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British and French ministers meet Tuesday in Paris for urgent talks on the growing migrant crisis in the English Channel. So far this year, more than 4,000 migrants, mostly from Africa and the Middle East, have attempted the crossing from France to Britain in overcrowded dinghies or makeshift boats, including around 700 in the past week.It is a voyage of some 35 kilometers across the busiest shipping lane in the world. Among the migrants are hundreds of unaccompanied children.  The surge in arrivals is creating political waves. Speaking to reporters in London Monday, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson promised action, but with little detail.“We need to stop them, working with the French, we need to stop them from getting across the channel. But No. 2, we need to look at the legal framework that we have, all the panoply of laws that an illegal immigrant has at his or her disposal that allow them to stay here,” Johnson said.  Immigration Minister Chris Philp was traveling to Paris for talks Tuesday, alongside Britain’s new so-called “Clandestine Channel Threat Commander,” Dan O’Mahoney, for talks with French counterparts on how to reduce the number of migrant crossings. One plan under discussion could see Britain paying more for land patrols along the northern French coastline.Border Force officers escort a group of men thought to be migrants to a waiting bus in the port city of Dover, England, Aug. 8, 2020.Under international maritime law, all vessels are obliged to aid those in distress at sea. Deploying the navy could have unintended consequences, says Yeo.“There is a humanitarian argument for making sure that people are safe in that area and taking them back to shore. But if it were the British who were doing that, it would be back to a British shore and that is exactly what the British government is seeking to avoid.”Under European Union law known as the Dublin Regulation, the first EU country where a migrant arrives is meant to process any asylum request. Britain has deported hundreds of migrants to its European neighbors in recent years under the arrangement. When Britain exits the Brexit transition period at the end of the year, however, that law no longer applies.  “You cannot just send people back to a country that won’t take them back,” says Yeo. “I think what the U.K. government would ideally like is to have some sort of arrangement where if somebody is intercepted in the English Channel, the assumption would be that they’ve come from France and therefore they are landed in France. But we don’t have that agreement at the moment, and frankly it doesn’t seem that likely that we would enter into such an agreement with the French because it doesn’t necessarily appear to be in French interests.”Activists say the surge in arrivals shows the desperation of the migrants and Britain should be doing more to help the global refugee crisis.“Clearly, the numbers are higher this year, but I think as a country, as a government, every time we see incidents like this, you’ve got two kind of choices to make,” Stephen Hale, chief executive of charity group Refugee Action, told the Reuters news agency Tuesday.  “The first is to say this is serious for the people concerned, but it’s a modest movement by international standards, and it’s certainly something that Britain can cope with. You know, it’s something we can step up and find solutions to in the interests of our country and in the interests of these people. Or we can kind of go the other way and really send the message that these numbers are huge. It’s not something we can manage,” Hale said.The British government says the route must be shut down to prevent tragedy at sea.  Analysts say that politically, the images of migrant boats arriving at the foot of Britain’s iconic white cliffs of Dover are clearly potent for a government that pledged to take back control of its borders after Brexit.
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Russian President Vladimir Putin says his country has become the first in the world to formally approve a new COVID-19 vaccine, despite a lack of data to back up his claims that the drug is safe to administer to humans.President Putin announced the development during a meeting with his government ministers Tuesday that was carried live on state television.”I know that it works quite effectively, it forms a stable immunity,” Putin said of the new vaccine developed by Moscow’s Gamaleya Institute.  He said the vaccine had undergone “all the necessary checks” to ensure its safety, adding that his own daughter has been inoculated in an early testing phase.  The president said his daughter ran a slight fever on the first day, but her temperature dropped to normal the following day.Production of the new Russian vaccine — which has been dubbed Sputnik V, in honor of the world’s first man-made satellite launched by the then-Soviet Union in 1957 — will begin next month, with mass vaccinations starting as early as October. Russian authorities have said that medical workers, teachers and other risk groups will be the first to be inoculated. Deputy Prime Minister Tatyana Golikova said that the vaccination of doctors could start as early as this month.The new vaccine is one of more than 100 possible vaccines being developed in a race by  governments and biomedical firms to blunt a pandemic that has now sickened more than 20 million people and caused more than 736,000 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University’s coronavirus tracker.The Russian vaccine is not among the handful that reached the third and final phase of testing in human trials, which usually involve thousands of people and lasts for months, according to the World Health Organization.  Scientists within Russia and abroad have questioned the move to register the vaccine before Phase 3 trials are complete.Critics say this could prove harmful to patients, and either lead to a false sense of security or undermine trust in vaccinations.And Russia has also been accused by the United States, Britain and Canada of using hackers to steal vaccine research from labs in their countries.Putin’s announcement comes as Chinese-based biotech company Sinovac has launched a late-stage human trial of a potential COVID-19 vaccine in Indonesia. The vaccine, dubbed CoronaVac, will be administered to as many as 1,620 volunteers to test its safety and effectiveness.  