As Kyiv continues its offensive inside Russia and the Russian army nears a key hub in Ukraine’s Donbas region, leaders of more than 50 nations, known as the Ukraine Defense Contact Group, met in Germany on Friday to help get Kyiv the support it seeks. VOA Pentagon correspondent Carla Babb reports.
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A Russian missile strike on the historic Ukrainian town of Lviv on September 4 killed at least seven people and damaged parts of the city’s historic downtown. On Thursday, rebuilding began, even as the city mourned the dead. Omelyan Oshchudlyak reports. Camera: Yuriy Dankevych.
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Ukraine has a new foreign minister, one of the latest moves as President Volodymyr Zelenskyy embarks on the largest overhaul of his administration since Russia’s 2022 full-scale invasion. Eastern Europe Bureau Chief Myroslava Gongadze reports on the appointment of nine new ministers in the Cabinet shakeup. Videographer: Daniil Batushchak
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Moscow — The Kremlin on Friday accused the United States of applying unacceptable pressure on Russian media after the U.S. Justice Department charged Russian TV contributor Dimitri Simes and his wife with schemes to violate U.S. sanctions. 

The two indictments were announced just one day after the U.S. took several legal actions against Russia to combat alleged efforts to meddle in the 2024 presidential elections, including charging two employees of the Russian state media network RT and sanctioning RT and its top network editor. 

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, who has said Russia is not seeking to interfere in the U.S. presidential election, told reporters that Washington was trying to ensure that Moscow’s own perspective on world affairs was not available to people. 

“Washington continues to try to put pressure on Russia, on Russian citizens, and even on the Russian media, which is engaged in informing both citizens inside our country and world public opinion about what is happening, from our perspective,” said Peskov. 

“Washington does not even accept that there should be options out there for anyone to get news from our perspective.  

This is nothing other than blatant pressure. We strongly condemn this stance as unacceptable,” he said. 

Moscow still grants accreditation to Western journalists to work in Russia, though many have left since the start of the Ukraine war in 2022 and the arrest of Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich on spying charges in March 2023. 

Gershkovich, who denied the charges, was freed in a prisoner swap last month. 

Russia has said it will take retaliatory measures against U.S. media in response to Washington’s moves against RT. 

Asked what those measures would be, Peskov said Russia carefully evaluated the editorial policies of various foreign media outlets and would take those factors into account when making any decisions, on what he suggested would be a case-by-case basis. 

 
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Paris — France’s far-right National Rally (RN) is exerting outsize power over President Emmanuel Macron and his new Prime Minister Michel Barnier, rivals said on Friday, a day after the veteran politician got the job with tacit support from the RN.

Macron named former 73-year-old Barnier, a conservative and a former Brexit negotiator, as prime minister on Thursday, capping a two-months-long search following his ill-fated decision to call a legislative election that delivered an unruly hung parliament.

France’s next prime minister faces the daunting task of trying to drive reforms and the 2025 budget through a hung parliament, as France is under pressure from the European Commission and bond markets to reduce its deficit.

The RN gave tentative support to Barnier’s nomination by saying it would not immediately try to vote it down, but made clear it could withdraw support at any point if its concerns on immigration, security and pocketbook issues were not met.

Marine Le Pen’s party had vetoed other possible prime ministers Macron had considered over the past weeks.

“Today, we have a prime minister who is completely dependent on the RN,” said Lucie Castets, the prime ministerial pick of the leftist alliance that came top in the July vote, but who was overlooked by Macron after it failed to secure an absolute majority.

“In so doing, the president has put himself in cohabitation with the RN,” she said, referring to the term used in France when the president governs with a prime minister from a rival party. The left is organizing protests across the country on Saturday.

After hoping to win the snap election following a strong showing in the first round, the RN came third when voters and other parties, especially to the left, rallied to keep it out of power in the run-off round.

But appointing Barnier after the RN signaled it would not block him is making the government’s dependent on the RN’s goodwill, said Sacha Houlie, an MP who used to belong to Macron’s camp.

