Iranian diplomats say they expect President Donald Trump to abandon the international deal restricting Tehran’s nuclear activities. They are intensifying their lobbying of European governments, especially the signatories to the agreement, France, Britain and Germany, hoping they can dissuade the U.S. administration from repudiating the agreement.

And in the event the U.S. repudiates the deal, then Tehran is urging Europeans not to join Washington in re-imposing sanctions.

The Iranians say if Europe and the other signatories, Russia and China, stick with the deal and don’t join a renewed sanctions regime, then Tehran will continue to adhere to the agreement.

Iran’s foreign secretary, Mohammad Javad Zarif, highlighted that appeal in an interview with British newspapers published Saturday, warning that if Europe followed Washington’s lead if the Trump administration abandons the deal, Iran would resume uranium enrichment and other aspects of its nuclear program at a more advanced level than before the deal was struck.

Trump on deal

The U.S. State Department is due to certify to Congress in two weeks time whether Iran has been complying with the terms of the deal, formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or JCPOA. Trump has said he has made up his mind already, but hasn’t told European leaders his decision, including Britain’s Theresa May, who asked him reportedly at a bilateral meeting at the UN last month.

Trump has been a stern critic of what his predecessor, Barack Obama, saw as a signature foreign policy achievement.

Dubbing it a “bad deal,” Trump pledged during his campaign for the White House last year to rip up the agreement. And in New York in a speech last month at the UN, he described the deal as an “embarrassment,” saying it was “one of the worst and most one-sided transactions the United States has ever entered into.”

Although the Trump administration has not offered any examples of JCPOA non-compliance by Iran, the belligerency of the President’s comments has heightened impressions that he’s laying the groundwork for the State Department to withhold certification on October 15. The administration is required to report to Congress every 90 days on the deal.

Iran’s intense lobbying effort has two main purposes, say analysts: to get the Europeans to press Washington not to walk away, and in the event President Trump does, to try to ensure the Europeans don’t follow suit — a move that could increase strains between Trump’s Washington and European leaders to a possible breaking point.

European impact

The Europeans would be placed in a lose-lose position, if the U.S. abandons the nuclear deal. Under the agreement’s provisions, any signatory can require the UN Security Council to vote on a resolution to continue the deal’s sanctions relief — a U.S. veto would result in the sanctions on Iran snapping back into place automatically.

That in turn would present the Europeans with the uncomfortable choice of either complying with a UN resolution or re-imposing sanctions against their own policy views. Either way, it would likely compound increasingly tense transatlantic relations.

European signatories to the deal have all publicly defended the nuclear agreement, which placed limits on Iran’s nuclear program designed to prevent Tehran from developing weapons in return for a lifting of international sanctions.

European ambassadors to the U.S. have been highly visible and vocal in Washington in recent days defending the agreement and insisting Iran has remained in compliance. That conclusion was supported last week by U.S. Marine Gen. James Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who in written testimony to a Senate committee said: “The briefings I have received indicate that Iran is adhering to its JCPOA obligations.”

Interviewed by National Public Radio, German envoy Peter Wittig, said Friday: “We believe it would be a mistake to walk away from the deal while Iran is complying.”

European envoys mounted a full-court defense of the nuclear deal last week at a think tank event, arguing Iran is complying with the deal that was struck in July 2015 and implemented since January 2016.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel talked midweek on the phone about Iran with President Trump, expressing her support for the deal. Although, according to German officials, she offered a sympathetic ear to the U.S. leader’s complaints about human rights abuses by Iran and destabilizing activities in the Middle East, including missile development, Tehran’s support for Houthi rebels in Yemen and for groups like Lebanon’s radical Shi’ite movement Hezbollah.

Part of the European lobbying effort on Trump’s Washington — from leaders and envoys — has been to argue that the nuclear deal shouldn’t be sacrificed because of those other areas of concern.

And there has been a quid pro quo hint from the Europeans that they will be more forward-leaning and cooperative with U.S. efforts to contain Iran on other fronts. “European foreign ministers tell me that they would join us in confronting other Iranian misdeeds,” if the Trump administration doesn’t abandon the deal, John Kerry, the former U.S. Secretary of State wrote in an opinion article for the Washington Post published Friday.

“Nothing in the agreement is preventing us from facing the challenges raised by Iran on other issues,” according to French Ambassador Gerard Araud.
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Turkey’s largest foreign military base in the world opened Saturday in Mogadishu, in a ribbon-cutting ceremony attended by Somali leaders, top Turkish military officials and diplomats.

Somali Prime Minister Hassan Ali Khaire and the head of the Turkish military, General Hulusi Akar have jointly inaugurated the 4 square kilometer (1.54 square mile) facility, which holds three military residential complexes, training venues, and sports courts. It had been under construction for the last two years.

General Akar said the base is the biggest sign of how Turkey wants to help Somalia.

“We are committed to help [the] Somali government, and this base will cover the need for building strong Somali National Army. And it is biggest sign showing our relationship.”

Speaking at the inauguration ceremony, Prime Minister Khaire highlighted the significance of the training base for his country.

“Today our country goes to the right direction toward development and the re-establishment of Somali Army, capable and ready for the defense of their nations,” said Khaire “This base is part of that on ongoing effort.”

More than 200 Turkish military personnel will train some 1,500 Somali troops at a time, according to Somalia’s defense Ministry. The Somali prime minister said it will manufacture an inclusive united Somali Army.

“This training base has a unique significance for us because it is a concrete step taken toward building an inclusive and integrated Somali National Army,” said Khaire. “My government and our Somali people will not forget this huge help by our Turkish brothers. This academy will help us train more troops.”

The inauguration ceremony was held amid tight security around the base located in the Jaziira coastal area in southern tip of the capital.

Hulusi Akar, the Turkish Army chief said, “the Turkish government would continue to support our Somali brothers until their country becomes militarily stronger.”

Other diplomats who attended the event said the training is part of an international effort to strengthen the Somali National Army to a point where it can take over security responsibilities from African Union troops currently fighting al-Shabab militants. The African Union has said it wants to begin withdrawing troops from Somalia next year.

Prime Minister Khaire said the base also will help to defeat the extremism and the ideology that drives young Somali men into violence and terrorism.

“To defeat terrorism and fight against the poverty, we have keep in mind that building our national security and eliminating corruption is the key,” he said.

Somalia has a significant number of military personal, but they are ill-trained and poorly equipped. Last week, the government repeated its plea for world leaders to lift an international arms embargo.

The U.S. already had deployed dozens of American soldiers to Mogadishu, and their presence marked the first American military forces in Somalia, except for a small unit of counterterrorism advisers, since March 1994.

The United Arab Emirates also has a military facility where they train the Somali Army, which many politicians condemn for taking orders directly from UAE commanders.

“The good news is not only the opening of this training base but also …that when Turkey trains our troops it will also equip them,” said Somali Military Chief, Ahmed Mohamed Jimale.

Al-Qaida-linked al-Shabab is attempting to overthrow the Somali government and install a strict form of Islamic law throughout the country. On Friday, 30 people were killed when al-Shabab militants stormed a Somali military army base in the town of Barire, 47 kilometers southwest of Mogadishu.

 
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Authorities in Spain have begun sealing off polling stations and confiscating ballots ahead of a planned referendum vote Sunday that possibly could lead to the Catalonian region’s independence.

The Spanish government says there will be no Catalonia independence vote Sunday, even as the regional government continues preparations for the referendum.

Enric Millo, the highest-ranking Spanish security official in the northeastern region, said Saturday police had already blockaded half of the more than 2,300 polling stations designated for the referendum vote.

He said Spanish authorities also had dismantled the technology Catalan officials had planned on using for voting and counting ballots, which he said would make the referendum “absolutely impossible.”

Catalan officials have said they plan to move forward with the vote despite the actions taken by Spain’s central government.

The president of the Catalan National Assembly appealed directly to the “conscience” of police officers deployed to the polling stations while speaking to reporters Saturday.

“I am aware they have a job to do, that they have their orders and have to carry them out. We are aware of that. But we also know that they have feelings, conscience,” he said.

“So tomorrow, when they carry out their orders they will undoubtedly receive, I hope they keep in mind – during the situations they find themselves in — that these could be their children, their mothers or their nephews, members of their family who just want to be able to  express themselves in freedom.”

