LONDON/PARIS — French President Emmanuel Macron and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer will travel to Washington next week amid alarm in Europe over U.S. President Donald Trump’s hardening stance toward Ukraine and overtures to Moscow on the three-year conflict.

The leaders of Europe’s two nuclear powers, who will be traveling separately, are expected to try to persuade Trump not to rush into a ceasefire deal with Vladimir Putin at any cost, keep Europe involved and discuss military guarantees to Ukraine.

Macron, who is trying to capitalize on a relationship with Trump built during their first presidential terms, has said agreeing to a bad deal that would amount to a capitulation of Ukraine would signal weakness to the United States’ foes, including China and Iran.

“I will tell him: deep down you cannot be weak in the face of President (Putin). It’s not you, it’s not what you’re made of and it’s not in your interests,” he said in an hourlong question and answer session on social media ahead of Monday’s visit to the White House.

The visits come amid a rift between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, whom Trump described as a “dictator.” That has alarmed Kyiv’s European allies, already reeling from a more aggressive U.S. posture on trade, diplomacy and even domestic European politics.

Philip Golub, a professor in international relations at the American University in Paris, said Trump’s rapid-fire moves in his first weeks in office, as well as the rhetoric from other U.S. officials, had been a major shock for the Europeans.

“They could not have expected that somehow within the United States would emerge this ultra-nationalist coalition of forces that would actually challenge Europe’s voice in world affairs in such a stark and strong way,” he told Reuters.

He said Macron believed he had a “historic role to play” in going to Washington to ensure Europe can weigh in on the ultimate negotiations on Ukraine. “Whether he can actually achieve something, however, in this visit is an entirely different matter,” he added.

Starmer, who has also warned the end of the war cannot be a “temporary pause before Putin attacks again,” will be in Washington on Thursday.

Speaking on a Fox News podcast on Friday, Trump said Macron and Starmer had not “done anything” to end the war. “No meetings with Russia!” he said, although he described Macron as “a friend of mine” and Starmer as “a very nice guy.”

However, the two countries are keen to show Trump they are ready to take on a bigger burden for European security.

Britain and France are firming up ideas with allies for military guarantees for Ukraine and their two leaders will seek to persuade Trump to provide U.S. assurances in any post ceasefire deal, Western officials said.

Their respective militaries began initial planning last summer for the post-war scenario, but the discussions accelerated in November after Trump secured the U.S. presidency, a French military official and two diplomats said.

They have also been supported in putting together an array of options by countries like Denmark and the Baltic states as Europeans discuss what they would be ready to do should there be an accord and peacekeepers required, officials said.

While both Britain and France have ruled out sending troops to Ukraine immediately, the plans, still in concept stage, center around providing air, maritime, land and cyber support that would aim to deter Russia from launching any future attacks, Western officials said.

Air and sea assets could be based in Poland or Romania, restoring safe international air space and ensuring the Black Sea remained safe for international shipping, the official said.

Part of the British and French talks center around the possibility of sending European peacekeepers. While U.S. boots on the ground may not be necessary, deterrence in the form of U.S. medium-range missiles and ultimately nuclear weapons will remain crucial.

The options being discussed would center not on providing troops for the frontline or the 2,000-kilometer border which would remain secured by Ukrainian forces, but further to the West, three European diplomats and the military official said.

Those troops could be tasked with protecting key Ukrainian infrastructure such as ports or nuclear facilities to reassure the Ukrainian population. However, Russia has made it clear it would oppose a European presence in Ukraine.

A French military official said there was little sense in talking numbers at this stage because it would depend on what was finally agreed, what international mandate was given and whether non-European troops would also be involved.

“It’s not about the numbers of troops in Ukraine. It’s the ability to mobilize and the ability to arrange everything into a package of interoperability units,” the French official said.

A Western official said that even 30,000 troops could be on the “high side.” 
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STRASBOURG, FRANCE — One person died and two police officers were seriously injured in a knife attack in eastern France on Saturday that occurred during a demonstration, the local prosecutor said.

Three more officers were lightly wounded in the attack in the city of Mulhouse, carried out by a 37-year-old suspect who is on a terror prevention watchlist, prosecutor Nicolas Heitz told AFP.

