Hungary boat tragedy captain already under investigation over earlier accident

Yahoo – AFP, June 6, 2019

Candles have been lit close to the Danube in memory of the victims (AFP
Photo/ATTILA KISBENEDEK)

The captain of a river cruise ship involved in a deadly collision last week with a smaller sightseeing boat in Budapest is already under investigation over another accident in April, Hungarian prosecutors said Thursday, as the toll rose to 17.

After last week's crash, the 64-year-old Ukrainian captain of the larger Viking Sigyn ship was arrested on suspicion of "endangering waterborne traffic resulting in multiple deaths".

Hungarian press reports said the same man, named as Yuriy C., was being investigated over the collision of another Viking ship, the Idun, with a chemicals tanker near the Dutch city of Terneuzen on April 1.

"He is being treated as a suspect in Holland," the Metropolitan Chief Prosecutor's Office told AFP in a statement, citing information from the EU judicial agency Eurojust, but without confirming the incident they were referring to.

In a statement sent to AFP on Thursday, Viking said: "We can confirm that even though the captain of the Viking Sigyn was onboard the Viking Idun on April 1, he was not serving as the ship's captain at the time of the incident."

"We are unable to comment further while the investigations of both incidents are ongoing," the statement added.

At the time of the April collision, the Idun had 43 crew and 137 passengers on board. Several passengers were injured.

Dutch authorities are still investigating the circumstances of that collision.

Hungarian prosecutors also said Thursday that the captain was suspected of "deleting data from his telephone after the collision" in Budapest.

The captain's lawyers could not be reached for comment on Thursday but said in a statement issued last Friday that he was "devastated" by the accident and insisted that he did not make any errors.

Meanwhile the death toll rose to 17 after the bodies of two more South Korean tourists were identified, leaving 11 people still missing from the occupants of the Mermaid sightseeing vessel -- nine South Koreans and two Hungarian crew members.

The Mermaid overturned and sank on May 29 seconds after colliding with the Viking Sigyn on a busy stretch of the Danube river in the heart of Budapest.

Only seven people are known to have survived the accident.

Divers have been unable to enter the sunken boat due to the strong current in a river swollen after weeks of rain.

A barge carrying a crane powerful enough to lift the Mermaid arrived in Budapest Wednesday but was to remain docked in the north of the city until the river level subsides enough to allow it to pass under several bridges to reach the accident scene.

Experts said the crane was unlikely to begin the salvage operation before the weekend.

The Viking Sigyn left Budapest with a new captain last Friday but Seoul has reportedly asked Hungarian authorities to return the ship to Budapest for the duration of the investigation.

Uprooted tree leads Dutch police to major cocaine lab

Yahoo – AFP, June 6, 2019

Clean-up workers removing a tree uprooted by a storm noticed a chemical smell and
"suspicious" men walking about a nearby farmer's shed (AFP Photo/EMMANUEL DUNAND)

The Hague (AFP) - A tree uprooted during a storm in the Netherlands has led to the discovery of one of the largest cocaine laboratories in the country, police said on Thursday.

Clean-up workers were removing the tree after the storm early Thursday when they noticed a chemical smell and "suspicious" men walking about a nearby farmer's shed in the southern Dutch village of Oud-Vossenmeer.

"Police were called and agents discovered the laboratory in the shed," a police statement said, adding it was "one of the largest discovered to date in the country."

Police declined to say how much cocaine was found, but admitted taking the laboratory apart will take "several days."

No arrests were made, with the suspects having fled.

Record quantities of increasingly pure cocaine are being seized by European authorities, the EU drugs agency said in a report published on Thursday.

EU member states seized 140 tonnes of cocaine in 2017, the highest level ever recorded, with an average street price of 55 to 82 euros ($62-92) per gram in the EU, the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction (EMCDDA) said.

The purity of cocaine at street level reached its highest level in a decade in 2017, while its retail price has remained stable.

Belgium accounted for the highest proportion of cocaine seizures with 45 tonnes, followed by Spain with 41 tonnes.

An increase in trafficking via shipping containers is a "major challenge", the report said.

