The European Union’s special envoy has warned Serbia and Kosovo that they must resume talks on normalizing ties if they want to make progress toward membership in the bloc.

Miroslav Lajcak arrived in Serbia's capital, Belgrade, on March 3 after previously visiting Pristina, the capital of Kosovo, at the start of his tour in the region.

Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008 but Belgrade does not recognize this. The EU has brokered negotiations to normalize ties but after a White House summit and talks in Brussels in September, the dialogue between Serbia and Kosovo has stalled.

After a meeting with Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic, Lajcak said that EU member states expect the two sides to move on.

“Dialogue is key for both sides to advance on their European path," Lajcak told a news conference. “We have no interest to preserve a status quo and we are ready to bring the process to a successful end as fast as the two sides are ready to go.”

Lajcak added that the EU is working closely with the United States with a common goal for Serbia and Kosovo in sight, which is membership in the EU.

Most EU nations and the U.S. have recognized Kosovo's independence, but not by Serbia's allies Russia and China.

Serbia was forced to cede control over Kosovo in 1999 after a U.S.-led NATO campaign ended Belgrade's crackdown against Kosovo's ethnic Albanian separatists. More than 10,000 people died in the 1998-99 Kosovo conflict.

Vucic said after his meeting with Lajcak that Serbia is ready to return to the talks and insists on reaching a compromise solution.

“We believe that a compromise agreement means no one gets everything and everyone gets enough,” Vucic said.

With reporting by AP

CHISINAU -- The European Union regards Moldova's new leadership with sympathy and has shown its readiness to help it fight corruption and reform its judiciary, President Maia Sandu has told RFE/RL, adding that the East European state needs to take advantage of this opportunity.

A U.S.-educated former adviser with the World Bank, Sandu defeated Moscow-backed incumbent Igor Dodon in November 2020 on a pledge to fight entrenched corruption and improve relations with the European Union.

"I've seen very much support and a lot of openness, unprecedented openness toward Moldova...which gives us enormous opportunities," Sandu said on March 3.

"We must seize this moment, because the people expect responsible decisions and actions mainly in the fight against corruption and judiciary reform," Sandu said.

Moldova is one of Europe’s poorest countries and is sharply divided between those who support closer ties with Russia and those who advocate stronger links to Brussels and neighboring EU member Romania.

"I would say that our country hasn't enjoyed such openness in a very long time. We need to take advantage of this situation on all fronts, including in acquiring more vaccines [to fight the pandemic]," Sandu said.

Standoff With Parliament

The country has lagged behind the rest of the continent in the scramble for anti-COVID-19 vaccines and welcomed donations from friendly governments.

The Moldovan drug regulator last month registered three vaccines -- Pfizer, AstraZeneca, and the Russian-made Sputnik V -- for use in Moldova.

The government this week said it expects a first shipment of vaccines under the global COVAX scheme for poorer countries. Last week, Romania donated 21,600 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine to the country of 3.5 million that has registered almost 190,000 infections and more than 4,000 fatalities.

Sandu, who is currently embroiled in a standoff with the parliament dominated by lawmakers allied with Dodon, has repeatedly said she wants to push for snap elections in order to acquire a working majority in the 101-seat legislature.

Moldova's Constitutional Court last month rejected Sandu's second attempt to nominate a prime minister, hindering her effort to force early elections.

Sandu had nominated Natalia Gavrilita unsuccessfully for a second time on February 11 despite parliament's earlier rejection of Gavrilita.

The second nomination appeared intended to clear a path for Sandu to dissolve parliament and call early elections.

Sandu's former party, the Party of Action and Solidarity, hopes a new vote would leave them stronger relative to Dodon's Socialists.

“More than 70 percent of the people want early elections. Who are these lawmakers, who acceded to parliament through fraud, to act against the will of 70 percent of the people?” Sandu said, adding that the dispute could be eventually settled through a referendum.

"If no compromise can be reached, this conflict must be settled by the citizens in a referendum to either suspend the president or call early elections."

A notorious convicted rapist known in Russia as the "Maniac of Skopin" has been released from prison after serving a 17-year prison term

Yulia Penkova, a spokeswoman for the Federal Penitentiary Service in the city of Saratov, said on March 3 that Viktor Mokhov left a correctional colony in the Saratov region earlier in the day.

Penkova added that Mokhov, whose crimes in 2000 shocked the country, will be under parole-like police control for another six years.

In September 2000, Mokhov and his girlfriend abducted two teenage girls in the city of Skopin in the western region of Ryazan, and kept them in a basement garage where he regularly raped them for almost four years before his arrest.

He was convicted and sentenced by the Skopin City Court in August 2005.

Based on reporting by TASS and Interfax

IRKUTSK, Russia -- Top officials at two penitentiaries in the Russian city of Irkutsk have been detained after probes were launched into the alleged torture and rape of two inmates.

Russia's Federal Penitentiary Service's (FSIN) branch in the Siberian region of Irkutsk said on March 3 that the warden of Correctional Colony No. 6 and the chief of the operations department of Detention Center No. 1 in Irkutsk had been taken into custody.

According to the statement, the warden was detained over "unlawful actions by inmates against inmate Bakiev," while the officer from the detention center was arrested over "unlawful actions by inmates against inmate Ondar."

The FSIN launched probes in February against an unspecified number of guards and 10 inmates who allegedly tortured and raped an inmate with Central Asian roots, Tahirjon Bakiev, at the Correctional Colony No 6.

The Gulagu.net rights group reported in December 2020 that another inmate, an ethnic Tuvinian, Kezhik Ondar, was tortured and raped in Detention Center No 1.

At the time, the FSIN said that wardens at the two facilities had been suspended as preliminary investigations began into the reports.

Gulagu.net’s founder, Vasily Osechkin, told RFE/RL on February 25 that some of the inmates had confessed to beating and torturing other inmates and testified that they did so at the direction of guards at the facility.

Bakiev and Ondar initially served their terms at the Correctional Colony No. 15 in the city of Angarsk in the Irkutsk region. In April 2020, inmates at that penitentiary staged a large riot protesting what they claimed were incidents of torture.

After the riot, many of the inmates were transferred to other prisons in the region.

