Month: September 2022

BELGRADE, Serbia -- Riot police clashed Saturday with soccer hooligans in downtown Belgrade, where a pan-European Pride march was held despite threats from anti-gay groups and an official earlier ban on the march in the traditionally conservative Balkan state. Tensions were high in the Serbian capital as ultranationalist fans hurled stun grenades, stones and flares at a police cordon, which repelled the attack with batons and riot shields. Hundreds of Pride march supporters, meanwhile, gathered a few kilometers (miles) away in the pouring rain, dancing and singing their march was held on shortened route. "We need justice and freedom,” said Goran Miletic, one of the Pride event organizers. Although several Pride marches have been held in Serbia in the past years, the Slavic nation that i...

PRAGUE -- Vlado Milunić, a Czech architect of Croatian ancestry who co-designed Prague’s iconic Dancing House building together with his colleague Frank Gehry, has died at 81. Czech public radio announced his death on Sunday and said it was confirmed by his family. No details were given. He was battling an unspecified serious illness. The Dancing House is an unusual building that resembles a pair of dancers; It’s is a rare example of top contemporary architecture in Prague, which otherwise abounds with picturesque historical buildings, churches and monuments. Due to its shape, the building is also known as Ginger and Fred after famed dancers Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. It’s formed by two central towers; the one known as Ginger is made of glass and steel, while Fred has a concrete bo...

YEREVAN, Armenia -- A U.S. congressional delegation headed by Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi arrived Saturday in Armenia, where a cease-fire has held for three days after an outburst of fighting with neighboring Azerbaijan that killed more than 200 troops from both sides. The U.S. Embassy said the visit will include a meeting with Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan. On Friday, Pelosi told reporters in Berlin that the trip “is all about human rights and the respecting the dignity and worth of every person.” Other members of the U.S. delegation include Rep. Frank Pallone, chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, and congresswomen Jackie Speier and Anna Eshoo. A cease-fire took effect on Wednesday evening following two days of heavy fighting that marked the largest out...

With her impeccable sense of timing, the late queen saved the best until last with her tribute to her eldest son, the future King Charles III. Her Majesty spoke, from the heart -- as a mother. Her words about Charles were among the warmest public remarks she ever made about him in public. As she addressed those in the packed room there to mark Charles's 70th birthday, she could not have been more proud of him. "It is a privilege for any mother to be able to propose a toast to her son on his seventieth birthday. It means that you have lived long enough to see your child grow up. It is rather like – to use an analogy I am certain will find favour – planting a tree and being able to watch it grow," she said. The late queen spoke too of Charles being a champion of conservation and the arts,...

KYIV, Ukraine -- An honor guard fired a three-gun salute toward cloudy skies as friends and comrades-in-arms gathered in Kyiv to bid farewell to a Russian woman who was killed while fighting on Ukraine’s side in the war with her native country. Olga Simonova, 34, was remembered for her courage and kindness at a funeral in the Ukrainian capital on Friday. Simonova’s coffin was draped in the blue-and-yellow Ukrainian flag, with a cuddly toy lion on top. Her nom de guerre was “Simba,” like the main character in the Disney cartoon “The Lion King.” Just a few days before Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24, Simonova spoke to The Associated Press in a trench in the Donbas region, where she had served for years alongside Ukrainian soldiers fighting against Russian-bac...

KYIV, Ukraine -- Pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin mounted on the battlefield and in the halls of global power as Ukrainian troops pushed their counteroffensive Saturday to advance farther into Ukraine's partly recaptured northeast. Western officials and analysts said Russian forces were apparently setting up a new defensive line in Ukraine’s northeast after the counteroffensive punched through the previous one, allowing Kyiv’s soldiers to recapture large swaths of land in the northeastern Kharkiv region that borders Russia. Putin, at a high-level summit in Uzbekistan this week, vowed to press his attack on Ukraine despite the recent military setbacks but also faced concerns by India and China over the drawn-out conflict. “I know that today’s era is not of war," Indian Prime ...