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June
Australia's prime minister says China should lift trade sanctions; welcomes talks
Written by Nur Yasmin
China needs to lift its sanctions on Australia to improve relations, Australia's prime minister said on Tuesday, as he welcomed as "a good thing" the first talks between ministers from the two countries in almost three years.
China is Australia's largest trading partner and the biggest customer for its iron ore - its largest export earner - but diplomatic relations have been strained in recent years.
In imposing its sanctions, China listed 14 grievances with Australia ranging from its call for an international inquiry into the origins of the coronavirus, a ban on China's telecommunications giant Huawei building a 5G network, and screening foreign investment for national security risks.
"It is China that has imposed sanctions on Australia. They need to remove those sanctions in order to improve relations," Prime Minister Anthony Albanese told reporters in Brisbane.
Australia's former government described China's sanctions on its agriculture and energy commodities as "economic coercion". Amid a years-long diplomatic freeze, Australian ministers have been unable to arrange calls with Chinese counterparts.
But Australia's defence minister, Richard Marles, met his Chinese counterpart, Wei Fenghe, on the sidelines of a security conference in Singapore on Sunday, with Marles describing their hour-long talk as an "important first step".
Albanese said it was "a good thing" the ministers had met and noted the importance of trade with China for Australia's economy.
China's foreign ministry said on Monday that Albanese had responded to a message of congratulations from Chinese Premier Li Keqiang on his election win last month, adding that it too wanted to see action for ties to improve.
"To improve China-Australia relations, there is no 'auto-pilot' mode. A reset requires concrete actions," China's foreign ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin told a regular press briefing in Beijing. He did not elaborate on the action China wanted.
Albanese declined to elaborate on what he had said to Li.
"I responded appropriately," he told reporters. (Reuters)
June
Sri Lanka gives public workers extra day off to grow food
Written by Nur Yasmin
Sri Lanka has approved a four-day work week for public sector workers to help them cope with a chronic fuel shortage and encourage them to grow food, the government said on Tuesday, as it struggles with its worst financial crisis in decades.
The island nation, which employs about one million people in its public sector, has been hit by a severe foreign exchange shortage, which has left it struggling to pay for critical imports of fuel, food and medicine.
Many of the country's 22 million people have to queue up at petrol stations for hours and have been enduring long power cuts for months.
Sri Lanka's Cabinet late on Monday approved a proposal for public sector workers to be given leave every Friday for the next three months, partly because the fuel shortage made commuting difficult and also to encourage them to farm.
"It seems appropriate to grant government officials leave of one working day ... to engage in agricultural activities in their backyards or elsewhere as a solution to the food shortage that is expected," the government information office said in a statement.
The United Nations last week warned of a looming humanitarian crisis and it plans to provide $47 million to help more than a million vulnerable people.
Currency depreciation, rising global commodity prices and a now-reversed policy to ban chemical fertilizer pushed food inflation to 57% in April.
The government is in talks for a bailout package with the International Monetary Fund and a delegation is expected in Colombo on June 20.
The United States is also ready to help, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said after a phone call with Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe late on Monday.
"During these economically and politically challenging times, the U.S. stands ready to work with Sri Lanka, in close coordination with the International Monetary Fund and the international community," Blinken said on Twitter.
Wickremesinghe said this month Sri Lanka needed at least $5 billion to meet essential imports for the rest of the year. (Reuters)
June
UK's first migrant deportation flight to Rwanda set to depart on Tuesday
Written by Nur Yasmin
Britain's first scheduled flight taking asylum seekers to Rwanda was due to depart on Tuesday, with the government warning that anyone who avoided it through last-minute legal challenges would be put on a later flight anyway.
Britain has struck a 120-million-pound ($148 million) deal with Rwanda to send some migrants, who had arrived illegally by crossing the Channel in small boats from Europe, to live in the landlocked African country.
The plan has horrified political opponents, charities and church leaders who say it is inhumane. The United Nations' refugee chief called it "catastrophic", the entire leadership of the Church of England denounced it as an "immoral policy that shames Britain".
The government says the deportation strategy is needed to stem the flow of migrants risking their lives in Channel crossings and smash the people-smuggling networks.
A government official, who asked not to be named, said there was the possibility after individual legal challenges were heard that the flight could leave with no asylum seekers on it. The government has chartered a private plane, which is scheduled to leave on Tuesday evening.
"We are expecting to send the flight later today," Foreign Secretary Liz Truss earlier told Sky News. "I can't say exactly how many people will be on the flight. But the really important thing is that we establish the principle."
