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Turkey summoned a top American diplomat Sunday after the U.S. Embassy’s official Twitter account “liked” a tweet that said the people of Turkey should prepare for a political era without the leader of Turkey’s national party, who is reportedly ill.The Foreign Ministry said the U.S. charge d’affaires Jeffrey Hovenier was summoned despite an embassy statement that said its Twitter account had liked “an unrelated post in error,” and apologized.Many interpreted the tweet as suggesting that the nationalist leader Devlet Bahceli could soon die. The tweet was posted by a journalist Turkey accuses of having links to a network led by a cleric who is blamed for a 2016 failed coup attempt. Turkish media reports say the journalist, Ergun Babahan, is wanted in Turkey.The tweet drew ire from President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s ruling party and as well as Bahceli’s party, which are allies. Turkey’s main opposition party also said it regarded the embassy’s move as an insult to Turkey’s parliament.The embassy issued a second apology after Hovenier was called to the Turkish Foreign Ministry.“We do not associate ourselves with Ergun Babahan nor do we endorse or agree with the content of his tweet,” the embassy’s second apology read. “We reiterate our regret for this error.”The incident occurred at a time when ties between Turkey and the U.S. are strained over Syria policies. Turkey is accusing Washington of not acting fast enough toward the creation of a so-called safe zone in northeast Syria that would keep U.S.-backed Syrian Kurdish fighters away from the Turkish-Syrian. Disagreements remain on the size of the zone.Erdogan has threatened a unilateral intervention to drive away the Kurdish fighters.Meanwhile, Erdogan and U.S President Donald Trump agreed to meet in Washington next month to discuss the proposed safe zone, Turkish officials said following a telephone call between the two leaders.During the call late Sunday, the Turkish leader “shared with President Trump his frustration over the U.S. military and security bureaucracy’s failure to implement” an agreement toward the creation of the zone, according to a statement from Erdogan’s office.Erdogan also told Trump that the creation of the safe zone was key to eliminating the threat posed to Turkey by the Kurdish fighters and would allow for the return of Syrian refugees, the statement said.
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The center-left Socialist Party collected the most votes in Portugal’s general election Sunday, an exit poll indicated, leaving it poised to continue in government for another four years.However, with the exit poll predicting they would get between 36-40% of the vote, the Socialists could fall short of a majority in parliament.That could mean they have to pursue alliances with other left-of-center parties, as they did in their last term with the Portuguese Communist Party and the radical Left Bloc, to pass legislation.The poll says the main opposition center-right Social Democratic Party will get 24-28%. It gives the radical Left Bloc 9-12%, the Portuguese Communist Party 5-7% and the Christian Democrats 2.4-5%Socialist leader and incumbent prime minister Antonio Costa took power four years ago on a promise to undo austerity measures introduced during Europe’s financial crisis, when Portugal needed an international bailout.Now his government is set to reap the rewards of an economic rebound in recent years. Growth climbed from 0.2% in 2014 to 2.1% in 2018, and unemployment dropped by around half, to 6%, over that period.As other Socialist parties have lost ground across Europe in recent years, Costa’s administration has proved wrong the doubters who said it would overspend and endeared itself to its European Union partners by straightening out Portugal’s ill-managed public finances.A woman casts her ballot at a polling station in Lisbon, Oct. 6, 2019.The budget deficit _ long a torment for Portugal as governments routinely overspent _ is now close to zero under the financial stewardship of Finance Minister Mario Centeno, who also chairs the meetings of finance ministers from the 19 European nations that used the shared euro currency.Centeno is expected to continue in the post.The Social Democrats are still associated in the public mind with deep cutbacks and a three-year recession that ended in 2014, when they were in government. Also, party leader Rui Rio has struggled to contain disagreements between factions of his party.Smaller, fringe parties may also gain a handful of seats in the 230-seat Republican Assembly, the country’s parliament, which will elect the next government. The country’s president is mostly a figurehead.Portugal hasn’t witnessed the rise of populist or far-right parties which have risen to prominence elsewhere in the EU. Protests in Portugal are traditionally channeled into a low turnout _ the exit poll said it could be a new low of around only half the country’s 10.8 million eligible voters.The next government faces plenty of challenges, including the United Kingdom’s impending departure from the EU. The U.K. is one of Portugal’s main export markets.While government spending is now more in line with revenues, Portugal’s government debt is equivalent to more than 120% of gross domestic product _ the third highest in the EU. And the combined government, private and corporate debt is more than three times the country’s GDP, the Bank of Portugal says. If European interest rates rise, the Portuguese could find themselves in big trouble.
