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Some gold, diamond and bauxite mines in the Venezuelan Amazon are largely controlled by criminal gangs who exploit, beat and even kill workers, a United Nations investigation has found.
 
Venezuelan security and military forces fail to prevent crimes and have participated in some violence against miners, the U.N. human rights office said in a report on Wednesday.
 
“Authorities should take immediate steps to end labor and sexual exploitation, child labor and human trafficking, and should dismantle criminal groups controlling mining activities,” Michelle Bachelet, U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, said in a statement.
 
Her deputy Nada Al-Nashif presented the findings, on the area known as the Orinoco Mining Arc, to the Human Rights Council saying: “According to first-hand accounts received by the Office, a large portion of mining activities remain under the control of organized criminal or armed elements that impose their own rules through violence and extortion.”
 
Venezuela’s ambassador, Jorge Valero, rejected the report in a speech that did not specifically mention mining.
 
“It is clear that there is manipulation and double standards at play here with a view to try to attack a sovereign state and expose it,” Valero told the Geneva forum.
 
The U.N. report said that 149 people were reported to have died in or around the mines from March 2016 to 2020, with security forces implicated in half of the incidents, adding that the government had not replied to its request for information.
 
“According to accounts received … bodies of miners are often thrown into old mining pits used as clandestine graves,” the report said.
 
The miners, who include young children, lack employment contracts and are exposed to mercury contamination and malaria, the report said.
 
It called for the government of President Nicolas Maduro to regularize mining activities and ensure that they meet international legal and environmental standards.
 
Created by a government decree in 2016, the area of some 42,800 square miles (111,000 sq km) in the Venezuelan Amazon is equivalent to 12 per cent of national territory.
 
Gold, diamonds, coltan, iron and bauxite are mined.
 
Venezuela’s central bank has not published data on gold and mineral exports since 2018, the report said.
 
The Maduro government has supported small-scale mining since 2016 to bring in revenue amid an economic crisis. Operations have expanded as the United States has increased sanctions.
 
Criminal groups have become more active since concessions for foreign mining companies were terminated in 2011, the report said.
  
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Chilean President Sebastian Piñera is hoping his second economic stimulus package proposal to help middle-class citizens impacted by the coronavirus lockdown gets the full backing of the Congress.  His initial $1.5 billion proposal failed to generate enough support from the Chilean Congress last week. In a televised speech, Pinera said his latest proposal delivers financial contributions directly to the middle class. Piñera’s new stimulus package also has credit extensions, rent subsidies and loans to help pay for college.  Piñera hopes his proposal will counter an initiative by the opposition that would allow pensioners to withdraw 10 percent of their savings from a total of 200,000 dollars in Chile’s Pension Funds Administrator.  The opposition argues Piñera’s proposal is costly and would burden the middle class with unnecessary debt. 
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Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro’s self-isolation with the coronavirus does not appear to be affording him any sympathy from protesters calling for his resignation. Demonstrators, who are upset over Bolsonaro’s response to the outbreak, placed crosses representing COVID-19 victims outside the Brazilian Congress in the capital, Brasilia, on Tuesday. Protesters, including members of trade unions, Indigenous people and LGBT activists, delivered a petition to Congress calling for his impeachment.  Bolsonaro has been widely criticized for downplaying the impact of the pandemic.  Indigenous leader Kretan Kaingang said demonstrators also wanted to honor warriors who died during the pandemic.  Brazil has confirmed more than 74,000 deaths, the second-highest in the world behind the United States.  So far, nearly two million people have been infected with the coronavirus in Brazil.  
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Hundreds marched in Minsk Tuesday after Belarus’ election officials refused to register two top opposition candidates for the August 9 presidential election. “We are categorically for honest and fair elections,” said one protester. It is unclear how many people were arrested Tuesday. The election commission allowed five candidates to put their names on the ballot but denied spots to opposition candidates Valery Tsepkalo and Viktor Babariko. Both are seen as the only serious competitors to longtime incumbent President Alexander Lukashenko. Tsepkalo is a former Belarusian ambassador to the United States. Election officials claim most of the names on the petition to place him on the ballot are invalid.Police officers detain protesters during a rally against the removal of opposition candidates from the presidential elections in Minsk, Belarus, Tuesday, July 14, 2020.Babariko, the former head of a Russia-owned bank, was jailed last month for alleged money laundering, a charge he denies.  European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borell says excluding Tsepkalo and Babariko “limits the possibility for the Belarusian people to express their will and already undermines the overall integrity and democratic nature of the elections.” Political observers say leaving the two off the ballot assures Lukashenko of another term. He has ruled Belarus with an iron fist for 26 years, stifling free speech and cracking down on the opposition and independent media. Lukashenko has tried to overcome his image as an authoritarian by drifting away from Russia and seeking better ties with the United States and European leaders.  
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Spain’s Catalonia regional government pushed ahead Tuesday with FILE – Migrants who are seeking seasonal work stand in a square in Lleida, Spain, July 2, 2020.”What is proposed today goes far beyond a simple limitation of movement and seriously affects constitutionally recognized rights,” Judge Elena Garcia-Munoz Alarcos said. Quim Torra, president of Catalonia, stood firm and refused to accept the ruling. “We cannot understand that there are bureaucratic obstacles in decisions that are taken for the health and life of citizens,” Torra told a news conference. “It’s a luxury to lose time with legal resolutions. We cannot allow this.” The regional government approved a decree Monday giving it legal backing to enact coronavirus lockdown measures, resulting in Tuesday’s confinement orders. The mixed messages between the judge and the regional government have caused confusion among Lleida’s 160,000 residents, with the city’s mayor, Miquel Pueyo, being unsure as to whether to tell people to stay at home or uphold the judge’s decision. Regardless of the outcome, Lleida’s residents will still be prohibited from leaving the region, as per a travel ban implemented July 4. Everyone in Catalonia is also held to a compulsory mask-wearing mandate put in place in early July. Violations result in a $114 fine. As of Tuesday, Spain had the highest number of coronavirus cases in the European Union, with 65,086 in Catalonia alone, and nearly 256,000 in Spain overall. 
 
