Month: August 2022

Germany has secured a power link to a planned offshore wind hub in the Danish part of the Baltic Sea that will help reduce energy dependence on Russia, Denmark’s energy ministry said on Monday.

The planned energy hub on the island of Bornholm will by 2030 link several offshore wind parks in the Baltic Sea with a total generating capacity of at least 3 gigawatts, enough to power 4.5 million German households, the ministry said in a statement.

The hub will be connected to Germany via a 470 kilometer power cable.

Investment and future profit will be shared equally between Germany and Denmark, the statement said without giving financial details.

“The Danish-German cooperation is a flagship project,” Germany’s Minister of Economy and Climate, Robert Habeck, said in the statement.

“The green electricity from Bornholm Energy Island will supplement the national electricity production and reduce our dependence on importing fossil energy,” he said.

Last year, the two countries began operating a smaller cross-border cable that also connects several wind farms in the Baltic Sea.

Bornholm Energy Island is part of Denmark’s broader plan to increase domestic offshore wind power production five-fold by 2030.

Early plans by Northern European countries to create a common power grid under the North Sea to connect future offshore wind farms have faced financing and regulatory challenges.

Denmark will host an energy summit on the Baltic Sea island on Tuesday.
…

Norwegian carbon dioxide (CO2) storage company Northern Lights and its owners have agreed to store emissions captured at fertilizer maker Yara’s Dutch operation from 2025 in what they say is a commercial breakthrough for the business. 

The joint venture founded by oil companies Equinor, TotalEnergies and Shell plans to inject CO2 from industrial plants into rock formations beneath the North Sea ocean floor. 

“With the first commercial agreement for transportation and storage of CO2, we open a value chain that is critical for the world to reach net zero by 2050,” Equinor Chief Executive Anders Opedal said in a statement. 

Under the deal with Yara, 800,000 tons of CO2 per year will be transported on ships from the Netherlands from early 2025. 

Northern Lights also has preliminary deals to store CO2 from a cement plant and a waste plant that, if confirmed, will fill the project’s phase 1 capacity of 1.5 million tons per year. 

Following the Yara deal, the partnership will now work on expansion of its storage capacity to between 5 million and 6 million tons of CO2 per year, Equinor said. 

The International Energy Agency says carbon capture and storage (CCS) is vital to reducing global CO2 emissions, including from hard-to-abate sectors such as cement production, to curb global warming. 

However, there are few commercial projects in existence. 

Norway tried a decade ago to create a carbon capture project at a gas power plant in a plan once touted as the oil-producing country’s “moon landing,” but it failed because of cost issues. 

In addition, some environmentalists say that CCS merely serves to prolong the age of burning carbon for energy and that the world needs a more decisive shift to renewables. 

Yara, one of the world’s largest fertilizer manufacturers, uses natural gas in its production processes and has long sought solutions to cutting the resulting emissions. 

France’s TotalEnergies said the deal to transport CO2 to Norway and store it 2,600 meters (8,500 feet) under the seabed was a breakthrough for commercial CCS operations. 

“TotalEnergies aims to develop CO2 storage capacity of more than 10 million tons per year by 2030, both for its own facilities and for its customers,” Chief Executive Patrick Pouyanne said in a separate statement. 
…

The Dutch defense ministry said Monday one of its soldiers died after being shot in the U.S. city of Indianapolis, Indiana. 

The defense ministry did not identify the soldier, but said he was a member of the Commando Corps who was participating in training in Indiana. 

Two other Dutch soldiers were also shot in the same incident early Saturday in front of their hotel, and the defense ministry said they were “conscious and able to speak.” 

Indianapolis police said they believe the shooting followed some type of altercation involving the three soldiers and another person or people. 

No arrests have been made in connection with the shootings. 

Some information for this story came from The Associated Press and Reuters. 
…

Fears of radiation leaks remain at Zaporizhzhia, but International Atomic Energy Agency says Ukraine reports the facility remains operational

The head of the U.N.’s atomic energy agency said it has a team on the way to visit Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, situated near the front line of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

International Atomic Energy Agency Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi tweeted that he is leading the team that will be at the power plant “later this week.”

