Prince Harry finished giving evidence at London’s High Court on Wednesday after nearly eight hours of cross-examination in his phone-hacking case against a British tabloid newspaper group, and described the experience as: “It’s a lot.”

Harry, the first senior British royal to appear in a witness box for more than 130 years, had been questioned for a second day over his allegations that tabloid newspapers had used unlawful means to target him since he was a child.

The prince was more combative in sometimes testy exchanges on Wednesday with Andrew Green, the lawyer for Mirror Group Newspapers (MGN), the publisher of the Daily Mirror, Sunday Mirror and Sunday People, which he and 100 others are suing over allegations of unlawful acts between 1991 and 2011.

Harry, the fifth-in-line to the throne, appeared emotional at the end of his evidence when he was asked by his lawyer David Sherborne how it felt to answer questions about his allegations in court when “the world’s media are watching.”

Harry exhaled deeply and replied: “It’s a lot.”

Lawyers representing Harry and other claimants are arguing senior editors and executives at MGN knew about and approved of phone-hacking and instructing private investigators to obtain information by deception.

However, Green said there was no mobile phone data to indicate that Harry had been the victim of phone-hacking and contrasted it with a 2005 police investigation that led to the conviction of the former royal editor at Rupert Murdoch’s now defunct News of the World paper.

“If the court were to find that you were never hacked by any MGN journalist, would you be relieved or would you be disappointed?” Green asked the prince.

Harry replied: “That would be speculating … I believe phone-hacking was on an industrial scale across at least three of the papers at the time and that is beyond doubt.

“To have a decision against me and any other people that come behind me with their claims, given that Mirror Group have accepted hacking, … yes, I would feel some injustice,” he said.

In response to Green’s suggestion that Harry wanted to have been a victim, the prince replied: “Nobody wants to be phone hacked.”

The last time a British royal was questioned in court was in 1891, when the future Edward VII, Harry’s great-great-great grandfather, was a witness in a slander trial over a card game.

MGN, now owned by Reach RCH.L, has previously admitted its titles were involved in phone-hacking — the illegal interception of mobile voicemails — settling more than 600 claims, but Green has said there was no evidence Harry had ever been a victim.

He argued that some of the personal information had come from, or was given with the consent of, senior Buckingham Palace aides.

In reference to one article about him not being allowed to return to combat in Afghanistan, Harry said: “It is suspicious that so much is attributed to a royal source.”

In his 50-page written witness statement and in questioning, Harry has said the press had blood on its hands, destroyed his adolescence, ruined relationships with friends and girlfriends, and sowed paranoia and mistrust since 1996 when he was a schoolboy.

He also broke royal protocol to say he believed the British government as well as the media had hit “rock bottom,” while his anger at suggestions that his mother, Princess Diana, was a victim of phone-hacking before her death in 1997 was also clear.

Green, who has described some of the prince’s allegations as “total speculation,” quizzed him in detail over 33 newspaper articles whose details Harry says were obtained unlawfully and many of which related to his relationship with former girlfriend Chelsy Davy.

Harry said intimate details reported about their break-up and arguments about him visiting a strip club had been obtained by phone-hacking, while Green suggested these had been widely reported previously elsewhere.

“This process is as distressing for me as it is for her,” Harry said.

As he wrapped up almost seven-and-a-half hours of questioning, Green asked him whether it was the prince’s case that his phone had been consistently hacked on a daily basis over a 15-year period.

“It could’ve been happening on a daily basis, I simply don’t know,” he said. Asked if there was any evidence he had been hacked, Harry replied: “That’s part of the reason why I’m here.”
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A controversial research project in Norway on whales’ hearing was suspended after a whale drowned, researchers said on Wednesday, as activists slammed the “cruel and pointless” experiments.

Under the project, run by the Norwegian Defense Research Establishment (FFI) each summer since 2021 minke whales are captured in the Lofoten archipelago and submitted to hearing tests before they are released into the wild again.

They are run in cooperation with the US National Marine Mammal Foundation.

The experiments, aimed at gathering knowledge in order to set limits on how much noise humans should be allowed to make in the ocean, have been criticized by animal rights defenders and scientists who consider the project dangerous.

In the night between June 2 and 3, bad weather damaged the project testing site, causing a barrier line to break free. A whale became entangled in it and died, the FFI said.

The incident occurred before the official start of this year’s experiments.

The project has been put on hold indefinitely while the incident is reviewed and the site repaired.

“Our aim is to protect Minke whales and other baleens, and to protect them from harmful human-made noise,” Petter Kvadsheim, chief researcher at FFI, said.

“We will continue our work on this. The health of the animals is our main priority in this experiment.”

The project had been due to continue until the summer of 2024.

In an interview with AFP, Kvadsheim blamed the incident on bad weather rather than the experiment, and said he hoped the project could resume “in the next few days”.

“It’s never been done before and unexpected things can happen,” he said, adding that it was unfolding “step by step” and “on schedule”.

He said only “a handful” of whales were needed to complete the project.

One whale entered the testing site the first year, in 2021, but it quickly escaped.

In 2022, another minke was captured but it was released immediately because it showed signs of stress.

“We have warned that these cruel and pointless experiments would lead to whales being killed and it is sadly ironic that this poor minke has died even before the experiments have got underway,” said a spokesman for the Whale and Dolphin Conservation, Danny Groves.

“No whales should have to face being bundled into a cage and have electrodes implanted under his or her skin. These experiments should be halted permanently,” he added.

