US President Joe Biden is set to declare a major disaster for Texas, clearing the way for more federal funds to be spent on relief efforts.
Power is returning in the state and temperatures are set to rise but some 13 million people are still facing difficulties accessing clean water, the BBC reported on Saturday.
Biden has said he will visit Texas as long as his presence is not a burden on relief efforts.
Nearly 60 deaths have been attributed to cold weather across the US.
White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki confirmed Biden has asked his team to expedite Texas' request for a disaster declaration.
He has also been in touch with the mayors of some of Texas' biggest cities, such as Houston, Austin and Dallas, to ensure they have access to government resources, an administration official said.
Several other states hit by snow and ice storms this week have also reported water service outages.
Winter weather has also cut off water in the city of Jackson, Mississippi - home to around 150,000 people - as well as the largest county in Tennessee that includes the city of Memphis, with over 651,000 residents.
Across the US South, a region unaccustomed to such frigid temperatures, people whose pipes have frozen have taken to boiling snow to make water.
The Southwestern state's energy grid has been overwhelmed by a surge in demand for heat as temperatures plummeted to 30-year lows, hitting 0F (-18C) earlier this week.
As of Friday, about 180,000 homes and businesses in Texas still had no electricity. Amid freezing temperatures earlier this week, as many as 3.3 million were without power.
Around 13 million people - close to half of the state's population - have faced some disruption of water services as hundreds of water systems have been damaged by the freeze.
Austin, the state's capital, lost 325 million gallons (1.2 billion litres) of water when pipes burst, the city's water director told reporters on Thursday.
Texas' largest city, Houston, is under a so-called "boil water notice", with the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) advising that all water planned for consumption - even if filtered - must be boiled as it may be contaminated.
Officials there say they are working to rapidly distribute bottled water, as well as power generators, to people in need. Breweries and other local businesses have also assisted with efforts to supply drinkable water.
On Friday, Texas Governor Greg Abbott said the state is providing "any and all resources to assist and to accelerate the response at the local level".
State officials could not offer a timeline for exactly when the water would come back on, saying it was a question for local water providers - and many have not yet fully assessed the damage to their systems.
Gov Abbott also said more plumbers are headed to the state. Water pipes have been bursting across Texas due to the freeze, and local plumbers have struggled to meet demand.
Over 320 plumbers have renewed their licences, and the state agencies are working with plumbing companies out-of-state to secure additional help, he said.
As of Friday, storm warnings are still in place across much of Texas, but temperatures will rise in the coming days, according to the National Weather Service (NWS).
The forecaster has also warned of dangerous travel conditions and power outages in eastern parts of the US as another winter storm system is expected to bring heavy snow, freezing rain and ice.
As the state continues to grapple with the weather crisis, Texas Republican Senator Ted Cruz is facing a backlash after he left Houston on Wednesday for a vacation in Mexico with his family.
Cruz apologised on Thursday and returned to the US after initially planning to stay through the weekend.
(Courtesy: IANS)
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and his counterparts from Britain, Germany, and France (E3) discussed the Iran nuclear issue on Thursday, calling on Tehran not to limit the verification of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
"The E3 and the US called on Iran not to take any additional steps, in particular with respect to the suspension of the Additional Protocol and to any limitations on IAEA verification activities in Iran," according to a joint statement issued after their meeting.
The US and its European allies in the statement urged Iran to "consider the consequences of such action, particularly at this time of renewed diplomatic opportunity", the Xinhua news agency reported.
The four foreign policy chiefs expressed concerns over Iran's recent actions to produce both uranium enriched up to 20 percent and uranium metal.
The statement also signalled that Washington is ready to engage with Tehran over the 2015 Iranian nuclear deal, formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).
"The E3 welcomed the US' stated intention to return to diplomacy with Iran as well as the resumption of a confident and in-depth dialogue between the E3 and the US," said the statement.
"If Tehran comes back into strict compliance with its commitments under the JCPOA, the US will do the same," Blinken reaffirmed in the statement, adding that Washington "is prepared to engage in discussions with Iran toward that end."
Iran, however, insisted the US take the first step. Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif reaffirmed on Wednesday that as soon as the US returns to its commitments, Iran will do the same, adding this can be done in full and at once, or in a series of gradual steps taken by Washington and then by Tehran.
Iran has threatened that if the parties to the JCPOA do not adhere to their commitments, Iran would stop implementing the Additional Protocol of the IAEA. In January, Iran launched a 20-per cent uranium enrichment process as part of Iran's Strategic Action Plan which was approved by the parliament in December 2020.
In response to the US withdrawal from the nuclear deal in 2018 and the re-imposition of sanctions, Iran has suspended implementing parts of its obligations under the 2015 nuclear deal.
