BLOGONITY

Over 160,000 Ukrainians fled their home country and came to the Baltic states of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia since the Russian invasion. Physicians were among the 50 thousand or so refugees who came to Latvia. Vladislavs Andrejevs spoke with some of them in Riga. Anna Rice narrates his story. (Camera: Vladislavs Andrejevs ; Produced by Yuriy Zakrevskiy) …

The FBI said more than 50 election sites across five battleground states received hoax bomb emails on Election Day in the U.S., and the emails in four of these states came from a Russian domain. None of the threats sent to polling sites in Georgia, Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Arizona were deemed credible, and while causing a brief disruption, they did not affect the voting, the FBI said. “We identified the source, and it was from Russia,” Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said in a news conference, adding that the Russians “don’t want us to have free, fair and accurate elections, and if they could make us fight among ourselves, they could count that as a victory.” Russia denied involvement, claiming to “never” have interfered in elections in the U.S. or elsewhere. Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and the Russian Embassy in the U.S. used similar language, calling the FBI allegations “malicious slander.” That belies a well-documented decades-long history of Russian attempts to meddle in the domestic affairs of numerous nations across continents, including systematic efforts against the United States, ranging from malicious cyberattacks to multimillion-dollar disinformation campaigns. Just last week, German officials said Russia organized bomb threats targeting polling stations during the presidential elections in Moldova, where the Kremlin is accused of trying but failing to replace the pro-Western president, Maia Sandu, with a more amenable candidate. As it became clear that former U.S. President Donald Trump was poised to return to power, Russian officials and state media signaled their satisfaction with the result. Vice President Kalala Harris, the Democratic candidate, “is finished,” former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev posted on social media platform X. “The objectives of the Special Military Operation [Russia’s war in Ukraine] remain unchanged and will be achieved.” The Kremlin-owned Sputnik News branch in India posted on X a short AI-generated video showing a laughing Harris against a background of exploding bombs and destroyed towns in Ukraine. Harris is leaving behind a “rich foreign policy legacy,” the post said. Russia-linked accounts shared posts saying goodbye to nearly all officials in the current U.S. administration, including Secretary of State Antony Blinken, whom they called a “butcher” for his support to Ukraine. Russia’s state-controlled news network RT [formerly Russia Today] published an election night story featuring its U.S. correspondent Valentin Bogdanov’s experience among Trump’s “most loyal supporters” near his Mar-a-Largo residence in Florida. Bogdanov described the affairs … “ Russia paints doomsday portrayal of US elections “ →

Ukraine’s military said Wednesday it shot down 38 of the 63 aerial drones that Russian forces launched in overnight attacks. The Ukrainian air force said it intercepted the drones over the Cherkasy, Chernihiv, Kirovohrad, Kyiv, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Zhytomyr and Zaporizhzhia regions. Vitaliy Kim, the governor of Mykolaiv, said on Telegram that Russia’s attack damaged energy infrastructure, but did not hurt anyone. Russia’s Defense Ministry said Wednesday it destroyed two Ukrainian drones over the Kursk region and another drone over Oryol. Russian officials said there were no reports of damage or casualties. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Tuesday that his country’s forces have engaged in battle with the North Korean troops that were deployed to Russia to assist in its war on Ukraine. “The first battles with North Korean soldiers open a new page of instability in the world,” Zelenskyy said Tuesday in his daily address — his first official acknowledgement of the encounter between the two forces. Rustem Umerov, Ukraine’s defense minister, has also confirmed the arrival of the North Korean forces. In an interview with South Korea’s public broadcaster KBS, he said the Ukrainian and North Korean forces have engaged in “small-scale” fighting. “The first North Korean troops have already been shelled in the Kursk region,” said Andrii Kovalenko, the head of the counter-disinformation branch of Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council. According to a U.S. official quoted by The New York Times late Tuesday, a “significant number” of North Korean troops had been killed, though the report said it was not clear when the fighting had occurred. Some information for this story was provided by Agence France-Presse, Reuters and The Associated Press.  …