Human rights groups have cited some of the inmates as saying that they faced beatings and torture after they were transferred to other prisons, where guards used other inmates who agreed “to cooperate” with the administration to force them to confess to organizing the riot.

MOSCOW -- A district court judge in Moscow has rejected five separate appeals by RFE/RL against lower-court rulings that imposed fines against the company for violating Russia’s controversial "foreign agent" law.

Judge Aleksei Krivoruchko of the Tverskoi district court issued the rulings on March 3, confirming fines imposed on RFE/RL for failing to mark written and broadcast materials in accordance with regulations set by the state media-monitoring agency Roskomnadzor. The lower court imposed the fines on February 10.

"RFE/RL rejects the imposition of these fines and does not accept the Russian court's decision to strike down our appeal of them," RFE/RL President Jamie Fly said in response to the rulings.

"We consider Russian Internet regulator Roskomnadzor's self-labeling regulations -- in fact, orders to deface our content platforms and intimidate our audiences -- to be a state-sponsored assault on media freedom that violates the Russian Constitution and Russia's media law," he said, adding that "RFE/RL will continue to object, protest, and appeal these requirements."

Despite ongoing appeals in more cases on the issue, RFE/RL now has 60 days to pay the fines and come into compliance with the regulations or face the potential closure of its operations inside Russia.

"RFE/RL will not abandon our growing audience in Russia, who continue to engage with our objective and independent journalism despite the Kremlin’s pressure campaign," Fly said.

"RFE/RL will not be deterred by these blatant attempts to influence our editorial independence and undermine our ability to reach our audience at a moment when the Russian people are demanding the truth," he added.

Large Fines

Since January 14, Roskommnadzor has opened 260 cases against RFE/RL for violations of the labeling requirements. A Moscow court has already levied fines in 142 cases, with the total fines approaching a value of nearly $1 million.

Judge Krivoruchko has played roles in several prominent cases in recent years, including the case of Sergei Magnitsky, a whistle-blowing lawyer whose death while in custody in 2009 prompted outrage among Western governments and international rights monitors. He has also ruled in cases involving opposition political figures Aleksei Navalny and Ilya Yashin.

Russia's so-called "foreign agent" legislation was adopted in 2012 and has been modified repeatedly. It requires nongovernmental organizations that receive foreign assistance and that the government deems to be engaged in political activity to be registered, to identify themselves as "foreign agents," and to submit to audits. Later modifications targeted foreign-funded media.

In 2017, the Russian government placed RFE/RL's Russian Service on the list, along with six other RFE/RL Russian-language news services, and Current Time, a network run by RFE/RL in cooperation with VOA.

At the end of 2020, the legislation was modified to allow the Russian government to include individuals, including foreign journalists, on its "foreign agent" list and to impose restrictions on them.

In December 2020, Russia added five individuals to its "foreign agent" list, including three contributors to RFE/RL's Russian Service. All five are appealing their inclusion on the list.

Roskomnadzor last year adopted rules requiring listed media to mark all written materials with a lengthy notice in large text, all radio materials with an audio statement, and all video materials with a 15-second text declaration.

RFE/RL has called the fines "a state-sponsored campaign of coercion and intimidation," while the U.S. State Department has described them as "intolerable."

Human Rights Watch has described the "foreign agent" legislation as "restrictive" and intended "to demonize independent groups."

Russian opposition leader Aleksei Navalny has sent his first message from custody after being transferred from a detention center in Moscow to the Vladimir region, northeast of the Russian capital, in late February.

In the message placed on Instagram on March 3, Navalny said that he is in the Detention Center No. 3 in the town of Kolchugino and is getting along with his cellmates.

"Everything is okay with me and there is even a chin-up bar in the yard for daily walks here," Navalny said in the post, adding that he and his cellmates have to dry bread as he is not allowed to buy food from the detention center's shop.

Media reports have said Navalny will be imprisoned in a penal colony in the Vladimir region's city of Pokrov, 100 kilometers east of Moscow. The colony has been known as one of the toughest in the European part of the Russian Federation.

The Federal Penitentiary Service (FSIN) on February 26 confirmed Navalny was moved from a Moscow detention center where he had been held since mid-January. But it did not specify where the anti-corruption crusader was being taken to begin serving the 2 1/2 years he has left of his sentence.

Russian authorities typically do not provide information about the transfer of prisoners until after they reach their destination. It is likely that he will be moved again from Detention Center No. 3 to a full prison.

SEE ALSO:

Navalny's Failure To Renounce His Nationalist Past May Be Straining His Support

Navalny was detained at a Moscow airport in January immediately upon returning from Berlin, where he was recovering from what several Western labs determined was a poisoning attempt using a Novichok-type nerve agent that saw him fall ill on a flight in Siberia in August 2020.

Russia has denied involvement but Navalny has said the assassination attempt was ordered by President Vladimir Putin.

A Moscow court in February ruled that while in Germany, Navalny had violated the terms of parole from an older embezzlement case that is widely considered politically motivated.

His suspended 3 1/2 year sentence was converted into jail time, though the court reduced that amount to 2 1/2 years for time already served in detention.

Navalny’s detention set off a wave of national protests and a crackdown against his supporters.

The European Union and the United States, on March 2, imposed fresh sanctions against Russia over the Navalny case.

A Russian court has sentenced a pro-Ukrainian activist from Moscow-annexed Crimea, Oleh Prykhodko, to five years in prison on terrorism charges that he and his supporters have dismissed as politically motivated.

Ukrainian Ombudswoman Lyudmyla Denisova said on Telegram that the Southern District Military Court in the city of Rostov-on-Don on March 3 ordered Prykhodko to pay a 110,000 ruble (around $1,500) fine.

Denisova called the court's ruling "unlawful" and "based on fabricated charges of an attempted terrorist attack and plotting an arson attack against the Russian Consulate in [Ukraine's western city of] Lviv in 2019."

"I condemn the unlawful verdict by the Russian court and consider it retaliation from the occupying government for Oleh's pro-Ukrainian stance [and] his public refusal to recognize Crimea's annexation by Russia," Denisova's statement said, while also saying that Prykhodko has a medical condition.

"I call on the international community to continue its pressure on the Russian Federation and demand the immediate release of all Kremlin critics," the statement said.

