Emotional homecoming for WikiLeaks’ Assange
London — WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange arrived in his home country of Australia a free man Wednesday after agreeing to a plea deal with U.S. prosecutors over espionage charges, ending a 14-year legal odyssey.
Supporters of the 52-year-old journalist and political activist welcomed his release, but said the prosecution sets a dangerous precedent for press freedom.
Assange received an emotional welcome as he arrived at Canberra Airport by private jet Wednesday morning. He was embraced by his wife Stella, and his father, John Shipton, before punching the air as he was cheered by a group of supporters gathered nearby.
“Julian wanted me to sincerely thank everyone. He wanted to be here, but you have to understand what he’s been through. He needs time. He needs to recuperate,” Stella Assange told reporters at a press conference in Australia’s capital.
She thanked his supporters around the world.
“It took millions of people. It took people working behind the scenes. People protesting on the streets for days and weeks and months and years. And we achieved it,” she said.
Assange spends years in prison
Assange spent more than five years in London’s high-security Belmarsh Prison as he fought a legal battle over extradition to the United States.
Britain’s High Court finally ruled in May that he could appeal the extradition order. That decision prompted the U.S. Department of Justice, British and Australian authorities, and Assange’s legal team to expedite negotiations on a deal in which Assange pleaded guilty to one charge of espionage.
He was flown Monday evening from London to the U.S. Pacific territory of Saipan, where a brief hearing at a U.S. District Court on Tuesday concluded the prosecution.
Assange was sentenced to the equivalent of the time he had already spent in prison and was free Wednesday morning.
Defense criticizes US prosecutors
Assange’s lawyer, Jennifer Robinson, criticized U.S. prosecutors’ pursuit of a conviction.
“In order to win his freedom, Julian pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit espionage for publishing evidence of U.S. war crimes, human rights abuse and U.S. wrongdoing around the world. This is journalism. This is the criminalization of journalism,” said Robinson.
“And while the plea deal does not set a judicial precedent — it’s not a court decision — the prosecution itself sets a precedent that can be used against the rest of the media,” Robinson said at the press conference in Canberra on Wednesday.
‘Democracy demands this’
U.S. prosecutors charged Assange in 2019 with 17 counts of espionage and one count of hacking, relating to the publication of stolen diplomatic cables covering the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Wikileaks said the material revealed abuses by the U.S. military. Campaigners for press freedom say Assange was simply doing his job.
“Essentially what he does is what all journalists want to do: expose incompetence, expose wrongdoing and hold the power to account. Because essentially, democracy demands this. I mean, without this, we wouldn’t have democracy,” said Abdullahi Tasiu Abubakar, a senior lecturer in journalism at City, University of London.
US State Department defends US’ action
The U.S. Department of Justice has not yet commented on the plea deal. The State Department defended the United States’ actions.
“I do think it is important when we talk about Julian Assange to remind the world that the actions for which he was indicted and for which he has now pled guilty are actions that put the lives of our partners, our allies and our diplomats at risk, especially those who work in dangerous places like Afghanistan and Iraq,” State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller told reporters on Wednesday.
“The documents they published gave identifying information of individuals who were in contact with the State Department that included opposition leaders, human rights activists around the world, whose positions were put in some danger because of their public disclosure,” Miller added. “It also chilled the ability of American personnel to build relationships and have frank conversations with them.”
Australian PM lobbies for release
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, who personally lobbied U.S. President Joe Biden to allow Assange’s release, welcomed the plea deal.
“Regardless of your views about his activities — and they will be varied — Mr. Assange’s case has dragged on for too long. I have said repeatedly that there was nothing to be gained by his continued incarceration.
“We have used all appropriate channels. This outcome has been the product of careful, patient and determined work, work I am very proud of,” Albanese told lawmakers on Tuesday.
Supporters say they’ll seek pardon
Assange spent seven years in self-imposed confinement in Ecuador’s embassy in London from 2012, as he evaded unrelated rape charges filed by Swedish prosecutors, which were later dropped. Assange said he always believed the U.S. was seeking his extradition.
He was arrested by British authorities for breach of bail after the Ecuadorian Embassy ejected him in 2019. Assange was held in Belmarsh Prison as he fought U.S. attempts to secure his extradition.
