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June
S.Korea to provide $1 mln in humanitarian aid to earthquake-hit Afghanistan
Written by Nur Yasmin
South Korea plans to provide $1 million in humanitarian assistance to victims of an earthquake in Afghanistan that killed 1,000 people, Seoul's foreign ministry said on Thursday.
The magnitude 6.1 earthquake struck early on Wednesday about 160 km (100 miles) southeast of Kabul in arid mountains dotted with small settlements near the border with Pakistan. (Reuters)
June
WHO eyes decision on monkeypox 'emergency', Africa says it's long overdue
Written by Nur Yasmin
The World Health Organization will decide on Thursday whether to declare monkeypox a global health emergency, stirring criticism from leading African scientists who say it has been a crisis in their region for years.
The deliberations and scrutiny of the WHO's response to the outbreak follows concerns over how the United Nations agency and governments worldwide handled COVID-19 in early 2020.
A "public health emergency of international concern" is WHO's highest level of alert. The agency does not declare pandemics, but it did start using the term to describe COVID-19 in March 2020.
For many governments, that - rather than WHO's earlier declaration of an emergency in January - was the moment they began to take real action to try to contain COVID, which proved to be too late to make a difference.
Monkeypox does not spread nearly as easily as COVID and there are vaccines and treatments available, unlike for the coronavirus when it emerged. But it has still raised alarm.
The case count from the current outbreak outside of Africa has topped 3,000 in more than 40 countries, according to a Reuters tally - largely among men who have sex with men - since it was first reported in May. There have been no reports of deaths.
The viral disease, which causes flu-like symptoms and skin lesions, is endemic in parts of Africa. The continent has registered just over 1,500 suspected cases since the start of 2022, of which 66 have been fatal, according to official data.
"When a disease affects developing countries, it is (apparently) not an emergency. It only becomes an emergency when developed countries are affected," said Professor Emmanuel Nakoune, acting director of the Institut Pasteur in Bangui, Central African Republic, who is running a trial of a monkeypox treatment.
Still, Nakoune said that if the WHO declares an emergency in the case of monkeypox, it would still be an important step.
"If there is the political will to share equitably the means of response between developed and developing countries..., each country will be able to benefit," he said.
At an online briefing with reporters on Thursday, the acting director of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, Ahmed Ogwell Ouma, said monkeypox case and death numbers were already at "emergency levels" on the continent.
The WHO will convene a closed meeting of experts at 12 p.m. (1000 GMT) in Geneva. It remains unclear when the decision will be announced.
The emergency committee meeting on Thursday includes experts from the most affected regions, who have also consulted with scientists including Nakoune. They will make a recommendation to WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, who makes the ultimate decision on whether to call the emergency.
The step mainly functions to sound the alarm, and can prompt further guidance from the WHO, as well as focus attention among member states. The WHO has already provided detailed guidance on the outbreak and said it is working on a mechanism for sharing treatments and vaccines.
Most experts agree monkeypox technically meets the criteria for the WHO definition of an emergency. It is a sudden and unusual event spreading internationally, and requires cross-country cooperation.
But the WHO is in a precarious position after COVID, according to Clare Wenham, a global health assistant professor at the London School of Economics.
If the WHO declares an emergency and countries do not act, it could undermine the agency's role in controlling global disease, she said.
"They're damned if they do, and damned if they don't," she added. (Reuters)
June
Attacks in Sudan's Darfur bring new surge in people fleeing their homes
Written by Nur Yasmin
Violence in western Sudan this month alone has displaced more than 84,000 people, doubling the number of those driven from their homes so far this year, according to UN reports.
The numbers are the highest since January 2021. Last year, at least 440,500 were displaced, five times more than in 2020, according to UN data.
Aid workers fear a displacement crisis akin to the one triggered by the conflict in Darfur in the early 2000s.
Violence in western Sudan this month alone has displaced more than 84,000 people, doubling the number of those driven from their homes so far this year, according to UN reports.
The numbers are the highest since January 2021. Last year, at least 440,500 were displaced, five times more than in 2020, according to UN data.
Aid workers fear a displacement crisis akin to the one triggered by the conflict in Darfur in the early 2000s.
June violence includes fighting in the Kulbus locality in West Darfur, where 125 people were killed and 50,000 displaced when Arab militias attacked villages belonging to the Gimir tribe.
"Before we finish responding to one emergency or major attack, another two have already happened," said Will Carter of Norwegian Refugee Council. "So far, nothing is averting this from becoming a new large-scale displacement emergency."
In South Kordofan state, home to a separate long-term civil conflict, fighting this month between the Hawazma and Kenana tribes in Abu Jubayhah killed 19 and displaced 15,150 after more than 4,000 homes were burned, said UNOCHA.
