Fugitive Catalan chief seeks parliament protection for vote

January 29, 2018

MADRID (AP) — Catalonia's fugitive ex-president, Carles Puigdemont, asked the region's parliament on Monday to guarantee his right to attend a session this week in which he hopes to be re-elected government leader, without being arrested.

Spain's Constitutional Court ruled Saturday that Puigdemont, who fled to Belgium following an illegal declaration of independence last October, must be present in parliament to be chosen as the region's chief in Tuesday's session. But a Spanish judge has ordered Puigdemont's arrest on possible rebellion and sedition charges if he re-enters Spain.

The Constitutional Court also said Puigdemont must get court permission to attend the session. Initially, Puigdemont was expected to seek that, but his lawyer said Monday this was unlikely. The lawyer did not rule out Puigdemont's attendance.

The Constitutional Court ruled the session would not be valid if Puigdemont attends without the permit. Should the Catalan parliament governing board approve Puigdemont's request and encourage his attendance without the permit it would set the chamber on course for further clashes with Spain's government and courts.

Puigdemont is just one of more than a dozen lawmakers and civic group leaders already under investigation for rebellion and sedition relating to an independence push that brought Spain's worst political crisis in decades to a head.

The slim majority regained by separatist lawmakers headed by Puigdemont in Dec. 21 elections has kept the crisis very much alive. In Tuesday's session, the parliament speaker has two choices. He can ignore the court and allow a vote with Puigdemont present in person, if he turns up, or by video conference, which has been banned by the tribunal.

Alternatively, he can seek another candidate but that would likely outrage the thousands of pro-independence supporters promising to rally outside the chamber. Polls regularly show most Catalans want the right to decide the region's future, but are evenly divided over splitting from Spain.

Serbia museum benefits from renewed interest in Nikola Tesla

January 30, 2018

BELGRADE, Serbia (AP) — Along dimmed corridors in an elegant villa in central Belgrade, visitors are treated to a flashy presentation of Nikola Tesla's technology — as well as a huge array of the visionary scientist's clothes, hundreds of instruments, and even his ashes.

The Serbian museum, dedicated to everything to do with the 19th-century inventor and electricity pioneer, remained in relative obscurity for decades under the communist-run former Yugoslavia. But thanks to a global revival of interest in the scientist, the collection is now drawing big crowds from home and abroad.

Museum staff say some 130,000 people visited last year, compared to about 30,000 a year in the past — when its audience included generations of local school children but hardly anyone from abroad. Now the small museum is ranked among the top must-see destination for tourists.

Tesla is best known for developing the alternating current that helped safely distribute electricity at great distances, including from the hydro-electric plant at the Niagara Falls in mid-1890s. He experimented with X-ray and radio technology, working in rivalry with Thomas Edison.

Although he's known to many science lovers, his following and name-recognition among the general public has rocketed in recent years thanks to Paypal billionaire Elon Musk's Tesla electric car. In the U.S., Tesla admirers have raised money through crowdfunding to purchase his laboratory In Shoreham, N.Y.

An ethnic Serb born in 1856 in the Austrian Empire in present-day Croatia, Tesla spent most of his life abroad, working in Budapest and Paris before emigrating to the U.S. in 1884. The Tesla Museum in Belgrade holds a vast array of the scientist's personal items, from his sleepwear, shaving kit, tailor-made suit and cane to tens of thousands of documents and his awards. Even pieces of furniture from the New Yorker Hotel room 3327, where Tesla spent the last ten years of his life — his bed, fridge, metal lockers and a cupboard — are included.

"He was a man who took great care of his belongings and saved a large number of documents, so thanks to that we can now reconstruct his life and his work," curator Milica Kesler said. "He was fully aware of the importance of what he was doing."

Packed in some sixty trunks and containers, Tesla's entire property first arrived in the former Yugoslavia on a ship from New York in 1951, eight years after his death. Authorities set up the museum in 1952, which later struggled with scarce funds and low attendance.

Nowadays, thrilled visitors are given fluorescent light sticks that light up wirelessly with the discharge from the Tesla coil, a four-meter-tall transformer circuit that generates electricity. In a separate room, in a somewhat macabre setting of dimmed lights and dark drapes, are Tesla's ashes in a golden ball urn.

There are now so many visitors that the museum has extended its working hours and introduced more guided tours. Museum worker Pavle Petrovic says "the holiday season is the busiest, of course, but numbers stay high throughout the year."

Although Tesla visited Belgrade just once for 31 hours, Serbia celebrates him as the pride of the nation. Belgrade's airport and a new city boulevard are named after Tesla, his image is on souvenirs, and the Serbian Orthodox Church wants Tesla's ashes placed in the country's main religious temple, triggering protests by the liberal scientific community.

Typical of the Balkan divide, neighboring Croatia also claims Tesla as its own, turning his house in the home village of Smiljan into a memorial center. The rival former Yugoslav republics have marked important dates in Tesla's life separately amid strained relations stemming from the 1990s' bloody breakup of the joint ex-federation.

Away from the crowds, Tesla's archive of more than 160,000 documents, scientific plans, manuscripts and letters is stored carefully in the museum's basement. Curator Kesler said Tesla made the experts' job easy by keeping a neat chronology of the documents.

