WASHINGTON — The U.S. economy is showing resilience after bouncing back from the COVID-19 pandemic but the eurozone’s prospects are gloomier due to recent crises and deeper problems, according to IMF forecasts released Tuesday.

In its latest World Economic Outlook report, the International Monetary Fund revised its 2025 eurozone growth forecast down from 1.5% in July to 1.2% as challenges in manufacturing bog down countries such as Germany.

In contrast, the world’s biggest economy is anticipated to grow 2.2% next year.

The United States and eurozone have seen their paths diverge over the past two years, with the U.S. economy logging 2.9% growth in 2023, significantly above the eurozone’s 0.4%, IMF figures show.

The fund expects the U.S. economy to expand by 2.8% in 2024, again higher than the euro area’s 0.8% growth forecast.

This is because “Europe has experienced two shocks, while the United States has only experienced one,” EY chief economist Gregory Daco told AFP.

After rebounding from the pandemic, which led to historic recessions around the world, European countries took a hit from the effects of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

This once again sharply raised energy prices and snarled supply chains in the region, with the United States experiencing less of an impact given its distance from the conflict and greater energy independence.

Germany stalls

In particular, the war has made a significant impact on the eurozone’s biggest economy — Germany — which saw its economy shrink in 2023.

The German economy is set to see no growth this year, only expanding 0.8% in 2025, said the IMF’s latest report.

The 2025 figure was revised down from July’s projection of 1.3% growth.

“Persistent weakness in manufacturing weighs on growth for countries such as Germany and Italy,” said the IMF.

Although Italy’s domestic demand is set to benefit from a European Union-financed recovery plan, “Germany is experiencing strain from fiscal consolidation and a sharp decline in real estate prices,” the fund said.

But it noted that “in the euro area, growth seems to have reached its lowest point in 2023.”

France, the second-biggest EU economy, is projected to post modest growth of 1.1% for this year and the next.

US advantages

Daco of EY said the United States benefits from more favorable structural factors: “In view of its population growth, investment rate and productivity, it has growth prospects that are double those of Europe.”

He pointed to a younger U.S. population and greater competitiveness.

Other factors include Washington’s support for households and businesses during the pandemic, which have helped to prop up consumption.

Funds from the government’s CHIPS and Science Act as well as Inflation Reduction Act — to boost domestic semiconductor and clean energy industries, respectively — are also stimulating the economy, he said.

Meanwhile, Europe is struggling to contend with these major initiatives.

A report by former European Central Bank President Mario Draghi, unveiled in September, aims to limit Europe’s economic gap with the United States.

“It is crucial to swiftly follow up, with concrete and ambitious structural policies, on Mario Draghi’s proposals for enhancing European competitiveness,” said ECB President Christine Lagarde last Thursday.
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U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin visited Ukraine amid a Russian advance on the battlefield and increasing anxiety among Ukrainians that Western allies are experiencing growing fatigue toward the Russia-Ukraine war. For VOA, Anna Chernikova reports from Kyiv. VOA footage by Vladyslav Smilianets.
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LONDON — Two passenger trains collided in Wales, killing a man and injuring 15 people, transport police said Tuesday.

The low-speed crash on Monday evening happened near the village of Llanbrynmair in central Wales.

“We can sadly confirm a man has died following this evening’s incident,” said British Transport Police superintendent Andrew Morgan.

Those taken to hospital were not believed to have suffered serious injuries.

Morgan said transport police were working “to understand the circumstances leading up to this collision.”
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Russian officials said Tuesday a Ukrainian drone attack caused an explosion and fire at a biochemical plant in the Tambov region.

Tambov Governor Maxim Yegorov said on Telegram the fire was extinguished early Tuesday and that preliminary information indicated there were no injuries.

Ukrainian drones also damaged two distilleries in the Tula region, officials said Tuesday.

Russia’s Defense Ministry said Tuesday it shot down 11 Ukrainian drones over the Bryansk region, three drones over Belgorod, two over Kursk and each over the Tula and Oryol regions.

The governor of Belgorod reported two homes were damaged by falling debris from destroyed drones, while the governor Bryansk said the attack damaged one building.

In Ukraine, Sumy Governor Ihor Kalchenko said a Russian drone attack killed three people.

Kalchenko said Ukrainian air defenses shot down 25 Russian drones in the region.

