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Ethnic minorities, the self-employed and low-income families in Britain suffered greater deprivation levels during the coronavirus pandemic despite “surprisingly positive” living standards figures, a report published Thursday found.The Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) think tank’s annual report on living standards, poverty and inequality identified these groups as the hardest hit, even as unprecedented state support mitigated the worst effects of the crisis.The research follows other studies showing that Britain’s ethnic minorities were more likely to suffer worse health and economic outcomes during the pandemic and less likely to accept vaccines.”How fast and to what extent these groups recover as the economy reopens will be a key determinant of the pandemic’s legacy,” said report co-author Tom Wernham.Some 15% of Britons from minority ethnic backgrounds were behind their household bills at the start of 2021, compared with 12% before the pandemic.The proportion of adults of Pakistani and Bangladeshi origin living in households where all adults were unemployed or furloughed remained 10 percentage points higher at the beginning of 2021 than pre-pandemic levels, as many of these households relied on one income earner.Household worklessness for black adults rose 2.4 percentage points, higher than the national average of 1.9, the report added.The share of self-employed workers who lost all work in the first lockdown in March 2020 and fell behind household bills is now 15%, up from 2% before the pandemic.Despite the government’s flagship furlough scheme, which has paid millions of workers’ wages since March 2020, 36% of self-employed workers — many of whom work in the hard-hit events, arts and culture sectors — were ineligible for the government self-employed income support scheme.Researchers also found that more families suffering from in-work poverty fell behind on bills during Britain’s first nationwide lockdown from last March, with the share jumping from 9 to 21%.The figure receded to 10% in the first quarter of 2021, but 13% of such families expect their financial situation to deteriorate in the near future.One of the report’s authors, Tom Waters, said the furlough scheme’s success largely explained Britain’s “surprisingly positive” deprivation and labor market statistics.But he added that people’s ability to return to their old jobs or find new ones would be the key factor for living standards as support was withdrawn.The government’s furlough scheme initially paid 80% of employees’ wages to prevent mass job losses but is to be phased out by the end of September.An increase of $28 per week to its main social security payment, Universal Credit, is also due to end at that time. 
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The Greeks are redoubling a monthslong diplomatic effort to persuade Germany to stop selling submarines to Turkey, saying that the planned sale of a half dozen subs will shift the balance of naval power in the eastern Mediterranean.Greece and Turkey have been locked in a quarrel about the territorial status of Mediterranean real estate and waters — and more important, the oil and gas reserves beneath them. The energy potential of the eastern Mediterranean has raised the stakes and drawn in neighboring powers.Turkey has said it will keep up energy exploration in the contested eastern Mediterranean waters, where last August a pair of Greek and Turkish frigates collided during a volatile naval standoff, bringing the two NATO members near to a military clash.Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Friday, during a tour of Turkey’s northwestern Black Sea province of Sakarya: “Whatever our rights are, we will take them one way or another. And we will carry out our oil exploration operations in the eastern Mediterranean, Cyprus, and all those seas.”The first of six German-designed submarines destined for Turkey was floated from its dock earlier this year and is scheduled to join the Turkish fleet next year. Five other Reis-class subs are to follow over the next few years in a deal worth around $4 billion.Greece asked the European Union last month to impose an arms embargo on Turkey, but Germany, Spain and Italy rebuffed the request.’Proactive’ foreign policy“Greece is entangled in the remarkably swift geopolitical changes in the eastern Mediterranean,” according to Vassilis Ntousas, a senior international relations policy adviser at the Foundation for European Progressive Studies, a think tank in Brussels.“Athens has responded to the region’s explosive mix of competing maritime interests, energy claims and military exercises by pursuing an increasingly proactive foreign policy,” he added. In a paper published last week he said, “Greece has reached out to [EU] member states that traditionally take a more conciliatory approach to Turkey – such as Spain, Italy and Malta.”Naval tensions have subsided recently in the eastern Mediterranean, where Greece and Turkey are also in a long-standing dispute over the status of Cyprus, following several rounds of face-to-face talks between the Turkish and Greek foreign ministers. Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis and Erdogan also met on the sidelines of the NATO summit in Brussels in June with both committing not to hold naval exercises the next few months.Greece Warns Turkey it Will Push for Sanctions if Tensions PersistThe two age-old foes and NATO allies exchange barbs ahead of a key summitKathimerini, the Greek daily newspaper published in Athens, said Erdogan “appeared eager not to stoke tension,” adding, “A calm tourist season is as important for Turkey as it is for Greece. On top of that, Erdogan wants to smooth relations with the European Union and the U.S.”Erdogan has irritated NATO allies by buying Russian surface-to-air missiles and intervening in Syria and Libya.But behind the scenes both Greece and Turkey have been maneuvering to strengthen their diplomatic positions — as well as their militaries. “Turkey’s president is trying to sound more helpful to the West. But his broader policy objectives have not changed,” according to Dimitar Bechev, author of a forthcoming book on Erdogan.’Charm offensive’He said Erdogan has been engaged in “a charm offensive over several months” aimed at rekindling his relations with the West and the Biden administration. The Turkish president met the U.S. leader last month.”The overtures towards Biden are broadly in line with Erdogan’s wish to ‘have his cake and eat it.’ That is, he wants to retain reasonably good relations with the U.S., despite the toxic anti-Americanism pervading Turkish media and the public at large, and to cling on to NATO, while at the same time teaming up with Russia on issues where their interests coincide,” he added in a commentary for the Royal United Services Institute, a British defense think tank.And Turkey, NATO’s second-largest military, has been on a buying spree — as has Greece.Greece announced in December that it was doubling its annual defense spending to $6.6 billion, and it signed a $3 billion deal in January with France to buy 18 Rafale warplanes, 12 of them used.Turkey is awaiting completion of a light aircraft carrier designed by Spain.The German-designed submarines are equipped with air-independent propulsion, or AIP, allowing them to go without the air supply normally needed by diesel engines. They can stay underwater for three weeks with little noise emission. Naval experts say they are well-suited for the shallow waters of the eastern Mediterranean and could be armed with medium-range anti-ship missiles.Greek Foreign Minister Nikos Dendias expressed his profound disappointment last month when Germany’s ruling coalition blocked efforts in the German parliament by opposition lawmakers to stop the submarine sales. “Both Prime Minister Mitsotakis and I have numerous times spoken to almost everyone in Germany about the necessity to keep the balance in the Aegean,” Dendias told reporters. He warned that the submarine deal risked shifting the balance in the Aegean Sea in favor of Ankara.
 
