Newsletter 28 August

Sino-Indian Standoff: India is clear that it will not agree to Any unilateral change of the LAC by China

Complete disengagement at the LAC requires agreed actions by both the sides, not attempting to alter the status quo unilaterally: India

It is natural that this can be done only through mutually agreed reciprocal actions. A statement from India’s Ministry of External Affairs said that it is important to bear in mind that achieving this requires agreed actions by both sides and not attempting to alter the status quo
India’s MEA, said this, after Chinese Defense Ministry today said, since the Galwan Valley clash, China and India have held several rounds of talks through military and diplomatic channels, and progress has been made in disengaging the frontline troops of both sides.
It added that the two sides will continue to sincerely work towards complete disengagement of the troops along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in the Western Sector in accordance with the agreements reached between the two foreign ministers and the two Special Representatives during their conversation on 5^th
Both sides also agree that full restoration of peace and tranquility in the border areas would be essential for the overall development of bilateral relations.
The two sides had also agreed to continue their engagements both through diplomatic and military channels.
Referring to various past border incidents, India’s EAM Dr. S. Jaishankar in a recent interview, had noted that what was common was that all borders situations were resolved through diplomacy.
EAM had further noted that “when it comes to finding a solution, this must be predicated on honoring all agreements and understandings. And not attempting to alter the status quo unilaterally”. (for details see Yesterday)
Shiv Sena (a state based party), on Fri said that the current situation in Ladakh is as severe as that of 1962, apparently referring to India-China war, but asserted that the Indian Army will not allow the history to repeat.
In its mouthpiece Saamana, the party said that Chinese “infiltration” and “land grabbing” activities have not reduced even as the country acknowledges India now has become more powerful.

EAM slams Pakistan, says exporter of terror projecting itself as 'victim of terrorism

Terrorism is a cancer that potentially affects everyone just as pandemics potentially impact all humanity: External Affairs Minister Dr S Jaishankar speaking at the 19^th Darbari Seth Memorial Lecture.

EAM also said the global responses to terrorism and pandemic have tended to emerge only when there were sufficient disruptions triggered by a specific event.

India remains global in its outlook, even more so after the pandemic.

Modi invokes a confident, “New India” mindset in defense

In an unscheduled appearance at a Ministry of Defense (MoD) webinar that even caught Defense Minister Rajnath Singh by surprise, Prime Minister Narendra Modi delivered an 18-minute speech on Thur, talking up the government’s “self-reliant India” policy in defense and urging private industry to play a larger role.
“For many years, India has been the world’s biggest importer of defense equipment,” said Modi, blaming it on the failure of earlier Govts.
This, he said was changing, repeatedly invoking the confidence of a “New India”.
“When India got independence, it had enormous capability as a defense producer.
At that time, there was a defense production eco-system that had been established more than a century earlier,” said Modi.
In fact, only the most rudimentary defense production facilities existed at independence: a handful of ordnance factories that produced low-tech stores such as clothing and ammunition; and a couple of shipyards with no ability to build modern warships.
“There were very few countries that had the capabilities and potential that India had. But it is India’s misfortune that, for decades, nobody gave this matter the attention it deserved… And many countries that started after us overtook us and went far ahead in the last half century,” said Modi.
“But now, the situation is changing. You would have experienced that, in the last few years, it has been our effort to throw off the shackles in this sector,” he said.
Modi laid claim to a list of achievements: more manufacturing, new technologies, and a larger role for the private sector.
“We have reformed the licensing norms in defense manufacturing, created a level playing field, simplified export procedures, reformed offset rules and many other such measures,” said Modi.

Fake News Much More Dangerous Than Paid News: Information And Broadcasting Minister

“Paid news is much milder than what fake news is. Fake news has a very potent power of disturbing the peace. The manipulation of public opinion over social media platforms has emerged as a critical threat to public life,” Mr Javadekar said.

# “Paid news is much milder than what fake news is. Fake news has a very potent power of disturbing the peace. The manipulation of public opinion over social media platforms has emerged as a critical threat to public life,” Mr Javadekar said at a virtual event organized by industry body IAMAI.

He said that digital content has become more powerful than print editions of newspapers and people tend to believe the content shared on social media platforms like WhatsApp. “… One WhatsApp message and the damage is done,” he said.

Supreme Court said students cannot be promoted without University final year exams.

Supreme Court upholds the University Grants Commission’s July 6 circular to hold University final year exams.