Prykhodko was detained in October 2019 and charged with illegally fabricating handmade explosives with the intention of carrying out a terrorist act.

He was charged later with possession of illegal explosives.

Prykhodko denies all the charges, calling them politically motivated.

Russia seized Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula in March 2014, sending in troops and staging a referendum denounced as illegitimate by at least 100 countries, after Moscow-friendly Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych was ousted amid a wave of public protests.

Rights groups say that since then Russia has moved aggressively to prosecute Ukrainian activists and anyone who questions the annexation.

European Union diplomats say ambassadors to the bloc have approved an extension of asset freezes imposed on former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych and seven people in his inner circle over the embezzlement of Ukrainian state funds.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, several EU diplomats who are familiar with the matter said that the 27 envoys agreed on March 3 to remove former Prime Minister Serhiy Arbuzov and former Education Minister Dmytro Tabachnyk form the sanctions list.

They also gave their green light to a six-month rollover of sanctions against 177 individuals and 48 entities the bloc believes are responsible for the undermining of Ukraine’s territorial integrity.

Both sanctions regimes will officially be extended later this week.

Brussels imposed the measures against Ukraine’s pro-Kremlin former president, family members, and close political allies shortly after the collapse of his government in February 2014.

Some of the people listed have challenged, and sometimes won court cases against the measure, leading to growing demands that the list should be pared down further or even scrapped.

EU diplomats told RFE/RL that there were discussions about removing from the list the former minister for duties and revenues, Oleksandr Klymenko, and the son of the ex-president, Oleksandr Yanukovych, but that the pair will remain under sanctions for now.

In 2020, sanctions imposed on former Prime Minister Mykola Azarov and ex-Energy Minister Eduard Stavytsky were lifted. Andriy Klyuyev, the former head of Yanukovych's presidential administration, was delisted the previous year.

The United States says it is "deeply concerned" over the release from pretrial detention of a Kyrgyz organized-crime figure for whom Washington has offered a $1 million reward.

In a statement on March 3, the U.S. Embassy in Bishkek described Kamchy Kolbaev as a “transnational organized-crime boss” and a “convicted murderer whose criminal network engages in drug trafficking, human trafficking, arms trafficking, and other dangerous criminal activity.”

Kolbaev’s drug trafficking network “poisons children across Central Asia, Russia, and Europe," it quoted Ambassador Donald Lu as saying.

Kolbaev was detained in October 2020 on suspicion of organizing a criminal group and participating in the activities of an organized criminal group.

A spokeswoman at the Bishkek City Court told RFE/RL that the decision to change Kolbaev’s pretrial restrictions was made on March 2. She did not say why the decision was made.

The next day, the State National Security Committee (UKMK) said Kolbaev would be unable to leave the city of Cholpon-Ata.

The committee also announced a new criminal case had been opened against him on money-laundering charges.

Kolbaev’s relatives transferred around 20 percent of the total amount of money allegedly laundered -- more than 250 million soms ($2,950,000)-- to the state, it said, adding that the rest should be paid by the end of April, which marks the end of the investigation period.

In 2014, the U.S. State Department offered a reward of up to $1 million for information leading to the disruption of the financial mechanisms of Kolbaev's criminal network.

“In a recent meeting with the leadership of the State Committee for National Security, Ambassador Lu repeated the U.S. commitment to support the efforts of Kyrgyz law enforcement to investigate and prosecute Kolbaev,” the U.S. Embassy said in its statement.

The U.S. envoy “also conveyed Washington’s intention to increase the award offered for the disruption of Kolbaev’s criminal network, and to create an improved mechanism to allow Kyrgyz citizens to collect this reward in order to assist the Kyrgyz government to rid the country of the threat posed by Kolbaev’s crime syndicate.”

TARAZ, Kazakhstan -- A court in southern Kazakhstan has handed a parole-like sentence to an activist for her links with the banned Koshe (Street) Party, the second supporter of the opposition movement to be sentenced in less than a week.

The Taraz City Court No. 2 late on March 2 sentenced Zhazira Qambarova to two years of "freedom limitation" after finding her guilty of organizing and participating in the activities of the opposition Koshe Party, which has links with another outlawed party, the Democratic Choice of Kazakhstan (DVK) movement.

Qambarova was banned from using the media or the Internet to conduct political and social activities for five years. She also is not allowed to get involved in any political activities for two years.

The activist, who was charged in September 2020, acknowledged she was taking part in the Koshe Party’s activities but denied she had organized any of them.

She said she would appeal the ruling, claiming she was being persecuted for her public activities.

Several activists across the Central Asian nation have been handed "freedom limitation" sentences for their involvement in the activities of the Koshe Party and DVK, as well as for taking part in the rallies organized by the two groups.

On January 26, a Kazakh court sentenced a Koshe Party supporter, Qairat Sultanbek, to one year of "freedom limitation" after he was detained and charged in September.

DVK is led by Mukhtar Ablyazov, the fugitive former head of Kazakhstan’s BTA Bank and outspoken critic of the Kazakh government. Kazakh authorities labeled DVK extremist and banned the group in March 2018.

Human rights groups have said Kazakhstan’s law on public gatherings contradicts international standards as it requires preliminary permission from authorities to hold rallies and envisions prosecution for organizing and participating in unsanctioned rallies even though the nation’s constitution guarantees its citizens the right of free assembly.

MOSCOW -- Russian feminist performance artist Darya Apakhonchich has filed a legal appeal against the government’s inclusion of her on its list of "media organizations fulfilling the functions of foreign agents."

Lawyer Pavel Chikov of the Agora legal-defense organization made the announcement on Telegram on March 1. Denis Kamalyagin, editor in chief of the online newspaper Pskovskaya Guberniya, has also appealed his inclusion on the "foreign agent" list, the website reported on March 3.

According to Chikov, Apakhonchich's appeal states that she "never received money or any property from foreign sources for the creation or dissemination of statements or materials that were distributed by foreign media listed under the foreign agents law."

Apakhonchich added that she regards the restrictions on her rights to be politically motivated, and her complaint includes 12 pages of examples of alleged violations of her rights to expression and privacy.

On December 28, 2020, Apakhonchich and four other individuals, including two contributors to RFE/RL's Russian Service, were included on the government’s list of "media organizations fulfilling the functions of foreign agents."

