ІНСАЙДЕР УКРАЇНА

A Spanish judge on Friday issued an international arrest warrant for Catalonia’s ousted president, a day after she jailed members of the region’s separatist government pending possible charges over last week’s declaration of independence.

The national court judge issued the warrant for Carles Puigdemont in response to a request from state prosecutors.

Puigdemont flew to Brussels earlier this week with a handful of his deposed ministers after Spanish authorities removed him and his cabinet from office for pushing ahead with the declaration, despite repeated warnings that it was illegal.

Puigdemont’s Belgian attorney said he would fight extradition without seeking political asylum.

The ousted president told Belgian state broadcaster RTBF he would turn himself in to Belgian authorities, “but not to Spanish justice.”

He said he would run for re-election and, if need be, run his campaign from Belgium, where he remained in hiding.

Puigdemont told RBTF Friday that he was “ready to be the candidate” in the election, scheduled for late December.

“We can run a campaign anywhere because we’re in a globalized world,” he said.

The beleaguered president was due to appear at Spain’s National Court on Thursday to answer questions in a rebellion case brought by Spanish prosecutors, but he did not show up.

The judge jailed nine former members of Catalonia’s separatist government on Wednesday, while they were being investigated on possible charges of rebellion, sedition and embezzlement connected to their push for achieving the region’s independence from Spain.

She later granted one of them bail at $58,300.

In an earlier address from Brussels broadcast by Catalan regional television TV3, Puigdemont called for the release of “the legitimate government of Catalonia” as hundreds of people gathered outside the Catalan parliament also calling for them to be freed.

“As the legitimate president of Catalonia, I demand the release of the members of my cabinet,” he said. “I demand respect for all political options, and I demand the end of the political repression.”

Puigdemont said the imprisonment of former Catalan Vice President Oriol Junqueras and eight members of his cabinet was an attack on democracy and not compatible with a “Europe in the 21st century.”

Meanwhile, data released Friday showed that unemployment rose sharply in Catalonia in October, more than anywhere else in Spain, as companies fled in the midst of the country’s worst political crisis in decades.
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Rescuers pulled 700 boat migrants to safety in the Mediterranean and found 23 bodies during one operation on Friday, an Italian coastguard spokesman said, the second loss of multiple lives recorded in the area so far this week.

After around three years of mass arrivals, the number of migrants reaching Italy has fallen sharply since July, when Rome struck a deal with Libya to block what had become a busy route for people smugglers.

A Spanish ship deployed in the European Union’s Operation Sophia naval mission recovered the dead, along with 64 survivors, from a sinking rubber boat, the mission said on its Facebook page.

“A tough day in the Central Mediterranean Sea,” the Facebook post said, adding the rescues had started in the early morning.

Six rescue operations were carried out in total on Friday, the spokesman said, making it one of the busiest days for rescues in recent months. Seven people were found dead and 900 saved on Wednesday.

The Italian Coast Guard ship Diciotti was heading for the southern port of Reggio Calabria with 764 rescued migrants on board, the ANSA news agency said in a report confirmed by the coast guard spokesman.

Diciotti was also carrying eight dead bodies, ANSA said. It was not clear if they had been among those recovered by the Spanish ship.

Those rescued were originally from Sub-Saharan Africa, Pakistan, Libya, Bangladesh, Algeria, Egypt, Nepal, Morocco, Sri Lanka, Yemen, Syria, Jordan and Lebanon, ANSA said.

In the Aegean Sea on Friday, three people drowned, six were known to be missing and scores of others were rescued while trying to reach Greece.

 
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In the days of communist Albania’s near-total isolation, Saimir Maloku used his technical know-how to gain illicit glimpses of the outside world. Unluckily for him, as he and his father watched forbidden Italian television, the regime was watching him.

Maloku was jailed for nine years in 1976 after the secret police bugged his home. Four decades on, he can visit a unique Tirana museum and see for himself the kind of listening devices that betrayed him.

At the Museum of Surveillance, created in the former headquarters of the feared Sigurimi security service, Albanians can now inspect some of the spying paraphernalia used by dictator Enver Hoxha’s totalitarian state as well as the files kept on many of them.

“Until now nothing had been done to show how Albanians were spied upon and kept in check, so this is a good step to illustrate the history of spying we were the victims of,” Maloku, now 71, told Reuters.

Visiting the museum, Maloku told the story of how he had wanted to help his paralyzed father by broadening his television viewing beyond the drab daily four hours of Albanian state broadcasts.

