'Azhar designation proof of commitment against terror'

Agencies
May 2, 2019

Washington, May 2: The designation of Pakistan-based JeM chief Masood Azhar as a global terrorist by the UN demonstrates the international commitment to rooting out terrorism in Pakistan and bringing security and stability to South Asia, the White House has said.

The UN sanctions committee on the Islamic State and Al-Qaeda on Wednesday announced the designation of Azhar, leader of Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM), over its ties to Al-Qaeda.

The JeM has claimed responsibility for the Pulwama suicide attack that killed 40 CRPF soldiers and led to a spike in military tensions between India and Pakistan.

Reacting to the development, Garrett Marquis, spokesperson of the National Security Council, White House said: "Designating Azhar demonstrates the international commitment to rooting out terrorism in Pakistan and bringing security and stability to South Asia".

The US commends the United Nations Security Council 1267 Sanctions Committee for the designation of Azhar, the leader of JeM, a UN-designated terrorist group that was responsible for the February 14 terrorist attack in Kashmir that killed over 40 Indian security personnel, Marquis said in a statement.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo also welcomed the move and said that it is a victory for American diplomacy and the international community against terrorism.

Pompeo also congratulated the US mission in the UN which took the lead in America's diplomatic effort to designate Azhar as a global terrorist, after China finally lifted its nearly 10-year technical hold on such an effort by India, the United States and other permanent members of the Security Council including Britain and France.

"Congrats to our team @USUN for their work in negotiating JEM's Masood Azhar's #UN designation as a terrorist," Pompeo tweeted.

"This long-awaited action is a victory for American diplomacy and the international community against terrorism, and an important step towards peace in South Asia," Pompeo said.

Meanwhile, State Department spokesperson Morgan Ortagus said that the JeM has been responsible for numerous terrorist attacks and is a serious threat to regional stability and peace in South Asia.

"The JeM was designated by the United States as a Foreign Terrorist Organization and Specially Designated Global Terrorist (SDGT) in 2001 and has been listed by the UN since 2001," she said.

The US also designated Azhar as an SDGT in 2010.

"As JEM's founder and leader, Azhar clearly met the criteria for designation by the UN. This listing requires all the UN member states to implement an asset freeze, a travel ban, and an arms embargo against Azhar. We expect all countries to uphold these obligations," Ortagus said.

Today's designation is an important step in promoting a peaceful and stable South Asia, she said.

"In line with this vision, we appreciate Pakistani Prime Minister Khan's stated commitment that Pakistan, for the sake of its own future, will not allow militant and terrorist groups to operate from its territory," Ortagus said.

The spokesperson said that the US looks forward to further and sustained actions from Pakistan as outlined in its National Action Plan consistent with its international obligations.

The US, France along with the UK had moved the proposal to designate Azhar as a "global terrorist" in the UN Security Council's 1267 Al Qaeda Sanctions Committee in February, just days after the deadly Pulwama terror attack.

A veto-wielding permanent member of the UNSC, China was the sole hold-out in the 15-nation body on the bid to blacklist Azhar, blocking attempts by placing a "technical hold" and asking for "more time to examine" the proposal.

Comments

Khasai Khane
 - 
Thursday, 2 May 2019

Dear CD.

 

First of all, the man in picture of your news is Hafeez Saeed, another terrorist.

 

 

As for UNSC branding masood Azhar as terrorist, that too after 18 years since Kandahar plane hijack, please note :

 

1] Hafiz Saeed, was branded a terrorist by UNSC atleast 10 years ago. What happened - Nothing.

 

2] Masood Azhar was branded terrorist by UNSC, which even CHina accepted was because there was a condition put by China and Pakistan to India to accept that this terrorist Masood Azhar was not involved in Pulwama attack. India accepted, Pakistan happy, China Happy, and we Indians are made a fool of.

Ok, now that India said to th UNSC that Masood Azhar was not involved in Pulwama attack, who is really is responsible.? In anycase it was intelligence failure, or it could even be a treachery by our politicians against our country. 

