Category: WORLD

Beirut, Dec 12 (IANS) Three people were killed and a fourth was injured in Israeli airstrikes on southern Lebanon, according to a source from the Lebanese Red Cross.

The source, who requires anonymity, told Xinhua that a Red Cross team transported the body of Amin Khsheish, one of the victims, from the town of Khiam to Marjeyoun Governmental Hospital.

According to the source, a unit from the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon found Khsheish’s body near his house in the northern outskirts of the southern Lebanese border town of Khiam, Xinhua news agency reported.

Another team from the Lebanese Red Cross transported a body and an injured person near the village of Aainata to the Bint Jbeil Governmental Hospital in southern Lebanon, the source added.

The source also noted that the body of a citizen named Hamza Badah was retrieved from inside a civilian car that was raided by an Israeli drone in the village of Beit Lif. The body was transferred to a hospital in the city of Tyre.

The latest incidents come amid the ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon, which took effect on November 27.

The ceasefire, brokered by the US and France, aims to halt nearly 14 months of fighting between Israel and Hezbollah.

Under the agreement, Israel will withdraw from Lebanese territory within 60 days, the Lebanese army will be deployed on the Lebanese-Israeli border, and Hezbollah will retreat to north of the Litani River.

–IANS

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Amman, Dec 11 (IANS) King Abdullah II of Jordan and Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia’ al-Sudani emphasised here on Wednesday the importance of strengthening coordination between the two countries to address the challenges posed by the regional situation.

During a meeting in Amman, the two sides also underlined the need to exert maximum efforts to prevent a slide into chaos and the expansion of conflict in the region, according to a statement by the Royal Hashemite Court.

During the meeting, the Jordanian king reiterated his country’s support for the Syrian people and respect for their will, stressing the need to protect Syria’s security and its citizens, Xinhua news agency reported.

He also underscored the importance of intensifying international efforts to achieve an immediate cessation of the Israeli war on Gaza and to double humanitarian and medical aid.

The king warned of the dangers posed by continued extremist settler violence against Palestinians in the West Bank and violations against Islamic and Christian holy sites in Jerusalem.

Regarding Lebanon, the king called for efforts to ensure the success of the ceasefire.

The two leaders also stressed the deep ties between the two countries and their peoples, as well as the commitment to enhancing cooperation across various fields.

–IANS

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Damascus, Dec 11 (IANS) Syria’s Military Operations Administration announced Wednesday that it has lifted the curfew previously imposed on Damascus and its surrounding areas, calling on residents to resume their daily activities and return to their workplaces.

In a statement, the administration encouraged citizens to “contribute to building the new Syria” as the country attempts to normalize conditions following recent fall of Bashar al-Assad’s government.

The lifting of the curfew came as Mohammed al-Bashir, previously a regional leader in northwestern Syria, announced Tuesday that he had been tasked with heading a transitional government in Syria until March 2025, Xinhua news agency reported.

A militant alliance led by the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham waged a major offensive from northern Syria since Nov. 27 and had since swept southwards through government-held areas, capturing the capital Damascus within 12 days.

–IANS

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Madrid, Dec 11 (IANS) Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez hosted his Lebanese counterpart Najib Mikati on Wednesday in Madrid to address pressing issues in Lebanon and the Middle East.

The Spanish prime minister’s office said that the meeting focused on Lebanon’s challenging situation, just two weeks after the ceasefire agreement with Israel took effect and five days following the fall of Bashar al-Assad in Syria.

Both leaders emphasized the importance of solidifying the ceasefire between Lebanon and Israel into a lasting peace, paving the way for full implementation of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1701. They stressed the need to end hostilities permanently to foster regional stability.

Sanchez reiterated Spain’s support for Lebanon and assured Mikati that Spain would contribute to reconstruction efforts, crucial for enabling displaced individuals to return to their homes, Xinhua news agency reported.

The leaders also highlighted the need for an orderly political transition that preserves Syria’s territorial integrity. They agreed that a stable and peaceful Syria is essential for the broader region’s benefit, particularly for Lebanon.

–IANS

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Jakarta, Dec 11 (IANS) Indonesia will build a methanol plant worth 1.2 billion US dollars in Bojonegoro, East Java, as part of the country’s efforts to achieve national energy sovereignty, said Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources Bahlil Lahadalia on Wednesday.

“The construction of this methanol plant is crucial to support the mandatory biodiesel programme, as methanol is used in the biodiesel production process,” Bahlil said during the National Investment Coordination Meeting in Jakarta.

Bahlil added that Indonesia needs around two million to 2.3 million tonnes of methanol, highlighting the importance of the methanol plant’s downstream development, Xinhua news agency reported.

The ministry has requested support from the Special Task Force for Upstream Oil and Gas Regulatory to ensure a gas supply of 90 MMBtu (million British thermal units) for the methanol plant.