Indonesia is the second nation where Sinovac has launched a late-stage trial.  Dr. Gustavo Romero, of University Hospital of Brasilia’s Nucleus of Tropical Medicine, presents to the press China’s Sinovac Biotech experimental coronavirus vaccine before it is administered to volunteers in Brasilia, Brazil, Aug. 5, 2020.Sinovac has already launched a late-stage trial of CoronaVac in Brazil, which has more than 3 million confirmed coronavirus infections and 101,752 deaths, placing it second behind the United States in both categories. Indonesia, the world’s fourth-most-populous country, has reported more than 127,000 total cases and 5,765 deaths.Sinovac may also soon begin late-stage human trials of CoronaVac in Bangladesh.  The company is not conducting human tests in China because of the low number of new infections.   Meanwhile, the Trump administration is considering a new set of immigration rules that would bar U.S. citizens and permanent residents from returning from abroad if that person is believed to have been infected with the virus.The proposal, first reported late Monday by The New York Times, would expand the administration’s current rules that ban foreign citizens from entering the U.S., citing the risk of someone from a coronavirus “hot spot” — a location with an unusually high rate of infections — coming into the country.The Times says the proposed rule could particularly impact the border with Mexico, where many American citizens and legal residents cross back and forth on a regular basis. The proposal notes the prevalence of COVID-19 in Mexico as evidence of its necessity, citing the death of the health minister in the border state of Chihuahua earlier this month from the virus.The Trump administration has moved aggressively to stem the flow of immigration since taking office, especially since the pandemic began.  Officials have implemented a program at the border that quickly sends most migrants taken into custody back to Mexico.The United States leads the world in the number of total coronavirus infections — nearly 5.1 million — and deaths, with 163,465, according to the coronavirus tracker established by Johns Hopkins University.The American Academy of Pediatrics and the Children’s Hospital Association have reported a large increase in the number of children sickened by the coronavirus last month.Nearly 100,000 youngsters became ill in the last two weeks of July.The coronavirus is relatively mild in children, but they can still pass the virus to older people, including the elderly who are much more susceptible, according to doctors.
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U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo embarks on a weeklong trip to central Europe on Monday, as the United States looks to confront Russian and Chinese economic and geopolitical competition in Europe. The top U.S. diplomat is traveling to Prague and Pilsen in the Czech Republic; Ljubljana, Slovenia; Vienna, Austria; and Warsaw, Poland, from August 11 to 15. Pompeo will become the first secretary of state since 2011 to visit Slovenia, where he will sign a Joint Declaration on 5G technology as Washington is countering risks posed by communist China’s “infiltration into high-tech networks” in the region. The trip comes as the Pentagon prepares to move forward with a plan to pull almost 12,000 troops from Germany and redeploy part of the U.S. forces to Poland and other NATO nations, raising concerns at home and in Europe even as senior officials defend it as a strategic necessity.Ambassador Philip Reeker, the State Department’s acting assistant secretary for European and Eurasian Affairs, said Pompeo will discuss with his counterparts the just-completed U.S.-Poland Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (EDCA) that “provides a framework” to further strengthen “the broad transatlantic security.”   The FILE – A worker puts a cap to a pipe at the construction site of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, near the town of Kingisepp, Leningrad region, Russia, June 5, 2019.Russia has previously defended the project as economically feasible.  The U.S. has been warning about the security risks of Russian energy export pipelines, in particular Nord Stream 2. U.S. officials said if completed, these projects would undermine European security and strengthen Russia’s ability to use its energy resources to coerce the U.S.’s European partners and allies.Czech RepublicIn Prague, Pompeo will meet with Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis to discuss nuclear energy cooperation and the Three Seas Initiative, a political platform to promote connectivity among nations in central and eastern Europe by supporting infrastructure, energy and digital interconnectivity projects.   The initiative gets its name from the three seas that border the region: the Baltic, Black and Adriatic. On Wednesday, Pompeo is set to deliver a speech at the Senate of the Parliament of the Czech Republic on bilateral ties and foreign policy.   Americký ministr zahraničních věcí FILE – Poland’s President Andrzej Duda listens to U.S. President Donald Trump during a joint news conference in the Rose Garden at the White House in Washington, June 24, 2020.Poland sees Nord Stream 2, which would double Russia’s gas export capacity via the Baltic Sea, as a threat to Europe’s energy security. “In our view, it is paying with European money for Mr. (Vladimir) Putin’s weapons, and we don’t like it,” Morawiecki said during a recent webinar hosted by the Atlantic Council.  Morawiecki said Poland, as “the most pro-European and most pro-American country” in Europe, is strengthening the transatlantic alliance. Last month, the State Department said people making investments or engaging in activities related to Nord Stream 2, including pipe-laying vessels and engineering service in the deployment of the pipelines, could face U.S. sanctions. “It’s a clear warning to companies: aiding and abetting Russia’s malign influence projects will not be tolerated,” said Pompeo during a July 15 press conference.   “Let me be clear. These aren’t commercial projects. They are the Kremlin’s key tools to exploit and expand European dependence on Russian energy supplies,” Pompeo said. 
 
