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Indonesia sends second aid shipment to Gaza, pledges continued support for Palestine

Indonesia sends second aid shipment to Gaza, pledges continued support for Palestine
Indonesian President Joko Widodo oversees the dispatching of aid for Gaza in Jakarta. (Supplied)
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Updated 20 November 2023
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Indonesia sends second aid shipment to Gaza, pledges continued support for Palestine

Indonesia sends second aid shipment to Gaza, pledges continued support for Palestine
  • Indonesian humanitarian assistance came from both government, people
  • Indonesia’s president, FM have been advocating for Palestine in various exchanges abroad
Updated 20 November 2023
Sheany Yasuko Lai
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JAKARTA: President Joko Widodo pledged continued support for Palestine on Monday as he sent off the second consignment of Indonesian humanitarian assistance for Gaza.

Widodo oversaw the dispatching of aid from the Halim Perdanakusuma military airport in Jakarta, alongside his cabinet ministers, including Finance Minister Sri Mulyani and Health Minister Budi Gunadi Sadikin.

“I reiterate once again that Indonesia will continue to support the struggle of the Palestinian people,” Widodo said in a press conference.

Two military aircraft will carry the second batch of assistance, comprising 21 tons of medicine, food, hygiene kit, blankets, mattresses, and medical equipment for hospitals. Indonesia’s first consignment of humanitarian aid was dispatched on Nov. 4.

Widodo noted that aid items were selected “based on the needs of the people in Gaza” and had come from the government and the people.

“Besides humanitarian assistance, Indonesia will also give continued political support for Palestine,” he said. “The Indonesian foreign minister will also be visiting several countries to rally support to end the atrocities in Gaza, to implement a ceasefire as soon as possible, and for humanitarian aid to be allowed through to help our brothers in Gaza.”

Widodo and his foreign minister, Retno Marsudi, have in the past month actively advocated for Palestine in their international engagements, including during the president’s meeting with US President Joe Biden last week, where he urged Washington to “do more” to end the atrocities in Gaza.

Marsudi was in Beijing on Monday with a delegation of Arab and Muslim ministers, including Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan. They are on the first leg of a tour to meet officials representing each of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council to push for an end to the hostilities in the devastated Palestinian enclave.

At least 13,000 Palestinians have been killed since Israel began its daily bombardment of the already besieged enclave on Oct. 7, in retaliation for an attack by the Gaza-based militant group Hamas.

Two-thirds of the dead are women and children, according to the UN, while Palestinian health authorities estimate that thousands of people are still buried underneath the ruins of buildings destroyed by Israeli bombs.

Indonesia has long been a staunch supporter of Palestine, with its government seeing Palestinian statehood as mandated by their own constitution, which calls for the abolition of colonialism.

“I am very glad to see that our country is supporting and facilitating humanitarian aid (for Gaza),” Indonesian actress Shireen Sungkar told reporters. “Now we pray that our efforts will arrive there safely just like the first aid shipment that they have thankfully received.”

Fadil Jaidi, another Indonesian public figure, was thankful to his fellow Indonesians for contributing to the cause.

“May this be of help to our brothers and sisters in Palestine,” he said.

Topics: War on Gaza Indonesia

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Griffiths sees ‘promising signs’ of Gaza aid access via Israel

Griffiths sees ‘promising signs’ of Gaza aid access via Israel
Updated 12 sec ago
AFP
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Griffiths sees ‘promising signs’ of Gaza aid access via Israel

Griffiths sees ‘promising signs’ of Gaza aid access via Israel
Updated 12 sec ago
AFP

