Month: May 2024

WARSAW, Poland — Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk traveled Saturday to the country’s border with Belarus, which is also the European Union’s external border with the autocratic state, and pledged to do more to strengthen security along its entire eastern frontier.

Tusk accused Belarus, Russia’s ally, of intensifying what he called a “hybrid war” against the West by encouraging migrants to try to cross into the EU. He vowed that Poland would spare no expense on its border security.

“I know that there are more and more illegal crossings every day,” Tusk told reporters at the border, where he met with Polish army soldiers, border guard officers and police. He also cited “the growing threat resulting from the Russian-Ukrainian war, Russia’s aggression against Ukraine and the uncertain geopolitical situation.”

The visit to the border, Tusk’s first since he took office in December, comes after a Polish judge defected to Belarus this month. He claimed he was facing persecution in Poland, a democracy. Officials have denounced him as a traitor, and he is being investigated on suspicion of espionage.

Tusk replaced a national conservative party at odds with the EU over rule-of-law issues. That party, Law and Justice, took a strong stance against migration in a way that set it at odds with other European allies when it first took power in 2015.

Since then, though, the general mood against migration across Europe has toughened. While Tusk does not use some of the harsh anti-migrant rhetoric of his predecessors, he, too, is opposed to unregulated migration.

“This is not only Poland’s internal border, but also the border of the European Union. Therefore, I have no doubt that all of Europe will have to — and I know that we will achieve this — invest in its security by investing in Poland’s eastern border and in the security of our border,” Tusk said.

He added that he made a declaration to the commanders of the security forces at the border that “there are no limits on resources when it comes to Poland’s security.”

The visit comes weeks ahead of next month’s elections for the European Parliament, and Tusk seemed intent on sending a message to voters that his political party, Civic Coalition, favors border security and supports the uniformed officers there.

“I came today primarily so that both commanders and their subordinates have no doubt that the Polish state and the Polish government are with them in every situation, here at the border,” he said.

A crisis erupted along the EU’s eastern border with Belarus in 2021 when large numbers of migrants from the Middle East and Africa began arriving there. The EU accused Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko of encouraging the migration to destabilize the EU after it imposed sanctions on the country for an election widely viewed as fraudulent.

Poland’s previous government responded to the crisis by constructing a tall steel wall.
…

your ad here

MALMO, Sweden — The Netherlands’ contestant in the Eurovision Song Contest was dramatically expelled from competition hours before Saturday’s final of the pan-continental pop competition, which has been rattled by protests over the participation of Israel.

Competition organizer European Broadcasting Union said Swedish police were investigating “a complaint made by a female member of the production crew” against Dutch performer Joost Klein. The organizer said it wouldn’t be appropriate for Klein to participate at the event in Malmo while the legal process was underway.

Although Eurovision’s motto is “united by music,” this year’s event has proven exceptionally divisive. Israel’s participation has attracted large pro-Palestinian demonstrations, with protesters saying the country should be excluded because of its conduct in the war in the Gaza Strip.

Klein, a 26-year-old Dutch singer and rapper, had been a favorite of bookmakers and fans with his song “Europapa.”

He failed to perform at two dress rehearsals on Friday, and the EBU had said it was investigating an “incident.” Although rumors had been flying that the incident was connected to Israel’s delegation, organizers said that it “did not involve any other performer or delegation member.”

Dutch broadcaster AVROTOS, one of dozens of public broadcasters that collectively fund and broadcast the contest, said that it “finds the disqualification disproportionate and is shocked by the decision.”

“We deeply regret this and will come back to this later,” AVROTOS said in a statement.

It all makes for a messy climax to an event that draws both adoration and derision with its campy, kitschy ethos and passion for pop.

Thousands of people gathered in central Malmo on Saturday to march for the second time this week through Sweden’s third-largest city, which has a large Muslim population, to demand a boycott of Israel and a cease-fire in the seven-month war.

In Finland, a group of about 40 protesters stormed the headquarters of public broadcaster YLE on Saturday morning, demanding it withdraw from the song contest because of Israel’s participation.

Several kilometers from the city center at the Malmo Arena, 25 acts — narrowed from 37 entrants by two semifinal runoffs — are scheduled to perform three-minute songs in front of a live audience of thousands and an estimated 180 million viewers around the world.

Tensions and nerves were palpable in the hours before the final. Several artists were absent from the Olympics-style artists’ entrance at the start of the final dress rehearsal, although all but Ireland’s Bambie Thug went on to perform.

The Irish performer issued a statement saying the absence was due to a situation “which I felt needed urgent attention from the EBU” and telling fans: “I hope to see you on the stage later.”