"Sometimes I have a feeling he left us some kind of a path, a guideline to follow," she said with a smile.

Polish Senate backs controversial Holocaust speech law

February 01, 2018

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Poland's Senate has backed legislation that will regulate Holocaust speech, a move that has already strained relations with both Israel and the United States. The bill proposed by Poland's ruling conservative Law and Justice party and voted for early Thursday could see individuals facing up to three years in prison for intentionally attempting to falsely attribute the crimes of Nazi Germany to the Polish nation as a whole. It was approved by the lower house last week.

Though the bill exempts artistic and research work, it has raised concerns that the Polish state will decide itself what it considers to be historic facts. The bill has already sparked a diplomatic dispute with Israel and drawn calls from the United States for a reconsideration.

Senators voted 57 to 23 in favor of the bill with two abstentions. To become law, the bill requires approval from President Andrzej Duda, who supports it. Poland's government says it is fighting against the use of phrases like "Polish death camps" to refer to death camps operated by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland during World War II. Poland was among the hardest-hit victims of Nazi Germany and is preserving Holocaust memorials.

Expressing surprise at the storm the legislation has unleashed, the Polish government said it was to issue an explanatory statement later Thursday. Though Deputy Justice Minister Patryk Jaki suggested Israel had been consulted on the bill and voiced no objections, many in Israel have argued that the move is an attempt to whitewash the role some Poles played in the killing of Jews during World War II.

Halina Birenbaum, a Holocaust survivor and acclaimed Israeli author, called the new law "madness," telling Israel's Army Radio it was "ludicrous and disproportionate to what actually happened to Jews there."

Birenbaum, a member of the International Auschwitz Committee, said she was concerned the Polish government "might arrest me there for what I'm saying now." And Israeli Transportation Minister Yisrael Katz said the law constituted "a denial of Poland's part in the Holocaust of the Jews." He called on Netanyahu to immediately recall Israel's ambassador to Poland for consultation.

"In the balance between diplomatic considerations and moral considerations, there must be a clear decision: perpetuating the memory of the victims of the Holocaust above any other consideration." Working groups in Poland and Israel are to start discussing the issue this week, although it was not clear what effect it could have on the bill.

Just hours before the Senate's vote, the U.S. asked Poland to rethink the proposed legislation saying it could "undermine free speech and academic discourse." State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert voiced concern about the "repercussions this draft legislation, if enacted, could have on Poland's strategic interests and relationships — including with the United States and Israel."

Poland's Deputy Prime Minister Jaroslaw Gowin said the government will take every effort to "minimize the losses" stemming from the storm over the bill. "Having been entangled into a big international conflict, without any such intention on our part, we decided that the basic goal is to defend the good name of Poland and (so the Senate) approved the bill," Gowin said on TVN24. "We acted in good faith."

Israel's Holocaust memorial, Yad Vashem, issued a statement saying it was "most unfortunate" that Poland was proceeding with a law "liable to blur historical truths" that "jeopardized the free and open discussion of the part of the Polish people in the persecution of the Jews at the time."

Ilan Ben Zion in Jerusalem contributed to this report.

Israeli criticism sparks anti-Jewish remarks in Polish media

January 30, 2018

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — A diplomatic dispute between Poland and Israel over pending legislation that would outlaw blaming Poland for the crimes of the Holocaust has led to an outburst of anti-Semitic comments in Poland, including some in the government-controlled media.

Poland's lower house of parliament gave its approval Friday to the bill, which calls for penalties of up to three years in prison for anyone who "publicly and against the facts" accuses the Polish people of crimes committed by Nazi Germany during World War II.

Poland's ruling Law and Justice party says the law is meant to fight expressions like "Polish death camps," to refer to the wartime camps that Nazi Germany operated in occupied Poland. Poles were among those imprisoned, tortured and killed in the camps, and many today feel Poles are being unfairly depicted as perpetrators of the Holocaust.

As part of the same effort, the government launched a website on Tuesday in Polish, German and English with documentary evidence that death camps like Auschwitz were built and operated by Nazi Germany, a historically accurate account.

Germany occupied Poland in 1939, annexing part of it to Germany and directly governing the rest. Unlike other countries occupied by Germany at the time, there was no collaborationist government in Poland. The prewar Polish government and military fled into exile, except for an underground resistance army that fought the Nazis inside the country.

The Israeli government in the past has supported the campaign against the phrase "Polish death camps," but it has strongly criticized the new legislation, which still must be approved by the Senate and President Andrzej Duda, who both support it.

Israel, along with several international Holocaust organizations and many critics in Poland, argues that the law could have a chilling effect on debating history, harming freedom of expression and leading to a whitewashing of Poland's wartime history, which also includes episodes of Poles killing Jews or denouncing them to the Germans.

Polish Holocaust and World War II scholars, as well as international organizations including Yad Vashem, the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum and the Wiesenthal Center, are among groups who have criticized the law. Critics have said they fear the law could lead to self-censorship in academia and that the legislation — which also mentions "other crimes against peace and humanity" — is so broad that it could be used to fight any form of criticism against Poland by authorities already accused of eroding democratic standards.

