Brittney Griner: 'No higher priority' than bringing her home - BBC

Reuters

There is "no higher priority" than bringing basketball star Brittney Griner home, US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said on Friday, as her drug trial in Russia begins.

Ms Griner, a three-time WNBA league champion and seven-time All-Star, was seen arriving handcuffed at a court in the town of Khimki, outside Moscow.

She faces 10 years in prison.

The US says she is being wrongfully held. Russia denies that her detention is motivated by US-Russia tensions.

Speaking outside the courthouse, a senior US embassy official said she had spoken to Ms Griner who was "as well as can be expected".

"She asked me to convey that she is in good spirits and is keeping up the faith," said Elizabeth Rood, the deputy chief of mission in Moscow.

Ms Griner was detained on 17 February at a Moscow-area airport after cannabis oil was allegedly found in her luggage.

A veteran of the Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA), she is considered one of the most dominant players in her sport's history.

Colin Allred, a Democratic congressman involved with her case, told the BBC on Friday that Ms Griner was "being used as a political pawn".

"This is a sham trial," he said. "But I do think that we're going to get Brittney home".

On the eve of Ms Griner's trial, her wife Cherelle Griner, told CNN the Biden's administration had not done enough to bring her partner home.

"I have to push people to make sure the things they are telling me are matching their actions," she said. "It's really really difficult."

• Players step up calls for Griner's release from Russian prison
• The troubling tale of a vanished basketball star

The US State Department declined to comment.

On Friday, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said in tweet that US officials attended Ms Griner's trial in Moscow.

"We - and I personally - have no higher priority than bringing her and other wrongfully detained Americans, including Paul Whelan, home," he said. Mr Whelan, a US citizen and former marine, was first detained in Russia in December 2018.

Ms Griner had travelled to Russia to play for EuroLeague team UMMC Ekaterinburg, where she had worked since 2014 during the US off-season. Roughly half of WNBA players compete overseas in the off-season.

For most, it's a way to augment their domestic income, with WNBA players being paid roughly five times more in Russia than they do in the US.

The 10-year maximum prison sentence faced by Ms Griner applies to "large-scale transportation of drugs".

However, even if acquitted at the trial, the government in Russia has the authority to overturn any decision and still send her to prison.

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2022-07-01 16:48:22Z
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Ukraine takes back Snake Island from fleeing Russians - The Times

Ukrainian forces were celebrating yesterday as Russian troops retreated from the strategic Black Sea outpost of Snake Island after being bombarded for days with long-range weaponry donated by western allies.

An image posted online by Ukraine’s military command showed columns of smoke billowing from the outcrop, about 90 miles south of Odesa, after the last Russians were forced to flee in two boats. Andriy Yermak, head of the office of the Ukrainian president, wrote on Twitter: “Kaboom! No Russian troops on the Snake Island any more. Our armed forces did a great job.” Ukrainian soldiers are expected to return soon to take control of the island.

The Russian retreat will bolster Ukraine’s morale after a torrid week in the east of the country, where its

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2022-06-30 23:01:00Z
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Turkey's Erdoğan threatens to derail Nato enlargement again - Financial Times

Turkey’s president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has claimed that Sweden must extradite 73 people Ankara accuses of terrorism or face the risk that his nation’s parliament will reimpose a veto on the country’s bid to join Nato.

No such commitment appeared in the text of a joint memorandum that was signed by Turkey along with Sweden and Finland this week in an eleventh-hour deal on the eve of a Nato summit that appeared to have overcome Turkey’s objections to the admission of the two Nordic nations to the western military alliance.

The text said that Stockholm and Helsinki would “address” Turkey’s pending deportation or extradition requests. But Erdoğan told reporters: “Sweden has given us the promise that 73 terrorists will be extradited and deported to Turkey . . . We will see whether they will give them or not.”

The Turkish president warned that Sweden and Finland’s entry into Nato “would not happen” unless ratified by his nation’s parliament, which is controlled by his ruling Justice and Development party and its ultranationalist allies. He said: “Sweden and Finland must keep their word. If they don’t, this [ratification] will not come before parliament.”

