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November
Kazakhstan Welcomes France's Macron Under Moscow's Disapproving Gaze
Written by Nur Yasmin
VOINews, Jakarta - French President Emmanuel Macron arrived in Kazakhstan on Wednesday on the first leg of a trip to Central Asia, a region long regarded as Russia's backyard which has drawn fresh Western attention since the war in Ukraine began.
Oil-rich Kazakhstan has already emerged as a replacement supplier of crude to European nations turning off Russian supply and an important link in the new China-Europe trade route bypassing Russia.
In addition to oil, Kazakhstan is a major exporter of uranium, and France's Orano already operates a joint venture with its state nuclear firm Kazatomprom.
At a meeting with President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, Macron complimented Kazakhstan for refusing to side with Moscow on Ukraine and said the two countries signed business deals, including a declaration of intent for a partnership in the much-sought area of rare earths and rare metals.
"I don't underestimate by any means the geopolitical difficulties, the pressures ... that some may be putting on you," Macron told Tokayev, who called the visit "historic."
"France values ... the path you are following for your country, refusing to be a vassal of any power and seeking to build numerous and balanced relations with different countries."
Russia has voiced concern at the West's growing diplomatic activity in former Soviet Central Asian nations.
While on Wednesday, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Kazakhstan as a sovereign state was free to develop ties with any countries, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said last week the West was trying to pull Russia's "neighbours, friends and allies" away from it.
Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, where Macron goes next, have refused to recognise Russia's annexation of Ukrainian territories and have pledged to abide by Western sanctions against Moscow, while calling both Russia and Western nations such as France their strategic partners.
"We respect our friends, we are here when they need us and we respect their independence," Macron said. "And in a world where major powers want to become hegemons, and where regional powers become unpredictable, it is good to have friends who share this philosophy."
Asked about Macron's visit, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Russia valued its relations with Kazakhstan "very highly."
"In our turn, we have historical ties, ties of strategic partnership with Kazakhstan, they are our allies and our interests are united in many international bodies," Peskov told reporters. (Reuters)
November
Biggest Chinese Antarctic Fleet Sets Off to Build Research Station
Written by Nur Yasmin
VOINews, Jakarta - Two Chinese icebreaker research vessels and a cargo ship set sail on Wednesday for the Antarctic with more than 460 personnel on board to help complete construction of China's fifth station on the world's southernmost continent.
China's biggest flotilla of research vessels deployed to the Antarctic will focus on building the station on the rocky, windswept Inexpressible Island near the Ross Sea, a deep Southern Ocean bay named after a 19th century British explorer.
Work on the first Chinese station in the Pacific sector began in 2018. It will be used to conduct research on the region's environment, state television reported.
China has four research stations in the Antarctic built from 1985 to 2014. A U.S.-based think tank estimated the fifth could be finished next year.
The facility is expected to include an observatory with a satellite ground station, and should help China "fill in a major gap" in its ability to access the continent, the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) said in a report this year.
The station is also well situated to collect signals intelligence over Australia and New Zealand and telemetry data on rockets launched from Australia's new Arnhem Space Centre, it said.
China rejects suggestions that its stations would be used for espionage.
The two icebreakers, Xuelong 1 and Xuelong 2, the name means "Snow Dragon" in Chinese, set sail from Shanghai with mostly personnel and logistics supplies on board.
The cargo ship "Tianhui", or "Divine Blessings", taking construction material for the station, set off from the eastern port of Zhangjiagang.
The five-month mission will include a survey on the impact of climate change.
The two icebreakers will also conduct environmental surveys in the Prydez Bay, the Astronaut Sea in southeast Antarctic, and in the Ross Sea and Amundsen Sea in the west.