French singer Slimane cut short his song “Mon Amour” at the dress rehearsal to give a speech urging people to be “united by music, yes — but with love, for peace.”
…

your ad here

BARCELONA, Spain — Carles Puigdemont, Catalonia’s fugitive former leader, stares confidently out the backseat window of a car, the sun illuminating his gaze in a campaign poster for Sunday’s critical elections in the northeastern Spanish region.

The image plays on another one imagined from six years prior when Puigdemont hid in the trunk of a car as he was smuggled across the French border, fleeing Spain’s crackdown on a failed illegal 2017 secession attempt that he had led as Catalan regional president.

Sunday’s elections will be a test to see if Catalonia wants him back as leader or if the wealthy region has moved on from secession and has more pressing worries.

Puigdemont is still technically a fugitive. But ironically, recent maneuvers by Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez have revitalized his political career. Sánchez promised amnesty to Puigdemont and other separatists facing charges in return for the support of separatist lawmakers in the national parliament to form a new government in Madrid. But that could now backfire and cause problems for the national government if Puigdemont, public enemy No. 1 for many Spaniards, is reelected.

Sánchez’s stake

Either from conviction or necessity, Sánchez has spent huge amounts of political capital taking decisions embraced in Catalonia but largely lambasted in the rest of the country that were aimed at wooing back voters from the separatist camp.

So far it seems to be working.

The Socialists’ candidate, Salvador Illa, is currently leading all the polls ahead of both Puigdemont and current Catalan regional president Pere Aragonès, another secessionist from a different Catalan party.

Illa won the most votes in the 2021 Catalan elections but could not stop Aragonès from keeping the separatists in power. If the Socialists win Sunday, Sánchez, who has campaigned alongside Illa, can boast that his risky bets on Catalonia have paid off.

“Carles Puigdemont is the past, we represent the future,” Illa said at a debate this week, as he focuses on social issues and casts the debate about secession as stale.

“If the Socialists have a strong showing, that will give Sánchez a boost, especially before European elections (in June),” Oriol Bartomeus, a professor of political science at the Autonomous University of Barcelona told The Associated Press.

But Illa’s chances of becoming regional president will, according to all election polling, still hinge on winning the support of other parties, including most likely Aragonès’ Republican Left of Catalonia.

Puigdemont’s pledge

Puigdemont is running on the pledge that he will finally return home — in theory under the protection provided by the amnesty — when the newly elected lawmakers convene to form a new regional government. That investiture vote would come in the weeks after the post-election negotiations between parties.

Puigdemont has moved, at least temporarily, from Waterloo, Belgium, where he has lived as a self-styled “political exile,” to a French village just north of Spain where he has campaigned with rallies by followers who have crossed the border.

He has said that if he is not restored to power he will retire from politics.

Voter priorities

The question Puigdemont, Illa, Aragonès and the other candidates now face is how much Catalonia has changed.

A record drought, not independence, is the number one concern among Catalans, according to the most recent survey by Catalonia’s public opinion office. Some 70% of would-be voters now say that the management of public services, the economy and climate change would drive their choice at the polls, while 30% say the question of independence was still their priority.

The opinion office said 50% of Catalans are against independence while 42% are for it, meaning support for it has dipped to 2012 levels. When Puigdemont left in 2017, 49% favored independence and 43% were against.

Pablo Simón, political science professor at Carlos III University in Madrid, said that the secessionist movement was in a period of uncertain transition.

“I would not dare say that the secessionist movement is dead, but I can say that we are in a period where we don’t know what will come next,” he said.
…

your ad here

…

your ad here

ROME — Pope Francis pressed his campaign Friday to urge Italians to have children, calling for long-term policies to help families and warning that the country’s demographic crisis was threatening the future.

“The number of births is the first indicator of the hope of a people,” Francis told an annual gathering of pro-family groups. “Without children and young people, a country loses its desire for the future.”

It was Francis’ latest appeal for Italy – and beyond that Europe – to invert what he has called the demographic winter facing many industrialized countries.

Italy’s birth rate, already one of the lowest in the world, has been falling steadily for about 15 years and reached a record low last year with 379,000 babies born.

With the Vatican’s strong backing, the right-wing government of Premier Giorgia Meloni has mounted a campaign to encourage at least 500,000 births annually by 2033, a rate that demographers say is necessary to prevent the economy from collapsing under the weight of Italy’s aging population.

Francis called for long-term political strategies and policies to encourage couples to have children, including an end to precarious work contracts and impediments to buying homes, and viable alternatives so women don’t have to choose between motherhood and careers.

“The problem of our world is not children being born: it is selfishness, consumerism and individualism which make people sated, lonely and unhappy,” Francis said.

