtime President Alexander Lukashenko in power.Shouting “go away” and “you’re a rat,” members of the crowd waved red and white opposition flags.At least 100 people were detained, the Russian news agency Interfax quoted the government as saying, while the Minsk-based Viasna Human Rights Center put the figure at more than 200. Protests and detentions in other cities were shown on local media.Large Protests Against Lukashenko Persist  Tens of thousands of demonstrators took to the streets Sunday in Minsk, continuing what is now nearly a month of pressure on the government Using military vehicles and water cannons, riot police and plain clothes officers wearing masks and wielding truncheons tried to contain the demonstrators, Reuters reported.Footage from local media outlet TUT.BY showed a masked man beating a protester as he lay on the ground. Plain clothes officers could be seen smashing the glass door of a cafe to get at protesters sheltering inside, Reuters said.”We ran into a cafe to hide from the riot police, they broke the glass, burst inside, pulled out three people, beat at least one,” Evgeny, a 28-year-old protester, told Reuters while waiters cleaned up the glass.Internal Affairs Minister Yuri Karayev defended the actions of the security forces.”They talk about the brutality of the Belarusian police, and I want to say this: there are no more humane, restrained and cool-headed police anywhere in the world,” he said, according to the official Belta news agency.Lukashenko, in power since 1994, claimed victory in elections August 9. Opposition parties, along with the United States and the European Union, say the poll was heavily rigged.   More than 7,000 protesters have been arrested, and widespread evidence of abuse and torture has been reported in the month of protests. At least four people were reported to have died during the demonstrations.  Belarus’ main opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya has been in Lithuania since the election for what she says is her own safety.In an interview with VOA, Tsikhanouskaya said she is working to organize new elections despite Lukashenko’s refusal to do so.“Our plan is absolutely clear. It’s organization of new elections, fair and transparent,” she said.
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Greece is beefing up land patrols to stem a rising tide of illegal migrants trickling in from neighboring Turkey. With tensions between the two NATO allies at their highest in years, Athens fears Ankara may move to weaponize refugees, sparking a fresh migration crisis on top of a lingering energy dispute. Greek authorities say they are mobilizing scores of special border guards to scour sprawling fields and marshland along the Evros region that divides Greece and Turkey.Hundreds more will also be deployed on Greece’s Aegean islands to stop illegal sea crossings.United Nations statistics show that illegal land entries into Greece from Turkey, have doubled in the last month alone, stoking concerns of a new migration crisis as tensions between the feuding countries have flared over energy rights in eastern Mediterranean Sea.Migration Minister Notis Mitarachis explains the Greek position.”We want Turkey to conform to agreements it has signed to stem the flow of illegal immigration,” he said. “Any attempt to weaponize the suffering of refugees for geopolitical interests will not be tolerated.” FILE – Migrants walk in Edirne at the Turkish-Greek border, Monday, March 9, 2020.Greece fended off a major migration push from Turkey earlier this year after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan temporarily lifted his country’s border controls, allowing refugees and migrants to make their way freely into Europe. Greece claimed to have thwarted what it called “an enemy invasion” of hundreds of thousands of asylum seekers into the country earlier this year and has kept its defenses on alert in the Evros region since then.The border reinforcement also comes amid a flurry of media reports saying that Turkey was withdrawing 40 tanks from Syria, moving them instead to the Greek-Turkish border.Turkey has not explained the deployment but Kostas Lavdas, a professor of international relations at Panteon University in Athens, says Greece must be ready for war.It may be a simple rotation of forces, he said, because Turkey has several military fronts open. Regardless the reason, he said, Turkey has repeatedly shown that it wants to be ready for all scenarios relating to Greece, including war.Greece, he said, may want to avoid that but it also needs to be prepared for it.FILE – Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan speaks with Turkish drilling ship, Fatih, in background, in Istanbul, Aug. 21, 2020.Relations between the two countries have deteriorated dangerously in the past month as Turkey has sent an exploration ship near a cluster of Greek islands, to hunt for undersea oil and gas in a patch of the eastern Mediterranean which Athens says only it has the right to survey.Turkey rejects the claims, saying islands are not entitled to what is known as an exclusive economic zone …. Ankara instead believes it has the right to explore the oil and mineral rich East Mediterranean seabed after a recent maritime agreement it concluded with Libya.Erdogan has agreed to engage in talks with Greece to over decades-old differences over air and sea rights but said this weekend he would do anything to defend his country’s interests.He said, either Athens will heed to diplomacy or it will re-live bitter memories of war.Greece has sought recourse with the United Nations, submitting what it called a bulky dossier of alleged violations by Turkey in recent weeks. The United Nations has made no response. 
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Several thousand people protested Sunday for the independence of Hungary’s University of Theatre and Film Arts following the imposition of a government-appointed board, which they say will undermine its autonomy.The management of the school, which nurtured many of Hungary’s most famous directors and filmmakers, resigned Monday in protest over the changes, which have also prompted several top theater directors to quit their teaching roles.Attendants of the rally formed a chain in the streets of central Budapest before the crowd gathered at a main square outside Parliament, demanding autonomy for the school and freedom for artistic endeavor and education.Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s supporters have long argued that it was time for a shift in culture towards conservative values to end what they call the domination of the arts in Hungary by liberals and left-wingers.”For a university to be able to operate autonomously is the foundation of democracy,” said Marta Barbarics, who attended the rally. “If a university cannot teach in a way as its citizens deem appropriate then there are serious problems, and the leadership of a university does not quit for no reason.” 
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Protesters once again took to the streets of Belarus Sunday, the latest in nearly a month of demonstrations following disupted elections that left longtime president Alexander Lukashenko in power. Tens of thousands took to the streets of Minsk Sunday in numbers comparable to previous weekends, waving red and white opposition flags and chanting slogans. Human rights groups have said at least 70 protesters were detained Sunday. A police barricade with two water cannons is set blocking a street during an opposition rally to protest the official presidential election results in Minsk, Belarus, Sept. 6, 2020.Lukashenko, in power since 1994, claimed victory in elections August 9. Opposition parties, along with the United States and the European Union, say the poll was heavily rigged.     More than 7,000 protesters have been arrested, and widespread evidence of abuse and torture has been reported. At least four people were reported to have died during the demonstrations.  FILE – Belurus opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya takes part in an U.N. General Assembly online debate from Vilnius, Lithuania, Sept. 4, 2020.Belarus’ main opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya has been in Lithuania since the election for what she says is her own safety. In an interview with VOA, Tsikhanouskaya said she is working to organize new elections despite Lukashenko’s refusal to do so. “Our plan is absolutely clear. It’s organization of new elections, fair and transparent,” she said. 
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President Milos Zeman sought on Sunday to defuse a row with China over a visit by the head of the Czech Senate to Taiwan, calling the speaker’s trip a “boyish provocation”.  
 