“We must protect the safety and security of #Ukraine’s and Europe’s biggest nuclear facility,” Grossi said.

The IAEA said the mission will focus on assessing physical damage at the plant, determining the functionality of safety and security systems, evaluating staff conditions and performing “urgent safeguards activities.”

Russia has controlled the plant site since early in its six-month invasion, but the plant is being operated by Ukrainian engineers.

Despite numerous attacks in the area that Russia and Ukraine have blamed on each other, Grossi said Ukraine has told the agency that “all safety systems remained operational and there had been no increase in radiation levels.”

Russia launched new rocket and artillery attacks near the facility early Sunday, with Ukrainian officials reporting significant damage.

Ukraine’s Valentyn Reznichenko, governor of the Dnipropetrovsk region, said that heavy firing during the night left parts of Nikopol, about 10 kilometers from the nuclear site, without electricity. Rocket strikes damaged about a dozen homes in another nearby city, Marhanets.

The city of Zaporizhzhia, about 40 kilometers upriver from the nuclear facility, was also attacked, with city council member Anatoliy Kurtev saying two people were injured.

Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov claimed Sunday that shells fired by Ukrainian forces fell near buildings storing reactor fuel and radioactive waste.

The U.S. State Department accused Russia of blocking a consensus document on a nuclear non-proliferation treaty because the agreement noted the risk posed by fighting near the Zaporizhzhia plant.

“For the Russian Federation to not accept such language in the face of overwhelming international consensus underscores the need for the United States and others to continue urging Russia to end its military activity near ZNPP and return control of the plant to Ukraine,” the statement said. 

Moscow said it supports the work of the IAEA but has refused to withdraw its soldiers from the complex to create a demilitarized zone.

An engineer working under Russian occupation since March 4 at the Zaporizhzhia power plant has told VOA that Russian forces have placed artillery and missile installations within and around the property.

The engineer, whose identity is being withheld for fear of retaliation by the occupying authorities, supports Ukrainian government claims that Russia itself is responsible for the explosions.

Some information for this story came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters.
…

Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer backs a European Union-wide cap on runaway electricity prices, he said in a statement issued by his office Sunday.  
Austria’s conservative-led government was initially skeptical at the idea of capping power prices, but it has warmed to the idea as they have continued to rise in line with soaring gas prices following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

“We must finally stop the madness that is taking place in energy markets. And that can only happen through a European solution,” the statement quoted Nehammer as saying, adding that he would seek to convince holdouts in the bloc.

“Something has to happen at last. This market will not regulate itself in its current form. I call on all the EU 27 (member states) to stand together to stop this price explosion immediately.”

Austria is heavily dependent on Russian gas particularly in industry and heating, obtaining about 80% of its supply from Russia before the war. Most of its electricity, however, comes from renewables and there is growing incomprehension among the Austrian public at the market system where gas and power prices are closely linked.

The market price for electricity must come back down and must be decoupled from gas to bring it closer to actual production costs, Nehammer said.

“We cannot let (Russian President Vladimir) Putin determine the European electricity price every day,” he added.

The Czech Republic, which holds the rotating EU presidency, will propose an extraordinary meeting of the EU Energy Council as soon as possible to deal with soaring energy prices, Czech government officials said Friday as they seek to build European support for energy price caps.

The statement by Nehammer’s office said he would push for a sustainable model that can be implemented quickly, without elaborating. It added that he had discussed the issue with his Czech and German counterparts.  

 
…

Italian authorities scrambled Sunday to relieve overcrowding in shelters after scores of boats carrying a total of about 1,000 migrants reached Italy’s southern shores and two of its tiny islands over the weekend.

Nearly 50 boats arrived between Friday night and Saturday on Lampedusa island off Sicily, according to state radio and other Italian media. Other boats carrying migrants reached Pantelleria, another tiny island favored by vacationers.

Hundreds of migrants stepped ashore from the virtual flotilla of smugglers’ vessels on those islands. Several of the vessels launched by migrant smugglers held as few as eight passengers. But others had around 100 passengers aboard, many of them from Tunisia, according to the reports.

