Nobel in medicine goes to 2 scientists whose work enabled creation of mRNA vaccines against COVID-19

The Nobel Prize in medicine has been awarded to Katalin Karika and Drew Weissman for discoveries that enabled the development of effective mRNA vaccines against COVID-19.(AP)

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Updated 02 October 2023

October 02, 2023 10:03

Nobel in medicine goes to 2 scientists whose work enabled creation of mRNA vaccines against COVID-19

The secretary of the Nobel Assembly announced the award Monday in Stockholm
The Nobel Prizes carry a cash award of 11 million Swedish kronor

Updated 02 October 2023

October 02, 2023 10:03

STOCKHOLM: Two scientists won the Nobel Prize in medicine on Monday for discoveries that enabled the development of effective mRNA vaccines against COVID-19.
The award was given to Katalin Karikó, a professor at Sagan’s University in Hungary and an adjunct professor at the University of Pennsylvania, and Drew Weissman, who performed his prizewinning research together with Karikó at the University of Pennsylvania.
“Through their groundbreaking findings, which have fundamentally changed our understanding of how mRNA interacts with our immune system, the laureates contributed to the unprecedented rate of vaccine development during one of the greatest threats to human health in modern times,” the panel that awarded the prize said.
Thomas Perlmann, secretary of the Nobel Assembly, announced the award and said both scientists were “overwhelmed” by news of the prize when he contacted them shortly before the announcement.
The Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine was won last year by Swedish scientist Svante Paabo for discoveries in human evolution that unlocked secrets of Neanderthal DNA which provided key insights into our immune system, including our vulnerability to severe COVID-19.
The award was the second in the family. Paabo’s father, Sune Bergstrom, won the Nobel Prize in medicine in 1982.
Nobel announcements continue with the physics prize on Tuesday, chemistry on Wednesday and literature on Thursday. The Nobel Peace Prize will be announced Friday and the economics award on Oct. 9.
The prizes carry a cash award of 11 million Swedish kronor ($1 million). The money comes from a bequest left by the prize’s creator, Swedish inventor Alfred Nobel, who died in 1896.
The prize money was raised by 1 million kronor this year because of the plunging value of the Swedish currency.
The laureates are invited to receive their awards at ceremonies on Dec. 10, the anniversary of Nobel’s death. The prestigious peace prize is handed out in Oslo, according to his wishes, while the other award ceremony is held in Stockholm.

Topics: Nobel Prize COVID-19

Scottish leader Humza Yousaf slams UK foreign minister as ‘petty’ over Erdogan COP28 meeting threat

Updated 18 sec ago

Arab News

December 11, 2023 19:06

Scottish leader Humza Yousaf slams UK foreign minister as ‘petty’ over Erdogan COP28 meeting threat

David Cameron issues warning over ‘breach of protocol’ following Yousaf’s talks with Turkish president in Dubai

Updated 18 sec ago

Arab News

December 11, 2023 19:06

LONDON: Scotland’s First Minister Humza Yousaf branded British Foreign Secretary David Cameron “petty” and “misguided” over his threat to withdraw foreign office support for Scottish ministers on overseas trips.

Cameron wrote a letter to Angus Robertson, the Scottish parliament’s constitution secretary, on Sunday in which he said Yousaf had breached protocol by meeting with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan at the recent UN COP28 climate conference in Dubai without a UK official present.

He accused Yousaf of failing to provide “sufficient advance notice” of the meeting to the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office.

Cameron, a former prime minister, also threatened to close Scottish offices in UK embassies and withdraw foreign office support for Scottish officials while overseas if there were “further breaches” of protocol.

James Cleverly made a similar threat during his time as UK foreign secretary after Yousaf met the prime minister of Iceland in August with no British officials present.

Yousaf, who is the first Muslim leader of Scotland and head of the governing Scottish National Party, dismissed the criticism on Monday, describing Cameron as an “unelected lord.”

He also said that any withdrawal of FCDO support would have a negative impact on Scotland’s economy.

