Voting session in UN General Assembly on Rusia Sanction -
On Thursday, 7 April 2022, the UN General Assembly voted to suspend Russia from the Human Rights Council in light of evidence of appalling war crimes committed in Ukraine by Russian military forces.
Following further reports of abhorrent attacks on civilians in Ukraine this week, on 6 April 2022 UK Foreign Secretary Liz Truss announced a significant ratcheting up of UK sanctions on Russia; full asset freeze on largest Russian bank and end to all new UK outward investment into Russia. UK will end all imports of Russian coal and oil by end of 2022 and take action against oligarchs and key strategic industries.
Foreign Secretary will urge G7 colleagues to maintain the momentum on further waves of sanctions in due course.
As a leading voice calling for international action, the UK’s fifth package of measures will cut off key sectors of the Russian economy and end our dependency on Russian energy.
According to a release received by Voice of Indonesia on Friday (08/04/22), Today’s measures have been delivered in lockstep with their global allies as the EU has also banned imports of Russian coal and the US has sanctioned SberBank. Asset freezes against Sberbank and Credit Bank of Moscow. Sberbank is Russia’s largest bank and this freeze is being taken in co-ordination with the US.
An outright ban on all new outward investment to Russia. In 2020 UK investment in Russia was worth over £11 billion. This will be another major hit to the Russian economy and further limit their future capabilities by the end of 2022, the UK will end all dependency on Russian coal and oil, and end imports of gas as soon as possible thereafter.
From next week, the export of key oil refining equipment and catalysts will also be banned, degrading Russia’s ability to produce and export oil – targeting not only the industry’s finances but its capabilities as a whole action against key Russian strategic industries and state owned enterprises.
This includes a ban on imports of iron and steel products, a key source of revenue. Russia’s military ambitions are also being thwarted by new restrictions on its ability to acquire the UK’s world-renowned quantum and advanced material technologies and targeting a further eight oligarchs active in these industries, which Putin uses to prop up his war economy//VOI
Literacy Safari program in East Nusa Tenggara -
The effort to sow the seeds of literacy continues to be echoed by the Indonesian Reading Ambassador Gol A Gong in the Literacy Safari program. The Java-Nusa Tenggara Island literacy safari that has been going on since January 2022 has reached its end in Kupang Regency. Along the literacy safari route, the campaign “Reading is Healthy, Writing is Great” continues to be voiced. Breaking through bureaucratic barriers and social strata.
Kupang Regent Korinus Masneno positively welcomed the Indonesian Reading Ambassador Literacy Safari. According to him, events like this should often be held in the district. Kupang thus triggering the publication of quality books produced by the community.
"We will replicate this activity in our education program. Something good doesn't need to be hesitated or embarrassed to be imitated," said Regent Korinus, starting his remarks, on Friday, (08/04/2022).
Adding to the Regent's confidence, Bunda Baca East Nusa Tenggara (NTT) Province Julie Sutrisno Laiskodat emphasized that the people need to improve their quality and capacity so they can become literacy ambassadors in the their province. Literacy is one way to improve one's quality.
"We need to campaign for tourism in NTT through various promotions and writings that arouse people's interest to come here, so that they know the potential and natural wealth of NTT," said Julie.
Julie then continued, NTT Province has 21 regencies and 1 city. And each region has a different tour. So, our joint task is to literacy the community so that they understand that the tourist destinations in NTT are unique, impressive, and beautiful.
Meanwhile, the Main Librarian of the National Library of Nelwaty stated that the benefits of reading not only make us think positively, furthermore, reading can also learn new skills.
“Reading makes people think positively, so it will give birth to positive energy. By reading a lot, the horizon of knowledge will be wide open," he said.
Indonesia, according to UNESCO's calculations, is still experiencing a shortage of reading materials. The ideal ratio recommended by UNESCO is 1 person reading 3 new books per year. Meanwhile, the current condition is that 90 people are waiting for 1 book (1:90). Therefore, he hopes that through activities like this, he can stimulate the birth of new writers in the regions, especially in the province of NTT.
According to a release received by Voice of Indonesia on Friday (08/04/22), literacy ambassador Gol A Gong said writing activities are part of self-identity. Especially if we write about local wisdom. Telling about the advantages that our own area has.
"By writing, everyone has the potential to elevate local culture into national wealth and even be known internationally," concluded Gol A Gong//VOI
The head of the National Library submits a report to the House of representative on the development of library that can be a key to people's knowledge -
Commission X of the House of Representatives (DPR) of the Republic of Indonesia encourages the National Library of Indonesia (NLI) to coordinate with relevant ministries and institutions in procuring formations and affirmations for librarians, both civil servants and government employees with work agreements (PPPK), at the central and regional levels.
This is reinforced by the statement of a member of Commission X DPR RI, Ledia Hanifa Amaliah, that the true need for librarian formation is very much needed in the effort to carry out library accreditation. So that the affirmation of the need for librarians must be proposed to the Ministry of Administrative Reform and Bureaucratic Reform (Ministry of PANRB).
