Pune – Bharti Airtel announced the deployment of its 5G services at Pune Lohegaon Airport, making it the first airport in the Maharashtra to have ultrafast 5G services.
Airtel recently announced the launch of 5G services at the new airport Terminal at Bengaluru.
Airtel 5G Plus service is now live in Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Siliguri, Nagpur, Varanasi, Panipat and Gurugram, the company said in a statement.
“Customers in these cities have started enjoying Airtel 5G Plus services in a phased manner as the company continues to construct its network and complete the roll out,” the company said.
Commenting on the launch, George Mathen, CEO, Maharashtra and Goa, Bharti Airtel said, “I am thrilled to announce the beginning of a new chapter in Maharashtra as Pune International Airport, becomes the first airport in the state to have the Airtel 5G Plus services”.
“While at the terminal, customers can now access superfast access to High Definition video streaming, gaming, multiple chatting, instant uploading of photos and more. I thank the authorities for all the support extended to make this project live,” Mathen added.
The RBI and the Royal Monetary Authority of Bhutan signed agreement of 200 USD
New Delhi – The Reserve Bank of India and the Royal Monetary Authority of Bhutan (RMA) signed an agreement to enable the RMA to avail of an additional currency swap amount of up to USD 200 million equivalent in INR from the RBI.
1. The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and the Royal Monetary Authority of Bhutan (RMA) today signed an Agreement to extend the validity period of the Bilateral Currency Swap Agreement signed on January 31, 2020 and to provide additional swap support to Bhutan. This agreement will enable the RMA to avail of an additional swap amount of up to USO 200 million equivalent in INR (approximately INR 1657 crore or BTN 16.57 billion) from the RBI. This support of USO 200 million INR equivalent is in addition to the extant currency swap support of USD 200 million INR equivalent extended by the RBI. This agreement was facilitated by the Government of India at the request of the Royal Government of Bhutan.
2. The agreement will be valid till June 30, 2023. In the past, the RBI and the RMA have signed bilateral currency swap agreements in 2013, 2016, 2019, and 2020. Under the SAARC Currency Swap Arrangement, the RBI offers an aggregate amount of USO 2 billion both in foreign currency (USO and Euro) and in INR to the requesting countries.
3. The swap agreement between the RBI and the RMA is intended to provide a backstop line of funding for RMA for short-term foreign exchange liquidity requirements or to meet any balance of payments and liquidity crises. The INR swap arrangements have benefited Bhutan in managing the INR liquidity. This facility has also helped to promote trade and investment between the two countries.
4. Additionally, India is currently providing two Standby Credit Facilities (SCF) to Bhutan, of INR 300 crore (BTN 3 billion) and INR 400 crore (BTN 4 billion), whose settlement period was recently extended by another 60 months with a reduced interest rate of 2.5°/o with effect from 01 July 2022. The SCFs also serve to promote bilateral trade by facilitating payments within India and meeting INR requirements in Bhutan.
5. India and Bhutan enjoy exemplary ties of friendship and close cooperation based on trust and mutual understanding across all sectors, including financial cooperation as brought out above.
India takes charge of G20 2023: Bali Summit Ends, Indonesian President Joko Widodo symbolically handed over the G20 Presidency to PM Narendra Modi.
PTI (Bali) – Indonesia on Wednesday handed over the G20 presidency to India for the coming year as the Bali summit of the grouping ended here with the member states finalizing the joint declaration.
Indonesian President Joko Widodo handed over the G20 presidency to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who said taking over the Presidency of the grouping is a matter of pride for every citizen in India.
‘Together with every countries’ efforts, we can make the G20 summit a catalyst for global welfare,” Modi said.
The handing over ceremony comes at the conclusion of the two-day G20 summit which ended with the member states finalizing the joint declaration.
Foreign Secretary Vinay Kwatra said that India has contributed ‘constructively’ to drafting of G20 ‘outcome document’.
The G20 comprises 19 countries: Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Turkey, the UK, the USA and the European Union (EU).
