Amid pope’s big Holy Year, overtourism aggravates housing crisis

When Pope Francis left the Vatican earlier this month for his traditional Christmastime outing downtown, he acknowledged what many Romans have been complaining about for months: That his big plans for a Holy Year had turned their city into a giant construction pit, with traffic-clogging roadworks tearing up major thoroughfares, scaffolding covering prized monuments and short-term rentals gobbling up apartment blocks. Francis urged Romans to pray for their mayor — “He has a lot to do” — but to nevertheless welcome the upcoming Jubilee as a time of spiritual repair and renewal. “These worksites are fine, but beware: Don’t forget the worksites of the soul!” Francis said. When he formally opens the Holy Year next week, Francis will launch a dizzying 12-month calendar of events that include special Jubilee Masses for the faithful from all walks of life: artists, adolescents, migrants, teachers and prisoners. And while the Jubilee’s official start means the worst of the construction headache is ending, the arrival of a projected 32 million pilgrims in 2025 is set to only increase congestion in the Eternal City and intensify a housing crunch that has been driving residents away. Like many European art capitals, Rome has been suffering from overtourism as the Italian travel sector rebounds from COVID-19: Last year, a record high number of people visited Italy, 133.6 million, with foreign tourists pushing Italy over the EU average in growth of the travel sector, national statistics bureau ISTAT reported. Rome, with its innumerable artistic treasures, the Vatican and Italy’s busiest airport, was the top city in terms of nights booked in registered lodging, ISTAT said. And yet for all its grande bellezze, Rome is hardly a modern European metropolis. It has notoriously inadequate public transportation and garbage collection. For the past two post-pandemic summers, taxis have been so hard to come by that the city of Rome authorized 1,000 new cab licenses for 2025. Rome’s growing housing crisis — rents have risen about 10% this year — has gotten so bad that vigilantes have taken to going out at night with wire cutters to snip off the keyboxes on short-term apartment rentals that are blamed in part for driving up rents and driving out residents. “The market is out of control and has definitely gotten worse with touristification, with the additional load of the Jubilee,” said Roberto Viviani, a university researcher whose landlord recently refused to renew his … “Amid pope’s big Holy Year, overtourism aggravates housing crisis”

Thousands rally at US Embassy in Cuba against trade embargo

HAVANA — Thousands of Cubans joined a protest Friday in front of the U.S. Embassy in Havana that was led by President Miguel Diaz-Canel and ex-leader Raul Castro against Washington’s long-standing trade blockade. “We are marching now to tell the U.S. government to let the Cuban people live in peace. Down with interference!” Diaz-Canel told a crowd that had gathered a month before Republican Donald Trump returns to the White House. Communist Cuba is enduring a worsening economic crisis that the government blames on U.S. sanctions that have been in place since 1962 and were tightened during Trump’s first term. “If we didn’t have the blockade, we would not be facing difficulty like this,” said 85-year-old retiree Faustino Miranda. The Caribbean nation faces a lack of food and medicine, frequent blackouts and a wave of emigration. Rogelio Savigne, 55, head of transport at a state-owned company, told AFP: “We need them to open the doors for us to be able to trade with all countries.” Authorities said that 700,000 people marched in the capital on Friday. AFP was not able to independently verify that number. Former president Castro, 93, stood at the head of the march along with Diaz-Canel, who earlier Friday had blamed the U.S. embargo for making this year “one of the most difficult” for Cuba. On Tuesday, the country’s deputy foreign minister reiterated its willingness to enter into a dialogue with Trump, who will take office on Jan. 20. During his first term, Trump halted an easing of relations between Washington and Havana that began in 2014. He implemented 243 measures that reinforced the embargo, including the reincorporation of the island into the U.S. blacklist of “countries that sponsor terrorism,” alongside Iran and North Korea. Current U.S. President Joe Biden has kept Cuba on that list but resumed discussions with Havana on counterterrorism and combating illegal migration.  …

