Thousands mourn at Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi’s funeral procession
NewsFeed Funeral services for Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi started in Tehran and ended in his hometown of Mashhad. Raisi died alongside Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian and six others Sunday in a helicopter crash near the border with Azerbaijan. Published On 23 May 202423 May 2024 Adblock test (Why?)
Ancient humans lived in East Timor 44,000 years ago, archaeologists find
Stone artefacts and animal bones found in a deep cave in northern East Timor offer new insights into where ancient humans lived more than 35,000 years before Egyptians built the first pyramids. Archaeologists from Australian and United Kingdom universities say thousands of stone artefacts and animal bones found in a cave, known as the Laili rock shelter, in the northern parts of East Timor, indicate ancient humans lived there some 44,000 years ago. The researchers say their analysis of deep sediment, dating back between 59,000 and 54,000 years, from the cave and other locations in East Timor, also known as Timor-Leste, revealed an “arrival signature” that suggests humans were not present in the area before 44,000 years ago. “Unlike other sites in the region, the Laili rock shelter preserved deep sediments dating between which showed no clear signs of human occupation,” said Shimona Kealy, an archaeologist and palaeobiologist from the Australian National University, who was involved in the research. Sue O’Connor, a Distinguished Professor at the School of Culture, History and Language at the Australian National University, examines a polished stone axe head found on the island of Timor [Courtesy of Jamie Kidston, ANU] Australian National University Distinguished Professor and archaeologist Sue O’Connor said the newly examined sediment gave insights into when humans arrived on the island of Timor. “The absence of humans on Timor Island earlier than at least 50,000 years ago is significant as it indicates that these early humans arrived on the island later than previously believed,” said O’Connor. The researchers – from the Australian National University (ANU), Flinders University, University College London (UCL) and the ARC Centre of Excellence for Australian Biodiversity and Heritage – published their findings in the journal Nature Communications this week. The new discovery in the country is the latest in a region known for some of the most ancient archaeological finds giving insights into the lives of ancient humans, alongside neighbouring Indonesia and Australia. A region of ancient artefacts Researchers say an ochre painting of a pig at Leang Tedongnge in Sulawesi, Indonesia, was painted at least 45,500 years ago [File: Adhi Agus Oktaviana, Griffith University via AFP] The island of Timor lies to the south of the Indonesian island of Sulawesi, where researchers believe a 45,500-year-old life-size ochre painting of a warty pig could be the oldest rock art painting on earth. Basran Burhan, an Indonesian archaeologist from southern Sulawesi and current Griffith PhD student who led the survey that found the painting, said of the discovery in 2021 that “humans have hunted Sulawesi warty pigs for tens of thousands of years”. “These pigs were the most commonly portrayed animal in the ice age rock art of the island, suggesting they have long been valued both as food and a focus of creative thinking and artistic expression,” said Burhan. The team had earlier found a 44,000-year-old painting in another Sulawesi cave, depicting half-human hunters using what appeared to be spears and ropes to chase wild animals. The discovery of that painting was named one of the top 10 scientific breakthroughs of 2020 by Science magazine. Ancient cultural heritage at risk? Many of the oldest cultural heritage sites on earth are found in Australia to the south of East Timor and Indonesia. Aboriginal people living in Australia have one of the oldest continuous living cultures on earth, as documented by archaeological evidence dating back at least 60,000 years. At Murujuga in northwestern Australia, an estimated one million petroglyphs include rock carvings dating back as far as 40,000 years. The carvings include drawings of animals that are now extinct, including nail-tailed wallabies and thylacines, also known as Tasmanian tigers. The Murujuga Cultural Landscape was formally nominated for UNESCO World Heritage status earlier this year. “Murujuga is a deeply storied landscape where the ancestors of Ngarda-Ngarli lived and thrived for thousands of generations,” said Murujuga Aboriginal Corporation CEO Kim Wood. “Every part of this landscape is inscribed with that history, culture and lore that has managed Ngurra [the word for ‘country’ in Indigenous Western desert languages] for 50,000 years,” Wood said. But some traditional owners have expressed concerns Murujuga could become the latest Indigenous heritage site in Australia to be damaged or destroyed, due to a gas project in the area. While a UNESCO World Heritage Listing could see the petroglyphs protected, the Western Australia state government last year overturned new cultural heritage laws introduced to protect cultural heritage sites after mining giant Rio Tinto destroyed a 46,000-year-old cultural heritage site at Juukan Gorge, about 1,075km (668 miles) north of Perth. The destruction of the Juukan Gorge shelters in May 2020 prompted widespread outrage, prompting Rio Tinto’s CEO to resign and an Australian government report titled Never Again, which recommended that the mining giant impose a moratorium on mining in the area and rehabilitate the sacred sites. Adblock test (Why?)