“It’s now the far right that makes the kings or queens,” Socialist Party chief Olivier Faure said on France Inter radio.

Neither Barnier, who has started meetings with parties on the right and center to pull together a government, nor Macron have made any comment on this or responded to criticism from the opposition.

‘At Le Pen’s mercy’?

Similar criticism were also made by some abroad.

“Barnier must not become prime minister at Le Pen’s mercy,” said Anton Hofreiter, chair of the German parliament’s Committee on European Union Affairs and a member of the Greens.

“I don’t expect any progressive ideas from the new prime minister. I can only hope that Barnier will draw on his many years of European experience and strengthen common European policies.”

Much attention will now focus on who Barnier seeks to name to his cabinet. Some ministers from the outgoing government may continue but Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire, who did not seek re-election as an MP, was unlikely to be among them, two sources told Reuters, saying Le Maire wanted to move on.

“Barnier’s choice for the finance ministry will therefore be crucial to reassure Brussels and financial markets that France can emerge safely from a dangerously intertwined political and fiscal crisis over the next three months,” Eurasia analysts said.

Government sources said Macron would like Foreign Minister Stephane Sejourne and Defense Minister Sebastien Lecornu to stay on in the new Cabinet.

Meanwhile, RN lawmaker Laurent Jacobelli sought to play down the far right’s power over the new government.

“We are in the opposition, clearly … We are not giving anyone the green light,” he said on France 2. “We will not be the political force that leads France into the wall by systematically opposing everything and creating chaos.”

The RN, whose priority is the 2027 presidential election and consequently wants to be seen by voters as responsible, also seemed to consider it had no interest in prolonging the past weeks’ political uncertainty, Eurasia said.

That same line of thinking could also prompt them to hesitate before bringing Barnier’s government down.

Eurointelligence analysts, noting that Barnier, a moderate, career politician, considerably toughened his discourse on immigration during his failed 2021 bid to get his party’s ticket for the presidential election, said: “The left parties will have to digest their defeat, while the RN could extract more dividends.”
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KYIV, Ukraine — Russian attacks on Ukraine overnight caused fires and injured at least five people across the country, local authorities said on Friday.

Ukraine’s air force said it shot down 27 out of 44 Russia-launched drones with eight more “likely downed by the electronic warfare tools” overnight.

Russia also used two missiles in the attack, the air force said in the statement via the Telegram messaging app.

The governor of the northeastern region of Kharkiv said a missile attack damaged residential buildings and injured three people in the town of Liubotyn on Friday morning.

Dnipropetrovsk regional governor Serhiy Lysak said the air force shot down five drones and one missile over the region.

Various overnight attacks in this central region injured two people, damaged over 12 homes and impacted power lines and gas pipelines, he added.

Lviv regional authorities said drone debris fell in an industrial zone, setting fire to four trucks. A team of 32 firefighters had put out the fire by the morning and the governor reported no injuries during the attack.

Another fire caused by falling debris had been put out in the southern region of Mykolaiv where the air force shot down seven drones, its governor said.
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Russia appears to be struggling to find buyers for its liquefied natural gas from a flagship Arctic development after the West imposed sanctions, forcing Moscow to store the gas in a huge container vessel in the Arctic Sea. Henry Ridgwell reports from London.
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A new conscription law has been in force in Ukraine for more than three months, and President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says the mobilization has been going according to plan. But studies suggest Ukrainians are ambivalent about the law. Lesia Bakalets in Kyiv looks at the reasons. Videographer: Vladyslav Smilianets
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ROME — Seven people were rescued and 21 people were missing at sea after a migrant shipwreck off the island of Lampedusa, the Italian coast guard said on Wednesday. 

The survivors, all male Syrian nationals, were picked up from a semi-sunken boat about 18.5 kilometers southwest of Lampedusa, a statement said. 

They told rescuers they had set off on Sunday from Libya, and that 21 of the 28 people they had aboard, including three children, had fallen into the sea during rough weather.  

The coast guard said it had taken the survivors to Lampedusa and had deployed naval and air units to look for the missing people. 