Ukraine strike kills 6 in Russia’s Kursk region

Ukraine attacked a town in Russia’s Kursk region Friday, killing six people, including a child, a senior local official said. Ten others were hospitalized in the town of Rylsk after the attack with U.S.-supplied HIMARS rockets, Kursk acting Governor Alexander Khinshtein said. The attack, Ukrainian officials said, followed an earlier Russian missile attack on Kyiv. Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry said an early Friday morning Russian ballistic missile attack on the capital killed at least one person, wounded 13 and damaged six foreign embassies and a university in the city’s center. On its Telegram social media account, Ukraine’s air force said it intercepted five Iskander short-range ballistic missiles fired at the city, but falling missile debris caused damage and sparked fires in three districts. City officials reported damage to multiple residential buildings, medical facilities and schools. Air force officials urged citizens to immediately respond to reports of ballistic attack threats because they provide very little time to find shelter. At a briefing in Kyiv on Friday, Ukrainian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Georgiy Tykhyi said the missile attack did significant damage to a building that houses the embassies of Albania, Argentina, the Palestinians, North Macedonia, Portugal and Montenegro. He shared pictures of the damage to the buildings. No injuries were reported in those attacks. The Kyiv National Linguistics University said on its Instagram account that its building also had been hit, and it shared a picture of an area near an entrance where two large windows had been blown out. Russia has said it launched the attack in retaliation for Kyiv’s firing U.S.-made weapons into Russia. Russia’s attacks on Kyiv came one day after Russian President Vladimir Putin’s year-end press conference. Putin has been talking about negotiations to end the war “for quite some time, but the bombing has continued,” said Charles Kupchan, senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. President-elect Donald Trump has talked about the possibility of talks with the Russian and Ukrainian presidents to end the war. He has said he could broker a deal to end the war in 24 hours. Kupchan said Trump is “naive” to think he could get the two countries to come to an agreement so swiftly. Trump “cannot afford a deal that effectively subjugates Ukraine and leaves it a ward of Russia,” Kupchan said. Ukraine must be defensible, he said, and “not left in a geopolitical limbo that invites Russia to simply pick up … “Ukraine strike kills 6 in Russia’s Kursk region”

Foreign worker visa program faces uncertainty under second Trump term

WASHINGTON — Foreign workers seeking U.S. jobs enjoyed near-guaranteed visa success in fiscal year 2024, with immigration authorities approving more than 97% of H1-B visa applications, as reported by the National Foundation for American Policy. The was the second-highest approval rate in more than a decade. But the exceptionally high success rate could soon end if President-elect Donald Trump’s team revives his first administration’s restrictive immigration policies, according to immigration lawyers. That in turn could significantly affect U.S. businesses and other institutions that rely on highly skilled foreign workers, especially those from India, they warn. “I think it’s going to get harder, and it’s going to be more complicated to approve things,” said Sharvari Dalal-Dheini, senior director of government relations at the American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA) and a former lawyer for U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS). Companies exploit program, say critics Created in 1990, the H-1B program lets U.S. employers hire foreign talent in specialized fields such as technology, engineering and health care, with 85,000 visas issued by lottery. Indian workers received more than 70% of the slots in recent years, followed by Chinese nationals. The program has long been the subject of controversy. Proponents point to its role allowing the U.S. to attract top foreign talent and fill critical jobs. A 2016 study by the National Foundation for American Policy found that nearly one-quarter of America’s billion-dollar startups had a founder who first came to the U.S. as an international student. But critics view the program as a weapon against American workers. Ira Mehlman of the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) pointed to Disney’s controversial move a decade ago to lay off hundreds of U.S. staff members, forcing them to train foreign replacements as a condition of their severance. Though Disney denied any wrongdoing and beat subsequent lawsuits, the case became a rallying cry among anti-immigrant groups. FAIR says U.S. companies exploit the system to hire cheaper foreign labor, driving down U.S. wages. “There are plenty of tech workers available here in the United States, and that should be the first resort for these companies to go out there and hire people who are American citizens,” Mehlman, FAIR’s media director, said in an interview with VOA. Mehlman said the program has strayed from its roots as a temporary foreign worker program, with foreign nationals using it as a backdoor to American citizenship. “This should be a program … “Foreign worker visa program faces uncertainty under second Trump term”

Musk backs German far-right party in social media post

Elon Musk, the billionaire ally of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, has praised the far-right Alterative for Germany party ahead of the election due in Germany early next year. The party wants to end Western support for Ukraine in its war against Russian invaders. Henry Ridgwell reports. …

