Islamabad, Oct 31 (PTI) Imran Khan on Monday targeted the chief of the Election Commission of Pakistan and announced that he will file a Rs 10 billion defamation suit against him for destroying his reputation by disqualifying him, as the ousted premier addressed his supporters at the start of the fourth day of his long march.

The head of the United Nations said he was “deeply concerned” by Russia’s decision to suspend its participation in a UN-brokered grain deal and delayed a foreign visit to try to revive the agreement, which aims to ease a global food crisis.

 Iranian students defied warnings from the feared Revolutionary Guards and Basij militia that nationwide protests must end by Sunday, prompting a fierce response from riot police and militia, videos on social media showed.

 Seoul, 

Concerned relatives raced to hospitals in search of their loved ones on Sunday as South Korea mourned the death of over 150 people, mostly in their 20s and 30s, who got trapped and crushed after a huge Halloween party crowd surged into a narrow alley in a nightlife district in Seoul.

97 women among dead

• Ninety-seven of the dead were women and 56 were men. More than 80% of the dead are in their 20s and 30s, but at least four were teenagers
• At least 20 of the dead are foreigners from China, Russia, Iran and elsewhere. There is one American among the dead, the Interior Ministry said
• An estimated 1 lakh people had gathered in Itaewon for the country’s biggest outdoor Halloween festivities since the pandemic began

One-week mourning

• South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol declared a one-week mourning on Sunday and ordered flags at government buildings and offices to fly at half-staff
• During a televised speech, Yoon said supporting the families of the victims, including their funeral preparations, and the treatment of the injured would be a top priority for his government

Witnesses said the crowd surge on Saturday night in the Itaewon area caused “a hell-like” chaos as people fell on each other “like dominoes.” Some people were bleeding from their noses and mouths while being given CPR, witnesses said, while others clad in Halloween costumes continued to sing and dance nearby, possibly without knowing the severity of the situation.

“I still can’t believe what has happened. It was like a hell,” said Kim Mi Sung, an official at a non-profit organisation that promotes tourism in Itaewon.

Kim said she performed CPR on 10 people who were unconscious and nine of them were declared dead on the spot. Kim said the 10 were mostly women wearing witch outfits and other Halloween costumes. The crowd surge is the country’s worst disaster in years. As of Sunday evening, officials put the death toll at 153 and the number of injured people at 133.

Washington, Oct 31 (PTI) US President Joe Biden has congratulated Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva on his election to be the next president of Brazil following a “free, fair, and credible” election and said he looks forward to working with him to strengthen bilateral ties.

Leftist Da Silva, 77, defeated President Jair Bolsonaro in an election runoff that marked a stunning comeback for him and the end of Brazil’s most right-wing government in decades.

“I send my congratulations to Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva on his election to be the next president of Brazil following free, fair, and credible elections,” Biden said in a statement on Sunday.

“I look forward to working together to continue the cooperation between our two countries in the months and years ahead,” he said.

Da Silva was previously president of Brazil from 2003 to 2010.

However, after leaving office he was swept up in a massive corruption scandal that landed him in prison for 19 months. A Supreme Court justice nullified his convictions in March 2021, clearing him to run for president again.

Bolsonaro, 67, an ally of former US President Donald Trump, never recognised Biden’s 2020 election victory and continued to question it ahead of his first meeting with his US counterpart in June.

Da Silva has pledged to rebuild international relationships that have frayed under Bolsonaro, and on Saturday said that he would seek to travel to the United States early in his presidency. PTI 

Jaishankar thanked Blinken for his “strong and clear message” on counter-terrorism as well as his call for holding those responsible for the 26/11 Mumbai attacks accountable.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken held a telephonic conversation with EUN Security Council’xternal Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar and discussed the ongoing Ukraine war, counterterrorism and other regional and global issues. Jaishankar thanked Blinken for his “strong and clear message” on counter-terrorism as well as his call for holding those responsible for the 26/11 Mumbai attacks accountable. 

The two leaders spoke on Saturday.“The two discussed regional and global issues, including counterterrorism cooperation and Russia’s continuing aggression against Ukraine,” Ned Price, spokesperson of the State Department said in a readout of the call on Saturday.

Blinken, while addressing an informal session of the UN Security Council’s Counter-Terrorism Committee (CTC) in Mumbai via video message on Friday, said allowing the architects of the Mumbai attacks to go unpunished will send wrong message.”We have a responsibility to the victims and to people everywhere to bring to justice the perpetrators of the Mumbai attacks, including their masterminds,” Blinken added.
 

 Washington, Oct 30 (PTI) The relationship between India and the US has grown steadily in substance and the convergence in the Indo-Pacific has given a new momentum to the bilateral strategic partnership, the Indian envoy here has said.

The remarks by Taranjit Singh Sandhu, India's Ambassador to the US, came during a keynote address at the ‘India at 75’ Conference at the School of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University on Saturday.

In his address, Sandhu said that the frequent engagements between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and US President Joe Biden and consultations at the ministerial and senior levels have provided overall direction to the relationship.

Russia has special ties with India and they have always supported each other and will remain so in the future, President Vladimir Putin has said, as he praised Prime Minister Narendra Modi for pursuing an "independent foreign policy" in the interest of his country.

Putin's remarks came at a plenary session of the Valdai International Discussion Club, a Moscow-based think-tank on Thursday. 

