(Reuters) – Russia’s Foreign Ministry said late on Sunday that the U.S. was behind the pressure that Ukrainian authorities have been exerting on the Russian-aligned wing of the Orthodox Church in Kyiv.

The Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC), which Kyiv says has ties with Russia, defied an eviction order last week from the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra monastery in the capital. On Saturday, a top Ukrainian cleric from the church was sentenced to house arrest.

“It’s no secret that the (President Volodymyr) Zelenskiy regime is not independent in its anti-clerical policy. The Orthodox schism, hitting this sphere of life, is a goal that has been long proclaimed in Washington,” the ministry said in a statement, without providing evidence.

“The capture of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra by Kyiv’s current authorities is an illegitimate act from a legal point of view and immoral from a spiritual point of view.”

(Reporting by Nick Starkov, Lidia Kelly and Ron Popeski; Writing by Lidia Kelly; Editing by Josie Kao)

(Reuters) – President Ebrahim Raisi said on Saturday that the hijab was the law in Iran after a viral video showed a man throwing yoghurt at two unveiled women in a shop near a holy Shi’ite Muslim city.

Growing numbers of women have defied authorities by discarding their veils after nationwide protests that followed the death in September of a 22-year-old Iranian Kurdish woman in the custody of the morality police for allegedly violating hijab rules. Security forces violently put down the revolt.

Judicial authorities in a town near the northeastern city of Mashhad issued arrest warrants for the man seen pouring yoghurt over the heads of the two women, a mother and her daughter. They were also the subject of arrest warrants for flouting Iran’s strict female dress rules, state media reported.

Risking arrest for defying the obligatory dress code, women are still widely seen unveiled in malls, restaurants, shops and streets around the country. Videos of unveiled women resisting the morality police have flooded social media.

In live remarks on state television, Raisi said: “If some people say they don’t believe (in the hijab)… it’s good to use persuasion … But the important point is that there is a legal requirement … and the hijab is today a legal matter.”

Authorities said the owner of the dairy shop, who confronted the attacker, had been warned. Reports on social media showed his shop had been shut, although he was quoted by a local news agency as saying he had been allowed to reopen and was due to “give explanations” to a court.

Judiciary chief Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejei earlier threatened to prosecute “without mercy” women who appear in public unveiled, Iranian media reported.

“Unveiling is tantamount to enmity of (our) values,” Ejei was quoted as saying by several news sites.

Under Iran’s Islamic sharia law, imposed after the 1979 revolution, women are obliged to cover their hair and wear long, loose-fitting clothes to disguise their figures. Violators have faced public rebuke, fines or arrest.

Describing the veil as “one of the civilizational foundations of the Iranian nation” and “one of the practical principles of the Islamic Republic,” an Interior Ministry statement on Thursday said there would be no “retreat or tolerance” on the issue.

It urged citizens to confront unveiled women. Such directives have in past decades emboldened hardliners to attack women without impunity.

([email protected]; Editing by Frances Kerry and Giles Elgood)

THE HAGUE (Reuters) – Former Kosovo president Hashim Thaci stands trial at a special court in The Hague on Monday for alleged war crimes during the 1998-99 insurgency that eventually brought independence from Serbia and made him a hero among compatriots.

Thaci was indicted in 2020 by the Kosovo Specialist Chambers on 10 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity including persecution, murder, torture and forced disappearance of people, including after fighting ended.

Thaci and three co-defendants, all former close associates in the guerrilla Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) and later in peacetime politics, have pleaded not guilty to all 10 counts.

More than 13,000 people, the majority of them members of Kosovo’s 90% ethnic Albanian majority, are believed to have died during the insurgency, when it was still a province of Serbia under then-strongman president Slobodan Milosevic.

The trial, conducted by international judges and prosecutors, will begin with opening statements by the prosecution followed by defence lawyers and a representative of Kosovo’s war Victims Council over the ensuing three days.