berlin — German Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s coalition faces a make-or-break moment on Wednesday as leaders of the three parties convene to forge compromises between their differing visions on rescuing the economy from decline. Relations between Scholz’s center-left Social Democrats (SPD), the Greens and free-market Free Democrats (FDP) have sunk to new lows over the past week as they aired their respective strategies without consulting one another. The FDP, long the odd-one-out in the ideologically mismatched and fractious coalition, has doubled down on its ultimatum: that some key deals must be reached in what the party has called an “autumn of decisions,” or the coalition is finished. “We need a real change in direction,” FDP parliamentary chief Christian Duerr said on Tuesday. Scholz, Finance Minister Christian Lindner of the FDP and Economy Minister Robert Habeck of the Greens are set to hold two crisis meetings on Wednesday, in addition to attending a cabinet meeting with a packed agenda. Then they will join a broader gathering of parliamentary and party leaders from the three camps at 6 p.m. (1700 GMT) that could extend into the night. The chancellor and his two top ministers hope to reach a preliminary agreement on how to plug a multi-billion-dollar hole in the budget and forge a compromise on economic policies that they can present to their respective parties. “It’s clear it is possible,” Scholz told reporters on Tuesday. A coalition collapse could leave Scholz heading a minority government and relying on ad hoc parliamentary majorities to govern, or trigger an early election – which surveys suggest would be disastrous for all three coalition parties. The SPD and Greens are polling well below their scores in the 2021 election, while the FDP could be ejected from parliament altogether. The three parties are at odds over how best to rescue Europe’s largest economy, which is now facing its second year of contraction and a crisis in its business model after the end of cheap Russian gas and amid increasing competition from China. The FDP has proposed public spending cuts, lower taxes and less regulation as the answer to this malaise. It also wants to slow down Germany’s shift to a carbon-neutral economy. The SPD and the Greens, meanwhile, while at odds on a host of other issues, agree that targeted government spending is needed. Still, Habeck made a major concession towards the FDP on Monday, saying the funds earmarked … “Germany’s awkward coalition faces make-or-break moment” →

MALMO, Sweden — A Swedish court sentenced a far-right politician Tuesday to four months in jail for two counts of “incitement against an ethnic group” after making hateful comments at political rallies two years ago.  The Danish-Swedish 42-year-old man, who was not named but has been identified by Swedish media as Rasmus Paludan, founder and head of the Danish nationalist anti-immigration party Stram Kurs, had been previously convicted and sentenced by a Danish court on a similar charge, the Malmo District Court said.  In 2022, Paludan made his offensive remarks directed at Muslims, Arabs and Africans during protests that he led in the southern city of Malmo, the court said. He also burned a copy of the Quran, Islam’s holy book, on at least one occasion. In response, a violent wave of riots swept the country.  Some observers also say Paludan’s actions may have momentarily risked Sweden’s chances of joining NATO after increasing political tensions with Turkey. Sweden joined the alliance in March this year.  The court in a statement Tuesday said Paludan’s remarks against Muslims “cannot be excused as criticism of Islam or as political campaign work.”  Chief Councilor Nicklas Soderberg, the court’s chairman, said: “It is permitted to publicly make critical statements about, for example, Islam and also Muslims, but the disrespect of a group of people must not clearly cross the line for a factual and valid discussion.”  He added that during the Malmo rallies in April and September 2022, “there was no question of any such discussion,” and that Paludan’s public statements “only amounted to insulting Muslims.”  The court took particular interest in whether the politician knew the protests were filmed and published on Facebook. Paludan had said that he wasn’t aware of it, but the district court disagreed and said his “actions at the gatherings would be downright illogical if he didn’t know about the publication on Facebook.”  Paludan, a lawyer by profession, told Swedish media outlets that he wasn’t surprised by the verdict.  “It was expected. We will appeal,” the Swedish newspaper Expressen cited him as saying.  …