The mission, China's 40th to the Antarctic, will also cooperate with countries including the United States, Britain, and Russia on logistics supply, state media said. (Reuters)
November
China Kicks Off Nationwide Population Survey Amid Declining Birth Rate
Written by Nur Yasmin
VOINews, Jakarta - China will begin polling 1.4 million people on Wednesday in a survey on population changes, as authorities struggle to incentivise people to have more children amid a declining birth rate and the first population drop in more than six decades.
The poll, which was announced on Oct. 10 in an unexpected move, will focus on urban and rural areas throughout the country. The survey will be based on a sample of 500,000 households and last for around two weeks until Nov. 15, China's National Bureau of Statistics said.
It will help provide a basis to monitor China's population developmental changes and for the government and Communist Party to formulate national economic, social development and population related policies, it said.
China last conducted its once-in-a-decade census in November 2020 which showed it grew at the slowest pace since the first modern population survey in the 1950s.
Population development has often been linked to the strength and "rejuvenation" of the country in state media amid the declining birth rate and widespread concerns by citizens on the difficulties of raising children.
High childcare costs and having to stop their careers have put many women off having more children or any at all. Gender discrimination and traditional stereotypes of women caring for the children are still widespread throughout the country.
Authorities have in recent months increased rhetoric on sharing the duty of child rearing but paternity leave is still limited in most provinces.
The country reported a drop of roughly 850,000 people for a population of 1.41175 billion in 2022, marking the first decline since 1961, the last year of China's Great Famine. (Reuters)
November
Japan, Philippines in Final Stages of Talks on Security Aid - Japan Govt Spokesperson
Written by Nur Yasmin
VOINews, Jakarta - Japan's top government spokesperson said on Wednesday that Japan is in the final stages of negotiations with the Philippines on what equipment to offer to Manila and when to sign an agreement under Tokyo's official security assistance programme.
The programme is aimed at helping boost deterrence capabilities of Tokyo's partner countries.
Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno made the comment to reporters ahead of Prime Minister Fumio Kishida's visit to the Philippines on Friday. (Reuters)
October
Palestinian Americans fundraise for Gaza, as aid groups receive record donations
Written by Nur Yasmin
VOI, Jakarta - Palestinian Americans and aid groups in the United States are raising funds for Gaza, which faces a deepening humanitarian crisis as the Israel-Hamas war enters its fourth week - but they have as yet limited ability to get supplies into the besieged enclave.
Aid organizations that serve civilians in Gaza say they are receiving record amounts of donations in a sign of public support for relief efforts even as a growing stock of supplies remain stalled at Egypt's Rafah border crossing.
In the Gaza Strip, where 2.3 million people live, civilians are in dire need of clean water, food and medicine, emergency medics say. Half of Gaza's population was already living in poverty before the crisis.
"We've seen a significant increase in donations, unlike we've ever seen before," said Steve Sosebee, president of the U.S.-based Palestine Children's Relief Fund, which has a staff of 40 in Gaza that provide medical support. He said the fund, which usually has an annual budget of around $12 million, had raised $15 million in just 10 days.
However, with a web of political and logistical obstacles on getting aid in, much of the money and supplies intended for Gaza is in limbo, forcing aid groups to wait as they amass truckloads of goods.
Hamas militants burst over the Gaza border and rampaged through Israeli towns on Oct. 7, killing 1,400 people and taking 229 hostages, according to Israeli authorities. In response, Israel launched its most intense air bombardment campaign on the tiny enclave, along with a "total siege," banning food, water and fuel imports.
Aid groups say they are building up supplies in hopes of eventually getting them through to civilians in Gaza, nearly half of whom are children.
There has been "a five-fold increase in the total number of donors versus typical past emergencies," said Derek Madsen, chief development officer of Anera, a nonpartisan emergency relief group for refugees throughout the Middle East. The organization, which maintains the privacy of individual donors, said it had recently received the largest single donation from an individual in its 55-year-old history.
The majority of support comes from donors based in the United States, he added, with individual donations averaging around $138. The efforts mirror those of Jewish groups in the U.S. and Canada who also fundraised millions for Israel.
