Kosovo hopes to join European Union
PRISTINA, Kosovo — The left-wing opposition leader who’s poised to become Kosovo’s next prime minister said Monday he would push hard for his country to join the European Union, but also urged the bloc to provide an economic aid package to help smooth the path to membership for western Balkan states.
Albin Kurti's Self-Determination Movement Party, or Vetevendosje!, won a clear victory with 48% of the vote in Sunday’s early election held amid the pandemic, an economic downturn and stalled negotiations with wartime foe Serbia. About 99% of the vote had been counted Monday.
The centre-right Democratic Party of Kosovo, or PDK, came a far second with 17% and the conservative governing Democratic League of Kosovo, or LDK, captured 13% of the vote.
Turnout was 47%, or 2.5% higher than the 2019 election, according to the Central Election Commission.
Kurti faces the challenges of reviving the poor nation’s economy and reducing unemployment, as well as fighting the pandemic, organized crime and corruption.
He hopes to secure the required 61 votes in the 120-seat parliament to govern alone, or cooperate with the non-Serb minority lawmakers to form his cabinet. He made it clear there would be no coalition with the PDK and LDK parties.
Kosovo'’ Serb minority has 10 seats in parliament and 10 other seats belong to other minorities.
In an interview with the Associated Press on Monday, Kurti urged the European Union to apply what he called a mini-Marshal plan — alluding to the U.S. post-Second World War reconstruction plan for Europe — for six western Balkan countries that are hoping to join the 27-nation bloc.
These countries are Kosovo, Albania, North Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia and BosniaHerzegovina.
“The Western Balkans Six have EU as the most important partner. But on the other hand, history teaches us that also (the) Balkans (are) very important for Europe,” Kurti said.
Negotiations on normalizing ties with Serbia, which stalled again last year after talks brokered by the U.S. and the EU, did not figure high on the winning party’s agenda. Kurti said forming a negotiating team for dialogue would not be a priority.
“To move on further, we need to establish clear principles of dialogue and (an) honest and serious approach by putting the demands of Kosovo and Serbia to each other,” he said.
EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell and Enlargement Commissioner Oliver Varhelyi urged Kosovo to soon form the new parliament and government, elect the president and advance reforms, pledging continuous support from Brussels.
“Kosovo's European path also goes through the comprehensive normalization of relations with Serbia,” their statement said.
Kosovo has signed a stabilization agreement with the EU, the first step towards membership.
Kurti said his government would apply for candidate status, and deplored that Brussels has still not allowed visa-free travel for Kosovars seeking to enter the EU.
Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008, a decade after a brutal 1998-99 war between separatist ethnic Albanian rebels and Serb forces.
AUSTIN, Texas — A frigid blast of winter weather across the U.S. plunged Texas into an unusually icy emergency Monday that knocked out power to more than two million people, closed dangerously snowy and slick highways and put the delivery of new COVID19 vaccine shipments on hold.
Temperatures nosedived as far south as San Antonio, and homes that had already been without electricity for hours had no certainty about when the lights and heat would come back on, as the state's overwhelmed power grid throttled into rotating blackouts that are typically only seen in summer.
The storm was part of a massive system that brought snow, sleet and freezing rain to the southern Plains and was spreading across the Ohio Valley and to the Northeast.
“We’re living through a really historic event going on right now,” said Jason Furtado, a professor of meteorology at the University of Oklahoma, pointing to all of Texas under a winter storm warning and the extent of the freezing temperatures.
In Houston, where county leaders had warned that the deteriorating conditions could create problems on the scale of massive hurricanes that slam the Gulf Coast, one electric provider said power may not be restored to some homes until Tuesday.
“This weather event, it’s really unprecedented. We all living here know that,” said Dan Woodfin, senior director of system operations at the Electric Reliability Council of Texas. He defended preparations made by grid operators and described the demand on the system as record-setting.
“This event was well beyond the design parameters for a typical, or even an extreme, Texas winter that you would normally plan for. And so that is really the result that we're seeing,” Woodfin said.
The largest grocery store chain in Texas, HE-B, closed locations around Austin and San Antonio, cities that are unaccustomed to snow and have little resources to clear roads.
State health officials said Texas, which expected to receive more than 400,000 additional vaccine doses this week, now does not expecting deliveries to occur until at least Wednesday.
“Vaccination will resume as soon as it is safe,” said Douglas Loveday, a spokesman for the Texas Department of State Health Services.
Lauren Schneider, a 24-year-old lab technician, was walking to a Dallas grocery store near her home Monday morning dressed in a
coat, hat and face mask.
Schneider said she didn’t feel comfortable driving with the roads covered in snow and ice. She said she hadn’t seen a serious snowfall in Dallas since her childhood and was caught without enough groceries.
“I really didn’t think it's would be this serious,” said Schneider.