Swiss women strike for equal pay again, three decades on

Yahoo – AFP, Agnès PEDRERO, June 4, 2019

The organisers are calling on women to stop work whether they have paid 

employment or do housework at home (AFP Photo/Fabrice COFFRINI)

Geneva (AFP) - Nearly 30 years after staging a first nationwide strike for equal pay, women across Switzerland say they are preparing fresh action to push for wage parity next week.

On June 14, 1991 -- 10 years after equality between the sexes was enshrined in the Swiss constitution -- half a million women walked out of their workplaces or homes to protest persistent inequalities.

Three decades on, however, unions and rights groups say things have barely improved.

They are calling on Swiss women to join a fresh strike, again on June 14, to demand "more time, more money, more respect".

Women in Switzerland on average still make 20 percent less than men.

And for men and women with equal qualifications, the wage gap remains nearly eight percent, according to the national statistics office.

"Even if you take into account all of the regular excuses and you only compare women and men in the exact same position with the same professional experience, the fact remains that a woman in Switzerland is cheated out of 300,000 Swiss francs ($313,000, 266,000 euros) over the course of her career, just because she is a woman," Switzerland's largest union UNIA said in a statement last year.

Strikers will also be demanding zero tolerance for violence against women and more respect and better pay for women's work, including through the introduction of a minimum national salary.

The idea of another nationwide women's strike was born out of frustration at a bid to change the law to impose more oversight over salary distribution, which passed through the Swiss parliament last year

The final text only applied to companies with more than 100 employees -- affecting fewer than one percent of employers -- and failed to include sanctions for those that allow persistent gender pay gaps.

Swiss women are angry that, decades after the constitutional recognition of the 

equality of women, they are still not getting paid as much as men (AFP Photo/

Fabrice COFFRINI)

'Women work for free'

Organisers have called upon women to snub their jobs, and also housework, for the entire day to help raise awareness about the vital contribution women make across society.

"Really, the objective is to block the country with a feminist strike, a women's strike," activist Marie Metrailler told AFP.

For those women unable to take a full day, the organisers urge them to at least pack their things and go by 3:24 pm -- in recognition of the male-female pay disparity.

"After that, women work for free," said Anne Fritz, the main organiser of the strike and a representative of USS, an umbrella organisation that groups 16 Swiss unions.

Gaining recognition of women's rights has been a drawn-out process in Switzerland.

It was one of the last countries in Europe to grant women the right to vote, in 1971 -- and in the conservative Appenzell region women only won that right in 1991.

And while Switzerland did enshrine gender equality into its constitution in 1981, it took another 15 years before the law took effect.

"In 1991, we determined that... nothing was moving. So we went on strike," Geneva author Huguette Junod told AFP.

Around 500,000 women -- a high number in a country that at the time counted fewer than 3.5 million female inhabitants -- marched and organised giant picnics in the streets. Some women hung brooms from their balconies.

The large turnout was all the more remarkable given that work stoppages have been extremely rare in Switzerland since employers and unions signed the "Peace at Work" convention in 1937. It states that differences should be worked out through negotiation rather than strikes.

Junod, 76, recalls that many women were blocked from participating in 1991.

But, she said, "those who were not permitted to strike wore a fuchsia-coloured armband ... and took a longer break".

Women demonstrated on May 14 in Lausanne, a month ahead of the nationwide
action to press for equal pay (AFP Photo/Fabrice COFFRINI)

'Illegal'

Organisers are bracing for a repeat of that situation, for while the strike has some support, the employers' organisation flatly opposes it.

"This strike is illegal," Marco Taddei, one of the organisation's representatives, told AFP.

He stressed that the demands put forward "do not solely target working conditions", and that the constitution "stipulates that a strike can only be used as a last resort."

The unions disagree.

"What is illegal is wage discrimination and sexual harassment in the workplace," Fritz said.

Recognising that many women will not be able to get away from work, organisers have declared purple the colour to wear this time to show support for the strikers.

Over the past three decades, womens' rights advocates in Switzerland have made some gains. Abortion was legalised in 2002, and 2005 saw the introduction of 14 weeks of paid maternity leave.

