Author: Worldcrew

Tens of thousands of demonstrators gathered in Macedonia’s capital, Skopje, Tuesday to protest a visit by a European Union envoy who is trying to break the political deadlock that has left the country without a government for three months.

Waving red-and-yellow national flags, the protesters chanted “Macedonia! Macedonia!” – as EU enlargement commissioner Johannes Hahn held talks with political leaders.

Protest organizers said they were holding rallies at 42 sites around the country, and unfurled giant banners along the route taken by Hahn from the airport to the capital.

Macedonia’s two largest parties do not have enough lawmakers to form a government after a general election in December.

They would need to form a coalition with one party from the country’s ethnic Albanian minority, which is demanding that Albanian be made the country’s second official language.

The long-governing conservatives rejected the minority demand outright. Conservative President Gjorge Ivanov, however, has refused to hand the rival Social Democrats a mandate to form a government until they do the same.

Ivanov, who did not meet with Hahn, argues that the language demand is an attempt to destroy Macedonia’s character.

Supporting Ivanov’s tough line, demonstrators have gathered regularly for the past three weeks, and organizers said that a crowd of 50,000 rallied in Skopje Tuesday _ a number not immediately confirmed by authorities.

“We’ve had enough of commissioners,” Bogdan Ilievski, a protest organizer, said. “The language we all understand is Macedonian and the [minority demand] is only aimed at breaking up the country. That’s why we won’t allow it to become the policy of any government.”

Ethnic Albanians make up a quarter of Macedonia’s population. Albanian is currently recognized as an official language in minority-dominated areas but not in the country as a whole.

Macedonia has been locked in a major political crisis for the past two years, sparked by a wiretapping scandal and corruption allegations.
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Poland’s defense minister has accused European Council President Donald Tusk of working with Russia’s Vladimir Putin to harm Polish interests following the 2010 plane crash that killed President Lech Kaczynski and 95 others.

The ministry notified the military department of the National Prosecutor’s Office on Monday that it suspected Tusk, who was Polish prime minister at the time, of an “abuse of trust in foreign relations.”

The move was the latest, and possibly most serious, in an internal political row between Poland’s ruling right-wing Law and Justice (PiS) party and rival Tusk.

Poland was isolated and rebuffed at an European Union summit earlier this month when Tusk, a centrist, was reappointed as council president over Warsaw’s objections.

Tusk accused of treason

A spokeswoman for the prosecutor’s office in Warsaw confirmed it had received the ministry’s notification, which effectively accuses Tusk of diplomatic treason. It now has 30 days to decide whether to investigate.

Tusk dismissed the accusations as “purely about emotions and obsessions.”

“This is not a matter of legal or political nature, it is purely about emotions and obsessions,” he said in emailed comments. “Therefore, it is not within my competence to comment on cases like this one.”

The PiS is led by Kaczynski’s twin brother Jaroslaw, Poland’s most powerful politician and a longstanding opponent of Tusk.

Lech Kaczynski died when in a plane carrying a Polish delegation crashed approaching Smolensk Air Base in Russia. He was flying from Warsaw to commemorate the 1940 Katyn massacre of Polish officers by Soviet secret police.

‘Illegal contract’ with Putin

Defense Minister Antoni Macierewicz told the Gazeta Polska Codziennie daily on Tuesday: “Tusk made an illegal contract with Vladimir Putin to the detriment of Poland and should bear criminal responsibility for that.”

State news agency PAP quoted the notification as accusing Tusk of agreeing to terms that prevented Poland from playing a full part in investigating the causes of the crash.

Macierewicz alleged that Tusk failed to secure from the start an agreement with Moscow “to guarantee the participation of representatives of Poland in all investigative activities on the site,” and that this allowed Russia to limit the Polish role.

The notification also accused Tusk of failing to take steps that would enforce the return of the Tu-154 plane wreckage to Poland, the notification said.

Russia has repeatedly refused Poland’s demand to return the Tu-154 wreckage and its black box recorders, citing its own ongoing investigation.