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France will soon require people to wear masks in enclosed public places to prevent a rebound in COVID-19 cases, French President Emmanuel Macron said Tuesday.After a two-month lockdown starting in March, France began easing restrictions in May, and reopened bars and restaurants in early June. But in recent weeks, France’s virus reproduction rate has crept up to a point each person with COVID-19 is infecting at least one other person. COVID-19 is the disease caused by the coronavirus.”We have some signs that it’s coming back a bit,” Macron said in an interview Tuesday with French broadcasters. “Faced with that, we must anticipate and prepare.”While reopening, France recommended people use masks but did not require them, except on public transit and in public spaces where social distancing is not possible — a requirement that did not apply to shopping in stores.”I want us, in the next few weeks, to make masks compulsory in enclosed public places,” Macron said. “I ask fellow citizens to wear masks as much as possible when they are outside, and especially so when they are in an enclosed space.”Around 30,000 people have died of COVID-19 in France, which has recorded close to 200,000 confirmed cases, according to the Johns Hopkins University COVID-19 dashboard.
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Ada Gutierrez has thought about returning to Venezuela every single day since Colombia went into quarantine in late March.Gutierrez, one of 5 million people who have fled crisis-stricken Venezuela, has spent months of quarantine in Colombia selling candy on the streets of Medellín, the country’s second biggest city.If she is lucky, she can scrape together enough money each night for her and her and her 18-month-old daughter to split a hotel room with other Venezuelan families. If not, the two sleep on the streets.“Just like all the Venezuelans around here, we have slept on the street,” she said, outside a station delivering parcels of food to migrants.“If we have to, we do not eat for the entire day to pay for our room. Our reality here is living day-to-day, sleeping in the streets and going hungry,” said Gutierrez.Life in limboAs Latin America emerged as the epicenter of the pandemic, Gutierrez said she wants to return home to Venezuela just as 81,000 other Venezuelans had done by the end of  June, according to Colombia’s border control agency.Gutierrez is among 30,000 Venezuelans that Colombian authorities say are in limbo on the Colombian side of the border.Their choice is stay in Colombia and struggle to survive through the lockdown or go home to a situation of uncertainty.At the beginning of the pandemic, migrants walked hundreds of miles back to the Venezuelan border. Others returned by buses facilitated by Colombia, the biggest receiver of the exodus – now eager to send them home.When they arrive at the border, migrants describe a brutal, sometimes months-long process before they can return home, packed into facilities by Venezuelan authorities with hundreds of other migrants, sleeping on cement floors and often eating little more than undercooked eggs and corn cakes known as arepas.FearThe return would be too harsh for her baby, Eva, to go through, Gutierrez said. Other vulnerable populations – families, the elderly, and migrants living with disabilities or medical conditions – have echoed Gutierrez’ fears. So day after day, she has opted to stay, hoping that at the end of the day, she and Eva will have food, a place to sleep and enough luck to not get infected.In recent weeks, the Venezuelan government has placed a limit on migrants crossing back to Venezuela, only letting 400 of its citizens cross the land border three times a week.This comes despite President Nicolas Maduro’s calls for Venezuelans to return home at the beginning of the pandemic, announcing over state television that returnees would be treated with “love and affection.”Now, more than 30,000 migrants are stuck waiting in Colombia alone, many in makeshift camps in big cities like Medellín and Bogota. The Colombian government said that the process to return could now take up to 6 months.Venezuelan migrants attempting to return to their country due to the COVID-19 pandemic remain in makeshift camps at the Simon Bolivar International Bridge in Cucuta, Colombia, July 7, 2020.As cases jump across the region, aid providers like Arles Pereda, president of COLVENZ, the Colony of Venezuelans in Colombia nonprofit group, warn that those camps could become hotbeds for contagion.“There is a very, very high possibility of an outbreak,” Pereda said. “We have had a lot of luck because that still has not happened,” he said. but it has been very tense because with this invisible enemy, we do not know when it is going to attack.”Pereda’s organization once provided a safety net to migrants arriving to Medellín. Now, they distribute boxes of food to families starving in months of quarantine and try to connect Venezuelans wanting to return with local governments.COVID-19 time bombDespite low testing rates, Colombia has reported 150,445 confirmed cases and 5,634 deaths as of July 14. Venezuela has reported 9,707 cases and 93 deaths, but observers say the Maduro government is drastically undercounting cases.An employee of the Ministry of Health talks to a man who will undergo a rapid test for the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), in Bogota, Colombia, July 1, 2020.In a Reuters interview last month, Colombian President Iván Duque described  Venezuela as public health “time bomb.”The exodus from Venezuela has ballooned in recent years as the South American country’s economic and political spiral accelerates, compounding its medical and energy crises.  In a report last year, the Council on Foreign Relations said 3.3 million Venezuelans – 10% of Venezuela’s population –  had fled in a four-year period starting in 2015.Gutierrez left two years ago to give birth to her daughter in Colombia because Venezuelan hospitals were already collapsed and maternal and infant mortalities have skyrocketed.A member of the National Police Action Force uses a megaphone, telling people to return home due to the government-ordered lockdown to curb the spread of COVID-19, in Caracas, Venezuela, July 2, 2020.The mass-migration to countries like Colombia, Peru, Ecuador, and Chile is set to surpass Syria’s as the biggest migration in the world, yet Venezuelan migrants only receive pennies on the dollar in international aid compared to their Syrian counterparts.Pereda and Gimena Sanchez, Andes director for the Washington Office on Latin America, WOLA, say resources were already insufficient before the pandemic hit. The needs are only heightened as migrants lose their jobs, are kicked out of their homes and face rising xenophobia.Sanchez said the pandemic is likely to transform the exodus and leave more migrants like the Gutierrez family vulnerable.Exodus changing direction“They cannot transit like they used to,” she said. “What you are going to see is more and more people becoming stuck or going back-and-forth.”While Colombia was once largely a transit country, regional restrictions and instability will push migrants to increasingly stay on Colombian territory, she said. As the crisis stretches on, Sanchez said there will be more of an ebb-and-flow from Venezuela as waves of crises strike, turning migration from a one-directional exodus to more of a pendulum of flows between the two countries.That could be devastating for Colombia, which is still struggling to emerge from decades of an internal conflict that already displaced nearly 8 million of its own citizens.Gutierrez takes it one day at time. As she sees it, she has no other choice.“I’m scared, but I have to go out to the streets every single day and search for a way to feed ourselves,” she said, “because that’s how we stay alive.” 
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Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, who has self-quarantined nearly a week after testing positive for the new coronavirus, is scheduled to take another COVID-19 test on Tuesday. Speaking by phone with CNN on Monday, outside his official residence at the Alvorada Palace in Brasilia, Bolsonaro said, he expects to get the results within a few hours, adding he feels well, but cannot stand being in isolation. Since the start of the outbreak four months ago, Bolsonaro has downplayed the seriousness of the epidemic, criticizing Brazilian governors for imposing restrictions to slow the spread of the virus. President Bolsonaro’s opposition is further highlighted because Brazil is the second-worst hit country in the world, only behind the United States. Brazil has confirmed more than1.8 million cases of the coronavirus and more than 72,800 deaths. 
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British officials are bracing for fierce Chinese government reaction and possible retaliation to Britain’s decision Tuesday to block Chinese tech giant Huawei from playing any role in the development of Britain’s next generation 5G phone network.
 
