Month: October 2022

“People are depleting their emergency stocks, had depleted it, used it as a mechanism to manipulate markets while its profound purpose was to mitigate shortage of supply,” Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman told an investor conference in the Saudi capital.

“However, it is my profound duty to make it clear to the world that losing emergency stock may become painful in the months to come.”

Prince Abdulaziz did not single out the United States in his comments about emergency stocks, but last week US President Joe Biden announced he was putting the final 15 million barrels on the market from a record release of US strategic reserves.

That tranche was to complete a 180-million-barrel release authorised in the spring, in response to price hikes linked to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

It also came on the heels of a decision by the Opec+ oil cartel, which Riyadh co-leads with Moscow, to cut oil production by two million barrels a day next month.

The cartel’s decision has drawn intense criticism from the White House, which has said it amounted to “aligning with Russia” in the Ukraine war.

Prince Abdulaziz pushed back against that assessment on Tuesday.

“I keep listening, are you with us or against us? Is there any room for, `We are for Saudi Arabia and for the people of Saudi Arabia’?” he said to applause.

Asked about getting the decades-old partnership between Riyadh and Washington back on track, he said: “I think we as Saudi Arabia decided to be the maturer guys and let the dice fall.”

Speaking on an earlier panel, Saudi investment minister Khalid al Falih described the dust-up as “unwarranted” and temporary.

“If you look at the relationship with the people side, the corporate side, the education system, you look at our institutions working together, we are very close, and we will get over this recent spat that I think was unwarranted,” he said.

JPMorgan Chief Executive Jamie Dimon also said he was optimistic that bilateral ties would eventually improve.

“Saudi Arabia and the US have been allies for the last 75 years… They’ll work it through,” he said.

“These countries will remain allies going forward.”

Davos in the Desert

Hundreds of CEOs and finance moguls are in Riyadh for the three-day Future Investment Initiative (FII), a Davos-style investment conference that analysts say will highlight Saudi Arabia’s geopolitical muscle despite strained ties with Washington.

The FII, often referred to as “Davos in the Desert”, was launched in 2017 as an economic coming-out party for the world’s largest crude exporter, which is trying to diversify away from oil under Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

The 37-year-old, who is first in line to the throne, “takes a very hands-on approach” to projects associated with his Vision 2030 reform agenda, said Kristin Diwan of the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington.

“Ultimately those attending will know that they will need his approval or those of his confidants to work in the kingdom,” she said.

Up to 400 American CEOs are expected to participate in the conference, though unlike in previous years there is no representation from the US government.

The event’s organiser said last week that American officials had not been invited.

“Saudi Arabia needs to attract American investment, technology, and popular interest to succeed,” Diwan said.

“It still remains to be seen if this broader engagement can be maintained if the political mood in the United States turns hostile toward Saudi Arabia.”

“A student may die but will not accept humiliation,” they chanted at Shahid Chamran University of Ahvaz, in the south-western province of Khuzestan, in an online video.

Young women and schoolgirls have been at the forefront of protests sparked by Amini’s death last month, after her arrest for an alleged breach of Iran’s strict dress code for women.

Amini, a 22-year-old Iranian of Kurdish origin, died three days after being taken into custody by morality police on Sept 13 while visiting Tehran with her younger brother.

Activists said the security services had warned Amini’s family against holding a ceremony and not to ask people to visit her grave in Kurdistan province on Wednesday, otherwise “they should worry for their son’s life”.

Wednesday marks 40 days since Amini’s death and the end of the traditional mourning period in Iran.

Online videos showed students protesting at Beheshti University and the Khaje Nasir Toosi University of Technology, both in Tehran, as well as Shahid Chamran University of Ahvaz, in Khuzestan province.

‘Attacked, strip-searched, beaten’

The fresh demonstrations came after security forces were accused by activists of beating schoolgirls at the Shahid Sadr girls vocational school in Tehran on Monday.

“Students of the Sadr high school in Tehran have been attacked, strip-searched and beaten up,” said the 1500tasvir social media channel.

At least one student, 16-year-old Sana Soleimani, had been hospitalised, said 1500tasvir, which chronicles rights violations by Iran’s security forces. “Parents later protested in front of the school. Security forces attacked the neighbourhood and shot at people’s houses,” it added.

Iran’s education ministry said a dispute erupted between schoolgirls and their parents and school staff after the principal demanded they comply with rules over the use of mobile phones.

“The death of a student in this confrontation is strongly denied,” a ministry spokesman said. Families were seen clamouring for information outside the school in the Tehran neighbourhood of Salsabil, in an online video.

Such reports have fuelled further anger among the Iranian public over the crackdown that the Oslo-based group Iran Human Rights said, in an updated toll on Tuesday, had cost the lives of at least 141 protesters, up from 122 previously.