‘Opened a window’

An electronic engineer, he built a device he called “the can” to convert UHF signals from Italy’s RAI television so they could be viewed on an Albanian set.

“The can opened a window into the West for the Albanians. I made them free of charge for my friends, but later learned some of them had denounced me,” Maloku said.

The Sigurimi planted a listening device in a wall to gather evidence against him.

The same model of device — once attached to a broomstick to spy on the Italian Embassy in Tirana — is on display in another museum depicting the work of the communist-era Interior Ministry.

In the age of the smartphone, both Maloku’s and the Sigurimi’s electronic gizmos now look quaintly crude. But they did their jobs, and Maloku went to prison for devising his, convicted of hostile “agitation and propaganda.” He remembers singing Rolling Stones and Beatles songs in his underground cell to preserve his sanity.

Before the collapse of Albanian communism in 1990, the building that now houses the Museum of Surveillance was known as the “House of Leaves” — a pun referring to both its ivy-clad walls and the “leaves” of secret police files kept on citizens.

During World War II it was used by the Gestapo of the occupying Nazi forces.
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A Spanish judge is considering whether to issue an international arrest warrant for Catalonia’s ousted leader Carles Puigdemont over the region’s contested independence drive.

Puigdemont flew to Brussels with four members of his cabinet this week after Spanish authorities removed him and the 13-member Cabinet from office for pushing ahead with secession.

If an arrest warrant is issued, Puigdemont will fight extradition without seeking political asylum, according to his Belgian lawyer.

Puigdemont had been due to appear at Spain’s National Court on Thursday to answer questions in a rebellion case brought by Spanish prosecutors, but he did not show up.

The judge jailed nine former members of Catalonia’s separatist government on Wednesday, while they are investigated on possible charges of rebellion, sedition and embezzlement connected to their push for the region’s independence from Spain.

She later granted one of them bail at $58,300.

In a short address from Brussels broadcast by Catalan regional television TV3, Puigdemont called for the release of “the legitimate government of Catalonia” as hundreds of people gathered outside the Catalan parliament also calling for them to be freed.

“As the legitimate president of Catalonia, I demand the release of the members of my cabinet. I demand respect for all political options and I demand the end of the political repression,” he said.

Puigdemont said the imprisonment of former Catalan Vice-President Oriol Junqueras and 8 members of his cabinet was an attack on democracy and not compatible with a “Europe in the 21st century.”

Meanwhile, data released Friday showed that unemployment rose sharply in Catalonia in October, more than anywhere else in Spain as companies fled in the midst of the country’s worst political crisis in decades.
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The resignation of Britain’s defense secretary amid a growing sexual harassment scandal is a sign the U.K.’s corridors of power are not always a comfortable place for women.

As allegations of impropriety and abuse spread to more politicians and officials, many women are expressing hope this will be a tipping point in transforming Britain’s macho political culture. Some men, though, worry they are being unfairly tainted by allegations of sexism.

​Political system challenged

Michael Fallon, a dependable lieutenant to Prime Minister Theresa May, quit as defense secretary late Wednesday, saying his past behavior “may have fallen below the high standards” expected. Fallon had apologized after a newspaper reported that he had repeatedly touched a journalist’s knee at a function in 2002, and reports suggested more allegations about him might emerge.

Fallon’s resignation is an unwelcome challenge for May, who is struggling to keep her fractious government united as Britain heads for the European Union exit. She replaced Fallon on Thursday with Gavin Williamson, the former Conservative chief whip.

It’s also a challenge to the British political system.

Multiple sexual-harassment claims against British politicians have emerged since the scandal around movie mogul Harvey Weinstein emboldened people in many industries, including politics, to speak up about improper behavior by powerful individuals who control their future job prospects.

In a new allegation, a 27-year-old woman told the Daily Telegraph newspaper that Labour Party lawmaker Kelvin Hopkins inappropriately touched her at a university event in 2014. Labour said it had suspended Hopkins after receiving allegations and was investigating.

​Intense and insular place

Britain’s Parliament is an intense and insular place, where politicians and parties employ large numbers of young and ambitious staff. The building, full of long corridors, dark crannies and cheap bars, is the perfect stage for liaisons, intrigue — and worse.

“Where you have lots of young individuals, be they men or women, with very little in terms of employment protection, it seems like the perfect environment for abuse,” said Victoria Honeyman, a lecturer in politics at the University of Leeds.

