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☆ Nobel winner Bialiatski jailed in Belarus for a decade, sparking outcry
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-03 | by ( Andrew Osborn | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

Footage from the cramped Minsk court showed Bialiatski, who co-founded the Viasna (Spring) human rights group, looking sombre, his hands cuffed behind his back, as he and his co-defendants watched proceedings from a courtroom cage. Bialiatski, who was arrested in 2021, and three co-defendants were charged with financing protests and smuggling money. Belarusian state news agency Belta confirmed the court had handed down long jail sentences to all the men, including a decade in prison for Bialiatski. That, she said, placed human rights defenders at risk of criminal prosecution for their legitimate activities. Viasna, the organisation he co-founded, took a leading role in providing legal and financial assistance to those jailed.

☆ Hungary starts process to ratify Finland, Sweden NATO bid
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-01 | by ( Gergely Szakacs | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

[1/4] A general view as the Hungarian parliament starts debating the ratification of Finland and Sweden's NATO membership in Budapest, Hungary, March 1, 2023. Sweden and Finland applied last year to join the transatlantic defence pact after Russia's invasion of Ukraine. With Hungary's ratification process stranded in parliament since July, nationalist Prime Minister Viktor Orban aired concerns about Sweden and Finland's NATO membership for the first time last Friday. "Finland and Sweden's NATO membership serves our foreign policy, security and economic interests and it also strengthens NATO." Finnish Foreign Minister Pekka Haavisto said on Tuesday Hungary intended to send a parliamentary delegation to Finland on or around March 9 to discuss the Nordic nation's bid for accession to NATO.

☆ Belarus official says claim activists blew up Russian spy plane near Minsk is fake
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-28 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

GENEVA, Feb 28 (Reuters) - A senior Belarusian official on Tuesday dismissed as fake a claim by anti-government activists that they had blown up a Russian military surveillance aircraft in a weekend drone attack on an airfield outside the Belarusian capital Minsk. Aliaksandr Azarov, leader of Belarusian anti-government organization BYPOL, was quoted on Sunday as saying that Belarusian "partisans" had used drones to carry out the attack on a Russian Beriev A-50 spy plane. Britain's military intelligence service said on Tuesday that attribution for the attack and damage to the aircraft had not been officially corroborated. "However, the loss of an A-50 Mainstay would be significant as it is critical to Russian air operations for providing an air battlespace picture," it said in a statement. "This will likely leave 6 operational A-50s in service, further constraining Russian air operations."

[1/3] An Ethiopian boy who fled the ongoing fighting in Tigray region, gestures in the Hamdayet village, in eastern Kassala state, Sudan December 15, 2020. The Ethiopian government's two-year conflict with forces in the northern Tigray region ended last November with thousands dead and millions uprooted. Though the Geneva-based U.N. Human Rights Council has never ended a probe before its mandate, Addis Ababa has circulated a draft version of a resolution calling for the Tigray inquiry to stop some six months early. AFRICAN OPPOSITIONThe war pitted the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) against federal troops, who were also backed by fighters from nearby Amhara region and Eritrea. Reporting by Emma Farge, Gabrielle Tetrault-Farber; Additional reporting by Dawit Endeshaw in Addis AbabaOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

☆ Russia 'not a responsible nuclear power' for suspending new START treaty - U.S. official
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-27 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: 1 min

GENEVA, Feb 27 (Reuters) - Russia's decision to suspend its participation in the new START nuclear arms control treaty shows it is not a responsible nuclear partner, a U.S. official said on Monday at the United Nations disarmament conference in Geneva. "Only a few days ago, President (Vladimir) Putin announced that Russia was unilaterally suspending the implementation of the New START treaty. Russia is once again showing the world that it is not a responsible nuclear power," said Bonnie Jenkins, U.S. Under-Secretary for Arms Control and International Security. Reporting by Gabrielle Tétrault-Farber and Emma Farge Editing by Gareth JonesOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

During the session, which opens on Monday and runs until April 4, many states will seek to extend the mandate of a U.N investigation body set up to probe atrocities in Ukraine. Kyiv and its allies are disgruntled by the participation of Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, who will address the council on Thursday. Filipenko said Ukraine did not welcome Russia's presence and would "act accordingly," without giving details. The Geneva-based U.N. human rights council is the only body made up of governments to protect human rights worldwide. Countries also will closely watch how Volker Turk, U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights since October, refers to China after his predecessor Michelle Bachelet was accused by some rights groups of being too soft on Beijing.

