SYDNEY: Hundreds of well-wishers greeted Britain’s King Charles and Queen Camilla in Sydney on Sunday as the royal couple attended church, with the king saying it was a “great joy” to return to Australia in his first visit to an overseas realm as sovereign.
Charles’ 16th official visit to Australia, where he attended school for six months as a teenager in 1966, is also his first major foreign trip since being diagnosed with cancer.
“What a great joy it is to come to Australia for the first time as sovereign and to renew a love of this country and its people which I have cherished for so long,” he said in a speech at the New South Wales parliament.
New South Wales state lawmaker Kellie Sloane, whose electorate covers some of Sydney’s most famous beaches, wrote on social media platform X after chatting with the king that he “sends his best to the ‘amazing’ surf clubs at Bondi Beach.”
The royal couple were earlier greeted at St. Thomas’ Anglican Church by the archbishop of Sydney, Kanishka Raffel, and children from the church’s Sunday school who waved Australian flags.
Camilla was given a flower bouquet by the minister’s wife, Ellie Mantle, who asked if they had recovered from jet lag after the long flight to Australia on Friday. “Sort of,” Camilla replied.
Inside the church, Charles and Camilla signed two bibles, including one that belonged to Australia’s first minister and chaplain of the First Fleet of ships that took convicts from Britain to the penal colony of Australia in 1788.
Outside, the royal couple shook hands and chatted with a large crowd of cheering fans, some singing “God Save the King.”
It was the public’s first opportunity to meet Charles and Camilla since they arrived in Australia’s biggest city on Friday night, and several hundred well wishers outnumbered a dozen protesters.
Traveling across Sydney Harbor, Charles visited the New South Wales parliament, marking the 200th anniversary of Australia’s oldest legislature.
The king presented the lawmakers with an hour glass to time their speeches, and highlighted the fundamental role of strong parliaments to democracies that serve today’s diverse societies.
“Democracy has, I believe, an extraordinary capacity for innovation, compromise and adaptability as well as stability,” he said.
The royal couple will travel to Canberra on Monday to meet Prime Minister Anthony Albanese at the national parliament and visit the Australian War Memorial.
Albanese met the couple on Friday at Admiralty House, the historic government harborside residence where they are staying, for what he said was an informal drink and chat.
The king will attend the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Samoa after the six-day Australia tour.
Charles had made a significant personal donation to create a skills program to tackle climate change and boost higher education in small island states, including the Pacific Islands, the Association of Commonwealth Universities said on Sunday.
Mid-career professionals and civil servants will benefit from the fellowships, in a program that aims to retain talent in small island states and bolster resilience to the impacts of climate change such as rising sea levels.
Britain’s King Charles meets cheering Australian crowds, says ‘great joy’ to return
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Britain’s King Charles meets cheering Australian crowds, says ‘great joy’ to return
- Charles’ 16th official visit to Australia is also his first major foreign trip since cancer diagnosis
Ex-general Prabowo Subianto takes oath as Indonesia’s 8th president
- Subianto is taking over Indonesian leadership from Joko Widodo, who was president for 10 years
- In inaugural presidential speech, Subianto reiterated Indonesia’s continued support for Palestinian independence
JAKARTA: Indonesia’s former defense minister Prabowo Subianto was sworn in as the country’s eighth president on Sunday morning, becoming the new leader of the world’s third-largest democracy.
The 73-year-old former special forces commander and former son-in-law of Indonesia’s late dictator Suharto won the Feb. 14 election with almost 60 percent of the vote. He succeeded Joko Widodo, who stepped down on Sunday after serving two five-year terms.
Subianto took the oath of office during a nationally televised special session of the People’s Consultative Assembly, followed by his vice president and Widodo’s eldest son, Gibran Rakabuming Raka.
The ceremony was attended by heads of state and special envoys of more than 30 countries.
In his first presidential speech, Subianto vowed to work toward achieving food and energy security, while promising to eradicate corruption.
“We will lead the leadership of Indonesia … sincerely, by prioritizing the needs of all Indonesians, including those who did not vote for us,” he said.
Indonesia’s new leadership will face a number of challenges, analysts say, including a shrinking middle class and regional security issues.
The Subianto presidency will begin amid a period of democratic backsliding that Widodo oversaw, marked by a rise in old-time patronage and dynasty politics, and a dent in the independence of the judiciary.
DEMOCRACY IN DECLINE
“Our democracy has seriously declined … we are not doing alright at all. There are many democratic institutions that were quashed during Jokowi’s presidency,” constitutional law expert Bivitri Susanti told Arab News.