In 2021, 50 international scientists had written to the Norwegian government to protest against the experiments.
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Pope Francis, 86, will have surgery on his abdomen on Wednesday afternoon at Rome’s Gemelli hospital, the Vatican said in a statement. 

It added that his medical team had decided in recent days that surgery was required and that he was expected to stay in hospital for “several days” to recover. 

He will have the operation on his abdominal wall under a general anesthetic, the Vatican said. 

Francis was due to be taken to hospital following his weekly audience at the Vatican on Wednesday morning, where he made no mention of the planned operation. He had spent 40 minutes having a check-up at Gemelli hospital on Tuesday. 

The pope, who marked the 10th anniversary of his pontificate in March, often uses a wheelchair or a cane to walk because of persistent knee pain. 

In July 2021 he had part of his colon removed in an operation aimed at addressing a painful bowel condition called diverticulitis. He said earlier this year that the condition had returned. 

The pope last year said he didn’t want to have an operation on his knee because the general anesthesia for his colon surgery had brought disagreeable side-effects. 
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Air India sent an aircraft on Wednesday to pick up passengers whose Delhi to San Francisco flight was diverted to Russia’s Far East after their Boeing BA.N 777 plane developed engine trouble, India’s aviation minister said.

The 216 passengers and 16 crew on board Tuesday’s flight had been moved to makeshift accommodation, given infrastructure limitations at the remote Magadan airport, the airline said in a statement.

The diversion raised questions over how quickly the $200 million U.S.-built plane, whose engines are made by General Electric GE.N, could be repaired amid U.S. and European Union sanctions on exports of aviation items to Russia.

“That plane needs to be repaired, mechanics are going on board,” India’s civil aviation minister, Jyotiraditya Scindia, told reporters, referring to the flight going out to pick up the stranded passengers.

“I don’t know how long it will take to repair that aircraft but passengers will be taken to their ultimate destination.”

A source at the Magadan airport told Reuters that Air India engineers would arrive on the reserve plane with spare parts.

A stranded passenger named Gagan told Indian broadcaster NDTV there were many U.S. citizens on the flight who were worried, given the tension between Russia and the United States.

“There are a lot a nervous people here,” the passenger said.

Air India did not immediately respond to a request for information on the passengers’ nationalities.

U.S. State Department deputy spokesman Vedant Patel had said on Tuesday it was “likely” there were Americans onboard given the flight’s destination.

Angry passengers took to Twitter to complain about inadequate supply of food at their accommodation, which they said looked like a school.

One user said his mother had been given tea, bread and some rice on Tuesday but there was later no contact as she wanted to save her phone battery as there was only one power outlet.

Air India said as it did not have any staff in Russia and the support being provided to the passengers was “the best possible in this unusual circumstance.”

“The ferry flight would be carrying food and other essentials for our passengers,” the airline said.

“All of us at Air India are … making every effort possible to operate the ferry flight as soon as possible, and to ensure the health, safety, and security of all while they wait.”
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Ukrainian officials are on alert following the destruction of the Kakhovka hydroelectric power station and say the flooding from the damaged reservoir is threatening Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant. The nuclear plant, occupied by Russian troops for some time, uses water from the Kakhovka reservoir to cool its reactors. VOA’s Eastern Europe chief Myroslava Gongadze has this story.
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British Security Minister Tom Tugendhat said on Tuesday China had closed reported “police service stations” at sites across the United Kingdom and that an investigation had not revealed any illegal activity by the Chinese state at these sites.

Britain has previously said reports of undeclared police stations in the country were “extremely concerning” and that any intimidation on British soil of foreign nationals by China or other states was unacceptable.

China has denied operating any such stations and issued a statement contesting Tugendhat’s remarks via its embassy in London, saying the accusations of running police posts in the U.K. were a “complete political lie.”

British police have investigated claims made by the nongovernmental human rights organization Safeguard Defenders that such police stations were operating at three British sites, Tugendhat said in a written statement to parliament.

“I can confirm that they have not, to date, identified any evidence of illegal activity on behalf of the Chinese state across these sites,” he said.

“We assess that police and public scrutiny have had a suppressive impact on any administrative functions these sites may have had.”

The Chinese government has previously said there are centers outside China run by local volunteers, not Chinese police officers, that aim to help Chinese citizens renew documents and offer other services.

U.S. federal agents arrested two New York residents in April for allegedly operating a Chinese “secret police station” in the Chinatown district of Manhattan. China had said it firmly opposed what it called “the U.S.’s slanders and smears.”

The British government has said it was aware of about 100 such stations around the world.

“The Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office have told the Chinese Embassy that any functions related to such ‘police service stations’ in the U.K. are unacceptable and that they must not operate in any form,” Tugendhat said.

“The Chinese Embassy have subsequently responded that all such stations have closed permanently. Any further allegations will be swiftly investigated in line with U.K. law.”

Asked about Tugendhat’s statement, a spokesperson for the Chinese Embassy in London said in a statement translated from Mandarin by Reuters:

“There is simply no existence of so-called ‘overseas police posts.’ The facts have proven that the so-called ‘overseas police posts’ [are] a complete political lie, and politicians who speculate on this topic are purely in political manipulations.

“The Chinese government urges the U.K. government to stop spreading false information, to stop generating hype and slandering China.”
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The U.N. General Assembly approved five new members for two-year terms on the organization’s powerful 15-nation Security Council on Tuesday, rejecting a bid from Belarus.

