Beijing — Chinese President Xi Jinping called for further cooperation with Italy on Monday at a meeting with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, saying the two countries were the ends of the historical Silk Road trade route.

Meloni pulled Italy out of China’s Belt and Road Initiative — whose name refers to the ancient overland trade route — in December, but signed an agreement Sunday that provides a new path for the two countries to cooperate on trade and other issues.

Meloni is on a five-day state visit, her first trip to China as prime minister.

The Belt and Road Initiative, one of Xi’s signature policies, aims to build power and transportation infrastructure around the world in order to stimulate global trade while also deepening China’s ties with other nations.

“China and Italy are located at opposite ends of the ancient Silk Road,” Xi told Meloni, “and the long-standing friendly exchanges between the two countries have made important contributions to the exchange and mutual learning of Eastern and Western civilizations, as well as human development and progress.”

“If countries are inter-connected, they will advance; if they are closed to each other, they will retreat,” said Xi.

Meloni said Italy could play an “important role” in China’s relationship with the European Union and creating balanced trade relationships. The EU imposed provisional tariffs of up to 37.6% on China-made electric vehicles in early July. China’s support for Russia after it invaded Ukraine has further strained relations with the EU.

She also noted China’s role as a diplomatic power on the global stage. “There is growing insecurity at the international level, and I think that China is inevitably a very important interlocutor to deal with all these dynamics,” said Meloni.
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Midyat, Turkey — Through a basement door in southeastern Turkey lies a sprawling underground city — perhaps the country’s largest — which one historian believes dates back to the ninth century before Jesus Christ.

Archaeologists stumbled upon the city-under-a-city “almost by chance” after an excavation of house cellars in Midyat, near the Syrian border, led to the discovery of a vast labyrinth of caves in 2020.

Workers have already cleared more than 50 subterranean rooms, all connected by 120 meters of tunnel carved out of the rock.

But that is only a fraction of the site’s estimated 900,000-square-metre area, which would make it the largest underground city in Turkey’s southern Anatolia region.

“Maybe even in the world,” said Midyat conservation director Mervan Yavuz who oversaw the excavation.

“To protect themselves from the climate, enemies, predators and diseases, people took refuge in these caves which they turned into an actual city,” Yavuz added.

The art historian traces the city’s ancient beginnings to the reign of King Ashurnasirpal II, who ruled the Neo-Assyrian Empire from 883 to 859 BC.

At its height in the seventh century BC, the empire stretched from The Gulf in the east to Egypt in the west.

Referred to as Matiate in that period, the city’s original entrance required people to bend in half and squeeze themselves into a circular opening.

It was this entrance that first gave the Midyat municipality an inkling of its subterranean counterpart’s existence.

“We actually suspected that it existed,” Yavuz recounted as he walked through the cave’s gloom.

“In the 1970s, the ground collapsed and a construction machine fell down. But at the time we didn’t try to find out more, we just strengthened and closed up the hole.”

A hiding place underground

The region where the cave city is located was once known as Mesopotamia, recognized as the cradle of some of the earliest civilizations in the world.

Many major empires conquered or passed through these lands, which may have given those living around Matiate a reason to take refuge underground.

“Before the arrival of the Arabs, these lands were fiercely disputed by the Assyrians, the Persians, the Romans and then the Byzantines,” said Ekrem Akman, a historian at the nearby University of Mardin.

Yavuz noted that “Christians from the Hatay region, fleeing from the persecution of the Roman Empire… built monasteries in the mountains to avoid their attacks”.

He suspects that Jews and Christians may have used Matiate as a hiding place to practice their then-banned religions underground.

He pointed to the inscrutable stylized carvings — a horse, an eight-point star, a hand, trees — which adorn the walls, as well as a stone slab on the floor of one room that may have been used for celebrations or for sacrifices.

As a result of the city’s long continuous occupation, he said it was “difficult to pinpoint” exactly what at the site can be attributed to which period or group.

But “pagans, Jews, Christians, Muslims, all these believers contributed to the underground city of Matiate,” Yavuz said.

Centuries of invasions

Even after the threat of centuries of invasions had passed, the caves stayed in use, said curator Gani Tarkan.

He used to work as a director at the Mardin Museum, where household items, bronzes and potteries recovered from the caves are on display.

“People continued to use this place as a living space,” Tarkan said.

“Some rooms were used as catacombs, others as storage space,” he added.

