https://arab.news/rbjee
ROME: Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni on Wednesday said her government’s efforts to help Tunisia overcome its economic crisis benefit the people of both countries.
Speaking in the Italian Chamber of Deputies, she told legislators about her government’s efforts to help Tunisia receive as soon as possible a loan of nearly $1.9 billion from the International Monetary Fund.
The IMF requires Tunisia’s government to carry out a series of reforms before giving the loan. However, Tunisia is asking for a first tranche of funding to be released immediately by the IMF, while the rest of the loan can be paid in line with the progress of reforms. Rome has urged the IMF to approve an initial, unconditional bailout package.
Meloni recalled her visit to Tunis on June 11 with Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Commission, and Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte in order to speed up the provision of EU financial aid to Tunisia.
“What we’re trying to do with Tunisia is to prevent a nation, which is our neighbor, from going into default. We’re trying to do this for the citizens of Tunisia and also for our citizens,” Meloni said.
She added that Italy promotes “a serious cooperation approach” toward Tunisia and other North African countries, “an equal approach to promote growth and development.”
Meloni described as “extremely positive” the fact that the situation in Tunisia will be covered during the EU Council meeting on June 29-30, and expressed her wish that Brussels will unlock an aid package “as soon as possible.”
She said: “Europe must keep its focus on Tunisia’s stability. This is a fundamental objective for the security of the entire Mediterranean area and, consequently, of Europe.”
BEIRUT: Lebanese expatriates and tourists from Arab nations planning to spend the Eid Al-Adha holiday, or longer summer breaks, in Lebanon continued to arrive at Rafic Hariri International Airport in Beirut on Wednesday.
The number of arrivals peaked at “16,000 in a single day,” according to a security source at the airport. The influx of travelers resulted in heavy traffic on roads, and busy scenes in restaurants, cafes, recreational areas and nightlife venues, providing a boost to the country’s sluggish economy and injecting much-needed US dollars into local markets.
People celebrated the first day of Eid across Lebanon on Wednesday despite the ongoing political disputes in the country which, among other things, have prolonged a presidential crisis that will enter its ninth month in two days. The office has remained vacant since the end of October, when President Michel Aoun’s term ended, as politicians have repeatedly failed to agree on a successor.
Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati and Lebanon’s Grand Mufti Sheikh Abdel Latif Derian were absent from Eid prayers at Mohammed Al-Amin Mosque in Beirut as they are performing Hajj.
During a message sent from Makkah, Derian extended Eid greetings to the people of Lebanon and urged “the concerned political parties responsible for electing a president to cooperate and promote the spirit of tolerance, love and unity, while rejecting division.”
He stressed that “a homeland cannot exist without electing a president who can be entrusted with its interests” and warned that “the ongoing presidential vacuum is a violation of all the concepts stipulated by the Taif Agreement,” the 1989 accord that formed the basis for ending Lebanon’s civil war.
“Have mercy on Lebanon and the Lebanese people, agree on the election and adhere to the constitution and the Taif Agreement,” Derian added.
“We will stand as a barrier against any attempt to circumvent the Taif provisions because what unites us as Lebanese is our national unity, coexistence and respect for the constitution.”
He thanked Saudi Arabia and other friendly countries “for their assistance in preserving Lebanon’s stability, safety and unity in these difficult circumstances.”
During his Eid sermon, Sheikh Amin Al-Kurdi, Lebanon’s Dar Al-Fatwa secretary, appointed by Derian, questioned the reasons for persistently “undermining the dignity of the Lebanese people and depriving them of their rights, as well as the failure of officials to bear the responsibility of fulfilling our country’s national obligations.”
Jean-Yves Le Drian, France’s presidential envoy, is expected to return to Lebanon next month to continue talks aimed at ending the political crisis. After discussions with Lebanese officials during a visit this month he confirmed his commitment to efforts to “facilitate constructive and inclusive dialogue among the Lebanese people in order to reach a consensus-based and effective solution, overcoming the institutional void and implementing the necessary reforms for Lebanon’s sustainable recovery, in consultation with Lebanon’s key partner countries.”