They were the first to be added to the list following a new amendment to the law that authorized the government to apply the designation to individuals.

SEE ALSO:

Individuals Named To Russia's 'Foreign-Agent' Registry For First Time

The Justice Ministry did not offer any justification for adding these individuals to the list.

In an interview with RFE/RL’s Russian Service following the designation, Apakhonchich said the listing was a surprise "because I am not engaged in journalism." She added that she believed she was targeted for her "feminist activities."

On March 1, human rights activist Lev Ponomaryov -- another of the individuals added to the list -- announced that he was closing down his For Human Rights nongovernmental organization after two decades because of the obstacles created by the controversial "foreign agent" legislation.

Russia’s so-called foreign agent legislation was adopted in 2012 and has been modified repeatedly. It requires nongovernmental organizations that receive foreign assistance and that the government deems to be engaged in political activity to be registered, to identify themselves as "foreign agents," and to submit to audits.

Later modifications of the law targeted foreign-funded media, including RFE/RL’s Russian Service, six other RFE/RL Russian-language news services, and Current Time.

Human Rights Watch has described the foreign agent legislation as “restrictive” and intended “to demonize independent groups.”

KOSTROMA, Russia -- A court in Russia's Volga city of Kostroma has sentenced a man to 18 months of forced labor on a criminal charge for attacking a police officer during January 23 rallies against the arrest of opposition politician Aleksei Navalny.

The Sverdlov district court said on March 2 that a 26-year-old Kostroma resident pleaded guilty to pushing a hat off of a police officer's head and kicking the officer from behind as police moved in to detain demonstrators.

The court ruled that the man will be placed in a specialized correctional center, where he will work at an industrial facility for 18 months. Ten percent of his salary will be given to the state.

The news website Mediazona identified the man as Aleksei Vinogradov.

OVD-Info, an independent monitoring group, says the sentence is the first in a criminal case against someone who took part in the pro-Navalny rallies in January.

The nationwide demonstrations held on January 23 and 31 protested the arrest of the Kremlin critic who was detained at a Moscow airport on January 17 upon his arrival from Germany, where he was recovering after being poisoned in Siberia in August by what several European labs concluded was a military-grade chemical nerve agent.

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Navalny has insisted that his poisoning was ordered directly by President Vladimir Putin, which the Kremlin has denied.

Last month, a Moscow court ruled that, while in Germany, Navalny had violated the terms of parole from an old embezzlement case, which is widely considered to be politically motivated.

Navalny's 3 1/2-year suspended sentence from the case was converted to a jail term, though the court said he will serve 2 1/2 years in prison given time he had been held in detention.

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5 Things To Know About Russia's Big Navalny Protests

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More than 10,000 supporters of Navalny were detained across Russia during and after the January rallies.

Many of the detained men and women were either fined or handed several-day jail terms. At least 90 were charged with criminal misdeeds, and several people were fired by their employers.

With reporting by OVD-Info and Mediazona

BUDAPEST -- Hungary's ruling Fidesz party has quit the European People's Party (EPP) in the European Parliament after the conservative grouping approved new internal rules.

Prime Minister Viktor Orban announced the move in a letter to EPP parliamentary group leader Manfred Weber on March 3 that was posted on Twitter by one of his ministers.

The decision comes after the EPP changed its internal rules earlier in the day to allow entire parties to be thrown out, rather than just individual members -- a change that was billed as a way to expel Fidesz from the largest faction in the EU legislature.

"The amendments to the rules of the EPP Group are clearly a hostile move against Fidesz and our voters...This is anti-democratic, unjust, and unacceptable," Orban wrote in his letter.

The EPP group, which includes German Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives, has been squabbling with Fidesz for years.

It remains unclear if Fidesz will also quit the EPP party family, led by former Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, in addition to pulling its lawmakers from the EPP’s parliamentary group.

The right-wing party, which has held a two-thirds majority in Hungary's parliament almost uninterrupted since 2010, has been suspended from the EPP since 2018, but it still had 12 lawmakers in the parliamentary faction.

The EU has long accused Orban of undermining democratic freedoms, media, nongovernmental organizations, and the rule of law.

The U.S.-led coalition in Iraq says at least 10 rockets have been fired at a military base that hosts American and other coalition troops.

The missiles struck the Ain Al-Asad Air Base in the western province of Anbar at 7:20 a.m. local time on March 3, spokesman Colonel Wayne Marotto said.

The Iraqi military said the attack did not cause significant losses and that security forces had found the launch pad used in the incident.

AFP quoted Western security sources as saying the rockets were Iranian-made Arash models.

"One civilian contractor died of a heart attack during the attack," a high-level security source told the news agency, adding that he could not confirm the contractor's nationality.

The Ain Al-Assad base hosts Iraqi forces, as well as troops from the U.S.-led coalition helping Iraq fight the Islamic State extremist group.

The attack comes after a February 16 rocket salvo on a military base in Iraq's northern Kurdistan region killed one civilian contractor and wounded a U.S. service member and other coalition troops.

It also comes two days before Pope Francis is due to travel to Iraq despite the deteriorating security situation in some parts of the country.

The leader of the Roman Catholic Church said on March 3 that he would make the three-day trip -- the first-ever papal visit to Iraq -- because "the Iraqi people are waiting for us."

“One cannot disappoint a people for the second time,” Francis said, referring to Pope John Paul II’s aborted plans to visit the country in 2000.

Based on reporting by AP, Reuters, and AFP

MOSCOW -- Russia’s Justice Ministry has added the professional medical organization Alliance Of Doctors to its controversial list of organizations fulfilling the functions of a “foreign agent.”

The ministry announced the decision on March 3, saying it had determined the NGO had received foreign funding and was engaged in political activity. It did not offer any specifics.

The Alliance Of Doctors is headed by ophthalmologist Anastasia Vasilyeva, who has treated opposition leader Aleksei Navalny in the past. The organization, founded in 2018, fights for fair wages and working conditions for medical professionals. Vasilyeva was detained by police for several days in January as part of a sweep by authorities on the eve of unsanctioned mass rallies against the Kremlin critic's arrest.

