Europe

BARCELONA, Spain (AP) — French President Emmanuel Macron and Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez signed a friendship treaty in Barcelona on Thursday to strengthen relations between the European neighbors, as both leaders faced protests on their home fronts.

The one-day summit came amid a day of widespread strikes on the other side of the Pyrenees against Macron’s bid to increase the minimum retirement age from 62 to 64. Sánchez, as host, had to endure a noisy rally by Catalan separatists near the meeting venue.

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Poland’s prime minister said Thursday that the country was reviewing the supervision of its gas and oil installations and other strategic locations after a weekend incident in which three foreign divers had to be rescued from near a key oil port where they had no authorization to be.

Premier Mateusz Morawiecki also said he had requested the secret security services to produce a detailed report on the incident.

BRUSSELS (AP) — The new executive director of European Union border agency Frontex pledged Thursday to ensure that illegal pushbacks of migrants trying to reach Europe wouldn’t take place under his watch.

Hans Leijtens was appointed as a replacement for Fabrice Leggeri, who resigned last year following media allegations that the agency was involved in that practice. A report by EU anti-fraud watchdog OLAF into Frontex later concluded that employees from the agency were involved in covering up pushbacks of migrants from Greece to Turkey.

DAVOS, Switzerland (AP) — Swedish climate campaigner Greta Thunberg on Thursday slammed corporate bigwigs meeting in Davos, Switzerland, for “fueling the destruction of the planet” by investing in fossil fuels and prioritizing short-term profits over people affected by the climate crisis.

Thunberg was joined by prominent young activists Vanessa Nakate, Helena Gualinga and Luisa Neubauer in a roundtable with International Energy Agency Executive Director Fatih Birol at the World Economic Forum’s annual gathering.

PARIS (AP) — Hundreds of thousands protested on the streets of Paris and other French cities Thursday amid nationwide strikes against plans to raise the retirement age, but President Emmanuel Macron insisted he would press ahead with the proposed pension reforms.

Nationwide strikes severely disrupted transport, schools and other public services across France.

During a news conference at a French-Spanish summit in Barcelona, Spain, Macron said that “we must do that reform” to “save” the pension system.

PARIS (AP) — Workers in many French cities took to the streets Thursday to reject proposed pension changes that would push back the retirement age, amid a day of nationwide strikes and protests seen as a major test for Emmanuel Macron and his presidency.

Demonstrations gathered thousands of people in the cities of Paris, Marseille, Toulouse, Nantes, Lyon and other places as strikes were severely disrupting transport, schools and other public services across the country.

BERLIN (AP) — Germany faced mounting pressure to supply battle tanks to Kyiv and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy aired frustration about not obtaining enough weaponry as Western allies conferred Thursday on how best to support Ukraine nearly 11 months into Russia’s invasion.

18 Jan 2023; MEMO: Denmark said it is optimistic that the United Arab Emirates, which hosts this year's UN climate talks, will push for ambitious action to curb climate change at the conference, following criticism from activists over the oil-producing nation's role, Reuters reports.

MOSCOW, January 18. /TASS/: The Bank of Russia starts setting official rates of the ruble against nine more foreign currencies from January 18, the regulator said on Wednesday.

"The UEA dirham, the Thai bath, the Vietnamese dong, the Serbian dinar, the New Zealand dollar, the Georgian lari, the Indonesian rupiah, the Egyptian pound, and the Qatari rial were additionally included in the list of foreign currencies, with their official rates against the ruble set by the Bank of Russia," the Central Bank said.

MOSCOW, January 18. /TASS/: Turkey supports normalizing relations with Syria and has asked for Russia’s assistance on the issue with a trilateral meeting of foreign ministers being in the works, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said at a press conference on Russian diplomacy in 2022 on Wednesday.