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Ex-governor Bola Tinubu closes in on Nigeria presidential election victory

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Ex-governor Bola Tinubu closes in on Nigeria presidential election victory

Bola Tinubu of the ruling APC party is leading with about 35 percent or 7.5 million of valid votes counted, while Atiku Abubakar of the main opposition PDP was trailing with 29 percent or nearly 6.2 million valid votes. TRT

Diplomat Times (ABUJA) – Provisional results from Nigeria’s disputed presidential election showed that Bola Tinubu from the ruling party is closing in on victory, according to the latest Reuters tally of votes in 31 of the country’s 36 states and from nation’s capital.

With only 5 states left to declare as of 1300 GMT on Tuesday, Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress party (APC) was ahead with about 35 percent or 7.5 million of valid votes counted, making it highly likely he would be declared winner on Tuesday following Saturday’s election to replace outgoing President Muhammadu Buhari, also APC.

Atiku Abubakar of the main opposition People’s Democratic Party (PDP) was trailing with 29 percent or nearly 6.2 million valid votes.

Peter Obi of the smaller Labour Party got 25 percent or about 5.2 million votes. More results were expected to show the winner later on Tuesday.

Known as the “Godfather of Lagos” for his influence, Tinubu served as governor of the country’s most populous state from 1999 to 2007.

Tinubu, however, lost narrowly to Obi in Lagos, garnering 572,000 votes against the latter’s 582,000 votes.

READ MORE : South Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa welcomes Belgium’s King Philippe and Queen Mathilde

As of 1230 GMT, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) had posted results from 83,906 polling units out of 176,846.

Opposition parties have rejected the results as the product of a flawed process, which suffered multiple technical difficulties owing to the introduction of new technology by INEC.

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The preliminary results announced in the states will again be presented at INEC’s central office in the capital, Abuja.

But INEC officers in Rivers State, the capital of Africa’s biggest oil industry, said they had suspended the announcement of results after state collation officer Charles Adias had received death threats via text message.

Nigerian electoral law says a candidate can win just by getting more votes than their rivals, provided they get 25 percent of the vote in at least two-thirds of the 36 states.

Saturday’s election was mostly peaceful, but many polling stations opened late, angering voters, and delays or technical failures slowed uploading of results to an official INEC website meant to promote transparency.

PDP and other party officials stormed out of the counting center on Monday night claiming tallies were manipulated.

Whoever replaces Buhari must quickly get to grips with Africa’s largest economy and top oil producer, which is beset by problems including a grinding violence in the northeast and double-digit inflation.

Buhari, a former army general first elected in 2015, will step down after two terms in office. His critics say he failed in his key promises to make Nigeria safer.

WHO IS BOLA TINUBU ? 

Bola Tinubu is a Nigerian politician and one of the most influential political figures in the country today. He was born on March 29, 1952, in Lagos, Nigeria, to a family of modest means. After completing his secondary education at Government College, Ibadan, he went on to obtain a Bachelor of Science degree in Accounting from Chicago State University in the United States.

He stated his career as accountant and politician who served as the Governor of Lagos State from 1999 to 2007 and Senator for Lagos West during the brief Third Republic. In June 2022, he was chosen as the All Progressives Congress nominee in the 2023 Nigerian presidential election.

His political career began in 1992, when he joined the Social Democratic Party where he was a member of the Peoples Front faction led by Shehu Musa Yar’Adua and made up of other politicians such as Umaru Yar’Adua, Atiku Abubakar, Baba Gana Kingibe, Rabiu Kwankwaso, Abdullahi Aliyu Sumaila, Magaji Abdullahi, Dapo Sarumi and Yomi Edu. He was elected to the Senate, representing the Lagos West constituency in the short-lived Nigerian Third Republic.

People are eager to know about Bola Tinubu Biography.

UK’s PM Rishi Sunak and EU chief clinch Brexit deal over Northern Ireland trade

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UK’s PM Rishi Sunak and EU chief clinch Brexit deal over Northern Ireland trade
UK’s PM Rishi Sunak and EU chief clinch Brexit deal over Northern Ireland trade

Diplomat Times (London)- Britain and the European Union on Monday agreed a crucial overhaul of trade rules in Northern Ireland, a breakthrough aimed at resetting seriously strained relations since Brexit.

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen adopted the deal at talks in Windsor, west of London, both sides said.

Von der Leyen told a news conference it was “historic what we have achieved today.” Sunak said there had been a “decisive breakthrough.”

