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International deliveries of arms were flat in the period from 2016 to 2020, ending more than a decade of increases, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) said in a report on Monday.The United States, France and Germany, three of the world’s biggest exporters, increased deliveries, but decreases in exports from Russian and China offset the rise, SIPRI said.It was the first time since 2001-2005 that the volume of deliveries of major arms between countries — an indicator of demand — did not increase from the previous five-year period, SIPRI said.While the pandemic has shut down economies across the world and pushed many countries into deep recessions, SIPRI said it was too early to tell whether the slowdown in arms deliveries was likely to continue.”The economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic could see some countries reassessing their arms imports in the coming years,” Pieter Wezeman, senior researcher with the SIPRI Arms and Military Expenditure Programme, said in a statement.”However, at the same time, even at the height of the pandemic in 2020, several countries signed large contracts for major arms.”The United Arab Emirates, for example, recently signed an agreement with the United States to purchase 50 F-35 jets and up to 18 armed drones as part of a $23 billion package.Middle Eastern countries accounted for the biggest increase in arms imports, up 25% in 2016-20 from 2011-15.Saudi Arabia, the world’s biggest arms importer, increased its arms imports by 61% and Qatar by 361%.Asia and Oceania were the largest importing regions for major arms, receiving 42% of global arms transfers in 2016-20. India, Australia, China, South Korea and Pakistan were the biggest importers in the region.”For many states in Asia and Oceania, a growing perception of China as a threat is the main driver for arms imports,” said Siemon Wezeman, senior sesearcher at SIPRI. 
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Queen Bey is closer to sitting on her Grammys throne: The singer won her 26th Grammy on Sunday, almost matching, and on track to surpass, Alison Krauss’ record of 27 wins.Beyoncé, this year’s leading contender with nine nominations, won two honors during the pre-ceremony including best rap performance for “Savage” with Megan Thee Stallion and best music video for “Brown Skin Girl.” She shares the latter with daughter Blue Ivy Carter, who is also having a historic night: At 9 years old, she’s the second youngest to win a Grammy.Beyoncé’s other nominations, including song and record of the year, best R&B performance and best rap song, will broadcast during the live show, which kicked off with host Trevor Noah telling jokes about the coronavirus pandemic and the year that was 2020.He was live from downtown Los Angeles, with attendees wearing masks and sitting, socially distanced, at small round tables.  That was followed by performances from Harry Styles, who is competing for his first Grammys this year, and Billie Eilish, who won five Grammys last year and picked up her sixth honor during the preshow.Taylor Swift, Dua Lipa and Beyonce Battle for Grammys Top Prizes  Beyoncé, now the most nominated female artist in Grammy history with 79 career nods, leads all comers with nine nominationsOther performances, taped days before the big show, will air throughout the night, including Taylor Swift, Bruno Mars, Cardi B, BTS, Bad Bunny, Megan Thee Stallion, DaBaby, Dua Lipa, Post Malone, Chris Martin, Lil Baby, John Mayer, Maren Morris and Doja Cat.During the preshow, Fiona Apple and Kaytranda were also double winners Sunday. John Prine and Chick Corea both earned two wins posthumously. Lady Gaga, Ariana Grande, Justin Bieber, Dan + Shay, James Taylor, H.E.R., Beck, Brandi Carlile, Burna Boy, Tiffany Haddish and Rachel Maddow also won Grammys.While Beyoncé is set to have a historic night, history could repeat itself and she could be shut out of winning a top award — a common occurrence for R&B and rap artists throughout Grammy history. Of her 26 wins, only one has been for one of the big four Grammys, song of the year. She has lost album of the year three times and record of the year five times.Jay-Z has never won a top award, and he and his wife join a list of mostly Black performers who have only won in the rap and R&B categories, including Kendrick Lamar, Kanye West, Mariah Carey, Eminem, Drake, Missy Elliott, Mary J. Blige and more.This year The Weeknd was the one who was snubbed. Despite having the biggest hit of 2020 with “Blinding Lights” and a top-selling, multihit album, he didn’t earn any nominations.  Still, Beyoncé and Megan Thee Stallion’s “Savage” could become the second hip-hop song to win record of the year.Taylor Swift could make history, too, and become the first woman to win the show’s top prize, album of the year, three times. Her first surprise album of 2020, “Folklore,” is competing for the top honor, an award she first won in 2010 for “Fearless,” and again in 2016 for “1989.”  Artists competing with Swift for album of the year include Coldplay, Post Malone, Dua Lipa, Jhené Aiko, HAIM, Black Pumas and Jacob Collier, who picked up a win during the pre-ceremony.The Grammys were originally scheduled for Jan. 31 but were pushed back because of the coronavirus pandemic.
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The World Food Program is leading a project to restore school feeding programs for vulnerable children who have been cut off from this nutritional lifeline because of the COVID-19 pandemic.An estimated 388 million children or one in two worldwide had been receiving school meals when the pandemic struck more than a year ago. The World Food Program says this is the highest number of children in history who had been benefiting from this vital source of nourishment.By April of last year, the U.N. Food agency reports 199 countries were forced to close their schools because of COVID-19 lockdown measures. As a result, it says, 370 million children now no longer receive daily school meals — for many, their only meal of the day.WFP spokesman Tomson Phiri said his agency has begun to assemble a coalition of stakeholders to help governments restore and boost access to school feeding programs for hundreds of millions of poor children worldwide. He said participants are drawn from governments, development agencies, U.N. and private agencies as well as other sectors.“The coalition aims to find sustainable and innovative funding sources for school feeding programs, strengthen evidence and guidance to improve said programs, as well as to bring together multiple sectors to achieve better outcomes for school children globally,” he said.Phiri said this initiative comes at a crucial time. He calls school feeding a game changer for many, not just for the children. Phiri said parents, smallholder farmers and communities as a whole benefit when children are not deprived of food essential for their health and well-being.“Activities help stave off hunger, support longer-term health and help a child to learn and thrive. This is especially true for girls. In places where there is a school meals program, girls attend as well as to stay in school longer. Child marriage rates go down and teen pregnancies decrease,” said Phiri.The World Food Program says it expects more partners will join the coalition over the coming months before the project is launched at the Food Systems Summit on the margins of the General Assembly in September or October.The summit, which will be convened by U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, aims to transform the way the world produces and consumes food. 
 
