The Armenian Defense Ministry says a soldier has been shot dead along the country's tense border with Azerbaijan in what Yerevan says was a cease-fire violation. The ministry said the incident happened near the village of Bardzruni at around 2:35 p.m. local time on December 4. Bardzruni Mayor Arsen Aleksanian told RFE/RL's Armenian Service that the shots were fired in the direction of the Armenian position at the border and were heard in the village. The Azerbaijani Defense Ministry denied the report, calling it "provocative information of the Armenian side" and a "complete lie." To read the original story by RFE/RL's Armenian Service, click here.

A U.S. citizen has been found dead at an immigration center in Russia's Krasnodar region, Kommersant reported on December 4. Ernest Harry Mitchell, 56, had been ordered held after a Russian court ruled that he violated regulations by having invalid health insurance and "undeclared cash" while trying to enter Georgia's breakaway region of Abkhazia from Russia, Kommersant said. The court fined Mitchell 3,000 rubles ($32) and ordered him to be deported. Mitchell did not plan to challenge the ruling. Kommersant said his body was found on the premises of the center and a preliminary report suggested suicide was the cause.

Seven former members of the Bosnian Serb forces have been charged with assisting in genocide in eastern Bosnia-Herzegovina during the Bosnian War in 1995, the Prosecutor-General's Office announced on December 4. The seven men are accused of being members of the Republika Srpska Military Police, which participated in capturing Bosniak men and boys as they tried to cross into territory controlled by the Bosnian military after the fall of the UN-protected zone of Srebrenica. The defendants are accused of detaining the Bosniaks and transporting them to three locations where they were shot and killed. To read the original story by RFE/RL’s Balkan Service, click here.

Russian opposition politician Ilya Yashin, who is serving an 8 1/2-year prison term for his criticism of Moscow's invasion of Ukraine, has been sent to solitary confinement for five days, his Telegram channel said on December 4. Officially, Yashin was "punished" for refusing to work on the construction of a new prison barrack. But Yashin said the issue of his work on the construction site was raised after he challenged the Kremlin in video testimony in a hearing last week. After the hearing a Moscow court fined him for failing to follow "foreign agent" requirements.

Russia and Niger agreed to strengthen military cooperation during a visit by a Russian delegation led by the deputy defense minister, Nigerien authorities said on December 4. The trip was the first official visit by a member of the Russian government since the army ousted the civilian government in a coup in July. The Russian delegation led by Colonel General Yunus-Bek Yevkurov was hosted by the head of Niger's military government, General Abdourahamane Tiani. The parties "signed documents to strengthen military cooperation between the Republic of Niger and the Russian Federation," according to Nigerien authorities.

Iranian media say the governorate of the central city of Qom has issued a directive mandating female employees in government offices adhere to strict Islamic dress codes, specifically wearing a black chador, a large piece of cloth that is wrapped around the head and upper body leaving only the face exposed, and refraining from using makeup.

The directive, initially disclosed by the Iran Watch rights group's website, marks a further tightening of the Islamic republic's stance on how women can dress in the workplace.

The deputy governor of Qom, Abolghasem Moghimi Araghi, emphasized in the directive the need for female employees to comply with the "laws of modesty and hijab." The requirement underscores the regime's renewed emphasis on conservative dress standards, particularly in Qom, a city known for its religious significance and as a hub for Shi'ite religious education.

The directive's publication coincides with a period of heightened sensitivity and opposition to Iran's mandatory hijab laws.

Nationwide protests under the banner of "Women, life, freedom" have called for the abolition of compulsory dress codes, with Iranian women risking much in their quest for freedom and equality by standing at the forefront of the demonstrations.

SEE ALSO:

Mahsa Amini And Iran's 'Women, Life, Freedom' Movement Win EU's Sakharov Prize

This latest regulation in Qom, compelling the wearing of a chador in public offices, is unprecedented in its scope and signals an intensification of the government's approach toward enforcing strict Islamic dress codes.