The Italian office of U.N. refugee agency UNHCR told Reuters that Sudanese people were also on the boat, which is believed to have departed from the port of Sabratha, west of Tripoli.  

The head of UNHCR Italy, Chiara Cardoletti, wrote on X that the survivors were in “critical” condition and had lost relatives at sea.  

The boat capsized “leaving people clinging to the side of the boat as their family members drowned around them,” Nicola Dell’Arciprete, UNICEF country coordinator for Italy, said in a statement.  

The central Mediterranean is among the world’s deadliest migration routes. According to the U.N. migration agency (IOM), more than 2,500 migrants died or went missing attempting the crossing last year, and 1,047 this year, as of Tuesday. 

The latest figures from the Italian interior ministry recorded that just over 43,000 migrants had reached Italy so far in 2024, well down from previous years.  
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washington — During his recent trip to Mongolia, Russian President Vladimir Putin promoted a plan to build a pipeline from his country to China. The pipeline, which could weaken U.S. energy leverage over Beijing, would have to pass through Mongolia.

In a joint press conference held after talks in Ulaanbaatar on Tuesday, Putin said cooperation in the gas sector looks promising.

The two sides have completed drawing up documents to design the Soyuz Vostok gas pipeline extension in Mongolia and it is “at the stage of state expert appraisal and assessment,” Putin said.

New export market

The Soyuz Vostok gas pipeline extension is part of the Power of Siberia 2 (PS-2) pipeline. The PS-2 pipeline would transport about 50 billion cubic meters (bcm) of natural gas annually to China when completed.

It is seen as an effort by Moscow to divert gas that had been exported to Europe to Asia after the Nord Stream 1 pipeline under the Baltic Sea was damaged by explosions last year.

Russia uses the Power of Siberia 1 pipeline to deliver gas to China, exporting 22.7 bcm in 2023. It aims to raise the supplies to 38 bcm annually by 2025.

“China is really Russia’s option to find a customer for a sizable portion of the pipeline gas it previously sent to Europe,” said Erica Downs, a senior research scholar focusing on Chinese energy markets at the Center on Global Energy Policy at Columbia University.

“Putin will continue to champion the project and look for ways to characterize any discussion of the project with Mongolian officials as progress,” she continued.

Beijing and Moscow have been in talks for years over PS-2, but a final agreement has not been reached. Mongolia also has not made a final approval for the pipeline to pass through its land.

“The pipeline, if built, would reduce U.S. LNG [liquefied natural gas] exports to China,” further weakening U.S. energy leverage over China that is already declining, said Joseph Webster, senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Global Energy Center.

Beijing seeks to reduce foreign energy dependence by “replacing imports with indigenously produced energy” including solar, wind, and nuclear energy, Webster said.

A report by the U.S. Congressional Research Service on Aug. 28 said, “PS-2 could strengthen China’s bargaining position” with the U.S. if it receives additional Russian natural gas. The U.S. has been the sixth largest exporter of LNG to China between 2016 and 2023, the report noted.

The report said PS-2 could also help Russia avoid sanctions imposed by the West because “PS-2 would involve pipeline trade of natural gas” and “no existing sanctions would impact this trade.”

Renewed push

Putin made an extra effort to promote the pipeline deal at the press conference with Mongolian President Ukhnaagiin Khurelsukh.

He said Russia and Mongolia are “not only talking about the transit of Russian gas across Mongolia” but “the potential delivery of gas to Mongolian consumers.”

Ahead of the talks, Putin said Mongolia initially “preferred to limit themselves to being just a transit country” for the pipeline but is now considering a deal to obtain “cheap pipeline gas to support the development of their economy and infrastructure.”

Putin made the comments in a written interview with Mongolia’s Onoodor newspaper, according to the Kremlin on Monday.

Putin’s renewed push to boost PS2 came after Mongolia in August excluded the pipeline project in its national development plan through 2028.

Diana Furchtgott-Roth, director of the Center for Energy, Climate and Environment at the Heritage Foundation, said Putin made the remarks “to project strength” and because he “needs a market for his oil.”

