6 Romanian ministers fired as party leader seeks more power

November 19, 2018

BUCHAREST, Romania (AP) — Romania's ruling Social Democratic Party fired six ministers on Monday as the beleaguered party chairman sought to tighten his grip on the government. Social Democrat chairman Liviu Dragnea has come under fire for his management style and corruption convictions, but has vowed to continue as party leader even though he can't be prime minister because of a conviction in 2016 for vote-rigging.

During a meeting, the party voted to fire the transport, economy, labor, culture, development, sports and communication ministers. Dragnea ally Lia Olguta Vasilescu switched from the labor to the transport ministry, while the others lost their ministerial posts. The defense minister resigned earlier Monday.

Premier Viorica Dancila said the changes were necessary because "we have to respond to new challenges ... both in the government and also as we (prepare) to take over the European Union presidency on Jan. 1."

Dancila, who has little executive power, thanked the previous ministers and explained why the party's new ministerial proposals were suitable. Dragnea who effectively runs the government said Monday's decisions were "political and managerial."

He was handed a 3½-year sentence in June for abuse of power in office, which he has appealed. In a boost for Dragnea, the party approved his ally, Codrin Stefanescu, as the new party secretary. He has been extremely critical about European Union commissioner Corina Cretu, a Romanian Social Democrat who has castigated the government for failing to absorb EU funds.

Earlier, Defense Minister Mihai Fifor and Bucharest Mayor Gabriela Firea resigned their positions to avoid being fired. Fifor said he would dedicate himself to helping the party win the 2020 parliamentary election.

Victor Ponta, a former prime minister and the party chairman before Dragnea, called the new government "a combination of professional incompetence, no backbone and unclean business with public money."

Firea, who has accused Dragnea of running the party in an underhand and arbitrary manner, resigned as acting leader of the party's Bucharest branch following reports that the party was poised to remove her. She later said she no longer held two other executive positions in the party.

"It is revenge," she said. "Dragnea wanted to get rid of me."

Kosovo police arrest 4 Serbs, sparking protests in the north

November 24, 2018

PRISTINA, Kosovo (AP) — Tensions in Kosovo rose again Friday after police arrested three ethnic Serbs, including two police officers, on suspicion of involvement in the killing earlier this year of a leading Serb politician in the north of the country.

The three men were arrested in the Serb-dominated town of Mitrovica, 40 kilometers (25 miles) north of the capital, Pristina, as suspects in the January slaying of Oliver Ivanovic, police said in a statement. A fourth Serb was arrested for resisting police. A fifth person is still at large, police said.

Police said they seized evidence for the investigation into Ivanovic's killing during raids in four locations. Police showed photos of a drone, automatic weapons and ammunition and other equipment found in the raids.

Prosecutor Syle Hoxha said they have questioned more than 40 witnesses to date in the case. Nobody has yet been charged in the slaying. Thousands of Serbs protested in Kosovo towns, some blocking all main roads leading to Northern Mitrovica, as well as several border posts with Serbia. No violence was immediately reported.

Kosovo's ethnic Albanians fought a bloody war with Serbia from 1998-1999 which ended with a 78-day NATO air campaign in June 1999. Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008 which Belgrade still refuses to recognize.

Earlier this week, tensions soared after Kosovo failed to become a member of the international police organization, Interpol, following intense lobbying by Serbia. Kosovo slapped a 100 percent tax on goods imported from Serbia in apparent retaliation.

In Belgrade, Serbia President Aleksandar Vucic said the arrests were a "demonstration of force" that he said was designed to frighten the Serbs in Kosovo and avert attention from the taxes that Kosovo imposed in violation of a regional trade agreement.

"We must prepare ourselves for long-term support for our people (in Kosovo) that won't be easy, simple or cheap," said Vucic. "Serbia will not agree to new rules and new blackmail against our country and our people."

Vucic spoke after a meeting with the members of the Serbian government. He held meetings earlier on Friday with security officials and the ambassadors or Russia and China, Serbia's allies in its refusal to recognize Kosovo's independence.

Kosovo Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj's Cabinet appealed for calm and said the police operation was not linked to any political development. NATO-led peacekeepers in Kosovo, a force known as KFOR, also urged calm and said "there was no unlawful operation or military action and there has never been any threat to safety and security of the citizens."

KFOR said in a statement that the situation "remains stable and under control on the ground," but acknowledged rising tensions "at political level due to some international and economic developments."

Haradinaj met with ambassadors of Western powers including the United States, Britain, Germany, and France, for talks on the country's situation and to explain the tax on Serb and Bosnian goods. Ethnic Serb leaders in Kosovo also called for calm and asked Serbia and the international community to assist them.

Goran Rakic, mayor of Northern Mitrovica, told The Associated Press that ethnic Serb leaders had formed a crisis center and called on the international community and Serbia for help. He said he had talked by phone with Vucic.

Vucic's adviser Nikola Selakovic said the arrests of four Serbs in Kosovo were designed to "spread fear, intimidate and demonstrate force" against the Serbs in Kosovo. "This is a game of nerves, a walk on thin line. The goal is to provoke our reaction which would be immediately used for measures against us," Selakovic said.

Llazar Semini reported from Tirana, Albania. Dusan Stojanovic and Jovana Gec contributed from Belgrade, Serbia. Bojan Slavkovic contributed from Northern Mitrovica.

Ireland to Become World's First Country to Divest From Fossil Fuels

By Lorraine Chow
Nov. 23, 2018

Ireland's landmark Fossil Fuel Divestment Bill passed the Seanad, or upper house, on Thursday, putting the Emerald Isle on track to become the first country in the world to divest from fossil fuel-related funds.

The bill—which requires the Ireland Strategic Investment Fund to sell off about €318 million ($361 million) investments in coal, oil, gas and peat assets over a five year period—now heads to President Michael D. Higgins for signature, where it will likely become law by the end of the year, according to the Irish Times.

Alice-Mary Higgins, an Independent Senator and the president's daughter, was jubilant about the bill's "swift passage" in the Seanad.

President Higgins told Green News in July that Ireland has a role in tackling climate change. He said the bill, first introduced by independent Donegal Deputy Thomas Pringle in 2016, was "greatly" needed and a "testament to cross-party cooperation and support."

"While we are a small nation, we have a huge impact on the most vulnerable citizens in the world. It's morally imperative that we urgently respond to climate change as it's those most vulnerable who cannot afford to wait for us to act accordingly," he added.

The bill's passage is a major step for Ireland, which ranks last among European Union countries in the 2018 Climate Change Performance Index.

Green Party Senator Grace O'Sullivan welcomed the final passage of the bill.

"Ireland can finally hold its head up high on an issue of climate policy, as the first country in the world to put a national divestment strategy into place," O'Sullivan said in a press release. "This bill will help protect us from climate change, will allow us to stand as an example to the world and protect Irish tax payers from massive losses as the world moves to a post-carbon future."

Source: EcoWatch.
Link: https://www.ecowatch.com/ireland-fossil-fuels-divestment-2621293680.html.

Merkel rebuffs German nationalists over migration pact

November 21, 2018

BERLIN (AP) — Chancellor Angela Merkel on Wednesday rejected calls from nationalist lawmakers for Germany to drop its support for a U.N.-backed agreement on migration. Several countries — including the United States, Hungary, Austria, Israel, Australia and Poland — have announced they won't back the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration, set to be approved next month in Marrakech, Morocco.

Speaking during parliament's annual budget debate in Berlin, Merkel told lawmakers that the pact would ensure "reasonable conditions" elsewhere that already exist in Germany, such as the right for migrants to access health services and get financial support.

"That's why it's in our national interest that the conditions around the world, for refugees on the one hand and migrants on the other, are improved," Merkel said. Opposition to the pact has come mainly from the far-right Alternative for Germany party, but a number of lawmakers from Merkel's own party have also begun to question the agreement.

Health Minister Jens Spahn called recently for a broader debate about the pact and, if necessary, for a delay in approving it. Spahn appears to be trailing other high-profile candidates in a bid to succeed Merkel as leader of her Christian Democratic Union party next month.

One of the leading contenders, Friedrich Merz, called Wednesday night for a clarification that the U.N. pact won't create any new grounds for asylum "through the back door." At an event in eastern Germany with the other candidates, Merz also advocated a wider discussion on how the right to asylum in Germany is defined.

Merkel, who has announced she won't run for a fifth term in 2021, said the migration pact is an example of the way in which global problems can only be solved through international cooperation. Amid a rise in nationalist sentiment around the world, Merkel has become one of the most vocal defenders of multilateralism, frequently noting that Germany owes its revival after World War II to institutions such as the European Union and United Nations.

Presenting her government's 356 billion-euro ($407-billion) budget for 2019, Merkel cited plans to invest more in care for children and the elderly, improve integration of migrants, raise pension levels and boost renewable energy.

Alternative for Germany's co-leader, Alice Weidel, earlier accused Merkel's government of spending "without thinking about tomorrow." Weidel used much of her speech to defend her party over its receipt of foreign donations and accuse rivals of having similarly dubious sources of income.

Merkel didn't respond to Weidel's comments about party funding.

Merkel says UN migrants pact is in Germany's interest

November 21, 2018

BERLIN (AP) — Chancellor Angela Merkel says it's in Germany's interest to support a U.N. agreement on migration that countries such as the United States, Hungary and Poland have rejected. Merkel told lawmakers Wednesday that the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration would ensure many of the conditions that already exist in Germany.

German officials hope the non-binding pact, due to be approved next month in Marrakech, Morocco, will reduce the flow of migrants to Germany by ensuring that they can expect humane conditions elsewhere, too.

Merkel used her budget speech to emphasize the importance of international cooperation, noting that Germany owes its revival after World War II in part to multilateral institutions such as the European Union and the United Nations.

