Europe

cross-posted from: https://scribe.disroot.org/post/4567049

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The number of such centers [where abducted Ukrainian children live in Russia] are similar to Soviet-era youth camps and have mushroomed since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Critics warn they are being used to indoctrinate children and prepare them for eventual service in the Russian military.

Human rights experts say the so-called re-education of deported Ukrainian children has become state policy in Russia since early 2022 when the all-out invasion began. Researchers describe a “lost connection syndrome” among abducted children, which is the result of deliberate efforts to sever them from their cultural and social roots.

“Russian officials are trying to portray the deportation of Ukrainian children as care and protection. In reality, this propaganda only obstructs efforts to bring the children home,” human rights defenders said.

Between 2023 and 2024, at least 8,270 children were confirmed transferred to 98 facilities in Russia and occupied territories, with 102 separate cases of forced relocation recorded.

Meanwhile, Russians have opened more than 250 “specialized” classes, nearly 100 of them with a military focus, in schools across the occupied part of the Luhansk region this academic year.

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The DSA [Digital Services Act] and the DMA [Digital Markets Act], [part of a EU] legislation aimed to prevent large tech companies from abusing their market power, impose burdens and requirements on tech companies operating in Europe, regardless of where the companies come from. Most major tech companies come from the United States, and many have lobbied against the passage of both the DSA and the DMA.

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In a recent hearing in the House Judiciary Committee, which he chairs, [U.S. Republican lawmaker Jim] Jordan argued that Europeans are trying to control how U.S. companies operate and to “censor Americans.”

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But genuine concern over free speech may not be what’s sparked the discussion. The Trump administration’s deep ties to tech CEOs appear to be one of the reasons for Washington’s newfound interest in EU regulations.

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Big American tech companies appear to have successfully convinced the White House to work on their behalf against legislation they believe hamstrings them. One European official, who asked to speak on background in order to talk candidly, said the tech industry “sees the possibility to exercise pressure or influence, to leverage the proximity they have to the administration to push against regulation.”

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“The DSA doesn’t specify what is illegal content and what is not illegal content. It’s not focusing on speech that much,” [the international policy director for the Electronic Frontier Foundation Christoph] Schmon said. “It’s more focused on transparency and processes on platforms. So it doesn’t regulate speech.

“It basically says, if there’s illegal content, and you’re notified about that illegality, you must take it off if you want to preserve your limited liability for third-party content,” he added. “This portrayal of the DSA as a speech-censorship tool doesn’t fully correspond to the reality of how the law is drafted.”

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Despite what appears to be a tempest in a teapot, the legislation is likely here to stay. Henna Virkkunen, the EU’s vice president for tech sovereignty, security, and democracy, has said the EU will continue to enforce the laws. And even if officials in Brussels wanted to rescind them, they would need to pass new legislation through the EU’s parliament to do that. That seems like a long shot.

Anna Cavazzini, chair of the European Parliament’s Committee on the Internal Market and Consumer Protection, which is in charge of digital legislation, argued the EU shouldn’t make concessions to Trump.

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“EU rules apply equally to all tech giants, regardless of where they come from. The Digital Services Act protects EU citizens from disinformation and hate online. And the Digital Markets Act gives small and medium-sized enterprises a fair chance to succeed in the digital single market,” Cavazzini said in an emailed statement. “The lesson here is clear: The EU should never give in to a blackmailer.”

Russia has used the widely-banned weapons "extensively" since the first day of the war, it said, adding that Ukraine too had deployed them and faced accusations of using them in Russia.

At least 193 cluster munition casualties were recorded in Ukraine in 2024, out of 314 globally, the report said.

In total, more than 1,200 such casualties have been registered in Ukraine since the start of the war, most of them in 2022.

cross-posted from: https://programming.dev/post/37443248

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Answer

Question no. 1425 (General part) from the Danish Parliament's Legal Affairs Committee:

"Will the minister elaborate on the minister's statement to TV2 on the 21st?"