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More than 20 million cases of COVID-19 have been confirmed worldwide as of Monday night, and Spain has overtaken Britain for the highest number of cases in Western Europe. Partly to blame, some Spanish health experts say, is that the government doesn’t have enough qualified contract tracers.  “Some regions have not understood that this was the key in the months after the lockdown and in the long term,” said Ildefonso Hernandez Aguado, a public health professor at Alicante’s Miguel Hernandez University.  He also blamed Spanish society for its eagerness to celebrate holidays and other events with large gatherings, saying, “This is a country that doesn’t understand holding a celebration or taking a holiday if you’re not going to share them.” The government defended its response.  “Appropriate measures are being taken to control the pandemic in coordination” with the regions, the government said in a statement, after experts questioned its policies. “The data shows that we are being very active in tracking and detecting the virus.” According to Johns Hopkins University, Spain has nearly 323,000 COVID-19 cases while Britain has recorded 313,000. More than 28,000 people have died from the disease in Spain and more than 46,000 have died in Britain.  Spain, one of the world’s hot spots early in the pandemic before imposing strict lockdowns and other measures, has seen a surge in the number of cases since lifting most measures instituted to contain the spread of the coronavirus, which causes COIVD-19. From an average daily infections tally of 132 cases in June, Spain has counted some 1,500 per day in the first 10 days of August.People wearing face masks wait their turn to be called for a PCR test for the COVID-19 at Vilafranca del Penedes in the Barcelona province, Spain, August 10, 2020.Both Spain and the Britain trail the United States in the number of COVID-19 cases — more than 5 million – and deaths – 163,000. Florida, one of the U.S.’s hardest hit states, broke its own record last week for the number of coronavirus hospitalizations, The Orlando Sentinel newspaper reports. Hospitals throughout Florida admitted 3,355 COVID-19 patients between August 2 and August 9. Florida has counted 536,961 cases and 8,408 deaths cases since the beginning of the pandemic, trailing only California, which has 568,000 confirmed cases and 10,378 deaths.  Medical officials in Florida blamed Gov. Ron DeSantis, saying he was more interested in gaining favor with President Donald Trump than taking measures such a statewide requirement for wearing face masks. The American Academy of Pediatrics and the Children’s Hospital Association have reported a large increase in the number of children sickened by the coronavirus last month. Nearly 100,000 youngsters became ill in the last two weeks of July. A woman with her children, wearing face masks amid the spread of the new coronavirus, wait at a health center in the Juan Diaz neighborhood, an area with high contagion levels of COVID-19, in Panama City, July 16, 2020.The coronavirus is relatively mild in children, but they can still pass the virus to older people, including the elderly who are much more susceptible, according to doctors. New Jersey police broke up a house party over the weekend where nearly 300 people were celebrating. The state has limited the number of people allowed to gather indoors to 25. New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy lashed out at the crowds packing bars in the state’s beach towns. The governor has criticized what he calls “knucklehead behavior” by those who won’t wear masks or practice social distancing for a rise in COVID-19 cases in the state. Nearly 50 public health officials across the U.S. have either been fired or quit since April under pressure from politicians and others resisting their calls for coronavirus restrictions, according to the Associated Press news service. Some of those officials said had been threatened with violence for advocating for lockdowns and masks.  Others were simply burned out. The former head of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Dr. Tom Frieden, calls the number of experts quitting their jobs “stunning.”  “The overall tone toward public health in the U.S. is so hostile that it has kind of emboldened people to make these attacks,” Frieden said. The latest to give up their positions are senior government health experts in California and New York City.  President Trump threw his support behind playing the college football season despite COVID-19. “The student-athletes have been working too hard for their season to be cancelled,” he tweeted Monday. Some large schools have canceled their seasons while others have not yet decided what they will do. Nebraska’s Republican Sen. Ben Sasse, who is a former president of Midland University, says the season should go on.  “This is a moment for leadership. These young men need a season. Please don’t cancel college football,” the senator said. Spanish actor Antonio Banderas spent his 60th birthday Monday in quarantine after announcing he has the coronavirus.  “I would like to add that I am relatively well, just a little more tired than usual and hoping to recover as soon as possible following medical instructions that I hope will allow me to overcome the infection that I and so many people in the world are suffering from,” he wrote on Instagram.  He says he plans to spend his time in recovery reading and writing. 
