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UNSC: 13 million people need humanitarian aid in DR Congo

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Citing ongoing political turmoil, malnutrition, and a cholera outbreak, UN says millions need aid in the DRC.

A Congolese soldier carries a box of ammunition near the town of Kimbau, North Kivu province [File: Reuters]

by Al Jazeera

Humanitarian needs caused by conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) have doubled over the last year, the UN Security Council said.

Speaking on Monday, the UN’s Under-Secretary-General Mark Lowcock said 13 million people are affected by internal conflict gripping the country and require humanitarian assistance.

“More than 4.6 million children are acutely malnourished, including 2.2 million suffering from severe acute malnutrition,” Lowcock said.

“We’re seeing mushrooming epidemics including the worst outbreak of cholera in 15 years. There’s also an epidemic of sexual violence – most of it unreported and unaddressed – and much of it against children.”

Fighting in the central African country has much to do with the long-delayed vote to replace President Joseph Kabila.

While elections were initially set for November 2016, they were pushed to December 2018. But the electoral commission has since said voting may not be possible until April 2019.

In the meantime, political opposition has been building up and a report released by the UN on Monday said at least 47 people were killed in the past year in demonstration-related violence.

Various warlords
Speaking from the UN headquarters in New York City, Al Jazeera’s Mike Hanna said the UN Security Council is drawing attention to the crisis in DRC – one that involves many layers.

“There’s the ongoing political uncertainty with a president who has overstayed his constitutional term in office,” Hanna said.

“There’s been ongoing conflict particularly in the north of the country where there are rebel groups still operating. There are also military groups associated with various warlords in the particular region.”

This has resulted in a massive amount of internally displaced people, Hanna said.

The UN has scheduled a donor’s conference on April 13, where Lowcock said $1.7bn in aid is needed for this year. To date, only four percent of the funds needed for 2018 has been received by the UN.

“Underfunding is the largest single impediment to the humanitarian response in the DRC,” Lowcock said, adding the crisis will continue to escalate if there is no successful political transition and a halt to the violence.

New Davis Cup Format Difficult For India: Amritraj

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the national tennis squad scheduled to face China next month, former star Vijay Amritraj on Tuesday said the new Davis Cup format is not ideal for emerging countries like India.

According to Amritraj, the new two-day format may be difficult for India as it will be difficult for players to compete in both singles and doubles.

“We have a good chance to win against China… I am not crazy about the two-day format in the Davis Cup.

“I don’t think the two-day format is a good thing because a country like us needs to have a good weekend of matches,” Amritraj told IANS.

“The three-day format is important for us because we may have a singles player who will also be required to play the doubles. The three-day format was a good one. It was a tried and tested format which worked very well,” he added.

The former World No.16 felt that it will be difficult for India to compete or even reach the World Group unless the country starts producing high quality singles players on a regular basis.

“We need to play four singles matches. They are most important as they give us four points. We have to try to get better singles players. Till we have guys who are good enough to be in the top 100 or 50, everything else is immaterial,” he said.

“To reach the World group we need players in top 50 and we can only achieve that by doing hard work.

“Our players are not good enough because results have shown we are not good enough. We are getting better,” he added.

Amritraj also asserted that current Indian stars Ramkumar Ramanathan and Yuki Bhambri have done well recently but will need more time to reach their full potential.

“Yuki and Ramkumar have been a bit better over the last six-to-seven month. I always said that their best years will be between 25 and 33 and not before that.

“Yuki had a terrific performance at Indian Wells. Ramkumar and Yuki are consistent these days and have qualified for a couple of ATP events,” the former star said.

“We start comparing them with western kids but it is a bit early. Indian kids mature physically later than western kids. I am still hoping our boys and girls can still do it between 25 and 33,” he added.

He also felt that Indian players needs better coaching and training facilities at the grassroots level.

“A lot of kids are playing at different levels but we don’t have kids excelling. The transformation is lacking completely. If you look at a particular level, they need better help,” Amritraj said.

“I think things have changed a lot now because you do get sponsorships and you do get coverage from media. You can get sponsorship to train abroad as well… like lots of kids have gone to Spain,” he added.

“There are lots of opportunities now. We have strong commitment from the children. We are in a little bit of dilemma. Our boys and girls are working hard but we need more results.”