(Courtesy: IANS)
New Zealand will conclude its deployment of the New Zealand Defence Force (NZDF) to Afghanistan by May 2021, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said on Wednesday.
"After 20 years of a NZDF presence in Afghanistan, it is now time to conclude our deployment," Ardern said in a statement.
"The deployments to Afghanistan have been one of the longest running in our history, and I wish to acknowledge the 10 New Zealanders who lost their lives in the line of duty, and the more than 3,500 NZDF and other agency personnel, whose commitment to replace conflict with peace will always be remembered," Ardern said.
Foreign Minister Nanaia Mahuta said that although the environment remains complex, the intra-Afghan peace process affords Afghanistan the best prospect of an enduring political solution, Xinhua reported.
"New Zealand's decision to conclude its deployment to Afghanistan in 2021 has been discussed with our key partners, with whom we have cooperated closely over the last 20 years," Mahuta said.
Defence Minister Peeni Henare said the current deployment consists of six NZDF personnel - three deployed to the Afghanistan National Army Officer Academy, and three deployed to the NATO Resolute Support Mission Headquarters.
(Courtesy: IANS)
The Kremlin has found SpaceX and Tesla CEO Elon Musk's proposal to have a chat with Russian President Vladimir Putin on voice-based social network Clubhouse interesting.
Talking to reporters on Monday, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov, however, said that details of the proposal should be considered first.
"We want to make sense of it first. Putin himself does not use social networks, he doesn't have any personal accounts," Peskov told reporters.
His comments came after Musk on Sunday said he was interested in talking to the Russian President.
".@KremlinRussia_E would you like join me for a conversation on Clubhouse?" Musk said in a tweet while tagging the Kremlin's Twitter account.
"It would be a great honour to speak with you," he said in a separate tweet.
Peskov noted that Musk's proposal is "without a doubt, very interesting," according to the Tass news agency.
"But we need to understand somehow what he means, what the offer is about, we need to verify this first, and then we will respond," the spokesman said.
Clubhouse is an audio-based chat app that allows members to join or start "rooms" of up to 5,000 people.
It has emerged as a favourite among tech leaders.
(Courtesy: IANS)
US President Joe Biden has called for the Congress to pass gun law reforms, including a ban on assault weapons.
Biden released the statement on Sunday, the third anniversary of the Parkland school shooting in Florida, the BBC reported.
"All across our nation, parents, spouses, children, siblings, and friends have known the pain of losing a loved one to gun violence," he said.
In 2018, 17 people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School were killed by an ex-student armed with an AR-15 rifle.
Many of the school's teenage survivors went on to become prominent advocates for gun legislation reform.
The right to bear arms is protected by the Second Amendment to the US constitution and is staunchly defended by many conservatives, including ex-president Donald Trump.
In his statement, President Biden also called for the introduction of background checks for all gun sales, a ban on high-capacity magazines, and for an end to legal immunity for gun manufacturers.
"We owe it to all those we've lost and to all those left behind to grieve to make a change," Biden said. "The time to act is now."
In a separate statement, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Congress would resurrect background check legislation that had stalled when Republican former President Donald Trump was in office.
"Now, working with the Democratic Senate and Biden-Harris Administration, we will enact these and other life-saving bills and deliver the progress that the Parkland community and the American people deserve and demand," she said.
(Courtesy: IANS)
At a time when the dragon is breathing fire, India must explore alternative tactics, perhaps establishment of formal diplomatic ties with Taiwan can be a landmark step
The standoff on the Ladakh border between the Indian Army and the PLA (People’s Liberation Army) continues amid failing talks and casus belli measures being unleashed by the Chinese regime. While the union government and the armed forces make it clear that they will do whatever it takes to protect India’s sovereignty and integrity, precious little has been done on the foreign policy front. While India and its democratic allies which comprise the Quad security grouping declare their intent to form the ‘Asian NATO’, the Quad continues to suffer from indecisiveness which was pretty much evident when the Quad did not even issue a joint statement to condemn China at the foreign ministers meeting held last year, only America publicly called out China.
In such a situation, it is imperative that India explore alternate diplomatic and militaristic routes to tame the dragon.
Recognizing Taiwan
Establishing formal diplomatic ties with Taiwan after recognizing should be vigorously pursuing by South Block. Indo-Taiwan ties date back to the early 1950s when Chiang Kai Shek, the ex-Chinese president and former head of state fled to the island of Formosa following the victory of Mao Zedong in the long drawn out Chinese civil war called on Nehru to establish and further ties with Formosa, however Nehru believing that Chiang was nothing but a “peanut” decided to ignore his call, choosing instead to concentrate on building ties with People’s Republic of China (PRC).