The agreement, which will allow goods to flow freely to Northern Ireland from the rest of the U.K., ends a dispute that has soured U.K.-EU relations, sparked the collapse of the Belfast-based regional government and shaken Northern Ireland’s decades-old peace process.

Fixing it ends a long-running irritant for von der Leyen and is a big victory for Sunak — but not the end of his troubles. Selling the deal to his own Conservative Party and its Northern Irish allies may be a tougher struggle. Now Sunak awaits the judgment of Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party, which is boycotting the region’s power-sharing government until the trade arrangements are changed to its satisfaction.

The joint solutions, found within the framework of the Withdrawal Agreement, are based on the following starting points:

  • Comprehensive, cross-cutting and definitive solution, addressing practical difficulties in the operation of the Protocol;
  • Balance between flexibilities for the movement of goods for end use in Northern Ireland and effective safeguards guaranteeing the protection of the EU’s Single Market;
  • Clear distinction between goods at risk and goods not at risk of entering the EU’s Single Market.
    New arrangements in the area of customs are based on an expanded trusted trader scheme that will also be open to businesses in Great Britain

Goods moved by trusted traders and not at risk of entering the EU’s Single Market will benefit from dramatically simplified procedures and drastically simplified declarations with reduced data requirements. Substantial facilitations were found for freight and the movement of all types of parcels, i.e., business-to-business, business-to-consumer, and consumer-to-consumer, with consumer-to-consumer parcels being entirely exempt from the main customs requirements.

These new solutions are made possible especially by new data-sharing arrangements allowing for risk assessments, which would constitute the principle basis for controls. Robust authorisation and monitoring of the trusted trader scheme, and increased market surveillance and enforcement by UK authorities also act as safeguards. Full customs procedures will apply to goods at risk of entering the EU’s Single Market.

A permanent solution has also been found to ensure that people in Northern Ireland have access to all medicines, including novel medicines, at the same time and under the same conditions as people in the rest of the UK. This complements the solution the EU adopted in April 2022 for the supply of generic medicines to Northern Ireland.

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These new arrangements are made possible by new safeguards, notably labelling, designed to ensure that the medicines do not enter the EU’s Single Market.

The joint solutions also address implementation difficulties related to tariff rate quotas (TRQs) for the most sensitive categories of steel and clarify the application of State aid rules.

These new arrangements have been carried out within the framework of the Withdrawal Agreement of which the Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland is an integral part. Within these pre-established legal parameters, a number of targeted amendments to the Protocol address, in a definitive way, unforeseen circumstances or deficiencies that have emerged since the start of the Protocol.

What is the Protocol Ireland/Northern Ireland ? 

The Protocol on Ireland/Northern Ireland, as an integral part of the Withdrawal Agreement, was agreed jointly and ratified by both the EU and the UK. It has been in force since 1 February 2020 and has legal effects under international law.

The aim of the Protocol is to protect the Good Friday (Belfast) Agreement in all its dimensions, maintaining peace and stability in Northern Ireland, avoiding a hard border on the island of Ireland, while preserving the integrity of the EU Single Market.

Migrant boat breaks apart off Italy; 45 dead, 80 survive

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Migrant boat breaks apart off Italy; 45 dead, 80 survive
Migrant boat breaks apart off Italy; 45 dead, 80 survive

Diplomat Times(Rome)- At least 45 migrants died when their wooden boat smashed into rocky reefs and broke apart off southern Italy before dawn Sunday, the Italian coast guard and UN agencies said. Survivors indicated that dozens more could be missing from the boat that had set out from Turkey.

The Italian Coast Guard said at least 80 people were found alive, “some of whom succeeded in reaching the shore after the shipwreck.”

 

The precise numbers were hard to establish. A reporter for Italian RAI state TV, standing next to the wreckage on the beach, quoted local authorities as saying 60 bodies had been recovered. With his foot, he indicated a life preserver bearing the word “Smyrna,” a Turkish port also known as Izmir.

Authorities said the cloth-covered bodies were brought to the sports stadium in the nearest city, Crotone.

More than 170 migrants were estimated to have been aboard the ship, two U.N. agencies, the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees and the International Organization for Migration, said in a joint statement that cited survivor accounts.

Among those aboard, there were “children and entire families,″ the U.N. statement, with most of the passengers coming from Afghanistan, Pakistan and Somalia.