Assange’s supporters say they will seek a full pardon of his espionage conviction and have vowed to fight for the principle of press freedom.
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Ukraine sets out on long path to EU membership
Warsaw, Poland — Ukrainian officials are embracing what will be a detailed and tortuous process of negotiations following the official opening of EU accession talks this week, saying they have already made major strides toward qualifying for a status that would cement their place in Western Europe.
While the process that began Tuesday at a ministerial-level meeting in Luxembourg can take years or even decades, the Kyiv government has declared its commitment to work diligently to meet the bloc’s exacting standards in areas ranging from agricultural policy to human rights.
This process “is not something to which Ukraine has come unprepared,” said Ukrainian legislator Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze, a former vice-prime minister for European and Euro-Atlantic integration, in an interview with VOA.
She said the country has undergone significant transformation under an association agreement concluded with the EU in 2017, especially in the process of securing a visa-free regime.
Ukraine was formally approved as a candidate for EU membership in June 2022, just months after Russia launched its full-scale invasion of the country. Moldova, which was approved as an EU candidate at about the same time as Ukraine, also began accession talks on Tuesday.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen praised Ukraine for its efforts to date in an address to the Ukrainian parliament in November 2023, saying that the country has “made great strides, much greater than anyone expected from a country at war.”
Klympush-Tsintsadze emphasized the need for consolidated efforts from all sectors of society and political factions if Ukraine is to continue its progress toward EU membership.
“It will be difficult without a real change in the civil service and public administration of Ukraine, without the engagement of all the possibilities of civil society, different political parties, and stakeholders, and having a very honest conversation with society about some of the very difficult steps,” she said.
Those steps require Ukraine, like any membership candidate, to bring its laws and standards into line with those of the EU in 35 policy areas, known as chapters, ranging from the free movement of goods through fisheries, taxation, energy and the environment to judicial rights and security.
Each of the chapters must be negotiated to the satisfaction of all 27 existing EU members, making for a complex and drawn-out process.
Ukrainian Deputy Minister of Economy Tatiana Berezhna echoed her colleague’s sentiments about Ukraine’s readiness for the long road ahead. She noted in an interview with VOA that Ukraine “has already managed to screen the implementation of European legislation.”
Berezhna, who is responsible for negotiating the chapters on employment, social issues, and the free movement of workers, stated that since the application, Ukraine has done its homework and is now “ready to proceed with negotiations.”
Already this year, Ukrainian officials have participated in several explanatory sessions with representatives of the European Commission.
“Now that the negotiations have started, we will have a series of meetings on all the clusters of legislation,” Berezhna said. “We understand that it’s a long process; however, we are eager to reunite with our European family.”
Wojciech Przybylski, the head of a policy forecasting unit at the Warsaw-based think tank Visegrad Insight, compared the path ahead for Ukraine to that of Poland, which completed its EU membership negotiations in just five years.
He pointed out that the negotiations for Ukraine’s membership opened just before Hungary, which opposes Ukraine’s bid for admission and further EU enlargement generally, takes the helm of the EU for the next six months.
“We know there will be a slowdown or a pause in the cycle, but this will come back as a topic under the Polish EU presidency in January,” said Przybylski, who believes the EU must be enlarged if it is to survive and thrive.
“Fortunately, right now, there is a political momentum building up. We need to grow this political support and the network of those who will politically sponsor enlargement.”
With Ukraine as ground zero in Europe’s biggest armed conflict since World War II,
Przybylski said he sees enlargement as “the peace project in Europe and the EU as an instrument of peacebuilding in Europe.”
EU membership for Ukraine, he added, will be a key component of that process.
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Emotional homecoming for WikiLeaks’ Assange, but supporters say free speech under threat
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange arrived in his home country of Australia a free man Wednesday – after agreeing to a plea deal with U.S. prosecutors over espionage charges. The deal ends an extraordinary 14-year legal odyssey. Supporters of Assange welcomed his release but say the prosecution sets a dangerous precedent for press freedom. Henry Ridgwell reports from London.
