Morsi wants India to join Suez Canal corridor project

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March 19, 2013
morsiNew Delhi, Mar 19: Egypt Tuesday pushed for India to join its ambitious Suez Canal corridor project as Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi met here for talks to forge closer cooperation in economic and other fields.

Morsi, Egypt's first democratically elected president who came to India after a day-long visit to Pakistan, said he welcomed India's contribution in the Suez Canal corridor project that is aimed to become a bridge connecting Africa with Asia.

Speaking to the media after a meeting with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Morsi said the corridor project once ready would make Egypt a hub for India's exports to the West and boost Indian exports to $200 billion.

The 190-km corridor project aims to turn the Suez Canal banks into a global economic zone and earn billions of dollars in revenue for Egypt. The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) has offered to invest Euro one billion in the project.

Morsi said in his talks with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh both sides had agreed to reinforce bilateral relations in various areas, including political, economic, military, cultural and tourism and "agreed to promote ties till they reach the level of strategic partnership".

India offered to share its experience in the field of IT, renewable energy, services, electronics, small and medium enterprises, manufacturing and fertilizers. Both sides inked seven agreements, including five MoUs, in the field of cyber security, Information Technology.

India is setting up a solar energy project in a village in north Egypt and also setting up a centre of excellence in IT at the well known Al Azhar University.

Morsi, who is facing troubles back home with a court ordering cancellation of the April 22 parliamentary elections, thanked India and its people for support for his country post the 'Arab Spring' revolution two years ago.

He said bilateral trade, despite the political tumult in his country, had grown to $5.5 billion, growing $2.5 billion in the past one year alone. Morsi, who has brought along a high-level delegations comprising seven minister-level officials and top business heads, said Egypt was keen to attract more Indian investment.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said India "deeply appreciates" the fact that Morsi has undertaken a state visit to India despite his pressing domestic commitments. "This is a reflection of his personal commitment to our relationship," he said.

The prime minister conveyed India's full support to Morsi and "offered to share our experience as he ably leads his nation in building strong institutions and frameworks for democracy, social justice and inclusive economic development".

He said Egypt's location "as a bridge between Asia and Africa, astride a major global trade route, together with its skilled human resources, makes it an attractive business destination for India".

Both sides have agreed to foster productive partnerships in socio-economic development programmes, skill development, higher education, agriculture and health care and also agreed to enhance defence exchanges and cooperation.

On Palestine, Manmohan Singh conveyed India's support to the Palestinian cause and expressed deep appreciation for the role played by Egypt in trying to forge unity between the Palestinian groups - Hamas and Fatah -- and work towards a peaceful resolution.

On Syria, both sides condemned the violence and agreed on the urgent need for a peaceful resolution of all issues through dialogue.

Both sides also agreed to intensify efforts on issues that affect developing countries, and increase coordination in various international forums, including the United Nations, G-77 and the Non Aligned Movement.

India and Egypt are founders of the Non-Aligned Movement and the two countries shared a very close relationship till the sixties during the time of Indian prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru and Egyptain President Gamal Abdel Nasser. But the relationship cooled off thereafter and the 30-year rein of previous president Hosni Mubarak were not marked by close ties.

Morsi has been keen to take Egypt's foreign policy away from its pro-West orientation and shift the focus back to Asia and the developing world.

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News Network
July 15,2020

New Delhi, Jul 15: Former Rajasthan deputy chief minister Sachin Pilot on Wednesday said that he is "not" joining the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

"I am not joining BJP," said Pilot in a telephonic conversation with ANI.

The comments came a day after he was sacked as Rajasthan deputy chief minister and Pradesh Congress Committee chief by the party.

The decision to sack Pilot was taken yesterday after a CLP meeting at the Fairmont Hotel in Jaipur, Rajasthan.

At the meeting, as many as 102 MLAs unanimously demanded that Pilot should be removed from the party.

The Rajasthan Congress is in turmoil over the past few days. While chief minister Ashok Gehlot has blamed the BJP for attempting to destabilise the state government by poaching MLAs, Pilot has been camping in Delhi.

A controversy broke out in Rajasthan after special operation group (SOG) sent a notice to Pilot to record his statement in the case registered by SOG in the alleged poaching of Congress MLAs in the state.

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Agencies
June 12,2020

New Delhi, Jun 13: Ten days after recording two lakh COVID-19 cases, India surpassed the three lakh-mark on Saturday with the worst daily spike of 11,458 infections, while the death toll too climbed to 8,884 with 386 new fatalities, the Union Health Ministry said.

