DHAKA, 02 September 2021, (TON): Around 30 percent of the country's area is set to be inundated as the water level of the Jamuna and Padma is forecast to continue rising over the next three days.

The Flood Forecasting and Warning Centre (FFWC) said “the overall flood situation will worsen in 11 districts -- Kurigram, Gaibandha, Jamalpur, Bogura, Tangail, Sirajganj, Pabna, Tangail, Manikganj, Faridpur and Shariatpur -- by today morning.”

"The water level will increase for the next three days and by then around 30 percent of the country would be flooded," Arifuzzaman Bhuiyan, executive engineer of FFWC flood forecasting and warning centre, told The Daily Star.

Structures of a house being moved elsewhere on a boat as Padma erosion has taken a serious turn in Munshiganj’s Tongibari upazila. Photo: Mostafa Shabuj, Palash Khan.

The FFWC bulletin said “of 109 water measuring points in different rivers, water is flowing above the danger level at 16 points while water levels at another 50 points are increasing.”

Our correspondents from the flood affected districts reported that people of those districts have been forced to leave their homes due to their houses being flooded and a lack of food and drinking water. A few lakh people are enduring hardships in those districts, they said.

In Kurigram, around 50,000 flood victims on the banks of the Brahmaputra, Dharla and Dudhkumar rivers are facing crises of food and pure drinking water.

BRUSSELS, 02 September 2021, (TON): The EU countries did not have the courage to offer asylum to Afghan refugees, said European Parliament President David Sassoli.

We were very disappointed with yesterday’s Home Affairs Council conclusions.

Sassoli said “we have seen countries outside the European Union come forward to welcome Afghan asylum seekers, but we have not seen a single member state do the same. Everyone rightly thought of those who worked with us and their families, but none had the courage to offer refuge to those whose lives are still in danger today.”

“We cannot pretend that the Afghan question does not concern us, because we participated in that mission and shared its objectives and aims.”

Further he said that “a strong and common European voice on the international stage is more necessary now than ever. Europe must take its place, make its voice heard, define its strategic interests also in the framework of the Transatlantic Alliance, in order to be able to carry out stabilization, peace building, and development action together with our partners in a multilateral framework.”

This goes hand in hand with the need to move forward together towards a true common security and defence policy, without which we will remain dependent on the goodwill of other great powers and expose ourselves to the threats of authoritarian regimes.

For this we must also take an ambitious step forward and consider qualified majority voting in the Council whenever possible, to ensure the speed and effectiveness of our common external action.

NAYPYITAW, 02 September 2021, (TON): Hundreds of police officers and soldiers arrested 31 young men from three villages in rural Sintgaing Township in Mandalay Region.

The troops travelled to Mon Pin, Kan Gyi and Ywar Bo villages in 10 military trucks and detained those they met on site.

The troops arrived in Mon Pin, around a one-hour drive from downtown Sintgaing, at around 6am and arrested around 25 people, mostly men in their 20s, after ransacking the village for an hour.

“They didn’t say what they were looking for. They were basically here for illegal portering,” a Mon Pin resident said, referring to the longtime military practice of forcing local men to carry goods, work as guides, or otherwise serve the army.

The local said “many fled the village. Those who were left were arrested,”,

He added that the young men who were detained were farmers and not involved in political activities.

Another local said that the mass arrests follow frequent raids on villages around Sintgaing, carried out since an alleged military informant was shot and killed in July by anti-junta resistance forces.

He said “I think they were looking for members of the local People’s Defence Force [PDF] but the people who were arrested were just civilians.”

DHAKA, 02 September 2021, (TON): Foreign Minister of Bangladesh Dr Momen said that Bangladesh wants safe, dignified and voluntary return of the Rohingya in a conducive environment in Myanmar.

Bangladesh has stressed on the international community’s responsibility towards establishing and supporting accountability and justice for the massive human rights violations perpetrated against Rohingyas in Myanmar.

In a meeting with United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet in Geneva, Foreign Minister Dr AK Abdul Momen also reiterated Bangladesh’s strong commitment to promoting the safe, dignified and voluntary return of the Rohingya in a conducive environment in Myanmar.

According to the Foreign Ministry “he conveyed Bangladesh’s readiness to work with Myanmar, UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNCHR), Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) and other concerned parties to bring about sustainable and durable solution.”

Dr Momen is on a three-day visit to Geneva to participate in the Asia-Pacific regional review meeting of the LDCs, convened jointly by the Government of Bangladesh, UN-OHRLLS and UN-ESCAP at the UN Headquarters in Geneva in preparation for the Fifth UN Conference on the Least Developed Countries (UNLDC-5).

