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Kamis, 04 Juli 2024

Xi Jinping tells leaders at Central Asia summit to 'resist external interference' - CNA

BEIJING: Chinese President Xi Jinping told leaders at a Central Asia summit in the Kazakh capital Astana on Thursday (Jul 4) to "resist external interference", state media reported.

"We should join hands to resist external interference, firmly support each other, take care of each other's concerns ... and firmly control the future and destiny of our countries and regional peace and development in our own hands," Xi told a meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), according to state broadcaster CCTV.

The SCO, which encompasses a vast stretch of the globe from Moscow to Beijing, includes around half the world's population and on Thursday will welcome its 10th member, Belarus.

Its other permanent members are this year's host Kazakhstan, India, China, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Russia, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and, as of last year, Iran.

"The world stands again at a crossroads," CCTV reported Xi as saying.

"It is extremely important to the world that the SCO stands on the right side of history and on the side of fairness and justice."

On Wednesday, Xi held talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin, who told the Chinese leader that the Shanghai alliance was strengthening its role as "one of the key pillars of a fair multipolar world order".

The SCO's main thrust is fostering economic ties between member countries and developing giant projects to link China and Europe via Central Asia.

Russia's invasion of Ukraine - which China has refused to condemn - has increased major powers' interest in the region. Moscow is seeking to maintain its traditional sway there, but Beijing now has strong ties through its flagship Belt and Road infrastructure project, while the West is also vying for influence.

According to CCTV, Xi told leaders on Thursday: "We must safeguard the right to development, adhere to inclusiveness, jointly promote technological innovation, maintain the stability and smoothness of industrial and supply chains, stimulate the endogenous power of the regional economy, and promote the realisation of common development goals".

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2024-07-04 09:26:00Z
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Rabu, 03 Juli 2024

Biden rejects growing pressure to abandon his presidential campaign, vows to stay 'to the end' - The Straits Times

US President Joe Biden met with Democratic governors and the mayor of Washington DC on July 3 to reassure them he is up to the job. PHOTO: EPA-EFE

WASHINGTON – US President Joe Biden vowed to stay in the 2024 presidential race during calls with campaign staff and meetings with Democratic lawmakers and governors on July 3, as he sought to shake off calls for him to drop out after his shaky debate performance last week.

Mr Biden dialled in to a call with worried members of his campaign team and told them he wasn’t going anywhere, according to two sources familiar with the call.

“No one is pushing me out. I’m not leaving. I’m in this race to the end,” Mr Biden said in a separate e-mail blast by his campaign, urging supporters to “pitch in a few bucks” to help defeat his Republican rival Donald Trump in the Nov 5 US presidential election.

The US President met virtually and in person with 24 Democratic governors and the mayor of Washington DC on the evening of July 3 to reassure them he is up to the job of standard-bearer for the party after the faltering debate performance.

Only three of the governors – the leaders of New York, Minnesota, and Maryland – met with reporters afterwards, vowing to stand with Mr Biden after what they called an honest discussion about his bad performance in last week’s debate.

“The President has always had our backs. We’re going to have his back as well,” Maryland Governor Wes Moore said.

Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, the chair of the Democratic Governors Association, said Mr Biden’s June 27 night debate performance against former US president Trump was bad, but added that he felt Mr Biden was fit for office.

Concerns about Mr Biden’s age and mental acuity exploded after June 27’s debate with Trump, in which the US President mumbled under his breath, lost his train of thought at times and, at one point, talked of beating Medicare.

The US President has said that he was tired after two foreign trips, and the White House has said he had a cold.

Asked on July 3 if Mr Biden was considering stepping down, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said: “Absolutely not.”

A Wall Street Journal survey found Trump beating Mr Biden by a margin of 48 per cent to 42 per cent, up one percentage point, while a New York Times/Siena poll found Trump’s lead over Mr Biden had widened by three points to 49 per cent to 43 per cent.