Algeria, Guyana, Sierra Leone, Slovenia and South Korea will start their terms on January 1, 2024.

The annual exercise held little excitement this year, as all but one seat was previously agreed on within regional blocs, setting up uncontested races. The only competition was between Belarus and Slovenia for a seat in the Eastern Europe Group. Slovenia defeated Belarus with 153 votes to 38.

“The race between Belarus and Slovenia is something of a litmus test for how U.N. members see East-West divisions now,” said Richard Gowan, U.N. director at the International Crisis Group and a long-time U.N. watcher, ahead of the vote.

Slovenia is a member of the European Union and NATO. Belarus is a close ally of Russia and has supported Moscow in its invasion of Ukraine, even agreeing to house Russian tactical nuclear weapons on its territory.

Slovenia, a small country in central Europe that was part of the former Yugoslavia, was a late entry, declaring its candidacy at the end of 2021 and campaigning intensively for about one year. Belarus, by contrast, announced its candidacy in 2007.

Foreign Minister Tanja Fajon told reporters ahead of the vote that, if elected, Slovenia would act as a unifying force on the Security Council.

“And with tensions and divisions that we all face today between the major players in the international community, many countries especially the smaller ones which make up the majority of the U.N. membership, want to connect with trusted partners,” she said.

Even though nearly all the seats were uncontested, candidates still needed to win a two-thirds majority of votes cast to succeed.

South Korea was confirmed for its seat with 180 votes. It will be the first time it sits on the council at the same time as Japan and comes as the two countries are repairing their historically strained relations.

“Tokyo and Seoul probably share the view that the council is not doing its job holding the DPRK to account over its proliferation activity,” Gowan told VOA. “I think we will probably see Japan and South Korea adopt a fairly common approach to urging China and Russia to put more pressure on DPRK to stop launching missiles.”

North Korea has launched dozens of ballistic missiles this year and last week attempted to put a spy satellite in orbit – all in violation of numerous Security Council resolutions. China and Russia have blocked council action.

Guyana (191 votes) will take over the seat for Latin America and the Caribbean Group. Algeria, which received 184 votes, and Sierra Leone (188 votes) will represent the African Group on the council.

Sierra Leone’s foreign minister, David Francis, told reporters after their election that his country has made the successful transition from war to peace and would bring its unique experiences to the council.

“We bring hope to all the war-torn countries in the world – from Ukraine to Afghanistan, to Iraq, to Sudan, to Yemen, to Arab-Israeli, that it can be done,” he said.

There were no available seats this year in the regional bloc dedicated to countries in the Western Europe “and others” group.

In exercising their responsibility for maintaining international peace and security, the 15 nations on the Security Council have the power to authorize the use of force, deploy peacekeeping missions and impose sanctions.

On January 1, the five winners will replace exiting members Albania, Brazil, Ghana, Gabon and the United Arab Emirates. They will join non-permanent members Ecuador, Japan, Malta, Mozambique and Switzerland, which will remain on the council through 2024, along with permanent members Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States.
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The PGA Tour, European Tour and rival Saudi-backed LIV Golf circuit announced a landmark agreement on Tuesday to merge and form a commercial entity to unify golf.

“After two years of disruption and distraction, this is a historic day for the game we all know and love,” PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan said in a joint news release.

The LIV Golf series is bankrolled by the Saudi Arabia Public Investment Fund and critics have accused it of being a vehicle for the country to attempt to improve its reputation in the face of criticism of its human rights record.

The rival circuit launched in 2022 and has lured a number of big-name players from the PGA Tour, including Hall of Fame golfer Phil Mickelson, former world number one Dustin Johnson, reigning PGA Championship winner Brooks Koepka and Australian Cameron Smith.
…

Russia is seeking to copy Iran’s tactics in evading Western sanctions imposed on Moscow since its February 2022 invasion of Ukraine, according to a report from Britain’s Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), published June 6.

Ukraine’s allies, including the United States, the European Union, Britain, Canada, Japan, Australia and New Zealand, have imposed successively tougher sanctions on Russia, initially since its forceful annexation of Crimea in 2014. 

Russia sanctions

The measures have been significantly tightened since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, targeting the Russian Central Bank, its finance and military-industrial sectors, alongside the country’s significant oil and gas exports. Individuals close to Russian President Vladimir Putin and the military have also faced asset freezes and travel bans.

The RUSI report, titled “Developing Bad Habits: What Russia Might Learn from Iran’s Sanctions Evasion,” says that “evidence is emerging of adaptations in Russia’s

financial and trade strategy.” 

“Examples include the switching of ownership of companies and properties to family members or affiliates, the use of trading companies to source foreign exchange to avoid the sanctions imposed on the Central Bank of Russia, and import substitution. … Alongside these steps, Russia is now gravitating further towards other states that have faced similarly sweeping restrictive measures or that facilitate sanctions evasion, to learn best practices, secure necessary services and establish trade relationships,” the report says.

Missiles

In a televised speech on June 4, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy warned that Russia is using a network of suppliers to evade international sanctions designed to prevent it from making missiles and other weapons.

“Unfortunately, the terrorist state manages to obtain the technologies of the world through a network of suppliers, manages to bypass international sanctions,” Zelenskyy said. “And we must close all such routes — together with our partners — so that there are no products of the free world in Russian missiles, in Russian weapons.”

He added, “Necessary steps will be taken.” 

