DHAKA, 7 April, 2021 (TON): On Tuesday, at least 20 people were injured in a blast at the residence of a Bangladesh municipality Mayor.

At 2100 hours, the incident took place when Haji Abdus Salam, the Mayor of Mirkadim Mirkadim municipality in Munshiganj district, was attending a meeting with councilors and other officials in the second floor of the building.

The injured people included four councilors and the Mayor's wife. Salam however, remained safe.

Twelve of the injured were immediately taken to the Sheikh Hasina National Institute of Burn and Plastic Surgery in Dhaka, while one person is undergoing treatment at Munshiganj General Hospital.

However, the reason behind the blast remained unclear, Abu Bakar Siddique, officer-in-charge of Munshiganj Sadar Police Station said.

NEW DELHI, 7 April, 2021 (TON): On Thursday, the Indian PM Modi will chair a meeting of the High-Level Committee.

The meeting will be held in commemoration of the 400^th birth anniversary (Prakash Purab) of Guru Tegh Bahadur, ninth of the ten Gurus who founded the Sikh religion, the head of the followers of Sikhism from 1665 until his beheading in 1675.

Union Home Minister Amit Shah will also attend the meeting which will discuss the year-long calendar of events planned to mark this special occasion.

The High-Level Committee was constituted by the Central government on 24 October last year to approve policies, plans and programs with 70 members including the PM as chairman.

TRIPOLI, 7 April, 2021 (TON): On Tuesday, the Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi arrived in Libya.

In Italian PM’s first trip outside Italy, he met the Libyan PM Abdul Hamid Dbeibah.

The meeting comes as Italy tries to reassert its role as a prominent ally of Libya after being pushed aside in recent years by Turkey, Russia, France and nations eager to influence the precarious political situation.

Additionally, efforts to stop the flow of migrants through Libya and across the Mediterranean also included.

However, the political crisis in the region seems to improve as the Libya has seen renewed interests from the international community since UN-mediated talks in February to form an interim unity was agreed to.

Moreover, last week, France announced to reopen its embassy in Libya's capital Tripoli and demanded the immediate withdrawal of foreign fighters.

RAMALLAH, 7 April, 2021 (TON): Israel has been accused of interfering in 22 May legislative polls.

The accusations were led by the Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas-led Fatah party and the Islamic Hamas movement.

The member of the Fatah Central Committee, Jamal Muheisen said, "Israel arrested on Tuesday morning four candidates who are on Fatah electoral list from East Jerusalem shortly before holding a meeting to discuss preparing their campaign for running in the legislative elections."

"Israel is banning all kinds of activities in East Jerusalem that are related to the Palestinian elections, mainly holding rallies and meetings in the city," he added.

Hamas spokesman in Gaza, Fawzi Barhoum said, "Arresting one of our candidates is a blatant interference in the Palestinian elections and reflects the endless Israeli attempts to sabotage the electoral process."

He called on the international community and the international human rights organizations to immediately act to protect the Palestinian electoral process and put an end to the Israeli measures and violations against the Palestinians.

Moreover, Palestine has also addressed letters to international parties, urging them to exert pressure on Israel to allow holding the Palestinian elections in East Jerusalem.

CAIRO, 7 April, 2021 (TON): Recent negotiations in DRC over the disputed GERD on the Nile River made no progress and failed to reach an agreement, the Egyptian Foreign Ministry maintained.

In a statement issued on Tuesday, Ahmed Hafez, spokesperson of the foreign ministry, "The latest African Union (AU)-sponsored talks that sought to re-launch the deadlocked negotiations for reaching a deal over the filling and operation of the dam came with no progress due to persisting differences."

The media cited the official saying Ethiopia refused the Sudanese proposal that has been approved by Egypt.

The proposal included forming an international quartet committee headed by the AU to mediate the three countries' conflicts.

He added Ethiopia has also rejected all the other alternatives that Egypt has proposed to develop the negotiation process.

He said, "Rejection of the Egyptian proposals that were welcomed by Sudan revealed the absence of Ethiopia's political willing to resume negotiation with good intentions.”

"Egypt is ready to cooperate with Felix Tshisekedi, the president of DR Congo and current chairman of the AU, for finding a solution for the GERD issue in a way that maintains the interests of the three countries and enhances the regional stability," Hafez said.

However, Ethiopia started building the GERD in 2011, while Egypt is concerned that the dam might affect its 55.5-billion-cubic-metre annual share of the Nile water. Meanwhile, Sudan has recently been raising similar concerns over the $4 billion dam as a direct threat to Sudan's national security.