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‘Before Bucha Was Abkhazia’: Georgians link past Russian atrocities with Ukraine invasion
Tbilisi, Georgia — Campaigners in Georgia are seeking to highlight atrocities committed by invading Russian troops and allied militias during the early 1990s, which they say should have been a warning of the dangers posed by Russia long before Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
Their campaign, “Before Bucha Was Abkhazia,” is touring U.S. and European cities and includes documentary screenings, photography exhibitions and presentations.
Russian atrocities
As the Soviet Union was collapsing, Georgia declared independence in 1991. There were tensions between Georgians and ethnic minority groups in the Abkhazia and South Ossetia regions bordering Russia. Many Georgians say Moscow exploited those tensions to stoke conflict.
Tamar Chergoleishvili, manager of the “Before Bucha Was Abkhazia” campaign, says Russia was to blame for the conflict.
“Wars broke out in Georgia that were branded as ethnic conflicts and civil war. But, in fact, it was Russia that was organizing all the turmoil, wars and bloodshed in order to dismember Georgia and not to allow a newly independent state to become truly independent, truly sovereign, and to become the member of the Western democratic world,” she told VOA.
Russia disputes that history and insists it sent troops into Abkhazia and South Ossetia as peacekeepers.
The ensuing conflicts between Georgians, Russians and their allied ethnic minority militias from 1989 to 1994 killed an estimated 10,000 to 30,000 people. More than 200,000 were forced to flee their homes. Many have never been able to return.
Survivors of the conflict say multiple atrocities were committed by armed separatists and their Russian allies. In one notorious incident, witnesses say 300 women and girls were held in a school and systematically raped. There are hundreds of other testimonies recounting killings and torture.
Taliko Zarandia recalled the killing of her neighbor’s son in Abkhazia.
“The militants arrived and charged at us like wolves,” she said. “They rushed towards the boy and asked how old he was. He replied that he was 15. ‘You deserve 15 bullets then,’ they replied. Then, they shot him 15 times in the head,” Zarandia said.
Ethnic cleansing
Russia denies its forces committed war crimes. However, the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe describes what happened in Abkhazia as ethnic cleansing.
The harrowing testimony of survivors is reminiscent of the accounts from Ukrainians following Russia’s February 2022 full-scale invasion.
In Ukrainian cities Bucha and Irpin, survivors describe similar killings, rapes and torture carried out by Moscow’s forces, which Russia also denies, despite widespread evidence and the uncovering of mass graves. The International Criminal Court in The Hague is investigating possible war crimes by Russian forces.
Chergoleishvili, who founded the independent news agency Tabula Media, said she was inspired to launch the campaign after Ukrainian television journalists contacted her for information on what had happened in Abkhazia.
“We all knew that something horrible had happened in Abkhazia, but it was so dusty. No one wanted to go through it ever again. But Ukrainians made me to go through the material before giving [it to] them, and I had goosebumps, and I felt so shameful,” she said, adding that Moscow’s war in Ukraine has alerted the world to the threat from Russia.
Warning to West
“Now we think that it is a good time — when there is the readiness to receive that information on the Western side — to remind the world, and ourselves, about the forgotten victims from Georgia that suffered the same aggression that Russia is using now against Ukraine. Just to warn the West that if they don’t stop Russia in Ukraine now, they will have to spend 100 times more in another 30 years,” Chergoleishvili told VOA.
Russia invaded Georgia again in 2008. It still occupies 20% of Georgian territory, including Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Many Georgians say their experiences should have provided the West with ample warning of the dangers posed by Russia, long before its February 2022 invasion of Ukraine.
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In deal with US, WikiLeaks’ Assange pleads guilty, secures freedom, ends legal fight
SAIPAN, Northern Mariana Islands — WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has pleaded guilty to a single felony charge for publishing U.S. military secrets in a deal with Justice Department prosecutors that secures his freedom and concludes a drawn-out legal saga that raised divisive questions about press freedom and national security.
The plea was entered Wednesday morning in federal court in Saipan, the capital of the Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S. commonwealth in the Pacific. He arrived at court shortly before the hearing was to begin and did not take questions.
Though the deal with prosecutors required him to admit guilt to a single felony count, it would also permit him to return to his native Australia without spending any time in an American prison. He had been jailed in the United Kingdom for the last five years, fighting extradition to the United States on an Espionage Act indictment that could have carried a lengthy prison sentence in the event of a conviction.