Britain’s culture minister, Oliver Dowden, told the House of Commons of the decision to banish Huawei from the network, saying any of the company’s components already installed will have to be removed from the network by 2027.  
 
The major policy U-turn is prompting fears in Downing Street that Britain may become the target of a possible China-sponsored cyberattack similar to one that struck Australia last month amid heightened tensions between Canberra and Beijing.
 
Chinese officials, including Beijing’s ambassador to London, have maintained a chorus of warnings in recent months, threatening serious consequences if Huawei, one of China’s flagship companies, is excluded from participation in developing Britain’s 5G network.
 A Trump victory
 
Tuesday’s announcement is seen by analysts and diplomats as a big win for the Trump administration which, along with other Western allies, has been lobbying Britain for more than a year to block Huawei from Britain’s 5G wireless network on security grounds.  
 
In January, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson decided to allow Huawei a role in the development of the fast-speed network, limiting the company’s participation to just 35%. But U.S. officials — as well their Australian counterparts — continued to lobby London to block Huawei altogether.  
 
U.S. officials say there is a significant risk that the company, which has close ties to the Chinese intelligence services and was founded by a former Chinese army officer, will act as a Trojan horse for Beijing’s espionage agencies, allowing them to sweep up data.
 
Dowden told British lawmakers: “We have not taken this decision lightly and I must be frank about the decision’s consequences for every constituency in this country; this will delay our roll-out of 5G.” The British government acknowledges the move will delay the rollout of 5G in the by two to three years and increase costs by at least $2.5 billion.  Huawei’s UK headquarters building is pictured in Reading, Britain, July 14, 2020.Acting on the guidance of Britain’s National Cyber Security Center, Johnson accepted that U.S. sanctions imposed on Huawei in May had become a “game changer.”  Previously the center, a department within Britain’s intelligence agency GCHQ, said the security risks posed by Huawei could be safely managed and mitigated, a view not shared by U.S. intelligence agencies. But the imposition earlier this year of new U.S. restrictions on Huawei altered the picture, the center warned.  
 
Britain’s cybersecurity chiefs concluded the U.S. sanctions, which block Huawei from using components and semi-conductors based on any American intellectual property, will mean the telecom giant will have to use “untrusted” parts, increasing security risks.  
 
Responding to the government’s announcement, Huawei UK spokesperson Ed Brewster said: “This disappointing decision is bad news for anyone in the UK with a mobile phone. It threatens to move Britain into the digital slow lane, push up bills and deepen the digital divide.” He added: “Regrettably our future in the UK has become politicized, this is about U.S. trade policy and not security.”
 
That view was not shared by former British Conservative leader Iain Duncan Smith, who has been at the forefront of a campaign to block Huawei. He says that it is impossible to separate Chinese firms like Huawei from the Chinese government. “Across the free world, more and more countries are now recognizing that they face a particular threat now from Chinese government intentions,” he said.  
 Big blow for Huawei
 
Britain’s decision is a big blow for Huawei. Europe accounts for 24% of the company’s sales and the British decision could have knock-on effects elsewhere on the continent, where other governments are currently assessing how much access to give Huawei.  British officials say the decision is bound to worsen already sharply deteriorating relations between the two countries. Chinese officials, including Beijing’s ambassador to Britain, Liu Xiaoming, have underscored for weeks that there will be repercussions in the event Huawei is excluded.Tensions have been escalating between London and Beijing quickly over a Chinese security clampdown on Hong Kong, a former British colony transferred to China in 1997. To Beijing’s anger, Britain announced Hong Kong residents would be allowed to move to Britain to escape the crackdown. The two governments have clashed also over Britain’s backing of an independent probe into the origins of the coronavirus.According to press reports, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison briefed Johnson recently on a massive cyberattack Morrison says was launched on his country last month. The incident, say Australian officials, targeted “government, industry, political organizations, education, health, essential service providers and operators of other critical infrastructure.”FILE – A sign reading “Boris Stop Huawei” is seen next to the M40 motorway, Tetsworth, Britain, May 1, 2020, in a reference to Prime Minister Boris Johnson.Australia and China’s communist government have been at loggerheads since Australia became the first nation to call for an international inquiry into the origins of the coronavirus.Critics have long alleged Huawei has close links to the Chinese Communist government and its equipment could be used for espionage purposes. The company denies the claim, describing Huawei as a private company “fully owned by its employees.”
 An ‘intimate part of the Chinese state’
 
Former British intelligence chief Richard Dearlove disputes that description. On Sunday, he said Huawei “is not an ordinary international telecommunications company. It is an intimate part of the Chinese state.” Dearlove added that a ban on Huawei would amount to “a reset of the whole of our relationship with the Chinese leadership.” He has long lobbied for Huawei’s exclusion, along with dozens of lawmakers from Johnson’s own ruling Conservative party.Last week, Ambassador Liu warned Johnson of the consequences of excluding Huawei, saying at a virtual press conference, “You cannot have a golden era if you treat China as an enemy.” A ban on Huawei, he said, would have many repercussions, including inflicting damage on Britain’s reputation as “a business-friendly, open, transparent environment.” Among other possible consequences, he said, China could disinvest from Britain’s energy sector.Fallout
 
Two studies, by British research groups and set for publication this week, warn that a major disruption in Britain’s trade relations with China sparked by a ban on Huawei would depress the British economy.Cambridge Econometrics says hundreds of thousands of British jobs depend on trade with China and that the relationship directly supports more than 100,000 jobs in sectors such as education and tourism. The study was commissioned by the China-Britain Business Council, a trade promotion association.Clive Hamilton, an Australian academic and co-author of “Hidden Hand,” a groundbreaking new book examining Chinese influence operations and networks in the West, says he expects “Beijing will react angrily” to Huawei’s exclusion.FILE – The British flag and a smartphone with a Huawei and 5G network logo are seen on a PC motherboard in this illustration picture taken Jan. 29, 2020.Hamilton’s book, co-authored with Marieke Ohlberg, a China scholar from Germany, has figured prominently in a fierce political debate raging in Britain about the future of Anglo-Chinese relations. The book has been cited by lawmakers who have been urging for Huawei to be banned from Britain’s 5G network.
 