French protesters angry over fuel taxes clash with police

November 24, 2018

PARIS (AP) — French police fired tear gas and water cannons to disperse violent demonstrators in Paris on Saturday, as thousands gathered in the capital and beyond and staged road blockades to vent anger against rising fuel taxes.

Thousands of police were deployed nationwide to contain the eighth day of deadly demonstrations that started as protests against tax but morphed into a rebuke of President Emmanuel Macron and the perceived elitism of France's ruling class. Two people have been killed since Nov. 17 in protest-related tragedies.

Tense clashes on the Champs-Elysees on Saturday saw police face off with demonstrators who burned plywood, wielded placards reading "Death to Taxes" and upturned a large vehicle. At least eight people, including two police officers, were injured in the day of unrest across France, according to authorities. Police said that dozens of protesters were arrested or detained in Paris for "throwing projectiles," among other acts. In the Place de la Madeleine, scooters were burned to blackened shells.

"It's going to trigger a civil war and me, like most other citizens, we're all ready," said Benjamin Vrignaud, a 21-year-old protester from Chartres. "They take everything from us. They steal everything from us," said 21-year-old Laura Cordonnier.

The famed avenue was speckled with plumes of smoke and neon — owing to the color of the vests the self-styled "yellow jacket" protesters don. French drivers are required to keep neon security vests in their vehicles.

Authorities said that 5,000 protesters flooded the Champs-Elysees at the demonstration's peak that had dwindled by dusk. There were nearly 81,000 protesters in total nationwide. Interior Minister Christophe Castaner denounced protesters from the far-right whom he called "rebellious," as he accused National Assembly leader Marine Le Pen of encouraging them.

But the Interior Ministry played down the scale of Saturday's demonstrations by highlighting that up to 244,000 people took part in last Saturday's protest. The unrest is proving a major challenge for embattled Macron, who's suffering in the polls.

The leader, who swept to power only last year, is the focus of rage for the "yellow jacket" demonstrators who accuse the pro-business centrist of elitism and indifference to the struggles of ordinary French.

Macron has so far held strong and insisted the fuel tax rises are a necessary pain to reduce France's dependence on fossil fuels and fund renewable energy investments — a cornerstone of his reforms of the nation. He will defend fresh plans to make the "energy transition" easier next week.

Paris deployed some 3,000 security forces on Saturday, notably around tourist-frequented areas, after an unauthorized attempt last week to march on the presidential Elysee Palace. Police officials said that a no-go zone, set up around key areas including the presidential palace and the National Assembly on the Left Bank of the Seine River, has not been breached.

But authorities are struggling because the movement has no clear leader and has attracted a motley group of people with broadly varying demands. The anger is mainly over a hike in the diesel fuel tax, which has gone up seven euro cents per liter (nearly 30 U.S. cents per gallon) and will keep climbing in coming years, according to Transport Minister Elisabeth Borne. The tax on gasoline is also to increase four euro cents. Gasoline currently costs about 1.64 euros a liter in Paris ($7.06 a gallon), slightly more than diesel.

Far left leader Jean-Luc Melenchon explained to BFMTV the historical importance of this issue in the Gallic mindset: "When tax is no longer agreed to, it's the start of revolutions in France."

Chris Den Hond and Patrick Hermensen contributed to this report.

Time for France to give back looted African art, experts say

November 23, 2018

PARIS (AP) — African artworks held in French museums — richly carved thrones, doors to a royal kingdom, wooden statues imbued with spiritual meaning — may be heading back home to Africa at last. French President Emmanuel Macron, trying to turn the page on France's colonial past , received a report Friday on returning art looted from African lands.

From Senegal to Ethiopia, artists, governments and museums eagerly awaited the report by French art historian Benedicte Savoy and Senegalese economist Felwine Sarr, and commissioned by Macron himself.

It recommends that French museums give back works that were taken without consent, if African countries request them — and could increase pressure on museums elsewhere in Europe to follow suit. The experts estimate that up to 90 percent of African art is outside the continent, including statues, thrones and manuscripts. Thousands of works are held by just one museum, the Quai Branly Museum in Paris, opened in 2006 to showcase non-European art — much of it from former French colonies. The museum wouldn't immediately comment on the report.

Among disputed treasures in the Quai Branly are several works from the Dahomey kingdom, in today's West African country of Benin: the metal-and-wood throne of 19th-century King Ghezo, the doors to the palace of Kign Gele, and imposing, wooden statues.

The head of Ethiopia's Authority for Research and Conservation of Cultural Heritage, Yonas Desta, said the report shows "a new era of thought" in Europe's relations with Africa. Senegal's culture minister, Abdou Latif Coulibaly, told The Associated Press: "It's entirely logical that Africans should get back their artworks. ... These works were taken in conditions that were perhaps legitimate at the time, but illegitimate today."

The report is just a first step. Challenges ahead include enforcing the report's recommendations, especially if museums resist, and determining how objects were obtained and whom to give them to. The report is part of broader promises by Macron to turn the page on France's troubled relationship with Africa. In a groundbreaking meeting with students in Burkina Faso last year, Macron stressed the "undeniable crimes of European colonization" and said he wants pieces of African cultural heritage to return to Africa "temporarily or definitively."

"I cannot accept that a large part of African heritage is in France," he said at the time. The French report could have broader repercussions. In Cameroon, professor Verkijika Fanso, historian at the University of Yaounde One, said: "France is feeling the heat of what others will face. Let their decision to bring back what is ours motivate others."

Germany has worked to return art seized by the Nazis, and in May the organization that coordinates that effort, the German Lost Art Foundation, said it was starting a program to research the provenance of cultural objects collected during the country's colonial past.

Britain is also under pressure to return art taken from its former colonies. In recent months, Ethiopian officials have increased efforts to secure the return of looted artifacts and manuscripts from museums, personal collections and government institutions across Britain, including valuable items taken in the 1860s after battles in northern Ethiopia, Yonas said.

In Nigeria, a group of bronze casters over the years has strongly supported calls for the return of artifacts taken from the Palace of the Oba of Benin in 1897 when the British raided it. The group still uses their forefathers' centuries-old skills to produce bronze works in Igun Street, a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Eric Osamudiamen Ogbemudia, secretary of the Igun Bronze Casters Union in Benin City, said: "It was never the intention of our fathers to give these works to the British. It is important that we get them back so as to see what our ancestors left behind."

Ogbemudia warned the new French report should not remain just a "recommendation merely to make Africans to calm down. "Let us see the action."

Elias Meseret in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia; Babacar Dione in Dakar, Senegal; Sam Olukoya in Lagos, Nigeria; Baba Ahmed in Bamako, Mali; Edwin Kindzeka Moki in Yaounde, Cameroon, and David Rising in Berlin contributed to this report.

French troops deployed amid protests on Reunion island

November 22, 2018

PARIS (AP) — France is deploying soldiers to calm violence on the Indian Ocean island of Reunion after protests over fuel tax hikes degenerated into looting and rioting. Schools on the island are closed for a third day Thursday because protesters' roadblocks prevent teachers, children and food supplies from reaching them, according to a statement from the regional administration.

Gas price protests have simmered in France and its overseas territories since Saturday. On Reunion, a verdant island cherished by tourists, the protests unleashed broader anger over poverty, which is much more widespread than on the French mainland.

French President Emmanuel Macron on Wednesday night defended government efforts to boost the economy on Reunion but also ordered troops to the area, calling the violence "unacceptable." The French military could not provide details on the deployments.

The prefecture said 123 people have been arrested on Reunion since Saturday and some 30 police officers injured. Nationwide, the gas price protests have left two people dead and hundreds injured. They are led by drivers who dub themselves the "yellow jackets" for the neon vests that all drivers are required to carry in their cars in case of car trouble.

A new wave of protests is planned for sites around the country Saturday. After tensions around an unauthorized protest attempt in Paris last week, the Interior Ministry agreed to allow a gathering on the Champ de Mars, the field stretching out beneath the Eiffel Tower.

Police are under orders to remove drivers blocking sites critical to the French economy such as oil depots and train stations. The drivers are protesting taxes that the government is hiking as part of efforts to wean France off fossil fuels. Gasoline currently costs about 1.64 euros a liter in Paris ($7.06 a gallon), slightly more than diesel.

French drivers block oil depots to protest fuel price hikes

November 19, 2018

PARIS (AP) — French drivers blocked oil depots and disrupted traffic toward the tunnel beneath the English Channel on Monday as they tried to keep up pressure on President Emmanuel Macron's government to abandon fuel tax hikes.

Scattered road blockades have continued around France since mass protests of the tax increases left one protester dead and hundreds injured Saturday. About 20,000 protesters took part in some 350 actions Monday around France, including on a highway leading to the tunnel used by Eurostar trains to Britain, according to Interior Ministry spokesman Frederic De Lanouvelle. About 30 people were arrested overnight as police tried to clear out protesters, a security official said.

Protest representative Benjamin Cauchy said on RMC radio that drivers blocked about 10 oil depots Monday and were demanding a freeze on taxes that he says disproportionately hurt the working class. French oil industry lobby UFIP said protesters blocked some of the country's 200 depots and slowed traffic at others, but couldn't give nationwide figures.

Local French media also reported road blockades Monday at sites from Verdun in the northeast to Bordeaux in the southwest. The protests reflect broader frustration with Macron, whose government is sticking to the fuel tax rise as part of efforts to clean up the environment.

Protesters called for more national actions Saturday. They also said they were raising money online for the family of the protester who was struck and killed by a panicked driver. Macron himself, whose popularity has been sinking, wouldn't comment when asked Monday about the protests. He referred to the Sunday night comments by his prime minister, Edouard Philippe, who vowed to keep the fuel tax hikes in place.

