global news. Archives - Read Selective

Russia mulls joining China in banning Japanese seafood imports

Russia may join China in banning Japanese seafood imports after Japan released treated radioactive water from the wrecked Fukushima nuclear power plant into the sea, and Moscow is seeking talks with Japan, a Russian regulator said on Tuesday.

Japan started releasing the water from the plant into the ocean last month, drawing strong criticism from China. In retaliation, China imposed a blanket ban on all aquatic imports from Japan.

Russian food safety watchdog Rosselkhoznadzor on Tuesday said it had discussed Japanese food exports with its Chinese counterparts. Russia is one of the biggest marine product suppliers to China and is seeking to increase its market share.

“Taking into account the possible risks of radiation contamination of products, Rosselkhoznadzor is considering the possibility of joining with Chinese restrictions on supplies of fish products from Japan,” Rosselkhoznadzor said in a statement. “The final decision will be made after negotiations with the Japanese side.”

So far this year, Russia has imported 118 tonnes of Japanese seafood, the regulator said.

Rosselkhoznadzor said it had sent a letter to Japan on the need to hold talks and requesting information on Japan’s radiological testing of exported fish products by Oct. 16, including tritium.

Japan will scrutinise Tuesday’s announcement by Russia, the top Japanese government spokesperson Hirokazu Matsuno said on Wednesday.

Source: https://www.reuters.com/world/russia-mulls-joining-china-banning-japanese-seafood-imports-2023-09-26/

Jaishankar takes ‘Bharat’ to United Nations

It was during the 18th G20 summit in New Delhi earlier this month that the Modi Government first started promoting ‘Bharat’ as the name of the country in the international forums.

External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar. Credit: PTI Photo

Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government on Tuesday took its promotion of ‘Bharat’ as the name of the country to the United Nations with the External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar commencing his address to the General Assembly of the international organisation with a ‘Namaste from Bharat’ greeting.

He concluded his 18-minute-long speech at the 78^th General Assembly of the United Nations by defining “India that is Bharat” as “a civilizational policy” that embraced “modernity” and brought “both tradition and technology equally confidently to the table”.

It was during the 18^th G20 summit in New Delhi earlier this month that the Modi Government first started promoting “Bharat” as the name of the country in the international forums. An invitation for a dinner at the Rashtrapati Bhavan was sent to the G20 delegates and other guests with the host being mentioned as “President of Bharat”. It prompted the Congress and the other opposition parties to allege that the BJP-led government was trying to drop India from the name of the country. They called it a move by the Modi Government in response to the opposition parties naming their alliance as I.N.D.I.A.

When Modi chaired the G20 summit on September 9 and 10, the plaque in front of him also read “Prime Minister Bharat”.

Source: https://www.deccanherald.com/india/jaishankar-takes-bharat-to-united-nations-2702281

As tensions rise between India-Canada, it should be a wakeup call for West

To most of the world, the Indian government’s response to Canada’s charge that it may have sponsored the murder of a Sikh activist in British Columbia must be befuddling. India has strenuously denied the charges, for which Canada provided no evidence publicly as yet.

But the Indian government has also gone further and blasted Canada for supposedly hosting a “nexus of terrorism,” serving as a “safe haven” for extremism and organised crime, and much else. Indian investigators have even released a list of what they call “terror-gangster networks” based in Canada. This is all absurdly detached from Canada’s popular image as a polite and welcoming multicultural utopia.

India’s rage is misplaced and hardly serves to endear the country to those appalled by the idea that it may have had a Canadian citizen killed. Still, it does reflect widespread sentiment — in India and beyond — that many countries in the West have long paid insufficient attention to the overseas activism of the immigrant communities they host.

That will no longer be possible. Even small, liberal countries such as Canada, Australia, and Sweden must now contend with the consequences of diaspora politics.

Sweden, for example, faced a particularly pernicious dilemma when Turkey blocked its entry into NATO on the grounds that it hosted Kurdish separatists. The Swedish government had to balance Turkey’s concerns and its own urgent security needs against its constitutional commitments to free speech and dissent.