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Dame Zaturoski from Struga, North Macedonia, is a lawyer by training, but his true passion is making models of boats and ships. Reporter Miki Trajkovski went to North Macedonia to see his latest creation and filed this story narrated by Anna Rice.
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London’s Metropolitan Police was under heavy pressure Sunday to explain its actions during a vigil for a woman whom one of the force’s own officers is accused of murdering.  Hundreds defied coronavirus restrictions to gather and protest violence against women, but the event ended with clashes between police and those attending.  Home Secretary Priti Patel said scenes from Saturday’s vigil in south London were “upsetting” and she is seeking a full report on what happened from the Metropolitan Police. The capital’s mayor, Sadiq Khan, said the police response was “at times neither appropriate nor proportionate.”  Police were seen scuffling with some women at the event, and one woman was seen pinned to the ground by two officers. Several women were led away in handcuffs as other attendees chanted “Shame on you” at police. The force later said four people were arrested for violating public order and coronavirus regulations.  Defending the force’s actions, Assistant Commissioner Helen Ball said “hundreds of people were packed tightly together,” posing a very real risk of transmitting the virus. She added that officers had repeatedly encouraged those attending to leave, but “a small minority” of people chanted at police, pushing and throwing objects.  “We accept that the actions of our officers have been questioned,” Ball said. “We absolutely did not want to be in a position where enforcement action was necessary. But we were placed in this position because of the overriding need to protect people’s safety.” Many of those attending the vigil were already wary of police because a serving Metropolitan Police officer, Wayne Couzens, was charged with the kidnap and murder of Sarah Everard, a 33-year-old woman who vanished March 3 while walking home in London. Her body was found a week later.  The case has sparked a national outcry and a heated debate on women’s safety. Organizers had planned an official vigil at Clapham Common, a park near where Everard was last seen alive, but were forced to cancel the event because of COVID-19 restrictions. A huge crowd turned up Saturday nonetheless. Jamie Klingler, who organized the canceled “Reclaim These Streets” event, blamed police for denying women their right to have a silent vigil in the first place. The force got the angry reaction Saturday because they refused to facilitate a peaceful rally, she said.  “I think we were shocked and really, really sad and to see videos of policemen handling women at a vigil about violence against women by men … I think it was painful and pretty triggering to see,” Klingler told Britain’s PA Media news agency Sunday.  Couzens, 48, appeared in court Saturday for the first time. He was remanded in custody and has another appearance scheduled Tuesday at London’s Central Criminal Court.  The Metropolitan Police has said it is “deeply disturbing” that one of its own is a suspect in the case. The force said Couzens joined its ranks in 2018 and most recently served in the parliamentary and diplomatic protection command, an armed unit responsible for guarding embassies in the capital and Parliament. Everard was last seen walking home from a friend’s apartment in south London at about 10:30 p.m. on March 3. Her body was found hidden in an area of woodland in Kent, more than 50 miles southeast of London, on Wednesday. A post-mortem examination was underway, police said Friday. 
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British-Iranian charity worker Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe appeared before Iran’s Revolutionary Court Sunday, facing charges of “propaganda against the system.” “Legally, the court should announce the verdict in a week, but it is up to the judge. I am very hopeful that she will be acquitted,” said her lawyer Hojjat Kermani. Zaghari-Ratcliffe was arrested in 2016 on charges that she was plotting to overthrow Iran’s government, a charge she has denied. Kermani said the trial was held in a “calm atmosphere” and the “final defense” was made.  Zaghari-Ratcliffe was released from house arrest last week and her ankle bracelet was removed, but she was not allowed to travel to join her family in Britain.    She was released from prison last year in March as the coronavirus began to snake around the world.  She had been imprisoned for five years.   British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has said Zaghari-Ratcliffe must be allowed to return home to Britain to her husband and daughter.  At the time of her arrest, Zaghari-Ratcliffe worked for the Thomson Reuters Foundation, a charity that operates independently of media firm Thomson Reuters and its news subsidiary Reuters. Sunday’s trial comes after Redress, a human rights aid organization, released a statement saying Zaghari-Ratcliffe is in urgent need of mental and physical health care after enduring hours of interrogation while blindfolded and solitary confinement. 