She said the allegations so far were likely “the tip of the iceberg.”

“I think there will be an awful lot of very, very worried individuals across the political spectrum,” she said.

For decades, Parliament was famous for a rowdy, male-dominated culture of hard drinking, boozy debates and midnight votes.

History of scandal

British politics also has a long history of sex scandals: The “Profumo affair” involving a government minister, a model and a Soviet attache helped bring down the Conservative government in 1963. Prime Minister John Major’s early-1990s government was debilitated by regular reports of embarrassing affairs.

Parliament’s raucous atmosphere was dealt a blow several years ago with a move to more “family friendly” hours, with sittings starting earlier in the morning and ending earlier in the evening. One of the building’s many bars has been turned into a nursery for the children of legislators and staff.

The number of female lawmakers has risen, though they are still outnumbered by men. When Margaret Thatcher became Britain’s first female prime minister in 1979, 3 percent of lawmakers were women. The figure rose to 22 percent by 2010, and to 32 percent this year.

In addition to a woman as prime minister, Scotland has a female leader in First Minister Nicola Sturgeon, and women lead the Scottish Conservatives, the Welsh party Plaid Cymru and Sinn Fein in Northern Ireland.

Yet many women in politics say there is much further to go.

Sophie Walker, leader of the Women’s Equality Party, said the stories emerging from the worlds of entertainment, media and politics “demonstrate an epidemic of sexual harassment which is absolutely about power — a massive, endemic imbalance of power.”

Fears of more to come

May has summoned party leaders to a meeting next week to discuss how to deal with harassment claims, amid worries there is more to come.

The No. 2 in May’s Cabinet, Damian Green, is being investigated by officials over an allegation he made inappropriate advances to a Conservative activist. Labour is investigating claims by a young activist that the party discouraged her from reporting that she was raped at a party conference.

A leaked document dubbed the “spreadsheet of shame” compiled by Conservative Party aides lists allegations about 36 lawmakers. The information ranges from gossipy claims of consensual affairs to allegations such as “handsy with women at parties” and “paid a woman to be quiet.”

Some of those named on the list have come forward to deny wrongdoing and suggest they are victims of a witch hunt.

Conservative lawmaker Dominic Raab said the document contained a false allegation that he had taken out an injunction against a woman, and accused those publishing untrue claims of “harassment and intimidation.”

As claim and counterclaim flew, Scottish Conservative leader Ruth Davidson called for major action, saying politicians are going to “need some pretty big shovels for the Augean stable” that must be cleaned.

“The house clearing that is about to happen needs to happen, and we can never go back to where we were before,” she said.
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Poland plans to bar Ukrainians with “anti-Polish views,” its foreign minister said on Thursday, emphasizing the nationalist credentials of his ruling party that often talks of the “historic wrongs” inflicted on Poles by their neighbors.

Witold Waszczykowski said the policy was a reaction to disrespect shown at a Polish cemetery in the western city of Lviv, which was part of Poland before World War II.

The foreign ministry said lion sculptures at the cemetery’s entrances that hold shields inscribed with the Polish phrases “Always faithful” and “To you, Poland” had been covered up with boxes.

Waszczykowski said Ukrainians who express anti-Polish sentiments or make it difficult to maintain ageing Polish symbols in Ukraine would be refused visas. He did not say how the policy would be applied in practice.

“At the moment, we are launching procedures that will not allow people with extremely anti-Polish views to come to Poland … Those who demonstrate and use administrative instruments against Poland will also bear the consequences,” Waszczykowski told state-run TVP1 television.

Poland is home to between 1.5 million and 2 million Ukrainians who left their country seeking jobs after the 2014 Maidan uprising and conflict with pro-Russian rebels in eastern Ukraine plunged their economy into recession.

Despite Poland’s support for an independent Ukraine that can stand up to Russia, tensions over the countries’ troubled shared history have risen since the Law and Justice (PiS) party came to power in Poland two years ago.

Poland last year passed a resolution that declared the World War Two-era killing of tens of thousands of Poles by units in the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) “genocide.” Ukraine rejects that label, saying the killings were tragic and calling for reconciliation and forgiveness.

Waszczykowski said Poland’s sympathy for Ukraine’s struggles with Russia must not push “historical issues” into the background.