In a sign of the sensitivities on both sides, Yair Lapid, head of Israel's centrist Yesh Atid party and the son of a Holocaust survivor, insisted in a heated Twitter exchange with the Polish Embassy that "there were Polish death camps and no law can ever change that." An Israeli journalist, Lahav Harkov, also wrote a tweet that consisted only of the phrase "Polish death camps" repeated 14 times.

Such Israeli remarks offended many in Poland, including many who oppose the law and any expressions of anti-Semitism in Poland. Far-right groups have called for a demonstration Wednesday in front of the Israeli Embassy in Warsaw to protest the "anti-Polish" sentiment they say is being propagated by Israel and some media.

And there has been an eruption of anti-Israel and anti-Jewish comments online and in the media, including in state media, which is tightly controlled by the right-wing ruling Law and Justice party. The director of the state-run television station TVP 2, Marcin Wolski, even went so far as to say Monday on air that the Nazi death camps should actually be called Jewish. "Who managed the crematoria there?" he asked — a reference to the fact that death camp prisoners, usually Jews, were forced to help dispose of gas chamber victims.

Wolski was joined on his show by a right-wing commentator, Rafal Ziemkiewicz, who only a day earlier had used an extremely derogatory term to refer to Jews on Twitter. The comment was later removed. And on another talk show Saturday on Polish state TV, anti-Semitic messages posted by viewers on Twitter were shown at the bottom of the screen as one participant said that a Jewish guest was "not really Polish." The state TV director later apologized for the messages, blaming a technical glitch that caused them to go onto the screen unedited.

In another case, a Polish state radio commentator, Piotr Nisztor, suggested that Poles who support the Israeli position should consider relinquishing their citizenship. "If somebody acts as a spokesman for Israeli interests, maybe they should think about giving up their Polish citizenship and accepting Israeli citizenship," Nisztor said in a comment carried on the radio's official Twitter account.

Some commentators in Poland, however, expressed dismay, saying it reminded them of an official state-sponsored anti-Semitic campaign carried out by Communist authorities in 1968. "There has been a lot of hate speech against refugees and Muslims over the past two years in state media, but anti-Semitism was so far rare," said Rafal Pankowski, who monitors anti-Semitism and other forms of extremism as head of the Never Again association. "But in the last couple of days it seems the floodgates have opened."

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki agreed after speaking by phone Sunday night to try to resolve differences over the legislation by convening a group of history experts, though it was unclear how effective that will be given the strong support for the bill by the ruling Law and Justice party.

Before the outbreak of World War II, Jews had lived in Poland for centuries, thriving in some eras and even becoming the world's largest Jewish population at one point. But anti-Semitism in the decades before the war had grown virulent, driving many Polish Jews to emigrate.

Relations between Jews and Poles had seen efforts of reconciliation since the fall of communism, but some fear the current controversy has set that back. Agnieszka Markiewicz, Central Europe director for AJC, a Jewish global advocacy group, called the language on state media "shocking."

"It is hard to imagine that there is actually space in the Polish public sphere for such anti-Semitic language and discourse," she told The Associated Press. "It's unacceptable, I believe, not only for Polish Jews, but also for millions of Poles who know World War II history."

Rising racism taints Italian electoral campaign

February 09, 2018

VERONA, Italy (AP) — When hundreds of hardcore Verona soccer fans chanted "Adolf Hitler is my friend" and sang of their team's embrace of the swastika, Italian Jewish communities complained, and waited.

Local officials initially dismissed the incident — which was filmed and circulated on social media by the so-called "ultras" themselves — as a "prank." Condemnation only came several months later, after another video from the same summer party, this time profaning Christian objects, also went viral.

"These episodes should absolutely not be dismissed," said Bruno Carmi, the head of Verona's tiny Jewish community of about 100, speaking at the Verona synagogue, which is flanked by two armed police patrols. "In my opinion, whoever draws a simple swastika on the wall knows what it means."

Racist and anti-Semitic expressions in Italy have been growing more bold, widespread and violent. Anti-migrant rhetoric is playing an unprecedented role in shaping the campaign for the country's March 4 national election, which many say is worsening tensions and even encouraging violence.

Hate crimes motivated by racial or religious bias in Italy rose more than 10-fold, from 71 incidents in 2012 to 803 in 2016, according to police statistics. The five-year period corresponded with an explosion in migrant arrivals.

The latest violence came Feb. 3 when a right-wing extremist shot and wounded six African immigrants in the small central Italian city of Macerata. Police say the suspect claims to have been acting out of revenge after a Nigerian immigrant was arrested on suspicion of killing and dismembering an 18-year-old teen whose remains were found three days earlier. The shooting drew widespread, but not universal, condemnation.

The attack also had a political taint. The alleged gunman, Luca Traini, was a failed candidate for the right-wing, anti-migrant Northern League last year and had previously flirted with more extreme neo-fascist movements. Police seized Nazi and white supremacist propaganda from his bedroom.

The night before the shooting, the leader of the rebranded League, Matteo Salvini, had cited the teen's murder in a campaign appearance in Verona, pledging to send home 150,000 migrants if elected. He only dug in further after the attack.

