BEIJING, 30 May 2021, (TON): hina on Saturday successfully launched an automated cargo spacecraft carrying supplies, equipment and propellant for the country's new space station Tianhe.

KABUL, 30 May 2021, (TON): 3 teachers have died and 15 more people have been injured after a roadside bomb hit a bus carrying university staff in northern Afghanistan.
Al-Biruni university’s professors and staff were travelling through Charikar, the capital of Parwan province, about 70km north of the capital Kabul. Taliban have condemned terror attack and denied any role in the attack. No group has claimed responsibility for the attack so far.
Violence in Afghanistan has increased in recent weeks as the United States and NATO prepare to withdraw all troops.
The deadline for the withdrawal is 11 September - 20 years to the day since the attack on the World Trade Center in New York.
“Some of the wounded teachers are in a critical condition. The university's chancellor was also reportedly injured in the attack” a spokesman for the Ministry of Higher Education said.

THIMPHU, 29 May 2021, (TON): Watershed Management Division of the forest department revealed a study “6,555 water sources in the country, 2,317 (35 percent) are drying up while 147 sources have dried up.”

Springwater (4,048) and streams (2,191) are major sources of drinking and irrigation water with lakes, rivers, ponds, and marshes contributing a negligible portion.

With the rapid drying of these sources due to changing climate, and Agriculture Research Specialist Mahesh Ghimirey, said that it could jeopardise the agriculture sector on which 69 percent of the rural population depend.
At the climate series last week, severely affected dzongkhags like Samtse, Tsirang, Mongar, Wangdue, and Dagana need interventions to reverse or halt the process.

Bhutan was economically water-stressed and has enough water resources with 94,500m3 per capita water availability, 500-6,000 mm rainfall, and four major river basins but lack adequate infrastructure for use or management.

KABUL, 29 May 2021, (TON): General Mark Milley has said “the US is “rapidly” making plans to evacuate Afghans who worked for the American military ahead of September’s troop pullout.”

Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen Mark Milley expressed his fears, “A significant number of interpreters and other employees could be targeted by Taliban militants.”
As many as 18,000 Afghan nationals have applied for US visas to immigrate to the US under a special programme.

General Milley said in remarks his office released “We recognise that there are a significant amount of Afghans that supported the United States and supported the coalition, and that they could be at risk.”

Sources in Washington told that these interpreters of Pushto, Darri and Persian would be intercepting traffic from Afghanistan.

ISLAMABAD, 29 May 2021, (TON): The President of the United Nations General Assembly, Volkan Bozkir, Friday departed here on completion of his three-day official visit to Pakistan.

He met Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi and discussed Palestine, Jammu and Kashmir, Afghanistan, UN Security Council reform, Pakistan’s Presidency of the United Nations Economic and Social Council, climate action, financing for development, and the equal, fair, and equitable access to COVID-19 vaccines for all.

The UNGA President was also received by Prime Minister Imran Khan and discussed the situations in Palestine, Jammu and Kashmir, and Afghanistan. President Alvi conferred Pakistan’s civil award ‘Hilal-e-Pakistan’ on Volkan Bozkir to recognize his outstanding service as a leader who has served the United Nations.

Meanwhile, on Volkan Bozkir  point of view on Kashmir at his Press conference with Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi, India was quite upset and said,  when incumbent President of the UN General Assembly makes misleading and prejudiced remarks, he does great disservice to the office he occupies.” India described as “unwarranted” and “regrettable” the remarks by UN General Assembly President Volkan Bozkir that Pakistan should raise the Kashmir issue more forcefully and that all parties should refrain from steps that affect the status of Jammu and Kashmir.

New Delhi claimed, Bozkir’s remarks during a press conference with Pakistan’s Foreign Minister that Pakistan is ‘duty bound’ to raise the Kashmir issue at the UN more strongly are unacceptable and there is no basis for comparing the situation in Jammu and Kashmir to other global situations.

COLOMBO, 28 May, 2021, (TON): With firefighting operations on container ship MV X-Press Pearl, off Colombo, the Indian Coast Guard (ICG) has said that fire appears to have reduced in the front and mid-region of the ship, while the blaze continues in the rear.