Macron says French troops will stay in New Caledonia ‘as long as necessary’
France’s president is visiting the Pacific territory where electoral reform plans have fuelled the worst unrest in more than 30 years. French President Emmanuel Macron has said French soldiers will remain in New Caledonia “as long as necessary” after more than a week of unrest triggered by French plans to change electoral rules in the Pacific island territory. Macron arrived in New Caledonia’s capital Noumea on Thursday, amid continuing protests over voting reforms the Indigenous Kanak people say would dilute their vote and undermine their struggle for independence. The reforms would allow French people who have lived in New Caledonia for 10 years or more to vote in New Caledonia’s provincial elections. About 3,000 soldiers have been sent from Paris since the violence began and could stay until the Olympic Games in Paris, which begin on July 26, Macron said. Six people, including three young Kanaks, have been killed and about 280 people arrested since the protests broke out and a state of emergency was declared. Macron observed a minute of silence for the people who had been killed and said if roadblocks and barricades were removed, he would be opposed to extending the state of emergency. The French president also met the pro-independence President of the Government of New Caledonia Louis Mapou and the President of Congress Roch Wamytan, in a meeting at the residence of France’s high commissioner to New Caledonia in Noumea on Thursday. Macron flew about 17,000km (10,500 miles) from mainland France to reach Noumea and was expected to remain in New Caledonia for around 12 hours. Demonstrators waving New Caledonian flags lined the streets as the French president’s convoy made its way along the newly reopened road from the international airport to Noumea. “I don’t know why our fate is being discussed by people who don’t even live here,” said Mike, a 52-year-old Kanak at a roadblock north of the capital, on the eve of Macron’s arrival. People demonstrate as French President Emmanuel Macron’s motorcade drives past in Noumea in France’s Pacific territory of New Caledonia on Thursday [Ludovic Marin/Pool via AFP] About 90 barricades put up by protesters had been cleared by heavily armed police and paramilitaries, but new barricades were still appearing the night before Macron arrived, according to the Reuters news agency. Jimmy Naouna, from the Kanak and Socialist National Liberation Front (FLNKS) of New Caledonia, said the pro-independence political party had called for protesters to remove the roadblocks, and urged Macron to drop the electoral reform plan. “We are expecting if [Macron] travels to Kanaky, he will make some strong announcement that he is withdrawing this electoral bill, but if he is just coming here as a provocation, that might just turn bad,” Naouna said ahead of the French president’s arrival, using the island’s Indigenous name. The Kanaks make up about 40 percent of the slightly more than 300,000 people who live in New Caledonia, which lies between Australia and Fiji in the Pacific Ocean. In 1998, France agreed to cede the territory more political power and to limit voting in New Caledonia’s provincial and assembly elections to those who were residents of the island at the time, under the so-called Noumea Accord. About 40,000 French citizens have moved to New Caledonia since 1998, and the changes expand the electoral roll to include those who have lived in the territory for 10 years. The Noumea Accord also included a series of three independence referendums, with the last one taking place in December 2021 at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. Pro-independence groups boycotted the vote, which backed remaining in France, and rejected the result. Last week, French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin told the TV channel France 2 that Azerbaijan, alongside China and Russia, were “interfering” in New Caledonia. “I regret that some of the Caledonian pro-independence leaders have made a deal with Azerbaijan,” Darmanin claimed. Adblock test (Why?)