In the book, Hamilton and his co-author accuse the CCP of intensive grooming of British politicians, business people and academics and warn that “so entrenched are the CCP’s influence networks among British elites that Britain has passed the point of no return, and any attempt to extricate itself from Beijing’s orbit would probably fail.”
 
Asked by VOA whether Tuesday’s decision to exclude Huawei would suggest that such a judgment is premature, Hamilton responded in an email exchange that he “expects the CCP’s powerful friends among Britain’s elites to re-emerge and lobby hard to give priority to economic relations and give way to Beijing on other issues.”  
 Losing friends  
 
Hamilton added, though, that the coronavirus pandemic, and increasing “public awareness of the nature of the CCP regime,” is hardening attitudes towards the Chinese government. “The pandemic, its origins in Wuhan and the early Chinese government handling of it have changed the international dynamic in ways that are still playing out.” He says the Chinese communist government has taken “a big reputational hit in many countries around the world. In Britain, the damage has been compounded by the events in Hong Kong, which looms large in Britain’s political consciousness for historical reasons.”
 
“Elsewhere in Europe, the picture is mixed. China retains warm ties with several nations in East and Central Europe and with Italy and Greece. But it is losing friends in nations like France and Sweden. Germany is the key, and it is wavering,” he added.
 
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The British government has banned China’s Huawei telecommunications equipment company from playing a limited role in Britain’s new high-speed mobile phone network.Britain’s Culture Secretary, Oliver Dowden, said the country’s telecommunications operators have until 2027 to remove Huawei’s equipment that is currently used in Britain’s 5G network.Britain’s decision could have wide-ranging implications for relations between the two countries and signals that Huawei may be losing support in the West. Dowden said the ban was imposed after the U.S. threatened to cancel an information-sharing deal due to concerns Huawei’s equipment could allow the Chinese government to penetrate British networks.British Prime Minister Boris Johnson agreed in January to give Huawei a limited role in Britain’s high-speed network, but the decision sparked a diplomatic disagreement with the U.S. 
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Ousmann Umar knows only too well how tough it is for migrants from Africa to reach Europe. Dumped in the Sahara by trafficking gangs when he was only 13, he believed he would share the fate of other migrants whose bodies lay strewn on the route northwards. Unlike the others, he survived, not just the desert but every step of a five-year odyssey from Ghana to Spain. Thirteen years later, the son of a traditional healer is now a businessman in Barcelona with a master’s degree from one of the world’s top business schools. On the face of it, he seems a poster boy for young Africans dreaming of a life in Europe. Instead, Umar, 30, has made it his mission to persuade Africans to stay at home rather than follow in his footsteps, insisting the emotional cost is too high. As Spain currently pushes for a joint European Union migration policy, the number of illegal immigrants who reached the country by land or sea between January and June fell by 31% compared with the same period in 2019. About 7,744 people made it to Spain during that time, compared with 11,316 in 2019. Traffickers switched routes from the Mediterranean to moving people from Mauritania in West Africa to the Canary Islands, a precarious 100-kilometer journey. Some 80% of all the 120,000 applications for asylum in Spain come from Latin American countries, principally from Venezuela and Colombia. Latin Americans  favored? Migrants from Africa and other parts of the world have claimed they are at a disadvantage in comparison with those who arrive from South or Central America. The reality, it seems, is more complicated. FILE – Venezuelan refugees, 8-month pregnant Stephanie Paez and her partner Kervin Leiva, hang clothes to dry outside their bungalow in La Ciguena holiday complex amid the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak in Arganda del Rey, Spain, April 3, 2020.Umar shares the view that it is easier for Latin Americans to reach the Promised Land and attain the hallowed status of residency. “It seems much easier for them to get legal residence here than some Africans because of the colonial links with Spain,” he told VOA. “I am from Ghana, which was a British colony, so for instance it would be easier for me to gain legal status in the UK.” However, he said the system itself made it very hard for anyone to establish themselves in Spain. “What you need is to be living in the same place for three years and to have a work contract for a year and then the Spanish are almost forced to grant you residence,” Umar said. “It is a mad system which forces people, wherever they are from, to live illegally in utter poverty in the hope they can get residency. It can apply to either Africans or Latin Americans,” he said.  Umar set up a charity, Nasco Feeding Minds, to buy computers for 19 schools in Ghana. He works with banks and other businesses, giving inspirational speeches and other European countries. After a torturous route through Libya, Algeria, Morocco and Mauritania, he eventually made it on a flimsy boat to the Canary Islands. From there, he ended up in Barcelona. After two years living rough, Umar got help from by a Spanish family who supported him through school. “I would not wish it on anyone,” he confides. Nuria Díaz, spokeswoman for CEAR, the Spanish Commission for Refugees, an NGO in Madrid, said getting to Spain was far harder for African or Asian migrants than for Latin Americans. Red Cross members take the temperature of a migrant before disembarking from a Spanish coast guard vessel in the port of Arguineguin on the island of Gran Canaria, Spain, May 17, 2020.“The practicality of it is with the European Union policy of trying to bar migration right now because of coronavirus, it is very difficult for these migrants to arrive via the Mediterranean. In comparison, Latin Americans can get to Spain by air, but they are still facing barriers because of the virus,” she in an interview with VOA. “Normally, in many cases, they do not need a visa because of reciprocal agreements between Spain and their governments.” Onshore, equal treatment Díaz added: “However, once they are here, the law is equal for all. Only 5% of those who apply for asylum get it. Last year, there was a waiting list of 120,000 and it normally takes up to 18 months for your case to be considered.” Judith Tabares, a lawyer who specializes in migration cases, says the ability of migrants to secure legal residence in Spain differs from case to case. “In theory it would be easy to say that it is easier for Latin Americans than Africans but in reality that is not the case,” she told VOA. Venezuelan residents in Spain gather at the QW Bar in Madrid, Spain, May 15, 2018. Picture taken May 15, 2018.“One migrant from an African country may have a relative living here which can help them while someone from Venezuela may still struggle to get legal status after years.” A spokesman for Spanish immigration ministry said: “The process of asylum is equal for all. All migrants when they arrive in Spain are treated the same, wherever they come from.”   
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Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, who has self-quarantined nearly a week after testing positive for the new coronavirus, is scheduled to take another COVID-19 test on Tuesday. Speaking by phone with CNN on Monday, outside his official residence at the Alvorada Palace in Brasilia, Bolsonaro said, he expects to get the results within a few hours, adding he feels well, but cannot stand being in isolation. Since the start of the outbreak four months ago, Bolsonaro has downplayed the seriousness of the epidemic, criticizing Brazilian governors for imposing restrictions to slow the spread of the virus. President Bolsonaro’s opposition is further highlighted because Brazil is the second-worst hit country in the world, only behind the United States. Brazil has confirmed more than1.8 million cases of the coronavirus and more than 72,800 deaths. 
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Mexico announced it’s considering an offer of $120 million in cash plus medical equipment from an unnamed entity to buy a luxury equipped presidential airplane. President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has been trying sell off the plane of his predecessor, former President Enrique Pena Nieto, since taking office in late 2018 on a campaign pledge of fugal spending.  López Obrador has been flying commercial airlines, citing the presidential plane to be an extravagance, with its presidential suite. Experts say the 787 Boeing jet, which initially cost $200 million, will be hard to off load because it would be difficult to reconfigure into a regular passenger jet. In an effort to boost the value of the presidential plane, the government is separately conducting a raffle, with winners getting cash prizes. 