Spanish Culture Minister Inigo Mendez de Vigo said Friday the independence vote violates Spanish law and the government will not accept the results of the referendum.

“We are open to dialogue within the framework of the law. As you would understand nobody can ask us … to engage in dialogue outside the framework of the law. It’s impossible,” he said. “No European political leader can even consider dealing with an issue that is not in [Spanish] government hands.”

Catalan authorities say they will declare independence from Spain within 48 hours of the vote if residents there choose to secede. The Spanish government has fought the measure and declared the vote illegitimate.

On Friday, Catalan farmers rode tractors through the streets of Barcelona, driving slowly and waving pro-independence flags and banners. The tractors eventually stopped, converging on the regional government building.

At the same time, European Union officials say they will not mediate the dispute between Spain and Catalonia, calling it a matter of Spanish law.

“[It is] a Spanish problem in which we can do little. It’s a problem of respecting Spanish laws that Spaniards have to resolve,” said European Parliament President Antonio Tajani.

European Commission Vice-President Frans Timmermans called on Europeans to respect the constitution and rule of law in their countries. He said people in the EU need to organize themselves “in accordance with the constitution of that member state.”

“That is the rule of law – you abide by the law and the constitution even if you don’t like it,” he said.

Catalan authorities previously had appealed to the EU for help, saying the Spanish government undermined their democratic values.

 
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Officials in far east Russia say a soldier who opened fire at other servicemen during drills has been tracked down and killed.

The military says the soldier, who killed three and wounded two other soldiers, offered resistance to arrest and was shot dead early Saturday following a massive manhunt.

During Friday’s incident, the soldier fired his Kalashnikov rifle at his comrades waiting to have target practice at a base outside the town of Belogorsk near the border with China and then fled.

The city administration in Belogorsk says the soldier came from the province of Dagestan in Russia’s North Caucasus.

Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu has sent a commission to investigate the shooting.
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Kosovo’s president, Hashim Thaci, says U.S. Vice President Mike Pence has pledged that the United States will be directly involved in reaching a final agreement to normalize relations between Kosovo and Serbia. 

Thaci told VOA’s Albanian service after meeting with Pence on Friday at the White House that “Pence will be focused and maximally involved” in reaching a deal between the two countries. 

“I believe that this willingness of the U.S. administration and personally of Vice President Pence is a guarantee for the success of this process,” Thaci said. 

He said he is confident the process will “lead Kosovo into a final agreement of normalization and reconciliation of Kosovo-Serbia relations and would open prospects for Kosovo’s integration into the United Nations.”

A White House statement Friday said Pence “expressed appreciation for Thaci’s leadership, along with Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic, to advance the EU-facilitated dialog to normalize relations between Kosovo and Serbia.”

The White House said Pence and Thaci “agreed on the importance of advancing reforms to strengthen the rule of law, fight corruption and boost economic growth” and said Pence reaffirmed the “United States’ support for a sovereign, democratic and prosperous Kosovo.”

The White House also encouraged Kosovo to ratify the border demarcation agreement with neighboring Montenegro “to resolve this long-standing issue.”

Thaci told VOA that Pence called on Kosovo to solve the issues as soon as possible. He said Kosovo has “good neighborly relations with Montenegro” and stressed the importance of such ties.

“No one can support you if you build bad relationships with your neighbors. We have a lot of problems with Serbia. We cannot open other problems with our neighbors that could cost us the integration processes” with the European Union, he said.

Thaci said the issue is in the hands of Kosovo’s parliament.

The border agreement was signed in 2015 but has not had sufficient support in Kosovo’s parliament for ratification.

The European Union insists Kosovo must approve the border demarcation deal before its citizens enjoy visa-free travel within Europe.

Montenegro has recognized Kosovo’s 2008 declaration of independence from Serbia, but Serbia vehemently opposes it.

VOA’s Albanian service contributed to this report.
…

Russian police released opposition leader and would-be presidential candidate Alexei Navalny on Friday after several hours in detention.

Police charged Navalny with repeatedly organizing unauthorized rallies, an administrative offense punishable with a fine of up to a 300,000 rubles ($5,200) and compulsory work for up to 200 hours.

“We were finally presented with a charge and released, and the trial will be on October 2 at the Simonovsky Court of Moscow at 15:00 Moscow time,” Navalny’s lawyer, Olga Mikhailova, told Interfax.

Police had stopped Navalny early Friday as he was headed to a campaign rally in the city of Nizhny Novgorod, where at least one other rally leader was also detained — Navalny’s campaign chief, Leonid Volkov. 

“I’m in a police station now and they’re going to accuse me of repeated violation of the procedure for holding a mass event,” Navalny told VOA’s Russian service reporter Danila Galperovich earlier Friday. “It means almost for sure they will arrest me after the court will hear my case. I don’t know when.”

Police in Nizhny Novgorod, about 260 miles (417 kilometers) east of Moscow, had cordoned off the campaign rally site hours before the event was to begin and removed a Navalny campaign tent.

Despite the police actions, hundreds of Navalny’s supporters rallied Friday in the provincial city in protest. Images from social media showed protesters walking on a central street while loud music from an officially sanctioned concert blared nearby. 

Call for reform

Navalny’s detention came as the Council of Europe’s commissioner for human rights issued a memorandum saying Russian authorities should revise the country’s freedom of assembly law, which, he says, has become more restrictive in recent years.

“As a result, the authorities have rejected a high number of requests to hold public assemblies,” said Commissioner Nils Muiznieks in the published memorandum. “Over the past year, there have been many arrests of people participating in protests, even if they did not behave unlawfully, as well as a growing intolerance toward ‘unauthorized’ events involving small numbers of participants and even of single-person demonstrations. 

“This runs counter to Russia’s obligations under the European Convention on Human Rights and it weakens the guarantees contained in its own Constitution concerning the right to freedom of assembly,” Muiznieks said.

Russia is one of 47 member countries in the Council of Europe, the continent’s leading human rights organization, but routinely dismisses its criticism.

‘Trend toward deterioration’

Navalny and his anti-corruption campaign team have been harassed and attacked numerous times by police and Kremlin supporters. In April, a man threw a chemical sanitizer in the Russian opposition leader’s face, causing a chemical burn that required eye surgery and left him partially blind.

Navalny supporter Nikolai Lyaskin was reportedly attacked in Moscow this month with an iron pipe.

In an exclusive interview with VOA reporter Galperovich on September 26, Navalny expressed dismay at the repressive trend.  

“We currently see a trend toward deterioration: At first it was fines, then administrative arrests, and now it is fabrication of criminal charges [and] house arrest,” he said.

Navalny said the trend is reminiscent of how Soviet leader Josef Stalin’s Great Purge began in 1937.

“The capabilities of propaganda are mostly exhausted: You turn on the TV, which from morning until night is talking about beautiful North Korea, awful Ukraine, ‘gay’ Europe, et cetera. It is already impossible there [on TV] to fan the flames higher. Therefore, they are using repression to take people off the streets, to intimidate them,” Navalny said.

Challenging Putin

Navalny plans to challenge Vladimir Putin in Russia’s March presidential election, though Putin has made no official announcement to run in a bid to continue his 17 years as leader.

The Russian opposition leader has been campaigning in cities across the country despite the central election commission declaring him ineligible because of a suspended prison sentence. Navalny’s supporters and numerous independent analysts back up his view that the sentence was politically motivated.

The Council of Europe’s Committee of Ministers on September 21 demanded that Navalny be allowed to take part in the elections and that the fraud case against him and opposition politician Pyotr Ofitserov be re-examined.

In the interview Tuesday with Galperovich, Navalny expressed doubt that Russian authorities would act on the European ministers’ demand.

“I do not think that international structures can affect that much; at least, we have not in recent years seen international structures somehow straightforwardly affecting the internal political situation in Russia,” Navalny said.

But he said the resolution was satisfying nonetheless. “It is probably the best of all possible rulings we could hope for,” he said. “It quite clearly and distinctly shows that, first of all, the ruling of the European Court of Human Rights was not implemented and, secondly, that there is a demand there for my admission to the elections.”

The European Court of Human Rights had demanded Navalny’s 2013 fraud case be retried because it violated the defendant’s right to a fair trial. Russia’s Supreme Court ordered a retrial in July that resulted in the same verdict and a suspended sentence.
…

Catalonia’s secessionists, who are trying to organize an independence vote from Spain on Sunday, may be getting aid from Russia as part of the Kremlin’s ongoing strategy to destabilize the European Union, according to European Union analysts.