Amritraj also opined that the high level of expenses and financial resources required for tennis put Indian kids at a disadvantage.

“It’s not easy… It costs… You need money. It is very very difficult to put together. You need lots of support to put those things together and we tried and keep trying,” he said.

French Ex-President Sarkozy Held On Funding From Gaddafi

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Former French President Nicolas Sarkozy has been taken into police custody for questioning over allegations that he received funding from the regime of the late Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi for the 2007 presidential election campaign.

Sarkozy, 63, was summoned to a police station in Nanterre and was being questioned in relation to “irregularities” over the financing of his 2007 campaign that swept him to power for a single five-year term, Le Monde daily reported citing court sources.

An inquiry was opened in April 2013 into allegations that Sarkozy’s campaign had benefited from illicit funds from Gaddafi but it was the first time that he is being questioned over the matter. He has denied any wrongdoing.

The development came several weeks after a former associate, Alexandre Djouhri, was arrested in London and later released on bail. One of Sarkozy’s former ministers and a close ally, Brice Hortefeux, was also being questioned on Tuesday, the BBC reported.

The former President can be held by police for up to 48 hours before facing magistrates.

French law bans candidates from receiving cash payments above 6,300 pounds, but the massive donation is said to have been laundered through bank accounts in Panama and Switzerland.

A document made public in Paris apparently showed that the French leader and the former Libyan dictator made an illegal financial deal, reports say.

Written in Arabic and signed by Mussa Kussa, Gaddafi’s intelligence chief, in 2006, it referred to an “agreement in principle to support the campaign for Sarkozy for a sum equivalent to 50 million euro”.

A bundle of evidence was originally leaked by senior members of Libya’s National Transitional Council to French investigative news site Mediapart, according to a Daily Mail report.

A governmental briefing note among papers sent to Mediapart pointed to numerous visits to Libya by Sarkozy and his colleagues which were aimed at securing funding, it said.

(IANS)

15-day parole for Sasikala after husband dies

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AIADMK’s jailed leader V.K. Sasikala was granted parole for 15 days on Tuesday to attend her husband M. Natarajan’s last rites, Bengaluru Central Jail Chief Superintendent M. Somashekar said.

Natarajan, 74, died on Tuesday in Chennai after he was hospitalized on March 16 for chest infection and kept on ventilator support.

His body is to be taken to his village in Thanjavur district of Tamil Nadu, about 350 km south of Chennai, for last rites.

Sasikala is currently serving a four-year sentence since February 15 last year after the Supreme Court upheld her conviction in a corruption case.

39 Indians Kidnapped By IS In Iraq’s Mosul Are Dead: Sushma (Lead)

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Thirty-nine Indians kidnapped by the Islamic State (IS) terror group in Iraq’s Mosul in 2014 are dead, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj said on Tuesday.

The minister confirmed the deaths in the Rajya Sabha and said the mortal remains will be brought back to India by Union Minister of State for External Affairs V.K. Singh.

“General V.K. Singh will go to Iraq to bring back the mortal remains of the Indians killed in Iraq. The plane carrying the mortal remains will first reach Amritsar, then Patna and then go to Kolkata,” Sushma Swaraj said.

She said the bodies were spotted using deep penetration radar and were exhumed from mass graves.

Their identities were confirmed by DNA tests.

“The bodies were brought to Baghdad for DNA testing. The DNA of 38 Indians have been matched.

“For verification of the bodies, DNA samples of their relatives were sent there. Four state governments — Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, West Bengal and Bihar — were involved in the process,” the minister said.

The victims — 31 from Punjab, four from Himachal Pradesh and four from Bihar and West Bengal — were construction workers and were employed by an Iraqi company in Mosul.

They were taken hostage when the IS took control of Mosul, the second largest city in Iraq. The workers were trying to leave Mosul when they were taken hostage.

Sushma Swaraj also dismissed claims of Harjeet Massi, one of them who escaped from Mosul.

“He was not willing to tell me how he escaped,” she said.

The minister said that she had concrete evidence that he was lying.

Massi had escaped along with Bangladeshis with the help of a caterer with a fake name ‘Ali’, she said.

She said the details were revealed to her by Massi’s employer and the caterer who helped him.

In July 2017, Sushma Swaraj had said that she would not declare the 39 Indians dead without concrete proof or evidence.