The abrupt conclusion enables both sides to claim a degree of victory, with the Justice Department able to resolve without trial a case that raised thorny legal issues and that might never have reached a jury at all given the plodding pace of the extradition process.
WikiLeaks, the secret-spilling website that Assange founded in 2006, applauded the announcement of the deal, saying it was grateful for “all who stood by us, fought for us, and remained utterly committed in the fight for his freedom.”
The deal, disclosed Monday night in a sparsely detailed Justice Department letter, represents the latest and presumably final chapter in a court fight involving the eccentric Australian computer expert who has been celebrated by supporters as a transparency crusader but lambasted by national security hawks who insist that his disdain for government secrecy put lives at risks, and strayed far beyond the bounds of traditional journalism duties.
The U.S. Justice Department agreed to hold the hearing on the remote island because Assange opposed coming to the continental U.S. and because it’s near Australia, where he will return.
The guilty plea resolves a criminal case brought by the Trump administration Justice Department in connection with the receipt and publication of war logs and diplomatic cables that detailed U.S. military wrongdoing in Iraq and Afghanistan. Prosecutors alleged that he conspired with former Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning to obtain the records and published them without regard to American national security, including by releasing the names of human sources who provided information to U.S. forces.
But his activities drew an outpouring of support from press freedom advocates who heralded his role in bringing to light military conduct that might otherwise have been concealed from view. Among the files published by WikiLeaks was a video of a 2007 Apache helicopter attack by American forces in Baghdad that killed 11 people, including two Reuters journalists.
The indictment was unsealed in 2019, but Assange’s legal woes long predated the criminal case and continued well past it.
Weeks after the release of the largest document cache in 2010, a Swedish prosecutor issued an arrest warrant for Assange based on one woman’s allegation of rape and another’s allegation of molestation. Assange has long maintained his innocence, and the investigation was later dropped.
He presented himself in 2012 to the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, where he claimed asylum on the grounds of political persecution, and spent the following seven years in self-exile there, hosting a parade of celebrity visitors and making periodic appearances from the building’s balcony to address supporters.
In 2019, his hosts revoked his asylum, allowing British police to arrest him. He remained locked up for the last five years while the Justice Department sought to extradite him, in a process that encountered skepticism from British judges who worried about how Assange would be treated by the American criminal justice system.
Ultimately, though, the resolution sparing Assange prison time in the U.S. is a repudiation of sorts of years of ominous warnings by Assange and his supporters that the American criminal justice system would expose him to unduly harsh treatment, including potentially the death penalty — something prosecutors never sought.
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Russia bans distribution of dozens of EU news outlets in retaliatory step
moscow — Russia said on Tuesday it was banning access inside Russia to the broadcasts of 81 different media outlets from the European Union — including Agence France-Presse and Politico — in retaliation for a similar EU ban on several Russian media outlets.
The European Union said in May it was suspending the distribution of what it described as four “Kremlin-linked propaganda networks,” stripping them of their broadcasting rights in the bloc.
It said at the time that the ban applied to Voice of Europe, to the RIA news agency, and to the Izvestia and Rossiyskaya Gazeta newspapers.
The Russian Foreign Ministry hit back on Tuesday, releasing a list of 81 media outlets from 25 EU member states, as well as pan-European outlets, whose broadcasts it said would no longer be available on Russian territory.
It accused the outlets of “systematically distributing inaccurate information” about what Russia calls its special military operation in Ukraine.
France’s Agence France-Presse (AFP) news agency, Austria’s ORF state TV company, Ireland’s RTE broadcaster, digital outlet Politico and Spain’s EFE news agency were among the outlets affected by the move, along with many other national broadcasters and newspapers.
“The Russian Federation has repeatedly warned at various levels that politically motivated harassment of domestic journalists and unjustified bans on Russian media in the EU will not go unanswered,” the Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
“In spite of this, Brussels and the capitals of the bloc’s countries preferred to follow the path of escalation, forcing Moscow to adopt mirror and proportional countermeasures.”
It said it would review its ban if the EU lifted its restrictions on RIA, Izvestia and the Rossiyskaya Gazeta newspaper, all of which it described as Russian media outlets.