Senate approves 235th judge of Biden’s term, beating Trump’s tally

WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden secured the 235th judicial confirmation of his presidency Friday, an accomplishment that exceeds his predecessor’s total by one after Democrats put extra emphasis on the federal courts following Donald Trump’s far-reaching first term, when he filled three seats on the Supreme Court. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, a New York Democrat, teed up votes on two California district judges, and they were likely to be the last judicial confirmations this year before Congress adjourns and makes way for a new, Republican-led Senate. The confirmation of Serena Raquel Murillo to be a district judge for the Central District of California broke Trump’s mark. Come next year, Republicans will look to boost Trump’s already considerable influence on the makeup of the federal judiciary in his second term. Biden and Senate Democrats placed particular focus on adding women, minorities and public defenders to the judicial ranks. About two-thirds of Biden’s appointees are women and a solid majority of appointees are people of color. The most notable appointee was Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, the first African American woman to serve on the nation’s highest court. “Prior to our effort, the number of women on the federal bench was really diminished. It was overwhelmingly white males,” said Sen. Dick Durbin, the Democratic chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. “We consciously moved forward to bring more women to the bench, and believe me, we had a great talent pool to work with. So I think it’ll enhance the image of the court and its work product to bring these new judges on.” Biden also placed an emphasis on bringing more civil rights lawyers, public defenders and labor rights lawyers to expand the professional backgrounds of the federal judiciary. More than 45 appointees are public defenders, and more than two dozen served as civil rights lawyers. While Biden did get more district judges confirmed than Trump, he had fewer higher-tier circuit court appointments than Trump — 45 compared with 54 for Trump. And he got one Supreme Court appointment compared with three for Trump. Republicans, much to Democrats’ frustration, filled Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s seat on the court the week before the 2020 presidential election. Ginsburg had died in September. Democrats also faced the challenge of confirming nominees during two years of a 50-50 Senate. Rarely a week went by in the current Congress when Schumer did not tee up votes … “Senate approves 235th judge of Biden’s term, beating Trump’s tally”

VOA Russian: Moscow ramped up repressions against journalists and LGBTQ+ in 2024

VOA Russian spoke to OVD-Info, Russia’s most trusted watchdog dealing with political arrests and trials. It said 620 people were persecuted in Russia on political grounds in 2024, with court cases involving terrorism charges rising sharply. Journalists became the most persecuted part of the society in the past year, while numerous arrests of LGBTQ+ people formed a worrying trend in 2024. Click here for the full story in Russian.  …

VOA Russian: Russian society broadly supports Putin’s ideas, including possible nuclear strikes

A well-known expert on Russia, CSIS analyst Maria Snegovaya, has presented her new, much-discussed report in which she outlined how Russian society closed its ranks behind Russian President Vladimir Putin with the support for the country’s war against Ukraine remaining stable and high at up to 70%. Snegovaya also notes that Russian elites would not stand in the way of any Putin’s initiatives, while the support for use of Russia’s nuclear weapons is rising. Click here for the full story in Russian. …

House approves bill to fund federal government, avoid shutdown

WASHINGTON — After two failed attempts, the U.S. House on Friday passed a stopgap spending bill to fund the federal government through March. The vote was 366 to 34, with one member voting present. Republicans cast all 34 votes against the bill. Republicans, who control the House, reached an agreement among themselves on a new proposal earlier Friday. It would fund the government through March and provide $100 billion for disaster aid and $10 billion for farmers. It would not raise the debt ceiling. “We’re excited about this outcome,” House Speaker Mike Johnson said after the vote, adding that he had spoken with President-elect Donald Trump, who “was certainly happy about this outcome, as well.” The Democratic-controlled Senate must also approve the measure to  avoid a government shutdown. President Joe Biden said Friday that he supported the bill and would sign it. “This was a necessary step to bridge the gap, to put us into that moment where we can put our fingerprints on the final decisions on spending,” Johnson told reporters after the vote. The last-ditch effort to avoid a shutdown came after Republicans failed  Thursday to pass a spending bill that Trump backed. That bill would have raised the debt ceiling, which Trump had demanded at the last minute. Dozens of Republicans voted against Thursday’s bill, and only two Democrats supported it. The new plan was the same bill as the one that failed Thursday, except without the debt ceiling suspension. Problems began for Johnson this week when he abandoned a bipartisan funding deal he had reached with Democrats after Trump and billionaire Elon Musk lambasted the plan. Even though the House passed the bill, government funding technically runs out at midnight Friday. But most of the impact of the shutdown wouldn’t begin to take effect until Monday, by which time the Senate and Biden will likely have acted. Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said the Senate would move quickly. The White House on Friday echoed calls from Democratic lawmakers in urging Republicans to avoid a government shutdown. In the event of a shutdown, many government workers would be furloughed, but those who provide essential services would continue to report to their jobs. But none of those federal workers would be paid until Congress passed a new spending bill. Active-duty members of the military and federal law enforcement are among those who would continue to work but not be paid … “House approves bill to fund federal government, avoid shutdown”

