NEW DELHI: India has signed a contract to purchase 26 Rafale fighter jets from France, New Delhi’s defense ministry said Monday, with the multi-billion-dollar deal to include both single and twin-seat planes.
When delivered, the jets would join 36 French-made Rafale fighters already acquired by New Delhi as part of its efforts to rapidly modernize its military hardware.
“The governments of India and France have signed an inter-governmental agreement for the procurement of 26 Rafale Aircraft,” the defense ministry said in a statement.
The jets made by French aerospace company Dassault Aviation are expected to operate from Indian-made aircraft carriers, replacing the Russian MiG-29K jets.
“It includes training, simulator, associated equipment, weapons and performance-based logistics” as well as 22 single-seater and four twin-seater jets, said India’s defense ministry.
“It also includes additional equipment for the existing Rafale fleet of the Indian Air Force (IAF).”
The Indian government announced its intention to procure 26 Rafales in 2023, when Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited France for the Bastille Day celebrations.
Despite historical ties with Russia as its key supplier for military equipment, India has diversified in recent years with key purchases including from France as well as from the United States and Israel.
Dassault said that the jets will provide India with “state-of-the-art capabilities” and an “active role in guaranteeing national sovereignty and consolidating India’s role as a major international player.”
India’s navy is the first user outside France of the Rafale Marine jet, the company said.
Monday’s deal comes as India’s relations with arch-rival Pakistan plummet to fresh lows.
New Delhi has accused Pakistan of backing the deadliest attack on civilians in Indian-administered Kashmir since 2000 — claims Islamabad denies.
The two countries have exchanged gunfire, diplomatic barbs, expelled each other’s citizens and shut border since the April 22 attack, in which 26 men were killed.
Analysts say there is also a serious risk of the crisis turning into a military escalation.
The earlier contract for 36 Rafale aircraft, agreed in 2016, was worth about $9.4 billion.
Many global arms suppliers see the world’s most populous nation — and fifth-largest economy — a key market.
India has become the world’s largest arms importer with purchases steadily rising to account for nearly 10 percent of all imports globally in 2019-23, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) said last year.
India has also eyed with worry its northern neighbor China, especially since a deadly 2020 clash between their troops.
That sparked a wave of defense reforms in the country, with both a push for fresh contracts from foreign suppliers and simplified laws to push domestic manufacturing and co-production of critical military hardware.
This decade India has opened an expansive new helicopter factory, launched its first homemade aircraft carrier, and conducted a successful long-range hypersonic missile test.
That in turn has fostered a growing arms export market which saw sales last year worth $2.63 billion — still a tiny amount compared to established players, but a 30-fold increase in a decade.
India has deepened defense cooperation with Western countries in recent years, including the Quad alliance with the United States, Japan and Australia.
India signs deal with France for 26 Rafale fighter jets
https://arab.news/54aa4
India signs deal with France for 26 Rafale fighter jets
- Monday’s deal comes as India’s relations with Pakistan plummet to fresh lows over an attack in Kashmir
- The two nuclear-armed countries have exchanged gunfire, diplomatic barbs and expelled each other’s citizens
US court issues order limiting troop deployment in LA
- California governor earlier asked the court to block Trump administration from using troops in immigration raids
- Trump has described Los Angeles in dire terms that Governor Newsom and Mayor Karen Bass say are nowhere close to the truth
LOS ANGELES : A US federal court on Tuesday issued a temporary restraining order limiting the deployment of troops in Los Angeles after President Donald Trump sent Marines and National Guard to the city.
The government is “temporarily enjoined from ordering or deploying the Title 10 Force to enforce or aid federal agents in enforcing federal law or to take any action beyond (protecting) federal buildings,” said the order, signed by District Judge Charles Breyer.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom earlier asked the court Tuesday to block the use of the National Guard and Marines to assist with immigration raids in Los Angeles, saying the practice would only heighten tensions.
Newsom filed the emergency request after President Donald Trump ordered the deployment to LA of roughly 4,000 National Guard members and 700 Marines following protests driven by anger over the president’s stepped-up enforcement of immigration laws.
The governor’s request said it was in response to a change in orders for the Guard members, who were originally deployed to protect federal buildings. The court documents said sending troops on immigration raids would only escalate tensions and promote civil unrest.
The Marines and another 2,000 National Guard troops were ordered to LA on Monday, adding to a military presence that local officials and Newsom do not want and that the police chief says makes it harder to handle the protests safely.