“It cannot be that geopolitics, that the Russian aggression will be an excuse and that for years we will not settle the issues that divide us,” Waszczykowski said.
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Ankara is anticipating who will succeed Iraqi Kurdish President Masoud Barzani, following his announcement he plans to quit. Relations between Ankara and Iraqi Kurds, once close allies, collapsed after Barzani held an independence referendum. But Ankara could be eyeing his nephew as an ideal successor.

Turkey made little secret of its pleasure at Sunday’s announcement by Iraqi Kurdish President Masoud Barzani that he is planning to step down. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan slammed Barzani for holding an independence referendum, which Ankara feared could fuel similar secessionist demands among its own restive Kurdish minority.

At his weekly news conference, Turkish presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin made clear Ankara was already looking to who will lead Iraqi Kurds going forward.

“A new tableau appears when the term of office of Masoud Barzani is not extended and there will be a transfer of his duties to Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani,” Kalin said.

Nechirvan Barzani, a nephew of outgoing President Masoud Barzani, is widely seen as by Turkey as the ideal future leader. Being a regular visitor to Ankara, Nechirvan has developed close ties with Erdogan. The Iraqi Kurdish prime minister’s coolness towards the independence referendum will likely enhance his credentials in Ankara.

His close ties with Turkey reportedly extend to significant personal business investments. Analysts say he is also seen by Turkey’s political leaders as sympathetic to its calls for more help in its war against the Kurdish rebel group PKK, which is has many bases in Iraqi Kurdistan.

Former senior Turkish diplomat Aydin Selcen established Turkey’s consulate in Iraqi Kurdistan. He said while Nechirvan Barzani is viewed as the ideal new leader of Iraqi Kurdistan, Turkey is being careful not to be seen to be interfering in the succession process.

“We know that Mr. Nechirvan Barzani’s relations with Ankara are best when compared to other political figures in Iraqi Kurdistan,” he said. “So that would be seen as a welcome development [by Ankara], although judging by the statement of Mr. [Mevlut] Cavusolgu, who is the foreign minister of Turkey, the official position of Ankara is that this is the internal political affairs of the Iraqi Kurdistan region, so Ankara will not have an official reaction to this development.”

Despite Nechirvan Barzani’s close ties with Ankara, the Turkish president has refused to meet him along with the rest of the Iraqi Kurdish leadership for several months, a result of the collapse in relations between the once-close allies.

But Turkish presidential spokesman Kalin said a future request by the Iraqi Kurdish prime minister would now be considered, but will hinge on unspecified conditions being met by the Iraqi Kurds.Ankara is demanding the Iraqi Kurdish leadership annul the result of October’s referendum vote, in which 93 percent of Kurds voted in favor of independence.
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A Spanish judge Thursday ordered nine former leaders from Catalonia jailed while they are investigated on possible charges of rebellion, sedition and embezzlement connected to their push for the region’s independence from Spain.

The judge later granted one of them bail at $58,300.

Ousted Catalan leader Carles Puigdemont was not among those who appeared in court in Madrid. A state prosecutor has called for an international arrest warrant to be issued for Puigdemont as he did not abide by a court order to appear. Puigdemont, along with four members of his former Cabinet, have been in Brussels for a week.

Puigdemont has dismissed the charges against him as politically motivated and said he would only return to Spain if he receives a guarantee that the legal process will be impartial and fair.

Prosecutors have filed charges against 14 Catalan leaders, including Puigdemont and his deputy, Oriol Junqueras.

Spain’s central government moved to take control of Catalonia last week and disbanded the regional parliament in response to an October 1 independence referendum and subsequent declaration of independence by Catalan lawmakers.

Catalonia itself is divided on the secession issue. Those who participated in the referendum opted for independence, but the opposition boycotted the vote, while the Madrid government also declared it illegal.

Last week’s move to strip Catalonia of its autonomy included setting up new elections in the region for December. 

 
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Britain’s defense secretary has become the first Cabinet casualty of a burgeoning sex harassment scandal roiling the country’s Parliament and threatening Prime Minister Theresa May’s highly fragile minority Conservative government, already riven over Brexit.

Michael Fallon resigned Wednesday after allegations that he’d repeatedly put his hand on the knee of a female political journalist during a party conference.  His resignation came as he was preparing for a scheduled meeting with U.S. Defense Secretary James Mattis.

Amid claims he had behaved inappropriately towards other women journalists, Britain’s 65-year-old defense secretary said he had fallen below the high standards required of his position.

