LONDON (AP) — European Union regulators said Tuesday they're investigating whether TikTok breached the bloc's digital rulebook by failing to deal with risks to Romania's presidential election, which has been thrown into turmoil over allegations of electoral violations and Russian meddling.
The European Commission is escalating its scrutiny of the popular video-sharing platform after Romania's top court canceled results of the first round of voting that resulted in an unknown far-right candidate becoming the front-runner.
The court made its unprecedented decision after authorities in the European Union and NATO member country declassified documents alleging Moscow organized a sprawling social media campaign to promote a long shot candidate, Calin Georgescu.
“Following serious indications that foreign actors interfered in the Romanian presidential elections by using TikTok, we are now thoroughly investigating whether TikTok has violated the Digital Services Act by failing to tackle such risks,” European Commission president Ursula on der Leyen said in a press release. “It should be crystal clear that in the EU, all online platforms, including TikTok, must be held accountable.”
The European Commission is the 27-nation EU's executive arm and enforces the bloc's Digital Services Act, a sweeping set of regulations intended to clean up social media platforms and protect users from risks such as election-related misinformation. It ordered TikTok earlier this month to retain all information related to the election.
In the preliminary round of voting on Nov. 24 Georgescu was an outsider among the 13 candidates but ended up topping the polls. He was due to face a pro-EU reformist rival in a runoff before the court canceled the results.
The declassified files alleged that there was an “aggressive promotion campaign” to boost Georgescu's popularity, including payments worth a total of $381,000 to TikTok influencers to promote him on the platform.
TikTok said it has “protected the integrity" of its platform over 150 elections around the world and is continuing to address these “industry-wide challenges.”
“TikTok has provided the European Commission with extensive information regarding these efforts, and we have transparently and publicly detailed our robust actions,” it said in a statement.
The commission said its investigation will focus on TikTok's content recommendation systems, especially on risks related to “coordinated inauthentic manipulation or automated exploitation." It's also looking at TikTok's policies on political advertisements and “paid-for political content."
TikTok said it doesn't accept paid political ads and "proactively" removes content for violating policies on misinformation.
The investigation could result in TikTok making changes to fix any problems, or in fines worth up to 6% of the company's total global revenue.
A TikTok sign is displayed on top of their building in Culver City, Calif., on Tuesday, Dec. 3, 2024. (AP Photo/Richard Vogel)
A man waves the Romanian flag outside the closed voting station where Calin Georgescu, an independent candidate for president who won the first round of presidential elections, was supposed to vote, after Romania's Constitutional Court annulled the first round of presidential elections, in Mogosoaia, Romania, Sunday, Dec. 8, 2024. (AP Photo/Andreea Alexandru)
An Israeli strike in Gaza killed at least eight people from the same family, most of them women and children, Palestinian medics said Tuesday.
The strike late Monday hit a house in Gaza City’s central neighborhood of Daraj, according to the Health Ministry’s ambulance and emergency service.
Among the bodies recovered from the rubble were a father and his three children, and the children’s grandmother, according to a casualty list obtained by The Associated Press. There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military on the strike.
Israeli bombardment and offensives in Gaza have killed more than 45,000 Palestinians over the past 14 months, according to the Gaza Health Ministry. The ministry’s tally does not distinguish between combatants and civilians, but it says more than of half the dead were women and children.
Israel launched its campaign in retaliation for Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack on southern Israel in which militants killed some 1,200 people and abducted 250 others, around 100 of whom remain in captivity.
Here's the latest:
TEHRAN, Iran — Iran's supreme leader said that Israel is wrong to believe that it can eradicate Hezbollah in Lebanon and that an “axis of resistance” of Tehran's allies in the region was not finished.
State TV quoted Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as saying during a recent meeting on the occasion of Women’s Day that “the Zionist regime, in its delusion, believes it is preparing itself through Syria to encircle and eradicate Hezbollah forces, but the one that will be eradicated is Israel.”
Khamenei also added that Israel and the United States“thought the issue of resistance was over. They are gravely mistaken.”
Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei meanwhile said Iran will use every opportunity to mobilize regional and international community to stop what he called Israeli aggression against neighboring countries like Syria, Yemen and others.
He also said that the Syrian people are the only who can decide on their country's future after the fall of President Bashar Assad, a Tehran ally. “Naturally, the regional countries should assist in this process without any destructive interference or any form of pressure and threats against the political actors in Syria.”
Baghaei urged regional countries to put pressure on the U.N. Security Council to stop Israel’s occupation in Syria and said, “Ultimately, the entire occupied Golan Heights of Syria must be liberated.”