Top official heckled

Deadly unrest has rocked Amini’s western home province of Kurdistan — but also Zahedan on Iran’s far southeast, where IHR said 93 people were killed in demonstrations that erupted on Sept 30 over the alleged rape of a teenage girl by a police commander.

Despite what rights group Amnesty International has called an “unrelenting brutal crackdown”, young women and men were again seen protesting in online videos on Tuesday.

Cyclones _ the equivalent of hurricanes in the Atlantic or typhoons in the Pacific _ are a regular menace in the region but scientists say climate change is likely making them more intense and frequent.

Cyclone Sitrang made landfall in southern Bangladesh late on Monday, but authorities managed to get about a million people to safety before the monster weather system hit.

Around 10 million people were without power in districts along the coast on Tuesday, while schools were shut across much of the country’s south.

Police and government officials said 24 people died, mostly after they were hit by falling trees, with two dying in the north on the Jamuna River when their boat sank in squally weather.

A Myanmar national working on a ship also died by falling off the deck, an official said.

“We still have not got all the reports of damage,” government official Jebun Nahar said.

Eight people are missing from a dredging boat that sank during the storm late on Monday night in the Bay of Bengal, near the country’s largest industrial park at Mirsarai, regional fire department chief Abdullah Pasha said.

“Strong wind flipped the dredger and it sank instantly in the Bay of Bengal,” he said, adding that divers were searching for survivors.

People evacuated from low-lying regions such as remote islands and river banks were moved to thousands of multi-storey cyclone shelters.

“They spent the night in cyclone shelters. And this morning many are heading back to their homes,” Mohammad Ahsan, a government official, said.

Nearly 10,000 homes were either “destroyed or damaged” in the storm and around 1,000 shrimp farms had been washed away in floods, he added.

In some cases police had to cajole villagers who were reluctant to abandon their homes.

Trees were uprooted as far away as the capital Dhaka, hundreds of kilometres from the storm’s centre.

Heavy rains lashed much of the country, flooding cities such as Dhaka, Khulna and Barisal — which took on 324 millimetres of rainfall on Monday.

About 33,000 Rohingya refugees from Myanmar, controversially relocated from the mainland to a storm-prone island in the Bay of Bengal, were ordered to stay indoors, but there were no reports of casualties or damage.

Panic and snakes

The cyclone downed trees and brought widespread panic to the southern island of Maheshkhali after power and telecoms were cut.

“Such was the power of the wind we could not sleep in the night because of the fear that our homes will be destroyed. Snakes entered many homes. Water also inundated many homes,” said Tahmidul Islam, 25, a resident of Maheshkhali.

In the worst-affected Barisal region, teeming rains and heavy winds wreaked havoc on vegetable farms, district administrator Aminul Ahsan said.

In the neighbouring Indian state of West Bengal, thousands of people were evacuated to more than 100 relief centres, officials said, but there were no reports of damage and people started returning home on Tuesday.

Last year, more than a million people were evacuated along India’s east coast before cyclone Yaas battered the area with winds gusting up to 155 kilometres an hour.

Cyclone Amphan, the second “super cyclone” recorded over the Bay of Bengal, killed more than 100 people in Bangladesh and India and affected millions when it hit in 2020.

In recent years, better forecasting and more effective evacuation planning have dramatically reduced the death toll from such storms.

The worst recorded, in 1970, killed hundreds of thousands of people.

This was the latest in a series of hacks targeting millions of people that have brought Australian companies’ lax approach to cyber security into sharp relief.

Medibank chief executive David Koczkar said information about each of the company’s 3.9 million policy holders — some 15pc of Australia’s population — had been compromised.

“Our investigation has now established that this criminal has accessed all our private health insurance customers’ personal data and significant amounts of their health claims data,” he said in a statement to the Australian stock exchange.

“This is a terrible crime. This is a crime designed to cause maximum harm to the most vulnerable members of our community.”

The cyber attack was revealed last week, but it was not known until now how many people were impacted.

The hackers have previously threatened to leak the data, starting with 1,000 famous Australians, unless Medibank pays a ransom.

Medibank on Wednesday also confirmed it was not insured against cyber attacks, estimating the hack could cost the company as much as Au$35 million (US$22 million).

The Medibank hack followed an attack on telecom company Optus last month that exposed the personal information of some nine million Australians — almost a third of the population.

The Optus attack was one of the largest data breaches in Australian history.

‘Inadequate’

Australia’s Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus has previously accused companies of stockpiling sensitive customer data they did not need.

Firms currently face paltry fines — Au$2.2 million — for failing to protect customer data.