Erdoğan’s insistence, made in the final press conference of the Nato summit, sours what had up to then been an event focused firmly on projecting western unity around opposition to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and support for beefing up Nato’s high-alert defences in Europe.

Sweden’s foreign ministry did not immediately respond to requests for comment, but officials in Stockholm have previously stressed that decisions on extraditions are made by the Swedish judicial system rather than politicians.

The demand is a significant increase on the number of people that Erdoğan asked to be extradited in earlier stages of the negotiations — a request that was rebuffed by Swedish officials, according to a person briefed on the talks.

Turkish officials hailed the deal reached with the two Nordic nations as a victory for Erdoğan, who also secured a long-coveted meeting with US president Joe Biden after dropping his objections to their admission.

Biden said that he used the meeting with his Turkish counterpart in Madrid to stress that the White House supported the sale of US F-16 jets to Turkey, which is seeking the aircraft to plug a gap in its air force.

“We should sell them the F-16 jets and modernise those jets as well,” Biden told reporters. “It’s not in our interest not to do that.”

But Biden said his backing for the F-16 sale was not a “quid pro quo”, even if he believed he could help convince Congress to give its blessing, as is required for US arms exports.

The US president praised Turkey after Tuesday’s deal, arguing that the admission of Sweden and Finland would “strengthen Nato’s collective security and benefit the entire transatlantic alliance.”

Analysts cautioned, however, that the vague language of the memorandum struck by the three countries and brokered by senior Nato officials left huge scope for disagreements.

The text promised that Stockholm and Helsinki “will not provide support” to Kurdish groups that Ankara views as terrorists or the Gülen movement that Turkey accuses of plotting a 2016 failed coup. It also indicated that they would drop a de facto arms embargo against Turkey, in place since 2019.

Some western officials fear that Erdoğan, who faces a challenging campaign for re-election in a vote that must be held before June 2023, could reignite the row in an attempt to shore up his public support.

“It seems the memorandum of understanding between Turkey-Sweden-Finland is a manifestation of deep misunderstanding,” Toni Alaranta, a Turkey expert at the Finnish Institute of International Affairs, wrote on Twitter in response to Erdoğan’s remarks.

He said that the three countries would have a “huge task to actually solve this before we get to any ratification”.

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2022-06-30 17:06:20Z
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Russian forces withdraw from Snake Island - Financial Times

Russia withdrew forces from the strategic Black Sea outpost of Snake Island in what the defence ministry described as a “gesture of goodwill” to help restore Ukrainian grain shipments, but which Kyiv claimed was a humiliating retreat.

The ministry on Thursday said its troops had “finished fulfilling their tasks” and “demonstrated that Russia is not blocking the UN’s efforts to organise a humanitarian corridor to export agricultural goods from Ukraine”.

Kyiv rejected this, saying it had driven Russian forces from Snake Island with an artillery bombardment. Foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba said the victory showed that allies “should not be wary of providing Ukraine with more heavy weapons”.

Andriy Yermak, chief of staff to Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskyy, posted a picture on Twitter of plumes of smoke billowing from the island and hailed the “great job” of the armed forces.

The recapture of Snake Island gives Ukraine a strategic outpost close to key shipping lanes and other contested areas of the Black Sea, as well as an important symbolic victory.

Little more than an outcrop of rock, the 0.2 sq km island received global attention in the early days of the conflict when a Russian cruiser demanded the Ukrainian contingent based there surrender, only to receive the reply: “Russian warship, go fuck yourself!” The response became Ukraine’s rallying cry and was immortalised on a stamp showing a trooper giving a Russian ship the middle finger.

Ukraine’s army posted a video showing what they said was a Ukrainian-made Bohdana howitzer hitting targets on the island. Russia evacuated troops overnight in two speedboats, the southern command of Ukraine’s armed forces claimed.

“The occupiers have left Snake Island after failing to cope with fire from our artillery, rocket, and air strikes,” Valery Zaluzhny, commander-in-chief of Ukraine’s armed forces, said in a statement.

Zaluzhny thanked “foreign partners for supplying offensive weapons” but did not say what other weapons Ukraine used to attack the island.

