BOGOR, Indonesia: East Timor President Jose Ramos-Horta said on Tuesday during a visit to Indonesia that he hoped to boost trade ties between the countries and seal a decades-long bid by his nation to join the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) next year.
Ramos-Horta met his counterpart Joko Widodo on his first state visit to neighboring Indonesia since he was elected in April for a second stint as president.
He previously served as president of East Timor, which is also known as Timor Leste, between 2007 and 2012.
“Timor Leste as part of Southeast Asia has fulfilled many of the requirements necessary for a functioning economy and democracy so... will be a productive member of ASEAN,” he said, noting he hoped his young country could join the group when Indonesia takes over the presidency next year.
East Timor, which applied for ASEAN membership in 2011, currently holds observer status.
Speaking at the presidential palace in Bogor, south of Jakarta, the Indonesian president said his country had invested $818 million in East Timor, mainly in energy, banking and communication businesses.
“We’ve agreed to increase trade between both countries,” said Widodo, who is widely known as Jokowi.
Official Indonesia data shows trade between the countries was worth around $250 million last year.
Heavily dependent on revenue from oil and gas, the half-island nation of 1.3 million people has grappled with diversifying its economy and reducing high rates of poverty.
Indonesia invaded the former Portuguese colony in 1975 and East Timor only gained full independence in 2002 after a long and bloody struggle to end an often brutal occupation.
Ramos-Horta, who won a Nobel Peace Prize for his peaceful efforts to end the conflict, said he welcomed deepening trade ties with Jakarta and Indonesia’s commitment to East Timor joining the 10-member ASEAN regional grouping.
East Timor hopes to join ASEAN under Indonesia presidency next year
https://arab.news/nqfgg
East Timor hopes to join ASEAN under Indonesia presidency next year
- East Timor, which applied for ASEAN membership in 2011, currently holds observer status
Swiss court mulls closing Assad uncle war crimes case
- His part in February 1982 massacre in Hama, which left between 10,000 and 40,000 dead, earned him the nickname of “the Butcher of Hama”
- Tribunal said the defendant in his 80s was suffering from ailments preventing him from traveling and taking part in his trial
GENEVA: Switzerland’s Federal Criminal Court is considering dropping a case charging an uncle of deposed Syrian president Bashar Assad with alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity, newspapers reported on Sunday.
Rifaat Assad is accused by Swiss prosecutors of a long list of crimes, including having ordered “murders, acts of torture, inhumane treatment and illegal detentions” while an officer in the Syrian army.
His part in the notorious February 1982 massacre in the western town of Hama, which left between 10,000 and 40,000 dead, earned him the nickname of “the Butcher of Hama.”
The date of the former vice president’s trial has not been announced.
On November 29, just a few days before his nephew’s overthrow by militants, the Federal Criminal Court informed the victim plaintiffs that “it wished to close the proceedings” into Rifaat Assad, according to the Swiss Sunday newspapers Le Matin Dimanche and SonntagsZeitung.
The tribunal said that the defendant in his 80s was suffering from ailments preventing him from traveling and taking part in his trial, the papers reported.
The federal public prosecutor’s office opened the criminal proceedings in December 2013 following a report by the Swiss non-governmental organization Trial International.
Alerted by Syrians living in Geneva, the rights group traced Assad to a major Geneva hotel.
“Trial confirms the intention expressed by the court to the parties to close the case. But the formal decision has not yet been taken,” Benoit Meystre, the NGO’s legal adviser, told AFP on Sunday.
“If the case is closed, the possibility of an appeal will be examined, and it is highly likely that this decision will be contested,” Meystre said, adding that any appeal would have to be brought by the plaintiffs and not the NGO.
Swiss prosecutors opened the proceedings on the grounds of universal jurisdiction in crimes against humanity and war crimes cases.
Assad went into exile in 1984 after a failed attempt to overthrow his brother, the country’s then-ruler Hafez Assad.
He then presented himself as an opponent of Bashar Assad, traveling to Switzerland and later France.
He returned to Syria after 37 years in exile in France to escape a four-year prison sentence for money laundering and misappropriation of Syrian public funds.