Dreyfus last week said these fines would be ratcheted up to Au$50 million.

“Unfortunately, significant privacy breaches in recent weeks have shown existing safeguards are inadequate,” he said.

“It’s not enough for a penalty for a major data breach to be seen as the cost of doing business.”

Home Affairs Minister Clare O’Neil on Tuesday said the fallout from the Medibank hack was “potentially irreparable”.

“One of the reasons why the government is so worried about this is because of the nature of the data,” she told Australia’s parliament.

“When it comes to the personal health information of Australians, the damage here is potentially irreparable.”

O’Neil has previously described hacking as a “dog act” — an Australian phrase reserved for something especially shameful or despicable.

Since Modi came to power in 2014 in the Hindu-majority nation of 1.4 billion, campaigners say persecution and hate speech have accelerated against religious minorities, especially for India’s 200-million-strong Muslim minority.

Read: US report identifies widespread rights violations in India

This is particularly the case in Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu Kashmir (IIOJK) since the Modi government in 2019 imposed direct rule on the restive Muslim-majority region where it has half a million troops stationed, activists say.

Pressure has also grown towards government critics and journalists, particularly women reporters — some have suffered relentless campaigns of online abuse including death and rape threats.

“As an elected member of the Human Rights Council, India has a responsibility to shape global human rights, and to protect and promote the rights of all individuals, including members of minority communities,” Guterres said in a speech in Mumbai.

 

Though he praised India’s achievements 75 years after leaving British rule, Guterres also pointedly said that the understanding that “diversity is a richness … is not a guarantee”.

“It must be nurtured, strengthened and renewed everyday,” he said.

Citing independence hero Mahatma Gandhi and India’s first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru — both of whom have become hate figures for some in Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party — Guterres said their values need to be guarded by “condemning hate speech unequivocally”.

India must do this “by protecting the rights and freedoms of journalists, human rights activists, students and academics. And by ensuring the continued independence of India’s judiciary”, he said.

“India’s voice on the global stage can only gain in authority and credibility from a strong commitment to inclusivity and respect for human rights at home,” he said, adding that “much more needs to be done to advance gender equality and women’s rights”.

“I urge Indians to be vigilant and to increase your investments in inclusive, pluralistic, diverse communities and societies,” Guterres said.

In February, UN rights experts called for an end to “misogynistic and sectarian” online attacks against one particular Muslim woman journalist who was a fierce critic of Modi.

Media rights group Reporters Without Borders (RSF) places India at a lowly 142 in its World Press Freedom Index, saying that under the premier, “pressure has increased on the media to toe the Hindu nationalist government’s line”.

Climate goals

On climate change, Guterres echoed New Delhi’s assertion that advanced economies must take the lead in cutting carbon emissions and provide money to poorer countries like India to develop renewable energies.

But the UN chief also said nations like India need to “take an extra step to close the mitigation gap”, referring to efforts to reduce or prevent the emission of greenhouse gases.

While setting ambitious goals for renewable energy, coal still makes up 70 per cent of India’s energy needs.

India and China weakened the final summit declaration at last year’s COP26, insisting that language was changed from “phase out” coal to “phase down”.

Guterres also said that as home to one-sixth of humanity India can “make or break” the Sustainable Development Goals and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

Some of the most fundamentals of these have “gone into reverse” due to the Covid-19 pandemic and the cost of living crisis “accelerated by the war in Ukraine”, he said.

The Islamist group, which controls the Gaza Strip, was long one of Syria’s closest allies, in large part due to a shared enmity towards Israel. But it left Syria in 2012 after condemning the Assad government’s brutal suppression of protests in March 2011, which triggered the country’s descent into civil war.

“This is a glorious and important day, in which we come back to our dear Syria to resume joint work,” Hamas chief of Arab relations Khalil al-Hayya told reporters in Damascus.

“This is a new start for joint Palestinian-Syrian action,” he said after meeting Assad along with other representatives of Palestinian factions. Hamas and Assad have agreed to “move on from the past and look to the future,” al-Hayya added.

By restoring ties with Damascus, Hamas cements its role within the “axis of resistance” against its arch-enemy Israel, analysts said, an Iran dominated alliance that extends to Lebanon’s Hezbollah movement and Yemen’s Houthi rebels.

Wednesday’s meeting with Assad “is in line with the broader rapprochement between Hezbollah and Hamas evident in Lebanon over the past year or more,” said Maha Yahya of the Carnegie Middle East Centre.

The moves come amid fundamental shifts in Middle East relationships, including the Islamist group’s long-time ally Turkiye restoring full diplomatic ties with Israel in August.

‘Hostile’ attitudes

Charles Lister, Director of the Syria Programme at the Middle East Institute, said rapprochement is the “only logical move” Hamas could take.