Seven decades on, plethora of changes has taken place on the foreign affairs front, while both China and India have developed considerably both militarily and economically the dragon has surpassed elephant to become an economic powerhouse in its own might. It has now embraced aggressiveness to enforce its 5th century vision of the ‘Middle Kingdom’. In such a situation providing legitimacy to the existence of Taiwan is a necessary first step.
Paradigm shift in policy
Establishing formal diplomatic ties with Taiwan will bring about a paradigm shift vis-à-vis India’s foreign policy. It will enforce the idea that liberal democracy is the last word in the battle of ideologies as Francis Fukuyama had visualized in his landmark book ‘The End of History and the Last Man’ and that there is no alternative to human rights and liberties, not even the Chinese model of ‘authoritarian development’. It will be the boldest step that any global leader has taken, not even the mighty US which has no formal diplomatic relations with Taiwan has taken this step.
Recognizing Taiwan will entail a lot of benefits for the mandarins of India’s foreign policy regime- firstly, Taiwan is a robust democracy with a booming economy, it will prove to be an alternative to China albeit in a relatively less proportion, secondly, India can bolster the legitimacy as the leader of the democratic world at a time when the democratic institutions in the US-often regarded as the cradle of democracy has been undermined.
Thirdly, India can get the support of another powerful ally in its attempt to carve out a new supply chain alliance which India-Japan-Australia formalized recently. Fourthly, recognizing Taiwan will make it clear to China that India means some serious business and if the need arises then India will not back down from sending dedicated naval and air assets in the disputed South China Sea region to enforce freedom of navigation principle in the resource rich region. Lastly, the Quad security grouping will be institutionalized which in the near future can even be extended to include new members, it will be the first time that India will be a part of any dedicated military and economic alliance which will deter the aggression of the Chinese war machine in the strategic Indian Ocean and Indo-Pacific Region.
Caveats remain
However, the recognition may invite severe ramifications for India. China will be infuriated and can choose to ratchet up tensions with India. India must be extremely careful while dealing with China as China is our second largest bilateral trade partner and a key export partner of India with regard to raw materials and goods. According to a FICCI report, India imports more than 40% of several important goods like the API (Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients), television, chemicals, chips, textiles and many more.
The dragon will as a possible retaliatory measure can activate its propaganda machinery to wage psychological warfare with India. It can also activate its terror financing networks which for years remained a chronic internal security for India in the northeast of the country. China will also collaborate with its ‘iron brother’ Pakistan to try and deter India by intensifying terrorism in the Kashmir valley and elsewhere. Further, China can use its potent disinformation empire to try and peddle fake news about the credibility of India’s indigenous vaccines at a time when the light at the end of the tunnel of a pandemic stricken world has appeared.
Exercising caution
Keeping all the dangers in mind, the Modi government must keep national interests in mind. Despite all the risks, it must work with all the like- minded countries to take own the mighty dragon responsible for unleashing a deadly virus which has wrecked havoc on humanity. For the sake of the free world, India must take the hard step which will reinforce India’s position in cementing its place as the leader of the free world.
Millions in the West wave goodbye to more of their freedoms and welcome more injections of racial riots, more home-grown terrorism, more debt filled poverty, lost jobs/homes and worsened mental health!
Throughout the whole of 2020 The majority of the Western World continued wallowing and weeping solely because of their foolish politicians BS virus that has stolen freedoms, their MSM news continuous brainwashing of the majority of their populations and their so-called medical experts who continued experimenting with untested vaccines on the many foolish guinea pig public. Ultimately, it is the majority of the Western public who are to blame. They elected these western pig politicians, they get easily swayed brainwashed by the western news and they continue believing/trusting the medical monsters leading them into more health hell on earth.
In 2021 the next plan the many pig Western Politicians have is to roll out the mass vaccinations by creating more fear via their MSM news channels and also getting/paying “friendly” actors, singers, sports persons, musicians AND religious leaders to sing the praises of the new Covid vaccines and preaching the benefits of being injected! The WHS Group Of Companies advises all the sane people in this World to 1st tell and force your Politicians, your MSM news anchors, your medical experts, sports persons, singers/actors and your religious spokespeople to take the vaccine injections 1ST So that the public can see the side effects and positive healthy benefits from this over exaggerated bout of seasonal cold flu symptoms that have destroyed freedoms! This BS Virus would have already killed the millions of poor and homeless people throughout the World as the millions of them do not have face masks, hand sanitizers and more importantly the water to even drink let alone wash their hands with! It is time for millions of more sane people to wake up to reality and be the real men and real women of good character that your good ancestors created and raised in this World. Have some shame and get your self esteem back to being human instead of being shameless sheep following western wolves! Have you not noticed that the main elements of this Covid virus BS show is masks and social distancing and now the vaccine etc being part of the act to not be allowed to travel. So here we have the 3 basic tenets of freedom. 1. Freedom of Expression 2. Freedom of Association 3.Freedom of Movement all gone in 2020 and still the sheep don’t get it! Your children’s future and educational peaceful healthy lives are being destroyed in front of your very eyes! You are wearing masks and not blinkers so open your eyes and look around you!
