by admin | May 25, 2021 | Muslim World
Istanbul : The 57-member Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) has vowed to take “all necessary steps” to prevent other countries from following the US example of moving their Israel embassies to Jerusalem.
The move on Friday came after the group held an extraordinary summit in Istanbul upon the call of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in response to the US inauguration of its embassy in Jerusalem and the killings of more than 60 Palestinian protestors by Israeli forces on Monday, Xinhua reported.
Citing Guatemala which has followed suit, the final communique adopted at the conclusion of the meeting voiced “determination to take the appropriate political, economic and other measures against countries which recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel or relocate their embassies thereto.”
“Countries running for international posts seeking the OIC’s support for their candidature will be assessed based on their positions regarding the Palestine question, in particular on Jerusalem,” said the final communique.
In the document, the group is calling for “necessary action” against member states failing to comply with OIC resolutions on the Palestinian cause.
Declaring the Israeli use of deadly force against unarmed Palestinians as “savage crimes,” the group called for an international protection of the Palestinians, urging member states as well as the international community to ban the import of products made in Israeli settlements built on the occupied land.
Reaffirming its rejection of US President Donald Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, the OIC called the embassy relocation move an act of “provocation and hostility” against the Muslim community.
“Sending international peace force to Palestinians who sacrifice young children every day to Israeli terror is imperative,” Turkish President Erdogan said at a press conference.
“Responsibility for consequences of this provocative decision to sabotage the peace process entirely belongs to the US,” he added.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | World
By Arul Louis,
United Nations : US President Donald Trump, who has had an adversarial relationship with the world body, surprisingly showered praise on Secretary-General Antonio Guterres saying he was “working hard to ‘Make the UN Great Again'”.
The unexpected kudos in his tweet came after their meeting on Friday, which played off his election slogan of “Make America Great Again” and appeared to show a newly found appreciation that the world body could help Washington by dealing with conflicts after several developments that have highlighted the rift between Trump’s US and the UN.
Trump’s praise of Guterres was centred on monetary savings for the US as he added in his tweet, “When the UN does more to solve conflicts around the world, it means the US has less to do and we save money.”
The UN has been at odds with Trump’s world view with the General Assembly criticising Trump’s decision to recognise Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and move the US embassy there, Guterres opposing Washington’s decision to withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal, and the UN failing to act jointly with the US against Syria.
The White House said that two of those issues — Iran and Syria — figured in the talks between Trump and Guterres.
A UN statement said: “The Secretary-General expressed his appreciation for the continued US engagement in the work of the UN.”
The meeting with Trump capped two days of Guterres’s diplomacy in Washington where he made rounds of Congressional leaders to try and revive the flagging support for the world body, especially with cuts in US contributions to the UN looming.
While neither the UN nor the White House gave details of who were at the talks, Trump’s tweet included a photograph that showed them with Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed, Permanent Representative Nikki Haley, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Trump’s National Security Adviser John Bolton.
Trump also praised Haley, saying in the same tweet that she “is doing a fantastic job!”
She is credited with squeezing out $285 million out of the 2018-2019 UN budget of $5.4 billion, saving about $63 million for the US, which foots 22 per cent of budget.
The White House said they also discussed UN reform — which is focused on saving even more — and “the President reiterated his support for the Secretary-General’s efforts to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the UN”.
Another topic in their discussions was North Korea, where Trump is hoping for a breakthrough in his upcoming talks with that nation’s leader Kim Jong-un leading to Pyongyang’s denuclearisation.
The UN statement said that they discussed the “broader situation” in the Middle East, without indicating if this week’s Palestinian protests in Gaza during which more than 60 people were killed in firings by Israeli forces came up.
Guterres’s Deputy Spokesperson Farhan Haq said that before the talks with Trump, he met with Pompeo and Bolton.
A former permanent representative, Bolton once said that if the UN headquarters building “lost ten stories, it wouldn’t make a bit of difference”.
On Thursday Guterres even had a meeting with the Freedom Caucus, a hardline right-wing group of Republican members of the Congress, who are very critical of the UN.
(Arul Louis can be reached at arul.l@ians.in)
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | World
Pyongyang : North Korea on Wednesday threatened to abandon planned talks between leader Kim Jong-un and US President Donald Trump in June if Washington continued to insist on pushing it “into a corner” on nuclear disarmament, media reports said.
A statement published by the state-run Korea Central News Agency (KCNA) said Pyongyang would never accept economic assistance from the US in exchange for unilaterally abandoning its nuclear program, CNN reported.
Kim Kye-gwan, North Korea’s First Vice Minister of on Foreign Affairs said the US has said “it would offer economic compensation and benefit in case we abandon (nuclear weapons)”.
“We have never had any expectation of US support in carrying out our economic construction and will not… make such a deal in future,” he added.
“If they try to push us into a corner and force only unilateral nuclear abandonment, we will no longer be interested in that kind of talks and will have to reconsider…the upcoming summit.”
South Korean Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-hwa spoke with US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo earlier on Wednesday (Seoul time).