“I don’t think we can separate between Jokowi and Prabowo. Take note of how Prabowo ran for the presidency three times, and he won only now, after Jokowi gave his son as a running mate ... the upcoming administration will be tied because its victory was guaranteed through unconstitutional acts.”
Susanti was referring to how Raka’s candidacy only became possible after the Constitutional Court, which at the time was headed by Jokowi’s brother-in-law, made a controversial decision to decrease the minimum age requirement for the role.
SHRINKING MIDDLE CLASS
While one of Subianto’s election promises was to accelerate economic growth to 8 percent from a current rate of 5 percent, the number of Indonesians classified as middle class has declined from about 57.3 million people in 2019 to 47.8 million this year, according to data from the Central Statistics Agency.
This decline means more people are in the “aspiring middle class,” which now comprise about 50 percent of the Indonesian population, or more than 137 million people.
The numbers indicate a decrease in purchasing power across Indonesia.
“There is a purchasing power problem we are facing and there’s the raising of the big question about the structure of the Indonesian economy right now, as the industry is slowing down and (there are) a lot of layoffs in the manufacturing sector,” Bhima Yudhistira, director of Jakarta-based think tank the Center of Economic and Law Studies, told Arab News.
‘MORE ACTIVE’ FOREIGN, DEFENSE POLICY
Jokowi, who never attended the UN General Assembly during his time in office, was not known as a “foreign policy president,” as he focused more on economics and domestic developments, said Pieter Pandie, international relations researcher at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies in Jakarta.
But that leadership style is likely to change under Subianto, who has already visited a number of countries as president-elect, including China, Australia and Saudi Arabia.
“In the transition to Prabowo, we’ll see a more active president, a more hands-on president in foreign policy and defense policy,” Pandie said.
Indonesia’s active support for Palestine, which under Widodo was driven by the foreign minister, Retno Marsudi, is also likely to continue. In his inaugural speech, Subianto again declared Indonesia’s support for Palestinian independence.
“I think the difference will be Prabowo will likely be a little more active in inserting a role for Indonesia in the region, although it remains to be seen what kind of role.”
As Indonesia holds control over critical sea lanes, including in the Malacca Strait, Lombok Strait and Sunda Strait, the government will need to prepare for possible regional security issues such as conflict in the South China Sea or Taiwan Strait.
Beijing has overlapping claims over the South China Sea with a number of countries, and has increased its activities over the strategic waters, despite a 2016 international tribunal ruling that rejected Chinese claims.
The East Asian giant also has claims over self-governed Taiwan, and has launched major military drills around the island, sparking concerns of a bigger conflict.
“We’ve seen increasing incidents between China, the Philippines, Vietnam and others that could very well erupt into a conflict,” Pandie said, adding that conflict spillover, refugee crises and disruptions to maritime routes are several potential issues that Indonesia may have to contend with.
“Given our non-alignment and neutrality we won’t be involved directly in a conflict, but should a conflict arise so close to our borders … many things could happen.”
Cuba suffers third major setback in restoring power to island, millions still in dark
HAVANA: Cuba’s efforts to restore power to the island were derailed for a third time late on Saturday, Cuban authorities said shortly before midnight, leaving millions in the dark and raising fresh questions over the viability of the government’s bid to reestablish electrical service.
Cuba’s national electrical grid first crashed around midday on Friday after the island’s largest power plant shut down. The grid collapsed again on Saturday morning, state-run media reported.
By early evening, authorities reported some progress restoring power before announcing the grid had once again collapsed.
“Tonight at 10:25 p.m. the total disconnection of the national electro-energetic system occurred again,” the Havana Electric company said on Telegram late on Saturday.
The post was later removed from the company’s Telegram feed. It was not immediately clear why the post was removed, but millions were still without power on early on Sunday.
Cuba’s energy ministry said shortly after the Havana Electric post that it was working to reestablish service, adding that “another disconnection” had occurred in the “western sub-system,” which includes the capital Havana.
“The process of reestablishing the electrical system continues to be complex,” the ministry said on X.
A third grid collapse marks a major setback in the government’s efforts to quickly restore power to exhausted residents already suffering from severe food, medicine and fuel shortages.
Reuters reporters witnessed two small protests overnight, one in Marianao and the other in the Cuatro Caminos area of Havana. Various videos of protests elsewhere in the capital began to crop up on social media late on Saturday, though Reuters was not able to verify their authenticity.