Yousaf said the meeting was arranged at short notice by a Turkish delegation, but that he would have had “no problem” with a British government official attending.

According to Yousaf, an FCDO official “chose not to stay with the Scottish delegation the whole day, and because of that they ended up missing the meeting.”

He added that a UK government representative had been present during a “vast majority” of meetings held during COP28.

“Nothing was discussed that hadn’t been discussed at other meetings, such as the climate crisis, and in this particular meeting the issue of the Israel-Gaza conflict,” Yousaf said.

“For Lord Cameron to say he’s basically going to stop Scotland’s international engagement because of one meeting, where one FCDO official wasn’t able to attend — because, of course, at events like COP, diaries can change quite last minute — is really petty, really misguided.

“I suggest to Lord Cameron that next time, if he has an issue like that, he should just pick up the phone. I’m sure it can be resolved.”

A UK government spokesperson said: “Foreign affairs is reserved under the Scotland Act and, in such turbulent times, the need for the UK to speak on the world stage with one consistent voice is more important than ever.”

Topics: UK Scotland Turkiye British Foreign Secretary David Cameron Humza Yousaf

UK’s Sunak faces key test over Rwanda migrant policy vote

Britain’s Prime Minister Rishi Sunak arrives at the COVID Inquiry at Dorland House in London, Monday, Dec. 11, 2023. (AP)

Updated 11 December 2023

AFP

December 11, 2023 13:40

UK’s Sunak faces key test over Rwanda migrant policy vote

Sunak has put the plan at the heart of his pledge to stop irregular migration, making the issue a key battleground in a general election expected next year

Updated 11 December 2023

AFP

December 11, 2023 13:40

LONDON: UK leader Rishi Sunak faces the riskiest week of his premiership, with lawmakers gathering Monday to decide whether to back his flagship policy to send asylum seekers to Rwanda.
Factions of MPs from across Sunak’s divided Conservatives have convened meetings to consider how to vote when the controversial legislation goes before parliament on Tuesday.
Sunak has put the plan at the heart of his pledge to stop irregular migration, making the issue a key battleground in a general election expected next year.
But opposition to the scheme from both right-wingers and centrists is widening schisms in the ruling party, putting Sunak’s year-and-a-bit leadership in jeopardy.
The government announced a new bill last week after Supreme Court judges ruled in November that the deportation plan was illegal, as Rwanda was not a safe country.
The legislation would compel judges to treat Rwanda as safe and proposes giving UK ministers powers to disregard sections of human rights legislation.
The proposals have sparked fresh concerns from opposition parties, human rights groups and more moderate Tories who oppose any violations of international law by Britain.
However, right-wingers — including Robert Jenrick, who quit as immigration minister last week, and firebrand ex-home secretary Suella Braverman — say the legislation fails to go far enough.
Some on the right have called for Britain to withdraw from the European Court of Human Rights and other international treaties, to stop courts blocking removals.
Up to 100 backbench MPs from five different groupings on the Conservatives’ right wing, including the powerful European Research Group (ERG), which advocated a hard-line Brexit.
The ERG called the bill was “the toughest piece of migration legislation ever put forward by a UK government.”
But it said it only provided a “partial and incomplete solution” to expected legal challenges and would require “very significant amendments.”
The centrist One Nation group, which also has about 100 members, is expected to release its own statement later on Monday.
Tuesday is the first opportunity that MPs will have to vote on the legislation, in what is called a second reading.
A government bill has not been defeated at this stage in the process for almost 40 years.
But several abstentions would also damage Sunak, who was elected unopposed by Tory MPs in October last year following Liz Truss’s calamitous 49-day reign.
If it scrapes through, right-wingers are also expected to try to rewrite the legislation at later stages while the House of Lords upper chamber would have an opportunity to block it.
Sunak has bet his pledge to “stop the boats” crossing the Channel on the Rwanda scheme — which has been stuck in the courts since the first deportees were pulled off a flight at the last minute in June 2022, after an injunction from the European Court of Human Rights.
Almost 30,000 irregular migrants have crossed the Channel from northern France in rudimentary vessels this year.
Tory divisions have worsened since Britain voted to leave the European Union in 2016, largely on a promise to “take back control” of its borders.
Sunak, who has told MPs the Conservatives must “unite or die,” has denied that Tuesday’s vote amounts to a confidence vote on his leadership.
Some Westminster watchers have speculated that he may be tempted to call an early election — which must be held by January 2025 — if he loses the vote.
The Conservatives, in power since 2010, have served up five prime ministers since the 2016 Brexit vote.
They currently lag well behind Labour, the main opposition party, in opinion polls.