India has sent three special Indian Coast Guard ships and an aircraft to help Sri Lanka put out a huge fire on a container ship off the island country’s coast amid mounting fears of a major oil leak.

Despite the ongoing adverse weather conditions, sustained firefighting operation by Sri Lankan Navy, Air Force, Sri Lanka Ports Authority and other local agencies in coordination with the Indian Coast Guard ships continued for the seventh day to control the fire on-board the MV X-Press Pearl.

Sri Lanka Ports Authority said the Sri Lankan tugs and Indian Coast Guard Ships have considerably reduced the blaze aboard MV X-Press Pearl and no oil spill was detected.

Accordingly, the samples of the ship’s cargo and floating objects and seawater samples were sent to the Government Analyst as per court orders.

The ship’s crew spotted the chemical leak in the Arabian Sea, about 1,000 nautical miles from Sri Lanka, a naval news service reported.

X-Press Pearl is a Singaporean container ship which was built in 2021 and it is around 186 metres (610 ft 3 in) long. It is operated by X-Press Feeders which is regarded as the largest feeder operator in the world.

The ship, which caught fire while at anchorage off Colombo and suffered an explosion, necessitating the swift evacuation of the crew.                                                   

COLOMBO, 28 May, 2021, (TON): The newly reclaimed land of 269 hectares in the heart of the Colombo Business District in Sri Lanka has been identified as a Special Economic Zone (SEZ) by the Sri Lankan Parliament, paving the way for the creation of an International Business and Multi Services hub for South Asia called the Port City Colombo.

Speaker Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena on May 27, has signed, validating the Colombo Port City Economic Commission Bill which was passed in Parliament on the 20th May 2021.

The Colombo Port City Economic Commission bill significantly enhances ease of doing business through a single window facilitation, streamlined arbitration mechanism and globally benchmarked incentives.

Slated as the 'Gateway to South Asia', the project is a Public Private Partnership between the Government of Sri Lanka and project company CHEC Port City Colombo. Port City Colombo is situated alongside the Port of Colombo, which is ranked as the World's 18th best connected Port, and is designed to strike a virtuous balance between commercial, residential and retail spaces.

NEW DELHI, 28 May 2021, (TON): Indian has introduced new social media rules that are designed to prevent abuse and misuse of platforms but offer users a robust forum for grievance redressal.

Indian Information & Technology Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad clarified on Thursday said that WhatsApp users have nothing to fear about new social media rules, that are designed to offer users a robust forum for grievance redressal. He said, "Ordinary users of WhatsApp have nothing to fear about the new Rules. Its entire objective is to find out who started the message that led to commissioning of specific crimes mentioned in the Rules."

The new IT rules require the social media companies to set up an India-based grievance redressal officer, compliance officer and nodal officer "so that millions of users of social media who have a grievance get a forum for its redressal", he said.

The government announced new rules on 25 February 2021 that invited a lot of criticism. Indian government defended its new digital rules, saying the requirement of messaging platforms like WhatsApp to disclose origin of flagged messages does not violate privacy, and went on to seek a compliance report from large social media firms.

Non-compliance with rules would result in these platforms losing their intermediary status that provides them immunity from liabilities over any third-party data hosted by them. In other words, they could be liable for criminal action in case of complaints.

PARIS, 28 May 2021, (TON): French President Emmanuel Macron arrived in the capital, Kigali on 27 May 2021, to hold talks with Rwandan President Paul Kagame. During his visit he delivered a speech in which French President took responsibility for the 1994 genocide of Muslims in the central African country.

Macron highlighted how France role but admitted only to a level that France had failed the 800,000 victims of the genocide.  He said, France “was not an accomplice” in the genocide but ended up siding with Rwanda's “genocidal regime" and bore an “overwhelming responsibility” in the slide toward the massacres.

Speaking at the genocide memorial in the capital, Kigali,  where some 250,000 victims of the mass killings are buried, French President  said, “France has a role, a history and a political responsibility in Rwanda. It has a duty: That of looking history in the face and recognizing the suffering that it inflicted on the Rwandan people by favouring silence over the examination of truth for too long.” 

The acceptance of involvement provided trial in the International Court of Justice as French forces are still occupant force in Mali and many other African countries.