Senate speaker Milos Vystrcil grabbed headlines last week when he told Taiwan’s parliament “I am a Taiwanese” in a speech that echoed the late U.S. President John F. Kennedy’s defiance of communism in Berlin in 1963.   In this photo released by the Taiwan Presidential Office, the Czech Senate President Milos Vystrcil is presented a medal by Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen during a meeting in Taipei, Taiwan, Sept. 3, 2020.Vystrcil’s trip did not have the backing of the Czech government, which sets foreign policy, and angered China, which said the Czech speaker would “pay a heavy price” for visiting the democratic island it sees as its own territory.  
 
This prompted Prague to summon China’s ambassador.  
 
Zeman has sought closer business and political ties with China since taking office in 2013, but his efforts have been hit by failed investment plans and have divided politicians.  
 
Zeman said in an interview on broadcaster Prima on Sunday he would stop inviting Vystrcil to meetings of the state’s top foreign policy officials and said his trip could be damaging for firms but that China’s comments were exaggerated.  
 
“I consider it boyish provocation,” Zeman said of the trip.  
 
Prime Minister Andrej Babis said later on the same debate show he would fight to prevent fallout for Czech companies.  
 
The Czech Republic, like most countries, has no formal diplomatic ties with Taiwan although Taiwan is a large investor in the country.  
 