“Why don't we pursue affirmations for PPPK librarians specifically, for example? So that later when we talk about wanting to accredit the library, there is already a librarian, so it's just a matter of adding a little to be an assessor," said the legislator from the PKS faction, in a hearing (RDP) between the National Library of Indonesia and Commission X DPR RI, Thursday (7/4). /2022).
Responding to this, the Head of the National Library of Indonesia, Muhammad Syarif Bando, explained that his party had submitted a written request to the PANRB Ministry for the addition of librarian PPPK staff. "For additional personnel, we have written to the PANRB Ministry regarding the addition of PPPK personnel. Hopefully there will be an answer from there," he replied.
According to a release received by Voice of Indonesia on Thursday (07/04/22), legislator Illiza Sa'aduddin Djamal, stated that the implementation of Law no. 13 of 2018 concerning the Handover of Printed and Recorded Works (SSKCKR), namely the processing of SSKCKR results must be carried out in accordance with the collection management standards for the handover of stored works set by the National Library of Indonesia. Furthermore, he questioned the standardization used by the National Library of Indonesia.
"We want to know the standardization used, and then if there are documents that are state secrecy, can they also be accessed for certain parties and or parties?" Iliza asked.
Answering the question, the Head of National Library explained that the standards used in processing SSKCKR results were in accordance with those carried out internationally. However, there is a difference in terms of placement.
“The management of printed and recorded works is carried out in the same way as the international standardization. However, only the placement is done specifically because it involves the issue of copy rights,” he explained.
On the same occasion, a number of legislators said that reading materials in the Frontier, Outermost, and Disadvantaged (3T) areas were not evenly distributed. Nasdem Party legislator, Ratih Megasari Singkarru, emphasized that it is not people who do not have the desire to read. However, access to reading materials does not exist, so he encourages National Library to be able to facilitate it.
In addition, member of Commission X DPR RI from the PKS faction, Sakinah Aljufri, hopes that the 3T area will be made a priority scale in terms of providing reading materials. This is based on the large natural resource potential (SDA) owned by the 3T area, but its human resources do not yet have sufficient capacity to process it//VOI
Gong hit by coordinating minister of for Human Development and Culture, marks the begining of the Perpusnas national working meeting 2022 -
The Coordinating Minister for Human Development and Culture, Muhadjir Effendy, officially opened the 2022 National Working Meeting for Libraries which was held at the Ballroom of the Bidakara Hotel, Jakarta on Tuesday, (29/3).
The opening ceremony of the 2022 National Coordination Meeting for Libraries was marked by the beating of the gong, where the Coordinating Minister for Human Development and Culture accompanied by the Head of the National Library Muhammad Syarif Bando stated that the National Library Coordination Meeting with the theme "Library Transformation to Realize a National Digital Ecosystem" was officially opened. This session was followed by various interesting discussions about literacy issues and challenges in Indonesia.
After the opening ceremony, Muhadjir Effendy who was also asked to be the Key Speaker in the 2022 National Library Coordination Meeting session said that in order to create quality and competitive human beings, human development must be based on basic services and social protection, increasing productivity and character building.
In this digital era, he said that the flow of information was very easy to reach, even the world experienced an abundance of learning resources, and it was so easy to access these learning resources.
According to a release received by Voice of Indonesia on Tuesday (29/03/22), Muhadjir Effendy fully supports the 2022 National Coordination Meeting for Libraries which takes the theme of digitization, because the problems and challenges facing society today are about people's behavior in cyberspace.
“Now the problem is the value. Axiology problems. Because of that now you have to be really good at choosing learning materials. Because the available learning materials are very complete, even mixed with garbage,” he said.
The failure of many people in learning is the failure to sort out the right information, especially from their respective cellphones.
"Our task now is how to scavenge and find valuable information in the trash, especially virtual waste," he continued.
Muhadjir Effendy also emphasized that the biggest challenge for the Indonesian nation in relation to digital libraries and digital literacy is that Indonesia still has a fairly low axiological awareness in the digital interaction space.
"Because it is not selective, our virtual world then influences our national aura to have an aura of darkness, full of commotion that does not support the progress and authority of the Indonesian nation," he criticized.
Muhadjir Effendy also underlined that in this digital era, the truth no longer comes absolutely from a finding that can be accounted for procedurally that can be defended professionally.
“Currently, the truth comes from how many followers, how many likes, how many re-uploads. We can be insane because we serve insane people (on social media)," he said.
According to the Coordinating Minister for Human Development and Culture, these important points are the task of the National Library, regional libraries, librarians and all literacy activists to shape the contents of the heads of all people through the massive literacy movement promoted by the National Library of Indonesia.
“The librarian is the person in charge of the nation's civilization. If you want to destroy the civilization of a nation, destroy its library. If we want to build the civilization of a nation, build its library,” he said.
So according to Coordinating Minister Muhadjir, library digitization is no longer an option but has become a necessity. And as the parent of all forms of libraries in Indonesia, the National Library must build a national ecosystem to transform the existence of libraries into learning resources.
“The mobile library or mobile library is also continuously running, especially since the current literacy roadmap is still not running optimally, because the effects of Covid are very much felt. But hopefully the target planned by the government through the RPJMN can also be realized quickly," he concluded//VOI