Europe

GENEVA, Oct 18 (NNN-SANA) – The latest round of Syrian constitutional talks, participated by members of the Syrian Constitutional Committee’s Small Body, will kick off in Geneva today, a United Nations envoy said, yesterday.

UN Special Envoy for Syria, Geir O. Pedersen, told a press conference here that, the parties have agreed to prepare and start drafting for constitutional reform, and “the new thing this week is that, we will actually be starting a drafting process for constitutional reform in Syria.”

BERLIN, Oct 18 (Reuters) - Germany's business-friendly Free Democrats (FDP) joined the Social Democrats (SPD) and Greens on Monday in approving a decision by party leaders to proceed with three-way coalition talks to form what they called "a government of the middle".

The FDP leadership and members of parliament voted in favour of the start to negotiations after initial exploratory talks that saw the three parties agree a roadmap. The Greens and centre-left SPD had already given their approval.

LUXEMBOURG, Oct 18 (Reuters) - The European Union on Monday played down the prospect of serious talks on Iran's nuclear programme outside the framework of negotiations between world powers and Iran in Vienna, with the EU's foreign policy chief saying time was not on Iran's side.

A senior EU official said last week Iran was not ready yet to return to actual talks with world powers over reviving its 2015 nuclear programme and related U.S. sanctions but could discuss with the EU in Brussels texts from when negotiations ended in June.

MOSCOW, Oct 18 (Reuters) - Russia said on Monday it would halt the activities of its diplomatic mission to NATO after the Western military alliance expelled eight Russians saying they were spies.

Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov also said staff at NATO's military mission in Moscow would be stripped of their accreditation from Nov. 1, and the alliance's information office in the Russian capital would be shuttered.

"If NATO members have any urgent matters, they can contact our ambassador in Belgium on these questions," Lavrov told a news conference.

GENEVA, Oct 18 (Reuters) - Washington is concerned about hypersonic missile technology and its potential military applications by China and Russia, a U.S. arms control official said on Monday, after a media report that Beijing had tested a nuclear-capable hypersonic glide weapon.

Hypersonic weapons are usually defined as missiles that fly more than five times the speed of sound, and a race is under way for the next generation of long-range weapons that are harder to detect and intercept.

PRAGUE, Oct 18 (Reuters) - Czech President Milos Zeman is currently unable to carry out his duties, the head of parliament's upper house said on Monday, citing a report he had requested from the hospital where Zeman has been in intensive care for more than a week.

Milos Vystrcil, the Senate speaker, told reporters that the report said there was only a small likelihood Zeman could return to work in the coming weeks. He said parliament needed to discuss enacting a constitutional clause that shifts the president's duties to other officials. 

MOSCOW, Oct. 18 (Xinhua) -- The Russian Foreign Ministry announced Monday that Moscow has decided to suspend the operation of the Russian Permanent Mission to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in retaliation for the alliance's "unfriendly actions."

Russia's ambassador to Belgium will be authorized for emergency contacts with the NATO headquarters, while an ambassador of the NATO member states in Moscow can perform similar functions, the ministry said in a statement.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Belarus on Monday ordered a halt to routine medical care at state clinics in order to devote more resources to coronavirus patients.

The Health Ministry said the suspended services include medical examinations and screenings, physiotherapy and dentistry.

Belarus has been hit by a rising wave of coronavirus infections, with around 2,000 new cases reported daily in the country of 9.3 million.

MOSCOW (AP) — Russia’s foreign minister said Monday that the country is suspending its mission to NATO.

Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said that the move is in response to last week’s expulsion by NATO of eight members of Russia’s mission to the military alliance.

NATO said that they were secretly working as intelligence officers and halved the size of Moscow’s team able to work at its headquarters. Lavrov also announced that NATO’s military liaison and information offices in Moscow would be closed.

LJUBLJANA, Slovenia (AP) — Slovenia’s populist prime minister on Monday blamed a rise in COVID-19 infections on protests in early October that erupted into clashes between police and thousands of opponents of vaccination and coronavirus restrictions.

Prime Minister Janez Jansa was responding in parliament to opposition criticism over the use of force by police against the protesters, including tear gas and water cannons. Jansa defended police actions, accusing the demonstrators of attacking the police.