Philippines says no intention of interfering in Taiwan issue as regional tension grows

A lone ship (R) sits at the entrance to a bay where live fire exercises were being held on land on Pingtan island, the closest point in China to Taiwan, in southeast China’s Fujian province. (File/AFP)
A lone ship (R) sits at the entrance to a bay where live fire exercises were being held on land on Pingtan island, the closest point in China to Taiwan, in southeast China’s Fujian province. (File/AFP)
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Updated 16 April 2023
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Philippines says no intention of interfering in Taiwan issue as regional tension grows

The Philippines has no intention of interfering in China’s affairs with Taiwan, officials have said. (File/AFP)
  • Manila recently gave Washington access to 4 more military bases under 2014 defense agreement
  • Increased security cooperation aimed at developing Philippine army, official says

MANILA: The Philippines has no intention of interfering in China’s affairs with Taiwan, officials have said, after Beijing’s ambassador to Manila accused the Southeast Asian nation of fueling regional tensions by expanding military base access to the US.

Manila recently granted the US entry to four more locations in strategic areas of the Philippines, with three of the new sites facing north toward Taiwan and one near an island in the disputed South China Sea.

Under its 2014 Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement, Washington now has access to a total of nine military sites in the country.

The development comes at a time of growing geopolitical tension over self-ruled Taiwan and concerns over China’s conduct in the resource-rich waterway Beijing claims almost in its entirety.

“The National Security Council wishes to clarify that the Philippines has no intention of interfering in the Taiwan issue and will not allow itself to be used by other countries to interfere in the said issue,” NSC spokesperson, assistant director-general Jonathan Malaya, said in a statement issued on Saturday.

Increased security cooperation between Manila and Washington was “meant to develop the capabilities” of the Philippine military, Malaya said.

“We observe the One China policy and subscribe to the ASEAN principle of non-interference in approaching regional issues,” he added.

“Our primary concern in Taiwan is the safety and well-being of the more than 150,000 Filipinos living and working on the island, and we take grave exception to any effort by guests in our country to use this to fearmonger and intimidate us.”

The statement came a day after Chinese Ambassador to the Philippines Huang Xilian said Manila was fueling geopolitical tension in the Asia-Pacific.

“Obviously, the US intends to take advantage of the new EDCA sites to interfere in the situation across the Taiwan Strait to serve its geopolitical goals,” Huang said on Friday while addressing a forum in Manila.

“The Philippines is advised to unequivocally oppose ‘Taiwan independence’ rather than stoking the fire by offering the US access to the military bases near the Taiwan Strait if you care genuinely about the 150,000 OFWs [Overseas Filipino Workers].”

The Philippines’ Foreign Ministry did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Huang’s statement also sparked anger among Filipinos, with lawmakers chiding the envoy on Sunday.

“These are truly disgraceful statements from Ambassador Huang Xilian. How dare he threaten us,” Sen. Risa Hontiveros said in a statement.

“Our OFWs in Taiwan will continue to work where they work. End of story. Filipinos will thrive and make a living according to our wishes.

“He, along with his country’s ships and artificial islands in the West Philippine Sea, should pack up and leave,” Hontiveros added, in reference to the Philippine part of the South China Sea.

Akbayan, one of the most prominent progressive political parties in the Philippines, has urged the government to expel the Chinese diplomat.

“How dare [Huang] barter with our people’s lives to promote Beijing’s hegemonic agenda in the region,” the party said in a statement.

“He has no right to threaten our citizens while enjoying our country’s hospitality.”


Japan condemns attack on Bahraini soldiers in Saudi Arabia

Japan condemns attack on Bahraini soldiers in Saudi Arabia
Updated 28 September 2023
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Japan condemns attack on Bahraini soldiers in Saudi Arabia

Japan condemns attack on Bahraini soldiers in Saudi Arabia

Tokyo: Japan on Thursday condemned Monday’s attack on Bahrain Defense Force soldiers in southern Saudi Arabia that left two military personnel dead and several others wounded.

A third Bahraini serviceman has since reportedly died from injuries sustained in the assault which is being blamed on the Iran-backed Houthis.

