NEW YORK, 10 August 2022, (TON): The US supports the ‘one-China’ policy, the visit to Taiwan was not an attempt to change it, US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi said in an interview with the NBC.

Pelosi stressed that all she wanted was to show China that the United States supported Taiwan. According to her, the American delegation didn’t go to Taiwan to change the ‘one-China’ policy, to which the US was still committed.

Pelosi said “she had gone there to recognize the status quo.”

She added “there was nothing destabilizing about the trip.”

Pelosi visited Taiwan on August 2 to 3. The trip drew sharp criticism from mainland China.

Beijing has repeatedly warned Washington that it would retaliate if the visit by Pelosi, the third most important post in the US government hierarchy, took place.

PINGTUNG, 10 August 2022, (TON): Taiwan warned “Chinese military drills aren’t just a rehearsal for an invasion of the self-governing island but also reflect ambitions to control large swaths of the western Pacific, as Taipei conducted its own exercises to underscore it’s ready to defend itself.”

Angered by U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s recent visit to Taiwan, China has sent military ships and planes across the midline that separates the two sides in the Taiwan Strait and launched missiles into waters surrounding the island.

The drills, which began, have disrupted flights and shipping in one of the busiest zones for global trade.

Ignoring calls to calm tensions, Beijing instead extended the exercises without announcing when they will end.

Taiwanese Foreign Minister Joseph Wu said that beyond aiming to annex the island democracy, which split with the mainland amid civil war in 1949, China wants to establish its dominance in the western Pacific.

JERUSALEM, 10 August 2022, (TON): Israeli President Isaac Herzog spoke with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday about Russia’s attempt to ban the world’s biggest Jewish nonprofit group, which helps Jews move to Israel.

Russia’s Justice Ministry is seeking to liquidate the Russian branch of the Jewish Agency for Israel for alleged breaches of privacy laws.

Some Israeli politicians have expressed concern that Russia may be retaliating for Israel’s criticism of its invasion of Ukraine, and about the effect that bilateral tensions might have on Russia’s own Jewish community.

Some also worry that it could damage Russian-Israeli communications on Syria, where Moscow deploys air power in support of the government and Israel has attacked what it describes as Iranian-linked military targets.

Herzog’s statement said “the phone call was frank and honest. The two presidents emphasised the important areas of cooperation between Israel and Russia and agreed to remain in contact.”

MOSCOW, 10 August 2022, (TON): Blasts rocked a Russian air base near seaside resorts in the annexed Crimean peninsula, injuring five people according to local authorities in what Moscow attributed to detonations in ammunition stories.

Local witnesses told Reuters they heard at least 12 explosions around 3:20 p.m. local time  from the Saky air base near Novofedorivka on Crimea’s western coast.

They described a final blast around 30 minutes later as the loudest.

Crimea has so far been spared the intense bombardment and artillery combat that have taken place in other areas of eastern and southern Ukraine since Feb. 24, when President Vladimir Putin ordered Russian armed forces into Ukraine – including some based in the peninsula.

Russia’s defence ministry said the “detonation of several aviation ammunition stores” had caused an explosion, Russian news agencies reported, but that there had been no injuries.

ANKARA, 10 August 2022, (TON): A series of diplomatic wins, capped by the deal to resume Ukraine’s grain exports, provides some respite for President Tayyip Erdogan from Turkey’s economic strife and offers a blueprint of his campaign strategy for elections due next year.

As he prepares for what is shaping up to be the biggest electoral challenge of his nearly 20-year rule, the president is playing up his achievements on the global stage.

“Turkey is going through its strongest period politically, militarily and diplomatically,” he told a crowd of thousands of people in northwest Turkey at the weekend, a day after holding talks in Russia with President Vladimir Putin.

KYIV, 10 August 2022, (TON): Kyiv and Moscow traded blame for the weekend shelling of Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear complex amid international alarm that their battle for control of the plant could trigger catastrophe.

Calling any attack on a nuclear plant suicidal,” United Nations chief Antonio Guterres demanded UN nuclear inspectors be given access to Zaporizhzhia, the largest complex of its kind in Europe.