The hijab, or Islamic head scarf, became compulsory for women and girls over the age of 9 in 1981, two years after the Islamic Revolution in Iran. The move triggered protests that were swiftly crushed by the new authorities. Many women have flouted the rule over the years and pushed the boundaries of what officials say is acceptable clothing.

Women also have launched campaigns against the discriminatory law, although many have been pressured by the state and forced to leave the country for safety reasons.

Tensions have run high in Iran over the hijab law since 22-year-old Mahsa Amini's death in police custody in September 2022.

Amini's death, which came just days after her detention in Tehran by the morality police for allegedly wearing her hijab improperly, led to nationwide protests and hundreds of demonstrators' deaths across the country.

Despite lasting public anger, parliament around the anniversary of Amini's death approved an updated version of the law that included harsher penalties for violations, including prison sentences of up to 10 years.

In late October, outrage boiled over again after another young woman died following an alleged encounter with "morality" enforcers earlier that month in a Tehran subway car.

Armita Garavand, 17, died after falling into a coma after the alleged confrontation on October 1. Some reports have suggested she was assaulted by the morality police, while others have said hijab guards were responsible.

Written by Ardeshir Tayebi based on an original story in Persian by RFE/RL's Radio Farda

Police in the northern Turkmen city of Koneurgench have arrested Hudaiberdy Allashov, a former correspondent for RFE/RL in the Central Asian country, on unknown charges.

Relatives told RFE/RL that Allashov was arrested on December 1, several days after he was summoned by the police, where he was "beaten and electroshocked."

According to the relatives, Allashov's whereabouts and the reason for his arrest are unknown.

Allashov worked as an RFE/RL correspondent for about three months in 2016 before he and his mother were arrested in December that year on a charge of using chewing tobacco, which is illegal in the tightly controlled former Soviet republic. Allashov and his mother, Kurbantach Arazmedova, rejected the charge at the time.

In mid-February 2017, amid an international outcry, Allashov and his mother were released after a court convicted them of possessing chewing tobacco and handed each a three-year suspended prison sentence.

After his release, Allashov stopped working for RFE/RL, as he feared for his safety.

In October 2019, police rearrested Allashov and beat him during questioning over several hours. The stress of her son's situation weighed on Arazmedova, who fell ill and died in hospital two days later.

In May 2022, an official severely beat Allashov and his wife in Koneurgench, after which Allashov's wife, Ejesh Arazgylyjeva, was hospitalized and he himself needed medical assistance.

Last month, another former RFE/RL correspondent in Turkmenistan, 74-year-old Soltan Achilova, was not allowed to leave the country for Switzerland, where she was expected to receive a prestigious human rights award for her reporting.

Achilova told RFE/RL at the time that she was strip-searched and humiliated at Ashgabat International Airport, where officials didn't allow her or her daughter to board a plane on November 17 despite having valid passports, visas, and tickets.

The only journalist in Turkmenistan who openly criticizes the authoritarian government, Achilova was scheduled to attend the Martin Ennals Award human rights ceremony in Switzerland on November 21.

The government maintains tight control of newspapers, radio, television, and the Internet in Turkmenistan, which placed 177th out of 180 countries in the 2023 Press Freedom Index published by Reporters Without Borders.

Prosecutors in Russia's Kirov region on December 4 asked a court in the regional capital of Kirov to sentence to 12 years in prison the region's former governor, Nikita Belykh, who is already serving an eight-year prison term on a bribe-taking charge that he rejects.

Belykh was arrested in July 2016 and sentenced to eight years in prison on February 1, 2018, after a Moscow court found him guilty of taking about 400,000 euros ($435,150) in bribes in 2012-16 in connection with timber projects in the region.

One of the highest-ranking officials to be arrested in office since President Vladimir Putin was first elected in 2000, Belykh maintained his innocence, saying he was the victim of a "banal provocation" by law enforcement.

