Dutch government to take Russia to European court over MH17

July 10, 2020

THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — The Dutch government is taking Russia to the European Court of Human Rights for its alleged role in the shooting down of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 over eastern Ukraine six years ago, the foreign minister announced Friday.

The move is intended to support individual cases being brought to the European court by relatives of some of the 298 people who were killed when a Buk surface-to-air missile fired from territory controlled by pro-Moscow Ukrainian rebels blew the Amsterdam-to-Kuala Lumpur flight out of the sky on July 17, 2014.

“Achieving justice for 298 victims of the downing of Flight MH17 is and will remain the government’s highest priority,” Foreign Minister Stef Blok said. “By taking this step today ... we are moving closer to this goal.”

By launching the case against Russia, the Dutch authorities can share evidence with the Strasbourg-based European court so it can be considered in individual relatives' cases. “As a government, we have information, evidence, that leads us to the conclusion of the involvement of the Russian Federation,” Blok told The Associated Press. “Of course, the relatives themselves do not have all this information so we can help them by starting this procedure.”

Moscow has repeatedly denied involvement in the downing of the Boeing 777. Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Russia sees Friday's announcement "in connection with the disaster of the Malaysian Boeing as another blow to Russian-Dutch relations.”

Throughout the case, the Netherlands has acted “exclusively within the framework of anti-Russian logic, to which both technical and criminal investigations were subordinated,” Zakharova said. However, an international team of prosecutors investigating the case has, however, charged three Russians and a Ukrainian with involvement in bringing down the plane and the murder of all on board. The men are on trial in a Dutch court, although none have been extradited to the Netherlands to face justice.

Blok said much of the evidence the government will submit to the human rights court also is part of that criminal case. Prosecutors say they have evidence the missile that blew MH17 out of the sky was trucked into Ukraine from a Russian military base and the mobile launcher was later returned to Russia.

The Russian foreign ministry didn't immediately react. Konstantin Kosachev, head of the foreign affairs committee in the upper house of Russia's parliament, called the Dutch move “a strange initiative from every aspect” in remarks carried by the Interfax news agency.

"The investigation isn’t over yet, there have been no court verdicts on the national level yet and, finally, what does the European Court for Human Rights have to do with it?” Kosachev said. Friday's move is the latest legal maneuver by the Dutch government, which has long vowed to secure justice for victims and their loved ones. Separately, the government is pursuing Russia for state responsibility in the downing.

“The government attaches importance to continuing the meetings with Russia on the matter of state responsibility,” the foreign ministry said in a statement. “The purpose of these meetings is to find a solution that does justice to the enormous suffering and damage caused by the downing of Flight MH17.”

Blok said the twin legal tracks are headed toward the same goal. “From the onset, we have made clear that the downing of an airplane, civilian airplane, and 298 innocent casualties is such a severe breach of international law that we will pursue any venue to find the truth and bring justice to the relatives,” he said.

Russia and West in showdown over aid to Syria's rebel area

July 10, 2020

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — Russia and the West are in a showdown over continuing the delivery of humanitarian aid to Syria’s mainly rebel-held northwest after the current U.N. mandate expires on Friday. Germany and Belgium on Thursday called for a vote on a draft resolution that would maintain the two border crossings from Turkey to the northwest for six months — a position supported by the U.N. secretary-general, U.N. humanitarian chief, and many aid organizations. The result is scheduled to be announced early Friday afternoon.

Without waiting for the announcement, Russia announced late Thursday that it had circulated a new resolution which would authorize just one crossing from Turkey for a year. It put the draft in a form that can be put to a vote.

A series of tweets from Russia’s deputy U.N. ambassador Dmitry Polyansky announcing the new Russian resolution and urging Western support strongly indicated that Moscow will veto the German-Belgium draft.

Russia, Syria’s closest ally, has argued that aid should be delivered from within Syria across conflict lines. But the U.N. and humanitarian groups say aid for 2.8 million needy people in the northwest can’t get in that way.