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Several Azeri soldiers have been killed and Armenian soldiers and police wounded in border clashes, both countries said Monday, each accusing the other of encroaching on its territory. The two former Soviet republics have long been in conflict over Azerbaijan’s breakaway, mainly ethnic Armenian region of Nagorno-Karabakh, although the latest clashes occurred around the Tavush region in northeast Armenia, some 300km (190 miles) from the mountainous enclave. Armenia’s Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan at the Chancellery in Berlin, Germany, Feb. 13, 2020.The Azeri defense ministry said four of its soldiers had been killed and five wounded while Armenia’s ministry said three of its soldiers and two police officers had been wounded in the clashes. The exchanges of fire began Sunday and continued into Monday. The two sides traded accusations of cease-fire violations and shelling. Azeri President Ilham Aliyev accused the Armenian leadership of a “provocation.” Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said the leadership of Azerbaijan would be responsible for “the unpredictable consequences of the regional destabilization.” The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), a security watchdog that has tried to help find a solution to the conflict, urged the two countries to speak to each other to prevent any further escalation. The U.S. State Department condemned the violence, urged the two sides to stop using force immediately, and said it would “remain actively engaged in efforts” to achieve a peaceful settlement. Nagorno-Karabakh, a mountainous part of Azerbaijan, is run by ethnic Armenians, who declared independence during a conflict that broke out as the Soviet Union crumbled in 1991. Though a ceasefire was agreed in 1994, Azerbaijan and Armenia continue to accuse each other of shooting attacks around Nagorno-Karabakh and along the separate Azeri-Armenian frontier. The frozen Nagorno-Karabakh conflict has concerned the international community in part because of its threat to stability in a region that serves as a corridor for pipelines taking oil and gas to world markets.  
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The legacy of former U.S. president Thomas Woodrow Wilson is going through a harsh re-examination by supporters of the Black Lives Matter movement in the United States, but in at least one country abroad, his place in history is undisputed. Wilson, who occupied the White House from 1913 to 1921, “is being criticized for his allegedly racist views as far as I know,” said Zdenek Beranek, the Czech Republic’s second-ranking diplomat in Washington.  The Czech people do not approve of any form of racism, Beranek said in an interview with VOA, but “we appreciate what he did for our nation. … Wilson invested his political capital to the independence of my country.”   Wilson, known internationally for his role in reshaping world affairs after World War I, has recently come under scrutiny amid a national movement to remove statues of Confederate generals and other historic leaders accused of having owned slaves or supported racial segregation.  A statue of former US President Woodrow Wilson is unveiled in Prague, Czech Republic, Oct. 5, 2011.Princeton University, one of America’s leading educational institutions, recently removed his name from its school of public policy because of his support for segregationist policies. In a sign of how problematic his legacy has become, the governor of New Jersey has decided to not sit behind a desk used by Wilson when he held that office.  Wilson, described by some as the most highly educated of all American presidents, served as a professor for many years before rising to become president of Princeton, then governor of New Jersey and then president of the United States. Until recently, he was best known for his handling of the presidency during the First World War — a period that saw the rise of the United States as a political and military power. In January 1918, as the war was drawing to a close, Wilson announced the Fourteen Points and laid the foundation for the Treaty of Versailles, which ended the war.   During the war years, he was influenced by the entreaties of Czech exile Tomas G. Masaryk, a fellow academician-turned-politician who, with Wilson’s crucial help, would go on to help establish the new country of Czechoslovakia and become its first president.  Wilson is said to have been deeply moved when he learned that a document drafted by Masaryk and other leading figures to proclaim the right of the Czech and Slovak peoples to self-governance was modeled after the American Declaration of Independence.   “You could say our very independence was declared on American soil,” Beranek said. The Czechs honored Wilson with a larger-than-life full-sized statue erected in central Prague; they also named their main railway station after him.   The statue was knocked down and the railway station renamed when the country became a Soviet satellite after World War II. But after Moscow lost its grip on the region in 1989, a new statue was erected in its place. The train station was not renamed, but it stands on Wilsonova, or Wilson Avenue. 
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Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau apologized on Monday for taking part in a Cabinet decision to use a charity he and his family have worked with to administer a $900 million ($663.4 million) student grant program.Trudeau, 48, is facing a third investigation for conflict of interest in a little over three years after his government tapped WE Charity Canada on June 25 to manage the program. The charity backed out about a week after the contract was announced. “I made a mistake in not recusing myself immediately from the discussions, given our family’s history, and I’m sincerely sorry about not having done that,” Trudeau said at a news conference. It is the second time in less than a year that the prime minister has apologized publicly for his actions in a live, nationally televised news conference. The first time was in September after decades-old images of him in blackface emerged. “I was very aware that members of my family had worked with and contributed to the WE organization, but I was unaware of the details of their remuneration,” Trudeau said. WE Charity disclosed last week that from 2016-2020 it paid honoraria to Trudeau’s mother, Margaret, amounting to C$250,000 for speaking at some 28 events, while his brother, Alexandre, received about C$32,000. Trudeau and his wife, Sophie Gregoire Trudeau, have regularly participated in WE Charity events, and Gregoire Trudeau hosts a podcast on the charity’s website for which she is not paid. Also on Monday, Finance Minister Bill Morneau, whose daughter works at WE Charity, offered a similar apology. “I will recuse myself from any future discussions related to WE,” Morneau said. The grant program, meant to help students struggling to find summer jobs during the COVID-19 pandemic, has been stymied by the controversy, and the government is now looking for a different way to administer it.  
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German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Monday it is not clear whether EU member states would reach an agreement on a COVID-19 recovery fund and multi-year budget at a summit this week, given that differences remain. The leaders of EU member nations are scheduled to gather in person on Friday and Saturday to work out a compromise on a multibillion-dollar stimulus package proposed by Germany and France. The debate has been linked to a discussion on the 27-country bloc’s long-term budget. Merkel spoke to reporters alongside visiting Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte at Meseberg Castle — the German government’s guest house, north of Berlin, where the two held talks. She said positions are still too far apart to make any predictions about how the negotiations will proceed. Merkel said what is important is the scope of the agreement.”What we want now, the recovery fund or the next generation EU program, it has to be staggering, something special. Because the task at hand is huge, and therefore the answer has to be big as well,” she said.Italian news reports quoted Conte as saying the EU should offer “solutions, not illusions and fears.” Much of the stimulus money would go to help countries that were hardest hit by the coronavirus, which causes the COVID-19 disease, and its economic impacts, such as Italy and Spain. Some fiscally conservative EU countries oppose the French-German plan because it would entail borrowing by the bloc as a whole for the first time. 
 
