VOI - Voice of Indonesia | RRI - Radio Republik Indonesia

Indonesian Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi was appointed as co-chair of the COVAX AMC Engagement Group, initiated by the World Health Organization (WHO) and Vaccine Alliance (GAVI).

Marsudi, along with Ethiopian Health Minister Lia Tadesse and Canadian Minister of International Development Karina Gould, will lead the COVID-19 vaccine procurement and distribution program for 92 COVAX AMC member countries.

The Indonesian foreign minister was appointed to the post after securing a 41-percent majority of the total votes that she described as a manifestation of trust of the world, especially developing countries, such as Indonesia.

"It is a huge responsibility for Indonesia to enable all countries to have equal access to the vaccine through multilateral networks. We will attempt to shoulder the huge responsibility as aptly as possible," she affirmed here on Wednesday.

The COVAX Advance Market Commitment (AMC) Engagement Group is a forum between the AMC member states and donor countries aimed at procuring and distributing vaccines for AMC member states.

Through the cooperation forum, 92 low- and middle-income countries, grouped in the COVAX Facility, will have access to safe and effective COVID-19 vaccines with the help of donor countries.

The COVAX Facility has targeted to procure vaccines for 20 percent of each AMC member state's population and support AMC member states' preparations for the national vaccination plan.

"Surely, the vaccine will be procured in stages due to limited vaccine stocks for all countries," she remarked.

Although COVAX will find it challenging to meet the target of procuring vaccine in the wake of limited resources and preparations of all countries to accept the COVID-19 vaccine, Marsudi expressed belief that close cooperation among all nations would help to achieve the target.

To follow up on her new role as co-chair of the COVAX AMC Engagement Group, the minister, through the Indonesian permanent representative to the UN in Geneva, will hold intensive communication with the Switzerland-based GAVI.

"In addition, I will contact the two other co-chairs to start our communication," she added. (antaranews)

Coordinating Maritime Affairs and Investment Minister Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan received a visit from Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Parapat at a location directly adjacent to Lake Toba, North Sumatra, on Tuesday.

During the meeting with Yi, Pandjaitan was accompanied by Deputy Minister of Trade Jerry Sambuaga to hold a discussion on efforts to boost strategic cooperation in the fields of investment and trade.

"The arrival of my friend, Mr Wang Yi, to Lake Toba is expected to forge good and sustainable cooperation between the two countries. Tomorrow, Mr Wang Yi will be welcomed by the president of the Republic of Indonesia and will heed personally the president's aspirations for strategic cooperation between the two countries," Pandjaitan noted in a written statement received here on Tuesday.

Yi is on a two-day visit to Indonesia on Jan 12-13, as part of a series of visits to four member countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) -- Myanmar, Indonesia, Brunei Darussalam, and the Philippines -- on Jan 11-16, 2021.

During the visit to North Sumatra, Yi and his delegates had visited several historical places around Lake Toba and engaged in hiking.

Pandjaitan had invited Yi to visit Toba and witness up-close the beauty of Lake Toba and engage in his hobby of hiking.

In Jakarta, on Wednesday, Yi was scheduled to pay a courtesy call on President Joko Widodo and Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi. (antaranews)

BEIRUT, (Reuters) - Interpol has issued red notices for the captain and owner of the ship that carried the chemicals which devastated Beirut in an explosion in August, killing 200 people, Lebanon’s state media said.

Five months since one of the biggest non-nuclear blasts on record, big questions remain about the ammonium nitrate that detonated after being stored at the port for years.

The Interpol notices, which are not international arrest warrants, ask authorities worldwide to provisionally detain people pending possible extradition or other legal actions. Interpol issues them at the request of a member country.

State news agency NNA said on Tuesday that Interpol also issued a notice for a Portuguese trader who examined the cargo at Beirut port in 2014, without giving a name or futher details.

The Interpol global police coordination agency says it does not confirm or deny red notices that are not publicly available on its website. An Interpol spokesperson said if there was a notice and it was not published online, that meant it was for law enforcement only.

Lebanese officials have faced accusations of negligence, with some port and customs employees detained in connection to the blast, which injured thousands of people. Families of the victims are still waiting for results of the investigation.

Lebanon’s public prosecution asked Interpol in October to issue arrest warrants for two people it had identified as the Russian captain and owner of the Rhosus ship which arrived in Beirut in 2013, security and judicial sources said.

Their names did not appear on the public list of Red Notices on Interpol’s website on Wednesday.

Boris Prokoshev, the captain at the time, has said the chemicals ended up in Beirut after the ship’s owner told him to divert to pick up extra cargo, and that Lebanese authorities had paid little attention to the nitrate.

“I am shocked,” he told Reuters when asked about the report of an Interpol red notice on Tuesday. “I do not understand at all what could be the basis for my arrest.” (Reuters)

SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korean leader Kim Jong Un called for increased military power and greater nuclear war deterrence, state news agency KCNA reported on Wednesday, as a rare ruling party congress came to a close after eight days of policy discussions.

The Eighth Party Congress occurred less than two weeks before U.S. President-elect Joe Biden takes office and amid a prolonged gridlock in talks aimed at ending the North’s nuclear and missile programmes in return for U.S. sanctions relief.

“We must do everything we can to increase nuclear war deterrence even further as we build the strongest military capability,” KCNA quoted Kim as saying at the conclusion of the congress.

Since announcing a self-declared moratorium on nuclear and intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) tests in 2018, Kim has called for continued production of nuclear weapons for his arsenal, launched a series of smaller missiles, and unveiled what would be North Korea’s largest ICBM yet at a parade in October.

Separately, Kim Yo Jong, the leader’s sister and a member of the party Central Committee, criticised South Korea’s military for monitoring a parade in Pyongyang. The move was an expression of the South’s “hostile approach” towards the North, she said in a separate statement carried by KCNA.

South Korea’s military said on Monday it had detected signs that North Korea held a nighttime military parade on Sunday for the congress.

Kim’s remarks come after South Korean President Moon Jae-in pledged to help engineer a breakthrough in stalled denuclearisation talks.

Kim Yo Jong has been serving as her brother’s “de facto second-in-command,” and her remarks ignoring Moon’s call for dialogue is a proof of her role in the regime, said Moon Seong-mook, a former South Korean military official and head of the Unification Strategy Center in Seoul.

“She didn’t mention dialogues with South Korea at all, even though the statement came a day after Moon’s New Year’s speech, which hints that talks or meetings are distant,” he said.

TIGHTENING STATE CONTROL

The results of the congress highlight how Kim Jong Un is continuing to tighten state control over society as well as the economy, said Benjamin Katzeff Silberstein, a North Korean economy expert at the U.S-based Stimson Center think-tank.

“Kim’s report is abundantly clear in stating that he wants the state to be the main planner and decision-maker not just over the general direction of the economy, but on a much more detailed level than that,” he wrote in a report on Tuesday.

Recent policies have exerted greater centralized control of consumer markets in the country, imposed limits on foreign exchange, and crackdowns on smuggling along the border with China.

The congress, which ran for eight days in Pyongyang, is the first since 2016, and just the second since 1980.

On Tuesday, Kim, cemented his power at the congress with his election as party general secretary.

A meeting of the Supreme People’s Assembly (SPA), or parliament, is scheduled on Sunday to discuss adopting a law on the five-year economic plan and state budget, KCNA said. (reuters)