Новости за 20.08.2020

All attention was on Belarus at Wednesday's video-summit, but EU leaders decided to hold special talks on the maritime dispute between Greece and Turkey next month.

Ethnicity, religion, and history are too often markers of exclusion and disenfranchisement for the estimated 15 million people of African descent in Europe, @Jallow_M writes.

Women, factory workers, lawyers, doctors, artists, intellectuals, and businessmen - they all want change in Belarus and Lukashenko has no good moves left to make.

With the experience of Ukraine in mind, EU leaders called for dialogue in Belarus and pledged funding, but stopped short of calling for new elections.

A 16-year old Sudanese boy was found dead on a beach in France Wednesday after trying to get to the UK on a dinghy, igniting a war of words between the UK and France on who is responsible for controlling migrant crossings. The British government wants the French and British navies to stop boats in French waters. French MPs say Britain should offer safe ways to claim asylum there.

The wife of a Slovak man who died in Belgian police custody in 2018 following brutal violence captured on video has called for a new enquiry into what happened. "They should have given him first aid. Instead, they sat on him with so many people. He couldn't breathe properly," Henrieta Chovancova told Belgian newspaper Het Laatse Nieuws, which published the video footage Wednesday, reminiscent of George Floyd's US killing.

France recorded 3,776 new Covid-19 cases Wednesday, in a new record after its initial lockdown earlier this year. "All the indicators keep going up and the transmission of the virus is getting stronger among all ages groups affected, young adults in particular," its health ministry said, noting that Paris and Marseille were the hardest hit. Spain, the worst hit in Europe, recorded 6,700 new cases in the past 24 hours.

Spokespersons for Russia's leading opposition activist, Alexei Navalny, have said he was poisoned after he fell unconscious on a flight from Tomsk in central Russia to Moscow on Wednesday morning. "We suspect Alexei was poisoned by something mixed into [his] tea ... Doctors are saying that the toxic agent absorbed faster through the hot liquid," Kira Yarmysh, his spokeswoman, tweeted. Russia has a history of poison attacks against regime opponents.

The Czech Republic is to stick to an EU scheme for buying Covid-19 vaccines instead of joining a rival World Health Organisation programme, despite scientists' warnings about hoarding anti-viral drugs. "We're going with the initiative by the European Commission, which is negotiating with producers, and the negotiations are very advanced, we will very soon take part in [an agreement] with AstraZeneca," Czech health minister Adam Vojtech said Wednesday, Reuters reports.