 Other challenges include climate change, as rainfall in the southern half of the country dwindles, and an aging population that threatens the financing of the welfare system. The EU says that at current fertility rates the number of Portuguese will decline from 10.3 million this year to 6.6 million in 2100.
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Greek authorities were transferring around 570 migrants from an overcrowded camp on the island of Lesbos on Sunday, officials said.A regularly scheduled ferry left Lesbos carrying the migrants, who used to live in the migrant camp of Moria.Authorities say this is part of the plan to reduce overcrowding at the camp, where about 13,000 people live in a space designed for 3,000.Migrants, most of them Afghans, have protested, sometimes violently, over the prevailing conditions, demanding their transfer out of Moria and a quick response to their asylum demands.Authorities say the 570 are among what they term “vulnerable categories” — families, single women with children and unaccompanied minors.The ferry will arrive at Piraeus, the main port in Athens, on Monday morning. The migrants will be moved to a camp near the northern city of Thessaloniki.Separately, Greek authorities said a Syrian toddler drowned at a beach in southern Greece after the boy wandered away from his parents and exited a migrant camp.The Ministry of Citizen Protection, which oversees Greek police, says that the boy was 2 years old. The boy drowned Sunday afternoon after leaving the camp in the city of Andravida in the western Peloponnese region. An inquiry has been launched by Greek officials.Germany’s top security official, meanwhile, said European Union nations need to work better together on the issue of migration or they risk facing a new flood of asylum-seekers that could rival that of 2015.Following a trip last week to Turkey and Greece, Interior Minister Horst Seehofer told the Bild newspaper on Sunday that “we need to do more to help our European partners with the controls on the EU’s external borders.”He said “if we don’t do that, we will experience a surge of refugees like 2015, perhaps even bigger.”Germany alone took in 890,000 migrants in 2015.The comments come ahead of meetings Tuesday with EU interior ministers on the issue.Seehofer also tells the Welt newspaper that Europe needs to do more to help Turkey in dealing with millions of Syrian refugees. 
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Thousands of demonstrators are rallying in Kyiv against President Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s plan to hold local elections in eastern Ukrainian territory that is under the control of Russia-backed separatists.Protesters at the rally are denouncing the plan as capitulation to Russia.On October 1, Ukraine, Russia, and mediators Germany and France signed a tentative agreement with the separatists on guidelines for holding local elections in eastern Ukraine.Zelenskiy has described the deal as a necessary intermediate step ahead of organizing a summit with the leaders of Russia, France, and Germany to push for a peace deal.In the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv, which is under Kyiv’s control, about 300 people gathered outside of the regional state administration headquarters on Sunday to protest the election plan.Participants of public organizations, activists, and representatives of political parties joined the all-Ukrainian protest rally in Kharkiv.Their main demand is for an extraordinary session of the Kharkiv Regional Council in order to draw up a formal complaint against the plan — in particular, the introduction of a special status for the Donbas region and the removal of Ukrainian government troops from the current front lines.’Capitulation Headquarters’Participants of the rally also announced the creation of what they call “Capitulation Headquarters,” which includes representatives of various political and public associations.The five-year conflict between the separatists and Ukrainian government forces has killed more than 13,000 people.Zelenskiy has vowed that elections would not be held in separatist-held areas of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions until all armed formations have left the area and Ukraine regains control over about 400 kilometers of borderland with Russia.”There cannot be and will not be elections held at gunpoint,” Zelenskiy said on October 2. “There will be no capitulation.”The regions would receive self-governing status once they hold elections that are deemed to be free and fair by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), according to what is known as the Steinmeier Formula, a component of an overall road map for attaining peace.The Kremlin has said that it approves of the deal. On October 6, Russian presidential aide Yury Ushakov said the signing of the Steinmeier Formula has increased the chances of organizing a summit that includes Russia, Ukraine, France, and Germany.Moscow had demanded that Kyiv agree to the Steinmeier Formula before it would consent to four-way peace talks with Ukraine.The four countries have not met for peace talks since October 2016. 