☆ Threatened by war, Ukrainian paintings find safe haven in Switzerland
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-23 | by ( Gabrielle Tétrault-Farber | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

[1/5] Visitors look at paintings from the collection of the National Art Gallery of Kyiv during the "From Dusk To Dawn" exhibition at the Rath Museum in Geneva, Switzerland February 22, 2023. The museum in Geneva, which took in paintings from Madrid's Prado Museum during the Spanish civil war in the 1930s, sent packing materials to ensure safe transport. The Musee Rath, which hosts the Musee d'Art et d'Histoire's temporary exhibitions, is now showing "From Dusk to Dawn", showcasing works by Ukrainian painters from the Kyiv gallery. Vakulenko said it was impossible to insure the paintings crossing Ukraine, so the shipment was accompanied by security on its two-day journey to the Polish border. "The most important thing was keeping secrecy of the cargo's movement on the territory of Ukraine," Vakulenko said.

☆ Northwest Syria of 'greatest concern' after quake -WHO
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-15 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

"It's clear that the zone of greatest concern at the moment is the area of northwestern Syria," WHO's emergencies director, Mike Ryan, told a briefing in Geneva. We have to remember here that in Syria, we've had ten years of war. Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the head of the World Health Organization (WHO), speaks with a man as he visits quake survivors at a hospital in Aleppo, in the aftermath of the earthquake, Syria February 11, 2023. We've seen the deployment of emergency medical teams. We've seen all the things that we need to see in a disaster.

☆ Disease the new threat as Turkey faces post-quake water shortage
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-15 | by ( Henriette Chacar | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

[1/2] Debris are seen in the aftermath of a deadly earthquake in Hatay, Turkey February 15, 2023. REUTERS/Clodagh KilcoyneKAHRAMANMARAS, Turkey, Feb 15 (Reuters) - More than a week after his home was wrecked in a deadly earthquake that hit southern Turkey, Mohammad Emin's body is still covered in dust and grime. He also said he had not been able to take a shower nor, like several other camp residents who Reuters spoke to, change his clothes. Batyr Berdyklychev, the World Health Organization's representative in Turkey, said the water shortage "increases the risk of waterborne diseases and outbreaks of communicable diseases." The WHO was working with local authorities to step up monitoring of waterborne diseases, seasonal influenza and COVID-19 among those displaced, he added.

☆ Capitals' Ovechkin announces death of his father
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-15 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

Feb 15 (Reuters) - Washington Capitals captain Alex Ovechkin announced the death of his father on Wednesday, a day after his National Hockey League team said they would be without the Russian forward for the foreseeable future. "My father died ... I thank everyone for the support but ask for your understanding and not to disturb my family in this extremely difficult time for us! Thank you," Ovechkin wrote in an Instagram post translated by Reuters. Reporting by Frank Pingue in Toronto; Additional reporting by Gabrielle Tetrault-Farber in GenevaOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

☆ Cameroon detects two suspected cases of Marburg virus near Eq. Guinea
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-14 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

Equatorial Guinea officially declared its first outbreak of the Marburg virus, an illness similar to Ebola, on Monday. Neighbouring Cameroon had restricted movement along the border to avoid contagion following reports of an unknown, deadly hemorrhagic fever in Equatorial Guinea last week. Forty-two people who came into contact with the two children have been identified and contact tracing was ongoing, he added. The World Health Organization (WHO) said earlier on Tuesday that it was increasing its epidemiological surveillance in Equatorial Guinea. He added that the country's authorities had not reported any new suspected cases in the last 48 hours.

☆ World Food Programme warns of stock shortage in quake-hit northwest Syria
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-10 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

GENEVA, Feb 10 (Reuters) - The World Food Programme (WFP) is running out of stocks in northwest Syria and called to open more border crossings from Turkey after both countries were ravaged by earthquakes, the U.N. food aid organisation said on Friday. "Northwest Syria, where 90% of the population depends on humanitarian assistance, is a big concern. The border crossing is open now, but we need to get new border crossings open." Currently, there is only one open crossing, at Bab al-Hawa, between Turkey and the opposition-held northwest Syria. Fleischer stressed that opening a second border crossing was essential to getting aid to northwest Syria.

☆ 'Not so rosy': Russian athletes face prospect of Olympics ban
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-10 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

[1/3] Olympic Rings are pictured in front of The Olympic House, headquarters of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) at the opening of the executive board meeting of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), in Lausanne, Switzerland September 8, 2022. Since the International Olympic Committee (IOC) opened the door for Russian and Belarusian athletes to compete as neutrals at the 2024 Paris Games, calls to have them excluded have snowballed. At an indoor track in northeastern Moscow on Friday, hurdler Sergey Shubenkov said he was avoiding reading the news about Russia's Olympic prospects. The measure was taken as part of wider sanctions against the Russian athletics federation, which has been suspended since 2015 over doping offences. "I think those who don't support (Russia's special military operation in Ukraine) have already left.

