General Awareness

INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS - June 2018

Jun 2018

Jun 24, 2019

Saudi Launches Residency Scheme

Saudi Arabia launched a new special residency scheme aimed at luring wealthy expats as the petro-state seeks to boost non-oil revenue.
The scheme offers a permanent residency for 800,000 riyals ($213,000) and a one-year renewable residency costing 100,000 riyals ($27,000).
The scheme would allow expats to do business without a Saudi sponsor, buy property and sponsor visas for relatives.
As per analysts, the programme would largely benefit wealthy Arabs who have lived in Saudi Arabia for years without permanent residency or MNCs seeking to do long-term business .
The move appears to be aimed at boosting non-oil revenue as the kingdom seeks to diversify its economy.
Though it was approved by the Saudi Cabinet in May, 2019, the portal began accepting applications now.
Saudi Arabia is currently home to some 10 million overseas workers.

Putin Calls for Dialogue with US

Days ahead of the upcoming G20 summit in Japan, Russian President Vladimir Putin called for dialogue with the US, saying it is impossible to find consensus without talks.
Earlier, US President Donald Trump had made it known that he would meet Putin during the summit on June 28-29, according to Al Jazeera. However, Kremlin at that time said no such arrangement had been made.
Putin has also claimed that the US political system is acting as a roadblock in improving relations between the two nations.

Erdogan's Party Loses Istanbul Re-poll

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan suffered a major blow as the Opposition candidate in Istanbul's controversial mayoral election re-run romped to victory.
Ekrem Imamoglu won the first vote in March 2019 by a tiny margin of just 13,000 votes in the city of 15 million.
That win was however annulled by election authorities after Mr. Erdogan's AKP party claimed that there was corruption in the counting.
But after being stripped of that victory, Mr. Imamoglu vowed a battle for democracy that turned him into a household name.
With more than 99% of ballots counted, Mr. Imamoglu was winning by more than 7,75,000 votes, and had 54% overall .

Jun 23, 2019

Afghan Attends Peace Meet in Pakistan

Dozens of Afghan political leaders attended a peace conference in Islamabad.
There were no representatives of the Taliban. However, attending the event was Hezb-e-Islami leader and warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who in 2016 struck a peace deal with President Ashraf Ghani's government, and was taken off a U.S. terrorist list.
At the outset of the meeting, Mr. Hekmatyar urged his fellow Afghans to press for the Taliban's demand for a quick and full withdrawal of U.S. and NATO troops.
Among the figures in attendance were the head of the Afghan government-sponsored High Peace Council, Mohammad Karim Khalili, as well as the leader of the powerful Jamiat-e-Islami political party, Ustad Atta Mohammad Noor.

Sri Lanka Extends State of Emergency

A state of emergency was extended by Sri Lanka's President Maithripala Sirisena, going back on pledges to relax the tough laws introduced after the Easter Sunday attacks that killed 258 people.
Mr. Sirisena believed there was a public emergency in the country, and was invoking provisions of the public security act extending the state of emergency.

Jun 22, 2019

No Renegotiation of Brexit

The European Union (EU)'s top leaders fired a Brexit warning to whoever wins the battle to become the next British Prime Minister, saying that the existing divorce deal could not be changed.
Boris Johnson will face Jeremy Hunt in a run-off vote to decide who takes on the tricky task of piloting the country's departure from the EU.
Both say they want to renegotiate the deal that outgoing PM Theresa May struck with Brussels.

FATF Warns Pakistan

Pakistan avoided being placed on the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) blacklist during the multilateral financial watchdog's plenary meetings in Orlando, Florida held from June 16 to 21.
However, the country, which continued to remain on a greylist, was given a warning at the end of the plenary session and told that it lacked a proper understanding of transnational terrorist financing.
In June 2018, Pakistan was placed on a FATF greylist of countries whose laws do not adequately deal with money laundering and terrorist financing and agreed to a 10-point action plan to strengthen its anti-money laundering and combating the financing of terrorism and proliferation regime.