Beyond negligence

The notification from the defense ministry covers the period from the plane crash on April 10, 2010 to 2014, when Tusk took up his current post as chairman of EU leaders’ summits. The alleged crime carries a sentence of one to 10 years in prison.

“It’s not about negligence, it is about a criminal offense,” Macierewicz said.

Polish prosecutors are already conducting several investigations into the Smolensk crash, including a case against a group of public officials also suspected of acting to Poland’s detriment in the year after the accident.

Tusk has frequently denied any responsibility for the crash, which an earlier official investigation concluded was an accident.

The accusation marks a sharp escalation of the conflict between PiS and Tusk, who led the rival Civic Platform party and was prime minister from 2007 to 2014. PiS has already accused him of neglecting the existence of a fraudulent investment  scheme when prime minister and selling off too many Polish businesses to foreigners.

Civic Platform party hopes Tusk may return to Poland after his EU stint and become its candidate for the next presidential election in 2020.
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An influential British think tank and Ukraine’s military are disputing a report that the U.S. cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike has used to buttress its claims of Russian hacking in the presidential election.

The CrowdStrike report, released in December, asserted that Russians hacked into a Ukrainian artillery app, resulting in heavy losses of howitzers in Ukraine’s war with Russian-backed separatists.

But the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) told VOA that CrowdStrike erroneously used IISS data as proof of the intrusion. IISS disavowed any connection to the CrowdStrike report. Ukraine’s Ministry of Defense also has claimed combat losses and hacking never happened.

The challenges to CrowdStrike’s credibility are significant because the firm was the first to link last year’s hacks of Democratic Party computers to Russian actors, and because CrowdStrike co-founder Dimiti Alperovitch has trumpeted its Ukraine report as more evidence of Russian election tampering.

Alperovitch has said that variants of the same software were used in both hacks.

While questions about CrowdStrike’s findings don’t disprove allegations of Russian involvement, they do add to skepticism voiced by some cybersecurity experts and commentators about the quality of their technical evidence.

The Russian government has denied covert involvement in the election, but U.S. intelligence agencies have concluded that Russian hacks were meant to discredit Hillary Clinton and help Donald Trump’s campaign. An FBI and Homeland Security report also blamed Russian intelligence services.

On Monday, FBI Director James Comey confirmed at a House Intelligence Committee hearing that his agency has an ongoing investigation into the hacks of Democratic campaign computers and into contacts between Russian operatives and Trump campaign associates. The White House says there was no collusion with Russia, and other U.S. officials have said they’ve found no proof.

Signature malware

VOA News first reported in December that sources close to the Ukraine military and the artillery app’s creator questioned CrowdStrike’s finding that a Russian-linked group it named “Fancy Bear” had hacked the app. CrowdStrike said it found a variant of the same “X-Agent” malware used to attack the Democrats.

CrowdStrike said the hack allowed Ukraine’s enemies to locate its artillery units. As proof of its effectiveness, the report referenced publicly reported data in which IISS had sharply reduced its estimates of Ukrainian artillery assets. IISS, based in London, publishes a highly regarded, annual reference called “The Military Balance” that estimates the strength of world armed forces.

“Between July and August 2014, Russian-backed forces launched some of the most-decisive attacks against Ukrainian forces, resulting in significant loss of life, weaponry and territory,” CrowdStrike wrote in its report, explaining that the hack compromised an app used to aim Soviet-era D-30 howitzers.

“Ukrainian artillery forces have lost over 50% of their weapons in the two years of conflict and over 80% of D-30 howitzers, the highest percentage of loss of any other artillery pieces in Ukraine’s arsenal,” the report said, crediting a Russian blogger who had cited figures from IISS.

The report prompted skepticism in Ukraine.

Yaroslav Sherstyuk, maker of the Ukrainian military app in question, called the company’s report “delusional” in a Facebook post. CrowdStrike never contacted him before or after its report was published, he told VOA.

Pavlo Narozhnyy, a technical adviser to Ukraine’s military, told VOA that while it was theoretically possible the howitzer app could have been compromised, any infection would have been spotted. “I personally know hundreds of gunmen in the war zone,” Narozhnyy told VOA in December. “None of them told me of D-30 losses caused by hacking or any other reason.”