Excavation leader Yavuz pointed to a series of round holes dug to hold wine-filled amphorae vessels in the gloomy cool, out of the glaring sunlight above.

To this day, the Mardin region’s Orthodox Christian community maintains that old tradition of wine production.

Turkey is also famous for its ancient cave villages in Cappadocia in the center of the country.

But while Cappadocia’s underground cities are built with rooms vertically stacked on top of each other, Matiate spreads out horizontally, Tarkan explained.

The municipality of Midyat, which funds the works, plans to continue the excavation until the site can be opened to the public.

It hopes the site will prove a popular tourist attraction and attract visitors to the city of 120,000.
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KYIV, Ukraine — Ukrainians urged their government to do more to get Russia to release prisoners of war, voicing their anger on Sunday at a ceremony commemorating the second anniversary of an explosion that killed more than 50.

Several thousand soldiers and civilians gathered at Kyiv’s Independence Square Sunday to commemorate the second anniversary of an explosion that killed more than 50 Ukrainians that Russia held in the Olenivka prison barracks.

Impassioned speakers at the ceremony urged the Ukrainian government to work harder to get the soldiers freed in a prisoner exchange.

The Olenivka explosion was one of the most painful pages in the war, according to many soldiers.

“I was there in Olenivka. I was rocked by the explosion,” said Sgt. Kyrylo Masalitin, who was later released. “Never before have I felt so helpless. And those still in captivity feel that helplessness every day. They must know that we have done everything we can do to get them released.”

Behind Masalitin, more than 300 soldiers of the Azov brigade stood in formation. In unison they recited a prayer before holding aloft red flares to honor their comrades.

Russia has claimed that the Olenivka explosion was caused by Ukrainian forces firing a missile that hit the prison barracks. But increasing evidence suggests that Russian forces set off the explosion, according to an investigation by The Associated Press.

The AP interviewed more than a dozen people with direct knowledge of details of the attack, including survivors, investigators and families of the dead and missing. All described evidence they believe points directly to Russia as the culprit. AP also obtained an internal United Nations analysis that found the same. Despite the conclusion of the internal analysis that found Russia planned and executed the attack, the U.N. stopped short of accusing Russia in public statements.

Two years after the explosion, many Ukrainians still want to know exactly how it happened. The demonstration Sunday brought together people who are commemorating Olenivka with others who are protesting Russia’s imprisonment of Ukrainian fighters who defended the Azovstal steel works and were taken prisoner when Russia seized the city of Mariupol.

Many were also pressing for the release of Ukrainian soldiers who were defending the Avovstal steel works and were captured when Mariupol fell in 2022. At least 900 soldiers from the Azov brigade are held as prisoners of war by Russia. The “Free Azov” campaign has become a vociferous pressure group in Kyiv and holds weekly vigils to urge President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s government to do a prisoner exchange to get free Ukrainian prisoners held by Russia.

“We’re here to remember those who died and also those in captivity. We’re here to push our government to work hard on this,” said a soldier who identified himself as Stanislav.

He said he had been a defender of Mariupol when the Russians invaded in February 2022 and he was injured in an artillery attack, losing his left arm. He was treated in the army base inside the Azovstal steel works before he was taken captive by the Russian forces and then released. After physical rehabilitation, Stanislav returned to the army and now works in military headquarters in Kyiv.

He said he will keep pushing for the release of captive soldiers.

“We’re here for a special reason, to see that our brothers-in-arms in captivity come back,” he said. “All of those in captivity.”

The event in the center of Kyiv drew together many families, including the mothers, wives and children of soldiers who were killed at Olenivka or are currently imprisoned by Russia.

Her voice cracking with emotion, Halyna Stafiichuk, 71, said her son is being held by the Russians and she hasn’t heard from him in more than two years.

“I’m crying every day. I’m just praying for a note from him that says he is OK and that he will be home soon,” said Stafiichuk. “We trust that God and our government will bring all our soldiers back.”
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CLARK, Philippines — France renewed a commitment to help defend freedom of navigation and overflight in the Asia-Pacific Sunday and said that its supersonic fighter jets — a pair of which landed for the first time in the Philippines — and advance military power would enable it to respond rapidly to any humanitarian or security crisis in the region. 

France is also working to quickly conclude a defense pact that would allow it to deploy a larger number of forces for joint exercises to the Philippines, French Ambassador to Manila Marie Fontanel said. 

France has moved to broaden its defense engagements in the Indo-Pacific region, including with the Philippines and other Southeast Asian nations. 