"There will be people on this flight and if they're not on this flight, they will be on the next flight because we are determined to break the model of the appalling people traffickers."
The courts have thrown out last-ditch bids by human rights groups and campaigners to halt the first flight, but London's High Court is set to hear further cases before it departs.
Amid legal challenges, only a few people are now scheduled to leave on the first plane.
Thirty-seven individuals had been scheduled to be removed on Tuesday, which charities said included people fleeing Afghanistan and Syria as well as Iran and Iraq. However, a string of successful legal challenges has reduced that number to seven, according to charity Care4Calais.
At least three High Court appeals were still to be heard.
Human rights groups say the policy will put migrants at risk. The UNHCR has said Rwanda, whose own human rights record is under scrutiny, does not have the capacity to process the claims, and there is a risk some migrants could be returned to countries from which they had fled.
The senior leadership of the Church of England said in a letter to the Times newspaper that those being deported had not had a chance to appeal and no attempt had been made to "understand their predicament".
A full hearing to determine the legality of the policy as a whole is due in July. (Reuters)
June
Ethiopia's Abiy says body formed to negotiate with Tigray forces
Written by Nur Yasmin
Ethiopia's Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed said on Tuesday the federal government had formed a committee to negotiate with the northern Tigray region's forces.
Fighting erupted in Tigray in November 2020 and spilled over into the neighbouring regions of Afar and Amhara last year, but it has eased since the federal government declared a unilateral humanitarian ceasefire in March. read more
"Regarding the peace, a committee has been established. Negotiation needs a lot of work. A committee has been established and it will study how we will conduct talks," Abiy told parliament.
It is the first time Abiy has made information about the committee public.
He said Deputy Prime Minister Demeke Mekonnen was leading the committee, which will have 10 to 15 days to work on finer details of what will be negotiated.
The war between the national government forces and its allies and those loyal to the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) has upset government plans to modernise the economy and has deterred some foreign investors.
Tigray's leaders accuse Abiy of wanting to centralise power at the expense of the regions. He accuses them of wanting to regain national power, which they lost to him after he was appointed in 2018. (Reuters)
June
Beijing in 'race against time' to contain COVID surge
Written by Nur Yasmin
Authorities in China's capital warned on Tuesday that a COVID-19 surge in cases linked to a 24-hour bar was critical and the city of 22 million was in a "race against time" to get to grips with its most serious outbreak since the pandemic began.
The flare-up means millions of people are facing mandatory testing and thousands are under targeted lockdowns, just days after the city started to lift widespread curbs that had run for more than a month to tackle a broader outbreak since late April.
Authorities announced on the weekend a "ferocious" COVID outbreak linked to the Heaven Supermarket Bar, which had only just re-opened after coronavirus curbs were eased last week.
The outbreak of at least 287 cases has raised new worries about the outlook for the world's second-largest economy. China is just recovering from a two-month lockdown in the city of Shanghai that had raised worries about global supply chains.
"We should go all out, race against time," He Lijian, spokesman for the Beijing municipal government, told a news conference, referring to efforts to contain the outbreak.
Drinking and dining in most establishments in Beijing only resumed on June 6, after more than a month of measures such as take-out meals only and working from home, along with the closure of malls and stretches of the transport system.
Authorities have refrained from restoring the toughest of the earlier restrictions, but about 10,000 close contacts of the customers of the bar have been identified and their residential buildings put under lockdown.
Chaoyang, the city's largest district in which the bar is located, began a three-day mass testing campaign on Monday for its roughly 3.5 million residents.
People infected in the latest surge in cases live or work in 14 of the capital's 16 districts, authorities have said.
Police have launched a criminal investigation into the person in charge of the bar on suspected interference with epidemic prevention, Pan Xuhong, deputy director of the city's Public Security Bureau, told the news conference.
'PROPAGATOR'
Pan said three other people, two of whom had visited the bar and the other a close contact of bar customers, had been put under criminal investigation after they insisted on going out despite being ordered to isolate at home.
The three were later confirmed to have been infected, which resulted in dozens of people being put into quarantine and more than 2,000 under other COVID measures, Pan said.
Earlier on Tuesday, the state-backed Beijing Daily said a team of officials would work to investigate and deal with the Heaven Supermarket Bar "quickly, strictly and seriously".
All of the city's bars, nightclubs, karaoke venues, internet cafes and other places of entertainment were being inspected, the newspaper said, with those in underground spaces being shut as epidemic prevention work is "tightened".