Anera was using the last of its stocks this week to distribute meals and vegetable parcels in Gaza. Its staff of 12, like everyone in Gaza, were facing "unbelievable, unimaginable trauma," he said.
GLUED TO THE TELEVISION
In Ann Arbor, Michigan, Rabia Shafie, national director of the Palestine Aid Society, said her group was speaking to student and Muslim groups on local university campuses and community centers to spread awareness and raise donations for the Red Crescent and UNRWA, the UN aid agency that serves Palestinian refugees.
"The money is needed to help people survive at this point of time. Medical support is so essential," she said.
"People are glued to the television ... watching the news moment to moment and very stressed out over the situation," said Shafie, adding that it was difficult as a Palestinian American to watch "the massacre and injustice done to our people back home."
Hamas-governed Gaza is one of the most densely packed places on earth and its medical authorities say over 8,000 Palestinians have been killed since airstrikes began, including more than 3,000 children.
Anera's Madsen called for a ceasefire and establishment of a humanitarian corridor "so that people literally do not starve to death, literally do not die of dehydration."
Last week, in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, home to one of New York's largest Muslim and Arab communities, hundreds of protesters called for a ceasefire with signs written in Arabic, Spanish, Hebrew and Korean.
In Clifton, New Jersey, the Palestinian American Community Center's priority is advocating for U.S. officials to support a ceasefire and for the hundreds of Americans trapped in Gaza, said Basma Bsharat, the education director of the center.
The center has also been collecting cash donations to send on to UNRWA. It has asked people not to donate supplies, which it has no easy way of sending to those in need in Gaza.
Last week, a woman came to the center anyway, hauling bags filled with goods.
"We didn't know how to say no," said Bsharat. "She was like, I just want to do something. I just want to help somehow."
"It's a very difficult time, and the fact that we do see the support coming in it, it gives some relief," she said. "It gives some kind of solace." (Reuters)
October
Pakistan's Plan to Expel Over 1 Million Afghans Living in the Country Illegally
Written by Nur Yasmin
VOINews, Jakarta - Pakistan set a Nov. 1 deadline for all foreigners without legal documents, including more than a million Afghans, to leave the country or face forcible expulsion.
Here are key facts about Islamabad's plan to deport hundreds of thousands back to its western neighbour Afghanistan:
- Pakistan announced the Wednesday deadline on Oct. 3, giving more than a million people about four weeks to move.
- The sudden expulsion threat came after suicide bombings this year that the government said involved Afghans, though without providing evidence. Islamabad has also blamed them for smuggling and other militant attacks as well as petty crimes.
- Islamabad says Afghan nationals were found to be involved in attacks against government and the army, including 14 of this year's 24 suicide bombings.
- Pakistan is home to more than 4 million Afghan migrants and refugees, about 1.7 million of them undocumented, according to Islamabad, although many have lived in Pakistan for their entire lives.
- About 600,000 Afghans have crossed into Pakistan since the Taliban took over in 2021, joining a large number present since the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979 and the ensuing civil wars.
- More than 60,000 Afghans returned to Afghanistan from Pakistan between Sept. 23 and Oct. 22, ahead of the deadline, with thousands more expected to have been on the move last week.
- Islamabad says deportation will be orderly, carried out in phases and start with those who have criminal records. Authorities have vowed raids in areas suspected of housing "undocumented foreigners" after Wednesday.
- Authorities have set up "holding centres" to process deportees before they return to Afghanistan. Reuters could not determine how long they might be detained in the centres. (Reuters)
October
Thailand to Waive Visas for Taiwan and India to Boost Tourism
Written by Nur Yasmin
VOINews, Jakarta - Thailand will waive visa requirements for arrivals from India and Taiwan from next month to May 2024, a government official said on Tuesday, in a bid to draw in more tourists as high season approaches.
