New opposition protests in Macedonia follow violent clashes

May 06, 2015

SKOPJE, Macedonia (AP) — More than 1,000 opposition supporters protested outside Macedonia's parliament on Wednesday over the 2011 police killing of a student, a day after violence at a similar demonstration left 38 officers and one protester injured.

Protesters peacefully chanted slogans calling for the resignation of conservative Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski's government, which the left-wing opposition party has accused of trying to cover up the fatal police beating.

Interior Minister Gordana Jankulovska said six of the officers injured Tuesday night were hospitalized in severe condition. "It was a brutal attack on the police," she said, adding that protesters used metal bars to beat police and threw stones, bottles and eggs.

The Vienna-based Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe voiced concern at the violence, urging restraint from police and protesters alike. "The right to peacefully gather and protest is a constitutionally guaranteed right of all citizens in the country," said Ralf Breth, head of the OSCE mission to Skopje. "However, such protests should not be marred by violence."

Before Tuesday's violence, Social Democrat head Zoran Zaev accused the prime minister of attempting to cover up the 2011 death of 22-year-old Martin Neskoski. Zaev released dozens of audio recordings he says are from illegal wiretaps, in which people purported to be Gruevski, the country's intelligence chief, its interior minister and other officials discuss how to cover up the killing.

The recordings are part of a series of wiretaps Zaev has been releasing amid Macedonia's most severe political crisis in years. Jankulovska described Zaev's claims as "monstrous" and accused him of abusing the young man's death for political gains.

Zaev has accused Gruevski of being behind the illegal wiretaps of about 20,000 Macedonians, including journalists, judges, ambassadors and lawmakers. Gruevski has denied the accusation, countering that the wiretaps were done by foreign spies.

Thousands turn out to clean Milan after May Day clashes

May 03, 2015

ROME (AP) — Thousands of Milan residents, led by Mayor Giuliano Pisapia, have marched through Italy's financial capital to protest violence that left much of downtown trashed on May Day.

Hundreds of the marchers on Sunday also removed graffiti and helped repair other damage wreaked by protesters who rampaged through downtown two days earlier while VIPs were inaugurating the world's fair the city is hosting, Expo 2015, which opened on its outskirts.

The vandals smashed bank and shop windows, torched parked cars and damaged traffic lights, breaking off from a peaceful Labor Day march on Friday that protested a high-speed rail line being built in northern Italy and other big construction projects.

France vows to defend Arab allies, strengthen business ties

May 05, 2015

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) — French President Francois Hollande vowed to defend Gulf Arab allies as he announced Tuesday that his country is in talks with Saudi Arabia for business deals worth tens of billions of euros (dollars).

Hollande made the remarks after a ceremonial meeting in Saudi Arabia's capital, Riyadh, with the heads of state of the six energy-rich countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council. The meeting was headed by Saudi King Salman, who met Hollande for bilateral talks Monday night.

The Western-allied council does not traditionally invite foreign heads of state to its meetings, but Tuesday's summit was meant primarily as a show of gratitude for Hollande, who has been supportive of the Gulf countries.

Hollande said threats faced by these Arabian Gulf nations are also faced by Paris. He said that any nuclear agreement between Iran and world powers also must not threaten the Gulf, pledging France would not hesitate to defend its allies there — even with military action.

"We are here to define a strategic, durable partnership," he told reporters about his meetings with the Saudis. He said both sides discussed "information and intelligence exchange in order to fight terrorism."

Hollande refused to provide detail on the potential business deals but said there were about 20 projects including arms exports, solar power installations, civil aircraft deliveries, transportation projects and health efforts. Some of the deals will be formalized in October, he said.

Ties between Washington and Riyadh have cooled under President Barack Obama as his administration works toward a nuclear deal with Iran. France's position on the issue has been closer to that of Saudi Arabia, which is worried that any deal lifting sanctions will bolster Iran's growing influence in the region.