VOA first contacted IISS in February to verify the alleged artillery losses. Officials there initially were unaware of the CrowdStrike assertions. After investigating, they determined that CrowdStrike misinterpreted their data and hadn’t reached out beforehand for comment or clarification.

In a statement to VOA, the institute flatly rejected the assertion of artillery combat losses.

“The CrowdStrike report uses our data, but the inferences and analysis drawn from that data belong solely to the report’s authors,” the IISS said. “The inference they make that reductions in Ukrainian D-30 artillery holdings between 2013 and 2016 were primarily the result of combat losses is not a conclusion that we have ever suggested ourselves, nor one we believe to be accurate.”

Erica Ma, operations administrator with IISS in the U.S., said that while the think tank had dramatically lowered its estimates of Ukrainian artillery assets and howitzers in 2013, it did so as part of a “reassessment” and reallocation of units to airborne forces.

“No, we have never attributed this reduction to combat losses,” Ma said, explaining that most of the reallocation occurred prior to the two-year period that CrowdStrike cites in its report.

“The vast majority of the reduction actually occurs … before Crimea/Donbass,” she added, referring to the 2014 Russian invasion of Ukraine.

‘Evidence flimsy’

In early January, the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense issued a statement saying artillery losses from the ongoing fighting with separatists are “several times smaller than the number reported by [CrowdStrike] and are not associated with the specified cause” of Russian hacking.

But Ukraine’s denial did not get the same attention as CrowdStrike’s report. Its release was widely covered by news media reports as further evidence of Russian hacking in the U.S. election.

In interviews, Alperovitch helped foster that impression by connecting the Ukraine and Democratic campaign hacks, which CrowdStrike said involved the same Russian-linked hacking group—Fancy Bear—and versions of X-Agent malware the group was known to use.

“The fact that they would be tracking and helping the Russian military kill Ukrainian army personnel in eastern Ukraine and also intervening in the U.S. election is quite chilling,” Alperovitch said in a December 22 story by The Washington Post.

The same day, Alperovitch told the PBS NewsHour: “And when you think about, well, who would be interested in targeting Ukraine artillerymen in eastern Ukraine? Who has interest in hacking the Democratic Party? [The] Russia government comes to mind, but specifically, [it’s the] Russian military that would have operational [control] over forces in the Ukraine and would target these artillerymen.”

Alperovitch, a Russian expatriate and senior fellow at the Atlantic Council policy research center in Washington, co-founded CrowdStrike in 2011. The firm has employed two former FBI heavyweights: Shawn Henry, who oversaw global cyber investigations at the agency, and Steven Chabinsky, who was the agency’s top cyber lawyer and served on a White House cybersecurity commission. Chabinsky left CrowdStrike last year.

CrowdStrike declined to answer VOA’s written questions about the Ukraine report, and Alperovitch canceled a March 15 interview on the topic. In a December statement to VOA’s Ukrainian Service, spokeswoman Ilina Dimitrova defended the company’s conclusions.

“It is indisputable that the [Ukraine artillery] app has been hacked by Fancy Bear malware,” Dimitrova wrote. “We have published the indicators to it, and they have been confirmed by others in the cybersecurity community.”

In its report last June attributing the Democratic hacks, CrowdStrike said it was long familiar with the methods used by Fancy Bear and another group with ties to Russian intelligence nicknamed Cozy Bear. Soon after, U.S. cybersecurity firms Fidelis and Mandiant endorsed CrowdStrike’s conclusions. The FBI and Homeland Security report reached the same conclusion about the two groups.

Still, some cybersecurity experts are skeptical that the election and purported Ukraine hacks are connected. Among them is Jeffrey Carr, a cyberwarfare consultant who has lectured at the U.S. Army War College, the Defense Intelligence Agency, and other government agencies.

In a January post on LinkedIn, Carr called CrowdStrike’s evidence in the Ukraine “flimsy.” He told VOA in an interview that CrowdStrike mistakenly assumed that the X-Agent malware employed in the hacks was a reliable fingerprint for Russian actors.