Thaci, 54, resigned as president shortly after his indictment and was transferred to detention in The Hague.

The four defendants are charged with participating in a “joint criminal enterprise … that carried out widespread or systematic attacks” on minority Serb civilians in Kosovo as well as Kosovo Albanian opponents of the KLA.

The trial is likely to be lengthy as prosecutors said in procedural conferences that they would need two years to present all its evidence.

Several thousand KLA veterans gathered on Sunday in Pristina to express support for Thaci and his three close associates. They chanted ‘Freedom’ and carried national flags of Kosovo and Albania, as well as flags with the KLA symbol.

The Kosovo Specialist Chambers, seated in the Netherlands and staffed by international judges and lawyers, was set up in 2015 to handle cases under Kosovo law against ex-KLA guerrillas.

Many Kosovars believe that the tribunal is biased against the KLA and interested in denigrating its record in paving the way to liberation of the ethnic-Albanian majority region from brutal Serbian rule.

“This trial is of four people accused of committing terrible crimes during (as well as) after the war, when the fighting had stopped, including against people from various ethnic groups,” Hugh Williamson, Europe and Central Asia director at Human Rights Watch, said in a statement on Friday.

“It offers a chance after so many years for the victims to learn what happened and highlights the pervasive impunity that still hangs over the Kosovo conflict.”

The court was created separately from the U.N. tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), which was also located in The Hague where it tried and convicted mainly Serbian officials for war crimes in the Croatia, Bosnia and Kosovo conflicts.

Milosevic went on trial before the ICTY but he died in 2006 before a verdict was reached.

(Reporting by Ivana Sekularac; Editing by Mark Heinrich)

By Sofia Menchu

GUATEMALA CITY (Reuters) – Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen completed a three-day trip to Guatemala on Sunday where she offered more cooperation with Guatemalan President Alejandro Giammattei’s government, one of Taiwan’s few allies in the world.

Tsai’s tour, which will take her to Belize on Sunday afternoon, comes a week after Honduras severed diplomatic relations with Taipei in favor of Beijing.

China and Taiwan have tussled for influence in Latin America since the end of the Chinese civil war in 1949, with Beijing considering Taiwan part of Chinese territory, a position Taipei strongly rejects. China refuses to allow other countries to maintain diplomatic relations with both at the same time.

While visiting Guatemala, Tsai signed a $4 million agreement to modernize rural areas and promised to promote and increase cooperation between the two countries.

“From now on, Taiwan and Guatemala will continue to show solidarity to each other, deepening cooperation in all possible areas based on firm objectives, solidarity and mutual benefit,” Tsai said during a tour of a hospital built with Taiwanese help.

Before arriving in Guatemala – one of the 13 countries that Taiwan has diplomatic relations with – Tsai made a controversial stopover in New York, angering China, which has repeatedly warned U.S. officials not to meet Tsai.

Chinese influence in Latin America has increased in recent years, with Nicaragua, El Salvador, Panama and Costa Rica abandoning Taipei in favor of Beijing.

Guatemala’s president thanked Tsai for visiting the Central American country.

“This visit in which we strengthened our ties of friendship will stay in our hearts,” Giammattei said.

Guatemala’s stance of maintaining relations with Taiwan is a way of currying favor with the U.S. at a time when relations with Washington have been strained, former Guatemalan Foreign Minister Edgar Gutierrez told Reuters on Sunday.

Guatemala’s government is trying to rebuild bridges with certain U.S institutions by “offering Guatemala as a migrant deposit, moving its embassy to Jerusalem, supporting Ukraine … extraditing more than 100 drug traffickers in 2022 and remaining an ally of Taiwan,” Gutierrez said.

(Reporting by Sofia Menchu; Writing by Diego Oré and Oliver Griffin; Editing by Josie Kao)

By Aleksandar Vasovic

PODGORICA (Reuters) – Montenegro’s former economy minister Jakov Milatovic declared victory in a presidential election run-off on Sunday, over long-standing incumbent Milo Djukanovic, ending more than three decades of his rule in the small Balkan republic.

