Category: Новини

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LONDON — British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak was accused Wednesday of leading a “chaotic” government as another one of his Conservative lawmakers defected to the main opposition Labour Party ahead of a looming general election. 

In a stunning move just ahead of the weekly prime minister’s questions, Natalie Elphicke crossed the floor of the House of Commons to join the ranks of Keir Starmer’s Labour Party, which appears headed for power after 14 years. 

“We need to move on from the broken promises of Rishi Sunak’s tired and chaotic government,” said Elphicke, who represents the constituency of Dover in southern England, which is at the front line of migrant crossings from France. “Under Rishi Sunak, the Conservatives have become a byword for incompetence and division.” 

Elphicke is the second Conservative lawmaker to defect to Labour in two weeks,; Dan Poulter quit in anger over the government’s handling of the National Health Service. 

The defection of Elphicke is particularly surprising as she was widely considered to be on the right of the Conservative Party. She has been hugely critical of Labour in the past and Starmer himself but has recently been increasingly disapproving of the government’s approach to migrant crossings. 

“From small boats to biosecurity, Rishi Sunak’s government is failing to keep our borders safe and secure,” she said. 

Just under 30,000 people arrived in Britain in small boats in 2023, and Sunak has made reducing that number a key issue ahead of the election due this year, notably with his controversial plan to send some asylum-seekers to Rwanda. More than 8,000 have made the dangerous crossing already this year. 

Elphicke was elected in 2019, taking over the Dover seat that had been held by her then-husband Charlie, who was found guilty in 2020 of sexually assaulting two women and sentenced to two years in prison, of which he served half. 

Elphicke will not be standing in her Dover seat at the next election, although she said she will help the party with Labour’s housing policies. 

Starmer welcomed Elphicke to the Labour benches as well as Chris Webb, the party’s new lawmaker in Blackpool South in northwest England following his big victory in a special election Thursday. 

The Labour Party’s head reiterated his call for Sunak to immediately call for a general election, saying the Conservatives cannot carry on when even a lawmaker at the forefront of the small-boats crisis — meaning Elphicke — said Sunak “cannot be trusted with our borders.” 

The date of the general election rests in the hands of the prime minister. It must take place by January, and Sunak has repeatedly said his “working assumption” was that it would take place in the second half of 2024. 

Last week, the Conservatives suffered a historic drubbing in local elections, with nearly half of its candidates losing, while Labour made gains and won most of the key mayoral races it fought, including in London. 

Particularly encouraging for Labour was winning in areas that voted for Britain’s departure from the European Union in 2016 and where it was crushed by former Prime Minister Boris Johnson at the general election in 2019. 

Elphicke’s defection may help Labour deflect Conservative attacks during the election that the opposition party may seek to reverse Brexit. In her statement Wednesday, she said Labour “has accepted Brexit and its economic policies.” 

Her defection has not only raised eyebrows within the Conservative Party. 

The left-wing Labour grouping, Momentum, said that Elphicke has “consistently demonized refugees and aid groups” and that she “should have no place in a Labour Party committed to progressive values and working-class people.” 
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MARSEILLE, France — French Olympic swimmer Florent Manaudou became the first Olympic torch carrier in France after the Olympic flame arrived in Marseille’s Old Port Wednesday on a majestic three-mast ship from Greece for the welcoming ceremony at sunset in the city’s Old Port. 

The ship sailed into Marseille’s old port with the French national anthem, La Marseillaise, echoing from the embankment and a French Air force flyover with planes first drawing the five Olympic rings and then the red-blue-white colors of the nation’s flag. 

The ship docked on the pontoon that reflects an athletics track and Manaudou carried the torch to mainland France as tens of thousands cheered and thousands of others waved from balconies and windows overlooking the festivities. 

“We can be proud,” said President Emmanuel Macron, who attended the ceremony to welcome the torch. 

“The flame is on French soil,” Macron said. “The games are coming to France and are entering the lives of the French people.” 

