Greece will bring Macedonia’s NATO accession agreement to parliament for ratification “in the coming days,” the government spokesman said Thursday, which will bring into effect the change of the country’s name to North Macedonia.

Once parliament ratifies the NATO protocol, Greece’s Foreign Ministry will inform Macedonia’s Foreign Ministry of the result, a move which will automatically bring into effect the name change, government spokesman Dimitris Tzanakopoulos said. He didn’t give a specific date.

 

The name change deal, dubbed the Prespa Agreement after the border lake where it was signed last year, ends a 27-year dispute between the two neighbors that had kept the former Yugoslav republic out of NATO and the European Union. Greece argued that the use of the name “Macedonia” implied territorial claims on its own northern province of the same name and usurped Greek history and culture, and had blocked its neighbor’s efforts to join NATO over the issue.

 

Tzanakopoulos said the nearly three-decade dispute had given rise to “the monster of lies, nationalism and extreme historic revisionism” in Greece. Greek lawmakers’ Jan. 25 ratification of the deal was “a historic milestone for peace, cooperation and stability in the Balkans,” he said during a media briefing, adding that the agreement restores Greece’s “leading role in the Balkans.”

 

The agreement’s ratification “symbolizes the victory of political courage and respect of the country’s history, over opportunism, nationalism, the taking advantage of patriotism and the commerce of hate,” he added.

 

The deal has been met with vociferous opposition by many in both countries, with critics accusing their respective governments of making too many concessions to the other side.

 

Once the deal comes into effect, Macedonia will have a five-year period to implement many of the practical changes it must make, including changing vehicle license plates and issuing new passports.

 

 
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At St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Dubai, an effort to transcribe the Bible in the native tongue of its flock saw the holy book presented in 52 languages — a sign of the cosmopolitan welcome awaiting Pope Francis’ upcoming visit to the United Arab Emirates.

The diversity among its parishioners can be seen in its pews and heard in the sermons of St. Mary’s priests, who celebrate Mass and offer prayers in Arabic, English, French, Tagalog, Tamil, Urdu and other languages.

The church, they say, offers an anchor for the Roman Catholics among the UAE’s vast foreign labor force, many of whom live in this federation of seven sheikhdoms alone while their families stay home.

“The whole world meets here in a way,” said the Rev. Lennie Connully, the parish priest of St. Mary’s. “We have people from all over.”

Pope Francis’ visit from Feb. 3 through Feb. 5 marks the first papal visit to the Arabian Peninsula, the birthplace of Islam. The pontiff will visit Abu Dhabi, the headquarters of the Catholic Church’s Apostolic Vicariate of Southern Arabia, which covers the UAE, Oman and Yemen.

There are nine Catholic churches in this federation of seven sheikhdoms governed by hereditary rulers; four other Catholic churches are in Oman. The Catholic flock’s rapid growth followed the discovery of oil in what was previously known as the Trucial States. Officials consecrated the first Catholic church in Abu Dhabi in 1965.

As Abu Dhabi became a major oil exporter and Dubai grew into the skyscraper-studded city it is today, the Emirates’ rapid economic expansion drew millions of foreigners to everything from white-collar office jobs to hard-hat construction work. Of the over 9 million people now living in the UAE, around 1 million are Emirati while the rest are foreign-born.

In 2010, there were an estimated 940,000 Christians living in the UAE, according to a 2015 Pew Research Center report, including 750,000 Catholics. The report suggests the number of Christians in the UAE would rise to about 1.1 million by 2020, with Catholics making up the lion’s share. The Catholic Church itself believes there are some 1 million Catholics in the UAE today.

The backbone of that population is Filipino and Indian. Life for them and others can be incredibly difficult as many move to the UAE often leaving their families and loved ones back home.

“The church is a base for them. They are far away from their homes,” Connully said. “They don’t have an extended family to support them. That family atmosphere is created here.”

Rulers in the UAE, which has described 2019 as the nation’s “Year of Tolerance,” have supported the Catholic community in the past by donating land for their churches. However, there are limits in this Muslim nation.

Proselytizing by non-Muslims remains illegal. Islam is enshrined as the UAE’s official religion in the country’s constitution, with government websites even offering online applications to convert. Conversion from Islam to another religion, however, is illegal, the U.S. State Department has warned. Blasphemy and apostasy laws also carry a possible death sentence.