Reporting from the village of Steccato di Cutro, state TV quoted survivors as saying the boat had set out five days earlier from Turkey.

Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni said the migrants had been crowded into a 20-metre (66-foot) -long boat.

Italian authorities said a rescue operation involving a helicopter and police aircraft, and vessels from state firefighter squads, the coast guard and border police, was underway Sunday. Local fishermen also joined in the search for survivors.

A pair of firefighter water rescuers struggled with wind gusts and waves several meters (yards) high crashing onto the beach as they brought a body ashore.

A local priest said he blessed bodies while they were still lying on the beach.

One survivor was taken into custody for questioning after survivors indicated he was a trafficker, Rai state TV said.

Some of the survivors tried to keep warm, wrapped in blankets and quilts. They were taken by bus to a temporary shelter. State TV said 22 survivors were taken to the hospital for treatment.

Pope Francis told the faithful in St. Peter’s Square he was pained by the news. “I pray for each of them, for the missing and the other migrants who survived.” The pontiff added he also was praying for the rescuers “and for those who give welcome” to the migrants.

 

“It’s an enormous tragedy,” Crotone Mayor Vincenzo Voce told RAI state TV. “In solidarity, the city will find places in the cemetery” for the dead, Voce said.

In 2022, some 105,000 migrants arrived on Italian shores, some 38,000 more than in 2021, according to Interior Ministry figures.

According to UN figures, arrivals from the Turkish route accounted for 15 per cent of the total number, with nearly half of those fleeing from Afghanistan.

In a statement released by the premier’s office Sunday, Meloni expressed “her deep sorrow for the many human lives torn away by human traffickers.”

“It’s inhumane to exchange the lives of men, women and children for the ‘price’ of a ticket paid by them in the false prospect for a safe voyage,” said Meloni, a far-right-wing leader whose governing allies includes the anti-migrant League party.

She vowed to pursue a crackdown on departures arranged by people smugglers and to press fellow European Union leaders to help Italy in her quest.

Opposition parties, however, pointed to Sunday’s tragedy as proof that Italy’s migration policy was badly flawed.

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“Condemning only the smugglers, as the center-right is doing now, is hypocrisy,” Laura Ferrara, a European Parliament lawmaker from the populist 5-Star Movement, said.

“The truth is that the EU today doesn’t offer effective alternatives for those who are forced abandon their country of origin,” Ferrara said in a statement.

As well as the route from Turkey, another route employed traffickers crosses the central Mediterranean Sea from Libya’s coast, where migrants often endure brutal detention conditions for months, before they are allowed to board rubber dinghies or aging wooden fishing boats, toward Italian shores. The route is considered one of the most deadly.

Another heavily plied begins on Tunisia’s shores, with many of those boats reaching the southern Italian island of Lampedusa, or Sardinian beaches, often without need of rescue.

Meloni’s government has concentrated on complicating efforts by humanitarian boats to make multiple rescues in the central Mediterranean by assigning them ports of disembarkation along Italy’s northern coasts, meaning the vessels need more time to return to the sea after bringing those rescued aboard, often hundreds of migrants, safely to shore.

Humanitarian organizations have lamented that the crackdown also includes an order to the charity boats not to remain at sea after the first rescue operation in hopes of performing other rescues, but to head immediately to their assigned port of safety. Violators face stiff fines and confiscation of the rescue vessel.

Italian President Sergio Mattarella called on the European Union to “finally concretely assume the responsibility of managing the migratory phenomenon to remove it from the traffickers of human beings.” He said the EU should support development in countries where young people who see no future decide to risk dangerous sea journeys toward what they hope will be better lives.

Italy has complained bitterly for years that fellow EU countries have balked at taking in some of the arrivals, many of whom are aiming to find family or work in northern Europe.

Source : CTV

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz arrived today in India for two-day visit

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German Chancellor Olaf Scholz arrived today in India for two-day visit
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz arrived today in India for two-day visit

Diplomat Times (New Delhi)- German Chancellor Olaf Scholz today arrived in New Delhi for a visit to India from February 25-26.

Scholz is accompanied by senior officials and a high-powered business delegation, and his visit to India is the first standalone one by any German Chancellor since the commencement of the Inter-Governmental Consultation (IGC) mechanism between the two nations in 2011, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said in a press release.

The Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany, H.E. Mr Olaf Scholz called on the President of India, Smt Droupadi Murmu at Rashtrapati Bhavan today (February 25, 2023).