The torch was lit in Greece last month before it was officially handed to France. It left Athens aboard a ship named Belem, which was first used in 1896, and spent twelve days at sea. 

Paris 2024 Olympics Organizing Committee President Tony Estanguet said the return of the Olympic Games to France was cause for a “fantastic celebration.” 

“As a former athlete, I know how important the start of a competition is. That is why we chose Marseille, because it’s definitely one of the cities most in love with sports,” added Estanguet, a former Olympic canoeing star with gold medals from the 2000, 2004 and 2012 Games. 

Safety of visitors and residents has been a top priority for authorities in Marseille, France’s second largest city with nearly a million inhabitants. About 8,000 police officers have been deployed around the harbor. 

Thousands of firefighters and bomb disposal squads have been positioned around the city along with maritime police and anti-drone teams patrolling the city’s waters and its airspace. 

“It’s a monumental day and we have been working hard for visitors and residents of Marseille to enjoy this historical moment,” said Yannick Ohanessian, the city’s deputy mayor. 

The torch relay will start on Thursday in Marseille, before heading to Paris through iconic places across the country, from the world-famous Mont Saint-Michel to D-Day landing beaches in Normandy and the Versailles Palace. 

A heavy police and military presence was seen patrolling Marseille’s city center Tuesday, as a military helicopter flew over the Old Port, where a range of barriers have been set up. 

French Interior Ministry spokesperson Camille Chaize said officials were prepared for security threats including terrorism. 

“We’re employing various measures, notably the elite National Gendarmerie Intervention Group unit, which will be present in the torch relay from beginning to end,” she said. 

The Olympic cauldron will be lit after the Games’ opening ceremony that will take place on the River Seine on July 26. 

The cauldron will be lit at a location in Paris that is being kept top-secret until the day itself. Among reported options are such iconic spots as the Eiffel Tower and the Tuileries Gardens outside the Louvre Museum.
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BRUSSELS — European Union nations reached a tentative breakthrough deal to provide Ukraine with billions in additional funds for arms and ammunition coming from the profits raised from frozen Russian central bank assets held in the bloc. 

The agreement among the 27 EU ambassadors was announced by Belgium, which holds most of the frozen assets in the bloc. It came after weeks of tough negotiations among member states, which were made more complicated by the stringent financial limits on using such funds. 

The deal should free up to $3.2 billion a year for Kyiv, of which 90% could be spent on ammunition and other military equipment. 

Officials said a first installment of the funds could reach Kyiv in July. 

The EU is holding around $225 billion in Russian central bank assets, most of it frozen in Belgium, in retaliation for Moscow’s war against Ukraine. Kyiv has long been urging that those funds be used to get vital military supplies as it struggles to stave off renewed Russian attacks. 

A small group of member states, especially Hungary, refuses to supply weapons to Ukraine so special safeguards had to be included in the deal to allow for some 10% of the funds to be considered general aid. 

EU member states still need to officially endorse the ambassadors’ agreement. 
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Geneva — United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk on Tuesday condemned Russia’s brutal crackdown on journalists, which he says has been increasing since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022. 

“The continuous attacks on free speech and the criminalization of independent journalism in Russia are very troubling,” Türk said in a prepared statement that called for the release of journalists detained “solely for doing their jobs.” 

The U.N. human rights office says the number of imprisoned journalists in Russia has reached an all-time high since Moscow began its war of aggression in Ukraine, noting that at least 30 journalists are currently detained on a variety of criminal charges. 

The charges include terrorism, extremism, spying, treason, extortion, violating the provisions of the law on foreign agents, inciting mass disturbances, illegal possession of explosives and illegal possession of drugs. 

Türk, who expressed concern about the frequent use “of the broad legislative framework to combat terrorism and extremism,” called on Russian authorities to amend the legislation in compliance “with international human rights law.” 

U.N. officials report 12 of the 30 jailed reporters are serving sentences ranging from five-and-a-half to 22 years in prison. 