The list, called FSPRT, compiles data from various authorities on people with the aim of preventing “terrorist” radicalization. It was launched in 2015 following deadly attacks on satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo’s offices and on a Jewish supermarket.

The suspect attacked local police officers in Mulhouse shouting “Allahu Akbar” (“God is greatest”) Saturday afternoon, France’s national antiterror prosecutors’ unit PNAT said in a statement.

A passerby was killed trying to intervene and help police, the prosecutor’s office said.

One of the seriously wounded police officers sustained an injury to the carotid artery, and the other to the thorax, Heitz said.

Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau was expected to travel to the scene of the attack later Saturday.

Police established a security parameter after the attack, which happened shortly before 4 p.m. local time during a demonstration in support of Congo.

According to union sources, the suspect, born in Algeria, has been under judicial supervision and house arrest, and under an expulsion order from France.

“Horror has seized our city,” Mulhouse Mayor Michele Lutz said on Facebook. The incident was being investigated as a terror attack, she said, but “this must obviously still be confirmed by the judiciary.”

French President Emmanuel Macron said Saturday that the deadly knife attack was “Islamist terrorism,” after France’s anti-terrorism prosecutor’s office confirmed it was investigating the case.

“It is without any doubt an act of Islamist terrorism,” Macron told reporters on the sidelines of the annual French farm show, adding that the interior minister was on his way to Mulhouse.

The suspect has been arrested, the prosecutor’s office said.

Some information in this report is from Reuters.
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ROME — The Vatican carried on with its Holy Year celebrations without the pope Saturday, as Pope Francis battled pneumonia and a complex respiratory infection that doctors say remains touch-and-go and will keep him hospitalized for at least another week.

Francis slept well overnight, Vatican spokesperson Matteo Bruni said in a brief early update Saturday.

But doctors have warned that the main threat facing the 88-year-old Francis would be the onset of sepsis, a serious infection of the blood that can occur as a complication of pneumonia. As of Friday, there was no evidence of any sepsis, and Francis was responding to the various drugs he is taking, the pope’s medical team said in their first in-depth update on the pope’s condition.

“He is not out of danger,” said his personal physician, Dr. Luigi Carbone. “So, like all fragile patients, I say they are always on the golden scale: In other words, it takes very little to become unbalanced.”

Francis, who has chronic lung disease, was admitted to Gemelli hospital on Feb. 14 after a weeklong bout of bronchitis worsened.

Doctors first diagnosed the complex viral, bacterial and fungal respiratory tract infection and then the onset of pneumonia in both lungs. They prescribed “absolute rest” and a combination of cortisone and antibiotics, along with supplemental oxygen when he needs it.

Carbone, who along with Francis’ personal nurse, Massimiliano Strappetti, organized care for him at the Vatican, acknowledged he had insisted on staying at the Vatican to work even after he was sick “because of institutional and private commitments.” He was cared for by a cardiologist and infectious specialist in addition to his personal medical team before being hospitalized.

Dr. Sergio Alfieri, the head of medicine and surgery at Rome’s Gemelli hospital, said the biggest threat facing Francis was that some of the germs that are currently located in his respiratory system pass into the bloodstream, causing sepsis. Sepsis can lead to organ failure and death.

“Sepsis, with his respiratory problems and his age, would be really difficult to get out of,” Alfieri told a press conference Friday at Gemelli. “The English say, ‘knock on wood,’ we say ‘touch iron.’ Everyone touch what they want,” he said as he tapped the microphone.

“But this is the real risk in these cases: that these germs pass to the bloodstream.”

“He knows he’s in danger,” Alfieri said. “And he told us to relay that.”

Deacons, meanwhile, were gathering at the Vatican for their special Jubilee weekend. Francis got sick at the start of the Vatican’s Holy Year, the once-every-quarter-century celebration of Catholicism. This weekend, Francis was supposed to have celebrated deacons, a ministry in the church that precedes ordination to the priesthood.

In his place, the Holy Year organizer will celebrate Sunday’s Mass, the Vatican said. And for the second weekend in a row, Francis was expected to skip his traditional Sunday noon blessing, which he could have delivered from Gemelli if he were up to it.