Welcoming Chancellor Scholz on his first visit to India as German Chancellor, the President said that India and Germany have a long standing relationship, which is underpinned by our common values and shared goals. Our bilateral relationship encompasses a wide range of areas, reflecting the mutual trust that has been nurtured over decades.

The President noted that Germany is India’s largest trade partner in Europe and also among the top investors in India. She said that Germany is also India’s second largest development cooperation partner and has played an important role in India’s developmental journey. In recent years, Germany has emerged as a favoured destination for Indian students and researchers wishing to pursue higher education, especially in Science and Technology. She said that India and Germany also have strong cultural connect, with a long tradition of German Indologists working on India.

The President said that India and Germany have a shared aims in upholding democratic values, the rules-based international order, multilateralism, as well as the reform of multilateral institutions. As two vibrant, pluralistic democracies, India and Germany can play an important role in addressing new and emerging global challenges.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi received Scholz for a ceremonial welcome at the forecourt of Rashtrapati Bhavan. He met PM Modi and other ministers during the event.

It is Scholz’s first visit to India after he became the German chancellor in December 2021. The Russia-Ukraine conflict and the situation in the Indo-Pacific region are also expected to figure prominently in the deliberations, news agency PTI reported.

“We already have good relations between Germany and India and I hope that we will strengthen this relationship. I hope we will discuss intensely all the topics relevant to the development of our countries and also peace in the world, ” Scholz was quoted by ANI as saying.

 

 

 

 

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will travel to Delhi next week, to participate in the G20 Foreign Ministers’ Meeting

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US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will travel to Delhi next week, to participate in the G20 Foreign Ministers’ Meeting
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will travel to Delhi next week, to participate in the G20 Foreign Ministers’ Meeting

Diplomat Times (New Delhi)- US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will travel to India next week to attend the meeting of G20 foreign ministers and meet senior Indian officials to reaffirm America’s strong partnership with the country.

Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken will travel to Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and India February 28-March 3, 2023. On February 28, he will visit Astana, Kazakhstan, where he will meet with senior Kazakh officials to deepen our bilateral cooperation.

He then will participate in a C5+1 Ministerial with representatives of each of the five Central Asian states, to reaffirm the United States’ commitment to the independence, sovereignty, and territorial integrity of Central Asian countries, and to collaborate with the region on solutions to shared global challenges.

The C5+1 Ministerial will focus on enhancing economic, energy and environmental, and security cooperation among the United States, the Republic of Kazakhstan, the Kyrgyz Republic, the Republic of Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and the Republic of Uzbekistan. The Secretary will meet separately on the margins of the C5+1 ministerial with senior government officials from the Kyrgyz Republic, Tajikistan, and Turkmenistan to discuss opportunities for bilateral and multilateral cooperation and advance our shared goal of a prosperous, secure, and democratic region.

He will then travel to Tashkent, Uzbekistan, where he will meet with Uzbekistani officials to further advance our partnership on a range of bilateral and regional issues.

On March 1, he will travel to New Delhi to participate in the G20 Foreign Ministers’ Meeting, which will focus on strengthening multilateralism and deepening cooperation on food and energy security, sustainable development, counter-narcotics, global health, humanitarian assistance and disaster relief, and gender equality and women’s empowerment.

He will meet with Indian government officials and civil society to reaffirm our strong partnership.

Speaking to a group of civil society leaders at a New Delhi hotel, Blinken said that the relationship between the United States and India was “one of the most important in the world”.

His visit in Delhi 2021 he has spoke to civil societies people “The Indian people and the American people believe in human dignity and equality of opportunity, the rule of law, fundamental freedoms including freedom of religion and belief … these are the fundamental tenets of democracies like ours,” he said.

“And of course, both of our democracies are works in progress. As friends we talk about that.”

Attendees included religious leaders such as Geshe Dorji Damdul of New Delhi’s Tibet House, a cultural centre of the Dalai Lama.

In his New Delhi meetings, Blinken is expected to raise India’s human rights record as well as a recent religion-based citizenship law widely seen as discriminatory towards Muslims.

 

Ajay Banga: US President Biden nominates former MasterCard CEO Ajay Banga to lead World Bank

Marietta Reformado
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Ajay Banga: US President Biden nominates former MasterCard CEO Ajay Banga to lead World Bank
1.US President Biden nominates former MasterCard CEO Ajay Banga to President World Bank

Diplomat Times (WASHINGTON)- Today, President Biden announced that the United States is nominating Ajay Banga, a business leader with extensive experience leading successful organizations in developing countries and forging public-private partnerships to address financial inclusion and climate change, to be President of the World Bank.