“Since March, at least seven journalists have faced administrative or criminal charges,” Ravina Shamdasani, spokesperson for the high commissioner, told journalists Tuesday in Geneva. 

She observed that all seven are Russian journalists who have faced the charges “for criticism of Russia’s actions in Ukraine or for alleged links to the late opposition politician Alexey Navalny, and his Anti-Corruption Foundation (FBK),” which Russia labeled extremist in 2021. 

According to the 2024 World Press Freedom Index produced by Paris-based Reporters Without Borders, Russia ranked 162nd out of 180 countries. Commenting on the designation, authors of the annual report said that Russian President Vladimir Putin, who “was unsurprisingly reelected in 2024, continues to wage a war in Ukraine” that “has had a big impact on the media ecosystem and journalists’ safety.” 

The latest report by the U.S.-based Committee to Protect Journalists finds “Russia holds a disproportionate number of foreign reporters in its jails,” noting that 12 of the 17 foreign nationals currently detained worldwide “are held by Russia.” 

Two are U.S. citizens. Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich has been held in pre-trial detention by Russia since March 2023 on charges of espionage, while Alsu Kurmasheva of VOA sister network Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty has been detained since October 2023 for failing to register as a “foreign agent.” Both detainees and their employers vehemently reject the charges as bogus and politically motivated. 

The 10 other foreign journalists imprisoned by Russia are from Ukraine, including five Crimean Tatars. 

“Russia is a place where it is very risky to be a journalist these days if you are reporting on issues that are very sensitive to the authorities,” Shamdasani said. “What is worrying us is the lack of transparency. 

“The fact that independent journalists are being cracked down on leads to a level of uncertainty and facilitates a climate of misinformation, disinformation, chaos and panic for people who do not know what their rights are in these circumstances,” she said. 

U.N. human rights chief Türk is calling for an immediate end “to the intense crackdown on journalists’ independent work,” describing the right to inform as a critical “component of the right to freedom of expression [that] needs to be upheld.” 

“Journalists should be able to work in a safe environment without fear of reprisals in line with Russia’s international human rights obligations,” he said.
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Sapporo, Japan — Friction between Japan and Russia will likely escalate amidst the burgeoning Ukraine war, with the decades-long land conflicts showing no sign of thawing.

The Kremlin recently banned non-Russian vessels from waters near the Kuril Islands – known in Japan as the Northern Territories – currently occupied by Russia but claimed by Japan.

Tokyo saw the move as part of a series of Moscow threats after the recent security alliance between the United States and Japan.

There will be further retaliation from Moscow against Japan, according to James DJ Brown, professor of political science at Japan’s Temple University.

“The Putin regime feels an obligation to retaliate against what it regards as unfriendly actions by Japan,” Brown told VOA News. “Every time Tokyo does something more to assist Ukraine or to strengthen military ties with the United States, Moscow takes some measures to punish Japan.”

He said that as Japan is likely to introduce further sanctions to support Kyiv, Moscow’s retaliation is “all but guaranteed.”

The retaliatory measures aren’t just targeting Tokyo. A Russian man residing in the Kuril Islands was warned in March by a Russian court over his remarks to Japanese media that the territory had belonged to Japan in the past.

Earlier this year, Russian President Vladimir Putin said he would visit the Kuril Islands, putting a damper on hopes for negotiations over sovereignty that both countries have attempted for decades.

Land disputes run deep

Russia and Japan’s competing claims over the four islands off the northeast coast of Hokkaido – Japan’s second-largest island – date back to at least the 19th century. Near the end of WWII, the then Soviet Union started fully occupying the Kuril Islands.

Japan claimed that the Soviet Union incorporated them “without any legal grounds” and refused to sign a peace treaty. Tokyo said about 17,000 Japanese residents were deported from the islands. The Russian public, Brown said, view the Kuril Islands as reward for the sacrifices of the Soviet people during the war.

The two countries have held talks off and on for decades to reach an agreement but to no avail.  