“Given the prevailing regional trend of Arab engagement with Israel, it’s not surprising to see Hamas’ leadership in Gaza seeking to re-enhance and amplify their role within the Axis of Resistance,” he said.

The United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Morocco have all normalised ties with Israel in the last couple of years. Aron Lund, a fellow with the Century International think-tank, said the thaw has “been propelled by the hostile regional attitude to Hamas and by Israel’s normalization with several Arab states.” “Hamas simply doesn’t have the luxury of being able to ignore or oppose the Syrian government indefinitely,” Lund said.

Al-Hayya said there was consensus among Hamas leadership and supporters over the resumption of ties with Syria — a move also backed by the Palestinian group’s foreign sponsors.

“All the states we notified of our decision were welcoming and supportive of the move, including Qatar and Turkey, who encouraged us to take the step,” al-Hayya said.

Turkey supports rebels against the government in Syria’s civil war, but has lately signalled a willingness to reconcile with Damascus.

According to Lund, Hamas’ rapprochement with Damascus “seems to have been facilitated by the fact that several other Arab states have reconnected with Assad’s regime.” “Turkey’s recent softening of tone will also have helped,” he said.

The Syrian presidency said Assad met a delegation of Palestinian leaders without mentioning the restoration of ties with Hamas. But the presidency published a video of Assad and Al-Hayya holding hands as they walked with other Palestinian officials.

The two-day Hamas visit to Syria comes after the Islamist group signed a reconciliation deal with its Palestinian rival Fatah in Algiers last week, vowing to hold elections by next October in a bid to settle a 15-year intra-Palestinian rift.

A Hamas leader said that the group, which was headquartered in the Syrian capital before leaving the country, plans to reopen its Damascus office. But it was “too early” to talk about relocating its headquarters to the Syrian capital, said the official who spoke on the condition of anonymity. The thaw between Hamas and Damascus was brokered by Tehran and Hezbollah, a senior Hamas source said. For the past decade, Syrian officials had accused Hamas of betrayal.

In a 2013 speech, Assad had accused Palestinian groups he did not identify of treating the country like a “hotel” that they leave “when conditions are tough” in a thinly-veiled reference to Hamas.

Hamas has its origins in the transnational Muslim Brotherhood, whose Syrian branch was one of the leading factions in the armed opposition after Syria’s civil war broke out. Hamas officials have said they broke ties with the Brotherhood in 2017.

During a week-long debate on weapons of mass destruction at the 77th session of UN General Assembly (UNGA), Pakistan reminded the international community that nuclear weapons and their delivery systems no longer exist in isolation; they “co-exist with other advanced weapon systems in different domains”.

Therefore, “the conversation on nuclear disarmament can no longer be oblivious to the mutually reinforcing relationship of various weapon systems and their collective impact on the security of states,” said Pakistani envoy Khalil Hashmi.

Ambassador Hashmi, who represents Pakistan at the UN office in Geneva, traveled to New York to participate in the UNGA debate.

Warns global community ‘prospects of nuclear war are back within realm of possibility’

The potential dual nature of the emerging technologies, he said, “should not be used as a pretext for proscribing or restricting their availability to developing countries.”

Participating in the thematic debate on nuclear weapons, Mr Hashmi also emphasised “the need for rebuilding a more enduring and equitable international security architecture” that also addresses the lack of balance in conventional balance.

The UNGA debate on nuclear weapons began on Oct 14 — a day after US President Joe Biden made controversial remarks about Pakistan and its nuclear assets. Addressing a Democratic fundraiser in California on Oct 13, President Biden surprised everyone with his off-the-cuff remarks: “What I think is maybe one of the most dangerous nations in the world: Pakistan.” And then he explained why he thought Pakistan was dangerous: “Nuclear weapons without any cohesion”.

The comments sparked outrage in Pakistan where it was denounced by both the government and the opposition. On Tuesday, Pakistan’s senior military command also issued an unusual statement reassuring the world that the country’s nuclear weapons and materials were well secured in accordance with the international standards.

Since then, the White House and the US State Department have issued several statements on the issue, assuring Islamabad that the United States has confidence in Pakistan’s ability to defend its nuclear assets and was seeking a strong partnership with the county to counter global terrorism.

At the UNGA debate, Pakistan also assured the world that it had a robust command and control system, and its nuclear weapons were completely safe.

But Pakistan warned the global community that “nuclear dangers are rising and the prospects of a nuclear war are back within the realm of possibility”.

The Pakistani envoy pointed out that nuclear disarmament remained largely unfulfilled as “evidenced by the constant shifting of goal posts towards additional non-proliferation measures”.