The news comes days after Trump appointee David Malpass announced plans to step down in June from his role leading the 189-nation poverty reduction agency. His five-year term was due to expire in April 2024.

President Biden says: “Ajay is uniquely equipped to lead the World Bank at this critical moment in history. He has spent more than three decades building and managing successful, global companies that create jobs and bring investment to developing economies, and guiding organizations through periods of fundamental change.

He has a proven track record managing people and systems, and partnering with global leaders around the world to deliver results.

He also has critical experience mobilizing public-private resources to tackle the most urgent challenges of our time, including climate change. Raised in India, Ajay has a unique perspective on the opportunities and challenges facing developing countries and how the World Bank can deliver on its ambitious agenda to reduce poverty and expand prosperity.”

Who is Ajay Banga, that US Nominee for President, The World Bank

Ajay Banga currently serves as Vice Chairman at General Atlantic. Previously, he was President and CEO of Mastercard, leading the company through a strategic, technological and cultural transformation.

Over the course of his career, Ajay has become a global leader in technology, data, financial services and innovating for inclusion. He is Honorary Chairman of the International Chamber of Commerce, serving as Chairman from 2020-2022. He is also Chairman of Exor and Independent Director at Temasek. He became an advisor to General Atlantic’s climate-focused fund, BeyondNetZero, at its inception in 2021. He previously served on the Boards of the American Red Cross, Kraft Foods and Dow Inc.

Ajay has worked closely with Vice President Harris as the Co-Chair of the Partnership for Central America. He is a member of the Trilateral Commission, a founding trustee of the U.S.-India Strategic Partnership Forum, a former member of the National Committee on United States-China Relations, and Chairman Emeritus of the American India Foundation.

He is a co-founder of The Cyber Readiness Institute, Vice Chair of the Economic Club of New York and served as a member of President Obama’s Commission on Enhancing National Cybersecurity. He is a past member of the U.S. President’s Advisory Committee for Trade Policy and Negotiations.

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Ajay was awarded the Foreign Policy Association Medal in 2012, the Padma Shri Award by the President of India in 2016, the Ellis Island Medal of Honor and the Business Council for International Understanding’s Global Leadership Award in 2019, and the Distinguished Friends of Singapore Public Service Star in 2021.

Vice President Kamala Harris says, Ajay Banga will be a transformative World Bank President as the institution works to deliver on its core development goals and address pressing global challenges, including climate change. Since I was elected Vice President, Ajay and I have worked closely together on a new model of public-private partnership designed to address the root causes of migration in Northern Central America.

Through that partnership, nearly 50 businesses and organizations have mobilized to generate more than $4.2 billion in commitments that will create opportunity and hope for people in the region. Ajay has brought great insight, energy, and persistence to the challenges of promoting economic development and tackling the root causes of migration.

Two days International Conference on Climate Change, Human Rights beings in Doha

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Two days International Conference on Climate Change, Human Rights beings in Doha
Two days International Conference on Climate Change, Human Rights beings in Doha

Diplomat Times (Doha) -Under the patronage of Prime Minister and Minister of Interior HE Sheikh Khalid bin Khalifa bin Abdulaziz Al Thani, the International Conference on Climate Change and Human Rights kicked off Tuesday in Doha, with the participation of more than 300 experts and stakeholders from different countries around the globe.

The conference is being organized by the National Human Rights Committee (NHRC), in cooperation with the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, UN Development Program (UNDP), League of Arab States, and Global Alliance of National Human Rights Institutions (GANHRI).

The two-day conference aims to emphasize the importance of rights-based climate action, highlight good practices relevant to Qatar and other active partners, including governments, the United Nations (UN), civil society organizations and companies, and develop recommendations for strengthening cooperation to support rights-based climate action around the globe, particularly in the Middle East and North Africa region.

During the opening session, which was attended by several ministers and officials from relevant entities in the country, Chairperson of NHRC HE Maryam bint Abdullah Al Attiyah said the conference provides a valuable opportunity for discussion and exchange of knowledge and experiences, in order to advance and accelerate the pace of dealing with climate change and environmental risks from a human rights perspective.

