Indian news portal NewsClick asserted Wednesday that it does not publish Chinese propaganda, and that its funding had been received through appropriate banking channels. The statement came a day after police raided the outlet’s New Delhi office and the homes of journalists as part of an investigation into the media outlet’s suspected illegal foreign funding. In its statement, NewsClick condemned the government for refusing to “respect journalistic independence” and treating “criticism as sedition or ‘anti-national’ propaganda.”
On 2 October, a group of Khalistani supporters staged a demonstration outside the Indian High Commission in London. In the protest, people set fire to the Indian Tricolour, and Dal Khalsa UK’s prominent figure Gurcharan Singh poured cow urine on the Indian national flag. Singh also challenged the UK PM Rishi Sunak to drink British cow urine. Paramjit Singh Pamma, who is on the National Investigation Agency’s (NIA) ‘most wanted’ list and is a member of the Khalistan Tiger Force (KTF) was also present at the protest site.
Taiwan’s National Security Bureau Director-General, Tsai Ming-yen, told lawmakers during a parliamentary committee session on Wednesday that China has “very diverse” ways of interfering in Taiwan’s elections, which are coming up in January. He added that such techniques involve military pressure, spreading fake news, and manipulating opinion polls.
Taliban has said that Pakistan’s plan to evict over 1.7 million Afghan refugees and migrants from the country is “unacceptable.” The spokesman for the Taliban Administration, Zabihullah Mujahid, said that Afghan refugees were not responsible for Pakistan’s security problems as claimed by Islamabad. The Pakistani government has set a deadline of 1 November for the refugees living without a legal status to leave or face expulsion.
On Wednesday, Russian President Vladimir Putin stated that the world is increasingly getting rid of isolated dictatorships that try to push others into economic servitude. Putin said, “building a multipolar world order that is more democratic, honest and fair for the majority of humanity is simply inevitable, historically necessary.”
US President Joe Biden’s advisors travelled to Saudi Arabia secretly last week to resume discussions on a potential mega-deal that might include a peace treaty between the country and Israel, as per the media sources. According to the sources, Brett McGurk, the White House Middle East czar, and Amos Hochstein, Biden’s senior advisor for energy and infrastructure, visited Saudi Arabia for several hours last Thursday. McGurk and Hochstein met with top Saudi officials to discuss various elements of the mega-deal and other regional and bilateral issues, sources said.