US aid

The United States “will get Ukraine what it needs” to continue to fight its 32-month war with Russia, U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said Monday during a visit to Kyiv.  

But he gave no indication the U.S. would consent to Ukraine’s wish to immediately join NATO or allow Kyiv’s forces to launch missile strikes deeper into Russia.  

Austin said the U.S. would hand Ukraine what it requires “to fight for its survival and security,” saying it was essential for Western allies to fend off Russia’s aggression.  

“Europe’s future is on the line,” Austin said in a speech at the Diplomatic Academy of Ukraine. “NATO’s strength is on the line. America’s security is on the line.”  

As Austin visited Ukraine, the U.S. announced its 68th tranche of military aid since the start of the war with Russia, about $400 million in new armaments, including munitions for rocket systems and artillery mortar systems and rounds, armored vehicles and anti-tank weapons.  

Anna Borshchevskaya, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, told VOA that the new U.S. assistance does not provide most of what Ukraine asked for. 

“In other words, there was no new weaponry provided. Ukraine still does not have the capability to use its weaponry to strike inside Russia, and there was no discussion of a potential NATO membership for Ukraine,” she said. 

As fighting continues, a Russian missile attack on the southern city of Zaporizhzhia killed two people and injured 15 in the city center and caused huge damage to civilian infrastructure, including a kindergarten and more than 30 residential buildings, regional Governor Ivan Fedorov said.   

North Korean involvement 

Separately at the U.N. Security Council, Western officials expressed concern that North Korea may be planning to send thousands of troops to Ukraine to fight for Russia. 

Zelenskyy said in his nightly address Sunday that there is satellite and video evidence that North Korea is sending not only equipment to Russia but is also preparing soldiers for deployment. 

Russia’s envoy only alluded to the accusations during a council meeting Monday on Ukraine. 

“They [the West] have become distracted by circulating scaremongering with Iranian, Chinese and [North] Korean bogeymen, each one of which is more absurd than the one before,” Russian Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia said. 

South Korea’s envoy said according to his government’s National Intelligence Service, Pyongyang has shipped Russia over 13,000 containers filled with artillery shells, missiles and anti-tank rockets since August 2023, and now they are sending troops. 

“Pyongyang, according to our NIS [National Intelligence Service], has deployed about 1,500 special forces troops to Russia’s Far Eastern cities, aboard Russian naval vessels, since earlier this month,” Ambassador Hwang Joonkook said. “The transported soldiers were provided with Russian military uniforms and Russian weapons. And to disguise their identity, they were issued with fake identity cards of residents from Yakutia and Buryatia who share similar facial features with North Koreans.” 

Hwang said North Korea will expect a “generous payoff” from Moscow in return for its troops. 

“It could be either military or financial assistance; it could be nuclear weapons-related technology,” he said. 

The U.S. envoy said Washington is aware of the reports, and if true, they are a “dangerous and highly concerning development.” 

“If Russia is indeed turning to the DPRK for manpower, it would be a sign of desperation on the part of the Kremlin,” U.S. Deputy U.N. Ambassador Robert Wood said. “We know Russia is suffering extraordinary casualties on the battlefield due to the bravery and effectiveness of the Ukrainian military. Russia cannot sustain its aggression without assistance.” 

Ukraine’s ambassador accused North Korea of fueling and prolonging the war and said Russia is “begging global outcasts” for weapons and troops. Sergiy Kyslytsya said according to publicly available information, about 11,000 North Korean infantry troops are being trained in the east of Russia and are expected to be ready for deployment by November 1. 

VOA national security correspondent Jeff Seldin and VOA U.N. correspondent Margaret Besheer contributed to this report. Some material was provided by The Associated Press and Reuters.
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Many European Union countries are calling for the bloc to clamp down on migration amid a surge in support for right-wing political parties. But Spain is bucking the trend — and insists Europe’s aging population needs controlled migration to boost its economy. Henry Ridgwell reports. Camera: Alfonso Beato.
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washington — The General Assembly of the World Uyghur Congress (WUC) is set to begin Thursday, following months of ongoing harassment from the Chinese government that the top Uyghur organization has described as “unprecedented.”

In the months leading up to the group’s eighth general assembly, which takes place this year in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Uyghur organization has endured numerous efforts to derail or even cancel the event, the group said. The harassment included threats of physical harm, arrest and sabotage.