Meanwhile, Alvarez and Marsal, the company tasked with conducting a forensic audit of Lebanon’s central bank accounts, has submitted its first report to Youssef Khalil, the caretaker finance minister. His ministry said on Tuesday it had received a “draft of the first report, still in a non-final format, and it belongs to the government, not the Ministry of Finance.”
MPs from the Free Patriotic Movement, Lebanese Forces and Kataeb parties accuse Khalil of withholding the report from the public.
There have been unconfirmed reports that the document mentions economic, financial and political figures that have been named in the ongoing investigation into allegations of misconduct and other violations relating to the activities of the central bank. However, the Ministry of Finance denied these claims.
The head of the parliamentary Finance and Budget Committee, MP Ibrahim Kanaan, sent a letter to the finance minister requesting a copy of the report.
FPM MP Salim Aoun said: “They are trying to conceal the preliminary report. A government that is too comfortable without a president is trampling on the constitution and the law.”
The leader of the Kataeb Party, MP Samy Gemayel, called on Khalil to “disclose the contents of the report so that we can carry out our legislative, oversight and accountability duties regarding financial and monetary policies, based on accurate and specific figures and data.”
Lebanese Forces MP George Adwan said: “Why was (the report) not sent to the government and the parliament for appropriate action?”
DUBAI: Jukka Petteri Taalas, secretary-general of the World Meteorological Organization, said that the UAE economy is less than 20 percent dependent on fossil fuels, making it a leading model in the Gulf region in this regard.
Discussing efforts to mitigate the effects of climate change, Taalas told Emirates News Agency that the shift away from relying on energy derived from fossil fuels has been carefully thought out.
“The World Economic Forum reaffirmed that climate change is a serious economic issue and that there are significant threats to the world economy if we don’t take action to mitigate or adapt to climate change during the next 10 years,” Taalas said.
“The World Meteorological Organization recorded a significant increase in ocean warming rates, in addition to an acceleration in snow melting, and sea level rise doubled during the last 20 years.
“Additionally, the world has started to witness a significant increase in climate disasters ,such as heatwaves in Europe, Asia and the US, the floods inundating Pakistan, and tropical cyclones in previously unseen locations such as southeast Africa.
“The organization has identified increasingly significant issues regarding water scarcity, drought and forest fires, all of which are extremely detrimental to human life.
“However, the use of electric vehicles, reasonably priced batteries for them, and other tactics are now part of a clearer picture that is being formulated on how to deal with this challenge.”
Concerning the UAE’s hosting of COP28, he expressed delight at visiting Abu Dhabi twice this year and meeting with COP28 President-Designate Sultan Ahmed Al-Jaber.
“The World Meteorological Organization is extremely pleased with the UAE’s actions, including their decision to increase investment in clean energy and other projects that support the organization’s strategy for addressing climate change issues, as well as their decision to host the headquarters of the International Renewable Energy Agency, which is a key player in this field,” he said.
KHARTOUM: Air strikes and anti-aircraft fire rattled parts of Sudan’s capital Khartoum on Wednesday, residents said, despite both the military factions that have been battling each other since mid-April declaring truces for the Muslim holiday of Eid Al-Adha.
War between Sudan’s army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) has caused a major humanitarian crisis and displaced nearly 2.8 million people, of which almost 650,000 have fled to neighboring countries.
The three cities that make up the wider capital around the confluence of the River Nile — Khartoum, Bahri and Omdurman — have seen more than 10 weeks of heavy clashes and looting, while the conflict has triggered a resurgence of ethnically motivated killings in the western region of Darfur.
Residents and news reports said fighting had intensified in Omdurman on Wednesday afternoon. The Darfur Bar Association, an activist group that monitors the conflict, said the RSF had carried out lethal attacks in the Manwashi area of South Darfur State twice in the past five days.