Many Czech companies operate in or export to China, the world’s second-largest economy. The richest Czech Petr Kellner’s Home Credit is a major consumer lender in China while the country is also the largest single market for Skoda Auto, the Czech car unit of Volkswagen.    
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Facebook on Saturday blocked live broadcasts from a bedridden, chronically ill man who appealed to French President Emmanuel Macron for a medically assisted death and who wanted to show what he expects will be a painful end to his life after he announced that he was stopping all food and drink.Prostrate on his bed, Alain Cocq posted video of himself Friday after taking what he said would be his last liquid meal.”I know the days ahead are going to be very difficult,” he said. “But I have taken my decision and I am serene.In a letter this week, which Cocq also posted, Macron said that French law forbade him from granting his request for the “right to leave with dignity,” with a medically assisted death.”With emotion, I respect your approach because it speaks to the very intimate relationship that each of us builds with the end of our life and our death,” Macron said in the letter dated Thursday, sent after one of his aides spoke at length with Cocq by telephone in August.But Macron added that “because I am not above the law, I am not in a position to grant your request.”In a handwritten addition at the end, Macron signed off the letter with the words, “With all of my personal support and my profound respect.”French media have reported that Cocq, a 57-year-old former plumber, suffers from a long-term and incurable degenerative illness. He says that he has lived in great pain for 34 years and that after multiple operations, he prefers to die. In his Facebook post on Friday evening, he said the alternative would be “the degradation of my body.””I am going to stop hydrating myself when I turn off the lights,” he said. “Given my general condition, it’s likely to be quick, which is what I hope for, because I’m not a masochist.”He said he would keep taking painkillers.”The path to my deliverance is starting and, believe me, I am happy about it,” he said. “To those I won’t see again, I say goodbye. Such is life.”Cocq had planned to subsequently broadcast live the end of his life that he expects will follow within days of his decision to stop all food, liquids and medicines. But a message Saturday on Cocq’s account said that Facebook has blocked him from posting videos until Tuesday.Facebook confirmed that it had blocked Cocq’s live broadcasts.”Our hearts go out to Alain Cocq and those who are affected by this sad situation,” it said in a statement. “While we respect his decision to draw attention to this complex and difficult issue, based on the guidance of experts, we have taken steps to keep Alain from broadcasting live, as we do not allow the depiction of suicide attempts.” 
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In the pubs of Dunmore in the west of Ireland, the Guinness glasses gather dust and the kegs are stacked dormant. Among the locals, a sober mood has taken hold.The lengthy coronavirus shutdown of pubs in Ireland has hit the 3,000 or so people in the village and surrounding area particularly hard.Five out of its six village pubs have been shut since March, depriving the community of institutions that act as pillars of rural life.Publican Joe Sheridan unbolts the door of Walsh’s Bar in the County Galway village.”They drink their pints along counters like that with their peers to discuss politics, to discuss the news of the day, to understand what’s going on in their own life,” he told AFP.”I have people that would confide in me here in the bar that may not necessarily say to their GP [doctor] what’s going on with them,” he said.With bars shut, “you can see the people carrying the woes of life on their faces,” said Sheridan, a seventh-generation publican.Inside his wood-paneled pub, he finds a pile of unopened mail and the musty smell of inactivity.Walls are jammed with group photos, sports memorabilia and dusty bottles.It is testament to the pub’s fluid role as community hall, museum and an understated sort of group catharsis in the village.”The lights are going out in rural Ireland,” he said.Publican Joe Sheridan is pictured at his closed pub, Walsh’s Bar, in the rural village of Dunmore, Ireland, Sept. 3, 2020.Dry spellIrish pubs shut on March 16 as the nation braced for the coronavirus, which has so far claimed 1,777 lives.After a 15-week hibernation, those serving food were permitted to reopen.But so-called “wet pubs” serving drink only remained shut, with the government repeatedly pushing back reopening.Restrictions are to expire on September 13 in what the Drinks Industry Group of Ireland has called the “longest lockdown in the EU.”Industry bodies estimate that around half of the republic’s 7,000 pubs are still shuttered.”The vast majority of these pubs are small rural outlets run by families who are on first-name terms with their customers,” said Vintners Federation of Ireland chief Padraig Cribben in July.In rural Ireland, pubs have a particular character. They are modestly sized, humbly decorated and staffed by friends and family.Many are not equipped for restaurant food service.One Dunmore pub has reopened under government guidelines by pairing with a local takeaway to provide sit-in meals.The closed Thomas Byrne bar is pictured in the rural village of Dunmore, Ireland, Sept. 3, 2020.’Meitheal’With population flight, a declining agriculture industry and scant alternative social outlets, pubs in rural Ireland play a role that is hard to overstate.Many people in the countryside still eat their main daily meal at lunchtime, reserving a stretch of uninterrupted evening for the pub.Historically, pubs have acted as hardware stores, grocery shops and drapers, filling the void of state infrastructure with small business and mutual aid.In Dunmore, three pubs still act as undertakers when regulars die, organizing the funeral and arranging for fellow drinkers to dig the grave.”It’s the thing of a ‘meitheal,’ ” Sheridan said. “It’s an Irish word for a group coming together to work voluntarily.”But the lockdown is “messing with traditions that have been built up over generations,” he said.Dunmore village, nested in improbably green fields laced by gray stone walls, is home to just 600.An outsider may think its six pubs existed in fierce competition. But Sheridan views them each as nodes in an ecosystem of support with subtly different vibes and navigated by locals according to need and preference.Alcohol seems almost besides the point.”It’s nearly like the jungle grapevine,” said the 49-year-old, who also serves as a councilor for the center-right Fianna Fail party currently in government.”The public house acts as a conduit for communities.”While rural decline is nothing new, coronavirus closures are “throwing petrol on the fire,” he said.An estate agent’s board reads “Public House For Sale” above the closed-down Tery’s bar in the rural village of Dunmore, Ireland, Sept. 3, 2020.Moths and light bulbsHomes scattered outside Dunmore are now where Sheridan’s customers, many of them older, single men, spend time siloed alone.Days are broken up by sprawling countryside walks — with slim chance of social interaction — and the clockwork visit of the postman.”Here you have nothing to look at but the light bulb, like a moth,” said Brendan Jordan, 51.His three or four weekly visits to the pub gave respite from the care he gives his disabled sister.”They are segregating us out here in the countryside and nobody cares,” said bachelor farmer John Hussey, 52.”They have everything killed in the rural areas.”
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Six Belarusian journalists detained earlier this week while covering an anti-government protest in Minsk were sentenced to three days in jail, as authorities continued their crackdown on dissent and media freedom following a disputed election that gave President Alexander Lukashenko a sixth-straight term.
 
The verdicts came just ahead of a scheduled address by Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, the self-exiled presidential candidate who has become a leader of the Belarusian opposition, to the U.N. Security Council later on September 4.
 