Ukraine’s allies have recently given it the longest-range and heaviest weaponry in the four-month conflict so far. These include US artillery rocket systems and French howitzers, but Kyiv says it needs significantly more weapons systems and ammunition to reclaim occupied territory.

Ukraine this month said it used US-made Harpoon anti-ship missiles to sink a Russian tugboat, the first time it has said it used western weapons against Russian targets in the Black Sea.

The increased Ukrainian firepower made the costs of retaining Snake Island too difficult for Russia, said defence analysts, and offers hope for unblocking grain shipments from the nearby port of Odesa.

Russia has blockaded all of Ukraine’s Black Sea ports, seized ports in the neighbouring Azov Sea and repeatedly struck key infrastructure for Ukraine’s grain exports, including railways and grain silos.

The UN is leading four-way talks with Turkey to end the blockade, which has shut off export routes for 80 per cent of Ukraine’s grain and threatened to cause a famine in many Middle East and African nations that buy its wheat and corn.

Putin blames Ukraine for the crisis and has said Russia will only end the blockade if the west relaxes sanctions on shipping, payments and insurance that Moscow claims are impeding its own agricultural exports.

The defence ministry said its withdrawal from Snake Island would prevent Kyiv from speculating “on the coming food crisis by saying it cannot transport grain because of Russia’s total control of the north-western part of the Black Sea”.

However, Kyiv said UN-led talks have stalled because Moscow was intent on using them to cement its dominance of the Black Sea. Ukraine is also reluctant to clear mines from its coast, which it says does not affect export routes and is necessary to guard against coastal assaults.

Russia has regularly used its presence in the Black Sea for missile strikes on the Ukrainian mainland. The crossfire has trapped some ships in Ukraine’s ports and deterred others from using the Black Sea’s shipping lanes.

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2022-06-30 12:52:12Z
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Terrorists behind 2015 Bataclan attack sentenced to life by Paris court - Financial Times

A French court has convicted 20 men of carrying out or aiding Islamist terrorist attacks that killed 130 people in Paris in 2015, following a trial that tested the nation’s judicial system and revived painful memories for victims.

Salah Abdeslam, the sole surviving member of the so-called Islamic State group responsible for the attacks, was sentenced to life with no possibility of parole.

Chief judge Jean-Louis Périès took almost an hour to read out the verdict in a packed courtroom on Wednesday night. “After 148 days of hearings during which 415 victims gave testimony, the court wanted to lay out its reasoning in a fleshed-out manner,” he said.

Besides Abdeslam, five Islamic State figures, tried in absentia and presumed dead in Syria, were also sentenced to life without parole. Another defendant was sentenced to life, with parole possible after 22 years. A further three defendants were given 30-year sentences, which was lighter than the life terms that prosecutors had sought.

They were convicted on charges of conspiracy to commit terrorism stemming from actions including fighting for Islamic State group in Syria, helping to plan the attacks or providing logistical support.

The remaining defendants received shorter sentences ranging from two to 18 years for playing lesser supporting roles.

The verdict caps a landmark 10-month trial that took place in a purpose-built courtroom in the Paris Palais de Justice. It not only judged the accused but also gave a voice to the victims of the attacks.

The trial stemmed from the deadliest attack ever in peacetime France, carried out in November 2015 by a Franco-Belgian cell sent by the Islamic State group. The cell attacked people at a heavy metal concert at the Bataclan theatre, outside a football match at the Stade de France and at multiple café terraces and restaurants in eastern Paris. About 400 people were wounded.

A victim lies covered on Boulevard des Filles du Calvaire, close to the Bataclan theatre after the attacks © Thierry Chesnot/Getty Images

The victims played a central role in the trial, with hundreds appearing in person to tell of their harrowing experiences during and after the attacks. Their participation reflected a distinctive aspect of the French legal system, which allows victims to join a case as civil parties and be represented by lawyers who can examine evidence, ask questions and call witnesses.

Virginie Sansico, a historian who observed the trial as part of a research group, said the proceedings as a consequence had a flavour of a truth commission aimed at forging France’s collective memory of the events.

“There were two parallel processes going on — judging the defendants and giving space to the victims to speak and heal,” she told France Info radio.