In a statement on Wednesday, Human Rights Watch said Sudan's transitional government and military rulers who seized power in October failed to provide adequate protection after the 2021 exit of international peace-keepers or to address underlying causes of the conflict, including land and resource disputes.
General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, whose Rapid Support Forces emerged out of some of the Arab militias and who is the deputy leader of Sudan's ruling council, visited West Darfur this week, calling on fighting to stop and promising to donate health and schooling facilities. (Reuters)
June
China's Xi criticises sanctions 'abuse', Putin scolds the West
Written by Nur Yasmin
Chinese President Xi Jinping on Thursday criticised "the abuse" of international sanctions, while Russian President Vladimir Putin scolded the West for fomenting global crisis, with both leaders calling for greater BRICS cooperation.
Xi called on Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa (BRICS) to take up the responsibility conferred by their economic clout, and said they should stand up for a truly multinational international system based on the United Nations.
"We must abandon Cold War mentality and block confrontation and oppose unilateral sanctions - and the abuse of sanctions," Xi told the BRICS summit through a translator.
"Our meeting today comes at a crucial moment of choice for the future of humanity: as key emerging markets and developing countries, BRICS countries must rise to our responsibility," Xi said.
China has by far the largest economy in the BRICS grouping, accounting for more than 70% of the group's collective $27.5 trillion economic might.
Putin called for stronger BRICS cooperation and took a swipe at the West which he accused of fomenting a crisis.
"Only on the basis of honest and mutually beneficial cooperation can we look for ways out of the crisis situation that has developed in the global economy due to the ill-considered and selfish actions of individual states," Putin said.
He accused the West of "using financial mechanisms" to "shunt their own mistakes in macroeconomic policy on to the whole world."
Putin has said relations with China are the best they have ever been and touts a strategic partnership with China aimed at countering U.S. influence.
U.S. President Joe Biden has said the West is locked in a battle with autocratic governments such as China and Russia.
The United States and European powers blame Putin's decision to invade Ukraine as the reason relations with the West have sunk to the lowest level since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis - including the severest sanctions in modern history.
But Putin says the West wants to destroy Russia, that the economic sanctions are akin to a declaration of economic war and that Russia will build ties with other powers such as China and India.
Putin, who casts the Ukraine war as a "special military operation", blames the United States for humiliating Russia in the aftermath of the 1991 fall of the Soviet Union and threatening Moscow by enlarging the NATO military alliance.
Russia sent troops into Ukraine on Feb. 24 to degrade its southern neighbour's military capabilities, root out people it called dangerous nationalists and defend the Russian-speakers of two eastern Ukrainian regions.
Ukraine says Russia has launched an imperial-style land grab and will never surrender its territory to Russia. (Reuters)
June
U.S. long-range rocket systems arrive in Ukraine - minister
Written by Nur Yasmin
Ukraine said on Thursday it had received U.S. supplies of High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS), a powerful long-range weapon system that Kyiv hopes can help turn the tide on Russia's invasion.
Moscow's forces are advancing in Ukraine's east in a bid to capture the industrial heartland known as the Donbas where Ukraine fears some of its troops could be encircled in a Russian pincer.
"Thank you to my U.S. colleague and friend Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin for these powerful tools! Summer will be hot for Russian occupiers. And the last one for some of them," Ukrainian Defence Minister Oleksii Reznikov tweeted of the HIMARS delivery.
He did not say how say many of the systems had arrived.
Ukraine says it needs the HIMARS systems to better match the range of Russian rocket systems that it says are being extensively used to pummel Ukrainian positions in Donbas.
Washington has said it has received assurances from Kyiv that those longer-range weapons would not be used to attack Russian territory, fearing an escalation of the conflict.
Moscow has warned it will strike targets in Ukraine which they "have not yet been hitting" if the West supplies longer-range missiles to Ukraine for use in high-precision mobile rocket systems. (Reuters)
June
EU seeks to halve use of pesticides, heal nature with landmark laws
Written by Nur Yasmin
The European Commission proposed on Wednesday legally binding targets to halve the use of chemical pesticides and restore nature across the EU, in an attempt to better protect health and recover plunging wildlife populations.
European Union environment policy chief Virginijus Sinkevicius told Reuters the proposal on repairing habitats would require EU countries to take steps to restore nature to at least 20% of EU land by 2030 and all degraded ecosystems by mid-century.
Under the proposals, the use of chemical pesticides should also be cut by 50% by the end of this decade. They will be banned altogether in sensitive places such as public parks and protected areas.