In July 2021, the Investigative Committee launched a new probe against Belykh, accusing him of abuse of office. According to investigators, while leading the region, Belykh used his post to illegally obtain 320 million rubles ($3.5 million) from a mortgage company for a local business.

The prosecutor's office added that the 12 years requested by prosecutors would include the time Belykh has already served, meaning the new case would add about four years to Belykh's current prison time.

Belykh has maintained innocence in the new case as well.

Once a leader of a liberal opposition party, the Union of Rightist Forces, Belykh was one of the few provincial governors in Russia not to be closely allied with Putin.

Before serving as Kirov governor, Belykh was a deputy governor of the Perm region and a lawmaker in the regional assembly.

He conducted several political campaigns in opposition to Putin's policies and was sharply criticized by liberals such as former ally Boris Nemtsov -- who was assassinated in February 2015 -- when he accepted appointment in 2009 by then-President Dmitry Medvedev.

Putin fired Belykh in July 2016, shortly after his arrest.

A court in Bishkek on December 4 fully acquitted blogger Yryskeldi Jekshenaliev, who was arrested in August on charges of making public calls for mass disorder and violence. Prosecutors sought seven years in prison for him. The probe against the 20-year-old blogger was launched in August last year. His arrest came hours after President Sadyr Japarov condemned unspecified "defenders" of the environment in the region, calling them "false patriots and liars." The charges against Jekshenaliev stemmed from his Facebook posts about ecological problems at an iron ore mining complex. To read the original story by RFE/RL's Kyrgyz Service, click here.

Iran has banned millions of Afghan refugees and migrants in the country from living in, traveling to, or seeking employment in just over half of the country's 31 provinces.

On December 3, Hamzeh Soleimani, the director-general of citizenship and foreign nationals affairs of the western Kermanshah Province, confirmed the ban was in place in 16 provinces nationwide.

"Numerous construction projects, greenhouses and livestock farms underwent inspection under the plan. [This led] to the arrest and expulsion of Afghan workers from the province," he said.

Iranian media have identified 15 of the 16 provinces, including Kermanshah, East Azarbaijan, West Azerbaijan, Ardabil, Zanjan, Kurdistan, Hamedan, Gilan, Mazandaran, Sistan-Baluchistan, Ilam, Lorestan, Chaharmahal and Bakhtiari, Kahgiluyeh and Boyer Ahmad, and Hormozgan.

In October, Iranian Interior Minister Ahmad Vahidi reiterated that Tehran would deport all "illegal" migrants, most of whom are Afghan nationals who fled war, persecution, and poverty.

SEE ALSO:

Iran Repeats Threat To Expel Undocumented Afghans

Tehran estimates that more than 5 million Afghans currently live in the country. Iranian officials now want to deport at least half of them because they do not have the documents to remain in the country.

During the past few months, the rate of Afghans deported from Iran has steadily increased despite efforts by Afghanistan's Taliban-run government to persuade Tehran to give the Afghans more time before embarking on a mass expulsion campaign like Pakistan.

Islamabad is currently deporting thousands of impoverished Afghans daily as part of its campaign to expel more than 1.7 million "undocumented foreigners."

In Iran, Afghans say their life is becoming more complicated with each passing day.

"The situation of Afghan refugees across Iran is very worrying," Sharif Mateen, an Afghan refugee, told RFE/RL's Azadi Radio.

"Police are arresting everyone irrespective of whether they have documents or not. They are then taken to repatriation camps," he added.

WATCH: Despite risks to their safety, thousands of Afghans -- often undocumented -- flock into Iran to find work.

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Iran has hosted millions of Afghans for more than four decades, but Tehran has often complained of the lack of international aid for hosting them.

More than 70 percent of the 3.6 million Afghans who left their country after the Taliban seized back power in August 2021 fled to Iran.

Data show most are educated, middle-class Afghans who served in the fallen pro-Western Afghan republic's security forces or civil bureaucracy.