GENEVA: UN humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths said he saw promising signs that a major crossing from Israel into Gaza might be opened soon to
allow in aid.
The Kerem Shalom checkpoint was responsible for 60 percent of goods getting into the besieged Palestinian territory before Oct. 7 and the start of the war between Israel and Hamas.
Griffiths said that in recent days, there had been signs that Israel and Egypt have become much more open to the idea of gradually reopening Kerem Shalom.
The crossing sits on the triple border between Israel, Gaza and Egypt.
“We’re still negotiating, and with some promising signs at the moment” that access through Kerem Shalom would soon be possible, Griffiths said in Geneva.
But Israel poured cold water on the idea of fully reopening the crossing, telling AFP following Griffiths’s comments that it would only allow aid truck inspections before directing supplies toward the Rafah Crossing between Egypt and Gaza.
“We will allow a security check of humanitarian aid trucks at the Kerem Shalom crossing, but not trucks crossing to Gaza,” said a spokesman for the Israeli Defense Ministry body responsible for Palestinian civilian affairs, COGAT.
An Israeli siege has seen only limited supplies of food, water, fuel, and medicines enter the Gaza Strip, triggering dire shortages.
The Rafah border crossing with Egypt is the only one currently open for aid to flow into Gaza.
“We have been arguing for the opening of Kerem Shalom... to go straight through Kerem Shalom up into the northern parts of Gaza, or wherever the need is greatest,” Griffiths said.
“If we get that, it will be the first miracle we’ve seen for some weeks, but it will be a huge boost to the logistical process ... it would change the nature of humanitarian access.”
Griffiths added that there were also discussions on the possibility of driving aid to the Gaza Strip from Jordan via the Allenby Bridge crossing into the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
A representative in Jordan was “already lining up the potential deliveries of aid by land... from Jordan over the Allenby Bridge, straight to Kerem Shalom,” he said.
On the situation inside the Gaza Strip, Griffiths said the territory was being stalked by hunger and deprivation.
“There are two horsemen of the apocalypse in Gaza today: Conflict, of course, but also disease, and that will only get worse as we are unable to sustain any supplies to hospitals,” he said.
“The pointers are going in the wrong direction — all of them.”
Griffiths said southern Gaza had been the cornerstone of international humanitarian plans to protect civilians and administer aid to them.
But now, “without places of safety, that plan is in tatters,” he said, calling the current circumstances, “at best, humanitarian opportunism.”
“It’s erratic, it’s undependable, and frankly, it’s not sustainable.”
The British diplomat said there was no sense of clarity, planning, or what the coming days may bring.
“None of us can see where this will end,” he said.

 

Topics: War on Gaza

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Hundreds still stranded, plants closed in India’s flood-hit Chennai

A woman along with her belongings, wades through a flooded street after heavy rains in Chennai on December 6, 2023. (AFP)
A woman along with her belongings, wades through a flooded street after heavy rains in Chennai on December 6, 2023. (AFP)
Updated 08 December 2023
Reuters
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Hundreds still stranded, plants closed in India’s flood-hit Chennai

A woman along with her belongings, wades through a flooded street after heavy rains in Chennai on December 6, 2023. (AFP)
  • The larger Chennai area is home to the Indian units of several global firms including Hyundai Motor, Daimler and Taiwan’s Foxconn and Pegatron which do contract manufacturing for Apple
Updated 08 December 2023
Reuters

CHENNAI: Volunteers waded through stagnant water to hand out food and supplies, and some manufacturing plants remained shut in India’s southern tech-and-auto hub district of Chennai on Friday, four days after cyclone Michaung lashed the coast.
At least 14 people, most of them in Chennai and its state of Tamil Nadu, have died in the flooding, triggered by torrential rains that started on Monday.
The cyclone itself made landfall further north in Andhra Pradesh state on Tuesday afternoon.
Authorities said some low-lying areas of the state were still inundated and government officials and volunteers were taking supplies to people stuck in their homes in slums and other areas.
The larger Chennai area is home to the Indian units of several global firms including Hyundai Motor, Daimler and Taiwan’s Foxconn and Pegatron which do contract manufacturing for Apple.

FASTFACT

The larger Chennai area is home to the Indian units of several global firms including Hyundai Motor, Daimler and Taiwan’s Foxconn and Pegatron which do contract manufacturing for Apple.

While many of them including Pegatron and Foxconn resumed operations within a day or two of the cyclone making landfall, some plants of the TVS group located in the worst-affected areas are yet to open, industry sources said.
Adani Krishnapatnam Port in Andhra Pradesh, said on Friday the cyclone had “very badly affected” its operations and it was declaring a force majeure period starting Dec. 3.
Force majeure is a notice used to describe events outside a company’s control, such as a natural disaster, which usually releases it from contractual obligation without penalty.
State-run Madras Fertilizers notified stock exchanges that its Chennai plant has been shut and is tentatively expected to resume operations within two to four weeks.