–IANS

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Berlin, Dec 11 (IANS) German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Wednesday submitted a formal request for a vote of confidence in the Bundestag, the country’s lower house of parliament.

According to a statement by the federal government, the vote is expected to take place on December 16.

Since the Free Democratic Party (FDP) left Germany’s ruling coalition during the government rift last month, the country has been on its way toward a snap election.

Considering the remaining Social Democratic Party (SPD) and Greens in the government no longer have a majority in the Bundestag, Scholz is expected to lose the vote of confidence next week, Xinhua news agency reported.

After Scholz lost the vote, the German president could dissolve the parliament within 21 days. Snap elections will have to take place within 60 days of the dissolution.

Major German parties have agreed that the snap election should be held on February 23, 2025.

–IANS

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New Delhi, Dec 11 (IANS) Urging governments, global organisations, private companies and individuals to stand with the Hindus of Bangladesh, a diverse coalition of American NGOs, scholars, religious leaders, human rights advocates, and civil rights leaders have jointly called for an immediate intervention to stop the “ongoing genocide” of religious minorities in the country under the “military-Islamist” interim government led by Muhammad Yunus.

Citing a factual ground report prepared by a multidisciplinary research team on the unabated violence and atrocities committed against religious minorities since the regime change in Dhaka after the fall of government led by former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in August, the Indian Americans – including members of Global Hindu Temple Network-America, Global Hindu Heritage Foundation and Hindu Action – assert that the United Nations and global human rights organisations must formally recognise the plight of Hindus in Bangladesh as an “ongoing genocide”.

Making an urgent plea for justice, they have also written to several other organisations – including the UN Peace Operations, UN Human Rights Organistation, UN Women, UNICEF, US State Department, USAID, USCIRF, World Bank, International Monetary Fund, Asian Development Bank and over a dozen private international firms that buy goods from Bangladesh – highlighting the ongoing systematic persecution and violence against minorities in Bangladesh, especially Hindus.

The report, titled ‘Bangladesh Hindus, Christians, Buddhists, and Religious Minorities – Killed, Converted, Forced to Flee’, is authored by former UN officer Mohinder Gulati and renowned scholars like Prof. Ramesh Rao of Columbus State University and Prof. Prakasha Rao Velagapudi, a retired Professor of Sociology from the Jackson State University in Mississippi.

“This report is not just a record of history but an urgent plea for justice. Hindus in Bangladesh, who have contributed to its culture and heritage for centuries, now face extinction in their own homeland. How much longer can the world remain silent? Each day of inaction pushes this ancient community closer to disappearance,” the report mentions.

It details that the regime change in Bangladesh this August – “when a democratically elected government led by Sheikh Hasina was unseated through street violence, student agitations, political opposition, Islamist organisations such as Jamaat-e-Islami, and the Bangladesh military” – unleashed targeted violence against Hindus, their places of worship, their properties and also against other minorities, fitting into the undesired pattern of most agitations and protests in volatile Bangladesh.

The report states that severity of violent atrocities is more pronounced in rural Bangladesh where, in the last five decades, the Hindu population has dwindled to a very small minority.

The situation for Hindus worsened drastically after August, the report says, as it documents an alarming rise in gang rapes, murders, and desecration of temples. Rural Hindu communities, it mentioned, face the brunt of these attacks, enduring atrocities that often go unreported and unpunished.

“The genocide of minorities in Bangladesh demands urgent attention, immediate intervention and swift action. The international community must hold the Government of Bangladesh wholly accountable for protecting its citizens and preventing further atrocities and demand compliance with its obligations under United Nations Human Rights Declaration, International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (ICESCR), United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, and the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) signed and ratified by it,” the authors urge in the report.

The report also proposed actionable measures to stop the ongoing persecution and foster an environment of safety and dignity for Hindus in Bangladesh, including by international recognition and intervention, UN organisations formally recognising the plight of Hindus in Bangladesh as an ongoing genocide, the interim government in Bangladesh held accountable for crimes against minorities, offer economic support, resettlement and financial aid to displaced Hindu families to help them rebuild their lives, etc.

“The findings of this report are more than just statistics; they are human lives impacted by injustice. By presenting these realities, we hope to inspire immediate action, foster international solidarity, and ensure the safety and dignity of Hindus in Bangladesh for generations to come,” the authors of the report detailed.

–IANS

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Sydney, Dec 11 (IANS) Australia’s largest telecommunications company has been fined over an emergency services network disruption.

The Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) on Wednesday announced a three million Australian dollar ($1.9 million) fine for Telstra for failing to comply with emergency call rules during an outage of Australia’s triple zero network in March.

As the national operator of the triple zero service, Telstra is required to meet obligations in relation to the handling and transfer of calls made to the emergency service number, reports Xinhua news agency.