Other boats reached the shores of the Italian mainland Saturday, either unaided or assisted by Italian coast guard vessels.

The Italian news agency ANSA said that 92 migrants, most of them from Afghanistan, reached Puglia — the “heel” of the boot-shaped peninsula — in a sailboat Saturday. Still other migrants sailed to Calabria in the “toe” of the peninsula, while other boats reached Sicily and Sardinia, Italy’s two biggest islands, in the last two days.

On Sardinia, Carabinieri paramilitary police spotted 29 migrants walking along a road, ANSA said.

The humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders tweeted that one of its rescue ships, Geo Barents, saved 25 migrants, including five minors, from a small boat in distress in international waters near Libya Saturday night. Geo Barents already had other migrants abroad plucked to safety in other rescue operations, the group said.

With the disembarkation of hundreds of migrants from boats in the last days, the residence temporarily housing rescued migrants on Lampedusa quickly became overcrowded. Corriere della Sera said the residence housed 1,500 asylum-seekers, nearly four times its capacity.

Interior ministry authorities arranged for a commercial passenger ferry to sail from Sicily to Lampedusa, where it was expected to arrive on Sunday night, embark 250 migrants and take them to Sicilian migrant residences to lessen crowding on the tiny island’s facility.

While hundreds of thousands of migrants have set sail from Libyan shores aboard smugglers’ boats in the last decades, many also set out from Tunisia.

Italian media noted the Tunisian coast guard had thwarted at least a score of attempts by vessels filled with migrants to head toward Italy and rescued many others from boats in distress on Friday and Saturday.
…

A year after the last wisps of smoke disappeared into the skies from the imposing chimneys of the Moorburg coal plant, hopes had grown that the mothballed site would see new life as Germany scrambles to secure energy supplies.

Russia’s curtailing of gas exports to Germany in the wake of the Ukraine war has forced Berlin to make the radical decision to restart coal power stations, at least temporarily.

But infrastructure issues, manpower shortages and logistical problems are proving to be major obstacles for the restart.

At Moorburg, operator Vattenfall has dashed hopes of new operations, saying simply that “restarting it would be neither technically, economically nor legally feasible.”

“Many parts have been dismantled and sold,” said Robert Wacker, director of the site.

Even power plants that had not been completely shut, but put in reserve to generate power only occasionally, are struggling with a complete reboot.

Further south from Moorburg, energy group Uniper will on Monday fire up its Heyden 4 site, which had been a reserve plant since mid-2021.

But the company warned that its output would be affected by railway capacity limits in ferrying hard coal to the site.

Dismantled

Germany began winding down its coal-fired power plants in the last few years, in view of meeting a target to end usage of the fossil fuel by 2030.

But Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has upended plans as Moscow reduced energy exports to Germany in what Berlin believes is retaliation for its support for Kyiv.

Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s government has said it would stick to the 2030 coal exit timetable, but in the meantime, it authorized the restart of 27 mothballed plants or those put in reserve to help fill the energy gap until March 2024.

With a capacity of 875 megawatts (MW), Uniper’s Heyden 4 figures as the largest on the list.

But the Moorburg plant, located in the suburb of Hamburg, had been one of the most modern in the world.

It was shut down in the summer of 2021, just six years after it was put into service, in exchange for a public subsidy program aimed at cutting coal from Germany’s energy mix.

Since then, the operator has started dismantling and selling the parts that are not necessary for hydrogen — a priority for Germany’s future energy sources.

Before it closed, the plant churned out around 11 billion kilowatts per year — the equivalent of the electricity consumption for the city of Hamburg.

But now, the installation is no longer complete.

In the turbine hall, thousands of small components have been packed away into boxes. A rotor, an element that allows the turbine to turn, is packed in aluminium, ready to be sent off.

The transformer is also no longer functioning.

“Without the transformer, the power plant is no longer linked to the network and cannot produce any electricity,” said Vattenfall.

Pointing at rust that has accumulated on the components over the last year, the operator’s spokesman Gudrun Bode said: “We can’t restart a plant just like that.”