The protest movement represents drivers of various backgrounds, notably those who rely on their cars to get to work. The protesters called themselves "yellow jackets" after the safety vests French drivers are obliged to keep in their cars for emergencies.

Taxes on diesel fuel have gone up 7 euro cents (nearly 8 U.S. cents) and are to keep climbing in the coming years, Transport Minister Elisabeth Borne has said. The tax on gasoline is to increase 4 euro cents. Gasoline currently costs about 1.64 euros a liter in Paris ($7.06 a gallon), slightly more than diesel.

Key points in the Brexit deal between Britain and the EU

November 22, 2018

LONDON (AP) — The draft divorce agreement between British and European Union negotiators has two parts: a legally binding withdrawal agreement, which runs more than 580 pages, and a 26-page political declaration on future relations.

Some key points:

WITHDRAWAL AGREEMENT

Transition period: Britain will leave the EU on March 29 but remain inside the bloc's single market and bound by its rules until the end of December 2020, while the two sides work out a new trade relationship. The transition period can be extended for up to two years before July 1, 2020 if both parties decide more time is needed.

Irish border: The deal commits the two sides to a "backstop" solution to guarantee the border between EU member Ireland and the U.K.'s Northern Ireland remains free of customs posts or other obstacles. It keeps the U.K. in a customs arrangement with the EU, and will last until superseded by permanent new trade arrangements. Both sides say they hope to have a new deal in place by the end of 2020, so the backstop is never needed.

Divorce bill: Britain agrees to cover contributions to staff pensions and commitments to EU programs the U.K. made while a member for the funding period that runs to 2020. The bill has previously been estimated at about 39 billion pounds ($50 billion).

Citizens' Rights: EU citizens living in Britain, and Britons elsewhere in the bloc, will continue to have the rights to live and work.

POLITICAL DECLARATION

The two sides commit to "an ambitious, broad, deep and flexible partnership across trade and economic cooperation, law enforcement and criminal justice, foreign policy, security and defense and wider areas of cooperation." But many of the details will only be worked out after Britain leaves the EU on March 29.

Trade: The two sides commit to a "comprehensive" economic relationship, including a free-trade area. There will be common customs arrangements to provide tariff-free trade, and the two sides commit to "build and improve on" the temporary single customs territory set out in the withdrawal agreement.

The U.K. "will consider aligning with Union rules in relevant areas" to ensure a friction-free economic relationship. But the document acknowledges that closeness will be limited by the EU's need to protect the integrity of its single market, and by Britain's desire for an independent trade policy.

Irish border: Britain and the EU commit to replacing the "backstop" with a permanent solution "that establishes alternative arrangements for ensuring the absence of a hard border on the island of Ireland." This could include as-yet undeveloped technological solutions.

Financial services: The two sides should explore whether they can declare the other's regulatory regimes "equivalent" in order to facilitate cross-border financial services. They should aim to conclude their assessments by the end of June 2020.

Fishing: One of the most contentious issues — who has access to U.K. and EU territorial waters — is deferred. The declaration says only that the two sides should "establish a new fisheries agreement," ideally by July 1, 2020.

Security: The two sides will try to maintain law-enforcement cooperation at the same level as now, "as far as is technically and legally possible." There should be "timely exchanges of intelligence and sensitive information between the relevant Union bodies and the United Kingdom authorities."

Travel: Citizens of the U.K. and the EU will not need visas for short visits.

May gets rebellion reprieve, but faces warning from allies

November 20, 2018

LONDON (AP) — British Prime Minister Theresa May got a reprieve in one of her Brexit battles Tuesday as party rebels said they did not yet have the strength for a leadership challenge. But she faced a new headache as parliamentary allies warned they could remove support from May's minority government if she does not alter her divorce deal with the European Union.

Northern Ireland's Democratic Unionist Party struck a deal last year for its 10 lawmakers to back May's Conservatives on major legislation. But the Protestant, pro-U.K. party opposes the Brexit deal's plans for keeping the border between Northern Ireland and EU member Ireland open after Brexit, saying it weakens the ties binding the U.K. by creating separate trade rules for Northern Ireland.

In a warning to May, DUP lawmakers abstained or opposed the government during several votes on a finance bill late Monday. DUP lawmaker Sammy Wilson said the votes were "designed to send a political message to the government: Look, we've got an agreement with you but you've got to keep your side of the bargain."

May defended her Brexit deal in an article for Tuesday's Belfast Telegraph, saying it "puts Northern Ireland in a fantastic position for the future." She said businesses would benefit because Northern Ireland would "be a gateway to both the EU market and the rest of the U.K.'s market."

In better news for the beleaguered British leader, a leading pro-Brexit lawmaker acknowledged that the rebels haven't mustered the numbers for a leadership challenge. Jacob Rees-Mogg is one of a group of Conservative legislators who have written letters calling for a no-confidence vote in the prime minister. They say the draft divorce deal would leave Britain tied to the bloc's rules without any say in making them.

The group had previously said it was confident of getting the 48 letters — 15 percent of Conservative lawmakers — needed to spark a leadership challenge. "Patience is a virtue, virtue is a grace," Rees-Mogg said Tuesday. "We shall see whether letters come in due time."

The draft agreement reached last week triggered an avalanche of criticism in Britain and left May fighting to keep her job even as British and EU negotiators raced to firm up a final deal before a summit on Sunday where EU leaders hope to rubber-stamp it.

The 585-page, legally binding withdrawal agreement is as good as complete, but Britain and the EU still need to flesh out a far less-detailed declaration on their future relations. May's office said she would meet European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker in Brussels on Wednesday as part of work to finalize the declaration.

EU leaders have largely welcomed the deal, but Spain expressed concerns, saying the wording leaves unclear how Gibraltar, the British territory at the southern tip of the Iberian Peninsula, would be dealt with.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said Tuesday that his country would vote against the divorce agreement if Gibraltar's future isn't considered a bilateral issue between Madrid and London. Sanchez told a business forum in Madrid that Spain "cannot accept that what will happen to Gibraltar in the future depends on negotiations between the U.K. and the EU. It will have to be something that we define and we negotiate and agree between the U.K. and Spain."

If the EU approves the deal it needs to be passed by the European and British Parliaments. The parliamentary arithmetic looks daunting for May, with both pro-Brexit and pro-EU lawmakers vowing to vote against the deal when it comes to a vote, likely next month. If lawmakers reject the agreement, the U.K. would face a political crisis just weeks before Britain leaves the EU on March 29.

Bank of England policymakers warned Tuesday that business concern was growing about the prospect of the country crashing out of the European Union without a deal. Bank governor Mark Carney said the risk of no deal — with the potential for tariffs, border checks and disruption to travel and trade — was "uncomfortably high."

Many U.K. businesses say they would be hurt by a "no-deal" Brexit and have welcomed the agreement. It gives companies a measure of certainty by confirming that relations between Britain and the EU will remain unchanged during a transition period until the end of 2020, and possibly beyond.

Tech giant Microsoft backed the agreement Tuesday, saying it would preserve U.K. and EU employees' rights to live and work wherever they currently reside and would help ensure "the free flow of data across borders."

"Microsoft, its employees and its customers need a workable deal, not 'no deal,'" said U.K. chief executive Cindy Rose. "The proposed agreement is both a necessary compromise and workable; leaving without a deal is neither."

Aritz Parra in Madrid and Pan Pylas in London contributed to this story.

UK leader has eye on rebellion as EU braces for Brexit push

November 19, 2018

LONDON (AP) — The U.K. and the European Union plowed ahead Monday with plans to have their divorce deal signed, sealed and delivered within days as British Prime Minister Theresa May waited to see whether rebel lawmakers opposed to the agreement had the numbers to challenge her leadership.

The draft agreement reached last week triggered an avalanche of criticism in Britain and left May fighting to keep her job even as British and EU negotiators raced to firm up a final deal before a weekend summit where EU leaders hope to rubber-stamp it.

The 585-page, legally binding withdrawal agreement is as good as complete, but Britain and the EU still need to flesh out a far less detailed seven-page declaration on their future relations. May said "an intense week of negotiations" lay ahead to finalize the framework.

The deal has infuriated pro-Brexit lawmakers in May's Conservative Party. The Brexiteers want a clean break with the bloc and argue that the close trade ties called for in the agreement May's government agreed would leave Britain a vassal state, bound to EU rules it has no say in making.

Two Cabinet ministers, including Brexit Secretary Dominic Raab, resigned in protest, and rebels are trying to gather the signatures of 48 lawmakers needed to trigger a no-confidence vote. One pro-Brexit Conservative lawmaker, Simon Clarke, on Monday urged wavering colleagues to join the rebellion, saying "it is quite clear to me that the captain is driving the ship at the rocks."

Even if May sees off such a challenge, she still has to get the deal approved by Parliament. Her Conservatives don't have a parliamentary majority, and it's not clear whether she can persuade enough lawmakers to back the agreement.

May argues that abandoning the plan, with Britain's withdrawal just over four months away on March 29, could lead to Brexit being delayed or abandoned, or to a disorderly and economically damaging "no deal" Brexit.

But Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn said his lawmakers would vote against May's agreement and also try to block a "no-deal" exit. He said "Labour will not countenance a no-deal Brexit," which could cause upheaval for businesses and people. But it is unclear what would happen if Parliament rejected the deal when it is put to a vote, likely next month.

Some Conservative "Brexiteers" say the prime minister should try to renegotiate the Brexit deal — something May and other EU leaders insist is impossible. The agreement also must be approved by the European Parliament. Manfred Weber, who leads the EU legislature's largest group, the center-right European People's Party, said its initial assessment of the deal is "very encouraging, very positive."

