Europe

BARCELONA, Spain (AP) — For years, Catalonia’s separatist movement painstakingly built an amiable image of its quest to secede from Spain: Smiling parents and grandparents with children in tow marched under the Mediterranean sun, waving the flags of their cause and cheerily chanting “independence!”

BRUSSELS (AP) — British Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s career of disdain for the European Union was a thing of the past on Thursday as he and the bloc’s leaders celebrated their long-sought Brexit deal. He now faces an opponent closer to home: his own Parliament.

MOSCOW, October 17. /TASS/: EU representatives attempting to debate the EU role in resolving the Syrian crisis seem bizarre given the fact that Brussels is not undertaking any action in this area, Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Thursday in light of a recent press conference of EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherini on this issue.

MOSCOW, October 17. /TASS/: Over 200 people have been killed in northern Syria since the start of the Turkish military operation in the region, the Asharq Al-Awsat daily informed, citing regional Kurdish officials.

According to the Kurdish officials, "218 people have been killed since the start of the Turkish offense in northeastern Syria." There are children and medical professionals among the victims, the newspaper’s source added.

MOSCOW, October 17. /TASS/: Russia continues Arctic cooperation with China and Japan on a wide range of issues, Russian Foreign Ministry Envoy Nikolai Korchunov, who is the country’s top official in the Arctic Council, said at a press conference dedicated to the Ninth International Forum dubbed "Arctic: Today and the Future" on Thursday.

KHABAROVSK, October 17. /TASS/: High-altitude fighter jets from a composite air regiment of the Pacific Fleet’s naval aviation performed a long-distance flight from Kamchatka to the Arctic to practice intercepting a notional enemy’s aircraft, the Fleet’s press office reported on Thursday.

MOSCOW, October 17. /TASS/: Leaders from 47 countries will take part in the Russia-Africa summit in Sochi next week, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.

"A total of 47 leaders have confirmed [their participation]," he said, adding that some countries will send their representatives to the summit. "Eight large African integration associations and organizations will take part [in the event] as well."

SEVASTOPOL, October 17. /TASS/: Air defense troops fired S-400 and Pantsir anti-aircraft missile systems to defend facilities against an attack by a notional enemy’s aircraft and helicopters in Crimea drills, the press office of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet reported on Thursday.

MOSCOW, October 17. /TASS/: Russia has payed 600 million rubles ($9.378 million) to its citizens after decisions made by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) in 2019, Russia’s Plenipotentiary Representative to the ECHR and Deputy Justice Minister Mikhail Galperin told TASS.

"Overall, since the beginning of this year the ECHR made around 250 decisions in cases against our country. In the same period, the Russian Justice Ministry paid around 600 million rubles to Russian plaintiffs," Galperin said.

17 October 2019; AFP: A 93-year-old former SS guard goes on trial in Germany on Thursday for complicity in the murder of more than 5,000 people at a Nazi concentration camp during World War II, in what could be one of the last such cases.

The man, identified by German media as Bruno Dey, stands accused of involvement in the murder of 5,230 people when he worked at the Stutthof camp near what was then Danzig, now Gdansk in Poland.