☆ Quarter of Ukrainians at risk of severe mental health conditions - adviser
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-09 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

GENEVA, Feb 9 (Reuters) - A quarter of Ukraine's population is at risk of developing a severe mental health condition as the country grapples with the year-long Russian invasion, a senior health official said on Thursday. The World Health Organization "estimates that at this time, one out of four people in Ukraine is at risk of severe mental health conditions," Kazatchkine, who also serves as special adviser to the WHO's Regional Office for Europe, said. "Mental health is becoming a predominant public health issue in Ukraine," he told reporters in Geneva. "The economic downturn comes on a background of fragile health systems and very constrained health budgets," he added. Reporting by Cécile Mantovani; Writing by Gabrielle Tétrault-Farber; Editing by Jonathan Oatis and Andrew HeavensOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

LONDON, Feb 8 (Reuters) - The recent spread to mammals of H5N1 influenza - commonly known as bird flu - needs to be monitored, but the risk to humans remains low, the World Health Organization said on Wednesday. He said the risk to humans remained low, noting that human cases have been rare since the flu strain emerged in 1996. "But we cannot assume that will remain the case and we must prepare for any change in the status quo," Tedros said. He said people were advised not to touch dead or sick wild animals and to instead report them to local and national authorities, who were monitoring the situation. The WHO also recommended strengthening surveillance in settings where humans and animals interact, he said.

☆ WHO says Syria, already in crisis, needs massive humanitarian aid after quake
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-07 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

GENEVA, Feb 7 (Reuters) - Senior officials from the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Tuesday that Syria's humanitarian needs where the highest after a major earthquake killed thousands there and in southern Turkey. Adelheid Marschang, WHO Senior Emergency Officer, said Turkey had a strong capacity to respond to the crisis but that the main unmet needs in the immediate and mid-term would be across the border in Syria, already grappling with a years-long humanitarian crisis due to the civil war and a cholera outbreak. "All over Syria, the needs are the highest after nearly 12 years of protracted, complex crisis, while humanitarian funding continues to decline." WHO said it was dispatching emergency supplies, including trauma and emergency surgical kits, and activating a network of emergency medical teams. He said the WHO was especially concerned about areas of Turkey and Syria where no information had emerged since Monday's earthquake.

☆ Death toll from Turkey, Syria quake set to jump, WHO says
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-06 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

GENEVA, Feb 6 (Reuters) - The World Health Organization (WHO) expects a significant jump in the death toll following a major earthquake and its aftershocks in southern Turkey and northwestern Syria that reduced many buildings to rubble. The magnitude 7.8 quake, which rattled southern Turkey early on Monday, was the worst to hit the country this century, killing more than 900 people there and about 550 across the border in Syria, according to officials. "I think we can expect the death toll to increase significantly," Rick Brennan, the WHO's regional emergency director for the Eastern Mediterranean, told Reuters. "There's been a lot of building collapses and it will increase more significantly around the epicentre of the earthquake." "It's harder for the rescue teams to get in there to extract people," he said.

LONDON/GENEVA, Feb 1 (Reuters) - Governments may have to reserve drugs and vaccines for the World Health Organization to distribute in poorer countries to avoid a repeat of the "catastrophic failure" during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to an early draft of a global pandemic agreement. The agreement, which is commonly known as the pandemic treaty, has been drawn up by WHO member states and will now go through a lengthy negotiating process before being finalised. Talks on the draft treaty will begin on Feb. 27 and are set to continue to 2024. However, there will be "heat and opposition" in the negotiations ahead, particularly around the intellectual property provisions, said James Love, director of the NGO Knowledge Ecology International. The draft also calls for a new WHO Global Pandemic Supply Chain and Logistics Network to ensure better and fairer distribution of counter-measures, as well as a global compensation scheme for vaccine injuries.

At his funeral in the western Ukrainian town of Letychiv, friends of the 22-year-old, who volunteered for the military and was hit by shrapnel in Bakhmut last week, were vehement that Russians should be excluded from the Olympics. Fellow decathlete Dmytro Korbenko, who described himself as Androshchuk's best friend, said of Russian athletes: "It's obvious they're not supposed to be in sports, nor at the 2024 Olympic Games." As mourners laid bouquets near Androshchuk's feet or kissed his forehead, Korbenko described his friend as a strong-willed athlete. In response, Ukraine has threatened to boycott the 2024 Olympics if the year-long war is still raging and if Russians are allowed to compete. Russia, which denies committing atrocities in Ukraine, said attempts at banning it from international sports were "doomed to fail."