2021 is The Best of Asia prospering peacefully throughout the World and protecting their countries & citizens. Firstly, Millions of Asian students/skilled workers will not be studying or working in the West again as they have seen how they have been badly treated, racially abused and shunned since the beginning of this 2020 of this Covid virus BS. The Old Western educational Systems and old western career types are finished in Asia as what it has created is very evident...More Western Pig Politicians, More Western Criminal Banksters, More BS Filled Western MSM Anchors/Journalists who fanned the flames of terrorism, warmongering, bs mouth piecing Western Government propaganda medical fear mongering and more mentally shrunk medical maestros who experiment on innocent people by giving them new untested medical drugs/injections!
The Asian Future of teaching: Future of Education
Our World Smartechno ATEC (Anti-Terrorism Economic Crimes) Academies have now tailor-designed and launched the new 2021 and beyond STEM programs (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) with the additional key components of unbiased T.I.E Agricultural. It is the 1st of its kind in the World and exclusive software products and elite employment careers from/with The World Homeland Security/Smartechno Group of Companies and its exclusive R.I.C.A/SCO business partners.
The evolving brains of Centennials require new teaching strategies
Born between ~2000 and 2020, and predominantly children of Gen Xers, today's centennial teenagers will soon become the world's largest generational cohort. They already represent 25.9 percent of the US population (2016), 1.3 billion worldwide; and by the time their cohort ends by 2020, they will represent between 1.6 to 2 billion people worldwide.
A unique trait about centennials (at least those from developed countries) is that their average attention spans have shrunk to 8 seconds today, compared to 12 seconds in 2000. Early theories point to Centennials' extensive exposure to the web as the culprit for this attention deficit. Moreover, centennials' minds are becoming less able to explore complex topics and memorize large amounts of data (i.e. traits computers are better at), whereas they are becoming far more adept at switching between many different topics and activities, and thinking non-linearly (i.e. traits related to abstract thought that computers currently struggle with). These findings represent substantive changes in how today's children think and learn. Forward-thinking education systems will need to restructure their teaching styles to take advantage of Centennials' unique cognitive strengths, without bogging them down in the rote and obsolete memorization practices of the past.
The teaching profession hasn't changed all that much over the past few centuries. For generations, teachers worked to fill the heads of young disciples with enough knowledge and specific skills to transform them into wise and contributing members of their community. These teachers were men and women whose mastery could not be questioned and who dictated and regimented education, deftly guiding students toward their predefined answers and worldview. But over the past 20 years, this long-standing status quo has crumbled.
Teachers no longer hold a monopoly on knowledge. Search engines took care of that. Control over what topics students can learn, and when and how they learn them has given way to the flexibility of YouTube and free online courses. And the assumption that knowledge or a specific trade can guarantee lifetime employment is quickly falling by the wayside thanks to advances in robots and artificial intelligence (AI). In all, the innovations happening in the outside world is forcing a revolution inside our education system. How we teach our youth and the role of teachers in the classroom will never be the same.
The labour market refocuses education
AI-powered machines and computers will eventually consume or make obsolete up to 47 percent of today's (2020) jobs. It's a stat that makes great many anxious, and rightfully so, but it's also important to understand that robots aren't really coming to take your job—they are coming to automate routine tasks.
Switchboard operators, file clerks, typists, ticket agents, whenever a new technology gets introduced, monotonous, repetitive tasks that can be measured using terms like efficiency and productivity fall by the wayside. So if a job involves a narrow set of responsibilities, especially ones that use straightforward logic and hand-eye coordination, then that job is at risk for automation in the near future.
Meanwhile, if a job entails a broad set of responsibilities (or a “human touch”), it’s safe. In fact, for those with more complex jobs, automation is a huge benefit. By hollowing out a job of wasteful, repetitive, machine-like tasks, a worker’s time will be freed to focus on more strategic, productive, and creative tasks or projects. In this scenario, the job doesn’t disappear, so much as it evolves.
Put another way, the new and remaining jobs that robots won't take over are those jobs where productivity and efficiency are not important or not central to success. Jobs that involve relationships, creativity, research, discovery and abstract thinking, by design such jobs are neither productive nor efficient because they require experimentation and an aspect of randomness that pushes the boundaries to create something new. These are jobs that people are already attracted to, and it's these jobs that robots will foster.
Another factor to keep in mind is that all future innovations (and the industries and jobs that will emerge from them) wait to be discovered at the cross section of fields once thought to be entirely separate.