Local military officials in eastern Ukraine say Russian forces have expanded their avenues of attack against the Donetsk region town of Avdiyivka in an effort to surround and capture it "at any cost."

Ukrainian forces have been engaged in heavy fighting for weeks as they try to stave off Russian advances on the industrial hub, and are now facing assaults from two new directions, according to Vitaliy Barabash, the head of Avdiyivka's military administration.

Live Briefing: Russia's Invasion Of Ukraine

RFE/RL's Live Briefing gives you all of the latest developments on Russia's full-scale invasion, Kyiv's counteroffensive, Western military aid, global reaction, and the plight of civilians. For all of RFE/RL's coverage of the war in Ukraine, click here.

"The current third wave of enemy assaults differs from the previous two in that they have conditionally opened two new directions," Barabash told Ukrainian state media on December 4. "The launching of new directions proves that the enemy has been given a command to capture the city at any cost."

Ukrainian commanders have said that Russian forces have suffered heavy losses during the assault on the frontline town, while British intelligence has said that the fight for Avdiyivka has led to the highest casualty rates among Russian troops since Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

Barabash said some 1,300 civilians remained in Avdiyivka, which once had a population of about 30,000.

The comments came as Ukraine touted multiple battleground victories, but also received troubling news about possible issues regarding future financial and military support from its Western allies.

In the United States, the administration of U.S. President Joe Biden sent a letter to Congress urging lawmakers to approve tens of billions of promised economic assistance to Kyiv to support Ukraine's war effort.

Office of Management and Budget Director Shalanda Young warned in the letter that without action funding for Kyiv would run out by the end of the year, a scenario Young said would "kneecap" Ukrainian forces.

Funding to support Ukraine's economy had already dried up, Young added, saying that "if Ukraine's economy collapses, they will not be able to keep fighting, full stop."

"We are out of money -- and nearly out of time," Young said.

While the Biden administration has sought a nearly $106 billion aid package to cover Ukraine, Israel, allies in the Indo-Pacific, and other priority areas, the request has been met with skepticism by some lawmakers.

Congress previously allocated $111 billion in Ukrainian aid.

In NATO-member Bulgaria, meanwhile, President Rumen Radev vetoed the country's plans to send 100 surplus armored personnel carriers to aid Ukraine's efforts to stave off invading Russian forces.

Radev said on December 4 that lawmakers needed to reassess if the vehicles, which were to be provided free of charge, might still be of use to Bulgaria in the case of emergencies. The deal will now go back to parliament for a second vote.

SEE ALSO:

Bulgarian President Vetoes Donation Of Armored Personnel Carriers To Ukraine

Meanwhile, Ukraine's military also said on December 4 that it had downed dozens of drones launched by Russia over the past 24 hours, and that an overnight drone attack launched by Ukrainian forces had destroyed a major oil depot on Russian-controlled territory in the eastern Luhansk region.

In Russia, the governor of the Voronezh region, Aleksandr Gusev, on December 4 confirmed reports that Russian Major General Vladimir Zavadsky died last week in Ukraine.

Unconfirmed reports in Russian and Ukraine said earlier that the 45-year-old deputy commander of the 14th Army Corps was killed in Ukraine on November 28

The Russian media website iStories said at the time that Zavadsky was the seventh Russian general whose death in the war in Ukraine had been confirmed by Russian sources.

With reporting by AFP and AP

KAZAN, Russia -- A court in Kazan, the capital of Russia's Tatarstan region, has rejected an appeal filed by lawyers of Alsu Kurmasheva, a veteran journalist of RFE/RL's Tatar-Bashkir Service, against another court's October decision to fine her 10,000 rubles ($110) for "failure to inform Russian officials about holding a second citizenship."

After the Soviet district court pronounced its decision on December 4, the ruling to fine Kurmasheva, who has been in Russian custody since October 18 on a separate case, officially came into force.

Kurmasheva, a Prague-based journalist with RFE/RL who holds dual U.S. and Russian citizenships, traveled to Russia for a family emergency in May.