Israel says it will close Dublin embassy, citing ‘extreme anti-Israel policies’
- Irish Prime Minister Simon Harris said the decision was deeply regrettable
- “I utterly reject the assertion that Ireland is anti-Israel. Ireland is pro-peace, pro-human rights and pro-International law,” he said in a post on X
JERUSALEM: Israel will close its Dublin embassy due to the “extreme anti-Israel policies of the Irish government,” Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said on Sunday, citing its recognition of a Palestinian state and support for legal action against Israel.
Israel’s ambassador to Dublin was recalled following Ireland’s decision on a Palestinian state in May, Saar’s statement added. Last week, Dublin announced its support for South Africa’s legal action against Israel in the International Court of Justice (ICJ), accusing Israel of genocide.
Irish Prime Minister Simon Harris said the decision was deeply regrettable. “I utterly reject the assertion that Ireland is anti-Israel. Ireland is pro-peace, pro-human rights and pro-International law,” he said in a post on X.
“Ireland wants a two state solution and for Israel and Palestine to live in peace and security. Ireland will always speak up for human rights and international law.”
Irish Foreign Minister Micheal Martin said in March that while it was for the World Court to decide whether genocide is being committed, he wanted to be clear that Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack and what is happening in Gaza now “represents the blatant violation of international humanitarian law on a mass scale.”
A statement from Israel’s foreign ministry also announced the establishment of an Israeli embassy in Moldova.
Bangladesh inquiry recommends feared police unit shut over rights abuses
- The police unit was launched in 2004, billed as a way to provide rapid results in a country where the judicial system was slow
- But the unit earned a grim reputation for extrajudicial killings and was accused of supporting ec-PM Hasina’s political ambitions
DHAKA: A Bangladesh commission probing abuses during the rule of toppled leader Sheikh Hasina has recommended a much-feared armed police unit be disbanded, a senior inquiry member said Sunday.
Hasina, 77, fled by helicopter to neighboring India on August 5 as a student-led uprising stormed the prime minister’s palace in Dhaka.
Her government was accused of widespread human rights abuses, including the extrajudicial killing of hundreds of political opponents and the unlawful abduction and disappearance of hundreds more.
The Commission of Inquiry into Enforced Disappearances, set up by the caretaker government, said it found initial evidence that Hasina and other ex-senior officials were involved in the enforced disappearances alleged to have been carried out by the Rapid Action Battalion (RAB).
The RAB paramilitary police force was sanctioned by the United States in 2021, alongside seven of its senior officers, in response to reports of its culpability in some of the worst rights abuses committed during Hasina’s 15-year-long rule.
“RAB has never abided by the law and was seldom held accountable for its atrocities, which include enforced disappearances, extrajudicial killings, and abductions,” Nur Khan Liton, a member of the commission, told AFP.
The commission handed its preliminary report to the leader of the interim government Muhammad Yunus late Saturday.
The Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), one of the country’s largest political parties, also called for RAB’s abolition.
Senior BNP leader M. Hafizuddin Ahmed told reporters that the force was too rotten to be reformed.
“When a patient suffers from gangrene, according to medical studies, the only solution is to amputate the affected organ,” he said.
The elite police unit was launched in 2004, billed as a way to provide rapid results in a country where the judicial system was notoriously slow.
But the unit earned a grim reputation for extrajudicial killings and was accused of supporting Hasina’s political ambitions by suppressing dissent through abductions and murders.
German far-right leader questions NATO membership
- ‘Europe has been forced to implement America’s interests. We reject that’
BERLIN: The co-leader of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party on Sunday said Germany should reconsider its membership of NATO if the US-led military alliance did not consider the interests of all European countries, including Russia.
“Europe has been forced to implement America’s interests. We reject that,” the AfD’s Tino Chrupalla told German daily Welt.
“NATO is currently not a defense alliance. A defense community must accept and respect the interests of all European countries — including Russia’s interests,” Chrupalla said.
“If NATO cannot ensure that, Germany must consider to what extent this alliance is still useful for us,” he added.
The far-right AfD is polling at around 18-19 percent ahead of snap elections on February 23, following the collapse of Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s coalition government last month.
The score puts the party ahead of Scholz’s Social Democrats on 16-17 percent and behind only the conservative CDU-CSU bloc, which is polling around 31-32 percent.
The AfD has little chance of forming a government because other parties have ruled out cooperation with the far-right group.
But it could continue a streak of strong electoral showings, after a landmark win in Thuringia, one of the regions in Germany’s formerly communist east.