August 2024, where the minister says: "We have to break with the totally mistaken notion that it is every man's freedom to communicate on encrypted messaging services

(…)”?”

Answer:

We know that social media and encrypted services are unfortunately largely is used to facilitate many forms of crime. There are examples on how criminal gangs recruit completely through encrypted platforms young people to commit, among other things, serious crimes against persons. It is an expression of a cynicism that is almost completely incomprehensible.

We therefore need to look at how we can overcome this problem. Both in terms of what the services themselves do, but also what we from the authorities can do. It must not be the case that the criminals can hide behind encrypted services that authorities cannot access access to.

Therefore, we, as a government, will also strengthen the police's capabilities in the area of ​​decryption, of course under appropriate legal guarantees, as is also the case today. In addition, the Ministry of Justice has The Criminal Justice Committee has just started working on a terms of reference that will look at the challenges that technological developments present to the police investigation, including the use of encrypted messaging services.

I also note that steps have been taken within the EU towards a strengthened regulation of, among other things, digital information services and social media platforms.

For example, the European Commission has proposed a new Regulation on rules for preventing and combating sexual abuse of children. The proposed regulation contains rules on obligations for certain online services to minimize the risk of their services being misused for online child sexual abuse, and the services can, if necessary, be required to track down, report, remove and block access to material showing sexual abuse of children.

Romania summoned the Russian ambassador to Bucharest on Sunday after a drone was observed breaching the country's airspace on its way to strike targets in Ukraine on Saturday. Poland also scrambled fighter jets last week to shoot down a number of Russian drones that had entered its airspace.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.zip/post/48712513

Smaller vehicles that do not need to meet the same safety requirements as existing cars could be Europe's answer to maintaining its automotive industry.

Germany's interior minister has confirmed direct talks with Afghanistan's rulers to facilitate "regular" deportations. Follow for the latest from Germany.

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Schleswig-Holstein only has about 3 million inhabitants, and is far from the richest part of Germany, but for the past several years it’s been following an ambitious strategy to wean itself off Big Tech’s software.

This means switching the workplaces of 30,000 civil servants – a headcount roughly comparable to the European Commission – from Microsoft Office software to open alternatives.

In an interview with Euractiv, digital minister Dirk Schrödter said his state is well on the way to achieving this goal. After getting started last March, Schleswig-Holstein is set to reduce the number of Office licences needed for administration by more than two-thirds by the end of this month, he told us.

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The administration will still need a few Office licences to communicate with other regions and Germany’s federal tax administration, according to Schrödter. But the goal is to be able to get rid of all but a very few Microsoft Office licences by 2029.

Instead of sticking with Word and Powerpoint, the state’s civil servants are migrating to LibreOffice. Emails will go through Open Xchange and Thunderbird, rather than Microsoft’s Outlook, and documents will be edited collaboratively via Nextcloud, not Sharepoint.

The migration goes beyond desktop programmes, too. Schleswig-Holstein is running a Linux pilot to replace Windows itself. Currently around 150 people are testing the new operating system, including the digital minister.

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A major focus for the shift is on making the change seamless. “It’s supposed to change as little as possible,” Schrödter said.

Civil servants will have to get used to new desktop icons and tools that are designed slightly differently, but – in theory – the alternatives should be just as comfortable to use.

But like every tech migration, this one is not going off without some pain. Just last week, an association of judges called for a return to Outlook, saying that outages were plaguing civil servants’ new email clients.

While the alternative software that Schleswig-Holstein is adopting is openly available, a lot of work needs to be done to integrate it with the needs of public administration. The region is mostly handing this work to existing contractors, just with new provisions for supporting open document formats.

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The CHP's presidential candidate is in prison, and the party leadership faces removal from office. Now, a court case is looming. Turkey's largest opposition party is in danger of falling apart.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.zip/post/48703504

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