Europe

When American conservative commentator Tucker Carlson interviewed Russian IT entrepreneur Pavel Durov in April, he had an additional unexpected audience: scammers. After the video was published, a phony Russian-language transcript of the interview tried to attract “investors” to a cryptocurrency scheme that promised monthly earnings of $13,000. That scheme came to VOA’s attention because its creators used a copy of a VOA Russian article page …

JAKARTA, INDONESIA — Centuries-old stone Buddha statues and precious jewelry repatriated by the Dutch government to its former colony are on display at Indonesia’s National Museum, providing a glimpse into the country’s rich heritage that the government had struggled to retrieve. The collection is part of more than 800 artifacts that were returned under a Repatriation Agreement signed in 2022 between Indonesia and the Netherlands, said …

ROME — Italy’s prime minister addressed growing criticism Saturday of the repatriation of a Libyan warlord wanted by the International Criminal Court, as Giorgia Meloni cited an appeals court order and security concerns. The repatriation of Ossama Anjiem to Libya, a key partner in Europe’s efforts to keep migrants from crossing the Mediterranean and landing on its shores, sparked outrage from human rights groups and questions …

HALLE, GERMANY — Tens of thousands of Germans rallied Saturday against the far right ahead of next month’s legislative elections, as U.S. tech billionaire Elon Musk again endorsed the anti-immigrant AfD party. Musk, speaking by video link, told thousands of AfD supporters gathered in the eastern city of Halle that their party was “the best hope for the future of Germany.” AfD supporters at the rally …

KYIV, UKRAINE — Moldovan President Maia Sandu visited Kyiv on Saturday for talks with Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskyy amid growing tensions in Transnistria, a pro-Russian separatist enclave of Moldova that neighbors Ukraine. The territory, which has a population of half a million, has seen heating, hot water and electricity cut-offs since the start of the year because a Kyiv-Moscow gas transit contract that had allowed Russian …

HAIFA, ISRAEL — Naftali Furst will never forget his first view of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp, on Nov. 3, 1944. He was 12 years old. SS soldiers threw open the doors of the cattle car, where he was crammed in with his mother, father, brother, and more than 80 others. He remembers the tall chimneys of the crematoria, flames roaring from the top. There were dogs …

New online videos recently investigated by VOA’s Russian and Ukrainian services show how artificial intelligence is likely being used to try to create provocative deepfakes that target Ukrainian refugees.  In one example, a video appears to be a TV news report about a teenage Ukrainian refugee and her experience studying at a private school in the United States. But the video then flips to footage …

BELGRADE, SERBIA — A woman rammed a car into a crowd of anti-government protesters in Serbia’s capital and injured one of them Friday, police said, as a student-led strike shut down businesses and drew tens of thousands of people to demonstrations around the country. The nationwide protests took place on the same day that President Aleksandar Vucic held a big afternoon rally with thousands of supporters …

WASHINGTON — Ahead of Belarus’ presidential election this weekend, a media advocacy group filed a complaint Friday with the International Criminal Court accusing the country’s longtime leader of crimes against humanity against journalists. The complaint, filed by Reporters Without Borders, known by French acronym RSF, accuses President Alexander Lukashenko of orchestrating a harsh crackdown on independent media that began after he claimed victory in the disputed …

LONDON — A London judge on Friday rejected a U.S. mother’s challenge to be extradited to Colorado to face murder charges in the deaths of two of her young children. Judge John Zani said in Westminster Magistrates Court that it would now be up to the British Home Secretary to order Kimberlee Singler returned to the United States. Singler, 36, is accused of two counts of …

Near Auschwitz’s walls, the former home of the concentration camp’s commandant, Rudolf Hoss, stands as a symbol of denial and complicity, its windows overlooking the site of some of the Holocaust’s worst atrocities. As the world marks the 80th anniversary of Auschwitz’s liberation (Jan. 27), plans are under way to transform the house into a research center on hate, extremism, and radicalization. VOA’s Eastern Europe …

Officials in Ukraine say Russia launched a barrage of drones in an overnight attack Friday killing at least two civilians, wounding several others and damaging commercial and residential buildings. The interior ministry said two victims were killed by drone debris in the central Kyiv region. It said a multistory residential building and commercial buildings were among the infrastructure that sustained damage during the attack. Meanwhile, …

