Month: November 2022

The European Commission set out a 20-point action plan on Monday designed to address surging migration in the central Mediterranean ahead of an emergency meeting of interior ministers.

Over 90,000 migrants and refugees have arrived in the European Union this year via the central Mediterranean route, such as across the sea from North Africa to Italy or Malta, a 50% increase from 2021. Interior ministers will hold talks on Friday.

European Home Affairs Commissioner Ylva Johansson told a news conference that one focus of the EU plan was to strengthen cooperation with third countries, including actions to prevent departures from North Africa.

The Commission says the majority of migrants depart from Libya and Tunisia and come primarily from Egypt, Tunisia and Bangladesh. The EU aims to have spent 580 million euros ($594 million) between 2021 and 2023 to support North African countries and help foster economic growth and jobs in the region.

The issue came to a head earlier this month as Paris and Rome clashed over France’s acceptance of a boat carrying 234 rescued migrants that Italy had turned away.

Italian Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi called the proposal a “solid start”, welcoming the focus on more cooperation with countries of origin and transit and more coordination of sea rescue activities.

Johansson said there needed to be greater EU coordination of search and rescue, including among coastal and flag states, and stressed that providing assistance to people found in distress at sea was a legal obligation.

She also highlighted an EU deal reached in June on voluntary relocation of migrants and financial contributions from EU countries not in the front line.
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A landmark new Spanish law on sexual violence is the target of protests after at least 15 convicted offenders used the legislation to secure reductions to their jail terms while others were released.

Known as the “only yes means yes” law in Spain, it reformed the criminal code to define all non-consensual sex as rape.

Before this, rape convictions could only be secured if prosecutors could prove that violence or intimidation had been used. Often, a lesser charge of sexual abuse was alleged if these factors could not be proved.

The new law, enacted in October, also made wolf-whistling at women an offense and ordered sex offenders to take re-education courses.

Ana I. Bernal, a journalist who specializes in writing about feminism, told VOA: “This law has left a legal loophole. There are many victims who are scared about what could happen because the people who abused them could be let out of prison earlier. They are worried about their safety.”  

The law raises the sentences for gang rape or chemical submission, but it reduces both the maximum and minimum sentences in cases where there are no aggravating circumstances like violence or intimidation.

In Spain, a jail term can be retroactively modified if changes to the penal code benefits the convicted offender.

Hundreds of convicted offenders have applied to have their sentences revised since the law came into effect.

The legislation was brought in after a group of five men, known as the Wolf Pack, raped an 18-year-old woman at Pamplona at the world-famous bull running festival in 2016.

In a politically embarrassing reverse for Spain’s leftist government, which has made feminism a central part of its policies, the offenders whose crimes inspired the new rape law could benefit from the legislation.

Augustín Martínez, a lawyer for one member of the Wolf Pack, whose name came from the WhatsApp social media group which the attackers used, said he intends to use the law to try to reduce the offender’s sentence.

The ‘Wolf Pack’ are not the only ones who could benefit.

One man who sexually assaulted his 13-year-old stepdaughter had his sentence reduced from eight years to six years.

In another case, a teacher who paid for sex with his pupils was released after his sentence was reduced.

Victims have gone public to express their anger that they may come face to face with the men who abused them sooner than they believed.

Antonia’s former partner was jailed for 13 years for raping her, but he has had his sentence cut to 11 years.

“It is like a bucket of cold water thrown in my face. This makes me very scared and angry,” she told RTVE, the Spanish state television network. She consented to appear on television but did not give her full name.

With the lesser charge of ‘sexual abuse’ dropped from the criminal code and wider range of offences grouped under ‘sexual assault’, a broader range of penalties was required to ensure proportionality.

This means anyone who was previously convicted of sexual assault who was jailed for the minimum sentence of eight years, can now benefit from the minimum being reduced to six.

Accusations of chauvinism

Spain’s Equality Minister, Irene Montero of the far-left Unidas Podemos party, which is the junior partner in Spain’s coalition government, accused judges who have cut sentences of “breaking the law” on the grounds of “male chauvinism” – remarks which angered the judges’ organizations.

The General Council of the Judiciary, the body responsible for ensuring the judiciary’s independence, hit back in a statement, saying these were “intolerable attacks.”

A female judge, who did not want to disclose her name, told VOA: “Clearly, we are not all machos! This is nonsense.”

Carlos Flores, a professor of constitutional law at the University of Valencia, told VOA that the minister’s claims about judges ‘male chauvinism’ did not make sense.

“At least 55% of Spanish judges are women so you cannot accuse them of machismo. Also, all the judges sitting today trained in the period after the death of (the dictator) General Franco (in 1975) and most receive education in gender politics,” he said.

Flores said that the row over the law which was designed to give more protection to victims has proved embarrassing for the Spanish government.

“All this is happening in an area which this government has made one of its dearest concerns – feminism. This is the most feminist government in Spanish history with the largest number of women ministers. It is a major failure in a major area of interest for this government,” he noted.

Amid calls for Montero to resign, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez has come under pressure to act.

Political Cornerstone

“It is unlikely that Sanchez will sack Montero over this. It would be the end of the coalition,” Pablo Simón, a political expert from the University Carlos III in Madrid, told VOA.

This week, the Supreme Court will review a number of cases.

“Let’s wait to see what the courts and prosecutors say about this,” Sanchez said last week.

Opposition parties have exploited the political crisis.

Alberto Núñez Feijóo, leader of the opposition conservative People’s Party, said: “The effect is that there are rapists who have committed sexual abuse who, thanks to this law, are now more protected because of the president of the government.”

Flores said it was unlikely that the new law would be modified.