Court says States must hold exams to promote students. It says states under Disaster management Act can postpone exams in view of pandemic & can consult UGC to fix dates

NHRC issues notice to J&K police over SSP’s tweets on encounter killings of terrorists

Commission after taking suo motu cognizance while the forces have a right to respond in self-defense, it does not have the right to glamorize killings.

“By releasing video of attack, #terrorists want to glamourise #terrorism. But they can’t. We replied by actions & killed 04 top cmdrs, Sajjad @ Haider & FT Taimur Khan @ Abu Usman (seen in said video/attack) & Naseer @ Sad bhai & FT Ali bhai @ Danish within 72 hours. @JmuKmrPolice (sic),” the Kashmir Zone Police’s official handle tweeted on Aug 21.

The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) has issued a notice to the JnK Director General of Police.

Two unidentified militants killed in an encounter with security forces in Kiloora area of Shopian district: JnK Police

Encounter breaks out between security forces and terrorists in Kiloora area of Shopian district. Operation still underway.

PNB fraud case: Interpol issues red notice against Nirav Modi's wife on ED request

An Interpol global arrest warrant has been issued against Ami Modi, wife of prime accused in the over $2 billion PNB bank fraud case Nirav Modi, on charges of money laundering.

Once such a notice issued against a fugitive, the Interpol asks its 192-member countries to arrest or detain the person if spotted in their countries after which extradition or deportation proceedings can begin.

PNB bank fraud: CBI set to file fresh charges in $2 billion scam, report said on Nov 14^th 2019. Police filed first charges in May last year and at the time detailed only some of the alleged fraudulent transactions.

PNB, India’s second-biggest state-run bank, in 2018 alleged that a few rogue employees had issued fake bank guarantees over several years to help jewelry groups, controlled by Modi and his uncle Mehul Choksi, raise funds in foreign credit. Both have denied any wrongdoing.

Modi was arrested in London in Mar and is currently fighting extradition to India.

Congress leader in Lok Sabha Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury writes to Speaker Om Birla, urging him not to curtail power of members to ask questions and raise issues during Monsoon Session of Parliament that is likely to commence from Sept 14.

Neighborhood

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe resigned, said local media, adding that he wanted to avoid causing problems to the government due to a worsening of his chronic health condition: Reuters

Abe said “health should hold up until successor chosen”

Is analysis of COVID-19 origins based on Chinese Communist Party's lie?

Ever since it was first identified as the closest relative to the COVID-19 virus, SARS-CoV-2, the bat coronavirus RaTG13 has been at the center of hundreds of scientific articles attempting to trace the origin of the pandemic.
But is RaTG13 real or has the global scientific community been chasing a false blip on the radar screen?
According to China’s narrative, in 2013, “bat woman” Zheng-Li Shi and her team from the Wuhan Institute of Virology were asked to investigate the virus profile of a mine shaft in Yunnan Province after six miners contracted pneumonia with symptoms similar to Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS).
After sampling the mine shaft for a year, the researchers identified a diverse group of bat coronaviruses from bat fecal samples, one of which was designated RaBtCoV/4991 (National Institutes of Health GenBank accession number KP876546), whose partial sequence was published in a 2016 Virologica Sinica article.
After that, RaBtCoV/4991 virtually disappeared from the scientific literature, until 2020, when it was inexplicably renamed RaTG13.
In their article in Nature (Feb 3^rd, 2020) Zheng-Li Shi and her colleagues stated that the coronavirus RaTG13 showed a 96.2% sequence identity with SARS-CoV-2 and, therefore, “RaTG13 is the closest relative” forming a distinct lineage from other coronaviruses and supporting China’s persistent claim that SARS-CoV-2 is naturally-occurring.
Since then, nearly all the scientific research studying the origin of SARS-CoV-2 has been based on the assumption that it evolved from RaTG13.
Unfortunately, RaTG13 is not actually a virus because no biological samples of it exist. It is a sequence of a virus for which there are now serious questions about the accuracy of that sequence.
In a July 31^st, 2020 Science article Zheng-Li Shi admits that her laboratory never cultured the virus confirming that RaTG13 exists only on paper.
China has long implied that RaTG13 was “re-discovered” in 2020 after the onset of the pandemic via a search of its coronavirus database.
That claim was echoed by Peter Daszak, President of the EcoHealth Alliance and long-time collaborator of the Wuhan Institute of Virology.
“We found the closest relative to the current SARS-CoV-2 in a bat in China in 2013. We sequenced a bit of the genome, and then it went in the freezer; because it didn’t look like SARS,” he stated.
Contrary to those claims, there appear to be 33 separate reads of the genetic sequence for RaTG13 on the NIH database between June 2017 and Oct 2018 of which only Chinese or selective Western scientists could have been aware.
Already in May 2020, comments were appearing on scientific blogs about the unusual mutation pattern between RaTG13 and SARS-CoV-2 as expressed by the ratio of non-synonymous to synonymous substitutions.
The former mutation produces a change in the amino acid and a possible structural alteration and the latter represents only a change in a single nucleotide without a subsequent change in the amino acids or structure.
That analysis suggested a mutation pattern that would not be compatible with a natural evolutionary process.
Two scientific studies have recently been published “The anomalous nature of the fecal swab sample used for RaTG13 genome assembly as revealed by NGS data analysis” and “Anomalies in BatCoV/RaTG13 sequencing,” both of which raise serious and detailed questions about the accuracy of the RaTG13 sequence, the latter stating unequivocally:
“The sequencing of BtCoV/RaTG13 cannot be considered to be valid or honest as is, and any publications…that cite or use RaTG13 as critical pieces of information or proof must be immediately invalidated and retracted.”
The lack of any biological sample of RaTG13 available for independent testing and the growing volume of evidence raising questions about the accuracy of the RaTG13 sequence, places in doubt the validity of all the scientific studies using RaTG13 as a basis for comparison.
Without RaTG13, the entire theory of a naturally-occurring COVID-19 virus collapses.