Spain’s central government has deployed thousands of police to contain expected disorder. They have threatened local officials who support the referendum with stiff fines and jail. Spain’s constitutional court has declared the pending vote illegal.

Despite what some see as a heavy-handed response by Madrid, the United States and most EU governments have backed Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy in his efforts to keep Spain united.

Russian state media have disseminated reports consistently favorable to Catalan independence in a move some analysts consider to be Moscow’s latest attempt to interfere in Western electoral processes.

The Kremlin has taken no public position on the referendum, calling it an “internal” matter for Spain.

Russia’s use of hacked information and dissemination of “fake news,” however, has been detected in recent Western electoral events,  including the 2016 U.S. elections, Britain’s decision to leave the EU, or Brexit, and the just-concluded German elections.

“It’s not that Russia necessarily wants the independence of Catalonia. What it’s principally seeking is to foment divisions to gradually undermine Europe’s democracy and institutions,” said Brett Schaffer, an analyst of the Alliance to Safeguard Democracy, a project supported by the German Marshall Fund, which monitors pro-Kremlin information networks.

The Russian social media outlet Voice of Europe (@V_of_Europe) has run such headlines as “The EU refuses to intervene in Catalonia even as Spain violates basic human rights,” calling Catalonia’s referendum “a time bomb that threatens to destroy the EU.”

The internationally broadcast Russian Television, or RT, alleged on September 20 that a “state of siege” has been imposed on Catalonia and dubbed cruise liners chartered to house additional police agents being deployed to the Catalonia as “Ships of Repression.”

The Russian digital newspaper Vzglyad borrowed a page from the Western media’s treatment of uprisings against Soviet domination in Eastern Europe during the Cold War, with the September 20 headline “Spain brutally suppresses the Catalan Spring.”

Some editorials and Kremlin-sponsored academics took note of how the U.S. and EU neglected to recognize a Russian-sponsored Crimean referendum approving reunification with Russia and compared that with their current indifference toward the Catalan vote.

Catalan secessionist politician Enric Folch, who is international secretary of the Catalan Solidarity Party for Independence, has said on Russian media that a Catalan state would support Moscow in world forums and recognize the independence of territories of Abkhasia and South Ossetia, which separated from Georgia with Russian support.

Folch was a star participant at a Kremlin-sponsored conference of independence movements in Moscow last year.

David Alendete, an investigative reporter with the newspaper El Pais, said the conference was organized by a Russian lawyer who is defending Russian computer hackers arrested in Spain and is wanted by the FBI in connection with the hacking of Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential election campaign in the U.S.
…

To the untrained eye, the Scottish wildcat looks quite similar to a normal domestic cat. But it is a unique species, and it could become extinct. As VOA’s Kevin Enochs reports, the greatest threat to these cats is other cats.
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The influx of more than a million asylum-seekers into Germany in 2015 is widely seen as driving the upsurge of the anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany or AfD party, which gained 13 percent of the vote in Sunday’s election. The government hopes to stem that rise by integrating the refugees as quickly as possible. Henry Ridgwell visited Berlin and spoke to some of the newcomers about their experience settling in Germany and their feelings over the success of the AfD.
…

North Korean overseas workers are feeling the heat as countries are stepping up their efforts to implement U.N. sanctions against their motherland.

On Wednesday, the Polish foreign ministry told VOA’s Korea Service that Poland does not intend to issue new work permits to North Korean workers to comply with the two latest U.N. Security Council resolutions. These measures were passed in response to the Kim Jong Un regime’s long-range intercontinental ballistic missile launches and sixth nuclear test.

“The Ministry of the Family, Labour and Social Policy has sent out a communication to voivodship [provincial] offices asking them to withhold all decisions regarding applications for work permits concerning [North Korean] citizens,” the foreign ministry said in an email to VOA, “until the process of transposition and development of a common position by European Union member states regarding the scope and method of implementing the resolution is completed.”

Fewer North Koreans working in Poland

With not one work visa being issued to a North Korean national in 2016 and 2017, the number of North Koreans employed in Poland stood at about 400 as of January this year, a decline from 550 in July last year, according to the Polish government’s estimates. In 2014, the Polish consul in Pyongyang issued 147 work visas, and in 2015, 129 such visas were issued.

The Polish foreign ministry said Poland, which is one of the European Union countries that hires many North Korean laborers, does not have any systemic measures in place that would prevent citizens of other countries, including North Koreans, from taking up work in the country, imposing a work ban would represent “an unequivocal demonstration of discrimination on the grounds of nationality.”

“In this context, we welcomed Resolution 2371 of 5 August 2017 and 2375 of 11 September 2017, the first to refer to the employment of [North Korean] citizens abroad in so decisive terms,” the ministry said.

Since North Korea has long been accused of using money paid to its overseas workers to finance its weapons programs, the two latest U.N. resolutions for the first time included restrictive measures on North Korean laborers abroad, first banning the hiring of additional North Korean workers, then barring the renewal of their work contracts when they expire.

Residency permits not renewed

Similar action was taken by Kuwaiti authorities, who have stopped issuing entry visas of any kind to North Korean nationals and forbidding them from transferring their residency permits from one company to another, according to the country’s implementation report on U.N. Security Council resolution 2371 submitted to the council in late August.

“Expired residency permits are not renewed, and permit holders are requested to leave the country promptly once the permit has expired,” reads the report.

Also taking heed of the Security Council resolutions on North Korea are Senegal and Qatar. Senegal suspended the issuance of entry and short-stay visas to North Korean workers. Qatar discontinued issuing the approvals of employment requests and the renewal of residence of workers.

Jenny Lee contributed to this report.
…

More than 20 migrants or refugees were rescued and one child died Thursday on a Greek island after the boat they set sail in overnight from the nearby Turkish coast either capsized or sank, Greek authorities said.

A vessel from the European border agency Frontex patrolling the area initially picked up six people – one man, two women and three children – it spotted in the sea off the small southeastern island of Kastellorizo in the early hours of Thursday, the Greek coast guard said. The six were transported to land immediately because one of the children, a 9-year-old girl, needed medical attention, but she later died, the coast guard said. Another four of the survivors were hospitalized.

Greek authorities launched a search operation with patrol boats and a helicopter, and crews later found and rescued another 20 people – five children, two women and 13 men – who had managed to swim to a rocky coast on the island. One of the group was also hospitalized.

It was unclear what type of vessel the migrants had used and whether it sank or capsized. The coast guard said all on board had been accounted for and there were no missing people reported. Those injured were being transported to a hospital on the island of Rhodes.

Greece was the preferred route for refugees and migrants fleeing war and poverty in their homelands to seek access into the European Union until last year, when an EU-Turkey deal drastically reduced the number of people heading to Greek islands from the Turkish coast.

Despite the deal and the overcrowded conditions in the camps on the Greek islands, hundreds still make the journey every week, using often unseaworthy and overcrowded inflatable dinghies or small wooden boats.
…

A top Moldovan official says its parliament plans to amend the constitution to explicitly state that joining the European Union is a key goal for the ex-Soviet republic.

Moldova, located between Ukraine and Romania, has been divided between moving closer to the EU and returning to the Russian orbit.

Parliament speaker Andrian Candu acknowledged that Moldovans lost confidence in pro-European politicians after some of them were accused of involvement in the looting of $1 billion from Moldovan banks in 2014. But he says trust is slowly being restored with a series of anti-corruption measures.

The ruling Democratic Party says changing the constitution will clarify Moldova’s future regardless of election results and other developments.

Many Moldovans favor closer relations with Russia. Pro-Russian President Igor Dodon was elected last year.

 
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Catalonia’s foreign affairs chief has appealed for support from the European Union before a disputed referendum calling for independence from Spain.

Raul Romeva, speaking to journalists Thursday in Brussels, said that EU institutions need to “understand that this is a big issue.” Romeva spoke a day after Catalan regional president Carles Puigdemont accused the EU, in an interview with The Associated Press , of “turning its back” on Catalonia in its conflict with Spain’s central government.

Romeva accused the Spanish government of a “brutal crackdown” on Catalan officials to try to prevent Sunday’s referendum, which Spain considers to be illegal, and that it’s “generated an unprecedented level of shock.”