“He wants to see what the West says,” and also “to see whether Mongolia changes its mind,” but the pipeline deal is still incomplete “until we get confirmation from Mongolia,” she said.

Khurelsukh did not confirm in his statements in the bilateral talks with Putin whether he agreed to allow the pipeline deal to proceed.

In a series of documents signed on Tuesday, Russia and Mongolia made agreements on the supplies of oil, petroleum products, and aviation fuel but did not mention any agreements on the pipeline deal.

China-Russia competition

Mongolia is heavily dependent on Russian energy, importing 95% of its petroleum products and more than 20% of electricity. A spokesperson for the Mongolian government told Politico on Tuesday that is why it did not arrest Putin when he was in the country.

The International Criminal Court issued a warrant for Putin’s arrest for crimes committed in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. As a member country of the ICC, Mongolia was obligated to arrest him.

“Mongolia probably does not have to make a final decision about Power of Siberia 2 anytime soon because China is in no hurry to move forward with the project,” Downs said.

“The fact that Mongolia did not include Power of Siberia 2 in its next four-year spending plan indicates that it does not expect the project to move off the drawing board before 2028,” she said.

Russia also has been in talks with China about the project in recent months.

In May, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak said Beijing and Moscow are expected to sign a contract on the PS-2 gas pipeline “in the near future.”

But the pipeline deal between the two remained stalled over pricing demands by Beijing, the Financial Times reported in June.

On Wednesday, Chinese Ambassador to Russia Zhang Hanhui apparently told the Russian News Agency Tass on the sidelines of the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok that Beijing and Moscow would eventually launch PS-2 despite difficulties surrounding the project.

“China always drives a hard bargain on the pricing of gas imports and wants to control as much as possible of the transportation network involved in its imports and exports,” said Thomas Duesterberg, senior fellow at Hudson Institute.

“Russia and China compete over influence in Mongolia, and the Russo-Mongolian deal is subject to close scrutiny because of these factors, and that likely explains the failure at this time to reach a deal,” he added.

Chinese Vice President Han Zheng will visit Mongolia from Sept. 4 to 8 after attending the Eastern Economic Forum held in Vladivostok, the Chinese Foreign Ministry announced on Tuesday.

It is uncertain, however, whether Beijing and Ulaanbaatar will discuss the PS-2 pipeline project.
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European Union governments have accused Russia of “weaponizing” migration by helping illegal migrants cross into the EU, stoking political tensions in countries such as Finland, Poland and Latvia. Latvian political observers say this tactic, in part, led to the gains of far-right parties in European elections this year. Henry Wilkins reports from Riga, Latvia
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Ukraine faces wildly different prospects under a potential Donald Trump or Kamala Harris U.S. presidency. But as their campaigns race to the finish line, neither candidate has laid out exactly how they plan to deal with Russia’s war on Ukraine. Experts say in that same space of time, the battlefield in Ukraine has itself radically changed, giving more power to Ukraine in determining its own fate. VOA White House correspondent Anita Powell reports from Washington.
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  Washington  — In an interview with a Mongolian newspaper, Russian President Vladimir Putin this week accused the West of persecuting Russian journalists. 

“In order to hide from inconvenient facts, from truthful information, the West, which considers itself the standard of freedom, has launched an open persecution against Russian correspondents,” Putin told the newspaper Onoodor.  

Putin spoke with the newspaper the day before he arrived in Mongolia, where he traveled despite being under an international arrest warrant. 

And the comments came just days after the Kremlin announced it was banning entry to Russia for 92 more people — mainly U.S. citizens, including several journalists — over what Moscow characterized as Washington’s anti-Russia posture. 

Among those banned were The Wall Street Journal’s editor-in-chief Emma Tucker, as well as other journalists from the Journal, The New York Times and The Washington Post.  

Media analysts said Putin’s comments reflect the restricted environment facing journalists in Russia. 

