World

LISBON — The world’s largest Catholic gathering, a week-long religious festival known as World Youth Day, kicks off in Lisbon on Tuesday, a day before Pope Francis arrives on his first foreign trip since recent surgery.

Around 300,000 people are expected to attend the opening mass at 7:00 pm (18:00 GMT) at the hillside Eduardo VII park, which offers sweeping views of the Portuguese capital and the Tagus River.

The 86-year-old Pontiff is set to arrive in Lisbon on Wednesday morning to celebrate World Youth Day, a week of religious, cultural and festive events held about every three years in a different city.

He has a typically packed schedule for his five-day visit to Portugal, despite having spent nine nights in hospital after undergoing hernia surgery in June.

Francis, the first Latin American Pope, is due to make 11 public pronouncements and hold numerous meetings, and on Saturday will visit the shrine of Fatima north of Lisbon.

Church organisers expect one million faithful will attend the event’s closing mass held by the pope on Sunday at a waterside park on the outskirts of Lisbon.

Images of the pope were on display on banners set up across the city as well as on screens on automatic bank machines along with the message: “I am with you.”

A Lisbon pastry shop is even selling cookies with the image of the smiling Pontiff wearing a crucifix.

“I think it is going to be amazing experience to be in the same spot as the Pope,” said Barbara Weisz, a 19-year-old student from the United States, part of a group of 37 youths who came from a San Diego parish.

“It is a great feeling to be among so many young people who share your beliefs,” she added as the group, who wore matching red t-shirts, gathered in the lobby of their hotel before going sightseeing before attending the opening mass.

World Youth Day, which has been dubbed the “Catholic Woodstock”, is part of the Vatican’s efforts to galvanise young Catholics at a time when secularism and disgust over clerical child sex abuse cause some faithful to abandon the Church.

In recent days groups of event volunteers, decked out in their distinctive yellow T-shirts, could be seen outside of churches in Lisbon to welcome pilgrims who have flocked to the city.

“It is a special moment that you should experience at least once in your life,” said Samuel Navarro, a 19-year-old student from Spain.

Meeting with abuse victims 

Pope Francis is expected during his visit to meet privately with victims of sexual abuse by members of the Portuguese clergy.

A report published in February by an independent commission found at least 4,815 children were sexually abused by clergy members — mostly priests — since 1950.

The inquiry, based on testimony from over 500 victims, concluded that the Church hierarchy in Portugal “systematically” tried to conceal the abuse.

“I know [the meeting] will take place... but I don’t know where it will happen or how many people will take part,” Lisbon’s patriarch, Cardinal Manuel Clemente, told a news conference Monday.

“There is a total commitment on the part of the Portuguese Church to settle this issue,” he added.

Around 16,000 members of law enforcement, civil protection and medical staff are being deployed for the pope’s visit, officials said.

Initially scheduled for August 2022, but postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic, the Lisbon World Youth Day is the 16th international edition of what has become the largest gathering of Catholics worldwide.

The brainchild of late Pope John Paul II, this year’s event is the fourth presided over by Pope Francis, who became head of the Catholic Church in 2013.

The last three events took place in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in 2013, Krakow, Poland in 2016 and Panama City, Panama in 2019.

KYIV — A missile strike on a residential building in Ukraine killed six and wounded dozens on Monday, as Russia said it stepped up strikes against Ukrainian military facilities in response to attacks on its territory, including Moscow.

Two missiles landed close to the centre of the central Ukrainian city of Kryvyi Rig just after 9:00am (06:00 GMT), Ukrainian Interior Minister Igor Klymenko wrote on Telegram.

Among the dead were a 10-year-old girl and her 45-year-old mother, while 75 people were injured, according to local authorities.

One of the strikes hit a large nine-storey residential apartment block, punching a huge hole in the facade that destroyed flats on several floors and sparked a fire.

Firefighters used a cherry-picker crane to direct jets of water at the fire, while the emergency ministry said part of the building had collapsed while the rubble was being cleared.

As the toll of the strike rose, Russia said it had intensified attacks on military infrastructure in Ukraine after increasingly frequent drone assaults blamed on Kyiv.

Russia on Sunday said it had downed Ukrainian drones targeting Moscow and annexed Crimea in the latest wave of drone attacks.

'Act of desperation' 

"Against the background of the failure of the so-called 'counteroffensive', Kyiv... has focused on carrying out terrorist attacks on civilian infrastructure," Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu said on Monday.

In response, "the intensity of our strikes against Ukrainian military facilities... has been considerably increased", Shoigu said.