"It must be clear to our British partners that there will be no renegotiation of this text that is now on the table," Weber said in Berlin. Luxembourg Foreign Minister Jean Asselborn said the deal "is the best one possible."

"There is no better one for this crazy Brexit," Asselborn said as EU foreign ministers met in Brussels before a leaders' summit on Sunday at which the bloc intends to sign off on the deal. While most of the contentious negotiating issues have been resolved, Spain insisted it needed more clarity on how Gibraltar, the British territory at the southern tip of the Iberian peninsula, would be dealt with.

EU chief negotiator Michel Barnier said the EU ministers "have agreed to the principle" of a one-off extension of the post-Brexit transition period if the two sides need more time to finalize a trade deal. Under the divorce agreement, Britain agrees to be bound by EU rules during the transition. It is due to end in December 2020 but can be extended by mutual agreement if the two sides need more time.

Barnier wouldn't give a specific end-date for the extension. It's a delicate issue for May, because some in her party worry the extension could be used to trap Britain in the EU's rules indefinitely. May says any extension must be finished before the next U.K. election, scheduled for the first half of 2022.

May tried to build public and business support for the deal on Monday, telling business lobby group the Confederation of British Industry that it "fulfils the wishes of the British people" to leave the EU, by taking back control of the U.K.'s laws, money and borders.

May confirmed the government's plan to end the automatic right of EU citizens to live and work in the U.K., saying Britain's future immigration policy will be based on skills, rather than nationality.

She said EU nationals would no longer be able to "jump the queue ahead of engineers from Sydney or software developers from Delhi" — a phrase that risked further upsetting EU citizens in Britain, who have faced more than two years of uncertainty about their future status.

British businesses, longing for an end to uncertainty about what rules they will face after Brexit, have broadly welcomed the agreement. But some are unhappy with the immigration plans, which have yet to be revealed in detail.

The Confederation of British Industry's Carolyn Fairbairn said "a new immigration system represents a seismic shift," and urged the government not to make "a false choice between high- and low-skilled workers" that would leave many sectors short-staffed.

May said she was confident the deal "will work for the U.K." "And let no one be in any doubt - I am determined to deliver it," she said. In Brussels, Austria's minister for Europe, Gernot Bluemel, struck a more melancholy tone.

"A painful week in European politics is starting," he said. "We have the divorce papers on the table; 45 years of difficult marriage are coming to an end."

Raf Casert reported from Brussels.

Seoul says it will close Japan-funded sex slavery foundation

November 21, 2018

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korea said Wednesday it will dissolve a foundation funded by Japan to compensate South Korean women who were forced to work in Japan's World War II military brothels. The widely expected decision, if carried out, would effectively kill a controversial 2015 agreement to settle a decades-long impasse over the sexual slavery issue and threatens to aggravate a bitter diplomatic feud between the Asian U.S. allies over history. Many in South Korea believed the Seoul government settled for far too less in the sex slave deal and that Japan still hasn't acknowledged legal responsibility for atrocities during its colonial occupation of the Korean Peninsula from 1910 to 1945.

Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Kono sharply criticized South Korea's decision to shut down the foundation, saying that Seoul would violate the "most basic rule to live in the international society" by walking back on the deal. Japanese Vice Foreign Minister Takeo Akiba summoned South Korean Ambassador to Japan Lee Su-hoon to the ministry to lodge a protest.

"The announcement is problematic and unacceptable," said Kono, urging Seoul to stick with the agreement signed under its previous government. South Korea's Foreign Ministry couldn't immediately confirm Kono's comments that Ambassador Lee told Japanese officials Seoul doesn't plan to scrap or renegotiate the agreement.

Seoul's Ministry of Gender Equality and Family said it will take legal steps to dissolve the foundation, a process ministry officials said could take months. Lee Nam-hoon, an official from the gender equality ministry, said Seoul's Foreign Ministry plans to consult with Tokyo on what to do with the 1 billion yen ($8.8 million) Japan funded to the foundation that was formally launched in July 2016.

"After considering diverse opinions over the 'Reconciliation and Healing Foundation' based on victim-centric principles, we have decided to push for the dissolution of the foundation," Gender Equality Minister Jin Sun Mee said in a statement. She said the ministry will continue to push policies to "restore the honor and dignity" of the sexual slavery victims.

The decision was welcomed by hundreds of protesters gathered in Seoul for a weekly rally denouncing sexual slavery by Japan's wartime military. Organizers played a recorded message by a hospitalized 92-year-old victim, Kim Bok-dong, who said she was happy that the foundation was getting dissolved but also demanded a proper apology and compensation from Tokyo.

"We won, (but) it's just the start," said Yoon Meehyang, who heads an activist group representing South Korean sexual slavery victims. "In saying that we won, we mean that we turned back history to the day before Dec. 28, 2015. We will invest all our passion to write a new history of justice while the victims still have time and overcome past three years that were lost."

Historians say tens of thousands of women from around Asia, many of them Korean, were sent to front-line military brothels to provide sex to Japanese soldiers. Liberal South Korean President Moon Jae-in, who has been a harsh critic of the 2015 deal reached under his conservative predecessor, told Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe during a meeting in September that the foundation was failing to function properly because of strong opposition by the victims and public. A South Korean government panel in December last year concluded the deal as seriously flawed because Seoul's previous conservative government failed to properly communicate with the victims before reaching the deal.

South Korea and Japan are already at odds over a ruling by Seoul's Supreme Court last month that a major Japanese steelmaker should compensate four South Koreans for forced labor during Japan's colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula before the end of World War II. Abe said Tokyo will respond "resolutely" to the ruling, which he described as a violation of a 1965 treaty between Seoul and Tokyo that restored diplomatic ties and was accompanied by more than $800 million in economic aid and loans from Tokyo to Seoul.

Seoul and Tokyo's bitter disputes over history have complicated Washington's efforts to strengthen trilateral cooperation to deal with North Korea's nuclear threat and China's growing influence in the region.

At the time of the sex slave deal, Seoul said there were 46 surviving South Korean victims. But 19 of them since died. Twelve victims who rejected payment from the foundation sued the Seoul government over the deal in August 2016, saying it didn't go far enough to establish Japan's responsibility.

Lee, the ministry official, said the foundation had used 4.4 billion won ($3.8 million) in cash payments to 34 victims who were alive at the time of the 2015 deal and to relatives of 58 victims who were dead by then. Only 27 of around 240 South Korean women who registered with the government as victims of Japan's wartime sexual slavery are currently alive, Lee said.

Under the 2015 agreement, which was then described by both governments as "irreversible," Japan pledged to fund the foundation to help support the victims. However, Japan said it didn't consider the 1 billion yen it provided to the fund as compensation, saying such issues were settled in a 1965 treaty. South Korea, in exchange, vowed to refrain from criticizing Japan over the issue and will try to resolve a Japanese grievance over a statue of a girl representing victims of sexual slavery that sits in front of the Japanese Embassy in downtown Seoul.

Taiwan ruling party suffers major defeat in local elections

November 25, 2018

TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) — Taiwan's ruling party was handed a major defeat in local elections Saturday that were seen as a referendum on the administration of the island's independence-leaning president amid growing economic and political pressure from China.

Soon after the results came in, President Tsai Ing-wen resigned as head of the Democratic Progressive Party. She will remain as president and her resignation will have no direct effect on the business of government, although the results bode ill for her re-election chances in two years.

Rival China said the results reflected a desire of Taiwanese for better relations with the mainland. Ma Xiaoguang, the spokesman for Beijing's Taiwan Affairs Office, said his government will continue to treat Taiwan as part of China and "resolutely oppose separatist elements advocating 'Taiwan independence' and their activities," according to the official Xinhua news agency.

In another victory for China, voters rejected a proposal to change the name of its Olympic team to Taiwan from the current Chinese Taipei. They also approved a referendum opposing same-sex marriage in a setback to LGBT couples, though ballot initiatives in Taiwan are non-binding.

The DPP lost the mayoral election to the Nationalist party in the southern port city of Kaohsiung, where it had held power for 20 years. The Nationalists also defeated the DPP in the central city of Taichung, home to much of Taiwan's light industry, while Ko Wen-je, the independent mayor of Taipei, the capital, narrowly won a second term. The Nationalist candidate in Taipei has asked for a recount.

At a brief news conference at DPP headquarters late Saturday, Tsai announced she was stepping down as DPP chair and said she had refused Premier William Lai's resignation, saying she wanted him to continue her reform agenda.

"Today, democracy taught us a lesson," Tsai said. "We must study and accept the higher expectations of the people." The elections for mayors and thousands of local posts were seen as a key test for Tsai's 2-year-old administration, which has been under relentless attack from Beijing over her refusal to endorse its claim that Taiwan is a part of China.

Tsai and the DPP won a landslide victory in 2016, but China swiftly responded by cutting all links with her government. Beijing has been ratcheting up pressure on the island it claims as its own territory by poaching its diplomatic partners and barring its representatives from international gatherings, while staging threatening military exercises and limiting the numbers of Chinese tourists visiting Taiwan.

The Nationalists, known also as the KMT, had campaigned on their pro-business image and more accommodating line toward Beijing. Since her election, Tsai has walked a fine line on relations with China, maintaining Taiwan's de facto independent status that the vast majority of Taiwanese support, while avoiding calls from the more radical elements of her party for moves to declare formal separation from the mainland.

Taiwanese officials had warned that Beijing was seeking to sway voters through the spread of disinformation online similar to how Russia was accused of interfering in U.S. elections. Although domestic concerns were in the foreground, China played a major factor in voter sentiment, analysts said.