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Antonio Banderas says he’s tested positive for COVID-19 and is celebrating his 60th birthday in quarantine.  The Spanish actor announced his positive test Monday in a post on Instagram. Banderas said he would spend his time in isolation reading, writing and “making plans to begin to give meaning to my 60th year to which I arrive full of enthusiasm.” “I would like to add that I am relatively well, just a little more tired than usual and hoping to recover as soon as possible following medical instructions that I hope will allow me to overcome the infection that I and so many people in the world are suffering from,” Banderas wrote. A spokesperson for Banderas didn’t immediately respond to messages Monday. Earlier this year, Banderas was nominated for the Academy Award for best actor for his performance in Pedro Almodóvar’s Pain & Glory.  
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Greece’s entire armed forces are on emergency alert Monday following Turkey’s decision to send a vessel to explore potential drilling sites off the coast of two Greek islands in the southeast Aegean Sea. The escalation comes after Greece and Egypt signed a maritime deal blocking Turkish access to the Eastern Mediterranean — a move that has enraged Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, leading him to flex his country’s muscle in a long-running territorial tussle.Defense ministry officials denied that reservists had been called up overnight as a result of the brewing crisis.Still, the same sources tell VOA that Greece’s entire military apparatus is on red alert, monitoring Turkey’s movements after the neighboring state launched naval drills east and south of the islands of Rhodes and Kastellorizo in the southeast Aegean Sea over the weekend.The drills include live fire, and most worrying for Greece, Ankara on Monday also sent out the vessel Oruc Reis to survey the continental shelf in an area in the Eastern Mediterranean, which both Greece and Turkey consider their own.While both NATO allies, the two neighboring countries have been challenging each other’s air and sea rights in the region for decades.FILE – German Chancellor Angela Merkel wears a protective face mask as she arrives for the continuation of an EU summit meeting in Brussels, Belgium, July 20, 2020.The two countries came to the brink of war more than 20 years ago. Just last month, German Chancellor Angela Merkel weighed in on a fresh territorial tussle between the two, convincing Erdogan to back off from sending the Oruc Reis on a similar expedition in the same region.Both sides agreed to a moratorium, promising to refrain from any hostile action until sitting down at a negotiating table later this month to try and sort out differences.But in the past week, Greece has angered Turkey with what Ankara has billed a breach of the moratorium — a maritime agreement that Athens secretly clinched with Egypt, limiting Ankara’s influence and energy designs in the region.As a result, Erdogan ordered out the Oruc Reis, sending it on its initial expedition escorted by Turkish battleships, which Ankara has said it will use if Greece makes any attempt to block the vessel from its course.On Monday, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis chaired an urgent meeting of his national security council. A terse announcement issued after the hourlong meeting said officials had assessed the situation and reviewed Greece’s response to any Turkish provocation, as they put it.Since then, Mitsotakis has also briefed leading European officials, and he is due to speak to the Secretary-General of NATO, insisting, as his advisers tell VOA, that the U.S.-led military alliance weigh in against Turkey. FILE – Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan talks to the media in Istanbul, Turkey, Aug 7, 2020.Foreign Minister Nikos Dendias, meantime, says Greece remains ready to sit down and talk with Turkey.”We understand that Turkey has called off the talks. But I am surprised it has done so,” Dendias said. “Maybe it is the result of some inexplicable rage. We can only hope it comes back to its senses.”The stakes are high, and Greece has warned it will use force to block any Turkish encroachment of its sea and land rights.Experts like Costantinos Filis expect the crisis to escalate before it eases to any show of rapprochement.”I expect the tension to grow in the coming days. But ultimately, the fate of the feeble Turkish economy will weigh in on any final decision Erdogan will take,” Filis said. If Erdogan feels Europeans are serious about their threats to retaliate, then he will probably think twice about making any risky moves. Then again, Filis says, Erdogan is extremely unpredictable, and if he feels he is cornered, he may ultimately go for a daring move to cater to his domestic audience alone.EU leaders already have threatened Turkey with economic sanctions. 
 