He said that he doesn’t expect violence, because “it’s not in the Catalan DNA to use violence to solve political problems.”

 
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In a sign of rapidly deepening ties, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan will welcome his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, to the presidential palace in Ankara Thursday for talks on Syria and a growing range of other issues that are prompting the two to set aside their differences.

A packed agenda is testament to an improved and growing relationship between the two countries. “Talks will focus on the Turkish decision to buy a Russian made S400 anti-missile system, but it’s not limited to that; the future of Syria will be discussed,” said Sinan Ulgen, an analyst at Carnegie Europe in Brussels. “The consequences of the Kurdish regional government independence referendum will be discussed. There are also large projects, one being Russia’s building of Akkuyu nuclear power plants in Turkey,” Ulgen said.   

Turkey last month announced the purchase of the S400 system, raising concerns among the country’s NATO partners. Adding to those concerns is the speed of the courtship. Bilateral relations were in a deep freeze following Turkey’s downing of a Russian bomber that was operating from a Syrian airbase in 2015.

Signals to NATO and Washington

Rapprochement efforts with Moscow coincided with Ankara’s growing disenchantment with some of its Western allies, especially Washington. “Erdogan will want to use Thursday’s meeting (with Putin) to demonstrate, to its partners in the West, that Turkey has the option of becoming more convergent with Russia if the relationship with the West continues to be under duress,” Ulgen said.

Washington’s support of the Syrian Kurdish militia YPG in its fight against Islamic State militants remains a major point of tension with Ankara. The Turkish government considers the Kurdish militia terrorists who are linked to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, a separatist group that has been waging a decades-long war in southeastern Turkey.

The Syrian civil war will be the focus of Thursday’s talks between Putin and Erdogan. While Ankara and Moscow are backing rival sides in the conflict, the two sides are increasingly cooperating. Erdogan and Putin are expected to discuss the enforcement of last month’s three-way deal with Iran to introduce a de-escalation zone in the Syrian Idlib region, the last major center of opposition.

A pragmatic approach

What matters for Turkey is avoiding what Ulgen said could be a nightmare scenario in the region.

“The nightmare scenario is (if) Russia-backed regime forces would attack Idlib. Turkish forces would be faced with a quandary: some of the forces that Turkey backed in the past have now found refuge in Idlib; either Turkey would have to move into Idlib to protect them or open its border to save some of these people,” Ulgen said. “At the same time, Ankara knows full well that most of these people are affiliated with groups of extreme Islam, radical Islam, so Ankara doesn’t want to open its border to these people,”  he said.

Many observers see Moscow as having the upper hand in its relations with Ankara, something that will be put to use as Russia seeks to protect significant commercial interests in the region. They say Putin will want to use his leverage to defuse growing tensions following the Iraqi Kurds’ referendum vote in favor of independence this week. Erdogan has condemned the poll and warned that Turkey may close an oil pipeline that carries Iraqi Kurdish oil to world markets via the Turkish Mediterranean port of Ceyhan.

“Russia has become the No. 1 partner of Iraqi Kurdistan,” said Aydin Selcen, a former senior Turkish diplomat, pointing to lucrative deals between Iraqi Kurds and the Russian state-owned oil firm Rosneft. “Rosneft boss, Mr. Igor Sechin, is one of the closest allies to Putin and the (Iraqi Kurds).”

Analysts said Thursday’s meeting, and the images of two leaders getting along, suit the current agendas of both men. “This is a pragmatic and transactional relationship which we see,” Ulgen said, “but with a political underpinning, where both leaders Putin and Erdogan are almost instrumentalizing this relationship, to demonstrate and to make a point to the West.”
…

Russian President Vladimir Putin announced Wednesday that Russia would destroy all its chemical weapons on this day, hailing the move as a “historic event.”

“Today the last chemical ammunition from Russia’s chemical weapon stockpile will be destroyed,” Putin said in a televised address. “This is a huge step toward making the modern world more balanced and safe.”

Noting that Moscow managed to destroy the ammunition three years ahead of schedule, Putin went on to criticize Washington for not following suit.

The U.S. “unfortunately is not carrying out its obligations when it comes to the timeframe of destroying chemical weapons — they pushed back the liquidation timeframe already three times,” Russian news agencies quoted Putin as saying.

Putin said the United States cites a lack of financial resources for pushing back its timeframe.
…

A court on Wednesday found a Crimean dissident opposed to Russia’s annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea guilty of separatism and sentenced him to two years in a prison colony, a punishment supporters said amounted to a death penalty for such an ill man.

Ilmi Umerov was deputy head of the Crimean Tatars’ semi-official Mejlis legislature before it was suspended by Moscow after it took control of the peninsula in 2014, a move condemned by the West and Ukraine.

State prosecutors had accused the 60-year-old of making statements that undermined Russia’s territorial integrity by calling in an interview for an end to Russian control of Crimea.

Umerov, who suffers from Parkinson’s disease and attacks of high blood pressure, said he did oppose Russia’s annexation but that the interview which prosecutors objected to had been badly translated and his words distorted.

His lawyer, Mark Feygin, said on social media that he would appeal Wednesday’s verdict which was delivered by a court in Simferopol, the Crimean capital.

Feygin said he hoped Western countries would put pressure on Russia to try to quash the verdict. “His dispatch to a prison colony would mean his death,” he said of his client.

The Tatars, a mainly Muslim community that makes up about 15 percent of Crimea’s population, have largely opposed Russian rule in the peninsula and say the 2014 annexation was illegal, a view supported by the West.

Moscow says the overwhelming majority of Crimeans voted to join Russia in a proper and fair referendum.

Feygin, Umerov’s lawyer, posted a video on social media in which his client said he still thought Crimea should be returned to Ukraine.

Ahtem Chiygoz, another Crimean Tatar leader, was found guilty of stirring up anti-Russian protests earlier this month and jailed for eight years, a move Ukraine’s president called an act of Russian repression.

A U.N. human rights report said on Monday that Russia had committed grave human rights violations in Crimea, including its imposition of citizenship and by deporting prisoners. Moscow said it deemed those allegations “groundless”.
…

U.S. President Donald Trump has come out unequivocally in favor of Spanish unity, just days before voters in the Catalan region are slated to vote on independence from Madrid.

At a joint news conference Tuesday with Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy in a sweltering White House Rose Garden, Trump said he would bet most Catalonians want unity.

“I’m just for a united Spain,” Trump said. “I really think the people of Catalonia would stay with Spain. I think it would be foolish not to.”

Trump’s comments appear to go against official U.S. government policy. State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said this month the United States would not take a position on the Catalan vote.

The Catalan government is pushing ahead with preparations for Sunday’s vote, even after the government declared the balloting illegal and Spain’s Constitutional Court suspended the referendum law.

The Spanish leader, speaking after Trump, cautioned Catalan separatists not to push ahead with their independence plans.

“The decision to unilaterally declare independence is not a decision I would make,” Rajoy told reporters. “It’s a decision which will have to be made or not by the Catalan government. I think it would be very wrong.”

The prime minister said holding a referendum next Sunday would be impossible.

“There isn’t an electoral committee, there isn’t a team at the Catalan government organizing the referendum, there aren’t ballots, there aren’t people at the voting stations — so it’s just crazy,” he said.

Rajoy said under those circumstances, the result would not be valid, and would only be a distraction.

“The only thing it’s doing is generating division, tensions, and it’s not contributing in any way to the citizens’ situation,” he said.

Trump said he could not predict whether the referendum would be held, even as he follows developments in the independence-minded province.

“I’ve been watching that unfold. But it’s actually been unfolding for centuries and I think that nobody knows if they’re going to have a vote,” he said.

“I think the president [Rajoy is considered president of the Spanish government] would say they’re not going to have a vote, but I think that the people would be very much opposed to that,” Trump told reporters. “I can say only speaking for myself, I would like to see Spain continue to be united.”

Catalonia divided

Opinion polls suggest that Catalonia’s population of more than 7 million is divided on the independence question. Catalan officials have said they would declare independence within days if voters approve the referendum.

At Tuesday’s news conference, Rajoy, whose country was victimized by an Islamic State-sponsored attack in August that killed 16 people in the Catalan capital, Barcelona, said he and Trump had spent a considerable amount of their meeting talking about terrorism.