According to a statement, Pompeo was quoted as saying that preparations would continue for the Trump-Kim summit, “keeping in mind this action of the North”, CNN reported.
The two have agreed to continue close cooperation to achieve a complete denuclearisation and peace settlement on the Korean Peninsula, the South Korean statement said.
The statement also referred to comments made by Trump’s National Security Adviser John Bolton about Libya being a potential model for North Korean denuclearisation.
Bolton’s comments, Kim said, were indicative of “an awfully sinister move to impose on our dignified state the destiny of Libya or Iraq which had been collapsed due to yielding the whole of their countries to big powers”, the CNN reported.
“It is absolutely absurd to dare compare (North Korea), a nuclear weapon state, to Libya which had been at the initial stage of nuclear development,” he added.
“World knows too well that our country is neither Libya nor Iraq which have met miserable fate.”
After weeks of improving ties on the Korean Peninsula, capped by the dramatic image of Kim shaking hands with South Korean President Moon Jae-in, things took a sudden step backwards on Wednesday.
In a missive delivered to the South in the early hours during the day, the North said it was suspending high-level talks scheduled for Wednesday in view of “provocative military disturbances with South Korea.”
North Korea’s anger, which took both Seoul and Washington off guard, came as the two allies were conducting annual “Max Thunder” air force drills, which Pyongyang has always objected to in the past and accused of destabilising the situation on the Peninsula, the CNN reported.
In a statement, South Korea’s Unification Ministry said it was regrettable that the North unilaterally postponed the talks due to the annual (South Korea-US) joint air combat drills.
“Such action by the North is inconsistent with the fundamental spirit and purpose of the Panmunjeom Declaration agreed by the South and North leaders on April 27,” it added.
An earlier KCNA report said the Max Thunder 2018 air combat drill was against the declaration — signed last month between the Koreas — wherein they agreed to cease all hostile acts against each other, the CNN reported.
In March though, North Korea had said the drill were necessary it understood.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Muslim World
Benjamin Netanyahu
Jerusalem : Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday called on world leaders to follow the US and relocate their embassies to Jerusalem.
Speaking during a reception of a US diplomatic delegation in Jerusalem, Netanyahu thanked the US for the relocation, which will take place on Monday.
“There is no greater supporter of Israel on the earth,” he said. “We are eternally grateful.”
He called on other countries to follow the US move, saying that “in any peace that you could possibly imagine, Jerusalem will remain as Israel’s capital.”
He also thanked the leaders of Guatemala and Paraguay for their decisions to move their embassies to Jerusalem.
According to Netanyahu, other countries are expected to announce similar decisions soon. “We will not say whom because that is a state secret,” he said.
The delegation is led by US President Donald Trump’s daughter Ivanka, his senior adviser and son-in-law Jared Kushner and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, reports Xinhua.
US Deputy Secretary of State John J. Sullivan said at the welcoming ceremony that Trump’s decision to relocate the embassy was “essential to creating a roadmap for peace in the region.”
A total of 86 foreign ambassadors in Israel were invited to the opening ceremony of the US embassy in Jerusalem on Monday, while 40 of them accepted the invitation.
Four European countries — Austria, Czech Republic, Romania, and Hungary — have confirmed their participation in the US move while the European Union opposes the relocation.
Thousands of police officers were deployed throughout Jerusalem over fear of Palestinian protests and riots.
Additionally, Police officers will stand in “human wall” between the neighbourhood of Arnona, where the new embassy is located, and the Palestinian Sur Baher.
—IANS
by admin | May 25, 2021 | Business, Large Enterprise, Markets, Technology, World
Washington : Washington and Beijing are working to get Chinese telecom equipment maker ZTE, which is suffering from a US exports ban, back into business, said US President Donald Trump.
“President Xi of China, and I, are working together to give massive Chinese phone company, ZTE, a way to get back into business, fast,” Trump tweeted on Sunday.
“Too many jobs in China lost. Commerce Department has been instructed to get it done!” he added.
ZTE, one of the world’s largest telecom equipment makers, was forced to suspend its main operations worldwide after the US Commerce Department prohibited American companies from exporting products to it in mid-April.
ZTE admitted to violating US sanctions in 2017, by illegally shipping US technology to Iran and Korea and was later fined $1.1 billion.
Following the exports ban, ZTE said it was making active communications with relevant parties to seek a solution to the issue and stressed that it attached significant importance to export control compliance.
The Chinese public and government are greatly concerned about the fate of the company, which has nearly 80,000 employees across the globe.
The incident also triggered in China extensive discussions about the necessity and urgency to develop a reliable domestic chip industry.
During the latest China-US economic and trade consultations held in Beijing in early May, the Chinese side lodged “solemn representations” with the US over the ZTE case.
The US delegates responded that they “attach importance to” China’s stance and will report it to President Trump, according to a spokesperson with the Chinese Ministry of Commerce.
The ZTE ban is also expected to cause sizable losses for the companies’ key American suppliers in both revenues and jobs.
—IANS