“We now know that’s false,” he said, “and that the source code has been obtained by others outside of Russia.”

This report was produced in collaboration with VOA’s Ukrainian Service.
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Turkish security forces carried out mass arrests of pro-Kurdish activists in the run-up to Tuesday’s Nowruz celebrations, which mark the start of the Kurdish new year.

Nearly 1,000 activists have been arrested in a week-long nationwide sweep by Turkish security forces.

Authorities say the detentions are aimed at preventing possible attacks by the PKK Kurdish insurgent group, which has been fighting the Turkish state for greater minority rights. Turkey considers the PKK a terrorist organization.

Critics argue the crackdown has little to do with fighting terrorism. “All of those who have been arrested are local HDP activists,” said Ertugrul Kurkcu, parliamentary deputy of the pro-Kurdish party.

“The government wants to keep the Kurdish masses out of squares and streets and out of the political context,” he argued. “It’s obvious the Nowruz celebration is an opportunity for a political awakening and the horizon of Nowruz this year is the referendum.”

Turkey will hold a referendum next month on giving President Recep Tayyip Erdogan sweeping powers, and the HDP is in the forefront of campaigning against that vote.

Security concerns have also been cited for banning Nowruz celebrations in Turkey’s capital, Ankara, and Istanbul, which is home to the world’s largest Kurdish population. Permission has been granted for celebrations in Diyarbakir, the main city in Turkey’s predominantly Kurdish southeast.

Nowruz is widely acknowledged as the most important event of the year for Kurdish cultural identity. For decades, it was banned in Turkey.

U.S.-based Human Rights Watch, in a report released Monday, highlighted what it described as an alarming crackdown on pro-Kurdish groups in Turkey.

“It’s deeply damaging to Turkey’s democracy that the government is locking up the leaders and MPs of an opposition party that received five million votes in the last election,” said Hugh Williamson, Europe and Central Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “The fact that the curbs come during a vital national debate about the country’s future is doubly disturbing.”

“We have not seen anything on this scale for many, many years,” said Emma Sinclair Webb, chief Turkey researcher for Human Rights Watch. She said  the timing and scale of the arrests, which includes 13 HDP members of parliament, are of concern.

“In the run-up to the referendum, there is a huge crackdown on Kurds in Turkey and a crackdown on the second opposition party in Turkey’s parliament, which has a lot of its members in prison, including the leaders of the party,” said Webb.

Moreover, Webb said on the local government level, “you have got 82 municipalities basically brought under government control and co-mayors of those municipalities jailed. They’ve seen 5,000 of their party officials jailed as well. There is no coincidence in the timing of this crackdown; it’s entirely intended to frustrate the activities of a big parliamentary opposition party.”

The government refutes such allegations, arguing it is engaged only in fighting terrorism. Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu has promised no let up in the crackdown, despite concerns over the forthcoming referendum.

“The arrests and detentions are upsetting our regular [campaign] work creating a shortage of experienced and seasoned organizers and activists,” said parliamentary deputy Kurkcu.

Kurkcu said the “No” campaign is adapting, going in an “unsusal direction.”

“The campaign is not run by organizing [traditional] outdoor rallies,” he said, “but through door-to-door campaigning and this campaigning is conducted by everyone available. This doesn’t require political leadership, but political courage and political will.”

Most opinion polls predict the outcome of the referendum remains too close to call. Analysts point out the crackdown on pro-Kurdish groups also plays well with Turkish nationalist voters — key constituents in Erdogan’s bid to win the referendum — making any let-up in the wave of detentions unlikely.

“They really cannot step back from what they have done, what they’ve engaged in, because we do have a referendum and they cannot make any maneuver that would look like they are capitulating,”said Soli Ozel, an international relations expert at Istanbul’s Kadir Has University.
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The top candidates in France’s volatile presidential election go head-to-head in a televised debate Monday as polls show centrist Emmanuel Macron and far right leader Marine Le Pen pulling away from the pack five weeks before the first round.

Macron, Le Pen and the three other leading candidates will take part in a nearly three-hour debate on the main private channel starting at 9 p.m. (2000 GMT) on Monday expected to be watched by millions.