Retired

With winter round the corner, the race is getting tighter for Germany to ramp up its power generation capacity.

But so far, only one — the Mehrum plant with a capacity of 690 MW, has restarted.

Besides technical issues, power suppliers are struggling with an acute worker shortage.

In Moorburg, “most of those who left have found a job, or are retired,” said Wacker.

Energy giant RWE told AFP it is seeking several hundred workers as it prepares to reopen three plants with a capacity each of 300 MW.

Logistics was also turning out to be tricky, with a drought further putting pressure on the distribution network.

The river Rhine has been a key route for coal transport to power plants in the west of the country.

But record low water levels over the last week have limited shipments and forced suppliers to turn to rail transport — putting further pressure on strained cargo trains.

Uniper has said Heyden 4’s operation will be “limited partly by limits of rail transport capacity bringing coal to the site.”

Energy supplier STEAG has also said that it would bring into operation two coal-fired plants from its reserve.

It has targeted November as a possible restart date, but it also noted that current rules require sites to have coal supplies for 30 days — something that would be unachievable “given the current tight logistics situation on rail transport.”

In a bid to unblock the jam, Berlin decided Wednesday to prioritize coal and oil cargo over passenger travel this winter.

 
…

The annual Notting Hill Carnival has returned to the streets of London for the first time since 2019, with more than 1 million people expected to take in the music, spectacular parades, dancing and food offerings at Europe’s largest street party on Sunday and Monday.

The carnival, which celebrates Caribbean culture at the end of August every year, had to take place online for two years due to the coronavirus pandemic.

The carnival traces its history back to 1958, when Trinidadian human rights activist Claudia Jones began organizing a gathering to unify the community after a series of racially motivated attacks on West Indians in west London’s Notting Hill neighborhood.

The event has grown from a festival drawing several hundred people to a huge annual street party, with tens of thousands of performers in the parade and more than 30 sound systems.

Celebrations began on Saturday night, as more than 1,000 people gathered to watch a steel band competition in west London.

Pepe Francis heads the Ebony Steelband Trust, which has been performing at the carnival for decades.

“Since the band has started, I’m on my fifth generation of people and there’s been a lot of changes,” he said. “But our members look forward to carnival every year and practice takes place regularly from year to year.”

“A lot of people have been waiting for it to come back,” Francis added.
…

The death toll from an accident when a truck drove off a dike and slammed into a community barbecue in a village south of Rotterdam rose to six Sunday and police said a further seven people are in hospital, including one in critical condition.

Police spokeswoman Mirjam Boers said the truck driver, a 46-year-old Spanish man, is suspected of causing the accident that happened early Saturday evening in the village of Nieuw-Beijerland.

The large truck the man was driving left a small rural road and careered down the bank of the dike and plowed into the village gathering. Boers said the driver was not under the influence of alcohol at the time of the crash.

“We are investigating what could have happened,” Boers said.

Forensic investigators worked into the night Saturday around the truck where it stopped at the bottom of the dike. Later, a crane and a tow truck hauled it back onto the road.

Photos of the scene showed bunting hanging between trees and chairs scattered around trestle tables with plates still on them.

Local Mayor Charlie Aptroot visited the scene Saturday night.

“My condolences go out to the victims, their families, eyewitnesses and first responders,” he said in a statement.

He added that he had spoken to many of the people at the scene and expressed “appreciation for the way in which people are there for each other.” 
…

Pope Francis, who has often said he may step down in the future if bad health impedes him from leading the Catholic Church, on Sunday praised the humility of one of the few popes in history to resign willingly instead of ruling for life.

L’Aquila, a central Italian city which Francis visited briefly, is the burial place of Celestine V, who resigned as pope in 1294 after only five months to return to his life as a hermit, establishing a papal prerogative.

Pope Benedict XVI, who in 2013 became the first pontiff in about 600 years to resign willingly, visited L’Aquila four years before stepping down. In the past, Francis has also praised Benedict’s courage.

