Livestream
Special Interview
Video Streaming
24
January

AXCCRVGFPFJJVDHACIKPAVNGPE.jpg

 

 

The White House on Tuesday nominated a special envoy for human rights in North Korea, moving to fill a post that has been empty since 2017 amid debate over how rights issues fit with efforts to counter Pyongyang's nuclear weapons programme.

President Joe Biden nominated Julie Turner, a long-time diplomat and current director of the Office of East Asia and the Pacific in the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor at the Department of State, the White House said in a statement.

She speaks Korean and has previously worked on North Korean human rights as a special assistant in the envoy's office, the statement said.

The special envoy position - and a similar one in South Korea - had become controversial as preceding administrations tried to bring North Korea to the negotiating table. Some activists said human rights had been shunted aside in favour of national security priorities.

Biden vowed repeatedly after taking office in 2021 that human rights would be at the centre of his foreign policy, but the position had remained vacant.

South Korea's ambassador on North Korean human rights expressed disappointment last year that Biden's administration had yet to appoint an envoy for the issue at the time.

North Korea has repeatedly rejected accusations of human rights abuses and blames sanctions for a dire humanitarian situation. It accuses Washington and Seoul of using the issue as a political tool to smear Pyongyang's reputation.

A landmark 2014 U.N. report on North Korean human rights concluded that North Korean security chiefs - and possibly leader Kim Jong Un himself - should face justice for overseeing a state-controlled system of Nazi-style atrocities.

Since then, North Korea's coronavirus curbs have aggravated human rights violations, United Nations investigators have said, citing extra restrictions on access to information, tighter border security and heightened digital surveillance. (Reuters)

24
January

XTKQWCYRAVNNVFG3ZZD3OKTKAQ.jpg

 

 

The United Nations' aid chief visited Kabul on Monday and raised concerns over women's education and work with the Taliban administration's acting minister of foreign affairs, an Afghan ministry statement said.

The Taliban-run administration last month ordered NGOs not to allow most female employees to work, prompting many aid agencies to partially suspend operations in the midst of a humanitarian crisis unfolding during a bitterly cold winter.

U.N. Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Martin Griffiths raised the issue of women's education and work and how this affected the U.N.'s operations, according to a ministry of foreign affairs statement.

Speaking generally about Griffiths's visit to Afghanistan, U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric said Griffiths would engage the Taliban administration "with the same message that we've been delivering since the beginning on the need to to rollback the policies that were put in place" on women.

He said Griffiths would "underscore the message that humanitarian aid cannot be delivered without women."

Griffiths's travel follows a visit to Afghanistan last week by U.N. Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed, who expressed alarm to Taliban officials in Kabul and the southern city of Kandahar over the administration's orders restricting women from work and education.

Acting Afghan Minister of Foreign Affairs Amir Khan Muttaqi said he asked Griffiths to share with the international community the Taliban administration's "achievements and opportunities" like a general amnesty for former opponents, "instead of complaints and shortcomings."

The foreign ministry statement said Griffiths had acknowledged security had improved in the country, which had seen decades of fighting before the Taliban took over as foreign troops withdrew in 2021.

No foreign government has formally recognised the Taliban administration since it seized power, with some diplomats saying it must change course on women's rights. Many countries have expressed major concerns over most girls and women over the age of 12 being stopped from attending school or university.

Enforcement of sanctions and a cut in development aid have contributed to the country falling into an economic crisis which has left more than half the population dependent on humanitarian aid, aimed at meeting urgent needs. (reuters)

24
January

775NLN7LSBKIZI57Z24XSW4V7M.jpg

 

 

Pakistan's energy minister on Tuesday blamed the worst power outage in months on a lack of investment in the network, saying the aid-dependant nation had "learned lessons" from the breakdown that left millions of people without electricity.

Like much of the national infrastructure, the power network desperately needs an upgrade, but funding has been patchy as Pakistan lurched from one International Monetary Fund bailout to the next. The outage, which began on Monday morning, was the second major breakdown since October.

"We learned lessons from yesterday that we need to invest in the distribution system," Energy Minister Khurram Dastgir told reporters as he announced that power had been fully restored to the nation of nearly 220 million people.

"There hasn't been any investment in improving these systems from the previous government," he added.

The International Monetary Fund has bailed out Pakistan five times in the last two decades. Its latest bailout tranche, however, is stuck due to differences with the government over a programme review that should have been completed in November.

Pakistan has enough installed power capacity to meet demand, but the sector is so heavily in debt that it cannot afford to invest in infrastructure and power lines. Analysts say transmission and distribution are the weakest links.

China has invested in its power sector as part of a $60 billion infrastructure scheme that feeds into its "Belt and Road" initiative, but details of this investment are unclear.

Dastgir said the cause of the outage was not yet known, but the ministry was conducting a safety audit of the entire network. "The government plans to add more power distribution lines within the next 36 months," he added.

Millions of Pakistanis suffer partial blackouts almost daily, including scheduled "load shedding" power outs aimed at conserving electricity.

Many take these disruptions in their stride, investing in generators and solar panels to generate their own power, but the frail infrastructure also takes its toll. "Without electricity, we can't do anything," said Sara Khan, the principal of a school for girls in Jacobabad, a southern city which regularly goes up to 18 hours a day without power. "The people are facing too many difficulties because of the power cuts." (reuters)

24
January

FB_IMG_1674480027682.jpg

 

 

 

Indonesia and Kenya will soon form a joint task force to strengthen bilateral relations and cooperation between the two countries, an Indonesian top minister said on Monday. 

Coordinating Minister for Maritime Affairs and Investment Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan in his personal Instagram account said the joint task force will discuss cooperation on three main areas: trade and investment, mining, and strategic defense.

He was in Kenya after attending the World Economic Forum (WEF) Annual Meeting 2023 in Davos, Switzerland.

During his visit to the East African country, Pandjaitan conveyed President Joko Widodo’s congratulations to William Ruto, who has been elected as the President of the Republic of Kenya, and discussed several commitments and agreements.

He emphasized that those commitments and agreements were made to strengthen bilateral relations and cooperation to benefit the two countries.

"I also explained that Indonesia's current vast wealth of natural resources has been allocated effectively to push sustainable development in various sectors," he said.

Among the sectors are renewable energy, mining, electric vehicle ecosystem, pharmaceuticals, defense and strategy, and digitizing public services and port operations.

"We conveyed that Indonesia is ready to share its experiences and best practices with Kenya in all of those sectors," the minister added.

He expressed the hope that his working visit to Kenya would strengthen relations between the two nations, especially since Kenya is one of the countries in East Africa that has had good relations with Indonesia since 1955.

The relations between the two countries were strengthened by the opening of the Indonesian Embassy in Nairobi in 1982 and the Kenyan Embassy in Jakarta in 2022.

"Hopefully, with this visit, the relations between Indonesia and Kenya can become stronger," he remarked. (antaranews)