Nvidia’s profits soar as AI boom shows no sign of slowing down
California-based company reports seven-fold jump in profit to $14.88bn in first quarter. Nvidia, the chipmaker at the centre of the boom in artificial intelligence (AI), has reported a seven-fold jump in profit, sending its stock to a record high. The Santa Clara, California-based company said on Wednesday that net income rose to $14.88bn in the first quarter, up from $2.04bn a year earlier. Revenue more than tripled to $26.04bn, well above analysts’ forecasts. Nvidia forecast revenue would hit $28bn, plus or minus 2 percent, in the second quarter, also beating analysts’ forecasts. Nvidia also announced it would split its stock 10-for-1, effective June 7, to make its shares more accessible, and raise its quarterly dividend by 150 percent to 1 cent per share. Stock splits increase the number of outstanding shares without affecting the company’s market capitalisation, making each share cheaper to buy for investors. Nvidia shares, which are up over 90 percent this year, surged 5.9 percent to break past the $1,000 mark. “The next industrial revolution has begun,” Nvidia chief executive Jensen Huang said in a conference call with analysts. “Companies and countries are partnering with Nvidia to shift the trillion-dollar traditional data centres to accelerated computing and build a new type of data centre – AI factories – to produce a new commodity: artificial intelligence.” Huang said he expected demand for Nvidia chips to outstrip supply for the foreseeable future, with the company “racing every single day” to keep up with orders. Nvidia has seen skyrocketing demand for its graphics processing units over the past year as tech giants such as Google, Meta, OpenAI and Amazon race to take the lead in AI. In March, Nvidia overtook Saudi Aramco to become the world’s third-most valuable firm after Apple and Microsoft, with a market value of more than $2.1 trillion. Adblock test (Why?)
Why are Kenyan forces set to intervene in Haiti and how is the US involved?
Kenyan President William Ruto is in the United States for a three-day state visit in the first such trip for an African leader since 2008. When Ruto meets his counterpart Joe Biden at the White House on Thursday, at the top of their agenda will be a multinational security intervention in the troubled Caribbean nation of Haiti – a mission that Kenya is leading and Washington is backing. While the US has refused to contribute forces to the United Nations-backed initiative, Washington has nonetheless become Kenya’s loudest supporter and the mission’s biggest funder even as Nairobi faces domestic challenges over the strategy. The planned deployment of police to Haiti – a first for the East African country outside the continent – has sparked fierce debates in Kenya’s Parliament and in its courts. Here’s what we know about the planned mission, how Kenya got involved and why some are fiercely against it: Kenyan President William Ruto [File: Monicah Mwangi/Reuters] What’s the backdrop to the Haiti crisis? The Caribbean nation has been racked by violence in recent months after gangs declared war on the government of former Prime Minister Ariel Henry in February. The UN says more than 2,500 people were killed or injured across the country from January to March while at least 95,000 people have fled the capital, Port-au-Prince. Henry had pleaded with the UN Security Council last year to deploy a mission that would bolster Haiti’s fragile security forces and help clamp down on rampant gang violence. For months, the Security Council failed to find a country to step up and lead such a mission after a previous UN mission to Haiti was beset by controversies. By mid-2023, it emerged that the US was considering backing a Nairobi-led police mission and Kenyan officials were weighing the proposal. It came as a surprise to many: Kenya has sent troops on missions inside and outside Africa, but no African country has ever led a security mission outside the continent, and an army deployment is more traditional, rather than a police mission. Kenyan officials highlighted historic connections between Haiti and Africa. “Kenya stands with persons of African descent across the world,” then-Foreign Minister Alfred Mutua said. Residents of the Lower Delmas area carry their belongings as they flee their homes due to gang violence in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, on May 2, 2024 [Ralph Tedy Erol/Reuters] What is the MSS? On October 2, the UN Security Council voted in favour of motions by the US and Ecuador to deploy the Multinational Security Support Mission (MSS) in Haiti. It is not a UN mission but is being referred to as a “UN-backed initiative”. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken called the mission “pivotal”. Washington has pledged $300m in funding while Canada has pledged $123m to Haiti with $80.5m allocated to the mission. The 2,500-strong force will be led by 1,000 Kenyans from the Administrative Police Unit and the battle-trained paramilitary General Service Unit, called the Recce commandos. The commandos were previously tasked with quelling domestic riots and participating in operations against al-Shabab in neighbouring Somalia. Several other countries have also pledged police, including Benin, the Bahamas, Jamaica, Guyana, Barbados, Antigua and Barbuda, Bangladesh and Chad. Hundreds of Kenyan police have reportedly been undergoing training and taking French classes in preparation for their deployment. Kenyans speak English, Swahili and other Indigenous languages while Haitian French and Creole are the official languages of Haiti. This week, an advance team of Kenyan forces touched down in Haiti, according to Kenyan media reports, coinciding with Ruto’s meeting with Biden. The MSS will work in collaboration with Haiti’s police. They will look to rapidly wrest back key government infrastructure from the control of gangs. High-ranking Kenyan police commander Noor Gabow will reportedly lead the mission. Why is Kenya getting involved in Haiti and who opposes the MSS? The deployment faces fierce pushback from Kenya’s opposition lawmakers, human rights groups and lawyers, but Ruto has pressed ahead with it. In January, he told reporters it is because the mission was “a bigger calling to humanity”. Had a telephone conversation with United States Secretary of State Antony Blinken on the developments in Haiti. @SecBlinken briefed me on the decision of the Summit of Caribbean Countries (Caricom) and the US, together with other partners, on the political situation in Haiti.… — William Samoei Ruto, PhD (@WilliamsRuto) March 13, 2024 Opposition legislators accuse Ruto’s government of failing to secure Kenya and say the country is part of the initiative only for monetary gains. They also say authorities are deploying police in contradiction to the constitution, which allows only military deployments. After one lawmaker challenged the mission in the courts, a judge declared in January that the government did not have the jurisdiction to deploy the police and a special security arrangement with Haiti would be required. It was that agreement that Henry was in Nairobi to sign in February when the gangs declared war in the then-Haitian prime minister’s absence, forcing him to resign and remain in exile in Puerto Rico. Ruto’s government temporarily paused the MSS deployment in March after Henry’s resignation but resumed plans after the recent appointment of a new transitional governing council in Haiti under new Prime Minister Fritz Belizaire. Despite Ruto’s manoeuvring, however, opposition lawmakers in Kenya filed another lawsuit to be heard in June. Meanwhile, human rights activists point out that Kenya’s police force has long been accused of extrajudicial killings and torture. In July, the police opened fire on people protesting higher taxes and rising living costs, killing at least 35. Many in Haiti are also wary of foreign interventions. The 15-year-long UN mission there has a tainted legacy, dogged with sexual abuse allegations against peacekeepers and accusations they introduced cholera to the country. Former Haitian Prime Minister Ariel Henry, second from left, after giving a lecture at United States International University in Nairobi, Kenya, on March 1, 2024 [Anrew Kasuku/AP] Why did the US nominate Kenya and why is it not in the MSS? Washington
Biden cancels $7.7bn more in student debt for 160,000 borrowers
The move brings the total number of students benefitting from the president’s debt relief push to 4.75 million. United States President Joe Biden has announced his administration is cancelling a total of $7.7bn in student debt for another 160,000 borrowers. The latest action on Wednesday brings the total number of people to benefit from the president’s debt relief push to 4.75 million, according to the US Department of Education. Biden, keen to shore up waning support among young people ahead of the November presidential election, had pledged last year to find other avenues for tackling debt relief after the Supreme Court in June blocked his broader plan to cancel $430bn in student loan debt. The president said beneficiaries of the newest measures include people in three categories who meet certain milestones that make them eligible for cancellation, including 54,000 borrowers enrolled in Biden’s Saving on a Valuable Education (SAVE) repayment plan, 39,000 enrolled in earlier income-driven plans and about 67,000 people who are eligible through the Public Service Loan Forgiveness programme. “Today’s announcement comes on top of the significant progress we’ve made for students and borrowers over the past three years,” Biden said in a statement. “I will never stop working to cancel student debt – no matter how many times Republican elected officials try to stop us.” The statement added that each of the borrowers had an average of $35,000 of debt written off. Wednesday’s announcement brings total debt relief approved by the Biden administration to $167bn. The issue remains high on the agenda of younger voters, many of whom have concerns about Biden’s foreign policy on Israel’s war in Gaza and fault him for not achieving greater debt forgiveness. The campaign of former President Donald Trump, Biden’s Republican challenger in the White House race, criticised in March the student loan cancellation as a bailout that was done “without a single act of Congress”. Republicans have called Biden’s student loan forgiveness approach an overreach of his authority and an unfair benefit to college-educated borrowers while other borrowers received no such relief. As of the end of 2023, 43.2 million US student loan recipients had over $1.6 trillion in outstanding loans, according to the website of Federal Student Aid (FSA), an office of the US Department of Education. Higher education debt has tripled since the 2008 financial crisis. Adblock test (Why?)