The televised debate, the first held before the first round of a French presidential election, may be crucial in helping viewers make up their minds.

Opinion polls show almost 40 percent of voters are not completely sure who to back in the election, being held over two rounds on April 23 and May 7 against a backdrop of high unemployment and sluggish growth.

Markets, surprised by Britain’s Brexit vote last June, are nervous about the possibility of a victory by National Front leader Le Pen, who pledges to take France out of the euro and hold a referendum on EU membership.

Polls show Macron and Le Pen establishing a clear lead in terms of voting intentions in the first round, while conservative candidate Francois Fillon, the one-time front-runner who has been damaged by a financial scandal, has slipped back.

An attack at Paris Orly airport on Saturday, when a man known to police as a radicalized Muslim was shot dead after trying to grab a soldier’s rifle, has put security back in the spotlight after a series of Islamic attacks shook France.

That could play into the hands of right-wing candidates Le Pen and Fillon, who advocate tougher security measures.

The latest daily Opinionway poll on Monday showed Le Pen scoring 27 percent in the first round, in front of Macron on 23 and Fillon on 18. Only the top two candidates go through to the runoff, when polls suggest Macron would easily beat Le Pen.

The premium that investors demand to hold French instead of German debt rose to its highest in almost two weeks Monday, reflecting unease among investors before the debate.

“We think the importance of this debate should not be underestimated. Only 60 percent of voters polled by Ifop say they have made up their mind,” said Mizuho rates strategist Antoine Bouvet.

Pollster Ifop’s data show more than 80 percent of Le Pen’s backers saying they would definitely vote for her in the first round. By contrast, less than 49 percent of Macron’s supporters were certain they would vote for him.

The other two candidates taking part in Monday evening’s debate are the ruling Socialist Party’s candidate Benoit Hamon and Jean-Luc Melenchon, who have split the left-wing vote.

Macron, 39, a former economy minister and investment banker who has never run for elected office, made a name for himself by criticizing sacred cows of the French “social model” such as the 35-hour working week, iron-clad job protection and civil servants’ jobs for life. Other candidates are likely to attack his relative inexperience.
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Syrian government representatives will attend upcoming peace talks in Geneva, Russia’s state RIA news agency reported on Monday, citing Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov.

Bogdanov said Moscow hoped that Syrian armed opposition would be able to attend the peace talks.

Bogdanov also said the United Nations’ Special Envoy for Syria, Staffan de Mistura, would visit Moscow ahead of the Geneva talks.

De Mistura is trying to mediate a political agreement between Syria’s warring sides, and after a procedural round of talks in Geneva ended on March 3, he plans to bring the negotiators back for in-depth discussions on March 23.
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Blood tests determined Sunday that a suspected Islamic extremist consumed drugs and alcohol before a frenzied spree of violence that ended when he took a soldier hostage at Paris’ Orly Airport and was shot dead by her fellow patrolmen.

The Paris prosecutors’ office said toxicology tests conducted as part of an autopsy found traces of cocaine and cannabis in the blood of the suspect, Ziyed Ben Belgacem.

He also had 0.93 grams of alcohol per liter of blood when he died Saturday, the prosecutors’ office said. That is nearly twice the legal limit for driving in France.

The 39-year-old Frenchman with a long criminal record of drugs and robbery offences stopped at a bar in the wee hours Saturday morning, around four hours before he first fired bird shot at traffic police. Then, 90 minutes later, he attacked the military patrol at Orly, causing panic and the shutdown of the French capital’s second-biggest airport.

Yelling that he wanted to kill and die for Allah, Belgacem wrestled away a soldier’s assault rifle but was shot to death by two other soldiers before he could fire the military-grade weapon in Orly’s busy South Terminal, Paris prosecutor Francois Molins said.

In an interview Sunday with French radio Europe 1, a man identified as the suspect’s father said Belgacem wasn’t a practicing Muslim and drank alcohol.

“My son was never a terrorist. He never attended prayer. He drank. But under the effects of alcohol and cannabis, this is where one ends up,” said the father. Europe 1 did not give his name.

