World

Jakarta, Sep 16 (IANS) Higher costs are expected to hit Indonesia's tourism sector after the government raised the price of subsidised fuel by about 30 per cent earlier this month.

Tourism operators in the archipelago are now racking their brains under the circumstances.

I Gede Nyoman Sangka, who runs his own travel agency on the resort island of Bali for more than five years, is currently working to improve the operational efficiency of his business.

"Just like any businesses out there, we are also being put in difficult situations after the hiked fuel prices," he told Xinhua news agency.

The fuel price hike came shortly after the rising inflation.

Indonesia's inflation at the end of August reached 4.6 per cent year on year, slightly lower than the previous month's 4.9 per cent, and both figures exceeded the central bank's target range from around 2 to 4 per cent.

In a meeting with provincial government heads this week, President Joko Widodo asked them to allocate 2 per cent of their budget to controlling transportation costs and suppressing inflation, particularly for micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises and informal workers.

Bali, one of the world's most famous tourist destinations, is still striving to revive its tourism sector impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic in the past more than two years.

The government has expressed its optimism about achieving an overall target of 3.6 million foreign visitor arrivals this year, although the Southeast Asian country is still grappling with other problems, such as the outbreak of foot and mouth disease among animals and the menace of monkeypox to public health.

Sangka expressed hope that authorities would design a special policy to help boost tourism in Bali.

"Tickets to fly to Bali should be subsidized. Cheaper tickets will bring more visitors and increase the hotel occupancy rate. This is important," he said, adding that the authorities should also temporarily suspend the hotel and restaurant taxes.

Meanwhile, the Tourism and Creative Economy Ministry has said that it is preparing strategies to manage the significant impact of the rising fuel prices on the tourism and creative economy sectors.

Earlier this week, Tourism and Creative Economy Minister Sandiaga Uno said his ministry will provide technical guidelines and assistance particularly for small and medium-sized tourism businesses to manage operating costs in more effective ways.

It will also manage special interest tourism activities which have the potential to reduce fuel consumption directly or indirectly, and encourage businesses in the tourism and creative economy sectors to start transitioning to renewable energy.

According to the Minister, the number of visitors from middle-income groups and the upper class to tourist destinations in Indonesia is currently increasing.

"Tourism has become a basic need. It's for healing. A need for refreshment is sometimes needed," Uno said.

--IANS
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Washington, Sep 16 (IANS) Initial jobless claims in the US have dropped for the fifth straight week to reach 213,000 amid continued labour market tightness, the Labour Department reported.

In the week ending September 10, the number of Americans filing for unemployment benefits decreased by 5,000 from the previous week's downwardly revised level of 218,000, according to a report released on Thursday by the Department's Bureau of Labour Statistics (BLS).

The four-week moving average for initial jobless claims, a method to iron out data volatility, also decreased by 8,000 to 224,000, Xinhua news agency quoted the report as saying.

The latest report also showed that the number of people continuing to collect regular state unemployment benefits, which was reported with a one-week lag, increased by 2,000 to 1.4 million during the week ending September 3.

The latest weekly figure of 213,000 was below the 2019 weekly average of 218,000, which was the pre-pandemic level.

In the week ending March 21, 2020, initial jobless claims skyrocketed to 2.9 million.

Jobless claims totalled 166,000 in the week ending March 19 this year, the lowest in decades. In recent months, the figures have been trending up amid surging inflation and rising interest rates.

The latest figure, however, showed that applications for unemployment insurance fell for a fifth week, signaling still robust demand for labour even as economic growth slows.

The number of job openings in the US rose to 11.2 million by the end of July, as the imbalances between labour market supply and demand remained, the Department had reported earlier.

With the increase in job openings, there were nearly two job positions per available worker.

--IANS
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Los Angeles, Sep 16 (IANS) Actress Amber Heard is hit with yet another accusation in the aftermath of the much-publicised defamation trial against Johnny Depp. She is now accused of blackmailing Hollywood men to nab parts, including 'Aquaman' director James Wan.

According to a source close to production producers, the rumours about Heard had been swirling even "before the divorce drama started, it's just a different tune now."

The source went on detailing, "Anybody who is anybody in Hollywood has heard of Amber's wild orgies and sadly that means Depp knew too. He knew and it was slowly killing him."

"He didn't want to confront Heard, he just ran away, went on benders to try and kill his emotions and thoughts with drugs and alcohol."

As "most big studios began distancing themselves from Amber Heard after the messy divorce simply because they didn't want to upset Johnny Depp by hiring her," the source wonders how Heard managed to secure her role in 'Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom' following her loss in the defamation case, reports aceshowbiz.com.