Topics: Rwanda UK UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak

200 Afghan ex-special forces who worked with British military denied relocation to UK: BBC

Updated 11 December 2023

Arab News

December 11, 2023 14:14

200 Afghan ex-special forces who worked with British military denied relocation to UK: BBC

Gen. Richard Barrons: ‘It reflects that either we’re duplicitous as a nation or incompetent’
Ex-commando: ‘We never thought that heroes would be abandoned. It is really disappointing’

Updated 11 December 2023

Arab News

December 11, 2023 14:14

LONDON: About 200 former Afghan special forces whose anti-Taliban operations with Britain’s military were “incredibly important” have been denied relocation to the UK, the BBC reported on Monday.

A further 32 former government officials, as well as a number of civilian leaders who aided Britain’s mission in the country, have also been denied by the Afghan Relocations and Assistance Programme.

The former soldiers’ “abandonment” by the UK government has been labeled a “betrayal” and “disgrace” by senior British military figures, including Gen. Richard Barrons, who served in Afghanistan for more than a decade.

He told the BBC that the UK’s failure to relocate the former soldiers “is a disgrace, because it reflects that either we’re duplicitous as a nation or incompetent.”

Barrons added: “It is a betrayal, and the cost of that betrayal will be people who served with us will die or spend their lives in prison.”

The UK’s then-Prime Minister Boris Johnson in 2021 described the work of the former Afghan special forces as “incredibly important.”

Britain set up two major units composed of elite Afghan soldiers in an effort to combat opium production and the Taliban presence in Afghanistan.

Commando Force 333, and its sister unit, Afghan Territorial Force 444, were known as “the Triples,” and “quickly gained a reputation for effectiveness, honesty and courage,” the BBC reported.

One of the former CF333 members, known as Ali, described being “abandoned and betrayed” by the UK after spending “day and night” together with British soldiers.

He added: “During training we slept under one tent, eating from the same dish. During operations we fought shoulder-to-shoulder with the British, as members of one family.”

During the evacuation from Kabul in August 2021, Ali oversaw the protection of British passport holders as they left the country on emergency flights.

But he was denied entry on the same flights, and eventually fled to Pakistan by land out of fear of reprisal attacks from Afghanistan’s new Taliban rulers.

“We never thought that heroes would be abandoned. We took all those risks. We were ready to help the international community, we respected freedom of speech and human life, then everything turned upside down. It is really disappointing,” he said.

Figures compiled by a network of Afghan veterans, seen by the BBC, show that there are up to 200 other former soldiers in the same position as Ali. Their applications to Britain’s ARAP scheme have faced delays or rejection.

Civilian leaders who helped Britain’s mission in Afghanistan have also been denied by the scheme.

Among them is Mohammad Fahim, a former governor of Helmand province’s Garmsir district, a key Taliban stronghold before 2001.

Despite working “shoulder-to-shoulder” with Britain, he says he was “betrayed” and “never thought that I would be left alone like this.”

He added: “We arrested a number of Taliban leaders when I was governor. They knew that we were fighting together with the international forces, so the threat to me is real.

“We ran programmes shoulder-to-shoulder, with the shared aim of bringing security for the people who lived in Helmand, giving them a good life and making peace.”

His work to counter the Taliban presence in his district resulted in the murder of his brother and two cousins, and in 2018 Fahim was almost beaten to death.

Barrons said: “I’m personally ashamed because I feel very deeply that we made an obligation to them and we have not fulfilled it.