The paper has repeatedly pointed the finger at an individual, dubbed Patient No. 1,991, for triggering the flare-up. Careless behaviour had turned the unidentified person into the "propagator" of the outbreak.
Beijing authorities say the person did not take a COVID test between May 26 and June 8, despite visiting a number of restaurants, bars and crowded places at that time.
The patient developed a fever by the evening of June 8, two days after a visit to the 24-hour bar at the centre of the cluster.
But despite the fever, the person returned to the bar early on June 9, the same day a handful of other bar patrons were found to be infected. (Reuters)
June
S.Korea strike disrupts shipments of key cleaning agent for chipmaking
Written by Nur Yasmin
A nationwide strike by truck drivers in South Korea has disrupted shipments to China of a key cleaning agent used by makers of semiconductor chips, the Korean International Trade Association (KITA) said on Tuesday.
It was the first sign the eight-day-old strike was affecting chip production's global supply chain. It has already cost South Korea's industry more than $1.2 billion in lost output and unfilled deliveries, according to the industry ministry.
KITA said a Korean company that produces isopropyl alcohol (IPA), a chemical used in the cleaning of chip wafers, faced difficulties in shipping to a Chinese company that in turn supplies wafers to chipmakers. It did not name either company.
About 90 tonnes of the material, or a week's worth of shipments, have been delayed, the trade body said in a statement.
It corrected an earlier statement that had wrongly said production was disrupted, and added that the Chinese firm did not supply wafers to Samsung Electronics Co Ltd's (005930.KS) chip production operations in China.
A major South Korean petrochemical company was also facing problems sending out IPA shipments from its plant in the port city of Yeosu, according to a person familiar with the matter who asked not to be named.
Only an "essential amount" is being let through, they said, declining to identify the company because of the sensitivity of the matter.
The truckers' union, which is protesting against soaring fuel prices and demanding guarantees of minimum pay, vowed to continue the strike after four rounds of talks with the government failed to find a resolution.
Transport Minister Won Hee-ryong ruled out accepting any demand that sought to use the national economy as a hostage.
"The government will continue to listen to reasonable arguments but strictly respond to illegal actions in accordance with laws and principle," Won said, according to a ministry statement.
The two sides plan to resume talks at 7 p.m. (1000 GMT) on Tuesday, the transport ministry said, an hour earlier than previously announced by the union.
Analysts expect the strike's impact on domestic chipmakers to be limited, saying that both Samsung and the world's second largest memory chip maker, SK Hynix (000660.KS), usually keep enough material on hand for three months or more.
"Both drastically increased inventory since Japan's export curbs on chip material in 2019 highlighted the issue," Ahn Ki-hyun, senior executive director of the Korea Semiconductor Industry Association, said.
Small business owners voiced concern about the havoc a lengthy strike could have on the recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic, as the truckers launched their action less than two months after social distancing norms were lifted.
"Small business owners are waiting helplessly," a dozen lobby groups representing such businesses said in a joint statement, adding that shipments of liquor, food, farm and fisheries products had been blocked.
An official from HiteJinro Co Ltd (000080.KS), the biggest brewer of soju, the South Korean liquor, said its shipments were cut by about 40% by the strike. (Reuters)
June
Canada and Denmark divide small Arctic island, ending ownership dispute
Written by Nur Yasmin
Denmark and Canada will divide the small, uninhabited island in the Arctic known as Hans Island, ending an almost 50-year long ownership spat, in a largely symbolic act of diplomacy designed to avoid tensions in the high North.
The two NATO allies have been engaged in a mostly good-natured squabble over the island, situated at equal distance between Greenland and Canada's Ellesmere Island, since 1971 when their rival claims came to light.
Greenland is an autonomous territory within the Kingdom of Denmark. It leaves Copenhagen to manage certain policy areas, including foreign and security policy.
Canada and Denmark will divide the 1.2 square-kilometre (0.75 square miles) island into two almost equally large parts along a naturally occurring cleft on the rocky outcrop, according to a deal published by the Danish Foreign Ministry on Tuesday.
Some view the peaceful settlement as a sign of Arctic NATO states moving closer together since Russia's isolation over its invasion of Ukraine raised security concerns after decades of calm in the region. read more
"It really is a signal to the other parties with interests up there, that this is the way to do it. Whether that is realistic as long as Russia is involved, I don't know," military historian at the Royal Danish Defence College, Soren Norby, told Reuters.
The island is named after Greenlandic explorer Hans Hendrik, who took part in the first expedition to the island in 1853. It's called Tartupaluk in Greenlandic, which translates to "kidney shaped".