(IANS)

Sri Lanka lifts state of emergency as communal tensions subside

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Buddhist mobs swept through towns, burning at least 11 Muslim-owned shops and homes [AP]

by Al Jazeera

Sri Lanka’s president announced he has lifted the nationwide state of emergency that was imposed after communal clashes resulted in the deaths of three people.

The latest series of violence began on March 4, after a Buddhist Sinhalese man was beaten to death by a group of Muslim men following a traffic accident in Teledeniya town in Kandy.

Several dozen people were wounded in the riots, in which mobs vandalised mosques and scores of Muslim homes and businesses.

“Upon assessing the public safety situation, I instructed to revoke the State of Emergency from midnight yesterday,” President Maithripala Sirisena said on Twitter.

The measure was imposed on March 6 after police failed to control the riots and the military was deployed. Internet access was also blocked across the country.

Police have arrested the suspected instigators of the riots.

The United Nations condemned the string of anti-Muslim attacks in Sri Lanka last week.

Under-Secretary-General for Political Affairs Jeffrey Feltman told the Sri Lankan government the people behind the violence should be brought to justice.

During his visit, Feltman “condemned the breakdown in law and order and the attacks against Muslims and their property”, a UN statement said.

The violence has raised fears of instability in Sri Lanka, a South Asian island nation still struggling to recover from nearly three decades of ethnic civil war.

Coalition blues hit Yogi govt in UP; minister calls BJP arrogant, power drunk

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Lucknow: Coalition blues hit the Yogi Adityanath government in Uttar Pradesh on Monday as senior cabinet minister and Suhaildev Bharatiya Samaj Party (SBSP) President Om Prakash Rajbhar accused the BJP of “not respecting its alliance partners”.

Predicting bad days for the Bharatiya Janata Party, the minister alleged that the ruling party had “lost its mental balance in the wake of the brute majority handed over to it in the UP Assembly”.

The remarks came on a day when the BJP government completed one year in office and rolled out grand celebrations on the occasion.

Rajbhar also created a flutter in political circles by announcing that his support for the BJP’s Rajya Sabha nominees was still uncertain.

He said his party could have got at least 30,000 votes for the BJP in the Phulpur and Gorakhpur Lok Sabha by-elections but he was not even asked to campaign.

“The BJP’s humiliating defeat in the by-elections is a result of its arrogance and reflects that within one year they have lost the trust of the people,” Rajbhar told IANS on phone.

He accused the BJP government of paying attention only to temples and doing nothing for the poor, backwards, Dalits and farmers. “A lot is being said, claimed and written but on the ground nothing is seen.”

The minister, whose party has four members in the UP Assembly, added: “For now we are with the NDA but the BJP is not following the coalition dharma.”

He also told IANS that till BJP President Amit Shah speaks to him to settle the issues raised by him, his legislators will not participate in the Rajya Sabha biennial polls slated for March 23.

(IANS)

Lalu convicted, Mishra acquitted in fodder scam

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Ranchi: A special CBI court here on Monday convicted RJD chief and former Bihar Chief Minister Lalu Prasad in the fourth fodder scam case but acquitted another former Chief Minister Jagannath Mishra.

Judge Shuvapal Singh delivered the judgment relating to fraudulent withdrawal of Rs 3.13 crore from December 1995 to January 1996 from the Dumka treasury. The verdict, scheduled on March 15, was deferred four times.

The judge delivered the verdict alphabetically but Lalu Prasad — who was the Chief Minister when the wrongdoing took place — reached the court after it was delivered. Mishra was, however, present in the court.

Lalu Prasad was admitted to the Rajendra Institute of Medical Science (RIMS) on Saturday after he complained of constipation. His lawyer was present when the verdict came.

This is second case in which Mishra has been acquitted. Both Lalu Prasad and Mishra are facing five cases each in the fodder scam in Ranchi.

There were 31 accused in this case, of which 19 were convicted and 12 acquitted.

According to Lalu Prasad’s lawyer, the CBI court will pronounce the quantum of sentence later.

(IANS)

MNS chief Raj Thackeray calls for ‘Modi-mukt Bharat’

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Mumbai: Launching a scathing attack on the BJP-led NDA government, Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) chief Raj Thackeray has called for opposition unity and a “Modi-mukt Bharat” by 2019.