In Turkey, listeners of Acik Radyo are protesting after regulators revoked the Istanbul-based station’s license. For nearly 30 years, Acik sought to bridge the country’s divides. Analysts say the action against it is part of a wider government media crackdown. Dorian Jones reports from Istanbul. …

NOVI SAD, Serbia — Protesters threw flares and red paint Tuesday on the City Hall building in the Serbian city of Novi Sad in rage over last week’s collapse of a concrete canopy at the railway station that killed 14 people. Police responded by firing tear gas canisters.  The protesters surrounded the building in central Novi Sad, breaking windows and throwing stones and other objects despite calls by organizers to remain calm. Special police troops were deployed inside the building.  Some of the angry protesters wearing masks, believed to be soccer hooligans who are close to the populist government, tried to get inside the building and hand over their demands that those responsible for the canopy collapse face justice.  Serbia’s autocratic President Aleksandar Vucic said the police are “showing restraint,” but also issued a warning saying “horrific, violent protests are underway.”  “People of Serbia, please do not think violence is allowed,” he said on X, formerly Twitter. “All those taking part in the incidents will be punished.”  Protest organizers said they wanted to enter the Hall and submit their demands.  Miran Pogacar, an opposition activist, said “one glass window can be mended but we cannot bring back 14 lives. People are angry. Serbia won’t stand for this.”  Bojan Pajtic, an opposition politician, said he believed the violent incidents were stoked deliberately by provocateurs, a tactic used before in Serbia to derail peaceful anti-government protests and paint the opposition protesters as enemies of the nation.  Thousands first marched through the city streets demanding that top officials step down because of the fatal outer roof collapse last Friday, including President Vucic and Prime Minister Milos Vucevic.  The protesters first gathered outside the railway station where they held a moment of silence for the victims as organizers read their names. The crowd responded by chanting: “arrest the gang” and “thieves.”  The protest started peacefully but some demonstrators later hurled plastic bottles and bricks at the headquarters of Vucic’s ruling Serbian Progressive Party and smeared red paint on posters of the Serbian president and the prime minister — a message that they have blood on their hands.  The protesters removed most of the Serbian national red, blue and white national flags that were apparently hung on the headquarters to prevent it from an attack. That triggered an angry reaction from the president.  “Our Serbian tricolor has been destroyed, hidden and removed by all those who … “Police fire tear gas at protests of deadly canopy collapse in Serbia” →

LONDON — Russia is “flagrantly violating” its agreements with the OPEC oil cartel by concealing the true amount of oil it is producing and selling, according to a new report that says the profits are funding Moscow’s war on Ukraine. The investigation by the Ukrainian Center for Defense Reforms asserts that Russia is breaching an OPEC agreement to cut oil production. The think tank is chaired by Oleksandr Danylyuk, a former chief adviser to the Ukrainian defense minister. Oil cut “In 2016, amid declining oil prices and to stabilize the market, OPEC reached an agreement with ten additional oil-producing countries, including Russia. The participants in this expanded format, known as OPEC+, agreed to reduce oil production, leading to a natural rise in global commodity prices,” the report says. However, the authors say that Russia has “flagrantly violated its obligations under the OPEC+ agreement” by concealing the true extent of its production and sales, thereby exceeding its production quota “by no less than 2.57 million barrels per day (28%) on average during the first four months of 2024.” $60 billion That has enriched the Kremlin, said report co-author Danylyuk. “It’s about $60 billion per year. And it’s also important because this is the money which is not seen by anyone,” Danylyuk told VOA. “And obviously, this is extra funds Russia can use to support the war efforts in Ukraine. This is actually the money they can use to buy microelectronics, to buy explosives, to buy shells, to pay countries like North Korea and Iran.” The report claims Russia is concealing the true volume of oil sold to its two biggest customers, India and China. “To disguise these deliveries, Russian authorities list zero value for certain contracts in the customs declarations,” says the report. “Over the first four months of 2024, Russia exported at least 789,000 barrels of oil per day more to China than officially reported. During the same period, exports to India exceeded official statistics by at least 280,000 barrels per day.” Shadow fleet In addition, Moscow is using a so-called shadow fleet of tankers to mask the true scale of its oil sales. The vessels “frequently change flags or ownership structures, deliberately deactivate the Automatic Identification System, falsify location under the influence of electronic warfare, and use other deceptive shipping practices.” By comparing discrepancies in shipping data, the Center for Defense Reforms estimates that Russia is exporting an unaccounted crude … “Report: Russia deceives OPEC on oil sales to fund Ukraine war” →