She was temporarily detained while waiting for her return flight on June 2 at the airport in Kazan, where both of her passports were confiscated. She was not able to leave Russia as she awaited the return of her travel documents.

On October 11, a court ordered Kurmasheva to pay the fine for failing to register her U.S. passport with Russian authorities.

Kurmasheva was detained again on October 18 and this time charged with failing to register as a foreign agent, a crime that carries a maximum sentence of five years in prison.

The Investigative Committee said Kurmasheva was being charged under a section of the Criminal Code that refers to the registration of foreign agents who carry out "purposeful collection of information in the field of military, military-technical activities of Russia," which, if received by foreign sources, "can be used against the security of the country."

It gave no further details.

Last week, the Soviet district court extended Kurmasheva's pretrial detention until at least February 5.

The Investigative Committee said its investigation found that while the Russian Justice Ministry did not add her to the list of foreign agents, she failed to provide documents to be included on the registry.

Kurmasheva and RFE/RL have both rejected the charge.

Russia's detention of Kurmasheva, the second U.S. media member to be held by Moscow this year, triggered a wave of criticism from rights groups and politicians saying the move signals new level of war-time censorship.

The court decision to extend Kurmasheva's detention came on December 1, a day after leading Russian human rights group Memorial recognized her as a political prisoner.

Moscow has been accused of detaining Americans to use as bargaining chips to exchange for Russians jailed in the United States. Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich was arrested for allegedly spying -- a charge he and the newspaper vehemently deny -- in March.

Kurmasheva is one of four RFE/RL journalists -- Andrey Kuznechyk, Ihar Losik, and Vladyslav Yesypenko are the other three -- currently imprisoned on charges related to their work. Rights groups and RFE/RL have called repeatedly for the release of all four, saying they have been wrongly detained.

Losik is a blogger and contributor for RFE/RL’s Belarus Service who was convicted in December 2021 on several charges including the “organization and preparation of actions that grossly violate public order” and sentenced to 15 years in prison.

Kuznechyk, a web editor for RFE/RL’s Belarus Service, was sentenced in June 2022 to six years in prison following a trial that lasted no more than a few hours. He was convicted of “creating or participating in an extremist organization.”

Yesypenko, a dual Ukrainian-Russian citizen who contributed to Crimea.Realities, a regional news outlet of RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service, was sentenced in February 2022 to six years in prison by a Russian judge in occupied Crimea after a closed-door trial. He was convicted of “possession and transport of explosives,” a charge he steadfastly denies.

Bulgarian President Rumen Radev has vetoed the country's plans to send 100 surplus armored personnel carriers (APCs) to Ukraine, sending the arrangement back to parliament for reconsideration. In explaining the veto, signed off on by parliament last month, Radev said on December 4 that lawmakers needed to assess if the vehicles -- last deployed in the 1980s -- were expendable and not of possible use to Bulgaria in case of emergencies. Under an agreement signed with Kyiv in August, the APCs were to be provided free of charge. The deal will now go back to parliament for a second vote. To read the original story by RFE/RL's Bulgarian Service, click here.

ALMATY, Kazakhstan -- Police in Kazakhstan’s largest city, Almaty, have blocked five Kazakh men and women from approaching the Chinese Consulate, where they planned to demand the release of their relatives imprisoned in so-called reeducation camps in China's northwestern region of Xinjiang.

The protesters, who planned to picket the Chinese Consulate on December 4, told RFE/RL that it was the 1,000th day of their rallies "against China's genocidal politics against ethnic Kazakhs, Uyghurs, and Kyrgyz," as well as other indigenous peoples of the region.

According to the protesters, their relatives in Xinjiang were incarcerated either for being practicing Muslims or for posts on the Internet.

China has been accused of human rights violations against Kazakhs, Uyghurs and other mostly Turkic-speaking indigenous ethnic groups over the existence of mass detention camps in Xinjiang.