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A Vatican spokesman said Wednesday Pope Francis’ recovery from intestinal surgery continues to be “regular and satisfactory.”  
In a statement, Vatican Press Office Director Matteo Bruni said the 84-year-old pope was continuing to eat regularly following his Sunday surgery to remove the left side of his colon, and that intravenous therapy had been stopped.
In a post on his official Twitter account, the pope said “I am touched by the many caring messages received in these days. I thank everyone for their closeness and prayer.”
Bruni said final examination of the affected tissue “confirmed a severe diverticular stenosis with signs of sclerosing diverticulitis,” or a hardening of the sacs that can sometimes form in the lining of the intestine.
Francis underwent three hours of planned surgery Sunday. He is expected to stay in Rome’s Gemelli Polyclinic in the pope’s special suite.
During a White House news briefing Tuesday, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said U.S. President Joe Biden — a Roman Catholic — wishes the pope “well and a speedy recovery.” Bruni said Francis appreciated all the prayers coming his way.
Francis had been considered healthy overall and this is the first time he has been admitted to the hospital since he became pope in 2013, though he lost the upper part of one lung in his youth because of an infection. He also suffers from sciatica, or nerve pain, that makes him walk with a pronounced limp.
The Vatican has continued normal operations in his absence, though July is traditionally a month when the pope cancels public and private audiences. 
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The Transportation Department issued a final order Tuesday that blocks most travel between the United States and Belarus, underscoring Washington’s concern about the recent forced landing of a passenger jet to arrest a dissident Belarussian journalist.The order, which was requested by the State Department, bars airlines from selling tickets for travel between the two countries, with exceptions only for humanitarian or national security reasons.The Transportation Department proposed the ban last week and said Tuesday that it received no objections. There are no direct passenger flights between the U.S. and Belarus.In May, Belarussian officials ordered a Ryanair flight from Athens to Vilnius, Lithuania, to land in Minsk, where authorities removed journalist Raman Pratasevich from the plane and arrested him. Pratasevich faces a possible 15-year prison term.President Joe Biden has called the forced diversion an “outrageous incident” and joined others in calling for an international investigation.
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Celebrity crime reporter Peter R. de Vries, known for his work in exposing the Dutch underworld, was shot and seriously wounded on a street in Amsterdam, police said Tuesday. “Peter R. de Vries was shot down in Lange Leidsedwarsstraat,” police said in a statement, referring to a street near one of the city’s largest public squares, where he had been in a television studio earlier in the evening. He was taken to a nearby hospital in “serious condition,” the police said, calling for eyewitnesses to come forward. Police had cordoned off the area as crowds gathered near the site where the incident took place. De Vries won an international Emmy Award in the current affairs category in 2008 for his work investigating the disappearance of teenager Natalee Holloway in Aruba in 2005. FILE – Dutch crime reporter Peter R. de Vries arrives for a live TV show in Amsterdam, Netherlands, Jan. 31, 2008.An alleged shooter was arrested shortly afterward, the newspaper Algemeen Dagblad reported, citing anonymous sources. Police said that they could neither confirm nor deny that report but that they expected to update the public later Tuesday evening. Prime Minister Mark Rutte was expected to make a statement after meeting with leading law enforcement officials in the wake of the shooting, news agency ANP reported. Dutch broadcaster RTL said that de Vries had just left its studio in downtown Amsterdam and that one of the shots hit him in the head. Amsterdam’s Parool newspaper published an image of the scene that showed several people gathered around a person lying on the ground. De Vries, 64, is a celebrity in the Netherlands, as both a frequent commentator on television crime programs and an expert crime reporter with sources in both law enforcement and the underworld. De Vries is known in the Netherlands for investigative work on countless cases, notably following the 1983 kidnapping of beer magnate Freddy Heineken. De Vries had been subjected to threats from the criminal underworld in connection with several cases. In 2013, Willem Holleeder, the Heineken kidnapper, was convicted of making threats against de Vries. Holleeder is currently serving a life sentence for his involvement in five murders. In 2019, Ridouan Taghi, currently on trial for murder and drug trafficking, took the unusual step of making a public statement denying reports that he had threatened to have de Vries killed. De Vries has been acting as a counselor, but not lawyer, to a state witness identified as Nabil B. testifying in the case against Taghi and his alleged associates. Nabil B.’s previous lawyer was shot and killed on an Amsterdam street in September 2019. 
 
