Amnesty International reports the number of executions around the world continued to fall last year, with a 4 percent drop in executions and a significant decline in the number of new death sentences.

In an annual report on executions and the death penalty released on Thursday, the human rights organization said there were at least 993 executions in 23 countries last year, down 4 percent from 1,032 in 2016 and down 39 percent from 1,634 in 2015.

The vast majority of global executions recorded last year took place in China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Pakistan, according to the report.

China

China remained the world’s top executioner, the rights group said. Though the precise number of executions in China remains unknown, Amnesty said “thousands of executions [are] believed to have been carried out” in the country last year.

Four countries — Iran, Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Pakistan — accounted for 84 percent of the reported executions. Iran had at least 507 executions, Saudi Arabia at least 146, Iraq at least 125 and Pakistan at least 60, Amnesty said.

Five other countries — Botswana, Indonesia, Nigeria, Sudan and Taiwan reported no executions.

Amnesty International said the drop in executions was driven by growing aversion to the death penalty around the world, in particular in sub-Saharan Africa where 20 countries have abolished the practice and others are taking steps to repeal it.

“Developments across sub-Saharan Africa in 2017 exemplified the positive trend recorded globally, with Amnesty International’s research pointing to a further decrease in the global use of the death penalty in 2017,” said the report.

USA

In the United States, the only Western country with the death penalty, there were 23 executions and 42 death sentences. Though slightly higher than 2016, both figures are in line with historically low trends seen in recent years, Amnesty said.

In Europe and Central Asia, Belarus was the only country to execute people, with at least two executions and at least four death sentences, Amnesty said.

The global trend toward abolishing the death penalty continued.

Executions eliminated

Guinea and Mongolia expunged the death penalty for all crimes. Guinea became the 20th sub-Saharan country to abolish the punishment for all crimes. Kenya ended mandatory death penalty for murder while Burkina Faso and Chad took steps to repeal the practice.

“The progress in sub-Saharan Africa reinforced its position as a beacon of hope for abolition,” Amnesty International’s Secretary-General Salil Shetty said in a statement. “The leadership of countries in this region gives fresh hope that the abolition of the ultimate cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment is within reach.”

At the end of 2017, 106 countries had abolished the death penalty in law for all crimes and 142 countries had abolished the death penalty in law or practice, according to Amnesty.
…

Kensington Palace has announced that politicians and world leaders won’t be attending Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s wedding. But 1,200 members of the public — many involved with charities or community groups — have been invited to the grounds of Windsor Castle for the May 19 celebration. That will give them a chance to see the royals arrive at the chapel and to see the carriage procession after the wedding ceremony.

Here’s a look at some of the people invited:

– Pamela Anomneze, 52, who works with 306 Collective in London, which helps people with mental health issues by teaching them to create mugs, jewelry, textiles and other items.

– Catherine Cooke, 53, and her daughter Julie-Ann Coll, 35, of Northern Ireland. Cooke was chosen for her involvement with a network of women’s groups across the country and Coll for her work with Life After Loss, a child bereavement support group she joined after her 22-week-old son died.

– Kai Fletcher, 18, who was homeless at 15 and now works with a charity called Southside in the English city of Bath.

– Jorja Furze, 12, who was born with only one leg and is an ambassador for Steel Bones, a charity in England that supports civilian amputees.

​- Phillip Gillespie, 30, a former soldier from Northern Ireland who lost his right leg in a combat incident in Afghanistan, where Harry also served.

– David Gregory, 28, a teacher in northeastern England who is a driving force behind efforts to get students more engaged with science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

– Reuben Litherland, 14, who was born deaf and has started giving sign language lessons at his school in England.

– Amelia Thompson, 12, who was caught up in the suicide bombing at an Ariana Grande concert in Manchester that killed 22 people last year. As her guest she’s taking Sharon Goodman, the grandmother of 15-year-old Olivia Campbell-Hardy, who died in the attack.

– Amy Wright, 26, from Scotland, chairwoman of the board of directors for The Usual Place, a cafe that provides training opportunities for young adults who need support.

 
…

Four laboratories linked to the international chemical weapons watchdog have confirmed Britain’s findings that a nerve agent was used last month to poison a former Russian spy and his daughter.

The confirmations were in an Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) report released Thursday.

British Ambassador to the U.N. Karen Pierce said OPCW’s conclusions “agree explicitly with the U.K.’s analysis” and added the chemical used in the attack was a “military-grade nerve agent of high purity.”

British Prime Minister Theresa May said former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, were poisoned last month in Salisbury, England with a military-grade nerve agent developed by the Soviet Union in the 1970s and ’80s.

The watchdog did not blame Russia for the attack nor did it name the specific chemical agent used.  But British Foreign Minister Boris Johnson said only Russia had the “means, motive, and record” to carry out such an attack.

Russia has denied involvement in the attack and contends Britain has not provided evidence to support its allegation.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Thursday Russia would not accept any of the report’s conclusions unless Russian officials were provided access to the ongoing investigation. Zakharova also accused Britain of waging a campaign to discredit Russia.

“We are all simply drowning in a torrent of misinformation that is in one way or another supported by official London,” she told reporters. “There are no grounds to believe that all of this is not the continuation of a crude provocation against the Russian Federation on the part of the British special services.”

Britain, meanwhile, has called on the U.N. Security Council to convene a meeting to discuss the report, according to a tweet from Britain’s mission to the United Nations.

Ambassador Pierce said it would probably be held next Wednesday.

Yulia Skripal was discharged Monday from a British hospital. She said she was still suffering from the effects of the poisoning and her father remains seriously ill.  

She lives in Russia but was visiting her father in Britain when they were poisoned. In a statement issued Wednesday night by Britain’s Metropolitan Police Service that was attributed to her, she rejected an offer of assistance from the Russian Embassy. Zakharova reiterated that British officials were keeping Yulia Skripal in isolation and said Moscow would continue to demand access to her.

 
…

America’s allies are offering to join a possible military response to a suspected chemical weapons attack in Syria by forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad. But they’re urging Washington to avoid swift retaliation, saying that before a reprisal is launched, more evidence is needed that Syria was behind the chemical attack.

In very direct terms, U.S. President Donald Trump warned on Twitter Wednesday that a military response was coming:

Russian officials were quick to respond, saying if there was an American strike, then Russia would shoot down the missiles and target the positions from where they were launched.

“Smart missiles should fly toward terrorists, not the legal government that has been fighting international terrorism for several years on its territory,” Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova remarked in a Facebook post.

Amid the heated social media exchange with threats and counterwarnings, all raising the stakes of a military confrontation between the U.S. and Russia, Britain, France and Australia offered backing for a U.S. missile strike, but they weighted their backing with caveats.

And they questioned the deterrent effect of missile strikes, pointing out that U.S. military retaliation a year ago in response to a Syrian government sarin gas attack on Khan Sheikhoun in the northern Syrian province of Idlib had failed to stop Assad from launching other chemical attacks, predominantly with chlorine barrel bombs dropped from regime helicopters.

In a phone conversation with Trump late Tuesday, British Prime Minister Theresa May offered her support but, according to British officials, said Britain would need more evidence of who was behind the suspected chemical attack on Saturday on a rebel-held Damascus suburb. The attack left at least 40 people dead and up to 500 injured.

With inspectors from the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) preparing to visit the suburb of Douma, the site of the attack, other Western allies said there should be no action until more facts were established.

France’s President Emmanuel Macron has said France is ready to commit to punitive action, if it is confirmed that Assad crossed a red line and used chemical weapons. But he appears to want to limit retaliatory strikes to Syrian government chemical weapons facilities.

With the U.S. and its Western allies telegraphing a possible military response, analysts say they have lost the element of surprise and given the Syrian government and its military backers Russia and Iran plenty of time to get ready for an attack.

“The obvious pitfall for this likely U.S.-France-U.K. strike on Assad is that the effect of surprise is totally lost but also has given enough time for the Syrian regime, Russia and Iran to get prepared with anti-aircraft batteries and to empty potential targets,” said Olivier Guitta, managing director at GlobalStrat, a security and geopolitical risk consultancy.