US charges Russian Israeli dual national tied to Lockbit ransomware group

washington — The United States has charged a Russian Israeli dual citizen over alleged involvement with the Lockbit ransomware group, the Justice Department said Friday.  Rostislav Panev, 51, was arrested in Israel in August and is awaiting extradition to the United States, the department said.  Panev was a developer at Lockbit from its inception in 2019 until at least February 2024, during which time the group grew into “what was, at times, the most active and destructive ransomware group in the world,” the department said.   “The Justice Department’s work going after the world’s most dangerous ransomware schemes includes not only dismantling networks but also finding and bringing to justice the individuals responsible for building and running them,” Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a statement.  Lockbit and its malware were linked to attacks on more than 2,500 victims in at least 120 countries around the world, according to the department, including small businesses and large multinationals, hospitals, schools, critical infrastructure, government and law enforcement agencies.  Lockbit was discovered in 2020 when its eponymous malicious software was found on Russian-language cybercrime forums.  It operated a ransomware-as-a-service operation, in which a core group of developers and administrators worked with affiliates who carried out attacks. Extortion proceeds were split among the parties involved.  Lockbit and its affiliates extorted at least $500 million in payments from victims, according to the Justice Department, as well as causing significant costs from lost revenue and incident response and recovery.  The arrest followed two guilty pleas in July from a pair of Russian members of the Lockbit gang — Ruslan Astamirov and Mikhail Vasiliev — and the seizure in February of numerous Lockbit websites by Britain’s National Crime Agency, the FBI and other international law enforcement agencies.  Lockbit reappeared online not long after the seizure, defiantly saying: “I cannot be stopped.” But law enforcement officials and experts say the bust helped damage the gang’s standing in the cybercriminal underworld.  Government actions “have proven incredibly effective at dismantling and discrediting” Lockbit as a brand and bringing the group’s volume of attacks down precipitously, said Jeremy Kennelly, a cybersecurity analyst with Google owner Alphabet.   Affiliates and others working with the group may have shifted to collaborating with other gangs, Kennelly said, but the crackdown has been “critical to ensuring that ransomware and extortion are seen as crimes for which there are consequences.”  …

US flu season is under way, as cases surge in some areas and vaccinations lag

NEW YORK — The U.S. flu season is under way, with cases surging across much of the country, health officials said Friday.  The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention noted sharp increases in several measures, including lab tests and emergency room visits.  “It’s been increasing at a pretty steady pace now for the past several weeks. So yeah, we are certainly in flu season now,” said the CDC’s Alicia Budd.  Thirteen states reported high or very high levels of flu-like illness last week, about double from the week before. One is Tennessee, where a sickness spike is hitting the Nashville area, said Dr. William Schaffner, an infectious diseases expert at Vanderbilt University.  “Flu has been increasing, but just this last week has exploded,” Schaffner said. He noted that in a local clinic that serves as an indicator of illness trends, as many as a quarter of the patients have flu symptoms.  Louisiana is another early hot spot.  “Just this week is really that turning point where people are out because of the flu,” said Dr. Catherine O’Neal, an infectious diseases doctor at the largest private hospital in the state, Our Lady of the Lake Regional Medical Center in Baton Rouge. “You hear parents saying, ‘I can’t come to work because of the flu’ and ‘Where can I get a flu test?’”  There are a number of bugs that cause fever, cough, sore throat and other flu-like symptoms. One is COVID-19. Another is RSV, or respiratory syncytial virus, which is a common cause of cold-like symptoms but can be dangerous for infants and the elderly.  The most recent CDC data show COVID-19 hospitalizations have been declining since summer. COVID-19 activity is moderate nationally, but high in the Midwest, according to CDC wastewater data.  RSV hospitalizations started rising before flu did and now show signs of possibly leveling off, but they remain a little more common than admissions for flu. Overall, RSV activity is low nationally, but high in the South, the wastewater data show.  The CDC called the start of flu season based on several indicators, including lab results for patients in hospitals and doctor’s offices, and the percentage of emergency department visits that had a discharge diagnosis of flu.  No flu strain seems to be dominant, and it’s too early in the season to know how good a match the flu vaccine will be, Budd said.  Last winter’s flu season was … “US flu season is under way, as cases surge in some areas and vaccinations lag”

Erdogan says Turkey expects allies to pull support from Kurds in post-Assad Syria