Speculation mounts of an early UK election as Sunak fails to quell rumours
Rumours have swirled around parliament that Prime Minister Rishi Sunak was poised to call an election. British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has failed to stem growing speculation that he might call an election in July after ministers cancelled events and either curtailed or delayed foreign trips to attend a government meeting. On Wednesday, rumours swirled around parliament that the British leader was poised to call an election. The political editor of the Guardian, citing sources, said Sunak would call an election on July 4. Earlier, when asked about the rumours, Sunak stuck to his wording that a national election would be held in the second half of 2024. But then foreign minister David Cameron cut short a trip to Albania and the defence minister delayed a foreign visit to attend a cabinet meeting of senior ministers. That fuelled speculation that the meeting could be required to sign off on a decision to call an election earlier than the October or November dates that most obsservers had seen as most likely. “Spoiler alert: there is going to be a general election in the second half of this year,” Sunak told parliament. Sunak’s press secretary declined to be drawn on the rumours. “I know there is a lot of interest in this, as there has been pretty much every week over the last five months. I will just say the same thing I have always said, which is that I am not going to rule anything in or out,” she told reporters. British elections must be held at least every five years, but the timing is the prime minister’s choice. If Sunak were to announce one, he’d make a courtesy call on King Charles III, then set a date for the dissolution of Parliament, the formal end of its term. An election would be held 25 working days later. The strategy is risky. Sunak’s Conservatives are running way behind Labour in the opinion polls, and despite hailing a decline in inflation and an increase in defence spending, they have failed to make a dent in the opposition party’s lead. Sunak is the third Conservative prime minister since the last election in 2019. He managed to steady the economy, but without boosting the Conservatives’ popularity with the public. He may take heart from figures released Wednesday showing inflation in the UK fell sharply to 2.3 percent, its lowest level in nearly three years on the back of big declines in domestic bills. But Labour has held a lead over the Conservatives of around 20 points in opinion polls since late 2021 – before Sunak took office in October of that year. The party said on Wednesday it was more than ready for an election. “We are fully ready to go whenever the prime minister calls an election. We have a fully organised and operational campaign ready to go and we think the country is crying out for a general election,” Labour leader Keir Starmer’s spokesperson told reporters. Adblock test (Why?)
Russia-Ukraine war: List of key events, day 817
As the war enters its 817th day, these are the main developments. Here is the situation on Wednesday, May 22, 2024. Fighting Ukrainian President Volodymy Zelenskyy said his country’s troops are achieving “tangible” results against Russian forces in the northeastern Kharkiv region but the situation on the eastern front near the cities of Pokrovsk, Kramatorsk and Kurakhove was “extremely difficult”. A Russian official said Moscow’s forces controlled “about 40 percent” of Vovchansk, a town near the border with Russia and at the epicentre of fighting. The World Health Organization (WHO) said that more than 14,000 people had been displaced from the Kharkiv region since Russia launched a ground offensive there on May 10. The WHO said some 189,000 people were still living within 25km (15 miles) of the border with Russia and facing “significant risks” as a result of the fighting. The Ukrainian military said it destroyed the Russian navy’s Tsiklon, a cruise missile carrier, in Sevastopol in Russian-occupied Crimea on the night of May 19. Ukrainian Deputy Minister of Justice Olena Vysotska said more than 3,000 prisoners had applied to join the military since the law was amended to allow certain convicts to serve in the armed forces. Moscow began nuclear weapons drills close to Ukraine in exercises the Ministry of Defence said were to test the “readiness” of its “non-strategic nuclear weapons… to ensure the territorial integrity and sovereignty of the Russian state”. Politics and diplomacy The European Union formally adopted a plan to use windfall profits from Russian central bank assets frozen in the EU for Ukraine’s defence, the Belgian government said. Under the agreement, 90 percent of the proceeds will go into an EU-run fund for military aid for Ukraine against Russia’s invasion, with the remainder providing Kyiv with other forms of support. Germany’s Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock made her eighth visit to Kyiv since Russia launched its full-scale invasion in February 2022 [Evgeniy Maloletka/AP] A court in Moscow ruled that investigators acted lawfully when they refused to look into two alleged attempts on the life of Kremlin critic Vladimir Kara-Murza in 2015 and 2017. Kara-Murza, a dual citizen of Russia and the United Kingdom, is serving a 25-year prison sentence for treason over his criticism of the Ukraine war. A media investigation into the 2015 and 2017 incidents suggested he had been poisoned by Russia’s FSB intelligence service. Russian general Ivan Popov, who was sacked last July after he criticised army leaders and raised concerns about the high casualty rate in Ukraine, was arrested on suspicion of “large-scale fraud”. State news agencies said the 49-year-old was remanded in custody for two months by a military court. Weapons Ukraine’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Dmytro Kuleba urged the country’s allies to consider shooting down Russian missiles over Ukrainian territory to better protect its cities from Russian aerial attacks. Kuleba, who was speaking alongside visiting German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock, said Ukraine’s Western backers should not see such a step as “escalatory”. Baerbock, on her eighth visit to Kyiv since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, acknowledged the situation on the front had “dramatically deteriorated”, and that Ukraine needed air defence as an “absolute priority” amid continuing Russian drone, rocket and missile attacks. Adblock test (Why?)
