United News of Bangladesh

Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen met Monday with a delegation of U.S. Congress members in a further sign of support among American lawmakers for the self-governing island that China claims as its own territory. Taiwanese media showed the delegation arriving for the talks, but details of the meeting were not immediately released. It comes less than two weeks after U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan, which prompted days of threatening military exercises by China, including the firing of missiles over the island and into the Taiwan Strait. China has also sent warplanes and navy ships across the waterway’s median, which has long been a buffer between the sides that separated amid civil war in 1949. China regards formal contacts between U.S. politicians and the island’s government as support for its independence from Beijing. China says it wants to use peaceful means to bring Taiwan under its control, but its recent saber rattling has emphasized its military threat. The five-member delegation is led by Democratic Sen. Ed Markey of Massachusetts and is to meet with other government and private sector representatives. Reducing tensions in the Taiwan Strait and investments in Taiwan’s crucial semiconductor industry are expected to be key topics of discussion. The other members of the delegation are Republican Rep. Aumua Amata Coleman Radewagen, a delegate from American Samoa, and Democrats John Garamendi and Alan Lowenthal from California and Don Beyer from Virginia. Read: More US lawmakers visit Taiwan 12 days after Pelosi trip A senior White House official on Asia policy said last week that China had used Pelosi’s visit as a pretext to launch an intensified pressure campaign against Taiwan, jeopardizing peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait and in the broader region. “China has overreacted, and its actions continue to be provocative, destabilizing, and unprecedented,” Kurt Campbell, a deputy assistant to President Joe Biden, said on a call with reporters. “It has sought to disregard the centerline between the P.R.C. and Taiwan, which has been respected by both sides for more than 60 years as a stabilizing feature,” he said, using the acronym for the country’s full name, the People’s Republic of China. China accuses the U.S. of encouraging independence forces in Taiwan through its sale of military equipment to the island and engaging with its officials. The U.S. says it does not support independence for Taiwan but that its differences with China should be resolved by peaceful means. China’s ruling Communist Party has long said that it favors Taiwan joining China peacefully but that it will not rule out force if necessary. The two split in 1949 during a civil war in which the Communists took control of China and the losing Nationalists retreated to the island of Taiwan. Campbell, speaking on Friday, said the U.S. would send warships and planes through the Taiwan Strait in the next few weeks and is developing a roadmap for trade talks with Taiwan that he said the U.S. intends to announce in the coming days.

A truck overturned and fell onto a passenger van in eastern Pakistan during heavy rain, killing 13 people and injuring five, officials said Sunday. Riasat Ali, a senior administrative officer in Liaquat Pur in Punab province, said the incident took place late Saturday near the town of Feroza in heavy rain. He said a truck loaded with sacks of sugar overturned and fell on the van. Read: 6 killed, 12 injured in road accident in SW Pakistan Ali said the van was smashed under the heavy load and rescue workers could only get five passengers out alive who were critically injured. He said the dead were taken out after workers cut through the twisted wreckage. The truck's driver was not among the fatalities. Poor road conditions, lack of safety awareness and disregard for traffic rules often cause fatal traffic accidents in Pakistan.

India's first billionaire investor Rakesh Jhunjhunwala, who started his investing career with 100 US dollars, died at a hospital in Mumbai on Sunday morning. He was 62. Jhunjhunwala was rushed to Mumbai's Breach Candy Hospital around 7am (local time) after he complained of severe chest pain. However, he was declared dead on arrival, family sources told the local media. The ace investor's demise comes a week after he launched India's newest passenger airline, Akasa Air. Read: India's Sonia Gandhi tests positive for Covid Popularly called "India's Warren Buffett" and the "Big Bull", Jhunjhunwala's net worth was estimated to be some 5.8 billion US dollars. A qualified chartered accountant, he was ranked the 36th richest billionaire in India. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi took to Twitter to condole his untimely death. "Jhunjhunwala was indomitable. Full of life, witty and insightful, he leaves behind an indelible contribution to the financial world. He was also very passionate about India’s progress," he wrote. The son of an income tax officer, Jhunjhunwala embarked on his investment career at the age of 25. He later founded his own investment firm, Rare Enterprises. He is survived by his wife Rekha and three children.