“This is nothing new, this kind of vocabulary. But it underlines yet again that there is no independent press in Russia, especially when it comes to reporting on the war in Ukraine,” Karol Luczka, Eastern Europe monitor at the International Press Institute in Vienna, told VOA. 

Putin’s comments follow years of Moscow’s harsh crackdown on independent media, with dozens jailed, including local and foreign reporters, and a series of harsh laws that analysts say make independent journalism all but impossible. 

Since the 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine, independent outlets and journalists have been forced to decamp to other countries to avoid arrest and to keep reporting on Russia. And even in exile, Russian journalists continue to face Moscow-backed harassment in a process known as transnational repression. 

Putin’s claims echoed a statement that Russia’s Foreign Ministry gave VOA in August. 

The Foreign Ministry declined to answer VOA’s specific questions about threats and harassment facing journalists, but a spokesperson said “protecting the rights of journalists” is the ministry’s “constant focus of attention.” 

The emailed response then shared a list of instances in which foreign governments fined, banned or suspended Kremlin-run media. 

Washington has imposed sanctions against some state-run Russian television stations, which it says have spread disinformation to boost Moscow’s war in Ukraine. And Canada and the European Union blocked broadcasts to Russian state-run news outlets.  

Russia’s Washington embassy, meanwhile, did not immediately reply to VOA’s email requesting comment for this story. 

Putin, however, maintained that news outlets operate freely in Russia. 

“The only requirement for them is compliance with Russian legislation,” he said. “Foreign correspondents accredited in our country should understand this.” 

Luczka said that statement was “laughable” and “not something that can be taken seriously.” 

“What does respect the law mean? The laws are such in Russia that independent media cannot function — so, yes, they can function as long as they respect the law, but the law says that they cannot function,” Luczka said. 

In early August, two American journalists — Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s Alsu Kurmasheva and The Wall Street Journal’s Evan Gershkovich — were released from Russia, where they were held on bogus charges, in a historic prisoner swap between the U.S. and Russia. Gershkovich was accredited to report in Russia but was still arrested for his work.

Press freedom experts say their jailings underscored Russia’s disdain for media freedom. 

Putin’s comments came ahead of his first trip to Mongolia in five years. 

Ukraine and the European Union expressed concern that Mongolia, which is a member of the International Criminal Court, or ICC, did not act on a warrant to arrest Putin when he arrived in Mongolia on Monday. 

The ICC issued an arrest warrant for Putin in 2023 over alleged war crimes committed in the war in Ukraine. As a member of the ICC, Mongolia has a responsibility to act on warrants. 

Some information in this report came from Reuters. 
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copenhagen, denmark — Sweden’s Foreign Minister Tobias Billström, who steered the Scandinavian country along a sometimes bumpy road to NATO membership and stood tall on supporting Ukraine, stunned the political establishment Wednesday by saying he was leaving the Swedish government next week.

“It has not been an easy decision but something that I have thought about and processed for some time,” Billström wrote on X.

Billström became foreign minister in October 2022, when Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson formed a coalition government with his own conservative Moderate Party, the smaller Christian Democrats and the Liberals.

In May 2022, Sweden and neighboring Finland sought NATO membership, ending decades of post-World War II neutrality and centuries of broader non-alignment with major powers as security concerns in Europe spiked following Russia’s 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

After 18 months of delays, Sweden’s membership bid cleared the final hurdle in February Hungary gave its consent.

Turkey also objected to Sweden joining the alliance, but on January 23, Turkish legislators voted in favor. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan put forth a series of conditions including a tougher stance from Stockholm toward groups that Turkey regards as threats to its security, such as Kurdish militants and members of a network it blames for a failed coup in 2016.

Sweden became the 32nd member of the military alliance in Marc. Billström, 50, said on X that he had taken Sweden through “a sometimes challenging NATO process.”

On Facebook, Kristersson said that Billström had discharged his duties with “flying colors.”

Billström said on X that he would “leave politics completely. This means that I am also leaving my seat in the Riksdag,” the Swedish parliament. The 349-member assembly will convene next week after the summer recess.

Billström has not announced what he’ll do next and his replacement has not yet been named.
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