When the Vatican announced in June Francis’ trip to L’Aquila – to inaugurate an annual “feast of forgiveness” – it fueled speculation that a conjunction of events – including the induction of new cardinals on Saturday and meetings starting on Monday on the Vatican’s new constitution – could foreshadow a resignation announcement.

However, in an interview with Reuters last month Francis, 85, laughed the idea off, saying “it never entered my mind,” while leaving open the possibility that he could step down for health reasons in the distant future.

In the homily of a Mass for thousands of people in a central square, Francis noted that in “The Divine Comedy,” Dante Alighieri condemned Celestine for having carried out what the medieval poet called “The Great Refusal.”

But Francis, who prayed silently before Celestine’s tomb, said that by relinquishing power, Celestine showed the strength that comes from humility.

“In the eyes of men, the humble are seen as weak and losers, but in reality, they are the real winners because they are the only ones who trust completely in the Lord and know His will,” Francis said.

The pope, who has been using a wheelchair and a cane for the past few months because of a knee ailment, sat through most of the Mass but read his homily in a strong voice and often went off script.

He told the crowd how the pilot of the helicopter that brought him from Rome had to circle for some time because of thick fog in the mountainous area before finding an opening in the mist. He compared this to seizing an opening from God in one’s life.

Although Francis has quashed rumors that he plans to resign anytime soon, the visit underscored the Catholic Church’s need to regulate the status of pontiffs who step down.

L’Aquila was hit by a devastating earthquake in 2009 that killed 309 people, injured several thousand, and destroyed many buildings.

At the start of Sunday’s visit, Francis donned a grey fire fighter helmet and was taken around the ruins of the city’s cathedral, which is being reconstructed.
…

Poland and Czechia signed an agreement Saturday to protect Slovak airspace as Slovakia gives up its old Soviet-made MiG-29 jets.

The vow of protection by NATO allies is to last until Slovakia receives new F-16s from the United States, something expected to happen in 2024.

Under the agreement, Poland and Czechia are providing the necessary forces to quickly react in the case of violations of Slovakia’s airspace.

The agreement was signed at a Slovak air base by defense ministers Mariusz Blaszczak of Poland, Jana Cernochova of Czechia and Jaroslav Nad of Slovakia.

Blaszczak said under the agreement, a pair of Polish F-16 fighter jets would begin patrolling Slovakia’s air space starting Sept. 1. He called the effort a way for the neighbors to “deter a possible aggressor.” Slovakia has a short border with Ukraine, which Russia invaded in February.

Slovakia has a fleet of 11 MiG-29 jets, and last month Nad said Slovakia may consider donating them to Ukraine under certain conditions.

Asked by a reporter at a joint news conference about whether the jets might go to Ukraine, Nad said Slovakia was in talks with Ukraine and European Union allies about how best to help. But he said he could not say what that help might look like yet.

Since the start of the Russian invasion Feb. 24, Ukraine has urged Western allies to provide it with warplanes to challenge Russia’s air superiority.

Poland, Czechia and Slovakia belong to a region that was under Moscow’s control during the decades of the Cold War. Many people here worry that if Russia isn’t stopped in Ukraine, Moscow’s renewed imperial ambitions could target them too.
…

An elaborate fireworks display took place Saturday under calm skies in Hungary’s capital after a postponement of the show last weekend caused controversy when it led to the firing of the country’s top meteorologists over their weather predictions.

Saturday’s event, a rescheduling of the display planned for Hungary’s national holiday a week earlier, drew tens of thousands to the Danube River in Budapest in what was billed as Europe’s largest fireworks show.

On Monday, the two top officials at Hungary’s National Meteorological Service were fired after the government committee managing holiday events postponed the show based on the weather service’s prediction of a high probability of heavy rain that evening.

While storms did strike other areas of Hungary that night, they did not hit the capital. Weather service chief Kornelia Radics, who had served since 2013, and her deputy Gyula Horvath, who has served since 2016, lost their jobs.

Gabor Valter Tolczli, a spectator at Saturday’s fireworks show, said, “I was surprised that the fireworks were postponed a week ago because there was no storm then. But today I don’t mind the postponement, because there are fewer crowds.”