In a statement, the Japanese Foreign Ministry said: “The government of Japan condemns this attack and expresses its concern that it could run counter to the ongoing efforts of the political dialogue in Yemen to bring about a permanent peace from the current de-facto ceasefire.

“The government of Japan expresses its heartfelt condolences to the victims and their bereaved families and prays for the early recovery of the injured.”

The statement added that Tokyo was dedicated to helping with the peace process for the region.

“The government of Japan strongly hopes that a dialogue among the Yemeni people will be held as soon as possible to realize peace and stability in Yemen, and in cooperation with the United Nations and countries concerned, will continue to extend necessary assistance and diplomatic efforts toward achieving this goal,” the ministry said.


Italy to step up age checks as migrant numbers surge

Italy to step up age checks as migrant numbers surge
Updated 28 September 2023
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Italy to step up age checks as migrant numbers surge

Italy to step up age checks as migrant numbers surge
  • X-ray techniques to ascertain age criticized by experts as unreliable
  • European Commission president visits Lampedusa amid rift with Tunisia

London: Italy will speed up age checks on migrants and deport those who falsely claim to be under the age of 18, amid a standoff between the EU and Tunisia over arrangements to stem the flow of people from North Africa to Europe, The Times reported on Thursday.

So far, 11,650 unaccompanied minors have arrived in Italy this year out of a total of 133,139 people — nearly double the number at the same stage last year. Under Italian law, migrants younger than 18 cannot be repatriated.

Italy currently uses psychological evaluation of migrants to determine age under a 2017 law, but it is now expected that X-rays of wrist bones will be used more frequently instead after new rules were approved on Wednesday.

Campaigners warn that the wrist X-ray approach to age verification is unreliable. “All the studies show you cannot use it to establish age with any certainty. There is a two-year margin of error,” Antonella Inverno, head of research, data and policy with Save the Children in Italy, told The Times.

Others have suggested X-raying molar teeth and collar bones as more reliable ways of ascertaining age.

“The collar bone is the best because it’s the last bone to completely form, but you would also need to consider ethnicity. Even then you still have an age range,” said Cristina Cattaneo, a professor of forensic medicine at the University of Milan.

The new decree will also see minors older than 16 placed in adult migrant holding centers, which has raised concerns across Italy as 21,000 unaccompanied minors, many of them Egyptian, have disappeared from such facilities.

Italian Sen. Sandra Zampa said: “Protecting minors immediately after they arrive is crucial. If you go to big markets in cities at 4 a.m. you will find Egyptian kids at work.”

The moves come as Italy continues to bear the brunt of an increased flow of people from North Africa, with Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni facing increased pressure from within her own party and from her coalition ally Matteo Salvini.

This week Meloni visited the island of Lampedusa, which has experienced a surge in migrant numbers in recent days, alongside European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, who said: “The future of Europe depends on its ability to tackle epoch-making challenges of our time and the challenge of illegal immigration is for sure one of them.”

Officials in Brussels, meanwhile, are said to be displeased with Tunisia after the number of people leaving the country for Europe increased despite a deal struck in July to reduce boat crossings in exchange for millions of euros in aid.

Sources in Tunisia said the money from Europe had not been delivered, and President Kais Saied denied entry into the country to a number of European Commission representatives and members of the European Parliament earlier this month.

“I imagine the commission delegation will be welcome in Tunisia when the financial support promised is delivered,” Tarek Kahlaoui, former head of the Tunisian Institute of Strategic Studies, told The Times.


EU impatience builds over thorny migration reform

EU impatience builds over thorny migration reform
Updated 28 September 2023
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EU impatience builds over thorny migration reform

EU impatience builds over thorny migration reform
  • Key proposals include lengthening the detention period of irregular migrants arriving on EU soil from 12 weeks to 20 weeks and accelerating evaluations of asylum applications