Pak: Govt establishing Economic Zones in GB: Gandapur

Minister for Kashmir Affairs & Gilgit Baltistan Ali Amin Khan Gandapur said Turkish President has always adopted a clear stance on Kashmir issue and Govt and people of Pakistan thank Turkey for its continued support in this regard.

The Country Head of Turkish Agency Gökhan Umut says Turkey is working with Pak in the social sector and always ready to cooperate for the welfare of the people of Pakistan

Pakistan: SC moved for referendum on presidential system

A constitutional petition has been filed in the Supreme Court, seeking direction to the prime minister for holding referendum about the establishment of presidential form of government in Pakistan.

The petitioner seeks direction from the apex court to the Prime Minister of Pakistan to hold a referendum, as provided under the Clause 6 of the Article 48 of the Constitution to determine whether the people of Pakistan for their welfare and wellbeing want Presidential form of government or not.

Citing the following reasons in the petition, which sought direction from SC.

It is stated that currently Pakistan is the sixth most populous country in the world with an estimated population of 212 million people. According to the United Nations’ observations, this population is estimated to reach 403 million by 2050, the petition stated.

Pakistan has also one of the world’s largest youth population, as 64% of the Pakistanis are now under the age of 30. Pakistan is ranked as 122^nd out of 190 countries in the world in the opinion of WHO’s performance report in terms of quality and accessibility of health care, it adds.

As of March 2020, the petition states, public debt of Pakistan was estimated at about Rs42.8 trillion or $256 billion, which is 98.2% of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP), while the external debt stood at around $112 billion. Pakistan owes $5.765 billion to International Monetary Fund (IMF).

No doubt, 25% of Pakistan’s population lives below the poverty line. At present, the average human development index (HDI) and the GDP are the lowest as compared to other South Asian countries like India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal and Bhutan, says the petition.

This poor condition of masses of Pakistan directly reflects upon the system of the government in Pakistan and it has been established that the parliamentary system of governance in the country has utterly failed, the petition contends.

“It is for this reason that often a healthy opposition and a strong government are not there to take care of the welfare and wellbeing of the people. Similarly, there is little legislation in the assemblies and the meetings of legislatures often fail due to shortage of quorum. The monitoring role of the opposition is therefore often compromised.”

It is further contended that there is not a complete separation of powers between the executive and the legislature. This has been principal cause of politicization of the administration, non-professionalism, nepotism and corruption.

“The people who are posted at sensitive posts are often not eligible for those posts and are appointed without being competent for those posts to win over the members of opposition and allies of that government,” the petition contends.

India’s COVID19 recoveries are nearing 26 lakh. 60,177 have recovered in the last 24 hours & recovery rate has touched 76.28%. Active cases are only 21.90% of total COVID cases & the number of recoveries is nearly 3.5 times the active cases: Ministry of Health and Family Welfare