Iranians reacted with praise and worry Saturday over the attack on novelist Salman Rushdie, the target of a decades-old fatwa by the late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini calling for his death. It remains unclear why Rushdie's attacker, identified by police as Hadi Matar of Fairview, New Jersey, stabbed the author as he prepared to speak at an event Friday in western New York. Iran's theocratic government and its state-run media have assigned no motive to the assault. But in Tehran, some willing to speak to The Associated Press offered praise for an attack targeting a writer they believe tarnished the Islamic faith with his 1988 book “The Satanic Verses.” In the streets of Iran’s capital, images of the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini still peer down at passers-by. “I don’t know Salman Rushdie, but I am happy to hear that he was attacked since he insulted Islam," said Reza Amiri, a 27-year-old deliveryman. “This is the fate for anybody who insults sanctities.” Others, however, worried aloud that Iran could become even more cut off from the world as tensions remain high over its tattered nuclear deal. “I feel those who did it are trying to isolate Iran," said Mahshid Barati, a 39-year-old geography teacher. “This will negatively affect relations with many — even Russia and China.” Khomeini, in poor health in the last year of his life after the grinding, stalemate 1980s Iran-Iraq war decimated the country's economy, issued the fatwa on Rushdie in 1989. The Islamic edict came amid a violent uproar in the Muslim world over the novel, which some viewed as blasphemously making suggestions about the Prophet Muhammad's life. "I would like to inform all the intrepid Muslims in the world that the author of the book entitled ‘Satanic Verses’ ... as well as those publishers who were aware of its contents, are hereby sentenced to death," Khomeini said in February 1989, according to Tehran Radio. He added: "Whoever is killed doing this will be regarded as a martyr and will go directly to heaven." Early on Saturday, Iranian state media made a point to note one man identified as being killed while trying to carry out the fatwa. Lebanese national Mustafa Mahmoud Mazeh died when a book bomb he had prematurely exploded in a London hotel on Aug. 3, 1989, just over 33 years ago. Matar, the man who attacked Rushdie on Friday, was born in the United States to Lebanese parents who emigrated from the southern village of Yaroun, the town’s mayor Ali Tehfe told the AP. Read: Author Salman Rushdie stabbed on lecture stage in New York Yaroun sits only kilometers (miles) away from Israel. In the past, the Israeli military has fired on what it described as positions of the Iran-backed Shiite militia Hezbollah around that area. At newsstands Saturday, front-page headlines offered their own takes on the attack. The hard-line Vatan-e Emrouz's main story covered what it described as: “A knife in the neck of Salman Rushdie.” The reformist newspaper Etemad's headline asked: “Salman Rushdie near death?” The conservative newspaper Khorasan bore a large image of Rushdie on a stretcher, its headline blaring: “Satan on the path to hell.” But the 15th Khordad Foundation — which put the over $3 million bounty on Rushdie — remained quiet at the start of the working week. Staffers there declined to immediately comment to the AP, referring questions to an official not in the office. The foundation, whose name refers to the 1963 protests against Iran's former shah by Khomeini's supporters, typically focuses on providing aid to the disabled and others affected by war. But it, like other foundations known as “bonyads” in Iran funded in part by confiscated assets from the shah's time, often serve the political interests of the country's hard-liners. Reformists in Iran, those who want to slowly liberalize the country's Shiite theocracy from inside and have better relations with the West, have sought to distance the country's government from the edict. Notably, reformist President Mohammad Khatami's foreign minister in 1998 said that the “government disassociates itself from any reward which has been offered in this regard and does not support it." Rushdie slowly began to re-emerge into public life around that time. But some in Iran have never forgotten the fatwa against him. On Saturday, Mohammad Mahdi Movaghar, a 34-year-old Tehran resident, described having a “good feeling” after seeing Rushdie attacked. “This is pleasing and shows those who insult the sacred things of we Muslims, in addition to punishment in the hereafter, will get punished in this world too at the hands of people,” he said. Others, however, worried the attack — regardless of why it was carried out — could hurt Iran as it tries to negotiate over its nuclear deal with world powers. Since then-President Donald Trump