No Specific Talks on India's Entry to NSG

There was no specific discussion on India's admission to the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) at the NSG's two-day meeting in Astana , Kazakhstan, on June 20-21 , China said that New Delhi's admission will be discussed only after a consensus evolves over the entry of all non-signatories to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) into the bloc.
The Chinese foreign ministry declined to give a timeline for such a consensus to emerge among the NSG's 48 members.
China is one of the countries to stall India's entry into the nuclear export control bloc since 2016, giving the reason that New Delhi isn't a signatory to the NPT.

Trafficking in Persons Report 2019

The U.S. State Department has released its 2019 Trafficking in Persons (TIP) report, highlighting the need for action against domestic trafficking.
India continued to be placed in Tier 2 on the 1-3 country trafficking scale.
The 2019 report highlights the national nature of trafficking: in 77% of the cases, victims are trafficked within their own countries of residence, rather than across borders.
Victims of sex trafficking were more likely to be trafficked across borders while victims of forced labour were typically exploited within their own countries.
The report categorises countries into three groups based on the Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA), U.S. legislation enacted in 2000. The categorisation is based on efforts to meet minimum standards for the elimination of human trafficking.

Jun 21, 2019

Britain Suspends New Saudi Arms Licences

The British government would suspend issuing new Saudi licenses for the sale of arms that might be used in the Gulf kingdom's bombing campaign in Yemen.
International Trade Secretary Liam Fox announced the decision in parliament after a British court ordered the government to reconsider the sales because of their humanitarian impact.
Britain's Court of Appeal had ruled that the government broke the law by failing to properly assess whether the arms it sells to Riyadh violated its commitment to human rights.

China Confirms that it Hosted Mullah Baradar

China confirmed that it had hosted Taliban leader Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar as part of its bid to expand its role in Afghanistan.
According to Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lu Kang, Chinese officials exchanged views with Mr. Baradar and his aides on peace and reconciliation process as well as the fight against terrorism.
The dialogue took place ahead of the seventh round of talks between the Taliban and the U.S. in Doha, Qatar.

Jun 20, 2019

Pakistan Faces FATF Blacklisting

Pakistan faces the onerous task of defending its actions to curb terror financing at the plenary meeting of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) in the US against the backdrop of reports that the country failed to deliver on a 27-point action plan framed by the multilateral watchdog.
The FATF plenary at Orlando, Florida is crucial as its findings would determine whether Pakistan would remain on the watchdog's grey list or be downgraded to the black list, which would lead to harsher financial sanctions.
However, a final announcement on Pakistan's status is expected only after the FATF's next plenary in Paris during October 2019.
The Orlando plenary will specifically look at developments in the financing of Islamic State, al-Qaeda and affiliates and countries' disruption strategies, including prosecution of terrorist financing.
Pakistan aligned its domestic counter-terror and money laundering legislations and regulatory mechanisms with international obligations, especially the need to crack down on individuals and groups listed by the United Nation's 1267 Sanctions Committee.
It also took some steps to detain operatives of Lashkar-eTaiba (LeT) and Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) and their affiliates such as Jamaat-ud-Dawah and Falah-e-Insaniyat Foundato tion and to restrain the activities of these groups.
However, several reports suggested that evaluations by the Asia Pacific Group, a regional affiliate of the FATF, have concluded Pakistan hasn't done enough on the ground to disrupt fund-raising by eight terror groups, including LeT and JeM, and to completely freeze their assets.
Pakistan was placed on the grey list in June last year (2018) after a majority of FATF members concluded that the nation wasn't doing enough to curb terror financing.

Xi Jinping Voices Firm Support for Dictator Kim

China supports the correct decision of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un to politically resolve the Korean Peninsula problem, voicing firm support for the secretive regime a day ahead of his visit, a first by a top Chinese leader in 14 years.
China would actively contribute to regional peace, stability, development and prosperity by strengthening communication and coordination with the DPRK and relevant parties to jointly push for progress in talks and negotiations on the issue.

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