Asia
Supreme Court of India Aadhaar appeal to 31 March 2018
Indian Supreme Court has ruled that the mandatory use of national identity card and linking them to mobile phones and accounts is extended till 31st March 2018.
Indian Supreme Court has ruled that the mandatory use of national identity card and linking them to mobile phones and accounts is extended till 31st March 2018.
‘The unique biometric identity would help reduce duplicate and ghost entries in the list of beneficiaries of Government schemes, and pave the way for direct benefit transfers to them eventually,’ the then Government headed by the Congress party told us. The elimination of false claimants and a chain of Government officials who administer public delivery systems would help cut down on corruption and enable the state to do more with fewer resources, we were told,’ writes Sumit Mishra for Economic Express.
‘As far as identification technology for citizens goes, nothing in the world rivals or comes even close to Aadhaar. The biometric-based (fingerprints and iris scans) 12-digit unique identity, now used by almost 1.1 billion Indians, is the most advanced of its kind, Jaijit Bhattacharya, partner, strategy and economics,’ writes Shelley Singh for Economic Times India.
Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered a partial withdrawal of Russian troops from Syria during a visit to the war-torn country on Monday. ‘In two years, the Russian armed forces, together with the Syrian army, have defeated the most lethal group of international terrorists,’ Tass quoted Putin as saying. ‘In this regard, I have decided that a significant part of the Russian military contingent in the Syrian Arab Republic is returning home to Russia’.
‘In the current failure of foreign policy, it is important for Putin to appear as a military victor and a leader of a global power in the eyes of Russian citizens who will vote for him in a few months,’ said Golts, SBS News Australia.
‘And Putin did say, “If terrorists come back, we will strike them”. So that means Russia’s military strength is still present in Syria’. George Alam Political Analyst based in Beirut told Al Jazeera. He added, Russia’s way of asking the ‘international community to pressure the US to withdraw its troops from Syria’.
More than 6700 Rohingya Muslims, including at least 730 children under the age of five, were killed in the first month of a crackdown that started in August in Myanmar’s northern Rakhine state, according to Médecins Sans Frontières.
‘Against this backdrop of human suffering, the funds needed to continue providing nutrition, better sanitation and housing, and continued health care and vigilance against infectious diseases—not to mention ongoing protection and education for children remain utterly inadequate. To date, the fundraising appeal remains just under 35 percent of its goal of $434 million’, writes Alyssa Ayres for Council on Foreign Relations.
A day after Prime Minister Haider-Al-Abadi announced the ouster of the Jihadi group, Iraq celebrated with a military parade, on Sunday. ‘Our forces are in complete control of the Iraqi-Syrian border and I therefore announce the end of the war against Daesh (IS),’ Abadi told a conference in Baghdad. ‘Our enemy wanted to kill our civilization, but we have won through our unity and our determination. We have triumphed in little time,’ he said.
It is true that the Islamic State is the primary reason behind the Iraq crisis, but Iraq requires far more. It requires, social, political and economic reforms to unite its sectarian and political divides in post-ISIS era to avoid resurgence of the insurgent group.
It is a moment for Iraqis to celebrate after nearly nine months of bloody warfare against the Sunni extremists of the Islamic State. But despite the flaring of hope for a new national unity, the Government’s costly victory in Mosul and the questions hanging over its aftermath feel more like the next chapter in the long story of Iraq’s unravelling.
‘Most pressing is the need to bring back hundreds of thousands of displaced Sunni civilians. But Iraq has failed to rebuild and resettle some other communities freed from the Islamic State as tensions between the Sunni minority and the majority Shiites still undermine efforts to reunite the country,’ writes Time Arango for New York Times.
‘Iraq still needs the intelligence cooperation with the international coalition and neighbouring countries because there are many places for ISIS to hide’, said Wathiq al-Hashimi, the Chairman of the Iraqi Group for Strategic Studies, an independent think tank in Baghdad. He added, ‘ISIS commanders are now in different countries in the world’.
Twelve members of the Congolese militia, Djeshi ya Yesu (The Army of Jesus) had carried out rapes believing that this would give them supernatural power in the battle field.
‘A major legal victory that should give survivors a sense of justice…The next, perhaps equally challenging, test is to ensure that the reparations promised in judgment are actually received. These legal victories are won in the name of, and on the backs of, survivors – but too often, we then fail when actually delivering reparations to make them whole.’ Says, Kim Thuy Seelinger, the Director of the Sexual Violence Program at Berkeley School of Law.
However, the legal victory will create a sense of fear (deterrence) among other groups, which intends to do the same in future. Likewise, quick prosecution and speedy justice will give a sense of trust to victims. The de-radicalization workshops, and counselling’s of such criminals will prevent them to believe in stereos like supernatural powers; in future.
British Prime Minister Theresa May arrives in the Belgian capital reeling from a parliamentary defeat on Brexit, just as her European counterparts are set to moving on to the second phase of Brexit negotiations. ‘The House of Commons has agreed a proposal in a new law passed by the Parliament. MPs vote 309 to 305 to approve amendment 7 to the EU withdrawal bill’, tweeted the House of Commons official page. However, Prime Minister May hailed a new sense of optimism in Brexit, telling the Parliament on Monday that an agreement to move negotiations on to the future lies in progress.
British Parliaments vote is bad for Theresa May, because neither EU will change its position nor the House of Commons and nor the British People. Julia Hartley-Brewer, a journalist and broadcaster at telegraph said ‘Brexit is about the British people taking back control and not the Parliament’. She added, ‘we get this a lot from all you lovely remainers about how we voted for the Parliament to take back control. I didn’t, I voted for the British people to take back control’.
China’s Navy Chief has told his Australian counterpart that Australian actions in the past year have ‘run counter to the general trend of peace and stability’ in the disputed South China Sea, according to China’s state media.
‘China is the main aggressor. The country claims sovereignty over most of the South China Sea, including a bunch of small land formations, directly challenging the territorial claims of its neighbours — the Philippines, Vietnam, Taiwan and Malaysia. These countries are all keen to exploit the vast fisheries and significant oil reserves that lie beneath,’ writes Jane Norman for ABC news Australia.
Australia has a trade of $150 billion a year, with China. This means that the economic fortunes of both states are connected and both states should avoid conflict.
No state among 57 members of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation has the relative power capabilities that can harm US interest in the region or across. Therefore, there will be no serious implications for Washington. Arab states are either busy in fighting for their regime survival, or terror groups. However, the US recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital will deteriorate the Middle Eastern security environment.
An analysis was published by the Centre for Strategic and Contemporary Research on the subject. It can be accessed at https://cscr.pk/explore/themes/politics-governance/relighting-oic-jerusalem/
‘The political turmoil will probably have far-reaching consequences, and the United States, which wields considerable influence in the country, shares some responsibility for creating the political landscape that laid the ground for the crisis’. Writes Sarah Kinosian for the Guardian.
‘The United States has funnelled money into Honduras in large part to train security forces so they can better participate in the war on drugs. Honduras is a major transhipment point for cocaine moving toward the US’, writes Christopher Sherman, Garance Burke and Martha Mendoza, for ABC news.