"I think part of the reason for the vote on Saturday was concern about relations between Taiwan and mainland China," said Huang Kwei-bo, vice dean of the international affairs college at National Chengchi University in Taipei. "Their relations have slid backward."

Saturday's results also throw Tsai's political future into question. While the DPP still controls the national legislature, local politicians are crucial in mobilizing support among grass-roots supporters.

"I'm afraid it will be a big challenge for her in 2020," said Gratiana Jung, senior political researcher with the Yuanta-Polaris Research Institute think tank in Taipei. Economic growth, employment and pension reforms were among key issues in the elections, which drew high turnout from the island's 19 million voters. Government employees who feel slighted by pension cuts that took effect in July probably mobilized against Tsai's party, Jung said.

Nationalist Party Chairman Wu Den-yih told reporters Saturday that his party would keep trying to avoid diplomatic friction with China and ensure smooth two-way trade. "We hope the two sides will soon go back to a peaceful and stable trend in relations," he said.

Chiang Kai-shek's Nationalists rebased their government to Taiwan in 1949 amid the civil war with Mao Zedong's Communists. They ruled under martial law until the late 1980s, when the native Taiwanese population began to take political office, mostly through the DPP.

The vote against changing the name used in international sporting events to Taiwan was seen as a test of support for independence. It was symbolic in nature, as the International Olympic Committee had ruled out a name change, which would be opposed by China.

Though referendums are only advisory, the vote in favor of restricting marriage to male-female couples will likely put lawmakers in a difficult position. They face both a court order to make same-sex marriage legal by 2019 and elections in 2020.

IOC's Bach and Abe make brief visit to Fukushima region

November 24, 2018

FUKUSHIMA, Japan (AP) — IOC President Thomas Bach and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe made a quick trip Saturday to the region northeast of Tokyo that was devastated by a 2011 earthquake and tsunami that destroyed three nuclear reactors.

The Fukushima region will hold baseball and softball games during the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. The visit was intended to showcase a region that government officials say is safe, except for a no-go zone around the nuclear plant. Environmental groups have disputed some government claims and have raised safety concerns.

Neither Abe nor Bach took questions after visiting a baseball stadium and meeting with local residents and athletes. Government officials want the Olympics to convince a world audience that the region is safe.

Bach is in Japan for a week of meetings with Tokyo Olympic organizers and national Olympic officials for about 200 countries.

Separatists attack Chinese Consulate in Pakistan, killing 4

November 23, 2018

KARACHI, Pakistan (AP) — Armed separatists stormed the Chinese Consulate in Pakistan's southern port city of Karachi on Friday, triggering an intense hour-long shootout during which two Pakistani civilians, two police officers and all three assailants were killed, Pakistani officials said.

The killed Pakistani civilians were a father and a son had come to the consulate to pick up their visas to China, police said. The brazen assault, claimed by a militant group from the southwestern province of Baluchistan, reflected the separatists' attempt to strike at the heart of Pakistan's close ties with major ally China, which has invested heavily into road and transportation projects in the country, including in Baluchistan.

All the Chinese diplomats and staff at the consulate were safe and were not harmed during the attack or the shootout, senior police official Ameer Ahmad Sheikh said. They were evacuated from the area shortly after and taken to a safe place.

Following the attack, China asked Pakistan to beef up security at the mission. In Beijing, Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang said that China would not waver in its latest big project in Pakistan — the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor — and expressed confidence that Pakistan could ensure security.

Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan condemned the attack, describing it as part of a conspiracy against Pakistan and China's economic and strategic cooperation. Khan lauded the Karachi police and the paramilitary rangers, saying they showed exceptional courage in defending the consulate and that the "nation salutes the martyrs."

He also ordered an investigation and vowed that such incidents would never be able to undermine relations with China, which are "mightier than the Himalayas and deeper than the Arabian Sea." The attackers stormed the consulate shortly after 9 a.m., during business hours. They first opened fire at consulate guards and hurled grenades, then managed to breach the main gate and enter the building, said Mohammad Ashfaq, a local police chief.

Pakistani security forces quickly surrounded the area. Local TV broadcast images showing smoke rising from the building, which also serves as the residence of Chinese diplomats and other staff. Multiple blasts were heard soon afterward but Sheikh could not say what they were. The shootout lasted for about an hour.

"Because of a quick response of the guards and police, the terrorists could not" reach the diplomats, Sheikh said after the fighting ended. "We have completed the operation." He added that one of the attackers was wearing a suicide vest and that authorities would try and identify the assailants through fingerprints. Dr Seemi Jamali, a spokeswoman at the Jinnah Hospital, said a consulate guards was also wounded in the attack and was being treated at the hospital.

Geng, the Chinese spokesman, said the attackers hadn't managed to get into the consulate itself, and that the exchange of fire took place outside the building. The discrepancy with the Pakistani officials' reports could not be immediately reconciled.

Elsewhere in Pakistan on Friday, a powerful bomb at an open-air food market in the Orakzai region of the Khyber Pukhtunkhwa province, which borders Afghanistan, killed 25 people and wounded dozens of others, said police official Tahir Ali.

Most of the victims in the attack in the town of Klaya were minority Shiite Muslims. No one immediately claimed responsibility for the bombing. Orakzai has been the scene of several militant attacks in recent years, mostly by Pakistani Sunni militants, who revile Shiites as apostates.

In its claim of responsibility for the Karachi attack, the Baluch Liberation Army said it was fighting "Chinese occupation" and released photos of the three attackers. This was the second attack this year by Baluch separatists in Pakistan. Karachi, the capital of Sindh province, which borders Baluchistan, has a presence of several militant groups, including Baluch separatists.

In August, a suicide bomber rammed into a bus ferrying Chinese workers to the Saindak mining project in southwestern Baluchistan, wounding five workers. The project is controlled by the Chinese state-owned Metallurgical Corporation of China. And in May, gunmen opened fire on two Chinese nationals in Karachi, killing one and wounding the other.

Friday's attack was an uptick in the level of violence perpetrated by the Baluch separatist, said Amir Rana, executive director of the independent Pakistan Institute for Peace Studies. So far this year, the Baluch Liberation Army has claimed responsibility for 12 attacks against security personnel guarding projects linked to the so-called Chinese Pakistan Economic Corridor as well as to the infrastructure.

In a letter dated Aug. 15, the group released a letter warning China against the "exploitation of Baluchistan's mineral wealth and occupation of Baluch territory." The letter was addressed to China's ambassador to Pakistan.

But, Rana said, both China and Pakistan have calculated the security risks, which include the threats from the Baluch separatist. "I don't see that this will have any impact on the Chinese projects in Pakistan. These threats were already on Pakistan and China's threat radar," he said.

The attack will compel China to step-up security around its people in Pakistan and increase cooperation with the local authorities, said Zhao Gancheng of the Shanghai Institute of Foreign Studies. But he said that would not sway China's government and Chinese firms from expanding their footprint abroad, even while they take additional precautions.

"As more and more Chinese people go abroad, and more and more Chinese investment goes overseas, the security situation of the destination countries has become a very important element for consideration," Zhao told The Associated Press.

China is a longtime ally and has invested heavily in transport projects in Pakistan. The two countries have strengthened ties in recent years and China is currently building a network of roads and power plants under a project known as the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, or CPEC.

The Baluchistan separatists have for years fought a low level insurgency in Pakistan, demanding a greater share of the province's wealth and natural resources In a rare statement about attacks in Pakistan, neighboring India condemned the assault on the Chinese Consulate, saying that "there can be no justification whatsoever for any act of terrorism."

New Delhi also said "perpetrators of this heinous attack should be brought to justice expeditiously." Pakistan has long accused India of supporting Baluch separatists. The two countries have a history of bitter relations and have fought two of their three wars over the disputed region of Kashmir since gaining independence from Britain in 1947.

Associated Press writers Munir Ahmed and Kathy Gannon in Islamabad, Riaz Khan in Peshawar, Pakistan; Christopher Bodeen in Beijing and Ashok Sharma in New Delhi contributed to this report.

Olympic referendum: Shall it be 'Taiwan' or 'Chinese Taipei'

November 22, 2018

Athletes from Taiwan compete at the Olympics under the name of a make-believe country: Chinese Taipei. They march behind an imaginary national flag and, if they win a gold medal, hear an "alternate national anthem" being played.

Imagine if France or Australia had to use an assumed name at the Olympics, or the United States and Japan were banned from flying their flags. A referendum to challenge this will be held in Taiwan on Saturday. It asks if the self-governing island should compete in international sports events — including the 2020 Tokyo Olympics — as "Taiwan" instead of "Chinese Taipei."

"We are the sole IOC member banned from using our own country's name," said Chi Cheng, a bronze medalist in the 1968 Olympics. "We are the only member who cannot sing our national anthem and fly our national flag. We are the only one. This shows how seriously China is suppressing us."

No matter what voters want, nothing is likely to change. China's authoritarian government has viewed Taiwan as a renegade province since the two separated in the 1949 civil war. The International Olympic Committee backs China, which will host the 2022 Winter Olympics after spending $40 billion on the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing.

In a statement to the Associated Press, the IOC said it will not alter a 1981 agreement that Taiwan must compete as Chinese Taipei. Its executive board repeated that stance in meetings on May 2-3. "The agreement remains unchanged and fully applicable," the IOC said.

That puts the Chinese Taipei Olympic Committee in a bind. If the referendum passes, it could be required by Taiwanese law to go ahead with the name change pending approval from the legislature. But in a statement to AP, it said "we are bound by the Olympic Charter, the agreement we signed with the IOC in 1981, and also by the IOC executive board decision."

Taiwan's athletes are caught in the middle. Dozens protested Wednesday, fearing they could lose their chance to participate in the Olympics. Even if Taiwan was booted out, the IOC has frequently let athletes compete under an independent Olympic flag.