“Look, even though he’s not [physically] here, we know he’s here,” said Luis Arnaldo Lopez Quirindongo, a deacon from Ponce, Puerto Rico who was at the Vatican on Saturday for the Jubilee celebration. “He’s recovering, but he’s in our hearts and is accompanying us because our prayers and his go together.”

Beyond that, doctors have said that Francis’ recovery will take time and that, regardless, he will have to live with his chronic respiratory problems back at the Vatican.

“He has to get over this infection, and we all hope he gets over it,” said Alfieri. “But the fact is, all doors are open.”
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WASHINGTON — This week, thousands of conservative politicians, activists and influencers convened outside Washington for the Conservative Political Action Conference, the premier annual gathering of the American right.

The four-day event, hosted by the American Conservative Union since 1974, features U.S. President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance, among other high-profile speakers from around the world.

Dubbed the “Woodstock for conservatives,” CPAC was once the go-to event for conservative Republicans and presidential hopefuls, with its presidential straw poll serving as a barometer of grassroots support. However, Trump’s political rise in recent years has transformed it into a platform for populism.

Driven by the rise of populist movements globally, the conference has ventured overseas in the past decade. It launched its first international conference in Japan in 2017, expanded to Australia, Brazil and South Korea in 2019, then added Hungary, Mexico and Israel in 2022. Argentina joined the fold last year following the election of populist President Javier Milei.

The international conferences, CPAC says, serve to “unite conservatives from all over the world, strengthen the movement, and challenge globalism.” They are also used for public outreach, recruitment and mobilization, according to a recent paper on CPAC by Grant A. Silverman, a research assistant at George Washington University in Washington.

CPAC’s growing international outreach mirrors a recent surge in far-right populism worldwide. Last year’s foreign speakers included Presidents Nayib Bukele of El Salvador and Javier Milei of Argentina, as well as Prime Minister Victor Orbán of Hungary.

Here’s a look at some of the foreign speakers for this year’s CPAC and what they’re saying:

Javier Milei, Argentine president

Milei, wielding a chain saw, electrified the CPAC crowd Thursday when he shared the stage with billionaire Elon Musk and presented Musk, Trump’s cost-cutting czar, with his signature campaign prop.

“This is the chain saw of bureaucracy,” Musk, the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, shouted, waving the tool.

As head of the Department of Government Efficiency, Musk, who made his first CPAC appearance, is spearheading the Trump administration’s massive governmentwide cost-cutting efforts.

This marks Milei’s third CPAC appearance. The self-styled “anarcho-capitalist” campaigned in 2023 on shrinking Argentina’s government, often brandishing a chain saw at rallies.

At last year’s Washington conference, he vowed to eliminate unnecessary government agencies, declaring, “We will not surrender until we make Argentina great again!”

Speaking at CPAC Argentina in December, Milei declared that the “new winds of freedom are sweeping through the world” and called on allies to fight against “lefties.”

“We must stand together, establishing channels of cooperation throughout the world,” he told the crowd.

Jair Bolsonaro, former president of Brazil

Brazil’s former right-wing president is a CPAC regular. After Bolsonaro lost a reelection bid in 2022, his supporters stormed federal government buildings in an alleged attempt to seize power. Banned from seeking office until 2030, Bolsonaro faces charges of plotting a coup.

His son, Eduardo Bolsonaro, organizes CPAC Brazil. At last year’s conference in Balneario Camboriu, the elder Bolsonaro joined Milei and other right-wing politicians from Latin America to hail conservatism’s global rise and expressed hope for Trump’s return to office.

For his part, Milei used the platform to denounce socialism, saying it restricts liberties and breeds corruption.

Robert Fico, prime minister of Slovakia

Robert Fico makes his CPAC debut this year. Though he leads a left-wing populist party, he has drawn controversy for his attacks on journalists, immigrants and LGBTQ+ people.

In October, he called journalists “bloody bastards” and threatened new media restrictions. An opponent of same-sex marriage, he has called adoption by gay couples a “perversion.”

During the Ukraine conflict, Fico has opposed European sanctions on Moscow and echoed Moscow’s messaging, drawing comparisons to Hungary’s pro-Kremlin prime minister.

In May, he survived an assassination attempt by a gunman opposed to his stance against military assistance to Ukraine.