Bruno Poncet, a survivor of the Bataclan attack, said the trial had helped him but he was glad it was over. “Being a victim of terrorism is not my profession, so I want to move on to a new phase of my life,” said the 49-year-old railway worker.

Despite testimony from investigators, intelligence officials, academics and psychologists, some aspects of the attack remain unexplained and prosecutors acknowledge that they were not able to bring the top planners to justice.

An image of Salah Abdeslam from Belgian police © Belgium Federal Police/AP

Another mystery is why Abdeslam did not detonate his own explosive vest: whether the device was defective or he backed out of blowing himself up at a café in northern Paris out of “humanity”, as he claimed in his testimony. Judge Périès said the court had found that the vest was “not functional”, which “seriously calls into question the declarations of Abdeslam about renunciation”.

The views of the 32-year-old French citizen, who grew up in Molenbeek, a suburb of Brussels, switched at the trial between hostility, provocation and regret. On the first day he declared himself a soldier for Islamic State who justified the attacks as a response to French aggression in Syria but on the last day he apologised to victims. “I am not a killer,” he said.

The Bataclan attacks were part of a traumatic period for France, with terrorist acts ranging from the killing of journalists at the Charlie Hebdo magazine to an attack using a truck in Nice. Its effects still reverberate within the country, affecting debates on immigration and security as the far-right rises as a political force.

Georges Fenech, a judge and former deputy in the National Assembly who investigated intelligence failures leading to the attack, said in an interview before the trial that the that “ripple effects” were still being felt in French intelligence policies and in geopolitics in particular.

“There was a before and after November 13 2015 in France just as there was a before and after Sept 11 2001 in the US,” he said.

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2022-06-29 20:24:49Z
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US to boost Europe military presence as Nato strengthens defences - Financial Times

The US will significantly increase its military deployments in Europe with additional troops and weaponry, as part of the largest scaling up of Nato defences since the cold war in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

President Joe Biden said the US would enhance its military presence in Europe “to defend every inch of allied territory”, at a summit of Nato leaders set to agree an overhaul of the alliance’s strategy for defending eastern Europe from Moscow.

The US will establish a permanent headquarters for its 5th Army Corps in Poland, send 5,000 additional troops to Romania and increase rotational deployments in the Baltic states, Biden said, as part of efforts to stiffen Nato’s first line of defences against possible attack.

Two squadrons of US F-35 fighter aircraft will be sent to the UK, Biden added, in addition to stationing air defence systems in Italy and Germany and increasing the number of US naval destroyers to Spain to six from four.

The new deployments will be in addition to the more than 100,000 US troops currently stationed in Europe, which had already increased by about 20,000 since Putin launched his invasion of Ukraine four months ago.

Other Nato states were expected to announce increases in defence spending and additional deployments at the summit in Madrid, as well as agreeing additional military support for Ukraine. The UK’s defence secretary said it would commit an additional 1,000 troops to defending Estonia from possible Russian attack and would pledge a naval carrier strike group to Nato’s new high-alert forces.

Nato also formally invited Finland and Sweden to join the alliance, after Turkey dropped its veto on their membership applications late on Tuesday.

Biden said the summit was “history-making” and that the additional US deployments would “send an unmistakable message that Nato is strong and united”.

“In a moment where [Russia’s President Vladimir] Putin has shattered peace in Europe and attacked the very tenets of the rule-based order, the United States and our allies are stepping up,” Biden said. “The steps we’re taking during this summit are going to further augment our collective strength.”

The scale of Russia’s invasion, which has killed thousands and displaced about a quarter of Ukraine’s population, forced Nato officials and western leaders to abandon their existing plans for defending the eastern flank of the alliance which are now deemed insufficient to resist an attack.

“The US will enhance our force posture in Europe, and respond to the changed security environment to defend every inch of allied territory,” Biden said.

The US deployments come as Nato prepares to agree new defence plans that will increase more than seven-fold the number of troops on high alert to respond to an invasion to more than 300,000 from 40,000 currently.

That comes in response to demands from Baltic countries and other eastern Nato allies for more permanent, larger and better equipped forces to defend them from Russia.