That dovetails with the effort of the administration of Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. to boost his country’s territorial defense by allowing a larger U.S. military presence in the Philippines under a 2014 defense agreement and by building security alliances with Asian and Western nations as it deals with China’s increasingly assertive actions in the disputed South China Sea. 

An annual French air force mission called Pegase, which showcases its combat power and travels to friendly countries to deepen defense relations, arrived over the weekend at Clark air base, a part of the former U.S. Air Force base, north of Manila, with two French-made Rafale fighter jets and air force cargo and transport aircraft. 

The French air force flew a small group of journalists, including from The Associated Press, aboard an Airbus A400M cargo aircraft over Philippine waters facing the South China Sea Sunday to demonstrate its crucial capability to undertake aerial refueling. But pockets of turbulence prompted the French military to abort the maneuver for safety reasons. 

Philippine air force personnel will also get the chance to fly onboard the Rafale jets and familiarize themselves with the aircraft. The fighter jets have been a “game changer,” French air force Brig. Gen. Guillaume Thomas, who was heading the air force mission, told a news conference. 

“They enable us to go very far and very fast and to be able to react very quickly… in case of a humanitarian crisis or even security crisis,” Thomas said. “We are able to deploy forces from France to be in this area in the Pacific in a very short notice.” 

The French air force mission “is not designed to target any specific country or any specific situation” and does not aim to escalate regional tensions, Fontanel said. 

France and the Philippines have begun preliminary talks on a status-of-forces agreement that would provide a legal framework and enable troops from each country to hold exercises in the other’s territory. France has been tasked to finish an initial draft of the agreement by September that would be the basis of future talks, Fontanel said. 

Aside from France, the Philippines has been holding separate talks with Canada and New Zealand for such agreements. It signed a similar pact with Japan earlier this month. 

China has strongly criticized such alliance-building and large-scale U.S. military exercises in the Philippines, saying the Philippines is “ganging up” with countries from outside Asia, and warned that military drills could instigate a confrontation and undermine regional stability. 

Philippine military officials have dismissed China’s criticism, saying the drills and alliances are aimed at boosting Manila’s territorial defense and are not directed at any country. 
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KYIV — Five civilians died and 15 more were wounded following Russian strikes Saturday and overnight in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region, its governor said, as Moscow claimed further gains in its monthslong grinding offensive in the country’s war-battered industrial heartland.

Shortly after Donetsk Gov. Vadym Filashkin reported on the casualties Sunday, other local Ukrainian officials said Russian shelling wounded more civilians in the east and south.

At least eight people suffered wounds after Moscow’s forces Sunday struck the eastern Ukrainian city of Nikopol, local Gov. Serhii Lysak reported that same day. Lysak said a toddler and a 10-year-old girl were among the victims, six of whom had to be hospitalized.

Russian shelling Sunday also wounded eight more civilians, including a 10-year-old and two teenagers, in a village in Ukraine’s southern Kherson province, local official Roman Mrochko reported.

Russia started its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in Feb. 2022, sending millions of people fleeing to neighboring countries. Taking control of all of Donetsk is one of the Kremlin’s main war goals.

In the Donetsk region, Russian troops continued to eke out gains as they pushed westward toward the towns of Pokrovsk and Kurakhove. Russia’s Defense Ministry said Sunday that its forces had taken control of two neighboring villages some 30 kilometers (19 miles) east of Pokrovsk, Prohres and Yevhenivka. The day before, Moscow claimed the nearby village of Lozuvatske, one of nearly a dozen it says it has captured in the province this month.

Earlier Sunday, Russia’s Defense Ministry said seven Ukrainian drones were shot down overnight over Russian territory, while a regional official said a drone strike set fire to an oil depot in southern Russia. Firefighters were battling the blaze Sunday morning after three fuel tanks went up in flames in the Kursk region, according to acting regional Gov. Alexey Smirnov. Smirnov said nobody was hurt.
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LONDON — When Donald Trump suggested during the 2016 presidential campaign that he might not honor a U.S. commitment to defend other NATO countries if they were attacked, it triggered alarm throughout the trans-Atlantic alliance.

With Trump’s “America First” rhetoric drawing cheers from fervent supporters, the future of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization is once again on the agenda. But this time, European leaders acknowledge the alliance must evolve to meet the challenges of the 21st century and say they are ready to shoulder more responsibility for their own defense.

A lot has changed in eight years.