As Malaysia faces CEDAW review, women refugees continue to struggle
Unlike the excitement felt by many women when they find out they are expecting a baby, Hanna* was filled with fear when she realised she was pregnant. The Myanmar refugee who arrived in Malaysia in 2023 and is still waiting for her United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) card had many reasons to fear what was to come. “I didn’t have money to go to a doctor, so I had to eat less for five months to save enough money to get a medical check,” she told Al Jazeera. Later, she was referred to a private clinic that provides antenatal care to refugees and asylum seekers for nominal prices. But the pains she endured during her pregnancy left Hannah with no choice but to seek help at a public hospital, where, as a refugee, she risked being reported to immigration for not having any documents. Under Malaysia’s immigration laws, public health facilities are instructed to report undocumented patients to the authorities, putting them at risk of arrest, detention and deportation. This was reinforced by a directive from the Ministry of Health in 2001 that made it mandatory for public health workers to report undocumented patients. Malaysia is not a signatory to the 1951 Refugee Convention or the 1967 protocol relating to it. This means refugees are not recognised and they are deprived of basic human rights such as work, access to education and healthcare, and live under constant risk of arrest and detention. Nora*, a refugee who works at the clinic, told Al Jazeera that Hanna was not the only refugee woman facing difficulties in her pregnancy due to the lack of access to healthcare and its cost. “We offer help to over 22 refugees and asylum seekers. They can’t afford healthcare, it’s very expensive for them,” she said. Refugees registered with the UNHCR get a 50 percent reduction on healthcare charges paid by foreigners, but the cost remains unaffordable for many, according to Nora. As for those who are undocumented like Hanna, the costs are not only expensive but full of risks. Refugee women often struggle with the costs of paying for healthcare for themselves and their children [File: Ahmad Yusni/EPA] Hanna ended up giving birth to her child in March at another public hospital. According to her, the doctors assured her safety and did not follow the order to report her to immigration, but the caesarean section that she needed cost her more than 6,000 Malaysian ringgit ($1,200). “I saved only 3,000 ringgits over my pregnancy, so I had to borrow money from my friends to afford the procedure,” she said. ‘Changes have not happened’ Hanna’s story is one of many that highlight the challenges women face as asylum seekers and refugees in Malaysia as a result of their precarious status. The Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) will convene on Wednesday to review Malaysia’s progress in implementing the recommendations of last year’s review, which highlighted the problems caused by the continued lack of a legal framework for refugees. The committee presented a list of issues and questions to Malaysian officials, including a recommendation that the country adopt a “long-term legislative approach” to ensure women asylum seekers, refugees and migrants have access to health services and are exempt from paying higher fees than Malaysians. The committee also asked Malaysia to repeal the order to report undocumented patients to immigration authorities and repeated previous recommendations to the National Security Council (NSC) to adopt a legal framework for refugees as a “priority”. In its reply, the Malaysian government said the country provided unrestricted access to all ranges of health facilities in both public and private health sectors, but did not comment on the recommendation to exempt refugees and asylum seekers from higher fees than Malaysians. As for the requirement to report undocumented migrants to the immigration authorities, Malaysia said it would continue. “It is the prerogative of a sovereign State to detained [sic] and return any undocumented person staying illegally in the country,” the response read. “The detention of such [a] person allows the Government to determine the security nature or threat that the person may hold against the country.” However, in its response, Malaysia also said it had amended National Security Directive Number 23 – Mechanisms for the Management of Illegal Immigrants that hold UNHCR Cards – to provide a policy for the management of asylum seekers and refugees, and that it included “major changes” that would grant asylum seekers and refugees access to employment, healthcare and education. “In this regard, refugees and asylum seekers as defined in the Directive are allowed to remain or stay temporarily in Malaysia