Israeli troops have seized a border buffer zone, sparking condemnation, with critics accusing Israel of violating the 1974 ceasefire and possibly exploiting the chaos in Syria for a land grab. Israel captured the Golan Heights in the 1967 Mideast war and annexed it, though the international community except for the U.S. regards it as occupied.
ANKARA, Turkey — European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced on Tuesday an additional 1 billion euros for Turkey to help it support millions of Syrian refugees.
Speaking after a meeting with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the Turkish capital, von der Leyen said the funding would help with health care and education for refugees, as well as migration and border management, including voluntary returns of Syrian refugees. She said the funds could be adjusted to meet needs that may arise as the situation in Syria evolves.
Erdogan said both Turkey and the EU agree on the need to establish an inclusive government in Syria following the ouster of President Bashar Assad.
“We saw that we agree on the establishment of a participatory administration, especially on the preservation of Syria’s sovereignty and territorial integrity,” Erdogan said.
He reiterated Turkey’s strong opposition to the presence in Syria of the Islamic State group or of Syrian Kurdish militia that Ankara considers to be terrorists.
“We will absolutely not allow these organizations to grow. There is no place for either the IS or the PKK and its derivatives in the future of our region,” Erdogan said, in reference to Syrian Kurdish groups that are linked to the banned Kurdistan Workers’ Party, PKK.
Von der Leyen emphasized the need to stay alert against the “real” threat of the reemergence of IS in Syria. She acknowledged Turkey’s security concerns but said it was important to ensure that all minorities are safe, an apparent reference to Syrian Kurds.
The Turkish leader accused the international community of failing to provide adequate support to Syrians during the long civil war. “It is now possible to compensate for this. The way to do this is to support Syria’s construction and development efforts,” he said.
GENEVA — A U.N.-backed team investigating years of crimes in war-torn Syria says it has reached out to its new government and hopes to deploy to help gather and preserve evidence on the ground -- in hopes of bringing torturers, killers and other war criminals to justice one day.
Robert Petit, head of the international, impartial and independent mechanism on Syria, said its team has reason to believe that mass graves exist across Syria, but exhumation, DNA collection and tests for cause of death require “a lot of resources.”
He provided no further details about any such mass graves.
Petit said the government of former President Bashar Assad, who fled Syria on Dec. 8, didn’t cooperate with his team, and the change of authority offers a chance to establish the fates of “tens of thousands of people” who died and suffered under his rule.
The investigators, following Assad’s downfall, have told Syrian authorities of “our willingness to engage and to go to Syria to fulfill our mandate,” he said. “We are awaiting a response. And as soon as that response is forthcoming, we will deploy.”
A “monitoring cell” on the U.N.-backed team has collected recent images from social media, he said, while its sources on the ground have been able to collect new evidence and testimonies in the wake of Assad’s ouster.
The mechanism was created in 2016 by the U.N. General Assembly to collect, preserve, consolidate and analyze evidence of “serious crimes” committed in Syria since the civil war erupted in March 2011, Petit said. A U.N.-backed Commission of Inquiry is doing similar work.
BRUSSELS — The European Union plans to reopen its office in Damascus following “constructive first contacts” between an envoy and Syria’s new representatives, the bloc’s top diplomat said on Tuesday.
“We are ready to reopen our delegation, which is the European embassy, and we want this to be fully operational,” EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas told EU lawmakers.
A diplomat from Beirut was dispatched to Damascus on Monday for talks with representatives of the new leadership and civil society in Syria.
Kallas described it as “a very important step” that would allow for “really constructive engagement and to have the input and information from the ground as well.”
After talks in Turkey with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said the EU also wants to “enhance our engagement in early recovery, including basic services like electricity and water and infrastructure.”
LONDON — British diplomats have met the leader of the militant group that toppled Syrian leader Bashar Assad.
Photographs posted by the group on social media showed senior officials, including the U.K. special representative for Syria, Ann Snow, meeting Hayat Tahrir al-Sham leader Ahmad al-Sharaa, formerly known as Mohammed al-Golani, in Damascus on Monday.
Foreign Secretary David Lammy confirmed Monday that Britain had sent “a delegation of senior U.K. officials to Damascus this week for meetings with the new Syrian authorities and members of civil society groups.”
Britain, along with the U.S. and other countries, classifies HTS, a former al-Qaida affiliate, as a terrorist organization. U.K. officials have suggested they may reconsider that designation, but have not given a timeline. They say British officials can still talk to HST in the meantime.
In an interview with the Times of London newspaper, Al-Sharaa urged the West to lift sanctions and said Israel should stop its strikes on Syria.
“We do not want any conflict whether with Israel or anyone else and we will not let Syria be used as a launchpad for attacks,” he was quoted as saying. “The Syrian people need a break, and the strikes must end and Israel has to pull back to its previous positions.”
DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip — An Israeli strike in Gaza killed at least eight people from the same family, most of them women and children, Palestinian medics said Tuesday.
The strike late Monday hit a house in Gaza City’s central neighborhood of Daraj, according to the Health Ministry’s ambulance and emergency service.
Rescuers recovered the bodies of eight people including two women and four children from under the rubble, it said. Among the dead were a father and his three children, and the children’s grandmother, according to a casualty list obtained by The Associated Press.
There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military on the strike.
BERLIN — Germany says its diplomats will hold their first talks on Tuesday with the new Syrian government installed by the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group, or HTS.
The Foreign Ministry in Berlin said the talks will center on an “inclusive transition process” in Syria and the protection of minorities. The German delegation also plans to sound out the possibility of a German diplomatic presence in Damascus, and will meet representatives of Christian communities among others.
The ministry said in a statement that “we know where HTS comes from and know its origins in al-Qaida ideology,” and said that Germany is watching the activities of the group and the interim government closely.
“As far as can be said at all at this point, they are acting prudently so far,” it added. “Like our international partners, we will measure them by their actions. Any cooperation requires that ethnic and religious minorities be protected and women’s rights respected.”
The U.S. has already said that its officials have been in direct contact with HTS.
Germany has been a leading destination for Syrian refugees over the past decade.
DAMASCUS, Syria — A U.S.-backed force in Syria says U.S.-led mediation efforts have failed to reach a permanent truce in Syria's north between the force's fighters and Turkish-backed gunmen.
The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces said the failure to end the fighting in the northern areas of Manbij and Kobani were unsuccessful due to Turkey’s unwillingness to accept key points.
“Despite U.S. efforts to stop the war, Turkey and its mercenary militias have continued to escalate over the last period,” the SDF said.
The failure of the mediation is expected to lead to a new round of fighting between the SDF and the Turkey-backed Syrian National Army in the areas of Kobani.
CAIRO — The U.S. military on Tuesday said it bombed a Houthi military facility in Yemen’s capital, Sanaa, the latest U.S.-led attack on the Iranian-backed rebels.
The Houthi media office said the strike hit part of the sprawling complex that houses the rebels’ Defense Ministry. There were no immediate reports of casualties.
U.S. Central Command said the strike late Monday targeted a key command and control facility that was “a hub for coordinating Houthi operations,” including attacks on U.S. Navy and merchant vessels in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden.
Houthis have targeted dozens of merchant vessels with missiles and drones since the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza started in October last year. They have seized one vessel and sunk two in the campaign, which has killed four sailors.
The rebels have maintained that they target ships linked to Israel, the U.S. or the United Kingdom to force an end to Israel’s campaign against Hamas in Gaza. However, many of the ships attacked have little or no connection to the conflict, including some bound for Iran.
Monday’s U.S. strike came hours after the Houthis said they fired a hypersonic ballistic missile toward Israel. The Houthi missile triggered sirens across the Tel Aviv metropolitan area.
The Israeli military said it intercepted the missile outside Israel’s borders. However, shrapnel that the military said was likely from an Israeli interceptor missile fell on the roof of a home in east Jerusalem.
Members from Bashar Assad's Syrian army period line up to register with Syrian rebels as part of a "identification and reconciliation process" at a army compound in Latakia, Syria, Tuesday Dec. 17, 2024.(AP Photo/Leo Correa)
Members of Bashar Assad's army or pro-government militias line up to register with Syrian rebels as part of an "identification and reconciliation" process at an army compound in Latakia, Syria, Tuesday, Dec. 17, 2024. (AP Photo/Leo Correa)
An Israeli Air Force Black Hawk helicopter flies over Mount Hermon near the so-called Alpha Line that separates the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights from Syria, viewed from the town of Majdal Shams, Tuesday, Dec. 17, 2024. (AP Photo/Matias Delacroix)
Israeli soldiers stand on an armoured vehicle after crossing the security fence along the so-called Alpha Line that separates the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights from Syria, in the town of Majdal Shams, Tuesday, Dec. 17, 2024. (AP Photo/Matias Delacroix)
A Palestinian, wounded in the Israeli bombardment of the Gaza Strip, arrives at the Al-Aqsa Hospital in Deir al-Balah, Monday, Dec. 16, 2024. (AP Photo/Abdel Kareem Hana)
Palestinians, wounded in the Israeli bombardment of the Gaza Strip, receive treatment at the Al-Aqsa Hospital in Deir al-Balah, Monday, Dec. 16, 2024. (AP Photo/Abdel Kareem Hana)
