India, China must respect each other’s core concerns: Jaishankar in Beijing

Agencies
August 14, 2019

Beijing, Aug 14: India and China should find stronger convergences, respect each other’s core concerns and manage differences, External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar has said as he underlined that the relationship between the two Asian giants has become “so big” that it has acquired a “global dimension”.

Mr. Jaishankar, who concluded his three-day visit to Beijing on Monday, held extensive and in-depth talks with his counterpart Wang Yi on the entire gamut of the India-China ties.

During his visit, he also met Chinese Vice President Wang Qishan, a close confidant of President Xi Jinping.

As the two largest developing countries and emerging economies, cooperation between India and China is of great importance to the world, Mr. Jaishankar told state-run Xinhua news agency here in an interview on Sunday.

“Our relationship is so big that it is no longer a bilateral relationship. It has global dimensions,” the report quoted Mr. Jaishankar as saying.

Describing the world as “more multi-polar” with changing global order, he said India and China need to enhance communication and coordination to contribute to world peace, stability and development.

‘People-to-people exchanges’

The two countries should find stronger areas of convergence, respect each other’s core concerns, find ways of managing differences and keep a strategic view of the direction of bilateral ties, he said.

The Minister said the two neighbours have a long history that goes back to thousands of years and the two countries’ civilisations are among the oldest that represent two pillars of the civilisation of the East.

“A lot of people, including young people of both countries, really don’t have a good understanding of how much our two cultures of civilisations have affected each other,” Mr. Jaishankar said, underlining that “promoting a greater awareness of that history” through more cultural exchanges is an important task for the two countries.

India and China have agreed to establish a high-level people-to-people exchanges mechanism in April last year and the first meeting was held in New Delhi in December.

Describing the move as “taking the bilateral relationship from the narrow diplomatic field to a larger societal interaction”, Jaishankar said the more people of the two nations interact face-to-face, the more their sense of relating to each other will grow.

“It’s important for our relationship to build popular support. Our people must feel good about each other,” he said.

Jaishankar had also co-chaired the 2nd meeting of the China-India high-level people-to-people exchanges mechanism with Wang Yi, agreeing to further promote friendship between the two peoples.

This was his first visit to China after taking over the position of the External Affairs Minister. He had earlier served as India’s envoy to China from 2009 to 2013, the longest tenure by an Indian diplomat to Beijing.

His visit was finalised much before India’s move to revoke Article 370 of the Constitution that gave special status to J&K.

Jaishankar also discussed arrangements for President Jinping’s visit to India later this year for second informal summit with Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

During his meeting with Mr. Wang Yi, Mr. Jaishankar said India’s decisions on Jammu and Kashmir are country’s “internal” matter and have no implication for either the external boundaries of India or the Line of Actual Control (LAC) with China.

The remarks came in response to Wang, who brought up developments pertaining to legislation passed recently by the Indian Parliament on J&K, saying China is “very closely” following the Indo-Pak tensions over Kashmir and its “ramifications” while asking New Delhi to play a “constructive role” for regional peace and stability.

According to an official release from the external affairs ministry, during the bilateral meeting, Jaishankar conveyed that this was an “internal” matter for India and the issue related to changes in a temporary provision of the Constitution of India and was the sole prerogative of the country.

Asserting that the legislative measures were aimed at promoting better governance and socio-economic development, Jaishankar also said there was no implication for either the external boundaries of India or the LAC with China.

“India was not raising any additional territorial claims. The Chinese concerns in this regard were therefore misplaced. The minister also conveyed that so far as the India China boundary question was concerned the two sides had agreed to a fair, reasonable and mutually acceptable settlement of the Boundary Question on the basis of the 2005 Political Parameters and Guiding Principles,” the release said.

Jaishankar also told Wang that it was important to ensure that bilateral differences should not become disputes and emphasised that the future of the ties will depend on the mutual sensitivity to each other’s “core concerns“.

