UN runs out of money, urges members to pay up

Agencies
July 28, 2018

Washington D.C, July 28: The United Nations (UN) is reeling under alarming financial crisis and is also appealing to its member to pay up to the international body, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has said.

As per Fox News, Guterres, in a letter, said he has warned member states of a "troubling financial situation facing the United Nations," which he stated is caused due to late payments by member states to the UN.

"Our cash flow has never been this low so early in the calendar year, and the broader trend is also concerning; we are running out of cash sooner and staying in the red longer," Fox News quoted Guterres' as stating in the letter.

Guterres further said that the UN will take some measures for reducing costs and will also propose several ways to states in order to improve financial stability at the UN.

United States President Donald Trump threat to deduct funding is not being considered as the reason of the cash crunch as the US has not made any delay in payments to the budget.

Earlier this year, the US cut off the financial aid to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees,

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Agencies
June 22,2020

The total number of global COVID-19 cases was nearing 9 million, while the deaths have increased to over 467,000, according to the Johns Hopkins University.

By Monday morning, the total number of cases stood at 8,927,195, while the fatalities increased to 467,636, the University's Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) revealed in its latest update.

With 2,279,306 cases and 119,967 deaths, the US continues with the world's highest number of COVID-19 infections and fatalities, according to the CSSE.

Brazil comes in the second place with 1,083,341 infections and 50,591 deaths.

In terms of cases, Russia ranks third (583,879), and was followed by India (410,461), the UK (305,803), Peru (251,338), Spain (246,272), Chile (242,355), Italy (238,499), Iran (204,952), France (197,008), Germany (191,272), Turkey (187,685), Mexico (180,545), Pakistan (176,617), Saudi Arabia (157,612), Bangladesh (112,306) and Canada (103,078), the CSSE figures showed.

The other countries with over 10,000 deaths are the UK (42,717), Italy (34,634), France (29,643), Spain (28,323), Mexico (21,825) and India (13,254).

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Agencies
August 7,2020

Washington, Aug 7: US President Donald Trump on Thursday (local time) signed executive orders halting all transactions with Chinese applications TikTok and WeChat within 45 days, citing national security concerns, further escalating the tensions between Beijing and Washington.

"WeChat, a messaging, social media, and electronic payment application owned by the Chinese company Tencent Holdings Ltd., reportedly has over one billion users worldwide, including users in the United States. Like TikTok, WeChat automatically captures vast swaths of information from its users. 

This data collection threatens to allow the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) access to Americans' personal and proprietary information," Trump said in a statement.

Citing reasons for the ban on WeChat, the US President said that the application captures the personal and proprietary information of Chinese nationals visiting the US, thereby providing the CCP a mechanism to keep tabs on the Chinese citizens who may be "enjoying the benefits of a free society for the first time in their lives".

"In March 2019, a researcher reportedly discovered a Chinese database containing billions of WeChat messages sent from users in not only China but also the United States, Taiwan, South Korea and Australia. WeChat, like TikTok, also reportedly censors content that the CCP deems politically sensitive and may also be used for disinformation campaigns that benefit the CCP. 

These risks have led other countries, including Australia and India, to begin restricting or banning the use of WeChat. The US must take aggressive action against the owner of WeChat to protect our national security," he added.

Earlier, Trump had issued an order banning TikTok as it "reportedly censors content that the CCP deems politically sensitive, such as content concerning protests in Hong Kong and China's treatment of Uighurs and other Muslim minorities. 

TikTok may also be used for disinformation campaigns that benefit the CCP."
US politicians have repeatedly criticised TikTok, owned by Beijing-based startup ByteDance, of being a threat to national security because of its ties to China.

The development comes as China and the US are at loggerheads on a variety of issues including Hong Kong national security law, the South China Sea, the novel coronavirus and trade.

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Agencies
June 24,2020

Seoul, Jun 24: North Korea on Wednesday said leader Kim Jong Un suspended a planned military retaliation against South Korea, possibly slowing the pressure campaign it has waged against its rival amid stalled nuclear negotiations with the Trump administration.

Last week, the North had declared relations with the South as fully ruptured, destroyed an inter-Korean liaison office in its territory and threatened unspecified military action to censure Seoul for a lack of progress in bilateral cooperation and for activists floating anti-Pyongyang leaflets across the border.

Analysts say North Korea, after weeks deliberately raising tensions, may be pulling away just enough to make room for South Korean concessions.

Pyongyang's official Korean Central News Agency said Kim presided by video conference over a meeting Tuesday of the ruling Workers' Party's Central Military Commission, which decided to postpone plans for military action against the South brought up by the North's military leaders.

KCNA didn't specify why the decision was made. It said other discussions included bolstering the country's "war deterrent".

Yoh Sang-key, spokesman of South Korea's Unification Ministry, said Seoul was "closely reviewing" the North's report but didn't further elaborate.

Yoh also said it was the first report in state media of Kim holding a video conferencing meeting, but he didn't provide a specific answer when asked whether that would have something to do with the coronavirus.

The North says there hasn't been a single COVID-19 case on its territory, but the claim is questioned by outside experts.

Kim Dong-yub, an analyst from Seoul's Institute for Far Eastern Studies, said it's likely that the North is waiting for further action from the South to salvage ties from what it sees as a position of strength, rather than softening its stance on its rival.

"What's clear is that the North said (the military action) was postponed, not cancelled," said Kim, a former South Korean military official who participated in inter-Korean military negotiations.

Other experts say the North would be seeking something major from the South, possibly a commitment to resume operations at a shuttered joint factory park in Kaesong, which was where the liaison office was located, or restart South Korean tours to the North's Diamond Mountain resort.

Those steps are prohibited by the international sanctions against the North over its nuclear weapons programme.

The public face of the North's recent bashing of the South has been Kim Yo Jong, the powerful sister of leader Kim Jong Un, who has been confirmed as his top official on inter-Korean affairs.

Issuing harsh statements through state media, she had said the North's demolishing of the liaison office would be just the first in a series of retaliatory action against the enemy South and that she would leave it to the North's military to come up with the next steps.

The General Staff of the North's military has said it would send troops to the mothballed inter-Korean cooperation sites in Kaesong and Diamond Mountain and restart military drills in frontline areas.

Such steps would nullify a set of deals the Koreas reached during a flurry of diplomacy in 2018 that prohibited them from taking hostile action against each other.

Also condemning the South over North Korean refugees floating anti-Pyongyang leaflets across the border, the North said Monday it printed 12 million of its own propaganda leaflets to be dropped over the South in what would be its largest ever anti-Seoul leafleting campaign.

It wasn't immediately clear whether Kim's decision to hold back military action would affect the country's plans for leafleting. The North's military had said it would open border areas on land and sea and provide protection for civilians involved in the leafleting campaigns.

The North has a history of dialling up pressure against the South when it fails to get what it wants from the United States. The North's recent steps came after months of frustration over Seoul's unwillingness to defy US-led sanctions and restart the inter-Korean economic projects that would breathe life into its broken economy.

Nuclear negotiations between Pyongyang and Washington largely stalled after Kim's second summit with President Donald Trump last year in Vietnam, where the Americans rejected North Korea's demands for major sanctions relief in exchange for a partial surrender of its nuclear capabilities.

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