He said the situation now was different from 2013 when Trump’s predecessor, Barack Obama, threatened to strike at Assad for a chemical attack, also on rebels and civilians in a Damascus suburb.

“Then the repercussions would have been much less in terms of actors because Iran and Russia were barely present in Syria,” he said. “While a strike on Assad is more than overdue since 2013, there’s a risk of conflagration, escalation and the first actual fighting between Russia and the West, opening the door to a longer, protracted conflict,” he warned.

That fear also appeared to be weighing on the minds of European governments allied with the U.S., including among members of May’s ruling Conservative Party in Britain, who worry that the Trump administration has no overall strategy for Syria.

“There are worries about being involved in any military action,” said David Amess, a British lawmaker. “Given the disastrous consequences of our involvement in Iraq, we need a strategy. We need it clearly laid out to parliament, what our objectives are. This is not a straightforward issue and we need to wait for the reports from the OPCW. This is a very dangerous and worrying time.”

Like other senior Conservative lawmakers, he said the prime minister would have no option but to seek parliamentary approval before ordering any strike on Syria. Julian Lewis, chairman of the British Parliament’s defense committee, said Tuesday: “When we are contemplating military intervention in other people’s conflicts, Parliament ought to be consulted first.”

That raises the prospect of a repeat of the setback suffered by May’s predecessor in Downing Street, David Cameron, who sought Parliament’s agreement in 2013 to participate in a U.S.-led military strike on Syria, only to lose the vote. The withholding of British support contributed to Obama’s decision to stay his hand and not to enforce his “red line” on the use of chemical weapons by the Assad government.

British officials said Trump had not formally asked May to participate in military action. They also said there were no immediate plans to recall the House of Commons, which is currently in recess. But May has called for a meeting Thursday of her “war cabinet,” prompting concern among opposition leaders that she might commit to some joint action without seeking parliamentary approval first.

In a statement after May’s conversation with the U.S. leader, Downing Street said the two had agreed that the international community had to respond, but they stopped short of blaming the Syrian government, which denies being behind the Douma attack. That contrasted with the tone of U.S. officials, who have been clear in pointing the finger at Assad.

The former head of British armed forces, Lord Richard Dannatt, said that if the U.S and Britain did take action, it shouldn’t be restricted to an isolated retaliatory strike, which, he said, on its own would be meaningless. 

A reprisal, he said, has to be done within a “broader strategy.” He said an isolated “missile strike like the one Donald Trump ordered last year wouldn’t achieve anything, and that didn’t achieve anything.”

Dannatt dismissed various and shifting Russian explanations for the attack, including Kremlin claims that the White Helmets, a first-response volunteer organization operating in parts of rebel-controlled Syria, could have faked the attack. “The Russians have developed fake news into an art form,” he said.

“Up to this moment, it has seemed much more than likely, and high on the balance of probabilities, that this was an attack using chemical weapons carried out by the Syrian regime. … And it is right that they don’t get away with it,” he said.
…

When the U.S. fired Tomahawk missiles at a Syrian airfield a year ago after a chemical weapons attack, the Pentagon gave Moscow advance warning to get its personnel out of harm’s way.

Since then, U.S.-Russian relations have soured, and the two nuclear powers have raised the ante, getting dangerously close to a potential military clash in Syria.

U.S. President Donald Trump has taunted Moscow to “get ready” for “nice and new and ‘smart”‘ missiles coming to punish Syria for a purported chemical attack on Saturday that killed at least 40 people. The tweet followed Russia’s warning that it will strike at incoming U.S. missiles and their launch platforms.

The defiant posture leaves both the White House and the Kremlin with fewer options to respond without losing face.

A stern statement last month by Russia’s top military officer effectively drew a red line on any U.S. strike. Gen. Valery Gerasimov, the chief of the Russian military’s General Staff, said Russian military officers are at Syrian facilities throughout the country and warned that “if a threat to our servicemen emerges, the Russian armed forces will take retaliatory measures against both missiles and their carriers.”

Some say the U.S. could launch a limited strike like it did in April 2017, when it hit Syria’s Shayrat airfield with cruise missiles after warning Russia. Such a scenario would allow Washington to claim it made good on its promise to punish Syrian President Bashar al-Assad without triggering a clash with Russia.

A pinpoint U.S. strike on Syrian targets that does not harm Russian personnel “will allow Trump to say that the Assad regime has paid a heavy price … and Russia, in its turn, will be able to limit itself to ringing statements,” said Fyodor Lukyanov, the head of the Council for Foreign and Defense Policies, an association of top Russian political and security experts.

He added, however, that the U.S. would be unlikely to warn Russia of the coming strike this time.

“The context of the relations has changed radically in the past year: We’re in a state of a real and tangible Cold War,” Lukyanov said.

Cooling relations

Moscow’s hopes of warmer ties with Washington under Trump have been shattered by the ongoing U.S. investigations of alleged Russian interference in the 2016 election and its potential ties with the Trump campaign. The Trump administration has ramped up sanctions against Russia and expelled dozens of diplomats. Tensions between the two countries have escalated on a broad range of issues — from the crisis in Ukraine to the war in Syria to the poisoning of an ex-Russian spy in Britain, which triggered the massive diplomatic war.

President Vladimir Putin’s top adviser, Vladislav Surkov, said in an article released earlier this week that Russia has abandoned its centuries-long aspirations of integrating into the West and is bracing for a new era of “geopolitical loneliness.” Surkov warned that “it’s going to be tough,” but added cryptically that “it’ll be fun.”

Opinions vary about what may happen in Syria.

“The situation is pretty bad, but it shouldn’t be overdramatized,” Alexei Malashenko, a leading Russian expert on Syria said in televised remarks. “I don’t believe that a clash between Russia and the U.S. is possible.”

Washington and Moscow both have said that a hotline established in 2015 to prevent incidents between their militaries in Syria has worked well, but the rising stakes make the situation more unstable than ever during the Syrian conflict.

Possible scenarios

Under one possible scenario, Russia may try to use its sophisticated electronic warfare systems deployed in Syria to make U.S. missiles veer off course without shooting them down. If that softer option doesn’t work, the Russian military could use an array of its state-of-the-art air defense assets in Syria to target the U.S. cruise missiles or drones.

Vyacheslav Nikonov, a senior lawmaker in the Kremlin-controlled lower house of parliament, said in televised remarks that the Russian military was getting its electronic countermeasures and air defense assets ready for action. He added on a combative note that the situation offers a “good chance to test them in conditions of real combat.”

An even more threatening situation may evolve if the U.S. and its allies use manned aircraft, and the Russian strike results in casualties.

Such a scenario could trigger a quick escalation, leaving Russia and the U.S. on the brink of a full-scale conflict — a situation unseen even during the darkest moments of the Cold War.

Retired Lt. Gen. Yevgeny Buzhinsky, the former chief of the Russian Defense Ministry’s international department, warned that Russia has thousands of military advisers in Syria “practically in every battalion,” and a strike on any Syrian facility could jeopardize their lives. He warned that Russia and the U.S. will quickly find themselves in a major conflict if they allow a collision in Syria to happen.

“I have an impression that Americans’ survival instincts have grown numb, if not vanished completely,” Buzhinsky said. “They seem not to really believe that Russia will give a tough military response and expect some sort of a local brawl, exchanging some minor blows. It’s a miscalculation. Any clash between Russian and U.S. militaries will expand beyond a local conflict and an escalation will be inevitable.”

Fears of war

Andrei Klimov, the head of an upper house committee that investigates foreign meddling in Russian affairs, proudly said on the top talk show on Russian state TV that his relative, a Soviet pilot, won a medal for combat duty in Vietnam. Klimov pointed to heavy U.S. losses from Soviet missiles and jets in Vietnam, adding that Russia stands ready to counter any possible U.S. strike.

Unlike the Vietnam War, where Soviet advisers helping North Vietnam supposedly weren’t directly engaged in combat, the potential clash in Syria would pit Russia directly against the U.S.

Fears of war swept Russian newspaper headlines and TV news, with commentators discussing the darkest possible outcomes, including a nuclear war.