Neither country knew about the other's claim to the island until a bilateral meeting held in 1971 to discuss territorial boundaries.
Since the 1980s, officials, scientists and soldiers from Denmark and Canada have visited the island, taking turns at removing the other country's flag and raising their own.
It even became tradition for visitors to leave a bottle of either Canadian whisky or Danish schnapps for their rivals to find on their next visit, according to media reports.
In 2018, the two countries decided to establish a joint working group to resolve the dispute, ending their decades-long "agree to disagree" policy. The deal will be formally signed by ministers from both countries following parliamentary approval.
With the deal, Canada and Denmark have established the world's longest maritime border of 3,882 kilometres (2,412 miles) spanning from the Lincoln Sea in the North to the Labrador Sea in the South, the foreign ministry said. (Reuters)
June
India police charge 30 soldiers for killing six tribal labourers
Written by Nur Yasmin
Police in India's northeastern state of Nagaland said 30 army soldiers were charged for killing six tribal labourers mistaken for militants during an anti-insurgency operation last year.
"Investigations revealed that the operation team had not followed the standard operating procedure and the rules of engagement," Nagaland police chief T.J. Longkumer told reporters in the capital city Dimapur, adding that army officials had resorted to "disproportionate firing."
The police probe was launched after 13 members of the region's predominantly Konyak tribe and one security trooper were killed in December last year after defence forces stationed in the border state mistook the group of labourers for militants entering from Myanmar and opened fire. read more
Six coal miners returning from work were killed at Oting in Nagaland's Mon district. Seven others were gunned down when villagers, angry after discovering the bullet-riddled bodies of the labourers on an army truck had clashed with the soldiers.
One security personnel was also killed in the clashes.
"The sanction for prosecution is still awaited," Longkumer said, adding that a chargesheet had been filed to prosecute the 30 accused army personnel.
A spokesperson for the Indian army was not immediately available for comment. A defence ministry official in New Delhi said the case has been placed before Indian courts for final order.
Thousands of army officials are posted in the country's northeast, home to a complex web of tribal groups, many of which have launched insurgency and separatist activities accusing New Delhi of plundering resources and doing little to improve their lives.
Soon after the killings, protests intensified over the Armed Forces Powers Act (AFSPA) that gives the armed forces sweeping powers to search and arrest, and to open fire if they deem it necessary in "disturbed areas".
The Act is still in force in Mon.
The notification of "disturbed areas" under AFSPA has been in force in several parts of seven northeastern states.
Starting in 2015, the federal government removed AFSPA entirely from the states of Tripura and Meghalaya, and partially from Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Nagaland and Manipur. (Reuters)
June
Myanmar junta can't beat rebels, should restore democracy, U.S. diplomat says
Written by Nur Yasmin
Myanmar's junta likely cannot to defeat the rebels fighting its rule and should restore democracy after seizing power last year, a senior U.S. diplomat said.
"It's hard to see today how they could realistically think they can win," said Derek Chollet, the State Department counsellor. "They're losing territory. Their military is taking serious losses."
Speaking to Reuters and another journalist in Bangkok on Friday, Chollet said the military government is becoming isolated not only internationally but also at home and should end the fight and return to democracy.
The junta overthrew the elected government of Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi in February 2021 and has since used deadly force and mass arrests to suppress demonstrations.
Civilians have taken up arms to fight police and soldiers, answering a call by an alliance of lightly armed rebels for a people's revolt. The junta has declared the alliance "terrorists".
A spokesperson for the military did not answer calls seeking comment on Sunday about Chollet's remarks.
The diplomat is visiting Thailand, Singapore and Brunei to follow up on a meeting last month of the United States and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).
In addition to imposing sanctions, Washington is working with ASEAN and countries such as Singapore, Indonesia and Malaysia regarding Myanmar, Chollet said.
He expressed hope that China could also be "part of the solution" in Myanmar. (Reuters)
June
North Korea fires multiple artillery shots, South Korea says
Written by Nur Yasmin
North Korea on Sunday fired multiple artillery shots between 8:07 a.m. and 11:03 a.m. local time, South Korea's military said, in another show of force a day after leader Kim Jong Un vowed to boost the reclusive nation's military power.
The Joint Chiefs of Staff gave no other details but added it had decided to issue a statement late in the evening as the shots were of a traditional type, with relatively short range and low altitude.
Firing of artillery shots comes as Kim on Saturday presented goals to boost the country's military power and defence research to protect North Korea's sovereign rights, as it concluded The Plenary Meeting of the Central Committee of the Workers' Party of Korea (WPF) held last week. (reuters)