Thailand in September scrapped visa requirements for Chinese tourists, the country's top pre-pandemic tourism market with 11 million of the record 39 million arrivals in 2019.
From January to October 29, there were 22 million visitors to Thailand, generating 927.5 billion baht ($25.67 billion), according to the latest government data.
"Arrivals from India and Taiwan can enter Thailand for 30 days," spokesperson Chai Wacharonke said.
India has been Thailand's fourth largest source market for tourism so far this year with about 1.2 million arrivals after Malaysia, China and South Korea.
Inbound tourism from India showed signs of growth as more airlines and hospitality chains targeted that market.
Thailand is targeting about 28 million arrivals this year, with the new government hoping the travel sector can offset continued weak exports that have constrained economic growth.
($1 = 36.1300 baht) (Reuters)
October
Afghans Return to Taliban Rule as Pakistan Moves to Expel 1.7 Million
Written by Nur Yasmin
VOINews, Jakarta - As the clock ticked down to the Nov. 1 deadline Pakistan set for undocumented migrants to leave the country, Muhammad Rahim boarded a bus from Karachi to the Afghan border.
"We'd live here our whole life if they didn't send us back," said the 35-year-old Afghan national, who was born in Pakistan, married a Pakistani woman and raised his Pakistan-born children in the port city - but has no Pakistani identity documents.
The Taliban government in Afghanistan said some 60,000 Afghans returned between Sept 23 to Oct 22 from Pakistan, which announced on Oct 4 it will expel undocumented migrants that do not leave.
And recent daily returnee figures are three times higher than normal, Taliban refugee ministry spokesman Abdul Mutaleb Haqqani told Reuters on Oct 26.
Near Karachi's Sohrab Goth area - home to one of Pakistan's largest Afghan settlements - a bus service operator named Azizullah said he had laid on extra services to cope with the exodus. Nearby, lines formed before competitor bus services headed to Afghanistan.
"Before I used to run one bus a week, now we have four to five a week," said Azizullah, who - like all the Afghan migrants Reuters interviewed - spoke on condition that he be identified by only one name due to the sensitivity of the matter.
Reuters interviewed seven refugee families in Sohrab Goth, as well as four Taliban and Pakistani officials, community leaders, aid workers and advocates, who said Islamabad's threat - and a subsequent rise in state-backed harassment - has torn families apart and pushed even Afghans with valid papers to leave.
The Pakistani Interior Ministry did not immediately return a request for comment. Foreign Ministry spokesman Mumtaz Zahra Baloch said in a statement that the expulsion plan was compliant with international norms and principles: "Our record of the last forty years in hosting millions of our Afghan brothers and sisters speaks for itself."
Pakistan is home to over 4 million Afghan migrants and refugees, about 1.7 million of whom are undocumented, according to Islamabad. Afghans make up the largest portion of migrants - many came after the Taliban retook Afghanistan in 2021, but a large number have been present since the 1979 Soviet invasion.
The expulsion threat came after suicide bombings this year which the government - without providing evidence - said involved Afghans. Islamabad has also blamed them for smuggling and other militant attacks.
Cash-strapped Pakistan, navigating record inflation and a tough International Monetary Fund bailout program, also said undocumented migrants have drained its resources for decades.
Despite the challenges facing migrants, Pakistan is the only home many of them know and a sanctuary from the economic deprivation and extreme social conservatism that Afghanistan is grappling with, said Samar Abbas of the Sindh Human Rights Defenders Network, which is helping 200 Afghans seeking to remain.
RISE IN RETURNS
In early September, an average of 300 people crossed the border into Afghanistan daily, according to international organizations working on migration issues, who provided data on condition that they not be identified due to the sensitivity of the matter. After Islamabad announced the November deadline, crossings jumped to roughly 4,000, the organizations said.
These figures are small compared to the number of people to be affected in coming days. The information minister for Balochistan province, which borders Afghanistan, told Reuters it is opening three more border crossings.