based on humanitarian grounds in the fulfilment of Malaysia’s international moral obligations,” it said. Despite that, the situation on the ground has not changed, according to the refugee rights organisation Asylum Access Malaysia, which submitted a report to the CEDAW committee ahead of this year’s review. Asylum Access noted that the details of the directive remained unknown and unpublished, and that it was uncertain how refugees and asylum seekers were defined in the directive or if it aligned with international definitions. The “NSC directive significantly falls short of a legal framework as recommended by the CEDAW committee”, it said. The organisation warned that the claimed amendments to the directive also lacked any clarity on data protection for refugees added to the national registration system or whether the data could be used as a surveillance tool or be shared with other governments. Refugee women in Malaysia learn English with volunteer teachers [File: Vincent Thian/AP] The report criticised the adoption of such a directive in what it described as a “highly classified internal decision-making process” by the National Security Council without any form of public review or legal challenge. Katrina Jorene Maliamauv, the executive director of Amnesty International Malaysia, said that despite the claims from the government that the situation had changed, the experience of refugee women and girls suggested otherwise. “As refugees continue to be arrested,
Russia starts ‘tactical nuclear drills’ near Ukraine border
‘First stage’ of exercises involves Iskander and Kinzhal hypersonic missiles and is seen as a warning to Ukraine’s Western allies. Russia has begun the first stage of tactical nuclear weapons drills, involving Iskander and Kinzhal missiles, in areas bordering Ukraine. The Russian Ministry of Defence said on Tuesday that the drills were taking place in its Southern Military District, which borders and includes parts of Ukraine that Moscow has occupied and illegally annexed since its full-scale invasion began in February 2022. The ministry did not give the exact location of the exercises. Belarus, where Russia said last year it was deploying tactical nuclear weapons, is also expected to take part. Since launching its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Moscow has repeatedly talked up its arsenal of nuclear weapons and its readiness to deploy them in the face of a security threat. Nuclear analysts say the exercises are designed as a warning signal by Russia’s President Vladimir Putin to deter Ukraine’s Western allies, which have provided weapons and intelligence to Kyiv, from wading more deeply into the war. The exercises are to ensure that units and equipment are ready for “the combat use of non-strategic nuclear weapons to respond and unconditionally ensure the territorial integrity and sovereignty of the Russian state in response to provocative statements and threats of individual Western officials against the Russian Federation”, the ministry said. Putin ordered the drills after Western politicians suggested they might be willing to go further in their support of Ukraine. Earlier this month, French President Emmanuel Macron said he had not ruled out deploying troops to Ukraine under certain conditions, while the United Kingdom’s foreign minister, David Cameron, said Kyiv had the right to fire Western missiles at Russian territory. Russia’s Southern Military District is the command centre for its offensive on Ukraine, with its headquarters in Rostov-on-Don, 60km (40 miles) from the border with Ukraine. The Defence Ministry published footage showing trucks carrying missiles to a field where launch systems were prepared and troops at an airfield readying a bomber to carry a nuclear warhead. It said the drills involved practising the loading of launch vehicles, driving to designated launch sites and loading planes with Kinzhal missiles, which are hypersonic weapons. It did not indicate whether any test firings had taken place. “The exercises are, obviously, a signal in response to discussion of NATO countries’ troops in Ukraine,” Nikolai Sokov, a former Soviet and Russian arms control official, told the Reuters news agency. “The most important features are advance announcement and visibility.” Western militaries will be watching the exercises closely and seeking to draw conclusions about how much warning time they would have if Russia deployed such weapons for real, he said. Tactical nuclear weapons, also known as non-strategic nuclear weapons, are designed for use on the battlefield and have vast destructive potential. Russia has about 1,558 non-strategic nuclear warheads, according to the Federation of American Scientists, although there is uncertainty about the exact figures. Adblock test (Why?)