The conflict eased in 2016, when the two countries agreed on joint economic activities including tourism projects on the islands, as well as visa-free visits for Japanese citizens.

Two years later, former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe proposed a split of the four islands, returning two islands to Japan, but Putin rejected it. Akihiro Iwashita, professor of the Slavic-Eurasian Research Center at Japan’s Hokkaido University, called this Putin’s “failed diplomacy” toward Japan that eventually led to Tokyo taking a more hardline approach against Moscow.

“If Putin had shown goodwill to Japan, negotiating with Shinzo Abe for the peace treaty, Japan would not have taken a critical position over the Ukraine war,” Iwashita told VOA News. “Remember Japan’s hesitation to sanction Russia after its 2014 aggression against Ukraine? Japan now does not need to restrain its policy towards Russia.”

Tensions over the Ukraine war

Soon after Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, Moscow put all peace treaty talks with Japan on hold and suspended the previously agreed economic activities and visa-free visits to the islands for Japanese citizens. This followed Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s siding with Ukraine in the war, with Kishida calling the suspension “extremely unjust.”

Japan has been providing assistance to Ukraine against Russia’s invasion, including supplying Patriot air defense systems last year. Kishida was the first Japanese leader to visit an active war zone, to show solidarity with Ukraine and the U.S.

Moscow warned of “grave consequences” for its ties with Tokyo. That did not stop Japan from pledging $4.5 billion in aid to war-torn Ukraine last December, including $1 billion for humanitarian purposes.

Japan’s aid to Ukraine has affected residents of Hokkaido. A survey conducted by Hokkaido authorities and the Hokkaido Shimbun last year showed that over half of the respondents near the Russia-Japan border in the north felt a negative effect of the Ukraine war on local life, including reduction in fishing activities and trade, and human contacts.

In October last year, Russia banned all seafood imports from Japan, citing Tokyo’s release of wastewater from the Fukushima nuclear plant.

“Moscow used the pretense of the threat of radiation from treatment water from the Fukushima plant. In reality, it was an attempt by Moscow to punish Japan for its support for Ukraine,” Brown said.

In the survey, many also said they cannot foresee a solution for the northern territories, but a majority said they support Tokyo’s policy against Russia.

Both experts said Russia does not currently pose a military threat to Japan. Brown said, “the Russian military is present on the disputed islands, but their role is to defend the Sea of Okhotsk, which is important as a bastion for Russian nuclear submarines. It does not have the capabilities on the islands to launch an amphibious assault on Hokkaido.”

Peace treaty negotiations are expected to continue to be frozen for the foreseeable future, despite Kishida’s calls for their resumption in February this year.

“Kishida is displaying diplomatic goodwill towards Russia, but with no expectations of it being reciprocated…There is little room to fill the interest gap between the two,” said Iwashita.

He added that Russia’s pressure on Japan “will not lead to any results.”
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SKOPJE, North Macedonia — Voters in North Macedonia were casting ballots on Wednesday in a parliamentary election and a presidential runoff dominated by issues including the country’s path toward European Union membership, corruption and the economy.

The first round of the election for president, a largely ceremonial post, was seen as a barometer for the parliamentary vote. It gave a clear lead to Gordana Siljanovska-Davkova, the candidate backed by the center-right opposition, over incumbent Stevo Pendarovski, who is supported by the governing center-left coalition.

Siljanovska-Davkova garnered 41.2%, in the first round on April 24, compared to 20.5% for Pendarovski. The two had also squared off in the previous election in 2019, when Pendarovski won with nearly 54% of the vote. Turnout in the runoff must be at least 40% for the result to be valid.

In the parliamentary election, more than 1,700 candidates are vying for the 120 seats in the unicameral assembly. There are also three seats reserved for expatriates, but in the previous election in 2020, turnout was too low for them to be filled.

The monthlong campaign focused on North Macedonia’s progress toward joining the 27-nation EU, the rule of law, corruption, fighting poverty and tackling the country’s sluggish economy.