The far-right party has been a vocal critic of Germany’s military support for Ukraine and has argued for a swift end to the war prompted by Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022.
“The German government must finally get to the point of wanting to end the war,” said Chrupalla, whose colleague Alice Weidel will lead the AfD into the election as the party’s candidate for chancellor.
“Russia has won this war. Reality has caught up with those who claim to want to enable Ukraine to win the war,” he said.
The conflict in Ukraine is set to be one of the major themes of the campaign, which will culminate on the eve of the third anniversary of the invasion.
Scholz has pledged sustained support for Ukraine but has counselled prudence, as he hopes to tap into pacifist currents among voters, which are particularly strong in the east.
The chancellor has resisted calls to send long-range missiles that Kyiv could use to strike Russian territory for fear of being drawn into the conflict, and recently reinitiated direct contact with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
DR Congo, Rwanda peace talks canceled
- Since 2021 a Rwanda-backed rebel militia has seized swathes of the eastern the Democratic Republic of Congo
- The Congolese government says that the M23 rebels only exist because of Rwandan military support
LUANDA: Talks due Sunday between the leaders of Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo to end conflict in the eastern DRC were called off after negotiations deadlocked, officials said.
Since 2021 a Rwanda-backed rebel militia has seized swathes of the eastern DRC, displacing thousands and triggering a humanitarian crisis.
There had been high hopes that the summit hosted by Angola’s President Joao Lourenco – the African Union mediator to end the conflict – would end with a deal to end the conflict.
But around midday Sunday the head of the Angolan presidency’s media office said it would not go ahead.
“Contrary to what we expected, the summit will no longer be held today,” media officer Mario Jorge told journalists.
Lourenco was meeting with DRC leader Felix Tshisekedi and without Rwandan President Paul Kagame, he said.
The Congolese presidency said that negotiations had hit deadlock over a Rwandan demand that the DRC hold direct dialogue with the Kigali-backed and largely ethnic Tutsi M23 rebels who have since 2021 seized swathes of the eastern DRC.
“There is a stalemate because the Rwandans have set as a precondition for the signing of an agreement that the DRC hold a direct dialogue with the M23,” Giscard Kusema, the Congolese presidency spokesman present in Luanda, said.
Rwanda’s Foreign Minister Olivier Nduhungirehe said Friday that his country wanted “a firm commitment from the DRC to resume direct talks with the M23 within a well-defined framework and timeframe.”
The Congolese government says, however, that the M23 only exists because of Rwandan military support.
“If Kigali is in good faith in the negotiations and on its promise to withdraw... its troops from Congolese soil, the conflict will end with the M23, and at the same time it will stop with Rwanda,” a Congolese government source said.
Kagame and Tshisekedi last saw each other in October in Paris but did not speak, though they have maintained dialogue through the mediation of Luanda.
In early August, Angola mediated a fragile truce that stabilized the situation at the front line, but both sides continued to exchange fire and clashes have intensified since late October.
Home to a string of rival armed groups, the mineral-rich eastern DRC has been plagued by internal and cross-border violence for the past three decades.
“Our country continues to face persistent rebellions, including the aggression by the Rwandan army and the M23 terrorists,” Tshisekedi said in parliament Wednesday, calling the militants and Rwanda “enemies of the Republic.”
The capital of DRC’s North Kivu province Goma, home to about one million people and another million displaced by war, is now nearly surrounded by M23 rebels and the Rwandan army.
Early in November, the two central African neighbors launched a committee to monitor ceasefire violations, led by Angola and including representatives from both the DRC and Rwanda.
Kinshasa and Kigali a few weeks later approved a document setting out the terms by which Rwandan troops will disengage from Congolese territory.
A previous draft dated in August listed the dismantling of the FDLR militia, created by ethnic Hutus involved in the Rwandan genocide in 1994, as a precondition for Rwanda’s withdrawal.
Often portrayed by Kigali as a threat to its security, the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) is one of various disparate militias fighting alongside the Congolese army against the M23.
The August draft was rejected by the DRC, which demanded that the withdrawal occur at the same time as the FDLR’s dismantling.
The final strategic document, seen by AFP, planned for a period of 90 days to “conclude the neutralization of the FDLR and the lifting of Rwanda’s defensive measures.”