Together, they account for over 80 per cent of the global GDP, 75 per cent of international trade and two-thirds of the world population.
(This story has been published from a wire agency feed without any modifications to the text. Only the headline has been changed.)
PM Modi was joined by other world leaders, including U.S. President Biden and French President Macron, EU President Ursula von der Leyen.
Diplomat Times (Bali) -Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi along with other G-20 Leaders visited and planted Mangroves at the ‘Taman Hutan Raya Ngurah Rai’ Mangrove forests.
Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi along with other G-20 Leaders visited and planted Mangroves at the ‘Taman Hutan Raya Ngurah Rai’ Mangrove forests on the sidelines of G-20 Summit in Bali today.
Mangroves play an important role in global conservation efforts. India has joined the Mangrove Alliance for Climate (MAC), a joint initiative of Indonesia and UAE under the Indonesian G-20 Presidency.
More than 50 mangrove species can be found spread over 5000 sq km in India. India is placing emphasis on the protection and restoration of mangroves, which are rich sites of biodiversity and serve as effective carbon sinks.
What is Mangrove ?
Indonesia harbors the largest area and diversity of mangrove ecosystems in the world. Mangroves support coastal livelihoods through fisheries (fish, crab, and other seafood), protect the country’s coasts from disasters, and store 3.14 billion tons of CO2, playing a significant role in mitigating global climate change. Recent World Bank research found Indonesia’s mangroves are worth approximately US$15,000 per hectare on average, with some locations – particularly those near developed coastal areas — worth about $50,000, due to their role in flood protection.
A recent study suggested that in this past ten years, mangrove conversion contributed to almost 200 million tons of CO2 going into the atmosphere, equivalent to the electricity use in over 35 million homes for one year.
Where and how to reach :
The mangrove forest is located 6 kms away from Sanur in Kuta direction. You can reach there by taxi or car from Ngurah Rai Airport.
“PM @narendramodi and other G20 leaders visited a mangrove forest in Bali, giving a strong message of coming together to tackle climate change and boost sustainable development. India has also joined the Mangrove Alliance for Climate,” the Prime Minister’s Office tweeted.
Reuters (Dubai) – Six candidates including one woman won seats in a first phase of Bahrain’s parliamentary election, while others will compete for the remaining 34 seats in the main event next week, authorities announced on Sunday.
Bahraini voters cast their ballots in polling stations across the small Gulf kingdom on Saturday, but in the absence of two major opposition groups that were dissolved years ago.
Justice Minister Nawaf bin Mohammed Al-Maawda told reporters late Saturday that turnout was 73 percent in the poll, contested by a record number of candidates.
This was “the highest participation rate since 2002,” he said, and “no violations were recorded.”
More than 330 candidates, including a record 73 women, are competing to join the 40-seat council of representatives — the lower house of parliament that advises King Hamad, who has ruled since his father died in March 1999.
This is up from the 293 people — including 41 women — who ran for parliament in the last election in 2018.
On Sunday, the results showed that six candidates, five men and one woman, won seats, while the remaining seats will be contested in a run-off next Saturday.
The two main opposition groups, the Shiite Al-Wefaq and the secular Waad, were prevented from presenting candidates. These parties were dissolved in 2016 and 2017 respectively.
This is the third election since demonstrations in 2011 driven by demands for a constitutional monarchy and other political reforms.
Amnesty International said ahead of the poll that the elections were taking place in an “environment of political repression”.
A government spokesperson pushed back against that criticism on Saturday.
“Requirements include not having a criminal record or not belonging to a society dissolved due to their court-proven involvement in acts of violence in contravention of legitimate political activity”, he said.
The number of registered voters in the Gulf kingdom is about 350,000 people out of a population of about 1.4 million people.
Global Media Congress kicks off in Abu Dhabi with wide-scale international participation, Under the patronage of Mansour bin Zayed
Abu Dhabi – Under the patronage of His Highness Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of the Presidential Court, the first edition of the Global Media Congress 2022 kicked off in Abu Dhabi, under the theme “Shaping the Future of the Media Industry”.