But Switzerland still offers no paternity leave, and limited access to over-priced daycare is seen as a major hindrance to women's full participation in the world of work.

Switzerland "is very conservative on the question of women's rights," Eleonore Lepinard, a sociologist and associate professor of gender studies at Lausanne University, told AFP.

The authorities have yet to commit to collective policies on day-care and elderly care, which would make it easier for women to enter, remain and thrive in the workforce.

Women's forced absence from the workforce for years at a time "benefits men on the employment market and in terms of salaries", Lepinard said.

She hailed women's growing ability to speak up and make their grievances known.

The question, she said, is: "Do the politicians know how to listen?"

Related Article:

Dutch women football players to earn the same as men in 2023

Commission into French church sex abuse claims opens

Yahoo – AFP, Karine PERRET, June 3, 2019

France's Catholic bishops set up the commission under Jean-Marc Sauvé in
response to a series of scandals that shook the Church in the country and also
worldwideJean-Marc Sauvé (AFP Photo/JACQUES DEMARTHON)

Paris (AFP) - An independent commission set up by the French Catholic Church to look at allegations of sexual abuse by clerics begins its work on Monday by launching an appeal for witness statements.

France's Catholic bishops set up the commission last year in response to a number of scandals that shook the Church in the country and also worldwide.

It now has the task to shed light on sexual abuse committed by French clerics on minors or vulnerable individuals going right back to the 1950s.

"For the first time in France, an independent institution is going to launch, over the course of a year, an appeal for witness statements about sexual abuse," said commission president Jean-Marc Sauve.

He has promised that the commission -- made up of 22 legal professionals, doctors, historians, sociologists and theologians -- would deliver its conclusions by the end of 2020.

"It is an important action to be able to give victims psychological or legal help," he told AFP.

The commission opens after Pope Francis in May passed a landmark new measure to oblige those who know about sex abuse in the Catholic Church to report it to their superiors, a move which could bring countless new cases to light.

Sauve expects thousands of telephone calls to a special hotline as well as messages to an email address, with victims then offered face-to-face interviews in a later stage.

The Bishops' Conference of France agreed in November to set up the commission after scandals which shook the Catholic Church at home and abroad.

'Hopeful but concerned'

The move sparked mixed reactions from victims' associations, who applauded attempts to encourage survivors to speak out, but questioned the French government's willingness to act.

"I'm hopeful this will help to break the silence, but also concerned about whether anything will come of the commission's findings," said Veronique Garnier, who represents a group of victims invited by bishops to the southwestern pilgrimage town of Lourdes last autumn.

For Olivier Savignac, from the same association, "This is the first time that such a substantial consultation has been created and we're hoping to see a wave of victims come forward", he said.

"I hope that public authorities will consider this problem in all areas of society."

Francois Devaux, president of La Parole Liberee ("The Liberated Word") association agreed the project was "a step in the right direction" but doubted "if people who have been betrayed by authority will be inclined to testify".

"I'm worried that it'll be brushed under the carpet, like counselling services" set up in churches, he added, criticising the commission's failure to include survivors' representatives.

French cardinal Philippe Barbarin was handed a six-month suspended jail sentence in March for failing to report sex abuse by a priest under his authority.

Also in March, the Vatican's former number three, Australian Cardinal George Pell, was sentenced to six years in prison by a Melbourne court for the "brazen" sexual abuse of two choirboys.

Pope apologises to Roma for Catholic Church's 'discrimination'

Yahoo – AFP, Mihaela RODINA, 2 June 2019

Pope Francis met with members of the Roma community

Pope Francis apologised to the Roma people on Sunday for the Roman Catholic Church's "discrimination" against them as he wrapped up a visit to Romania.

Making up around 10 percent of Romania's 20 million people, many Roma are marginalised and live in poverty and have suffered centuries of discrimination and insults.

"I ask forgiveness ? in the name of the Church and of the Lord ? and I ask forgiveness of you. For all those times in history when we have discriminated, mistreated or looked askance at you," the pope said in a speech to the Roma community in the central town of Blaj.