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With infection rates falling and vaccination numbers rising, Turkey has lifted nearly all COVID restrictions and is seeking a return to normalcy after several months of lockdown measures. Dorian Jones reports for VOA from Istanbul. 
 
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Russian authorities say the country is facing a surge in new coronavirus infections.  And, as Charles Maynes reports from Moscow, that has prompted a renewed effort to convince a skeptical public that the time to get vaccinated is now.Camera: Ricardo Marquina      Video editor: Rob Raffaele
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Belgium’s Africa Museum, once a celebration of the country’s colonial rule, will begin a multi-year process of returning stolen art to Democratic Republic of Congo, the Belgian government said on Tuesday.
 
From the late 19th century to 1960, thousands of art works including wooden statues, elephant ivory masks, manuscripts and musical instruments were likely taken by Belgian and other European collectors, scientists, explorers and soldiers.
 
Following a 66-million-euro ($78 million) overhaul of the Africa Museum to take a more critical view of Belgium’s colonial past, the government is ready to meet DRC calls for restitution.
 
“The approach is very simple: everything that was acquired through illegitimate means, through theft, through violence, through pillaging, must be given back,” Belgian junior minister Thomas Dermine told Reuters. “It doesn’t belong to us.”
 
Millions of Congolese are estimated to have died from the late 19th century when Congo was first a personal fiefdom of King Leopold II, before becoming a colony of the Belgian state.
 
Belgium will transfer legal ownership of the artefacts to DRC. But it will not immediately ship art works to the country from the museum in Tervuren, just outside Brussels, unless they are specifically requested by DRC authorities.
 
That is partly because the museum, which has proved popular since its renovation and attracted hundreds of thousands visitors before the COVID-19 pandemic, wants to keep artefacts on display. One option is to pay a loan fee to DRC.
 
Belgium says the Congolese authorities are conscious of the bigger audience in Belgium compared to DRC, which is one of the world’s poorest countries, according to the United Nations. It has few cultural centers or storage facilities.
 
“The museum believes it will be able to cooperate with the Congolese authorities, as is common among international institutions, to keep the objects in Belgium via loan agreements,” said museum director Guido Gryseels.
 
The museum also has a huge number of artefacts whose provenance is unclear. It hopes to use a team of scientists and experts over the next five years to identify them and to separate those that were acquired legally by the museum.
 
“In five years with a lot of resources we can do a lot, but it could be work for the next 10 to 20 years to be absolutely sure of all the objects we have, that we know the precise circumstances in which they were acquired,” Gryseels said.
 
Placide Mumbembele Sanger, a professor of anthropology at the University of Kinshasa who is working at the museum in Tervuren, said the process was a simple one.
 
“These are objects going back to their natural context so I don’t see why we should ask so many questions,” he said. “It’s as if you go out and someone steals your wallet and the person asks you whether or not you are ready to have it back.”
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Russia reported a record 737 deaths from coronavirus-linked causes in the past 24 hours on Tuesday, pushing the national death toll to 139,316.
 
The country confirmed 23,378 new COVID-19 cases, including 5,498 in Moscow, taking the official national tally since the pandemic began to 5,658,672.
 
The federal statistics agency has kept a separate count and has said Russia recorded around 270,000 deaths related to COVID-19 from April 2020 to April 2021.
 
Health Minister Mikhail Murashko was quoted by TASS on Tuesday as saying that up to 850,000 people were being vaccinated against COVID-19 in Russia every day and building up immunity was key.
 
The Kremlin would not support the idea of closing borders between Russia’s regions to stop the virus from spreading, although some regions may take swift and harsh measures to withstand the pandemic, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Tuesday.
 
The recent surge in COVID-19 cases, along with the need to raise interest rates to combat inflation, are seen challenging economic growth in Russia this year.
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Since Britain voted five years ago to break with the European Union, there has been an exodus from the country of EU workers, which has gathered pace since the pandemic struck, according to British government figures.
 
Many among the more than one million EU citizens who have left went to Germany and the Netherlands, leaving Britain’s coronavirus-hit businesses desperately short now of labor and complaining they are unable to fill staff vacancies just as Britain is planning to lift, on July 19, its remaining pandemic restrictions and hoping for a V-shaped economic recovery.  
 
The country’s hospitality industry, which is heavily dependent on foreign-born labor, has been among the hardest hit by staff shortages. Last month, several restaurants in North West England’s Lake District, an idyllic tourist spot whose businesses hope to benefit from an influx of British so-called “staycation” tourists unable to fly for overseas vacations, announced they were closing because of staff shortages, including Little Italy in the town of Kendal.  
 