The event welcomed the participation of more than 1,200 media sector leaders and pioneers, specialists, influencers, experts, and intellectual icons from six continents.
The opening ceremony of the Global Media Congress was attended by His
Excellency Dr. Sultan bin Ahmed Al Jaber, Minister of Industry and Advanced
Technology; His Excellency Dr. Thani bin Ahmed Al Zeyoudi, Minister of State for
Foreign Trade; Her Excellency Shamma bint Suhail bin Faris Al Mazrui, Minister of
State for Youth Affairs; His Excellency Dr. Ramzan bin Abdullah Al Nuaimi, Minister
of Information Affairs in the Kingdom of Bahrain; His Excellency Ahmed Afif, Vice
President of the Republic of Seychelles; His Excellency Mona Ghanem Al Marri,
President of the Dubai Press Club; and Mohammed Jalal Al Rayssi, Director General
of Emirates News Agency (WAM). In addition to 12 ministers from different countries
and more than 35 ambassadors to the UAE.
The event was also attended by His Excellency Osman Abukar Dubbe, Minister of
Information, Culture and Tourism of Somalia; His Excellency Walid Ammar Al Lafi,
Minister of State for Communication and Political Affairs of Libya; His Excellency
Monica Mutsvangwa, Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting Services of
Zimbabwe; His Excellency Guy Ahmed, Minister of Justice of the Comoros; His
Excellency Mohamed Idris, Minister of Information of Ethiopia; His Excellency
Babacar Diagne, President of the Audio Visual Regulation Council of Senegal.
The opening ceremony, which was organized by ADNEC Group in partnership with Emirates News Agency (WAM), began with the national anthem of the United Arab
Emirates. Her Excellency Shamma bint Suhail Faris Al Mazrui, Minister of State for
Youth Affairs also delivered a speech, which was followed by the first metaverse
media interview and an interactive art performance about the future.
In a speech delivered on his behalf Mohammed Jalal Al Rayssi, Director General of
WAM, His Highness Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan said: “The UAE, under
the leadership of His Highness Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, President of
the UAE, is a futurist state that focuses on the continuous launch of world-class
strategic initiatives and projects in various fields and sectors. The UAE has been
successful in reaching the world through its influential national media system that
applies creativity, innovation, and advanced technology to create reliable and high-
quality media content.”
“Our national media is witnessing sustainable development that aligns with the vision
of our wise leadership and supports the UAE’s direction for the next fifty years. Over
the past decades, the UAE has been able to develop a media system that has
become at the forefront of the regional and global scenes and has become a catalyst
for achieving development and spreading the values of tolerance, coexistence, and
peace,” His Highness added.
Photo : GMC
“The Global Media Congress, which brings together media leaders, experts, and
professionals in the sector, is the culmination of the UAE’s efforts to build an
exceptional environment characterized by flexibility and competitiveness and based
on an advanced digital infrastructure. This in turn consolidates its position as a global
hub and destination that embraces talent, creators, and influencers in the field of
media and social communication, particularly in light of the rapid changes and digital
transformation.” His Highness added.
The Global Media Congress includes a conference and exhibition, which provides an
inspiring platform to learn about the media industry and realize a forward-looking
vision for the future of the sector, which has become a major catalyst for sustainable
development.
Photo : GMC
The global event attracts more than 200 CEO’s and includes more than 30 dialogue
sessions and more than 40 workshops, in which more than 162 prominent
international speakers will participate. In addition, more than 193 prominent media
institutions and companies from 42 countries will participate in the exhibition, where they will highlight the latest global technologies specialized in this vital sector.
The Congress will feature six major initiatives, including the Live Shows Platform, the
Global Program for Empowering Young Media Professionals, the Future Media Lab,
the Innovation Platform, the Global Buyers Program, and a special session on the
role of media in building a culture of tolerance in human societies.