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Voting has begun in Kosovo’s snap parliamentary elections after a campaign dominated by the issues of corruption, high unemployment, and a possible peace deal with Serbia that would clear the way for Kosovo’s membership in the United Nations.Valdete Daka, head of the Central Election Commission, was among the first to vote in Pristina on Sunday when the polls opened at 7 a.m. local time. She urged all Kosovars to cast a ballot before the polls close at 7 p.m.Kosovo President Hashim Thaci also called for as much citizen participation as possible, and for a free and fair election process. Thaci said in a Facebook post on October 6 that the new government which emerges as a result of the vote should “improve the lives of our citizens and face the challenges ahead.””We have built a tradition of holding good elections. Let Kosovo win today,” Thaci added.Some 1.9 million people are eligible to cast ballots. They will elect 120 lawmakers in what is Kosovo’s fourth parliamentary election since it declared independence from Serbia in 2008.”Voting was very easy but let’s see what our votes will bring,” said 46-year-old taxi driver Avdi Morina after casting his ballot at a sports hall in Pristina.Mentor Nimani, a 47-year-old university lecturer of international law in Pristina, said before casting his ballot that Kosovo needs “freedom, a state governed by the rule of law, prosperity, and economic development.”Retired doctor Muharrem Bajrami said after voting in Kosovo’s capital that voters want “well-being and jobs for young people.”Kosovo has Europe’s youngest population with an average age of 29, and economic growth has averaged 4 percent over the past decade. But it remains very poor — unemployment is 25 percent — and more than 200,000 Kosovars have left and applied for asylum in the European Union since Pristina won its independence.The election was triggered by the resignation of Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj in July after war crimes prosecutors at The Hague summoned him for questioning over his wartime role as a commander of the Kosovo Liberation Army (UCK).Public dissatisfactionPublic dissatisfaction with the record of Haradinaj’s three-party governing coalition has boosted the chances of opposition parties, with the center-right Democratic League of Kosovo (LDK) and the nationalist, left-leaning Vetevendosje vying for first place.The LDK’s candidate for prime minister, Vjosa Osmani, told RFE/RL’s Balkan Service that her election as Kosovo’s first female prime minister could be “transformative not only for the institutions of Kosovo but for society as a whole.”Osmani vowed to usher in a “new mindset” and ruled out governing alongside the long-in-power Democratic Party of Kosovo (PDK) after partnering with it in the recent three-party coalition.She also pledged that, “instead of investing the bulk of the budget in asphalt,” her government would “completely turn its focus to investing in human capital.”Other potential prime ministers are thought to include Haradinaj, running for the Alliance for the Future of Kosovo (AAK) and packaging himself as a seasoned “21st-century statesman”; PDK leader Kadri Veseli, who as parliamentary speaker dissolved the legislature to set the stage for these elections; Fatmir Limaj, a deputy prime minister in the outgoing coalition and leader of the Social Democratic Initiative (NISMA); and Albin Kurti, leader of the nationalist Self-Determination (Vetevendosje) party, which has used extreme methods like throwing tear gas and water bottles in parliament to protest against deals with Serbia.With the exception of Osmani, all of the leading contenders for the prime minister’s post are former members of the Kosovo Liberation Army, an ethnic-Albanian separatist militia that fought against Serb authorities in Kosovo’s 1998-1999 war that ended when NATO intervened on behalf of the ethnic Albanian majority.Ten seats of the 120 are reserved for ethnic Serbs and another 10 are set aside for other minorities, including ethnic Turks and Roma.The Serb community is represented in the election by four political entities – the Kosovo Serb Party from Leposavic, the Gracanica-based Freedom Coalition, the Independent Liberal Party, also from Gracanica, and the Serb List based in North Mitrovica.The total number of voters in 10 Serb-majority municipalities is over 117,000, while 50 candidates are competing for the 10 seats reserved for ethnic Serbs.Candidates from the Serb List voted together at a polling station in North Mitrovica immediately after the polling station opened.With them were workers of institutions funded by the Republic of Serbia. Based on a Central Election Committee decision, voting is only allowed with Kosovo documents.Kosovo’s independence has been recognized by more than 110 states but not by others, including five EU members, as well as Serbia, Russia, and China.Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic announced during last month’s UN General Assembly that he was “working on new withdrawals of recognition” from some UN states.’Political priority’European Union-sponsored talks aimed at normalizing ties between the two countries stalled last year over Kosovo’s decision to impose a 100 percent tax on goods from Serbia.The EU has sent a 61-member team of observers for the election to show that Pristina “remains a political priority.”The EU regards Kosovo as at a crossroads, but Brussels’ leverage is limited amid an ongoing Brexit debate, some members’ reluctance to recognize Kosovo, and little prospect of early entry for aspiring members.So Haradinaj and others have largely sought to tap into voters’ perceptions of Western support for Kosovo via the United States.Haradinaj, endorsed by two of the outgoing ruling coalition’s parties, has publicly declared his good relations with Americans while at the same time suggesting that Washington is an ally of Kosovo but not of all Kosovar politicians.Billboards for