First, Trump’s presidency forced Europe to recognize that U.S. military support was no longer guaranteed, then Russia’s invasion of Ukraine underscored the threat on its eastern border. Meanwhile, the U.S. has increasingly focused on China’s expansion in the Asia-Pacific, as well as Iran and North Korea.

“Confronted with powers such as Russia and China, and a United States whose pivot to Asia seems inevitable, no matter who wins the next election, we Europeans need to do more to ensure our own security,” Josep Borrell, the European Union’s foreign policy chief, wrote last weekend in The Times of London.

After relying on U.S. leadership of NATO to protect them with overwhelming nuclear and conventional capability for the past 75 years, European nations must take on a larger role in funding and leading the 32-nation alliance because their interests are increasingly diverging from those of the United States.

“We are talking about a NATO which the United States is still part of, but which the United States is no longer the indispensable leader (of),” said Malcolm Chalmers, deputy director-general of the Royal United Services Institute, a London-based think tank focused on defense and security. “I mean, that is what JD Vance and Donald Trump are talking about. They’re talking about a NATO that is transformed and one in which the Europeans take the greatest share of the burden.”

NATO grew out of secret talks among U.S. officials after World War II about how to supply military equipment to Western Europe and ensure a coordinated response to any attack by the Soviet Union. The 12 founding members signed the North Atlantic Treaty on April 4, 1949.

NATO’s military structure is headed by the Supreme Allied Commander Europe, who is also the commander-in-chief of American forces in Europe. The U.S. is expected to spend almost twice as much on its military this year as all the other alliance members combined, according to NATO statistics.

Trump’s skepticism about NATO was underlined last week when he named Vance as his running mate. Vance has opposed U.S. support for Ukraine, has criticized European nations for slashing defense spending since the Cold War, and said it’s time for “Europe to stand on its own feet.”

Europe got another wakeup call on Sunday when President Joe Biden, whose strong support for NATO was cemented during standoffs with the Soviet Union in the 1970s, said he would not seek reelection. Vice President Kamala Harris, the likely Democratic presidential nominee, has backed the administration’s position on NATO and aid to Ukraine, but she entered politics long after the Cold War and is better known for her work on domestic issues.

“The question is whether she will have that same strong trans-Atlantic view that’s kind of part of her blood in the way that Biden had it,” said Armida van Rij, an expert on European security policy at the Chatham House think tank in London.

Trump’s threat to renege on NATO’s collective security guarantee, a cornerstone of the alliance, is based on his belief that member states aren’t living up to their funding commitments, forcing U.S. taxpayers to subsidize Europe’s defense.

That argument has weakened since 2016.

Twenty-three of the alliance’s 31 non-U.S. members will meet or exceed their commitment to spend at least 2% of economic output on defense this year, up from just three 10 years ago, according to figures compiled by NATO. Overall, the non-U.S. members now spend 2.02% of gross domestic product on defense, compared with 3.4% by the U.S.

Besides that, the European Union has ambitious plans to boost its defense industry in response to the threat posed by Russia’s war on Ukraine. France’s President Emmanuel Macron has urged European nations to seek more independence on airspace defense and relocate production to the continent rather than purchasing material off the shelf from American arms merchants.

The EU plans center on streamlining arms procurement and to increasingly produce them within the 27-state bloc in a multibillion-dollar pivot away from the United States.

The risks for Europe, as well as the United States, are evolving. It’s not just about Russian tanks on Europe’s borders. NATO, as a defensive alliance, must also consider the threats posed by Iran, China and North Korea and be prepared for cyber warfare and foreign interference in elections, as well as conventional military attacks, van Rij said.

That means European nations need to increase troop numbers, upgrade equipment such as tanks, fighter planes and transport aircraft, and improve their ability to counter technological threats, she said. “We need to look at this not as Trump-proofing, but as future-proofing European security and the NATO alliance as a whole,” van Rij said. “Because yes, while there are concerns about U.S. engagements in Europe … — and the JD Vance appointment as Trump’s running mate has only accelerated concerns — there is a bipartisan focus on China, which in the medium- to longer-term could mean that we see resources being reallocated elsewhere.”

One model may be NATO’s newest members, Finland and Sweden, which joined the alliance to bolster their security in the face of Russian aggression.

As historically non-aligned nations, they were forced to develop strategies to fight off any Russian incursion largely on their own, equipping their militaries with a full range of capabilities sometimes missing in NATO countries that are used to relying on the U.S. for commanders and battle plans. Both have military service, important weapons industries and large standing armies.