The father was released from police custody overnight Saturday. Belgacem’s brother and a cousin were released later Sunday.

Belgacem called his father and brother early Saturday morning, minutes after he fired at a police traffic patrol, injuring an officer in the face, to say that he had made a stupid mistake, according to Molins, the prosecutor.

“He called me at seven, eight in the morning and said, ‘There you go, Papa.’ He was extremely angry, even his mother couldn’t understand him,” the man identified as the father said on Europe 1. “He told me: ‘I ask for your forgiveness. I’ve screwed up with a gendarme.'”

A subsequent police search of Belgacem’s flat found cocaine, Molins said.

Belgacem had been flagged as having been radicalized during a spell in detention in 2011-2012, Molins said. His house was among dozens searched in November 2015 in the immediate aftermath of suicide bomb-and-gun attacks that killed 130 people in Paris.

The Orly attack forced both of the airport’s terminals to shut down and evacuate, sent passengers and workers fleeing in panic and trapped hundreds of others aboard planes that had just landed.

According to the soldiers, the attacker yelled: “Put down your weapons! Put your hands on your head! I am here to die for Allah. Whatever happens, there will be deaths,” Molins said.

The drama, which caused no injuries except for the light wound to the traffic police officer, further rattled France, which remains under a state of emergency after attacks the past two years that have killed 235 people.

 
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President Donald Trump risks driving wedges between the United States and its closest allies, something America can ill-afford. So say lawmakers of both political parties as public disputes have arisen between the White House and Britain as well as Germany. VOA’s Michael Bowman reports from Washington.
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Tensions between Germany and Turkery are on the rise again, with the Turkish president accusing the German chancellor of using “Nazi” measures. The accusation follows a pro Kurdish rally in Germany Saturday that turned into a rally against the Turkish President.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, campaigning in a referendum to extend his presidential powers again, turned his fire on the German chancellor Angela Merkel. In a televised speech Sunday, Erdogan used Germany’s Nazi past against Merkel

“When we call them fascists, Nazis they in Europe get uncomfortable. They rally together in solidarity. Especially Merkel,” Erdogan said adding, “But you are right now employing Nazi measures,”

Erdogan was infuriated after two of his ministers earlier this month were prevented from addressing meetings in Germany for the Turkish diaspora, in support of a yes vote in April’s referendum. The meetings were cancelled by local authorities because of security concerns. But on Saturday tens of thousands of Kurds were allowed to attend a gathering in the German City of Frankfurt. The meeting ostensibly to mark Newroz, the Kurdish new year, turned into a rally against Erdogan and called for a “No” vote in the referendum.

Turkish foreign minister Mevlut Cavusolgu in a statement accused Berlin of double standards, hypocrisy and supporting the” No” vote. Sunday, the German ambassador was summoned to the foreign ministry to receive an official condemnation.

Adding to Ankara’s anger, many Kurds attending the Frankfurt rally carried pictures of the imprisoned leaderof the PKK Abdullah Ocalan. The PKK is fighting the Turkish State and is designated internationally as a terrorist organization..

Political columnist Semih Idiz of Al Monitor website says the Europe is becoming increasingly embroiled in Turkish politics.

“The vote in Europe is significant , there is nearly 5 million people across Europe who are Turkish. In Germany 1.4 million who are eligible to vote. So this a reflection of domestic politics overflowing into the foreign domain and creating a big mess,” said Idiz.

Observers say the importance of the diaspora vote which traditionally gives strong support to Erdogan is viewed as increasingly key given that opinion polls indicate the result is too close to call. Tensions with Berlin could ratcheted up further with an Erdogan spokesman saying Turkey is considering sending another minister to Germany to speak at a rally ahead of the April referendum.

 
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U.S. Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin said the meeting of finance ministers of the G20 countries was a success Saturday despite the ministers not reaching agreement on trade protectionism.

“I will leave here confident that my colleagues and I are able to work in partnership to …foster and promote global growth and financial stability,” he said.

Citing President Donald Trump’s commitment to American companies and workers, Mnuchin pushed back on and effectively omitted a ban on protectionism from the joint statement released at the end of the summit.