In a call among House Democrats on July 3, Arizona’s Raul Grijalva called for Mr Biden to drop out of the race, while Representative Seth Moulton from Massachusetts pointed to Mr Biden’s age as a liability.

“The unfortunate reality is that the status quo will likely deliver us president Trump,” Mr Moulton said in a statement. “President Biden is not going to get younger.”

While the campaign has highlighted fund-raising successes with grassroots donors and held damage control calls with donors, Mr Reed Hastings, a major Democratic Party donor and a co-founder of streaming platform Netflix, called for Mr Biden to step aside.

US Vice-President Kamala Harris has meanwhile gained support as his potential replacement.

Mr Dmitri Mehlhorn, an adviser to LinkedIn co-founder and Democratic megadonor Reid Hoffman, told Reuters his team would “enthusiastically support a ticket led by our tough and savvy Vice-President if Biden were to step aside for any reason”.

Mr Melhorn said Ms Harris was the only serious national contender who had already been subjected to major attacks by Trump’s Make America Great Again supporters.

“We would lose Joe’s superpower brand, but we would gain other benefits and would still be competitive,” he said.

Governors as alternatives?

Democrats and donors concerned about Mr Biden’s viability in the November election will be closely watching an interview with ABC News expected to be taped and aired on July 5 during a campaign visit to Madison, Wisconsin.

The White House said Mr Biden has spoken with Democratic leaders in Congress as well as Democratic Representative Jim Clyburn, who was instrumental in Mr Biden’s 2020 win.

Mr Clyburn, who has said he would back Ms Harris as the presidential candidate if Mr Biden stepped aside, told CNN on July 3 that the party should hold a “mini-primary” if Mr Biden steps aside. He is the first senior party member to talk publicly about how replacing Mr Biden as a candidate could work.

Some of the governors who met with Mr Biden on July 3 could be potential rivals if pressure for him to step aside were to increase, but many of them also speak on Mr Biden’s behalf on the campaign trail.

Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, California Governor Gavin Newsom, Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker, Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro, and Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear have all been mentioned as possible replacements to Mr Biden. REUTERS

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2024-07-03 18:35:35Z
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China supports Kazakhstan joining BRICS, President Xi says - CNA

BEIJING: China's President Xi Jinping said he supports Kazakhstan joining the BRICS bloc, Chinese state media reported on Wednesday (Jul 3), as the group of developing nations mulls further expansion to rival a Western-dominated world order it sees as outdated.

Speaking to the press alongside Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev following a meeting in the Central Asian state's capital, Xi encouraged Kazakhstan to "play the role of a middle power on the international stage and make its due contribution to global governance", while endorsing Astana's accession.

China and Russia are pushing for the expansion of the BRICS grouping, which also includes Brazil, India and South Africa, as they seek to counter Western economic dominance.

Originally an acronym coined by Goldman Sachs chief economist Jim O'Neill in 2001, the bloc was founded as an informal four-nation club in 2009 and added South Africa a year later.

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2024-07-03 09:16:00Z
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China becomes key player in Iraq's oil industry as the Middle Eastern country rebuilds - CNA

IRAQ STILL WANTS US PARTICIPATION

Baghdad still wants US participation in its oil industry.

Iraq’s Prime Minister Mohammed Shia' al-Sudani visited Texas in April and personally invited oil companies to buy licences this year, but in vain.

“Oil is geographically widespread. It’s being produced in ever more countries all the time. So they (the US) might be comparing Iraq with places like Suriname, or Tanzania, or Mozambique, or Papua New Guinea, or Guyana,” said Dr Krane, who is also co-director of the Middle East Energy Roundtable.

“(These are) relatively risky locales, where they’re going to be looking for a generous production service contract with some potential upside into it.”

In Iraq’s latest licensing round, it was mostly so-called technical services contracts for sale under which oil majors get a flat fee per barrel of oil they extract.

US giants typically want a production-sharing contract, which allows them to make bigger profits.