“This will be a historic and transformative summit for our alliance,” Nato secretary-general Jens Stoltenberg said on Wednesday morning. “We meet in the midst of the most serious security crisis we have faced since the second world war.”

“The biggest overhaul [of] our collective defence since the end of the cold war will be agreed at this summit,” he added.

Britain already has two battlegroups of 1,000 troops each in Estonia. One battlegroup is there on a permanent basis and one is committed until the end of the year at least. The additional 1,000 troops would not be based in the country but dedicated to its defence, to be deployed if needed.

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2022-06-29 17:32:34Z
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Police ban internet and public gatherings as tensions rise in India after Hindu tailor killing - Sky News

Police have banned public gatherings and suspended internet services in the Indian state of Rajasthan a day after two Muslim men posted a video claiming responsibility for killing a Hindu tailor.

Tensions have been high in the northwestern city of Udaipur after police arrested the two men, who are accused of slitting the tailor's throat in his shop on Tuesday.

Brandishing a meat cleaver, the two bearded men claimed responsibility for the killing in a clip shared online.

They said they were avenging an insult to Prophet Mohammad which was made by the victim.

They also alluded to Nupur Sharma, a former spokeswoman for the ruling Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), whose remarks about the Prophet earlier this month triggered domestic and international outrage.

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India's government has subsequently asked social media platforms to immediately remove content that encourages, glorifies or justifies the killing.

In a bid to stop the video from being shared, authorities suspended internet services in the city and surrounding Rajasthan state, while deploying additional police to Udaipur and banning large gatherings in an attempt to prevent religious unrest from escalating.

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Following the killing, several dozen people in New Delhi associated with right-wing groups protested and demanded the culprits be hanged.

The two suspects were being interrogated by federal investigators on Wednesday as police were on guard against any unrest in the state.

"We are under strict orders to prevent any form of protests or demonstrations scheduled to condemn the murder," Hawa Singh Ghumaria, a senior police officer in Rajasthan, said.

He added that the crime had sent "shockwaves through the country".

Image: Activists of Bajrang Dal, a Hindu hardline group, protest following the killing

The tailor has been identified as 48-year-old Kanhaiya Lal, who reportedly shared a social media post supporting one of the spokespeople who were suspended for the Prophet Mohammad remarks, according to local media.

The two suspects were arrested a few hours after the attack and have been identified as Udaipur residents Gos Mohammad and Riyaz Akhtari.

Footage of the attack itself shows one of the assailants being measured by the tailor, while the other one films.

The man being measured then starts stabbing Mr Lal with a knife, with the tailor desperately trying to fend him off with his hands.

Bhawarlal Thoda, a city administrator in Udaipur, said the tailor had been detained over a social media post in support of the BJP spokeswoman that was traced to his mobile telephone.

After he was released, he reported to police on 15 June that he was being threatened.

The suspects posted a second video of themselves in the aftermath of the killing, accusing Mr Lal of blasphemy and threatening to kill Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the same way.

They brandished long blood-covered knives as they smiled while sitting on a couch.

Image: Activists of the Bajrang Dal, a Hindu hardline group, react after being detained by police

Meanwhile, a spokesperson from Pakistan's foreign ministry rejected reports appearing in some Indian media that linked the suspects to a Pakistan-based organisation.

"Terrorists executed my father in the most shocking way, the country must stand with our family to demand justice," the victim's son, Yash, told Reuters news agency after the cremation of his father's body.

He said the culprits should be tried and sentenced to death, and denied that his father has made any remarks that would be offensive to other religions.

Image: People carry the body of Kanhaiya Lal for his cremation

Politicians and prominent Islamic preachers condemned the killing, with Maulana Ahmed Siddiqui, a Muslim cleric based in Udaipur, saying: "The incident has shocked followers of Islam, the heinous act committed by two men is absolutely un-Islamic."

The incident follows a spate of attacks by Hindu nationalists on minority groups - especially Muslims - who have been targeted for everything from their food and clothing style to interfaith marriages.

Bulldozers have also been used to demolish Muslim homes in some Indian states, in what critics describe as a growing pattern of "bulldozer justice" against the minority group.

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2022-06-29 17:15:00Z
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