Groups that advocate for Uyghur human rights have long faced harassment from the Chinese government, but this recent harassment was particularly extreme, according to Zumretay Arkin, the WUC’s spokesperson and director of global advocacy.

“It’s reached another level this time,” Arkin told VOA from Sarajevo. “The World Uyghur Congress is among the most important organizations in our movement, in the diaspora, and they want to destroy it completely.”

In one of the most severe examples, the email account of a WUC employee was hacked, Arkin told VOA. The unidentified hackers on Monday sent out emails, which VOA has reviewed, to all attendees, including WUC delegates and candidates, as well as foreign lawmakers, falsely claiming that the general assembly had been postponed.

The WUC holds its general assembly every three years. At each assembly, the organization elects its leadership and sets strategic priorities in response to human rights abuses in the Chinese region Xinjiang, where most Uyghurs live.

“We are advocating for not only the human rights of Uyghur people, but also self-determination of Uyghurs. And that’s considered a threat to the Chinese government,” said Arkin, who is running to be the WUC’s next vice president.

The Germany-based WUC has condemned the harassment.

“It is a clear effort to intimidate the Uyghur community and silence their voices,” the organization said in a Friday statement.

In other cases of harassment, the Chinese Embassy in Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia and Herzegovina, has exerted pressure to cancel the general assembly entirely and indicated it would encourage local authorities to arrest former WUC President Dolkun Isa, who is a German citizen.

Bosnia and Herzegovina has an extradition treaty with China. When Isa and Arkin arrived in Sarajevo on Monday, Arkin said they didn’t have any issues in entering the country.

China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and embassy in Sarajevo did not immediately reply to VOA’s emails requesting comment.

In another example, an informant with knowledge of the situation told the Norway-based Uyghur activist Abduweli Ayup that Chinese authorities were considering various ways to disrupt the general assembly, including staging a car accident or cutting electricity.

“He told me that they might make [a] car accident and cut the electricity, or protest in front of the World Uyghur Congress,” Ayup told VOA.

Chinese authorities have also directly targeted WUC delegates from countries including Australia, Germany, Ireland and Turkey, Arkin said. Those authorities have pressured delegates not to participate in the general assembly, including by making threats against family members who are still in Xinjiang, according to Arkin.

And in the case of Uzbekistan, local Uzbek authorities pressured WUC delegates who live in Uzbekistan to not participate in the general assembly, according to Arkin, who said no delegates from Uzbekistan will be attending as a result.

Uzbekistan’s Washington embassy did not immediately reply to VOA’s email requesting comment.

Beijing has long targeted Uyghur rights groups and activists around the world to silence criticism, according to Sophie Richardson, a visiting scholar at Stanford and the former China director at Human Rights Watch. This recent bout of harassment is just the latest example.

“It’s the ultimate expression of how desperate it [Beijing] is to keep people from talking about genocide and crimes against humanity,” Richardson told VOA.

The Chinese government stands accused by rights groups and multiple Western governments of perpetrating genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs in the northwestern region of Xinjiang, which many Uyghurs prefer to call the Uyghur Region or East Turkestan. Beijing denies any wrongdoing in the region.

Part of why the Chinese government is so brazen in its perpetration of transnational repression is that Beijing has long done so with almost complete impunity, according to Richardson.

“They’ve now been doing so for decades and accelerated it significantly over the last decade — and not really had to pay a price for doing so,” Richardson said.

With the general assembly set to begin in just a few days, there are a lot of things on Arkin’s mind — the most pressing of which is the safety of WUC members, her family members still inside Xinjiang and herself.

Nevertheless, Arkin thinks the extreme lengths the Chinese government is going to in order to derail the general assembly may also underscore Beijing’s own fears.

“We’re building a system that is our own. We’re building something totally opposite to what the Chinese government has, and so they’re scared of that. They’re scared of democracy and human rights,” Arkin said.
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TIRANA, Albania — Albania’s left-wing Freedom Party said Monday its leader and former Albanian President Ilir Meta has been arrested on alleged corruption charges.

Meta, 55, was arrested in the capital, Tirana, by officers with the National Investigation Bureau, according to local media. Local television stations showed masked, plainclothes police officers taking Meta from his vehicle after he returned from neighboring Kosovo ahead of holding a news conference.

The party’s secretary-general, Tedi Blushi, called it “a criminal kidnapping.”

There was no immediate comment from the prosecutor’s office.

