TURKISH VOTE WARNS KURDS
ISTANBUL» The Turkish parliament on Saturday renewed a bill allowing the military to intervene in Iraq and Syria if faced with national security threats — a move seen as a final warning to Iraqi Kurds to call off their Monday independence referendum.
The decree allows Turkey to send troops over its southern border if developments in Iraq or Syria are seen as national security threats. Turkish officials have repeatedly warned the semi-autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government in Iraq to abandon its plans for independence.
Kurds are dispersed across Turkey, Syria, Iraq and Iran and lack a nation state. Turkey itself has a large ethnic Kurdish population and is battling a Kurdish insurgency on its own territory that it calls separatist.
The bill read in parliament Saturday listed combating Kurdish militants in Syria and Iraq and the Islamic State group as national security requirements for Turkey. It also emphasized the importance of Iraq and Syria’s territorial integrity and said “separatism based on ethnicity” poses a threat to both Turkey and regional stability.
Leftists protest Macron’s plan.
French far-left firebrand Jean-luc Melenchon urged protesters Saturday to take to the streets and mount strikes to force President Emmanuel Macron to withdraw the labor law changes that are key to his business-friendly economic vision.
Speaking to tens of thousands in Paris, Melenchon assailed the president’s new labor decrees as a gift to greedy corporations and the financial markets that have both fueled income inequality.
Macron, for his part, says the decrees are crucial to creating jobs and tackling France’s chronic high unemployment.
Group accuses Pope Francis of heresy. CITY» Several
VATICAN dozen tradition-minded Roman Catholic theologians, priests and academics have formally accused Pope Francis of spreading heresy with his 2016 opening to divorced and civilly remarried Catholics.
In a 25-page letter delivered to Francis last month and provided Saturday to The Associated Press, the 62 signatories issued a “filial correction” to the pope — a measure they said hadn’t been employed since the 14th century.
The letter accused Francis of propagating seven heretical positions concerning marriage, moral life and the sacraments with his 2016 document “The Joy of Love” and subsequent “acts, words and omissions.”
The initiative follows another formal act by four traditionminded cardinals who wrote Francis last year asking him to clarify a series of questions they had about his 2016 text.
Actor Firth adds 2nd citizenship.
British actor Colin Firth says he has taken Italian citizenship as a “sensible” move amid global political uncertainty.
Firth, who is married to environmentalist Livia Giuggioli, says he has become a dual U.k.-italian citizen, and his wife is applying for British nationality. Their two sons already have dual citizenship.
In a statement Saturday, the 57-year-old Firth said he and his wife had never thought much about their different passports, “but now, with some of the uncertainty around, we thought it sensible that we should all get the same.”
Lithuanians join mushroom hunt.
VARENA,
Hundreds of Lithuanians have been running around with baskets and buckets in a southeastern pine forest.
Why you ask? It’s the national championship of wild mushroom picking — a competition always held on the last Saturday in September.
Participant Janina Juodine said that’s when conditions are “not too dry, not too wet, the humidity is perfect.” Rival Julius Sostakas called the event “part of our cultural heritage” — since edible fungi are considered an essential element in Lithuanian cuisine.
A local team called Mushroom Nightmares won by delivering 128 pounds of mushrooms.