BRUSSELS: The EU will seek Thursday to make progress on a troubled reform of its policy toward asylum-seekers and migrants, with many member states looking to coax Germany to agree key measures.
Paralysis on the issue has caused frustration in the 27-nation bloc as it faces a rise in irregular migration. The arrival of thousands of asylum-seekers on the Italian island of Lampedusa has spurred matters.
The aim of the reform, put on the table three years ago, is to have EU countries share the burden posed by the arrivals, either by taking in some of the migrants who mainly arrive in Italy or Greece or contributing money to those that do.
The text, drawn up by the European Commission, is in part a bid to forge Europe-wide solidarity in case of a repeat of the massive 2015-2016 influx of asylum-seekers, most of whom were Syrians fleeing their civil war.
Key proposals include lengthening the detention period of irregular migrants arriving on EU soil from 12 weeks to 20 weeks and accelerating evaluations of asylum applications.
In July, an attempt to get the reform adopted failed when the required weighted majority of EU countries was not met.
Hungary, Poland, Austria and the Czech Republic voted against the package, while Germany, Slovakia and the Netherlands abstained.
Germany — a heavyweight voting power — wanted carve-outs for minors and families.
Its foreign minister, Annalena Baerbock, on Sunday warned that the current proposal would “de facto prompt a large number of unregistered refugees to head toward Germany if there were a crisis”.
But German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser on Wednesday told Handelsblatt newspaper that Berlin was determined to “finalize” revised EU policy on migration.
Several EU countries have called for the file to be settled quickly.
“We have no time to lose,” Belgium’s minister for migration Nicole de Moor said during a conference Monday organized by the European Policy Center think tank. Failure to agree the pact “could threaten European unity”.
To put pressure, the European Parliament last week decided to pause its negotiations with EU member states on aspects of the pact, dealing with reinforced security along the bloc’s outer border.
One relates to Eurodac, a biometric database for asylum-seekers, and the introduction of a mandatory screening procedure of irregular arrivals.
The goal of the EU is to have the reform adopted before European elections next June that will usher in a new European Parliament and commission.
The next cycle in EU politics could see a political shift in the European Parliament, given the rise of rightwing parties in several EU countries, and would see Hungary and Poland — both hostile to hosting asylum-seekers — take turns holding the rotating EU presidency that sets policy agendas.


Biden isn’t paying much attention to the 2024 GOP debate. He’s already zeroing in on Trump

Biden isn’t paying much attention to the 2024 GOP debate. He’s already zeroing in on Trump
Updated 28 September 2023
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Biden isn’t paying much attention to the 2024 GOP debate. He’s already zeroing in on Trump

Biden isn’t paying much attention to the 2024 GOP debate. He’s already zeroing in on Trump
  • Biden is drawing a contrast with the GOP logjams in Congress, seeking to showcase what he is getting done
  • Says he is running to prevent Donald Trump and MAGA Republicans from destroying American democracy

SAN FRANCISCO, California: President Joe Biden was raising campaign cash in San Francisco on Wednesday while seven Republican presidential hopefuls held a debate down the coast in Simi Valley. Biden wasn’t paying them much attention because he’s already zeroing in on Donald Trump, the GOP front-runner who wasn’t on the stage.

The president has been increasingly calling out Trump by name and referring to him as his “likely opponent” in 2024, signaling a likely rematch from four years earlier and warning of what the Democratic incumbent sees as major dangers to the nation if he is not reelected.
“I’m running because Democracy is still at stake in 2024. Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans are determined to destroy American democracy,” he said during one fundraiser, referring to a Trump campaign slogan and skipping entirely over Trump’s GOP rivals.
Biden’s trip to the West this week is counterprogramming of sorts as a government shutdown looms, House Republicans launch impeachment hearings, the Republican debate unfolds and Trump makes a campaign stop in Michigan to court autoworkers.

Former US President Donald Trump speaks at a campaign rally at Drake Enterprises, an automotive parts manufacturer, on September 27, 2023 in Clinton Township, Michigan. President Joe Biden met with striking UAW workers the day before at a General Motors parts facility. (Getty Images/AFP)