The journalists were covering a student rally demanding the resignation of Lukashenko on September 1 when they were detained by police near the Dinamo district stadium.
 
A district court in the capital sentenced the journalists to three days’ administrative arrest after finding them guilty of participating in an illegal rally, an accusation they denied.
 
They were later released having already served their terms while in pretrial detention.
 
The reporters work for the Belarusian independent news website Tut.by, the local Komsomolskaya Pravda v Belarusi daily, and the independent news agency BelaPAN.
 
Hundreds of thousands of citizens have taken to the streets across Belarus to protest the “rigged” results of the August 9 vote.Belarus Opposition Leader Appeals to UN to Stop Human Rights Abuses in Her CountrySviatlana Tsikhanouskaya tells UN that ‘a nation cannot and should not be a hostage to one man’s thirst for power’The protesters are calling on the 66-year-old Belarusian leader to step down after 26 years in power, release all political prisoners, and hold free and fair elections.
 
The authorities have tried to halt the protest movement with threats and the prosecution of protesters, political activists, and journalists covering the demonstrations.
 
On September 4, police detained several student protesters gathered inside the Minsk State Linguistic Institute. A witness said the students started singing the French national anthem La Marseillaise, which contains words about the fight against tyranny, when riot police entered the building and dragged the students away.
 
Officials at the institute had warned students it would call in the police unless they halted their protests.
 
Those detained were later released from police custody after reportedly being charged with taking part in illegal rallies.
 
The Interior Ministry earlier said that a total of 26 people were detained during protests in Minsk on September 3 for violating the law on public events, adding that seven of them will remain in pretrial detention.
 
A photographer working for the news outlet Tut.by., Zmitser Brushko, was detained for a few hours and charged with petty hooliganism for allegedly pushing a police officer.
 
The crackdown on protests, strikes, and the media has drawn condemnation from human rights groups, media freedom watchdogs, and the international community.
 
On September 3, Britain and Canada said in a joint statement to the Permanent Council of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) that they were “extremely concerned” by the treatment of journalists and independent media in Belarus.
 
“Though the strain faced by independent media has been made evident before, during, and after the presidential elections, in the past week Belarusian authorities have made greater moves to hinder the free press,” the statement said, adding that more than 70 independent news websites had been blocked.
 
About 50 journalists were detained on August 27-28 for accreditation checks and some foreign reporters were subsequently deported and banned from Belarus for five years, it also noted.
 
At least 17 journalists, including four from RFE/RL’s Belarus Service, had their accreditations revoked. 
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Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Saturday warned Greece to enter talks over disputed eastern Mediterranean territorial claims or face the consequences.
 
“They’re either going to understand the language of politics and diplomacy, or in the field with painful experiences,” he said at a hospital’s opening ceremony in Istanbul.
 
Ankara is currently facing off against Greece and Cyprus over oil and gas exploration rights in the eastern Mediterranean. All sides have deployed naval and air forces to assert their competing claims in the region.
 
“They are going to understand that Turkey has the political, economic and military power to tear up the immoral maps and documents imposed,” Erdogan added, referring to areas marked by Greece and Cyprus as their economic maritime zones.
 
He stressed that Turkey was “ready for every eventuality and result.”
 
Meanwhile, Turkish media reported that tanks were being moved towards the Greek border. The Cumhuriyet newspaper said 40 tanks were being transported from the Syrian border to Edirne in northwest Turkey and carried photographs of armored vehicles loaded on trucks.
 
There was no immediate official confirmation of the deployment.
 
The president’s comments come after NATO said military officers from Greece and Turkey had begun technical discussions to reduce the risk of armed conflict or accidents.
 
The two NATO allies have been locked for weeks in a tense standoff in the eastern Mediterranean, where Turkey is prospecting the seabed for energy reserves in an area Greece claims as its own continental shelf.
 
Ankara says it has every right to prospect there and accuses Athens of trying to grab an unfair share of maritime resources.
 
Simulated dogfights between Greek and Turkish fighter pilots have multiplied over the Aegean Sea and the eastern Mediterranean. A Turkish and a Greek frigate collided last month, reportedly causing minor damage to the Turkish frigate but no injuries.
 
Erdogan said Turkey had repeatedly expressed its willingness to come to a just agreement.
 
“Our word is sincere,” he said. “The problem is those before us disregard our rights and try to situate themselves above us.”
 
Turkey faces a wide range of opponents in the eastern Mediterranean. France, Italy and the United Arab Emirates have all sent forces to join war games with either Greece or Cyprus in recent weeks. Egypt has signed an energy exploration deal with Athens for the Mediterranean.
 
The EU, which numbers Greece and Cyprus as members, has also threatened possible sanctions against Ankara over its “illegal” actions.
 
This week, the U.S. announced it was easing a 33-year-old arms embargo against ethnically divided Cyprus.
 
The island split in 1974 when Turkey invaded following a coup by supporters of a union with Greece. Turkey is the only nation to recognize a Turkish Cypriot declaration of independence and it maintains more than 35,000 troops in northern Cyprus.
 