“We’ve been hit by jihadi terrorist attacks on our soil,” he told reporters, noting that the two countries cooperate closely on anti-terrorism strategies. “We still need to do a lot in the area of intelligence, we need to improve coordination mechanisms in the area of cybersecurity or preventing recruitment and financing of terrorists.”

Rajoy also expressed support for Trump’s tough response to North Korea’s provocative nuclear missile tests, despite fears in some quarters that it could lead to war.

“No one wishes war anywhere in the world,” Rajoy said. “But it’s true that the recent events in North Korea, with implications in the neighboring countries, very important countries, it means that we all have to be forceful.

“Those of us who defend the values of democracy, freedom and human rights have to let North Korea know that it isn’t going anywhere in that direction,” the Spanish leader said.
…

As China battles the twin challenges of rapid city growth and extreme weather, it is adopting a new tactic: turning its cities into giant sponges.

Thirty pilot cities in the country are trying to trap and hold more water to deal with such problems as flooding, drought, extreme heat and pollution.

The effort, launched by Chinese President Xi Jinping, relies on a range of innovations, such as green roofs on buildings and more urban wetlands. It is already being hailed as a bold step to solve some of the environmental problems plaguing the world’s most populous country.

“It’s a timely reminder that dealing with urban climate challenges requires a holistic approach,” said Sunandan Tiwari, a sustainable urban development expert at ICLEI (Local Governments for Sustainability), a global network of 1,500 cities, towns and regions.

People and water

Like many other large urban areas, Chinese cities are grappling with both rapid urbanization — more than half of the country’s population lives in urban areas — and extreme weather, such as severe floods, water shortages and heat waves.

Both problems can leave more people at risk,but the sponge city effort, launched in 2015, aims to reduce the threats.

The pilot cities have been charged with finding ways to absorb, store, filter and purify rainwater, retain it within their boundaries, and release it for reuse when needed instead of channeling it away through sewers and tunnels.

The cities, including Beijing, Shenzhen and Shanghai, receive funds and practical help to redesign their urban areas in a water-sensitive way, with the aim of turning 80 percent of China’s urban areas into sponges by 2030.

Flood control and water conservation, among other issues, are at the heart of the ambitious push.

But sponge cities have another benefit that looks set to become a major plus as urban areas in China and around the world get hotter: They can reduce the impact of heat waves, which are more pronounced in built-up areas, where concrete and asphalt trap heat.

Trees and other plants absorb water and then release it through evaporation. That creates a cooling effect, in the same way that sweat evaporating from skin cools people.

“Cooling is largely seen as a co-benefit of sponge cities. But with record temperatures in China and many parts of the world, it is becoming a key element in planning for climate-resilient cities,” said Boping Chen, China director at the Hamburg-based World Future Council, a think tank.

Getting hotter

Shanghai, China’s most populous city with 24 million people, baked under a record high temperature of 40.9 degrees Celsius (105 degrees Fahrenheit) last July, even as southern China was hit by torrential rain and floods.

Efforts to build sponge cities aim to deal with both problems, and improve life for city residents.

“It’s not just about limiting the damage of flooding, it’s also about coping with rising temperatures, improving urban biodiversity, better public health and quality of life,” Tiwari, of ICLEI, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

Measures taken in sponge cities include covering buildings with green roofs and facades and creating urban wetlands and trenches to filter runoff water that can be used to replenish aquifers, irrigate gardens and urban farms, flush toilets and clean homes.

The government has allocated each pilot city between 400 million yuan and 600 million yuan ($60 million to $90 million) each year for three consecutive years, and cities are encouraged to raise matching funds through public-private partnerships and other financial ventures, according to a 2017 study in the journal Water.

Lingang, in Shanghai’s Pudong district, has invested 800 million yuan in a 79-square-kilometer (30-square-mile) area it hopes will become China’s largest sponge city — one that experts say could be a model for other cities lacking modern water infrastructure.

Lingang aims to cover rooftops with plants, create wetlands for rainwater storage, and create permeable pavements that store runoff water, allowing it to evaporate to moderate temperatures.

Shanghai also announced last year the construction of 400,000 square meters of rooftop gardens, alongside other measures to green the city.

“Many of the sponge cities have done really well, but it is a long-term task that needs to be done in a systematic way,” said the World Future Council’s Chen.

Forest cities

While China faces formidable financial and logistical challenges to creating sponge cities, Italian architect Stefano Boeri has plans to make “forest cities” in the country.

Boeri, who made headlines when he covered two residential tower blocks in Milan with 800 trees, 4,500 shrubs and 15,000 other plants, has won planning approval to build a forest city in Liuzhou in southern China.

Conceived as a green metropolis, the city will house 30,000 people, and all its buildings will be covered entirely with plants and trees, said Boeri, who declined to give a cost estimate for the project.

In total, Liuzhou’s forest city aims to host 40,000 trees and almost 1 million plants from more than 100 species, planted over buildings to improve air quality, decrease temperatures and contribute to biodiversity, Boeri said.

The city is expected to absorb almost 10,000 tons of carbon dioxide — the equivalent emissions of 2,000 passenger cars driven for a year — and 57 tons of pollutants per year. The greenery will also produce 900 tons of oxygen every year, Boeri said.

He is working with botanists and engineers to create a high-nutrient soil mixture able to retain water while still keeping weight to a minimum.

“Bringing forests into the city is one of the most radical and efficient ways to deal with climate change,” Boeri told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

“We sometimes joke and say we’re building houses for trees,” he said.

To increase energy self-sufficiency, solar panels on the roofs will collect renewable energy to power the buildings, while geothermal energy — heat and cooling drawn from constant temperatures underground — will power air conditioning, adding to the project’s green appeal.

Boeri also aims to build vertical forests, similar to the one in Milan, in Nanjing, Shanghai and Shenzhen in China and in other parts of the world.

Nature at work

While China’s sponge city program is the most ambitious of its kind, urban planners have embraced nature-based solutions to heat and water worries in other parts of the world, too.

The sponge city initiative takes inspiration from the North American concept of low-impact development, sustainable urban drainage systems in Europe and water-sensitive urban design in Australia and New Zealand, all of which mimic nature’s water cycle.

The southern German city of Stuttgart, prone to high summer temperatures and air pollution, also has been a pioneer of using nature to adapt to climate change.

Officials there published a climate adaptation plan in 2012, but planners have been thinking about the valley city’s microclimate as far back as 1938, according to Hans-Wolf Zirkwitz, head of Stuttgart’s Office for Environmental Protection.

“Even before we knew about climate change, our planning has been optimized with regards to the climate and improving air quality, because of our local climate conditions,” Zirkwitz told the Thomson Reuters Foundation in emailed comments.

City officials, for instance, have created green ventilation corridors to enable fresh air to sweep down from the city’s surrounding hills and building regulations that aim to keep these corridors free from new construction.

Thanks to a combination of mandatory building requirements and subsidies, the city of about 600,000 people also is a European green roof pioneer, with more than 60 percent of its area covered by greenery to absorb pollutants and reduce heat.
…

Spain’s government said on Tuesday police would take control of voting booths in Catalonia to help thwart the region’s planned independence referendum that Madrid has declared illegal.

The dispute has plunged Spain into one of its biggest political crises since the restoration of democracy in the 1970s after decades of military dictatorship.

Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy has said the referendum is against the law and the constitutional court has ordered it be halted while its legality is determined. Catalonia’s separatist government, however, remains committed to holding it on Sunday.

Rajoy, speaking on Tuesday alongside U.S. President Donald Trump in Washington, said it would be “ridiculous” if the affluent northeastern region declared independence from Spain.

Trump said he opposed the referendum and wanted a united Spain. “I really think the people of Catalonia would stay with Spain. I think it would be foolish not to,” he told reporters.

Senior Spanish government officials said on Tuesday authorities had done enough to prevent a meaningful referendum as Catalonia lacked an election commission, ballot boxes, ballot papers, a transparent census and election material.

Logistics have been dismantled

“Today we can affirm that there will be no effective referendum in Catalonia. All the referendum’s logistics have been dismantled,” the Spanish government’s representative in Catalonia, Enric Millo, told reporters in Barcelona.

Catalonia’s prosecutor has ordered the regional police — known as the Mossos d’Esquadra — to take control of any voting booths by Saturday, a spokesman for the Madrid government’s Catalan delegation said.

In an order to police issued on Monday, the prosecutor’s office said they would take the names of anyone participating in the vote and confiscate relevant documents.