This year’s Congress focuses on a number of themes, topics, and key issues,
including digital communication, the impact of artificial intelligence on contemporary
media, and the integration of advanced technologies and innovation in the media
sector.
The Event will consist of a series of dialogues, the launch of innovations, interactive
workshops, and discussion sessions. This is in addition to allocating a number of
areas for meetings with various participants on the sidelines of the event, which will
also include a set of specialized sessions in the fields of press, radio, television, the Internet, social media, and global influencers. The Congress will also feature 30
dialogue sessions, highlighting digital technologies, artificial intelligence, advanced
technologies, and innovation.
Myanmar: Junta bans independent news outlet The Irrawaddy
The IPI global network condemns the recent decision by Myanmar’s ruling military junta to ban the independent media outlet The Irrawaddy. The military regime should immediately reverse this move and allow independent media in the country to operate freely.
Burma – The ordered closure of The Irrawaddy came in a statement issued by state media on October 29. Authorities allege that the outlet’s reporting is damaging state security, the rule of law, and public tranquility.
The military regime had previously targeted the news outlet with arrests, threats, lawsuits, and raids. Recently, the military junta threatened to take legal action against The Irrawaddy and BBC Burmese Service for “misreporting” an incident in which three Buddhist pilgrims were shot and killed. This caused staff to go into hiding.
In a statement on its website, The Irrawaddy called the ban the first public acknowledgment of the regime’s efforts to suppress its reporting. The outlet has been working mainly in exile. Editor-in-Chief Aung Zaw told IPI that the newly ordered ban will not stop them from reporting.
“We continue our reporting even though the Myanmar military regime revoked our publishing license”, Zaw said. “Readers from inside and outside of the country can continue to access our publication on the website and on various digital platforms. Our readership keeps on growing, as the people want credible, reliable news and analysis.”
“IPI strongly condemns the Myanmar military junta’s ordered closure of The Irrawaddy, which is an obvious attempt at silencing independent news and information in the country. Authorities should immediately reverse this decision and allow The Irrawaddy and all other independent news outlets to operate freely in Myanmar”, IPI Deputy Director Scott Griffen said.
“The targeting of The Irrawaddy is the latest attack on press freedom by the military regime, which has cracked down brutally on journalists and news outlets following last year’s coup. The international community must do more to pressure the junta to respect fundamental rights and reinstate democracy.”
The ban follows a worrying crackdown on the media environment in Myanmar since the military junta took power in a coup early 2021. In October alone, Japanese journalist Toru Kubota was sentenced to ten years in jail for filming an anti-junta protest and journalist Sithu Aung Myint was sentenced to three years in prison for incitement.
Trump’s threat to imprisoned journalists : RSF condemns
RSF warns that Trump’s new threats against American press should be taken seriously and that a federal press shield law is needed to protect the sanctity of journalistic sources.
Washington, D.C.- Former President Donald Trump has reportedly held discussions with advisors about how to circumvent the First Amendment and jail journalists during a potential second term in office. According to Rolling Stone, “Trump has privately strategized about what a second term, potentially starting in 2025, could look like, he’s begun occasionally soliciting ideas from conservative allies for how the U.S. government and Justice Department could go about turning his desires — for brutally imprisoning significant numbers of reporters — into reality.”
Trump made a similar threat in public at a rally on November 7th, just one day before this week’s midterm elections, when he mused about jailing reporters for not surrendering their sources and even made a vulgar joke about sexual assault in prison: “You tell the reporter who is it … and if the reporter doesn’t want to tell you it’s ‘bye bye.’ The reporter goes to jail. When the reporter learns he’s going to be married to a certain prisoner that’s extremely strong, tough, and mean, he will say, ‘you know, I think I’m going to give you the information.’
“The former president has often spoken admiringly of authoritarians who punish critics and imprison journalists. We need to take his threats to mimic them seriously, and one of the best ways to do that would be to pass a federal press shield law to protect journalists and their sources.”