Vyacheslav Volodin, the speaker of the State Duma lower house of parliament, said in May that the EU move had shown that the West refused to accept any alternative point of view and was destroying freedom of speech.
‘Unjustified measure’
Italy’s Foreign Ministry on Tuesday condemned the Russian decision to ban access to outlets including Italian broadcasters Rai and La7 and newspapers La Repubblica and La Stampa.
“We regret the unjustified measure taken against these Italian broadcasters and newspapers, which have always provided objective and unbiased information on the conflict in Ukraine,” the ministry said.
AFP declined to comment, and RTE did not immediately reply to a request for comment on the measures, announced a day before the Russian trial of U.S. journalist Evan Gershkovich on espionage charges is due to begin.
Jamil Anderlini, Politico’s editor-in-chief for Europe, described the measures as “completely unacceptable” and said in a statement that it was “not the first time press freedoms have been restricted through politically motivated attacks.”
“We call for the immediate lifting of these restrictions and continue to call for Evan’s immediate release,” he wrote.
The first American journalist to be detained on spy charges in Russia since the Cold War more than three decades ago, Gershkovich, a reporter for The Wall Street Journal, has denied he is a Central Intelligence Agency spy. The Journal says Gershkovich was doing his job and denies he is a spy.
Many Western news organizations pulled staff out of Russia after it launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 and passed laws soon afterwards that set long prison sentences for “discrediting” the armed forces.
Russian officials say large parts of the Western media spread false, unbalanced stories about Russia, and that Western media organizations are waging an information war.
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У Мінфіні США стверджують, що MODAFL та КВІР займаються кількома комерційними видами діяльності, що приносять дохід
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Переговори щодо адаптації України до права ЄС почнуться у липні і стосуватимуться закупівель – торгпред
Тарас Качка початок переговорів назвав «історичною миттю»
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Ukraine begins talks to join European Union
Georgians link past Russian atrocities with Ukraine invasion
Campaigners in Georgia are seeking to highlight past atrocities committed by invading Russian troops and allied militias during the early 1990s, which they say should have acted as a warning of the dangers posed by Russia, long before Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Henry Ridgwell reports from Tbilisi.
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Violence erupts again on French Pacific territory of New Caledonia
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US and allies clash with Tehran, Moscow at UN Security Council
UNITED NATIONS — The United States and its key European allies clashed with Iran and Russia over Tehran’s expanding nuclear program, with the U.S. vowing “to use all means necessary to prevent a nuclear-armed Iran” in a U.N. Security Council meeting Monday.
The U.S., France, Britain and Germany accused Iran of escalating its nuclear activities far beyond limits it agreed to in a 2015 deal aimed at preventing Tehran from developing nuclear weapons, and of failing to cooperate with the U.N. nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency.
Iran and Russia accused the U.S. and its allies of continuing to apply economic sanctions that were supposed to be lifted under the deal and insisted that Tehran’s nuclear program remains under constant oversight by the IAEA.
The clashes came at a semi-annual meeting on implementation of the nuclear deal between Iran and six major countries — the U.S., Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany — known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.
Under the accord, Tehran agreed to limit enrichment of uranium to levels necessary for the peaceful use of nuclear power in exchange for the lifting of economic sanctions.
Then-President Donald Trump pulled the U.S. out of the deal in 2018. Trump said he would negotiate a stronger deal, but that didn’t happen.
The council meeting followed an IAEA report in late May that Iran has more than 142 kilograms of uranium enriched up to 60% purity, a technical step away from weapons-grade level of 90%. The IAEA said this was an increase of over 20 kilograms from February.
The IAEA also reported on June 13 that its inspectors verified that Iran has started up new cascades of advanced centrifuges more quickly enrich uranium and planned to install more.
U.S. deputy ambassador Robert Wood told the council that the IAEA reports “show that Iran is determined to expand its nuclear program in ways that have no credible civilian purpose.”
Wood said the U.S. is prepared to use all means to prevent a nuclear-armed Iran, but said it remains “fully committed to resolving international concerns surrounding Iran’s nuclear program through diplomacy.”