Internet traffic dropped off sharply in Cuba on Saturday, according to data from Internet monitoring group NetBlocks, as vast power outages made it all but impossible for most island residents to charge phones and get online.
“Network data show that Cuba remains largely offline as the island experiences a second nationwide power outage,” Netblocks said on Saturday.
Even before the grid failures, a dire electricity shortfall on Friday had forced Cuba’s Communist-run government to send non-essential state workers home and cancel school for children as it sought to conserve fuel for power generation.
The government has blamed weeks of worsening blackouts — as long as 10 to 20 hours a day across much of the island — on deteriorating infrastructure, fuel shortages and rising demand.
Cuba also blames the US trade embargo, as well as sanctions instituted by then-President Donald Trump, for ongoing difficulties in acquiring fuel and spare parts to operate and maintain its oil-fired plants.
The US has denied any role in the grid failures.
German authorities arrest Libyan man suspected of planning attack on Israeli Embassy
- The man was detained on Saturday in Bernau, a town just outside of Berlin
- Israeli Embassy in Berlin confirmed to dpa that there had been a plan to attack the diplomatic mission.
BERLIN: German authorities said Sunday that they have arrested a Libyan national with suspected ties to the extremist group Islamic State who was allegedly planning a firearms attack on the Israeli Embassy.
Police and other security forces detained the man on Saturday evening in Bernau, a town just outside of Berlin, and searched his home there, the Federal Prosecutor’s Office said in a statement.
The prosecutor’s office said the suspect was a Libyan national whom they identified only as Omar A.
“He intended to carry out a high-profile attack with firearms on the Israeli Embassy in Berlin,” the statement said. In his planning, the statement added, “the accused exchanged information with a member of IS in a messenger chat.”
Security forces also searched the home of another person who is considered a witness and not a suspect, the prosecutor’s statement said.
Interior Minister Nancy Faeser said that German security authorities “struck in time to thwart possible plans to attack the Israeli Embassy in Berlin.”
“This shows that protecting Jewish and Israeli institutions in our country is vital and of the utmost importance to us,” she added.
The suspect was expected to be brought before an investigating judge at the country’s highest court, the Federal Court of Justice in Karlsruhe, on Sunday, the prosecutor’s office said.
Israeli Ambassador Ron Prosor thanked the German security authorities “for ensuring the security of our embassy,” dpa reported.
News of the case first came from the Bild newspaper, which reported that a heavily armed elite police unit stormed the suspect’s home in Bernau. It said German authorities acted after receiving a tipoff from an unspecified foreign intelligence agency.
“We are acting with the utmost vigilance and attention in view of the high threat posed by Islamist, antisemitic and anti-Israel violence,” Faeser said.
Harris, Trump duel over endurance as celebrities join campaign trail
- At rallies in Detroit and Atlanta Harris brought out pop stars Lizzo and Usher respectively to warm up her crowds
- Both candidates are spending their final campaign days in pivotal battleground states where early voting is already underway
Latrobe: Kamala Harris and Donald Trump invited star power to the campaign trail Saturday, as they took shots at each other’s endurance and urged early voting in battleground states key to the ever-tightening US presidential race.
At rallies in Detroit and Atlanta Harris brought out pop stars Lizzo and Usher respectively to warm up her crowds, while painting her rival Trump as exhausted and unhinged.
The Republican running for a second go in the White House countered those accusations with a marathon speech in Pennsylvania, as billionaire Elon Musk campaigned for him elsewhere in the state.
Both candidates are fighting on every front to seal up voters’ support in a race that polls suggest is effectively tied with fewer than three weeks to Election Day.
Harris told voters in Detroit that her opponent’s platform is “self-consuming” while repeating vows to invest in the working and middle classes.
“We stand for the idea that the true measure of the strength of a leader is not based on who you beat down, it’s on who you lift up,” said Harris.
Later in Atlanta Harris, who turned 60 on Saturday, accused the 78-year-old Trump of “ducking debates and canceling interviews because of exhaustion.”
“When he does answer a question or speak at a rally — have you noticed he tends to go off script and ramble, and generally, for the life of him, cannot finish a thought?” she said.
“He’s called it the weave. But we here we will call it nonsense.”
Trump began his more than 90-minute rally with a lengthy monologue on the late golfer Arnold Palmer, for whom the regional airport in Latrobe, where the Republican appeared, is named.
He went so far as to praise Palmer’s genitalia.
“When he took the showers with other pros, they came out of there, they said, ‘Oh my God. That’s unbelievable,’” Trump said with a laugh. “I had to say it.”