Francis is expected to continue emphasizing his demographic call during the upcoming 2025 Holy Year, which has hope as its main theme. In the official Jubilee decree, or papal bull, that was promulgated Thursday, Francis called for a new social covenant among Christians to encourage couples to be open to having children.
…

your ad here

london — Chinese President Xi Jinping departed Hungary on Friday after a five-day trip to Europe, his first visit to the continent in five years. Xi pledged to work with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban in a new “multipolar world order.” Analysts say Beijing is courting its allies in Eastern Europe to exploit Western divisions.

Xi left Budapest after having signed 18 bilateral agreements to increase economic and cultural ties during his two-day stay in Hungary. The two countries announced what the Chinese president termed a “new-era, all-weather, comprehensive strategic partnership.”

“We are ready to take this as a new starting point to push our relations and practical cooperation into a golden voyage,” Xi said Thursday at a news conference.

“The two sides will strengthen the docking of development strategies, deepen cooperation in the fields of economy and trade, investment and finance, push forward the construction of key projects such as the Budapest-Belgrade Railway,” he added.

Current Chinese investment projects in Hungary amount to over $17 billion, according to Budapest, with further investments from Beijing to follow, including in several electric car and battery plants.

The European Union accuses Beijing of unfairly subsidizing the industry and undercutting its own carmakers, which China denies.

Multipolar world

But Xi’s visit was about more than money. China and Hungary sent a geopolitical message to the West.

“We used to live in a one-center world order. Now we live in a multipolar world, and one of the pillars of this new world order is the Republic of China — the country which now defines the course of world and economic politics,” Orban told reporters Thursday.

Hungary sees dual benefits in wooing China, said analyst Andras Hettyey of the University for Public Service in Budapest. “The government believes that this will be beneficial for the Hungarian economy as a whole. But I think we shouldn’t forget that this also comes with political allegiances or political ties — a political bond between Hungarian leading politicians and Chinese leading politicians,” he told VOA.

War on Ukraine

Xi and Orban discussed Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine. The West accuses China of aiding Moscow’s war through economic support and the sale of dual-use goods that can be used in weapons. Beijing denies the accusations.

Hungary’s Orban also maintains close political and economic ties with Russia, and echoed his Chinese counterpart’s claim that they are working toward peace.

“Our voice in Europe is a lonely one. Europe today supports war. The only exception is Hungary, urging immediate cease-fire and peace talks. And we support all international efforts towards peace, and thus we support the Chinese peace initiative presented by President Xi Jinping,” Orban said.

Ukraine has said it will not negotiate until invading Russian troops leave its territory.

Western anger

Orban’s traditional allies in the European Union and NATO have voiced concerns about his close ties with Beijing and Moscow and have criticized a perceived backsliding of democracy in Hungary.

That won’t bother Budapest, said Hettyey. “In fact, it might be even a point of which our government will be proud. Because by now there is a very strong alienation between the Hungarian government and its Western partners, to the point where the present Hungarian government does not want to achieve, does not deem important to have a good reputation in the West,” he said.

There were small demonstrations against the Chinese president’s visit, including by pro-Tibetan and Hong Kong pro-democracy campaigners. Teams of people in red baseball caps — whom the Chinese Embassy in Budapest described as “volunteers” — confiscated protesters’ flags.

Serbia visit

Prior to visiting Hungary, Xi visited Serbia, another European ally with close ties to Moscow — and which is, like Hungary, a partner of Beijing’s Belt and Road Initiative and has received billions of dollars in infrastructure and industrial investment.

The visit to Belgrade coincided with the 25th anniversary of NATO’s accidental bombing of the Chinese Embassy in the city, which killed three people, prompting an apology from the United States.

During his visit, Xi reaffirmed Beijing’s view that Kosovo, which declared independence in 2008, is still part of Serbia. Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic reiterated his country’s acceptance of the “One China” principle, which considers Taiwan as part of China.

Exploiting divisions

Earlier in the week, Xi visited France, meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron and EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen. There were few indications that Xi is prepared to offer concessions on Chinese trade practices or on its support for Russia.

The Chinese president did, however, praise his French counterpart’s desire for “strategic autonomy” — the idea that Europe should reduce its security reliance on the United States. China is seeking to exploit divisions in the West, said analyst Steve Tsang, director of the China Institute at SOAS, University of London.

“The ‘united front’ approach of divide and rule is integral to Chinese foreign policy, particularly under Xi Jinping. And that is, of course, reflected in the choice of all three countries that Xi Jinping would visit.