She also noted that in a few decisions that have been issued by the International Human Rights Commission (IHRC), the commission explained the importance of adopting a human rights perspective when discussing climate mitigation and adaptation measures.

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She expressed hope that the conference would result in recommendations that constitute the Doha program on human’s right to dignified living in relation to climate change, especially that it includes all parties, partners, and stakeholders, whose goal is to examine the opportunity provided by human rights standards to save the planet, and to help the international community fulfill its obligations to achieve zero emissions, considering it a step towards creating a safer, more sustainable and more equitable world for us and future generations.

The opening session witnessed interventions from the various organizers of the conference, which in turn emphasized the importance of this international event in facing challenges related to preserving human rights in the light of national and global measures related to climate change.

Mr. Justice Arun Mishra, Chairperson, NHRC, India has said that the human-induced build-up of Green House Gases is causing climate change raising serious concerns about human rights. It is unfair to expect developing countries to follow the same emission standards rigorously. They often need more resources and technology. To meet it, the global fraternity has to prioritize technology transfer capacity-building.

The NHRC Chairperson said that the transportation of hazardous waste by developed countries to under-developed and developing countries for disposal needs to be stopped as it results in environmental degradation and consequent violation of human rights. Plastic dumping in the Ocean is endangering bio-diversity. There is illegal transportation of e-waste to developing countries under the guise of being capable of reuse of which only 9% can be recycled.

Justice Mishra said that an inclusive climate change action entails designing policies that are fair and accessible, and equitable. This requires prioritizing the needs and perspectives of all stakeholders, including those most vulnerable and marginalized.

He said that climate change causes displacement, loss of property, income and access to essential services like healthcare and education due to which the vulnerable groups suffer most. Therefore, it is necessary to include human rights issues into climate policies and programmes along with proper funding of social protection schemes to promote local knowledge and assist community-led adaptation to the effects of climate change.

Qatar NHRC representative highlighted the great success achieved by the State of Qatar in organizing the first global football championship (FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022), which was environmentally friendly and carbon neutral.

Putin raises tension on Ukraine, suspends START nuclear pact with US

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Putin raises tension on Ukraine, suspends START nuclear pact with US

Putin raises tension on Ukraine, suspends START nuclear pact with US

by AP -Russian President Vladimir Putin suspended Moscow’s participation in the last remaining nuclear arms control pact with the United States, announcing the move Tuesday in a bitter speech where he made clear he would not change his strategy in the war in Ukraine.

In his long-delayed state-of-the-nation address, Putin cast his country — and Ukraine — as victims of Western double-dealing and said it was Russia, not Ukraine, fighting for its very existence.

“We aren’t fighting the Ukrainian people,” Putin said ahead of the war’s first anniversary Friday. “The Ukrainian people have become hostages of the Kyiv regime and its Western masters, which have effectively occupied the country.”

The speech reiterated a litany of grievances he has frequently offered as justification for the widely condemned military campaign while vowing no military letup in a conflict that has reawakened Cold War fears.

On top of that, Putin sharply upped the ante by declaring Moscow would suspend its participation in the New START Treaty. The pact, signed in 2010 by the U.S. and Russia, caps the number of long-range nuclear warheads the two sides can deploy and limits the use of missiles that can carry atomic weapons.

Putin also said Russia should stand ready to resume nuclear weapons tests if the U.S. does so, a move that would end a global ban on such tests in place since the Cold War era.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken described Moscow’s decision as “really unfortunate and very irresponsible.”

“We’ll be watching carefully to see what Russia actually does,” he said while visiting Greece.

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It was the second time in recent days the Ukraine war showed it could spread into perilous new terrain, after Blinken told China at the weekend that it would be a “serious problem” if Beijing provided arms and ammunition to Russia.

China and Russia have aligned their foreign policies to oppose Washington. Beijing has refused to condemn Russia’s invasion or atrocities against civilians in Ukraine while strongly criticizing Western economic sanctions on Moscow. At the end of last year, Russia and China held joint naval drills in the East China Sea.

The deputy head of Ukraine’s intelligence service, Vadym Skibitskyi, told The Associated Press that his agency hasn’t so far seen any signs that China is providing weapons to Moscow.

Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022, and made a dash toward Kyiv, apparently expecting to overrun the capital quickly. But stiff resistance from Ukrainian forces — supported by Western weapons — turned back Moscow’s troops. While Ukraine has reclaimed many areas initially seized by Russia, the sides have become bogged down elsewhere.