“The Finnish defense people would say … we planned up to now to fight Russia by ourselves, now NATO is definitely a bonus…,” Chalmers said. “NATO countries have the opposite problem. They’re so used to thinking about fighting with others and particularly fighting with the Americans, they sometimes get out of the habit of thinking about fighting for themselves.”

The risks of over-reliance on the U.S. were highlighted this year when the House of Representatives blocked $61 billion of military aid for Ukraine for months while conservative Republicans argued the government should focus on domestic border security and the nation’s rising debt.

While the funding was eventually approved, the delay left Ukraine short of ammunition and hardware as Russia launched a brutal spring offensive.

A second Trump presidency would bring that mindset to the White House.

“Today … we peer apprehensively across the Atlantic at a worst case in which an erratic, ignorant, self-obsessed prospective U.S. president might cut us loose,” historian Max Hastings wrote in The Times. “Trump is right about one big thing: behind an American shield, since the 1950s Europeans have enjoyed an almost free ride. This is now over, and Vladimir Putin is licking his lips.”
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Dakar, Senegal — Mali’s army and its Russian allies suffered a major setback and significant losses on Saturday while fighting separatists in the country’s north, a spokesman for the rebels told AFP. 

The West African nation’s military leaders, who took power in a 2020 coup, have made it a priority to retake all of the country from separatist and jihadi forces, particularly in Kidal, a pro-independence northern bastion. 

“Azawad fighters are in control in Tinzaouaten and further south in the Kidal region,” said Mohamed Elmaouloud Ramadane, a spokesman for an alliance of predominantly Tuareg separatist armed groups called CSP-DPA. 

“Russian mercenaries and Malian armed forces have fled,” he added. “Others have surrendered.” 

He also shared videos of numerous corpses of soldiers and their allies. 

“The Malian army has retreated,” a local politician told AFP, citing at least 17 dead in a provisional toll. 

“The CSP people are still in Tinzaouaten. The army and Wagner are no longer there,” he said, referring to the Russian mercenary group.  

Fighting also took place further south toward Abeibara, the politician said.  

A former United Nations mission worker in Kidal said: “At least 15 Wagner fighters were killed and arrested after three days of fighting” adding that “the CSP rebels have taken the lead in what happened in Tinzaouaten.”  

Mossa Ag Inzoma, a member of the separatist movement, claimed that “dozens and dozens” of Wagner fighters and soldiers had been killed and taken prisoner. 

Fighting on a scale not seen in months broke out Thursday between the army and separatists in the town of Tinzaouaten, near the border with Algeria, after the army announced it had taken control of In-Afarak, a commercial crossroads in Kidal.  

Mali has been unsettled by violence by jihadi and criminal groups since 2012. 

A junta led by Colonel Assimi Goita took power in 2022 and broke the country’s traditional alliance with France, in favor of Russia. 
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HAVANA — Havana residents watched from shore on Saturday as Russian warships arrived for the second time in as many months in a visit that Cuba called routine. 

Cuban authorities fired shots into the air to signal their welcome, while curious fishermen watched from Havana’s waterside promenade as the ships advanced up the bay. Russian residents were also among the few up early to see the fleet’s arrival. 

The patrol ship Neustrahimiy, training vessel Smolniy and support vessels, all from the Baltic Fleet, are scheduled to depart on Tuesday. 

A brief statement by the Cuban Revolutionary Armed Forces described their arrival as routine. 

A Russian nuclear submarine, frigate and support ships in June also flexed Moscow’s muscles in the port of Havana, less than 160 kilometers (99.4 miles) from Florida. 

“Russia’s deployments in the Atlantic pose no direct threat or concern to the United States,” a U.S. Northern Command spokesperson said, adding the command monitored all approaches to North America. 

Tensions between the United States and Russia have increased since Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, and Russian naval activity — though routine in the Atlantic — has ratcheted up because of U.S. support for Ukraine, U.S. officials say. 

Simultaneously, relations between Cold War allies Russia and Cuba have markedly improved as the Communist-run country battles an economic crisis it charges is due mainly to U.S. sanctions. 

High-level contacts between the countries have increased to a level not seen since the fall of Cuba’s former benefactor, the Soviet Union, with Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel visiting Moscow four times. 

Russia has sent oil, flour and increasing numbers of tourists to the Caribbean nation, which is short of cash and goods. Citizens suffer through daily power outages and other travails, resulting in scattered protests and record migration. 