Marine Corps Gen. Eric Smith said Tuesday that the Marines deployed to the area had not yet been called to respond to the protests and were there only to protect federal officials and property.
The Marines were trained for crowd control but have no arrest authority, Smith told a budget hearing on Capitol Hill.
Paul Eck, deputy general counsel in the California Military Department, said the agency was informed that the Pentagon plans to direct the California National Guard to start providing support for immigration operations. That support would include holding secure perimeters around areas where raids are taking place and securing streets for immigration agents, he said in the governor’s emergency request.
According to US officials, the California Guard members who were deployed were authorized to provide protection and secure streets and perimeters around areas where enforcement actions are taking place. The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss military operations, said the Guard members are not participating in any of the enforcement actions, but are providing security and have already been doing some of those missions in the Los Angeles area.
Trump says he’s open to using Insurrection Act
Trump left open the possibility of invoking the Insurrection Act, which authorizes the president to deploy military forces inside the US to suppress rebellion or domestic violence or to enforce the law in certain situations. It’s one of the most extreme emergency powers available to a US president.
“If there’s an insurrection, I would certainly invoke it. We’ll see,” he said Tuesday from the Oval Office. “But I can tell you last night was terrible, and the night before that was terrible.”
Trump has described Los Angeles in dire terms that Mayor Karen Bass and Newsom say are nowhere close to the truth.
While protesters blocked a major freeway and set cars on fire over the weekend, the demonstrations in the city of 4 million people have largely been centered in several blocks of downtown. On Monday, they were far less raucous, with thousands of people peacefully attending a rally at City Hall and hundreds more protesting outside a federal complex that includes a detention center where some immigrants are being held following workplace raids across the city.
Los Angeles police said they made over 100 arrests Monday evening, mostly for failing to disperse the downtown area. One person was arrested for assault with a deadly weapon and two police offers were injured, the department said.
Obscene slogans directed at Trump and federal law enforcement remained scrawled across several buildings. At the Walt Disney Concert Hall, workers were busy washing away graffiti Tuesday morning.
In nearby Santa Ana, armored Guard vehicles blocked a road leading to federal immigration and government offices. Workers swept up plastic bottles and broken glass.
Sending in the military is the latest step in the administration’s immigration crackdown as Trump pursues the mass deportations he promised last year during the presidential campaign. The protests have been driven by anger over enforcement that critics say is breaking apart migrant families.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth suggested Tuesday that the use of troops inside the US will continue to expand.
“I think we’re entering another phase, especially under President Trump with his focus on the homeland, where the National Guard and Reserves become a critical component of how we secure that homeland,” he said on Capitol Hill.
Los Angeles officials say police don’t need help
The mayor and the governor say Trump is putting public safety at risk by adding military personnel even though police say they don’t need the help.
Los Angeles Police Chief Jim McDonnell said he was confident in the police department’s ability to handle large-scale demonstrations and that the Marines’ arrival without coordinating with the police department would present a “significant logistical and operational challenge.”
The protests began Friday after federal immigration authorities arrested more than 40 people across Los Angeles and continued over the weekend as crowds blocked a major freeway and set self-driving cars on fire. Police responded with tear gas, rubber bullets and flash-bang grenades.
Demonstrations have spread to other cities nationwide, including San Francisco, as well as Dallas and Austin, Texas. Authorities in Austin said police used pepper spray balls and tear gas to disperse a crowd that threw rocks and bottles at officers Monday, injuring four.
LA response takes stage on Capitol Hill
The Pentagon said deploying the National Guard and Marines costs $134 million. That figure came out Tuesday just after Hegseth engaged in a testy back-and-forth about the costs during a congressional hearing.
The defense secretary defended Trump’s decision to send the troops, saying they are needed to protect federal agents doing their jobs.
Meanwhile, Democratic members of California’s congressional delegation on Tuesday accused the president of creating a “manufactured crisis” with his orders to send in troops.
On Monday, California Attorney General Rob Bonta filed a lawsuit over the use of National Guard troops following the first deployment, seeking an order declaring Trump’s use of the Guard unlawful and asking for a restraining order to halt the deployment.
Trump said the city would have been “completely obliterated” if he had not deployed the Guard.
US officials said the Marines were needed to protect federal buildings and personnel, including immigration agents.
Despite their presence, there has been limited engagement so far between the Guard and protesters while local law enforcement implements crowd control.