Biden is drawing a contrast with the GOP logjams in Congress, seeking to showcase what he is getting done and trying to make the case that will continue as long as he wins a second term.
“I’m running because important freedoms we have now are at stake,” Biden told supporters at a Tuesday night fundraiser. “The right to choose. The right to vote. The right to be who you are, love who you love. They’re being attacked and being shredded right now.”
Earlier Tuesday, Biden became the first modern president to walk a picket line when he joined UAW members in the Detroit area. The union has expanded its strike against Detroit automakers by walking out of spare-parts warehouses in 20 states.
Biden met with the science and technology advisers on Wednesday to discuss artificial intelligence, vaccine misinformation and other concerns. He said he did not think a government shutdown was unavoidable.
“I don’t think anything is inevitable when it comes to politics,” the president said. When asked what could be done to avoid it, he said, “If I knew that I would have done it already.”
Before he heading to Phoenix in the evening, Biden headlined three Northern California fundraisers, avoiding for now the famous names — and bank accounts — in Los Angeles as the actors’ strike wears on, although the writers’ strike ended Tuesday.
In Arizona, a critical swing state he won in 2020, Biden will pay tribute to the late US Sen. John McCain and give a democracy-focused address on Thursday.
Trump, meanwhile, railed against electric vehicles during a speech in Michigan at a non-unionized auto parts supplier, shortly before the second debate of the primary season got underway without him. Biden never mentioned the debate, but at his final fundraiser of the night, he told supporters Trump was out for revenge.
“He’ll seek revenge for what’s happened ... you know all the assertions he’s made,” Biden said. “Donald Trump does believe we’re a nation driven by anger and fear, and is playing on it. He says we’re a failed nation.
“Did you ever think you’d hear a former president of the United States say those kinds of things?”
Trump is facing multiple criminal indictments, including charges related to the Republican’s role in seeking to overturn the 2020 election he lost to Biden. Nonetheless, Trump is the most popular choice among Republicans at this point for the party’s White House nomination.
Nearly two-thirds of Republicans — 63 percent — now say they want him to run again, according a poll last month from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. That’s up slightly from the 55 percent who said the same in April when Trump began facing a series of criminal charges.
While 74 percent of Republicans say they would support Trump in November 2024, 53 percent of those in the survey say they would definitely not support him if he is the nominee. An additional 11 percent say they would probably not support him.
Biden doesn’t fare much better, with 26 percent overall wanting to see him run again, with 47 percent of Democrats saying they want him to run, compared with 37 percent in January.
 


Pakistani vocational school helps Afghan women refugees build businesses

Pakistani vocational school helps Afghan women refugees build businesses
Updated 28 September 2023
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Pakistani vocational school helps Afghan women refugees build businesses

Pakistani vocational school helps Afghan women refugees build businesses
  • Officials say hundreds of thousands of Afghans have traveled to Pakistan since foreign forces left and the Taliban took over in 2021

PESHAWAR, Pakistan: In a small workshop in the bustling northwestern Pakistani city of Peshawar, a dozen Afghan women sit watching a teacher show them how to make clothes on a sewing machine.
The skills center was set up last year by Peshawar resident Mahra Basheer, 37, after seeing the steady influx of people from neighboring Afghanistan where they face an economic crisis and growing restrictions on women since the Taliban took over in 2021.
Trying to create options for women to become financially independent, she opened the workshop to teach tailoring as well as digital skills and beauty treatments. Basheer quickly found hundreds of women enrolling and has a long wait list.
“If we get assistance, I think we will be able to train between 250 and 500 students at one time, empowering women who can play an important role in the community,” Basheer said.
Officials say hundreds of thousands of Afghans have traveled to Pakistan since foreign forces left and the Taliban took over in 2021. Even before then, Pakistan hosted some 1.5 million registered refugees, one of the largest such populations in the world, according to the United Nations refugee agency.
More than a million others are estimated to live there unregistered. Grappling with an economic crisis of its own, Pakistan’s government is increasingly anxious about the number of Afghans arriving, officials say. Lawyers and officials have said scores of Afghans have been arrested in recent months on allegations they don’t have the correct legal documents to live in Pakistan.
Basheer said that her main focus was expanding operations for Afghan women and she has also included some Pakistani women in the program to boost their opportunities in the conservative area. Once graduating from the three-month course, the women are focused on earning a modest but meaningful income, often starting their own businesses.
Nineteen-year-old Afghan citizen Fatima who had undertaken training at the center, said she now wanted to open a beauty parlour in Peshawar – currently banned in her home country just a few hours away.
“Right now my plan is to start a salon at home. Then to work very professionally so that I can eventually open a very big salon for myself,” she said.