Several other ministers are under investigation, including May’s deputy, Damian Green, who’s accused of making inappropriate sexual advances towards a journalist, and Mark Garnier, the international trade minister, who demanded his secretary buy sex toys for him and repeatedly made sexual remarks about her publicly.

Garnier has dismissed the incidents as “good-humored high jinks” and “amusing conversation,” but apparently that has not satisfied May, who has declined to express her confidence in him.

Two other ministers have denied allegations of sexual harassment, and in Britain’s House of Commons there is a swirl of rumors circulating about more ministers amid a torrent of misconduct allegations that started to flow after harassment and rape accusations against Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein.

Allegations of sexual abuse have included a charge of rape by an activist against a senior lawmaker in the opposition Labour Party.  Researchers and aides in the House of Commons have been keeping a list of serial “sex pests” in the ranks of the country’s lawmakers that include nearly 50 names.  

The list, portions of which are spreading across social media sites, includes seven Cabinet ministers, 14 junior ministers and eight former ministers.

“The culture has changed over the years and what might have been acceptable 10 or 15 years ago is clearly not acceptable now,” Fallon told the BBC Wednesday.  “Parliament now has to look at itself and the prime minister has made very clear that conduct needs to be improved and we need to protect the staff of Westminster,” he added.

Government officials admit they are concerned other Cabinet ministers could be forced to resign over past conduct, not only embarrassing May but risking the longevity of her government, which is engulfed by sharp divisions over Brexit and economic policy that threaten to tear apart the Conservative Party.

May has been able to just about contain, partly thanks to her deputy Damian Green, the internecine rifts by balancing her Cabinet between so-called “hard Brexiters,” who want a clean break from the European Union, and those who want to maintain close links with the economic bloc or not to exit at all.  

“The fall of Michael Fallon is a mighty blow to Theresa May.  Her rickety government has just lost one of its old reliables,” argued veteran political commentator Polly Toynbee.  She added, “What an irony it would be if another good old British parliamentary sex scandal brought down this government” rather than Brexit.

May’s minority government is dependent on the votes of Northern Ireland’s Ulster Unionists.  But their votes might not be sufficient if there are not only departures from her Cabinet, but also resignations from the House of Commons, thinning out Conservative ranks in the Parliament, and triggering an early election.   

Fallon’s downfall shocked Conservative lawmakers Thursday.  A solid politician, they had thought the first casualty would be among the more colorful characters of the Cabinet, most likely the foreign secretary and leading Brexiter Boris Johnson, who has long been dogged by controversy over highly public affairs and the fathering of a child outside his marriage.

Some lawmakers included on the list compiled by House of Commons researchers and aides have reacted angrily, complaining the definition of sexual misconduct being used is far too broad.  Some lawmakers have been included in the list, nicknamed by Britain’s tabloid press “the dirty dossier,” because they had affairs with staff even though the relationships were consensual.

But many of the misconduct allegations include abuse, harassment and coercion.

Earlier this week, former Cabinet minister Stephen Crabb, who last year ran for the party leadership, apologized for sexting a 19-year-old woman after he interviewed her for a job.  Crabb resigned from the Cabinet last year following reports of a similar incident.

The House of Commons has long been notorious for sexual misadventures and misconduct and has had difficulty, despite the dramatic increase in the number of female lawmakers in recent years, from shaking off its reputation and habits as an “old boys club” where female staff have been considered prey and can come under pressure to agree to sexual favors to get jobs or keep them.

Women lawmakers, backed by some of their male counterparts, have long campaigned for the introduction of a tough disciplinary mechanism and a “grievance procedure” that is transparent and not convoluted as the current one to protect staff and deter misconduct.
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Britain’s Defense Minister Michael Fallon has resigned after allegations of inappropriate behavior emerged.

Fallon said in a resignation letter to Prime Minister Theresa May that his “previous conduct … may have fallen below the high standards that we require of the Armed Forces.”

May accepted the resignation Wednesday, saying she appreciated “the characteristically serious manner” in which Fallon had considered his position.

The sexual harassment and assault allegations brought against Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein have emboldened women in several countries to speak out about their experiences.

In Britain, it has produced soul-searching about the growing number of reports of sexual harassment and abuse in politics. May has called a meeting of party leaders to discuss how to deal with the topic.

Fallon apologized this week for putting his hand on the knee of a journalist, Julia Hartley-Brewer, in 2002, but he was not being investigated over the incident.