The recent crisis is the most serious in Turkish-Greek relations in decades. The neighbors have come to the brink of war three times since the mid-1970s, including once over maritime resources in the Aegean.
 
Earlier, Ankara announced joint military exercises with northern Cypriot forces from Sunday to Sept. 10. The air, land and sea drills are held every year. 
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Masked security agents dragged students off the streets and bundled them into vans as new protests broke out against Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko on Saturday on the fourth weekend since his disputed re-election.
 
Up to 30 people were detained for taking part in unsanctioned protests, Russian news agency TASS quoted the Minsk police as saying.  Draped in red-and-white opposition flags, students staged protests in several places in the capital, including outside the Minsk State Linguistic Institute where police had arrested five people on Friday, local media footage showed.
 
Elsewhere masked men dragged away students who had gathered at an eatery in Karl Marx Street in the center of Minsk, while some of the protesters shouted “tribunal!,” according to footage shown by news outlet TUT.BY.
 
Thousands of women later held a separate march through Minsk in the afternoon, shouting “hands off the children” as one of their slogans.
 
A former Soviet collective farm manager, Lukashenko has struggled to contain a wave of mass protests and strikes since he won a sixth term at an election last month that opponents say was rigged. He denies electoral fraud.
 
Lukashenko has previously dismissed the coronavirus pandemic as a “psychosis” that could be tackled by drinking vodka and taking saunas.
 
But on Saturday he appeared to chide the protesters for spreading the disease.
 
“We stagger through the streets, rubbing against each other,” he said at a televised government meeting. “Where’s the social distancing and so on in that? We’re doing everything we can to delay the moment when we say goodbye to this disease. That’s unacceptable.”
 
