KYIV, 30 November 2022, (TON): NATO allies promised more arms for Kyiv and equipment to help restore Ukrainian power and heat knocked out by Russian missile and drone strikes, as air raid sirens blared across Ukraine for the first time this week.

Ukrainians fled the streets for bomb shelters, although the all-clear later sounded across the country. In the eastern Donetsk region Russian forces pounded Ukrainian targets with artillery, mortar and tank fire.

Foreign ministers from the NATO alliance, including US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, began a two-day meeting in Bucharest, seeking ways both to keep Ukrainians safe and warm and to sustain Kyiv’s military through a coming winter campaign.

By Ali hassan
Sri Lanka is facing its worst economic crisis since its independence from the United Kingdom in 1948. As in the period of independence it was not expected that Sri-Lanka would go under such crises but bad governance and poor policies not only led Sri-Lanka to food crises but it has been enduring soaring inflation, power blackouts, and fuel rationing since last year severely. The main reasons which caused food insecurity in Sri Lanka and which has increased dramatically are reduced domestic agricultural production, scarcity of foreign exchange reserves and depreciation of the local currency which further caused food shortages and a spike in the cost of living, which is limiting people’s access to healthy and affordable meals. Moreover, Sri-Lanka came on the heels of successive waves of COVID-19 threatening to undo years of development progress, severely undermining the country’s ability to achieve the UN’s 2030 Sustainable Development Goals.
However, before the economic crisis and the pandemic, malnutrition rates across Sri Lanka were already high. Before the COVID-19 pandemic, Sri Lankan women and children suffered from far higher rates of malnutrition than most other middle-income countries. According to an estimate 17 percent of children aged fewer than 5 in Sri-Lanka were too short because of stunting in addition 15 percent were too thin for their height. Hence sustainable development and constructive way of economic growth became impossible as most of the people of Sri-Lanka were not able to work mainly due to heath sickness and disabilities.
In June 2022 UN agencies had estimated that 1.7 million out of the 22 million populations in Sri Lanka are dependent and required help. Moreover, the number of people in Sri Lanka needing urgent humanitarian help has doubled to 3.4 million, which is an alarming situation and hence more than 6 million people nearly 30 percent of the population are currently food-insecure and require humanitarian assistance. Further in contemporary poverty rate in the South Asian nation has doubled to 25.6 percent this year, up from 13.1 percent last year. Viewing the current situation the United Nations has warned of a worsening food crisis in the south Asian island nation that declared itself bankrupt in July amid an unprecedented economic crisis.
UN agencies working in Sri Lanka in a joint statement declared that they had raised $79m to feed that in need, but the increasing number of poor people meant an additional $70m was needed. The UN said its revised plan aims at feeding 2.1 million people, including pregnant mothers and school children and providing livelihood support to 1.5 million farmers and fishermen.The country defaulted on its $51bn external debt in mid-April and is in talks with the IMF for a $2.9bn bailout. Moreover months of protests against high prices and shortages of food and medicines just led to the toppling of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa in July. There was no plenary action which could possible taken in order to meet the response of the protestors due to economic crises.
The latest WFP assessment reveals that 86 percent of families are buying cheaper, less nutritious food, eating less and in some cases skipping meals altogether. In addition, weather extremes such as droughts, floods and landslides are heightening food and nutrition insecurity. Moreover, The World Food Programme (WFP) has been working with the Government of Sri Lanka since 1968 to address malnutrition, support families to access food and improve the productivity and incomes of smallholder farmers.WFP supports school-aged children in food insecure areas to access to food year-round, provides children aged under 5, adolescent girls and women of reproductive age with nutritious food and helps communities prepare for and respond to climate shocks. Gender empowerment is integrated into all of WFP’s activities, to promote equality and strengthen food and nutrition security for women and girls.
WFP is scaling up its operations to support 3.4 million people between June and December 2022 whose food security, nutrition and livelihoods are at risk.Since mid-2020, food prices worldwide have been consistently rising. The pandemic, and subsequently, the Russian invasion of Ukraine, have exacerbated food inflation and increased the cost of importing food. Similarly, increased crude oil prices as well as the disruption in fertilizer supplies have raised fertilizer prices. Sri Lanka’s dwindling foreign currency reserves in the aftermath of reduced tourist inflows due to the pandemic, further compounded by tax cuts has led to a precarious fiscal position. In this backdrop, importing food and fertilizer is a challenge for Sri Lanka.
As an emergency response, international organizations have begun humanitarian programs targeting the country’s vulnerable segments. The WFP has already been distributing food vouchers to pregnant women in underserved districts of Colombo. Further, FAO and WFP are closely monitoring the food security situation in Sri Lanka and have just concluded a Crop and Food Security Assessment Mission (CFSAM). Asian Development Bank, upon the request of the government of Sri Lanka is preparing an emergency assistance package in close coordination with the World Bank, the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, IMF, and the United Nations agencies.
ADB joins six other International Financial Institutions to address food security, which includes the African Development Bank (AfDB), European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), World Bank, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD). ADB is also working to establish a food security support program to mobilize more resources to promote food security and resilience of food system.