Anyone in possession of the keys or entrance codes to a polling booth could be considered a collaborator to crimes of disobedience, malfeasance and misappropriation of funds, the order said.

Unrelenting opposition

The Madrid government has in recent weeks taken political and legal measures to prevent the referendum by exerting more control over the use of public funds in Catalonia and arresting regional officials. Hundreds of police reinforcements have been brought into Barcelona and other cities.

Madrid has also threatened fines against bureaucrats working on the ballot, including the region’s election commission, which was dissolved last week.

These actions have provoked mass demonstrations and drawn accusations from Catalan leaders that the Madrid government was resorting to the repression of the Franco dictatorship.

Catalan government to hold election

A “yes” vote is likely, given that most of the 40 percent of Catalans who polls show support independence are expected to cast ballots while most of those against it are not.

But the unrelenting opposition from Madrid means such a result would go all but unrecognized, potentially setting up a new phase of the dispute.

The Catalan regional government, which plans to declare independence within 48 hours of a “yes” victory, maintained on Tuesday the vote will go ahead and it sent out notifications to Catalans to man polling booths across the region.

Many had not yet received information about where or when they would be working after the state-run postal service was ordered to stop all mail related to the vote, a parliamentary spokeswoman for one separatist party said.
…

Russia’s proposal for United Nations peacekeepers to be sent to Ukraine shows that the Kremlin is interested in negotiating a resolution to the three-year-old conflict, said the United States special envoy for Ukraine Kurt Volker.

“I take the point of view that Russia would not have proposed anything if they weren’t prepared to get into a negotiation about it,” said Volker in an interview Monday with VOA’s Ukrainian Service chief Myroslava Gongadze.

“They haven’t done anything for three years on this. They haven’t proposed a peacekeeping force before. As recently as a couple weeks ago, they were saying that they would never want the U.N. there. So, the fact that they opened this conversation, to me, is an indication that they are willing to discuss it.”

The Ukraine crisis began in March 2014 when Russian special forces took over Ukrainian military bases in Crimea. Subsequent Russian military support for Russia-leaning separatists in eastern Ukraine fueled an ongoing conflict with the Ukrainian military that has so far left more than 10,000 people dead.

Russia’s proposal earlier this month at the U.N. called for peacekeepers along the line of conflict in eastern Ukraine, but not along the Russia-Ukraine border where weapons and fighters can easily cross.

Volker called it a “very narrow concept” that would have the effect of dividing the country even further.

“That’s not acceptable to anybody and does not restore the territory,” he said. “On the other hand, if we can establish a peacekeeping force and build that concept into one that is covering the entire contested area, that is containing heavy weapons and that is controlling the Ukraine-Russian border from the Ukrainian side, then there is a lot of promise in that.”

“That’s where both governments are right now seeing whether it is possible to expand this concept into one that would be truly meaningful and helpful,” he added.

Russia’s growing costs

Russia’s costs for maintaining the conflict in Ukraine have only gone up while benefits the Kremlin may have expected have not panned out, said Volker. Russia has lost influence in Ukraine while Western support for Kyiv has increased along with sanctions against Moscow.

“So, for all of these reasons, the costs are increasing. Even the financial costs of just maintaining the Donbas, and they’re not getting anything out of it. So, that at least opens the door to thinking maybe Russia would like to try something else,” Volker said.

“Ultimately, I think it really boils down to Russia’s decision-making,” he added. “Do they want to resolve the crisis in Ukraine, get their forces out, and re-establish Ukraine’s territorial integrity or, do they not want to do that? If they want to dig in and create another Abkhazia [breakaway region of Georgia supported by Russia], they can do it. But, that’s a very costly proposition for Russia.”

A 2015 peace deal Russia signed with Ukraine, Germany, and France in Minsk has failed to come to fruition as Kyiv and Moscow blame each other for not moving on the plan.

“The problem with the Minsk agreement is that it was becoming a circular argument that was going nowhere,” said Volker. “The Russians are saying ‘no, Ukraine has to do the political steps.’ Ukraine says, ‘it can’t do the political steps because it can’t even access the territory.’ And, then how can we go to the Rada [Ukrainian parliament] and get a vote when nothing has happened on a ceasefire in three years. So, it’s stuck that way and I think, in some respects, some of the actors found that to be conveniently stuck.”

Volker said the U.S. role was to try to unstick the Minsk deal.

“If we can get to a more strategic level of decision-making with Russia and, frankly, with our European partners and with Ukraine, then if we can create political will, Minsk is a perfectly fine vehicle for implementation,” he said.

In August, the U.S. envoy met with Kremlin aide Vladislav Surkov in Minsk.  Surkov is considered the architect of Russia’s strategy on Ukraine and its military backing for separatists in eastern Ukraine’s Donbas region.

Status quo:  Bad for all

“When we met in August, one of the things we agreed is that the status quo is not good for anybody,” said Volker. “It’s not good for Russia, it’s not good for Ukraine, it’s not good for the people of the Donbas. So we should be exploring to see if there is something else that would be better.”

More than 10,000 people have been killed in eastern Ukraine since fighting between government forces and Russia-backed separatists broke out in early 2014.

Volker said the U.S. is still considering supplying lethal, defensive weapons to Ukraine’s military forces.

“I don’t have anything new to say on timing of this sort of thing [possibly selling lethal, defensive weapons to Ukraine],” he said. “But, I can say that it’s taken very seriously in the administration and there are people working very hard at it.”

Volker said the U.S. would seek progress in eastern Ukraine separate from the issue of Crimea, the Black Sea peninsula that Russia annexed from Ukraine in March 2014.

“If we are able to make progress in one area  the Donbas  let’s do it. Let’s make progress, let’s see if we can get that territory back,” he said. “At the same that doesn’t change at all our refusal to accept the annexation of Crimea and grant any legitimacy to Russia’s actions.”

Budapest memorandum

The U.S. envoy acknowledged more should have been done to back up the 1994 Budapest Memorandum, which was signed when he was a mid-level diplomat at the U.S. Embassy in Budapest and should have prevented Russia taking Crimea.

“The only country violating the Budapest Memorandum is Russia. So, France didn’t invade Ukraine. U.K. didn’t invade Ukraine. Only Russia invaded Ukraine,” Volker said.

Ukraine agreed to give up its Soviet-era nuclear weapons in return for guarantees of territorial integrity and sovereignty under the deal signed by Russia, the U.K., and U.S. But, when Russian forces began taking over Ukraine’s Crimea military bases, none of those who signed the memorandum attempted to stop them.

“We should have done more immediately,” said Volker. “It’s important for Ukraine itself. It’s important for the principle that it establishes about non-proliferation of nuclear weapons. And, so, unfortunately, when Russia invaded, we didn’t do enough on that.”

The U.S. envoy said all that can been done now is go forward to help restore Ukraine’s territorial integrity. “If we do that, we’ll be taking a step towards the fulfillment of Budapest,” he said.

Peacekeeping Forces

Volker, who President Donald Trump made special envoy in July, shot down suggestions that Russians could be among any peacekeepers deployed to Ukraine.

“I think the U.N. standards themselves are that neighboring countries should not be involved in peacekeeping in neighboring states,” he said. “And, certainly in this case since Russia has been a party to the conflict it would clearly not make sense.”

Despite much evidence to the contrary, the Kremlin maintains it is not involved in the military conflict in eastern Ukraine, known as the Donbas.

VOA’s Myroslava Gongadze contributed to this report.
…

Turkey’s state-run news agency says a court in Istanbul has ordered a columnist for Turkey’s main opposition newspaper released from prison pending the conclusion of his trial.

Anadolu Agency reported that the court released Cumhuriyet columnist Kadri Gursel from pre-trial detention on Monday.

Anadolu says the court ruled that four other newspaper employees, including editor-in-chief Murat Sabuncu and investigative journalist Ahmet Sik, would remain in custody.

The trial was adjourned until Oct. 31.

Prosecutors have charged 19 Cumhuriyet employees with “sponsoring terror organizations” that include Kurdish militants and the network of the U.S.-based cleric the government blames for a coup attempt last year.   

Kemal Aydogdu, who did not work for Cumhuriyet and is suspected of using a Twitter handle critical of the government, also was ordered to stay in detention.

 
…

The Alternative for Germany party has pledged to use its platform in parliament to “reclaim the country and its people.” The AfD won nearly 14 percent of the vote in Sunday’s election, giving them 94 seats.

