VOI - Voice of Indonesia | RRI - Radio Republik Indonesia

VOINews, Jakarta - The Coordinating Ministry for Human Development and Culture emphasized that sustainable development of tourism is key to the progress of villages, so support that advances the local aspects and good tourism governance is deemed necessary.

The ministry's Assistant Deputy for Regional Empowerment and Spatial Mobility Herbert Siagian told the press here on Thursday that several villages in remote areas became known by other countries due to the tourism sector. Hence, it is deemed necessary that sustainability is maintained.

"It can be said that tourism is one of the gateways to village transformation. Therefore, we help by coordinating with relevant ministries and agencies if there are obstructions or impasses that hinder the development," he remarked.

According to Siagian, one of the important aspects of villages' tourism sustainability is the development of local wisdom potential that signifies the uniqueness of a village.

He explained that several villages have good natural landscapes and supportive tourism infrastructure but cannot compete due to not having unique qualities that they want to promote.

"Therefore, if the village can (maintain an) inventory and manage existing local wisdom properly, it will be a step forward towards ensuring the sustainability of tourism as well as village independence by developing the village's original source of income," he stated.

He assessed that local wisdom gives higher investment value than tourism infrastructure development.

To this end, he emphasized the need to ensure village-owned enterprises (BUMDes) serve as business entities as well as managers of various resources in the tourism sector.

"Thus, there must be local residents that know about the management and governance of the village's wealth, including the human resources and local wisdom to empower the wealth for developing the prosperity of the village," he remarked.

He also highlighted the importance of coaching by professional workers, both through workshops and talk shows, to share literacy and assist BUMDes to support them in being independent and ready to manage the tourism potential of the village.

"Villages, whose tourism sector is already advanced today, (could be on that level) because they first employ professionals temporarily, so there are individuals, who understand and assist in matters of tourism management and governance," he remarked. (Antaranews)

VOINews, Jakarta - Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi has reaffirmed that her side has been striving to evacuate 10 Indonesian citizens from the Gaza Strip every day amid an escalation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

"Almost every day I communicate with representatives of our citizens in Gaza. However, the evacuation could not be done yet because the situation is still very difficult," she said in a press statement on the development of the Gaza situation, which was received here on Wednesday.

She further said that she has been communicating with the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and various parties who can help carry out the safe evacuation of Indonesian citizens.

"We will mobilize all efforts to evacuate Indonesian citizens safely," she assured.

Based on the ministry's data, the 10 Indonesian citizens trapped in Gaza comprise 3 MER-C volunteers at the Indonesian Hospital and 7 Indonesian nationals who are married to locals.

Marsudi said that the evacuation of Indonesian citizens can only be carried out if a ceasefire is agreed upon between the two nations, which have witnessed an escalation in conflict since the Hamas group attacked Israeli territory on October 7, 2023.

On October 13, the Indonesian government successfully evacuated 4 Indonesian citizens from the West Bank and surrounding areas.

Meanwhile, as many as 129 Indonesian citizens living in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, and parts of the West Bank chose not to return to their home country because they felt their situation was still safe.

In a telephone conversation on October 15, Marsudi and Malaysian Foreign Minister Zambry Abdul Kadir discussed the issues related to the latest developments in Palestine.

The two, according to Kadir, discussed the importance of an uninterrupted humanitarian corridor to Gaza to quickly address the mounting humanitarian crisis. (Antaranews)

VOINews, Jakarta - A Pakistan court on Thursday barred authorities from arresting a former three-time prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, upon his expected return home on Saturday from four years in self-imposed exile, his lawyer said.

Lawyer Azam Nazeer Tarar told reporters that Sharif had been granted protective bail, under which authorities could not arrest him until he himself appears before a court on Oct. 24, adding that Sharif would address a rally in the city of Lahore upon his return.

Sharif's younger brother, Shehbaz Sharif, was prime minister from 2022 until this year, when his government was replaced by a caretaker administration upon the dissolution of parliament in advance of a general election due early next year.

The younger Sharif welcomed the court's decision.

"He was implicated in absurd cases and subjected to mistreatment," Shehbaz Sharif said on the X social media platform, formerly known as Twitter.

"Any fair hearing would have established his innocence."

Nawaz Sharif was in 2018 convicted on corruption charges, which he denied, in two cases and sentenced to a total of 14 years in prison.

A court allowed him to travel to London for medical treatment in 2019 under a rare surety bond, under which he undertook to return after treatment. Later, he was declared an absconder after failing to return.

The veteran politician has said he was ousted as prime minister in 2017 by leaders of the powerful military and the judiciary after he fell out with the generals.

The military, which has ruled Pakistan for extended periods since independence in 1947 and retains significant influence, even over civilian government, denies that.

Tarar said Sharif would follow up appeals against his convictions, which have been pending since he left, in the hope of overturning them and campaigning for the general election.

Upon his return on Saturday, he would address a rally in his old stronghold of Lahore, Tarar said.

"It is everyone's constitutional rights to freely do political activities," Tarar said.

Sharif's party has said he would like to contest a seat in the general election but that would depend on the court over-turning his convictions.

Groomed by the military when he entered politics in the late 1970s, Sharif fell out with then army chief, General Pervez Musharraf, during a second stint as prime minister and was ousted in a 1999 coup.

Musharraf ruled for nearly a decade when Pakistan, which supported the U.S.-led "war on terror", was rocked by Islamist militant violence. Sharif returned to Pakistan and to politics in 2007. (Reuters)

VOINews, Jakarta - A team of international scientists collected fish samples from a port town near Japan's crippled Fukushima nuclear plant on Thursday, seeking to assess the impact of the plant's recent release of treated radioactive water into the sea.

The study by the U.N.'s nuclear watchdog is the first since the water release began in August, a move that drew criticism from local fisherman and prompted China to ban all imports of marine products from Japan over food safety fears.

Scientists from China, South Korea and Canada observed the collection of fish samples delivered fresh off the boat at Hisanohama port, about 50 kilometres south of the plant which was destroyed in the 2011 earthquake and tsunami.

The samples will be sent to laboratories in each country for independent testing, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said.

"The Japanese government has requested that we do this and one of the reasons they want us to do this is to try and strengthen confidence in the data that Japan is producing," said Paul McGinnity, a research scientist with the IAEA overseeing the survey.

More than a million metric tons of water - enough to fill 500 Olympic-sized smimming pools - was contaminated from contact with fuel rods at the reactor following the 2011 disaster.

Before being released, the water is filtered to remove isotopes, leaving only tritium, a radioactive isotope of hydrogen that is hard to separate, plant operator Tepco says. The water is also diluted until tritium levels fall below regulatory limits.

Tritium is considered to be relatively harmless because its radiation is not energetic enough to penetrate human skin; however, when ingested at levels above those in the released water it can raise cancer risks, a Scientific American article said in 2014. (Reuters)