RIYADH, 29 November 2022, (TON): The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization has lauded the Kingdom for its its climate change commitments such as the Saudi Green Initiative and the Middle East Green Initiative, environment protection and energy transition programs.
In an exclusive interview with Arab News, the FAO’s Assistant Director General and Regional Representative for the Near East and North Africa Abdulhakim Elwaer said that this was the view of FAO’s Director-General QU Dongyu.
Elwaer said "the FAO’s director general, who had recently visited the Kingdom, had signed an agreement with the International Date Council headquartered in Riyadh to boost the industry in preparation for the International Year of the Date Palm 2027."

AL-MUKALLA, 29 November 2022, (TON): Rashad Al-Alimi, the chairperson of Yemen’s Presidential Leadership Council, arrived in the Jordanian capital Amman in his continuing efforts to build international support for punishing the Iran-backed Houthis for their escalating attacks on government-controlled areas and the country’s oil infrastructure.
Yemen’s official Saba News Agency reported that Al-Alimi, who was accompanied by two council members, will meet King Abdullah II and other Jordanian officials to discuss the war in Yemen and lobby for international support to counter Houthi threats to international maritime traffic off the coast of the country.
Yemen’s internationally recognized government has stepped up its diplomatic pressure to gain international support for labeling the Houthi militia as a terrorist group and persuade the world to publicly denounce them for targeting oil terminals in southern Yemen over the past two months.

KYIV, 29 November 2022, (TON): The Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in southern Ukraine remains under Russian control, authorities installed by Moscow in the nearby city of Enerhodar said, after a Ukrainian official suggested Russian forces were preparing to leave.
Russia-installed administration wrote on the Telegram messaging app “the media are actively spreading fake news that Russia is allegedly planning to withdraw from Enerhodar and leave the. This information is not true."
The head of Ukraine’s state-run nuclear energy company said on Sunday there were signs that Russian forces might be preparing to vacate the vast Zaporizhzhia plant which they seized in March, soon after invading Ukraine.

OTTAWA, 29 November 2022, (TON): Canada's Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has paid a visit to the indigenous community where 11 people were killed in a stabbing spree earlier this year.
Mr Trudeau visited James Smith Cree Nation in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan three months after the September attacks.
He paid his respects at the burial site of victims and met local leaders.
Mr Trudeau also announced C$62.5m (£38.7m) in funding for the First Nations community.

ANKARA, 29 November 2022, (TON): Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said "Turkiye and Egypt could reappoint ambassadors and restore full diplomatic ties between the two countries within months."
His announcement came just days after Turkiye’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan revealed plans to meet with Syrian President Bashar Assad when conditions are right in a bid to rebuild relations.
Ankara has recently attempted to mend bridges with several nations in the region, and the warming of bonds with Egypt follows years of tensions since the 2013 ouster of former Egyptian President Mohammed Mursi, of the Muslim Brotherhood, in a military coup.

MOSCOW, 29 November 2022, (TON): The United States and Russia are discussing the release of basketball star Brittney Griner and ex-marine Paul Whelan through special channels, the RIA Novosti news agency reported, citing a top US diplomat.
Elizabeth Rood, charge d’affaires of the US embassy in Russia, was quoted as saying that the United States had submitted a serious proposal for consideration but it had not received a serious response back from Russia.
Russia and the United States have been discussing a deal that could see Griner, who is facing nine years in jail in Russia on drug charges, return to the United States in exchange for convicted Russian weapons trafficker Viktor Bout.

DHAKA, 29 November 2022, (TON): The Embassy of Netherlands in Dhaka and the International Organization for Migration have signed an agreement based on which the Netherlands will provide $7.5 million to IOM for the implementation of the “Restoring the Environment and Strengthening Resilience of Rohingya Refugees and Host Communities in Cox's Bazar” project.
The project aims to provide multi-sectoral support assistance for the Rohingya refugees and the host communities in Cox's Bazar.
On Monday, an exchange of notes was signed by Charge d'Affaires Thijs Woudstra, deputy ambassador of the Netherlands to Bangladesh, and Fathima Nusrath Ghazzali, officer in charge of IOM Bangladesh at the IOM Office in Dhaka.
Cox's Bazar district, currently hosting nearly one million Rohingya refugees since 2017, is prone to natural disasters and climate change impacts.

LONDON, 29 November 2022, (TON): A row is brewing in the UK after Amnesty International condemned a group of Conservative MPs who called on Prime Minister Rishi Sunak to return Albanian asylum-seekers to their home country including those claiming to be victims of human trafficking.
The UK has witnessed a marked increase in the number of Albanians coming to the country in the past 12 months, with many who cross the English Channel in small boats claiming they have been trafficked, and are victims of modern slavery.
The group of more than 50 politicians said moves to expedite the process of deporting Albanians was necessary to dissuade migrants from making the journey from what, they said, was a safe country, and reduce significant backlogs in the UK’s asylum process.
In a letter to Sunak, the MPs said “if they have really been taken against their will, then they could not reasonably object to being returned to their own homes."