unilaterally withdrew America from the accord in 2018, Tehran has seen its rial currency plummet and its economy crater. Meanwhile, Tehran enriches uranium now closer than ever to weapons-grade levels amid a series of attacks across the Mideast. “It will make Iran more isolated,” warned former Iranian diplomat Mashallah Sefatzadeh. While fatwas can be revised or revoked, Iran's current Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei who took over after Khomeini has never done so. “The decision made about Salman Rushdie is still valid,” Khamenei said in 1989. “As I have already said, this is a bullet for which there is a target. It has been shot. It will one day sooner or later hit the target.” As recently as February 2017, Khamenei tersely answered this question posed to him: “Is the fatwa on the apostasy of the cursed liar Salman Rushdie still in effect? What is a Muslim’s duty in this regard?”   Khamenei responded: “The decree is as Imam Khomeini issued.”

India's main opposition Congress party's chief Sonia Gandhi has contracted Covid for the second time in two months. The 75-year-old widow of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi is currently in home isolation in the national capital, a senior Congress leader tweeted on Saturday. "Congress President Sonia Gandhi tested positive for Covid-19 today. She will remain in isolation as per government protocol," Jairam Ramesh, a former federal minister, wrote. In June this year too, Gandhi tested positive for coronavirus and had to be admitted to a hospital for treatment. Read: Sonia Gandhi in hospital due to Covid issues, party says condition stable Gandhi's son Rahul and daughter Priyanka had earlier tested positive for Covid-19.   Gandhi's health has been a subject of rumours in the Indian media. More than a decade ago, she underwent a surgery at a hospital in the US for an undisclosed medical condition.

Soldiers from the U.S., Indonesia and Australia joined a live-fire drill on Friday, part of annual joint combat exercises on Sumatra island amid growing Chinese maritime activity in the Indo-Pacific region. A total of more than 5,000 personnel from the U.S., Indonesia, Australia, Japan and Singapore are participating in this year’s exercises, making them the largest since they began in 2009. The expanded drills are seen by China as a threat. Chinese state media have accused the U.S. of building an Indo-Pacific alliance similar to NATO to limit China’s growing military and diplomatic influence in the region. The United Kingdom, Canada, France, India, Malaysia, South Korea, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea and East Timor also sent observers to the exercises, which began early this month. The U.S. Indo-Pacific commander, Adm. John C. Aquilino Aquilino, said the 14 nations involved in the training are signaling their stronger ties as China grows increasingly assertive in claiming virtually the entire South China Sea and holds exercises threatening self-ruled Taiwan. “The destabilizing actions by the People’s Republic of China as it applied to the threatening activities and actions against Taiwan is exactly what we are trying to avoid,” he said at a joint news conference with Indonesian military chief Gen. Andika Perkasa in Baturaja, a coastal town in South Sumatra province. “We’ll continue to help deliver a free and open Indo-Pacific and be ready when we need to respond to any contingency,” Aquilino said. Read: Taiwan says China military drills appear to simulate attack Indonesia and China enjoy generally positive ties, but Jakarta has expressed concern about what it sees as Chinese encroachment in its exclusive economic zone in the South China Sea. Despite its official position as a non-claimant state in the contested South China Sea, Indonesia has been “dragged along” in the territorial dispute since 2010 after China claimed part of Indonesia's exclusive economic zone in the northern region of the Natuna Islands, said Connie Rahakundini Bakrie, a security analyst at the University of Indonesia. The edge of the exclusive economic zone overlaps with Beijing’s unilaterally declared “nine-dash line” demarking its claims in the South China Sea. Increased activities by Chinese coast guard vessels and fishing boats in the area have unnerved Jakarta, prompting Indonesia's navy to conduct a large drill in July 2020 in waters around Natuna at the southern portion of the South China Sea. Indonesia sees the current exercises with the U.S. as a deterrent in defense of the Natuna Islands, while for Washington, the drills are part of efforts to forge a united front against China’s military buildup in the South China Sea, Bakrie said. "Indonesia wants to send the message that it is fully prepared for any high-intensity conflict in the South China Sea area,” she said. The joint combat exercises end Sunday.