Russia is “flagrantly violating” its agreements with the oil cartel OPEC by concealing the true amount of oil it is producing and selling, according to a new report that says the profits are funding Moscow’s war on Ukraine. Henry Ridgwell reports. …

London — Two new cases of the mpox variant clade 1b detected in the U.K. are the first locally transmitted cases in Europe and the first outside Africa, the World Health Organization said Tuesday. The U.K. Health Security Agency (UKHSA) confirmed late Monday that the two new cases were household contacts of Britain’s first case identified last week, bringing the country’s total confirmed cases to three. The WHO warned that European states should be prepared for “rapid action” to contain the latest mpox variant, which spreads through close physical contact including sexual relations and sharing closed spaces. The two cases are also the first to be locally transmitted outside Africa since August 2024, when the WHO declared the outbreak of the new variant an international public health emergency — its highest level of alarm. Those affected are under specialist care and the risk to the U.K. population “remains low,” UKHSA said. The original case was detected after the person traveled to several African countries on holiday and returned to the U.K. on Oct. 21. The patient developed flu-like symptoms more than 24 hours later and, on Oct. 24, started to develop a rash that worsened in the following days. Mpox, a viral disease related to smallpox, has two types, clade 1 and clade 2. Symptoms include fever, a skin rash or pus-filled blisters, swollen lymph nodes and body aches. The WHO first declared an international public health emergency in 2022 over the spread of clade 2. That outbreak mostly affected gay and bisexual men in Europe and the United States. Vaccination and awareness drives in many countries helped stem the number of worldwide cases and the WHO lifted the emergency in May 2023 after reporting 140 deaths out of around 87,400 cases. In 2024, a two-pronged epidemic of clade 1 and clade 1b, a new strain that affects children, has spread widely in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The new strain has also been recorded in neighboring Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda and Uganda, with imported cases in Sweden, India, Thailand, Germany and the U.K. …

SEDAVI, Spain — Francisco Murgui went out to try to salvage his motorbike when the water started to rise.  He never came back.  One week after catastrophic flooding devastated eastern Spain, Maria Murgui still holds out hope that her father is alive and among the unknown number of the missing.  “He was like many people in town who went out to get their car or motorbike to safety,” the 27-year-old told The Associated Press. “The flash flood caught him outside, and he had to cling to a tree in order to escape drowning. He called us to tell us that he was fine, that we shouldn’t worry.”  But when Maria set out into the streets of Sedavi to try to rescue him from the water washing away everything in its path, he was nowhere to be found.  “He held up until 1 in the morning,” she said. “By 2, I went outside with a neighbor and a rope to try to locate him. But we couldn’t find him. And since then, we haven’t heard anything about him.”  At least 218 have been confirmed dead after a deluge caused by heavy rains late on October 29 and the next morning swamped entire communities, mostly in Spain’s Valencia region, catching most off guard. Regional authorities have been heavily criticized for having issued alerts to mobile phones some two hours after the disaster had started.  Authorities have yet to any give an estimate of the missing seven days on. Spanish state broadcaster RTVE, however, shows a steady stream of appeals by people who are searching for family members who are not accounted for.  Maria Murgui herself has posted a missing person’s message on social media with a photo of her father, a 57-year-old retiree.  “This is like riding a roller coaster. Sometimes I feel very bad and sometimes I feel better. I try to stay positive,” she said. “This truly is madness. We don’t know what else to do. Neither does anybody else in town.”  Relief package  While many search for their loved ones, the gargantuan recovery efforts in Sedavi and dozens of other communities slowly moved forward.  To aid those in need, the central government approved a 10.6-billion-euro relief package for 78 communities on Tuesday. Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez compared it to the measures taken during the COVID-19 pandemic.  The package includes direct payments of 20,000 euros to 60,000 euros to owners of … “A week after Spain’s floods, families hopeful missing loved ones are alive” →