Thousands took part in protests that coincided with the start of the school year on Tuesday. At the Minsk State Linguistic Institute, students sang “Do you hear the people sing,” a protest anthem from the musical “Les Miserables.” 
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A bitter dispute between China and the Czech Republic threatens to affect relations between Europe and Beijing. A delegation from the Czech senate visited Taiwan this week – which China claims as part of its territory. Strongly worded threats from Beijing against the delegation have prompted criticism from EU leaders. As Henry Ridgwell reports, the dispute comes as Europe hardens its language towards China. 
Camera: Henry Ridgwell
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Belarusian opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya appealed to the United Nations on Friday to stop human rights abuses in her country, a month after the results of a disputed presidential election have led to the arrests of thousands of peaceful protesters.“The demands of the nation are simple,” Tsikhanouskaya told an informal meeting of the U.N. Security Council by video from Lithuania, to which she fled after the results of the August 9 election were published. “The immediate termination of violence and threats by the regime, immediate release of all political prisoners, and a free and fair election.”Tsikhanouskaya also called on the United Nations to condemn the use of excessive force by the Belarusian security services against protesters; to convene a special session of the U.N. Human Rights Council; and to send an international monitoring mission to Belarus to document the situation on the ground.She said there is a single obstacle to the people’s demands being met.“This obstacle is Mr. Lukashenko, a man desperately clinging onto power and refusing to listen to his people and his own state officials,” she said. “A nation cannot and should not be a hostage to one man’s thirst for power. And it won’t.”Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin, left, shakes hands with Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko prior to their talks in Minsk, Belarus, Sept. 3, 2020.President Alexander Lukashenko has kept a tight grip on Belarus for 26 years, and he was declared the winner with more than 80% of the votes. Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya was his leading opponent in the race. She took the place of her husband, Sergei, a blogger and pro-democracy activist who had presidential aspirations. He was arrested in late May and a criminal case was opened against him, preventing his candidacy.In the months leading up to the election, and escalating afterward,  Lukashenko’s government cracked down on street protests, using excessive force on demonstrators. Thousands were arrested and many reported being tortured in custody. After the election, internet access was severely disrupted for three days and the websites of dozens of influential media and civil society groups were blocked. Foreign journalists could not obtain credentials to cover the vote and some were deported.The election results have been widely viewed as rigged in Lukashenko’s favor and have been rejected by the European Union and the United States, among others. The EU will soon impose sanctions on those responsible for violence, repression and the falsification of election results.The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), of which Belarus is a member, has offered to send a high-level delegation to the capital, Minsk, to facilitate dialogue between the authorities and the opposition. Lukashenko and his supporters have refused to engage.Russia backs Lukashenko, and its deputy U.N. envoy on Friday accused Western nations of seeking “regime change” in Belarus.Valentin Rybakov, then-Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs for Belarus, speaks during the 71st session of the United Nations General Assembly, Sept. 26, 2016.Belarus’ U.N. ambassador accused the Security Council of abusing its authority by discussing the issue, which he said does not threaten international peace and security.“The future of Belarus will be decided by its own people,” Ambassador Valentin Rybakov said. “Outside interference will never be tolerated by the Belarusian authorities.”The U.N. special rapporteur on human rights in Belarus argued that rights violations are of interest to the international community, especially when there is a risk of escalating violence.“When a government announces its readiness to use the army against its own citizens in peacetime, when it baselessly accuses its neighbors of interference and aggression, and when it is prepared to sacrifice the sovereignty of the country and the independence of its institutions in order to stay in place at all costs, it is international peace and security that are threatened,” Anais Marin told the meeting.
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El Salvador President Nayib Bukele vehemently denied allegations of collusion Friday after a report circulated by the online media outlet El Faro said his government had been engaging in talks with one of the country’s most prolific gangs.El Faro reported Friday that it had obtained a cache of government documents, including prison logs and prison intelligence reports, that show government officials engaging in talks with members of the MS-13 gang since last June.The report alleges Bukele’s involvement with the gang stems from an effort to lower the country’s notoriously high murder rate and boost support for his campaign before the midterm elections in exchange for privileges in prison.Attorney General Raúl Melara, whose office is independent of the Bukele presidency, said in an interview with a local television station that his office would be investigating the claims.The 39-year-old former businessman won the race for the presidency in 2019, despite not being from either of the country’s historically dominant parties, after campaigning as a law-and-order candidate. He quickly earned recognition for the steady decline of El Salvador’s murder rate.Imprisoned gang members, wearing protective face masks, look out from behind bars during a media tour of the prison in Quezaltepeque, El Salvador, Sept. 4, 2020.El Salvador’s homicide rate has declined steadily from 104 per 100,000 inhabitants in 2015 to 36 per 100,000 in 2019. The 2019 rate is still seven times the rate of the United States, according to U.S. State Department data.Bukele took to Twitter to proclaim his innocence and target his critics, who he said “invented a novel” with the story after exhausting other attacks against him. As a means of disputing the allegations of collaboration with the gangs, Bukele cited criticisms that his administration was a dictatorship that has committed human rights violations against gangs in the region.“The Salvadoran people are happy that after a civil war and 30 more years of crime, they can live in a much safer country than before,” he tweeted Friday. Bukele says his critics are just changing the narrative. “Now, the government is not bad with the terrorists, but good.”The allegations against Bukele’s administration are not the first time Salvadoran officials have been accused of engaging with the country’s gangs. Former President Mauricio Funes was granted asylum in Nicaragua in 2016 after facing similar accusations. Funes has denied he negotiated with MS-13.On Friday, Melara said on a local news show, “There are politicians and ex-politicians prosecuted for negotiations with the gangs. Rumors have arisen that this situation is happening again, and we are going to investigate. No one can take advantage of the institutionality to negotiate with terrorists.”
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China is warning of retaliation in response to a visit to Taiwan by a Czech Senate delegation, saying Senate President Milos Vystrcil crossed a “red-line” and violated the one-China principle under which Beijing asserts sovereignty over the island.As part of the business trip, which ended Friday, Vystrcil delivered a speech in Taiwan’s parliament and met with President Tsai Ing-wen. China said Vystrcil’s visit was an “open provocation,” with Foreign Minister Wang Yi warning that Vystrcil would “pay a heavy price.” The threat led to criticism from European Union leaders. China considers Taiwan a renegade province.Analysts in the Czech Republic say actions taken by China, if any, may include freezing diplomatic ties with Prague, liquidating China-owned stakes in several Czech companies and restricting Prague-bound Chinese tourists.They said such action will have a limited impact on the Czech economy given its low dependence on Beijing, yet, may trigger a concerted response from some other European countries. The government in Prague, led by Czech President Miloš Zeman and Prime Minister Andrej Babis, still favors closer ties to China.Prague Mayor Zdeněk Hřib speaks during a press conference organized by Taiwan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Taipei on Sept. 4, 2020.Sanctions?Prague Mayor Zdeněk Hřib said he had experience with China’s sanctions last year after Taipei became a sister city to Prague. Beijing, in turn, canceled a tour to China by four Prague-based classical orchestras. Hřib described the sanctions as “laughable and pathetic.”Hřib later branded China as “a country filled with hatred” and “an unreliable business partner.”When asked to comment on possible sanctions by China over the visit, the mayor Friday told a media briefing in Taipei that China has broken many of its promises to invest in the Czech Republic and its economic influence in the country remains limited.Citing Czech analysts, he said China contributed to 1% of the Czech Republic’s GDP, 0.42% of all foreign direct investment and 1.5% of Czech’s exports, the latter of which has been declining since 2017.Sets an exampleBrushing aside any harm sanctions may bring, Hřib said the Senate delegation’s visit to Taiwan set an example for many European countries.“This time, the delegation is not just from Prague; there are senators whose constituencies [are] from all over the country. And I believe that this visit will also be [an] inspiration for other countries in the EU,” the mayor said.China enjoyed a trade surplus over the Czech Republic as statistics showed that, in 2019, Chinese imports totaled $26.8 billion, up 3% year-on-year, while Czech exports to China declined 4.5% to $2.5 billion.Czech Senate president Milos Vystrcil, center, and members of the Czech delegation attend a forum on supply chain restructuring in Taipei, Taiwan, Sept. 4, 2020.Bark worse than biteTwo Czech-based analysts, who spoke to VOA also said China has little leverage in the Czech economy.“It’s kind of a bluff because China’s afraid of more countries building relations with Taiwan. So, they wanted to just put everybody off,” Jeremy Garlick, assistant professor of international relations at the University of Economics in Prague, told VOA by phone.“It’s kind of a question — the bark is worse than the bite because I don’t really see what China can really do to the Czech Republic,” he added.Wang’s verbal threats served two purposes, said Richard Turcsányi, director of the Central European Institute of Asian Studies at Palacky University in the Czech Republic.“China will apply very harsh rhetoric; we’ve seen that already. [The] Chinese government probably feels that it has to do that for two reasons. One reason is because of domestic nationalist audience. They have to show them that they protect what they see as China’s core interests,” Turcsányi told VOA by phone.“The other reason is to discourage other countries from travelling to Taiwan,” he added.China sells shares?Garlick said China might liquidate its shares in several Czech companies, including a beer brewery, a football club, an airliner and several media outlets; but he said doing so will do little harm to the Czech economy.Those China-owned stakes were reportedly estimated to be worth $1 billion.But that was just one-14th of Taiwan’s accumulated investment in the Czech Republic, according to Dalibor Roháč, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington.Turcsányi said China might freeze its diplomatic relations with Prague and cut back on Czech imports as punishment similar to how it had frozen relations with Norway for years and decreased imports of Norwegian salmon, although the Norwegian economy felt little squeezed.Symbolic punishmentOther sanctions such as the cancellation of direct flights between four Chinese cities and Prague and a ban on Czech-bound Chinese tourists or Czech beer imports will also be symbolic, he said.The volume of China-Prague direct flights has lost momentum following the coronavirus pandemic and their escalating tensions while Prague has been overcrowded with tourists in the past five years and may soon cap the number of inbound visitors, the researcher added.
At a routine media briefing, China’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson, Hua Chunying, Thursday reiterated China’s stance toward the delegation, saying “Vystrcil has openly supported the pro-Taiwan independence forces … But we noticed that the Czech government has drawn a line to distance with him and his behavior doesn’t represent the government’s policy.” Hua called on the Czech government to reverse the delegation’s negative impact.
Both Turcsányi and Garlick, moreover, warned that the delegation’s warm reception in Taiwan and its growing support from countries including Germany, France, Slovak Republic and the U.S., send a warning signal to China.They say China is becoming unpopular among the Europeans — reasons behind recent visits to Europe by Wang.“The opinion in Europe is kind of turning against China on the whole. So, the Chinese leverage in Europe is kind of weak at the moment because the general opinion is China is being too aggressive and too assertive,” Garlick said.Wang’s threats toward the Czech Senate speaker overshadowed his trip aimed at improving relations with European countries, Turcsányi said.“China needs Europe especially now with the U.S. tensions growing. So, I think the Chinese government will try to balance this kind of need to be tough, and then not to risk undermining the relationship with Europe too much,” he said. The United States and China have been embroiled in a trade dispute and have been at odds over other issues that include Beijing’s handling of the coronavirus outbreak.
 