He added, however, that he was “outraged that the meteorologists were fired, because you can never predict the weather 100%.”

The firings led to accusations from critics of Hungary’s nationalist government, led by autocratic Prime Minister Viktor Orban, of punitive political pressure reminiscent of Hungary’s communist past.

Academics and scientists in Hungary have long complained of pressure being exerted on independent scientific bodies and Orban’s government has been accused of corruption, nepotism and anti-democratic tendencies.

This has led to clashes with the European Union, which has withheld billions in pandemic recovery funds from Hungary over what the bloc sees as deficiencies in the Hungarian government’s adherence to basic values and the rule of law.

Hungary’s government says the firings were related to the Aug. 20 forecast but that the minister overseeing the weather service had previously been dissatisfied with its performance. In a news conference Tuesday, Orban’s chief of staff, Gergely Gulyas, said the service’s assessment of a high probability of extreme weather — which never came — was “the last straw.”

On Wednesday, Hungary’s government appointed Laszlo Hanyecz, the weather service’s vice president for economic affairs, as its interim head. Of 19 leading officials at the agency, Hanyecz, who is not a meteorologist, was one of only two not to sign a letter demanding the reinstatement of the fired weather chiefs.

Climate Without Borders, an international network of weather presenters, released a letter signed by 76 members from 48 countries expressing solidarity with the fired forecasters.

“As forecasters, our first mission is to protect life and property. When Hungarian meteorologists saw danger in the forecast, they did what any of us would do — warned of the risk to life,” the letter read, condemning the firings.
…

In Poland’s late summer heat, dozens of cars and trucks line up at the Lubelski Wegiel Bogdanka coal mine, as people fearful of winter shortages wait for days to stock up on heating fuel in queues reminiscent of communist times.

Artur, 57, a pensioner, drove up from Swidnik, some 30 kilometers from the mine in eastern Poland on Tuesday, hoping to buy several tons of coal for himself and his family.

“Toilets were put up today, but there’s no running water,” he said, after three nights of sleeping in his small red hatchback in a crawling queue of trucks, tractors towing trailers and private cars.

“This is beyond imagination; people are sleeping in their cars. I remember the communist times, but it didn’t cross my mind that we could return to something even worse.”

Artur’s household is one of the 3.8 million in Poland that rely on coal for heating and now face shortages and price hikes, after Poland and the European Union imposed an embargo on Russian coal following Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine in February.

Poland banned purchases with an immediate effect in April, while the bloc mandated fading them out by August.

While Poland produces over 50 million tons from its own mines every year, imported coal, much of it from Russia, is a household staple because of competitive prices and the fact that Russian coal is sold in lumps more suitable for home use.

Soaring demand has forced Bogdanka and other state-controlled mines to ration sales or offer the fuel to individual buyers via online platforms, in limited amounts. Artur, who did not want to give his full name, said he had collected paperwork from his extended family in the hope of picking up all their fuel allocations at once.

The mine planned to sell fuel for some 250 households Friday and would continue sales over the weekend to cut waiting times, Dorota Choma, a representative for the Bogdanka mine told Reuters.

The limits are in place to prevent hoarding and profiteering, or even selling spots in the queue, Choma said.

Like all Polish coal mines, Bogdanka typically sells most of the coal it produces to power plants. Last year, it sold less than 1% of its output to individual clients so it lacks the logistics to sell fuel directly to retail buyers.

Lukasz Horbacz, head of the Polish Coal Merchant Chamber of Commerce, said the decline in Russian imports began in January when Moscow started using rail tracks for military transport.

“But the main reason for the shortages is the embargo that went into immediate effect. It turned the market upside down,” he told Reuters.

A spokesperson for the Weglokoks, a state-owned coal trader tasked by the government to boost imports from other countries declined to comment, while the climate ministry was not available for comment. Government officials have repeatedly said Poland would have enough fuel to meet demand.

In recent years, Poland has been the most vocal critic of EU climate policy and a staunch defender of coal that generates as much as 80% of its electricity. But coal output has steadily declined as the cost of mining at deeper levels increases.