Former Premier Silvio Berlusconi, who is competing with Salvini for leadership of the center-right coalition, significantly upped the political ante after the shooting. He claimed that 600,000 migrants were in Italy illegally, calling them "a social bomb ready to explode because they are ready to commit crimes," and threatened to deport many.

"The facts of Macerata in some ways show that in recent years there has been a process of cultural, social and political legitimization of racism that is creating enormous damage, most of all at the expense of people's lives," said Grazia Naletto, president of Lunaria, a Rome-based non-governmental agency that compiles a database of racist incidents in Italy.

Lunaria counts 84 cases of racist violence against individuals in the past three years, including 11 racially motivated murders, a statistic that Naletto called unprecedented in Italy. A report on hate for the Italian parliament last summer reported that 40 percent of Italians believe other religions pose a threat, especially the Muslim faith. It also said anti-Semitism is shared by one in five Italians. The IPSOS MORI polling company found that Italy is the least informed country in the world regarding immigration, with most people overestimating by more than three times the number of immigrants living in Italy.

Findings by the swg research institute based in Trieste published in January said the demographic most vulnerable to neo-Nazi ideals are those aged 25-34, and that among Italians overall, 55 percent of those in the lowest income range either indulge in or oppose combating neo-Nazi and neo-fascist ideals.

Experts cite many reasons for the spread of extremism and racist expressions that until recently were mostly relegated to the margins of society. They include a superficial understanding of history, as well as an economy weakened by a long crisis that sidelined many ordinary workers and barred many young people from entering the work force.

More recently, there is the added pressure of migrants arriving from across the Mediterranean, with arrivals nearing 120,000 last year and topping 180,000 the year before. The head of the immigration office at the Verona diocese concedes that many Italians have not accepted that theirs has become a multicultural society, despite the fact that about 9 percent of the nation's residents are foreigners. The diocese where he works hosts 11 foreign Christian communities, but resistance to integration is entrenched, he said.

"Romanian youths have less trouble integrating than ones from Ghana or Sri Lanka," the Rev. Giuseppe Mirandola said. "That is to say, we still have difficulty with the color of the skin." He said even Pope Francis' calls to welcome migrants in this predominantly Roman Catholic nation have fallen on some deaf ears.

"The theme of immigrants and the fact that Pope Francis insists on their welcome touches very sensitive nerve in some people who refuse this message," Mirandola said. "While they appreciate the simple style of the pope, on this issue they find themselves ill at ease."

The audience of some 500 for Salvini's Verona appearance included farmers, families with children, university students, artists and political activists. Many spoke out against migrants, even before the candidate took the stage.

Luisa Albertini, whose family owns eight orchards in the province, echoed Salvini's rhetoric of a migrant invasion "because not all are escaping from war. There are people who are taking advantage because they know that they can find everything they want here."

Alessandro Minozzi, a city councilman from the town of Bolvone, said migrants being housed in the town pose a threat to order. "A person can't go around peacefully if there are these 100 people who don't know what to do during the day," he said.

In the countryside around Verona, it is still possible to read inscriptions of Italy's Fascist leader Benito Mussolini's most infamous mottos on the sides of buildings, with some seemingly recently re-painted. Photographs of Mussolini can be readily found at flea markets and newly minted calendars bearing his image sell in newsstands.

And while such items may fall short of an apology for fascism — a crime in Italy — their public display without context can fuel a misunderstanding of history, said Carmi, the Verona Jewish leader. "It was not a golden period for everyone in Italy," said Carmi, whose great aunt and uncle were among the 8,000 Italian Jews deported to Nazi death camps, where most perished. "For some it was. Certainly not for us."

Police: Extreme-right gunman shoots 6 Africans in Italy

February 03, 2018

MILAN (AP) — An Italian gunman with extreme right-wing sympathies shot and wounded six African immigrants Saturday in a two-hour drive-by shooting spree, authorities said, terrorizing a small Italian city where a Nigerian man had been arrested days earlier in a teenager's gruesome killing.

Police photos showed the shooting suspect with a neo-Nazi tattoo prominently on his forehead as he sat in custody and an Italian flag tied around his neck as he was arrested in the central Italian city of Macerata. Authorities identified him as Luca Traini, a 28-year-old Italian with no previous record.

Traini had run for town council on the anti-migrant Northern League's list in a local election last year in Corridonia, the party confirmed, but its mayoral candidate lost the race. The news agency ANSA quoted friends of his as saying that Traini had previously been affiliated with Italian extremist parties like the neo-fascist Forza Nuova and CasaPound.

The shooting spree came days after the slaying of 18-year-old Pamela Mastropietro and amid a heated electoral campaign in Italy where anti-foreigner sentiment has become a key theme. Italy has struggled with the arrival of hundreds of thousands of migrants in the last few years coming across the Mediterranean Sea in smugglers' boats.

After the attack, Premier Paolo Gentiloni warned in Rome that "the state will be particularly severe against whoever thinks of feeding the spiral of violence." In Macerata, Interior Minister Marco Minniti said the gunman had been motivated "by racial hatred," and had "a background of right-wing extremism with clear references to fascism and Nazism."

"What happened appears to be a completely random armed retaliation raid," Minniti said, adding that evidence indicated that while the gunman had planned the attack, he had acted alone. "In a democracy, it is not permitted for individuals to seek justice alone, even if in this case, there is nothing that recalls a notion of justice."