The deployment appeared to be the first time in decades that a state’s National Guard was activated without a request from its governor, a significant escalation against those who have sought to hinder the administration’s mass deportation efforts.
The last time the National Guard was activated without a governor’s permission was in 1965, when President Lyndon B. Johnson sent troops to protect a civil rights march in Alabama, according to the Brennan Center for Justice.
UN envoy to Myanmar warns that violence puts country on ‘path to self-destruction’
- The military takeover triggered intensified fighting with long-established armed militias organized by Myanmar’s ethnic minority groups in its border regions, which have struggled for decades for more autonomy
UNITED NATIONS: Myanmar is on “a path to self-destruction” if violence in the conflict-wracked Southeast Asian nation doesn’t end, the UN envoy warned on Tuesday.
Julie Bishop told the UN General Assembly that “alarmingly” the violence didn’t end after a powerful earthquake in late March devastated parts of the capital, Naypyitaw, and the country’s second-largest city, Mandalay, killing more than 3,000 people and injuring thousands more.
Ceasefires announced by some parties have largely not been observed, “embedding a crisis within a crisis,” and people in Myanmar must now deal with the raging conflict and the earthquake’s devastation, said Bishop, a former foreign minister of Australia.
“A zero-sum approach persists on all sides,” she said. “Armed clashes remain a barrier to meeting humanitarian needs. The flow of weapons into the country is fueling the expectations that a military solution is possible.”
A widespread armed struggle against military rule in Myanmar began in February 2021 after generals seized power from the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi. More than 6,600 civilians are estimated to have been killed by security forces, according to figures compiled by nongovernmental organizations.
The military takeover triggered intensified fighting with long-established armed militias organized by Myanmar’s ethnic minority groups in its border regions, which have struggled for decades for more autonomy. It also led to the formation of pro-democracy militias that support a national unity government established by elected lawmakers barred from taking their seats after the army takeover.
More than 22,000 political prisoners are still in detention, Bishop said, including Suu Kyi, who turns 80 on June 19, and the ousted president, Win Myint.
The UN envoy said she detected “some openness to political dialogue with some regional support, but there is not yet broader agreement on how to move forward.”
In meetings with the country’s leaders, Bishop said she encouraged them to reconsider their strategy, which has left the country more divided. She also warned against elections, planned for December or January, saying they risk fueling greater resistance and instability unless there is an end to the violence and they can be held in an inclusive and transparent way.
Bishop said she has been coordinating further action with Othman Hashim, the special envoy for Myanmar from the 10-nation Association of Southeast Asian Nations, known as ASEAN, and they agreed to visit Myanmar together.
The UN envoy said she had a meeting online on Monday with representatives of the Rohingya minority from Myanmar and Bangladesh.
She said the situation for the Rohingya in Myanmar’s northern Rakhine state remains dire, with up to 80 percent of civilians living in poverty and caught in crossfire between the government’s military forces and the Arakan Army, the well-armed military wing of the Rakhine ethnic minority, and “subject to forced recruitment and other abuses.”
More than 700,000 Muslim Rohingya fled to Bangladesh from Myanmar starting in late August 2017 when Myanmar’s military launched a “clearance operation.” Members of the ethnic group face discrimination and are denied citizenship and other rights in the Buddhist-majority nation.
Bishop said there’s hope that a high-level conference on the Rohingya and other minorities called for by the UN General Assembly on Sept. 30 will put a spotlight on the urgency of finding “durable solutions” to their plight.
US denounces UK, allies’ sanctions on Israeli far-right ministers
- Five Western countries imposed sanctions on Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir for 'repeated incitements of violence' against Palestinians
WASHINGTON: The United States on Tuesday denounced sanctions by Britain and four mutual allies against Israeli far-right ministers, saying they should focus instead on the Palestinian armed group Hamas.
“We find that extremely unhelpful. It will do nothing to get us closer to a ceasefire in Gaza,” State Department spokeswoman Tammy Bruce told reporters.
Britain, Canada, Norway, New Zealand and Australia “should focus on the real culprit, which is Hamas,” she said of the sanctions.
“We remain concerned about any step that would further isolate Israel from the international community,” she said.
The five Western countries imposed sanctions on Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir for “repeated incitements of violence” against Palestinians.
The two ministers faced repeated criticism but no formal sanctions under former US president Joe Biden. Since taking office, President Donald Trump has vowed unstinting support for Israel.