The three Western countries that remain in the JCPOA — France, Germany and the United Kingdom — issued a joint statement after the council meeting also leaving the door open for diplomatic efforts “that ensure Iran never develops a nuclear weapon.”
They said Iran’s stockpile of highly enriched uranium is now 30 times the JCPOA limit and stressed that Iran committed not to install or operate any centrifuges for enrichment under the JCPOA.
Their joint statement also noted that “Iranian officials have issued statements about its capacity to assemble a nuclear weapon.”
Iran’s U.N. Ambassador Amir Saeid Iravani blamed “the unilateral and unlawful U.S. withdrawal from the JCPOA” and the failure of the three European parties to the deal “to honor their commitments,” saying it is “crystal clear” they are responsible for the current non-functioning of the agreement.
In the face of U.S. and European sanctions, he said, Iran has the right to halt its commitments under the JCPOA.
Iravani reiterated Iran’s rejection of nuclear weapons, and insisted its nuclear activities including enrichment are “for peaceful purposes” and are subject to “robust verification and monitoring” by the IAEA.
The Iranian ambassador strongly endorsed the JCPOA, calling it a hard-won diplomatic achievement “that effectively averted an undue crisis.”
“It remains the best option, has no alternative, and its revival is indeed in the interest of all of its participants,” he said. “Our remedial measures are reversible if all sanctions are lifted fully and verifiably.”
But France, Germany and the UK said some of Iran’s nuclear advances are irreversible.
Russia’s U.N. Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia said U.S. promises “to abandon the policy of maximum pressure on Tehran and to return to the nuclear deal remained empty words.”
He accused some other JCPOA parties, which he didn’t name, of “doing everything possible to continuously rock the boat, jettisoning opportunities for the implementation of the nuclear deal.”
Nebenzia urged the European parties to the agreement and the United States to return to the negotiating table in Vienna and “demonstrate their commitment to the objective of restoration of the nuclear deal.”
EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell, the coordinator of the JCPOA, said the compromise text he put forward two years ago for the U.S. to return to the JCPOA and for Iran to resume full implementation of the agreement remains on the table.
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US expected to announce $150M in new military aid for Ukraine
Pentagon — The U.S. is expected to announce a new military aid package for Ukraine valued at up to $150 million as soon as Tuesday, two U.S. officials tell VOA.
The package is being provided to Kyiv under the presidential drawdown authority (PDA), which pulls weapons, ammunition and equipment from U.S. military stockpiles to fulfill Ukraine’s short-term needs.
One of the officials — who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the package ahead of its planned announcement — said the latest round of aid would include munitions for HIMARS and other critical munitions. It does not include cluster munitions, according to the official.
Asked whether the aid package includes long-range missiles known as ATACMS, the official replied, “For operational security reasons, we aren’t going into further details.”
ATACMS have a range of up to 300 kilometers (about 185 miles) and nearly double the striking distance of Ukraine’s missiles.
When asked by VOA on June 12 if the United States had provided Ukraine with more ATACMS since mid-March, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General C.Q. Brown said, “We’re working through the ATACMS piece, and we continue to provide that capability through our PDAs.”
Russia has accused Ukraine of using some of the U.S.-provided ATACMS in deadly strikes this week inside Crimea, which Russia illegally annexed in 2014, and in Russia’s Belgorod region bordering Ukraine.
Russia summoned the U.S. ambassador in Moscow on Monday to protest the use of the missiles.
This week’s aid package for Kyiv will dip into the $61 billion in Ukraine funding signed into law by President Joe Biden in April.
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For Ukraine’s older workers, war opens hope for ending age discrimination
As in many countries, job seekers in Ukraine who are in their 50s and 60s have a harder time than younger workers. One organization is trying to change that by taking advantage of Ukraine’s wartime labor shortage. For VOA, Lesia Bakalets reports from Kyiv. VOA footage by Vladyslav Smilianets.
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Heat wave in Greece claims more lives among tourists
US TV host Rachael Ray visits Ukraine, cooks for locals
TV personality Rachael Ray is a U.S.-based chef, author and celebrity. But Ukrainians know her better thanks to her charity work to help the war-torn country. Omelyan Oshchudlyak reports. Camera: Yuriy Dankevych.
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