For most teenage girls in Afghanistan, it’s been a year since they set foot in a classroom. With no sign the ruling Taliban will allow them back to school, some are trying to find ways to keep education from stalling for a generation of young women. At a house in Kabul, dozens gathered on a recent day for classes in an informal school set up by Sodaba Nazhand. She and her sister teach English, science and math to girls who should be in secondary school. “When the Taliban wanted to take away the rights of education and the rights of work from women, I wanted to stand against their decision by teaching these girls,” Nazhand told The Associated Press. Hers is one of a number of underground schools in operation since the Taliban took over the country a year ago and banned girls from continuing their education past the sixth grade. While the Taliban have permitted women to continue attending universities, this exception will become irrelevant when there are no more girls graduating from high schools. “There is no way to fill this gap, and this situation is very sad and concerning,” Nazhand said. The relief agency Save the Children interviewed nearly 1,700 boys and girls between the ages of 9 and 17 in seven provinces to assess the impact of the education restrictions. The survey, conducted in May and June and released Wednesday, found that more than 45% of girls are not going to school, compared with 20% of boys. It also found that 26% of girls are showing signs of depression, compared with 16% of boys. Also read: Amnesty: Taliban crackdown on rights is 'suffocating' women Nearly the entire population of Afghanistan was thrown into poverty and millions were left unable to feed their families when the world cut off financing in response to the Taliban takeover. Teachers, parents and experts all warn that the country's multiple crises, including the devastating collapse of the economy, are proving especially damaging to girls. The Taliban have restricted women’s work, encouraged them to stay at home and issued dress codes requiring them to cover their faces, except for their eyes, though the codes are not always enforced. The international community is demanding that the Taliban open schools for all girls, and the U.S. and EU have created plans to pay salaries directly to Afghanistan’s teachers, keeping the sector going without putting the funds through the Taliban. But the question of girls’ education appears to have been tangled in behind-the-scenes differences among the Taliban. Some in the movement support returning girls to school — whether because they see no religious objection to it or because they want to improve ties with the world. Others, especially rural, tribal elders who make up the backbone of the movement, staunchly oppose it. During their first time ruling Afghanistan in the 1990s, the Taliban imposed much stricter restrictions on women, banning school for all girls, barring women from work and requiring them to wear an all-encompassing burka if they went outside. Also read: Afghan man charged in killing of 2 Muslims in Albuquerque In the 20 years after the Taliban were driven from power in 2001, an entire generation of women returned to school and work, particularly in urban areas. Seemingly acknowledging those changes, the Taliban reassured Afghans when they seized control again last year that they would not return to the heavy hand of the past. Officials have publicly insisted that they will allow teen girls back into school, but say time is needed to set up logistics for strict gender segregation to ensure an “Islamic framework.” Hopes were raised in March: Just before the new school year was to begin, the Taliban Education Ministry proclaimed everyone would be allowed back. But on March 23, the day of the reopening, the decision was suddenly reversed, surprising even ministry officials. It appeared that at the last minute, the Taliban's supreme leader, Mullah Haibatullah Akhundzada, bowed to the opposition. Shekiba Qaderi, a 16-year-old, recalled how she showed up that day, ready to start the 10th grade. She and all her classmates were laughing and excited, until a teacher came in and told them to go home. The girls broke into tears, she said. “That was the worst moment in our lives.” Since then, she’s been trying to keep up with studies at home, reading her textbooks, novels and history books. She’s studying English through movies and YouTube videos. The unequal access to education cuts through families. Shekiba and a younger sister can’t go to her school, but her two brothers can. Her older sister is at a private university studying law. But that is little comfort, said their father, Mohammad Shah Qaderi. Most of the professors have left the country, bringing