ACMA found 473 breaches of the rules during a March 1 incident in which Telstra’s Triple Zero call centre was hampered in transferring calls to emergency services for 90 minutes.

The investigation found that 127 calls during that period were not transferred to emergency services because Telstra neglected to update its backup phone data.

ACMA said the remaining 346 calls were successfully transferred, but Telstra failed to provide the caller’s digital location information to emergency service organizations.

“Telstra, as the emergency call provider, is at the centre of this critical public safety service. As such, it must have fail-safe systems and processes in place at all times. In this circumstance, its systems and contingency plans failed people in real need,” ACMA member Samantha Yorke said in a statement.

She said that Telstra has been open and apologetic about the outage and has taken steps to prevent a similar incident in the future.

Optus, Australia’s second-largest telecommunications provider, was fined 12 million AUD ($7.6 million) in November by ACMA after thousands of customers were unable to call triple zero during an unprecedented outage in November 2023.

–IANS

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Tokyo, Dec 11 (IANS) The Japanese government is finalising plans to increase corporate and income tax rates to fund its plan to nearly double defence spending to 2 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP), local media cited sources as saying on Wednesday.

The government is targeting April 2026 for a 4 per cent hike in corporate tax rates, while the income tax rate is expected to rise by 1 per cent starting January 2027, reports Xinhua news agency, quoting Kyodo News.

Additionally, tobacco taxes will likely be raised incrementally from April 2026.

Japan plans to outlay a total of 43 trillion yen (about $284 billion) on national defence over the five years through fiscal 2027, and the government aims to collect an additional 1 trillion yen annually through tax increases, according to the report.

The government and ruling parties are drafting comprehensive tax reform plans for fiscal 2025, beginning next April. The finalised schedule for the tax increases is expected to be outlined in a draft to be completed by the end of December, the report added.

The expansion of Japan’s military budget has raised concerns domestically and internationally.

The country has set a goal outlined in its 2022 National Security Strategy of bringing defence spending to 2 per cent of the GDP in fiscal 2027, after long maintaining an informal cap of around 1 per cent, or about 5 trillion yen, under its war-renouncing Constitution.

–IANS

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Dhaka, Dec 11 (IANS) A Bangladesh court on Wednesday rejected the bail plea of Chinmoy Krishna Das, a Hindu priest and spokesperson of the Bangladesh Sammilit Sanatan Jagran Jote also associated with the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON), who has been arrested and jailed by the local authorities on charges of sedition.

Local media reported that Chittagong Metropolitan Sessions Judge Md. Saiful Islam, who is on vacation, passed the order on Wednesday citing that the plea was rejected because Das did not have a lawyer’s letter of attorney on his behalf.

The petition, which will be heard on January 2 next year now, states that Das – a monk who is suffering from various diseases including diabetes and respiratory problems – has been arrested in a false and fabricated case.

It also mentions that his lawyer Subhashish Sharma could not attend the hearing on December 3 due to security reasons.

“Chittagong Metropolitan Sessions Judge Court Public Prosecutor PP Mofizul Haque Bhuiyan said that the state party informed the court that lawyer Rabindra Ghosh, who had applied for Chinmoy’s anticipatory bail hearing, had not given any power of attorney to fight the case on his behalf. Apart from this, Chinmoy’s lawyer Subhashish Sharma was also not present. Subhashish did not give anything in writing to Rabindra Ghosh to fight the case. Later, the court rejected the application made by lawyer Rabindra Ghosh,” reported the country’s leading Bengali daily Prothom Alo.

It was revealed that the bail hearing of two other accused in the case was also scheduled for Wednesday but could not take place due to the lawyer’s absence.

India has been reiterating that it hopes that the trial will be “fair and transparent” as the arrested Hindus have legal rights that should be respected.

New Delhi has also urged the interim government’s authorities in Dhaka to ensure the safety and security of Hindus and all minorities, including their right of freedom of peaceful assembly and expression while highlighting that the arrest of Das follows multiple attacks on Hindus and other minorities by extremist elements in Bangladesh.

“The interim government must live up to its responsibility of protecting all minorities. We are concerned at the surge of extremist rhetoric, increasing incidents of violence and provocation. These developments cannot be dismissed only as media exaggerations. We once again call upon Bangladesh to take all steps for the protection of minorities,” Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said last month.

On Monday, during his visit to Dhaka, Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri had conveyed India’s concerns, especially those related to the safety and welfare of minorities, during his meetings with the Chief Advisor of the Interim Government of Bangladesh, Muhammad Yunus and the Foreign Affairs Advisor, Touhid Hossain.

“We also discussed some regrettable incidents of attacks on cultural, religious, and diplomatic properties. We expect, overall, a constructive approach on all these issues by the Bangladesh authorities, and we look forward to moving the relationship forward in a positive, forward-looking, and constructive direction,” Misri told reporters in Dhaka on December 9 following his meeting with Hossain.

–IANS

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