The war has revived the divide between Russia and the West, reinvigorated the NATO alliance, and created the biggest threat to Putin’s rule of more than two-decades. U.S. President Joe Biden, fresh off a surprise visit to Kyiv, was in Poland on Tuesday to solidify that Western unity.

While Russia’s Constitution mandates that the president deliver the speech annually, Putin never gave one in 2022, as his troops rolled into Ukraine and suffered repeated setbacks. Much of it covered old ground, as Putin offered his own version of recent history, discounting Ukraine’s arguments that it needed Western help to thwart a Russian military takeover.

“Western elites aren’t trying to conceal their goals, to inflict a ‘strategic defeat’ to Russia,” Putin said in the speech broadcast on all state TV channels. “They intend to transform the local conflict into a global confrontation.”

He added that Russia was prepared to respond since “it will be a matter of our country’s existence.” He has repeatedly depicted NATO’s expansion to include countries close to Russia as an existential threat to his country.

Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni, who was in Ukraine on Tuesday, said she hoped Putin had taken a different approach.

“What we heard this morning was propaganda that we already know,” Meloni said in English. “He says (Russia) worked on diplomacy to avoid the conflict, but the truth is that there is somebody who is the invader and somebody who is defending itself.”

Putin denied any wrongdoing in Ukraine, even after Kremlin forces struck civilian targets, including hospitals, and are widely accused of war crimes. Ukraine’s military reported Tuesday that Russian forces shelled the southern cities of Kherson and Ochakiv while Putin spoke, killing six.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy lamented that Russian forces were “again mercilessly killing the civilian population.”

Putin began his speech with strong words for those countries that provided Kyiv with crucial military support and warned them against supplying any longer-range weapons.

“It’s they who have started the war. And we are using force to end it,” Putin said before an audience of lawmakers, state officials and soldiers.

Putin also accused the West of taking aim at Russian culture, religion and values because it is aware that “it is impossible to defeat Russia on the battlefield.”

Likewise, he said Western sanctions hadn’t “achieved anything and will not achieve anything.”

Reflecting the Kremlin’s clampdown on free speech and press, it barred coverage of the address by media from “unfriendly” countries, including the U.S., the U.K. and those in the European Union, with Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov saying their journalists could watch the broadcast.

He previously told reporters that the speech’s delay had to do with Putin’s “work schedule,” but Russian media reports linked it to the setbacks by Russian forces. The Russian president also postponed the state-of-the-nation address in 2017. Last year, the Kremlin also canceled two other big annual events — Putin’s news conference and a highly scripted phone-in marathon taking questions from the public.

Analysts expected Putin’s speech would be tough in the wake of Biden’s visit to Kyiv on Monday, which he did not mention. In his his own speech later Tuesday, Biden is expected to highlight the commitment of the central European country and other allies to Ukraine over the past year.

White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan said that Biden’s address would not be “some kind of head to head” with Putin’s.

“This is not a rhetorical contest with anyone else,” said.

Jen Psaki, ex-Biden spokesperson, to debut Sunday MSNBC show

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Jen Psaki, ex-Biden spokesperson, to debut Sunday MSNBC show

Jen Psaki, ex-Biden spokesperson, to debut Sunday MSNBC show

Diplomat Times (New York)  — Former White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki will debut a weekly MSNBC political program on Sundays at noon next month, the network said on Tuesday.

“Inside with Jen Psaki” will contain one-on-one interviews with newsmakers, and discuss policy issues like the war in Ukraine and debt ceiling talks, MSNBC said.

The show is scheduled to premiere March 19.

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The show will feature a recurring segment, “Weekend Routine,” where Psaki will feature a lawmaker or newsmaker and follow them as they go about some everyday activities.

The MSNBC show will stream the next day on Peacock. Psaki, who appears regularly on other MSNBC programs like “Morning Joe,” is developing another streaming show that’s set to debut this spring.

Psaki was press secretary during the first 16 months of President Joe Biden’s administration, before landing at MSNBC last May.

Now she’ll take charge of an hourlong program on a Biden-friendly network, mixing policy and political discussions with lighter fare like human-interest profiles of politicians, celebrities and athletes. (One of her dream guests: Joe Burrow, the quarterback of her husband’s hometown Cincinnati Bengals.)

Ms. Psaki, who began appearing on MSNBC as an analyst in September, is the latest in a line of White House communicators — including George Stephanopoulos, Diane Sawyer, and Dana Perino — who have left government for the more glamorous and better remunerated world of TV news.