INFRASTRUCTURE QUESTIONED
Information technology (IT) services providers told staff to work from home for the week, while schools and colleges closed. A few schools and colleges were converted into temporary shelters.
This week’s floods in Chennai brought back memories of the extensive damage caused by floods eight years ago which killed around 290 people.
In Andhra Pradesh, the damage from the cyclone was relatively contained, with roads damaged and trees uprooted as big waves crashed into the coast.
Defense Minister Rajnath Singh visited Chennai on Thursday and announced New Delhi will release a second instalment of 4.5 billion rupees ($54 million) to Tamil Nadu to help manage the damage. The federal government has also approved a 5.6 billion-rupee project for flood management in Chennai, he said.
Chennai residents questioned the ability of the city’s infrastructure to handle extreme weather.
“Not only has urbanization itself caused a problem, but the nature of the urbanization has preyed upon open spaces, holding areas like marshlands and flood plains,” social activist Nityanand Jayaraman said.
Experts have, however, said better stormwater drainage systems would not have been able to prevent the flooding caused by very heavy and extremely heavy rains.
“This solution would have helped a lot in moderate and heavy rainfall, but not in very heavy and extremely heavy rains,” Raj Bhagat P, a civil engineer and geo-analytics expert, said on Wednesday.

 

Topics: India rain Chennai

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UK hits rights abusers with sanctions

UK hits rights abusers with sanctions
Updated 08 December 2023
AFP
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UK hits rights abusers with sanctions

UK hits rights abusers with sanctions
  • Five individuals in the Iranian judiciary, security forces and Tehran public transport system face curbs
  • Eight people in Syria face restrictions for “complicity in atrocities against the Syrian people”
Updated 08 December 2023
AFP

LONDON: The UK on Friday announced coordinated sanctions with the United States and Canada against human rights abusers, to mark the 75th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
London said it was hitting 46 individuals and entities with asset freezes and travel bans, before the December 10 landmark.
“We will not tolerate criminals and repressive regimes trampling on the fundamental rights and freedoms of ordinary people around the world,” said Foreign Secretary David Cameron.
“I am clear that 75 years after the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the UK and our allies will continue to relentlessly pursue those who would deny people their freedom.”
In Belarus, 17 members of the judiciary, including judges, prosecutors and an investigator involved in politically motivated cases against activists, journalists and rights defenders are on the list.
Five individuals in the Iranian judiciary, security forces and Tehran public transport system face curbs for imposing and enforcing the country’s mandatory hijab law.
Eight people in Syria, including government ministers and senior members of the armed forces, face restrictions for “complicity in atrocities against the Syrian people.”
Nine individuals and five entities are sanctioned for their involvement in trafficking people in Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar.
Two people in Haiti were sanctioned for their involvement in 2018 attacks in which dozens of protesters were killed by armed criminal gangs with support from government officials.
The foreign office said the coordinated sanctions were aimed against “human rights abusers and accessories to authoritarian governments around the world.”
The US and Canada are due to release their sanctions list later on Friday.

Topics: UK sanctions human rights abuses US Syrians Iranians

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France’s Macron criticized for Hanukkah candle lighting ceremony at Elysee

France’s Macron criticized for Hanukkah candle lighting ceremony at Elysee
Updated 08 December 2023
Reuters
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France’s Macron criticized for Hanukkah candle lighting ceremony at Elysee

France’s Macron criticized for Hanukkah candle lighting ceremony at Elysee
  • France’s laws on state secularism, passed in 1905, give everyone in France the freedom to worship as they wish
  • Laws specify that religion should play no part in the running of the state
Updated 08 December 2023
Reuters