Of course, peaceful political expression must be defended. And countries with a reputation for taking in refugees and asylum seekers, such as Canada and Sweden, will naturally host many more dissenters than elsewhere.

The problem is when, as sometimes happens in communities still focused on the disputes they left behind, dissent slides into extremism. How long can governments ignore political radicals merely because they are confining their activities to their old homes, not their new ones?

Source: https://www.business-standard.com/india-news/as-tensions-rise-between-india-canada-it-should-be-a-wakeup-call-for-west-123092500076_1.html

‘Empire of lies’: Russia’s Lavrov slams West in UN speech

Russia’s foreign minister glosses over Ukraine, accuses Western allies of neo-colonialism at the UN General Assembly.

Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov attends a news conference after addressing the UN General Assembly [Eduardo Munoz/Reuters]

Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has called the West an “empire of lies” and accused it of adopting a neo-colonial mindset in its overtures to the Global South to win backing for Ukraine in the war.

Speaking after a week of intense global diplomacy at the annual gathering of world leaders at UN headquarters in New York, where Ukraine and its Western allies sought to drum up support for Kyiv as it fights against Russia’s invasion, Lavrov said a “global majority” was being duped by the West.

“The US and its subordinated collective continue to fuel conflicts which artificially divide humanity into hostile blocks and hamper the achievement of overall aims,” Lavrov said.

“They are trying to force the world to play according to their own self-centred rules.”

James Bays, Al Jazeera’s diplomatic correspondent, said Lavrov’s speech was part of a “tour around the world of Russia’s views” that contained no real mention of Ukraine and few indications of Moscow’s plan one year into the conflict.

During a news conference following the speech, the foreign minister dismissed a 10-point proposal put forward by Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, as well as the latest UN proposals to revive the Black Sea grain initiative.

“It is completely not feasible,” he said of the peace blueprint promoted by Kyiv. “It is not possible to implement this. It’s not realistic and everybody understands this, but at the same time, they say this is the only basis for negotiations.”

He also said the UN proposal would not fly because the West did not deliver on its promises to Moscow, including removing sanctions on a Russian bank and reconnecting it to the global SWIFT system.

Source: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/9/23/empire-of-lies-russias-lavrov-slams-west-in-un-speech

India joins US, Australia and Japan to urge Russia against arms deal with North Korea

North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Un recently made a rare weeklong visit to Russia and had a meeting with the president of the former Soviet Union nation Vladimir Putin.

EAM Jaishankar with representatives of the Quad countries, namely Yoko Kamikawa, Penny Wong and Antony Blinken. Credit: X/ @DrSJaishankar

After persuading the West to accept the G20 Delhi Declaration without a word of condemnation for Russia for its military aggression against Ukraine, India has joined the United States, Japan and Australia to tacitly ask Russia to refrain from clinching any arms transfer deal with North Korea.

The foreign ministers of Quad – a four-nation coalition comprising India, Japan, Australia and the United States – sent out a message to Russia, urging all member states of the United States to abide by the Security Council resolutions prohibiting “the transfer to North Korea or procurement from North Korea of all arms and related materiel”.

External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar joined his Japanese, Australian and American counterparts, Yoko Kamikawa, Penny Wong and Antony Blinken, for a meeting of the Quad on the sideline of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA).

Source: https://www.deccanherald.com/india/india-joins-us-australia-and-japan-to-urge-russia-against-arms-deal-with-north-korea-2698681

Pope says countries should not “play games” with Ukraine on arms aid

Pope Francis holds a news conference as he returns to the Vatican following his apostolic journey to Hungary, aboard the plane, April 30, 2023. Vatican Media/Handout via REUTERS/File Photo Acquire Licensing Rights

Pope Francis suggested on Saturday that some countries were “playing games” with Ukraine by first providing weapons and then considering backing out of their commitments.