The German-Belgium resolution being voted on would extend the mandate for the two border crossings from Turkey to the northwest — Bab al-Salam and Bab al-Hawa — for six months. The Russian-drafted resolution would only authorize cross-border deliveries through the Bab al-Hawa crossing, for a year.

Germany’s U.N. ambassador, Christoph Heusgen, said Wednesday that while the Bab Al-Hawa crossing is used to deliver aid to Idlib province, the Bab al-Salam crossing reaches the region north of Aleppo, where an additional 300,000 Syrians displaced by the last offensive are now sheltering.

“Both areas are separated by conflict lines,” he said. Russia’s Polyansky tweeted Thursday evening that Bab Al-Hawa “accounts for more than 85% of total volume of operations.” “We categorically reject claims that Russia wants to stop humanitarian deliveries to the Syrian population in need,” he tweeted. “Our draft is the best proof that these allegations are groundless.”

In a third tweet, Polyansky said Western nations should “seize this opportunity” and support the Russian draft which adapts “to the situation on the ground.” “If they block our compromise proposal they will be responsible for the consequences,” the Russian envoy warned.

U.S. Ambassador Kelly Craft has accused Russia and China of “breathtaking callousness and dishonesty” and distorting the realities on the ground. Their actions in both resolutions underscore “a harrowing truth — that Russia and China have decided that millions of Syrian lives are an insignificant cost of their partnership with the murderous Assad regime,” she said in a statement.

Thursday’s rival resolutions capped a week of high-stakes rivalry over cross-border aid. The initial German-Belgium resolution authorizing two crossings for one year won support from 13 of the 15 council members on Tuesday but was vetoed by Russia and China.

A Russian draft resolution authorizing one crossing for six months failed to get the minimum nine “yes” votes on Wednesday. And a similar Russian amendment to the latest German-Belgium resolution was dramatically rejected earlier Thursday, getting only two “yes” votes from Russia and China.

In January, Russia scored a victory for Syria, using its veto threat to force the Security Council to adopt a resolution reducing the number of crossing points for aid deliveries from four to just two, from Turkey to the northwest. It also cut in half the yearlong mandate that had been in place since cross-border deliveries began in 2014 to six months, as Russia insisted.

The defeated German-Belgium resolution had dropped a call for the reopening of an Iraqi crossing to the northeast to deliver medical supplies for the COVID-19 pandemic. In May, Russia’s U.N. Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia said: “Do not waste your time on efforts to reopen the closed cross-border points.”

Russian space official, ex-journalist, charged with treason

July 07, 2020

MOSCOW (AP) — A former journalist who worked as an adviser to the director of Russia's state space corporation was arrested and jailed Tuesday on charges of passing military secrets to a Western nation, accusations that many of his colleagues dismissed as absurd.

Ivan Safronov, who had written about military and security issues for a decade before becoming an adviser to Roscosmos head Dmitry Rogozin, was detained outside his apartment in Moscow by agents of the Federal Security Service (FSB), the main KGB successor agency.

He pleaded innocent to the charges during a court hearing where a judge considered - and ultimately granted - the FSB’s request to authorize his arrest. The judge ordered Safronov jailed for two months as the investigation continues

Safronov's detention sent shock waves across Russian media, with many journalists questioning the treason charges and his former newspaper openly rejecting them as “absurd.” The FSB said that Safronov is accused of relaying sensitive data to a spy agency of an unspecified NATO member. It said in a statement that the information he provided referred to “military-technical cooperation, defense and security of the Russian Federation.”

The agency released video footage of plainclothes agents stopping Safronov outside his apartment building, searching him and putting him inside a minivan in handcuffs. Safronov could face up to 20 years in prison, if convicted.

Roscosmos said that Safronov didn't have access to state secrets, and claimed that the charges didn't relate to Safronov's work for the corporation, which he joined in May. Prior to that, Safronov worked as a correspondent for the top business daily Kommersant for nearly a decade until 2019, and after that worked for a year for another business daily, Vedomosti.