ANKARA, TURKEY — Turkey expects foreign countries will withdraw support for Kurdish fighters in Syria following the toppling of Bashar al-Assad, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said, as Ankara seeks to isolate Kurds who have long fought alongside U.S. troops.  Germany’s foreign minister later said Kurdish forces should disarm and integrate into Syria’s national security structure, and Washington’s top diplomat for the Middle East said the U.S. was working on a “managed transition” for the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces, or SDF, in northern Syria.  Speaking to reporters on the flight home from a summit in Egypt on Thursday, Erdogan said there was no longer any reason for outsiders to back Kurdish YPG fighters. His office released his comments Friday. The Kurdish YPG has been the main force in the alliance, but Turkey considers the group an extension of the PKK, which has long fought the Turkish state and is banned as a terrorist group by Ankara, Washington and the EU.  In his remarks, Erdogan compared the U.S.-backed YPG to Islamic State, and he said neither group had any future in Syria.  “In the upcoming period, we do not believe that any power will continue to collaborate with terrorist organizations. The heads of terrorist organizations such as Islamic State and PKK/YPG will be crushed in the shortest possible time.”  German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said after talks with her Turkish counterpart in Ankara that the security of Kurds was essential for a free Syria, but that Turkey’s security concerns must also be addressed to ensure stability.  “The Kurdish groups must be disarmed and integrated into the national security structure,” she said.   Barbara Leaf, U.S. assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern affairs, told reporters after visiting Damascus on Friday that Washington was working with Ankara and the SDF to find “a managed transition in terms of SDF’s role in that part of the country.”  “The conditions which led Kurds in northeast Syria to organize themselves and to defend themselves as they did were one set of conditions, and things have really changed in a very dramatic fashion,” Leaf said.  The United States said this week that it has 2,000 troops on the ground in Syria working alongside the YPG-led alliance known as the Syrian Democratic Forces. The SDF played a major role on the ground defeating Islamic State militants in 2014-17 with U.S. air support and still guards Islamist fighters in prison … “Erdogan says Turkey expects allies to pull support from Kurds in post-Assad Syria”

Teen stabs 7-year-old girl to death at school in Croatia

A 7-year-old girl was stabbed to death Friday at an elementary school in Croatia by a knife-wielding teenager who also wounded three other children and a teacher, officials said.   Video footage Friday showed children running away from the school as a medical helicopter was landing.    The attacker is a former student of the Precko Elementary School in Zagreb where the attack took place, according to Interior Minister Davor Bozinovic.  The teen had a history of mental health issues and after Friday’s incident “shut himself in a nearby health center where he tried to injure himself with the knife,” according to Bozinovic. Police were able to prevent him from committing suicide.  Last year, the teen also tried to kill himself, the minister said.   “Five persons have been hospitalized, and their lives are not in danger,” Croatian Health Minister Irena Hrstic said, including the attacker in the count.  Leaders declare day of mourning School attacks are rare in Croatia.    “There are no words to describe the grief over the horrible and unthinkable tragedy that shocked us all today,” said President Zoran Milanovic.  “We are horrified,” said Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic.   Following the assault at the school, Croatian officials declared Saturday as a day of mourning.   Some information for this report came from The Associated Press and Reuters.    …

New US missile defense base in Poland fortifies NATO’s eastern flank

The United States last month formally opened a permanent military base in Poland, part of NATO’s missile defense system amid rising tensions with Russia. The Polish defense minister says the base is a testament to Polish-American cooperation. VOA Eastern Europe Bureau Chief Myroslava Gongadze reports from Redzikowo, Poland. …

Elon Musk considers funding Nigel Farage’s populist party in UK

LONDON — It’s a photo that sent a tremor through British politics: Elon Musk flanked by British politician Nigel Farage and a wealthy backer, in front of a gilt-framed painting of a young Donald Trump. Taken this week at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida, the image suggested that Musk, a key player in the incoming U.S. administration, could soon turn his disruptive attention to the U.K. Farage, Trump’s highest-profile British champion, confirmed talks are under way about Musk making a hefty donation to Farage’s party, Reform U.K. The Times of London reported it could be as much as $100 million, which would be far and away the largest political donation in U.K. history. The reports have sparked calls for Britain’s rules on political donations to be tightened — quickly. “We did discuss money,” Farage told broadcaster GB News after the meeting with Musk. “That’s a negotiation we will go back and have again. He is not against giving us money. He hasn’t fully decided whether he will.” Britain has strict limits on how much political parties can spend on elections, but they can accept unlimited donations, as long as the donors are U.K. voters or companies registered in Britain. Musk’s social network X has a British arm, Twitter U.K. Ltd., with a registered address in London. Critics say that’s a loophole that allows foreign influence in U.K. politics. The voting watchdog, the Electoral Commission, is calling for changes, including limiting the amount a company can donate to how much it earns in Britain. “It’s crucial that U.K. voters have trust in the financing of our political system,” the commission’s chief executive, Vijay Rangarajan, told The Guardian. “The system needs strengthening, and we have been calling for changes to the law since 2013, to protect the electoral system from foreign interference.” Britain’s center-left Labour Party pledged during the summer election campaign to tighten the rules on political donations, although legislation is not scheduled in the coming year. Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s spokesperson Dave Pares said Wednesday that work is already under way to “reinforce existing safeguards” against “impermissible proxy donations.” The Labour government and the right-of-center opposition Conservatives are trying to figure out how to deal with Musk, who has taken a keen interest in the U.K. — and seemingly formed a strong dislike for Starmer. Musk often posts on X about the U.K., retweeting criticism of Starmer and the hashtag TwoTierKeir … “Elon Musk considers funding Nigel Farage’s populist party in UK”