Francis made his comments aboard the plane returning from a trip to the French port city of Marseilles. He was responding to a reporter’s question about whether he was frustrated that his efforts to bring about peace had not succeeded. He has sent an envoy, Italian Cardinal Matteo Zuppi, to Kyiv, Moscow, Washington and Beijing to meet with leaders there.

He said he did feel “some frustration” and then began talking randomly about the arms industry and the war.

“It seems to me that the interests in this war are not just those related to the Ukrainian-Russian problem but to the sale of weapons, the commerce of weapons,” he said.

“We should not play games with the martyrdom of this people. We have to help them resolve things … I see now that some countries are moving backwards, not wanting to give (Ukraine) arms. A process is starting in which the martyr certainly will be the Ukrainian people and that is an ugly thing,” he said.

Asked for a clarification, Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni said the pope was not taking a stand on whether countries should continue to send weapons to Ukraine or stop sending them.

“It was a reflection on the consequences of the arms industry: the pope, with a paradox, was saying that those who traffic in weapons never pay the consequences of their choices but leave them to be paid by people, like the Ukrainians, who have been martyred,” Bruni said.

Source:https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/pope-says-countries-should-not-play-games-with-ukraine-arms-aid-2023-09-23/

Ukraine war latest: North Korea moves to deepen ties with Russia; strikes at ‘sensitive location’ will be ‘strategic concern’ to Moscow; Zelenskyy in Canada after challenges on US trip

Volodymyr Zelenskyy is in Canada, where he will be guaranteed a warmer reception than he received during yesterday’s Washington visit. The Ukrainian president assured US politicians Kyiv is “winning” – but some sections of Congress are battling against more funding for the war effort.

The three major powers have all built new facilities and dug new tunnels at their nuclear test sites, according to CNN.

Satellite images obtained by the broadcaster appear to show expansions at the nuclear sites in recent years.

No evidence suggests any are preparing for imminent nuclear tests.

The sites are in China’s western region of Xinjiang, Russia’s Arctic Ocean archipelago, and America’s Nevada desert.

The images show new tunnels, roads and storage facilities, as well as increased vehicle traffic in and out of the sites.

Jeffrey Lewis, an adjunct professor at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies, there are really a lot of hints that we’re seeing that suggest Russia, China and the United States might resume nuclear testing.

Source: https://news.sky.com/story/ukraine-war-latest-fire-at-russian-oil-tank-ukrainian-forces-close-in-on-supply-road-into-key-battleground-zelenskyy-accuses-moscow-of-genocid-12541713

Zelenskiy calls for Russia to lose its veto power at UN Security Council

Ukrainian President Zelenskiy and Russian Ambassador Nebenzia clashed at a UN Security Council meeting on Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine. Albanian Prime Minister Rama made a sarcastic remark, and Zelenskiy called for Russia to be stripped of its veto right.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy addresses a high level Security Council meeting during the 78th session of the United Nations General Assembly at U.N. headquarters, Wednesday. (AP)

It was Ukrainian President Volodomyr Zelenskiy’s first in-person appearance at a UN Security Council meeting on Moscow’s invasion of his country when Russian Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia objected to him taking the floor at the start of the meeting, according to Reuters reports.

Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama responded with a gibe at Moscow, which has long said the invasion does not amount to war but was a mere “special military operation”.

“I want to assure our Russian colleagues and everyone here that this is not a special operation by the Albanian presidency,” Rama, known for a piercing sense of humor, said to muted laughter across the room, Reuters reported.

Addressing Nebenzia directly at the meeting, Rama said, “There is a solution for this. If you agree, you stop the war and President Zelenskiy will not take the floor.”

However, Nebenzia did not agree and went on to say the session was a show. He criticized Rama for what he said was making politically charged statements rather than acting as a neutral guardian of procedure.

After the session, the Ukrainian PM expressed gratitude to Rama on social media, saying the Albanian showed the world how to correctly handle Russia along with its lies and hypocrisy.

Source: https://www.livemint.com/news/world/zelenskiy-calls-for-russia-to-lose-its-veto-power-at-un-security-council-11695256928569.html