Jacqueline Yi-ting Shen, the secretary general of the Chinese Taipei Olympic Committee, declined to comment for this article. But she spoke about Taiwan's predicament in an interview with the AP at the Asian Games in August.

"This gives us a chance to compete and make our strength known internationally, so we accept the pity that we have to compete under the name of Chinese Taipei," Shen said. She added: "I'm sure that many people (in Taiwan) feel dismayed. But quite a lot understand that it is the reality in the international sporting realm. If we use our own name, we will lose the chance for our athletes. They will lose the playground, or the showcase they have. The right of our athletes to compete is our utmost concern. And I think most Taiwanese understand that."

Ma Xiaoguang, a spokesman for China's Taiwan Affairs Office, told a news conference this month that Taiwan was using the name issue to "politicize" sports. He said the referendum would damage Taiwan's interests but gave no details of measures Beijing might take.

Earlier, China warned that Taiwan would "swallow its own bitter fruit" over the referendum issue. Taiwan's ruling party, the independence-leaning Democratic Progressive Party led by President Tsai Ing-wen, has remained largely silent on the name change.

"There are international constraints on her (Tsai)," Dachi Liao, who teaches political science at National Sun Yat-sen University, told the AP. "She cannot speak out loudly on this; maybe doing something subtly, but never speaking out."

Liao said the referendum is a proxy vote on independence, and China fears it could echo in the ethnic-minority regions of Tibet and Xinjiang. "People who support changing the name, many of these supporters are pro-independence," Liao said. "The pro-independence people are feeling upset, so they try to find an opportunity to promote this kind of issue even though they know it may not pass."

China has thwarted Taiwan's every move to assert its independence, even in the sporting sphere. Earlier this year, Taiwan lost the right to hold the East Asian Youth Games, under reported pressure from China.

Taiwan held the Summer University Games last year with about 7,500 athletes. China skipped the opening ceremony, but competed in the events. Athletes from Argentina unfurled Taiwan's real flag at the closing ceremony, waving an independence symbol that Taiwan athletes are forbidden from displaying.

The Argentines were reprimanded for breaking Olympic rules, but warmly applauded inside the stadium. China has warned international airlines and hotels not to use the word "Taiwan" on maps or other material.

The referendum needs one-quarter of Taiwan's 19 million voters to be approved. Liao, the political scientist, doubts it will reach that threshold. If it does, the Chinese Taipei Olympic Committee is likely to ask its membership what to do.

It risks IOC censure if it moves ahead. The IOC is reported to have warned it at least three times not to proceed. If it backs down, it's thwarting the democratic will of Taiwan voters. "It's insulting to us because everyone knows we are Taiwan," George Chang, the former mayor of Tainan and a referendum organizer, told AP. "Chinese Taipei is not an area or a country. What is Chinese Taipei? Nobody knows. So let Taiwan be Taiwan."

Taiwan participated in the 1972 games as the Republic of China. It boycotted the next several after its United Nations seat was handed to China, returning in 1984 after submitting to the name change and China's rising clout.

Despite the roadblocks, the island of 24 million remains a regional power and placed seventh in the recent Asian Games, fielding a delegation of 550 and boasting stars like badminton's No. 1-ranked woman Tai Tzu-ying.

Alexander C. Huang, who teaches political science at Tamkang University in Taiwan, said the island only faces more isolation if it challenges China. "Taiwan does not have much leverage or support our noble cause, to get our name right or to get our flag flying," he said. "Maybe in the future ... the atmosphere would lead us to that eventual goal. But not now."

Associated Press video journalist Johnson Lai in Taipei, Taiwan, and writer Chris Bodeen in Beijing contributed to this report.

Russian lawmakers ask Kremlin to review nuclear doctrine

November 21, 2018

MOSCOW (AP) — A group of Russian lawmakers asked the Kremlin Wednesday to review the nation's rules for the use of nuclear weapons, amid tensions with the West. Participants in the hearings organized by the upper house's defense committee suggested that the presidential Security Council should draft a new version of the nuclear doctrine.

The lawmakers said in their proposals cited by Russian news agencies that the revised doctrine should in particular spell out a response to an attack on Russia with hypersonic and other strategic non-nuclear weapons.

The current Russian military doctrine states that Russia can use nuclear weapons in response to a nuclear attack on it or its allies or an aggression involving conventional weapons that threatens "the very existence of the state."

The state RIA Novosti news agency quoted an upper house member, Franz Klintsevich, as saying that the proposal to review the nuclear doctrine had been driven by the deployment of NATO forces closer to Russia's borders. "All that is aimed at threatening Russia," he said.

Earlier this week, Russian President Vladimir Putin chaired a meeting with military officials to discuss a response to the planned U.S. withdrawal from the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty.

Kremlin critic, facing new charge, sounds alarm on Interpol

November 20, 2018

MOSCOW (AP) — Russian prosecutors announced new criminal charges against U.S.-born Kremlin foe Bill Browder on Monday, days before a Russian police officer could become president of Interpol in a move that some Moscow critics fear might politicize the law enforcement agency.

Browder and other opponents of Russian President Vladimir Putin have complained that Russia has tried to use Interpol against them. If a Russian is elected as its new president, it could encourage Moscow to intensify attempts to hunt down its critics abroad.

The new charges leveled against Browder accuse him of forming a criminal group to embezzle funds in Russia. They also alleged that he could be behind the death of his employee, Sergei Magnitsky, in a Russian prison.

Magnitsky, a 37-year-old lawyer who alleged he had uncovered $230 million in tax fraud by Russian officials, died in 2009 while in pre-trial detention. A Russian presidential commission concluded he had been beaten and denied medical care, and two prison doctors were charged with negligence leading to his death; one was acquitted and the other went free because the statute of limitations had expired.

Browder mounted an international campaign to bring Magnitsky's killers to justice, and in 2012, the U.S. Congress passed the Magnitsky Act that imposed travel and financial sanctions on top Russian officials, including prosecutors. Several other countries have since adopted similar legislation.

Browder, who had owned a major investment fund in Russia before he was barred entry to the country, was convicted in absentia in Russia on charges of tax evasion and funneling money overseas in both 2013 and again last year, and sentenced to nine years in prison.

On Monday, Mikhail Alexandrov of the Russian Prosecutor General's Office told reporters that they have opened a criminal case into the poisoning of three people described as associates of Browder, saying it was "highly likely" that Magnitsky was poisoned as well with the same military-grade substance.

Browder has blamed Russian prison officials for Magnitsky's death and dismissed the new charges against him as a sham. He told The Associated Press that he has no relation to the three men named by the prosecutors and described the accusations of poisoning as an attempt to discredit his campaign for justice for Magnitsky.

Putin's "reaction is so absurd that it only helps our campaign and our cause," he said. The Russian prosecutors said they decided to pursue the new charges against Browder after reviewing evidence submitted by Natalia Veselnitskaya, a Russian lawyer who met with Donald Trump Jr. and members of his father's presidential campaign in 2016 and who lobbied for the repeal of the Magnitsky Act. That meeting at Trump Tower occurred in June 2016 after the younger Trump was told by an intermediary that she represented the Russian government and was offering Moscow's help defeating Hillary Clinton. Emails later released by Trump Jr. show that she had been described as a "Russian government attorney."

The timing of the new charges against Browder comes as the Netherlands is preparing to host diplomats from all European Union member states to discuss a pan-EU Magnitsky Act. But the charges also come two days before Interpol's general assembly, meeting in Dubai, is expected to elect its new president, and one of the front-runners is Alexander Prokopchuk, who holds the rank of general in the Interior Ministry, which runs the police force. The officer had headed Interpol's Russian bureau before taking the job of Interpol's vice president in 2016.

Putin's spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, told reporters Monday that the Kremlin is "rooting for the Russian candidate and we would like the Russian candidate to win this election." Interpol works as a clearinghouse for national police services that are hunting down suspects outside their borders, issuing "red notices," or alerts that identify a person wanted by another country.

While its charter explicitly proclaims its neutrality, the organization has faced criticism that governments have abused the "red notice" system to go after political enemies and dissidents. Two years ago, Interpol introduced measures aimed at strengthening the legal framework around the red notice system. As part of the changes, an international team of lawyers and experts first check a notice's compliance with Interpol rules and regulations before it goes out. Interpol also says it enhanced the work of an appeals body for those targeted with red notices.

Browder noted the timing of the announcement of the new charges against him and the Interpol election, tweeting: "On the eve of Interpol deciding whether a Russian official should be president of Interpol, the Russian prosecutor's office holds a huge press conference about me and how they will chase me down anywhere in the world."

At the news conference, prosecutors said they will be placing Browder on Interpol's wanted list and they expect its cooperation. Russia has previously tried to get Browder placed on the wanted list, but the body has rejected the efforts, viewing his prosecution as politically motivated. He was briefly detained in Spain in May but released after police found that the arrest warrant for him was no longer valid.

Browder said Prokopchuk's possible appointment "puts the organization in a grave danger of being fully discredited." Other Kremlin critics also have raised alarm about the possible politicization of Interpol.

Opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who has faced a flurry of detentions and criminal charges, tweeted Monday that his associates "have suffered abuse" from Interpol officials who were complying with Russian warrants to persecute Kremlin opponents.

"I don't think that a president from Russia will help to reduce such violations," he said on Twitter. Similar concerns surfaced when the previous Interpol president, Meng Hongwei, was named because he was a senior security official in the Chinese government. China has also been accused of trying to use Interpol for political ends. Meng is now detained in China as part of a sweeping purge against allegedly corrupt or disloyal officials.