the PDK variously showed party leader Veseli next to U.S. President Donald Trump and ex-President Bill Clinton, whose decision to intervene militarily in 1999 won him lasting admirers in Kosovo.U.S. and European officials have repeatedly dismissed the idea that they supported any particular sides in Kosovo’s election.But the potential for even unofficial American influence among Kosovar voters was thrust into sharper relief this week by a campaign appearance in Pristina by Trump’s former acting attorney general, Matthew Whitaker, for the PDK.Whitaker, now a political consultant, expressed support for his “friend” Veseli at an October 1 rally as a potential “prime minister that looks to the United States for friendship and support.”Not to be outdone, the leader of Kosovar independence icon Ibrahim Rugova’s former party, the Democratic League of Kosovo chief Isa Mustafa, responded that “if anyone is with America, it is the Democratic League of Kosovo,” adding that the PDK’s billboards were an “abuse” of U.S. prestige.The U.S. Embassy in Pristina was quick to reiterate that it didn’t “endorse or support” any one candidate or party in the Kosovo vote.In August, the so-called Quint states — Italy, France, Germany, the United States, and the United Kingdom — challenged Pristina and Belgrade to restart talks “with urgency” and said the current stalemate was “not sustainable.”And Washington showed its concern with the quagmire when the White House announced on October 3 that Richard Grenell, the U.S. ambassador to Germany, was named as the special envoy for Serbia and Kosovo peace negotiations.That suggests that no matter who next takes the reins of government in Kosovo, they will immediately face tough decisions about how and when to reengage with neighbor Serbia and the rest of Europe.But there’s no telling whether that’s sufficient incentive for Kosovo’s voters.”I’m selling nine votes or exchanging them for Golf 2 seats,” read one of the many offers of votes for cash last week on MerrJep.com, one of Kosovo’s most popular buy-and-sell sites.A MerrJep representative told RFE/RL’s Balkan Service that the site was trying to weed out such offers — selling votes is illegal — but that its small staff just couldn’t keep up.
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Masood Farivar and Steve Herman contributed to this report.A second U.S. intelligence official has approached the intelligence community’s watchdog with “first-hand information” that backs the original whistleblower complaint against President Donald Trump’s dealings with Ukraine, a lawyer representing the two said on Sunday.Mark Zaid, who represents both whistleblowers, said the second whistleblower came forward after the intelligence community’s inspector general began investigating in August whether the complaint was credible and of “urgent concern.”  The complaint has sparked an impeachment inquiry into Trump. “It’s not a new approach,” Zaid told VOA.   “It was part of the ICIG’s urgent concern investigation.”The first whistleblower filed a complaint regarding a July 25 phone call between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in which Trump asked for help investigating a Democratic rival, former Vice President Joe Biden along with Biden’s son, Hunter.FILE – U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during a bilateral meeting with Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskiy on the sidelines of the 74th session of the U.N. General Assembly in New York, Sept. 25, 2019.
Trump tweeted Saturday, “The first so-called second hand information “Whistleblower” got my phone conversation almost completely wrong, so now word is they are going to the bench and another “Whistleblower” is coming in from the Deep State, also with second hand info. Meet with Shifty. Keep them coming!”The first so-called second hand information “Whistleblower” got my phone conversation almost completely wrong, so now word is they are going to the bench and another “Whistleblower” is coming in from the Deep State, also with second hand info. Meet with Shifty. Keep them coming!— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 6, 2019Trump has insisted that no pressure was exerted during the July 25 call with Ukraine’s president. He has repeatedly termed the call with Zelenskiy as “perfect,” while attacking his critics as “traitors” and alleging a “coup” is in the works to remove him from officeThe president, however, told reporters on Thursday he would like both Ukraine and China to investigate ties between their countries and Biden’s son.Some members of Trump’s own Republican Party criticized Trump over comment. Those included U.S. Senators Mitt Romney, Ben Sasse and Susan Collins.
 
The president lashed out at Romney on Saturday and Sunday, tweeting “The Democrats are lucky that they don’t have any Mitt Romney types. They may be lousy politicians, with really bad policies [Open Borders, Sanctuary Cities etc.], but they stick together!”The Democrats are lucky that they don’t have any Mitt Romney types. They may be lousy politicians, with really bad policies (Open Borders, Sanctuary Cities etc.), but they stick together!— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 6, 2019 
The first whistleblower complaint prompted House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi to launch impeachment proceedings against Trump, saying that his actions threatened national security.The complaint alleges Trump used “the power of his office to solicit interference from a foreign country in the 2020 election,” and that Attorney General Bill Barr and Trump’s personal attorney, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, also appear to be involved in the effort.  
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Caviar, a food associated with luxury, is being produced for the first time in Madagascar. The product makes consumers in faraway France happy, and provides hundreds of jobs in this African country.  VOA’s Jim Randle has our story.