“What if the war starts tomorrow?” the front page of Moskovsky Komsomolets clamored on Wednesday. Russia’s best-selling newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda wondered: “Is macho Trump going to start World War III?”

Even former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev weighed in. The 87-year-old former president compared the tensions to the 1962 Cuban missile crisis and said he feels “great concern.”
…

The daughter of poisoned former spy Sergei Skripal said Wednesday that she didn’t want help from the Russian Embassy as she recovers from the nerve agent attack that left her and her father in critical condition and created an international furor.

Yulia Skripal, 33, said in a statement that she found herself with a “totally different life” than the one she had before the March 4 poisoning in southwest England. She was released from the hospital this week, while Sergei Skripal remains hospitalized.

“I have been made aware of my specific contacts at the Russian Embassy who have kindly offered me their assistance,” Skripal, a Russian citizen who was visiting her father in the cathedral city of Salisbury, said in the statement. “At the moment, I do not wish to avail myself of their services, but if I change my mind I know how to contact them.”

Britain has blamed the attack on Russia, triggering the expulsion of more than 150 Russian diplomats from Western countries. Russia vehemently denies any involvement and has responded by expelling the same number of diplomats.

Russian criticism

Yulia Skripal’s statement, which was distributed by London’s Metropolitan Police, is important because the Russian Embassy in London has criticized the British government for not allowing diplomatic staff to visit the Skripals since they were stricken. Britain has said it is up to the father and daughter to decide whether they want to meet with embassy officials.

Earlier, the embassy protested that its requests for consular access had been “left without a substantial reaction on part of the British authorities.”

“We would like to know what exactly the British side did to comply with its international obligation under the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations and the bilateral Consular Convention, and what were the reasons for such a unfounded conclusion,” the embassy said.

Yulia Skripal’s statement also addressed a controversy over her cousin, Viktoria. British officials alleged that the cousin was a pawn of the Russian government after she gave interviews with Russian media outlets.

Skripal thanked Viktoria for her concern and asked her to “not visit me or try to contact me for the time being.”

“Her opinions and assertions are not mine and they are not my father’s,” Yulia Skripal said.
…

One of Hungary’s two national opposition dailies will shut down on Wednesday due to financial problems, its publisher said, in a sign of rapidly deteriorating prospects for media freedom after the landslide re-election of Prime Minister Viktor Orban.

The closure of Magyar Nemzet will be a milestone in the gradual disappearance of independent media in Hungary that western European Union leaders and international rights groups say underlines the country’s slide into authoritarianism.

The 80-year-old daily is owned by tycoon Lajos Simicska, once an ally of the right-wing nationalist prime minister who fell out with him and became one of his staunchest opponents in the election campaign.

Simicska’s media holdings, once highly profitable, incurred heavy losses after he fell out with Orban and his publications were deprived of government advertising.

“Due to the financing problems of Magyar Nemzet, the owners have decided to cease media content production activity from April 11, 2018. Therefore Magyar Nemzet and its online version mno.hu will close,” the publisher said in on its website.

The timing of the announcement, two days after Orban won a two-thirds majority for the third time with the ability to amend the constitution to entrench his power, suggests the newspaper’s closure had political dimensions.

“Simicska dedicated his past year to revenge (against Orban), and his media portfolio was a conduit for that,” Policy Solutions analyst Tamas Boros said. “Now that he sees Orban with another two-thirds majority, it was no longer worth his while.”

“He sees the results, anticipates government revenge, and is shutting down unprofitable media organizations.”

Magyar Nemzet publisher’s will also close Lanchid Radio, a sister radio station, at midnight on Tuesday and seek buyers for other Simicska group outlets.

Orban has become the central European country’s dominant leader by projecting himself as a savior of its Christian culture against Muslim migration into Europe, an image which resonated with more than 2.5 million voters on Sunday.

Orban’s Fidesz party, in power since 2010, has turned public broadcasters into obedient mouthpieces, his closest allies have bought big stakes in privately owned media and advertising has been channelled to heavily benefit government-friendly outlets.

Businessmen close to the premier purchased then-shuttered Nepszabadsag, the country’s top opposition newspaper, in 2016.

They also bought up nearly all regional dailies and acquired dozens of radio licenses covering the entire country.

The only remaining independent publications with widespread reach are the RTL television group owned by Germany’s Bertelsmann and the news website Index.hu, where a close Simicska associate sits on the board of the foundation that owns the company.

The other independent national newspaper, Nepszava, is owned by ex-Socialist Party treasurer Laszlo Puch via an Austrian company, but has far less readership than Index.
…

Russian retailers warned of price increase after ruble tumbles

European electronic and household goods manufacturers have warned Russian retailers of a possible 5 to 10 percent rise in prices after the ruble tumbled this week due to U.S. sanctions, retailers said on Tuesday.

Eldorado, which operates over 400 stores in Russia, said the hikes may mean it has to adjust its retail prices.

“Suppliers have already started warning of a possible 5-10 percent adjustment in prices,” a spokesperson for Eldorado told Reuters, adding that the warnings had primarily come from European manufacturers that do not produce goods in Russia.

A spokesperson for M.Video, which operates a network of 424 stores, also said that some of its suppliers had told them of plans to raise prices by between 5 and 10 percent.

The ruble fell sharply on Monday as investors took fright after a new round of U.S. sanctions against Moscow, targeting officials and businessmen around Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The ruble extended its losses on Tuesday, shedding over 3 percent of its value against the dollar, as investors continued a sell-off of assets fueled by fears that Washington could impose more sanctions and a realization that Russian credit and market risks had substantially increased.
…

Emmanuel Macron has blurred a line that has kept French government free of religious intervention for generations, critics said on Tuesday, after he called for stronger ties between the state and the Catholic Church.

The issue is particularly sensitive in historically Catholic France, where matters of faith and state were separated by law in 1905 and which is now home to Europe’s largest Muslim and Jewish communities.

The president’s remark might have raised fewer eyebrows had he left it until later in a one-hour speech on Monday night to Church dignitaries in Paris, where he began by saying that just arranging such a gathering was an achievement in itself.

“If we’ve done so, it must be because somewhere we share the feeling that the link between Church and State has been damaged, that the time has come for us, both you and me, to mend it,” he said.

Critics, many his natural political opponents, took the president to task.

“It took three centuries of civil war and struggle to get to where we are and there’s absolutely no reason to turn the clock back … because of an intellectual whim of the president’s,” said hardline leftist Jean-Luc Melenchon, a candidate in the election that brought Macron to power last May.

Former prime minister Manuel Valls and Socialist Party head Olivier Faure said the separation of church and state must remain a mainstay of political life, in a country where public service employees are banned from wearing Muslim veils and other dress with religious connotation.

Gay rights groups, who fought a bitter campaign against the Church over the introduction of same-sex marriage in 2013, were also critical.

The role of Islam

Raised in a non-religious family, Macron was baptized a Roman Catholic at his own request when he was 12. His government is now struggling to redefine the role of France’s second most popular religion, following a spate of attacks by Islamist militants that have killed around 240 people since early 2015.

Hardline Islam sits uneasily with France’s secular foundations, and Macron is under mounting pressure to address voter fears that its influence may spread via mosques and prisons that offer fertile ground for radical proselytizers.

Prime Minister Edouard Philippe responded in February by introducing prison isolation zones and more stringent licensing rules for faith-based schools.

France’s guiding principles also hold that religious observance is a private matter, for all faiths.

Catholic leaders present for Macron’s speech seemed less persuaded than his political detractors that might soon again be exerting influence on government.

Cardinal Georges Pontier, who met the president on Monday night, told CNews TV he read the remarks as nothing more than an invitation to more open dialogue.

“Some people imagine the Church wants to take power over people’s minds and more, but that’s not true,” he said.

This story was written by Reuters.
…

British media report that Yulia Skripal, one of two Russians poisoned by nerve agent, has been released from the hospital.

BBC News said Tuesday the 33-year-old Skripal had been discharged from hospital and taken to a “secure” location on Monday.

Skripal was in critical condition after the March 4 nerve agent attack, apparently aimed at her father, Sergei Skripal. 

He remains hospitalized but officials say he is improving rapidly.

