VOI - Voice of Indonesia | RRI - Radio Republik Indonesia

A container load of Indonesia-made furniture and home decor products was dispatched to Monterrey City, Mexico on February 1, 2021. (Antara/  Dokumentasi KBRI Mexico City)

The Indonesian Embassy and the Indonesian Trade Promotion Center (ITPC) in Mexico City have facilitated business cooperation between Indonesian and Mexican companies for export of furniture, home decor items, and textiles.

The cooperation is part of efforts taken since early this year to increase Indonesia's exports to Mexico, the Indonesian Embassy in Mexico City said in a written statement issued on Saturday.
The agreement includes cooperation to export Indonesian furniture to Mexico and market Balinese clothes and textiles to the country.

Indonesia exported a container load of furniture and home decor items to Monterrey City, Mexico, via the Tanjung Priok Port in North Jakarta on February 1, 2021.The products, which mostly came from West Java, will be displayed and sold at a gallery in Monterrey, which has so far sold home decor products from the United States.

On February 3, 2021, PT. Asia Garmen Internasional of Indonesia and Pareos Del Mar of Mexico inked a memorandum of understanding (MoU) online on business cooperation.

Indonesian Ambassador to Mexico Cheppy T. Wartono and Director of Promotion and Image Development at the Indonesian Trade Ministry Tuti Prahastuti witnessed the signing of the MoU, the embassy informed.

Under the cooperation agreement, Pareos Del Mar will serve as a representative agent for PT. Asia Garmen Internasional’s products in Mexico//ANT

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, seen introducing President Joe Biden at the State Department on Feb 4, 2021, has offered a tough tone in his first talks with China. (Photo: AFP/SAUL LOEB)

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken told top Chinese diplomat Yang Jiechi in a phone call on Friday (Feb 5) the United States will stand up for human rights and democratic values in Xinjiang, Tibet and Hong Kong, the State Department said.

Blinken also pressed China to condemn the military coup in Myanmar, and he reaffirmed that Washington will work with allies to hold China accountable for efforts to threaten stability of the Indo-Pacific, including across the Taiwan Strait, the department said in a statement.

The relationship between the world's two biggest economies hit its lowest point in decades during the presidency of Donald Trump, and Chinese officials have expressed cautious optimism that it would improve under the administration of Joe Biden.

Foreign ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin also said on Friday that "the common interests of the two countries outweighed their differences" and urged the United States to "meet China halfway" to improve relations//CNA

File photo of a healthcare worker preparing a dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine in Singapore. (File photo: Jeremy Long)

Receiving more than the recommended dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine is unlikely to be harmful, said Singapore's Ministry of Health (MOH) on Saturday (Feb 6), citing clinical trial data from the two pharmaceutical companies.

This comes after an employee from the Singapore National Eye Centre (SNEC) was wrongly administered the equivalent of five doses of the vaccine due to a human error.The recommended schedule for the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine is two doses, 21 days apart.

“Clinical trial data from Pfizer-BioNTech has indicated that receiving more than the recommended dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine is unlikely to be harmful,” said MOH in response to CNA’s queries.

“The affected staff is well, and did not have any adverse reaction or side effects.”MOH said the incident at SNEC is an isolated one due to a human error by a staff member administering the vaccine, adding that it has not been notified of any similar incidents at other vaccination sites.

The error happened on Jan 14 during a vaccination exercise conducted at SNEC for its staff members.

According to SNEC in an earlier media release, investigations showed that the error resulted from a lapse in communication among the vaccination team at the time.

The error was discovered within minutes of the vaccination when the affected employee was resting in a designated area after the jab. As a precaution, the affected employee was warded at Singapore General Hospital (SGH) for observation as was discharged two days later.In response to CNA's queries, the eye centre said the affected employee remains well and is scheduled for the second dosage of the vaccine, pending the blood serology test results//CNA

Pakistan's K2 has been dubbed the "Savage Mountain" for its perilous conditions AFP/AMELIE HERENSTEIN

Three climbers have gone missing attempting to summit the world's second-highest mountain, K2, their expedition manager and the Alpine Club of Pakistan said Saturday (Feb 6).

Climbers John Snorri from Iceland, Juan Pablo Mohr from Chile and Muhammad Ali Sadpara from Pakistan reportedly lost contact with base camp on Friday.

An army helicopter has conducted a search flight for the missing climbers, Sherpa said in a separate statement.

"Unfortunately, they cannot trace anything and the condition up in the mountain and even at the basecamp is getting poor", he said.Karrar Haidri, Secretary of the Alpine Club of Pakistan, also told AFP that the climbers had gone missing on the mountain.

News of the missing men comes a day after a Bulgarian mountaineer was confirmed to have died on K2.

He is the third mountaineer to die on K2's slopes this year, after a Spanish climber fell to his death last month.

Russian-American Alex Goldfarb also died on a nearby mountain during an acclimatising mission in January.

With Pakistan's borders open and few other places to go, this winter an unprecedented four teams totalling around 60 climbers have converged on the mountain, more than all previous expeditions put together.

Unlike Mount Everest, which has been scaled by thousands of climbers young and old, K2 is much less travelled due to its tough conditions//CNA