Tabanovce, Macedonia / AFP Mohamad Jomaa breathlessly recounts his covert journey from Greece to Macedonia: a 10-day trek through the mountains, getting robbed by local “mafia” and handing over costly bribes to police. While the so-called “Balkan route” is now officially closed to migrants, hundreds are still finding ways to cross it every day—whether furtively by foot or in …

  Brussels / AFP NATO foreign ministers met on Thursday to finalise the alliance’s biggest military build-up since the end of the Cold War to counter what they see as a more aggressive and unpredictable Russia. At a Warsaw summit in July, NATO leaders will sign-off on the revamp which puts more troops into east European member states as part …

  MOSCOW / AP A Russian artist known for his radical politically-charged performances has been convicted of vandalism in a pro-Ukraine protest and sentenced to 16 months in prison. The court, however, lifted the punishment for Pyotr Pavlensky in Thursday’s ruling on the grounds that the statute of limitations had expired for his pro-Ukraine protest in 2014. Pavlensky and a …