After meeting Meta at the police department, his lawyer Genc Gjokutaj said the former president is being investigated for alleged corruption, money laundering and hiding personal income and property.

Meta was Albania’s previous president, serving from 2017-2022. He was being investigated for alleged illegal lobbying in the United States years ago. He and his former wife also have been investigated on allegations of hiding their personal property and income.

Meta has been a vocal opponent of the government of Prime Minister Edi Rama, accusing it of running a “kleptocratic regime” and concentrating all legislative, administrative and judiciary powers in Rama’s hands.

Corruption has been post-communist Albania’s Achilles’ heel, strongly affecting the country’s democratic, economic and social development.

Judicial institutions created with the support of the European Union and the United States have launched several investigations into former senior government officials allegedly involved in corruption. Albania seeks EU membership.

Former prime minister and president Sali Berisha, now a lawmaker and leader of the main opposition Democratic Party, is also accused of corruption and is under house arrest waiting for the trial.

Soon after Meta’s arrest, Romana Vlahutin, EU ambassador to Tirana when the judicial reform was approved in 2016 and now a European Council official, said on social platform X, “Justice reform in full force! There are no untouchables.”
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Paris — French drugmaker Sanofi’s confirmation that it will sell a controlling stake in its consumer health unit to a U.S. investment fund sparked a new political backlash Monday, stoked by fears the deal marks a loss of sovereignty over key medications.  

Paris “must block the sale” using powers to protect strategic sectors, Manuel Bompard, a senior lawmaker in the hard-left France Unbowed (LFI) party, told the TF1 broadcaster.  

Politicians and unions have torn into Sanofi’s proposed 16-billion-euro ($17.4 billion) deal with U.S. investment fund CD&R for a controlling stake in Opella.  

The subsidiary makes household-name drugs including Doliprane branded paracetamol  whose yellow boxes dominate the French market.  

Under pressure, Prime Minister Michel Barnier’s minority government said it had secured a two-percent stake in Opella for public investment bank Bpifrance and “extremely strong” guarantees against job cuts and offshoring.  

Opella employs over 11,000 workers and operates in 100 countries.  

Sanofi said it is the third-largest business worldwide in the market for over-the-counter medicines, vitamins and supplements.  

CD&R — which has a battery of investments in France — would help build Opella into a “French-headquartered, global consumer healthcare champion,” the pharma giant said in a statement.  

‘Just words’

But with memories of drug shortages during and since the Covid-19 pandemic still raw for many, critics say the defenses are too weak.

A small stake “won’t give the French state a say in strategic decisions” at Opella, said Bompard, whose LFI dominates a left alliance that is the largest opposition group against Barnier and President Emmanuel Macron.  

Thomas Portes, also of the LFI, posted on X that the government had offered “no guarantees, just words.”  

Economy Minister Antoine Armand said a contract between CD&R, Sanofi and the government included maintaining production sites, research and development and Opella’s official headquarters in France, as well as investing at least 70 million euros over five years.  

It covers “keeping up a minimum production volume for Opella’s sensitive products in France,” Armand added, including Doliprane, digestive medication Lanzor and Aspegic branded aspirin.  

There would be financial penalties for closing French production sites, laying off workers or failing to buy from French suppliers.  

That includes Seqens, a company re-establishing production in France of Doliprane’s active ingredient paracetamol.  

“Workers are not at all reassured by the latest developments,” said Johann Nicolas, a CGT union representative at Opella’s Doliprane plant in Lisieux, northern France.  

He added that a picket had throttled production there from around 1.3 million boxes of the drug per day to around 265,000.  

The proposed protections in the deal have also failed to win over even some in the government camp.  

Monday’s guarantees “do not at all indicate a commitment for the long term, whether on investment, supply or jobs,” Charles Rodwell, a lawmaker in Macron’s EPR party who has closely followed the case, told AFP.  

He vowed “painstaking” parliamentary surveillance of government action over the deal including measures to “block” the sale if ministers fall short.

Brand loyalty

Macron said last week that “the government has the instruments needed to protect France” from any unwanted “capital ownership.”  

Emotion over the Opella sales is closely linked to Doliprane.  

Boxes of the non-opioid analgesic against mild to moderate pain and fever often line entire pharmacy walls.  

The drug comes in many doses — from 100 mg for babies to 1,000 mg for adults — and in tablet, capsule, suppository and liquid forms.  