"My heart, however, is heavy. It is weighed down by the many experiences of discrimination, segregation and mistreatment experienced by your communities. History tells us that Christians too, including Catholics, are not strangers to such evil," he said.

"Indifference breeds prejudices and fosters anger and resentment. How many times do we judge rashly, with words that sting, with attitudes that sow hatred and division!"

Earlier, the pontiff beatified seven Greco-Catholic bishops jailed and tortured during the Communist era.

Pope Francis, seen holding an icon, said the beatified Catholic bishops, victims of 

political oppression, were "shepherds, martyrs of faith" whose gifts to the Romanian 

people in the early days of Communist rule were "freedom and mercy"

"The new blessed ones suffered and sacrificed their lives, opposing a system of totalitarian and coercive ideology," he told some 60,000 worshippers attending mass on a "Field of Liberty" in Blaj.

"These shepherds, martyrs of faith, garnered for and left the Romanian people a precious heritage which we can sum up in two words: freedom and mercy," added Francis, while praising the "diversity of religious expression" in mainly Orthodox Romania.

Regime officials detained the beatified bishops overnight on October 28, 1948, accusing them of "high treason" after they refused to convert to Orthodoxy.

The Greek-Catholic Church was outlawed under 1948-89 Communist rule.

Buried in secret

The bishops died of maltreatment, some still in jail, others in confinement in an Orthodox monastery. They were then buried in secret -- to this day the whereabouts of four of their graves is unknown.

The bars of the cells where they were held were symbolically incorporated into the throne built specially for the papal visit.

The bishops followed the Eastern Rite Catholic Church which emerged from an Orthodox schism at the end of the 17th century when the central region of Transylvania was part of the Austro-Hungarian empire.

Romanian faithful in traditional dress turned out in their thousands to attend the pontiff's 

service in Blaj, notably home to thousands of Roma, a long marginalised community

While retaining Orthodox practices they recognised Roman Catholic papal authority -- unacceptable for the Communist regime which took power following World War II. Under a 1948 decree formally abolishing the Eastern Catholic churches, Greco-Catholics were forcibly obliged to return to the Orthodox fold.

Under such stark political repression, most Romanian Catholics -- who numbered more than 1.5 million in 1948, abandoned their faith and their community has shrunk to around 200,000 today in a country of 20 million, almost nine in 10 of whom profess Orthodoxy.

The politics which has seeped through Romania's modern religious history has poisoned inter-faith relations -- even if the papal visit has softened feelings to a degree.

"No matter where we go, to the town hall, to the police or to school, doors get closed," a 72-year-old Roma, who gave his name as Ion, told AFP.

Roma, originating from northern India, suffered around five centuries of slavery before the practice was formally abolished in 1856.

But they remain a mainly poor and marginalised community -- even if recent years have seen roads paved and homes getting running water and electricity.

A Romanian couple in Blaj hold a Vatican flag as they attend Pope Francis's mass

Seeking inclusiveness

Francis's arrival in Blaj to wind up his visit was part of his attempt at inclusiveness on his three-day visit to one of what remains Europe's poorest states.

Although Romania has developed apace since obtaining EU membership in 2007 there remain some "urban or rural ghettos where nothing has changed," according to sociologist Gelu Duminica, who heads the anti-discrimination Impreuna (Together) association.

Duminica and others in Blaj saw it as no coincidence that Francis, often seen as a defender of the rights of the most marginalised, chose the Barbu Lautaru district of Blaj, whose inhabitants are mainly Roma, to launch his appeal for tolerance and social inclusion.

"The pope's visit is a message for those who are marginalised, disregarded or not accepted by others," said Mihai Gherghel, an eastern Catholic priest, who supervised the construction of the Blaj church where Francis celebrated Sunday mass.

Pompeo attends secretive global meet in Switzerland

Yahoo – AFP, Francesco FONTEMAGGI, June 1, 2019

Pompeo told journalists he was staying so long in Switzerland as he is a "big
cheese and chocolate fan" (AFP Photo/Fabrice COFFRINI)

Bern (Switzerland) (AFP) - US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo will take part Saturday in a secretive meeting in Switzerland of global power brokers discreetly discussing issues like Brexit and the future of capitalism.