Clayton Weimers, Executive Director of the Reporters Without Borders US Bureau
Considering these threats, Congress should pass the PRESS Act, which would limit the government’s ability to compel journalists to reveal their sources. Protection of anonymous sources is essential to investigative journalism and free press.
Not the first time Trump has targeted journalism
During President Trump’s first term in office, he asked what could be done to punish members of the media for doing their jobs. According to the New York Times, Trump broached the topic of jailing journalists who published classified information with then FBI director James Comey in 2017.
Press freedom conditions began declining swiftly during the Trump administration. In 2020, President Trump’s fourth year in office, a record-breaking number of journalists were arrested, in addition to 856 other types of aggressions committed against journalists – the majority of which were deliberate and unprovoked physical attacks on clearly identified reporters. The final days of the Trump administration were marked by an insurrection in Washington, D.C. in which five people were killed, and rioters damaged tens of thousands of dollars worth of media equipment owned by The Associated Press, smashed cameras while yelling “CNN sucks,” and scrawled the words, “Murder The Media” onto doors inside the Capitol Building.
Donald Trump: "The reporter goes to jail, and when the reporter learns that he's going to be married in two days to a certain prisoner…" pic.twitter.com/wvK7Ilrhn9
Archbishop tells G20 event Christianity ‘on the very edge of extinction’ in Iraq
Erbil – Speaking at a G20 event centered on religion’s role in helping solve global problems, an Iraqi archbishop warns that Christianity in his country is “on the very edge of extinction.”
The Most Rev. Bashar Warda, the Chaldean Catholic Archbishop of Erbil, spoke last week at the G20 Religion Forum in Bali, Indonesia, an event attended by more than 300 religious leaders from across the globe.
He gave a speech titled “The Future of Religious Pluralism: A Warning from Iraq,” a copy of which was emailed to The Christian Post.
During his remarks, the archbishop stressed that “sectarian violence” is a significant problem in Iraq. This country suffered the rise of an Islamic State stronghold during the last decade in which thousands of Iraqi religious minorities were killed, enslaved or forced to flee their homelands.
Warda stated, “without an end to this sectarian violence, there is no future for religious pluralism in Iraq, or anywhere else in the Mideast for that matter.”
“The brutal logic of this is that there does eventually reach an end point where there are no minorities left to kill, and no minorities left to persecute,” said Warda.
“Such is the bleak future of religious pluralism in Iraq today. As I share with you this experience, I pray that you will find in our story a clear warning to you all.”
Warda noted that after around 1,900 years of existing in the region, “we Christians of Iraq now find ourselves on the very edge of extinction.”
“Our Christian ancestors shared with Muslim Arabs a deep tradition of thought and philosophy and engaged with them in dialogue respectfully since the eighth century A.D. The Arabic Golden Age, historian Philip Jenkins has noted, was built on Chaldean and Syriac scholarship,” he continued.
“Now we face the end in Iraq, the same end faced by the Iraqi Jews before us, and the same end now being faced by the Yazidis, with whom we have suffered so much pain, alongside us.”
There is “a fundamental crisis of violence within Islam” that “can no longer be ignored,” Warda said, adding that it “continues to affect the entire Middle East, Africa, Asia and beyond.”
“And if this crisis is not acknowledged, addressed, and fixed, then there can be no future for Christians or any other form of religious pluralism in the Middle East,” the archbishop said.
“Indeed, there is little reason to see a future for anyone in the Middle East, including within the Islamic world itself, other than in the context of continued violence, revenge, and hatred.”
Warda acknowledged that “we Christians have too often embraced the most radical and violent interpretations of our faith,” looking at the Second Vatican Council’s official recognition of religious freedom in 1962 as a critical turning point.
“This is where we Iraqi Christians are today: not forgetting, but still forgiving. Can our Muslim brothers and sisters follow us in this, or will their own story of violence continue, destroying themselves eventually?” he asked.
“Fundamentally, this change in direction can only come about as the conscious work of the Islamic world itself.”
Open Doors USA, a watchdog group that monitors persecution in over 60 countries, ranks Iraq as the 14th worst country in the world when it comes to Christian persecution.