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Serbia and Kosovo have agreed to normalize economic relations, following U.S.-brokered talks that include Serbia moving its Israeli embassy to Jerusalem and Kosovo formally recognizing Israel.
 
U.S. President Donald Trump made the announcement Friday, after meeting with Kosovo Prime Minister Avdullah Hoti and Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic in the Oval Office earlier in the day.“It took decades because you didn’t have anybody trying to get it done,” said Trump. “There was a lot of fighting and now there’s a lot of love.”
 
Additionally, the president said in a statement, “By focusing on job creation and economic growth, the two countries were able to reach a real breakthrough on economic cooperation across a broad range of issues.”
 
Kosovo declared its independence from Serbia in 2008, but the latter has refused to recognize it. Kosovo’s independence also is not recognized by Russia or China.
 
Serbian President Vucic said Friday President Trump has done a “great job,” praising his commitment to the region and inviting the U.S. leader to visit his country.
 
Kosovan Prime Minister Hoti called the agreement to normalize economic ties a big step forward.
 
After the meeting Friday at the White House, Hoti and Vucic are scheduled to meet separately with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo at the State Department.Kosovo’s independence has been recognized by more than 100 members of the United Nations, including the United States, and most of the European Union member states, except for Slovakia, Cyprus, Greece, Romania and Spain.VOA White House Bureau chief Steve Herman contributed to this report.
 