He covered military issues, arms trade and government affairs. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Safronov's detention wasn't related to his activities as a journalist. Grilled about the case during a conference call with reporters Tuesday, Peskov described Safronov, who once covered the Kremlin, as a “talented journalist.”

Kommersant put out a statement in support of Safronov, hailing him as one of the country's top journalists and a “true patriot” who was deeply concerned about the state of the military and space industries that he covered. The newspaper described the accusations against him as “absurd.”

The paper noted that rights activists, journalists, scientists and corporate officials who faced treason accusations found it difficult to defend themselves because of secrecy surrounding their cases and lack of public access.

“As a result, the public has to rely on the narrative offered by special services, whose work has increasingly raised questions,” Kommersant said. “Journalists asking those questions find themselves under blow.”

About 20 journalists, including those who worked with Safronov for years, were detained outside FSB headquarters in Moscow when they picketed to protest his arrest. Some were handed court summons for violating a ban on street gatherings during the coronavirus pandemic, an offense punishable by an administrative fine.

Many former colleagues of Safronov alleged that the authorities may have wanted to take revenge for his reporting that exposed Russian military incidents and opaque arms trade deals. Last year, the FSB reportedly opened an inquiry following publication of an article by Safronov that claimed that Russia had signed a contract with Egypt for the delivery of sophisticated Su-35 fighter jets. Kommersant later removed the report from its website, and no charges were filed.

Safronov left the paper following another article, claiming that the speaker of the Russian parliament's upper house was about to step down, provoked official anger. Safronov's father also worked for Kommersant after retiring from the armed forces and covered military issues. In 2007, he died after falling from a window of his apartment building in Moscow.

Investigators concluded that he killed himself, but some Russian media questioned the official version, pointing to his intent to publish a sensitive report about secret arms deliveries to Iran and Syria.

US, Russia share a complex and bloody history in Afghanistan

July 02, 2020

ISLAMABAD (AP) — Moscow and Washington are intertwined in a complex and bloody history in Afghanistan, with both suffering thousands of dead and wounded in conflicts lasting for years. Now both superpowers are linked again over Afghanistan, with intelligence reports indicating Russia secretly offered bounties to the Taliban to kill American troops there.

But analysts suggest that despite these apparent differences, the two adversaries actually have much in common, especially when it comes to what a postwar Afghanistan should look like: Both want a stable country that does not serve as a base for extremists to export terrorism.

“The Russian endgame is an Afghanistan which will neither support jihadi movements in the former U.S.S.R. nor host American bases that might one day be used against Russia,” says Anatol Lieven, a Georgetown University professor in the Middle Eastern state of Qatar and a senior fellow at the New American Foundation.

Even the Pentagon said this week in a report to the U.S. Congress that Russia backed Washington’s deal with the Taliban as the best path forward, while at the same time the Kremlin has sought to cultivate interest with the group, limit the West's military presence and encourage operations against Islamic State militants.

Lieven, who studied the Soviet Union's invasion of the country in 1979 and its subsequent occupation, defeat and withdrawal a decade later, said Moscow would “prefer to see a mixed government in Afghanistan, with Taliban power limited.”

He says Moscow has not forgotten its experience in Afghanistan, where at least 15,000 Soviet troops were killed in fighting that began as an effort to prop up a communist ally and soon became a grinding campaign against the U.S.-backed mujahedeen insurgency.

But in today’s Afghanistan, the threat facing Russia is the Islamic State affiliate and its allies known as the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, a terrorist organization that has taken aim at Russia's Muslim regions and was born of brewing discontent in Muslim-dominated Central Asia.

Even as Russia and the U.S. vie for influence in Afghanistan, they are aligned in their opposition to IS. Lieven says Moscow regards the Taliban as the lesser evil and, like Washington, sees it as an ally in the fight against both IS and the IMU.

Remnants of the mujahedeen groups in Afghanistan are now warlords-turned-political leaders in the Kabul government and also are in the ranks of the Taliban. The chief Taliban negotiator in peace talks with the United States, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, fought in the 1980s on the side of the U.S.-backed mujahedeen, as did Mullah Mohammed Omar, the founder of the Taliban.