Russia has procured drones from Iran and has used them to attack cities across Ukraine.

“In response — and demonstrating the seriousness with which Ukraine’s allies are treating this growing relationship — Western allies are increasingly targeting Iranian entities with sanctions,” the RUSI report says.

Adaptation

Russia is rapidly learning to adapt to the sanctions, said Tom Keatinge, a co-author of the report.

“In particular, sourcing the kind of electronic components they need to support their military, that’s the first thing,” he told VOA. “The second thing is obviously, they’ve had to look for new markets for their hydrocarbons, their oil exports. That’s a key revenue generator for the country.”

Russia said its economy shrank by 2.1% in 2022 — less than many expected —although some analysts question the reliability of the government figures. 

Russian oil

Meanwhile, imports of Russian crude oil by China and India hit an all-time high in May. Analysts said buyers took advantage of discounted prices. In December, Western nations imposed a price cap of $60 per barrel on Russian crude oil. The U.S. Treasury said that has resulted in a more than 40% drop in oil revenue in the first quarter of 2023.

The sanctions only apply to Western governments and companies trading with Russia.

“And therefore, if you’re a bank in India, you can perfectly well have a financial connection with a Russian bank,” Keatinge said.

Nevertheless, most global trade is still conducted in U.S. dollars. So, how has Russia circumvented attempts to strangle its economy? 

Iran’s playbook

Keatinge said the Kremlin is increasingly looking to Iran as a model on how to evade sanctions. Tehran has been subject to various Western sanctions since 1979 over its nuclear and missile programs and its support for terrorist groups, which Iran denies.

“Iran — as a hydrocarbon economy trying to export oil — has learned a lot of tricks over the recent years that we do see Russia start to employ. So, for example, shadow fleets of tankers — so this kind of switching oil between tankers in the middle of the night, with location devices switched off. But also using front companies in places like Turkey or the UAE to try and hide the origin of trade,” Keatinge told VOA.

Last month, Russia’s second-largest bank, VTB, opened an office in Tehran. The two countries have begun connecting their financial systems to facilitate transactions outside the global SWIFT payment system. Russian banks were ejected from the SWIFT network in the wake of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine last year, while Iranian banks were first excluded in 2012 before being readmitted four years later as part of the JCPOA nuclear agreement. Iran was again ejected from SWIFT in 2019, following the reimposition of sanctions by then-U.S. President Donald Trump.

Wagner

The RUSI report draws parallels between the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah, which is a U.S.-designated foreign terrorist organization, and the Wagner Group, a private army with close links to the Kremlin.

“Iran’s funding and resourcing of Hezbullah is reciprocated in numerous ways, including through support for the state’s intermediary oil trading schemes. Such joint ventures or marriages of convenience between rogue states and their proxies may possibly be mirrored in the ways in which private military companies patronized by Russia advance Russian interests (and enable the circumvention of sanctions) globally,” the report says.

Compliance

How can Ukraine’s allies prevent Russia from evading the sanctions? The private sector is the front line of compliance, Keatinge noted.

“The private sector has had to scramble to get itself in a position to ensure that it knows who its customers are, it knows who it’s exporting things to, it knows what’s allowed and what’s not allowed. And so, the result is that there are huge gaps in the system,” Keatinge said.

“We see that in the way that companies are still exporting electronics to places like Kazakhstan and celebrating the fact that their exports have gone up without thinking that perhaps Kazakhstan is just a cutout on the way to Russia,” he said.

Lessons

The report urges the West to educate the private sector on detecting illegal trades. It warns that Moscow will increasingly seek to use Iran’s playbook as it tries to circumvent sanctions.

“We need to look at countries like Iran to learn how did they shape-shift, how did they change, (in order) to anticipate what Russia might do. There has been a lax attitude towards sanctions, particularly across Europe, in the years gone by. And that has to change,” Keatinge said.
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Many voters in southeast Turkey lost their homes, valuables and loved ones in February’s earthquakes. Still, they came out to vote Sunday in what analysts say could be the country’s most pivotal elections in decades. VOA’s Heather Murdock reports on the scene with videographer Yan Boechat.
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French topflight football club Rennes on Sunday held an emotional homage to Arman Soldin, their former youth player and the AFP video reporter killed Tuesday in Ukraine.

Soldin’s mother and brother live in the western city and Rennes held the tribute to his memory at the Breton club’s home match with Troyes.

Rennes invited around 30 of Soldin’s friends and family — including a sister living in the Bosnian city of Mostar — to pay tribute to his sacrifice.

Fans joined them in warmly applauding as images of the slain reporter were shown on giant screens at the stadium while the announcer saluted Soldin’s courage and commitment to “informing as many as possible about the realities of a conflict.”

Bosnian-born French citizen Soldin, 32, was on assignment with an AFP team as the global news agency’s video coordinator in Ukraine when they came under fire from Grad rockets while with Ukrainian soldiers near Bakhmut.

Before becoming a journalist, Soldin, who as a toddler left war-torn Bosnia with his mother on a humanitarian flight to France, had been a keen footballer as a teenager.   

Growing up in the western region of Brittany he earned a place on the Rennes youth team between 2006 and 2008 in his mid-teens — only giving up on a professional career due to knee injuries.

“Football was a big part of his life,” his brother Sven told AFP. “He was extremely good, extremely talented. He had something extra.”

Even after launching a career as a journalist, Soldin never lost his passion for the round ball.