 
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Kosovo is electing a new parliament amid calls for leaders to resume dialogue with Serbia over normalizing ties.About 1.9 million eligible voters Sunday started to cast their ballots to elect 120 lawmakers.The vote comes after the outgoing prime minister resigned in July following a request from a Hague-based court to question him over crimes against ethnic Serbs during and after the country’s 1998-99 war.No single political party is likely to win the vote on its own.The Serb minority has 10 seats and 10 others belong to other minorities.Kosovo became independent in 2008 after NATO intervened in 1999 to stop then-Serbian strongman Slobodan Milosevic’s bloody crackdown on Albanian independence fighters’ insurrection. It is recognized by more than 100 countries but not by Serbia.
 
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Hundreds of climate activists barricaded themselves into a Paris shopping center Saturday as security forces tried to remove them, ahead of a planned series of protests around the world by the Extinction Rebellion movement.Campaigners faced off against police and some inconvenienced shoppers as they occupied part of the Italie 2 mall in southeast Paris.They unfurled banners with slogans like “Burn capitalism not petrol” above restaurants and the window displays fashion boutiques.A police officer removes a bicycle outside Lambeth County Court, during a raid on an Extinction Rebellion storage facility, in London, Oct. 5, 2019.The protest comes ahead of planned disruption to 60 cities around the world from Monday in a fortnight of civil disobedience from Extinction Rebellion (XR), which is warning of an environmental “apocalypse.”As the center tried to close in the evening, security forces ordered the protesters to leave the area, activists told AFP.According to images broadcast on social networks, police then tried to enter the building, while protesters blocked entrances with tables and chairs.“I am with XR to say stop this crazy system before it destroys everything,” one young woman told AFP, giving only her first name Lucie.Other campaign groups also joined in with the Paris shopping center demonstration, including some members of the “yellow vest” anti-government protest group.Non-violent protests are chiefly planned by XR from Monday in Europe, North America and Australia, but events are also set to take place in India, Buenos Aires, Cape Town and Wellington.Activists arrive at a camp set for Extinction Rebellion climate activists next to the Reichstag in Berlin, Oct. 5, 2019. Hundreds of activists plan to block major roads in the German capital in a week of protests for new climate-protection policies.Another protest was held in Berlin Saturday, with campaigners setting up camp near the parliament building.“To governments of the world: we declared a climate and ecological emergency. You did not do enough. To everybody else: rebel,” XR said on its website ahead of its International Rebellion wave of activism.“You can’t count on us or Greta to do this for you,” it said, referring to teenage Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg. “Look inside yourself and rebel.”Extinction Rebellion was established last year in Britain by academics and has become one of the world’s fastest-growing environmental movements.Campaigners want the government to declare a climate and ecological emergency, reduce greenhouse gas emissions to zero by 2025, halt biodiversity loss and be led by new “citizens’ assemblies on climate and ecological justice.”
 
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Thousands marched in Edinburgh Saturday calling for Scottish independence, with a possible British exit from the European Union just weeks away and calls growing for a fresh vote in Scotland on breaking from Britain.The demonstrators, many carrying Scottish flags, some wearing kilts and a few playing musical instruments – including bagpipes – set off from Holyrood Park in the heart of the Scottish capital.Among them was lawyer and Scottish Nationalist (SNP) lawmaker Joanna Cherry, who was behind one of the successful legal challenges to Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s decision to suspend parliament.She was also one of main backers of a law passed last month forcing Johnson to ask the European Union for more time to avoid crashing out of the EU without a deal.The group organizing Saturday’s march, All Under One Banner, said were hoping to get 100,000 people to attend.Scotland voted against independence in a 2014 referendum by 55 percent.But nationalists argue that the 2016 British referendum in favor of Brexit means another independence referendum is necessary — because Scotland voted by 62 percent to stay in the EU.Scotland’s First Minister Nicola Sturgeon, leader of the SNP, has argued that Brexit will devastate the economy.Nationalists also argue that some people voted against independence thinking it would guarantee their place inside the EU.Sturgeon, who wants a second independence referendum in 2021, was unable to attend the march, but tweeted a message of support.Some independence activists also joined the march, while a few pro-Union protesters carrying Union Jack flags staged a small counter-demonstration. 
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U.S. and North Korean officials are set to resume working-level nuclear talks in Stockholm.They will be the first formal negotiations since U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un agreed in June to restart them after they collapsed in February at a summit in Vietnam.The talks broke down over how to pace sanctions relief with steps to dismantle North Korea’s nuclear program.U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in Greece Saturday he is “hopeful” progress would be made and that U.S. negotiators arrived in Stockholm “with a set of ideas.”It is not clear if either side has softened their negotiating stance, though recent developments suggest an increased willingness to work towards a deal.Late last month, Trump said a “new method” to the nuclear talks would be “very good,” echoing similar language North Korean officials have used for months.North Korea has repeatedly said it is not willing to unilaterally surrender its nuclear weapons. Pyongyang, instead, prefers a phased approach in which the U.S. takes simultaneous steps to relieve sanctions and provide security guarantees.Until recently, most Trump White House officials insisted they were not interested in a phased approach, and that North Korea must agree to completely abandon its nuclear weapons before receiving sanctions relief.Saturday’s expected talks came days after North Korea said it test-fired a new ballistic missile developed for a submarine launch. 