Ana Garces, a 78-year-old retiree, told Reuters she remembered the Soviet Union was the only country to help Cuba during the 1962 missile crisis, the peak of tensions with Washington, when the world teetered on the brink of nuclear war. 

“We are very grateful,” she said. “Why should we not receive it with open arms? This is friendship. All kinds of ships have entered here.” 

“It shows how other countries do support us and takes away a little of the world’s mentality about our country,” said her husband, 71-year-old retiree Rolando Perez. 
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BUDAPEST, HUNGARY — Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said on Saturday that Russia’s leadership was “hyper rational” and that Ukraine would never be able to fulfill its hopes of becoming a member of the European Union or NATO.

Orban, a nationalist in power since 2010, made the comments during a speech in which he forecast a shift in global power away from the “irrational” West toward Asia and Russia.

“In the next long decades, maybe centuries, Asia will be the dominant center of the world,” Orban said, mentioning China, India, Pakistan and Indonesia as the world’s future big powers.

“And we Westerners pushed the Russians into this bloc as well,” he said in the televised speech before ethnic Hungarians at a festival in the town of Baile Tusnad in neighboring Romania.

Orban, whose country currently holds the rotating EU presidency, has sharply differed from the rest of the bloc by seeking warmer ties with Beijing and Moscow, and he angered some EU leaders when he went on surprise visits to Kyiv, Moscow and Beijing this month for talks on the war in Ukraine.

He said that in contrast to the “weakness” of the West, Russia’s position in world affairs was rational and predictable, saying the country had shown economic flexibility in adapting to Western sanctions since it invaded Crimea in 2014.

Orban, whose own government has passed several anti-LGBT measures, said Russia had gained clout in many parts of the world by severely restricting LGBTQ+ rights.

“The strongest international appeal of Russian soft power is its opposition to LGBTQ,” he said.

He added that Ukraine would never become a member of the EU or NATO because “we Europeans do not have enough money for that.”

“The EU needs to give up its identity as a political project and become an economic and defense project,” Orban said.

The EU opened membership talks with Ukraine late last month, although a long and tough road lies ahead of the country before it can join the bloc.

A declaration at the end of the NATO summit this month said the alliance will support Ukraine on “its irreversible path” toward membership.
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MADRID — The global cruise industry expects to carry 10% more passengers by 2028 than the 31.7 million who took cruise holidays in 2023, when the sector surpassed pre-pandemic levels, but sees some routes exposed to protests over overtourism.

Long criticized for its impact on the environment and coastal communities, the industry has ordered 57 more cruise ships in addition to some 300 now in operation to meet the projected demand, said the European director of Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA), Marie-Caroline Laurent.

At the same time, companies are working to adapt the ships so they can switch to electricity from highly polluting marine fuel when they are moored at ports and to be ready to comply with EU maritime environment regulations by 2030.

But as travel continues to grow, cruise operators face a growing debate about excessive tourist numbers in crowded European port cities such as Spain’s Barcelona, the scene of protests this month in which a small group sprayed tourists with water pistols.

Cruise ship passengers represent just 4% of all tourists visiting Barcelona, CLIA representatives said.

Jaume Collboni, the mayor of Barcelona, which is the biggest cruise ship port in Europe, told Reuters his administration would seek a new deal with the port to reduce the number of one-day cruise calls.

CLIA’s Laurent said violent protests could have an impact on the itineraries in the future.

“There will be some consideration of adapting the itineraries if for some reason we feel that all passengers will not be well-treated,” she said.

Instead, the industry could offer more cruise holidays in Asia, in northern Europe and the Caribbean in the coming years, as well as different ports in the Mediterranean.

The World Travel & Tourism Council expects Spain’s tourism revenues to reach nearly 100 billion euros this year, 11% above pre-pandemic 2019 levels.

Meanwhile, the cruise industry forecasts a 5% increase in visitors in Spain during 2024, below the 13% increase in summer visitor arrivals projected by Spanish authorities.
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paris — They’re often thought to have practically cornered the market on romance, yet they also can bicker and squabble as though they were Olympic sports.

They practically wrote the book on fraternity, liberty and equality — words inscribed on their schools and town halls — but also recognize that those ideals aren’t always applied to citizens of color.

Les Français — the French, as the people of France call themselves — simply don’t fit neatly into any one box.

Now that they’re hosting the Olympics, here’s a look at some of the particularities that make the French, well, French: 

The basics 

France has one of Europe’s most diverse populations, thanks to centuries of conquest and, in the last 200 years, immigration from Italy, Spain, eastern Europe and France’s former colonies overseas.