India took 64 days to cross the 1 lakh-mark from 100 cases, then in another fortnight it reached the grim milestone of two lakh cases. It has now become the fourth worst-hit nation by the pandemic with a caseload of 3,08,993, according to coronavirus statistics website Worldometer.

However, the Health Ministry said on Friday the doubling time of coronavirus cases has improved to 17.4 days from 15.4 days. And its data updated at 8 am on Saturday showed active cases at 1,45,779 and those who have recovered at 1,54,329; one patient has migrated.

"Thus, around 49.9 per cent patients have recovered so far," a ministry official said.

The total number of confirmed cases include foreigners.

Of the 386 new deaths, Delhi accounted for the highest 129 fatalities followed by Maharashtra 127. The virus is moving rapidly in Delhi, which for the first time reported over 2,000 cases on Friday, and Maharashtra, where the number of cases has crossed one lakh.

Gujarat reported 30 deaths, Uttar Pradesh 20, Tamil Nadu 18, West Bengal, Telangana and Madhya Pradesh 9 each, Karnataka and Rajasthan 7 each, Haryana and Uttarakhand 6 each, Punjab 4, Assam 2, Kerala, Jammu and Kashmir and Odisha 1 each.

Of the total 8,884 deaths, Maharashtra tops the tally with 3,717 fatalities followed by Gujarat with 1,415, Delhi with 1,214, West Bengal with 451, Madhya Pradesh with 440, Tamil Nadu with 367, Uttar Pradesh with 365, Rajasthan with 272 and Telangana with 174 deaths.

The death toll reached 80 in Andhra Pradesh, 79 in Karnataka, 70 in Haryana and 63 in Punjab. Jammu and Kashmir has reported 53 COVID-19 fatalities, Bihar 36 and Uttarakhand 21, Kerala 19, Odisha 10 and Jharkhand and Assam 8 each.

Chhattisgarh and Himachal Pradesh have registered 6 deaths each, Chandigarh 5, Puducherry 2, while Meghalaya, Tripura and Ladakh 1 each, according to the health ministry.

Maharashtra has reported the maximum number of cases at 1,01,141 followed by Tamil Nadu (40,698), Delhi (36,824), Gujarat (22,527), Uttar Pradesh (12,616), Rajasthan (12,068) and Madhya Pradesh (10,443).

The number of COVID-19 cases has gone up to 10,244 in West Bengal, 6,516 in Karnataka, 6,334 in Haryana and 6,103 in Bihar. It has risen to 5,680 in Andhra Pradesh, 4,730 in Jammu and Kashmir, 4,484 in Telangana and 3,498 in Odisha and Assam each.

Punjab has reported 2,986 cases while Kerala has 2,322 cases.

A total of 1,724 people have been infected by the virus in Uttarakhand, 1,617 in Jharkhand, 1,424 in Chhattisgarh, 961 in Tripura, 486 in Himachal Pradesh, 463 in Goa, 385 from Manipur and 334 in Chandigarh.

Ladakh has registered 239 COVID-19 cases, Puducherry 157, Nagaland 156, Mizoram 104, Arunachal Pradesh 67, Sikkim 63, Meghalaya 44 while Andaman and Nicobar Islands has registered 38 cases.

Dadar and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu together have reported 30 cases.

The ministry said 7,984 cases are being reassigned to states and "our figures are being reconciled with the ICMR". State-wise distribution is subject to further verification and reconciliation, it added.

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News Network
July 4,2020

New Delhi, July 4: India on Friday reported its highest single-day spike of COVID-19 cases with 22,771 cases reported in the last 24 hours, said the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.

With these new cases, India's coronavirus cases tally has gone up to 6,48,315, out of which there are 2,35,433 active cases in the country and 3,94,227 cases have been cured/discharged or migrated.

As many as 442 deaths due to COVID-19 have been reported in the last 24 hours taking the number of patients succumbing to the deadly virus across the country to 18,655.

As per the Union Health Ministry, Maharashtra -- the worst affected state due to COVID-19 -- has a total of 1,92,990 cases which is inclusive of 8,376 deaths. Meanwhile, Tamil Nadu, the second worst-affected state, has a total of 1,02,721 cases and 1,385 fatalities. Delhi's tally of coronavirus cases stands at 94,695 which is inclusive of 2923 deaths due to the virus.

The Centre said that the recovery rate has further improved to 60.80 per cent. The recoveries/deaths ratio is 95.48 per cent : 4.52 per cent.

The Indian Council of Medical Research, earlier on Saturday, said that the total number of samples tested up to July 3 is 95,40,132, out of which 2,42,383 samples were tested yesterday.

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