A senior EU Commission official acknowledged studies showing that a significant drop in use of pesticides could lead to lower yields and higher food prices, but stressed that new techniques were now available which can effectively replace chemical pesticides without reducing agriculture output.
The rules on pesticides, if approved by EU governments, would replace the existing laxer law that the Commission said had been applied inconsistently across the EU.
Under the new regime, governments would have to submit regular reports on their progress towards the targets.
"Nothing can replace ecosystem services that the oceans provide, our soils or our forests," Sinkevicius said in an interview about the proposal to restore nature, which would be the EU's first such law.
The proposed law lays down binding goals to increase farmland bird populations, reverse the decline of pollinators, and restore 25,000 km (15,500 miles) of rivers to flow along their natural courses by 2030. Countries will have to produce national plans to contribute to the EU-wide aims.
Intensive farming, forestry and urbanisation are fuelling the degradation of natural habitats. Most of Europe's protected habitats and species have a negative conservation status, and a third of bee and butterfly species have declining populations.
The proposal on nature, which has been delayed twice, will need approval from the European Parliament and EU countries - some of whom have sought to delay or roll back sustainable farming measures, citing the Ukraine war's impact on global food supply. read more
Sinkevicius said the global food crisis was caused entirely by Russia blocking the export of millions of tonnes of Ukrainian grain. He warned that failing to stop the degradation of nature would ultimately diminish Europe's farming abilities.
"If we lose soil fertility, if soil erosion and degradation continue, that is going to be a major impact on our agricultural output," he said. Soil erosion already costs Europe around 1.2 billion euros ($1.3 billion) a year in lost agricultural production.
Economic activities like farming would not be banned on land where nature restoration measures are rolled out, under the EU law. (Reuters)
June
S.Korea reports first confirmed monkeypox case, steps up monitoring
Written by Nur Yasmin
South Korea on Wednesday confirmed its first case of monkeypox virus and pledged to strengthen monitoring and response systems as it raised the alert level to "caution" for the infectious disease.
A Korean citizen, who is receiving treatment at the Incheon Medical Center after showing symptoms while entering the country from Germany on Tuesday afternoon, has tested positive, the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) said. It did not provide details of the individual.
The agency raised the alert level for the infectious disease to "caution", the second of the country's four levels, upon confirmation of the virus case.
It said it will step up monitoring by designating areas that require strengthened quarantine management, mainly among people from countries where monkeypox occurs frequently.
"The KDCA has been pushing for utilising secured (monkeypox) vaccines and treatments ... and additional introduction of those, while the agency is continuously expanding its diagnostic testing capabilities," KDCA Commissioner Peck Kyong-ran said.
Separately on Wednesday, President Yoon Suk-yeol ordered health authority to "step up quarantine management of foreign entrants at airports ... and to be fully prepared to distribute vaccines and treatments to the medical field."
Yoon also ordered to swiftly complete the introduction of third-generation vaccines and antiviral drugs for monkeypox.
Earlier in June, South Korea designated monkeypox as a second-degree infectious disease, according to its four-tier system, with 22 contagious diseases including COVID-19, cholera and chickenpox being included in the same category. (Reuters)
June
Support for EU membership highest in 15 years, survey finds
Written by Nur Yasmin
Nearly two-thirds of Europeans consider membership of the European Union a "good thing", according to a survey by the bloc's parliament published on Wednesday, marking the highest result in 15 years.
Most countries showed significantly more positive attitudes towards EU membership compared to a survey conducted at the end of last year, the European Parliament said in a statement, notably in the Baltic States of Lithuania and Estonia.
"With war returning to our continent, Europeans feel reassured to be part of the European Union," added the parliament's president Roberta Metsola.
The survey showed that only one in 10 respondents saw Russia positively compared to one in three in 2018.
Attitudes to China also deteriorated, though Europeans reported a more positive image of the UK and United States.
Nearly 60% considered defence of "common European values" a priority, even if it were to affect prices and costs of living, which have further shot up since Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
Another EU-backed survey published last week had shown 80% support for economic sanctions again Russia and a common security and defence policy.
European ministers and diplomats expect Ukraine to become an official candidate for EU membership on Thursday - though Kyiv would likely take years to become a member, if at all.
The European Parliament poll surveyed nearly 27,000 people across the bloc's 27 member states between April and May. (Reuters)
June
Finland is ready to fight Russia if attacked - defence chief
Written by Nur Yasmin
Finland has prepared for decades for a Russian attack and would put up stiff resistance should one occur, its armed forces chief said.
The Nordic country has built up a substantial arsenal. But aside from the military hardware, General Timo Kivinen said, a crucial factor is that Finns would be motivated to fight.
"The most important line of defence is between one's ears, as the war in Ukraine proves at the moment," Kivinen said in an interview.