Authorities said the six wounded — five men and one woman — appeared to be random targets in various parts of the city of 43,000 in Italy's central Marche region. Italian news reports indicated that the gunman's trajectory included the area where the Italian murder victim was found and where the prime suspect in her slaying lived.

The identities and nationalities of the shooting victims remained unknown. Hospital officials said late Saturday that one had been treated and released, while the others had either undergone surgery or were facing operations for their injuries. One of them remained in intensive care.

As the violent attack unfolded, police told residents to stay inside and ordered a halt to public transport to limit the casualties. Such violent shootings are rare in Italy, and usually associated with the southern Italian mafia.

A video posted by the il Resto di Carlino newspaper showed the suspect with an Italian flag draped over his shoulders being arrested by armed Carabinieri officers in the city center, near where he apparently fled his car on foot. Italian news reports said a registered gun was found inside the car and the suspect did a fascist salute as he was arrested, but no salute was visible in the video.

The tattoo on Traini's forehead was that of the Wolfangel, an ancient runic symbol that according to the Anti-Defamation League was appropriated by Nazi Germany and later adopted by neo-Nazis in Europe and the United States.

Macerata Mayor Romano Carancini confirmed that all six victims were black Africans. "They were all of color, this is obviously a grave fact. As was grave what happened to Pamela. The closeness of the two events makes you imagine there could be a connection," Carancini said.

Mastropietro's dismembered remains were found Wednesday in two suitcases two days after she walked away from a drug rehab community. A judge on Saturday confirmed the arrest of the main suspect, identified as 29-year-old Innocent Oseghale.

Italy is heading into a general election on March 4 and the head of the rebranded League party, Matteo Salvini, had capitalized on the teen's killing in campaign appearances even before the shooting Saturday.

Salvini is pledging to deport 150,000 migrants in his first year in office if his party wins control of parliament and he is named premier. That has drawn sharp rebukes that Salvini is using the migrant crisis to foment xenophobia for political gain.

Salvini's League, which dropped "northern" from its name in a bid for a national following, has joined a center-right coalition with Silvio Berlusconi's Forza Italia and Giorgia Meloni's much smaller Brothers of Italy. They are running against Matteo Renzi's much-splintered center-left Democratic Party and the populist 5-Star Movement.

Salvini told reporters Saturday at a campaign stop in Bologna that he would bring security to Italy. "Whoever shoots is a delinquent, no matter the skin color. It is clear that out-of-control immigration ... brings social conflict," he said.

Senate president Pietro Grasso of the small liberal party Free and Equal chastised Salvini for using the tragedies to gain votes. "Whoever, like Salvini, exploits news events and tragedies for electoral purposes is among those responsible for the spiral of hatred and violence that we must stop as soon as possible," Grasso said.

UN warns of rampant sexual violence in Greek refugee camps

2018-02-09

ATHENS - Asylum seekers in Greece suffer widespread sexual violence and harassment in the country's sub-standard, overcrowded reception centers, the UN said on Friday.

In 2017, the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) received reports from 622 survivors of sexual and gender-based violence on the Greek islands, around one third of whom said they had been assaulted after arriving in Greece.

But UNHCR spokesman Cecile Pouilly said that there is a reluctance to report such violence out of fear, shame and concerns about discrimination, retaliation and stigma.

"The actual number of incidents is therefore likely to be much higher than reported," she told reporters in Geneva, acknowledging that the UN has only a "very partial picture of what the reality is."

Pouilly said the situation was most worrying in the reception and identification centers of Moira on Lesbos, and Vathy on Samos, "where thousands of refugees continue to stay in unsuitable shelter with inadequate security."

These centers are currently holding around 5,500 people -- double their capacity, she added.

- Afraid to shower -

"In these two centers, bathrooms and latrines are no-go zones after dark for women and children," she said, adding that "even bathing during the daytime can be dangerous.

In Moira, one woman told UNHCR staff that she had not showered for two months for fear of being attacked.

Pouilly said an acceleration in recent weeks of transfers to the mainland had slightly reduced overcrowding.

But she warned that even now "crowded conditions hinder outreach and prevention activities."

In Moira, 30 government medical staff, psychologists and social workers are squeezed together in three rooms where they conduct examinations and assessments with little to no privacy, she said.

UNHCR welcomed measures taken by Athens to reduce the violence, but said other steps were needed.

It said, for instance, that women should not be forced to live in close quarters with men they do not know.

The UN agency also called for more efforts to reduce overcrowding and improve lighting in toilet and shower areas, as well as an increased police presence.

The Aegean Sea had been a main point of entry for asylum seekers to Europe, which has been facing its worst migrant crisis since World War II.

But the flow of migrants to Greece has been sharply cut since the EU signed a controversial deal with Turkey in 2016 to send back migrants.

Greece said last month that it still shouldered a "disproportionate burden" of the EU's asylum applications in 2017, taking 8.5 percent of the bloc's total requests.

The country of 11 million people recorded 58,661 applications last year, making Greece the European country with the highest number of asylum seekers per capita, according to the Greek Asylum Service.

