World

Colombo, Dec 20 (IANS) Sri Lanka's cabinet of ministers have granted the issuance of investment, employment and resident visas to foreigners at the Colombo Port City, a top official said here on Tuesday.

Addressing reporters, cabinet spokesman Bandula Gunawardena said that the proposal was tabled by Minister of Public Security Tiran Alles, reports Xinhua news agency.

Gunawardena said the Colombo Port City Economic Commission, which was established to regulate the port city, recommended the issuance of the above-mentioned visa types.

The introduction of these visas were vital for the operation and the success of the Port City, he said.

Sri Lanka expects that the Port City will be a main driver of foreign investments to the island nation in the coming years, Gunawardena said.

Spanning 269 hectares of reclaimed land from the sea, the port city will comprise five different precincts including the Financial District, Central Park Living, Island Living, The Marina and the International Island.

--IANS
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Islamabad, Dec 20 (IANS) At least 12 people were killed and 13 others injured due to a massive gas cylinder blast at a market in Pakistan's Balochistan province, a local official said on Tuesday.

Deputy Commissioner of Lasbela Murad Khan Kasi told the media that the incident took place at a shop during its gas refilling process, causing a huge explosion and spreading fire to the adjacent shops in the Bela area of Lasbela, reports Xinhua news agency.

The official said 25 people received burn injuries who were shifted to the Civil Hospital in Karachi, adding that 12 of the wounded succumbed to their injuries during their treatment overnight.

The official feared that the death toll might increase because most of the injured were in critical condition.

The explosion-triggered fire also engulfed other cylinders stored in the shop, leading to more blasts that have destroyed four neighbouring shops and around 12 vehicles parked nearby.

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Tokyo, Dec 20 (IANS) Record levels of snow hitting Japan's Niigata, Tohoku and other areas north of Tokyo have left vehicles stranded on highways, caused power outages and disrupted transportation, the weather agency and local media said on Tuesday.

Weather officials said vehicles became stranded in heavy snow on roads in Niigata prefecture, with local media reporting that the Self-Defense Forces were enlisted to help with the situation, reports Xinhua news agency.

The Japan Meteorological Agency reported that as of 11 a.m., the amount of snowfall had reached three times the seasonal average in some areas, with 2.24 metres recorded in one village in Yamagata prefecture and 1.87 meters in Niigata.

Local authorities said traffic jams on major affected highways in these regions are set to continue.

In the early hours of Tuesday, around 800 vehicles were stranded on highways in Niigata's Kashiwazaki, with the heavy snow also causing power outages and bringing a halt to some train services.

East Japan Railway Co. said it halted a number of local services starting from the first planned departures early Tuesday morning.

The weather agency said that icy conditions are expected to hit again from Thursday and alerts for strong winds, blizzards and heavy snowfall may be issued, owing to a winter pressure system mixing with an influx of cold air.

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Toronto, Dec 20 (IANS) A 30-year-old Sikh, who came to Canada just last month from Punjab, died on the spot after being hit by a transport truck in Mississauga.

Manpreet Singh was pronounced dead at the scene of the accident, which happened at Courtneypark Drive and Edwards Boulevard just before 7 a.m. on December 13, Peel Regional Police said.

Manpreet worked at a factory in Mississauga and had left early in the morning.

"At around 6.47 a.m. or 6.50 a.m. in the morning, he met with the accident. He got down the bus and was walking when a truck hit him," Manpreet's friend Balwinder Singh told Omni News, a multilingual and multicultural television broadcaster in Canada.

Balwinder said that Manpreet, the only child of his parents, had come from Punjab's Faridkot district on a spousal visa.

A GoFundMe page has been set up for taking Manpreet's body to India for his funeral.

Last month, 20-year-old Indian student Kartik Saini was killed after he was hit and dragged by a pickup truck while crossing a road on a cycle in Toronto.

According to Ontario Provincial Police (OPP), so far this year there have been 259 fatalities on OPP-patrolled roads, waterways and trails.