That’s why to truly excel in the future job market; it once again pays to be a polymath: an individual with a varied set of skills and interests. Using their cross-disciplinary background, such individuals are better qualified to find novel solutions to stubborn problems; they are a cheaper and value-added hire for employers, since they require far less training and can be applied to a variety of business needs; and they are more resilient to swings in the labor market, as their varied skills can be applied in so many fields and industries.
These are just a few of the dynamics playing out across the labour market. And it's also why today's employers are on the hunt for more sophisticated workers at all levels because tomorrow's jobs will demand a higher level of knowledge, thought, and creativity than ever before. In the race for the last job, those selected for the final interview round will be the most educated, creative, technologically adaptable, and socially adept.
Since the mid-2000s, much of the discussion about what we teach has zeroed in on ways to improve the quality and uptake of STEM programs (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) in our high schools and universities so young people can better compete in the labour market upon graduation.
In one respect, this increased emphasis on STEM makes perfect sense. Almost all of tomorrow's jobs will have a digital component to them. Therefore, a certain level of computer literacy is required to survive in the future labour market. Through STEM, students gain the practical knowledge and cognitive tools to excel in varied, real-world situations, in jobs that have yet to be invented. Moreover, STEM skills are universal, meaning that students who excel in them can use these skills to secure job opportunities wherever they arise, nationally and globally.
However, the downside of our over-emphasis on STEM is that it risks turning young students into robots. Case in point, a 2017 study of US students found that nationwide creativity scores are falling, even as IQs are on the rise. STEM subjects may allow today's students to graduate into upper-middle-class jobs, but many of today's purely technical jobs are also very much at risk of being automated and mechanized by robots and AI by 2040 or earlier. Put another way, pushing young people to learn STEM without a balance of humanities courses can leave them unprepared for the interdisciplinary requirements of tomorrow's labour market.
To address this oversight, the 2020s will see our education system begin de-emphasizing rote-learning (something computers excel at) and re-emphasizing social skills and creative- and critical thinking (something computers struggle with). High schools and universities will begin forcing STEM majors to take a higher quota of humanities courses to round out their education; likewise, humanities majors will be required to study more STEM courses for the same reasons.
The return of the trades
The next three decades will see a boom in the demand for people educated in the skilled trades. Consider these three points:
Infrastructure renewal: A great deal of our roads, bridges, dams, water/sewage pipes, and our electrical network was built more than 50 years ago. Our infrastructure was built for another time and tomorrow's construction crews will need to replace much of it over the next decade to avoid serious public safety hazards.
Climate change adaptation: On a similar note, our infrastructure wasn’t just built for another time, it was also built for a much milder climate. As world governments delay making the hard choices needed to combat climate change, world temperatures will continue to rise. In aggregate, this means regions of the world will need to defend against increasingly sweltering summers, snow dense winters, excessive flooding, ferocious hurricanes, and rising sea levels. Infrastructure in much of the world will need to be upgraded to prepare for these future environmental extremes.
Green building retrofits: Governments will also attempt to combat climate change by offering green grants and tax breaks to retrofit our current stock of commercial and residential buildings to make them more efficient.
Next generation energy: By 2050, much of the world will have to entirely replace its aging energy grid and power plants. They will do so by replacing this energy infrastructure with cheaper, cleaner, and energy maximizing renewables, connected by a next-generation smart grid.
All these infrastructure renewal projects are massive and cannot be outsourced. This will represent a substantial percentage of future job growth, exactly when the future of jobs is becoming dicey.
The Best of Asia rises higher and grows more powerful as the West Weeps
China’s economy will be about as big in 2021 as everyone in 2019 expected it would be. Let that claim sink in for a moment. It amounts to saying that China’s economic output will be as voluminous as it would have been had the western coronavirus BS of lies and fear mongering pandemic never happened. That is not even an especially bold prediction. It is only a little above the consensus. It is no less impressive for that.
Everyone expects China’s growth in 2021 to be unusually fast. A rate of 8% would surprise no one. Some reputable economists think it could top 9%. This brief return to the growth rates of an earlier era is not in itself all that remarkable. Most economies bouncing back from the covid-19 BS of lies and fear mongering pandemic in 2021 are likely to expand at uncharacteristic speed, having shrunk at an unprecedented pace the year before. What sets China apart is that it will also manage to have grown, albeit modestly, in 2020. China remains a peaceful country and does not favour conflicts BUT if pushed/goaded unfairly it will retaliate justifiably with a combination of fearless power and pride so that their citizens remain protected.