At St. Mary’s and other churches, crosses are for the most part carefully concealed behind compound fences. There are no bells that toll to mark the start of services, though loudspeakers on minarets proclaim the call to prayers, like at the mosque across the street from St. Mary’s.

Despite facing restrictions, Christians in the UAE have never faced the violence that has targeted those in Syria and Iraq during the rise of the Islamic State group and other militants. Coptic Christians, a minority in Egypt that has faced extremist attacks in their homeland, also can safely worship.

In recent years, militant attacks have only exacerbated a “long, slow decline” of Christianity in the wider Middle East that began with mass migrations of the 19th Century, said Robin Darling Young, a professor studying church history at the Washington-based Catholic University of America.

The growth of ultraconservative Islamic beliefs, like Wahhabism in Saudi Arabia, coupled with the creation of independent states, further fueled that, she said. America’s 2003 war in Iraq and the chaos that followed made it even worse, she said.

“Particularly in areas where Wahhabi Islam is strong, like the Arabian Peninsula, Christians have been subject to more restrictions,” Young said. “The UAE is trying to make itself look better to the West by permitting, under certain restrictions, public Christian worship.”

Catholics in the UAE, however, make a point to thank the UAE’s ruling sheikhs for being able to worship freely. During a recent Mass at St. Mary’s, the Father Andre Francisco Fernandes led worshippers in a prayer asking for God’s blessings upon “the rulers of the UAE,” specifically naming UAE President and Abu Dhabi ruler Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan and Dubai’s ruler, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum.

Fernandes’ sermon that day focused on the parable of the loaves and the fishes, the story of Jesus Christ feeding a crowd of 5,000 with just five loaves of bread and two fish. The priest urged those listening to keep their faith and view the world with an open heart.

“Every day, miracles are happening,” he told parishioners. “We need to believe.”
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Venezuelan authorities detained three foreign journalists and a driver working for the Spanish news agency EFE on Wednesday, the company said, in the latest arrests of reporters covering U.S.-backed efforts to oust President Nicolas Maduro.

Colombian photographer Leonardo Muñoz was arrested with his Venezuelan driver Jose Salas while reporting on protests against the government.

Hours later intelligence officers detained Spanish reporter Gonzalo Domínguez Loeda and Colombian TV producer Mauren Barriga Vargas at their hotel, EFE’s bureau chief in Caracas, Nelida Fernandez said.

The entire team had travelled from Bogota earlier in the month.

The arrests follow the deportation of two Chilean reporters detained this week. A French diplomatic source said on Wednesday that two French reporters covering the turmoil had been arrested and that the French Embassy was seeking their release.

“Our Embassy has requested consular protection in accordance with the Vienna Convention and in particular the right of access,” the source said.

The French reporters were working for daily television program Quotidien, part of the TF1 television network. TF1 declined to comment.

Accused of election fraud, and overseeing a deep economic collapse that has led millions of Venezuelans to migrate, Maduro is facing the biggest challenge to his rule since replacing Hugo Chavez six years ago.

Opposition leader Juan Guaido has won the backing of the most countries in the Western Hemisphere since declaring himself interim president last week and calling for fresh elections.

Maduro says the strategy to topple him is a coup, led by hawks in the Trump administration such as Special Envoy to Venezuela Elliott Abrams, a veteran diplomat involved in the armed interventions in Central America in the 1980s.

France said on Wednesday that Maduro appeared not to be heeding calls for new presidential elections and that European foreign ministers would discuss next steps at a meeting in Bucharest on Thursday.
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Marie Toussaint has launched a climate petition in France that has attracted skyrocketing support. Ludovic Bayle splits his days between working at a restaurant and moonlighting as a climate activist. And in Sweden, Switzerland and Belgium, students are skipping school, demanding more action against what many Europeans consider one of the biggest threats to their future: climate change.

“Climate is one of the main concerns” in Europe, said Neil Makaroff, European Union policy adviser for the NGO Climate Action Network France. “Citizens are more and more mobilized today. They are taking different actions like marches, petition, litigation.”

Several hundred thousand Europeans took to the streets this past week alone. Students marched in Brussels where the European Union is headquartered, and climate activists briefly occupied the Scottish parliament. At the yearly Davos gathering in Switzerland, Swedish teenage activist Greta Thunberg, who is behind the growing school strikes, told the rich and powerful they were to blame for the climate crisis. And in France, dozens of towns held climate marches last weekend, bringing young and old to the streets in sometimes pounding rain.