“If our allies want to help, they should focus on supporting Special Envoy (Steve) Witkoff’s negotiations and backing the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation when it comes to food and aid,” she said.
The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation has distributed aid in coordination with the Israeli military, an effort criticized by the United Nations and longstanding aid groups, which say it violates humanitarian principles.
Philippines Senate returns Sara Duterte impeachment case to lower house
- After a series of debates among members, the senators voted in favor of returning it to the lower house to certify that the complaint was constitutional
MANILA: Philippine senators on Tuesday voted to send an impeachment case against Vice President Sara Duterte back to the lower house for clarification, just hours after convening a trial that could see her banned from politics for life.
After a series of debates among members that included a motion presented by a Duterte ally to dismiss the case, the senators voted in favor of returning it to the lower house to certify that the complaint was constitutional.
The lower house in February voted to impeach the vice president for alleged high crimes and betrayal of the public trust, allegations she has vehemently denied. A majority of the senators on Tuesday approved a motion to return the case to confirm the complaint did not violate the constitution and the next session of Congress was “willing and ready” to pursue the impeachment complaint following midterm elections in May.
The decision could be a stay of execution for Duterte, a likely contender to be the next president, in a trial that could be a pivotal moment in Philippine politics.
The outcome of the trial could not only make or break Duterte, but also carries big implications for President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and his agenda for the remaining three years of his presidency and beyond. The impeachment accusations against Duterte range from budget anomalies to amassing unusual wealth and threatening the lives of Marcos, his wife, and the house speaker. She rejects the allegations and on Tuesday, her office said the impeachment process had been weaponized.
The trial of the popular daughter of firebrand former President Rodrigo Duterte follows an acrimonious falling-out with former ally Marcos, who ran on a joint ticket that won the 2022 election in a landslide.
Marcos is limited to a single term in office and is expected to try to retain future influence by grooming a successor capable of fending off Duterte in the next election if she is acquitted. The president has distanced himself from the impeachment process, even though it was launched by his legislative allies.
Sara Duterte is the fifth top official in the Philippines to be impeached, only one of whom, Renato Corona, a former chief justice of the Supreme Court, was convicted.
US imposes sanctions on a Palestinian NGO and other charities, accusing them of ties to militant groups
- Those sanctioned include Addameer, a nongovernmental organization that was founded in 1991 and is based in the city of Ramallah in the Israeli-occupied West Bank
WASHINGTON: The US Treasury Department on Tuesday imposed sanctions on a major Palestinian legal group for prisoners and detainees along with five other charitable entities across the Middle East, Africa and Europe, accusing them of supporting Palestinian armed factions and militant groups, including Hamas’ military wing, under the pretense of humanitarian aid in Gaza.
Those sanctioned include Addameer, a nongovernmental organization that was founded in 1991 and is based in the city of Ramallah in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
The Palestinian group provides free legal services to Palestinian political prisoners and detainees in Israeli custody and monitors the conditions of their confinement.
The federal government claims that Addameer “has long supported and is affiliated” with the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, a secular, left-wing movement with a political party and an armed wing that has carried out deadly attacks against Israelis. Israel and the United States have labeled the PFLP a terrorist organization.
Addameer did not immediately have a comment on the sanctions.
Israel has alleged that Addameer funds terrorism, a claim that the United Nations previously said it could not support with compelling evidence. In a 2022 report on human rights practices, the US State Department noted Israel’s arrest of Salah Hammouri, a French-Palestinian human rights lawyer and an Addameer employee, in a section on “retribution against human rights defenders.”
The organization also works with Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and is a member of the World Organization Against Torture.
Israel’s 2022 storming of Addameer’s offices, prompted a rebuke from the UN, who said in a statement that Israel had not provided convincing evidence to support the claim. The UN said Addameer was conducting “critical human rights, humanitarian and development work in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.”
In February, Zachor Legal Institute, an Israeli-American advocacy group that says it focuses on combatting antisemitism and terrorism, requested Addameer be added to Treasury’s sanctions list. The letter, which was written by Zachor, signed by 44 other groups and is addressed to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, relies in part on undisclosed evidence from the Israeli Security Agency in its call for sanctions on Addameer.
Marc Greendorfer, president of Zachor Legal Institute said in an email to the Associated Press that his group is “very pleased to see Treasury following up on our request.” He said the federal government should act “to prevent hostile foreign actors from spreading hate and violence in the United States. We applaud Treasury’s action and encourage Treasury to expand its focus to the other groups that we identified.”