Britain has accused the Russian government of masterminding the attack on the Skripals.
…

Voters in the oil-rich Caspian Sea nation of Azerbaijan are set to cast ballots in a snap presidential election Wednesday that is all but certain to extend the rule of the country’s long-serving leader by another seven years.

President Ilham Aliyev is expected to win the vote by a landslide. Leading opposition parties boycotted the race, leaving seven token challengers. Opinion surveys have put support for the incumbent at over 80 percent.

Aliyev, 56, has led Azerbaijan since 2003. He succeeded his father, Geidar Aliyev, who ruled Azerbaijan first as Communist Party boss and then as a post-Soviet president for the greater part of three decades.

Like his father before him, the son has cast himself as a custodian of stability, an image that resonates with many in a nation where memories of the chaos and turmoil that accompanied the 1991 breakup of the Soviet Union are still fresh.

Since Aliyev won the last election in 2013 with 85 percent of the vote, Azerbaijan’s Constitution has been amended to extend the presidential term from five to seven years. Aliyev’s critics denounced the 2016 plebiscite as effectively cementing a dynastic rule.

The presidential election that had been due in the fall was moved up to April. Officials said the move was made because the country would be busy with various high-profile events at the end of 2018.

Aliyev has allied the majority Shia Muslim nation of almost 10 million with the West, helping to protect its energy and security interests and to counterbalance Russia’s influence in the strategic Caspian region.

Critics

At the same time, his government has long faced criticism in the West for alleged human rights abuses and suppression of dissent.

The opposition has denounced the election as lacking a viable challenger. Most of the seven candidates seeking to unseat Aliyev ran for president in the past but never pulled in more than 2 percent of the vote.

“We will urge the people to resist that game being played by the authorities,” said Jamil Hasanli, the head of the National Council of Democratic Forces of Azerbaijan, a leading opposition movement.

However, Aliyev’s critics have a limited following in Azerbaijan; only a few thousand people attended recent opposition rallies.

‘Political stability’

The public indifference stems from Azerbaijan’s relative stability under Aliyev, who has used the nation’s oil riches to transform the once-gritty capital, Baku, into a shining metropolis. Some of the oil wealth has trickled down to reach even the poorest residents, helping secure Aliyev’s rule.

“People want to see the preservation of political stability, the deepening of economic reforms and an even more active fight against corruption,” Elkhan Sahinoglu, head of the independent Atlas Research Center in Baku, said.

He added that Aliyev has dismissed some of the worst government ministers and the public hopes he will continue getting rid of corrupt officials.

“Social problems, including low wages, remain, but most people think that political stability is the most important thing,” Sahinoglu said.

Samir Aliyev, a Baku-based independent economic expert who is not related to the president, said that while the opposition boycott may affect turnout, most voters focus on economic and social issues and don’t pay much attention to the opposition.

“People are mostly worried about their material situation, wages and inflation,” he said.
…

Hungary’s Central European University, an international school embroiled in a conflict with the government of Prime Minister Viktor Orban, said Monday it had signed an agreement with the City of Vienna to open a new satellite campus there.

CEU has found itself in the eye of a political storm since last year, when Hungary passed a law setting tougher conditions for the awarding of licenses to foreign universities.

Critics said the law would hurt academic freedom and was especially aimed at CEU, founded by Hungarian-born George Soros after the collapse of Communism and considered a bastion of independent scholarship in the region.

The new law stipulated that CEU must open a branch in its “home state” of New York alongside its campus in Budapest and secure a bilateral agreement of support from the U.S. government.

The university has since set up a U.S. site at Bard College in New York State.

Orban’s ruling Fidesz party, which won Sunday’s election with a landslide, vilified Soros in a fierce anti-immigrant election campaign that helped the 54-year-old premier win a third successive term in power.

CEU said last month it was in talks with Vienna about a memorandum of understanding that would enable it to open a satellite campus there, complementing its Budapest campus and its U.S. site.

“CEU has signed an MoU with the City of Vienna and looks forward to working with city representatives to open a satellite campus there. We consider Bard College in New York a first satellite campus and Vienna would be a second satellite campus,” said CEU International Media Relations Manager Colleen Sharkey.

CEU is still waiting for its agreement with New York to be signed by the Hungarian government, prolonging a period of uncertainty over the Budapest operation.

“As we have said repeatedly, Budapest is our home and this is where we want to stay. We have no reason to believe that the Hungarian government would not sign the agreement … but we are still waiting for the signature to bring the lexCEU issue to a close,” Sharkey added. She said the Vienna campus would be functioning from the autumn of 2019.

The government has said it did not want to close down CEU and only wanted to ensure all universities are governed by the same rules.

Orban has been locked in a series of running battles with the EU, where Western states and the Brussels-based executive Commission decry what they see as his authoritarian leanings, the squeezing of the opposition and the free media.

The crackdown on CEU triggered mass protests in Budapest last year, and the European Commission took Hungary to court over the legislation targeting the university.
…

Russia said Monday it will support companies hit by fresh U.S. sanctions as Russian stocks dropped and shares in aluminum producer Rusal plummeted.

Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich said in comments reported by state news agencies that Russia is prepared to back the companies if their positions worsen.

“We have a very attentive approach to our leading companies. They mean thousands of employees and very important jobs for our country,” he was quoted as saying by the TASS agency.

Shares in Rusal, which is controlled by billionaire businessman Oleg Deripaska, plunged just over 50 percent on the Hong Kong stock exchange Monday.

Rusal said the sanctions “may result in technical defaults in relation to certain credit obligations.”

“The company’s initial assessment is that it is highly likely that the impact may be materially adverse to the business and prospects of the group,” Rusal said in a statement.

Deripaska controls a business empire with assets in aluminum, energy and construction. He has figured in Russian election-meddling investigations in the U.S. due to his ties to former Donald Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort, who once worked as his consultant. The 55-year-old Deripaska is worth $5.3 billion, according to Forbes magazine.

On the Moscow stock exchange, the flagship MOEX index traded down over 6.5 percent as of early Monday afternoon, having partially recovered from a steeper slump which took the index down almost 10 percent. Metals companies were among the main losers.

The euro traded above 73 rubles for the first time since September 2016, while the dollar neared the 60-ruble mark.

The U.S. Treasury Department on Friday announced sanctions against seven leading Russian businessmen, 17 officials and a dozen Russian companies.

Besides Deripaska, targets included Alexei Miller, the head of state natural gas giant Gazprom, and Andrey Kostin, the head of the state-controlled VTB Bank, which is Russia’s second-largest.

There was also a place on the list for Kirill Shamalov, who is reportedly Putin’s son-in-law, married to his daughter Katerina Tikhonova, although neither Putin nor the Kremlin have acknowledged that she is his daughter. In 2014, Shamalov acquired a large share of Russian petrochemical company Sibur, later selling most of his stake for an undisclosed sum.
…

Syria and Russia say two Israeli war planes operating in Lebanese air space carried out an attack early Monday on an air base in central Syria.

Israel’s military did not comment on the strikes against the T4 base in Homs province. 

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said 14 people were killed, including Iranian forces.

In February, Israel accused Iranian forces of using the same site to send a drone to Israeli territory. It responded by attacking Syrian air defense and Iranian military targets within Syria, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pledged to “continue to harm anyone who tries to harm us.”

Initial Syrian state media reports Monday blamed the United States, which along with France denied responsibility.

“However, we continue to closely watch the situation and support the ongoing diplomatic efforts to hold those who use chemical weapons, in Syria and otherwise, accountable,” Pentagon spokesman Christopher Sherwood said in a statement.

Syria has repeatedly denied using chemical weapons throughout the conflict that began in 2011, including the most recent suspected chemical attack Saturday in a rebel-held suburb of Damascus that killed at least 40 people.

Late Sunday, the White House said President Donald Trump and French President Emmanuel Macron strongly condemned chemical attacks in Syria and agreed Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s government “must be held accountable for its continued human rights abuses.”

“They agreed to exchange information on the nature of the attacks and coordinate a strong, joint response,” the White House said about a phone call between the two leaders.