Beijing denies that the facilities are internment camps, saying its actions are aimed at combating terrorism. People who have fled the province, however, say people from the ethnic groups are undergoing "political indoctrination" at a network of facilities officially referred to as reeducation camps.

Amid ongoing rallies and pickets in front of China's diplomatic missions in Kazakhstan, the Chinese Embassy said in March 2021 that all ethnic Kazakhs incarcerated in Xinjiang are Chinee citizens and are being held there for breaking Chinse laws.

Several relatives of the protesters were released and allowed to travel to Kazakhstan in recent years.

Kazakh authorities refrain from openly criticizing the policies of China, one of their main creditors.

The U.S. State Department has said that as many as 2 million Uyghurs, Kazakhs, and members of Xinjiang's other indigenous, mostly Muslim ethnic groups have been taken to detention centers.

Kazakhs are the second-largest Turkic-speaking indigenous community in Xinjiang after Uyghurs. The region is also home to ethnic Kyrgyz, Tajiks, and Hui, also known as Dungans. Han, China's largest ethnicity, is the second-largest community in Xinjiang.

A court in Kazakhstan’s largest city, Almaty, has sentenced journalists Vladimir and Nargiz Severny to seven years and eight years in prison, respectively, on extortion charges that the couple rejects. The court ruled on December 4 that Nargiz Severnaya may start serving her prison term in 2028. Investigators say the married journalists blackmailed two businesses in Almaty, extorting significant amount of cash from them for withholding sensitive information related to the businesses from being published. The couple pleaded not guilty and denies any wrongdoing. To read the original story by Current Time, click here.

Revenue from the sales of arms and military services by the 100 largest companies in the global defense industry was down in real terms an annual 3.5 percent in 2022, despite a sharp rise in demand, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) said on December 4.

The combined arms revenue of the world’s largest arms-producing and military services companies -- the SIPRI Top 100 -- totaled $597 billion last year, according to new data released by the research institute.

The fall in revenue “was mostly driven by overall decreases in the arms revenue of companies in the United States and Russia,” SIPRI said, adding that orders are likely to increase in the coming years.

“Large backlogs in orders and surging demand for arms during 2022 and 2023 suggest that the total Top 100 arms revenue may rise significantly in the years ahead,” the institute added.

The data also shows that Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine drove an increase in demand for weapons in 2022, but many arms companies’ efforts to increase production capacity were hindered by labor shortages, rising costs, and supply chain disruptions.

Despite the year-on-year drop, the total arms revenues of the Top 100 firms were still 14 percent higher in 2022 than in 2015, the first year that SIPRI included Chinese companies in its ranking.

While three U.S. companies -- Lockheed Martin, Raytheon Technologies, and General Dynamics -- topped the list, revenue nonetheless was down for arms manufacturers in the United States and Russia as well, while among Asian and Middle Eastern companies, revenue increased substantially, it said.

Arms revenue at the seven companies in the Top 100 based in the Middle East went up by 11 percent to $17.9 billion. This was the largest annual percentage increase in arms revenue when assessed by region.

The SIPRI data also shows that China accounted for 18 percent of the Top 100’s arms revenue in 2022, the second most after the United States at 51 percent.

The aggregate arms revenue of the eight Chinese companies in the rankings increased to $108 billion, SIPRI said.

The seven British companies in the top 100 grew their revenue to $41.8 billion, 7 percent of the overall total.

The combined arms revenues of the two Russian companies in the Top 100 fell by 12 percent to $20.8 billion, SIPRI said, adding that there was an overall lack of data on Russian companies as “transparency in the Russian arms industry continued to decline.”

The only Ukrainian company in the top 100, UkrOboronProm, saw a real 10 percent drop in its arms revenue to $1.3 billion. Although its arms revenue increased in nominal terms, this was more than offset by the country’s high inflation.

Two people were killed in Ukraine's southern Kherson region on December 3 after the region came under heavy shelling by Russian forces.