China on August 6 had objected to the formation of Ladakh as Union Territory by India, saying it undermined its territorial sovereignty, evoking a sharp reaction from New Delhi, which asked Beijing to refrain from commenting on its “internal affairs“.

Ahead of Mr. aishankar’s visit, Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi air-dashed to Beijing and held talks with Wang, seeking China’s support for Islamabad’s efforts to take India’s decision to revoke special status to Kashmir to the UN Security Council.

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News Network
November 10,2024

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The media office in the Gaza Strip, where the Israeli regime has been waging a genocidal war since last October, says as many as 188 Palestinian journalists have been killed since the onset of the brutal military onslaught.

The office provided the figure on Saturday, naming four journalists as the most recent victims of the onslaught.

It identified the foursome as Zahraa Mohammad Abu Sukheil, Ahmad Mohammad Abu Sukheil, Mustafa Khadr Bahar, and Abdel Rahman Khadr Bahar.

The office said it “strongly condemns the targeting, killing, and assassination of Palestinian journalists by the Israeli occupation and holds it fully responsible for committing this heinous crime.”

“We call on the international community, international organizations, and those involved in journalistic work worldwide to take action against the occupation, pursue it in international courts for its ongoing crimes, and pressure it to halt the genocide and the targeted killings of Palestinian journalists,” it said.

Earlier in the day, the office said the Israeli regime had bombed the tents sheltering journalists and displaced persons at the al-Aqsa Martyrs' Hospital in the city of Deir al-Balah in central Gaza for the ninth consecutive time.

The atrocity that claimed the lives of two people and injured 26 others came as part of “the genocidal crimes committed by the Israeli occupation army against hospitals, civilians, and displaced persons,” it said.

The media office held the regime and the United States, its biggest ally, as well as other countries aiding the genocide fully responsible for such systematic crimes.

At least 43,552 Palestinians, mostly women and children, have been killed and 102,765 others wounded since the launch of the war that followed a retaliatory operation by Gaza’s resistance groups.

The fatalities include 44 people, who were killed across the coastal sliver, in the most recent phase of the military onslaught.

As many as 24 of the victims were killed in the northern part of the territory, where the regime has markedly intensified its deadly attacks for weeks.

They included an eight-year-old child and a five-year-old one, who lost their lives after Israeli warplanes targeted a group of minors filling up jerry cans with water alongside their mother at the Jabalia Refugee camp.

Gaza’s heath ministry, meanwhile, said a number of victims remained under the rubble and in the streets following Israeli airstrikes, saying ambulances and civil defense teams could not reach them due to the sheer extent of the destruction caused by the raids and obstruction caused by the regime.

Also on Saturday, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) report, a United Nations-backed assessment, warned that famine was looming in northern Gaza amid escalated Israeli aggression and the regime’s near-total siege of the targeted areas.

The alert from the Famine Review Committee warned of "an imminent and substantial likelihood of famine occurring, due to the rapidly deteriorating situation in the Gaza Strip."

On October 17, the body projected that the number of people in Gaza facing "catastrophic" food insecurity between November and April 2025 would reach 345,000, or 16 percent of the population.

The IPC report classified that figure as Phase 5 -- a situation when "starvation, death, destitution, and extremely critical acute malnutrition levels are evident."

The Israeli military, however, questioned the report's credibility.

"To date, all assessments by the IPC have proven incorrect and inconsistent with the situation on the ground," the army said in a statement, denouncing "partial, biased data and superficial sources with vested interests."

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News Network
November 11,2024

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Mangaluru: In a deeply tragic turn of events, a 28-year-old woman named Ranjitha, who had recently given birth but tragically lost her newborn, ended her life by suicide on Monday. She reportedly leapt from the fourth-floor window of Lady Goschen Hospital’s luggage room.