Macron’s office added that the two sides “exchanged information and analysis confirming the use of chemical weapons.”

Trump used Twitter earlier Sunday to say there would be a “big price to pay” for what he called the “mindless chemical attack” Saturday.

In a rare direct condemnation of Russia’s leader, Trump declared, “President Putin, Russia and Iran are responsible” for their support of “Animal Assad.”

He further called for Syria to open the area of the alleged chemical attack to allow in verification and medical teams.

The Russian foreign ministry rejected claims of a chemical attack, saying, “The spread of bogus stories about the use of chlorine and other poisonous substances by (Syrian) government forces continues.

“We have warned several times recently against such dangerous provocations,” the Moscow statement said. “The aim of such deceitful speculation, lacking any kind of grounding, is to shield terrorists and to attempt to justify possible external uses of force.”

Iran said U.S. claims about the attack were aimed at justifying new American military action. A year ago, after an earlier chemical weapons attack by Syria, Trump launched 59 Tomahawk missiles into Syria, targeting the military base that was home to the warplanes that carried out the attack. 

Trump did not say how the U.S. might respond to Saturday’s suspected chemical attack. But Homeland Security and counterterrorism adviser Thomas Bossert told ABC News, “I wouldn’t take anything off the table.”

The United Nations Security Council will meet Monday about the alleged attack, after nine countries demanded an urgent session. The European Union said “evidence points toward yet another chemical attack” by the Syrian regime.

Trump also said that if his predecessor, former President Barack Obama, “had crossed his stated Red Line In The Sand,” to hold Assad accountable for previous chemical attacks, “the Syrian disaster would have ended long ago! Animal Assad would have been history!”

Trump’s rebuke of Putin was unusual. 

The U.S. leader has been reluctant during his nearly 15-month presidency to accept the conclusion of the U.S. intelligence community that Putin directed a 2016 campaign to meddle in the U.S. presidential election to help Trump win. U.S. special counsel Robert Mueller has been conducting a wide-ranging criminal investigation of the Trump campaign’s links to Russia, but Trump has repeatedly rejected the notion there was any collusion with Russia.

The alleged chemical attack occurred late Saturday amid new attacks on the last rebel enclave in eastern Ghouta.

First responders said they discovered families suffocated in their homes and shelters with foam on their mouths. Relief workers said more than 500 people, mostly women and children, were brought to medical centers with difficulty breathing, foaming at the mouth and their eyes burning.

The Civil Defense and Syrian American Medical Society said patients gave off a chlorine-like smell, and some had blue skin, an indication of oxygen deprivation.

“Dropping poison gas in a way that attacks women and children down in the shelters is a way to try to panic the civilians into leaving and cut the ground underneath the rebels,” University of Pennsylvania political science professor Ian Lustick told VOA.

Trump’s rebuff of Putin and Iran, which has forces in Syria, came as Syrian state television said Sunday an agreement has been reached for rebels to leave Douma, their last stronghold near Damascus.

The accord calls for the Jaish al-Islam fighters to release all prisoners they were holding in exchange for passage within 48 hours to the opposition-held town of Jarablus in northern Syria near the Turkish border. Russia said last week that Jaish al-Islam accepted a deal to leave Ghouta, which houses tens of thousands of people. However, the evacuations stalled over reports that the rebel group remained divided over the withdrawal. 

The pact was reached just hours after the suspected chemical attack.
…

U.S. President Donald Trump has blamed his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin and Russia, as well Iran, for enabling an alleged poisonous attack in Syria late Saturday. Syrian activists and medical sources say at least 40 people have died. The suspected chlorine attack came during a government offensive to retake rebel-held areas near Damascus after the collapse of a truce with the Army of Islam rebel group. VOA’s Zlatica Hoke has more.
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As Orthodox Christians around the world celebrated Easter on Sunday, a town on Greece’s Peloponnese peninsula observed the holy day by burning an effigy of Judas at sea.

The ritual burning of Judas is a custom also observed by Roman Catholics in parts of Latin America as a symbolic punishment for Judas’ betrayal of Christ for a monetary reward.

The tradition dates back centuries in some places. In the Greek town of Ermioni, it has been observed the past 25 years.

About 20 small boats circled around a raft bearing a wire model of Judas that floated off Ermioni and then the figure was set ablaze. More than 1,000 locals and visitors watched from shore and also listened to music and saw a laser show.

In older times, the Judas effigy was made of straw. Sometimes, topical variations on the theme are introduced. In at least two villages in Crete this year, the Judas figure was made to resemble Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

A darker side of the custom is an implied hostility in some cases toward Jews as the “killers of Christ.’”

The tradition even led to an international incident in mid-19th century Greece.

Worried about offending James de Rothschild, founder of the French branch of the famous Jewish banking family who was in Greece to negotiate a loan, the government banned the burning of Judas in Athens in 1847. An outraged mob then ransacked the house of a Jew who was a British subject.

Britain demanded restitution equal to a sizeable percentage of the Greek budget. The Greek government refused, and Britain imposed a naval blockade in 1850. France and Russia took Greece’s side and the British lifted their blockade after six months. A restitution agreement was reached the following year.

Orthodox Easter came a week later than the holiday this year for Western-based Christian churches, with significant observances in Russia, Greece, Ukraine, Serbia and Kosovo.

In Russia, President Vladimir Putin and Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev attended Easter services at Christ the Savior Cathedral, Moscow’s largest church.

In Kyiv, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko attended Easter services at the Volodymyrskiy Monastery.

Serbia celebrated the day in a highly charged atmosphere over Kosovo, the former Serbian province whose predominantly Muslim, ethnic Albanian people declared independence a decade ago.

Kosovo is considered by Serbian nationalists to be the cradle of the Balkan nation’s statehood and religion. On the eve of Easter, Serbian Orthodox Church Patriarch Irinej urged political leaders never to accept Kosovo’s independence, even if the price is abandoning the country’s proclaimed goal of joining the European Union.

 
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Prosecutors said Sunday they still do not know why a 48-year-old German national drove a van into a crowd of people in the western city of Muenster, killing two and injuring 20 more.

The man, whose name was not released, then shot himself in the van. Officials said six of those injured were in critical condition.

Police also said Sunday that they believe he acted alone. They said the driver was well-known to police, had a history of run-ins with the law and had expressed suicidal thoughts to a neighbor last month.

Muenster Police President Hajo Kuhlisch said the man’s four apartments, two in Muenster and two in Saxony, and several cars had been searched thoroughly.

Inside the van, police found illegal firecrackers that were disguised as a fake bomb, a fake pistol and the real gun that the driver used to kill himself.

Inside the apartment, where the man was living, they found more firecrackers and a “no-longer usable AK-47 machine gun” and several gas bottles and canisters containing gasoline and bio-ethanol, but did not know yet why they were stored there.

Authorities identified the victims as a 51-year-old woman from northern Germany and a 65-year-old man from Broken, near Muenster.  

Merkel ‘deeply shocked’

Muenster Mayor Markus Lewe told reporters Saturday that “all of Muenster mourns over this horrible thing,” expressing compassion for the families of those killed and wishes for a swift recovery for those injured.

A spokeswoman for German Chancellor Angela Merkel called reports of the event “terrible news.” Merkel released a statement saying she is “deeply shocked by the terrible events in Muenster.”

A White House statement released late Saturday said U.S. President Donald Trump had been briefed on the incident.

“While the German authorities have not yet announced a motive for this cowardly attack on innocent people, we condemn it regardless, and pledge any support from the United States Government that Germany may need,” the statement said.

Germany has been on high alert for terror attacks since a truck crashed into a Christmas market in Berlin two years ago, killing 12 people.

Saturday was also the one-year anniversary of an April 7 attack in Stockholm, Sweden, where a truck crashed into a crowd of people in front of a department store. Five people died in that attack. The attacker claimed to be a member of the Islamic State terror group.

 
…

German authorities said six people have been detained Sunday allegedly in connection with a plan to carry out an extremist attack on Berlin’s half-marathon.

In a joint statement, prosecutors and police said, “There were isolated indications that those arrested, aged between 18 and 21 years, were participating in the preparation of a crime in connection with this event.”