Some information for this report came from Agence France-Presse.
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The International Atomic Energy Agency said it planned to carry out inspections Monday at Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant after two days of shelling in the area renewed concerns about the potential disaster at the site.

The latest round of attacks near Europe’s largest nuclear power plant included what the IAEA said were more than a dozen blasts Sunday.

“Even though there was no direct impact on key nuclear safety and security systems at the plant, the shelling came dangerously close to them. We are talking meters, not kilometers,” IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi said. “Whoever is shelling at the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, is taking huge risks and gambling with many people’s lives.”

Ukraine and Russia have repeatedly blamed each other for shelling near the power plant amid the war Russia launched in late February with its invasion of Ukraine.

A Kremlin spokesman told reporters Monday other countries need to use their influence to help end attacks at the site.

As bitter winter weather hits Ukraine, Russia has been attacking the Ukrainian power grid and other key infrastructure from the air, causing widespread blackouts for millions of Ukrainians. In the Zaporizhzhia region alone, the Ukrainian presidency said, Russian forces shelled civilian infrastructure in about a dozen communities, destroying 30 homes.

Some information for this story came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters.
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Russian tanks lumbered into Kherson on the first day of the war last February. Its liberation this week was a significant victory for Ukrainian forces. But nearly nine months of war have had a devastating effect on this region. Yelyzaveta Krotyk has more in this report narrated by Anna Rice.
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The British government Sunday denied a report that it is seeking a “Swiss-style” relationship with the European Union that would remove many of the economic barriers erected by Brexit — even as it tries to improve ties with the bloc after years of acrimony.

Health Secretary Steve Barclay told Sky News “I don’t recognize” the Sunday Times report, insisting the U.K. was still determined to “use the Brexit freedoms we have” by diverging from the EU’s rules in key areas.

Switzerland has a close economic relationship with the 27-nation EU in return for accepting the bloc’s rules and paying into its coffers.

The U.K. government said, “Brexit means we will never again have to accept a relationship with Europe that would see a return to freedom of movement, unnecessary payments to the European Union or jeopardize the full benefit of trade deals we are now able to strike around the world.”

But despite the denials, the new Conservative government led by Prime Minister Rishi Sunak wants to restore relations with the EU, acknowledging that Brexit has brought an economic cost for Britain. Treasury chief Jeremy Hunt last week expressed optimism that trade barriers between the U.K. and the EU would be removed in the coming years.

The shift comes as public opposition grows to the hard form of Brexit pursued by successive Conservative governments since British voters opted by a 52%-48% margin to leave the bloc in a 2016 referendum.

Now, according to polling expert John Curtice, 57% of people would vote to rejoin the bloc and 43% to stay out.

When the U.K. was negotiating its divorce from the EU, Conservative governments under Prime Ministers Theresa May and her successor Boris Johnson ruled out remaining inside the EU’s borderless single market or its tariff-free customs union. Politicians who wanted closer ties were ignored or pushed aside.

The divorce deal struck by the two sides in 2020 has brought customs checks and other border hurdles for goods, and passport checks and other annoyances for travelers. Britons can no longer live and work freely across Europe, and EU citizens can’t move to the U.K. at will.

The British government’s fiscal watchdog, the Office for Budget Responsibility, said last week that leaving the EU has had “a significant adverse effect on U.K. trade.”

Yet only recently have members of the government begun acknowledging Brexit’s downsides. Hunt, who last week announced a 55 billion-pound ($65 billion) package of tax increases and spending cuts to shore up an economy battered by soaring inflation, acknowledged Brexit had caused “trade barriers” with the U.K.’s nearest neighbors.

“Unfettered trade with our neighbors is very beneficial to growth,” he told the BBC, and predicted that the “vast majority” of barriers would be removed – although it would take years.

Any move to rebuild ties with the EU will face opposition from the powerful euroskeptic wing of the Conservative Party. Even the opposition Labour Party — reluctant to reopen a debate that split the country in half and poisoned politics — says it won’t seek to rejoin the bloc, or even the EU’s single market, if it takes power after the next election.

Sunak, who took office last month, is a longtime Brexit supporter, but also a pragmatist who has made repairing the economy his top priority. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which has rocked European security and sent energy prices soaring, has put Brexit squabbles into perspective for politicians on both sides of the English Channel.

Sunak wants to solve a festering feud with the EU over trade rules that have caused a political crisis in Northern Ireland, the only part of the U.K. that shares a border with an EU member nation. When Britain left the bloc, the two sides agreed to keep the Irish border free of customs posts and other checks because an open border is a key pillar of the peace process that ended 30 years of violence in Northern Ireland.

Instead, there are checks on some goods entering Northern Ireland from the rest of the U.K. That angered pro-British unionist politicians, who say the new checks undermine Northern Ireland’s place in the United Kingdom. They are boycotting Belfast’s power-sharing government, leaving Northern Ireland without a functioning administration.

The U.K. government is pinning its hopes on striking a deal with the EU that would ease the checks and coax Northern Ireland’s unionists back into the government.

Months of talks when Johnson was in office proved fruitless, but the mood has improved since Sunak took over, though as yet there has been no breakthrough. 
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Turkey’s Defense Ministry said Sunday that it has launched airstrikes over the northern regions of Syria and Iraq where the ministry is targeting Kurdish groups that it believes are responsible for an attack last week in Istanbul.

The ministry said the strikes hit the bases of the Kurdistan Wokers’ Party, or PKK, and the Syrian People’s Protection Units or YPG.

A bomb hit central Istanbul last week, killing six people and wounding over 80.

Turkey blames the PKK and the YPG for the attack, but both groups have denied the charges.

Washington backs the YPG in its war against the Islamic State terrorist group.
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