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U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Saturday defended the Trump administration’s approach to Ukraine that is at the center of an impeachment inquiry. He rejected allegations it was at best inappropriate or at worst an illegal abuse of power for which Congress should remove President Donald Trump from office.Pompeo maintained that the investigation the United States sought from Ukraine’s government involved possible interference from Ukraine in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. He did not speak to Trump’s stated desire for Ukraine to specifically investigate former Vice President Joe Biden’s and his son Hunter, which impeachment investigators are focused on since a whistleblower complaint surfaced last month.Pompeo criticized the impeachment inquiry as “clearly political” and said the actions of the State Department were aimed solely at improving relations with the new government of Ukraine that took office this spring. He also said the work of a former special envoy to Ukraine, Kurt Volker, was based on the direction of the president to do just that.Kurt Volker, a former special envoy to Ukraine, is leaving after a closed-door interview with House investigators as House Democrats proceed with the impeachment investigation of President Donald Trump, at the Capitol in Washington, Oct. 3, 2019.Volker was interviewed by congressional investigators on Thursday and turned over text messages between himself and other officials. Those messages detailed their push to get Ukraine to agree to investigations into an energy company on whose board Hunter Biden sat, and 2016 election interference. In exchange, American officials dangled the offer of a meeting with Trump in Washington for Ukraine’s new president.“The State Department was very focused, at the direction of the president, on creating space where we could ultimately deliver a good relationship with this government,” Pompeo said. “Ambassador Volker worked diligently to create that opportunity.”Robert Mueller, the special counsel who investigated Russian interference in the 2016 election, has warned about the dangers of Moscow’s intrusions in the American political system.Pompeo said the administration had an obligation to investigate alleged election interference and ask foreign governments for assistance if needed.“The administration was incredibly focused on making sure that we worked with Ukraine in a way that was appropriate. It is not only appropriate, it is our duty if we think there was interference in the election of 2016,” he said. “I think everyone recognizes that governments have an obligation, indeed a duty, to ensure that elections happen with integrity, without interference.”In Trump’s July telephone call with Ukraine’s president, Trump referred to a discredited conspiracy theory that tries to cast doubt on Russia’s role in the 2016 hacking of the Democratic National Committee and alleges that Ukraine had spread disinformation during the U.S. election.Separately, on impeachment, Pompeo said the State Department had responded to a congressional subpoena for him to produce Ukraine-related documents. He did not say what that response was.He had faced a Friday deadline to hand over the documents, but he suggested that he had not and would instead move to comply with the subpoena at his own pace. 
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The European Union has rejected a British request to hold Brexit talks this weekend, British media reported, as Prime Minister Boris Johnson reiterated his commitment to leaving the bloc Oct. 31 despite the possibility of a not reaching an exit deal.The European Commission said that Johnson’s new Brexit proposals do not provide any basis for finalizing a separation agreement, according to Sky News.Talks on Johnson’s plan to replace the Irish backstop will not take place over the weekend, EU Commission spokeswoman Natasha Bertaud was quoted as saying by Sky.She added that the UK will be given “another opportunity to present its proposals in detail” Monday.“If we held talks at the weekend it would look like these were proper negotiations,” the Times newspaper had earlier cited an EU diplomat as saying. “We’re still a long way from that.”Johnson has consistently said he will not ask for a Brexit delay, reiterating the point on Friday.“New deal or no deal — but no delay. #GetBrexitDone #LeaveOct31” Johnson said in a tweet.However, his government also acknowledged for the first time Friday that Johnson will send a letter to EU asking for a Brexit delay if no divorce deal has been reached by Oct. 19.Johnson has not explained the apparent contradiction, with opponents believing he will seek some kind of legal escape route to avoid asking for an extension, or try to pressure the EU into refusing to agree to such a request.