Elon Musk gives nod to German far-right party as election looms 

U.S. billionaire Elon Musk, set to join President-elect Donald Trump’s administration, waded into Germany’s election campaign on Friday, calling the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) the country’s savior. The AfD is running second in opinion polls and might be able to thwart either a center-right or center-left majority, but Germany’s mainstream, more centrist parties have vowed to shun support from the AfD at national level. Europe’s leading power is expected to vote on February 23 after a center-left coalition government led by Chancellor Olaf Scholz collapsed. “Only the AfD can save Germany,” Musk wrote in a post on his social media platform, X. Musk, the world’s richest person, has already expressed support for other anti-immigration parties across Europe. The German government said it had taken note of Musk’s post but declined to give any further comment at its regular press conference. Musk reposted a message by German right-wing influencer Naomi Seibt that criticized Friedrich Merz, chancellor candidate for the conservatives, who are comfortably ahead in surveys. Musk had already voiced support for the AfD last year, when he attacked the German government’s handling of illegal migration. Last month, Musk called for the sacking of Italian judges who had questioned the legality of government measures to prevent irregular immigration. And this week Nigel Farage, leader of Britain’s right-wing Reform UK party and friend of Trump, posted a photo of himself and Reform’s treasurer meeting Musk at Trump’s Florida residence, and said he was in talks with Musk about financial support.   …

Russia hands 16-year prison term to east Ukraine resident for ‘treason’ 

Moscow — Russia on Friday sentenced a resident of east Ukraine’s Lugansk region to 16 years in prison for “high treason,” Moscow’s FSB security service said. Moscow regularly hands heavy sentences to people it accuses of spying for Ukraine and has also consistently imprisoned Ukrainians in Russia and occupied regions. The sentencing came as President Vladimir Putin called on security services to be “tough” in anti-terror measures and especially vigilant in military counterintelligence as the Kremlin’s Ukraine offensive drags on for almost three years. Putin called for special services to “identify spies and traitors” and to “stop the work of foreign security services.” The unnamed man was sentenced Friday by a military court in Russia’s southern city of Rostov-on-Don. Prosecutors said he had handed information on the Russian armed forces to Kyiv’s security services. The FSB, cited by Russian news agencies, said the man was found guilty of state treason, being an accomplice in terrorist acts as well as the illegal handling and transport of explosives. The court ordered that he serve his sentence in a high-security penal colony. The Tass news agency published a video showing the man’s arrest, in which FSB officers stopped a car, dragged a man out and threw him to the ground, before handcuffing him and taking him to the local headquarters of the security force. The video showed a man with his face blurred — filmed by the FSB — saying he had been recruited by Ukraine’s SBU security service in 2016. Russia regularly releases confession videos filmed by the FSB after arrests. Russian independent media reported that an activist had killed himself Thursday in a Rostov detention center, shortly after being sentenced to 16 years in prison also in the Rostov region. The Mediazona website said it got confirmation from prison officials that Roman Shved — a 39-year-old anarchist sentenced for an arson attack on a government building after the Kremlin announced a military mobilization in 2022 — had died in a Rostov detention center. Several social media channels had said Shved had killed himself hours after being sentenced. Russia has punished thousands of its citizens for opposing the Ukraine campaign. …

Russian missiles target Kyiv after Ukraine fires US-made missiles across the border