Mateusz Morawiecki, former Polish prime minister

After speaking at CPAC Hungary last year, Morawiecki makes his first U.S. appearance this year. He served as prime minister from 2017 to 2023 and is now a leading figure in the opposition Law and Justice Party.

Despite his party’s strong support for Ukraine, Morawiecki maintains close ties with Hungary’s Orban and Spain’s Santiago Abascal, leader of the conservative Vox political party. Abascal is an invited speaker at CPAC.

Immigration is a unifying issue for Europe’s right-wing populists. At last year’s Hungary conference, Morawiecki called Orban his friend and credited his tough response to Europe’s 2015 migration crisis with preventing “chaos” in Europe.

Liz Truss, former British prime minister

The former Conservative Party leader and prime minister made her second CPAC appearance in a row Wednesday. Calling Britain a “failed state” ruled by a socialist government, she called for a Trump-style MAGA movement to save it.

“We want a Trump revolution in Britain,” she said to applause, praising Trump’s second presidency as “the golden age of America.”

Blaming Britain’s decline on unelected bureaucrats, she urged the dismantlement of the “deep state,” a favorite theme among conference attendees.

“We want Elon and his nerd army of muskrats examining the British deep state,” Truss said.

Truss served just 49 days as prime minister and lost her Parliament seat last year. 
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Pope Francis’ medical team said Friday that his medical condition was not life-threatening, but that the pontiff was not out of danger.

“If the question is, ‘Is he out of danger?’ the answer is, ‘No,’ ” Sergio Alfieri, the head of the team of doctors at Rome’s Gemelli Hospital taking care of the pope, said. “But if you then ask us if, at this moment, his life is in danger, the answer is [also], ‘No.'”

The doctors said Francis was in good spirits and had maintained his sense of humor. Alfieri said when he greeted the pope Friday in the pope’s hospital suite as “Holy Father,” the pope returned the greeting with “Holy Son.”

Francis, the leader of the world’s Roman Catholics, was admitted to the hospital last week after a case of bronchitis worsened. At the hospital, he was diagnosed with double pneumonia and a complex bacterial, viral and fungal infection, and doctors placed Francis on a strengthened drug therapy.

Francis also has been receiving supplements of oxygen when needed, his doctors said Friday. Alfieri said Francis was not on a ventilator.

Alfieri said there was a possibility that germs from Francis’ respiratory tract could enter his bloodstream, causing sepsis, but there was currently no evidence that it had happened. Sepsis is a complication of an infection that can lead to organ failure and death.

The 88-year-old pontiff has been able to get out of bed and do some work, according to his doctors. They said Francis would remain in the hospital “at least” through next week.

With his hospitalization, there has been speculation about Francis stepping down from his duties as head of the Roman Catholic Church, a post he has held since 2013. His immediate predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI, was the first pope in 600 years to resign.

In a recent memoir, Francis addressed the possibility of his own resignation if he became incapacitated. He said such a move would be a “distant possibility,” justified only if he were facing “a serious physical impediment.”

However, in 2022, Francis confirmed he wrote a resignation letter not long after becoming pope. He said it was written in case medical issues prevented him from executing his papal duties.

The Catholic faithful around the world have been encouraged to pray for Francis’ rapid recovery. On Friday in the Philippines, a hourlong prayer was held for Francis at the Manila Cathedral. Francis celebrated Mass in a Manila park in 2015, drawing a record-breaking crowd of 6 million, according to official estimates.

Saturday is the Feast of the Chair of St. Peter, a day commemorating the authority Jesus gave to the pope. Catholics are set to gather outside Gemelli Hospital to pray for Francis’ health, according to the Catholic News Agency.

Some information for this article came from Reuters and The Associated Press.
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BERLIN — German police said Friday they have arrested an 18-year-old Russian man on suspicion of planning a “politically motivated” attack in Berlin, two days before national elections.

The man was detained late Thursday in the state of Brandenburg, which surrounds Berlin, police and prosecutors said in a statement.

Authorities did not provide further details about the attack plot, but the Tagesspiegel newspaper reported the suspect was Chechen and is believed to have been planning an attack on the Israeli Embassy.

The Israeli Embassy could not be reached for comment outside of business hours, while state prosecutors and the Russian Embassy did not immediately respond to written requests for comment from Reuters.