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Senior German and European Union officials have finished a two-day visit to Turkey to save a migrant deal in an effort to avert a humanitarian crisis.The number of migrants entering Greece from Turkey continues to surge, following a threat by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to open the borders to Europe.German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer, EU migration commissioner Dimitris Avramopoulos and French ambassador to Turkey Charles Fries held meetings that began Thursday with senior Turkish ministers.”Productive and frank,” Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said Friday in describing the talks. “We said that migration is a humanitarian issue, and our cooperation should continue. Also, we laid out our expectations from the EU.””There is an urgent need to control the departures from Turkey,” commissioner Avramopoulos said, as the increasing numbers of refugees and migrants arriving on the Greek islands are causing alarm within the EU.”I appreciate the work already done by Turkey, especially as the migratory pressure on Turkey continues,” he added, speaking at a joint press conference Thursday evening with the Turkish and German interior ministers and the ambassador.”Without your solidarity, the migration problem in our region would not have been overcome,” Seehofer said.Heading their delegations, Turkey’s Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu, 2nd right, and European Commissioner for Immigration Dimitris Avramopoulos, left, attend a meeting to discuss cooperation on migration management in Ankara, Turkey, Oct. 4, 2019.Gatekeeper roleSince Ankara signed a deal in 2016 with the EU to control migration, Turkey has become Europe’s gatekeeper. The agreement ended the mass migration into the EU, which saw nearly a million people entering Greece in 2015. In the following years, the number fell to around 30,000 annually.In the last few months, however, numbers have been rising again. According to the United Nations, 9,000 migrants entered Greece from Turkey in September, bringing the total to more than 40,000 since the start of the year.The rise in migrants coincides with Erdogan threatening to open Turkey’s borders to migrants unless his country’s needs are addressed.Erdogan accuses the EU of failing to honor its financial commitments as part of the migrant deal. Under the agreement, $6.5 billion was pledged to help Ankara host 3.6 million Syrian refugees, but as of June, only $2.4 billion had been paid.Brussels said Ankara has failed to provide details on how the money will be used. Erdogan has dismissed such claims as excuses, pointing out that Turkey has already spent more than $30 billion hosting the refugees.Analysts suggest Ankara does have powerful leverage over Europe.”Europeans are scared stiff of another possible influx of refugees,” said Soli Ozel, an international relations lecturer at Istanbul’s Kadir Has University. “Straight after Erdogan spoke about opening borders, [German Chancellor Angela] Merkel called Erdogan. What Ankara wants is money.”Seehofer said Turkey has faced “enormous” migratory pressure.”And that is why we must look at how this pact between the European Union and Turkey can be strengthened,” he added, after meeting his Turkish counterpart, Suleyman Soylu. The German minister indicated extra funding for Turkey was on the table.Ankara’s stepping up of pressure on Europe comes as Turkey braces for a new surge of Syrian refugees. Soylu warned Thursday that up to 3.75 million Syrians could seek refuge in Turkey if Damascus forces overrun Idlib, the last rebel-controlled enclave in northwest Syria.”Many people in Turkey are already very unhappy with the nearly 4 million refugees,” said Professor Mesut Casin, an Erdogan adviser. “If more millions [refugees] come from Idlib, Turkey cannot take any more, as Mr. Erdogan said Turkey would open the border to Europe. The refugee problem is not just Turkey’s problem, but Europe’s.”Members of pro-Islamic groups stage a rally to defend Syrian refugees and migrants, in Istanbul, July 27, 2019.Resettlement planErdogan is pressing Europe for support for his plans to resettle millions of Syrians in northeast Syria. Turkish forces are poised to create a 30-kilometer-deep corridor into the region. Ankara says the corridor is necessary to protect the Turkish border from the Syrian Kurdish militia, the YPG, which is designated as a terrorist group by Turkey.Syria, Russia and Iran have raised questions over Erdogan’s plans for a mass return of Syrians, as Ankara remains at loggerheads with Washington over Ankara’s plans in northeast Syria.The two NATO allies have a tentative deal to create a corridor in Syria, but analysts say significant differences remain. The Syrian Kurdish militia is a crucial ally of the Washington-led war against the Islamic State terror group.Ankara says its patience is running out with Washington, warning it will act unilaterally in Syria if its agreement is not implemented quickly.Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Akar discussed Syria by telephone Thursday with U.S. Defense Secretary Mark Esper. Friday saw the third joint patrol between Turkish and U.S. forces in Syria. The patrols are part of efforts to create a corridor to protect Turkey’s border.Some analysts suggest Erdogan’s stepping up of pressure on his Western allies could be a sign the Turkish president realizes that time is running out to address mounting domestic pressure over Syrian refugees.”Domesticity is a huge problem. This is a huge problem for Erdogan. This is what is called chickens coming from home to roost,” said Ozel, the Kadir Has University lecturer. “My understanding is, anywhere in the country where there is a concentration of Syrians is like a tinderbox. I was just with people who work in the municipalities of Hatay and Antep [Turkish cities bordering Syria]. They are really scared that something is just going to explode.”