Sunday's drone attack damaged two office towers in a Moscow business district, shattering several windows and leaving documents strewn on the ground.

The capital and its environs, lying about 500 kilometres  from the Ukrainian border, had rarely been targeted during the conflict until several drone attacks this year.

Following the strikes, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warned on Sunday that war was coming to Russia.

"Gradually, the war is returning to the territory of Russia — to its symbolic centres and military bases, and this is an inevitable, natural and absolutely fair process," Zelensky said.

The Kremlin responded Monday, describing the strikes on the capital as an "act of desperation" by Ukraine following setbacks on the battlefield.

“It is obvious that the counteroffensive is not a success,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters, adding that the situation was “very difficult” for Ukrainian forces on the front.

“All possible measures have been taken to defend civil infrastructure” against Ukrainian strikes, Peskov added.

Ukraine began its long-awaited counteroffensive in June but has made modest advances in the face of stiff resistance from Russian forces on the frontline.

President Volodymyr Zelensky, who was born and grew up in Kryvyi Rig, said Russians were “continuing to terrorise peaceful cities and people”.

The strikes in the city also damaged an academic building, according to the head of the city’s military administration Oleksandr Vilkul.

In the southern city of Kherson, Russian shelling killed four and injured another 17, said the head of Ukraine’s presidential office, Andriy Yermak.

“The enemy is hitting residential neighbourhoods,” Yermak said.

Meanwhile, shelling by Kyiv’s armed forces killed two people and wounded six in Ukraine’s eastern city of Donetsk, which is controlled by Russian forces, Moscow-installed authorities said.

“A bus was destroyed by the shelling... Two people died and six were wounded,” the Russian-installed head of the Donetsk region Denis Pushilin said on Telegram.

Russian forces had repelled Ukrainian attacks in the east and south of the country, while it continued its own offensive around Kupiansk, the defence ministry said in its daily briefing.

STOCKHOLM, July 31, 2023 — Two men set the Koran alight outside parliament in Stockholm on Monday, an AFP reporter saw, at a protest similar to previous ones that have sparked tensions between Sweden and Muslim nations.

Salwan Momika and Salwan Najem stomped on the Muslim holy book, set its pages ablaze before slamming it shut, as they did at a protest outside Stockholm’s main mosque in June — sparking outrage across the Middle East.

The duo also staged a similar protest outside Iraq’s embassy in Stockholm on July 20, where they stomped on the religious text but did not burn it.

Swedish police granted a permit for the protest by campaigners hoping to see the Koran banned in the country.

“I want to protest in front in front of Sweden’s parliament and demand that the Koran be banned,” organiser Najem wrote in the application, which has been viewed by AFP, adding that he would “burn the Koran there”.

As at earlier protests, Momika and Najem were the only participants, with a small group of counterprotesters gathering outside the police cordon, according to an AFP reporter at the scene.

Around a dozen counter-protesters held up copies of the Koran, with some waving Iraqi flags, and shouted at Momika, who just as at earlier events wore sunglasses and grinned defiantly while taunting them.

Mats Eriksson, a spokesman for Stockholm police, told AFP the event “had been conducted without any serious public order disturbances”.

During the protest Momika also stomped on a picture of Shiite Muslim cleric and political leader Moqtada Sadr — whose followers had stormed Sweden’s embassy in Baghdad in response to previous desecrations. They had started fires within the compound the night before the July protest.

The Iraqi prime minister and president “vehemently condemned the repeated acts of desecration” of the Koran.

They called on the countries where the attacks took place to take a “firmer position and put an end to these criminal practices”.

‘All for attention’ 

“We saw him standing there again and yelling stuff about the Koran and about Islam, playing with the Koran, and honestly it’s all for attention and it’s pretty obvious,” Tamazight El Yaakoubi, an 18-year-old law student from The Netherlands, told AFP.

“Before we came here we were pretty scared, we were like, ‘Koran burned down, why?’” added the Muslim visitor.

“But when we came here almost everyone is full of love and everyone is very respectful.”

Sweden has already seen its diplomatic relations with several Middle Eastern nations strained over previous protests involving Koran desecrations.

Swedish police have previously stressed they only grant permits for people to hold public gatherings and not for the activities conducted during the events.

Both previous protests have led to widespread outrage and condemnations.

The Organisation of Islamic Cooperation on Monday met to address Koran desecrations and voiced “disappointment” with Sweden and Denmark’s response.

Secretary-General Hissein Brahim Taha called on both countries to prevent Koran desecration and “expressed his disappointment that no measures were taken in this regard so far”, the 57-member, Jeddah-based body said.