Western-educated Milatovic, 37, the deputy head of the Europe Now movement, campaigned on pledges to curb graft, improve living standards and bolster ties with the European Union and fellow former Yugoslav republic Serbia.

“Tonight is the night we have been waiting for over 30 years. I wish you a happy victory,” Milatovic told cheering supporters of his right-centrist Europe Now Movement in its party headquarters in Podgorica.

“Within the next five years, we will lead Montenegro into the European Union,” he said.

In the capital Podgorica, some of his jubilant supporters drove through the centre, honking their car horns while others set off fireworks or fired guns into the air.

Djukanovic, 61, a former communist, has dominated Montenegro as president or prime minister for 33 years since the start of the collapse of the now-defunct six-republic Yugoslav federation. He conceded defeat to Milatovic.

“Montenegro has made its choice. I respect that choice and I congratulate Jakov Milatovic,” Djukanovic, who will remain at his post until the handover on May 21, told his backers in the headquarters of his Democratic Party of Socialists (DPS) in Podgorica.

Milatovic won 60.1% to Djukanovic’s 39.9%, the Podgorica-based Center for Monitoring and Research (CEMI) pollster said on the basis of results tabulated from a statistical sample of votes cast.

Another pollster, the Podgorica-based Center for Democratic Transition (CDT) also put Milatovic in the lead with 56.9%.

Voter turnout stood at about 70%, CEMI said.

The state election commission is expected to announce official results in the coming days, on the completion of complaints procedures.

Djukanovic led Montenegro to independence from a state union with much larger Serbia in 2006 and to NATO membership in 2017. The country is also a candidate to join the European Union. 

Opponents accuse Djukanovic and the DPS of corruption, ties with organised crime and running the small Adriatic republic as their fiefdom – allegations they deny.

“You could see the force of a unified Montenegro tonight … this is why it (the victory) is so big and so historical, tonight we have said a goodbye to crime and corruption in Montenegro,” Milatovic said.

Sunday’s vote follows a year of political instability in which two governments that came to power on the back of 2020 protests supported by the influential Serbian Orthodox Church, were felled by no-confidence votes.

It was also marked by a dispute between lawmakers and Djukanovic over his refusal to name a new prime minister.

“The people have sent a clear message they want changes and that the new political elite should be paying more attention to their (people’s) problems and needs,” said Milos Besic, a lecturer in political science at the University of Belgrade.

On March 16 Djukanovic dissolved parliament and scheduled snap elections for June 11. Although the presidential post in Montenegro is largely ceremonial, victory in the presidential election would bolster the chances of the winner’s party in June.

Montenegro, which mainly relies on revenue from tourism along its scenic coast, has a legacy of bitter divisions between those who identify as Montenegrins and those who see themselves as Serbs and are opposed to the country’s independence.

    The country joined NATO after a 2016 coup attempt that the Djukanovic government blamed on Russian agents and Serbian nationalists. Moscow dismissed such claims as absurd.

    After Russia’s invasion of Ukraine last year, Montenegro joined EU sanctions against Moscow and expelled a number of Russian diplomats. The Kremlin has placed Montenegro on its list of unfriendly states.

(Reporting by Aleksandar Vasovic in Podgorica; Editing by David Goodman, Philippa Fletcher and Matthew Lewis)

By Dan Williams

JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israel authorised on Sunday a national guard sought by far-right security chief Itamar Ben-Gvir to focus on Arab unrest, but held off on giving him direct command after political rivals voiced concern the force could become a sectarian “militia.”

The previous government began setting up an auxiliary police force to tackle internal violence following pro-Palestinian protests in mixed Jewish-Arab areas during the Gaza war of May 2021. That government fell before the new force was finalised.

