VOI - Voice of Indonesia | RRI - Radio Republik Indonesia

Saudi Arabia will partially lift its suspension of international flights as of Sept. 15 to allow “exceptional categories” of citizens and residents to travel, the state news agency SPA said on Sunday.

The kingdom will scrap all travel restrictions on air, land and sea transport for citizens on Jan. 1, 2021, it said.

In March, the kingdom suspended international flights to prevent the spread of the novel coronavirus.

Exceptional categories include public and military sector employees, diplomats and their families, those working for public or non-profit private sector jobs abroad, businessmen, patients who need treatment abroad, those studying abroad as well as people with humanitarian cases, and sports teams.

GCC citizens and non-Saudi residents with valid residency, or visitors’ visas will be allowed to enter the kingdom as of Sept. 15 conditional on proving they are COVID-19 negative.

The kingdom introduced stringent measures to curb the spread of the coronavirus in March, including 24-hour curfews on most towns and cities.

The Kingdom has recorded 325,651 COVID-19 cases and 4,268 deaths. (Reuters)

China and India said on Friday they had agreed to de-escalate renewed tensions on their contested Himalayan border and take steps to restore “peace and tranquility” following a high-level diplomatic meeting in Moscow.

Chinese State Councillor Wang Yi and Indian Foreign Minister S. Jaishankar met in Moscow on Thursday and reached a five-point consensus, including agreements that troops from both sides should quickly disengage and ease tensions, the two countries said in a joint statement.

The consensus struck on the sidelines of a Shanghai Cooperation Organisation meeting, came after a confrontation in the border area in the western Himalayas earlier this week.

“The two Foreign Ministers agreed that the current situation in the border areas is not in the interest of either side. They agreed therefore that the border troops of both sides should continue their dialogue, quickly disengage, maintain proper distance and ease tensions,” they said in the statement.

Jaishankar told Wang that the immediate task would be for troops to step back from the “areas of friction” so that things do not get worse, an Indian source said. Troops are barely a few hundred meters apart at some points.

China and India accused each other of firing into the air during the confrontation, a violation of long-held protocol not to use firearms on the sensitive frontier.

Wang told Jaishankar the “imperative is to immediately stop provocations such as firing and other dangerous actions that violate the commitments made by the two sides,” China’s foreign ministry said in a statement on Friday.

Wang also told Jaishankar all personnel and equipment that have trespassed at the border must be moved to de-escalate the situation.

In June, tensions erupted into a frontier clash in which 20 Indian soldiers were killed and China suffered an unspecified number of casualties. (AlJazeera)

The government updated the development of the COVID-19 case in Indonesia with a note that additional cases are still happening.

Based on data compiled by the Ministry of Health's website on Friday, over the past 24 hours, positive confirmed cases of COVID-19 have increased by 3,737 cases.

The total of the COVID-19 cases since early March to date is 210,940 cases.

The COVID-19 case has spread to 490 districts/cities in 34 provinces in Indonesia.

Several provinces reported the highest additional cases today, including Jakarta with an additional 964 new cases, Central Java with 566 cases, East Java with 362 cases, West Java with 272 cases, and Riau with 182 cases.

Meanwhile, recoveries increased by 2,707 people, bringing the total to 150,217 people. More 88 people died on Friday, bringing the total deaths to 8,544 people. (RRI)

Head of the COVID-19 Handling and National Economic Recovery Committee (KPCPEN) Erick Thohir put forth a suggestion of two schemes for the COVID-19 mass vaccination program.

The two schemes are a free vaccination program and a paid vaccination program, Thohir, also the state enterprises minister, noted while delivering a scientific oration at Padjadjaran University, Bandung, West Java, on Friday.

"We proposed two types of vaccination to the government and the parliament, specifically government-funded vaccination under the military/police program in cooperation with the Education Ministry as well as the Health Ministry and the Indonesian Red Cross," he stated.

The Education Ministry will deploy 40 thousand prospective nurses and 12 thousand prospective physicians to partake in the mass vaccination program, besides 1.5 million doctors and nurses ready to support the program.

The budget for the free vaccination program will come from the state budget by utilizing data of the National Health Insurance (BPJS Kesehatan). The government had fully subsidized the premiums of 93 million people, he stated.

"We are optimistic that people capable of paying (for the vaccination) would help the government by opting for the paid vaccination program," he pointed out.

During its meeting with the Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Kadin), the committee urged members of some associations to conduct paid vaccination to lower the government's burden.

Thohir praised their commitment to covering the funding for COVID-19 vaccination for their respective employees.

Indonesia will receive 30 million doses of the COVID-19 vaccine by 2020-end, and it will have 300 million vaccine doses in 2021.

"God willing by the end of this year, we will have 30 million doses of the vaccine, and in 2021, we will receive 300 million doses of the vaccine," Thohir stated. (Antaranews)