“A humiliating defeat of the U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan by the Taliban would provide some in Moscow with a feel-good sense of revenge for the U.S. support to mujahedeen groups in the 1980s that led to the humiliating defeat and withdrawal of Soviet forces,” says Andrew Wilder, vice president of the Asia Program at the U.S. Institute of Peace.

Wilder said Moscow's vision of a postwar Afghanistan is much the same as Washington's. “They would prefer an end state not that different from what the U.S. desires – a political settlement that leads to the withdrawal of U.S. and NATO forces but leaves behind a relatively stable and ethnically inclusive government that can ensure Afghanistan doesn’t again become a safe haven for transnational terrorist groups,” he said.

He said Afghanistan's neighbors, including the strategically sensitive nations of Central Asia bordering Russia, would be “the biggest losers” if a withdrawal of U.S. and NATO forces led to a collapse of the country and a return to the anarchy of the 1990s.

As for the reports of bounties being paid to the insurgents, analysts also say that cash from abroad has flowed into Afghanistan for years. Loyalties are fluid in the country and money has been used to buy influence, curry favor or manipulate government officials since the collapse of the Taliban in 2001.

As far back as 2013, suitcases of cash given to the Afghan government by the CIA was being blamed for runaway corruption. Washington's own watchdog, the Special Inspector general for Afghan Reconstruction (SIGAR) has alleged that billions of dollars have been pocketed by government officials, warlords, drug lords and insurgents.

The money was pumped into Afghanistan by the U.S., Iran, Pakistan, Russia and India. In Kabul's Sherpur neighborhood, the multistory marble mansions owned by warlords, drug lords and Kabul's political elite were built by corruption, according to Afghans who stage anti-graft protests. Last month, a group of lawyers and economists asked the International Monetary Fund not to lend money to Afghanistan because it would be pocketed by officials.

Insurgents also benefit from the exploding drug trade and have taken payments from countries seeking to buy influence, analysts say. “U.S. military officials have often suggested that Russia is funneling arms to the Taliban, but the evidence hasn’t been nearly as strong as it is for Pakistani and, more recently, Iranian support for the Taliban,” said Michael Kugelman, deputy director of the Asia Program at the Wilson Center.

“While Moscow has sought to scale up its engagement with the Taliban in recent years, much of this has been meant to promote support for peace and reconciliation. And this is part of a broader Russian objective to increase its influence in Afghanistan,” he said.

But for Brian G. Williams, author of “Counter Jihad. The America Military Experience in Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria,” and a former employee of the CIA’s Counter Terrorism Center, Russia's endgame in Afghanistan is to hand Washington a humiliating defeat.

“The generals in the FSB (Federal Security Service) and GRU (Main Intelligence Directorate) would again be toasting should American Chinooks be forced to chaotically evacuate U.S. personnel from the U.S. Embassy in Kabul.” he said,

Williams said President Vladimir Putin "has always seen America as its primary competitor for power in post-Soviet Eurasia.”

Russian opposition denounces vote extending Putin's rule

July 02, 2020

MOSCOW (AP) — A vote that cleared the way for President Vladimir Putin to rule Russia until 2036 was denounced Thursday by his political opponents as a “Pyrrhic victory” that will only further erode his support and legitimacy.

Putin himself thanked voters for their “support and trust,” and repeated a message that was often a hallmark of his presidential campaigns. “We need internal stability and time for the reinforcing of the country, of all of its institutions,” the 67-year-old Putin said in a televised statement.

According to election officials, nearly 78% of voters approved the constitutional amendments in seven days of balloting that concluded Wednesday. Turnout across the vast country was put at almost 68%.

The amendment that allows Putin to run for two more six-year terms after his current one expires in 2024 were part of a package of constitutional changes that also outlaw same-sex marriage, mention “a belief in God as a core value” and emphasize the primacy of Russian law over international norms. Voters could not decide on the individual amendments but only on the entire group.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the results were “a triumphant referendum on trust in President Putin.” Putin's critics argued the results were rigged and didn't reflect the dwindling enthusiasm for the once-popular president.