It is so ubiquitous that French people call any paracetamol product Doliprane, even when made by a different manufacturer.  

Sanofi, among the world’s top 12 health care companies, says the planned spinoff is part of a strategy to focus less on over-the-counter medication and more on innovative medicines and vaccines, including for polio, influenza and meningitis.
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In late September, the Russian parliament backed new legislation that will make it harder for some people to adopt children from the country. Some adoption advocates say the legislation is really designed to punish the West. VOA Russian has the story, narrated by Anna Rice. Camera: Andre Sergunin  
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CANBERRA, Australia — An Indigenous senator told King Charles III that Australia is not his land and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said the monarch is not needed as the country’s head of state as the British royal visited Australia’s parliament on Monday.

Indigenous independent Senator Lidia Thorpe was escorted out of a parliamentary reception for the royal couple after shouting that British colonizers have taken Indigenous land and bones.

“You committed genocide against our people,” she shouted. “Give us what you stole from us — our bones, our skulls, our babies, our people. You destroyed our land. Give us a treaty. We want a treaty.”

King Charles spoke quietly with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese while security officials stopped Senator Thorpe from approaching.

“This is not your land. You are not my king,” Thorpe yelled as she was ushered from the hall.

Albanese, who wants the country to become a republic with an Australian head of state, also told the king it was time for his role to end.

“You have shown great respect for Australians, even during times when we have debated the future of our own constitutional arrangements and the nature of our relationship with the Crown,” Albanese said. But, he said, “nothing stands still.”

Opposition leader Peter Dutton, who wants to keep the British king as Australia’s monarch, noted that even supporters of a republic were honored to attend a reception for the Charles and Queen Camilla at Parliament House in the capital Canberra.

“People have had haircuts, people have shined shoes, suits have been pressed and that’s just the republicans,” Dutton quipped.

Australia’s six state government leaders underscored the political divide on the country’s constitutional relationship with Britain by declining invitations to attend the reception. All six would prefer an Australian citizen was Australia’s head of state. They each said they had more pressing engagements on Monday, but monarchists agreed the royals had been snubbed.

Charles used the start of his speech to thank Canberra Indigenous elder Auntie Violet Sheridan for her traditional welcome to the king and queen.

“Let me also say how deeply I appreciated this morning’s moving Welcome to Country ceremony, which offers me the opportunity to pay my respects to the traditional owners of the lands on which we meet, the Ngunnawal people, and all First Nations peoples who have loved and cared for this continent for 65,000 years,” Charles said.

“Throughout my life, Australia’s First Nations peoples have done me the great honor of sharing so generously their stories and cultures. I can only say how much my own experience has been shaped and strengthened by such traditional wisdom,” Charles added.

Australians decided in a referendum in 1999 to retain Queen Elizabeth II as head of state. That result is widely regarded to have been the consequence of disagreement about how a president would be chosen rather than majority support for a monarch.

Albanese has ruled out holding another referendum on the subject during his current three-year term in government. But it is a possibility if his center-left Labor Party is reelected at elections due by May next year.

Charles was drawn into Australia’s republic debate months before his visit.

The Australian Republic Movement, which wants Australia to sever its constitutional ties with Britain, wrote to Charles in December last year requesting a meeting in Australia and for the king to advocate their cause. Buckingham Palace politely wrote back in March to say the king’s meetings would be decided upon by the Australian government. A meeting with the ARM does not appear on the official itinerary.

“Whether Australia becomes a republic is … a matter for the Australian public to decide,” the Buckingham Palace letter said.

Earlier Monday, Charles and Camilla laid wreaths at the Australian War Memorial then shook hands with well-wishers on the second full day of their visit.

The memorial estimated 4,000 people had turned out to see the couple.

Charles, 75, is being treated for cancer, which has led to a scaled-down itinerary. It is Charles’ 17th trip to Australia and the first since he became king in 2022. It is the first visit to Australia by a reigning British monarch since his late mother Queen Elizabeth II traveled to the distant nation in 2011.

Charles and Camilla rested the day after their arrival late Friday before making their first public appearance of the trip at a church service in Sydney on Sunday. They then flew to Canberra where they visited the Tomb of the Unknown Australian Soldier and a reception at Parliament House.

Before leaving the war memorial, they stopped to greet hundreds of people who gathered under clear skies flying Australian flags. 

On Wednesday, Charles will travel to Samoa, where he will open the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting.
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