KABUL, 01 September 2021, (TON): Celebratory gunfire echoed across Kabul as Taliban fighters took control of the airport before dawn on Tuesday following the withdrawal of the last US troops, ending 20 years of war that left the group stronger than it was in 2001.
Shaky video footage distributed by the Taliban showed fighters entering the airport after the last US troops took off a minute before midnight, marking the end of a hasty and humiliating exit for Washington and its Nato allies.
“The last US soldier has left Kabul airport and our country gained complete independence,” Taliban spokesman Qari Yusuf said.
The US Army shared an image taken with night-vision optics of the last US soldier to step aboard the final evacuation flight out of Kabul — Major General Chris Donahue, commander of the 82nd Airborne Division.
America's longest war took the lives of nearly 2,500 US troops and an estimated 240,000 Afghans, and cost some $2 trillion.

BERLIN, 01 September 2021, (TON): Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said Germany will wait for the Taliban to install a new government to see if the Islamists will honour their pledge to allow civilians to leave Afghanistan on flights from Kabul airport.
Maas said during a news conference in Islamabad with his Pakistani counterpart Shah Mehmood Qureshi"The Taliban have promised, but in the coming days and weeks we will find out whether we can count on that.”
“The Taliban want to install a new government, and this will give us an indication whether our request that it be inclusive is met,” he added.

ISLAMABAD, 01 September 2021, (TON): A microfinance pioneer from Pakistan who developed an interest-free microfinance programme was among Tuesday's winners of Asia's equivalent to the Nobel Prize.
Muhammad Amjad Saqib, 64, won the Ramon Magsaysay Award for his “first-of-its-kind” interest- and collateral-free microfinance programme that catalysed scores of poor households.
Nearly two decades after its launch, Akhuwat founded by Dr Saqib has grown into the nation's largest microfinance institution, distributing the equivalent of $900 million and boasting an almost 100 per cent loan repayment rate, the award foundation said.
Saqib, who uses places of worship to hand out money, was cited for “his inspiring belief that human goodness and solidarity will find ways to eradicate poverty.”

MINSK, 01 September 2021, (TON): The American embassy in Minsk reduced its staff at the request of the Belarusian authorities .
Said in a statement the embassy on Facebook “Today is the second time in three months diplomats have been forced to leave Belarus in connection with the regrettable decision of the (government) to limit the interaction and dialogue We say goodbye to them, and they say goodbye to you -. With the Belarusian people ."
Relations between the United States and Belarus deteriorated in the summer of 2020 shortly after the presidential elections in the republic, which were won by Alexander Lukashenko .
Washington did not recognize him as the legally elected head of state and, following Brussels and London, announced the imposition of sanctions against the Belarusian au-thorities. After that, the Be-larusian and American si-des mutually reduced the n-umber of employees in the embassies several times d-ue to political differences.

ISLAMABAD, 01 September 2021, (TON): Prime Minister Imran Khan emphasised that urgent steps were needed to stabilise the security situation in Afghanistan and address the country's humanitarian needs.
He made the comment during a meeting with German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas who called on the premier in Islamabad. They exchanged views on the situation in Afghanistan and relations between Germany and Pakistan, the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) said.
During the meeting, Prime Minister Imran emphasised that a peaceful and stable Afghanistan was "vitally important" for Pakistan as well as the South Asian region, the PMO said.
It was important for the international community to remain in support and solidarity with Afghans at this "pivotal moment" in the war-torn country's history, the premier said.
"The prime minister underlined that urgent steps were needed to stabilise the security situation, address humanitarian needs, and ensure economic stability in Afghanistan.
"These would require sustained engagement with Afghanistan," the PMO quoted the premier as saying.
He added that the two countries should work closely for the promotion of shared interests relating to regional peace and stability.

COLOMBO, 01 September 2021, (TON): Sri Lanka has declared a state of emergency over food shortages as private banks run out of foreign exchange to finance imports.
With the country suffering a hard-hitting economic crisis, President Gotabaya Rajapaksa on Tuesday said he has ordered emergency regulations to counter the hoarding of sugar, rice and other essential foods.
The regulations give wide powers to officials to seize food stocks held by traders, arrest people who hoard essential food and for the government to fix controlled prices.
Rajapaksa has named a top army officer as Commissioner General of Essential Services to coordinate the supply of paddy, rice, sugar and other consumer goods.
Trade Minister Bandula Gunawardena said some traders were hoarding stocks, resulting in shortages of food items and causing inconvenience to the public.