Source: Middle East Online.
Link: http://www.middle-east-online.com/english/?id=87192.

Greeks rally in Athens to protest use of the name Macedonia

February 04, 2018

ATHENS, Greece (AP) — Well over 100,000 protesters from across Greece converged Sunday on Athens' main square to protest a potential Greek compromise in a dispute with neighboring Macedonia over the former Yugoslav republic's official name.

Hundreds of chartered buses brought protesters in from around the country to the Greek capital, while more people arrived on ferries from the islands. Traffic was blocked throughout the city center and three major subway stops were closed.

Chanting "Hands off Macedonia!" and "Macedonia belongs to Greece!" the protesters converged on Syntagma Square in front of parliament, many waving flags bearing the Star of Vergina, the emblem of the ancient Greek kingdom of Macedonia.

Police officials estimated the attendance at 140,000. Organizers, who claimed 1.5 million were at the rally, used a crane to raise a massive Greek flag over the square. "We are trying to show the politicians ... that they must not give up the name 'Macedonia'," said 55-year-old protester Manos Georgiou.

In Skopje, a spokesman for the Macedonian government said he didn't know whether his government would react to the rally. Macedonian opposition leader Hristijan Mickoski said in a TV interview that the rally hurt the prospects of a deal on the name issue.

Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras was dismissive of the event. "The overwhelming majority of the Greek people...irrespective of their opinions (on the issue) agree that major foreign policy issues cannot be solved through fanaticism and intolerance," he said in a statement.

Tsipras used the occasion to attack Greek opposition leader Kyriakos Mitsotakis and his fellow conservative, former Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras, for allegedly trying to use Sunday's rally for their advantage and to paper over their own differing approaches.

About 700 left-wing and anarchist protesters set up a counter-demonstration nearby, bearing banners calling for Balkan unity. "Macedonia belongs to its bears" read one banner. Dozens of riot police were deployed to keep the two demonstrations separate.

Suspected far-right supporters attempted to attack the counter-demonstration, but were prevented by police who used stun grenades and tear gas to hold them back. The far-right side responded by throwing rocks at police.

There were also reports alleging that anarchists attacked a biker carrying a Greek flag and a person wearing a T-shirt commemorating the participation of Greek mercenaries in the massacres of Muslim civilians in Bosnia during the 1990s.

The name dispute broke out after Macedonia gained independence from Yugoslavia in 1991. The country is recognized by international institutions as the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, even though about 130 countries refer to it simply as Macedonia. Many Greeks refer to it by the name of its capital, Skopje.

Greece argues use of the name implies territorial claims on its own province of Macedonia, home of one of the most famous ancient Greeks, Alexander the Great. Officials in Skopje counter that their country has been known as Macedonia for a long time.

Composer and former minister Mikis Theodorakis, 92, the keynote speaker at the rally, repeated the controversial claim that Greece's neighbor wants to expand into Greek territory. "Using the name Macedonia as a vehicle and twisting historical events to a ridiculous extent, they actually seek to expand their borders at the expense of ours," Theodorakis said.

Rejecting any compromise on Greece's part, Theodorakis called for a referendum on the issue. The squabble has prevented Macedonia from joining NATO, to which Greece already belongs. The left-led governments in both countries have pledged to seek a solution this year, and have been holding talks with U.N. negotiator Matthew Nimetz.

The most likely solution will be to add a modifier such as "new" or "north" to the republic's name. But the proposals have triggered protests in both countries. The crowd at Sunday's rally in Athens jeered when speakers mentioned Nimetz's name.

"We're expecting them to hear us," protester Maria Iosifidou said of Greece's politicians. "We don't want Skopje to take the name ...let them have another name." About 100,000 people attended a similar protest last month in the northern Greek city of Thessaloniki, the capital of Greece's province of Macedonia.

Raphael Kominis and Demetris Nellas in Athens and Konstantin Testorides, in Skopje, contributed to this report.

Merkel clinches German coalition govt deal, hurdle remains

February 07, 2018

BERLIN (AP) — Chancellor Angela Merkel finally reached a deal Wednesday to form a new German coalition government, handing the powerful finance ministry to the country's main center-left party in an agreement aimed at ending months of political gridlock.

The center-left Social Democrats' leaders now have one last major hurdle to overcome — winning their skeptical members' approval of the deal. Merkel's conservative Christian Democratic Union, its Bavaria-only sister, the Christian Social Union, and the center-left Social Democrats agreed after a grueling final 24 hours of negotiations on a 177-page deal that promises "a new awakening for Europe."

"I know that millions of citizens have been watching us closely on this long road over recent weeks," Merkel said. "They had two justified demands of us: First, finally form a government — a stable government — and second, think ... of people's real needs and interests."

The coalition deal could be "the foundation of a good and stable government, which our country needs and many in the world expect of us," she added. Germany has already broken its post-World War II record for the longest time between its last election on Sept. 24 to the swearing-in of a new government. That is still at least several weeks away.

Merkel currently leads a caretaker government, which isn't in a position to launch major initiatives or play any significant role in the debate on the European Union's future, led so far by French President Emmanuel Macron.