☆ All countries 'dangerously unprepared' for future pandemics, says IFRC
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-30 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

GENEVA, Jan 30 (Reuters) - The world is "dangerously unprepared" for future pandemics, the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) say in a report published on Monday, calling on countries to update their preparedness plans by year-end. In its World Disasters Report 2022, the IFRC said "all countries remain dangerously unprepared for future outbreaks" despite COVID-19 killing more people than any earthquake, drought or hurricane in history. said Jagan Chapagain, secretary general of the IFRC, the world's largest disaster response network. "There will be no excuse for a continued lack of preparedness after having gone through three terrible years." "The important thing is there has to be a political will to commit to that," he said.

☆ IOC rejects 'defamatory' criticism from Ukraine
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-30 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

"The IOC rejects in the strongest possible terms this and other defamatory statements," the IOC told Reuters in a statement. This is whom the ignorant IOC wants to put under white flag allowing to compete," Kuleba wrote on Twitter. The IOC added then, however, that each sport federation was the "sole authority for its international competitions". Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Friday that Ukraine would launch an international campaign to prevent Russian athletes from being allowed to compete at the Games. The Russian foreign ministry has said any attempt to squeeze Moscow out of international sport because of what it calls its special military operation in Ukraine is "doomed to fail".

☆ Russian agency records 375 whereabouts rule violations in 2022
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-27 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

GENEVA, Jan 27 (Reuters) - Russian anti-doping agency RUSADA said on Friday it had recorded 375 cases last year in which athletes did not properly provide their whereabouts to allow for them to be tested for banned substances, TASS news agency reported. Three whereabouts violations in a 12-month period constitute an anti-doping violation that can lead to a suspension. A memorable case of whereabouts violations in Russia was that of high jumper Danil Lysenko. Lysenko, a silver medallist at the 2017 World Athletics Championships, was provisionally suspended in 2018 after recording three whereabouts failures within a 12-month period. RUSADA was suspended by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) in 2015 after the international anti-doping authority found evidence of mass doping in Russian athletics.

☆ China, U.S. spar at WTO meeting over disputes
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-27 | by ( Emma Farge | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

China's ambassador to the WTO Li Chenggang spoke at a meeting on trade disputes shortly after the United States lodged an appeal against a series of WTO rulings involving China, Turkey, Norway and Switzerland which found that U.S. metal tariffs breached global rules. Washington, which has long criticized the WTO dispute system for overreach and is leading discussions on reforming it, has criticized both rulings. The United States said it regretted the metal tariffs dispute with China was even on the agenda at the meeting and accused Beijing of imposing "illegal unilateral retaliatory measures" on U.S. exports. "A WTO that serves to shield China's non-market policies and practices is not in anyone's interest," said Deputy United States Trade Representative Maria Pagan, according to a copy of her speech. In an interview with Reuters on Thursday, Pagan played down the significance of more vocal criticism of Washington by China at WTO meetings.

☆ Hot air balloons soar over snowy Swiss town
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-24 | by ( Denis Balibouse | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

[1/6] Balloons take part in the 43rd International Hot Air Balloon Festival in Chateau-d'Oex, Switzerland January 24, 2023. REUTERS/Denis BalibouseCHATEAU D'OEX, Switzerland, Jan 24 (Reuters) - Tucked in a valley surrounded by snow-capped peaks, the sleepy Swiss town of Chateau d'Oex emerges from its slumber to host a hot-air balloon festival that draws thousands of spectators and flying enthusiasts. During a nine-day celebration ending on Sunday, 60 brightly-coloured hot balloons from 15 countries will soar through the sky over the valley, known for winds that make for particularly good flying. Some hot air balloon flights had to be cancelled on Monday due to unusually strong winds but festivities fully resumed the next day. "Every trouble in daily life just seems so small when you go up in the air,' Spildooren said.

☆ U.N. agency: Arabs' Israel ties no impediment to aiding Palestinian refugees
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-24 | by ( Gabrielle Tétrault-Farber | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, said he saw no contradiction between supporting Palestinian refugees and building ties with Israel. "You can have strong bilateral relations with Israel and be a strong supporter of the agency," Lazzarini told Reuters. "Whatever rapprochement or ties (with Israel) should not have the slightest impact on your commitment and your solidarity with the Palestine refugees and your support to an agency like UNRWA. "We have normal access when it comes to delivering our services in Gaza and the West Bank, but we are very concerned about the increased violence impacting this community," he said. Last year saw the worst levels of violence in the West Bank in more than a decade after Israel launched a crackdown on militants in response to fatal Palestinian street attacks.

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