Russia’s invading forces seized the southern Ukrainian region containing Zaporizhzhia in March, when the site was struck without damage to its reactors. The area, including the city of Kherson, is now the target of a Ukrainian counter-offensive.

Ukraine appealed for the area around the complex to be demilitarised and for the International Atomic Energy Agency, the UN’s nuclear watchdog, to be let in. Russia said it too favored an IAEA visit, which it accused Ukraine of blocking while trying to take Europe hostage by shelling the plant.

WASHINGTON, 10 August 2022, (TON): A senior Pentagon official estimated Monday that as many as 80,000 Russians have been killed or wounded in Ukraine since the war began in late February

Under Secretary of Defense Colin Kahl said “the Russians have probably taken 70 or 80,000 casualties in less than six months.”

Kahl also said “Russian forces have also lost three or four thousand armored vehicles, and could be running low on available precision-guided missiles, including air and sea-launched cruise missiles, after firing a large number on Ukraine targets since launching the invasion on February 24.”

He told reporters “those losses are pretty remarkable considering the Russians have achieved none of Vladimir Putin’s objectives at the beginning of the war.”

He said “the slowdown in Russian forces’ use of longer range and precision guided missiles was an indicator that their supplies had fallen close to what Moscow needed to hold in reserve for other contingencies.”

DHAKA, 10 August 2022, (TON): ASEAN Dhaka Committee on Monday celebrated the 55th anniversary of the founding of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations at the embassy of the Republic of Indonesia.

Foreign minister AK Abdul Momen joined the event as chief guest by delivering a pre-recorded video speech.

Haji Haris Haji Othman, high commissioner of Brunei Darussalam, Heru Hartanto Subolo, ambassador of the Republic of Indonesia, Haznah Md Hashim, high commissioner of Malaysia, Aung Kyaw Moe, ambassador of the Republic of the Union of Myanmar, Makawadee Sumitmor, ambassador of the Kingdom of Thailand, Pham Viet Chien ،foreign ministry officials and diplomats from ASEAN member states were present.

The celebration started with the ASEAN flag raising ceremony followed by ASEAN food festival, which reflects ASEAN unity and harmony based on cultural diversity.

Ambassador Aung Kyaw Moe, the current chair of ADC, highlighted the achievements of ASEAN throughout the past 55 years since its founding; the activities of ADC, the cordial relations between ASEAN countries and Bangladesh as well as the cruciality of ‘ASEAN Unity’ among the member states.

The ADC was established in the year 2014 and is comprised of eight ASEAN missions based in Dhaka.

DHAKA, 10 August 2022, (TON): Foreign Secretary Masud Bin Momen said “the US yesterday agreed to provide financial assistance for the Rohingyas in Bhasan Char, which can help mitigate the funding challenges for those sheltered in the island.”

Bangladesh and UN signed an MoU in October last year, but the US initially refrained from funding amid severe criticism of relocation of Rohingyas from Cox's Bazar to the island in Noakhali.

Currently, around 20,000 Rohingyas are living in the island.

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The government wants to relocate at least 80,000 more people who have sought refuge in Bangladesh from a brutal military crackdown in Myanmar's Rakhine State.

WASHINGTON, 10 August 2022, (TON): President Joe Biden formally welcomed Finland and Sweden joining the NATO alliance as he signed the instruments of ratification that delivered the US’s formal backing of the Nordic nations entering the mutual defense pact, part of a reshaping of the European security posture after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Biden said at the signing as he called the partnership “in seeking to join NATO, Finland and Sweden are making a sacred commitment that an attack against one is an attack against all.”

The US became the 23rd ally to approve NATO membership for the two countries. Biden said “he spoke with the heads of both nations before signing the ratification and urged the remaining NATO members to finish their own ratification process as quickly as possible.”

The Senate last week approved the two, once-non-aligned nations joining the alliance in a rare 95-1 vote that Biden said shows the world that “the United States of America can still do big things” with a sense of political unity.