Hartley-Brewer said she was “incredibly shocked” by Fallon’s resignation and did not think his decision was based solely on the 2002 incident.

“I’m assuming there are more allegations to come,” she told Sky News. “I doubt very much it’s because of my knee.”
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Dismissed Catalan leader Carles Puigdemont said on Wednesday he would ignore a court order to return to Spain to answer charges over the region’s push for independence, but he could testify from Belgium.

If Puigdemont fails to answer Thursday’s High Court summons, an arrest warrant could be issued that would make it virtually impossible for him to stand in a snap regional election called by the Spanish government for Dec. 21.

Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy sacked Puigdemont and his government on Friday, hours after the Catalan parliament made a unilateral declaration of independence in a vote boycotted by the opposition and declared illegal by Spanish courts.

On Monday, Spain’s state prosecutor filed charges of rebellion, sedition and misuse of public funds against Puigdemont for defying the central government by holding an referendum on secession on Oct. 1 and proclaiming  independence.

Puigdemont traveled to Belgium at the weekend with other members of the dismissed Catalan administration and hired a lawyer.

“Those summonses are part of proceedings that lack any legal basis and only seek to punish ideas. This is a political trial,” Puigdemont said in a statement signed by “the legitimate government of Catalonia.”

The High Court summoned Puigdemont and 13 other former members of the Catalan government to testify in Madrid on Thursday and Friday on the prosecutor’s charges.

A judge will then decide whether those called to testify should go to jail pending an investigation that could take several years and potentially lead to a trial. The judge might also grant them conditional bail or order them to surrender

their passports.

If Puigdemont and his associates did not turn up, the judge would be more likely to order them jailed as a flight risk.

The courts have also told the Catalan secessionist leaders to deposit 6.2 million euros ($7.2 million) by Friday to cover potential liabilities.

“Off to Prison?”

Three former Catalan government advisors returned to Spain from Belgium late on Tuesday and were greeted at Barcelona’s international airport by a small crowd chanting “off to prison.”

Puigdemont said on Tuesday he would only go back to Spain when given unspecified “guarantees” by the Spanish government.

He said he accepted the election called by Rajoy for December and Madrid said he was welcome to stand, though the legal proceedings might prevent that.

Uncertainty over how the crisis will play out has prompted more than 1,800 Catalonia-based companies to move their legal headquarters out of the region and the government to lower its national economic forecasts for next year.

On Wednesday, rating agency Moody’s said the declaration of independence and the suspension of self rule were credit negative for the region and the country, and that associated uncertainty would damage sentiment and consumer spending.

Moody’s raised Spain’s credit rating to Baa2 in 2014 as the country emerged from a prolonged economic slump.

On Tuesday, Moody’s affirmed Catalonia’s long-term issuer and debt ratings of Ba3, saying the government’s reinforced control compensated for the increased risks, in particular the region’s rapidly deteriorating business climate.
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Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei told visiting Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday that Tehran and Moscow must step up cooperation to isolate the United States and help stabilize the Middle East, state TV reported.

Iran and Russia are the main allies of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, while the United States, Turkey and most Arab states support rebel groups fighting to overthrow him.

Putin met Iranian political leaders in an effort to nurture a warming relationship strengthened since U.S. President Donald Trump threatened recently to abandon the international nuclear deal with Iran reached in 2015.

“Our cooperation can isolate America … The failure of U.S.-backed terrorists in Syria cannot be denied but Americans continue their plots,” Khamenei told Putin, according to Iranian state television.

Since Russia’s military intervention in Syria’s war in 2015, and with stepped-up Iranian military assistance, Assad has taken back large amounts of territory from rebels as well as swaths of central and eastern Syria from Islamic State militants.

Moscow is now trying to build on that success with a new diplomatic initiative, including a congress of Syria’s rival parties it plans in the Black Sea resort of Sochi on November 18, though a major opposition bloc has refused to take part.

Pragmatist Iranian President Hassan Rouhani echoed Khamenei, saying Iran and Russia together could tackle “regional terrorism” – an allusion to Sunni Muslim armed groups hostile to Iran, Assad and many other Arab states.

“Our cooperation has helped the fight against terrorism in the region…. Together we can establish regional peace and security,” Rouhani said in a televised joint press conference with Putin and Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev, who took part in a three-way summit in Tehran.

Rapprochement

The rapprochement between Iran and Russia is worrying for both Saudi Arabia, Shi’ite Muslim Tehran’s main Sunni rival for dominance in the Middle East, and the United States. Putin praised cooperation with Iran as “very productive.”

