VOI - Voice of Indonesia | RRI - Radio Republik Indonesia

Israel and South Korea to sign free trade pact - 

Israel will sign a free trade agreement with South Korea this week, marking the first such arrangement with an Asian market, Israel's economy ministry said on Sunday.

The deal is meant to bolster bilateral trade by cutting out customs duties and offering safety nets on investments. Bilateral trade reached about US$2.4 billion in 2020, about two thirds of it goods and services imported into Israel, the ministry said.

More than 95per cent of Israeli exports to South Korea will be customs-free, the ministry said. Israel is working on similar deals with China, Vietnam and India, it added//CNA

A medical worker swabs a member of the public at the Bondi Beach drive-through coronavirus disease (COVID-19) testing centre as the city experiences an outbreak in Sydney, Australia, December 21, 2020. REUTERS/Loren Elliott - 

Australia's most populous state of New South Wales recorded no new COVID-19 infections for a third straight day on Sunday (May 9), but extended raised social distancing and mask-wearing rules by a week as the authorities hunted for the source of a small outbreak.

After a Sydney couple tested positive for the coronavirus last week, ending a long run without community transmission, the authorities reinstated some social distancing measures until May 10, and a campaign to get more people tested, as they scrambled to determine the source of infection.

"As the 'missing link' case hasn't been identified we're keen to prevent a super-spreading event," said New South Wales state premier Gladys Berejiklian in a tweet.

"All safeguards/restrictions will be in place for an extra week, except for shoppers in retail who will no longer be required to wear a mask."

That means the more than 5 million people living in and around Sydney must wear masks on public transport and in most public venues, while households are limited to 20 guests at any one time until May 17.

Australia has largely eliminated the virus, with 79 days in 2021 without a locally acquired case, according to the government, as a result of a strategy of closing international and domestic borders, as well as social distancing measures.

As the country awaits vaccine shipments and watches infection spikes in other countries, top lawmakers have said borders now appear likely to reopen in 2022, not 2021 as previously envisaged.

In an interview with News Corp newspapers published on Sunday, Prime Minister Scott Morrison said it was unlikely Australia would reopen its borders soon, although he did not offer a timeline.

"I don't see an appetite for that at the moment," he said, referring to border reopening.

"What we're seeing at the moment is the appreciation of the people that the pandemic isn't going anywhere. We have to be careful not to exchange that way of life for what everyone else has."//CNA

Labour's Sadiq Khan speaks after he was reelected and declared as the next Mayor of London at City Hall, in London, Saturday, May 8, 2021. (Photo: AP/Victoria Jones/PA) - 

Labour politician Sadiq Khan won re-election as London mayor on Saturday (May 8) in a narrower than expected victory over Conservative rival Shaun Bailey.

Khan became the first Muslim mayor of a Western capital when first elected in 2016.

He won a second term with just over 1.2 million votes, who gained 977,601 votes in Thursday's poll. Turnout was lower than at the previous election, at 42 per cent.

The 50-year-old politician's victory was one of the bright spots for the main opposition Labour party after a largely desultory showing in local elections on Thursday.

In his victory speech Khan said that during his second term he would be focusing on "building bridges between the different communities" and between city hall and the government.

He said he wanted "to ensure London can play its part in a national recovery" and to "build a brighter greener and more equal future" for the capital.

Khan campaigned on a promise of "jobs, jobs, jobs", bidding to keep London on its perch as a top world city while tackling the crisis and the fallout from Brexit, which could threaten the capital's vital financial sector.

Khan has made a name for himself as a vocal critic of Brexit and of successive Conservative prime ministers, including his mayoral predecessor Boris Johnson - as well as for a feud with former US president Donald Trump.

The pair became embroiled in an extraordinary war of words after Khan criticised Trump's controversial travel ban on people from certain Muslim countries.

In a series of bizarre attacks, Trump accused Khan of doing a "very bad job on terrorism" and called him a "stone cold loser" and a "national disgrace".

Entering his first term, Khan vowed to focus on providing affordable homes for Londoners and freezing transport fares, but saw his agenda engulfed by the pandemic.

He is London's third mayor after Labour's Ken Livingstone (2000-2008) and Johnson (2008-2016), and there is widespread speculation he could try to follow in his predecessor's footsteps to Downing Street.

In his previous role as a human rights lawyer, Khan spent three years chairing the civil liberties campaign group Liberty.

In his victory speech, Khan referred to his humble origins, growing up in public housing in an ethnically mixed residential area in south London.

"I grew up on a council estate, a working class boy, a child of immigrants, but I'm now the Mayor of London," he said, describing himself as "a Londoner through and through"//CNA