While Chinese companies are similarly driven by profit, there is also a national imperative to extract oil - China needs to buy foreign oil to meet domestic demand and has been importing nearly half of Iraq’s oil.

But the US is a net exporter of oil and does not share this need.

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2024-07-03 09:37:05Z
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Selasa, 02 Juli 2024

UK election: Youths urge their peers to vote, as right-wing Reform Party gains popularity - CNA

REFORM PARTY GAINING POPULARITY

The youngest voters in the UK are likely unable to remember a government other than one helmed by the Conservative Party, which has been in power for 14 years.

But the ruling Tories are not expected to win their support in the current atmosphere of uncertainty and pessimism.

This has been apparent outside urban centres, like in the coastal town of Clacton-on-Sea on England’s east coast.

A relatively new political force has been capturing the attention of youngsters there – the right-wing Reform Party led by Nigel Farage, who is running for a parliamentary seat in Clacton.

This is particularly notable in a country where the young tend to vote for left-wing parties.

Farage has called the “rapidly growing” support among young voters “truly remarkable”.

While the party’s social media campaign has convinced many young voters, it is Farage himself who seems to have struck a chord. The 60-year-old has the highest number of followers by far on TikTok among UK politicians.

In one TikTok video, he told his audience: “If you're wondering why you can’t get a house, why rents are up 20 per cent in the last three years, if you're wondering why your granny can’t get a (medical) appointment – it's because we have a population explosion … The most affected group are the young people of this country.”

Farage and his party have also based their campaign around the fact that Brexit was not properly implemented, which is the “elephant in the room”, said Paul Pickering, professor in the School of Politics and International Relations at Australian National University.

He told CNA’s Asia First programme: “A lot of other commentators would say that a lot of the problems that the British economy is now facing – its labour market and so forth – are as a result of Brexit, but it's just no one really wants to go there again.

“That's something that no one's really prepared to talk about."

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2024-07-03 02:21:56Z
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Malaysia court dismisses jailed ex-PM Najib's bid to serve sentence under house arrest - CNA

KUALA LUMPUR: A Malaysian court dismissed jailed former prime minister Najib Razak's legal bid to obtain a document that he said would allow him to serve his remaining prison sentence under house arrest, his lawyer said on Wednesday (Jul 3).

In a judicial review application filed on Apr 1, Najib said an "addendum order" issued by the former king had accompanied a pardons board's decision in February to halve his 12-year jail sentence for graft in the multibillion-dollar 1MDB scandal.

Najib had sought for the court to compel the government to reply to or confirm the existence of the royal order, which he said would entitle him to serve the remainder of his term under house arrest, and to execute the order if it existed.

The Kuala Lumpur High Court found there was no merit to the former premier's bid and that the government had no legal duty to respond to the application, his lawyer Muhammad Shafee Abdullah told reporters.

Najib planned to appeal the decision, he said.

"In terms of ethics, the government should have responded," he said.

The attorney general's office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The pardons board that halved Najib's term was chaired by King Al-Sultan Abdullah Ahmad Shah, whose five-year reign as head of state ended in January.

Najib was found guilty in 2020 of criminal breach of trust and abuse of power for illegally receiving funds misappropriated from a unit of state fund 1Malaysia Development Berhad. The verdict was upheld by Malaysia's top court in 2022.

Malaysian and US investigators estimate US$4.5 billion was stolen from 1MDB and more than US$1 billion channelled to accounts linked to Najib.

The pardons board in February said Najib was expected to be released in August 2028, six years after he began serving his sentence. It also reduced fines imposed on the ex-premier, sparking uproar in Malaysia.

Najib, who is also considering filing a new petition for a full pardon, remains on trial for corruption in several other 1MDB-linked cases.

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2024-07-03 02:20:00Z
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China's Xi in Kazakhstan for state visit, SCO summit; Modi to skip annual huddle - CNA

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2024-07-02 12:15:24Z
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