BARCELONA (AFP) -- Prosecutors in Catalonia ordered police Tuesday to seize ballot boxes, election flyers or any item that could be used in a banned independence referendum called by the Spanish region’s separatist executive.
The chiefs of the Guardia Civil and National Police forces, and of the Mossos d’Esquadra -- a regional squad controlled by the Catalan government -- were called to the prosecutor’s office in Barcelona.
They were then ordered to take action against authorities, civil servants or individuals "to avoid offences being committed,” prosecutors said in a statement after the meeting.
Under Spanish law, prosecutors have the power to give instructions to judicial police forces in investigating offences, as do judges.
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BRUSSELS (Reuters) -- Eastern European Union states must drop their resistance and accept their share of refugees who arrived in the bloc, officials and diplomats said on Tuesday after a court ruled they must abide by the quota.
The EU’s highest court ruled last week that member states must take in a share of refugees who reach Europe, dismissing complaints by Slovakia and Hungary and reigniting an east-west row that has shaken the bloc’s cohesion.
Brussels and other capitals hope member states will respect the European Court of Justice (ECJ) ruling.
Poland and Hungary are opposed to accepting anybody, their reluctance shared by ex-communist peers Slovakia and the Czech Republic, who have, however, accepted a handful of people under a 2015 EU scheme designed to move 160,000 from Italy and Greece.
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GENEVA, Switzerland (AFP) -- More than half the world’s refugee children - some 3.5 million altogether - do not attend school, the UN refugee agency said Tuesday, urging greater and steadier funding for their education.
"Some 3.5 million didn’t get a single day” of school last year from among the 6.4 million children aged between five and 17 who were under the care of the UNHCR last year, the agency said in a report.
It was only a slight improvement over the previous year, when the figure was 3.7 million, said the report titled "Left Behind: Refugee Education in Crisis.”
"The education of these young refugees is crucial to the peaceful and sustainable development of the places that have welcomed them, and to the future prosperity of their own countries,” UNHCR chief Filippo Grandi said in the report.
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ROME (AFP) -- At least eight people died in flooding after violent rains lashed the Tuscan city of Livorno over the weekend, Italian rescue services said Tuesday.
The body of a 67-year-old man, who had been reported missing since Sunday, was found Tuesday, while the body of a 34-year-old woman had been found the day before.
Heavy rainstorms swept across the country overnight from Saturday to Sunday, with Livorno bearing the brunt of the flooding.
Four people from the same family were found dead in a flooded house in the city Sunday, where 40 centimeters of rainfall in four hours transformed streets into rivers and washed away cars. A fifth body was later found in an area devastated by landslides, while a sixth was found in a nearby hilltop neighborhood.
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PHNOM PENH (Reuters) -- The U.S. ambassador to Cambodia rejected government accusations of interference as "inaccurate, misleading and baseless” Tuesday, and called for the immediate release of opposition leader Kem Sokha.
The government of Prime Minister Hun Sen has charged Kem Sokha with treason, accusing him of conspiring to take power with the help of the United States, which has become an increasing target of Hun Sen’s rhetoric.
"On dozens of occasions over the past year, the United States has been subject to intentionally inaccurate, misleading and baseless accusations,” Ambassador William Heidt said in a statement. "All of the accusations you have heard in recent weeks about the United States - every one of them - are false,” he said.
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ATHENS (AFP) -- Emergency crews Tuesday scrambled to contain an oil spill near Athens after a tanker sank close to Salamis island over the weekend, the coastguard said.
The coastguard said an entire bay on the southeast of the island had been affected after the Agia Zoni II carrying 2.5 metric tons of fuel sank.
The spill extends over 1.5 kilometers and the full cleanup will likely require four months, greater Athens fisheries councilor Voula Toutountzi told the capital’s municipal radio.
It was not immediately clear what caused the sinking late Sunday. Weather conditions in the area were mild at the time.