Although comic-strip hero Asterix the Gaul is something of a national icon, loved by generations of French readers for his feisty ingenuity and pluck, the ancient Gauls who populated much of what is now France more than two millennia ago — and whom some in France still call “our ancestors” — were followed by waves of others.

Romans, Franks (from whom France got its name), Normans (who lent their name to what is now Normandy ) and more fought for the rich lands boxed in by the Mediterranean’s waters and mountains of the Alps and Pyrenees in the south, the mighty Rhine river in the east, and seas to the west and north.

Those natural barriers still largely delineate the borders of what is the largest territory in the European Union and its roughly six-sided shape — the reason the French often refer to their country as “the Hexagon.”

The national statistics agency, Insee, says France’s population at the start of this Olympic year numbered 68.4 million. That includes the 2.2 million inhabitants of five formerly colonized territories in the Caribbean, South America and Indian Ocean that are administered as overseas regions of France — considered as French as Paris, the Olympic host city.

By Insee’s count, France has 2 million more women than men. But France has never had a female president and counts dozens of women killed in domestic violence each year. Of the 78 luminaries honored by being inducted in the Panthéon, the centuries-old Paris resting place for the good and great of France, just five are women. The first, scientist Marie Curie, wasn’t added until 1995. 

A colorblind rainbow nation 

Officially, France is blind to the many colors of its inhabitants. Intending to treat all equally, the republic doesn’t count citizens by race or religion. Some French people, especially those who are white, consider it racist to even discuss skin color.

But people of color and human-rights watchdogs say France’s ideal of colorblind universalism results in discrimination that goes unmeasured and unsolved. The problem has repeatedly boiled over into violent unrest, often in underprivileged parts of France with immigrant populations. Race bias and religious intolerance have contributed to a deep polarization of French politics.

The anti-immigration, far-right National Rally party surged this year in elections marked by unusual violence. Its leaders have long targeted immigrants and their France-born children for supposedly failing to integrate. 

A godless nation of many religions 

After centuries of religious conflict, modern France is constitutionally secular, with church and state separated. Faiths are kept out of shared public spaces like schools, hospitals, courts and sports fields, where students, staff and players aren’t allowed to wear ostentatious crosses, kippahs or Islamic head coverings. France won’t allow its Olympians to wear headscarves at the Paris Games — a blanket ban that won’t apply to athletes from other nations.

But France also legally guarantees the right to believe — or to not believe — and to practice one’s faith. Its religious architecture — from Paris’ iconic Notre Dame Cathedral to modernist architect Le Corbusier’s Chapel of Notre-Dame du Haut in Ronchamp, eastern France — is stunning in its variety, beauty and history.

France has about 100,000 places of worship, including those that are no longer used, with the vast bulk of them built for the Catholic faith, according to the Observatory of Religious Patrimony, a preservation group.

Quiet churches and busy mosques speak to a changing picture of faith and worship in France. A major and rare public study published by Insee last year, which questioned more than 27,000 adults aged 18-59, found interest in religion fading. Just over half of the respondents declared that they have no faith, a growing trend particularly pronounced among people born in France and without any immigrant backgrounds.

Less than one-third identified as Catholic — still the largest single group of believers, although under 10% of them said they were regular churchgoers.

Muslims were the second-largest group of believers, accounting for 10% of respondents. 

Wine and food 

Ah, the reds, whites and rosés! The French used to guzzle their wines without moderation. It wasn’t until 1956 that the government barred children — under 14, that is — from being served alcohol in school canteens.

But since the 1960s, when French drinkers were downing a woozy 130 or so liters (35 or so gallons) of wines each per year, plus many more liters of beer and cider, they have steadily sobered up, cutting their consumption by around three-quarters and drinking higher-quality wines than the rotgut that washed down older generations’ meals, Insee data show.

Food habits are changing, too. Schools play a key role in passing from generation to generation France’s high regard for freshly cooked meals, with canteens typically offering a starter and a main course followed by a milk product (cheese, yogurt) and/or a dessert.

The Agriculture Ministry says about 60% of students eat at their school canteens at least four times a week. Schools also offer tasting classes, and school canteens are obliged to offer at least one vegetarian menu per week.

“Does your family pray before eating?” asks one joke about French eating habits. The punchline: “No, we are French, we know how to cook.” 