A key role in the EU is particularly dear to Social Democrat leader Martin Schulz, a former European Parliament president. On Wednesday he declared that, with the coalition deal, Germany "will return to an active and leading role in the European Union." The agreement states, among other things, that Germany is prepared to pay more into the EU budget.

To help that process, Schulz announced later he would hand over his party's leadership to Andrea Nahles, the head of its parliamentary group, and take on the role of Germany's foreign minister. Nahles will still have to be confirmed by the party.

Yet before addressing Europe's future, Schulz faces hard work at home. The coalition accord will be put to a ballot of the Social Democrats' more than 460,000 members, a process that will take a few weeks. Germany's highest court said Wednesday it had dismissed a series of complaints against the ballot.

Many Social Democrats are skeptical after the party's disastrous election result, which followed four years of serving as the junior partner to Merkel's conservatives in a so-called "grand coalition." The party's youth wing vehemently opposes a repeat of that alliance.

If Social Democrat members say no, the new coalition government can't be formed. That would leave only an unprecedented minority government under Merkel or a new election as options. Schulz had previously ruled out taking a Cabinet position under Merkel, and his decision to become foreign minister may complicate his efforts to sell the coalition deal to party members.

"We are optimistic that we can convince a wide majority of our members to enter this coalition," he said, speaking with Nahles at his side. Schulz's zigzag course has undermined his authority. He vowed to take the party into opposition on election night, but reversed course in November after Merkel's efforts to build a coalition with two smaller parties collapsed.

On the conservative side, Merkel needs only the approval of a party congress of her CDU, a far lower hurdle. "I am counting on convincing our members that we have negotiated a very good coalition agreement," Schulz said.

His party reached compromises on two key demands: curbing the use of temporary work contracts in larger companies and at least considering narrowing differences between Germany's public and private health insurance systems.

In addition to the Foreign Ministry, the Social Democrats are set to get the Labor and Finance Ministries — the latter a major prize, held by Merkel's CDU for the past eight years and an influential position given Germany's status as the eurozone's biggest economy. Unconfirmed reports in the German media say the new finance minister and vice chancellor would be Olaf Scholz, Hamburg's center-left mayor.

The Interior Ministry, also held by the CDU, would go to Bavaria's CSU, which has pushed hard to curb the number of migrants entering Germany. Merkel's party would keep the Defense Ministry and get the Economy and Energy Ministry, held by the Social Democrats in the outgoing government. One CDU lawmaker, Olav Gutting, wrote on Twitter: "Phew! At least we still have the chancellery!"

Merkel defended the carve-up of ministries. "Of course, after many years in which Wolfgang Schaeuble led the finance ministry and really was an institution, many find it difficult that we can no longer hold this ministry, and the same goes for the interior ministry," she said. "But we have important jobs. We have the economy ministry for the first time in decades."

She dismissed suggestions that Social Democrat-led ministries would force her to open Germany's purse wider for Macron's European reform proposals than she would like. "Regardless of whether a ministry is led by the Social Democrats or the (Christian Democratic) Union, you can only spend the money you have," Merkel said.

If the coalition comes together, the nationalist Alternative for Germany will be the biggest opposition party. Co-leader Alexander Gauland criticized the deal, particularly the possibility of deeper European financial integration.

"You ask yourself why Mr. Macron doesn't just move into the chancellery," he said.

David Rising contributed to this report.

German industrial union to resume wage talks after walkouts

February 05, 2018

BERLIN (AP) — Germany's biggest industrial union is set to resume negotiations with employers after staging a series of 24-hour walkouts to ramp up pressure in a dispute over wages and working time. News agency dpa reported that the IG Metall union said the two sides would sit down for talks in Stuttgart Monday.

The union is seeking a 6-percent pay increase for some 3.9 million workers and the right to reduce work weeks to 28 hours for up to two years. The latter demand also includes extra pay to partly even out lost income for those who reduce their working hours to care for small children or a family member — a particularly difficult sticking point.

IG Metall says some 500,000 workers participated in last week's walkouts.

France seeks closer ties with Russia despite Syria tensions

February 09, 2018

PARIS (AP) — Russian President Vladimir Putin and French President Emmanuel Macron discussed cooperating more closely to resolve the Syrian crisis in a phone call Friday, as France tries to smooth ties with Russia and move beyond years of tensions over Syria and Ukraine.

Macron is making his first presidential trip to Russia in May. The two leaders talked Friday about preparations for the visit, where Macron plans to attend the St. Petersburg Economic Forum and to meet with Putin.

The Kremlin said in a statement that Putin and Macron underlined during their call the need for developing closer cooperation on Syria. The statement did not elaborate. Macron's office said he pushed for more robust Syrian peace talks — notably after a Russia-sponsored effort last month boycotted by the Syrian opposition.

Macron also pressed Putin to stop "intolerable degradation of the humanitarian situation" in regions of Syria that were pummeled by Syrian and Russian airstrikes in recent days, according to a statement from his office.

The presidents discussed another sore point in relations: the conflict in Ukraine. They stressed the need to enforce the 2015 Minsk peace agreement that was sponsored by France and Germany. Putin and Macron also hailed a potentially problematic project launched Friday to encourage contacts among Russian and French citizens. Called the Trianon Dialogue, the initiative appears aimed at minimizing European sanctions against Russia for its support of separatists in eastern Ukraine.