“So, the more that China can charm Europe and persuade Europeans not to work with the Americans, the better,” Tsang told VOA.
…

your ad here

…

your ad here

…

your ad here

belgrade, serbia — Chinese President Xi Jinping’s visit to Serbia this week brought out a crowd waving Serbian and Chinese flags and praising the “ironclad” friendship of two countries. Elsewhere in the West, it raised many questions about Serbia’s future role in Europe. 

Analysts say that was exactly the idea. At a time of global rivalry between Beijing and Washington, the messages Xi delivered from Belgrade appeared aimed at a much wider audience. 

Xi and Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic signed a number of bilateral agreements on Wednesday, which followed the 25th anniversary of NATO’s bombing of the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade during NATO’s 1999 campaign to halt the ethnic cleansing of Albanians in Kosovo. The U.S. apologized for that action, calling it “a mistake.” 

David Shullman, an expert on China with the Washington-based Atlantic Council, told VOA that Xi’s arrival in Belgrade on the May 7 anniversary was aimed at sending a broader message in the context of the war in Ukraine: that China is not a “warmonger” like the U.S. and NATO. 

Chinese messaging, Shullman said, “parrots Russia’s messaging about the war in Ukraine, about not putting a blame on Russia, but putting a blame on the U.S., NATO for ‘fanning the flames’ of the war, continuing to support the Ukrainians, and that China is the one that’s the force for peace and stability. …  

“There is an awareness in the Chinese system [that] this is a key binding point between China and Serbia, and it fits into that message that China has been pushing about NATO and the U.S.” 

China’s president referred to the bombing of the Chinese Embassy in an op-ed published Tuesday in Serbia’s pro-government newspaper Politika: “The people of China value peace, but they will never allow a historical tragedy to happen again.”  

Paul McCarthy, director for Europe at the International Republican Institute in Washington, agreed that the timing of Xi’s visit was no accident. 

“I think that Xi’s entire visit to Europe was organized around the 25th anniversary of the NATO bombing,” he said. “It is too symbolic an opportunity for the Chinese to miss and underlines, so to speak, the position of Serbia and the strategic disagreement with the West that has been going on for 25 years.” 

Xi and Vucic signed a statement on the two countries’ “shared future,” which the Serbian president described as being a level above the Comprehensive Strategic Partnership the two countries agreed to in 2016. 

According to the Atlantic Council’s Shullman, Xi has often used the phrase “shared future” to indicate he wants a new balance of power in the world. 

“The story of a shared future is how China wants to establish a global order that is less U.S.-led, that is multipolar, that is a more ‘democratic’ international order — as the Chinese say,” he said. 

“In essence, it is an order that is no longer led by the U.S. and in which China plays a more significant role.” 

He added: “The fact that Serbia is spoken of as the first European country that will be part of the community and ‘common future’ shows that for Chinese leaders, especially Xi, Serbia is of great importance … as an economic partner and as a country that is a candidate for the EU.” 

In addition, Xi’s visit to Serbia signaled to Washington that China has reliable partners in Europe and that the U.S. “will not be able to completely win over Europe to its side.”  

China owns mines and factories across Serbia and has provided billions of dollars’ worth of funding for roads, bridges and various facilities, becoming Serbia’s key partner in much-needed infrastructure development.  

Still, some experts say the future of cooperation between Belgrade and Beijing is uncertain, given the complicated relations between the U.S. and China. 

Vuk Vuksanovic, a senior researcher at the Belgrade Center for Security Policy, told VOA that broadening cooperation between Serbia and China from a strategic partnership to the level of “building a community of Serbia and China with a common future in the new era” is little more than a diplomatic game that suits both governments at the moment. 

He added that the future relationship depends much more on Beijing than on Belgrade.  

“The previous strategic partnership agreement was a joint statement from 2009 that had warm rhetoric but did not actually bring about any monumental transformation of those relations,” he said. 

“And that was until the moment when China showed greater interest in the Balkans due to the Belt and Road Initiative,” a massive, Chinese-led global infrastructure development strategy. “I think the key question for the U.S. will be whether that cooperation will include some major project in the field of defense and high technology.” 

The International Republican Institute’s McCarthy said it is unclear how the agreements between Serbia and China and the plans for a “common future” will affect Serbia’s relationship with the West. 

Still, he noted, a free-trade agreement between China and Serbia that comes into force in July “turns Serbia more towards the East,” raising the question of “how serious is Serbia on its European path.” 

He added: “I have to say that, from Washington’s perspective, they might feel like they’re losing the battle for Serbia’s heart, so to speak.” 

This article originated in VOA’s Serbian Service with contributions from Dino Jahic, Marko Protic and Stefan Miljus.
…

your ad here