On March 2, lawyer Pavel Chikov of the Agora legal-defense organization announced that the ministry had filed a complaint against the NGO Nasiliyu.net, one of Russia’s leading organizations addressing domestic violence. Nasiliyu.net had been added to the “foreign agent” list in December 2020.

According to Chikov, the government has deemed that the activity of Nasiliyu.net in "publicizing the problem of domestic violence," "creating conditions so that victims know where to turn for help," and "participating in promoting and conducting campaigns aimed at adopting a law against family and domestic violence" must be considered "political activity" under the country’s "foreign agent" laws.

The government also deemed the NGO's public calls for government agencies "to take measures to protect victims of domestic violence" during the coronavirus pandemic to be "political activity."

The complaint also notes that Nasiliyu.net’s website includes contact information to the Anna domestic-violence crisis center, which has also been listed as a "foreign agent" organization.

Chikov said the government also listed as "political activity" the NGO’s participation in a 2019 sanctioned demonstration against gender discrimination and domestic violence held to mark International Women’s Day on March 8, although the Justice Department's complaint notes the event "took place without any disturbance to public order."

The ministry is asking a court to fine Nasiliyu.net from 300,000 to 500,000 rubles ($4,000 to $6,800). In addition, the ministry is seeking a fine of up to 300,000 rubles against the NGO's director, Anna Rivina.

Nasiliyu.net was founded in 2015 and was registered as an NGO in 2018. In December 2020, it was listed as a "foreign agent" organization, a designation that it is appealing in court.

When Nasiliyu.net was included on the list, Rivina wrote on Facebook that "95 percent" of the reason why the organization was targeted was "because of our draft law on domestic violence and 5 percent because of our support for LGBT rights.”

Russia's so-called foreign agent legislation was adopted in 2012 and has been modified repeatedly. It requires nongovernmental organizations that receive foreign assistance and that the government deems to be engaged in political activity to be registered, to identify themselves as “foreign agents,” and to submit to audits.

Later modifications of the law targeted foreign-funded media, including RFE/RL’s Russian Service, six other RFE/RL Russian-language news services, and Current Time.

Human Rights Watch has described the foreign agent legislation as "restrictive" and intended "to demonize independent groups."

With reporting by Kommersant

A record number of COVID-19 patients were taken to hospitals in Ukraine over the past 24 hours amid warnings from officials that there may be delays in the delivery of the vaccine developed by the Chinese company Sinovac.

Health Minister Maksym Stepanov said on March 3 that 3,486 people were hospitalized over the past day -- the highest number since the epidemic hit the country.

Stepanov said 7,235 new cases were registered over the past 24 hours with 185 deaths. Health authorities have reported more than 1.3 million coronavirus cases and over 26,000 deaths to date.

Speaking on television late on March 2, the minister said that shipments of the Sinovac vaccine would likely be delayed and warned that "dirty information attacks" on his ministry's work were hampering negotiations with other vaccine suppliers.

Stepanov said the Chinese vaccine had been due to arrive in the next few days, but he added: "I gave an order to clarify the situation with the counterparty, but something tells me that there may be a postponement."

The National Anti-Corruption Bureau has opened an investigation into the signing of a contract with a local intermediary to procure Sinovac vaccines that activists claim was too expensive.

Stepanov has denied any wrongdoing.

Ukraine started vaccinating its population after receiving 500,000 doses of the vaccine developed by the British-Swedish company AstraZeneca last month. It has been prioritizing health-care workers and soldiers.

President Volodymyr Zelenskiy had a coronavirus vaccine shot on March 2 during a visit to eastern Ukraine, where fighting between government forces and Russia-backed separatists has claimed more than 13,200 lives since April 2014.

Based on reporting by Reuters and RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service

Several sources close to the Uzbek government and the family of President Shavkat Mirziyoev say the president's son-in-law has been severely injured in a traffic accident.

According to the sources, Otabek Umarov, the husband of Mirziyoev’s daughter, Shahnoza, was paralyzed after he sustained head and leg injuries in a traffic accident in Tashkent on February 13 and that he has since been transported to South Korea for treatment..

The sources also told RFE/RL that President Mirziyoev has ordered an internal investigation into several members of his personal security staff regarding the traffic accident.

Some of the individuals, described by the sources as "athletes" who were with Umarov on the day when the traffic accident took place, are also being investigated. They said an office and a sports hall in Tashkent that are parts of Umarov-controlled business structures have been sealed.

The sources said that Umarov, 36, who is the deputy head of the president's personal security, and "the athletes" had regularly organized car races in the Uzbek capital, "creating dangerous traffic situations."

RFE/RL's attempts to contact the Prosecutor-General's Office, the Interior Ministry, and several Tashkent city officials to get comment on the situation were unsuccessful.

Amid unconfirmed reports about the accident involving Umarov in mid-February, Tashkent police said that "no such traffic accident was officially registered."

Russia has reacted angrily to the latest round of sanctions imposed on it over the poisoning and detention of opposition politician Aleksei Navalny, saying the move was "absolutely unacceptable" and would have a destructive effect on the country's already bad relations with the United States and the European Union.

President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov told journalists on March 3, a day after Washington and the EU targeted senior Russian officials and entities over Navalny, that Moscow would respond to the sanctions in a way that best served its interests.

His comments came after Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova called the sanctions "a hostile move toward Russia" and warned the West not to "play with fire."

During a visit to Ukraine, the president of the European Council, Charles Michel, said the new EU sanctions showed the bloc was "totally committed" to promoting democracy and the rule of law.

"We are united in Europe in order to be very tough, very firm, in order to promote our values, to defend our interests," he said.

Washington announced on March 2 that it was sanctioning seven senior Russian officials, including President Vladimir Putin's deputy chief of staff, after a U.S. intelligence assessment concluded "with high confidence" that officers from Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB) were behind Navalny's August poisoning.

The U.S. announcement came on the heels of European Union sanctions against four senior Russian officials -- Aleksandr Kalashnikov, the federal prisons administration; Aleksandr Bastrykin, the head of the Investigative Committee; Igor Krasnov, the prosecutor-general; and Viktor Zolotov, director of the National Guard.