Berlin police tweeted that six people were arrested after a joint operation with the Berlin’s prosecutor’s office.

The German daily Die Welt first reported that police was able to stop a plan to attack race spectators and participants with knives.

The paper also reported the main suspect apparently knew Anis Amri, a Tunisian asylum seeker who killed 12 people when he hijacked a truck and drove it into a crowded Berlin Christmas market in December 2016.

The arrests came after Germany special force police raided the homes of suspected members of a far-right group in Berlin, Germany’s federal prosecutor’s office said.

Authorities did not say if the two cases were connected.

At least eight people are allegedly involved. The chief federal prosecutor’s office said apartments in the states of Berlin, Brandenburg and Thuringia were searched on Sunday for weapons.

Though no one has been detained, officials believe the suspects are members of the Reichsbuerger (Citizens of the Reich) group — an organization that does not recognize modern-day Germany as a legitimate state and does not accept current rules.

The group believes the former “Deutsche Reich” is still alive, despite Nazi Germany’s defeat in World War II. They identify with a state system from 1871-1918, the German Kaiserreich area.  

Authorities said the accused formed the group in 2017. Besides efforts to acquire weapons, German police is also investigating the killings of some people. Officials said the group is ready to kill targeted people, if necessary.

Investigators said in a statement that they were assisted in their searches by the anti-terrorism GSG 9 police unit.

According to the domestic intelligence service, it is estimated the Reichsbuerger has several thousand members.

In October 2016, a member was shot and killed by a police officer in Bavaria when a special force team was about to enter his home to apprehend hunting and sports guns.

Sunday’s raids, however, were not linked to the incident in Muenster on Saturday, where a man drove a van into a group of people sitting outside a restaurant, killing two people. The man then shot himself to death, the prosecutor’s office said.
…

The United States has called on Russia to end its unmitigated support for the Syrian government immediately and “work with the international community to prevent further, barbaric chemical weapons attacks.”

U.S. State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said in a statement that the United States is closely following reports April 7 of another alleged chemical weapons attack, this time targeting a hospital in Douma, Syria.

The statement said “Russia, with its unwavering support for the regime, ultimately bears responsibility for these brutal attacks, targeting of countless civilians, and the suffocation of Syria’s most vulnerable communities with chemical weapons.”

​Accusations of chemical bombs

Rebels claimed Syrian government forces dropped barrel bombs containing poisonous chemicals on civilians Saturday, killing dozens, as Syria continued its offensive against the last rebel-held town in eastern Ghouta.

Syrian state media denied the rebels’ claim, as troops launched an assault on Douma, near the capital Damascus.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and the medical relief group Syrian American Medical Society (SAMS) said at least 30 people in Douma had been killed in airstrikes Saturday, with dozens more injured.

SAMS said a chlorine bomb hit Douma hospital, however Observatory director Rami Abdulrahman said he could not confirm the use of chemical weapons.

The fighting comes after other rebel groups in Ghouta accepted a safe passage to rebel-held areas northeast of Aleppo.

Government troops advance

The cease-fire effectively ended Friday, when Syrian troops have launched a ground and air assault on Douma.

The government forces pressed their offensive against the last rebel-held town in eastern Ghouta under the cover of airstrikes as shelling of civilian areas on both sides claimed more lives, state media and opposition activists said.

Syrian government forces resumed their offensive on rebel-held Douma on Friday afternoon after the10-day truce collapsed over disagreement regarding evacuation of opposition fighters. Violence resumed days after hundreds of opposition fighters and their relatives left Douma for rebel-held areas in northern Syria.

A reporter for Lebanon’s Al-Manar TV embedded with Syrian troops near Douma said government forces advanced toward Douma from the towns of Misraba and Madiara that were recently captured by troops. Al-Manar TV is run by Lebanon’s Hezbollah group that has sent thousands of fighters to Syria to back government forces.

​Street fighting expected

The government-controlled Syrian Central Military Media said government forces captured several farms Saturday on the southern and western edges of the city that is home to tens of thousands of people. SCMM said the area controlled by the Army of Islam in and around Douma is 19 square kilometers (7.3 square miles).

By Saturday evening, state media was reported that troops are approaching Army of Islam fortifications on the edge of the town adding that street battles could begin soon. It said warplanes bombarded the group’s headquarters and command and control center.

State TV said Army of Islam fighters pelted several neighborhoods in Damascus with mortar shells killing six civilians and wounding more than 30.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the bombardment of Douma killed eight people and wounded 48, including 15 children.

On Friday, opposition activists said 40 people were killed in Douma while state media said four were killed in government-held Damascus.

Turkish forces in the north

In northern Syria, the Turkish military said on its Twitter account that it has established the ninth observation post in the rebel-held province of Idlib as part of the de-escalation agreement with Russia and Iran. Turkey’s official Anadolu news agency said the military convoy reached the town of Morek in Idlib province.

Eastern Ghouta was also part of the same de-escalation plan signed last year in the Kazakh capital Astana. Turkey’s presidential spokesman said that the Turkish military presence in Idlib would serve as a “guarantee” against attacks to ensure that it does not meet the same fate as eastern Ghouta.

This story was written by VOA News with contributions from Associated Press writers Zeynep Bilginsoy in Istanbul and Jim Heintz in Moscow.
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Hungary is set to hold parliamentary elections Sunday, with the ruling Fidesz party expected to win. Prime Minister Viktor Orban has put his uncompromising anti-migrant rhetoric at the center of the campaign — to the alarm of the European Union, which has accused Hungary of putting fundamental democratic freedoms at risk. Henry Ridgwell reports from London.
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The 2018 World Cup of freestyle wrestling opened Saturday in the U.S. state of Iowa without Russia and Iran, two traditionally strong teams in the sport.

Iran, the six-time defending champ, pulled out in March without citing a reason, although many tied it to the resignation of the Iranian federation president, Rasoul Khadem, over issues related to the country’s state policy of refusing to compete against Israeli competition.

Khadem quit in protest after United World Wrestling (UWW) ruled that an Iranian wrestler threw a match at the Under-23 World Championships in November to avoid having to face an Israeli opponent and temporarily banning the athlete and his coach.

Russia pulled out of the tournament a week ago after saying it did not have enough time for the visa process needed to get the athletes cleared for the journey to Iowa City.

UWW invited Mongolia and India to replace Iran and Russia the annual meet, considered the second-biggest event outside of the World Championships, which will be held in Hungary in October.

“Our team was poised to do well [even if] Russia and Iran [were competing], so that’s a little bit disappointing,” said Rich Bender, the director of USA Wrestling.

“Certainly, in light of the current political situation and the relations between our governments and the drama around what’s going on in our State Departments, with their embassy and ours, this was not the year to wait until the last minute to apply,” he said of the Russians.

Bill Zadick, the U.S. freestyle coach, said, “It’s disappointing that they [Russians and Iranians] weren’t able to make it to the event because they have great wrestling traditions.”

“Despite our difference in politics on the government side, our federations share a brotherhood and have a really positive relationships that I think both sides value,” he added.

The U.S. team beat India in its first match, while Mongolia beat Kazakhstan.

Some material for this report came from AP, Sioux City Journal, Des Moines Register and Interfax.
…

Former Catalan president Carles Puigdemont called again on the Spanish government to begin negotiations over Catalonia’s secession declaration.

The former separatist leader renewed the call Saturday at a news conference in Berlin, one day after being released from a German prison in Neumuenster after two weeks of detention.

“The path for political negotiations based on mutual respect, this is what Europe expects. This is what the Catalan people ask for. This is what the Catalan economy, society and culture need,” Puigdemont said.

Puigdemont was arrested in Germany as he travelled from Finland to Belgium, where he had been in self-imposed exile after fleeing Spain in October.

The Spanish government has accused Puigdemont of provoking an uprising by attempting to declare Catalonia an independent state after a referendum last year the government says was illegal. Madrid has also accused Puigdemont of misusing public money.

Puigdemont was released on bail Friday pending a decision by German judges on whether to extradite him from Spain.

The Schwesig state court decided the charge of rebellion did not warrant extradition, but Puigdemont can still be extradited on the less serious charge of misuse of funds to hold Catalonia’s banned independence referendum.