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Clashes broke out Saturday between police and people who gathered in defiance of coronavirus restrictions at an unofficial vigil for a London woman whose killing has spurred a national conversation in Britain about violence against women.The hundreds who gathered on Clapham Common, near where marketing executive Sarah Everard was last seen alive on March 3, defied a judge’s order and a police request to disperse. They were there to honor Everard and draw attention to the fear and danger many women see as a daily part of British life.Everard disappeared while walking home from a friend’s apartment and was found dead a week later. The slaying sent shockwaves across Britain because a police officer is charged with kidnapping and killing her.Video of the informal vigil-turned-rally showed officers tussling with participants. Male officers grabbed several women and led them away in handcuffs as onlookers screamed and shouted, Britain’s Press Association reported.Many participants laid flowers at a bandstand in the park. Among them was Kate, the Duchess of Cambridge, who was seen pausing for a moment in front of the sea of flowers. Other people held signs reading “We will not be silenced” and “She was just walking home,” and the crowd chanted, “Sisters united will never be defeated.”The gathering happened hours after Metropolitan Police constable Wayne Couzens, 48, appeared in court for the first time since his arrest in Everard’s death. As Metropolitan Police officers approached the Clapham Common bandstand on Saturday evening, boos, jeers and shouts of “Shame on you” came from the crowd, according to the Press Association.Events canceledOrganizers had hoped to hold “Reclaim the Streets” vigils in Everard’s memory at the south London location and in other U.K. cities on Saturday but canceled the in-person events after a judge, in the face of coronavirus curbs on mass gatherings,  refused to grant an order allowing them to go on.Hundreds of people showed up nonetheless.People gather in Clapham Common in memory of Sarah Everard, after an official vigil for the slain kidnapping victim was canceled, in London, March 13, 2021.London Mayor Sadiq Khan decried the police response.”The police have a responsibility to enforce COVID laws, but from images I’ve seen it’s clear the response was at times neither appropriate nor proportionate,” Khan said on Twitter.Home Secretary Priti Patel tweeted that he had asked Metropolitan Police for a full report on what happened.In the wake of Everard’s disappearance and killing, many women have taken to social media to share their own experiences of being threatened or attacked while walking outside.A 33-year-old nurse who works in the Clapham area, Mel Clarke, said she felt “very conflicted” about attending Saturday’s gathering because of pandemic restrictions, but in the end “just felt that I needed to be here.””I’m really pleased that there are a lot of men here. I hope that this is kind of an opportunity for men to learn how women feel, how vulnerable we are,” Clarke said. “I hope that this is the start of justice being served for Sarah.”Suspect in courtThe Metropolitan Police expressed shock and horror that one of its own was a suspect in the case. The London police force said Couzens joined its ranks in 2018 and most recently served in the parliamentary and diplomatic protection command, an armed unit responsible for guarding embassies in the capital and Parliament.During his court appearance earlier in the day, Couzens stood wearing a gray track suit as the charges were read to him. He was remanded into custody and has another appearance scheduled Tuesday at London’s Central Criminal Court.Everard was last seen walking home from a friend’s apartment in south London about 10:30 p.m. on March 3. Her body was found hidden in an area of woodland in Kent, more than 80 kilometers (50 miles) southeast of London, on Wednesday. A post-mortem examination is under way, police said Friday.TV and radio presenter Sandi Toksvig said at the start of a vigil held online that a “cultural shift about how women are viewed and treated both in the public and private space” was needed.”I am filled in equal measure with profound sorrow and rage, and I know there are many who share this rage, and I think it is entirely justifiable,” Toksvig said. “But I also know that it will harm rather than help us if we don’t try and direct that anger to good purpose.” 