Climate change, some analysts believe, is also shaping up to be one of the most important issues in upcoming European parliament elections in May.

“People really, really need to wake up,” said Parisian Veronique Weil, who braved whipping rain to join a climate rally at the city’s iconic Place de la Republic. “The seas are rising, countries are going to disappear. … It’s crazy.”

In some ways, Europe seems an unlikely place for a climate revolt. The region is considered among the world’s green leaders, and the EU says it is on track to meet 2030 emissions reduction targets.

French President Emmanuel Macron has vowed to “make the planet great again,” launching a “One Planet summit” — now heading for its third edition — and urging American scientists to move to France after the U.S. announced it was pulling out of the Paris climate pact.

But climate activists have criticized Macron, saying France and Europe haven’t done enough. It’s a message echoed by popular French environment minister Nicolas Hulot, who quit Macron’s cabinet last year.

“Besides the nice sentences like ‘make our planet great again,’ our government is really not taking climate very seriously,” said Makaroff of Climate Action Network. “Because no climate action has been really strong in France to curb emissions.”

Now, citizens are taking matters into their own hands.

French environmentalist Marie Toussaint quit her government job two years ago to create a green NGO. In December, she launched a petition with three other groups, threatening to sue the French government for climate inaction. So far, the petition has gathered a record 2 million signatures, and counting.

“We really want to save the climate, to save the planet, but also to save solidarity, to save the people — to be part of the solution,” Toussaint said.

The grassroots uprising is being seen in ways big and small. In the Netherlands, activists sponsoring a similar climate petition won a landmark court ruling last year, ordering the Dutch government to accelerate emissions cuts.  And in Germany, the Greens Party is surging, ranked second in polls behind the ruling Christian Democrats.

In Versailles, just outside Paris, 34-year-old Ludovic Bayle spends most waking hours either waiting tables or working at his unpaid job as a member of Citizens for Climate France, one of the grassroots groups that organized last weekend’s French protests. Launched in September, the chapter has nearly 70,000 members on its Facebook page.

“Of course I’m scared” about climate change, Bayle said. “That’s why it’s so important to act. We need to mobilize to put pressure on decision-makers.”

Last weekend’s climate protests intersected with another citizen’s uprising in France — the yellow vest movement, in its third month. Now embracing broader demands for greater social justice, the yellow vest protests began over a fuel tax hike intended partly to fund climate measures.

As a result, some analysts suggest the yellow vests show that people ultimately are not willing to make sacrifices to curb emissions. But climate activists like Toussaint dismiss that view.

“What we see now is people who are polluting the least are being asked to pay the most,” said Toussaint, who said both movements share similar demands for greater social justice.

The European parliament elections may be an early test of whether climate uprisings can translate into political power. Green parties are gaining strength, but not everywhere. In France, a recent poll placed the Greens a distant fifth in voter intentions, behind a fledging yellow vest party.

Meanwhile, the far-right National Rally Party, with a minimalist green agenda, is surging in second place, and hopes to capture votes from yellow vests, who are a highly disparate group.

Still, Makaroff believes politicians have gotten the message from the streets.

“It would be suicide for political parties not to take up climate issues in the European elections,” he said. 
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A state-funded Russian film that lionizes a Soviet World War II tank and its crew has become the second highest grossing home-grown production since the collapse of the Soviet Union, part of a Kremlin-backed drive to instill patriotism in young people.

The Kremlin has long put the Soviet victory over Nazi Germany at the heart of a patriotic push to accompany what it casts as the country’s return to greatness under Vladimir Putin who has portrayed Russia as a fortress besieged by the West.

The new film, “T-34,” has been praised by the defense ministry which has shown it to its troops. Its release coincides with heightened tensions with the West, with President Putin warning of a new arms race. An opinion poll by Levada published on Wednesday showed more than half of Russians believe their country faces a foreign military threat.

It also comes as Kremlin critics warn of a growing militarization of society in the wake of Russia’s 2014 annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea, its continued backing for pro-Russian separatists in east Ukraine, and deployment in Syria.

“T-34” tells the story of a group of Soviet soldiers who escape a Nazi concentration camp inside a T-34 tank. It is loosely based on real events.