India under Modi/BJP ministers in more ways than one needs to re-build peaceful relations with its Asian neighbours and also lawfully deal with the Punjab Haryana farmers of India. They are the jewels of India and its healthy growth in 2021 and beyond. The farmers of Punjab Haryana can never ever be beaten and tormenting them with tail spinning lying tales will lead to more civil unrest and riots revolution. The present Indian government is playing with Punjabi firepower and it will get burned to cinders as the Punjab referendum of Khalistan is also upcoming in 2021 thus garnering more positive support voting from Punjab people. The days of “Howdy Modi” by Trump are over and the new USA Government in 2021 will not be “Howdy Partner” welcoming to Modi/BJP ministers of India as President Biden Trumps India with Xi Jinping’s China as he respects values him more so that more peace prevails in Asia. India’s support for the little state of Israel has also upset many Muslim countries as well as Indian Muslims living in India. Indian Modi/BJP Ministers in 2021 will face many more problems internally if it does not lawfully rule and give the citizens of India more jobs, more food, more good medicines and more opportunities to educate their children. Thus they are the main reasons why western companies/brands and investors are not investing in India now or in 2021. It is time for more positive peaceful prosperous change in India and the present Indian Modi government best take this last opportunity to heal a fractured India so it becomes more united.
The little Island BK (Broken Kingdom) Brits terrorist regime will continue sinking into deeper debts, bankruptcies, lost jobs, less education, more home-grown terrorism, less good quality foods and worse health all because of their present pig minded politicians & Racist clown PM BoJo. Their Brexit out of Europe has left the little island even more sunk. The BK British Breaking international laws in relation to Northern Ireland peace will have the new USA President Biden smashing the little Island with more sanctions and no special trade deals and rightly soo as peace in Northern Ireland is of the utmost of importance to the good people of Ireland and their innocent children. BK 2021is also a time when more racial tensions riots will increase due to the lack of government ministers playing/living by the laws and many white owned businesses only hiring white people. The WHS Group F.I.T UK Asian Community manager Mr. Ali Raja, will be dealing with discrimination disputes/cases and providing UK Asian businesses with alternative trade supply chain logistics options so that Asians/BAME are not crushed away in the Brexit aftermath ahead. The new office base for these discrimination disputes/cases business projects will be in Belfast, Northern Ireland.
Russia continues peacefully marching forward without worrying about the Western wailing and western MSM Media lies against Russia/Russian people. Russia has very good strong stable peaceful relations with the leaders of China, Iran, Syria and Pakistan. These relations will strengthen more in 2021. President Putin is a Peaceful Powerful Political Leader who does not favour conflict and as like President Xi Jinping of China... BUT if pushed/goaded unfairly it will retaliate justifiably with a combination of fearless power and pride so that their Country’s citizens remain protected.
With New Education subjects/ future proof systems more peace can and will prevail throughout the World.
The new 2021 USA Biden Presidency and administration ministers have an opportunity to increase more peace not just in the USA but if it wished overseas. We express that all good USA citizens should view/subscribe to the Great American Gentleman, Gerald Celente’s Occupy Peace on https://occupypeace.com/ and to his unbiased factual features weekly magazine https://trendsresearch.com/ there is also his weekly YouTube channel which will educate you with valid facts and truths https://www.youtube.com/user/gcelente. Mr Gerald Celente has decades of professional business experience and dedicated his life to increasing more peace, more truths, more Justice and more liberty so that many more people have joyful peaceful lives no matter which part of the World they live in. A true inspiration and gentleman who gives the youth and sane people extra doses of truthful realities and the action steps they need to take so that they have more peaceful lives while respecting fellow human beings and respecting this World’s God created beautiful wonders of nature and the real animal kingdom. Mr.Gerald Celente is a peaceful warrior marching forward with his trusted troops as they continue galvanising more peace in the USA and throughout the World without any bias or any political affiliations. 2020 is over and never in the history of this Earth has the World population ever been wholly captured, freedoms choked, travel restricted and forced not to meet their loved ones or attend births, weddings or funerals of their loved ones and friends and no religious ceremonies prayers in the churches, mosques and temples of the World. This has all happened because of the foolish public who voted for/elected two legged devilish animals to take care of them and their children. Wake up!.. They never have and never will! Unite and Fight in more ways than one so that you seize back your freedoms and joyful ways of living life as your souls start feeling the God Vibrations that gave you good peaceful happy healthy loving life on this earth so that your innocent children have better futures as adults and are not enslaved forever! It is not hard to make a decision when you know what your “True” Values are!
India's External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar returned to the country last week after a successful visit to Qatar, the seventh such high-level visit from India to West Asia amid the Covid-19 pandemic in the last four months.
Before this, the visit of Indian Army chief General MM Naravane to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Saudi Arabia in early December had garnered considerable attention, and was seen as 'historic' and 'a new leaf' in the India-Gulf countries' relations.
These visits are manifestation of the growing bonhomie between India and the West Asian countries, founded on constructive and mutually collaborative partnerships.
Some would also surmise that recent frostiness in Pakistan's relations with the Gulf countries, and the former's pathological obsession with India further cementing Pakistan's 'failed state' situation, may have something to do with these new developments.