down the quality of the education. Even if the young woman gets a university degree, “what is the benefit?" asked Qaderi, a 58-year-old retired government employee. "She won’t have a job. The Taliban won’t allow her to work,” he said. Qaderi said he has always wanted his children to get a higher education. Now that may be impossible, so he’s thinking of leaving Afghanistan for the first time after riding out years of war. “I can’t see them growing in front of my eyes with no education; it is just not acceptable to me,” he said. Underground schools present another alternative, though with limitations. A month after the Taliban takeover, Nazhand started teaching street children to read with informal outdoor classes in a park in her neighborhood. Women who couldn’t read or write joined them, she said. Some time later, a benefactor who saw her in the park rented a house for her to hold classes in, and bought tables and chairs. Once she was operating inside, Nazhand included teen girls who were no longer allowed to go to public school.   Now there are about 250 students, including 50 or 60 schoolgirls above sixth grade. “I am not only teaching them school subjects, but also trying to teach them how to fight and stand for their rights,” Nazhand said. The Taliban haven’t changed from their first time in power in the late 1990s, she said. “These are the same Taliban, but we shouldn’t be the same women of those years. We must struggle: by writing, by raising our voice, by any way possible.” Nazhand's school, and others like it, are technically illegal under the Taliban’s current restrictions, but so far they haven’t shut hers down. At least one other person operating a school declined to speak to reporters, however, fearing possible repercussions. Despite her unwavering commitment, Nazhand worries about her school's future. Her benefactor paid for six months’ rent on the house, but he died recently, and she doesn’t have any way to keep paying for rent or supplies. For students, the underground schools are a lifeline. “It is so hard when you can’t go to school,” said one of them, Dunya Arbabzada. “Whenever I pass by my school and see the closed door ... it’s so upsetting for me.”

Six people were killed when a speeding car crashed into an auto-rickshaw and a bike in the Indian state of Gujarat, police said on Friday. The accident occurred near Dali village of  Gujarat's Anand district, 100 kms from the western state's capital Gandhinagar, on Thursday night. "The car first hit the auto-rickshaw carrying four people and then the bike as its driver tried to speed away," a senior police officer told the local media. All the four occupants of the three-wheeler passenger vehicle and two teenagers on the bike sustained serious injuries in the impact of the crash. Read: Five relatives of late actor Sushant Singh Rajput die in India accident "They were rushed to a local hospital, where doctors declared them dead on arrival. The car driver also sustained minor injuries in the accident," the officer said. A probe has been ordered into the accident, he said. "The car driver has been booked for rash and negligent driving. He will be arrested upon discharge from the hospital." Road accidents are common in India, with one taking place every four minutes. These accidents are blamed on poor roads, rash driving and scant regard for traffic laws.  The Indian government's implementation of stricter traffic laws in recent years has failed to rein in accidents, which claim over 100,000 lives every year.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has declared victory over COVID-19 and ordered preventive measures eased just three months after acknowledging an outbreak, claiming the country's widely disputed success would be recognized as a global health miracle. The North’s official Korean Central News Agency also reported Thursday that Kim’s sister said her brother had suffered a fever and blamed the North Korean outbreak on leaflets flown from across the border from South Korea, while warning of deadly retaliation. Some experts believe North Korea has manipulated the scale of the outbreak to help Kim maintain absolute control of the country amid mounting economic difficulties. They believe the victory statement signals Kim's aim to move to other priorities but are concerned his sister's remarks portend a provocation. South Korea’s Unification Ministry, which handles inter-Korean affairs, issued a statement expressing strong regret over North Korea’s “extremely disrespectful and threatening comments” that were based on “ridiculous claims” about the source of its infections. Since North Korea admitted to an omicron outbreak of the virus in May, it has reported about 4.8 million “fever