Released on Jan. 1, it has already taken more than 2.1 billion rubles ($31.86 million) at the box office and has been watched by more than 8.3 million people, making it the second most successful domestically produced film in ruble terms since the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union.

The highest-grossing film, released last year, told the story of a Soviet Cold War sports victory over the United States.

Raising the flag

Vladimir Medinsky, Russia’s culture minister, has suggested people take their children to see “T-34.”

Medinsky, a Putin ally, has angrily likened critics of the film who have questioned its historical accuracy to Soviet wartime traitors.

“It seems to me that here we need to raise and hold the flag,” the TASS news agency cited Medinsky as saying this month, calling for people to feel pride in their country’s wartime achievements.

Some critics have said the film romanticizes war and have likened it to a computer game, suggesting it does too little to bring home the human cost of warfare.

But its director, Alexei Sidorov, said he had tried to make a film that was not too gloomy.

“Yes, it’s war. Yes, it’s death. Every family lost someone.

But we won this war and that’s important,” he said.

Russia estimates that nearly 27 million Soviet citizens – including both soldiers and civilians – perished during World War II. In Russia it has long been known as the Great Patriotic War.

 
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British and European Union negotiators expressed different views Wednesday on the state of Britain’s exit from the EU after British lawmakers gave Prime Minister Theresa May what she called a “mandate” to seek changes to the country’s withdrawal agreement.

A series of votes in the British parliament Tuesday resulted in May’s party getting approval for its plan to seek “alternative arrangements” to the Irish border provision of the current Brexit deal.

British Brexit minister Stephen Barclay told BBC radio in an interview Wednesday that those changes would be the subject of negotiations in the coming days.

But on the EU side, chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier said the bloc’s position “is very clear.”

“The only point I want to make is to confirm that the EU institutions remain united and we stand by the agreement we have negotiated with the [United Kingdom],” Barnier told reporters in Brussels on Wednesday.

He said European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker would address the issue later in the day.

Britain’s House of Commons rejected May’s Brexit plans two weeks ago, primarily because of the Irish border provision, known as the backstop, which would be in place until Britain and the EU could negotiate a new post-Brexit trade deal.

The backstop would keep Britain in a customs union with the EU in order to keep a free flow of goods between Ireland — an EU member — and Northern Ireland, which is part of the UK.

Backstop opponents who still support the idea of Brexit say it means Britain would still be subjected to EU rules, which is the reason they want Britain to leave the EU in the first place. 

Without an agreement in place, Britain faces a “no-deal” Brexit departure. 

U.S. Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats told a congressional panel in Washington Tuesday such an outcome “would cause economic disruptions that could substantially weaken the [United Kingdom] and Europe.”

Business leaders are worried that a no-deal Brexit would lead to economic chaos.

British opposition Labor leader Jeremy Corbyn said he believes the British government would have to delay its Brexit departure for three months to allow for more negotiations.

European Parliament Brexit negotiator Guy Verhofstadt said Wednesday it is not in anyone’s interest to prolong the process.
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America’s intelligence chiefs have warned of a dizzying array of security threats the United States faces across the globe. Among the conclusions unveiled at a Senate hearing Tuesday, North Korea is unlikely to completely give up all its nuclear stockpiles and Iran is technically in compliance with the 2015 nuclear deal – both points contradicting key tenets of President Donald Trump’s foreign policy. VOA’s Michael Bowman reports.
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European Union leaders have ruled out British Prime Minister Theresa May’s attempt to renegotiate the terms of Britain’s exit from the bloc in March.

The British parliament Tuesday approved May’s request to the EU to re-work the Irish border provision of the current Brexit deal.

But the spokesman for European Council President Donald Tusk immediately ruled out any re-negotiation.

“The Withdrawal Agreement is and remains the best and only way to ensure an orderly withdrawal of the United Kingdom from the European Union,” the spokesman said. “We continue to urge the UK government to clarify its intentions with respect to the next steps as soon as possible.”

Britain’s House of Commons rejected May’s Brexit plans two weeks ago, primarily because of the Irish border provision, known as the backstop. 

The backstop would keep Britain in a customs union with the EU in order to keep a free flow of goods between Ireland — an EU member —  and Northern Ireland, which is part of the UK.

Backstop opponents who still support the idea of Brexit say it means Britain would still be subjected to EU rules, which is the reason they want Britain to leave the EU in the first place. 

Without an agreement in place, Britain faces a “no-deal” Brexit departure.