Ben-Gvir, a hardline Jewish settler in the occupied West Bank with past convictions for support for terrorism and incitement against Arabs – who make up 21% of Israel’s population – rose in politics partly due to the 2021 unrest.

Having recanted some of his views, he joined Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s coalition with an expanded law-and-order portfolio that he pledged would include a beefed-up national guard for use mainly in crime- and rioting-hit Arab communities.

“It will deal with this exclusively. The police does not deal exclusively with this. It’s busy with a thousand and one things,” he told Army Radio.

The initiative was jump-started last week, when Netanyahu agreed to bring Ben-Gvir’s national guard for cabinet approval after the security minister backed his pause of a judicial overhaul proposal that had triggered nationwide street protests.

But having voted in favour on Sunday, the cabinet said in a statement that the question of whom the national guard would be subordinate to remained open. It appointed a multi-agency panel to submit recommendations on this and other issues in 90 days.

That appeared to be in response to criticism by Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara that the cabinet decision was made without first establishing the parameters of the national guard.

Israel’s police chief, Inspector-General Yaacov Shabtai, has expressed misgivings that the national guard, if not under his own force’s control, “could prove most costly and even harm the security of the citizenry,” according to the Ynet news site.

Opposition leader Yair Lapid last week scorned the proposed national guard as “a private militia for a dangerous Tik-Tok clown” – a reference to Ben-Gvir’s volubility on social media.

“Why does the State of Israel – which has an army, police, military intelligence, the Shin Bet, Mossad, National Security Council, Prisons Service, riot police, a SWAT team – need another national guard?” tweeted Arab lawmaker Ayman Odeh.

Ben-Gvir said he wants control of the national guard because, in his view, it had been neglected by police chiefs. But he told Army Radio he was willing to consider letting them stay in charge “if they’re serious and really want it.”

The national guard will take months to get off the ground, he said, with an initial intake of 1,850 personnel that could include seconded or reservist police officers and volunteers, from both Arab and Jewish sectors.

(Writing by Dan Williams in Jerusalem; Additional reporting by Maytaal Angel; Editing by Hugh Lawson, David Holmes and Matthew Lewis)

By Doina Chiacu, Steve Holland and Rich McKay

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Former U.S. President Donald Trump is set to make public remarks in Florida on Tuesday after being arraigned in New York City on an indictment by a grand jury that heard evidence on hush money paid to a [censored] star before the 2016 election, while his lawyer said on Sunday he anticipates moving to dismiss the charges.

Trump, 76, is expected to be arraigned, fingerprinted and photographed at a Manhattan courthouse on Tuesday as he becomes the first former U.S. president to face criminal charges.

Joe Tacopina, a Trump lawyer, said he expects more details surrounding the arraignment to be resolved on Monday and noted that the Secret Service, which protects former presidents, also has a role to play on Tuesday.

“All the Tuesday stuff is still very much up in the air, other than the fact that we will very loudly and proudly say, ‘Not guilty,'” Tacopino told CNN’s “State of the Union” program.

“Hopefully this will be as painless and classy as possible for a situation like this,” Tacopino added, portraying the charges as politically motivated to harm Trump as he seeks to regain the presidency in 2024.

Tacopina said it was unlikely there will be a “perp walk,” where an individual who has been charged is paraded in front of the news media, because of security concerns.

Before the indictment, the grand jury heard evidence about a $130,000 payment to adult film actress Stormy Daniels in the waning days of the 2016 presidential campaign. Daniels has said she was paid to keep silent about a sexual encounter she had with Trump in 2006. Trump has denied any such encounter.

Word of the indictment surfaced on Thursday though the specific charges against Trump arising from the investigation led by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, a Democrat, have not been made public.

“We’re not doing anything at the arraignment because that would be showmanship and nothing more – because we haven’t even seen the indictment,” Tacopina said.

Tacopina added that Trump’s lawyers will dissect the indictment once it is made public and will look at “every potential issue” to challenge.

“And of course I very much anticipate a motion to dismiss coming because there’s no law that fits this,” Tacopina added.

