The Washington Post - 07.09.2019

A8 EZ RE THE WASHINGTON POST.SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 7 , 2019

clashed repeatedly over climate change and the fires spreading across the Amazon rainforest.

Appeal filed in probe of 2009 Air France crash: The Paris prosecutor has appealed the decision to drop a decade-long investigation into the 2009 crash of Air France Flight 447 from Rio de Janeiro to Paris. Air France and Airbus were charged with manslaughter in the crash in the Atlantic Ocean, which killed all 228 people aboard and led to new aircraft safety regulations. But French investigating judges decided this week to drop the case, suggesting they felt that the pilots at fault and that there wasn’t enough evidence to send the companies to trial. Families of victims also said they were appealing the decision. — From news services

Palestinians to have the right to return to land their families fled or were forced to flee during Israel’s founding in 1948. — Reuters

Brazilian official apologizes for insulting French first lady: Brazil’s economy minister is apologizing for making fun of the appearance of France’s first lady — comments that angered many in both countries. Economy Minister Paulo Guedes issued the apology Thursday night, saying he did not mean to offend Brigitte Macron. Guedes’s comments followed an earlier uproar when Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro endorsed a Facebook message that insulted the first lady’s looks. The French president called the comments “extraordinarily disrespectful.” Bolsonaro and Macron have

protests along the Gaza-Israel border on Friday, Palestinian health officials said. They named the dead as Khaled Al-Rabai, 14, and Ali Al- Ashqar, 17. Seventy protesters were wounded, 38 of them by live fire, medical officials said. An Israeli military spokesman said troops guarding the border were faced with more than 6, demonstrators at several points along the fence, some hurling explosive devices and firebombs. He said that some briefly managed to cross the fence, and that Israeli forces responded with riot dispersal measures. The spokesman did not comment on the deaths. Palestinians have staged 18 months of weekly protests calling for an end to a security blockade imposed on Gaza by Israel and Egypt, and for

Hulusi Akar made the comments to reporters Friday. Turkey has been pressing for the creation of a safe zone that would keep U.S.-backed Syrian Kurdish fighters, considered terrorists by Turkey, away from its border. Turkey also said some Syrian refugees could be resettled in the zone. On Thursday, Turkey warned it could “open its gates” and allow refugees to move toward Western nations if a safe zone was not created. Turkey hosts 3.6 million refugees from Syria. — Associated Press

GAZA STRIP

2 protesters reported killed by Israeli fire

Israeli forces fatally shot two Palestinian teenagers during

helped by the army chief, forced Abdelaziz Bouteflika to resign in April. Since then, Gaid Salah has positioned himself as the nation’s main authority figure. Protesters want a democratic government and a say in how to achieve that goal. Many opposition politicians are withholding judgment on Gaid Salah’s call for a quick election, while others fear he is seeking a return of a system they reject. — Associated Press

SYRIA

Turkish-U.S. patrols of ‘safe zone’ to begin

Turkey’s defense minister said Turkish and U.S. troops will begin joint ground patrols of a planned “safe zone” i n northern Syria on Sunday.

ALGERIA

Thousands protest

plan for swift election

Te ns of thousands of
protesters piled once again into
the streets of the Algerian capital
and other cities Friday, with
many rejecting the army chief’s
call for a presidential election
before the end of the year.
This week’s pro-democracy
protest, the 29th in a row, was
seen as a test of the continued
strength of the movement and a
way to gauge the temperature
surrounding Gen. Ahmed Gaid
Salah’s call this week to set a date
by Sept. 15 for a presidential
election. That would mean
voting would be held by law 90
days later — in mid-December.
Algeria has lacked an elected
president since protesters,

billions added to the struggling Cuban e conomy each year. The new rules also prohibit banks from processing U-turn transactions, which originate and end o utside t he United S tates. T he ban could affect i nsurers that have provided coverage for foreign companies offering investment opportunities in Cuban state- owned enterprises. [email protected] [email protected]

ber every three months, and pro- hibits all remittances to relatives who are Cuban officials or members of t he Cuban Communist Par- ty. Nonfamily remittances are prohibited. Currently, t here are no limits on the amount or frequency of remittances under r ules t hat took effect when the Obama administration normalized relations with Cuba in 2014, ending five decades of Cold War hostility between the two nations. The payments amount to