Who is Jen Psaki ?

Former White House Press Secretary (President Joe Biden),

Jen Psaki was recently selected as White House Press Secretary by President-elect Joe Biden. Psaki previously served as White House Communications Director from 2015 to 2017. She has also served as a spokesperson for the Department of State and held various press and communications roles in the Obama White House. She is also a CNN contributor.

Psaki previously served as a senior communications advisor and traveling press secretary to President Obama during his successful re-election campaign. In this role, she was one of the primary on-air representatives on network, financial and cable news, briefed the national media daily, played a central role in media and communications strategy and was named by Politico as one of “50 Politicos to watch” in 2012.

Prior to joining the campaign, she served as Deputy Assistant to the President and Deputy White House Communications Director responsible for helping run the day-to-day incoming news response and longer term strategic communications planning.

Psaki was described by The New York Times as, “the unflappable and genial point-person ” to the media during the various crises of President Obama’s campaign and presidency.

She has also worked on many national and state political campaigns across the country in roles including Traveling Press Secretary for President Obama’s first presidential campaign, Communications Director for the Office of Congressman Joseph Crowley, and Midwest and Northeast Regional Press Secretary at the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.

She has a B.A. from The College of William and Mary.

 

 

Putin blame West of stoking global war to destroy Russia

Roshan Bilung
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Putin blame West of stoking global war to destroy Russia
Putin blame West of stoking global war to destroy Russia

MOSCOW(Reuters) – President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday vowed to continue with Russia’s year-long war in Ukraine and accused the U.S.-led NATO alliance of fanning the flames of the conflict in the mistaken belief that it could defeat Moscow in a global confrontation.

Flanked by four Russian tricolor flags either side, Putin told Russia’s political and military elite that Russia would “carefully and consistently resolve the tasks facing us” in Ukraine.

Besides the promise to continue the war and warnings to the West of a global confrontation, Putin also sought to justify the war, saying it had been forced on Russia and that he understood the pain of the families of those who had fallen in battle.

“The people of Ukraine have become the hostage of the Kyiv regime and its Western overlords, who have effectively occupied this country in the political, military and economic sense,” Putin said.

“They intend to transform a local conflict into a phase of global confrontation. This is exactly how we understand it all and we will react accordingly, because in this case we are talking about the existence of our country.”

Defeating Russia, he said, was impossible. The 70-year-old Kremlin chief said Russia would never yield to Western attempts to divide its society, adding that a majority of Russians supported the war.

UKRAINE
When he spoke about the annexation of four Ukrainian territories last year, he got a standing ovation at the Gostiny Dvor exhibition centre just a few steps from the Kremlin.

He asked the audience, which included lawmakers, soldiers, spy chiefs and state company bosses, to stand to remember those who had lost their lives in the war. He promised a special fund for the families of the victims.

The Ukraine conflict is by far the biggest bet by a Kremlin chief since at least the 1991 fall of the Soviet Union – and a gamble Western leaders such as U.S. President Joe Biden say he must lose.

For More Ukraine News 

Russian forces have suffered three major battlefield reversals since the war began but still control around one fifth of Ukraine.

Tens of thousands of men have been killed, and Putin now says Russia is locked in an existential battle with an arrogant West which he says wants to carve up Russia and steal its vast natural resources.

The West and Ukraine reject that narrative, and say NATO expansion eastwards is no justification for what they say is an imperial-style land grab doomed to failure.

TILT TO ASIA?
Putin, who was handed the presidency on the last day of 1999 by Boris Yeltsin, said the West had failed to destroy the Russian economy with the severest sanctions in modern history.

“They want to make the people suffer… but their calculation did not materialise. The Russian economy and the management turned out to be much stronger than they thought,” Putin said.

Russia’s $2.1 trillion economy is forecast by the International Monetary Fund to grow 0.3% this year, far below China and India’s growth rates but a much better result than was forecast when the war began.

Russia since the 1991 fall of the Soviet Union, Putin said, had been oriented on the West, quipping about how no ordinary Russians shed tears over the loss of yachts and property in the West by rich Russians.

Russia was turning to major Asian powers and Putin called on businesses to invest in the Russian economy.

Tens of thousands of men have been killed, and Putin, 70, now says Russia is locked in an existential battle with an arrogant West which he says wants to carve up Russia and steal its vast natural resources.

 

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