German newspaper Bild reported Friday that the investigation had been the result of a tip-off from a foreign intelligence agency. It said the suspect had been trying to leave the country via Berlin’s BER airport when he was detained.

Riot police and specialist officers were involved in making the arrest, which came after that tip-off, officials said.

“No further details as to the background and motive can be given for the moment to protect the investigation,” they added.

The man appeared in court Friday and was remanded in custody.

German authorities are on high alert ahead of Sunday’s federal elections.

Some material in this report is from Reuters.
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RFE/RL   — Iya Rashevskaya was told her husband — a member of the country’s armed forces – had gone missing in the frontline in the eastern Donetsk region, in April 2023. 

The news of Serhiy Skotarenko’s disappearance came just a month after he had joined the military, having given up his job abroad. 

Rashevskaya soon found out that her husband, a native of Ukraine’s southeastern Zaporizhzhya region, was alive and being held captive in Chechnya along with several other Ukrainian prisoners of war. 

A Ukrainian soldier who was released in a prisoner swap in June 2023 told Rashevskaya that he and Skotarenko had been held in the same jail in Chechnya. 

Rashevskaya recalls getting an unexpected, brief video call from her husband in August 2023. 

“My husband asked about me and our children. He also asked me to help him to return home, saying we were his only hope,” Rashevskaya said. “He looked awful, he has lost a lot of weight.” 

Ukrainian captives in Chechnya “were being held in a basement and survived on instant noodles, bread, and water,” according to Rashevskaya. 

Ukrainian authorities estimate that more than 150 Ukrainian POWs are currently being held in Chechnya, a Russian region ruled by authoritarian leader Ramzan Kadyrov. 

Kadyrov says the soldiers were captured by Chechen military units fighting alongside other Russian forces in Ukraine. 

But Ukraine’s Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of POWs has claimed that Chechnya also often “buys” Ukrainian captives from various Russian military units to use them as a bargaining chip in negotiations. 

RFE/RL cannot independently verify the claim. 

Some of the Ukrainian captives were exchanged with Chechen fighters seized by Ukrainian forces. 

Kadyrov, a vocal supporter of Russian President Vladimir Putin, has sent thousands of Chechen fighters to Ukraine since the invasion began three years ago. 

In December 2024, Kadyrov threatened to use Ukrainian captives as human shields to protect strategically important buildings in Grozny from Ukrainian drone attacks. He said he would place them on the rooftops of buildings. 

He made the statement after Ukrainian drones reportedly hit a police campus in the Chechen capital. 

In January 2024, Kadyrov offered to release 20 Ukrainian captives in exchange for the removal of U.S. sanctions against his relatives and horses. 

Kadyrov, 48, and several of his family members, including his mother, Aymani Kadyrova, have been sanctioned by the United States and the European Union in recent years. 

Kadyrova, 71, is the head of the Kadyrov Foundation, which runs reeducation programs for Ukrainian children abducted by Russian forces from occupied territories. Washington imposed sanctions on Kadyrova and the Foundation in August 2023. 

Kadyrov was sanctioned by Washington in 2017 and 2020 over accusations of human rights abuses. 

PR campaign for Kadyrov 

Chechen human rights lawyer Abubakar Yangulbaev says Kadyrov directly controls any prisoner swaps involving the Ukrainians captives in Chechnya. 

“While the Chechens fighting in Ukraine are part of Russian troops, Chechnya also has its own interests. It’s important for Kadyrov to secure the release of the Chechens captured in Ukraine to protect his own reputation before his people, whom he constantly calls to go to fight in Ukraine,” Yangulbaev told RFE/RL. 

“It is a PR campaign for Kadyrov,” he added. 

Chechnya has never released the exact number or Ukrainian POWs it holds. 

According to Maria Klimik, a reporter for the Ukraine-based monitor, Media Initiative for Human Rights, in some cases the Ukrainian and Chechen sides have swapped captured soldiers “informally” in the battlefields in Ukraine without involving a third party. 

Klimik told RFE/RL that Ukrainian POWs in Chechnya are usually held in dark, windowless basements of buildings – presumably police stations. Prisoners sleep on utility shelves as there are no beds in the basements, Klimik said citing accounts of former POWs. 