“It is unfortunate that the concerned authorities claiming freedom of expression continue to provide licences to repeat these acts contrary to international law, and this leads to a lack of respect for religions,” Taha said.

Before the meeting Swedish Foreign Minister Tobias Billstrom said he had been in contact with several of his counterparts among member states and sent a letter to all members.

In a statement, Billstrom said he had informed them about the process for granting permits for public gatherings in Sweden and that police made such decisions independently.

Billstrom said he had stressed “the Swedish government has been very clear in its rejection of the Islamophobic acts carried out by individuals at demonstrations in Sweden”.

Tensions flare 

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, whose support is crucial for Sweden’s bid to join the NATO defence alliance, has expressed deep anger at the Koran burnings.

The Nordic country abandoned centuries of military non-alignment and decided to apply for NATO membership in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Last week, Sweden ordered 15 government bodies including the armed forces, several law enforcement agencies and the tax office to strengthen anti-terrorism efforts.

On Sunday, neighbouring Denmark said it would explore legal means of stopping protests involving the burning of holy texts, citing security concerns following a backlash over Koran desecrations.

Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson said a similar process was already underway, while noting his country was in “the most serious security situation since World War II”.

“Here at home we know that states, state-like actors and individuals can take advantage of the situation,” Kristersson said in a post to Instagram.

Swedish and Danish envoys have been summoned in a slew of Middle Eastern nations.

MOSCOW — Russia said on Sunday it had downed Ukrainian drones targeting Moscow and the Crimea Peninsula in attacks that damaged two office towers in the capital and briefly shut an international airport.

One drone targeting Moscow was shot down on the city's outskirts and two others were "suppressed by electronic warfare" and smashed into an office complex early on Sunday, the Russian defence ministry said, adding that there were no injuries.

Moscow and its environs, lying about 500 kilometres from the Ukrainian border, had rarely been targeted during the conflict in Ukraine until several drone attacks this year.

Following the attacks, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warned that "war" was coming to Russia.

"Gradually, the war is returning to the territory of Russia — to its symbolic centres and military bases, and this is an inevitable, natural and absolutely fair process," Zelensky said on a visit to the western city of Ivano-Frankivsk.

Russia has been targetted with a series of recent drone assaults — including on the Kremlin and Russian towns near the border with Ukraine — that Moscow has blamed on Kyiv.

Russia's defence ministry denounced an "attempted terrorist attack" which Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said would have been "impossible without the help afforded the Kyiv regime by the United States and its NATO allies".

The defence ministry said on Telegram: "On the morning of July 30, the Kyiv regime's attempted terrorist attack with unmanned aerial vehicles on objects in the city of Moscow was thwarted.

"One Ukrainian UAV was destroyed in the air by air defence systems over the territory of the Odintsovo district of Moscow region.

"Two more drones were suppressed by electronic warfare and, having lost control, crashed on the territory of Moscow-City's non-residential building complex."

Moscow-City is a commercial development in the west of the capital.

Mayor Sergei Sobyanin posted on Telegram that the "facades of two city office towers were slightly damaged" but added there were no victims.

Several windows had been blown out on the corner of the buildings, AFP photos showed, with mangled steel beams visible and documents strewn on the ground below.

Police officers had cordoned off the area.

Airport briefly closed 

The TASS state news agency reported the capital’s Vnukovo airport was “closed for departures and arrivals, flights are redirected to other airports” but operations appeared to have returned to normal inside an hour.

Earlier this month, a volley of drone attacks briefly disrupted air traffic at the same airport.

The defence ministry also said on Sunday that 25 Ukrainian drones were destroyed by air defence fire in an overnight attack on Crimea, a peninsula Moscow annexed in 2014.

“Another nine Ukrainian drones were suppressed by means of electronic warfare and, without reaching the target, crashed into the Black Sea,” the ministry said, adding that there were no victims.

Crimea has been targeted by Kyiv throughout Moscow’s Ukraine offensive but has come under more intense, increased attacks in recent weeks.

Kyiv has repeatedly said it plans to take Crimea back.

The attacks on Moscow come several weeks into a Ukrainian counteroffensive to claw back territory captured by Russia since large-scale hostilities erupted in February 2022.

On Friday, Russia said it had intercepted two missiles over its southern Rostov region bordering Ukraine, with at least 16 people wounded by debris falling on the city of Taganrog.

Shortly after, it said it had downed a second S-200 missile near the city of Azov, with debris falling in an unpopulated area.