Many believed the turmoil of the 20th century had immunized Germany from a return of far-right politics, but Sunday’s result proved them wrong.

For the group’s opponents who gathered to protest the result in Berlin, the Alternative for Germany’s anti-migrant agenda has parallels with the Nazis’ rise to power.

“It is the first time since after the war that a racist and neo-Nazi party is in parliament,” said one protester. “So that is really worrying to us. And this reminds everyone of 1933.”

Jewish groups were among those expressing fear over the results.

The AfD’s co-leader, Alexander Gauland, has previously said Germans should be proud of their military’s achievements in World War II. However, at a news conference Monday, he denied the party is racist.

Gauland said there is nothing in the party or in its program that could or should disturb Jewish people in Germany. He said his pledge to “reclaim the country” is meant symbolically, adding he does “not want to lose Germany to an invasion of foreign people from foreign cultures.”

Analyst Professor Tanja Borzel of Berlin’s Free University says Chancellor Angela Merkel’s decision to let close to a million migrants into Germany at the height of the migrant and refugee crisis in 2015 led many to punish her at the polls.

Merkel’s Christian Democrats won the highest number of votes Sunday, but gained their lowest share in 70 years.

“Most people who voted for the Alternative for Germany did not vote for the party because they share the platform. It was a protest vote, clearly,” Borzel said.

The far-right’s success overshadowed Merkel’s win, which gives her a fourth term in power.

She told supporters Monday that her aspiration is to win the AfD voters back through good politics and problem solving.

Her first problem is forming a government. The second-placed Social Democrats have ruled out working together, so Merkel’s best option is likely a coalition with the Liberals and the Greens that could take months, Borzel says.

“It will be very hard to find a compromise on issues such as migration and refugees, but also climate change,” Borzel said. “So, we are looking at probably some lengthy negotiations.”

The AfD, meanwhile, has pledged to use its new platform in parliament to, in its words, “hunt down” Merkel and reclaim the country.
…

In the photograph, the distraught blonde-haired woman is surrounded by lascivious Middle Eastern-looking men. The caption refers to “New Year’s Eve,” a reference to the mass sexual assaults reported mainly in Cologne on December 31, 2015, involving men of Arab or North African appearance.

Posted on social media sites earlier this month, the photograph included the symbol of the far-right populist party, Alternative for Germany, which on Sunday eclipsed Angela Merkel’s re-election as German chancellor by winning nearly 100 seats in the Bundestag, becoming Germany’s third largest parliamentary party.  

The photograph — it has emerged — was a falsification: the woman pictured was a British glamor model, her image lifted from a glossy magazine, and the men, Egyptians protesting in Cairo in 2011.

In the three-month election campaign that ended Sunday mainstream politicians, some from minority backgrounds, lamented the rabble-rousing tactics of the AfD and its grassroots agitators and fellow-travelers and their menacing social media propaganda playing on fears of Islam and Muslim criminality and on foreigners in general.

From fringe to center of power

Winning seats in the Bundestag marks a startling new phase in the party’s progress from the fringe of German politics to closer to the center of power in Berlin. For far-right counterparts elsewhere in Europe the AfD’s electoral breakthrough serves as a consolation prize for election setbacks this year of like-minded populists elsewhere — Marine Le Pen in France and Geert Wilders in the Netherlands.

For mainstream German politicians, and Germany minorities, the rise of the AfD, which has called for the sealing of borders and a slimmed down appeals process for asylum-seekers making deportations easier, is a door opening on a German past they thought long buried.

“This is the most aggressive election campaign that Germany has seen since 1945,” lamented Senegal-born Karamba Diaby, who was first elected to the Bundestag in 2013 to become the country’s first black African lawmaker. Last month, he filed a legal complaint against members of the openly neo-Nazi National Democratic Party, whose supporters have been backing the AfD, for calling him an “ape” on a Facebook page.

For Diaby and other lawmakers from Germany’s major parties, the arrival of the AfD raises perplexing questions about how they should treat the first open nationalists to sit in the German legislature since the 1933 razing of the Reichstag by Adolf Hitler.

But treating AfD lawmakers any differently from other elected representatives could play into the hands of the far-right populists, allowing them to portray themselves as political victims and to claim that a political oligarchy is intent on ignoring the 12.6 percent of the population that voted for them.

Commentator Kay-Alexander Scholz argues that ostracizing the AfD in parliament would likely backfire. He maintains all the established parties “should be asking themselves what they did wrong over the last several years to set the stage” for the AfD.

Luring back AfD voters

Merkel went out of her way on Sunday night following the election results to reach out to AfD voters – especially those who defected from her Christian Democrats. “We want to win back AfD voters by solving problems, by taking account of their concerns and fears,” she said.

One of her advisers, Michael Fuchs, told VOA that “it isn’t good enough just to view the party as Nazi.” He argued that “some members are just conservatives” and he held out the prospect that under the pressure of day-to-day legislative work the AfD could split between its more moderate wing and the radicals.

But AfD moderates are hardly normal conservatives, either. Earlier this month the newspaper Welt am Sonntag published a 2013 memo written by one of the AfD’s stars, Alice Weidel, a leading moderate and lesbian, condemning the Merkel government as “pigs [who] are nothing other than marionettes of the victorious powers of World War II, whose task it is to keep down the German people.”  

This month it emerged that another of the party’s co-leaders, Alexander Gauland, another moderate, believes Germans “have the right to be proud of the achievements of German soldiers in two world wars.”

Chancellor Angela Merkel’s decision to admit more than a million refugees, breathed new life into the party, which lurched rightwards. Since 2015 the party has secured seats in all but three of Germany’s 16 regional parliaments.

The party appears in no mood to shift its confrontational tactics, a rejection of Germany’s post-war collaborative political ethos. Gauland signaled that in his post-poll comments to cheering supporters in Berlin: “We will change this country. We will chase them down, Angela Merkel and whoever else, and we will take our country back,” he said.
…

French trade unionists blocked access on Monday to several fuel depots in protest against an overhaul of employment laws, seeking to test the government’s will to reform the economy.

In southern France, protesters’ unions set up a road-block in front of Total’s La Mede refinery, while in western France fuel depots were blocked near Bordeaux and the coastal city of La Rochelle. Union members also held go-slow operations on highways near Paris and in northern France.

“We’re determined. We’re going to stay as long as possible while hoping that other blockades take place elsewhere, maybe that’ll make Mr. Macron move,” Force Ouvriere union official Pascal Favre told Reuters.

Eager to avoid fuel shortages, centrist President Emmanuel Macron’s government deployed police at some sites before dawn to ensure by force that protesters could not block access.

“It’s not in blockading the country’s economy and by preventing people from working, that one best defends one’s cause,” junior economy minister Benjamin Griveaux told RTL radio.

The labor reform is due to become law in the coming days after Macron formally signed five labor form decrees on Friday, in the first major economic reforms since he took power in May.

The new rules, discussed at length in advance with unions, will cap payouts on dismissals that are judged unfair, while also giving companies greater freedom to hire and fire employees and to agree working conditions.

While unions have failed to derail the reform, the considerable political capital Macron had after his landslide election victory in May is quickly evaporating.

Macron suffered his first electoral setback on Sunday when his Republic on the Move (LREM) party won fewer seats than expected in elections for the French Senate.
…

Swiss voters rejected raising women’s retirement age to 65 in a referendum on Sunday on shoring up the wealthy nation’s pension system as a wave of Baby Boomers stops working.

Authorities pushing the first serious reform of the pension system in two decades had warned that old-age benefits were increasingly at risk as life expectancy rises and interest rates remain exceptionally low, cutting investment yields.

But it fell by a margin of 53-47 percent, sending the government back to the drawing board on the thorny social issue.

The package turned down under the Swiss system of direct democracy included making retirement between the ages of 62 and 70 more flexible and raising the standard value-added tax (VAT) rate from 2021 to help finance the stretched pension system.

It sought to secure the level of pensions through 2030 by cutting costs and raising additional revenue.

Minimum pay-out rates would have gradually fallen and workers’ contributions would rise, while public pensions for all new recipients would go up by 70 Swiss francs ($72.25) a month.

The retirement age for women would have gradually risen by a year to 65, the same as for men.

“That is no life,” complained one 49-year-old kiosk cashier, who identified herself only as Angie. “You go straight from work to the graveyard.”