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Investigators of the Federal Security Service have formally charged an aide to the chief of Russia’s Roskosmos space agency, journalist Ivan Safronov, with high treason. 
 
Safronov’s lawyer Ivan Pavlov said his client was indicted on July 13, adding that he reiterated his previous not guilty plea. 
 
Moscow police on July 13 detained about 20 supporters of Safronov near the Lefortovo detention center in the Russian capital, where Safronov is being held. 
 
Among the detained supporters of Safronov were a member of the journalists’ labor union, Sofia Rusova, and reporters Pyotr Parkhomenko, Maria Karpenko, Olga Alenova, Alla Pugachyova and Taisia Bekbulatova. Safronov, who has worked since May as an adviser to Roskosmos head Dmitry Rogozin, is a prominent journalist who covered the military-industrial complex for the newspapers Kommersant and Vedomosti. Police detain RT television channel journalist Maria Sherstyukova during a rally to support Ivan Safronov near the Lefortovo prison in Moscow, Russia, July 13, 2020. Safronov, a former military journalist, was arrested and charged with treason.He was arrested on July 7 amid allegations that he had passed secret information to the Czech Republic in 2017 about Russian arms sales in the Middle East.
 
Safronov has rejected the accusations and many of his supporters have held pickets in Moscow and other cities, demanding his release. 
Human rights organizations have issued statements demanding Safronov’s release and expressing concerns over the intensifying crackdown on dissent in Russia. 
 
The chairman of the Union of Journalists of Russia, Vladimir Solovyov, said on July 13 that his organization will “continue to closely monitor Safronov’s case.” 
 