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Ireland’s Foreign Minister Simon Coveney said Saturday that Britain was demonstrating “perverse nationalism” by seeking to reach a trade deal with the United States before the European Union and questioned whether it was a trustworthy partner.“This idea that Britain can get there first is narrow-minded thinking, frankly. It’s a perverse nationalism when actually Britain and the EU should work together as partners,” he said in an interview with The Times newspaper.Coveney advocated Britain working with the EU and Canada to reach a joint trade deal with the United States, although the EU does not currently have plans for a major U.S. trade deal.He also questioned Britain’s trustworthiness following its plans to unilaterally delay imposing checks required by the Brexit deal on some food products traveling from England, Scotland or Wales to Northern Ireland.“It has reinforced an awful lot of the doubts in Brussels about whether or not this really is a British government we can rely on to be a trusted partner when it comes to implementing what has already been agreed,” he said.Prime Minister Boris Johnson views the ability to strike trade deals as one of the main benefits of Brexit and sees a deal with the United States as a big potential prize.Relations between London and Dublin have deteriorated since Britain voted in 2016 to leave the European Union.Trade arrangements in the British province of Northern Ireland have proved a particular sticking point.In a separate interview with Northern Ireland’s News Letter newspaper, Brandon Lewis, Britain’s Northern Ireland secretary, indicated that “grace periods” for the food checks should be extended indefinitely until a new long-term agreement was reached.“My position and the government’s position in terms of the grace period we’ve got for chilled meats at the moment is not that at the end of that grace period there is a cliff edge; it’s that we use the grace period to get a permanent solution to ensure that those products can continue to flow,” Lewis said.  
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Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko said Saturday that Belarus might submit a new entry to this year’s Eurovision Song Contest after the previous one, by a band known for mocking anti-government protests, was rejected as too political.Featuring lyrics such as “I will teach you to toe the line,” the entry had sparked a backlash from opposition figures and fueled calls by a European Parliament lawmaker for Belarus to be suspended from the popular competition.Eurovision’s organizers, the European Broadcasting Union, Thursday threatened Belarus with disqualification if it did not submit a modified version of the entry or submit a new song.To critics, allowing the original entry to be performed would have added legitimacy to a violent crackdown launched by Lukashenko against mass unrest that swept the country following an August election, which demonstrators say was rigged to extend his 27-year rule.To Lukashenko, it was another example of Belarus being besieged by outside forces. The veteran president has clung to power with support from traditional ally Russia and has accused the West of fueling protests to overthrow him.“They are starting to press us on all fronts. Even at Eurovision, I see,” Lukashenko said, in his first public comments about the row.“We’ll make another song,” he said, adding: “You see that this is all politicized.”He also commented for the first time on a film released this week by a Poland-based opposition news service that accused Lukashenko of spending hundreds of millions of dollars on a luxurious lifestyle.“I will never allow myself to steal something from people,” he said.  
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A Black French scholar and expert on U.S. minority rights movements who’s taking charge of France’s state-run immigration museum says it’s “vital” for his country to confront its colonial past so that it can conquer present racial injustice.
 