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Kathmandu, Dec 20 (IANS) Nepal's Department of Drug Administration has published a list of 16 Indian pharmaceutical companies, including Divya Pharmacy that manufactures Yoga guru Ramdev's Patanjali products, that failed to comply with the World Health Organization's (WHO) good manufacturing practices.

Publication of the list by the department, the national regulatory body of the drugs markets, both allopathic and ayurveda, means that medicines manufactured by those companies cannot be imported to Nepal, according to the Kathmandu Post daily.

"After inspection of the manufacturing facilities of the pharmaceutical companies, which had applied to export their products to our country, we have published the list of the companies that do not comply with the WHO's good manufacturing practices," said Santosh KC, a Department spokesperson.

Good manufacturing practice is a system of ensuring that products are constantly produced and controlled according to the set quality standards, said the news report, it is designed to minimise the risks involved in any pharmaceutical production that cannot be eliminated through testing the final product.

In April and July, the Department had sent a team of drug inspectors to India to probe the manufacturing facilities of pharmaceutical companies that had applied to supply their products to Nepal.

Besides Divya Pharmacy, the list also names Radiant Parenterals Ltd., Mercury Laboratories Ltd., Alliance Biotech, Captab Biotec, Aglowmed Limited, Zee Laboratories Ltd, Daffodils Pharmaceuticals Ltd, GLS pharma Limited, Unijules Life Science Ltd, Concept Pharmaceuticals Pvt, Shree Anand Life Sciences Ltd, IPCA laboratories Ltd, Cadila Healthcare Ltd, Dial Pharmaceuticals, Aglowmed Limited and Mackur laboratories Ltd.

The Department said that, among the Indian companies it has prohibited, some are already registered and some are new.

Products of some companies do not comply with the regulatory requirements and some companies do not comply with good manufacturing practices. Among them, some companies' products are used in critical care, dental cartridges and also vaccines.

The dSpartment has also published a list of 46 drug manufacturing companies, which are found to comply with the WHO's good manufacturing practices.

Inspecting good manufacturing practices of pharmaceutical companies, both national and foreign, is a regular duty of the Department.

A few months ago, the Department had alerted drug inspectors to step up surveillance to prevent the import and sales of cough syrups manufactured by an Indian pharmaceutical company after scores of children in Gambia died of kidney failure upon allegedly consuming the syrups.

The move followed a global alert by the World Health Organisation about four cough syrups that could have links to the deaths of the children in July, August, and September in the West African country.

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Beirut, Dec 20 (IANS) Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati said that the army is conducting necessary investigations into the killing of an Irish peacekeeper last week and a result is expected soon.

Irish soldier Sean Rooney was killed and three others were injured on the night of December 13 in Al-Aqbieh, just outside the area of operations of the UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), reports Xinhua news agency.

During a meeting with a delegation from the Lebanese Editors' Syndicate Council, Mikati said given that the incident occurred outside UNIFIL's area of operations, "it is likely that it was not planned".

"Investigations into the incident are ongoing, and the security services are aptly performing their role," said caretaker Minister of National Defense Maurice Slim earlier on Monday when visiting the headquarters of the Irish UNIFIL battalion.

"UNIFIL plays a very important role in preserving stability and calm in south Lebanon. Cooperation between UNIFIL and the Lebanese army continues in all fields to preserve this stability," said Slim.

UNIFIL was established in 1978 under the UN Security Council Resolutions 425 and 426 to confirm Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon and restore peace and security in the region.

At present, it has about 10,000 peacekeepers from 48 countries.

--IANS
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Tehran, Dec 20 (IANS) Iran is ready to return to its commitments under the 2015 nuclear deal, the senior advisor to the country's Supreme Leader said.

"Today, we have necessary nuclear capability, but we do not intend to produce a bomb ... (as) we consider the production of (nuclear) bombs forbidden on the basis of our (religious) beliefs," Xinhua news agency quoted Kamal Kharazi as saying at an event here.

"And from a strategic point of view, we do not consider it a path-breaker because if Iran moves toward nuclear weapons, a nuclear race will begin in the region," the former Foreign Minister added.

Possessing a nuclear weapon is not necessarily a component of security, but "having nuclear technology is a deterrent and shows our ability", he noted.