He said Russia and India continue to cooperate in the military and technical areas.

We have special ties with India that are built on the foundation of really close allied relations for decades. We never had any outstanding issues with India, we have always supported each other and I'm positive that's how it will remain in the future as well, Russian state media RT quoted Putin as saying.

Putin's comments came more than a month after Prime Minister Modi told him that today's era is not of war as they met on the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation's summit in Samarkand, Uzbekistan in September.

India has not yet condemned the Russian invasion of Ukraine and it has been maintaining that the crisis must be resolved through diplomacy and dialogue.

"PM Modi is one of those individuals in the world who is able to pursue an independent foreign policy in the interest of his country, and his people without any attempts to stop him, said Putin.

Russia has been a major supplier of military hardware to India. In October 2018, India signed a USD 5 billion deal with Russia to buy five units of the S-400 air defence missile systems, notwithstanding a warning by the US that going ahead with the contract may invite sanctions under the provisions of Countering America's Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA).

Putin said India has walked a great development path from being a British colony to its modern state and this has yielded significant results for the country's almost 1.5 billion people.

"It (India) attracts general respect from everyone in the world. A lot has been done in recent years under PM Modi's leadership. He is a true patriot of his country. And this concept of his, Make in India', is a significant effort. (India) really has progressed in its development. A great future lies ahead of it, Putin said, according to a translation of his remarks by the Russian Embassy in India.

(India) is not only the largest democracy, in a good sense of this word, but it should be proud of its growth rate, that's the basis of its progress and development, Putin added.

The Russian leader said that the economic cooperation between Delhi and Moscow is growing as well.

Prime Minister Modi asked me to increase fertiliser supplies which is crucial for Indian agriculture and we have done that, he said, adding that the supplies have been increased 7.6 times without giving details.

Putin said he believes that countries such as India not only have a great future ahead of them, but are going to have a growing role in forming global policies. 

His comments came ahead of External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar's visit to Moscow on November 8.

Islamabad, (PTI) Pakistan’s foreign ministry on Friday described as “baseless and fabricated” the reports that Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari wrote a letter to the UAE authorities to expel journalist Arshad Sharif who was killed in Kenya.

Sharif, 49, fled Pakistan in August for the UAE and later went to Kenya where he was killed on Sunday night. The Kenyan police later said it was a case of “mistaken identity” during a search for a similar car involved in a child abduction case.

His death has created a storm in Pakistan where allegations are being traded among politicians, apparently to gain political mileage.

Among those accusations were posts on social media, including by some PTI supporters, who claimed that Sharif left for Kenya when the UAE authorities refused to renew his visa on the request of Pakistani officials.

Foreign Office Spokesperson Asim Iftikhar Ahmad in his weekly briefing termed the reports totally “baseless and fabricated”, saying it was essential that the journalist’s murder be probed to establish the truth.

“We should wait for the investigation report of Kenyan and Pakistani inquiry committees,” he said.

The spokesperson also said that Pakistan was capable of defending itself against any aggression or ill designed moves.

To a question about Islamabad’s relations with London in view of the change of guard in the United Kingdom, the spokesperson said Pakistan enjoyed deep rooted relations with the UK.

“Our ties continue to grow irrespective of who is in power. Hence, our bilateral ties will further improve under UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak,” he said.

Commenting on the upcoming visit of Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif to China, he said it was very significant as the premier will be among the first world leaders to visit the country after the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of China.

“Broad range of areas of cooperation between the two countries as well as regional and global issues will come under discussion during the visit,” he said, adding that Pakistan and China will continue to work together for the peace and security of the region. PTI 

Washington, Oct 29 (PTI) US President Joe Biden will travel to Egypt next month to participate in the COP27 United Nations climate change summit to build on the significant work Washington has undertaken “to advance the global climate fight,” the White House said.

The US President will then travel to Cambodia from November 12-13 to participate in the annual US-ASEAN summit and the East Asia Summit, following which, he will visit Bali in Indonesia from November 13-16 for the G20 Leaders’ Summit, the White House said on Friday.

At the COP27 summit in Sharm el-Sheikh on November 11, Biden will build on the significant work the US has undertaken to advance the global climate fight and help the most vulnerable build resilience to climate impacts, as he will highlight the need for the world to act in this decisive decade, the White House said.

At the US-ASEAN Summit and the East Asia Summit in Cambodia, Biden will reaffirm the United States’ enduring commitment to Southeast Asia and ASEAN centrality, building on the success of the historic US-ASEAN Special Summit in Washington, DC, it said.

In Bali, Biden will commend President Widodo’s leadership of the G20 and highlight the US commitment to this premier forum for economic cooperation with countries representing more than 80 per cent of the world’s GDP.

He will work with G20 partners to address key challenges such as climate change, the global impact of Putin’s war on Ukraine, including on energy and food security and affordability, and a range of other priorities important to the global economic recovery, it said.

The G20 Leaders’ Summit will be attended by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

US Vice-President Kamala Harris will also travel to Asia and North Africa, following Biden’s visit, the White House said.

Harris will travel to Bangkok to attend the November 18-19 Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) leaders meeting, underscoring Washington’s commitment to economic cooperation in the Indo-Pacific region.

She will then travel to Manila, where she will meet with government leaders and civil society representatives and bolster bilateral ties between US and Philippines, the White House added. PTI