The United Nations mission in Sudan urged the two sides to maintain the truces they had committed to.
The RSF and allied militias remained accountable for violence, rape and looting in areas it controlled, and for ethnically targeted violence in Darfur, while the army remained accountable for attacks and aerial bombardments in residential areas, the mission said in a statement.
“These parties should be reminded that the world is watching and accountability for crimes committed during wartime will be pursued,” the statement said.
The conflict broke out amid disputes over what powers they would retain under an internationally-backed plan for a transition to civilian rule.
Multiple cease-fire deals have failed to stick, including several brokered by Saudi Arabia and the United States at talks in Jeddah that were suspended last week.
BEIRUT: Syrian and Russian forces have launched air strikes on rebel bases in the country’s northwest, the defense ministry said Wednesday, amid a weeklong uptick in deadly violence in the area.
Syrian forces “in cooperation with the friendly Russian forces carried out precision… air and missile strikes targeting the fortified bases of terrorist organizations” in the Idlib region, the ministry said in a statement carried by state news agency SANA.
The operation came “in response to daily and repeated attacks… on civilians” in residential areas in nearby Hama province, it added.
The bases, which contained weapons, ammunition and drones, were “totally destroyed,” according to the statement.
It did not specify the date of the bombardment, but the announcement came a day after Russian air strikes killed eight fighters affiliated with jihadist group Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS), which controls rebel-held Idlib, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Despite periodic clashes, a cease-fire deal brokered by regime ally Moscow and rebel-backer Ankara has largely held in northwest Syria since March 2020.
But the Britain-based Observatory war monitor said the Idlib region, Syria’s last opposition bastion, and nearby areas have witnessed an increase in attacks in recent days.
Sixteen civilians and 13 fighters have been killed in attacks by the Syrian regime and Russian forces on Idlib in the past week alone, according to the monitor.
Artillery and drone attacks by the jihadists on regime-held areas have killed six civilians including three children and a soldier in the same period, it added.
On Sunday, Russian air strikes killed at least 13 people in Idlib, in what the Observatory said was the deadliest attack in Syria this year.
At least nine civilians, including two children, were among the dead — six of them killed at a fruit and vegetable market in Jisr Al-Shughur.
In regime areas, one civilian was killed in a drone strike near the Latakia province village of Qardaha, where the family of President Bashar Assad hails from, according to the Observatory.
Syria’s 12-year war broke out after Assad’s repression of peaceful anti-government demonstrations escalated into a deadly conflict that pulled in foreign powers and global jihadists.
The war has killed more than half a million people and displaced millions.
Rebel-held Idlib region is home to about three million people, around half of them displaced.
WASHINGTON: Turmoil in the occupied West Bank, where violence between Jewish settlers and Palestinians is spiraling, is making Israel’s goal of normalizing relations with Saudi Arabia “a lot tougher, if not impossible,” US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Wednesday.
The Biden administration earlier this week objected to an Israeli decision to authorize settlement construction, the latest move by the religious-nationalist coalition despite appeals form Washington not to fan rising tensions.
Asked at a Council on Foreign Relations event in New York whether the dimmed prospect for a Palestinian state — given factors including Israeli settlement expansion and the recent uptick in violence in the West Bank — made normalization with Israel’s neighbors more difficult, Blinken said this was part of his conversations with Israeli officials.
“We’ve told our friends and allies in Israel that if there’s a fire burning in their backyard, it’s going to be a lot tougher, if not impossible, to actually both deepen the existing agreements, as well as to expand them to include potentially Saudi Arabia,” Blinken said, adding that he has spoken about the issue with Israel Foreign Minister Eli Cohen on Tuesday.
“It’s also, at least in our judgment as Israel’s closest friend and ally, profoundly not in Israel’s interest for this to happen — both because of the added degree of difficulty that this presents for pursuing normalization agreements, or deepening them, but also because of the practical consequences.”