Coal consumption has held mostly steady, prompting a gradual rise in imports. In 2021, Poland imported 12 million tons of coal, of which 8 million tons came from Russia and were used by households and small heating plants.

In July, Poland ordered two state-controlled companies to import several million tons of the fuel from other sources including Indonesia, Colombia and Africa, and introduced subsidies for homeowners facing a doubling or tripling of coal prices from last winter.

“As much as 60% of those that use coal for heating may be affected by energy poverty,” Horbacz said.

Back at Bogdanka, Piotr Maciejewski, 61, a local farmer who joined the queue Tuesday, said he was prepared for a long wait.

“My tractor stays in line, I’m going home to get some sleep,” he said.
…

Greece’s main opposition leader has called on the country’s prime minister to resign after he admitted that the nation’s spy chief bugged the phone of a senior political leader. The scandal is being dubbed Greece’s Watergate.  

Speaking before Greece’s Parliament, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis took the stage, defending what he called “a mistake.”

The minute he found out, he said, he looked the Greek people in the eye and told them he knew nothing of what was going on. 

It was wrong, he said, adding, however, that it was legal on national security grounds.

Greek law allows eavesdropping on criminal suspects, terrorists, and pedophiles,

but the Greek constitution bars phone-tapping of political leaders except on national security grounds.

Mitsotakis was hammered with complaints, charges, and demands during the heated debate Friday for failing to explain why the phone of Nikos Androulakis, the head of Greece’s Socialist party, had been tapped.

Instead, Mitsotakis added to conspiracy theories whirling since the scandal broke earlier this month that suggest Androulakis’ phone was hacked at the behest of foreign spy agencies.

Forces outside the country can only benefit from seeing this slip-up cause instability and a political crisis, he said.

Mitsotakis refused to elaborate, but Alexis Tsipras, Greece’s main opposition leader and a former prime minister, insisted the nation had to know why Androulakis’ phone tapping was allowed on grounds of national security.

“Is he a foreign agent, a spy? Your refusal, to tell the truth, is in itself an answer,” Tsipras said.

Local media loyal to the government have suggested Androulakis’s phone was hacked at the request of spy agencies from China, Armenia and Ukraine – allegations that the three countries have categorically denied.

Still, the scandal adds to fears of widespread surveillance across Europe at a moment when democracies feel threatened by Russian aggression. The European Union has begun to regularly check phones and other devices for listening applications and espionage.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez has also been a target recently, along with President Emmanuel Macron of France, the former prime minister of Belgium and top EU officials.

During the heated parliamentary debate, Tsipras urged the government to resign, accusing it of defying democratic practices and acting in a way that was a disgrace to the Greek people.

Parliamentary probes are set to begin in the coming weeks.
…

Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic announced the decision to cancel the September 12-18 EuroPride celebration during a news conference where he also proposed extending the term of Serbia’s prime minister, who identifies as a lesbian.

Members of the European Pride Organizers Association chose Serbia’s capital three years ago to host the annual event. Vucic said a crisis with neighboring Kosovo and various economic problems were among the reasons why the Balkan nation’s authorities did not think they could handle EuroPride, which features a Pride parade.

“This is a violation of minority rights, but at this moment the state is pressured by numerous problems,” he said.

EuroPride organizers said Serbian authorities must provide security against “bullies” who threaten the march and seek to discredit it. European Pride Organizers President Kristine Garina urged Serbian Prime Minister Ana Brnabic to honor a promise to support the event.

“President Vucic cannot cancel someone else’s event,” Garina said. “The right to hold Pride has been ruled by the European Court of Human Rights to be a fundamental human right.”

An organizer in Serbia, Goran Miletic, said police must formally ban the march to prevent it from happening. If they issue a ban, organizers would file a complaint at Serbia’s Constitutional Court. He insisted that indoor events planned as part of the week-long celebration can’t be banned.

“The only thing that can happen is for the police to ban the [pride] march,” Miletic said. “However, such a hypothetical decision would be contrary to the constitution.”