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As many as 35 Russian mercenaries are reported to have been killed in Libya while they were fighting for Khalifa Haftar, the military general most associated with the rule of the late leader Muammar Gaddafi, who launched an offensive earlier this year on the Libyan capital of Tripoli, home to the country’s internationally-recognized government, according to a Russian media.The mercenaries are thought to work for the Wagner Group, a military contractor run by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a businessman nicknamed Putin’s Chef because he holds lucrative Kremlin catering contracts.Asked by VOA about the reports of the fatalities in an airstrike on the outskirts of Tripoli, where Haftar’s forces have been bogged down for months, Maria Zakharova, the Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman, said she had “no detailed information” and suggested directing questions to Russia’s defense ministry.The spokeswoman later dismissed any notion the mercenaries are Kremlin-linked, saying there’s little Russia can legally do to prevent “private Russian citizens from acting as bodyguards overseas.” She added, “If Russian citizens get into trouble, our diplomatic missions can provide support for them.”FILE – An image grab from a video reportedly shows fighters of Libyan military strongman Khalifa Haftar’s self-proclaimed Libyan National Army on a road south of the capital Tripoli, May 26, 2019.Meduza, an independent investigative website, reported Thursday that up to 35 Wagner Group fighters were killed last month when an airstrike targeted them. The website, which has headquarters outside Russia and is currently under investigation by a Russian parliamentary commission for violating Russian censorship laws, quoted sources within the Wagner Group and Russian veterans saying the dead fighters mainly came from the Krasnodar, Sverdlovsk, and Murmansk regions of Russia.Some had fought previously in the Donbas, the eastern Ukraine region, where a five-year conflict has left more than 13,000 dead.Meduza interviewed the partner of one of the men believed to have been killed. Mother-of-one Oksana Chumakova said she’d not heard from her husband, Artyom Nevyantsev, but added he was away on a classified trip. “I don’t know where he is,” she said in a voice message to the news-site, with rising anxiety.Nevyantsev, a 38-year-old Yekaterinburg native and a veteran of the Second Chechen War, was listed by Ukrainian authorities as having been active in 2014 fighting alongside pro-Moscow separatists in the Donbas.One of the veterans quoted by Meduza subsequently denied having talked to the news outlet after the story was posted.Yevgeny Prigozhin, the owner of the Wagner Group, was indicted last year by U.S. special counsel Robert Mueller for overseeing a troll factory that led Russian meddling in U.S. elections. Prigozhin mocked the Mueller indictment, telling the Russian state news agency Ria Novosti, “The Americans are very impressionable people; they see what they want to see. I have a lot of respect for them. I am not upset at all that I ended up on this list. If they want to see the devil, let them see him.”Since the indictment, Prigozhin has emerged as a key figure in what analysts say is a wide-ranging Kremlin influence operation aimed at boosting Russian clout in Africa at the expense of Western powers.FILE – Kremlin-linked businessman Yevgeny Prigozhin gestures on the sidelines of a meeting at the Konstantin palace outside St. Petersburg, Russia, Aug. 9, 2016.According to documents published in June by an investigative unit funded by Mikhail Khodorkovksy, an exiled critic of Russian leader Vladimir Putin, Prigozhin is the go-to oligarch for Moscow’s ambition to turn sub-Saharan and North Africa into a strategic hub and to reduce Western influence. The documents, internal communications shared between Prigozhin’s employees, outline what Wagner has accomplished and plans to do in 13 African states, including the Central African Republic, Madagascar, Sudan, Zimbabwe, Libya and South Africa.The St. Petersburg-based Prigozhin has denied in the past the existence of the Wagner Group, but both were sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury Department in 2016 for supporting pro-Moscow separatists in the conflict in Ukraine’s Donbas region.The Treasury Department said Prigozhin provided extensive support to the separatists, including constructing a military base near Ukraine for Russian troops to use for deployments. Some Russian opposition leaders and independent military analysts suspect Wagner is a disguised unit of Russia’s defense ministry, allowing the Kremlin to deny involvement and to minimize official military death tolls.Western intelligence and military officials estimate that several hundred Russian soldiers are now present in Libya, providing the self-styled Field Marshal Haftar with logistical support and artillery as well as operating military drones. Libyan government troops posted video of possessions said to belong to the Russian mercenaries killed in last month’s airstrike, including a bank card belonging to Vadim Bekshenev, an alleged Wagner platoon commander.As the Libyan conflict rages, more foreign actors are being drawn into the fighting between the U.N.-recognized government of Fayez al-Sarraj and forces loyal to Haftar, who has the backing of the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Egypt, as well as Russia.In New York last week for the U.N. General Assembly’s annual meeting, Sarraj told The Washington Post on Friday, “We ask the United States, if it believes in a political solution, to stop these countries from providing [Haftar] the money, the equipment and the weapons that has enabled him to continue.” 
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