"A lot of us were actually pretty shocked when we found out that Amber Heard had been cast as Mera in the 'Aquaman' movies - not because of the Johnny Depp situation but because she's not a great actress. I would hesitate to even call her b-list," the source further told Australian gossip site Pop Topic.

"Also, being one of the leads in the film and only banking approximately USD$2 million for the part, that just doesn't seem right," the source added, hence the allegations that she's blackmailed Wan.

"A lot of us are starting to wonder whether she slept with James Wan and that's how she secured this role, especially after seeing in an intimate setting with him and Elon Musk. We know what kind of wild things the two of them got up to."

"The studio has wanted her gone since before the trial. She's a terrible actress. They tried to execute a clause in a contract which would have gotten her fired, but James Wan fought to keep her in."

"So, the executives decided to just limit her role in the entire film by cutting her screen time to just 10 minutes," according to the source, who claimed that "again, James Wan fought to restore her scenes. Something about his artistic direction and what-not."

"I am almost positive she slept with him, but I'm even more certain that 'Aquaman 2' will be the last Hollywood movie you'll ever see Amber Heard in, Hollywood has blacklisted her," the source additionally noted.

Following the verdict in the defamation case, Heard denied rumours that her role could be completely cut from the 'Aquaman' sequel.

A spokesperson for the 36-year-old told Entertainment Tonight in June, "The rumor mill continues as it has from day one - inaccurate, insensitive, and slightly insane."

During the trial, Heard also said that she "fought really hard" to save her role in the upcoming movie, though her part was reduced significantly.

--IANS
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Budapest, Sep 16 (IANS) Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban's right-wing Fidesz party slammed the European Parliament (EP) for "being occupied with attacking Hungary even in the midst of the current crises".

"While the people of Europe are suffering from an energy crisis due to the failed Brussels sanctions, the most important thing for the leftist European Parliament, even in this crisis situation, is to attack Hungary," Fidesz said in a statement on Thursday, reacting to a rule-of-law vote in EP against his government earlier in the day.

The EP adopted a report by French MEP Gwendoline Delbos-Corfield on the "Existence of a clear risk of a serious breach by Hungary of the values on which the Union is founded".

The vote was 433 in favour, 123 against and 28 abstentions.

The EP resolution, which is a non-binding political statement, stipulates that Hungary can no longer be considered "a full democracy".

The current report does not result in a new procedure, but the EP firmly condemned both the European Commission and the Council, arguing that it was also their responsibility that full democracy in a member state could have been abolished.

It called on both bodies not to transfer money to Hungary's government until the situation improves.

The Commission must decide by September 22 what to do with the conditionality mechanism it launched in April against the government of Hungary.

Based on this mechanism, the transfer of tens of billions of euros in European funds could be denied to Budapest because of rule of law problems.

--IANS
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Brussels, Sep 16 (IANS) The European Commission has presented a proposal for Cyber Resilience Act (CRA), a new European Union (EU) law aiming at guaranteeing cyber security in connected devices and software sold on the single market.

"The Cyber Resilience Act will ensure the connected objects and software we buy comply with strong cybersecurity safeguards," Margrethe Vestager, executive vice president of the European Commission for a Europe fit for the digital age, said on Thursday.

"Computers, phones, household appliances, virtual assistance devices, cars, toys, each and every one of these hundreds of millions of connected products is a potential entry point for a cyberattack. And yet, today most of the hardware and software products are not subject to any cyber security obligations," European Commissioner for the Internal Market Thierry Breton explained.

Based on the principle of "security by design", the new law will address three areas of action to ensure the safety of users: cyber security will become mandatory; the manufacturer will remain responsible for their product's cyber security throughout its life cycle; and consumers will be better informed about these parameters while choosing a product with digital elements, reports Xinhua news agency.

Producers will be able to self-assess 90 per cent of their products. These include photo editing, word processing, smart speakers, hard drives and games.

The remaining 10 per cent -- critical products such as password managers, firewalls, operating systems, microcontrollers and industrial firewalls --will be assessed by a third party.

The CRA will be enforced through a progressive set of measures, according to Breton.

The Commission will first ask the producer to comply with the CRA, then the product will either be recalled or permanently withdrawn, and finally a fine equivalent to 2 to 5 per cent of the company's global turnover will be applied.

The Commission's proposal for the CRA will now be examined by the European Parliament and the Council.

If adopted, EU member states and companies will have two years to transpose the regulation into national law.