Kharazi emphasized that Iran is ready to return to its obligations under the 2015 nuclear deal, also known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), when many relevant problems have been solved so far.

The only remaining issue is about safeguards, which will be hopefully resolved during the upcoming visit of the experts of the International Atomic Energy Agency to Tehran, he said.

Iran signed the JCPOA with world powers in July 2015, agreeing to put curbs on its nuclear program in return for the removal of the sanctions on the country.

The US, however, pulled out of the deal in May 2018 and reimposed its unilateral sanctions on Iran, prompting the latter to drop some of its nuclear commitments under the deal.

The talks on the JCPOA's revival began in April 2021 in Vienna.

No breakthrough had been achieved after the latest round of talks in August this year.

--IANS
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By Aditi Bhaduri
New Delhi, December 20: The Moscow led Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO) has just received its major jolt – one may say even an existential one. And it has not come from one of the muscle flexing central Asian states but from one of Russias closest allies – Armenia. And it may be symbolic of the covert shifts taking place in wake of Russias Ukraine operations.


At a recent summit meeting of the heads of the member states of the Moscow-led Collective Security Treaty Organisation held in Yerevan, Armenia, the host country refused to sign the summit declaration, calling into question the effectiveness of the alliance. Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan also criticised the role of the organisation in his speech. Coming from a state that is Russia's close ally for more than a century, economically weak, and dependent on Russia, it can be construed as a major jolt for the alliance.

The CSTO had been established in 2002 as a defence alliance, with Russia, Belarus, Armenia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan as its members. Uzbekistan had joined for a while, but then left it. One of its stated objectives is of preserving territorial integrity and seeking closer cooperation with other multilateral institutions, such as the United Nations, Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, Shanghai Cooperation Organization, etc. Article 4 of the Collective Security Treaty Organization says that the aggression against CSTO member states is considered by other participants as aggression against everyone. It is dominated by Russia, its most powerful state, and which contributes the most too in terms of troops, and resources.

In this regard the CSTO's recent role in Armenia (a member) and Azerbaijan, (a non-member) has come under criticism and scrutiny in the South Caucasian country. In general, there have been rumblings against Russia's role in the conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh. Though Russian peacekeepers are in the conflicted territory, the war ended in huge losses for Armenia, possibly the closest Russian ally after Belarus in the post-Soviet space. But the more recent clashes, which Armenia accuses Azerbaijan of directing at Armenian territory, well within its internationally recognised border elicited no response from member states, leave alone any action by the CSTO itself in defence of its member state.

Armenian analysts say that the role of India has been more proactive. Even though India did not name anyone, it clearly called the attacks an "aggression" against Armenia. Commenting on the hostilities MEA spokesperson Arindam Bagchi had said "We have seen reports of attacks along the Armenia-Azerbaijan border including targeting of civilian settlements and infrastructure on 12/13 September 2022. We call upon the aggressor side to immediately cease hostilities…" At the UN Security Council also, when the topic came up for discussion, India's PR to the UN Ruchira Kamboj had reiterated, "The recent reports of attacks along the Armenia-Azerbaijan border, including targeting of civilian settlements and infrastructure, are a matter of deep concern. We call upon the aggressor side to immediately cease hostilities and exercise restraint…"

So have countries like the USA, which sent its Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi to Armenia, and France. The CSTO did send a fact-finding mission to Armenia, but that was as far as it went. None of the member-states issued any condemnation of the aggression. This has seriously called into question the role of the CSTO in preserving its avowed intent – territorial integrity.

Earlier, the grouping had roiled member Belarus. It could not tackle the internal and border violence that had broken out when in 2010-member state Kyrgyzstan threw out its president Kurmanbek Bakiev. More recently the CSTO was nowhere to be seen in the very violent Kyrgyz-Tajik border clashes, with both being member-states of the alliance.

However, it did shore up border security with Tajikistan in the wake of the Taliban takeover, keeping that border safe, and engaged in a number of drills with other member-states to keep violence and threats emanating from Afghanistan, which borders three of the Central Asian republics, including sharing a long border with Tajikistan, a CSTO member, and very close to Kyrgyzstan, another CSTO member.