Starting off with AFP in the agency’s Rome bureau in 2015 he would enjoy weekly games with other journalists as well as a kickabout with migrants whose fate he was reporting on in the Italian Mediterranean island of Lampedusa.

He also had a four-year spell away from political reporting working for Canal Plus television’s ‘Match of ze Day’ program covering English Premier League football.

The broadcaster, where some colleagues nicknamed him “The Nutmeg Machine” for his skill of playing the ball between an opponent’s legs, put out a tribute to his time there in its Saturday night edition.  

Soldin also had a spell working for AFP in London.

While in Britain, he posted a tweet of him soaking up the atmosphere at a Tottenham match — not forgetting to keep an eye on his tablet with his beloved Rennes simultaneously meeting Marseille.

The death of Soldin brought to at least 11 the number of journalists, fixers or drivers for media teams, killed since Russia invaded Ukraine more than a year ago, according to advocacy groups.  

French anti-terror prosecutors said Wednesday they were launching a war crime investigation into Soldin’s death.

Hundreds of AFP staff observed a minute of silence Friday at Paris headquarters and from bureaus around the world via video conference.
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Dozens of supporters of two French nationals detained last year in Iran demanded their release in Paris Sunday after Tehran freed two fellow citizens who had been on hunger strike.

“Freedom for Cecile Kohler and Jacques Paris,” they chanted at the foot of the Eiffel Tower, a little over a year after their arrest on May 7, 2022.

Kohler, a teacher, and her partner Paris, remain in prison in the Iranian capital’s Evin prison accused of espionage charges their family deny. 

Their relatives and friends gathered in Paris after Iran on Friday released French nationals Benjamin Briere and Bernard Phelan, who also holds Irish nationality, from a prison in Iran’s northeastern city of Mashhad. 

“It gives us hope,” said Kohler’s sister Noemie.  

She said her sister had only received a single consular visit in what she described as the “nightmare of a year” since her arrest. 

“She’s holding on even if it’s still very tough… She spent several months in solitary confinement and is now with other detainees,” she added. 

“We send her books, but she has only received one since the start of her detention.” 

Kohler and Paris are among four French citizens, described previously as “hostages” by the French foreign ministry, who are still in prison in Iran. 

A fifth person, French-Iranian academic Fariba Adelkhah, was released from prison in February but appears unable to leave the country. 

Several other foreigners are also jailed in Iran. Campaigners view them as hostages held in a deliberate strategy by Tehran to extract concessions from the West.
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Serbian authorities on Sunday displayed many of around 13,500 weapons they say people have been handed over since this month’s mass shootings, including hand grenades, automatic weapons, and anti-tank rocket launchers.

The authorities have declared a one-month amnesty period for citizens to hand over unregistered weapons or face prison sentences as part of a crackdown on guns following the two mass shootings that left 17 people dead, many of them children.

Populist President Aleksandar Vucic accompanied top police officials on Sunday for the weapons’ display near the town of Smederevo, some 50 kilometers (30 miles) south of the capital, Belgrade.

Vucic said approximately half of the weapons collected were illegal while the other half were registered weapons that citizens nonetheless handed over. He added the weapons will go to Serbia’s arms and ammunitions factories for potential use by the armed forces.

“After June 8, the state will respond with repressive measures and punishments will be very strict,” he said of the post-amnesty period. “What does anyone need an automatic weapon for? Or all these guns?”

Serbia is estimated to be among the top countries in Europe in guns per capita. Many are left over from the wars of the 1990s and held illegally.

Other anti-gun measures are to include stricter controls of gun owners and shooting ranges.

Authorities launched the gun crackdown after a 13-year-old boy on May 3 took his father’s gun and opened fire on his fellow-students in an elementary school in central Belgrade. A day later, a 20-year-old used an automatic weapon to shoot randomly in a rural area south of Belgrade.

The two mass shootings left 17 people dead and 21 wounded, stunning the nation and triggering calls for changes in the country that has been through decades of turmoil and crises.

Tens of thousands of people have rallied in two protest marches in Belgrade since the shootings, demanding resignations of government ministers and a ban on television stations that promote violent content and host war criminals and crime figures.

Vucic on Sunday rejected opposition calls for the resignation of Interior Minister Bratislav Gasic, who was also present at Sunday’s weapons display. But the president suggested that the government might resign and that he will announce an early election at a rally he has planned for May 26 in Belgrade.

“We have no intention of replacing [interior minister] Gasic, who is doing a great job,” said Vucic. “What have police done wrong?”

Opposition politicians have accused Vucic’s populist authorities of fueling violence and hate speech against critics, spreading propaganda on mainstream media and imposing autocratic rule in all institutions, which they say stokes divisions in society.

On Friday, the protesters in Belgrade blocked a key bridge and motorway in the capital to press their demands. Protests also have been held in other Serbian cities and towns, in an outpouring of grief and anger over the shootings and the populist authorities.

Vucic has described the bridge blockade as harassment, while he and other officials and media under his control sought to downplay the numbers of protesters.
…

Turkey is voting in presidential and parliamentary elections Sunday, in what is predicted to be one of the closest votes in decades and one of the most important, both domestically and internationally. The poll will decide the political fate of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who has ruled for more than 20 years.

Sunday’s elections are predicted to see a record turnout in a country with one of the world’s highest voting participation rates. Both incumbent President Erdogan and his primary challenger, Kemal Kilicdaroglu, claim the election is the most important in the country’s history.