Asked about the upcoming vote at Interpol in connection with the Browder case, Prosecutor General's Office spokesman Alexander Kurennoy told reporters that Moscow views the organization as "trusted partners" and expressed hope that "the procedures will be followed in a regular manner" when it submits an arrest warrant for Browder.

Hard-line Hindus pressure Modi over temple at disputed site

November 26, 2018

LUCKNOW, India (AP) — Tens of thousands of hard-line Hindus rallied Sunday to demand a Hindu temple be built on a site in northern India where hard-liners in 1992 had attacked and demolished a 16th century mosque, sparking deadly Hindu-Muslim violence.

The Hindu hard-liners are building pressure on Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government to move quickly on the issue. Modi had promised to build the temple in 2014 elections that brought him to power. The next national elections are due before May.

Thousands of police and paramilitary forces were deployed in and around Ayodhya, 550 kilometers (350 miles) east of New Delhi, to prevent any attacks on Muslims, who comprise 6 percent of the town's more than 55,500 people.

The rally brought Hindu holy men and activists to the town where the Hindu god Ram was believed to have been born. The demonstrators chanted slogans demanding the building of the temple and waved a banner that said, "No more requests, now it will be battle."

"Hindus have waited for a long time. They are losing patience," Mahant Nritya Gopal Das, who heads the committee on the disputed land, told the crowd. "The time has come for the government to take a call."

The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party's ally in the federal government, the Shiv Sena party, asked Modi's government to bring legislation to build the temple, as India's top court is taking time to settle a land title dispute between Hindus and Muslims.

Shiv Sena's chief, Uddav Thackeray, said if construction of the temple does not start, Modi's government would not return to power. "The prime minister has to choose between the temple and the government," he told reporters.

Hindu fundamentalists with pickaxes and crowbars razed the 16th century Babri Mosque to the ground in December 1992. Hindu groups say the mosque was built after a temple dedicated to Ram was destroyed by Muslim invaders.

The destruction of the mosque sparked riots across India that left at least 2,000 people dead. Thousands more died in later violence caused by disputes over the site. The issue was also taken to court. A lower court in 2010 ruled that the disputed land should be divided into three parts — two for the Hindus and one for the Muslims. The decision was challenged in the Supreme Court, but there has not been any decision yet.

Africa and the Arab world are key to a clean-coal alliance

Tuesday
20/11/2018

JOHANNESBURG - Sharing technology on clean coal, Polish Deputy Foreign Minister Marek Magierowski says, “lies at the heart of our relations with India.”

He made the comment on a recent visit to New Delhi. Like many in Africa and Asia, both Poland and India get most of their electrical power from fossil fuel.

Egypt is building a clean-coal plant run with expertise from China. Iran and the United Arab Emirates are doing likewise and Japan and the United States have considered pooling research.

Australia and South Africa are leaders in carbon capture and a cleaner burn and Colombia, which has one of the world’s largest coal mines, is helping Latin America along the same path.

So why isn’t there a clean-coal alliance?

“We need a global sharing of research and the climate change summit in Poland next month could be where it happens,” said Samson Bada, a Nigerian engineer at Witwatersrand University (Wits) in Johannesburg.

Bada said the cost of electricity has become a political issue around the globe “and a lack of power comes up at every election right across the developing world.” Economies in Asia, Africa and the Middle East “will not stop using fossil fuel, no matter what activists in New York or London may say so the task is to make it cleaner,” Bada said.

Rosemary Falcon, a recently retired professor in charge of clean-coal research at Wits, said an “alliance is crucial and it would need to cover oil, gas and coal because all these put off smoke if you don’t use them properly and there’s an overlap in the chemistry.

“How can anyone suggest a poor country without the technology should be left to pollute the air with coal or gas when we know how to burn it cleanly? Obviously, this is something we must share with everyone.”

Falcon said the 24th Session of the Conference of the Parties — COP24 — scheduled for December 3-14 in Katowice, Poland, could be the place to build “even an informal union where we can share the science.”

Falcon said coal was the cheapest and most reliable source of energy. “Sun and wind only work some of the time and there has to be a baseload, topped up with renewables,” she said.

However, she added, any association must include all continents. “People forget that Tanzania has 4 billion tonnes of coal or Colombia with its huge open-cut mines. Africa, Asia and Latin America must all be part of the mix.”

Despite its huge oil reserves, she said the Arab world relied on a mix for electricity including gas and coal. “Even so, it’s a voice that’s often left out,” Falcon said.

“I’m passionate about the environment,” said Jacob Masiala, like Bada, one of Falcon’s former students at Wits, “but those who want to see an end to fossil fuel need to spend more time on the ground in Africa.”

Masiala said he believes in climate change but laments that “it’s become an obsession for the pampered and well-off.” The priorities for poorer countries are different, he said.

“When you have no job and live in a shack without electricity and your family is always hungry, you don’t talk about climate change. You worry about the next meal, not the next 50 years,” Masiala said.

The idea of an alliance is not new. Indian Coal Minister Piyush Goyal, for instance, has been hinting at it for years. “We must share technology for clean coal because this will be the mainstay in India’s fuel mix,” he said at a meeting in Japan in 2015.

US Secretary for Energy Rick Perry spoke about it on a visit to Cape Town in 2017, saying the supply of electricity across the developing world was not just a social issue but “a matter of national security for the United States.”

Perry said that without power, poor countries were unable to industrialize, leading to “poverty and a lack of jobs that drives young people to join militia.”

It was a factor, he said, in the war on terror.

So why no treaty? Could it happen in Poland, home to one of the world’s most ambitious clean-coal programs?

The first step is money. Even an NGO would need a secretariat with an office and a media team to get the word out. Fees from members could meet the cost but someone must kick it off.

At the United States Energy Association, a grouping of public and private energy-related organisations, executive director Barry Worthington said it was also a matter of politics. “Energy is tricky,” he said.

“We’ve seen how oil has been used as a weapon in wars across the Middle East but gas is just as vital during the winter in countries like Finland or Ukraine. For now, they rely on a Russian pipeline and this is a huge factor in their relations with Moscow,” Worthington said.

Taiwan has the world’s largest clean-coal plant, he said, “so how do you put them at the same table as China?”

One could say the same about Turkey and Saudi Arabia or the United States and North Korea.

He said this made it vital to set up an alliance that was politically neutral.

“Emissions blowing south from Pakistan don’t stop when they reach the border with India. “Ideally, there must be space for everyone at the table,” Worthington said.

He said the Paris Accord on climate change might serve as a template. “Some in the room are on less than good terms but they work to a common goal,” he said. “Why can’t we do the same thing with clean coal?”

COP24 is contentious because Poland has angered the European Union by building coal-powered generators and is planning more.

Developing countries, however, may be sympathetic to the Polish view.

Zimbabwe has among the largest coal deposits in Africa. Tanzania has a new plant on the border with Mozambique and Kenya is building its first near Lamu on the coast. South Africa is a leading exporter and gets more than 90% of its own power from coal.

Africa is often dismissed as a bit player but, for a clean-coal alliance, it could lead the way. Asia is of the same mind. India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Indonesia and the Philippines are growing their use of coal.

Energy ministers from the Association of South-East Asian Nations met in October in Singapore and their communique included a plan to share clean-coal technology, noting that fossil fuel will remain in play until at least 2040.

Real growth is expected in the Middle East. Egypt, Oman, Iran, Jordan and the United Arab Emirates all have clean-coal plants on the drawing board or under way.

The World Bank refuses to fund anything using oil, gas or coal but hundreds of projects across the globe have been funded by China, India or the private sector.

World Bank President, Jim Yong Kim admits he’s getting pushback. Leaders in Africa, he said, complained that the World Bank would not let them “have baseload power because we can’t use a single drop of fossil fuel for our own energy needs.”

“I can tell you, when I hear that, it’s compelling to me,” he said.

However, he and International Monetary Fund (IMF) Managing Director Christine Lagarde ruled out any change though the United States, the largest donor to the World Bank and IMF, has made clear it wants an end to the ban.

Masiala said any policy that ignored Africa was doomed. “We hold nearly one-quarter of the seats at the United Nations but millions of our people are still without electricity,” he said. “Yet there are those who seem to view themselves as our overlords.”

Bada agreed, saying: “That’s why we need an alliance of countries using fossil fuel. It would put us all on a more even footing, from big players like the United States and China, across to Africa and Latin America and, of course, the Arab world.”

Falcon says she has no doubt it will happen. “The idea of an alliance may have started with India and the United States but smaller countries are now pushing it,” she said, “and I think we could see Poland take the lead at the COP meeting in December.

“I guess there will be protesters in Katowice telling us there’s no such thing as clean coal but anyone with a brain has moved on. The focus now is on working together so coal can be part of the plan on climate change.”

Source: Middle East Online.
Link: https://middle-east-online.com/en/africa-and-arab-world-are-key-clean-coal-alliance.

Police clash with Catalan separatists in Barcelona

November 10, 2018

BARCELONA, Spain (AP) — Police in Barcelona have briefly clashed with Catalan separatists who are protesting a rally by Spain's national police forces in the Mediterranean city. Catalan regional police used batons to drive back a group of separatists in the city center Saturday, stopping them from advancing toward a march by an association of Spain's national police forces demanding higher pay.

In September, a similar protest by separatists of another march by the same national police association ended in clashes with regional security forces. The violent run-ins left 14 people injured and six arrests.

Spain has been mired in a political crisis since last year, when Catalonia's separatist lawmakers failed in a breakaway bid. Polls and recent elections show that the wealthy northeastern region's 7.5 million residents are roughly equally divided by the secession question.

Argentina minister says country without means to rescue sub

November 17, 2018

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) — Hours after announcing the discovery of an Argentine submarine lost deep in the Atlantic a year ago with 44 crew members aboard, the government said Saturday that it is unable to recover the vessel, drawing anger from missing sailors' relatives who demanded that it be raised.