Skopje voter Atanas Lovacev expressed disappointment with the current government but had low expectations from whoever comes next.

“Yes, [I expect changes], because the current government did nothing,” he said. “But I don’t expect anything either from the new government. … They all make promises, but the result is nothing.”

Opinion polls ahead of the vote had consistently shown the center-right opposition VMRO-DPMNE party, at the head of a 22-party coalition called “Your Macedonia,” with a double-digit lead over the coalition “For A European Future,” led by the Social Democratic Union of Macedonia, or SDSM.

There are also two coalitions representing ethnic Albanians, who account for a quarter of North Macedonia’s population. They include the European Front, led by the Democratic Union of Integration (DUI), which has been the coalition partner of all governments of the past 20 years. But VMRO-DPMNE leader Hristijan Mickoski wants to ally with the VLEN (Worth) four-party coalition, which has positioned itself to the right of DUI.

North Macedonia’s path to the EU is being blocked by neighboring Bulgaria, which demands that the constitution be amended to recognize a Bulgarian minority. And while the center-left has agreed to the demand, VMRO-DPMNE has denounced the government’s “capitulation [to] Bulgarian dictates.”

Just over 3,500 people out of nearly 1.84 million identified themselves as Bulgarians in North Macedonia’s latest census, in 2021.

North Macedonia has been a candidate to join the EU since 2005 but was blocked for years by neighboring Greece in a dispute over the country’s name. That was resolved in 2018, but Bulgaria is now the one blocking the process — it has said it will only lift its veto once the constitution is amended.

Skopje resident Gordana Gerasimovski said she was disappointed that the country had been waiting for so long to join the EU, but hoped there would now be real progress.

“We should have been part of European Union long time ago. This is what we are lacking, but we hope that the time will get us where we want to be for so long,” she said.

EU membership negotiations with North Macedonia — and fellow-candidate Albania — began in 2022 and the process is expected to take years.

Corruption is the other hot-button issue, with a European Commission report last year saying it “remains prevalent in many areas” of North Macedonia. In December, U.S. Ambassador Angela Aggeler said there was “an epidemic of corruption in this country that has affected every sector, every organization, and only by exposing the corrupt actors can we begin to help the country address these issues.”

Mickoski has accused the ruling SDSM and DUI of a “corruption pandemic.” Prime Minister Dimitar Kovachevski has said he is “aware that people are not satisfied” and promised anti-corruption measures.

More than 2,300 domestic and international observers were scheduled to monitor the election, according to the State Electoral Commission. Preliminary results were expected early Thursday.
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LONDON — Chinese President Xi Jinping offered few concessions to his counterpart and host Emmanuel Macron as he wrapped up a two-day visit to France on Tuesday evening. Both presidents are seeking to mend ties on Xi’s first trip to Europe in five years, after relations were soured by trade disputes and Beijing’s support for Russia in its invasion of Ukraine.

Macron invited Xi high into the Pyrenees Mountains, the home region of the French president’s maternal grandmother. Beneath snowy peaks shrouded in fog, the two leaders and their wives watched traditional dancers before dining on locally produced ham, lamb, cheese and blueberry pie.

French officials said the mountain trip on Tuesday would provide a chance for less- formal one-on-one discussions after the pomp and ceremony of Xi’s official state welcome in Paris on Monday.

Relations have worsened significantly since Xi last visited the region in 2019, before the coronavirus pandemic. Europe accuses Beijing of subsidizing industries that are undercutting its own companies in areas such as electric vehicles — but Macron told his Chinese guests that the European Union is not seeking to cut economic ties.

“Our shared objective is to continue our relationship,” Macron told delegates Monday at the Franco-Chinese Business Council in Paris. “There is no logic in decoupling from China. It’s a desire to preserve our national security, just as you do for your own. It’s a desire for mutual respect and understanding, and a desire to continue to open up trade, but to ensure that it is fully fair at all times, whether in terms of tariffs, aid or access to markets.”