KYIV, UKRAINE — A Russian ballistic missile attack on Ukraine’s capital Kyiv early Friday killed at least one person and injured nine others, officials said. Moscow claimed it was in response to a Ukrainian strike on Russian soil using American-made weapons. At least three loud blasts were heard in Kyiv shortly before sunrise. Ukraine’s air force said it intercepted five Iskander short-range ballistic missiles fired at the city. The attack knocked out heating to 630 residential buildings, 16 medical facilities, and 30 schools and kindergartens, the city administration said, and falling missile debris caused damage and sparked fires in three districts. “We ask citizens to immediately respond to reports of ballistic attack threats, because there is very little time to find shelter,” the air force said. During the almost three years since the war began Russia has regularly bombarded civilian areas of Ukraine, often in an attempt to cripple the power grid and unnerve Ukrainians. Meanwhile Ukraine, struggling to hold back Russia’s bigger army on the front line, has attempted to strike Russian infrastructure supporting the country’s war effort. The Russian Ministry of Defense said the strike was in response to a Ukrainian missile attack on Russia’s Rostov border region two days earlier. That attack used six American-made Army Tactical Missile System, known as ATACMS, missiles and four Storm Shadow air-launched missiles provided by the United Kingdom, it said. That day, Ukraine claimed to have targeted a Rostov oil refinery as part of its campaign to strike Russian infrastructure supporting the country’s war effort. The use of Western-supplied weapons to strike Russia has angered the Kremlin. Ukraine fired several American-supplied longer-range missiles into Russia for the first time on Nov. 19 after Washington eased restrictions on their use. That development prompted Russia to use a new hypersonic missile, called Oreshnik, for the first time. President Vladimir Putin suggested the missile could be used to target government buildings in Kyiv, though there have been no reports of an Oreshnik being used for a second time. Answering the Ukrainian attack on Rostov on Wednesday, the Defense Ministry said it carried out a group strike with “high-precision, long-range weapons” on the command center of Ukraine’s military intelligence agency and another location where it said Ukraine’s Neptune missile systems are designed and produced. The attack also targeted Ukrainian ground-based cruise missile systems and U.S.-made Patriot air defense systems, the Defense Ministry said. “The objectives of … “Russian missiles target Kyiv after Ukraine fires US-made missiles across the border”

Trump wants to quickly end Gaza war — can he?

WASHINGTON — President-elect Donald Trump has signaled eagerness to wrap up the war in Gaza as quickly as possible, even as the outgoing Biden administration continues its last-ditch diplomatic push for a ceasefire deal. Earlier this week, Trump said if the hostages held by Hamas are not home by Jan. 20, 2025, the date of his inauguration, then “all hell is going to break out.” The warning is similar to the threat he issued on social media earlier this month, where he said, “There will be ALL HELL TO PAY in the Middle East, and for those in charge who perpetrated these atrocities against Humanity. Those responsible will be hit harder than anybody has been hit in the long and storied History of the United States of America.” It’s not clear what Trump plans to do in Gaza. When asked to clarify the threat, he said, “It means it won’t be pleasant.” Trump may deploy resources to place military pressure on Hamas, said Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib, a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council. However, it’s unlikely to be “significantly harsher than what the Israelis have brought to bear over the last 14 months.” “There could be another element — which I hope that’s not the approach — to maybe squeeze some of that humanitarian aid going in,” Alkhatib told VOA. It’s also possible that Trump’s threats are directed to Hamas members outside of Gaza and the countries that support them, and Trump might move to pressure those nations to cut off financing, Alkhatib added. Hamas is a U.S.-designated terror organization. Hamas’ external wing may be more receptive to Washington’s pressure, particularly since its patron, Tehran, has been weakened through the loss of Hezbollah in Lebanon and the ouster of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Like Hamas, Hezbollah is an Iranian proxy, while the Assad regime was Tehran’s stalwart ally. Trump’s warnings send “an unmistakable message to the people in the Middle East that the U.S. wants to get this done,” said David Makovsky, director of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy Project on the Middle East Peace Process. This leaves Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu navigating between placating the ultraright-wing faction of his coalition — which is pushing for building settlements in and even annexing Gaza — and pleasing Trump, who wants credit for ending the war and potentially expanding the Abraham Accords to include Saudi Arabia, Makovsky told VOA. The … “Trump wants to quickly end Gaza war — can he?”