Combined with India's emergence as one of the key players in the geopolitical landscape in the Indian Ocean Region completes the picture, and indicates the direction in which the winds are blowing.
Pakistan's Unending Follies
To provide some context, the prevailing India-Gulf countries' bonhomie is akin to rubbing salt on Pakistani ego, bruised in March 2019 when India was invited as a guest of honour by the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) and a strong speech by then External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj to the grouping at Abu Dhabi.
The irony should not escape us that Pakistan, with over seven decades of close ties with the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries, had moved heaven and earth to stall India's participation.
The present government in Pakistan has been in power for over two years under the shaky leadership of Imran Khan Niazi. As ties with GCC countries have always been among the most important foreign policy priorities for Pakistan, during his victory speech in August 2018, Niazi boasted that Pakistan would play the 'role of a healer' in the Middle East - a statement that would be later proved hollow with his electoral slogan of 'Naya Pakistan'.
It came as no surprise that his first overseas visit was to Saudi Arabia in the first month of assuming power. Niazi continued his trips to the Gulf States for the next few months and touted the rebooting of relations with 'key partners' in the Gulf among his main accomplishments within the first 100 days in power.
The relations were re-set, but in a manner that foregrounded the shifting priorities of the Gulf countries, and Pakistan's relegation to the bottom of those priorities.
The Pathological India Obsession
Today, Pakistan's relations with GCC countries are at a historic ebb. Signing of the Abraham Accord is only one of the many reasons attributable to this. Frankly, given Pakistan's dismal capabilities in various domains, it features only perfunctorily in the requirements of the Gulf nations.
"Its GDP is still smaller than the Indian state of Maharashtra, where both the UAE and Saudi Arabia have plans of investing in hydrocarbons and related infrastructure," said a senior officer. Grasping this paradigm change is the key to understanding this epochal geopolitical shift.
The unravelling of Pakistan-GCC relationship began in June 2017 at the time of Saudi-Qatar feud, when Pakistan was point-blank asked to choose between Saudi and Qatar.
Pakistan was left in a quandary. Ever since a series of incidents and diplomatic gaffes by Pakistan, some induced by its anti-India obsession and paranoia and others via its military driven unstable foreign policy, have left it in an irremediable, shame-faced situation in the Gulf.
Rawalpindi-driven scathing criticism of the OIC, headed by Saudi Arabia, for its alleged inability to call a meeting of Foreign Ministers on the 'Kashmir issue' coupled with the intention of setting up an alternate Islamic grouping with Malaysia, Turkey, Indonesia and Qatar proved to be the turning point in Pakistan-Saudi relationship.
While Pakistan was diplomatically embarrassed and thereby refrained from attending the Kuala Lumpur Summit in December 2019, the damage was done.
Pakistan Army chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa rushed to Saudi Arabia for damage control but was not even granted an audience with crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
A Case of Faulty Priorities
This year, while the entire world was grappling with the coronavirus, and Indian teams were closely working with Kuwait and the UAE to battle the pandemic, Pakistan was busy spreading malicious anti-India propaganda in the Middle East by using bots and fake Twitter accounts that spewed venom against India's pluralistic credentials.
This was unequivocally and collectively rejected by many GCC countries, including Kuwait, Qatar, and Oman.
The Pakistani bluff was called out when a fake Pakistani Twitter account ostensibly of a member of Omani royal family peddling anti-India campaign was exposed and shamed.
In yet another embarrassing instance, Pakistani workers were banned from entering he UAE in November 2020. The UAE government has cited matters of national security, law and order.
A closer look at the Pakistani expat population in GCC countries, clearly indicates that Pakistani nationals are not preferred in any country.
"As an example, repeated requests from the Pakistani government have failed to increase the expat population in Qatar - where incidentally 88 per cent of the 27 lakh population is expat. Not surprisingly, of these, nearly 7 lakh are Indians but less than 1.5 lakh are Pakistanis," said a senior officer in Delhi.
Czech Republic's national intelligence agency, Security Information Service, in its recent annual report has highlighted increased proliferation concerns from Pakistan, a fact pointed out by a German government report of early 2020.
Pakistan's dubious track record on proliferation of sensitive technology is well known.
That an ex-PM of Pakistan has admitted on record of handing over US Tomahawk missile to the Chinese -- which was reverse engineered in no time -- doesn't instill any confidence in the western partners who export technology to the Gulf states.
It may be noted that a number of serving and retired Pakistani armed forces personnel are employed in militaries of GCC countries who have access to these niche technologies, and despite the best checks and balances, the likelihood of proliferation exists, further casting a doubt on Pakistan's already poor credentials.