Serbia pledged to protect LGBTQ rights as it seeks EU membership, but increasingly vocal right-wing supporters harass and sometimes attack people based on their sexual orientation or gender identity.

Serbia’s right-wing and pro-Russian groups have gained strength in the past several years and some secured parliament seats during the country’s April general election. Several thousand people recently joined a march in Belgrade against LGBTQ Pride.

“It’s not the question of whether they [extremists] are stronger, but you just can’t do it all at the same moment, and that’s it,” Vucic said. “I am not happy about it, but we can’t manage.”

Vucic won another five-year term in the first round of April’s vote, and his Serbian Progressive Party won the general election in a landslide. The president said Saturday that Brnabic, who has led the previous two governments in Serbia, should lead the new Cabinet that is expected to be formed in the coming weeks.

Brnabic first became Serbia’s prime minister in 2017, in what was seen as major change for the country that is predominantly conservative and male-dominated. Brnabic lives with her female partner, but LGBTQ groups have criticized the prime minister, saying she has done little to improve the position of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer individuals in Serbian society.

After Belgrade’s 2010 pride march produced clashes, subsequent marches took place with strong police protection.

EuroPride was first celebrated in London in 1992, and Belgrade was set to be the first city in southeast Europe to host the event, according to organizers. Next month’s event was expected to attract thousands of people from throughout Europe.

Vucic said the celebration could be postponed for “happier times.” He insisted that state authorities must plan instead for energy problems anticipated for the winter, partly as a result of Russia’s war in Ukraine.

The Serbian government has condemned the Russian invasion but has refused to join Western sanctions against Russia.

Vucic said tensions with Kosovo, a former Serbian province whose independence the government in Belgrade has refused to recognize, were another source of pressure on authorities.

The tensions soared last month from a dispute over travel documents and license plates, and have raised concerns about instability in the Balkans, where multiple wars were fought amid the breakup of Yugoslavia. Serbia relies on support from Russia and China to continue claiming that Kosovo is part of its territory.

Washington and most EU countries have recognized Kosovo independence. U.S. and EU envoys visited Kosovo and Serbia earlier this week in an effort to ease the tensions.

 
…

Serbia and Kosovo have settled an ethnic dispute over the movement of citizens across their border, European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said Saturday.

“We have a deal,” Borrell said in a tweet. “Kosovo Serbs, as well as all other citizens, will be able to travel freely between Kosovo & Serbia using their ID cards. The EU just received guarantees from PM [Albin] Kurti to this end.” 

The dispute stemmed from predominantly ethnic Albanian Kosovo’s declaration of independence from Serbia in 2008, something Belgrade has refused to recognize.

Serbia and Kosovo still have to agree on the hotly contested use of Serbian car number plates issued in the north of Kosovo where Serbs defy the government in Pristina and see Belgrade as their capital.

Independent Kosovo is recognized by the United States, all but five EU members, but not by a number of other states including Serbia’s allies Russia and China.

The most recent flareup of tensions between Serbia and Kosovo has been triggered by a directive for Kosovo authorities for local Serbs to switch their car number plates from Serbian to Kosovo ones from September 1.

Serbs from northern Kosovo, responded by setting roadblocks and clashing sporadically with police before NATO peacekeepers oversaw their removal.

The talks between EU and U.S. envoys with the authorities in Serbia and Kosovo have so far failed to yield concrete results about the car number plates issue.

Earlier in the day, Serbia’s President Aleksandar Vucic said he was hoping the EU would provide guarantees for the personal documents agreement. He also said Serbia would be issuing a “a general disclaimer” in which it would be written that the use of identity cards issued by Pristina was allowed for practical reasons with an aim of facilitating the freedom of movement but not tantamount to the recognition of Kosovo’s independence.

“Under the EU-facilitated Dialogue, Serbia agreed to abolish entry/exit documents for Kosovo ID holders and Kosovo agreed to not introduce them for Serbian ID holders,” Borrell tweeted.

Belgrade and Kosovo’s Serb minority also claim entitlement under a 2013 EU-brokered agreement to an association of semi-autonomous majority-Serb municipalities, which Pristina has refused to implement.
…