Ranjitha, whose strength and resilience had carried her through a difficult pregnancy, was scheduled for discharge on Monday. Her journey to Lady Goschen Hospital began on October 24, when she was transferred from Karkala. She was a high-risk patient, battling both hypertension and diabetes. At the time of her admission, she was just 27 weeks pregnant.

Due to the complexities of her health, doctors made the difficult decision to perform an emergency C-section on October 30. She delivered a baby girl, premature and weighing only 960 grams. The newborn was immediately moved to the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, where doctors did all they could. Despite these efforts, the baby passed away on November 3.

Ranjitha’s sorrow was profound. She stayed under hospital care even after her initial recovery and was preparing to go home on November 9. She had even requested a couple more days at the hospital, seeking time perhaps to cope with her unimaginable grief.

On the day of her discharge, a discharge card ready and her family eagerly waiting to take her home, Ranjitha reportedly made her way to the luggage room in the early hours. There, standing on a cot placed for patients' family members, she climbed to a window and fell from the fourth floor. Despite the attempts of another visitor to intervene, tragedy was inevitable. She was rushed to Government Wenlock Hospital, where doctors confirmed the worst—she was no more.

Dr. Durgaparasad M R, the Medical Superintendent at Lady Goschen Hospital, shared his grief and spoke of the ongoing investigation. A post-mortem is to be conducted, and the local Tahsildar will complete the necessary inquest procedures. Ranjitha’s exact reasons for taking this step are yet to be confirmed, though the weight of her recent losses paints a sorrowful picture.

If you or anyone you know is struggling emotionally, please remember that help is available. Reach out to mental health experts who can provide support and guidance. The toll-free helpline number 9152987821 is available to assist anyone in distress.

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News Network
November 18,2024

Advisors to US President-elect Donald Trump have instructed his allies and associates to refrain from using the inflammatory language they previously employed when discussing issues related to migrants and the deportation of asylum seekers, in a bid to avoid “looking like Nazis.”

US media reports said that Trump’s associates had been asked to stop using the word “camps” to describe potential facilities that would be used to accommodate migrants rounded up in deportation operations across the country.

The reports said the US president-elect’s allies had been ordered to stave off such charged terms as they would bring to mind “Nazis,” and be used against Trump.

“I have received some guidance to avoid terms, like ‘camps,’ that can be twisted and used against the president, yes,” one Trump ally told American monthly magazine Rolling Stone.

“Apparently, some people think it makes us look like Nazis.”

The presidential advisers also cautioned surrogates and allies to keep racist terms, which have dogged Trump’s campaign, out of their remarks.

They said with Trump’s heated rhetoric that used to compare undocumented immigrants to “animals” and his slight that they are “poisoning the blood of our country,” detractors did not need to reach too far to find parallels to Nazi Germany.

Stephen Miller, who Trump tapped to be his deputy chief of staff of policy, specifically used the word “camps” to describe holding facilities that he hoped the military could put together for immigrants.

Tom Homan, who served as the acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement and is chosen by Trump to be in charge of the US borders, was no stranger to such language.

“It’s not gonna be a mass sweep of neighborhoods,” he said in an interview earlier this week. “It’s not gonna be building concentration camps. I’ve read it all. It’s ridiculous.”

Becoming a little more forthright about the new government’s aggressive deportation plans, Homan likened the early days of the Trump administration to the initial invasion of Iraq in 2003.

“I got three words for them – shock and awe,” he said. “You’re going to see us take this country back.”

Trump made immigration a central element of his 2024 presidential campaign but unlike his first run, which was mainly focused on building a border wall, he has shifted his attention to interior enforcement and the removal of undocumented immigrants already in the United States.

People close to the US president and his aides are laying the groundwork for expanding detention facilities to fulfill his mass deportation campaign promise.

The businessman-turned-politician deported more than 1.5 million people during his first term.

The figure do not include the millions of people turned away at the border under a Covid-era policy enacted by Trump and used during most of Biden’s term.

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