cases” in its population of 26 million but only identified a fraction of them as COVID-19. It has claimed the outbreak has been slowing for weeks and just 74 people have died. “Since we began operating the maximum emergency anti-epidemic campaign (in May), daily fever cases that reached hundreds of thousands during the early days of the outbreak were reduced to below 90,000 a month later and continuously decreased, and not a single case of fever suspected to be linked to the evil virus has been reported since July 29,” Kim said in his speech Wednesday, according to KCNA. “For a country that has yet to administer a single vaccine shot, our success in overcoming the spread of the illness in such a short period of time and recovering safety in public health and making our nation a clean virus-free zone again is an amazing miracle that would be recorded in the world’s history of public health,” he said. For Kim to declare victory against COVID-19 suggests that he wants to move on to other priorities, such as boosting a broken and heavily sanctioned economy further damaged by pandemic border closures or conducting a nuclear test, said Leif-Eric Easley, a professor of international studies at Ewha Womans University in Seoul. Read:Kim threatens to use nukes amid tensions with US, S. Korea South Korean and U.S. officials have said North Korea could be gearing up for its first nuclear test in five years amid its torrid run of weapons tests this year that included its first demonstrations of intercontinental ballistic missiles since 2017. The provocative testing activity underscores Kim’s dual intent to advance his arsenal and pressure the Biden administration over long-stalled negotiations aimed at leveraging its nukes for badly needed sanctions relief and security concessions, experts say. Kim Jun-rak, a spokesperson for South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Thursday the South Korean military was maintaining firm readiness and prepared for “various possibilities” of North Korean provocations. The bellicose rhetoric of Kim’s sister, Kim Yo Jong, is concerning because it indicates she will try to blame any COVID-19 resurgence on the South and is also looking to justify North Korea’s next military provocation, Easley said. North Korea first suggested in July that its COVID-19 outbreak began in people who had contact with objects carried by balloons flown from South Korea — a questionable and unscientific claim that appeared to be an attempt to hold its rival responsible. Activists for years have flown balloons across the border to distribute hundreds of thousands of propaganda leaflets critical of Kim, and North Korea has often expressed fury at the activists and at South Korea’s leadership for not stopping them. During Wednesday’s meeting, Kim Yo Jong reiterated those claims, calling the country’s virus crisis a “hysteric farce” kicked off by South Korea to escalate confrontation. She claimed that her brother had suffered fever symptoms and praised his “energetic and meticulous guidance” for bringing an “epoch-making miracle” in the fight against COVID-19. “(South Korean) puppets are still thrusting leaflets and dirty objects into our territory. We must counter it toughly,” she said. “We have already considered various counteraction plans, but our countermeasure must be a deadly retaliatory one.” Kim Yo Jong's reference to Kim Jong Un's illness wasn't further explained. Outside experts suspect the virus spread after North Korea briefly reopened its northern border with China to freight traffic in January and surged further following a military parade and other large-scale events in Pyongyang in April. In May, Kim prohibited travel between cities and counties to slow the spread of the virus. But he also stressed that his economic goals should be met, which meant huge groups continued to gather at agricultural, industrial and construction sites. At the virus meeting, Kim called for the easing of preventive measures and for the nation to maintain vigilance and effective border controls, citing the global spread of new coronavirus variants and monkeypox.

China on Wednesday sent 16 new satellites into space from the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center in the northern province of Shanxi. The satellites, including a Jilin-1 Gaofen 03D09 satellite and Yunyao-1 04-08 satellites, were launched by a Long March-6 carrier rocket at 12:50 p.m. Beijing Time and entered the planned orbit successfully. Read: China reaffirms threat of military force to annex Taiwan The new batch of satellites is mainly used in the fields such as commercial remote sensing and atmospheric imaging. This launch marked the 432nd mission for the Long March series carrier rockets.