President Donald Trump laid out his approach to foreign investment to the world’s largest gathering of global business leaders, offering investors a take-it-or-leave-it deal to build in the U.S. or face stiff tariffs. VOA White House Correspondent Anita Powell reports. …

Italy’s highest court on Thursday upheld the slander conviction of American defendant Amanda Knox in a case related to the sensationalized 2007 murder of her British roommate.   Knox was convicted of slandering her former boss, Congolese bar owner Patrick Lumumba, by falsely accusing him of murdering Meredith Kercher.   A 21-year-old exchange student, Kercher was found stabbed to death in 2007 in the Perugia …

LONDON — A British teenager who murdered three young girls at a Taylor Swift-themed dance event was jailed for at least 52 years on Thursday, for an atrocity prosecutors said was so violent it appeared he had tried to decapitate one of the victims.  On Monday, Axel Rudakubana, 18, admitted carrying out the killings last July in the northern English town of Southport, a crime which …

London — Google’s Android and Apple’s iOS are facing fresh scrutiny from Britain’s competition watchdog, which announced investigations Thursday targeting the two tech giants’ mobile phone ecosystems under new powers to crack down on digital market abuses.  The Competition and Markets Authority said it launched separate investigations to determine whether the mobile ecosystems controlled by Apple and Google should be given “strategic market status” that would …

Officials in southern Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia region said Thursday a Russian ballistic missile attack killed at least one person and injured 24 others. Regional Governor Ivan Fedorov said on Telegram that Russian drones also destroyed an energy facility and knocked out power to tens of thousands of people. In the Mykolaiv region, Governor Vitaliy Kim said on Telegram that Ukrainian air defenses shot down nine Russian …

A record 47% of the European Union’s electricity now comes from solar and other renewables, a report Thursday said, in yet another sign of the growing gap between the bloc’s push for clean energy and the new U.S. administration’s pursuit of more fossil fuels. Nearly three-quarters of the EU’s electricity doesn’t emit planet-warming gases into the air — with another 24% of electricity in the …

Nuuk, Greenland — A blizzard whips the Danish, Greenlandic and Faroe Islands flags above the Joint Arctic Command headquarters overlooking the harbor of Nuuk, the capital of Greenland. The small military outpost staffed by around 80 personnel oversees Danish security for the vast Arctic island of some 2.1 million square kilometers. Greenland’s government is largely autonomous, but the island is part of the Danish Kingdom, and …

washington — Last December, Georgia’s parliament chose Mikheil Kavelashvili, a close ally of ruling Georgian Dream party founder Bidzina Ivanishvili, as the country’s new president. He replaced Salome Zourabichvili, who had won the presidency in 2018 in a popular vote. Zourabichvili was the country’s fifth president. Opposition parties and Zourabichvili contend that the country’s October 2024 parliamentary elections, which Georgian Dream officially won with 54.09% of …

LONDON — Prince Harry claimed a monumental victory Wednesday as Rupert Murdoch’s U.K. tabloids made an unprecedented apology for intruding in his life over decades and agreed to pay substantial damages to settle his privacy invasion lawsuit. News Group Newspapers offered a “full and unequivocal apology to the Duke of Sussex for the serious intrusion by The Sun between 1996 and 2011 into his private life,” …

U.S. President Donald Trump signaled the possibility of placing additional sanctions on Russia for its war in Ukraine. Asked about the prospect while speaking to reporters Tuesday, Trump responded, “Sounds likely.” Trump said his administration has been in talks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and would be speaking with Russian President Vladimir Putin “very soon.” He said the European Union should be “paying a lot …

ANKARA, TURKEY — Turkey has detained nine people, including the owner of the hotel, in connection with a deadly fire that claimed the lives of 76 people and injured dozens at a ski resort in western Turkey, Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya said early Wednesday. Yerlikaya also reported that the bodies of 45 victims had been handed over to their families, while DNA tests were being conducted …

WASHINGTON — U.S. President Donald Trump said on Tuesday he would likely impose sanctions on Russia if its president, Vladimir Putin, refuses to negotiate about ending the war in Ukraine.  Trump gave no details on possible additional sanctions. The United States has already sanctioned Russia heavily for its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.  Trump said his administration was also looking at the issue of sending …