A court official said the arraignment is scheduled for 2:15 p.m. (1815 GMT) on Tuesday. The official said the judge has asked both sides to submit their positions on whether cameras and video should be allowed in the courtroom.

Trump plans to deliver remarks at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach at 8:15 p.m. on Tuesday (0015 GMT on Wednesday), his office said on Sunday.

The Trump campaign declined to comment on what he will say. A source familiar with the matter said the Republican businessman-turned-politician is likely to focus on what he feels is his political persecution and “the political weaponization of the justice system to manipulate an election.”

A FAMILIAR JUDGE

Trump, who launched his 2024 candidacy in November, plans to fly to New York on Monday from Mar-a-Lago and spend the night at Trump Tower before his court appearance, a person familiar with the matter told Reuters last week.

Trump is expected to appear before Justice Juan Merchan of the criminal court in Manhattan. Merchan also presided over a criminal trial last year in which Trump’s real estate company was convicted of tax fraud, though Trump himself was not charged.

Trump on Friday lashed out at Merchan, saying the judge hates him and treated the Trump Organization “viciously.”

On Sunday, Tacopina sidestepped questions about whether Trump’s team will seek to have a new judge assigned.

“I have no issue with this judge whatsoever. He has a very good reputation,” Tacopina said.

Former Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson announced his candidacy on Sunday for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination and called on Trump to drop out of the race.

“I think it’s a sad day for America that we have a former president that’s indicted,” Hutchinson said on ABC’s “This Week.”

Asked whether Trump should step aside from the race, Hutchinson said, “Well, he should, but at the same time, we know he’s not.”

No other Republican candidate or potential candidate has made such a call. Prominent Republicans, including Trump’s former and future presidential rivals, have joined him in portraying the charges as political.

“I do think this is politically motivated,” Republican U.S. Representative Mike Turner said of the indictment on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “It’s one thing when you have a cancel culture. It’s another when you have a cancel criminal justice system.”

A handful of Trump supporters gathered on a bridge across from Mar-a-Lago on Sunday, included a woman who drove 23 hours from Detroit.

“I’m here because I want to support my president – it’s a simple concept,” said Debbie Macchia, 58, who noted that she has slept in her car since Thursday.

(Reporting by Diane Bartz, Steve Holland and Doina Chiacu in Washington, Rich McKay in Florida; Additional reporting by Karen Freifeld in New York; Editing by Will Dunham)

By Doina Chiacu

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Former Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson announced his 2024 U.S. presidential candidacy on Sunday with a proclamation that set him apart from other current or potential Republican candidates: former President Donald Trump should step aside from the race.

In an interview with ABC’s “This Week,” Hutchinson urged Trump, who launched his candidacy in November, to drop out of the race after the former president was indicted in New York following an investigation into hush money payments to a [censored] star.

“I mean, first of all, the office is more important than any individual person. And so for the sake of the office of the presidency, I do think that’s too much of a sideshow and distraction and he needs to be able to concentrate on his due process and there is a presumption of innocence,” Hutchinson said.

Hutchinson, who was governor of the southern state from 2015 until early this year after previously serving in the U.S. House of Representatives, said he would make his formal announcement in Arkansas later this month but has decided to run.

“I have made a decision, and my decision is I’m going to run for president of the United States,” Hutchinson said. “I’m convinced that people want leaders that appeal to the best of America, and not simply appeal to our worst instincts.”

Democratic President Joe Biden is expected to seek re-election next year.

Hutchinson, who has criticized Trump in the past, made it clear on Sunday he would not shrink, as a candidate, from confronting him. Trump remains popular among many Republicans despite becoming the first former U.S. president to be indicted on criminal charges.

“I think it’s a sad day for America that we have a former president that’s indicted,” Hutchinson said.

Asked whether Trump should step aside, Hutchinson said, “Well, he should, but at the same time, we know he’s not.”