In Istanbul’s Kadikoy district, voting was brisk, starting when polling stations opened. The economy was the main concern for voter Mustafa, who only wanted to be identified by his first name.

He said, “the economy is most important. You just need to look and see everywhere how bad things are.”

With inflation at more than 40% and a cost of living crisis, the economy is seen as the most crucial issue for many voters. However, Zehra, a pharmacist who also wanted to be identified only by her first name, democracy was the most important issue.

She said, “for me, the main issue is to move from one-man rule and return to a pluralist democracy so that all the opinions will be represented.”

Erdogan has turned the government into a powerful executive presidency that allows him to rule by decree. Critics blamed such centralized powers for failing to react swiftly to February’s deadly earthquakes that claimed more than 50,000 lives, a charge Erdogan denies. However, Kilicdaroglu is pledging to return Turkey to a parliamentary democracy. Erdogan insists such powers are vital, given that the country is in a neighborhood of turmoil, an argument backed by voter Ali Demir.

He said, “In this election, the foreigners are trying to divide and break up Turkey; they are trying to undermine us.”

In his last campaign speech Friday, Erdogan accused U.S. President Joe Biden of trying to oust him from power through the elections.

Washington has said it does not take sides in elections.

Relations between Turkey and its traditional Western allies have become strained in recent years over Ankara’s deepening ties with Moscow and concerns over democracy. Kilicdaroglu is vowing a reset with Turkey’s Western allies.
…

Four sisters are building the first Hobbit-style village in southeast Europe in the green hills of central Bosnia, hoping to attract fans of “The Lord of the Rings” books and movies as well as sharing their childhood memories.

“We have often held family gatherings on this hill and discussed what would be the best way to make use of this view for tourism purposes,” said Milijana, the eldest of the Milicevic sisters, pointing to the stunning view of a valley and a lake nestled among the hills.

The Kresevo Hobbiton, as the Hobbits’ village is called, is located in the village of Rakova Noga (The Crab’s Leg) near the old royal and mining town of Kresevo, some 40 minutes drive from the capital of Sarajevo.

Last year Marija, a 28-year-old geology engineer, proposed to her sisters Milijana, Vedrana and Valentina that they build house in the style of the Hobbit homes in J.R.R. Tolkein’s “The Lord of the Rings” tales. The “hole houses” are built into the ground.

The sisters decided that their houses must include characteristics of the area where they live and that each sister would decorate one dwelling as she likes.

They have already built two houses and three others are under construction.

The first house, with a round green door and window, was named Lipa after the village where Milijana had spent most of her childhood with their grandparents. Lipa is also the name for the linden tree.

“Lipa is my nostalgia, the memory of a healthy childhood where garden planting was a social game, domestic animals friends and a tin barrel the Adriatic Sea,” Milijana said in the wood-decorated house.

The second house is named Ober after a cave in Kresevo. Its ceiling is decorated with stalactites to provide the feeling of being in the cave.

“Ober in history has been the mine from which Kresevo miners had extracted cinnabar and melted it to get gold,” said Marija.

Her house’s door and window is painted red after the coloring of the cinnabar ore.

The other three houses, which should be completed soon, will also be named after local attractions.

For example Bedem, with towers on its corners, is named after the fortress where Bosnia’s last queen, Katarina, had stayed while in Kresevo.

Tourists from across the region and other European countries have already started visiting, Marija said.
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Voters in Turkey are heading to the polls Sunday for landmark parliamentary and presidential elections that are expected to be tightly contested and could be the biggest challenge Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan faces in his two decades in power.

The vote will either grant the increasingly authoritarian Erdogan a new five-year term in office or set the NATO-member country on what his opposition contender calls a more democratic path.

Polling began at 8 a.m. (0500 GMT) and will close at 5 p.m. (1400 GMT). Media organizations are barred from reporting partial results until an embargo is lifted at 9 p.m. (1800 GMT). There are no exit polls.

For the first time in his 20 years in office, opinion polls indicate that the populist Erdogan, 69, is entering a race trailing behind an opponent. Opinion surveys have given a slight lead to Kemal Kilicdaroglu, the 74-year-old leader of the center-left, pro-secular Republican People’s Party, or CHP, and the joint candidate of a united opposition alliance. If neither candidate receives more than 50% of the votes, the presidential race will be determined in a run-off on May 28.

More than 64 million people, including 3.4 million overseas voters, are eligible to vote in the elections, which are taking place the year Turkey marks the centenary of the establishment of the republic. Voter turnout in Turkey is traditionally strong, showing continued belief in this type of civic participation in a country where freedom of expression and assembly have been suppressed.

The elections come as the country is wracked by economic turmoil that critics blame on the government’s mishandling of the economy and a steep cost-of-living crisis.

Turkey is also reeling from the effects of a powerful earthquake that caused devastation in 11 southern provinces in February, killing more than 50,000 people in unsafe buildings. Erdogan’s government has been criticized for its delayed and stunted response to the disaster as well as the lax implementation of building codes that exacerbated the misery.

Internationally, the elections are being watched closely as a test of a united opposition’s ability to dislodge a leader who has concentrated nearly all powers of the state in his hands.

Erdogan has led a divisive election campaign, using state resources and his domineering position over media as in previous years. He has accused the opposition of colluding with “terrorists,” of being “drunkards” and of upholding LGBTQ rights which he says are a threat to traditional family values.