For weeks, state-run television has run a countdown to Nov. 1 on the top of its screens.
Federal Interior Minister Sarfaraz Bugti warned that law enforcement agencies will start removing "illegal immigrants who have ... no justification" being in Pakistan after Tuesday.
They will be processed at "holding centers" and then deported, he told reporters, adding that women, children and the elderly would be treated "respectfully." Reuters could not determine how long they might be detained in the centers.
Pakistani citizens who help undocumented migrants obtain false identities or employment will face legal action, Bugti warned.
"Post-November will be very chaotic and there will be chaos in the Afghan refugee camps," said Abbas, the advocate.
FEAR AND DESPERATION
The U.N. refugee agency UNHCR and the International Organization for Migration (IOM) said Pakistan's plans create "serious protection risks" for women and girls forced to leave. Restrictions in Afghanistan, especially on female NGO workers, have led to shrinking employment opportunities for women there.
While Pakistan says it will not target Afghans with legal status, many with proper documents also find themselves being targeted, according to migrant advocates.
UNHCR data shows that 14,700 documented Afghans left Pakistan as of Oct. 18 2023, more than double the 6,039 in all of last year.
The agency said in a statement that 78 percent of recent returning Afghans it spoke to cited fear of arrest in Pakistan as reason for their departure.
There are more than 2.2 million Afghan migrants in Pakistan with some form of documentation recognized by the government that conveys temporary residence rights.
Roughly 1.4 million of them hold Proof of Registration (PoR) cards that expired on June 30, leaving them vulnerable. Islamabad says it will not take action against people with invalid cards, but Abbas told Reuters that police harassment has ramped up since the expulsion threat.
More than a dozen migrants that Reuters spoke to corroborated the claim, which was also repeated by Taliban diplomats in Pakistan.
Karachi East Police Superintendent Uzair Ahmed told Reuters that while there might be "one or two" instances of harassment, it was non-systemic and offenders would be investigated.
Many Afghans with legal status told Reuters they feel compelled to leave out of fear of being separated from family members without documentation.
Hajira, a 42-year-old widow in Sohrab Goth, told Reuters she has the right to remain in Pakistan, as do two of her four sons. The other two don't.
Fearing separation from her children, she plans on leaving with her sons and their families before the deadline expires.
Majida, a 31-year-old who was born in Pakistan, lives with her husband and their six children in an apartment complex in Sohrab Goth, a squalid suburb whose narrow streets are filled with heaps of garbage.
She said her family has PoR cards but has still been subject to harassment: a brother-in-law and nephew were detained by local authorities for several hours before being released. Reuters could not independently verify her account.
When Majida fell ill earlier in October, her husband refused to help her pick up medication at a nearby pharmacy out of fear of detention.
"We don't have a home or work (in Afghanistan)," she said. "Obviously, we think of Pakistan as our home, we've been living here for so long."
PRESSURE IN AFGHANISTAN
Back in Afghanistan, the influx of returning migrants and refugees has exerted pressure on already limited resources that are stretched by international sanctions on the banking sector and cuts in foreign aid after the Taliban takeover.
The Afghan Ministry of Refugees says it intends to register returnees and then house them in temporary camps. The Taliban administration said it will try to find returnees jobs.
The unemployment rate more than doubled from the period immediately before the Taliban takeover to June 2023, according to the World Bank. U.N. agencies say around two-thirds of the population is in need of humanitarian aid.
"We had our own barbecue shop and meat shop here. We had ... everything. We were guests here," said 18-year-old Muhammad just before he boarded Azizullah's bus back to Afghanistan.
"You should think of it this way: that the country is kicking out its guests." (Reuters)
October
Singapore Expects Economy to Improve in Second Half of 2024
Written by Nur YasminVOINews, Jakarta - Singapore expects muted prospects for its economy in the short-term amid global uncertainty, but the second half of 2024 should bring gradual improvement, its central bank said on Monday.