BEIJING, 7 April, 2021 (TON): On Tuesday, China's State Council Information Office issued a white paper titled “Poverty Alleviation: China's Experience and Contribution.”

The paper was issued to record the course of the Chinese people's great fight in eliminating extreme poverty, introduce China's approach, and share its experience and actions in poverty alleviation.

The white paper consists of five parts, besides the preface and conclusion; "The Solemn Commitment of the CPC," "Final Victory in the Fight against Extreme Poverty," "The Strategy of Targeted Poverty Alleviation," "Exploring a New Path of Poverty Alleviation" and "A Global Community of Shared Future Free from Poverty."

However, China is home to nearly one fifth of the world's population and its complete eradication of extreme poverty is a milestone in the history of the Chinese nation and the history of humankind as it indicates courage, vision, sense of responsibility, and the eagerness to take on challenges.

THIMPHU, 7 April, 2021 (TON): After 18 years of the implementation of the Thimphu Structural Plan (TSP), the plan is now being reviewed following shortcomings and lack of coordination between agencies in the implementation.

Despite the plan requiring timely review and updating, the TSP has not been reviewed even once since its implementation.  Without the review, the planning has led to deviations from the original intent of the plan.

The TSP 2002-2027 is a long-term project spanning a period of 25 years and considered a living document that was prepared on the principles of intelligent urbanism (PIU).

The performance audit report on urban planning and development in Thimphu throm (2019) pointed out that there was a lack of clarity and disagreements as per correspondence between the agencies.

However, a member from the review team stated that MoWHS and thromde started the review last year.  The review will be for two years in two phases.

Meanwhile, as per the reports, the review was initially planned to complete in June next year, but given the lockdown due to the pandemic, the review period was disrupted.

JHAPA, 7 April, 2021 (TON):  While unveiling Martyr Yam Bahadur Acharya's statue in Buddhashanti Rural Municipality, Jhapa, the Nepali Congress President Sher Bahadur Deuba said that his party is ready to lead the government.

"NC must be and is ready to take on the mantle of the government," the NC supremo said,

Acharya was murdered by Maoist rebels 20 years ago.

 "We don't have enough seats in the House, while the Maoist party hasn't withdrawn its support to the government and Janata Samajbadi Party-Nepal hasn't made public its policy yet. Still, irrespective of which party leads the government, there will be polls sooner or later, so you must be ready for the same," he said.

However, the NC central member and former home minister Krishna Prasad Sitaula stressed

That to help the country cope with the political crisis, there is a need for the Congress to be ready.

RABAT, 7 April, 2021 (TON): Morocco’s Rabat-based General Directorate for Territorial Surveillance (DGST) said that Morocco has provided key intelligence about a planned attack on a church in France.

In a statement issued on Tuesday, the DGST passed on information of a French woman of Moroccan origin on 1April, who was in the final stage of executing a suicide attack on a church.

The statement added that the French authorities made a series of arrests on 3-4 April and then neutralized the terror risks.

On Monday, police in France announced that an 18-year-old woman, her mother and three sisters were arrested on the night of April 3 as part of a probe into terrorist criminal association and possession and manufacture of explosives.

The suspect is believed to have links with the extremist group.

However, the DGST asserted that Morocco will continue to support the international cooperation of fighting against terrorism.

KABUL, 7 April, 2021 (TON): A 15 member committee in the High Council of National Reconciliation (HCNR) is attempting this week to gather and finalize various submitted perspectives and plans for the Afghan peace process ahead of the UN-led conference on Afghanistan in Turkey.

The officials from HCNR confirmed that this involves a committee headed by the former Afghan Vice President Mohammad Younus Qanooni, and Foreign Minister Hanif Atmar, National Security Adviser Hamdullah Mohib, the State Minister on Peace Affairs and other political leaders.

The peace council said that until now no exact date about the date of the potential conference in Turkey has been shared.

However, the media stated that U.S. peace envoy Zalmay Khalilzad had reportedly shared a specific date for the conference with the negotiation teams in Doha.

The council also said there are overlapping ideas for peace among the various proposals, and the council expects to make a final document by the end of the week.

Faraidoon Khawzon, a spokesman for HCNR said, “There is a 15-member committee which is led by Mr. Qanooni, we hope that the committee wraps up its work by the end of the week so that we are able to prepare the draft.”

Besides, according to the council, there are overlapping ideas for peace among the various proposals, and the council expects to make a final document by the end of the week.

Sources said that the details of the agenda handed to the negotiators will be made public if they are accepted by the two sides.