“The French are highly reluctant to look at the dark dimensions of their own history,” Pap Ndiaye told The Associated Press in his museum, initially built to display colonial exploits but now meant to showcase the role of immigration in shaping modern France.
 
Ndiaye was named to head France’s National Museum of the History of Immigration at a crucial time, as his country is under pressure to reassess its colonial history and offer better opportunities for its citizens of color, in the wake of Black Lives Matter and other racial justice movements.
 
Following George Floyd’s death in the U.S. last year, thousands took to the streets in Paris and across the country expressing anger at racism and discrimination in French society, particularly toward people from the country’s former colonies in Africa.  
 
What happened in the U.S. “echoes the French situation,” Ndiaye said.  
 
The trial of a former police officer charged in Floyd’s death will be closely monitored in France, Ndiaye said, because “it tells about the reality of police violence, and we would like very much for this reality of police violence to be discussed the same way in France.”
 
Many young French are increasingly pushing back against a national doctrine of colorblindness, which aims at encouraging equality by ignoring race altogether — but has failed to eradicate discrimination.  
 
They “are disappointed in many ways in the French promise of equality and opportunities for all,” Ndiaye said. “We must go beyond the official discourse and acknowledge reality.”
 
These issues “have to be discussed. They have to be measured also through the use of statistics,” Ndiaye said, also urging “more effective policies” targeting discrimination in the job and housing markets.
 
These are bold statements for a top government-appointed official in France, where collecting data based on race or ethnicity is frowned upon, and where the far-right has brought anti-immigrant rhetoric to the mainstream. President Emmanuel Macron has promised more steps to fight discrimination and has treaded carefully on how to address colonial wrongs.
 
Ndiaye, who was born and raised in France, described his stay in the U.S. from 1991 to 1996 to study as “a personal revelation.” Born to a French mother and Senegalese father, he said his U.S. experience “helped me integrate that Black part of me I had put aside a little bit to make it a source of pride.”
 
Coming back to France, he specialized on the history of minorities in both countries, and his publication in 2008 of the book “The Black Condition” made him a precursor of Black Studies in France.
 
From his new post at the immigration museum, Ndiaye hopes to contribute to opening the debate needed so the French confront their collective memories.
 
“I know many French people would say that slavery is something that happened in the United States when slavery did not really happen in France or on a much smaller scale — which is not the case. The main difference between France and the U.S. is that slavery was overseas [in French colonies], very far from the mainland.”
 
France and the U.S. have different histories, but they’ve been facing “similar issues, issues of racial domination … issues of racial injustice,” Ndiaye stressed.  
 
The Palais de la Porte Doree, which houses the museum in the east of Paris, is a strong testimony from France’s colonial era.  
 
Built for the Paris Colonial Exposition of 1931, it aimed to present the French colonies in a favorable light.  
 
Amid other propaganda, Ndiaye said, a monumental fresco in the main hall of the museum was meant to convince the public “that colonization is good for the colonized themselves, that they enjoy being colonized by the French because of the civilizing mission of the French Empire.”
 
The fresco still stands, as a reminder. Visitors will be able to “measure the gap between the official discourse on colonization at that time… and the reality,” he said. “A reality of violence, a reality of oppression, a reality of domination.”
 