The State Department confirmed Saturday that Pompeo, who is on a four-nation tour of Europe, would take part in the four-day Bilderberg meeting, which kicked off on Thursday in the picturesque Swiss town of Montreux.

His participation had not been previously mentioned in the official agenda and he did not figure on the list of some 130 elites from 23 countries participating in the event.

Already on the list is US President Donald Trump's son-in-law and advisor Jared Kushner, who might use the forum to try to drum up support for his yet to be unveiled Middle East peace plan.

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg and elder statesman Henry Kissinger also figure on the list of participants, as do Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte, French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire and German Defence Minister Ursula von der Leyen.

The group, which has met every year since 1954 and was created as a forum for fostering dialogue between Europe and North America, is this year discussing a range of topics such as climate change, the future of capitalism, the ethics of Artificial Intelligence, China, Russia and Brexit, the organisers said.

The Trump administration has taken strong and controversial stances on a number of the topics on the agenda, including swelling tensions with Beijing, complex relations with Moscow and a more than sceptical attitude to calls to fight climate change.

The luxury hotel where the talks are taking place has placed high bushes all around 

its perimeters to keep the press at bay (AFP Photo/Fabrice COFFRINI)

Pompeo himself recently hailed that climate change was helping open new sea routes in the usually frozen Arctic.

The luxury hotel where the talks are taking place has placed high bushes all around its perimeters to keep the press at bay.

'Cheese and chocolate fan'

The participants are meanwhile held to the so-called Chatham House Rule, meaning that participants are free to use the information received, but may not reveal the identity nor the affiliation of the speaker.

The secretive nature of the group has given birth to conspiracy theories. Some have warned, for example, that Bilderberg is a group of rich and powerful kingmakers seeking to impose a one world government.

Pompeo arrived in Switzerland on Friday on the second leg of his European tour, following a stop in Berlin and before travelling on to The Hague and London.

On Saturday morning, he and his wife Susan had a guided tour of Bern's Old Town, and on Sunday he is due to meet with his Swiss counterpart Ignazio Cassis.

Asked why he chose to stay for so long in Switzerland -- from Friday afternoon through Monday morning, Pompeo told a group of journalists travelling with him that he is a "big cheese and chocolate fan".

Vengaboys head back to Ibiza with ‘protest’ hit in Austria

DutchNews, May 31, 2019

The Vengaboys in 2009. Photo: Violent Music via Wikimedia Commons

Dutch band Vengaboys chart topper We’re going to Ibiza, recorded 20 years ago, has become a number one hit in Austria after being used as a protest song. 

A video of the song was put online by German comedian Jan Böhmermann in the wake of a corruption scandal which involved deputy prime minister and leader of the right-wing FPÖ Heinz-Christian Strache. 

The politician, who has since stepped down, was set up to meet who he thought was a Russian investor in Ibiza and was filmed promising government contracts in exchange for electoral support. 

Wow, Going to Ibiza is #1 in Austria #ibizavideo

Hey @janboehm Did you make this happen?!https://t.co/grujlnjsuB pic.twitter.com/3q0hMbb705

— Vengaboys (@vengaboys) 21 mei 2019

The band, founded by DJs Wessel van Diepen and Dennis van den Driesschen, are now in great demand in Austria and performed at a protest meeting in Vienna earlier this week. 

The Vengaboys song is actually a version of Typically Tropical’s Barbados, which was a hit in 1975.

‘Vote for a woman campaign’ did the trick, 12 Dutch MEPs are female

DutchNews, May 29, 2019

Calls by campaigners for voters to give preference votes to women in last week’s European elections appear to have paid off, with three women leapfrogging other candidates to win seats in Brussels. 

Samira Rafaela from D66, Liesje Schreinemacher from the right-wing Liberal VVD and Kim van Sparrentak from GroenLinks have all been elected to the European parliament on the basis of preference votes.