A Trump political action committee, the Make America Great Again PAC, hit back at Hutchinson later on Sunday, tapping one of Trump’s favorite disparaging terms for his Republican critics, calling him a RINO, or Republican In Name Only.

“Hutchinson’s only fans are in the liberal media,” it said.

The other Republicans who have launched campaigns for the party’s 2024 nomination include former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley and activist investor Vivek Ramaswamy. Former Vice President Mike Pence and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis are considered as possible candidates, and both have come to Trump’s defense since the indictment on Thursday.

Hutchinson has touted his experience leading the deep red state as proof he can deliver on policies Republican voters care about, citing tax cuts and job creation initiatives as particular sources of pride.

He has said he is uniquely qualified to enforce security at the U.S.-Mexico border, a perennial theme for Republican candidates and one seized on by Trump in 2016. Hutchinson was a former head of the Drug Enforcement Administration and a Homeland Security official under President George W. Bush.

Still, his name recognition remains limited outside Arkansas, while almost half of Republican primary voters plan to support Trump, according to opinion survey averages.

(Reporting by Doina Chiacu, additional reporting by Gram Slattery; Editing by Will Dunham and Bill Berkrot)

By Humeyra Pamuk, Arshad Mohammed and Mark Trevelyan

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken urged the release of Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, who Russia accuses of spying, in a call on Sunday with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, who said Washington should not politicize the case.

Russia’s FSB security service said on Thursday it had arrested Gershkovich, accusing him of gathering information about a Russian defence company that was a state secret.

The Wall Street Journal has denied Gershkovich was spying. The White House has called the espionage charge, which carries a jail term of up to 20 years, “ridiculous.”

“Secretary Blinken conveyed the United States’ grave concern over Russia’s unacceptable detention of a U.S. citizen journalist. The Secretary called for his immediate release,” the U.S. State Department said in a statement that did not mention Gershkovich by name.

A U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the statement did refer to Gershkovich. Under U.S. law, the State Department is generally barred from speaking about a U.S. citizen unless he or she has signed a privacy waiver.

Russia’s foreign ministry said Lavrov told Blinken it was unacceptable for Washington to politicize the case, adding that Gershkovich’s fate would be determined by a court. He reiterated Russia’s assertion, for which it has not presented any evidence, that the journalist was “caught red-handed” last week.

“Blinken’s attention was drawn to the need to respect the decisions of the Russian authorities, taken in accordance with the law and international obligations of the Russian Federation,” the Russian foreign ministry said.

“It was emphasized that it is unacceptable for officials in Washington and the Western media to whip up a stir with the clear intention of giving this case a political coloring,” the ministry added, saying Blinken initiated the conversation.

Direct conversations between Blinken and Lavrov have been rare since Russia’s Feb. 24, 2022, invasion of Ukraine. The two spoke face-to-face for the first time since the invasion on the sidelines of a wider March 2 meeting in New Delhi.

Wall Street Journal Editor-in-Chief Emma Tucker decried Gershkovich’s arrest and the Russian accusations about the reporter but said she was reassured Blinken and Lavrov spoke.

“It’s a complete outrage that he was arrested like this … what the Russian authorities are saying is utter nonsense,” she told CBS’ “Face the Nation” program.

At a closed hearing on Thursday, Gershkovich was placed in pre-trial detention until May 29 at Moscow’s Lefortovo prison.

    Many Western and some Russian analysts suggested the arrest was a move by Moscow to secure a bargaining chip with Washington, four months after a high-profile prisoner swap where it traded U.S. basketball star Brittney Griner for convicted Russian arms trafficker Viktor Bout. Griner has urged the Biden administration to use “every tool possible” to free Gershkovich.

(Reporting by Humeyra Pamuk and Arshad Mohammed in Washington and by Mark Trevelyan in London; Additional Reporting by Dan Burns in New York; Writing by Arshad Mohammed; Editing by Frances Kerry and Lisa Shumaker)