“A record in falsifying votes has been set in Russia,” opposition politician Alexei Navalny said in a Facebook post. “The announced result has nothing whatsoever to do with the people's opinion.” Putin's approval rating was at 59% in May, according to the Levada Center, Russia’s top independent pollster. The lowest in two decades, the numbers have been steadily going down in the past five years amid growing frustration over declining living standards.

Critics pointed to widespread reports of pressure on voters and other irregularities, as well as a lack of transparency and independent control of the balloting that they said tarnished its validity. “Putin is weaker because it took so much effort, and unlawful effort at that, to get this vote,” said Masha Lipman, an independent political analyst.

For the first time in Russia, polls were kept open for an entire week, with ballot boxes unattended at night. Independent monitoring was hindered by bureaucratic hurdles and coronavirus-related restrictions. Voting also took place outside polling stations — in some instances on street benches, tree stumps and in the trunks of cars — as well as online in some places, including Moscow.

Abbas Gallyamov, a political analyst and former Kremlin speechwriter, said in a Facebook post that the victory cost the government “a serious dent in its legitimacy.” Opposition politicians argued it was hardly a win for the Kremlin.

“Did Putin impress us with the scale of the people’s love (for him)? No, he just made a fool of himself,” said Dmitry Gudkov, a former lawmaker and now an opposition leader, in a Facebook post. “Did he get the mandate from the people to reign forever? No, he just angered many by pressuring them to vote and started a rumor mill that will tell many people about this Pyrrhic victory.”

Golos, Russia’s top independent election monitoring group, deemed the results “falsified.” Gudkov pointed to independent exit polls that reported over 54% of more than 5,000 respondents in Moscow and 63% of nearly 3,000 respondents in St. Petersburg voted against the amendments.

A nationwide poll by Levada over the weekend showed that 68% of those who had cast their ballot by Saturday voted “yes,” and 54% of those who hadn’t would approve the amendments. The clause about resetting term limits for Putin, however, was only supported by 51% of the respondents.

Yulia Galyamina, one of the founders of the “No!” campaign, said in a Facebook post that people across Russia, even those who don't support any opposition group, voted against the amendments. "People said their ‘no’. And the authorities had to resort to unprecedented falsification, undermining the legitimacy of the president,” she said.

In his blog, Navalny said Putin has “showed his inadequacy” in the 20 years he has ruled Russia. “Everything (he does) is built on promises and lies. Around half of the people in the country understand that,” Navalny wrote. “So every day, you should do something to advocate against this regime.”

He urged his supporters to focus on regional elections in September and fight against candidates from the ruling United Russia party in 31 Russian regions. Ending the dominance of United Russia in regional parliaments and administrations will undermine “the formal mechanism” of Putin’s rule, Navalny said.

“It is a real fight in which a real victory is possible,” he added. Lipman agreed that discontent exists in Russia, but it is unlikely to lead to unrest or any kind of drastic action right now. “The mood is there. But from the mood and from grumbling and complaining, there’s a long way to action,” she said, adding that Putin is unlikely to lose his power any time soon.

“Putin is weaker, but still the strongest, by far the most powerful man in the country,” Lipman said. “He is still in charge.” That attitude was reflected in a statement Tuesday by Ramzan Kadyrov, the powerful leader of the southern republic of Chechnya, who suggested that Putin should be president for life.

“Who can replace him today?" Kadyrov said. "There is no political leader on that scale globally.”

Anna Frants contributed.

EU summit breaks up after all-night talks, to resume later

July 20, 2020

BRUSSELS (AP) — Weary and bleary European Union leaders temporarily broke up their summit at dawn on the fourth day of acrimonious haggling over an unprecedented 1.85 trillion-euro ($2.1 trillion) EU budget and coronavirus recovery fund to tackle the crisis. They committed to pick up the fight again later Monday.