In its semi-annual macroeconomic review, the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) said gross domestic product (GDP) growth, which veered on the edge of a technical recession in the middle of the year, should improve gradually next year while core inflation is expected to ease by December.
"The third quarter of this year likely marked the turning point in the slowdown," it said.
GDP growth was at 0.7% year-on-year in the third quarter of this year, according to advance estimates. The Asian financial hub narrowly avoided a technical recession, with the economy expanding 0.1% quarter-on-quarter in April to June following a 0.4% contraction in the first quarter of 2023.
"In the absence of renewed shocks or setbacks in the global economy, the Singapore economy should benefit as the global tech industry gradually emerges from its trough and global interest rates level off over 2024."
Meanwhile, MAS expects inflation to be on a broad moderating trend and slow to an average of 2.5–3.5% for 2024 as a whole.
Core inflation, which excludes private road transport and accommodation costs, has cooled from a 14-year high of 5.5% in January to 3.0% in September.
There are upside and downside risks to inflation, MAS said.
"Shocks to global food and energy prices or domestic labour costs could bring about additional inflationary pressures. However, a sharper-than-expected downturn in the global economy could induce a general easing of cost and price pressures."
Against this backdrop, MAS said the current appreciating path of the Singapore dollar nominal effective exchange rate, or S$NEER - is sufficiently tight.
The central bank kept monetary policy settings unchanged in April and October after tightening five times in a row from October 2021.
"The sustained appreciation of the policy band will continue to dampen imported inflation and curb domestic cost pressures, and thus ensure medium-term price stability," said the MAS. (Reuters)
October
Australia, EU Say Trade Deal Likely Years Away After Rejecting Terms
Written by Nur Yasmin
VOINews, Jakarta - Australia has rejected European Union proposals for a free trade agreement, and a deal is now unlikely to be reached for several years, Australian government ministers said on Monday.
The largest farm industry group thanked the government for refusing to "throw Aussie farmers under a bus" by signing a deal it said would not have let enough of their products into the EU.
The two sides have been negotiating since 2018, with Australia eager to boost agricultural exports by removing EU tariffs and expanding quotas, and Europe likely to gain greater access to Australia's critical minerals industry.
Australian Trade Minister Don Farrell said after a meeting of Group of Seven (G7) trade ministers in the Japanese city of Osaka over the weekend that no progress had been made.
"I came to Osaka with the intention to finalise a free trade agreement," Farrell said in a statement.
"Unfortunately we have not been able to make progress," he said. "Negotiations will continue, and I am hopeful that one day we will sign a deal that benefits both Australia and our European friends."
Australia's agriculture minister, Murray Watt, said the EU - one of the world's largest markets - had only slightly tweaked the proposal it put on the table three months ago.
"We just weren't able to see the EU increase its offer for things like beef, sheep, dairy, sugar, enough for us to think that this deal was in Australia's national interest," he told ABC Radio.
EU trade chief Valdis Dombrovskis said the bloc had "presented a commercially meaningful agricultural market access offer to Australia, while being mindful of the interests of the European agricultural sector".
"Unfortunately, our Australian partners were not able to engage on the basis of previously identified landing zones. We were therefore unable to make progress," he said.
'DUD DEAL'
Australia's Watt said it would be some time before the Australian government and EU leadership would be able to negotiate a deal because of upcoming elections in the EU.
Australian farm groups had pressured the government not to sign a "dud deal" that would put their members at a disadvantage to competitors in New Zealand, Canada and South America, who have greater access to EU markets.
The EU signed a trade deal with New Zealand last year that lowered tariffs for EU exports including clothing, chemicals and cars, and allowed more New Zealand beef, lamb, butter and cheese into the EU.
"It's disappointing the Europeans weren't willing to put something commercially meaningful on the table," National Farmers' Federation President David Jochinke said in a statement. (Reuters)