adviser John Bolton said in an April speech in Miami that new travel and financial restrictions were being put forward. In June, the administration followed up with Treasury Department orders that ended authorization for certain group travel to Cuba and for individuals making educational visits. Tourist travel has long been prohibited u nder U. S. law. The latest change sets a $1, cap on the money any one person can send to a Cuban family mem-

denying Cuba access to hard cur- rency, and we are curbing the Cu- ban government’s bad behavior while continuing to support the long-suffering people of Cuba.” This is the second round of steps to tighten pressure on Cuba in recent months as President Trump tries to reverse President Barack O bama’s moves t o normal- ize r elations with Havana, policies that Trump has called “terrible and misguided.” White House national security

new rules in the Federal Register means t hey will t ake effect Oct. 9. “We are taking additional steps to financially isolate the Cuban regime,” Treasury Secretary Ste- ven Mnuchin said in a statement issued Friday. “The United States holds the Cuban regime account- able for its oppression of the Cu- ban people and support of other dictatorships throughout the re- gion, such as the illegitimate Ma- duro regime. Through these regu- latory amendments, Treasury is

BY CAROL MORELLO AND KAREN DEYOUNG

The Trump administration has
unveiled n ew r estrictions l imiting
the amount of money Cuban
Americans c an send t o relatives on
the island, and prohibiting remit-
tances to certain government offi-
cials and members of the Commu-
nist Party.
The intent to make changes w as
first announced months ago, but
the impending publication of the

The World

DIGEST

BY MICHAEL BIRNBAUM

brussels — European Union of-
ficials were astonished when Brit-
ish Prime Minister Boris Johnson
this week claimed to be “encour-
aged by the progress” of critical,
last-ditch Brexit negotiations.
Nothing is under negotiation,
they said, because he has n ot both-
ered to make any suggestions.
Europeans listened to Johnson
accuse the British Parliament of
destroying his leverage by remov-
ing the threat of a no-deal with-
drawal and pushing for another
Brexit extension beyond the
Oct. 31 deadline.
But Johnson undermined his
own position by failing to follow
through on promised proposals
for d iscussion, they said.
After wild weeks of political
trench-fighting in London, many
Brexit policymakers in the E.U.
capital of Brussels and around
Europe say Johnson’s take-no-
prisoners political approach has
torpedoed what little remaining
trust t hey had placed in h im and in
the B ritish p olitical system.
“Perhaps it’s for domestic use.
But everybody reads the British
papers,” said Anne Mulder, a
Dutch lawmaker who leads Brexit
planning in his country’s parlia-
ment. “He’s totally unrealistic.
He’s saying if you don’t do what I
say, I’ll commit suicide. There are
no negotiations with this govern-
ment.”
European officials are more
than exasperated, according to
nine diplomats and other officials
who spoke on the condition of
anonymity to discuss sensitive d is-
cussions.
When Johnson came to power
in July, many Europeans ex-
pressed hope that he would be
more adept than his predecessor,
Theresa May, in getting Parlia-
ment to support a deal to manage
Britain’s withdrawal from the
trade bloc. Instead, Johnson has
sought to sideline Parliament by
suspending it for f ive w eeks ahead
of the Brexit d eadline.
At the same t ime, he h as told the
British p ublic that his Brexit nego-
tiators have been hard at work —
and m aking headway.
“I’ve been negotiating over the
past five weeks to get us a new
deal,” J ohnson s aid in a video post-
ed Thursday o n Twitter. “E.U. l ead-
ers w ere willing to negotiate a new
deal because they knew we were
willing to leave on October the
31st, deal or no d eal.”
E.U. officials have denied offer-
ing a new deal — or even substan-
tially amending the deal negotiat-
ed over two years with May.
Johnson’s primary objection is
to the so-called backstop — a last-
resort provision to prevent a hard
border between Ireland and
Northern Ireland and to maintain
the commitments of the 1998
Good Friday peace agreement. In
an Aug. 19 letter to European
Council President Donald Tusk,
Johnson wrote that the backstop,
which would keep Britain closely
tied to the E.U. for an indetermi-
nate time, is “anti-democratic and
inconsistent with the sovereignty
of the U.K.”
Johnson promised German

Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Ma- cron last month that he would come up with an alternative way to maintain an open border. He seemed earnest enough that the leaders c ame away t hinking he d id not want to leave the E.U. without a deal, according to advisers briefed o n their assessments. But Johnson has not yet come back with any ideas for how else to guarantee an open border, E.U. negotiators s aid. His Brexit negotiator, David Frost, met with his E.U. counter- parts o n Wednesday f or more t han five hours. He proposed to strip away m ost of the backstop, l eaving only a handful of bare-bones pro- visions, including borderless travel and a single electricity market, E.U. d iplomats said. The two sides met again Friday at Britain’s request. An E.U. diplomat said discussions focused on a British idea to avoid food safety controls o n the Irish border. E.U. diplomats have gotten the sense that continued talks are probably more for show than for substance. The lack of engage- ment by Johnson’s team on the core issues has led to puzzlement about his strategy. Does he genu-

inely want a deal but not have realistic ideas about how to get one? Or is it a bluff? Is he deliber- ately steering his country toward a Brexit without a safety net? European policymakers in- creasingly say that the answer is the latter, and that they worry about being set up to take the f all. One diplomat assessed that Johnson n eeds t o pretend negotiations are underway so he can blame t he E .U. for a ny f allout from a no-deal Brexit. But if Johnson negotiated in earnest, the details

— and the compromises — would quickly become public, sapping support from hardcore Brexit ad- vocates who are enthusiastic about leaving without a deal. “A s soon as the details of a deal leak, he’s going to lose the election,” t he diplomat said. Britain appears to be heading toward an early g eneral election i n coming weeks. Johnson is pressing for one ahead of a Brexit- focused summit of E.U. leaders that begins Oct. 17. He has argued that the British people should

have their say on who represents them at the meeting. He boasted Friday that he would be able to secure a new deal there through his “powers of p ersuasion.” But any agreement hammered out at the summit would almost surely come too late if Britain is leaving the E.U. on Oct. 31, Euro- pean officials said. Both the Brit- ish and t he E uropean parliaments would need to approve a deal, a process that is likely to take several weeks. E.U. officials said that if John- son — or any British leader — asked for a n extension beyond t he Oct. 31 deadline, he would almost surely receive one, if there was a clear rationale for it. Despite tough talk from Macron and others ahead of previous extensions this year, no E.U. leader wants to be responsible f or the chaos that is likely t o be unleashed by a no-deal Brexit, diplomats said. The British Parliament has leg- islated to postpone Brexit by an additional three months. Howev- er, Johnson said Thursday that he would “rather be dead in a ditch” than request f urther d elay. Even setting aside the uncer- tainty about events, there is deep skepticism in Europe that John-

son can be held to his word, and there are concerns about the health of Britain’s democracy. “A lot of the bridges have been burned. There is a real feeling within the E .U. that Britain cannot be trusted, because t he British system cannot be trusted,” s aid Fabi- an Zuleeg, the head of the Euro- pean Policy Center, a Brussels- based think tank. “It is difficult to imagine that any commitment that is made b y the leadership can be trusted, because we have seen in the l ast month h ow quickly that can c hange.” The problem, European officials say, is that the British discus- sion still bears little relationship to the reality of what the E.U. is willing to agree to. “Some members of the British Parliament are living in a fantasy world,” said Mulder, the Dutch lawmaker. “They want to be out- side the E uropean Union and k eep all the advantages. Which is im- possible. And if you live in this dream, then it is very difficult to negotiate, because it is not realistic.” [email protected]

Quentin Ariès contributed to this report.

State of Brexit negotiations astounds E.U. leaders

British prime minister has failed to come up with any ideas, they say, and his remarks on the talks bear little resemblance to reality

FRANCISCO SECO/ASSOCIATED PRESS Commuters, above, walk past the European Commission headquarters in Brussels on Thursday. Claims this week of “progress” in critical, last-minute Brexit negotiations by British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, below, left E.U. officials astounded. They say that after weeks of political wrangling, he has failed to follow through on any discussions.

U.S. sets limits on money Cuban Americans can send to family in Cuba

DANNY LAWSON/PA WIRE/POOL/REUTERS

The Washington Post - 07.09.2019

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