The U.S. also sanctioned Kalashnikov and Krasnov as well as Sergei Kiriyenko, the first deputy chief of staff; Andrei Yarin, the chief of the Kremlin's domestic policy directorate; FSB Director Aleksandr Bortnikov; Aleksei Krivoruchko, the deputy minister of defense responsible for armaments; and Pavel Popov, the deputy minister of defense responsible for research activities.

'Powerful Message'

Jen Psaki, the Biden administration’s spokeswoman, said the U.S. wanted to coordinate the timing of the sanctions with the EU to "send a powerful message" to the Kremlin.

Peskov dismissed the accusations that the FSB was behind Navalny’s poisoning as a notion that was "outrageous" and played down the impact of the Western sanctions.

Peskov dismissed the accusations that the FSB was behind Navalny’s poisoning as a notion that was "outrageous."

"Any such restrictions are absolutely unacceptable because they do serious harm to relations with the U.S. and the EU, relations which are already in a deplorable state," the Kremlin spokesman said.

"They are nothing other than interference in the internal affairs of the Russian Federation," he added.

Slamming what she called "the U.S.’s enthusiasm for sanctions," Zakharova said Russia would "continue to consistently and resolutely uphold our national interests and rebuff any aggression."

"We urge our colleagues not to play with fire." the Foreign Ministry’s spokeswoman added.

She also accused the United States of "lecturing" others and of being counterproductive with its words and actions.

"Based on the principle of reciprocity, we will respond but not necessarily with symmetrical measures." she said.

Navalny was detained in Moscow in January immediately upon returning from Germany, where he had recovered from what several Western labs determined was poisoning with a Novichok-type nerve agent that saw him fall ill on a flight in Siberia in August.

A Moscow court in February ruled that, while in Germany, he had violated the terms of parole from an older embezzlement case that is widely considered politically motivated. He was ultimately ordered to serve 2 1/2 years in prison.

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Russia has denied involvement in the poisoning but Navalny claims the assassination attempt was ordered by President Vladimir Putin.

Meanwhile, UN human rights experts on March 1 called for an international investigation into the poisoning of Navalny, Putin's most vocal critic, saying evidence points to the "very likely involvement" of Russian government officials.

The EU had already imposed sanctions on Russia following the poisoning attack on Navalny last year. But former U.S. President Donald Trump let the incident slide without punitive action.

With reporting by Reuters and AFP

Freedom House says the coronavirus pandemic, economic uncertainty, and conflicts across the world contributed to the decline of global freedom in 2020.

In its annual report released on March 3, the Washington-based human rights watchdog said that the number of countries designated "not free" was at its highest level in 15 years.

The country-by-country review said Kyrgyzstan and Belarus were ranked among nations recording the biggest losses in scores for political rights and civil liberties. Meanwhile, North Macedonia ranked among nations recording the biggest gains.

The report downgraded the freedom scores of 73 countries, including not just authoritarian nations like China, Belarus, and Venezuela but also "troubled democracies" like the United States and India.

The report said that in 2020 "democracy’s defenders sustained heavy new losses in their struggle against authoritarian foes, shifting the international balance in favor of tyranny."

"Incumbent leaders increasingly used force to crush opponents and settle scores, sometimes in the name of public health, while beleaguered activists -- lacking effective international support -- faced heavy jail sentences, torture, or murder in many settings," it said.

'Blatantly Fraudulent' Elections

In Kyrgyzstan, the report said, "blatantly fraudulent" parliamentary elections in October led to protests that triggered the toppling of the government and the resignation of then-President Sooronbai Jeenbekov.

Sadyr Japarov, serving a 10-year prison sentence for hostage taking, was among several prominent politicians freed from prison by protesters during the unrest. He was elected president in January after a landslide victory.

The report said Japarov has "advanced a new draft constitution that could reshape Kyrgyzstan's political system in the mold of its authoritarian neighbors."

Kyrgyzstan's freedom score declined by 11 points, the largest of any country, and its status was changed from "partially free" to "not free."

Belarus suffered the second-largest decline following violent government crackdowns against demonstrators demanding the resignation of authoritarian ruler Alyaksandr Lukashenka after a disputed presidential election in August.

The United Nations says authorities have detained more than 30,000 protesters. There have also been credible reports of torture and ill-treatment, and several people have died.

"The crackdown left a handful of protesters dead and hundreds at risk of torture in the country’s jails," the report said.

'Problematic Elections'

Freedom House also cited "problematic elections" in the region, including in Russia where a “rigged referendum” could potentially see President Vladimir Putin stay in power until 2036.

The report also mentioned the "comparatively free but flawed parliamentary elections in Georgia" that deepened the country’s political crisis. The second round of voting was boycotted by opposition parties.

In Ukraine, the report said, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s reform agenda "faltered in the face of the pandemic and political corruption, culminating in a constitutional crisis."

Meanwhile, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian made "some headway in his reform drive," although the report said the "consensus behind his government was shattered by defeat" in the six-week war with Azerbaijan over the region of Nagorno-Karabakh last year.

In Europe, the report said the government of right-wing Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban "misused" emergency powers during the coronavirus pandemic to "withdraw financial assistance from municipalities led by opposition parties."

In the Western Balkans, Freedom House reported both setbacks and progress.

It said that "flawed parliamentary elections dealt a grievous blow to Serbia’s multiparty system," while in Kosovo "the political old guard ousted Prime Minister Albin Kurti's short-lived government and formed a new one, unconstitutionally."

Freedom House said Montenegro "bucked a six-year string of score declines" as elections ushered in the first transfer of power in three decades.

North Macedonia's reformist government was reelected, and its "institutions have largely recovered from damage inflicted by the fugitive former Prime Minister, Nikola Gruevski," the report said.

COVID Cover-Up

In the Middle East, the report highlighted the Iranian government’s use of censorship and prosecutions to "suppress independent reporting" on the true extent of the country's coronavirus outbreak.

Authorities, the report said, used similar tactics to suppress information about the deadly government crackdown on anti-government protesters in November 2019 that killed hundreds of people and Iran's accidental downing of a Ukrainian passenger plane that killed 176 people.

The Freedom House report also said political rights and civil liberties in India have declined since Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist government came to power in 2014, with "increased pressure on human rights organizations, rising intimidation of academics and journalists, and a spate of bigoted attacks, including lynchings, aimed at Muslims."