Wat. Een. Weken. Super om alle reacties te zien. Net niet de 50 procent gehaald. Welke man geeft z’n zetel op 👀. Ik weet nog wel een vrouw die nu een zetel mist. https://t.co/cIBgE42w0C

— Devika 🐙 (@devikagauri) 28 mei 2019

‘What a week,’ said Devika Partiman, one of the campaign organisers, on Twitter. ‘Not quite the 50%, so which man is going to give up his place? I know a woman who missed a seat.’ 

Two of the successful woman overtook a man to win a seat, but Sparrentak’s seat is at the expense of another female candidate.

Why vote for a woman? The campaign trying to stir up politics 

The shift means 12 of the Netherlands’ 26 MEPs will be female when the new parliament is sworn in. 

Other female candidates, such as Kati Piri, number 4 on the PvdA list, also gathered enough preference votes to take a seat even if the party had only won three seats. In the event, the PvdA emerged as the largest Dutch party, with six MEPs.

Battered EU centre holds off populist surge in vote

Yahoo – AFP, Dave CLARK, May 27, 2019

21 countries voted on the final day of the European parliament elections (AFP Photo/
EMMANUEL DUNAND)

Brussels (AFP) - Europe's mainstream political parties took a hit in elections on Sunday but held off a strong surge by the populist right of Marine Le Pen, Matteo Salvini and Nigel Farage.

In one of the world's biggest democratic votes, the main centre-right and centre-left groups lost their combined majority in the European Parliament in the face of a challenge by eurosceptic and nationalist forces.

The symbolic clash of the campaign saw French far-right leader Le Pen's National Rally on course to come in just ahead of President Emmanuel Macron's centrist movement, damaging his drive for deeper European integration.

In Britain, Farage's one-issue Brexit Party appeared to have trounced the main parties and he will send a large contingent of British eurosceptics to a parliament they want to leave in a few months.

And in Italy, Salvini's far-right League achieved a similar result, strengthening its role at the core of a vocal populist faction in the EU's legislature.

European Parliament elections: projected number of seats per political group,
as of May 27 at 0130 GMT (AFP Photo/Paz PIZARRO)

The advance of the right was less pronounced in Germany -- where a strong showing by the Greens was reflected in a "green wave" in many countries -- but the anti-immigrant AfD broke the 10-percent barrier.

"We are facing a shrinking centre," said German conservative Manfred Weber, lead candidate for the centre-right European People's Party (EPP) to replace Jean-Claude Juncker as European Commission chief.

'Big win'

Turnout EU-wide was estimated at 51 percent, the highest in 20 years, suggesting more than 200 million citizens across the 28-nation bloc voted in a poll billed as a battle between populists and pro-European forces.

Across Europe, according to updated projections prepared by the parliament, the EPP is on course to have the most seats in the assembly with 179, down sharply from 216 in 2014.

With the centre-left Socialists and Democrats (S&D) projected to win 150, down from 185, the two mainstream parties will no longer have a majority and will have to reach out to liberals to maintain a "cordon sanitaire" and exclude the far-right from decision making.

Brexit Party chief Nigel Farage has rejected any tie-up with France's Le Pen
(AFP Photo/Ben STANSALL)

The Liberals (ALDE), who include Macron's party, are on course for 107 seats against 69 previously while the Greens are forecast to take 70 seats, up from 52.

The various populist, eurosceptic and right-wing parties won more than 150 seats, but form no coherent coalition.

The Europe of Nations and Freedom -- composed mainly of the French National Rally and Salvini's League -- saw their share rise from 37 to 58 seats.

Salvini tweeted a photo of himself with a sign saying "top party in Italy" while standing in front of a bookshelf featuring a Make America Great Again baseball cap and a picture of Vladimir Putin.

The Europe for Freedom and Direct Democracy -- which includes Britain's Brexit Party -- went from 42 seats to 56.

"It looks like it's going to be a big win for the Brexit Party," Farage said, after an election held against a backdrop of disarray including the resignation of Prime Minister Theresa May and the postponement of Britain's EU exit.

Extreme-right parties in western Europe (AFP Photo/)

'Save the EU' 

Each previous EU election since the first in 1979 has seen turnout fall, but turnout figures from across the 28-nation bloc were up, suggesting this year's culture clash has mobilised both populists and those who oppose them.