In his remarks, King Salman urged the international community "to set strict rules to ensure the preservation of the region's security and stability and to prevent the rush toward an arms race." Iran and Saudi Arabia are regional rivals who back opposite sides in Syria's civil war. Saudi Arabia and Iran also support rival political parties in Lebanon, and the kingdom is leading airstrikes against Iran-allied Houthi rebels in Yemen.

Monday, Hollande signed a 6.3 billion euro ($7 billion) deal to sell 24 Rafale fighter jets to Qatar, which Iranian President Hassan Rouhani quickly criticized. "European countries shouldn't be proud of selling more weapons to this or that country," Rouhani said in remarks carried by the semi-official Fars news agency.

Hollande also met former Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri while in Saudi Arabia. Considered Lebanon's most influential Sunni Muslim politician, Hariri splits his time between Saudi Arabia and France after leaving Lebanon in January 2011 after Hezbollah and its allies brought down his government.

In November, France and Saudi Arabia signed an agreement to provide the Lebanese army with $3 billion worth of weapons paid for by Riyadh. The Lebanese military is widely considered much weaker than the Shiite Hezbollah militant group, which is armed and funded by Iran.

Corbet reported from Paris. Associated Press writers Abdullah al-Shihri in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, and Amir Vahdat in Tehran, Iran, contributed to this report.

EU nations oppose key refugee quota scheme

May 08, 2015

BRUSSELS (AP) — A European Union proposal to establish a quota system obliging member countries to share the burden of settling refugees is likely to be rejected.

Slovakia and Estonia are among those that have publicly objected to a quota system, which would require unanimous agreement among the 28 EU nations. "The Slovak Interior Ministry currently refuses binding quotas on migrants," it said in a statement to The Associated Press. Estonia said it prefers voluntary relocation and resettlement for refugees.

The EU's executive Commission was to propose the plan next Wednesday as part of a strategy to cope with thousands of migrants fleeing conflict and poverty for better lives in Europe. More than 10,000 migrants have been rescued recently crossing the Mediterranean in unseaworthy boats. Some 1,700 are feared dead.

Europe marks 70 years since Nazi defeat, end of epochal war

May 08, 2015

PARIS (AP) — With quiet moments of memory or military pomp, leaders and ordinary citizens across Europe are marking 70 years since the Nazi defeat and the end of a war that ravaged the continent. But the East-West alliance that vanquished Hitler is deeply divided today.

Russia is celebrating Soviet wartime feats in a ceremony Saturday that is causing diplomatic tensions because of the country's role in Ukraine's conflict. Poland has held a ceremony meant as an alternative to Moscow's.

Paris' mile-long Champs Elysees was closed to traffic to make way for a procession of official motorcades and mounted military escorts that ascended the wide boulevard from the Place de la Concorde to the Arc de Triomphe, site of France's Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.

"The victory of May 8th wasn't the supremacy, the domination, of one nation over another. It was the victory of an ideal over a totalitarian ideology," President Francois Hollande said in a speech before arriving at the giant stone arch.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and the U.S. ambassador to France joined French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius to lay a wreath at the tomb, in a sign of appreciation for the American role in liberating France from German occupation.

Photos taken 70 years ago show massive crowds of Parisians filling the Champs Elysees to celebrate the Nazi surrender, after nearly five years of occupation. May 8 is now a public holiday in France, but relatively few people turned out on the Champs Elysees Friday for the official ceremony.

Other ceremonies took place around Europe, including in Poland, where President Bronislaw Komorowski was joined by U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon and the presidents of Ukraine and several Central European countries for a ceremony at the site where some of the first shots were fired by Germany against Poland at the start of the war on Sept. 1, 1939.

In Germany, top officials gathered at Berlin's Reichstag parliament building for an hour-long commemoration of the end of the war in Europe.

Cameron's Conservatives win in surprise UK election

May 08, 2015

LONDON (AP) — The Conservative Party swept to power Friday in Britain's Parliamentary elections, winning an unexpected and resounding victory that returns Prime Minister David Cameron to 10 Downing Street in a stronger position than before.