Meanwhile, the report said China "ramped up its global disinformation and censorship campaign to counter the fallout from its cover-up of the initial coronavirus outbreak, which severely hampered a rapid global response in the pandemic’s early days."

The report also cited Beijing’s "brutal crackdown" on “massive prodemocracy protests” in the territory of Hong Kong.

Freedom House also mentioned that former U.S. President Donald Trump "openly strove to illegally overturn his loss" in the November presidential election, "culminating in his incitement of an armed mob to disrupt Congress's certification of the results."

The report accused Trump, during his four years in power, of "condoning and indeed pardoning official malfeasance, ducking accountability for his own transgressions, and encouraging racist and right-wing extremists."

"Only a serious and sustained reform effort can repair the damage done during the Trump era to the perception and reality of basic rights and freedoms in the United States," the report said.

A Russian court has given the leader of an ethnic Circassian civic organization a three-year suspended sentence on narcotics charges, in a case human rights groups consider politically motivated.

Martin Kochesoko, the leader of the Khabze nongovernmental organization in the Republic of Kabardino-Balkaria, was also given one year of probation, the Memorial human rights center said on March 2.

Kochesoko was detained in June 2019 while traveling with a friend on a fishing trip in Russia’s North Caucasus region.

Police and hooded soldiers stopped their car and allegedly found 268 grams of marijuana.

Kochesoko claims the drugs were planted on him and he was forced to confess under duress.

At the trail, he pleaded not guilty.

The Memorial human rights center considers the 32-year-old activist politically persecuted and the charges against him fabricated.

Kochesoko has criticized Russia's laws on the teaching of native languages and has participated in the Democratic Congress of Peoples of Russia.

Civil rights groups say drug offenses have become one of Russian authorities preferred weapons to harass, intimidate, and punish political opponents, civil-society activists, and inconvenient journalists.

Thousands of opposition supporters have rallied in the Armenian capital Yerevan to demand the resignation of Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian.

More than 10,000 demonstrators gathered in front of parliament on March 3 under a heavy security presence, including snipers who were positioned inside and on the roof of the building.

Pashinian had earlier arrived for a parliament session.

The rally came a day after Armenia was plunged into deeper uncertainty following the president’s refusal to sign an order to dismiss the head of the military.

Pashinian moved to dismiss the chief of the General Staff after accusing top military brass last week of attempting a coup when they called on Pashinian to resign over his handling of last year's war with Azerbaijan.

Armenia’s largely ceremonial president, Armen Sarkisian, refused to approve the order dismissing chief of the General Staff Onik Gasparian for a second time on March 2.

However, the president did not ask the Constitutional Court to rule on whether the order to fire Gasparian complies with the constitution, a technicality that legal experts said means the dismissal would likely take effect automatically if the head of state does not appeal to the top court by March 4.

Political tensions in Armenia have been high, with supporters of Pashinian and the opposition staging rival rallies in the capital.

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Pashinian has faced mounting protests and calls from the opposition for his resignation following a six-week conflict between Azerbaijan and ethnic Armenian forces over the region of Nagorno-Karabakh last year.

At the heart of the turmoil is the Russian-brokered deal Pashinian signed in November that brought an end to the fighting after Armenian forces suffered territorial and battlefield losses from Azerbaijan's Turkish-backed military.

Under the deal, Armenia ceded control over parts of Nagorno-Karabakh and all seven surrounding districts of Azerbaijan that had been occupied by Armenian forces since the early 1990s.

Last week, the discontent spilled over into the military after Pashinian dismissed Tiran Khachatrian, the first deputy chief of the general staff, who mocked the prime minister’s analysis of Russian weapons used in the war against Azerbaijan.

In response, several dozen high-ranking military officers signed a letter accusing Pashinian and his government of bringing the country “to the brink of collapse” and calling for his resignation.

Pashinian said the move amounted to "an attempted military coup" and immediately moved to fire Gasparian, adding a new layer to the political crisis.

Pashinian, whose My Step faction dominates parliament, has refused opposition demands to resign but has hinted at accepting early parliamentary elections under certain conditions.

With reporting by AP

Former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev turned 90 on March 2, receiving greetings from the world leaders as well as the Kremlin.

Gorbachev is considered one of the greatest reformers of the 20th century.

After taking over the Soviet leadership in 1985, Gorbachev introduced his reform policies known as "glasnost" (openness) and "perestroika" (restructuring), which opened up the Soviet Union to the world, and ultimately led to the collapse of the communist regime and the end of the Cold War with the United States.

"Your commitment to freedom and your courage over the decades to make the tough, albeit necessary, decisions, have made the world a safer place," U.S. President Joe Biden wrote in a letter released by Gorbachev's staff.

The letter said that the agreed extension to the U.S.-Russian New START nuclear-arms treaty was proof that the two countries would continue Gorbechev's "legacy."

German Chancellor Angela Merkel congratulated Gorbachev, who was instrumental in the German reunification in 1990.

"I take your day of honor as an opportunity to thank you once more for your personal commitment for the peaceful overcoming of the Cold War and the completion of German unity," Merkel wrote in a letter to the former leader.

"Your important contribution to a reunification in freedom remains as unforgotten in Germany as your constant personal engagement for friendly relations between our two countries," Merkel said.

Russian President Vladimir Putin also congratulated Gorbachev, despite cool relations between the Kremlin and the former Soviet leader.

Gorbachev also owns a political foundation and co-owns the Kremlin-critical newspaper Novaya gazeta.

"You rightly belong to those bright, unconventional people, extraordinary statesmen of our time, who have had a significant impact on the course of national and international history," Putin wrote in a congratulatory letter to Gorbachev, published by the Kremlin.

Gorbachev's "great professional and life experience" still allowed him to "actively participate in popular social and educational work" as well as "international humanitarian projects," Putin wrote.

Many Russians also say he is responsible for the ensuing downfall of the Soviet Union in 1991. Putin himself has called the Soviet Union's collapse the "greatest geopolitical catastrophe" of the previous century.

