AMSTERDAM (Al Jazeera) – The Dutch central bank chief has apologized for the institution’s involvement in the 19th-century slave trade, the latest expression of contrition in the Netherlands linked to the country’s historic role in the trade in enslaved people. The apology came on Friday at an event on the country’s national day marking the Dutch abolishment of slavery and followed similar moves in recent years from municipal authorities in the main Dutch cities of Amsterdam, Rotterdam and Utrecht. De Nederlandsche Bank has acknowledged that it was involved in the transatlantic slave trade between 1814 and 1863 and even paid compensation to plantation owners when the Netherlands abolished slavery, including to members of the central bank’s board at the time. Klaas Knot, the president of the bank, told a gathering in Amsterdam: “Today, on behalf of De Nederlandsche Bank, I apologize for these reprehensible facts.” “I apologize to all those who, because of the personal choices of many, including my predecessors, were reduced to the color of their skin,” he said. The bank announced a series of measures including boosting diversity and inclusiveness in its ranks and setting up a five-million-euro ($5.2m) fund for projects aimed at reducing “contemporary negative effects of nineteenth-century slavery”.

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OTTAWA (Reuters) – The first in-person Canada Day celebrations in three years on Friday will include a huge police presence and street closures throughout downtown Ottawa to prevent anti-government “freedom” protesters from disrupting the festivities. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the free concerts and other activities usually held on the national holiday, which celebrates the founding of the country, were last held in 2019. Several groups are planning marches to protest coronavirus vaccination mandates, globalization and what they say is government overreach in Canada. Some of the same organizers were behind a truck convoy that blocked Ottawa’s downtown core around parliament for three weeks this past winter, causing a crisis that resulted in dozens of arrests. Separate protests during the same period snarled international travel and trade at border crossings. Earlier this week, Ottawa’s interim Police Chief Steve Bell said he expected hundreds of thousands of people to participate in the city’s celebrations, but he did not know how many people planned on joining the protests.

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MOSCOW (TASS/Reuters) – A multipolar world order is evolving globally now, Russian President Vladimir Putin says. “A multipolar system of international relations has been actively evolving. The process is irreversible, it has been unfolding in front of our eyes and it is objective in its nature,” Putin stated, addressing the 10th St. Petersburg International Legal Forum (SPBILF). “The position of Russia and many other countries is that this democratic, more just world order should be built on the basis of mutual respect and trust, and, of course, on the generally accepted principles of international law and the UN Charter,” he emphasized. Russia is ready to hold dialogue on strategic stability and the preservation of the modes of non-proliferation of the weapons of mass destruction (WMD), Putin noted. “Russia is open to dialogue on ensuring strategic stability, preserving the non-proliferation modes of the weapons of mass destruction and improving the situation in the sphere of arms control,” he continued.

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SEOUL (AP) – North Korea suggested Friday its COVID-19 outbreak began in people who had contact with balloons flown from South Korea. Activists for years have flown balloons across the border to distribute hundreds of thousands of propaganda leaflets critical of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, and North Korea has often expressed fury at the activists and at South Korea’s leadership for not stopping them. Ties between the Koreas remain strained amid a long-running stalemate in U.S.-led diplomacy on persuading North Korea to abandon its nuclear activities in return for economic and political benefits. The state media report said North Korea’s epidemic prevention center had found infection clusters in the town of Ipho near the southeastern border and that some Ipho residents with feverish symptoms traveled to Pyongyang. The center said an 18-year-old soldier and a 5-year kindergartener had contact with “alien things” in the town in early April and later tested positive for the omicron variant. In “an emergency instruction,” the epidemic prevention center ordered officials to “to vigilantly deal with alien things coming by wind and other climate phenomena and balloons” along the border and trace their sources to the last. It also stressed that anyone finding “alien things” must notify authorities immediately so they could be removed.
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LONDON (AP) – The World Health Organization’s Europe chief warned Friday that monkeypox cases in the region have tripled in the last two weeks and urged countries to do more to ensure the previously rare disease does not become entrenched on the continent. Dr. Hans Kluge said in a statement that increased efforts were needed despite the UN health agency’s decision last week that the escalating outbreak did not yet warrant being declared a global health emergency. “Urgent and coordinated action is imperative if we are to turn a corner in the race to reverse the ongoing spread of this disease,” Kluge said. To date, more than 5,000 monkeypox cases have been reported from 51 countries worldwide, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Kluge said the number of infections in Europe represents about 90 percent of the global total, noting that 31 countries in the WHO’s European region have now identified cases. Kluge said data reported to the WHO show that 99 percent of cases have been in men.