Again, in Januray this year, when a wave of violence and chaos engulfed one of its largest and powerful member Kazakhstan, the CSTO did send in troops, including from Armenia, to quickly quell the violence and rioting. It was blamed on "foreign hands". Because this was also perceived as a return of Russia to the region, the CSTO equally quickly withdrew its troops once the violence had been quashed. This was the first time such an operation was carried out by the organisation.

However, its effectiveness was called out earlier this year when Tajik-Kyrgyz border clashes erupted. To that effect, Russian President Vladimir Putin had to placate the heads of both states during a CIS summit in Asthana in October. The CSTO, like the Eurasian Economic Union, is a Russia led alliance. With Russia preoccupied in Ukraine, there is a sense that much of the CSTO's future will depend on the outcome of that conflict. This was one of the reasons why Russia felt the need to hold the first ever Russia-Central Asia Dialogue this year in October, it was to majorly reassure its Central Asian partners that Russia was not turning away from the security architecture it had helped cement with them through organisations like the CSTO.

However, the Armenia-Azerbaijan clash has once again highlighted the role or lack of the CSTO. "We did not expect CSTO to send troops, though we would have liked it…. considering Russia is busy with Ukraine. But that not a single condemnation was issued by any member including Moscow has not gone down well with the Armenian populace in general. And our Prime Minister had no option but to refuse to sign the summit because there was no sense that members were there to help each other. We do not even know what their position on the aggression was. So, we have to wait and see how effective the organisation proves itself to be."

All eyes are on the Russia-Ukraine conflict. If Russia wins, there is a sense that the organisation, in spite of all hiccups, will survive. And that remains to be seen.

(The content is being carried under an arrangement with indianarrative.com)

--indianarrative

New York, Dec 20 (IANS) UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called on the Taliban regime in Afghanistan to prevent terror groups from attacking Pakistan or any other neighbouring country from Afghan territory, saying the world body was in discussions with the de facto authorities in this regard.

"We consider that it is absolutely essential for the Taliban not to allow any form of terrorist activity that might have an impact in relation to Pakistan, as in relation to any other country of the region," the UN chief said in response to a question from a reporter about the stepped-up cross-border terrorist attacks from the Tehreek-i-Taliban (TTP) against Islamabad that have resulted in many casualties, Express Tribune reported.

"There are several clear things that we believe the Taliban must deliver from the point of view of the interests of the international community and from the point of view of the interest of Afghanistan itself," he said at his year-end press conference.

"One thing is that they must deliver in relation to inclusion in the power structures in Afghanistan," the Secretary-General said, emphasizing that all ethnic groups in Afghanistan should be represented.

"A second aspect is in relation to human rights and particularly women and girls' rights, the right of women to work, the rights of girls to attend school at all levels without discrimination," he said.

"And there is another clear ask from the international community, which is for Afghanistan to stop all forms of activity of terrorist organisations from Afghanistan that represent the threat to neighbouring countries, including Pakistan, and so we are actively engaged in our discussions with the Taliban de facto authorities in relation to this," the UN chief added.

--IANS
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Jerusalem, Dec 19 (IANS) The Israeli government has launched a plan to gather innovative solutions to the road noises of motor vehicles using automatic detection technology.

The plan encouraged tech firms and entrepreneurs to come up with solutions that would enable the detection of "abnormally noisy" vehicles in various visibility and weather conditions, such as darkness and fog, so that law enforcement could be less complex and requires less manpower, the Ministries of Innovation, Science and Technology, as well as Environmental Protection said in a joint statement on Sunday.

Three proposals would be selected for demonstration and each of them would receive government support of 50,000 shekels (about $14,440), Xinhua news agency reported.

Noise from vehicles has long been a hazard in Israel in recent years, causing health problems and interfering with daily activities, the Ministries said, noting excessive noises came from the illegally modified engine and exhaust system of motorcycles.

The plan was publicised on the new National Challenges website built to improve the Israeli government's performance through the assimilation of innovative technologies.

--IANS
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