VOI - Voice of Indonesia | RRI - Radio Republik Indonesia

President Joko Widodo attended a series of 37 ASEAN Summit (Summit) virtually via video conference from the Bogor State Palace, West Java, on Thursday.

At this summit, Vietnam acted as the host for a series of 17 ASEAN summits attended by 10 ASEAN heads of state/government and 8 heads of state/government of ASEAN partner countries.

South Korea, the 23rd ASEAN Summit with Japan, and the 17th ASEAN Summit with India.

The main series of summits will discuss joint steps to prevent the wider impact of this pandemic on the region by emphasizing the priority of cooperation in 2021, particularly regarding the presence and production of vaccines for the region.

The summit will also discuss priorities for economic development in the region with partners to deal with the economic and social impacts of COVID-19.

One of the initiatives carried out by Indonesia at this summit is an effort to build a joint commitment with ASEAN to immediately reopen connectivity and restore economic activity in ASEAN through the ASEAN Travel Corridor Arrangement (TCA).

TCA is expected to facilitate travel access for business people in ASEAN countries in new normal situations while still observing health protocols.

"This summit is important to unite steps and gain future commitment from the leaders of ASEAN partner countries to tackle the pandemic in a more structured manner, according to the required deadlines so as not to further delay the impact of an increasingly complex pandemic on the world and regional situation," Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi said, quoted from the kemlu.go.id page.

Also attending to accompany the President while attending the 37th ASEAN Summit virtually were State Secretary Pratikno, Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi, and Indonesian Permanent Representative to ASEAN Ade Padmo Sarwono. (Antaranews)

The Indonesia-Latin America and the Caribbean (INA-LAC) Business Forum has demonstrated that economic activities can run simultaneously with COVID-19 handling, according to the director-general for American and European Affairs at the Foreign Ministry.

“As conveyed by President Joko Widodo, we need to start economic recovery without putting at risk public safety and health,” I Gede Ngurah Swajaya said at the closing ceremony of the forum here on Wednesday.

The hybrid event, which was conducted in both offline and online formats from November 9-11, 2020, was attended by more than 500 businesspersons from Indonesia, Latin America, and the Caribbean.

Through the use of technology, about 36 one-on-one business meetings could be facilitated effectively and resulted in concrete cooperation, Swajaya informed.

The second INA-LAC forum booked total transactions of US$71.2 million (Rp1 trillion) and potential business worth US$14.3 million (about Rp201 billion) from one-to-one business meetings, he added.

"Total transactions agreed to in the INA-LAC business forum have doubled compared to last year's event," he said.

Interactions between Indonesian businessmen and their partners in Latin America and the Caribbean were supported by digital platforms, with no time and geographical boundaries, he remarked.

At least 146 Indonesian companies and 80 Latin American and Caribbean companies used the INA-LAC website to promote their products and interact with their partners at the forum, he informed.

The Indonesian government also used the platform to showcase 108 investment projects covering 10 sectors in 11 provinces across the country to attract investors from Latin America and the Caribbean.

"This is the benefit of our digital platform. This digital platform will continue to be developed, hence business interaction could run more effectively and efficiently," Swajaya said.

"Working from home is not a problem for you to interact in business," he added.

The economic cooperation between Indonesia and the regions in the future will be strengthened with the planned establishment of a chamber of trade and investment; further negotiation on trade deals that include PTA, FTA, and CEPA; and business trips, he informed.

The initiatives are supported by countries in Latin America and the Caribbean, which, according to the Ambassador of Chile, Gustavo Ayares, are seeking new partners for exports. (Antaranews)

Indonesia has urged Asian countries to revive their economies in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic through inclusive and sustainable tourism, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement released on Wednesday.

“Indonesia has encouraged Asian countries to cooperate in reviving the tourism sector to be secure, sound, strong, and sustainable through the Asian Cooperation Dialogue (ACD),” director of inter-regional and intra-regional cooperation for Asia and the Pacific at the Foreign Ministry, Andre Omer Siregar, said during the opening of the ACD tourism dialogue on Tuesday.

“A strong commitment from tourism stakeholders is needed to revive the sector which provides jobs to over 100 million workers worldwide,” Siregar said.

The theme of the dialogue, initiated by the Foreign Ministry in cooperation with the Ministry of Tourism and Creative Economy, was ‘Mitigating COVID-19 Pandemic Impacts Towards Inclusive and Sustainable Tourism’.

The forum was aimed at building a spirit of cooperation and solidarity among countries joining the ACD, within the framework of reviving the tourism sector in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the Foreign Ministry.

Tourism was one of the areas of priority cooperation at the ACD forum. The sector contributed significantly to the economies of ACD member states in 2019, the ministry noted.

However, global tourism bore the brunt of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Several ACD member states have formulated policies to revive their tourism sector, including relaxing restrictions on transboundary travels and offering incentives to tourism operators, the ministry observed.

At the dialogue, which brought together 25 tourism representatives from ACD member states, participants shared policies, innovations, and breakthroughs in tourism management and recovery during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The keynote speakers at the dialogue included representatives from Cambodia, Turkey, Indonesia, Nepal, Laos, and Bhutan. Asia and Pacific deputy regional director of the UN World Tourism Organization (UNWTO), Harry Hwang, and Asian Development Bank (ADB) expert Mattias Heible also spoke at the forum.

The dialogue’s participants issued a number of recommendations on tourism sector recovery, including controlling travel bubbles among countries, applying standard health protocols worldwide, and strengthening sustainable practices and government support, both fiscal and non-fiscal, for the tourism industry.

The ACD forum agreed to study further concrete cooperation opportunities to sharpen innovation and digitalization, follow stringent health protocols, and carry out good governance and human resources development. (Antaranews)

Millions of men, women, and children in war-torn Yemen are facing famine - again, top United Nations officials warned on Wednesday as they appealed for more money to prevent it - again.

“We are on a countdown right now to a catastrophe,” U.N. food chief David Beasley told the U.N. Security Council. “We have been here before ... We did almost the same dog-and-pony show. We sounded the alarm then.”

The United Nations describes Yemen as the world’s largest humanitarian crisis, with 80% of the people in need of help.

“If we choose to look away, there’s no doubt in my mind Yemen will be plunged into a devastating famine within a few short months,” Beasley told the 15-member council.

A Saudi Arabia-led military coalition intervened in Yemen in 2015, backing government forces fighting the Iran-allied Houthi group. U.N. officials are trying to revive peace talks to end the war as the country’s suffering is also worsened by an economic and currency collapse and the COVID-19 pandemic.

In late 2017, U.N. aid chief Mark Lowcock warned that Yemen was then facing “the largest famine the world has seen for many decades with millions of victims”.

“We prevented famine two years ago,” Lowcock told the Security Council on Wednesday. “More money for the aid operation is the quickest and most efficient way to support famine prevention efforts right now.”

He said the world body had received less than half of what it needed - about $1.5 billion - this year for its humanitarian operations in Yemen. Last year it received $3 billion.

“When I think about what famine would mean, I am really at a loss to understand why more is not being done to prevent it,” Lowcock said. “It is a terrible, agonizing and humiliating death ... Yemenis are not ‘going hungry’. They are being starved.” (Reuters)