Defense Minister Oscar Aguad said at a press conference that the country lacks "modern technology" capable of "verifying the seabed" to extract the ARA San Juan, which was found 907 meters (2,975 feet) deep in waters off the Valdes Peninsula in Argentine Patagonia, roughly 600 kilometers (373 miles) from the port city of Comodoro Rivadavia.

Earlier in the morning, the navy said a "positive identification" had been made by a remote-operated submersible from the American company Ocean Infinity. The company, commissioned by the Argentine government, began searching for the missing vessel Sept. 7.

It remained unclear what the next steps could be. In a statement to The Associated Press, Ocean Infinity CEO Oliver Plunkett said authorities would have to determine how to advance. "We would be pleased to assist with a recovery operation but at the moment are focused on completing imaging of the debris field," he said.

Navy commander Jose Luis Villan urged "prudence," saying that a federal judge was overseeing the investigation and would be the one to decide whether it was possible to recover a part or the entirety of the ship.

Without adequate technological capabilities, however, Argentina would likely need to seek assistance from foreign countries or pay Ocean Infinity or another company, potentially complicating its recent commitment to austerity. Argentina is currently facing a currency crisis and double-digit inflation that has led the government to announce sweeping measures to balance the budget and concretize a financing deal with the International Monetary Fund.

Any move to recuperate the vessel would also be a logistically large and challenging undertaking based on the submarine's distance from the coast, its depth, and the kind of seabed upon which it is resting.

Relatives of crew members were determined to fight for it to be quickly surfaced. Isabel Vilca, the half sister of crewman Daniel Alejandro Polo, told the AP that the discovery was just the beginning.

She said families need to recover the remains of their loved ones to know what happened and help prevent similar tragedies. "We do know they can get it out because Ocean Infinity told us they can, that they have equipment," said Luis Antonio Niz, father of crew member Luis Niz. "If they sent him off, I want them to bring him back to me."

The sub's discovery was announced just two days after families of the missing sailors held a one-year commemoration for its disappearance on Nov. 15, 2017. The San Juan was returning to its base in the coastal city of Mar del Plata when contact was lost.

On the anniversary Thursday, Argentina President Mauricio Macri said the families of the submariners should not feel alone and delivered an "absolute and non-negotiable commitment" to find "the truth."

On Saturday, Aguad said that the vessel was found to be in an area that investigators had deemed "most likely." Officials showed images of the submarine, which was located on a seabed with its hull totally deformed. Parts of its propellers were buried and debris was scattered up to 70 meters (230 feet) away.

The German-built diesel-electric TR-1700 class submarine was commissioned in the mid-1980s and was most recently refitted between 2008 and 2014. During the $12 million retrofitting, the vessel was cut in half and had its engines and batteries replaced. Experts said refits can be difficult because they involve integrating systems produced by different manufacturers, and even the tiniest mistake during the cutting phase can put the safety of the ship and crew at risk.

The navy said previously the captain reported on Nov. 15, 2017, that water entered the snorkel and caused one of the sub's batteries to short-circuit. The captain later communicated that it had been contained.

Some hours later, an explosion was detected near the time and place where the San Juan was last heard from. The navy said the blast could have been caused by a "concentration of hydrogen" triggered by the battery problem reported by the captain.

Macri promised a full investigation after the submarine was lost. Federal police raided naval bases and other buildings last January as part of the probe, soon after the government dismissed the head of the navy.

Argentina gave up hope of finding survivors after an intense search aided by 18 countries, but a few navy units have continued providing logistical support to Ocean Infinity. On Saturday, Plunkett tweeted: "Our thoughts are with the many families affected by this terrible tragedy. We sincerely hope that locating the resting place of the ARA San Juan will be of some comfort to them at what must be a profoundly difficult time."

He also said: "This was an extremely challenging project and today's successful outcome, following the earlier search operations, firmly endorses our technology." The company unsuccessfully searched for the Malaysia Airlines plane that disappeared in 2014 over the Indian Ocean.

Associated Press video journalist Paul Byrne contributed to this report.

Ukraine's Hungarian minority threatened by new education law

November 14, 2018

CHOP, Ukraine (AP) — The Hungarian minority in western Ukraine is feeling besieged. A new education law that could practically eliminate the use of Hungarian and other minority languages in schools after the 4th grade is just one of several issues threatening this community of 120,000 people in Transcarpathia, a Ukrainian region that in the past century has been part of Hungary, Czechoslovakia and the Soviet Union.

In February, the headquarters of the minority's biggest political organization, the Transcarpathian Hungarian Cultural Association, or KMKSZ, was firebombed. More recently, mysterious billboards have appeared in the region accusing its politicians of separatism. And a dispute has erupted over the legality of the community acquiring dual Hungarian citizenship.

The incidents have left many worried that even as Ukraine strives to bring its laws and practices closer to European Union standards, its policies for minorities seem to be heading in a far more restrictive direction.

"There is a sort of purposeful policy, which besides narrowing the rights of all minorities, tries to portray the Hungarian minority as the enemy in Ukrainian public opinion," said Laszlo Brenzovics, the only ethnic Hungarian in the Ukrainian parliament. He called the separatism charges "extraordinarily absurd" and a means to distract from Ukraine's domestic problems.

Brenzovics' party, the KMKSZ, has launched its own campaign with bilingual billboards reading "Let's not allow peace to be destroyed in Transcarpathia!" "This is a peace campaign to calm the mood," said Livia Balogh, a party official in Chop, a once-booming railroad city of 9,000 people on the border with Hungary. "Hungarians here are mostly surprised and tense but also angry that the minority card is being played."

With a presidential election expected in March, Ukraine is also facing an ongoing armed conflict on its eastern borders with Russian-backed separatists. Officials say the new language rules in education, to be implemented over several years, serve a unifying purpose.

"Education is the fundament to social cohesion, which is also the fundament of security in the country," said Anna Novosad, a senior official at Ukraine's Ministry of Education and Science. She attributed Russia's annexation of the Crimean peninsula in 2014 partly to the disintegration and linguistic isolation of the local, mainly Russian-speaking population from the rest of Ukraine.

"This is something that we would like not to repeat in the western part of our country," Novosad said. Vasyl Filipchuk, a Ukrainian diplomat and chair of the board of the International Center For Policy Studies in the capital Kiev, said the anti-Hungarian campaign was being used to distract voters.

"It's artificial, manipulative technology" to overshadow the real problems of the people — corruption, lack of jobs and lack of economic prospects, Filipchuk said, adding that the use of patriotic, nationalistic rhetoric is "very dangerous."

Some of the issues have triggered a diplomatic dispute between Ukraine and Hungary, with Hungary blocking Ukraine's talks on integration with the European Union and NATO until the language stipulations in the education law are revised. In early October, Ukraine expelled a Hungarian consul after a secret video surfaced of Ukrainian Hungarians taking the oath of Hungarian citizenship. In response, Hungary expelled a Ukrainian consul.

Almost all members of Ukraine's Hungarian minority live in Transcarpathia — called Zakarpattia Oblast in Ukrainian and Karpatalja in Hungarian. The last census, from 2001, counted 151,000 Hungarians, but unofficial estimates now see around 120,000.

Scores have emigrated to Hungary and western Europe, driven in part by Ukraine's economic crisis and facilitated by the possibility of acquiring dual Hungarian citizenship, which comes with a European Union passport.

It's a community that is still strongly tied to Hungary — everyone seems to set their watches to Hungary's time zone, an hour behind Ukraine's. Jozsef Kantor, principal of a high school with some 700 students in Velyka Dobron, a village near Chop with a majority Hungarian population, acknowledged that a more modern education law was needed. Still, he lamented the "much harsher and unfavorable education law" now proposed.

At Kantor's school, which is undergoing renovations paid mostly by subsidies from the Hungarian government, Ukrainian language and literature are the only classes not taught in Hungarian. National authorities seem open to developing Ukrainian language textbooks which would take into account the fact that many Hungarian children enter school without speaking much, if any, Ukrainian.

Many of the school's graduates are taking advantage of having an EU passport to get their higher education in Hungary or elsewhere abroad. "What affects us negatively is that many of them don't come back," Kantor said. "Ultimately, if this continues for 20 or 30 years, there's a risk that the intellectual class among Hungarians in Transcarpathia will shrink significantly."

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, who has made a name for himself in Europe through his unrelenting anti-immigration and nationalist policies, has made supporting the estimated 2.2 million Hungarians living in neighboring countries — lands that Hungary lost after World War I and the disintegration of the Austro-Hungarian Empire — a key objective.

Subsidies totaling some $60.1 million have been given to institutions, businesses and families abroad since 2017, and Brenzovics, the lawmaker, said the payments have helped establish 3,000 new businesses.

Officials have simplified steps for Hungarians abroad to acquire dual Hungarian citizenship. An initial goal of adding 1 million dual citizens — on top of Hungary's population of some 10 million — was achieved nearly a year ago.

Orban's efforts have created a political windfall. In April's elections, over 95 percent of voters casting ballots by mail — mostly from neighboring countries — backed Orban's coalition led by his Fidesz party, helping him to a third consecutive term.

In Chop, teacher Zsuzsanna Dzjapko, a Hungarian whose husband's family is Russian-Ukrainian, has accepted the fact that the best educational prospects for their 11-year-old daughter Rebeka — who speaks all three languages and is a talented singer and musician — are across the border.

"I don't have hopes that she'll come back, because as a Hungarian folk singer in this country, she wouldn't have much of a future," Dzjapko said in a small apartment shared by three generations. "We hope the times will change, the winds will change and the laws will change, as well."