“We are managing to coordinate our positions on the Syrian issue,” Putin said.

Moscow is also an important ally for Iran in its renewed confrontation with the United States, where Trump broke ranks with major allies on October 13 by de-certifying Tehran’s nuclear deal with six world powers including Washington under his predecessor Barack Obama.

Trump has called the agreement “the worst deal ever negotiated” and branded Iran a “terrorist nation” for involvement in conflicts in the Middle East.

“We oppose any unilateral change in the multilateral nuclear deal,” Putin told Khamenei, Iranian state TV reported.

Russia has criticized Trump’s disavowal of the nuclear agreement, which has opened a 60-day window for the U.S. Congress to act to reimpose economic sanctions on Iran. These were lifted under the 2015 accord in return for Tehran curbing nuclear activity of potential use in developing an atomic bomb.

“This is a very important visit [by Putin]…. It shows the determination of Tehran and Moscow to deepen their strategic alliance …, which will shape the future of the Middle East,” an Iranian official told Reuters on condition of anonymity.

“Both Russia and Iran are under American pressure…. Tehran has no other choice but to rely on Moscow to ease the U.S. pressure,” said the official.

Another Iranian official said Trump’s hawkish Iran policy had united the Islamic Republic’s often feuding leadership – split into hardline conservative, pragmatist and reformist factions – in alignment with Russia.

During Putin’s visit, Russian oil producer Rosneft and the National Iranian Oil Company agreed an outline deal to work on a number of “strategic” projects in Iran together worth up to $30 billion.

The deal appeared to dovetail with Putin’s strategy to reassert Russian political and economic influence in the Middle East that faded after the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union.

 
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Catalonia’s ousted leader Carles Puigdemont agreed Tuesday to a snap election called by Spain’s central government when it took control of the region to stop it breaking away, but he said the fight for independence would go on.

Below are several scenarios of what could happen in the next few days.

Courts

Puigdemont and his sacked cabinet have been ordered to testify before the Spanish High Court on Thursday and Friday after charges of rebellion, sedition and breach of trust were filed against them.

Under Spain’s legal system, a judge will then decide whether Puigdemont should go to jail pending an investigation that can sometimes take up to several years — and a potential trial.

Puigdemont traveled to Brussels after the Catalan regional parliament issued a unilateral declaration of independence on Friday, and it was not immediately clear whether he would heed the call to appear before the court.

He had said earlier Tuesday he would return to Spain only when given unspecified “guarantees” by the Spanish government.

The same charges have been drawn up against the Catalan parliament’s speaker, Carme Forcadell, and other senior lawmakers but, given they have parliamentary immunity, they will testify before the Supreme Court, which is in charge of handling cases relating to lawmakers or members of the government.

Prosecutors have asked the courts to order Catalan secessionist leaders to deposit 6.2 million euros to cover potential liabilities but they have not sought preventive jail against them.

This could change, however, if Puigdemont and his associates did not show up at the High Court as the judge could deem them to be a flight risk and jail them.

Elections

It is not clear whether a snap regional election will resolve the crisis.

Two recent opinion polls showed support for independence may have started to wane.

But an official regional survey published Tuesday showed some 48.7 percent of Catalans believe the region should be independent, up from 41.1 percent in June and the highest since December 2014.

Based on 1,338 interviews, the Centre d’Estudis d’Opinio poll was the first survey released since the independence declaration though the bulk of it was taken before then, between Oct. 16 and Oct. 29.

Other opinion polls have also shown Catalonia is almost evenly split between pro- and anti-independence supporters.

One key thing to watch will be if pro-independence parties run on a joint ticket or on separate platforms. If they ran separately, they could find it more difficult to reach a parliamentary majority.

They must say whether they intend to run together before Nov. 7, and then put forward their candidates by Nov. 18.

Direct rule

Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy sacked Catalonia’s government — including Puigdemont and his deputy Oriol Junqueras — and assumed direct control over the region. Central government ministries assumed the powers of the Catalan administration until a regional election takes place on Dec. 21.

That unprecedented step was implemented smoothly and calls for civil disobedience were widely disregarded.
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A top Ukrainian official says Russia should provide U.S. investigators with access to former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych, who fled to Russia after his rule was toppled in Ukraine’s Maidan revolution of 2014.