Addressing party workers at a rally at Shivaji Park in central Mumbai on Sunday, Thackeray said, “The country is fed up with the false promises made by (Prime Minister) Narendra Modi and his government.”

All opposition parties should come together to get rid of the BJP-led NDA government to ensure a “Modi-mukt Bharat”, he said, while reminding the audience of the BJP’s “Congress-mukt Bharat” slogan.

“India got its first independence in 1947, second in 1977 (after the post-Emergency election) and 2019 can bring a third independence if India becomes Modi-mukt,” the MNS chief said.

If the Modi government was ousted and an inquiry was ordered into demonetisation, it (the note ban) might turn out to be the biggest scam in the country since 1947, he said.

Quoting an ISRO report, Thackeray said, “A large-scale desertification of Maharashtra is going on due to depletion of groundwater. After Rajasthan, our state has reported the second highest rate of desertification in the country.”

He went on to question Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis’s claim of digging of 56,000 wells in the state.

The MNS chief said he was in favour of building a Ram temple in Ayodhya, but it should not be used as an election issue.

“The Babri Masjid demolition case is in the Supreme Court and it will be deliberately discussed in the coming days to instigate communal riots,” he claimed.

“The Ram mandir should be built, but it should not be used as an election plank to divide society and win votes,” he said.

Taking a dig at Modi’s foreign tours, Thackeray said the Prime Minister was apparently visiting those countries to get “flour for pakoda” as the visits had not fetched any investments.

The MNS chief also said films like ‘Toilet Ek Prem Katha’ and ‘Padman’ were a covert propaganda for government schemes.

Bollywood actor Akshay Kumar, who starred in both the films, was trying to follow in the footsteps of Manoj Kumar, an actor who was popularly known as Bharat Kumar, he added.

“But Akshay Kumar is not even an Indian citizen. He holds a Canadian passport and Wikipedia describes him as an Indian-born Canadian actor,” Thackeray said.

Taking potshots at Fadnavis, who recently featured in a video song about river conservation, the MNS chief said, “There are so many problems in the state, but apparently the CM is busy singing songs.”

Thackeray also questioned the government’s decision to accord a state funeral to Bollywood actor Sridevi last month. “Sridevi was a great actor, but what did she do for the country that her body was wrapped in the Tricolour?” he asked.

The media might have covered her funeral extensively at the government’s behest to divert the people’s attention from the Nirav Modi-Punjab National Bank scam, he said.

The government was trying to control the media, the judiciary and agencies like the CBI, Thackeray said, alleging that the media was under tremendous pressure from the BJP-led government.

Incidentally, Thackeray had met Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) president Sharad Pawar on Saturday, ahead of Sunday’s rally.

He, however, described the meeting at Pawar’s residence in south Mumbai as a courtesy call.

(PTI)

Kejriwal apologizes to Gadkari to end defamation case

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New Delhi: Making yet another U-turn, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Monday apologized to BJP leader Nitin Gadkari for making unverified allegations of corruption against him after which the Union Minister withdrew his defamation case.

The development came days after the AAP leader regretted having accused Akali Dal leader Bikram Majithia of drug trade without evidence.

In a letter to Gadkari, Kejriwal said he was feeling sorry for making “certain statements, without regard to its verifiability, which seem to have hurt you…

“I have nothing personal against you. I regret the same. Let us put the incident behind us and bring the court proceedings to a closure.”

He also suggested to the Union Shipping and Transport Minister that “we should put our energy to serve the people of this country in the spirit of mutual respect”.

Consequent to the regret, Gadkari and Kejriwal later filed a joint application in the Patiala House Court, seeking withdrawal of the defamation case.

“Kejriwal has acknowledged that (the) complainant (Gadkari) was hurt on account of unverified allegations and expressed regret, in the larger public interest” and that “the complainant does not wish to pursue the defamation case”, read the application.

In 2014, Gadkari had filed the defamation suit against Kejriwal after he named him in a list of “corrupt politicians”.

Kejriwal has been dragged to courts in several defamation cases by various political leaders, including Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and former Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit.

Last week, the AAP leader wrote to Shiromani Akali Dal leader Bikram Majithia for accusing his of involvement in drug trade without any proof to back the allegations..

The apology triggered a virtual rebellion in the AAP Punjab unit, leaing to the resignation of Bhagwant Mann as its Punjab Unit chief.

(IANS)

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