The immigration museum, inaugurated in 2007, is now closed to the public amid the virus crisis and in full renovation, with a reopening expected next year.
 
It will propose a new approach to the history of immigration to ensure that it is “not a footnote” in France’s history, Ndiaye said. “Immigration is presented in a positive manner of course when we know that one French out of four has at least one grandparent who came from elsewhere.”
 
The permanent exhibition will start from 1685, when King Louis XIV passed the Code Noir, or Black Code, legislation meant to regulate the conditions of slavery in French colonies. It legalized the brutal treatment of slaves and foresaw capital punishment for offenses including striking a “master.”
 
The display will focus on France’s colonial Empire that once included a large part of northern and western Africa and other territories in the Caribbean, the Middle East and south-east Asia.  
 
The exhibition will end with the migrant crisis that shook Europe in 2015, when more than 1 million people crossed by land and by sea to reach the continent.  
 
With a growing non-white French population with ancestors coming from colonized areas, Ndiaye said people want “their history, the history of their family, to be better integrated within the general master narrative of French history.”
 
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A bipartisan group of U.S. senators has called on Russian President Vladimir Putin to stop his country’s “state-sponsored assault on media freedom” through the targeting of U.S.-funded news service RFE/RL.
 
In a March 12 statement, Democrats and Republicans on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee called attention to the deteriorating media environment in Russia and a clampdown on RFE/RL under a controversial “foreign agent” law.
 
Russia’s state media monitoring agency, Roskomnadzor, has opened 260 cases against RFE/RL’s Russian-language news services for failing to mark written and broadcast materials in accordance with the onerous regulations. A Moscow court has already levied fines totaling some $1 million in 142 cases.
 
“Long employed to weaken Russian civil society, the Kremlin is now using onerous ‘foreign agent’ laws as a pretext to silence RFE/RL in Russia, pursuing court cases and fines,” Senators Chris Coons (Democrat-Delaware), Mitt Romney (Republican-Utah), Marco Rubio (Republican-Florida), and Bob Menendez (Democrat-New Jersey), chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said in a joint statement.
 
The senators accused Putin of consolidating control over the media and passing laws to punish critics, while threatening the safety of members of the press.
 
“In this harsh media environment, RFE/RL has performed an invaluable service to the Russian people, providing them uncensored local news that aims to meet the highest standards of objective journalism,” the senators said.
 
The string of cases against RFE/RL means that pending appeals, it must pay the fines and come into compliance with regulations or face the potential closure of its operations inside Russia.
‘Foreign Agent’ Law
 
Earlier this month the U.S. State Department expressed “deep concern” about what it called Russian government efforts “to clamp down on the exercise of freedom of expression.”
 
The statement came the same day a Moscow judge rejected five appeals by RFE/RL of fines imposed on the operation under the “foreign agent” law.
 
Russia’s so-called “foreign agent” legislation was adopted in 2012 and has been modified repeatedly. It requires nongovernmental organizations that receive foreign assistance and that the government deems to be engaged in political activity to be registered, to identify themselves as “foreign agents,” and to submit to audits.
 
Later modifications targeted foreign-funded media.
 
In 2017, the Russian government placed RFE/RL’s Russian Service on the list, along with six other RFE/RL Russian-language news services, and Current Time, a network run by RFE/RL in cooperation with VOA.The blacklist of “foreign agents,” seen here in a screenshot from the Russian Justice Ministry’s website, shows Voice of America (1), Radio Liberty/Radio Free Europe (7) and Current Time (5) among others.At the end of 2020, the legislation was modified to allow the Russian government to include individuals, including foreign journalists, on its “foreign agent” list and to impose restrictions on them.
 
In December 2020, authorities added five individuals to its “foreign agent” list, including three contributors to RFE/RL’s Russian Service. All five are appealing their inclusion on the list.
 
Roskomnadzor adopted rules last year requiring listed media to mark all written materials with a lengthy notice in large text, all radio materials with an audio statement, and all video materials with a 15-second text declaration.
 
RFE/RL President Jamie Fly has called the regulations “orders to deface our content platforms and intimidate our audiences.” He added that RFE/RL will continue “to object, protest, and appeal these requirements.”
 
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