With India-Gulf nations relations reaching a mutually enriching equilibrium, and both sides realising realpolitik's strong reliance on economics in modern diplomacy designs, Pakistan is left out in the cold with its 70-year-old obsession with Kashmir on one hand, and an uncertain future hinging on a battered economy resulting from corruption and misplaced priorities driven by the military on the other.
(Courtesy: IANS)
A new poll has revealed that 56 per cent Americans want former US President Donald Trump to be convicted in his second Senate impeachment trial slated to begin this week, as well as a ban against holding federal office ever again.
The ABC News/Ipsos poll released on Sunday revealed that 46 per cent of those surveyed from February 5-6 disagreed.
During Trump's first impeachment trial in January 2020, an ABC News/Washington Post found that 47 per cent Americans wanted Trump's removal, while 49 per cent said he shouldn't.
In the wake of the deadly January 6 Capitol riots, the Democrats-controlled House of Representatives voted to impeach Trump over "incitement of insurrection" in a 232-197 vote on January 13, making him the first sitting US President to be impeached twice.
The trial is expected to begin on Tuesday.
Under the impeachment process, the Senate will hold a judicial-style trial of Trump with the senators acting as jurors.
It is unlikely once again that Trump will be convicted in the upper chamber as the Democrats would need 17 Republicans to vote in a 50-50 Senate.
If enough Senators vote to convict, the chamber could hold a second vote on whether to bar him from holding federal office again.
This would only take a simple majority.
(Courtesy: IANS)
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO), has called on Covid-19 vaccine manufacturers to scale up production significantly and urged countries to share doses once they complete their inoculation programmes.
Reiterating the negative impact of inequitable access to Covid-19 vaccines worldwide at a press briefing here on Friday, Tedros said that although the number of vaccine doses administered globally has already exceeded the number of reported infections, more than three-quarters of those were administered in just 10 countries that account for almost 60 per cent of global gross domestic product (GDP).
Meanwhile, 2.5 billion people in almost 130 countries have yet to receive a single dose, Xinhua news agency quoted the WHO chief as saying.
"All governments have an obligation to protect their own people," Tedros said.
"But once countries with vaccines have vaccinated their own health workers and older people, the best way to protect the rest of their own population is to share vaccines so other countries can do the same.
"The longer it takes to vaccinate those most at risk everywhere, the more opportunity we give to the virus to mutate and evade vaccines. Unless we suppress the virus everywhere, we could end up back at square one," he warned.
The WHO chief also urged vaccine manufacturers to ramp up production, calling on them to issue non-exclusive licenses to allow other producers to manufacture their vaccines, just as they did in the past to expand access to treatments for HIV and Hepatitis C.
"Expanding production globally would also make poor countries less dependent on donations from rich ones," Tedros said.
"These are unprecedented times and we applaud those manufacturers that have pledged, for example, to sell their vaccines at cost."
He encouraged the world's vaccine manufacturers to share their dossiers with the WHO faster and more fully so that the latter can review them for emergency use listing.
As the world is struggling to contain the pandemic, vaccination is underway in some countries with the already-authorized coronavirus vaccines.
Meanwhile, 238 candidate vaccines are still being developed worldwide -- 63 of them in clinical trials -- in countries including Germany, China, Russia, the UK and the US, according to the WHO.
(Courtesy: IANS)
Former US President Donald Trump has announced to resign from the Screen Actors Guild - American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) after the leading labour union in the entertainment industry threatened to disqualify his membership.
In a letter sent on Thursday to SAG-AFTRA, which represents approximately 160,000 film and television actors, journalists, radio personalities, recording artists, singers, voice actors, internet influencers, fashion models, and other media professionals, Trump said he knew the Disciplinary Committee of the union could revoke his membership, but "who cares", reports Xinhua news agency.
"I no longer wish to be associated with your union. As such, this letter is to inform you of my immediate resignation from SAG-AFTRA. You have done nothing for me." the letter read.
Trump also listed his works on movie and TV shows in the letter, touting "I've also greatly helped the cable news television business, and created thousands of jobs at networks such as MSDNC and Fake News CNN, among many others".
Meanwhile, the former President slammed the union had done little for its members, "and nothing for me - besides collecting dues and promoting dangerous un-American policies and ideas".
The resignation of Trump, who had been a member of SAG since 1989, provoked a two-word response from the union immediately: "Thank you."
SAG-AFTRA's national board, meeting in special session last month, found "probable cause" that Trump had "violated the union's Constitution", and ordered the matter to be heard by SAG-AFTRA's Disciplinary Committee.
The charges cite the now-former President's role in inciting the attack on the US Capitol on January 6, and his "sustaining a reckless campaign of misinformation aimed at discrediting and ultimately threatening the safety of journalists, many of whom are SAG-AFTRA members".
(Courtesy: IANS)
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