Across the border, a Russian strike killed two people in the southern city of Zaporizhzhia on Saturday, authorities there said.

Two civilians were also killed in a missile attack Saturday on the north-eastern city of Sumy, the municipal city council said, with 20 more hurt, three of them hospitalised after a higher education institution was hit.

According to public broadcaster Suspilne, the building was destroyed in an explosion at about 8:00pm (17:00 GMT).

In early July, a Russian drone attack hit an apartment building in the same city, killing three and wounding 21.

NIAMEY — The Niger general who staged a coup on Friday declared himself the new leader of the jihadist-hit African nation and warned that any foreign military intervention would lead to chaos.

General Abdourahamane Tchiani, head of the Presidential Guard since 2011, appeared on state television, saying he was the "president of the National Council for the Safeguard of the Homeland".

The general, who is in his 50s and had previously kept out of public life, presented the coup as a response to "the degradation of the security situation" linked to militants bloodshed.

He questioned "the sense and scope of a security approach to the fight against terrorism which excludes any real collaboration with Burkina Faso and Mali" — neighbours which face similar threats.

But the putschists, who have faced international condemnation for taking power from a democratically elected president, also warned of "the consequences that will flow from any foreign military intervention".

On the third day since President Mohamed Bazoum was detained, former colonial master France demanded the restoration of the government, saying it “does not recognise” the putschists, and calling Bazoum the “sole president”.

The UN Security Council said in a statement late Friday that it “condemned the efforts to unconstitutionally change the legitimate government” in the country.

And US Secretary of State Antony Blinken offered Bazoum Washington’s “unflagging” support and warned those detaining him that “hundreds of millions of dollars of assistance” was at risk, according to the State Department.

“Secretary Blinken underscored that the United States will continue to work to ensure the full restoration of constitutional order and democratic rule in Niger,” department spokesperson Matthew Miller said in a statement.

Washington had previously warned it may “cease security and other cooperation”, although its approximately 1,000 troops stationed in the country will stay in place for now.

West African leaders will meet Sunday in the Nigerian capital Abuja to discuss the coup, President Bola Tinubu said.

“ECOWAS and the international community would do everything to defend democracy and ensure democratic governance continues to take firm root in the region,” Tinubu, who is also the chairman of the Economic Community of West African States regional bloc, said in a statement.

The European Union threatened to cut aid to Niamey after what it said was a “serious attack on stability and democracy”.

Meanwhile, two deputy directors of Bazoum’s Cabinet, Daouda Takoubakoye and Oumar Moussa, also hit back, calling Tchiani’s statement “lies” and accusing the general and the Presidential Guard of having staged the coup for “personal gains”.

Sources close to Bazoum said the deposed leader had been considering replacing Tchiani after their relations soured, a decision which had been due to be made at a cabinet meeting on July 24.

Bazoum and his family have been confined since Wednesday morning to their residence at the presidential palace located within the 700-strong Presidential Guard’s military camp.

He is said to be in good health and has been able to talk by telephone to other heads of state.

‘Risk’ to human rights 

The Guard chiefs who staged the coup had won broad army support by Thursday.

Armed forces chief Gen. Abdou Sidikou Issa swung his weight behind the putsch, saying it had occurred “in order to avoid a deadly confrontation”.

The latest target of a coup in Africa’s turbulent Sahel, Bazoum has tried to stand his ground.

French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna had seemed to hold out hope that he was not done yet.

“If you hear me talking about an attempted coup, it’s because we don’t consider things final,” she said. “There is still a way out if those responsible listen to the international community.”

France, which has 1,500 soldiers in Niger, would support sanctions, she added.

French President Emmanuel Macron will chair a defence meeting on the coup on Saturday, the presidency said.

“This coup is completely illegitimate and profoundly dangerous, for Nigeriens, for Niger and for the whole region,” Macron said during a visit to Papua New Guinea on Friday, while also calling for Bazoum’s release and “the restoration of constitutional order”.

Pro-coup demonstrations 

Landlocked Niger is one of the world’s poorest nations.

Since gaining independence in 1960, it has seen four coups as well as numerous other attempts — including two previously against Bazoum.

The 63-year-old is one of a dwindling group of elected presidents and pro-Western leaders in the Sahel, where a extremist insurgency has triggered coups in Mali and Burkina Faso.

Their juntas have forced out French troops, and Mali’s ruling military has woven a close alliance with Russia.

“What happened in Niger is nothing more than the struggle of the people of Niger against colonisers, who tried to impose their own rules of life,” the boss of Russia’s Wagner group, Yevgeny Prigozhin, said on Thursday in a message shared by a body linked to the mercenary organisation.