Finland fought two wars in the 1940s against its eastern neighbour, with which it shares a 1,300-km (810-mile) border.
Once a non-aligned country, it is now applying to join the NATO military alliance over concerns that Russia could invade like it did Ukraine on Feb. 24.
Since World War Two, Helsinki has kept up a high level of military preparedness.
"We have systematically developed our military defence precisely for this type of warfare that is being waged there (in Ukraine), with a massive use of firepower, armoured forces and also airforces," Kivinen said.
"Ukraine has been a tough bite to chew (for Russia) and so would be Finland."
Some 100,000 Finns were killed during the two wars Finland fought against the Soviet Union and it lost a tenth of its territory.
The nation of 5.5 million has a wartime troop strength of some 280,000 with 870,000 trained as reservists. It did not abolish military conscription for males as many other western nations did after the end of the Cold War.
It has also built one of Europe's strongest artilleries and has stocked up on cruise missiles with a range of up to 370 km (230 miles). It spends 2% of its GDP on defence, a level higher than many NATO countries.
It is ordering four new warships, as well as 64 F-35 fighter jets from U.S. defence giant Lockheed Martin (LMT.N).
It plans to order up to 2,000 drones, its own high altitude anti-aircraft equipment and is building barriers on its border with Russia. read more
Some 82% of respondents in a May 18 poll by the defence ministry said they would be willing to participate in national defence if Finland was attacked.
Still, Kivinen welcomed Finland's decision to apply to join NATO. Finland and fellow Nordic country Sweden are in talks with Turkey to discuss the latter's opposition to their applications.
Ankara has been angered by what it says is Helsinki and Stockholm's support for Kurdish militants and arms embargoes on Turkey. read more
NATO membership would allow Finland to boost its early warning capacity by being part of the alliance's joint airspace control, Kivinen said.
Finland would also benefit from the deterrence of being part of an alliance in which an attack on one member is an attack on all its members, he said.
Nevertheless, he said, "the main responsibility for Finland's defence will still be borne by Finland". (Reuters)
June
Russia says West is spreading lies about causes of world's food crisis
Written by Nur Yasmin
Russia on Wednesday said the West was spreading lies about the causes of the global food crisis which Moscow said was being stoked by the sanctions imposed on Russia by the United States and European Union due to the invasion of Ukraine.
Besides the death and devastation sown by Russia's invasion, the war and the West's attempt to cripple Russia's economy as punishment have sent the price of grain, cooking oil, fertiliser and energy soaring, hurting global growth.
Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told reporters in Moscow she was dismayed by repeated Western statements that Russia was to blame for the global food crisis.
"It is a lie - such accusations are complete lies," Zakharova said. "So the West can supply all these arms to Ukraine but for some reason nothing can be taken out of Ukraine?"
The United States and European Union members, which are supplying arms to Ukraine, have accused Russia of stoking a food crisis by preventing grain exports from Ukraine - which accounts for about one tenth of global wheat exports.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy warned on June 9 that millions of people could starve because of a Russian blockade of Ukraine's Black Sea ports which he said had left the world "on the brink of a terrible food crisis".
Russia and Ukraine are two of the most important producers of agricultural commodities in the world. Russia is the world's largest wheat exporter after the European Union while Ukraine is the world's top sunflower seed exporter.
Both play a big role on the barley, maize and rapeseed markets while Russia is one of the world’s top fertiliser exporters.
Western sanctions, Zakharova said, had tipped agricultural markets towards the edge of the abyss by disrupting payment systems, shipping, insurance which had prevented many Russian exports of food and fertiliser.
"It is illogical - on the one hand the European Union... says a threat to global food security is being created but at the same time they block the delivery routes of goods to themselves on their own continent," Zakharova said.
President Vladimir Putin and Russian officials do not use the words "war" or "invasion". They cast the action as a "special military operation" aimed at preventing the persecution of Russian speakers in eastern Ukraine.
Putin also casts the war as a revolt against the United States, which he says has humiliated Russia since the 1991 fall of the Soviet Union by pushing for the enlargement of the NATO military alliance westwards.
Ukraine says it is fighting for its survival against a land grab by Russia and that it will fight to the end to free its territory from Russian control. Kyiv dismisses claims that Russian-speakers have been persecuted.
Eritrea, Armenia, Mongolia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Somalia, Belarus, Turkey, Madagascar, Lebanon, Egypt and Pakistan depend on Russia or Ukraine for more than 70% of their wheat imports in 2021, according to United Nations data.
Mongolia, Kazakhstan, Moldova, Serbia, Honduras and Ghana rely on Russia for 50% or more of their fertiliser imports in 2021, according to the data. (Reuters)