Cameron's office said he would go to Buckingham Palace, where he is expected to tell Queen Elizabeth II that he has enough support to form a government. That brings the election to a much-quicker-than-expected conclusion. Polls ahead of Election Day showed Conservatives locked in a tight race with the opposition Labor Party, raising the possibility of days or weeks of negotiations to form a government.

Labor took a beating, mostly from energized Scottish nationalists who pulled off a landslide in Scotland. With Cameron's Conservatives winning a working majority in the 650-seat House of Commons, the election result looked to be far better for him than even his own party had foreseen. With 639 constituencies counted, the Conservatives had 324 seats to Labour's 229.

The prime minister beamed early Friday as he was announced the winner of his Witney constituency in southern England. "This is clearly a very strong night for the Conservative Party," he said, stopping just short of declaring overall victory. He would be the first Conservative prime minister to win a second term since Margaret Thatcher.

"I want my party, and I hope a government that I would like to lead, to reclaim a mantle that we should never have lost — the mantle of one nation, one United Kingdom," Cameron said, vowing to counter the rise of Scottish nationalism with more powers for Scotland and Wales.

Labor, led by Ed Miliband, was routed in Scotland by the Scottish National Party, which took almost all of the 59 seats in Scotland. "What we're seeing tonight is Scotland voting to put its trust in the SNP to make Scotland's voice heard, a clear voice for an end to austerity, better public services and more progressive politics at Westminster," party leader Nicola Sturgeon told the BBC.

"The Scottish lion has roared this morning across the country," said former SNP leader Alex Salmond, who was elected in the seat of Gordon. Scottish Labor leader Jim Murphy insisted he would not resign despite losing his seat but Miliband's grip on the overall leadership seemed more tenuous, as the party failed to make predicted gains against the Conservatives across the rest of Britain.

"This has clearly been a very disappointing and difficult night for the Labor Party," Miliband said. Cameron's coalition partner, the Liberal Democrat party, faced electoral disaster, losing most of its seats as punishment for supporting a Conservative-led agenda since 2010.

Leader Nick Clegg did hold on to his seat but resigned as party leader Friday. Almost 50 million people were registered to vote in Thursday's election, one of the most unpredictable in decades. Opinion polls during the monthlong campaign had suggested the result was too close to call.

Votes in each constituency were counted by hand and the results followed a familiar ritual. Candidates — each wearing a bright rosette in the color of their party — line up onstage like boxers as a returning officer reads out the results.

But if the form was familiar, the results were often shocking. Among the early Scottish National Party winners was 20-year-old student Mhairi Black, who defeated Douglas Alexander, Labor's 47-year-old foreign policy spokesman and one of its most senior figures. Black is the youngest U.K. lawmaker since 13-year-old Christopher Monck entered Parliament in 1667.

One of the big losers of the day was U.K. Independence Party leader Nigel Farage, who resigned after losing his race. His party ran third in opinion polls, but by early Friday had won only one seat because its support is spread out geographically.

Britain's economy — recovering after years of turmoil that followed the 2008 financial crisis — was at the core of many voters' concerns. The results suggest that many heeded Cameron's entreaties to back the Conservatives as the party of financial stability.

Public questions at television debates made plain that many voters distrusted politicians' promises to safeguard the economy, protect the National Health Service from severe cutbacks and control the number of immigrants from eastern Europe.

British voters reacted with surprise as they awoke to the news. Polls had shown a virtual dead heat in the race, and many expected weeks of wrangling over who would be in power. "I thought it would be closer," said account manager Nicky Kelly-Lord, 38.

But some, like project manager Jonathan Heeley, 42, thought it inevitable that a country struggling to rebuild in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis would be anxious to keep the economic recovery going.

"The country's rebuilding itself and people want to stay with that," he said. The pound surged as much as 2 percent after exit poll results were released, as investors took that as reassurance that the country will not see days or weeks of uncertainty over the formation of a new government. The currency held onto most of those gains on Friday, trading at $1.5440. Stocks also surged, with the main FTSE 100 up 1.6 percent.

Sylvia Hui, Paul Kelbie, Gregory Katz and Martin Benedyk contributed to this story