Although Christians in Iraq once numbered around 1.5 million, that number has fallen to below 200,000 today as the Christian population has deteriorated since the United States military intervention began in 2003.
Although the Islamic State’s stronghold in Nineveh Plains was eradicated in 2017, the country remains plagued by conflicts that “gravely affect the country’s minority Christian population,” according to Open Doors.
A gathering of 19 countries plus the European Union aimed at addressing issues surrounding the global economy, the G20 Heads of State and Government Summit is scheduled for Nov. 15-16.
Lagos – Islamic jihadist groups in Nigeria are responsible for killing at least 4,000 Christians and abducting more than 2,300 other Christians in the first 10 months of this year alone, according to a report released this week by the International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law.
The Fulani herdsmen and Islamic terror groups allied with it were responsible for 2,650 of the 4,020 Christian deaths between January and October, the Anambra-based group Intersociety said in a report sent to The Christian Post.
The other terror groups, including Islamic State in West Africa Province, Boko Haram and Ansaru, accounted for 450 Christian deaths and the Fulani (Zamfara) bandits and their splinter groups were responsible for 370 Christian deaths, it added.
Fulani herdsmen and Fulani (Zamfara) bandits and other armed jihadist groups that are “Nigerian government friendly” abducted more than 2,315 Christians, out of which, 1,401 were abducted between January and June, and 915 between July and October, added Intersociety, which is run by Christian criminologist Emeka Umeagbalasi.
Out of the 2,315 abducted Christians, about 10%, or 231, might not ever be able to return to their families due to their circumstances or have “most likely been killed in captivity for their refusal to convert to Islam or inability to pay huge ransoms demanded,” it further said.
On an average, as per the statistics, more than 400 Christians were slaughtered and 231 others were abducted per month, or 13 deaths and eight abductions were reported per day, respectively, Intersociety stressed.
The report comes about two months after the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom warned that religious freedom was deteriorating in Nigeria because of rising violence by non-State actors and that “poor governance” was driving and aggravating that violence.
“In recent years, nonstate actor violence has increased in most parts of Nigeria, and this violence has yielded devastating humanitarian and human rights consequences, including but not limited to violence based on religion and other violations of Nigerians’ rights to freedom of religion or belief,” USCIRF said in a report on violence in Africa’s most populous country.
“Violence that infringes on freedom of religion or belief in Nigeria includes militant Islamist violence, identity-based violence at the intersection of religion, ethnicity, and geographic heritage, mob violence against individuals accused of blasphemy, and violence impacting worship,” explains the commission, a congressionally mandated body of independent experts tasked with advising the federal government on religious freedom issues.
According to a recent study from the Anambra-based International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law (Intersociety), at least 60,000 Christians have been killed in the past two decades in Nigeria. The organization, which is run by Christian criminologist Emeka Umeagbalasi, reported that hundreds of churches had been threatened, attacked, closed, destroyed or burned in 2021 alone.
Intersociety said in an earlier report that at least 60,000 Christians had been killed in the past two decades in Nigeria, adding that an estimated 10 million people had been uprooted in northern Nigeria, where extremist violence was most severe, from July 2009 to July 2021.
The report added that about 2,000 Christian schools were attacked during that time.
The atrocities included “massacres, killings, mutilations, torture, maiming, abductions, hostage-taking, rape, girl-child defilements, forced marriages, disappearances, extortions, forceful conversions and destruction or burning of homes and sacred worship and learning centers,” Intersociety reported at the time.
Many have raised concerns about what they perceive as the government’s inaction in holding terrorists accountable for the rising number of murders and kidnappings, which some groups warn have reached the level of genocide.
In its report, USCIRF recommended that the State Department designate Nigeria as a Country of Particular Concern for “engaging in and tolerating systematic, ongoing, and egregious violations of religious freedom.”
Countries subject to the State Department’s “CPC” designation face negative consequences, including the possibility of crippling sanctions.