A poll conducted by the All-Russia Opinion Research Center had 51 percent of respondents saying that he brought the nation more harm than good, while 32 percent said it was about equal, 7 percent viewed his action as mostly positive, and the rest were undecided. The nationwide poll of 1,600 was conducted on February 28 and had a margin of error of no more than 2.5 percentage points.

Pro-democratic forces, however, see him as a symbol of freedom, as he has criticized repression under Putin and warned against falling back into a dictatorship.

With reporting by AFP, Reuters, and dpa

Autocratic leader Alyaksandr Lukashenka says there will be "no transfer of power" in Belarus, where thousands have demonstrated across the country since early August demanding his resignation over an elections they say was rigged.

"No transfer [of power] is possible in Belarus.... Everything will be in accordance with the constitution," Lukashenka said in Minsk on March 2 as he spoke about his talks last month with President Vladimir Putin in the Russian city of Sochi.

"The [new] constitution, as I said before, we will adopt in January-February next year. And that is all that the transfer of power will be about," Lukashenka said, adding that a transfer of power was not on the agenda when he met with Putin.

Lukashenka has been under pressure to step down for months after claiming he won an August 9 election by a landslide, while his main challenger, Svyatlana Tsikhanouskaya, has said she was the rightful victor.

Thousands of protesters have been arrested by Belarusian security forces at the anti-government rallies that have continued since August, and beatings at the hands of police have been widely documented.

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The EU, which considers the election that extended Lukashenka's 26-year authoritarian rule fraudulent, has progressively imposed sanctions on Belarus in response to the violent repression of peaceful protesters, the opposition, and media.

Crisis In Belarus

Read our coverage as Belarusian strongman Alyaksandr Lukashenka continues his brutal crackdown on NGOs, activists, and independent media following the August 2020 presidential election.

Tsikhanouskaya has called for the EU to take a tougher stance against Lukashenka's regime.

Lukashenka has long sought to portray himself as a brake on Moscow's pressure to merge Belarus with Russia. But seven months of unprecedented street protests and the resulting EU sanctions have put the Belarusian leader on the defensive and seemingly more reliant on Putin's support.

In recent years, Russia has pressured Belarus to take steps toward integration in order to cement a 20-year-old agreement to form a union state, only to be rebuffed by Lukashenka's defense of the nation's sovereignty.

However, the situation began to change after Russia helped prop up Lukashenka in the wake of the presidential election, bringing the two sides closer over common threat perceptions.

Lukashenka acknowledged the close relationship but also emphasized on March 2 that Belarus remained "a sovereign and independent state."

Putin himself has been under pressure from the West in recent months.

The EU and Washington announced new sanctions against Russian officials on March 2 over the detention of opposition politician Aleksei Navalny and evidence that the anti-corruption campaigner was poisoned with a Novichok-like nerve agent. Navalny blames his poisoning on Putin and Russian agents, which the Kremlin denies.

Navalny's detention in January upon his return from life-saving treatment in Germany and a subsequent crackdown on some of Russia's largest anti-government protests in a decade have prompted international outrage.

With reporting by BelTA

MOSCOW -- A court in Moscow has extended the pretrial detention of former journalist Ivan Safronov, who is charged with high treason, an accusation he has rejected outright.

The Lefortovo district court on March 2 ruled that Safronov must be held until at least May 7. The hearing was held behind closed doors, as the case is classified.

The 30-year-old Safronov, who has worked since May last year as an adviser to Dmitry Rogozin, the head of the Roskosmos space agency, was previously a prominent journalist who covered the military-industrial complex for the newspapers Kommersant and Vedomosti.

He was arrested on July 7 amid allegations that he had passed secret information to the Czech Republic in 2017 about Russian arms sales in the Middle East.

Safronov has repeatedly denied the accusations and many of his supporters have held pickets in Moscow and other cities demanding his release.

Human rights organizations have issued statements demanding Safronov's release and expressing concerns over an intensifying crackdown on dissent in Russia.

With reporting by TASS and Interfax

MINSK -- A physician and a journalist in Belarus have been convicted of disclosing information that contradicted official statements about the death of a protester killed during a crackdown on demonstrations against authoritarian ruler Alyaksandr Lukashenka.

On March 2, a district court in Minsk sentenced journalist Katsyaryna Barysevich to six months in prison and fined her 2,900 rubles ($1,110) for disclosing medical data and instigating a crime by pushing a first responder to share the information.

Doctor Artsyom Sarokin was handed a suspended two-year prison term and ordered to pay a fine of 1,450 rubles ($555) for disclosing the data to Barysevich.

The two were arrested on November 19, 2020, after Barysevich cited Sarokin in an article she wrote for the online media outlet Tut.by about Raman Bandarenka, who several days earlier died from injuries sustained in a beating by a group of masked assailants -- whom rights activists claim were affiliated with the authorities.

Belarusian officials have said that Bandarenka's attackers had nothing to do with authorities or riot police, adding that he was drunk at the time of the attack.

Contradictory Account

Barysevich contradicted that account, writing that no alcohol had been found in Bandarenka's blood, information she obtained from Sarokin, whose ambulance team provided Bandarenka with medical attention and took samples for tests right after he was found severely beaten.

In late November 2020, Amnesty International recognized Sarokin and Barysevich as prisoners of conscience and demanded their immediate release.

Crisis In Belarus

Read our coverage as Belarusian strongman Alyaksandr Lukashenka continues his brutal crackdown on NGOs, activists, and independent media following the August 2020 presidential election.

Bandarenka is one of several people to have been killed during the protests demanding Lukashenka's resignation after he was announced as the winner in an August presidential election.

Outrage over what was seen by both the opposition and by many Belarusians as a rigged vote to hand Lukashenka a sixth term in office brought tens of thousands onto the streets.

Security officials have cracked down hard on the demonstrators, arresting thousands, including dozens of journalists who covered the rallies, and pushing most of the top opposition figures out of the country.

Some rights organizations say there is credible evidence of torture being used by security officials against some of those detained.

Lukashenka, who has run the country since 1994, has denied any wrongdoing with regard to the election and refuses to negotiate with the opposition on stepping down and holding new elections.

The European Union, United States, Canada, and other countries have refused to recognize Lukashenka, 66, as the legitimate leader of Belarus and have slapped him and senior Belarusian officials with sanctions in response to the “falsification” of the vote and postelection crackdown.