Mnuchin did, however, say that the United States still believed in free trade.

“We believe in free trade, we’re one of the largest markets in the world, we’re one of the largest trading partners in the world,” Mnuchin said. “Having said that, we want to re-examine certain agreements,” he continued, speaking specifically about NAFTA.

Other world powers present played down any disagreement between the countries.

“It’s not true we are not agreed. It’s completely clear we are not for protectionism,” Wolfgang Schaeuble, finance minister of host country Germany, told reporters, though he did, without mentioning a country by name, say that “maybe one or the other important member state needs to get a sense of how international cooperation works.”

The G20 is a informal forum on economic cooperation between 19 countries plus the European Union. Representatives from the 19 countries and the EU will meet for a formal summit in July.

 
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President Donald Trump is scheduled to speak by phone Saturday afternoon with the president of Brazil, a nation in which many favored Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton over Trump – due in large part to his opposition to free global trade.

Nevertheless, Brazilian President Michel Temer sent a message to Trump shortly after his November election victory expressing confidence they could collaborate to strengthen relations between the countries.

Temer has said increasing trade with the U.S. and securing more U.S. investment are keys to lifting Brazil out of what he calls a “very violent” recession, its worst on record.

Trump is opposed to global trade deals, such as the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the NAFTA pact with Mexico and Canada, and he has said he would seek to rework them to protect U.S. jobs.

Trump’s election has raised concerns in many Latin American countries due to his views on immigration, and his promise to expel undocumented U.S. residents and build a wall along the U.S.-Mexican border to stem the flow of illegals.

Temer, a pro-business centrist, became president in August after Dilma Rousseff was impeached in the midst of the brutal two-year recession. The Brazilian economy is showing signs of recovery, but Temer still grapples with transportation strikes and street demonstrations against proposed changes to work rules and pensions.

Trump’s conversation with the Brazilian president comes one day after he met at the White House with German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

In tweets Saturday morning from his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida, Trump reiterated a call for Germany to make a larger financial contribution to support NATO.

During his weekly radio address Saturday, Trump reiterated plans to reverse an executive action from Barack Obama’s administration that was “threatening thousands of auto jobs in Michigan and across America.” This comes on the heels of his visit earlier this week to Willow Run auto plant in Michigan.

The president also said task forces are being established in every federal agency to identify “unnecessary regulation” that is hindering job creation.

Before his phone call with Temer, Trump will receive his daily briefing at Mar-a-Lago – his fifth weekend there since taking office.
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Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Saturday that he expects parliament to move to allow capital punishment – a change that could officially end Turkey’s bid to join the European Union.

Speaking at a ceremony marking the anniversary of a World War I campaign, Erdogan focused on the current political climate rather than historical successes.

“The families of the martyrs, the heroes [those killed as a result of a failed July 15 coup attempt] don’t need to worry,” he said as quoted from the rally by the French Press Agency. “I believe, God willing, that after the April 16 vote parliament will do the what is needed concerning your demands for capital punishment.”

The EU has long said that reinstating capital punishment in Turkey, which was outlawed there in 2004, would be the end of Turkey’s decades-long bid to join the bloc.

Tensions with Europe already are high as Turkey prepares for the April 16 referendum, which would broaden president Erdogan’s powers. Turkish officials have been campaigning among emigre Turks in Germany and the Netherlands to promote the referendum. Many of the scheduled rallies were canceled by German and Dutch leaders, resulting in various spats – including Erdogan referring to the Netherlands as “Nazi remnants”.

In addition to damaging Turkey’s chances of joining the EU, the diplomatic crisis threatens a deal agreed upon by the two sides last year that is aimed at alleviating the refugee crisis in Europe.

The ceremony, at which Erdogan spoke, marked the anniversary of what the Turkish people call the Canakkale battle, one of the greatest Ottoman victories during World War I and a defining moment in Turkish history.

Saturday’s celebrations also featured the beginning of construction on what would be the world’s largest suspension bridge, as announced by Prime Minister Binali Yildirim.
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U.S. President Donald Trump and German Chancellor Angela Merkel shook hands warmly at the end of a sometimes awkward “getting-to-know-you” session Friday at the White House that seemed to symbolize the difficulties ahead for the trans-Atlantic relationship.