This story was written by VOA News.
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Millions of people worldwide face financial ruin; their assets wiped out because of a catastrophic illness or accident that saddles them with staggeringly high health bills they are unable to pay.

This nightmare scenario rarely, if ever, occurs in countries that have universal health coverage. Such systems insulate people from the financial disasters that occur in countries where national health schemes do not exist.

“Today, about 100 million people fall into poverty because of health expenditure,” said Rudiger Krech, World Health Organization director for health systems and innovation. He told VOA that every country, poor and rich alike, can afford universal health coverage.

“It is not just a matter of money, but of political will, of political choice. So, you can afford health coverage for everyone, even if you are not one of the most affluent countries in the world,” he said.

For example, he said that relatively low-income countries such as Cuba and Costa Rica have developed good health systems; while in the United States, one of the world’s richest countries, “people have to pay huge amounts of their salaries and their income for health services.”

“We call these catastrophic health expenditures because people are losing their fortune because they had a big accident or an open-heart surgery,” he said. “So, this still pulls people into poverty.”

Half of world lacks full coverage

The World Health Organization reports at least half of the world’s population lacks full coverage for essential health services. More than 800 million people, or nearly 12 percent of the world’s population, spend at least 10 percent of their household budgets to pay for health care, WHO said. In 2015, it said the world spent an eye-watering $7.3 trillion on health, representing close to 10 percent of global Gross Domestic Product.

WHO is on a mission to make it possible for all people and communities to receive the health services they need without suffering financial hardship. As such, it is using this year’s World Health Day, April 7, to promote the U.N. Sustainable Development Goal that calls for the adoption of universal health coverage in 90 percent of the world’s countries by 2030.

“I think this is a goal that people all over the world should aspire toward,” said Shih-Chung Chen, Taiwanese minister of health and welfare.

“I will not say that it will be achieved by 2030,” Chen told a group of visiting journalists, “but I think all countries should have the willingness to try to achieve this, and that is why we want to participate in the World Health Assembly. That would allow us to contribute toward that goal.”

Last year, China blocked Taiwan from participating in the WHA as an observer and, so far this year, Taiwan has not received an invitation to attend.

Taiwan’s system

“I think that in order to ensure that health is a basic human right, no country’s experience should be left out,” said the Taiwanese health minister. “We are extremely proud of our universal health coverage system. I think this would be a very important way for us to share with the world.”

Taiwan’s single payer National Health Insurance, a compulsory program that was launched in 1995, provides comprehensive, affordable coverage for the island’s more than 23 million inhabitants. The government calculates “a family of four pays roughly $100 U.S. per month as the premium.” This comes to about 2 percent of the average household income. Average life expectancy in Taiwan has risen to 80 years, on a par with Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) countries.

“More than 85 percent of the people in Taiwan report very high satisfaction with our national health Insurance,” Chen said.

Low health expenditure

The health minister told VOA that Taiwan’s total health expenditure is 6 percent of GDP, the lowest in the world, compared with more than 16 percent for the United States.

“The U.S. is entirely capable of providing universal health care to its citizens,” he said. “However, because the U.S. has a multitude of systems in place that have been there for a long time and there are a lot of stakeholders involved, it would be a bit difficult. In addition, the U.S. places a lot of importance on freedom of choice.”

Chen said the world could learn a lot from Taiwan’s health insurance program. Unfortunately, he said Taiwan was not able to help because it is barred from participating in international organizations such as the World Health Organization.

Krech told VOA it was the United Nations, not WHO, that decided whether Taiwan could be included in international health matters.

“We are talking to Member States and obviously Taiwan is not a Member State. But, it is Chinese Taiwan and Chinese Taipei and, therefore, it is under this “One China” policy.

“That does not bar us from discussing with representatives of Chinese Taipei, at all,” he said. “We have regular exchanges. We see what is happening.”

This story was written by Lisa Schlein.
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The Catholic Easter custom of hunting brightly colored eggs and chocolate bunnies may be over now, but in the Orthodox world, Easter comes one week later. And it brings with it, its own unique traditions. One of them is the centuries-old practice of drawing elaborate patterns on Easter eggs decorated and painted using hot wax. Mariia Prus and Konstantin Golubchik produced this report from Alexandria, Virginia that is narrated by Katherine Gypson.
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The United Nations human rights office is echoing a recent call by U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres for an independent investigation into Israel’s use of force against Palestinians who staged protests in Gaza on March 30. The call came Friday as Israeli troops again clashed with Palestinians staging “right of return” border protests.

What began as a peaceful demonstration along the Gaza-Israeli border Friday turned deadly shortly after the U.N. human rights office in Geneva called for restraint by both the Israeli security forces and Palestinians. Spokeswoman Liz Throssell told reporters U.N. officials feared a repeat of last month’s riots, which resulted in the deaths of 16 people and injuries to more than 1,000.  

She said several hundred protesters reportedly were wounded by live ammunition. She noted the victims reportedly were unarmed or did not pose a serious threat to the Israeli security forces, who were well protected. The rights office said Israeli security forces used excessive force last month. Throssell told VOA that Israel denies the accusation.

“From what we have documented, it is certainly that the killings and the injuries do actually point to an excessive use of force and, in particular lethal force,” said Throssell. “And, that was in a situation where there was no threat of death or serious injury. And, that is why we have made this call. This is a law enforcement issue. This has law enforcement principles.” 

Under international human rights law, firearms may be used only as a last resort, only in response to an imminent threat of death or risk of serious injury. Throssell said international law obliges Israel’s security forces to respect the rights of peaceful assembly.  

She said in the context of a military occupation, as is the case in the self-governing Palestinian territory, the unjustified and unlawful recourse to firearms by law enforcement resulting in death may amount to a willful killing and a grave breach of the Fourth Geneva Convention.

The Palestinians have constructed protest tent camps along the entire length of the Gaza Strip in five locations. They are expected to stay in place for six weeks.

The protests are designed to commemorate the Nakba or “catastrophe” when hundreds of thousands of Palestinians had to flee their land or were expelled during the 1948 war that led to the creation of Israel. Israel has deployed more than 100 snipers along the Gaza Strip.

 
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When calls to a Polish domestic violence helpline in Britain plunged last year, its founder Ewa Wilcock was puzzled.

Since its launch in 2014, she had been receiving more calls from compatriots living in Britain than she could handle. Yet they halved — to just over a dozen a month — in mid-2017.

“People would start the conversation saying they were not sure if they should be calling at all because they were afraid of the social services,” Wilcock told Reuters by phone from Cheshire in northwest England.

Wilcock soon discovered that myths were spreading among Poles on social media — and by abusers — that parents who reported domestic violence would lose their children, making victims too scared to seek help.

“Some people said that social services remove children from homes and put them up for adoption,” she said.

“[They said] that foster families get a lot of money for caring for children, that it’s a great business.”

There is no reliable data on domestic violence among the 900,000 Poles in Britain — its largest overseas-born population — but nearly 2 million people, mostly women, are physically or emotionally abused by a partner or relative each year.

“They are ashamed to tell family in Poland,” Wilcock said. “They don’t want them to worry, but they have no one to talk to in Britain.”

Scared

Services provided by Polish charities are often the first point of contact because they make the process of accessing support and finding safety less intimidating for victims.

“When you’re stressed, it’s very difficult to communicate even in your own language,” domestic violence counselor Anna Janczuk told Reuters.

“It’s even more difficult using a second language and finding appropriate words to describe what is happening,” said Janczuk, who runs the London-based nonprofit Familia Support Centre, which provides legal and psychological consultations.

Katarzyna Zatorski, a family solicitor based in the northern town of Huddersfield, said most of her Polish clients dealing with domestic violence are referred to her by Polish charities.

“The most difficult thing is to seek a lawyer’s help,” she told Reuters by phone. “If it’s difficult for a Briton, then it’s much more difficult for someone living in a foreign country.”

Hanna, who declined to give real name, said her husband used to suffocate and beat her, once breaking her nose. He told her that social workers would take their daughter away if she reported him.

“I didn’t know what to start with, how to do it, because I was very scared,” she said.