China’s response

Xi made no immediate concessions, said analyst Steve Tsang, director of the China Institute at the University of London School of Oriental and African Studies.

“Xi Jinping does not feel that China has an overcapacity issue. And he feels that the European position on Chinese EVs, for example, is unreasonable. But then of course he is also trying to engage with the French and potentially having a leading Chinese car manufacturer setting up facilities in France, as a kind of incentive to persuade that maybe it’s in France’s interest to engage with China and welcome Chinese EVs,” Tsang told VOA.

The trade relationship is tilted in Beijing’s favor, according to Nicholas Bequelin, a senior fellow at Yale Law School’s Paul Tsai China Center.

China “has a major export economy towards Europe. The trade deficit in Europe is huge and growing. The de-risking or anti-subsidy policies that the European Union wants to put in place will take a lot of time — and because they affect the different countries in the European Union differently, it is very difficult to get to an agreement,” Bequelin said.

Russia threat

Europe faces the more pressing security threat of Russia, as the Kremlin’s forces slowly advance in eastern Ukraine. China has given Moscow diplomatic and economic support, despite Western appeals for Beijing to help end the illegal invasion.

Xi declared a “no limits” partnership when Russian President Vladimir Putin visited Beijing in February 2022, just days before the Kremlin’s tanks rolled across the Ukrainian frontier.

A recent U.S. assessment concluded that China is providing vital components such as machine tools and microelectronics that Russia is using to make weapons. Last year, trade between China and Russia hit a record $240 billion.

Speaking in Paris Monday, Xi rejected European accusations that China was aiding Russia’s war.

“China is neither the creator of the crisis, nor a party, a participant of the war. However, we didn’t just watch the fire burning across the river but have been playing an active role in achieving peace,” Xi told reporters.

Europe’s message

China’s claim is demonstrably false — and European leaders must take a tougher line, said analyst Igor Merheim-Eyre, a policy adviser at the European Parliament and research fellow at the University of Kent.

“We’ve already had [German] Chancellor Olaf Scholz, we’ve had Macron, we’ve had Charles Michel, the president of the European Council, we have [EU Commission] President [Ursula] von der Leyen, all making trips to Beijing and repeating the same message: that China should not be supporting Russia in its aggression against Ukraine. And in those two years, I see no change,” Merheim-Eyre told VOA.

“What they’ve really failed at is spelling out to Xi Jinping what will be the cost of China supporting Russia’s war of aggression — which it clearly is. I mean if it wasn’t, we wouldn’t already have four Chinese companies on the EU sanction list. And the circumventions are much broader than that,” he said.

Costs for China

Europe should make the costs clear, said analyst Tsang, because China’s “policy has always been one of declaring neutrality, supporting Putin and refusing to pay a price for that.”

Sanctioning Chinese companies that are supplying Russia’s military would likely be effective, he said. “For Xi Jinping, the important thing is that he stays in power, and that means he has to keep the Chinese economy on an even keel. Supporting Putin is a desirable thing — but fundamentally staying in power overrides the aspirational goal of undermining U.S. global preeminence and leadership.” Tsang said.

“Shared interest”

Von der Leyen on Monday urged Beijing to help end the war. “We agree that Europe and China have a shared interest in peace and security. We count on China to use all its influence on Russia to end Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine,” she said in a recorded video address.

But European leaders should be more realistic about Beijing’s ambitions, argued analyst Merheim-Eyre.

“I’m looking at my world map, and I’m trying to see where exactly this common interest lies. Because wherever I look, from Africa to the South China Sea to Ukraine, China is playing a destructive role, and I do not see common areas of interest in these matters.”

After visiting France, Xi was headed Tuesday for Serbia, a key Balkan partner in Beijing’s Belt and Road investment program. On Wednesday, Xi is due to travel to Hungary, his closest European ally and a longtime thorn in the side of EU unity on Russia and China policy.

VOA’s Mandarin Service contributed to this story.
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