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Election officials in North Macedonia carried ballot boxes to the homes of voters suffering from COVID-19 or in quarantine Monday, at the start of three days of voting in a general election that was delayed for months by the pandemic. Wearing white coveralls and other protective gear, the officials were visiting the homes of some 700 people who registered to vote in the pandemic but were unable to travel to polling stations. It is the first time elections have been held on a weekday, with the date set after the original April 12 vote was postponed due to the pandemic.After the delays, special provisions were made for those quarantined due to the virus. Of the roughly 5,000 people quarantined, just over 700 have registered to vote. Prison inmates, the elderly and the ill vote on Tuesday before the polls open Wednesday.  North Macedonia is holding its first parliamentary election under its new country name, with voters heading to the polls during an alarming spike of coronavirus cases in this small Balkan nation.The country has been run by a caretaker government since January following the resignation of Prime Minister Zoran Zaev after the European Union failed to set a date for North Macedonia to begin accession talks. Parliament elected a temporary government consisting of members of both main parties, with the sole aim of organizing the election.  Opinion polls in the run-up to Wednesday’s vote indicate a close race between coalitions led by the former governing Social Democrats and the center-right opposition VMRO-DPMNE party. The opposition is eager to return to power after losing the last election in 2016 following a decade running the country.Due to the coronavirus outbreak, the Social Democrat-led coalition “Mozeme” (We Can) and the VMRO-led coalition “Obnova” (Renewal) are campaigning mostly through small gatherings and video messages.The caretaker government handled the coronavirus outbreak relatively well until May, imposing a lockdown that kept the number of infections and deaths low. But after authorities eased restrictions and opened the borders, North Macedonia saw an increase in new cases and deaths that have placed it among the most badly affected European nations in terms of the number of deaths and confirmed cases per capita.With more than 8,000 infected people and about 380 deaths in this country of around 2 million people by Sunday, the pandemic and its devastating economic consequences have become the main election issue. The opposition accuses Zaev’s party of being unable to deal with the outbreak or pull the country out of recession.North Macedonia is one of the poorest countries in Europe with a per-capita GDP of about $6,100. About a half of its 2 million people live on the brink of poverty.Polls suggest neither party will win the 61 seats needed in the 120-member parliament to be able to govern alone, meaning a coalition government with a smaller ethnic Albanian party is likely. A total of 15 parties and coalitions are running.Zaev, the Social Democrat leader, has touted his success in securing the country’s NATO membership after sealing a historic 2017 deal with neighboring Greece over the country’s name. Greece had been blocking the country’s NATO accession for three decades, objecting to the use of the name “Macedonia” which it said harbored expansionist claims on its own province of the same name.Zaev also signed a friendship deal with Bulgaria, part of a push to resolve issues with neighboring countries and prepare for EU membership.  The Social Democrats beat the populist conservative VMRO-DPMNE party in 2016 after a decade of autocratic rule by its then-leader Nikola Gruevski, who fled to Hungary to avoid serving a two-year jail sentence for abuse of power and corruption. Hungary granted him political asylum and North Macedonia is seeking his extradition.Gruevski’s successor, Hristijan Mickoski, moved VMRO-DPMNE toward the center-right and is appealing to voters disappointed with the country’s name change and the deal with Bulgaria. He also accuses the Social Democrats of corruption, influencing the judiciary, nepotism and destroying the economy.”These are elections when we decide on the future of our families, elections in which we need to make our ancestors proud,” Mickoski said during a recent television debate with Zaev. “The choice now on July 15 is between injustice, humiliation, and on the other hand justice and dignity.”The Social Democrats point to their success in achieving NATO membership and promise EU accession and a revival of the economy with billions in foreign investments.  “We have proved that North Macedonia could be a friend with everybody, made smart deals that brought the country into NATO and enabled a green light for the start of accession talks with the EU after 15 years,” Zaev said.If neither party wins enough seats to form a government, the largest ethnic Albanian party, the Democratic Union for Integration, or DUI, is the most likely coalition partner.  DUI has been in coalition governments for the past 18 years, and now says it is “high time” for an ethnic Albanian to head the government.Its slogan “Pse Jo?” (Why not?) was chosen to challenge the last “remaining ethnic taboo” of an ethnic Albanian being named prime minister. DUI has already chosen a long-retired politician for the post.Ethnic Albanians make up about a quarter of North Macedonia’s population. They took up arms against government forces in 2001, and the six-month conflict ended with a Western-brokered deal granting them greater minority rights, including making Albanian the country’s second official language.  Both main parties have rejected DUI’s idea.Over 1.8 million people are eligible to vote at nearly 3,500 polling stations. About 2,000 domestic and 130 international observers will monitor the process.Masks are compulsory during voting, and a two-meter distance must be kept from election officials. Authorities are assuring voters the process will not endanger their health. 
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British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said Monday it was important to wear face coverings in confined spaces such as shops and added that the government would be making an announcement in the coming days on possible steps to make them mandatory.Critics have accused Johnson’s government of failing to offer clarity on the mask issue in the days since he began backtracking on previous advice suggesting such coverings were not necessary.But Johnson says the scientific research is now showing that masks help stop the transmission of COVID-19. Talking to reporters Monday, during a visit to the London Ambulance Service, Johnson said “Just to be absolutely clear, face coverings do have a real value in confined spaces, and I do think the public understand that.”When pressed on whether it should be mandatory, Johnson said “we will be looking at the guidance, we will be saying a little bit more in the next few days.”He said he wants to see people who have been working at home for a long time talking to their employers about coming back to work “in a safe way.”Johnson also suggested British citizens plan “staycations” and take their holidays in the country rather than going overseas. He said he plans to stay within Britain when he takes time off but would not say where he was going. 
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Incumbent Polish President Andrej Duda has won the presidential election. With 99 percent of the ballots counted from Sunday’s runoff election, Duda won 51.2 percent of the vote. The narrow victory was announced early Monday.The right-wing Duda and liberal Warsaw Mayor Rafal Trzaskowski both had about 50 percent of the votes late Sunday night with one exit poll by a state-run Polish TV station giving Duda a very slight lead.The president claimed victory Sunday night. “Thank you to all my fellow Poles who voted for me and cast their votes. I want to thank you with all my heart,” he told a rally in Pultusk.Duda’s Law and Justice Party wants to extend its majority in parliament and implement conservative social, judicial and immigration policies that many in the European Union have criticized as anti-democratic.Those policies include Duda’s pledge to ban gay rights classes in schools. He has called homosexuality worse than communism.Trzaskowski, of the Civic Platform party, campaigned on promises to preserve the ruling party’s popular welfare programs but said he would block any legislation he says would be unconstitutional. He also wanted to restore good relations with the European Union.The coronavirus outbreak forced a nearly two-month delay in the first round of voting.Observers say the postponement hurt Duda, who had looked as if he would cruise to a first-round victory. But his popularity in the polls slipped after the Civic Platform party replaced a much less popular candidate with Trzaskowski and other candidates were allowed to get out and campaign more when COVID-19 restrictions were eased. 