Dmitry Shymkiv, the deputy head of the administration of President Petro Poroshenko, said access to Yanukovych could prove vital to an understanding of the work done for Ukraine by indicted former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort.

Shymkiv, whose role is similar to that of deputy chief of staff in the United States, spoke to VOA in response to comments made Tuesday by Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, who said Washington should further investigate Ukrainian links to Manafort.

Kyiv “has information” about the 2016 U.S. presidential election, Lavrov told a news briefing, according to reports by Russian news outlet RIA.

U.S. investigators probing Russian efforts to interfere in the 2016 U.S. election — which Moscow denies having made — charged Manafort and a business associate on Monday with conspiracy to launder money and other crimes. The charges, some going back more than a decade, center on Manafort’s work in Ukraine, specifically for Yanukovych’s pro-Russian Party of Regions.

Yanukovych, who fled to Crimea just before it was annexed by Russian forces in February 2014, was not seen again until he held a news conference three weeks later in Rostov-on-Don, Russia.

Ukrainian TV channel TSN has reported that Yanukovych lives in the Rostov region, although Russian officials have never confirmed this.

“We need to understand … how all of the [ties between Manafort and top Ukrainian officials] took place,” said Shymkiv, secretary of the National Reform Council to the president of Ukraine and deputy head of Poroshenko’s administration.

Russia, however, has not cooperated with a Ukrainian government arrest warrant for Yanukovych, who stands accused of the “mass murder of peaceful citizens” during the uprising against his administration. Similarly, Shymkiv suggested in a Skype interview with VOA’s Ukrainian service, Russian officials would be unlikely to accommodate a U.S. request for Yanukovych to testify in the Manafort trial.

“I believe Yanukovych should be interrogated by the U.S. government, but I don’t think the Russians would let the Americans do that,” he said, laughing. “But it is absolutely a valid claim, because Yanukovych was the leader of Ukraine’s oligarchical structure, the leader of the corrupted vertical that was built in Ukraine since his rise to power in 2012 and up to the 2013 revolution of dignity.”

Watch: Ukraine, Russia urge US to expand Manafort probe

In his remarks Monday, Lavrov suggested that the charges over Manafort’s work for Ukraine indicated that the U.S. investigators had so far been unable to make a case against Russia, which has been the main focus of the probe headed by special counsel Robert Mueller.

“He has been working for several months. Accused two former Trump campaign managers of what they were doing on behalf of Yanukovych. Even though they were looking for a Russian trace,” Lavrov said, according to the Russian news outlet Sputnik International.

Lavrov also hinted at a Ukrainian role in last year’s U.S. presidential election, saying Ukrainian officials “can say a lot about their position toward the candidates during the 2016 presidential campaign.”

Shymkiv said U.S. investigators should explore whether Manafort was connected to the confiscation of revenue from some Ukrainian businesses while he was serving as a consultant to Yanukovych’s party.

“There was very aggressive behavior toward Ukrainian business people, and there was a strong extraction of money from different industries, so [Yanukovych] should be interrogated in this case, or at least be a subject of the case, because Paul Manafort was hired by the Party of Regions, which represented Mr. Yanukovych,” said Shymkiv.

Ukraine focus on lobbying

Asked for his reaction to the Manafort indictment, Shymkiv, who is tasked with overseeing post-Maidan reforms under Poroshenko’s administration, said that while U.S. news coverage has been dominated by the money-laundering and tax-evasion charges, Ukrainians are focused on U.S.-based lobbying groups in the employ of various Ukrainian politicians.

“[The Manafort trial] puts a significant light on a lot of lobbying activities in the U.S. from international governments or some political forces,” he said. “We’ve seen many Ukrainian politicians hiring lobbyists for different activities — creating, for example, fake hearings in the Congress.

“We appreciate American journalists who investigated it and showed how fake it is. But it is important that through the interrogation of Manafort by U.S. law enforcement agencies, we might get some additional insight into corruption practices, or other similar activities, which were happening in Ukraine during the Yanukovych regime,” Shymkiv added. “This can help Ukrainian law enforcement agencies build stronger cases on convicting some Ukrainian individuals.”

Ukrainian prosecutors, he noted, are willing to remain in touch with U.S. Justice Department officials.

“As this Manafort case evolves, there will be more stories and more disclosures taking place,” he said.

Manafort, who served as Trump’s campaign manager for about two months in the summer of 2016, was forced to resign after reports surfaced about his financial relationship with Yanukovych.

This story originated in VOA’s Ukrainian service.
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