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News Network
February 6,2020

Washington, Feb 6: U.S. president Donald Trump drew on staunch Republican support to defeat the gravest threat yet to his three-year-old presidency on Wednesday, winning acquittal in the Senate on impeachment charges of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.

Only the third U.S. leader ever placed on trial, Trump readily defeated the Democratic-led effort to expel him from office for having illicitly sought help from Ukraine to bolster his 2020 re-election effort.

Trump immediately claimed "victory" while the White House declared it a full "exoneration" for the president -- even as Democrats rejected the acquittal as the "valueless" outcome of an unfair trial.

Despite being confronted with strong evidence, Republicans stayed loyal and mustered a majority of votes to clear the president of both charges -- by 52 to 48 on abuse of power and 53 to 47 on obstruction of Congress -- falling far short of the two-thirds supermajority required for conviction.

"Two thirds of the senators present not having found him guilty of the charges contained therein, it is therefore ordered and adjudged that the said Donald John Trump be, and he is hereby, acquitted," said Supreme Court chief justice John Roberts, who presided over the trial.

The months-long impeachment of the 45th US leader shone a harsh light on America's political divide, with Trump's core support base united behind him in rejecting it as a "hoax."

One Republican, senator Mitt Romney, a longtime Trump foe, risked White House wrath to vote alongside Democrats on the first count, saying Trump was "guilty of an appalling abuse of public trust." He voted not guilty on the second charge.

But the verdict was never truly in question since the House of Representatives formally impeached Trump in December, and has now cleared out a major hurdle for the president to fully plunge into his campaign for re-election in November.

Trump to speak Thursday

Responding to the verdict, Trump announced he would deliver a formal statement Thursday from the White House "to discuss our Country's VICTORY on the Impeachment Hoax!"

Shortly before, the president tweeted a montage depicting a fake cover of Time magazine declaring him president for all eternity.

The White House declared that Trump had obtained "full vindication and exoneration."

But Nancy Pelosi, the House Speaker and top Democrat in Congress, said that by clearing Trump, the Republicans had "normalized lawlessness."

"There can be no acquittal without a trial, and there is no trial without witnesses, documents and evidence," she said.

"Sadly, because of the Republican Senate's betrayal of the Constitution, the president remains an ongoing threat to American democracy, with his insistence that he is above the law and that he can corrupt the elections if he wants to."

Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer said the acquittal was "virtually valueless" since Republicans refused witnesses at his trial.

'Forever impeached'

The Democrats' intense 78-day House investigation faced public doubts and high-pressure stonewalling from the White House.

Concerned about the political risk for the party, Pelosi rejected a call early last year to impeach Trump on evidence compiled by then-special counsel Robert Mueller that he had obstructed the Russia election meddling investigation.

But her concerns melted after new allegations surfaced in August that Trump had pressured Ukraine for help for his 2020 campaign.

Though doubtful from the outset that they would win support from Republicans, an investigation amassed with surprising speed strong evidence to support the allegations.

The evidence showed that from early in 2019, Trump's private lawyer Rudy Giuliani and a close political ally, Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland, were scheming to pressure Kiev to help smear Democrats, including Trump's potential 2020 rival Joe Biden, by opening investigations into them.

"We must say enough -- enough! He has betrayed our national security, and he will do so again," Adam Schiff, who led the House investigation, argued on the Senate floor this week.

"He has compromised our elections, and he will do so again," Schiff said.

'Colossal' mistake

In the trial, Trump's defence was not seen as having undermined the facts compiled by Schiff's probe, and several Republican senators acknowledged he did wrong.

But his lawyers and Senate defenders argued, essentially, that Trump's behaviour was not egregious enough for impeachment and removal.

And, pointing to the December House impeachment vote, starkly along party lines, they painted it as a political effort to "destroy the president" in an election year and insisted voters should be allowed to decide Trump's fate.

Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell said impeachment will benefit Republicans.

"Right now this is a political loser for them. They initiated it. They thought this was a great idea. At least for the short term, it has been a colossal political mistake."

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Agencies
August 5,2020

Ninety per cent of a sample group of coronavirus-recovered patients from a prominent hospital in China's Wuhan city where the pandemic broke out have reported lung damage and five per cent of them are again in quarantine after testing positive for the virus, according to a media report on Wednesday.

A team at the Zhongnan Hospital of Wuhan University led by Peng Zhiyong, director of the hospital's Intensive Care Unit, has been conducting follow-up visits with '100 recovered patients' since April.

The first phase of this one-year programme finished in July. The average age of the patients in the study is 59.

According to the first phase results, 90 per cent of the patients' lungs are still in a damaged state, which means their lungs ventilation and gas exchange functions have not recovered to the level of healthy people, state-run Global Times reported.

Peng's team conducted a six-minute walking test with the patients. They found that the recovered patients could only walk 400 metres in six minutes while their healthy peers could walk 500 metres in the same period.

Some recovered patients have to rely on oxygen machines even three months after being discharged from the hospital, Liang Tengxiao, a doctor from the Dongzhimen Hospital, Beijing University of Chinese Medicine, was quoted as saying by the report.

Liang's team is also conducting follow-up visits with recovered patients aged above 65.

The results also showed that antibodies against the novel coronavirus in 10 per cent of the 100 patients have disappeared.

Five per cent of them received negative results in Covid-19 nucleic acid tests but positive results in Immunoglobulin M (IgM) tests, and thus have to be quarantined again, the report said.

IgM is usually the first antibody produced by the immune system when a virus attacks. A positive result in an IgM test usually means that a person has just been infected by the virus.

It is still unclear if this means these people have been infected again.

The 100 patients' immune systems have not fully recovered as they showed a low level of B cells -- - a primary force for killing viruses in the human body -- but a high level of T cells which only recognise viral antigens outside infected cells.

"The results revealed that the patients’ immune systems are still recovering," Peng said.

The patients also suffered from depression and a sense of stigma. Most of the recovered patients told the team that their families were not willing to have dinner with them at the same table, the report said.

Less than half of the recovered patients have returned to work, it said.

The findings are significant as the coronavirus first emerged in Wuhan city.

Hubei province for which Wuhan is the provincial capital has reported a total of 68,138 confirmed Covid-19 cases till now. The disease has claimed 4,512 lives in the province, according to the official data.

China reported 27 new confirmed Covid-19 cases on Tuesday, including 22 locally-transmitted cases, the National Health Commission (NHC) said on Wednesday.

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News Network
April 6,2020

New Delhi, April 6: The United States has donated $2.9 million assistance package for India to help the Narendra Modi government brace itself against the coronavirus as countries across the world are coming together to combat the outbreak.

On March 28, the US government, via US Agency for International Development, announced $2.9 million to support India in its response to COVID-19.

"It builds on a foundation of over $1.4 billion in health assistance and nearly $3 billion in total assistance that the US provided to India over the last 20 years," the US Embassy in India said in a statement.

"These new funds will support two organisations, including $2.4 million for USAID's health strengthening project, implemented by Jhpiego, an international non-profit health organisation affiliated with Johns Hopkins University and $500,000 for the World Health Organization (WHO)," the statement said.

The funds will also help India combat the spread of COVID-19, provide care for the affected and support local communities with the tools needed to contain the disease, it added.

Moreover, being a global leader in health and humanitarian response to COVID-19, the US has provided approximately $18.3 million assistance package to ASEAN member countries to fight the contagion.

The funds will be used to prepare laboratories for large-scale testing for the lethal virus, infection prevention and control, enable risk communication, implement public-health emergency plans for border points of entry, activate case-finding and event-based surveillance for influenza-like illnesses, train and equip rapid-responders in investigation and contact-tracing and update training materials for health workers.

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