In a bid to woo voters hit hard by inflation, he has increased wages and pensions and subsidized electricity and gas bills, while showcasing Turkey’s homegrown defense industry and infrastructure projects.

He has extended the political alliance of his ruling Justice and Development Party, or AKP, with two nationalist parties to include a small leftist party and two marginal Islamist parties.

Kilicdaroglu’s six-party Nation Alliance, has promised to dismantle an executive presidential system narrowly voted in by a 2017 referendum that Erdogan installed and return the country to a parliamentary democracy. They have promised to establish the independence of the judiciary and the central bank, institute checks and balances and reverse the democratic backsliding and crackdowns on free speech and dissent under Erdogan.

The alliance includes the nationalist Good Party led by former interior minister Meral Aksener, and two parties that splintered from the AKP and are led by former prime minister Ahmet Davutoglu and former finance minister Ali Babacan, as well as a small Islamist party.

The country’s main Kurdish political party, currently Turkey’s second largest opposition grouping that the government has targeted with arrests and lawsuits, is supporting Kilicdaroglu in the presidential race.

Also running for president is Sinan Ogan, a former academic who has the backing of an anti-immigrant nationalist party. One other candidate, the center-left politician Muharrem Ince dropped out of the race on Thursday following a significant drop in his ratings but his withdrawal was considered invalid by the country’s electoral board and votes for him will be counted.

Voters will also be casting ballots to fill seats in the 600-member parliament. The opposition would need at least a majority to be able to enact some of the democratic reforms it has promised.

Balloting in the 11 provinces affected by the earthquake has given rise to concern about the registration of nearly 9 million voters.

Around 3 million people have left the quake zone for other provinces, but only 133,000 people have registered to vote at their new locations. Political parties and non-governmental organizations planned to transport voters by bus but it was not clear how many would make the journey back.

Many of the quake survivors will cast votes in containers turned into makeshift polling stations erected on school yards.
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The Group of Seven (G-7) rich nations is set to agree on establishing a new program to distribute vaccines to developing countries at next week’s summit of leaders, Japan’s Yomiuri newspaper said Saturday.

In addition to the G-7, G-20 nations such as India and international groups such as the World Health Organization (WHO) and the World Bank will participate, it added, citing Japanese government sources.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, the COVAX facility, backed by WHO and the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization (GAVI), delivered nearly 2 billion doses of coronavirus vaccine to 146 countries.

However, COVAX faced setbacks in ensuring equitable access, as wealthy nations prioritized shots for their citizens while insufficient storage facilities in poorer nations caused supply delays and disposal of millions of close-to-expiry doses.

The new program aims to pool rainy-day funds for vaccine production and purchases, as well as investment in low-temperature storages and training of health workers to prepare for the next global pandemic, the Yomiuri said.

Japan, this year’s chair of the G-7 meetings, looks to build support from emerging nations on wide-ranging issues such as supply chains, food security and climate change to counter the growing influence of China and Russia.

Saturday’s meeting of G-7 finance ministers agreed to offer aid to low- and middle-income countries to help increase their role in supply chains for energy-related products.

At a meeting Saturday, G-7 finance and health ministers called for a new global financing framework to “deploy necessary funds quickly and efficiently in response to outbreaks without accumulating idle cash,” they said in a statement.

The G-7 will collaborate with the WHO and the World Bank, which manages an international pandemic fund, to explore the new funding scheme ahead of an August meeting of G-20 finance and health ministers in India, they said.

The G-7 grouping of Britain, Canada, the European Union, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the United States, is considering whether to issue a statement on a global pandemic response at the May 19-21 summit in Japan’s city of Hiroshima, the Yomiuri said.  
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Driving through the city of Hatay in Turkey is like touring a war zone in the months after a battle. Some apartment buildings are gutted, others are massive piles of rubble and tangled metal.

“This city was a rose garden,” says Ali Kandenir, a 62-year-old truck driver, in a settlement of tents housing families displaced in the February earthquakes that killed more than 50,000 people in Turkey and Syria. “Now the city is gone.”

Kandenir says he is among those who intend to show his anger at the polls this weekend, when Turkey votes in what could be its most significant election in decades. But other voters in this tent city say the opposite, that they will proudly reelect their current leader for another term.

Kandenir lives about 4 kilometers (2.5 miles) away in a temporary metal housing unit known as a container. He is trying to collect small amounts of humanitarian aid because his home — along with billions of dollars in property — was destroyed in the earthquakes.

As Kandenir describes how he fled his home in the rain in early February as the earth shook beneath him, his wife, Gul Kandenir, wipes tears from her face.

“The people here are in pain,” she says.

Divided voters

Ali Kandenir’s face grows slightly redder as he continues telling his story.

Too many people died in the earthquakes, he says, and there was too much destruction. He says Turkey’s refugee population — the largest in the world — is taking resources from people who are suffering.

“Rescue teams came but it was not fast enough,” he says. “My brother survived because we could pull him from the rubble ourselves.”

As he speaks, Devlet Ipek, a 48-year-old mother of four pops out of her nearby tent and watches us through a chain link fence. She invites us in.

Ipek says she thinks the government has responded to the disaster as well as possible and that she plans to vote for it to remain in power.

She says the Islamic nature of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s administration is welcomed, as are, in her opinion, the millions of refugees in Turkey.

“They are afraid because there is no security in Syria,” she says. “Why should they go?”

Opposition issues

Erdogan has led Turkey for more than 20 years, and some political parties say they believe this election may be their chance to step in.