RFE/RL cannot independently verify the claims. 

In his New Year address, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that 3,956 Ukrainian soldiers had been freed in prisoners’ exchanges between Kyiv and Moscow since the beginning of the invasion. 

There has been no public mention of any direct prisoner exchanges between Ukraine and Chechnya, as the families of the captives in Grozny call for their release. 
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Vice President JD Vance sketched his conservative view of foreign affairs Thursday at the Conservative Political Action Conference, accompanied by foreign politicians who say they support President Donald Trump’s agenda. VOA White House correspondent Anita Powell reports from Washington.
Camera: Anthony LaBruto
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Pope Francis “had a restful night,” and Thursday morning “got out of bed and had breakfast in an armchair,” the Vatican said in a statement.

Francis was admitted to Rome’s Gemelli Hospital last week with bronchitis, which then developed into double pneumonia.

Vatican spokesperson Matteo Bruni said Thursday that the pope now has focal pneumonia with limited areas of infection in the lungs. Bruni said Francis is breathing on his own, and his heart is stable.

An earlier statement Thursday reported the pope’s clinical condition as “stable,” and his blood tests had shown “a slight improvement, particularly in the inflammatory indices.”

Wednesday evening, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni visited the pope for 20 minutes in the hospital’s special papal suite.

“We joked as always,” the prime minister said in a statement afterward. “He hasn’t lost his proverbial sense of humor.”

Francis, whose birth name is Jorge Mario Bergoglio, has been the head of the Roman Catholic Church since 2013, when his predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI, resigned from the papacy.

In a recent memoir, Francis addressed the possibility of his own resignation if he became incapacitated. He said such a move would be a “distant possibility,” justified only if facing “a serious physical impediment.”

“We are all worried about the pope,” Cardinal Matteo Maria Zuppi, head of the Italian Bishops’ Conference, told Agence France-Presse. Zuppi said, however, that the reports about Francis eating and greeting people are good indications that “we are on the right path to a full recovery, which we hope will happen soon.”

Speaking at a Vatican news conference about a Mediterranean youth peace initiative, Cardinal Juan Jose Omella Omella of Barcelona compared the papacy to a train to give reassurances that the work of the papacy will continue, even with Francis’ hospitalization.

“Popes change, we bishops change, priests in parishes change, communities change, but the train continues being on the move,” the cardinal said.

Some information in this report came from Reuters and Agence France-Presse.
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Azerbaijan’s government has ordered the suspension of the Azerbaijani operation of BBC News, the British news agency confirmed Thursday.

In a statement, the BBC said it had made the “reluctant decision” to close its office in the country after receiving a verbal instruction from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

“We deeply regret this restrictive move against press freedom, which will hinder our ability to report to and from Azerbaijan for our audiences inside and outside the country,” a BBC spokesperson said in a statement.

The suspension comes after Azerbaijani state-run media last week reported that the Azerbaijani government wanted to reduce the number of BBC staff working in the country to one.

The BBC said it has received nothing in writing about the suspension from the Azerbaijani government. While the news agency seeks clarification, its team of journalists in the country have stopped their journalistic activities, according to the BBC.

Neither Azerbaijan’s Foreign Ministry nor its Washington embassy immediately responded to VOA’s emails seeking comment.

The BBC has operated in Azerbaijan since 1994. The news agency says its Azerbaijani service reached an average of 1 million people every week.

The BBC suspension marks the continuation of a harsh crackdown on independent media that the Azerbaijani government has engaged in for years.

Azerbaijan is among the worst jailers of journalists in the world. As of last week, at least 23 journalists were jailed in the former Soviet country in retaliation for their work, according to the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists.

Many of the journalists jailed in Azerbaijan are accused of foreign currency smuggling, which media watchdogs have rejected as a sham charge.

Among those jailed is Farid Mehralizada, an economist and journalist with the Azerbaijani Service of VOA’s sister outlet Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.

Jailed since May 2024, Mehralizada faces charges of conspiring to smuggle foreign currency and “illegal entrepreneurship, money laundering, tax evasion and document forgery.” He and his employer reject the charges, which carry a combined sentence of up to 12 years behind bars.
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