“It’s beyond absurd to say they don’t qualify and that they should be left behind to a fate at the hands of the Taliban.”

Lt. Gen. Abdul Hadi Khalid, former first commanding officer of CF333, said Britain’s treatment of the Triples will diminish the country’s standing in the region.

He added: “I’m 100 percent sure that when other nations, other progressive forces, see Afghanistan, when they look at Afghan people, Afghan miseries, how can they trust the West?”

In response to the BBC’s reporting, a UK Ministry of Defense spokesman said: “So far, we have brought around 24,600 people to safety, including thousands of people eligible for our Afghan schemes.

“Each ARAP application is assessed individually and in accordance with published policy, and we do not automatically make a decision on eligibility based on a job role.”

Topics: Britain Afghanistan

UN mission in Mali officially ends after 10 years

Updated 11 December 2023

AFP

December 11, 2023 10:07

UN mission in Mali officially ends after 10 years

The mission, known as MINUSMA, lowers United Nations flag on its headquarters in the capital Bamako

Updated 11 December 2023

AFP

December 11, 2023 10:07

BAMAKO: The UN mission in Mali officially ended a 10-year deployment in the country on Monday, its spokesperson said, in a pull-out ordered by Mali’s military leaders.
The mission, known as MINUSMA, lowered the United Nations flag on its headquarters in the capital Bamako, its spokesperson Fatoumata Kaba said.
The symbolic ceremony marks the official end of the mission, she said.
A “liquidation phase” will take place after January 1, involving activities such as handing over remaining equipment to the authorities.
The withdrawal of the UN stabilization mission, known as MINUSMA, has ignited fears that fighting will intensify between troops and armed factions for territorial control.
MINUSMA had for the past decade maintained around 15,000 soldiers and police in Mali. About 180 members have been killed in hostile acts.
As of Friday, more than 10,500 uniformed and civilian MINUSMA personnel had left Mali, out of a total of around 13,800 staff at the start of the withdrawal, the UN mission said on X, formerly Twitter.

India’s top court upholds end of special status for Kashmir, orders polls

Updated 11 December 2023

Reuters

December 11, 2023 10:42

India’s top court upholds end of special status for Kashmir, orders polls

Modi-led government in 2019 revoked Indian-administered Kashmir’s special status
The region has been the heart of over 75 years of animosity with neighboring Pakistan

Updated 11 December 2023

Reuters

December 11, 2023 10:42

NEW DELHI: India’s Supreme Court upheld on Monday a 2019 decision by the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi to revoke special status for Indian-administered Kashmir and set a deadline of Sept 30 next year for state polls to be held.

Indian-administered Kashmir, India’s only Muslim-majority region, has been at the heart of more than 75 years of animosity with neighboring Pakistan since the birth of the two nations in 1947 at independence from colonial rule by Britain.

The unanimous order by a panel of five judges came in response to more than a dozen petitions challenging the revocation and a subsequent decision to split the region into two federally administered territories.

It sets the stage for elections in the region, which was more closely integrated with India after the government’s contentious move, taken in line with a key longstanding promise of Modi’s nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

Indian paramilitary troopers patrol along a road in Srinagar on December 11, 2023, ahead of Supreme Court's verdict on Article 370. (AFP)

The decision is a shot in the arm for the government ahead of general elections due by May.

The challengers maintained that only the constituent assembly of Indian-administered Kashmir could decide on the special status of the scenic mountain region, and contested whether parliament had the power to revoke it.

The court said special status was a temporary constitutional provision that could be revoked by parliament. It also ordered that the federal territory should return to being a state at the earliest opportunity.

The territory is divided among India, which rules the populous Kashmir Valley and the Hindu-dominated region of Jammu, Pakistan, which controls a wedge of territory in the west, and China, which holds a thinly populated high-altitude area in the north.

Topics: India Kashmir elections Polls

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Nobel in medicine goes to 2 scientists whose work enabled creation of mRNA vaccines against COVID-19

Nobel in medicine goes to 2 scientists whose work enabled creation of mRNA vaccines against COVID-19

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