“It’s possible for us to win in the first round,” says one member of the Republic People’s Party, the leading opposition party, who does not want to be identified. If one presidential candidate does not win more than 50% of the first vote, a second round will be held in two weeks.

If his party wins, he says, they have promised to reform the justice system and to expel refugees within two years.

But analysts say Turkey’s skyrocketing prices are the voters’ biggest concern. The cost of food and rent has doubled, tripled or even quadrupled in some parts of Turkey.

“It’s not a normal time to have an election,” says Ipek, as the wind loudly flaps her plastic tent walls. “But that’s what we are doing, so we will do it.”
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The family of a Frenchman released this week after he had been jailed by Iran said on Saturday he was “relieved” to be back in France.

On Friday, Benjamin Briere, whose ordeal in Iran lasted three years, and French-Irish citizen Bernard Phelan, held since October, were freed from their prison in the northeastern city of Mashhad, the French foreign ministry said.

There had been grave concerns about the health of the men, both of whom had been on hunger strikes to protest their conditions.

‘Relieved’ 

Briere, 37, was first detained while traveling in Iran in May 2020 and later sentenced to eight years in prison for espionage.

“We were able to hold him in our arms at 1930 (1730GMT) on Friday, May 12, after three years of hell,” Briere’s family said in a press release.

“He is, like all of us, relieved, calm, and he is trying to realize that he’s really here, with us,” they said. “He is, however, very weak, physically and morally, a return to normal life will be long and certainly difficult, but now he is in good hands.” 

Dozens of foreigners jailed 

The pair were among some two dozen foreigners jailed in Iran, who campaigners see as hostages held in a deliberate strategy by Tehran to extract concessions from the West.

Four more French citizens, described previously as “hostages” by the French foreign ministry, are still in prison by Iran.

A fifth individual, French-Iranian academic Fariba Adelkhah was released from prison in February but appears still unable to leave the country.

Several U.S., German, British, Swedish and other European citizens, such as Belgian aid worker Olivier Vandecasteele — who was arrested in February 2022 — also remain detained.

“All our thoughts now turn toward the five other French hostages still held in Iran,” Briere’s family said.

“Our thoughts are also with other families of European hostages held in Iran, with whom we share this heavy and painful battle,” they said. “We send them strength and courage, and we continue to fight alongside them,” they added.
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New developments:

Germany says it is preparing a new weapons package for Ukraine worth $3 billion, reportedly the nation’s largest package since Russia invaded its neighbor last year.
Russia says its forces launched attacks on Ukrainian troops and military facilities on front lines in Kupyansk, Bundman and western Bakhmut.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy arrived in Rome on Saturday for expected talks with Italian political leaders and the pope.

Zelenskyy’s trip comes as Russia again launched a drone attack on Kyiv and shelled cities in central and southern Ukraine, causing material damage, amid reports of some Ukrainian gains in Bakhmut, where heavy fighting has been under way for months.

Kyiv’s air defenses shot down all the drones launched by Russia overnight, the capital’s military administration reported Saturday, without specifying the number of drones.

There were no reports of damage or casualties, it said. It was the sixth drone attack on Kyiv this month.

In the central city of Khmelnytskyy, people were wounded and critical infrastructure was damaged by Russian shelling overnight, the region’s military administration reported early Saturday.

Khmelnytskyy Mayor Oleksandr Symchyshyn said schools, medical facilities, administrative buildings, industrial objectives, and high-rise residential buildings were damaged. “The number of wounded is currently being established,” he said.

The mayor of the southern city of Mykolayiv, Oleksandr Syenkevych, said three people were wounded in overnight shelling that damaged a factory and several residential buildings.

In Rome, Zelenskyy is to meet President Sergio Mattarella, Prime Minister Georgia Meloni, and Pope Francis during his visit, whose details have not been revealed for security reasons.

Zelenskyy on Sunday is due to receive the prestigious Charlemagne Prize in the northern German city of Aachen.

It remains unclear if he will attend the ceremony in person and if he would also travel to Berlin for meetings with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and President Frank-Walter Steinmeier.

Germany’s Der Spiegel reported Saturday that Berlin has put together a new package of military equipment for Ukraine worth $3 billion, the biggest since Russia’s invasion began.

The package will include 20 Marder infantry fighting vehicles, 30 Leopard 1 tanks, 15 Gepard antiaircraft tanks, 200 reconnaissance drones, four additional Iris-T antiaircraft systems including ammunition, additional artillery ammunition, and more than 200 armored combat and logistics vehicles, the article said.

Zelenskyy’s trip to Italy comes a day after Ukraine said it had recaptured some territory in the bitterly contested city of Bakhmut in the Donetsk region.

Russia has acknowledged its forces retreated from positions north of Bakhmut, with Defense Ministry spokesperson Igor Konashenkov telling the media that Russian forces “occupied a new frontier” at the Berkhivske reservoir, some 2 kilometers from Bakhmut.

Konashenkov said Friday that Ukraine had launched an assault with more than 1,000 troops and up to 40 tanks after advancing the day before in the Soledar direction “along the entire line of contact” with a length of more than 95 kilometers.

The gains, if confirmed, would be the biggest for Ukraine in six months.

It is unclear if the developments were part of a long-planned counteroffensive.

There also were reports of Ukrainian advances to the south, suggesting a coordinated push by Kyiv to encircle Russian forces in Bakhmut.
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