The French-Russian project is aimed at encouraging interactions through joint theater productions, school trips, sister city agreements and real estate investments. Yet geopolitical tensions threaten to complicate the effort.

Among the Russians overseeing the Trianon Dialogue are magnate Gennady Timchenko, a longtime associate of Putin's, and former railways chief Vladimir Yakunin — both targets of U.S. sanctions over Russia's actions in Ukraine. A former ambassador who is an outspoken supporter of Russia's bombings of Syria and annexation of Crimea also is involved.

An official in Macron's office acknowledged that "we may run into difficulties" in juggling the project's open-arms mission with today's East-West tensions. The official said the French side would remain "vigilant" to prevent Putin's administration from using the event for political ends.

Macron has remained publicly committed to the European Union's sanctions on Russia, but the Trianon Dialogue could be seen as undermining them. Aides said he pushed for the project "to encourage Franco-Russian economic relations" despite curbs on trade prompted by the sanctions and a Russian embargo.

The French members of the project's board all are from outside politics. They include an astronaut, a ballet star, the director of the Versailles Chateau and the CEOs of oil giant Total and car-sharing company Blablacar.

Vladimir Isachenkov in Moscow contributed.

Putin, 7 rivals register for Russia's presidential race

February 08, 2018

MOSCOW (AP) — Russia's election officials have registered eight candidates for the March 18 presidential election, including President Vladimir Putin. With his approval ratings topping 80 percent and rivals trailing far behind, Putin is set to easily win a fourth term. Putin's most vocal critic, the 41-year-old opposition leader Alexei Navalny, has been barred from the race due to a criminal conviction that he calls politically motivated.

Here is a quick look at the Russian presidential candidates.

VLADIMIR PUTIN

The 65-year-old Russian leader served two four-year presidential terms in 2000-2008 before shifting into the prime minister's seat due to term limits. Putin continued calling the shots during the next four years as his longtime associate Dmitry Medvedev served as Russia's president. Before stepping down to let Putin reclaim the top job in 2012, Medvedev initiated constitutional changes that extended the presidential term to six years.

A Putin victory in March would put him on track to become Russia's longest-serving leader since Josef Stalin. The legal limit of two consecutive presidential terms means that Putin won't be able to run again in 2024, but many observers expect him to continue playing the top role in Russian politics even after that.

KSENIA SOBCHAK

The 36-year-old star TV host casts herself as a choice for those who have grown tired of Putin and his familiar challengers and want liberal changes. The daughter of Putin's one-time patron, the late reformist mayor of St. Petersburg, she has assailed the Kremlin's policies but largely avoided personal criticism of Putin.

Observers believe that Sobchak's involvement in the race will help combat voter apathy and boost turnout to make Putin's victory look more impressive. Some think she also could help the Kremlin counter Navalny's calls to boycott the presidential vote and could split the ranks of the liberal opposition. Sobchak has denied being in collusion with the Kremlin.

PAVEL GRUDININ

The 57-year-old millionaire strawberry farm director has been nominated by the Communist Party, but he's openly proud of his wealth and rejects basic Communist dogmas. Until 2010, Grudinin was a member of the main Kremlin party, United Russia. He has been openly critical of Russia's current political and economic system, but avoided criticizing Putin. His nomination has been seen as an attempt by the Communists to broaden the party's appeal beyond aging voters nostalgic for the Soviet Union.

VLADIMIR ZHIRINOVSKY

The 71-year-old leader of the ultranationalist Liberal Democratic Party has won notoriety for his xenophobic statements. This will be the sixth time he has run for president. While Zhirinovsky has catered to nationalist voters with his fiery populist rhetoric, he has steadfastly supported Putin and his party in parliament has invariably voted in line with the Kremlin's wishes. He won 6 percent of the presidential vote in 2012.

GRIGORY YAVLINSKY

The 65-year-old liberal economic expert ran against Putin in the 2000 election, garnering about 6 percent of the vote. Yavlinsky has denounced the Kremlin's policies and frequently criticized Putin, calling for more political freedoms and a more liberal economic course. His support base is a relatively small number of middle-aged and elderly liberal-minded voters in big Russian cities.

BORIS TITOV

Putin's 57-year-old business ombudsman is running for president for the first time, nominated by a pro-business party. Before becoming an advocate for business, Titov had a successful career dealing in chemicals and fertilizers. His platform has focused on creating a more favorable business environment.

SERGEI BABURIN

The 59-year-old legal expert played a prominent role in Russian politics in the 1990s, opposing the 1991 breakup of the Soviet Union and becoming one of the leaders of a parliament rebellion against President Boris Yeltsin in 1993. He spent several stints in parliament and served as a deputy speaker of the lower house in the 1990s and the 2000s. After failing to make it to parliament in 2007, he left politics and served as the rector of a Moscow university. He has been nominated for the presidential race by a fringe nationalist party.

MAXIM SURAIKIN

The 39-year-old has been nominated by the Communists of Russia, a fringe group that casts itself as an alternative to the main Communist Party. He was trained as an engineer and ran a small computer business. In 2014, Suraikin ran for governor of the Nizhny Novgorod region, getting about 2 percent of the vote.