“In a situation like this, you don’t even know what your name is. When you speak about legal matters, you don’t understand the meaning of certain expressions.”

Without Janczuk’s support “nothing” would have changed, Hanna said, nearly a year after she left her abusive husband.

“Contact [with Janczuk] calmed me,” she said.

Volunteers

Wilcock’s helpline only takes calls twice a week, while Janczuk’s support center is open for less than 20 hours a week because of funding shortages.

“Some funders don’t like it that we help just one minority,” Janczuk said, sitting next to a donated computer in the modest room from which she runs her organization with the support of volunteers.

“We are doing more than the limited resources that we have allow us to do,” said Janczuk, who helps about 25 victims of domestic violence per month.

“Sometimes it’s just this one piece of information that we give the victims that allows them to go on.”

Hanna said she still calls Wilcock’s helpline about once a month when she is worried about issues like child custody.

She used to call every week.

“If they were open more than twice a week, I would have called them more often,” she said.
…

The European Union said Friday Facebook has told it that up to 2.7 million people in the 28-nation bloc may have been victim of improper data sharing involving political data-mining firm Cambridge Analytica.

EU spokesman Christian Wigand said EU Justice Commissioner Vera Jourova will have a telephone call with Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg early next week to address the massive data leaks.

The EU and Facebook will be looking at what changes the social media giant needs to make to better protect users and how the U.S. company must adapt to new EU data protection rules.

Wigand said that EU data protection authorities will discuss over the coming days “a strong coordinated approach” on how to deal with the Facebook investigation.

Separately, Italy’s competition authority opened an investigation Friday into Facebook for allegedly misleading practices following revelations that the social network sold users’ data without consent.

Authority chairman Giovanni Pitruzzella told Sky News24 that the investigation will focus on Facebook’s claims on its home page that the service is free, without revealing that it makes money off users’ data.

The investigation comes as Italian consumer advocate group Codacons prepares a U.S. class action against Facebook on behalf of Italians whose data was mined by Cambridge Analytica. Codacons said just 57 Italians downloaded the Cambridge Analytica app, but that an estimated 214,000 Italians could be affected because the data mined extended to also the users’ friends.

A top Facebook privacy official is scheduled to meet with the authority later this month.

This story was earlier corrected to show that the EU call will take place with Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg not with Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg.
…

A German court ruled Thursday that Catalan separatist leader Carles Puigdemont cannot be extradited to Spain on charges of revolution and can be freed from a German jail on bail.

Puigdemont supporters say they expect Catalonia’s former president to be out of jail by Friday morning.

The judges in Schleswig in northern Germany based their ruling on German law, saying while rebellion may be a crime in Spain, it is not a criminal offense in Germany.

The judges also ruled Puigdemont could still be extradited to Spain on charges of embezzling public funds not rebellion, but could only be tried for embezzlement if he is sent back.

If Puigdemont posts bail, he can only leave Germany with prosecutors’ permission, inform them when he changes his address, and must report to police once a week.

Pro-independence Catalans celebrated when they heard the German court’s decision and some cried openly.

Spanish officials and the country’s supreme court have not yet commented on the German ruling.

German police arrested Puigdemont on a Spanish warrant last week. He crossed into Germany from Belgium, where he fled on October to avoid arrest.

He is wanted in Spain on charges of inciting rebellion by defying the central government and going ahead with a Catalan independence referendum in October, leading to a violent police crackdown.

Twenty-four other Catalan separatist leaders are also facing rebellion charges.

Pro-independence lawmakers won a slim majority in December’s parliamentary elections in Catalonia. But parliament has been unable to name a new president since Puigdemont fled, and the future of independence is murky.

Catalonia, in northeast Spain, and its capital Barcelona are major tourist destinations. It has its own language and distinct culture. But the separatist crisis has hurt tourism and the regional economy.

Catalan separatists call the region a powerful economic engine that drives Spain, and they have demanded more autonomy.

Those who want to stay united with Spain fear the region will sink into an economic abyss without the central government, its ties to the European Union, and its numerous existing bilateral relations.

This story was written by VOA News.
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A District of Columbia judge on Thursday sentenced two Turkish-Americans to one year and one day in prison after they pleaded guilty of assaulting pro-Kurdish demonstrators during Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s visit to Washington last year.

Sinan Narin, 46, of Virginia and Eyup Yildirim, 51, of New Jersey each pleaded guilty in December to one count of assault with significant bodily injury in connection with the May 2017 clashes with protesters near the Turkish ambassador’s residence.

Judge Marisa Demeo of the Superior Court for the District of Columbia accepted their plea agreements and imposed the previously agreed upon sentence on each.

The two have been in jail since their arrest last June and will receive credit for time already served, the U.S. attorney’s office for the District of Columbia said.

The street brawl that led to the pair’s arrest started after a small group of Kurdish demonstrators gathered near the Turkish ambassador’s residence to protest Erdogan’s arrival, only to be confronted by the president’s supporters, security guards and other members of his delegation.

WATCH: Demonstration at Turkish Embassy in DC Turns Violent

Video of the confrontation recorded by a VOA journalist showed what appeared to be Erdogan’s security guards pushing, shoving and kicking the protesters, some of whom were carrying Kurdish flags.

A grand jury last August indicted 19 people — 15 members of Erdogan’s security detail, the two Turkish-Americans and two Turkish-Canadians — on charges of conspiracy to commit a crime of violence, a felony punishable by up to five years in prison.

But U.S. prosecutors later dropped charges against 11 of the guards for what a government official described as “evidentiary reasons.”

Criminal charges against the other four bodyguards remain pending, as do ones against the two Canadian citizens of Turkish ancestry.

The Turkish-Canadians have not been arrested, and it remains unclear whether they’ll be extradited to the U.S. to stand trial.
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A U.N. rights watchdog called on Hungary on Thursday to crack down on hate speech by politicians against Roma, Muslims and other minorities, and to repeal a law allowing migrants to be deported without a chance to seek

asylum.

It urged the nationalist government to reject draft laws known as the “Stop-Soros Package” that would empower the interior minister to ban nongovernmental organizations that support migration and pose a “national security risk.”

The government says the bill is meant to deter illegal immigration that Prime Minister Viktor Orban says is eroding European stability and has been stoked in part by Hungarian-born U.S. financier George Soros. It says its policies are to ensure Hungarians can live in safety.

Orban, seeking a third consecutive term Sunday, has campaigned on a strong anti-migration message, although a U.N. panel expert said the timing of the watchdog’s comments, at the end of a four-week meeting, was not directed at voters.

The U.N. Human Rights Committee voiced concern at “hate crimes and about hate speech in political discourse, the media and on the internet targeting minorities, notably, Roma, Muslims, migrants and refugees, including in the context of government-sponsored campaigns.”

The panel issued its findings and recommendations after its 18 independent experts reviewed Hungary’s record on upholding civil and political rights.

“The concern we saw in Hungary is that sometimes hate speech is accompanied by hate crimes which are directed against minorities and against migrants,” Yuval Shany, the panel vice chair, told Reuters TV.

​Security issue

Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto defended Hungary’s policies, telling the U.N. panel last month: “First and foremost, it is a firm conviction of the government that the Hungarian people have the right to live a life in security, without fear of terrorist atrocities.”

In 2015, the central European country had a “sad experience” when 400,000 migrants passed through on their way to Western Europe, “ignoring all rules,” he said.

The U.N. panel also decried a Hungarian law adopted a year ago that allows for automatically removing all asylum applicants to transit zones for indefinite confinement.

People should be allowed freedom of movement while their asylum claims are examined to see whether they are refugees fleeing war or persecution, the committee said.

The panel added that Hungary should repeal a June 2016 law that enables police to summarily expel anyone entering irregularly.

The committee also voiced concern at the “prevalence of anti-Semitic stereotypes” and how “high-ranking officials have nurtured conspiracy theories relating to George Soros.”

Orban has waged a billboard and media campaign asserting that Soros would “settle millions from Africa and the Middle East,” among other allegations.

Soros, who is Jewish, has rejected the campaign against him as “distortions and lies” meant to create a false external enemy.
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