The French are just behind the Italians as the least overweight population in the European Union, according to the most recent figures from the EU’s statistics agency, from 2019. It found that 47% of French adults were overweight, with a body mass index of 25 or above, compared with 46% of Italian adults. 

But French people also have become fans of what they call “le fast food” — burgers, pizzas, kebabs and so forth.

In the 45 years since McDonald’s opened its first restaurant in France in 1979, the country has become one of its largest markets in Europe, with 1,560 eateries in cities and towns nationwide.
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KYIV, Ukraine — Signing an agreement with Russia to stop the war with Ukraine would amount to signing a deal with the devil, a top adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said, as pressure mounts on the country to seek an end to more than two years of fighting. 

A deal would only buy time for Russian President Vladimir Putin to strengthen his army and usher in another,potentially more violent chapter in the war, Mykhailo Podolyak told The Associated Press in an interview Thursday. 

“If you want to sign a deal with the devil who will then drag you to hell, well, go for it. This is what Russia is,” Podolyak said when asked about the prospects for a peace deal for Kyiv, whose forces are locked in a bloody war of attrition with Moscow’s troops in eastern Ukraine. 

“If you sign anything today with Russia, that will not lose the war and will not be legally responsible for mass crimes, this will mean that you have signed yourself a ticket to continue the war on a different scale, with other protagonists, with a different number of killed and tortured people,” he said. 

Morale appears to be eroding

It is a view held across Zelenskyy’s camp and reflected broadly among Ukrainians. But it also increasingly comes up against the current of Western pressure, as Kyiv continues to face difficult front-line conditions against Moscow’s larger, better equipped army, as well as uncertainty over the level of future political support from Ukraine’s closest ally, the U.S. 

War fatigue also appears to be eroding the morale of Ukrainians, who have struggled with constant bombardment, electricity outages and the loss of loved ones. A poll by the Kyiv International Institute for Sociology found that the number of Ukrainians opposed to territorial concessions to Russia in exchange for peace has continued to fall. It was 55% in July, compared with 74% in December. 

Even Zelenskyy hinted at a willingness to negotiate with Russia for the first time since the 2022 full-scale invasion, suggesting Moscow should send a delegation to the next global peace summit, which is expected in November. 

But Podolyak insisted that an agreement now would only delay greater violence. 

“Yes, it can be a freeze of the conflict for a certain time. But this means that the Russian Federation will work on its mistakes and update its own army,” he said. “An aggressor country did not come to the territory of Ukraine to sign a peace agreement. That’s nonsense!” 

A lasting peace that works for Ukraine would ensure a steady erosion of Russian military might encompassed by the “three tools” often reiterated by Zelenskyy: increased military support, effective economic sanctions and diplomatic pressure to isolate Russia. 

As he spoke, Ukraine Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba was in China, one of Russia’s closest allies, on a mission to forge closer ties. Podolyak said the goal was to provide explanations for Ukraine’s positions and for why China should play a more “active intensive function in ending the war on the terms of international law.” 

On good terms with both US parties

Few countries are watching the twists and turns of the U.S. presidential election more intently than Ukraine. But Zelenskyy is confident that his government has established good relations with both sides in the U.S. election, Podolyak said. 

“Ukraine has fine relations … with both the Republican Party and the Democratic Party,” he explained. “It’s not a matter of personal relationships, only on the candidate-leader level. This is a question of the institutional relations between the parties of the United States and the parties and institutions of Ukraine.” 

Some leading Republican politicians, including Republican nominee Donald Trump’s running mate, Ohio Senator JD Vance, have voiced support for withdrawing vital American military support to Ukraine, and Trump is often portrayed as favoring Russian leader Vladimir Putin. 

Zelenskyy, however, took Trump’s nomination as an opportunity and had a phone call with him shortly after the Republican National Convention. Podolyak asserted that the phone call between the two was positive. 

As for the Democratic Party, Podolyak said he has “great sympathy” for President Joe Biden’s administration despite what he said was its slow decision-making regarding Ukraine. 

“But they made all the decisions that Ukraine needed, one way or another: arms supplies to Ukraine; additional permits for strikes on the border territories of the Russian Federation; global diplomatic and informational support of Ukraine, and so on.” 

Whichever party emerges victorious from the November election, Podolyak asserted that Ukraine will continue to have strong relations with the U.S. 

“Regardless of who will be the head of the White House, I don’t see a scenario where it is possible to stop aid to Ukraine,” he said. 
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