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Several companies that certify vessels are seaworthy and ship insurers have withdrawn services to tankers involved in the Venezuelan oil trade as the United States targets the maritime industry to tighten sanctions on the Latin American country.U.S. sanctions have driven Venezuela’s oil exports to their lowest levels in nearly 80 years, starving President Nicolas Maduro’s socialist government of its main source of revenue and leaving authorities short of cash for essential imports such as food and medicine.The sanctions are part of U.S. efforts to weaken Maduro’s grip on power after Washington and other Western democracies accused him of rigging a 2018 reelection vote. Despite the country’s economic collapse, Maduro has held on and frustrated the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump.Maduro’s government says the United States is trying to seize Venezuela’s oil and calls the U.S. measures illegal persecution that heap suffering on the Venezuelan people.Washington has homed in on the maritime industry in recent months in efforts to better enforce sanctions on the oil trade and isolate Caracas, Washington’s special envoy on Venezuela Elliott Abrams told Reuters.”What you will see is most shipowners and insurance and captains are simply going to turn away from Venezuela,” Abrams told Reuters in an interview.”It’s just not worth the hassle or the risk for them.”The United States is pressuring shipping companies, insurers, certifiers and flag states that register vessels, he said.Ship classification societies, which certify safety and environmental standards for vessels, are feeling the heat for the first time.The United States is pressuring classifiers to establish whether vessels have violated sanctions regulations and to withdraw certification if so, as a way to tighten sanctions further, a U.S. official told Reuters, speaking on condition of anonymity.Without certification, a vessel and its cargo become uninsured. Ship owners would also be in breach of commercial contracts which require certificates to be maintained. In addition, port authorities can refuse entry or detain a ship.London-headquartered Lloyd’s Register (LR), one of the world’s leading ship classifiers, said it had withdrawn services from eight tankers that were involved in trade with Venezuela.”In accordance with our program for complying with sanctions’ laws, where we become aware of vessels operating in breach of relevant sanctions laws, LR classification has been withdrawn,” a Lloyd’s Register spokeswoman said.Abrams said the pressure on the maritime industry was working.”We have had a number of shippers that come to us and say, ‘We just had our insurance company withdraw the insurance, and the ship is on the high seas and we’ve got to get to port. Could you give us a license for one week?'” Abrams said.In June, the United States designated six shipping companies — two of them based in Greece – and six tankers they owned for participating in proscribed Venezuelan trade.Another leading ship classifier, Hamburg-headquartered DNV GL Maritime, said it had suspended services for three of those vessels in June.The company resumed services when the United States removed those vessels from the list of sanctioned entities after the shipping companies that own and operate the vessels agreed to cease trade with Venezuela.Chilling effectThe United States has threatened sanctions on any company involved in the oil trade with Venezuela, and that has had a chilling effect even on trade permitted under sanctions.Some oil companies are refusing to charter vessels that have called at Venezuelan ports in the past year, even if the voyage was exempt from sanctions.”The shipping sector has been at the receiving end of U.S. action on Venezuela and it has caused much uncertainty as no one knows who will be next,” one shipping industry source said.Insurers are also in a bind. They have been conservative in their interpretation of U.S. sanctions to avoid any potential violations, said Mike Salthouse, chairman of the sanctions sub-committee with the International Group association. The group represents companies that insure about 90% of the world’s commercial shipping.”If there is ambiguity as to what is lawful and what is unlawful it makes it almost impossible for an insurer to say whether someone has cover or not,” he said.Even after ships and companies are removed from the sanctions list, they may face difficulties, Salthouse said.”The stigma associated with a designation may last some time,” he said.Oil majors, for example, may review relationships with companies that own or manage vessels that the United States had designated and then removed to avoid any possible problems with other vessels, he said.’Real threat’Venezuela is on the list of high-risk areas set by officials from London’s insurance market.”If a vessel sails to Venezuela they have to notify the underwriter and it may be that the underwriter will not be able to cover them,” said Neil Roberts, head of marine underwriting at Lloyd’s Market Association, which represents the interests of all underwriting businesses in London’s Lloyd’s market.The industry faces “the direct and real threat of having its trade stopped by a watchful U.S. administration because of an inadvertent infringement,” he said.”This risk alone is enough to fuel the multiplication of compliance checks.”Some of the biggest global flag registries including Panama and Liberia are also looking more closely at ships that were involved in Venezuela trading as they come under U.S. pressure to withdraw registration for ships violating sanctions.Maritime lawyers in Panama said its registry is fining vessels that do not comply with the U.S. maritime guidance issued in May. The registry is mostly de-flagging vessels targeted by multilateral sanctions rather than unilateral U.S. sanctions, the lawyers said.Officials at Liberia’s registry did not respond to requests for comment.U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, a former investor in shipping, helped craft the strategy targeting the maritime sector, sources said.A Commerce Department spokesperson acknowledged Ross had worked with other government agencies “to determine how to best hold accountable those who are evading U.S. sanctions” on Venezuela.Abrams vowed to keep up the pressure.”There are people who don’t cooperate … We’ll go after the ship, the ship owner, the ship captain.” 
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Thousands of Bulgarians gathered for a fourth day on Sunday in Sofia and other cities to protest against corruption and demand the resignation of the conservative government.Over 3,000 protesters shouted “Mafia!” and “Resign!” outside the government headquarters in Sofia and marched to parliament.The protests in the capital were sparked by an unprecedented raid by heavily armed police and prosecutors on the presidential headquarters on Thursday.President Rumen Radev’s legal affairs and anti-corruption secretary and his security and defense adviser were detained for questioning and their offices searched as part of two separate probes into influence-peddling and disclosure of state secrets.Protesters also gathered in at least 10 other towns on Sunday.The searches on Thursday sparked public anger and brought thousands of demonstrators onto the streets of Sofia to condemn the raids as an attack by the government and the chief prosecutor against the Socialists-backed Radev.The president is an outspoken critic of the cabinet of Prime Minister Boyko Borisov, accusing it of “links with oligarchs.”Borisov on Saturday refused to resign but opponents launched an online petition aiming to gather as many as 1 million signatures to demand his ouster.The Socialist opposition in parliament also said Sunday that they would table a no confidence motion against the cabinet for “corruption” next Wednesday, appealing to protesters to back them.Friday’s rallies turned violent with 18 protesters arrested, including two men who were hospitalized after being beaten, prompting an even bigger turnout on Saturday when Radev joined protesters in their demand for the resignation of the cabinet and the chief prosecutor.Police had appealed for restraint ahead of Sunday’s demonstration and the interior ministry announced late Sunday that the rally had ended without incident.Thirteen years after joining the EU as its poorest country, Bulgaria has also remained the bloc’s most graft-prone member state, according to Transparency International’s corruption perception index.A new rally is scheduled for Monday afternoon and another nationwide protest for Thursday. 
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Iran claims “human error” was responsible for the downing of a Ukrainian passenger plane earlier this year that killed all 176 people on board.The Iranian Civil Aviation authority said late Saturday, “A failure occurred due to a human error in following the procedure” for aligning the radar.The misalignment caused a “107-degree error” in the system, Iran said.On the same night of the plane downing, Iran had launched a ballistic missile attack targeting U.S. soldiers in Iran.The attack was in response to the killing of one of Iran’s top generals in a U.S. missile strike in Iraq.Scenes of Mourning, Anger in Wake of Ukraine Plane CrashIranian officials, after days of denials, admitted Jan. 11, 2020, that Tehran was responsible for mistakenly downing a Ukrainian airliner early on Jan. 8. Iran’s admission sparked anti-government protests in Tehran. Demonstrators gathered at two universities, where some called for the resignation of their country’s leaders.
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