He then launched into his routine, meandering speech that includes attacking migrants, personally denigrating Harris and repeating false claims about the 2020 election.
But his was a show of onstage endurance, which also included a number of guests and screenings of his filmed campaign ads.
Shortly after recalling his own expensive education at the private Ivy League University of Pennsylvania, Trump vied to appeal to working class voters by bringing a parade of steel workers in hard hats onstage.
He also underscored the importance of the eastern US state’s electoral college delegates to the overall election: “If we win Pennsylvania, we win the whole damn thing.”
At rally in Las Vegas, former US President Barack Obama took aim at Trump, comparing him to a grandfather whose bizarre behavior would spark worry after his rambling speeches and a strange dance party.
“So you would be worried if your grandpa started acting like this. You would,... right? You’d like, call up your brother,... be like, have you seen grandpa lately? What we gonna do?
“But this is coming from somebody who wants unchecked power, wants the most powerful office on Earth, with the nuclear codes and all that,” said Obama.
Earlier in the day the pop star Lizzo noted that “whether you’re a Democrat or Republican or neither, you deserve a president who listens when you speak.”
“You deserve a president who respects when you protest. You deserve a president who understands that their job is to be a public servant,” she said before emphasizing that Harris offers just that.
Lizzo — who sported a suffragette-white pantsuit as she addressed the crowd in Motor City — also drew cheers when urging listeners that America was more than ready for its first woman president, dropping a reference to her own hit song: “It’s about damn time!“
One of Atlanta’s major stars, Usher, told voters there that “I’m counting on you” to get Harris’s “campaign across the finish line” in Georgia.
Both candidates are spending their final campaign days in pivotal battleground states where early voting is already underway.
Musk, who endorsed Trump in July, is one of the Biden administration’s fiercest critics and has emerged as a loud voice in US politics since taking over Twitter, now known as X.
The Tesla and SpaceX CEO has taken an increasingly visible role in Trump’s campaign and has donated almost $75 million to his political organization America PAC.
Speaking in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, he announced he would start randomly distributing cash awards — $1 million each day until the November 5 vote — to a registered voter in the state who signed his organization’s petition.
Elon Musk promises to award $1 million each day to a signer of his petition on US constitution
- Petition pledges support for the US Constitution's provisions guaranteeing "freedom of speech and the right to bear arms"
- Musk started America PAC, a pro-Trump political action organization, to help mobilize and register voters in battleground states
- He said on Saturday that if Harris wins, it will be “the last election,” suggesting the US will no longer exist
HARRISBURG, Pennsylvania: Billionaire Elon Musk promised on Saturday to give away $1 million each day until November’s election to someone who signs his online petition supporting the US Constitution.
And he wasted no time, awarding a $1 million check to an attendee of his event in Pennsylvania aimed at rallying supporters behind Republican Donald Trump. The winner was a man named John Dreher, according to event staff.
“By the way, John had no idea. So anyway, you’re welcome,” the Tesla founder said as he handed Dreher the check.
The money is the latest example of Musk using his extraordinary wealth to influence the tightly-contested presidential race between Trump and his Democratic rival Kamala Harris.
Musk started America PAC, a political action organization he founded in support of Trump’s presidential campaign. The group is helping mobilize and register voters in battleground states, but there are signs it is having trouble meeting its goals.
The Harrisburg event is the third in as many days in Pennsylvania, where Musk is painting November’s election in stark terms and encouraging supporters to vote early and get others to do the same.
He said on Saturday that if Harris wins, it will be “the last election,” suggesting the US will no longer exist.
He also said the two assassination attempts against Trump prove he is ruffling feathers and upending the status quo in ways Harris won’t. He said that’s why no one is trying to kill Harris.
“Assassinating a puppet is worthless,” Musk said, reiterating an argument he has made in a social media post.
The petition Musk is asking people to sign reads: “The First and Second Amendments guarantee freedom of speech and the right to bear arms. By signing below, I am pledging my support for the First and Second Amendments.”
Attendees of Saturday’s event had to sign the petition, which allows America PAC to garner contact details for more potential voters that it can work to get to the polls for Trump.
Musk, ranked by Forbes as the world’s richest person, so far has supplied at least $75 million to America PAC, according to federal disclosures, making the group a crucial part of Trump’s bid to regain the White House.
The entrepreneur behind carmaker Tesla TSLA.O and rocket and satellite venture SpaceX has increasingly supported Republican causes and this year became an outspoken Trump supporter.
Trump in turn has said if elected he would appoint Musk to head a government efficiency commission.