Trump and Merkel, considered the two most powerful leaders in the Western world, appeared to get off to a rocky start in their first face-to-face meeting. They notably did not shake hands as they sat for photographers in the Oval Office after their opening conversation. 

At a news conference later, however, following their two hours of talks, both leaders made more conciliatory statements.

“They were civil. It was workmanlike. They did not demonstrate any particular affinity, and one could sense there had been some significant differences of opinion in the meeting,” said Charles Kupchan, senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.

WATCH: Trump, Merkel Meet in Oval Office

Trump did not bring up the sharp criticisms of Merkel he issued when he was running for president last year, when he said the veteran chancellor’s policy of welcoming immigrants was “ruining” her country and much of Europe. And Merkel was gentle in her comments about the immigration controversies in the United States since Trump took over the White House.

The problems of “migration, immigration, integration have to be worked on, obviously,” Merkel said, adding: “But this has to be done while looking at the refugees as well, giving them opportunities to shape their own lives where they are. … I think that’s the right way of going about it. And this obviously is what we have an exchange of views about.” 

Trump, who once famously called NATO “obsolete,” reaffirmed his support for the alliance, and Merkel said she was “gratified” by that. He did not, however, back down from previous criticism of allies who he says are not accepting their fair share of the defense burden.

WATCH: NATO Members ‘Must Pay Fair Share,’ Trump Says

Trump’s NATO pledge welcomed

“I reiterated to Chancellor Merkel my strong support for NATO, as well as the need for our NATO allies to pay their fair share for the cost of defense,” the U.S. president said. “Many nations owe vast sums of money from past years, and it is very unfair to the United States. These nations must pay what they owe.”

Trump’s NATO endorsement will be especially welcome to European ears, according to Jeffrey Rathke, deputy director of the Europe Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies: “This is more than the president has ever said about NATO since being elected.  So today was a bit more than that, and that will help reassure our allies of the U.S. commitment.”

Trump also tried to ease concerns that he will move the United States toward protectionism, as he has been portrayed by many European media, but he repeated that he will seek better deals with trading partners.

“I don’t believe in an isolationist policy,” the president said. “But I also believe a policy of trade should be a fair policy. And the United States has been treated very, very unfairly by many countries over the years, and that’s going to stop.”

Merkel seeks ‘compromise … good for both’

Merkel struck a conciliatory tone, while not yielding on key German interests. “We tried to talk about areas where we disagree, and find a compromise,” she told reporters. “That is good for both, because we need to be fair.”

The German chancellor emphasized the need for trade deals that benefit both sides, but she seemed to be emphasizing that any negotiation with the United States will be with the entire 28-member European Union, not with individual member states.

“I think it’s only fair, and that’s the purpose of concluding agreements: Both sides win,” Merkel said. “And that’s the sort of spirit in which we ought to be guided in negotiating any agreement between the United States and the EU. I hope we will come back to the table and talk about the agreement between EU and the U.S. again.”

WATCH: Merkel Discusses US-EU Trade Agreement Talks

Veteran observers of U.S. trans-Atlantic relationships generally agreed that this first meeting of two very different leaders and experienced negotiators was a substantive start.

“At the beginning it was much more of, ‘It’s a good meeting, we are hopeful we can work together,’ ” said John Hughes, a former U.S. diplomat who is vice president of the Albright Stonebridge Group. “But, at the same time, it became evident in some of Merkel’s responses [that] she doesn’t see eye to eye with President Trump on everything, and she was going to be forceful in making her case on some of these issues, and not just bowing down to his demands.”

Merkel told reporters that she and Trump had more discussions ahead on economic topics, during a late lunch at the White House, but she said she wanted to “project” her view about how Germany achieved its dominant role in Europe — that economic advancement has always been accomplished together with security and peace.

“The successes of Germans have always been those where Germany’s gains are one side of the coin,” Merkel said, “and the other side of the coin has been European unity and European integration. That is something of which I am deeply convinced.”
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