PARIS: French President Emmanuel Macron has been criticized by opponents for what they said was a violation of the principle of secularism after attending a ceremony on Thursday to mark the start of Hanukkah, a Jewish religious holiday, at his Elysee palace.
He had earlier on Thursday received the Lord Jakobovits Prize, awarded to European heads of state who fight against antisemitism, at the palace.
But a short video clip later published on social media that also shows France’s Chief Rabbi Haïm Korsia lighting the first candle at the Elysee as Macron watches, stirred the controversy.
France’s laws on state secularism, passed in 1905, give everyone in France the freedom to worship as they wish, but specify that religion should play no part in the running of the state.
Hard-left Les Insoumis party deputy Manuel Bompard wrote on social network X: “Saturday, we are celebrating the anniversary date of the 1905 law on the separation of Churches and State. Macron is trampling it when organizing a religious ceremony at the Elysee. An unforgivable political fault.”
Even Yonathan Arfi, president of the Jewish Council in France, described the ceremony as “a mistake.”
“It is not the place of the Elysee to light a Hanukkah candle, because the Republican DNA is to stay away from anything religious. This is not traditionally the role of the public authorities,” said on Sud Radio.
Macron told reporters during a visit to Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris on Friday that he did not regret his gesture, adding he was “respectful of secularism” but that “secularism is not about wiping out religions.”
Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne also defended Macron’s gesture, saying it was intended to “show support” of the Jewish community at a time of mounting antisemitism in France.
Macron’s decision not to attend a Nov. 12 march to condemn a surge in antisemitic acts in France since the Oct. 7 Hamas attack on Israel and the resulting conflict in Gaza, had raised questions at the time.
David Lisnard, the LR conservative mayor of Cannes and head of the French Mayors Association said: “How can one refuse to participate in a civic march against antisemitism on the incongruous and fallacious grounds of safeguarding national unity, and celebrate a religious holiday in the presidential palace?”

Topics: French President Emmanuel Macron Hanukkah Elysee Jewish

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Killings hit record high in 2021 as post-lockdown stress grew — UN

Killings hit record high in 2021 as post-lockdown stress grew — UN
Updated 08 December 2023
Reuters
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Killings hit record high in 2021 as post-lockdown stress grew — UN

Killings hit record high in 2021 as post-lockdown stress grew — UN
  • Around 458,000 people were killed intentionally, higher than the 400,000 to 450,000 recorded every year since researchers started collating the data in 2000
  • Escalations in gang or political violence in Ecuador, Myanmar and other countries played their part, the study said
Updated 08 December 2023
Reuters

VIENNA: The number of murders and other intentional killings surged to a record high across the world in 2021, driven in part by the stress and economic pressures of COVID-19 lockdowns, a UN report said on Friday.
Around 458,000 people were killed intentionally, higher than the 400,000 to 450,000 recorded every year since researchers started collating the data in 2000, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) Global Study on Homicide said.
Escalations in gang or political violence in Ecuador, Myanmar and other countries played their part, the study said.
But the after-effects of lockdowns, where people were cooped up inside for long periods, also took their toll.
“The noticeable spike in killings in 2021 can be attributed in part to the economic repercussions of COVID-related restrictions,” the report said.
Initially, the lockdowns that rolled out across the world from 2020 may have reduced the number of murders, as potential killers largely stayed inside and only mixed with people in the same household, the study said.
But “in the longer term, the negative social and economic repercussions of lockdowns, which may include increased stress and anxiety, unemployment or loss of income, can be expected to affect homicide trends by creating an environment of ‘strain’ that drives individuals to commit crime,” the report said.
In Colombia, strict lockdown measures imposed in March 2020 led to a sharp but short-lived drop in homicides, the researchers found. That was followed by a surge in 2021.

AMERICAS HAD HIGHEST HOMICIDE RATE
Overall, countries in the Americas continued to have the highest homicide rate of the five global regions — more than six times Europe’s, which was the lowest.
In 2021, eight of the 10 countries with the highest homicide rates were in Latin America and the Caribbean, the report said, citing factors such as crime groups competing for control of markets, weak rule of law and social inequality.
Honduras, Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago and Mexico were among those with the highest homicide rates. The two in the top 10 outside Latin America and the Caribbean were Myanmar and South Africa.
In Ecuador, the government blamed a surge of killings on drug gangs that use the country as a transit point en route to the United States and Europe.
In Myanmar, after overthrowing Aung San Suu Kyi’s elected government in February 2021, Myanmar’s military junta met sustained resistance in the countryside from militias allied with that government. A 2022 UN report said troops had carried out mass killings and targeted civilians.
Myanmar’s military said it had a duty to ensure peace and security. It denied atrocities had taken place and blamed “terrorists” for causing unrest.
The UNODC homicide study, published every four to five years, analyzed developments up to 2021 as that was the latest year with a full set of data.
The study said it looked at killings of one person by another that were intentional and unlawful.
“Death as a result of terrorist activities” was included despite the lack of an international definition of terrorism, and most conflict deaths were excluded, though “it is often difficult to disentangle” the types of killing in conflict situations that should be included and those that should not, the study said.

Topics: UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) murders covid19 stress

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