U.S. Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats told a congressional panel in Washington Tuesday that such an outcome “would cause economic disruptions that could substantially weaken the [United Kingdom] and Europe.”

Business leaders are worried that a no-deal Brexit would lead to economic chaos.

British opposition Labor leader Jeremy Corbyn said he believes the British government would have to delay its Brexit departure for three months to allow for more negotiations.

The pact defeated two weeks ago took British and EU negotiators 18 months to reach. Since then, May has pledged to go forward with the agreement and seek some changes to earn the necessary support.

May’s Conservative Party is now supporting what it calls “alternative arrangements” to overcome the concerns about tying Britain’s policies to EU rules.

What is not certain is whether those changes would be enough to win over a majority of parliament. There also is the question of whether the European Union would agree to alter the agreement, something its leaders have repeatedly said throughout the debate in Britain they have no intention of doing.
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Kosovo is ready for a compromise deal with Serbia to resolve long-standing issues between the countries, President Hashim Thaci said in a letter to U.S. President Donald Trump.

Serbia and its former province of Kosovo, which declared independence in 2008, committed in 2013 to a European Union-sponsored dialogue aimed at resolving the situation but little progress has been made.

The talks have been halted since November when the government in Pristina raised customs tariffs on imports of locally-made products from Serbia by 100 percent. Serbia said it would not hold talks if the trade situation was not returned to normal.

“I will be ready and willing to make compromises necessary to reach a comprehensive and balanced settlement that will encompass all outstanding issues, thereby ending the century-old conflict with Serbia, and bringing peace to the whole region,” Thaci said in his letter dated January 8.

It remains unclear why Thaci published the letter now, days after he received a letter from Trump urging his Kosovo counterpart to do everything to reach a deal with Serbia two decades after the war ended.

Thaci said in June he would seek a solution with Serbia by “correcting borders,” but politicians and analysts in Kosovo said that would mean land swaps.

His plan rang alarm bells among Balkan neighbors and Western governments who saw it as a move to take three Serbian municipalities inhabited mainly by ethnic Albanians, who make up more than 90 percent of Kosovo’s population.

If there was a land swap Serbia would get part of northern Kosovo populated mainly by minority Serbs who refuse to recognize the authority of the Pristina government.

Kosovo Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj has said he is not willing to change his government’s decision on tariffs. Washington remains the biggest supporter of Kosovo politically and financially.

It was under U.S. command that NATO bombed Serbian forces in 1999 to halt killings and the expulsion of Kosovo Albanians during a counter-insurgency operation.

Kosovo is recognized by around 110 nations, but not by Serbia, Russia and five EU member states.
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The United Nations is launching a three-year Humanitarian Response Strategy together with the Nigeria Regional Refugee Response Plan. The $983 million appeal will assist millions of victims of Boko Haram attacks in northeastern Nigeria and hundreds of thousands of refugees who fled to neighboring countries.

The bulk of the appeal, $848 million, will assist 6.2 million vulnerable people in Nigeria’s north-eastern Borno, Adamawa and Yobe states.They have been the hardest hit by the decade-long crisis between Boko Haram and Nigeria’s government forces.

Boko Haram, which wants to set up its own Islamic State based on Shariah law, reportedly has killed more than 20,000 people and forced more than two million to flee their homes since the insurgency began in 2009.

Spokesman for the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, Jens Laerke, says a recent upsurge in violence has displaced more than 80,000 civilians who have sought refuge in crowded camps or in towns in Borno State.

“In total,” added Laerke, “1.8 million people are internally displaced in the northeast due to this protracted crisis which is characterized by massive abuses against civilians including killings, rape, abduction, child recruitment and burning and pillaging of homes and entire villages.”

Food aid accounts for nearly one third of the appeal.Money also will be used to provide special treatment for some 370,000 severely, acutely malnourished children, for nutrition, health, water and sanitation projects among others.

The U.N. refugee agency and U.N. Development Program are launching Nigeria’s Refugee Response Plan.The agencies are appealing for $135 million to assist more than one-quarter million Nigerian refugees displaced by the worsening Boko Haram insurgency in the Lake Chad Basin region.

The appeal will assist Nigerian refugees in Cameroon, Chad and Niger.Beyond supporting those forced to flee, money also will help the communities hosting the refugees as they themselves are living below the poverty line and are in dire need of aid.
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