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Greece on Monday accused Turkey of “threatening peace” in the eastern Mediterranean and called a military meeting after Ankara resumed oil and gas exploration near a Greek island.  
 
The Greek foreign ministry said that Turkey’s decision to deploy seismic research ship Oruc Reis constituted a “new serious escalation” and “exposed” Turkey’s “destabilizing role”.  
 
Energy exploration in the gas-rich eastern Mediterranean is a frequent source of tension between Turkey and a bloc of neighbors including Greece, Cyprus, and Israel.  
 
The Greek ministry said Athens “will not accept any blackmail” and “will defend its sovereignty and its sovereign rights.”.  
 
The announcement came after Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis conferred with military chiefs and his foreign minister.  
 
Mitsotakis’ office said the prime minister had spoken to EU Council President Charles Michel on the issue, and would later speak to NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg.  
 
A senior Greek minister added that navy ships were monitoring the Turkish seismic research ship.  
 
“We are in complete political and operational readiness,” Minister of State George Gerapetritis said on state TV ERT.  
 
“Most of the fleet is ready to be deployed wherever necessary,” he said.  
 
Turkish Energy Minister Fatih Donmez had earlier tweeted that the Oruc Reis had “reached the destination where work would be undertaken”, near the island of Kastellorizo.  
 
Turkey sent out a message on NAVTEX, the international maritime navigational telex system, announcing the vessel would be carrying out activities off the island of Kastellorizo between August 10 and 23.  
 
The move came just days after the NATO allies seemed close to talks over disputed maritime zones in the Aegean.  
 
Turkey had called off an earlier search by the Oruc Reis last month to hold negotiations with Greece and Germany, which holds the rotating EU presidency.   
 
But the mood soured last week after Greece and Egypt signed an agreement to set up an exclusive economic zone in the region.  
 
The Turkish foreign ministry said the “so-called maritime deal” was “null and void”.  
 
Egypt, Cyprus and Greece have likewise denounced a contentious deal, including a security agreement, signed last year between Ankara and UN-recognized government in Libya.  
 
Greece, Cyprus and Israel in January signed an agreement for a huge pipeline project to transport gas from the eastern Mediterranean to Europe despite Turkey’s hostility to the deal.  
 
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Britain is leaving the European Union in less than five months. Requesting another extension is not possible and it is unclear if a deal will be reached in the coming months. This will have a significant impact on companies in the Netherlands, one Britain’s largest EU trading partners. Every day, as many as 60 trucks of Jan de Rijk Logistics cross the channel into Britain. The Dutch logistics company is preparing its drivers for all kinds of scenarios when Britain officially leaves the European Union at the end of 2020.Company CEO Fred Westdijk said the uncertainty of the Brexit withdrawal terms mean he is also preparing for the worst possibility.“We have instructed our drivers that if they get stuck on the British border, that we will fly in security guards to guard the trucks while it’s waiting for the border crossing. We have instructed our drivers to call our planning department, in case they get stuck and don’t have food. Some of the scenarios show queues of maybe days,” he said.Britain voted to leave the European Union in a referendum in June 2016. This means Britain will no longer be part of the customs union, ending previous free trade arrangements with EU countries.It remains uncertain what type of trade rules will apply after Brexit.In 2018, Britain was the third largest destination for Dutch exports. The Netherlands is the fourth export destination for Britain.The international food coloring company GNT Group has its headquarters in the Netherlands. Close to a third of its trade is with Britain. Supply Chain Manager Hans Bruning feels there is still a lack of information and knowledge with his customers in Britain.“When we have some discussions with our customers, they’re still asking really simple and easy questions about customs clearance and that kind of things. What do we need? How can we organize this? We would have thought that these kinds of questions were already known by the customers. But that they are there at this time that is really scaring us a little bit,” he said.Despite the expected hiccups following the withdrawal, Dutch companies are eager to continue trading with Britain.Britain and the EU have until the end of October to reach a new separate trade deal. If no agreement is reached, observers say companies might have to fall back on WTO trade regulations.
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