Live Briefing: Russia's Invasion Of Ukraine

RFE/RL's Live Briefing gives you all of the latest developments on Russia's full-scale invasion, Kyiv's counteroffensive, Western military aid, global reaction, and the plight of civilians. For all of RFE/RL's coverage of the war in Ukraine, click here.

Regional head Oleksandr Prokudin said on December 4 that in addition to the deaths, eight people were injured as the region was targeted 117 times by Russian shelling.

In the regional capital, Kherson, residential areas, medical facilities, and other infrastructure were damaged, Prokudin said.

Ukraine's military leadership in Kherson said earlier on December that the city was under "heavy fire" from Russian forces from the "temporarily occupied left bank" of the Dnieper River.

Meanwhile, the Biden administration on December 4 sent the U.S. Congress an urgent warning about the need to approve tens of billions of dollars in military and economic assistance to Ukraine, saying Kyiv's war effort to defend itself from Russia's invasion may grind to a halt without it.

In a letter to House and Senate leaders and also released publicly, Office of Management and Budget Director Shalanda Young warned that the United States will run out of funding to send weapons and assistance to Ukraine by the end of the year, saying that would “kneecap” Ukraine on the battlefield.

With reporting by AP

The first 30 trucks passed through the newly opened Uhryniv-Dolhobychuv crossing on the Ukrainian-Polish border that Kyiv expects will unblock main land corridors amid protests by Polish drivers, Ukraine's border service said on December 4. Those protests, over what Polish truckers see as unfair competition from their Ukrainian peers, started on November 6, with four border crossings now under a blockade. Polish haulers' main demand is to stop Ukrainian truckers having permit-free access to the EU, something that Kyiv and Brussels say is impossible.

Belarusian leader Alyaksandr Lukashenka discussed ways to boost diplomatic and economic cooperation with China, as well as the ongoing war in Ukraine, during talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping on December 4. Xi told Lukashenka that China was ready to continue to strengthen bilateral cooperation, including through international bodies like the United Nations, according to Xinhua. The Chinese state news agency also said the two leaders discussed the war in Ukraine launched by mutual ally Russia. Belarusian state media said that the meeting, the two leaders' second this year, lasted more than three hours. To read the original story by RFE/RL's Belarus Service, click here.

Serbian Mining and Energy Minister Dubravka Djedovic Handanovic announced on December 3 that all the work has been completed and testing should begin this week on a "strategically important" interconnector to carry natural gas between Bulgaria and Serbia, an official statement said. Djedovic Handanovic said the 109 kilometers of new pipeline with a transmission station in Trupale would more safely provide a stable supply of gas to Serbia from sources "especially Azerbaijan." Russia provides most of Serbia's natural gas imports. President Aleksandar Vucic said last summer that Serbia was negotiating for 300-400 million cubic meters of gas from Azerbaijan. To read the original story by RFE/RL's Balkan Service, click here.

Amnesty International has warned that Serbia's recently revamped system with World Bank funding to determine eligibility for social protections has worsened poverty "especially for Roma and people with disabilities" in the Balkan nation of around 6.6 million people.

The international rights group said in a report published on December 4 that the so-called Social Card registry launched in 2022 has adversely affected already "poverty-stricken and marginalized communities" and "strip[ped] them of social assistance."

Damini Satija, who heads a lab at Amnesty's global digital collective, Amnesty Tech, was quoted in a statement as saying the registry's effects confirm "that imposing automation in social assistance systems can exacerbate inequality, entrench or scale discrimination, and pose a dire risk to human rights."

The report is titled Trapped By Automation: Poverty And Discrimination In Serbia’s Welfare State.

The World Bank touts registries like the Serbian Social Card registry as "inclusion systems" or a "tool for inclusion."

But Amnesty International, citing the data and individual cases in Serbia, suggested people forced to appeal their exclusion can end up "trapped in a bureaucratic maze."