Some critics had complained that the higher retirement age for women and higher VAT rates were unfair, while others opposed expanding public benefits and said the reforms only postponed for a decade rather than solved the system’s financial woes.

Opinion polls had shown the reforms just squeaking by, but support had been waning.

The standard VAT rate would have gone up by 0.3 point from 2021 to 8.3 percent — helping generate 2.1 billion francs a year for pensions by 2030 — but the rejection means the standard VAT rate will now fall to 7.7 percent next year as a levy earmarked for disability insurance ends.

A 2014 OECD survey found Switzerland, where a worker earns over $91,000 on average, spends a relatively low 6.6 percent of economic output on public pensions. Life expectancy at birth was 82.5 years. More than 18 percent of the population was older than 65.

($1 = 0.9690 Swiss francs)
…

The Vatican on Sunday denounced its ousted auditor general for revealing that he resigned under threat of arrest for what he says were trumped-up charges.

In a statement, the Vatican admitted that Libero Milone resigned in June after Vatican investigators determined his office had “illegally hired an outside company to conduct investigations into the private lives of Holy See personnel.”

Milone told reporters Saturday that he was told on June 19 that Pope Francis had lost confidence in him. He said he was subsequently subject to an “aggressive” interrogation by Vatican police who seized material from his office and told him to resign or face arrest.

“They wanted me to confess to something. I don’t know what, because I acted within the confines of the statute,” he told Sky TG24 and other media.

The Vatican said Milone had exceeded his mandate, freely tendered his resignation and was treated with full respect by investigators. It said it was “surprised and saddened” that Milone had violated the terms of his departure, which had called for secrecy about the reasons behind it.

Milone’s resignation had raised eyebrows because he was only two years into a five-year term, and had been seen as a key part of Francis’ efforts to reform the Vatican’s finances. Along with Cardinal George Pell, he was tasked with overseeing the Holy See’s budgets and making sense of the finances of the Vatican’s various departments.

Pell recently returned to his native Australia to face trial on historic sex abuse allegations, which he denies. His secretariat for the economy, which includes Milone’s office, is being run by underlings for now.
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The grassroots groups driving Catalonia’s separatist movement defied Spanish authorities on Sunday by distributing one million ballots for an Oct. 1 independence vote that the central government in Madrid has called illegal and vowed to halt.

Jordi Cuixart, president of the separatist group Omnium Cultural, announced the ballots were being distributed during a rally in Barcelona.

“Here are the packs of ballots that we ask you to hand out across Catalonia,” Cuixart said.

Spanish police have confiscated millions of ballots in recent days as part of a crackdown to stop the Oct. 1 vote, which has been suspended by Spain’s Constitutional Court. Around a dozen regional Catalan officials were arrested Wednesday, provoking a wave of protests across the prosperous northeastern region.

Catalonia’s separatists have pledged to hold the vote regardless of the central government’s wishes and rallied Sunday in public squares in Barcelona and other towns in the region. Many carried pro-independence flags and signs calling for the independence vote and urging the “Yes” side to victory.

The crowds were asked by secessionist politicians and grassroots groups to also print and distribute posters supporting the vote.

“I ask you to go out and vote! Vote for the future of Catalonia!” Carme Forcadell, the speaker of Catalonia’s regional parliament, told a Barcelona crowd.

Polls show the 7.5 million residents of Catalonia are roughly split on breaking with the rest of Spain.

 
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Germany’s national election Sunday is widely expected to give Chancellor Angela Merkel a historic fourth mandate and the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party seats in parliament for the first time in 60 years.
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Germans go to the polls Sunday in an election that will most likely result in a fourth term for Chancellor Angela Merkel, but could also see the first time a far-right party has become part of the Bundestag since the end of World War II.

Support for Merkel’s center-right Christian Democrat party was at 34 percent, while her challenger, Martin Schulz, and his center-left Social Democrats were projected to receive 21 percent of the vote.

But the far-right Alternative for Germany, or AfD, appeared to have more support than the 5 percent of the vote required to get a seat in Germany’s multiparty Bundestag. In fact, the latest polls showed AfD could get as much as 13 percent of the vote, making it the third-largest party in parliament.

Campaign stops

Schulz addressed the trend at a campaign rally in the western city of Aachen on Saturday, urging his supporters to turn out at the polls to prevent the AfD from gaining more power.

“Young people, think about Brexit,” he said, referencing Britain’s recent vote to withdraw from the European Union. “Think about [U.S. President Donald] Trump. Go vote.”

Merkel was heckled Friday evening at her final stump speech in Munich but used the cacophony to punctuate her message. Emphasizing stability and prosperity in her speech, Merkel said, “The future of Germany will definitely not be built with whistles and hollers.”

Germany is not the only European nation experiencing a rise in support for nationalist parties. France, Austria and Poland have seen similar trends.

But Germany is still recovering from the rule of the far-right Nazi Party last century, whose hold on power in the 1930s and early 1940s led an ethnic cleansing campaign against millions of Jews, Poles and others deemed unwanted.

German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel, a member of the Social Democrats, has warned that “for the first time since the Second World War, real Nazis will sit in the German parliament.”

Schulz has called the party “a shame for our nation.”

Limited by history

AfD co-leader Alexander Gauland, who helped found the party in 2013, told The Washington Post on Saturday that his party’s support had been limited by Germany’s history.

“What is National Socialist in Germany is [considered] out of order and you can’t discuss it correctly. It is very difficult for so-called right-wing parties to gain votes in Germany,” Gauland said.

A former member of Merkel’s party, Gauland said he left because the party changed.

“Angela Merkel changed the CDU from a party that had convictions to a party that’s an empty balloon,” he told the Post. “A lot of decisions of Angela Merkel — transitioning to renewable energy, refugees, changing of the military from conscription to volunteer — ran opposite to what we called in former times ‘the soul of the CDU.’ ”

Berlin-based journalist Thomas Habicht said AfD’s rise in influence was rooted in Germany’s participation in pan-European issues.

“AfD gained support as some voters got the impression [that] the euro crisis caused by Greece, Italy and France cost us too much money,” Habicht told VOA in an email. “Germany contributes 27 percent to the EU budget and some Germans don’t want to finance economical mismanagement in southern Europe.”

Cost of refugee crisis

In addition, the refugee crisis, to which Merkel has pledged German support, is seen by AfD supporters as a burden.

“Since September 2015, we had an influx of 1.25 million asylum-seekers,” Habicht said, noting that caring for them had cost the government $25 billion.

Adding to the complication, he said, is crime. “Last year we had a terror attack at a Berlin Christmas market. It was committed by an asylum-seeker from Tunisia and 12 persons died,” he said.

Yet, Habicht noted, all parties in the Bundestag at the time supported Merkel on the refugee situation. “They were seen as a big chance for us, while the problems of integration were not fully discussed,” he said.

While the presence of a far-right party in parliament may be startling in Germany, where the rule of the Nazis last century orchestrated millions of civilian deaths, Habicht said the AfD influence would be far more subtle.

“I do believe the AfD will be quite isolated in our next Bundestag,” he said. “But indirectly, they will influence government policies.”
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Turkey’s main opposition united with the government Saturday to overwhelmingly pass a motion giving its military a mandate to carry out operations in neighboring Iraq and Syria.

The parliament met in an emergency session two days ahead of an independence referendum by Iraqi Kurds. Addressing parliament, Defense Minister Nurettin Canikli warned that the Kurdish referendum would bring very dangerous consequences, perhaps even clashes even in global terms.

“Pulling out just a brick from a structure based on very sensitive and fragile balances will sow the seeds for new hatred, enmity and clashes,” Canikli said.

He added that all options and methods were on the table regarding the independence vote and that Turkey would not hesitate to use them.

Ankara strongly opposes the referendum, fearing it could fuel secessionist demands within its own large restive Kurdish minority.

On Saturday, the head of the Iraqi armed forces met with his Turkish counterpart in Turkey’s capital, Ankara, for talks on the forthcoming referendum. Baghdad shares Ankara’s opposition to the vote.

Turkish armed forces carrying out drills on the Iraqi Kurdish border received new reinforcements. The army has been holding military exercises there for the past six days.

Turkish forces were also being beefed up on the Syrian border, with Ankara again warning it would not allow Syrian Kurds to create their own independent state.
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