DUBAI, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES — An Iranian official claimed Tuesday that Iranian-German prisoner Jamshid Sharmahd died before Tehran could execute him — directly contradicting the country’s earlier announcement he had been put to death. The comment by Asghar Jahangir came after Germany shut down all three Iranian consulates in the country over Sharmahd’s death, leaving only the embassy in Berlin open. Germany later disputed Jahangir’s remark. Meanwhile, even Iran’s reformist President Masoud Pezeshkian has offered his own criticism of Germany’s response to Sharmahd’s death as tensions remain high between Tehran and the West over its rapidly advancing nuclear program and the ongoing Mideast wars. The judiciary’s Mizan news agency quoted Jahangir as saying: “Jamshid Sharmahd was sentenced to death, his sentence was ready to be carried out, but he passed away before implementation of the sentence.” He did not elaborate. Jahangir’s remarks were made to the state-affiliated Quds newspaper after a weekly news conference, when journalists typically buttonhole the spokesperson into answering questions he didn’t take from the podium. Germany’s Foreign Ministry, reacting to the official’s comment, said, “His death was confirmed to us by the Iranian side. “Jamshid Sharmahd was abducted by Iran and held for years without a fair trial, in inhumane conditions and without the necessary medical care,” the ministry said. “Iran is responsible for his death.” Germany added it was “lobbying the Iranian government to hand over his body to his family.” The State Department in the United States, where Sharmahd once lived, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Jason Poblete, a lawyer representing Sharmahd’s family, told The Associated Press that the conflicting comments from Iran were “deeply concerning.” “This inconsistency raises serious questions about the circumstances of the death and the transparency of the Iranian system,” Poblete said. “The family has been urging the German and U.S. authorities to investigate this matter to ascertain the truth, ensure accountability thoroughly and reunite Jimmy with his family in California.” Iran had said it executed Sharmahd on October 28. He was 69. Iran accused Sharmahd, who lived in Glendora, California, of planning a 2008 attack on a mosque that killed 14 people — including five women and a child — and wounded over 200 others, as well as plotting other assaults through the little-known Kingdom Assembly of Iran and its Tondar militant wing. Iran also accused Sharmahd of “disclosing classified information” on missile sites of Iran’s … “Iran claims Iranian-German prisoner died before he could be executed” →

London — Brazilian police official Valdecy Urquiza will be the next chief of Interpol, the global police organization announced Tuesday. Urquiza was elected secretary-general by a vote of Interpol’s general assembly at its meeting in Glasgow, Scotland, and will take up the post when the gathering ends on Thursday. Currently Interpol’s vice president for the Americas, Urquiza is the first chief of the Lyon, France-based organization not to come from Europe or the United States. The Interpol secretary-general essentially runs the organization on a daily basis. Juergen Stock of Germany, who has held the post since 2014, is not allowed under its rules to seek a third term. Urquiza pledged to promote diversity within the organization, saying “a strong Interpol is one that includes everyone.” “When we respect and elevate diverse perspectives, we get a clearer, more comprehensive approach to global security,” he said. Interpol, which has 196 member countries and celebrated its centennial last year, works to help national police forces communicate with each other and track suspects and criminals in fields such as counterterrorism, financial crime, child pornography, cybercrime and organized crime. The world’s biggest police organization has been grappling with challenges including a growing caseload of cybercrime and child sex abuse, and increasing divisions among its member countries. Interpol had a total budget of about $188 million last year, compared to more than $200 million at the European Union’s police agency, Europol, and some $11 billion at the FBI in the United States. …