Serbia's 2022 census counted nearly 132,000 Roma, or under 2 percent of the population, but most experts warn that such official figures are probably undercounts.

Minority Rights Group International quotes local and international estimates at between 300,000 and 460,000 Roma, which would make them the country's largest minority group above Hungarians (184,000) and Bosniaks (154,000).

The United Nations recently estimated that nearly 600,000 people in Serbia, most of them women or girls, live with some type of disability.

“Rather than make benefit payments fairer, thousands of people who rely on these payments as their only source of income have been locked out of the social safety net and cut off from essential assistance," Satija said.

"Already marginalized groups, have suffered the sharpest consequences of this automated system, leading to disproportionate impact on their access to benefits programs."

Low-quality data translates into problems, Amnesty International said. The accuracy of existing databases at the Social Card registry's inception "plays a huge role in ensuring fair application outcomes and continued receipt of social assistance," the group said.

It also said "the semi-automated layer has reduced the role of social workers in verifying the data and documents of applicants."

Amnesty International said the World Bank, an international financial institution established in 1944 to help finance projects in middle- and low-income countries, provided technical and financial assistance for Serbia's Social Card registry and helped implement similar schemes in other places, including nearby Montenegro and Bosnia-Herzegovina.

UNICEF, the UN's aid and relief organization for children, said that 6.9 percent of Serbia's population lived below the absolute poverty line in 2020.

“The World Bank and governments -- including in Serbia -- must conduct robust human rights risk assessments both during the design and implementation of such programs, and ensure system design that eliminates potential threats to human rights," Amnesty Tech's Satija said.

"Crucially if the human rights risks of a system cannot be prevented then this system is not fit for purpose and should not be rolled out."

The anti-Western president of Bosnia-Herzegovina's majority-Serb entity says he intended to "declare independence" for Republika Srpska during U.S. President Donald Trump's first term and regrets he "got scared and didn't do it," but "if Trump won again, I think I wouldn't hesitate." The 64-year-old Bosnian Serb leader Milorad Dodik further told Serbian TV Prva that he believes Republika Srpska will be independent some day. Dodik has threatened secession for years as he spurned the rest of Bosnia and its UN-backed overseer and cozied up to Moscow, but has taken steps to establish some separate institutions over the past 18 months. To see the original story by RFE/RL's Balkan Service, click here.

One of Russia's best-known film directors, Aleksandr Sokurov, says his "professional career...is over" because of Russia's ban on his new film. Sokurov told News.ru he's "not working on new projects" after the Culture Ministry refused to allow distribution of Fairytale (Skazka). International media describe the film as an experimental "deepfake" film that uses archival imagery to depict Stalin, Churchill, Mussolini, and Hitler meeting in purgatory. The outspoken Sokurov publicly supported artist Aleksandra Skochilenko last month when she was sentenced to seven years in prison for using price tags to spread information about the war in Ukraine. To read the original story by Current Time, click here.

Police in the western Russian city of Ulyanovsk joined ongoing official backlash over a bumper-sticker protest involving women purportedly calling for their husbands deployed for the war in Ukraine to be sent home. The 7x7 Telegram channel said police suggested to four women they might be accused of breaking the administrative law on "discrediting" the army. They have summoned at least one of the wives for questioning on December 4. An unnamed deputy mayor reportedly also got involved after media reported individuals were putting stickers on cars reading, "Bring back husband. I'm [expletive] tired of this." To read the original story by Current Time, click here.

Ukraine's military leadership in the southern city of Kherson said on December 3 that the city was under "heavy fire" from Russian forces from the "temporarily occupied left bank" of the Dnieper River, and one person had been killed in the attacks. Roman Mrochka, head of Kherson's military administration, urged residents to seek safe shelter and avoid open spaces. He later updated the casualty figure to say one person had been killed and three injured after a multistory building was shelled. Ukraine's military said early on December 3 that it had destroyed 10 Russian drones overnight. To read the original story by RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service, click here.