In a two-day summit scheduled to have ended Saturday, deep ideological differences between 27 leaders forced the talks into Sunday and then through the night until the sun came up again over the EU capital. Grumpy, some leaders lashed out at each other when a common middle ground was still out of reach.

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte, defending the cause of a group of five wealthy northern nations seeking to limit costs and strict reform guarantees, came under criticism from Italy and Hungary, whose Prime Minister Viktor Orban asked why the Dutchman had such “hate" toward him.

Rutte took it in stride. “We are not here because we are going to be visitors at each other’s birthday party later. We are here because we do business for our own country. We are all pros," he said. The leaders were teetering on the brink of collapse though, Rutte said, before things somewhat turned around before dawn Monday.

“It looks more hopeful than when I thought during the night: ‘It's over,'" he said. On Sunday night, after three days of fruitless talks, EU Council president Charles Michel implored leaders to overcome their fundamental divisions and agree on the budget and recovery fund.

“Are the 27 EU leaders capable of building European unity and trust or, because of a deep rift, will we present ourselves as a weak Europe, undermined by distrust," he asked the leaders at the end of another day of divisive negotiations. The text of the behind-closed-doors speech was obtained by The Associated Press.

“I wish that we succeed in getting a deal and that the European media can headline tomorrow that the EU succeeded in a Mission Impossible," Michel said. But early on the fourth day of talks — the summit was meant to last only two — the leaders still had not reached a compromise. As dawn broke Monday, they were still haggling over the size and terms of the recovery fund. Debate centered on whether needy nations should get between 375 billion euros to 390 billion euros in grants, officials said.

Even with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron negotiating as the closest of partners, the traditionally powerful Franco-German alliance could not get the bloc's 27 quarreling nations in line.

At their dinner table Sunday night, the leaders could mull a proposal from the five wealthy northern nations — the Netherlands, Austria, Finland, Sweden and Denmark — that suggested a coronavirus recovery fund with 350 million euros of grants and the same amount again in loans. The five EU nations nicknamed “the frugals” — had long opposed any grants at all.

“We are ready to take the leap from loans to subsidies. If there are reforms, they need to be strictly defined. And, two, they need to be able to be enforced,” Rutte said. The pandemic has sent the EU into a tailspin, killing around 135,000 of its citizens and plunging its economy into an estimated contraction of 8.3% this year.

The bloc’s executive has proposed a 750 billion-euro coronavirus fund, partly based on common borrowing, to be sent as loans and grants to the countries hit hardest by the pandemic. That comes on top of the seven-year 1 trillion-euro EU budget that leaders have been haggling over for months even before the pandemic hit.

All nations agree they need to band together but the five richer countries in the north, led by the Netherlands, want strict controls on spending, while struggling southern nations like Spain and Italy say those conditions should be kept to a minimum.

Rutte has long been known as a European bridge builder, but this weekend his tough negotiating stance was being blamed for holding up a deal. He and his allies have been pushing for labor market and pension reforms to be linked to EU handouts and a “brake” enabling EU nations to monitor and, if necessary, halt projects that are being paid for by the recovery fund.

“He can’t ask us to do specific reforms,” Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte said, complaining it may look like a hero in his home nation, but nowhere else. Rutte also wants a link to be made between the handout of EU funds and the rule of law — a connection aimed at Poland and Hungary, countries with right-wing populist governments that many in the EU think are sliding away from democratic rule.

That drew Orban into anger. “I don’t know what is the personal reason for the Dutch prime minister to hate me or Hungary, but he’s attacking so harshly and making very clear that because Hungary, in his opinion, does not respect the rule of law, (it) must be punished financially,” Orban said.

Corder reported from The Hague, Netherlands. Associated Press writer Geir Moulson contributed from Berlin.

Governments around world eye tougher steps to fight virus

July 20, 2020

(AP) Signs of governments reassessing their coronavirus response were scattered around the world Sunday, with the mayor of Los Angeles saying the city was reopened too quickly, Ohio's governor warning his state is “going the wrong way,” Hong Kong issuing tougher new rules on wearing face masks and Spain closing overcrowded beaches.

Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti said Los Angeles was “on the brink” of new widespread stay-at-home orders as Los Angeles County continued to see the state’s largest increase in confirmed coronavirus cases. California reported on Saturday its fourth-highest daily total of newly confirmed coronavirus cases, with more than 9,000.

Appearing on CNN Sunday, Garcetti was asked about a Los Angeles Times editorial that criticized the rapid reopening of California, which was followed by a spike in new COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations.

“I do agree those things happened too quickly,” Garcetti said, adding that the decisions were made at the state and county levels, not by city officials. But he also said people in general had become less vigilant about taking precautions to avoid transmission.

“It’s not just what’s open and closed,” he said. “It’s also about what we do individually.” Infections have been soaring in U.S. states including California, Florida, Texas and Arizona, with many blaming a haphazard, partisan approach to lifting lockdowns as well as the resistance of some Americans to wearing masks.

In Florida, where health officials reported nearly 12,500 new infections and nearly 90 additional deaths on Sunday, U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio called for consistent, nonpartisan messaging. “We’ve seen a lot of these things turned into sort of a partisan fight or a political statement,” he told South Florida television station, CBS4, on Sunday.

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine, like Rubio a Republican, said he would not rule out a statewide mandate on wearing masks, as infections in his state grew. He has already issued such orders in 19 counties accounting for nearly 60% of the state’s population.

“We’re going the wrong way. We’re at a crucial time,” DeWine said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” Globally, the World Health Organization said that 259,848 new infections were reported Saturday, its highest one-day tally yet. India, which has now confirmed more than 1 million infections, on Sunday reported a 24-hour record of 38,902 new cases.

Pope Francis said “the pandemic is showing no sign of stopping” and urged compassion for those whose suffering during the outbreak has been worsened by conflicts. In Europe, where infections are far below their peak but local outbreaks are causing concern, leaders of the 27-nation European Union haggled for a third day in Brussels over a proposed 1.85 trillion-euro ($2.1 trillion) EU budget and coronavirus recovery fund.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel said there is “a lot of good will, but there are also a lot of positions” in the talks, which have have laid bare divisions about how the countries hit hardest by the pandemic, such as Italy and Spain, should be helped. She said the talks, which were initially scheduled to end on Saturday, could still end without a deal.

Confirmed global virus deaths have risen to more than 603,000, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University. The United States tops the list with over 140,000, followed by more than 78,000 in Brazil. Europe as a continent has seen about 200,000 deaths.

The number of confirmed infections worldwide has passed 14.3 million, with 3.7 million in the United States and more than 2 million in Brazil. Experts believe the pandemic's true toll around the world is much higher because of testing shortages and data collection issues.

Even where the situation has been largely brought under control, new outbreaks are prompting the return of restrictions. Following a recent surge in cases, Hong Kong made the wearing of masks mandatory in all public places and told non-essential civil servants to work from home. Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam said the situation in the Asian financial hub is “really critical” and that she sees “no sign” that it’s under control.

Police in Barcelona have limited access to some of the city’s beloved beaches because sunbathers were ignoring social distancing regulations amid a resurgence of coronavirus infections. Slaughterhouses also have featured in outbreaks in the U.S., Germany and elsewhere. Authorities in northwestern Germany's Vechta county said 66 workers at a chicken slaughterhouse tested positive, though most appeared to have been infected in their free time. An earlier outbreak at a slaughterhouse in western Germany infected over 1,400 and prompted a partial lockdown.

Cases in the Australian state of Victoria rose again Sunday, prompting a move to make masks mandatory in metropolitan Melbourne and the nearby district of Mitchell for people who leave their homes for exercise or to purchase essential goods.

Victoria Premier Daniel Andrews said those who fail to wear a mask will be fined 200 Australian dollars ($140). “There’s no vaccine to this wildly infectious virus and it’s a simple thing, but it’s about changing habits, it’s about becoming a simple part of your routine,” Andrews said.

Moulson contributed from Berlin and Calvan from Tallahassee, Fla. Associated Press writers around the world contributed to this report.