Bazoum took office after elections two years ago, in Niger’s first peaceful transfer of power since independence.

The country of 26 million people is two-thirds desert and frequently ranks at the bottom of the UN’s Human Development Index.

ATHENS — Wildfires that have scorched Greece for more than two weeks were on Saturday mostly under control, but firefighters remained in key hotspots with strong winds still a threat, officials said.

Three fires broke out on Saturday in the Peloponnese peninsula, with authorities protectively ordering the evacuation of four communities near the city of Pyrgos.

Over 100 firefighters are active in the area, backed by seven aircraft and two helicopters, the fire department said.

Earlier Saturday the agency had told AFP there was "no active front" in the three biggest wildfires in Rhodes, Corfu and central Greece that had forced thousands of people to flee in recent days.

Nevertheless, more than 460 firefighters were still deployed in these three areas as a precaution, it said.

"There is no de-escalation of forces until the major incidents are checked," it said.

Fed by scorching temperatures, dry conditions and strong winds, the two-week inferno had sparked chaos at the peak of the busy summer tourist season.

Some 20,000 visitors and locals fled from hotels and villages on the island of Rhodes. Hundreds more were evacuated in Corfu and other areas.

The fires killed at least five people and scorched nearly 50,000 hectares of forest and vegetation, according to estimates by the Athens Observatory.

Two pilots died on Tuesday when their water-bombing plane crashed while battling a blaze in Evia, while three more bodies were recovered in fires in Evia and near the industrial zone of the port city of Volos in central Greece.

The blazes have also put political pressure on the conservative government of Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, which was reelected just a month ago.

The citizen's protection minister resigned his post Friday after it emerged that he had taken a vacation as the country battled the wildfires.

For more than 10 days this month, Greece sweltered under what some experts say is the longest heatwave recorded in July for decades.

Temperatures, which reached 46oC this week, have begun to fall.

National weather forecaster EMY predicted the mercury would not climb above 37oC on Saturday, but said wind gusts could reach 60 kilometres per hour.

Fires have also flared in Croatia, Italy and Portugal this week, and blazes killed 34 in Algeria in extreme heat that has left landscapes tinder dry.

WASHINGTON — US President Joe Biden hosts Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni at the White House on Thursday, celebrating a staunch NATO ally, while setting aside any qualms about her far-right government.

The White House played down controversies over Meloni's domestic agenda, instead focusing on the roles Italy plays as a key member of the G-7 and NATO, especially when it comes to the Western push to support Ukraine's war effort.

Biden and Meloni have a “good, productive relationship” and Biden has “been looking forward to this visit quite a bit”, National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told reporters on Wednesday.

Kirby noted Italy’s place in the European Union and other Western groups, as well as strong US ties to the country through an estimated 18 million Italian-Americans. Italy will take over the rotating presidency of the G-7 next year.

Biden and Meloni plan to discuss efforts to support Ukraine against Russia’s invasion, the global climate crisis, migration, and also the prickly subject of China.

“As we deal with important global challenges, including Russia’s war against Ukraine and the climate crisis, the US-Italy partnership and Italy’s strong voice within the NATO alliance certainly remain important,” Kirby said.

On China, European countries and Washington broadly agree that the time has come to reduce dangerous dependency on Beijing — “de-risking”, as the new policy is dubbed. However, there is less agreement on details of how far to go and how much economic risk can be tolerated.

Kirby said Biden and Meloni would discuss “closer transatlantic coordination regarding the People’s Republic of China”.

Meloni in particular has come under pressure to pull Italy out of China’s Belt and Road initiative — a trillion-dollar infrastructure investment scheme that Beijing has used to secure influence around the world, mostly in countries with economic difficulties.

Kirby would not confirm that this would come up, saying only “they certainly will talk about shared concerns and perspectives and challenges with respect” to China.

Another delicate point is Meloni’s stature as leader of one of Europe’s most successful far-right movements — and in a country with a painful history of fascism.

However, US officials see the Italian prime minister as having moderated since coming to power and she has surprised many with her decisive posture on supporting Ukraine against Russia, where Vladimir Putin was close friends with the late, long-serving Italian premier Silvio Berlusconi.

Asked about Biden’s view of the far-right in Italy, Kirby said “the Italian people get to decide who their government is — it’s a democracy. The president respects that.”

On a more concrete level, the US link to Italy is ensured through a major military presence, comprising some 30,000 Americans — whether service members or their families — in five bases.