“It was a very successful restaurant, but I just can’t staff it,” Richard Berry, the owner, told the local newspaper, the Westmorland Gazette. “We got to the bare bones with really good-quality staff and getting new staff when people leave is almost impossible,” he added. British Firms Mull Relocating To ‘Other Side of Brexit Curtain’Some British firms consider fully or partially relocating to mainland Europe, saying they fear for their prospects, if they don’tThe owners of a gingerbread store in the nearby village of Grasmere echo the complaint, telling local media they have spent more than $7,000 advertising four staff vacancies to no avail. “This is the worst staffing challenge we’ve ever had,” co-director Joanne Hunter said.Britain’s pubs are also scrambling to recruit staff, prompting the owner of JD Wetherspoons, a chain that owns nearly a thousand pubs, to urge the government to allow more migrants from the EU to work in Britain. Tim Martin, the founder and chairman of the chain, was an ardent advocate of Brexit.
 
The freight, construction and health sectors are also struggling to fill vacancies, adding to the rising alarm of owners and their shareholders already trying to limit the economic damage of 15 months of pandemic lockdowns and restrictions.  
 
They have been urging the ruling Conservatives to make it easier to hire workers from EU countries. Under new post-Brexit immigration rules, EU citizens not already settled in Britain have no automatic right to work in the country and the new immigration system gives priority to high-skilled workers.
 
Britain’s shipping and freight industry has warned that Britain is facing a mounting delivery crisis because of a shortage of drivers. Industry officials say supermarkets risk seeing supply chains erode because of the labor shortfall. Last month trucking company bosses urged Prime Minister Boris Johnson to allow them greater access to the EU labor market by introducing temporary worker visas for Heavy Goods Vehicle drivers.  They say the shortfall is partly the result of pandemic delays in testing new drivers and partly the result of at least 15,000 drivers from EU countries not returning to Britain after leaving last year during the lockdown.  Brexit Bites for British Businesses as Border Delays Slow TradeGovernment says ‘teething problems’ will be sorted out, but analysts warn of structural issues in Brexit deal So far their request has been rebuffed. Britain’s interior ministry said in a statement in response to the plea that employers should “focus on investing in our domestic workforce, rather than relying on labor from abroad.” Commercial transport bosses say that won’t help them fill vacancies in the short term.   
 
After meeting with government officials last week, the chief executive of the Road Haulage Association, Richard Burnett, said in a press statement: “The need for action is clear and urgent. We and many others have provided overwhelming evidence that the shortage is getting worse — the situation must be addressed right now.”
 
The RHA estimates that the country is short of 60,000 drivers— other industry groups put the figure closer to 100,000, around a third of HGV drivers working pre-pandemic. The training and examining of new recruits can take several months. The boss of Britain’s biggest supermarket chain, Tesco, says his company is facing a shortage of drivers. Ken Murphy told a conference call with analysts that Tesco was “working hard” to address the problem
 
Approximately 5.6 million EU citizens living in Britain before the country’s formal departure from the bloc last year have applied to settle in the country under terms London and Brussels agreed in a Brexit deal, according to new data released this month by the British government.  That is two million more than authorities had estimated were in the country.  
 
According to Jonathan Portes, an economics professor at King’s College London and a former British treasury official, the data shows “the importance of EU nationals to the UK economy and labor market.” But in a recently published paper he says, “It is still the case that EU migration has fallen very sharply since the referendum.”
 
He puts the exodus down to several factors, including legal and psychological ones “relating to the uncertainty about the future rights that EU citizens currently resident might enjoy, and the more general political and social climate, with the UK no longer seen as a hospitable destination for EU migrants.”
 
But the pandemic and lockdowns have also, he says, been key drivers in the outflow of at least 1.3 million EU citizens. “For many migrants, especially those from eastern, central, and south-eastern Europe and especially those who have arrived recently or have family back home, the choice would have been to stay here, with no job, less or no money, and pay for relatively expensive rented accommodation — or return home to family, with lower costs and most likely less risk of catching COVID,” he wrote.
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