In Belgium, the far-right Flemish separatist Vlaams Belang was on course to triple its previous score.

And in Finland, the far-fight Finns Party increased its vote share and retained its two EU seats. The Sweden Democrats were on course to increase their share from 9.67 to 16.9 percent.

Dutch anti-Islam leader Geert Wilders was however set to lose all his Freedom Party's seats, although there was a strong showing by upstart populist Thierry Baudet.

In his home country of Poland, European Council chief Donald Tusk expressed confidence that voters would not succumb to "radical political movements" but admitted that the priority was to "save the EU as a project".

Turnout EU-wide was estimated at 51 percent, the highest in 20 years, in a poll 

billed as a battle between populists and pro-European forces (AFP Photo/JOHN THYS)

In France, Macron had taken it upon himself to act as a figurehead for the centrist and liberal parties, and Le Pen took up the 41-year-old's challenge.

"It is up to the president of the republic to draw conclusions, he who put his presidential credit on the line in this vote in making it a referendum on his policies and even his personality," Le Pen said.

An aide to Macron however said the result was "respectable", with exit polls showing his centrist alliance on 22.5-23.0 percent, just behind Le Pen's 24-24.2 percent.

Another nationalist party, the Fidesz of Hungary's Prime Minister Viktor Orban, was on course for a massive 56 percent victory, according to a poll conducted Sunday.

French President Emmanuel Macron, seen with his wife Brigitte, will try to form a 

broad centrist coalition within the EU parliament (AFP Photo/Philippe HUGUEN)

The mainstream parties are vying between themselves for influence over the choice of a new generation of top EU officials, including Tusk and Juncker's replacements.

EU leaders have been invited to a summit on Tuesday to decide how to choose the nominee. The EPP is insisting on Weber for the Commission, but Macron and some others want a higher-profile candidate.

Environmentalist parties have seen record gains in the EU elections as the conservative EPP and centre left Social democrats seem likely to lose ground, setting the stage for the Greens to end up as kingmaker in the European Parliamenthttps://t.co/JsYDZACdgl pic.twitter.com/NB4NAQLCje

— AFP news agency (@AFP) 26 mei 2019

Ireland votes overwhelmingly to relax strict divorce law

Yahoo – AFP, May 26, 2019

The outcome of Friday's referendum will also see Irish lawmakers granted powers to
recognise foreign divorces once it is signed into law by the president (AFP Photo/PAUL FAITH)

Dublin (AFP) - Ireland voted by an overwhelming majority to relax its constitutional restriction on divorce, results showed Sunday, the latest in a series of reforms to modernise the charter of the once devoutly Catholic nation.

Some 82 percent of voters cast their ballots in favour of removing a provision requiring couples to live separately for four out of the previous five years before dissolving their marriage.

The Irish government has signalled it will bring forward new legislation shortening the requirement to two out of the prior three years.

At present Irish divorce law is regarded as among the most restrictive in Europe.

It is thought to be responsible for the republic having the lowest separation rate of any EU member state, according to 2015 figures from the country's Central Statistics Office.

The outcome of Friday's referendum will also see Irish lawmakers granted powers to recognise foreign divorces once it is signed into law by the president.

The mandated separation period was a hangover condition from the 1995 referendum which granted Irish couples the right to divorce by a slim majority of 50.3 percent.

Campaigners said it placed an unfair emotional and financial burden on couples and families at a time when Irish rental and property prices are spiking.

The result of the vote comes one year on from the day when 66 percent of voters cast referendum ballots in favour of repealing the republic's constitutional ban on abortion.

While the result of that vote was hailed by crowds in jubilant scenes in Dublin Castle, Sunday's result was announced without fanfare.

In October of last year voters also chose to lift a rarely enforced -- and oft ridiculed -- constitutional ban on blasphemy.

A further referendum to excise or alter the constitutional article referring to the "woman's life within the home" is expected to be brought forward soon.

The turnout in the referendum, which took place alongside EU elections, was 51 percent.