Several cities in the U.S. saw record lows as Artic air remained over the central part of the country.
In Minnesota, the Hibbing/Chisholm weather station registered –39 C while Sioux Falls, S.D. dropped to –26 C.
In Kansas, where wind chills dropped to as low as –34 C in some areas, Gov. Laura Kelly declared a state of disaster.
Most government offices and schools were closed for Presidents Day, and authorities pleaded with residents to stay home.
Louisiana State Police reported that it had investigated nearly 75 weather-related crashes caused by a mixture of snow, sleet and freezing rain in the past 24 hours.
“We already have some accidents on our
roadways,” Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear said during a morning news conference. “It is slick and it is dangerous.”
Air travel was also affected. By midmorning, 3,000 flights had been cancelled across the country, about 1,600 of them at Dallas/Fort Worth International and Bush Intercontinental airports in Texas.
The storm arrived over a three-day holiday weekend that has seen the most U.S. air travel since the period around New Year's.
More than one million people went through airport security checkpoints on Thursday and Friday. However, that was still less than half the traffic of a year ago, before the pandemic hit with full force.
The southern Plains had been gearing up for the winter weather for the better part of the weekend. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott issued a disaster declaration for all of the state’s 254 counties.
Abbott, Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt and Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson each activated National Guard units. President Joe Biden also declared an emergency in Texas
In 1838, an act of the British Parliament suspended the constitution in Lower Canada.
In 1872, the first session of the British Columbia legislature opened.
In 1878, the silver dollar became legal currency in the U.S.
In 1881, the Canadian Pacific Railway was incorporated.
In 1896, the first comic-strip cartoon appeared. “The Yellow Kid” was created for the New York World newspaper by Richard Outcault.
In 1923, the burial chamber of King Tutankhamen's recently unearthed tomb was unsealed in Egypt by English archaeologist Howard Carter.
In 1933, the Canadian government refused to allow liquor to be exported to prohibition countries.
In 1937, nylon was patented by a du Pont research team headed by Dr. Wallace
Carothers.
In 1944, Major Charles Hoey of Duncan, B.C., won the Victoria Cross while serving with the British Army in Burma during the Second World War. Hoey was fatally wounded while capturing a Japanese position.
In 1949, the House of Commons passed the Newfoundland Union Act by a vote of 140-47. Newfoundland officially joined Canada on March 31, 1949.
In 1959, Fidel Castro became premier of Cuba following the overthrow of Fulgencio Batista.
In 1970, Toronto police recovered the Grey Cup from a downtown hotel locker room after an anonymous tip. The CFL championship trophy had been stolen two months earlier from the Ottawa Rough Riders' trophy room.
In 1971, Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau mouthed an expression in the Commons he later described as “fuddle-duddle.”
In 1973, an anti-hijacking agreement signed by Canada and Cuba required the countries to prosecute hijackers or return them to the country where the hijacking occurred.
In 1982, more than 7,000 nurses went on strike in Alberta.
In 1984, Quebec speedskater Gaetan Boucher completed the greatest individual Canadian showing in an Olympic Games. Boucher added the 1,500-metre gold medal in Sarajevo to his gold in the 1,000-metre and his bronze in the 500. Boucher also won the silver in the 1,000 at the 1980 Games in Lake Placid, N.Y.
In 1987, John Demjanjuk went on trial in Jerusalem, accused of being Ivan the Terrible, a guard at the Treblinka concentration camp. He was convicted, but the verdict was overturned by the Israeli Supreme Court. (U.S. immigration officials later ordered his deportation to Germany to face similar charges. In May 2011, he was again convicted and sentenced to five years in prison, but was released pending appeal. He died on March 17, 2012.)
In 1987, Mark David Chapman, in an interview with “People” magazine, said he might have tried to kill Paul McCartney, Ronald Reagan, Elizabeth Taylor or Johnny Carson. But Chapman said he chose to shoot John Lennon in December 1980 because he was easier to get at.
In 1998, a China Airlines Airbus A300-600R, trying to land in fog near Taipei, Taiwan, crashed, killing all 196 people on board.
In 1999, Kurds stormed diplomatic missions in Canada and across Europe after Abdullah Ocalan, the Kurdish fugitive rebel chief, was taken to Turkey for trial on terrorism charges. Ocalan was later convicted.
In 2005, NHL commissioner Gary Bettman announced the cancellation of the 2004-2005 hockey season on the 154th day of a lockout. It was the first time a major sports league had lost an entire season and playoffs to labour trouble. The dispute lasted 310 days but ended in July 2005 when a new six-year collective bargaining agreement was ratified. The agreement allowed the NHL to hold a regular 2005-06 season.
In 2005, the Kyoto global warming treaty came into force, seven years after it was negotiated, imposing limits on emissions of carbon dioxide and other gases that are blamed for rising world temperatures, melting glaciers and rising oceans.