US accuses man of being Chinese agent

LOS ANGELES — China’s ruling Communist Party used an agent in California to influence state politics, U.S. prosecutors said Thursday as they unveiled criminal charges against a Chinese national.    FBI agents arrested Yaoning “Mike” Sun, 64, at his home in Chino Hills, near Los Angeles, on charges that he acted as an agent for a foreign government while getting involved in local politics. The complaint claims Sun served as the campaign manager and close confidante for an unnamed politician who was running for local elected office in 2022. During the campaign, he is alleged to have conspired with Chen Jun — a Chinese national sentenced to prison last month for acting as an illegal agent of Beijing — regarding his efforts to get the politician elected. The U.S. Department of Justice said Chen discussed with Chinese government officials how they could influence local politicians, particularly on the issue of Taiwan. China considers the self-ruled island of Taiwan part of its territory. Beijing — which has said it would never rule out using force to bring Taiwan under its control — has been accused of using local influence campaigns, among other tactics, to sway global opinion on the issue. Charging documents say after the local politician won office in late 2022, Chen instructed Sun to prepare a report on the election to be sent to Chinese government officials, who expressed their thanks for his work. “The conduct alleged in this complaint is deeply concerning,” said United States Attorney Martin Estrada. “We cannot permit hostile foreign powers to meddle in the governance of our country.” Sun was charged with one count of acting as an illegal agent of a foreign government, which carries a maximum sentence of 10 years in federal prison. He also faces one count of conspiracy to commit an offense against the United States, which carries a maximum penalty of five years. Asked about the charges on Friday, Beijing’s foreign ministry said it was “not aware of the details in the case you mentioned.” But spokesperson Lin Jian said, “China never interferes in the internal affairs of other countries.” “The international community sees clearly who is actually wantonly interfering in the internal affairs of other countries,” he said during a regular briefing. …

Top US officials in Damascus to meet new Syrian rulers, State Department says

WASHINGTON — Top diplomats from the Biden administration are in Damascus on Friday to meet new Syrian authorities led by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), a State Department spokesperson said, the first in-person and official meeting between Washington and Syria’s de-facto new rulers. The State Department’s top Middle East diplomat, Barbara Leaf, Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs Roger Carstens and newly appointed Senior Adviser Daniel Rubinstein, who is now tasked with leading the Department’s Syria engagement, are the first U.S. diplomats to travel to Damascus since Syria’s opposition militias overthrew oppressive President Bashar al-Assad. The visit comes as Western governments are gradually opening channels to HTS and its leader, Ahmed al-Sharaa, and start debating whether or not to remove the terrorist designation on the group. The U.S. delegation’s travel follows contacts with France and Britain in recent days. In their meetings, the U.S. officials will discuss with HTS representatives a set of principles such as inclusivity and respect for the rights of minorities that Washington wants included in Syria’s political transition, the spokesperson said. The delegation will also work to obtain new information about U.S. journalist Austin Tice, who was taken captive during a reporting trip to Syria in August 2012, and other American citizens who went missing during the Assad regime. “They will be engaging directly with the Syrian people, including members of civil society, activists, members of different communities, and other Syrian voices about their vision for the future of their country and how the United States can help support them,” the department spokesperson said. “They also plan to meet with representatives of HTS to discuss transition principles endorsed by the United States and regional partners in Aqaba, Jordan,” the spokesperson said. The United States cut diplomatic ties with Syria and shut down its embassy in Damascus in 2012. In a seismic moment for the Middle East, Syrian rebels seized control of Damascus on Dec. 8, forcing Assad to flee after more than 13 years of civil war, ending his family’s decadeslong rule. The lightning offensive raised questions over whether the rebels will be able to ensure an orderly transition. Forces under the command of al-Sharaa – better known as Abu Mohammed al-Jolani – replaced the Assad family rule with a three-month transitional government that had been ruling a rebel enclave in Syria’s northwestern province of Idlib. Washington in 2013 designated al-Sharaa a terrorist, saying al Qaeda in Iraq had … “Top US officials in Damascus to meet new Syrian rulers, State Department says”

VOA Mandarin: China faces operational challenges if it were to invade Taiwan, US says

The U.S. Defense Department’s annual report on China’s military power, released this week, says the PLA is accelerating modernization, but it still faces several operational challenges in executing a rapid and decisive invasion of Taiwan. Click here for the full story in Mandarin.  …

VOA Mandarin: Chinese netizens react to Trump saying he, Xi can fix the world

During his first press conference as president-elect, Donald Trump mentioned U.S.-China relations, stating, “China and the United States can together solve all of the problems of the world.” The remark quickly trended on Weibo, sparking discussions among Chinese netizens. Click here for the full story in Mandarin.   …

VOA Russian: Europe targets Russia’s ‘shadow fleet’

Leaders of 12 European countries agreed at a meeting in Tallinn to expand sanctions against Russia’s “shadow fleet” that is used by Moscow to sell oil and evade Western sanctions. Several European states imposed new policies on Russian vessels transiting through European waters to curb Russia’s ability to use profits from illicit oil sales to fund its war in Ukraine. Click here for the full story in Russian.   …

VOA Russian: Defense minister charts Kremlin’s path toward a war with NATO

Russian Defense Minister Andrei Belousov said that a conflict between Russia and NATO is possible within the next decade. VOA Russian spoke to experts who agreed that Belousov is most likely voicing the Kremlin’s true intentions, and that the West should treat these statements seriously. Click here for the full story in Russian. …