--IANS
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Los Angeles, Sep 16 (IANS) More than 14.6 million children in the US have tested positive for Covid-19 since the onset of the pandemic, according to the latest report by the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) and the Children's Hospital Association.

More than 340,000 of these cases have been added in the past four weeks. Nearly 6.7 million reported cases have been added in 2022, according to the report.

For the week ending September 8, nearly 83,300 child Covid-19 cases were reported, but the reported cases are likely a "substantial undercount" of Covid-19 cases, according to the report.

There is an urgent need to collect more age-specific data to assess the severity of illness related to new variants as well as potential longer-term effects, said the AAP as quoted by Xinhua news agency report.

"It is important to recognise there are immediate effects of the pandemic on children's health, but importantly we need to identify and address the long-lasting impact on the physical, mental, and social well-being of this generation of children and youth," the AAP added.

--IANS
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Guatemala City, Sep 16 (IANS) At least nine people were killed and nearly 20 were injured after a stampede at the end of a concert celebrating Guatemalan Independence Day in the western city of Quetzaltenango, the local Red Cross confirmed.

The incidengt took place on early Thursday morning, Xinhua news agency reported.

According to its reports on social media, the Guatemalan Red Cross and volunteer firefighters "stabilised more than 20 injured people and nine died at the scene."

The stampede occurred at one of the exits of the fairgrounds at the end of the outdoor concert, and Guatemalan authorities are investigating the causes.

September 15 marks the 201st anniversary of the independence from Spain of Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua.

--IANS
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Jerusalem, Sep 16 (IANS) Israel closed the registration for political parties intending to run in the upcoming parliamentary elections.

The Central Elections Committee said on Thursday in a statement that the submission of candidate lists has been concluded after being opened to individual candidates and parties for two days, resulting in 40 lists running for the elections scheduled on November 1.

Less than an hour before the deadline, the Arab party of Balad announced it will run solo, splitting from the Joint List, a large alliance of Arab parties in the parliament, effectively breaking apart the alliance that has already lost the Ra'am Party which quitted over political differences in early 2021, Xinhua news agency reported.

TV polls predict that Balad might not pass the electoral threshold needed to get it into parliament. Commentators on the state-owned Kan TV news said the move might mean former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's bloc will get an extra seat to a total of 61 seats, according to polls.

Recent polls predict that only about 12 parties would pass the electoral threshold, with prospects suggesting yet another political deadlock between a bloc of supporters of Netanyahu and a bloc calling to replace him, led by current caretaker Prime Minister Yair Lapid, also a leader of the centrist Yesh Atid Party, and Benny Gantz, Defence Minister and leader of the National Unity Party.

--IANS
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United Nations, Sep 16 (IANS) The UN Security Council adopted a resolution to renew the mandate of a UN investigative team for crimes committed by the Islamic State (IS) in Iraq.

Resolution 2651, which won the unanimous support of the 15-member council, on Thursday decides to extend the mandate of the UN Investigative Team to Promote Accountability for Crimes Committed by Da'esh/Islamic State (UNITAD) for a year, till September 17, 2023.

Any further extension of UNITAD's mandate will be decided at the request of the Iraqi government or any other government that has requested the team to collect evidence of acts that may amount to war crimes, crimes against humanity, or genocide, committed by the IS in its territory, says the resolution.

The resolution requests the special adviser, who heads UNITAD, to continue to submit and present reports to the Security Council on the team's activities every 180 days, Xinhua news agency reported.

UNITAD was authorised by the Security Council in September 2017 to support Iraq's efforts in holding the IS accountable for the crimes the terrorist group committed in Iraq. The team became fully operational in November 2019.

--IANS
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Islamabad, Sep 16 (IANS) Pakistan has received a total of 100 international flights carrying relief items for flood victims since August 28, Pakistan's Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Asim Iftikhar Ahmad said.

The humanitarian relief goods include food items, tents, blankets, medical supplies, survival and hygiene equipment, and high-capacity water pumps, according to the spokesperson on Thursday.

Earlier, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said that devastating floods have caused immense damage with the communication system, crops, houses and roads completely destroyed in parts of Pakistan, Xinhua news agency reported.

The federal government has allocated 70 billion rupees (nearly $295.5 million) for the victims, while 24 billion rupees have already been distributed to the flood victims, the Prime Minister added on Wednesday.

According to the latest figures released by the National Disaster Management Authority, the floods in the country have killed 1,508 people, injured more than 12,000 others and left thousands homeless since mid-June.

--IANS
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