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After an urgent meeting of NATO ambassadors on Friday to discuss the poisoning of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, the allies said Russia must fully cooperate in an impartial investigation under the supervision of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons.Speaking to reporters after the meeting in Brussels, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said, “Any use of chemical weapons shows a total disrespect for human lives and is an unacceptable breach of international norms and rules.”FILE – Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny takes part in a rally in Moscow, Feb. 29, 2020.NATO members agreed that Russia faces serious questions it must answer, Stoltenberg said.The Kremlin has rejected accusations it was behind the sudden illness of the leading Russian opposition politician, one day after a highly anticipated German investigation concluded Navalny had been poisoned by a banned Soviet-produced military-grade nerve agent.The investigation, whose findings were announced Wednesday by German Chancellor Angela Merkel, concluded Navalny was recovering in a Berlin hospital from Novichok, a Soviet-era toxin that Merkel said was clearly an attempt on the opposition politician’s life by state-sponsored actors in Russia.FILE – German Chancellor Angela Merkel speaks to media in Berlin, Germany, Sept. 2, 2020.”Alexei Navalny was the victim of an attack with a chemical nerve agent of the Novichok group. This poison could be identified unequivocally in tests,” said Merkel.”There are serious questions that only the Russian government can answer.”The Kremlin immediately cast doubt about the diagnosis, maintaining that Russian doctors conducted analyses that showed no signs of the nerve agent — much less poisoning — before Navalny was evacuated to Berlin from a Siberian hospital on August 22.”Before the patient was taken to Germany, in accordance with all international standards, a whole series of tests was done in Russia, and no poisonous substance was found,” said Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin’s spokesman, reacting to Merkel’s announcement.”There are no grounds to accuse the Russian state. And we are not inclined to accept any accusations in this respect,” added Peskov.FILE – Police officers stand outside the Charite Mitte Hospital Complex, where Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny is receiving medical treatment, in Berlin, Germany, Aug. 24, 2020.Russia’s Foreign Ministry also cast scorn on the report and said its ambassador to Germany had been summoned by German authorities but not presented with evidence.”Where are the facts, where are the formulas, at least some kind of information?” asked the ministry spokeswoman, Maria Zakharova, in an interview on Russia’s state-run Channel One.On Friday, the head of Russia’s Interior Ministry, Vladimir Kolokoltsev, argued that he saw no criminality to pursue in the incident. “Where would this criminal even be?” said Kolokoltsev in comments to the Interfax news agency.The minister added, “We see no basis” to investigate.Yet Navalny’s chief strategist, Leonid Volkov, said the mere traces of Novichok established the direct complicity of the Russian leadership.”Novichok means it was Putin. It’s not something that you can pick up at the pharmacy,” FILE – Inspectors from the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) arrive to begin work at the scene of a nerve agent attack on former Russian agent Sergei Skripal, Salisbury, Britain, March 21, 2018.The Salisbury poisonings also triggered the expulsion of more than 100 Russian diplomats and additional sanctions by the United States, Britain and other Western allies — a specter that Merkel suggested may be in the offing once again.The chancellor said she had notified EU and NATO partners about the German report and that allies would issue “an appropriate, joint reaction” to Russia.The poisoning also echoed in the U.S. presidential race, with Democratic nominee Joe Biden accusing the Kremlin of an “outrageous and brazen attempt on Mr. Navalny’s life” and President Donald Trump of failing to stand up to Putin.Trump’s secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, has previously expressed concern about Navalny’s condition, and called for an investigation “if the reports prove accurate” about deliberate poisoning.U.S. National Security Council spokesman John Ullyot said Wednesday, “The United States is deeply troubled by the results released today,” calling Navalny’s poisoning “completely reprehensible.””We will work with allies and the international community to hold those in Russia accountable, wherever the evidence leads, and restrict funds for their malign activities,” Ullyot added.Meanwhile, the lower house of Russia’s parliament is launching its own investigation into Navalny’s illness — arguing the opposition leader was poisoned by Western security services in an effort to blacken Russia’s reputation and, perhaps, derail a key German-Russian gas project. Trump has imposed sanctions on European companies that help Russia complete a key gas pipeline deal to Germany known as Nord Stream 2.There were calls Thursday among German lawmakers to reconsider the deal.Sudden illness Navalny fell ill August 20 during a flight to Moscow from Siberia — forcing the pilot to carry out an emergency landing in the city of Omsk.Within hours, news broke that the opposition leader was in a coma in a local hospital fighting for his life.FILE – An ambulance which is believed to transport Alexei Navalny arrives at the Charite hospital in Berlin, Germany, Aug.22, 2020.Yet Russian doctors initially delayed Navalny’s transfer for care to Berlin — arguing his condition was too fragile for travel, despite the wishes of his family.Navalny’s family and supporters argue the delays were intended to obscure what toxin had felled the opposition leader.In the run-up to the German report, the Kremlin had been arguing there was no basis to even investigate what had caused Navalny’s sudden illness.He is currently receiving treatment at Berlin’s Charite Hospital, where doctors say he remains gravely ill in an artificially induced coma.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 — and made scores of enemies in government and business circles.Navalny also has made no secret of his political ambitions. He tried to run a campaign for president in 2018 that ultimately was undone by a lingering criminal conviction.His supporters — and the European Court of Human Rights — said the charges were filed to keep him out of politics.Despite Navalny’s prominence as a leading Kremlin critic, government officials have an unofficial policy to never mention his name — a tradition the Kremlin spokesman continued even as he fielded questions about the opposition leader’s poisoning.”We’re without a doubt interested in finding out the cause behind what happened,” said Peskov, referring to Navalny merely as “the Berlin patient.”Isabela Cocoli contributed to this report.
 
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