World News Monitor: 6 May, 2022
A quick look at events from around the globe.
South Asia
Sri Lankan police fired tear gas at students protesting outside the Parliament against the government’s mishandling of the economic crisis. Nevertheless, the students continued to protest and vowed to take over the Diyatha Uyana park near the Parliament. [Colombo Page]
Severe flash floods in Afghanistan have killed 22 people across ten provinces over the past five days. According to the Taliban’s Deputy Minister for Disaster Management, Sharafuddin Muslim, response teams had been dispatched to provide affected areas with food and shelter. [The News Pakistan]
Bangladesh police detained at least 450 Rohingya refugees celebrating Eid at a beach 40 kilometres away from Cox’s Bazaar, officials said on Thursday. Bangladesh’s deputy refugee commissioner Shamsud Douza said the refugees would be sent back to their camps. Around 1.2 million Rohingya Muslim refugees in Bangladesh are banned from leaving the refugee camps in Cox’s Bazaar. [The Straits Times]
Central Asia and the Caucasus
Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev signed a decree on Thursday to hold a constitutional referendum on June 5 as part of his proposed reforms to decentralise the country’s politics. A total of 56 amendments have been proposed, including restoring the Constitutional Court, which was abolished in 1995, and banning the President from being a member of political parties and his family members from holding public office. The last referendum in Kazakhstan was held in 1995 to approve the current constitution. [RFE/RL]
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Thursday that Russia is interested in stabilising the domestic situation in Armenia, even though Moscow understands it is an internal affair of Yerevan. Saying that Armenia is Russia’s “greatest friend,” Peskov said that “we are interested that this period ends in Armenia as quickly as possible and there is a period of stability in the country which will allow to gradually move on the implementation of the trilateral agreements over Karabakh.” Thousands of Armenians have been protesting against Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan over the possibility of Armenia recognising Azerbaijan’s sovereignty over the entire Nagorno-Karabakh region. [Armen Press]
East and Southeast Asia
Fifty-three people have been reported dead in a building collapse in central China, authorities said on Friday. The commercial building in Changsha city, which collapsed last Friday, prompted a rescue mission that has lasted over six days. [Channel News Asia]
A major North Korean propaganda website on Thursday criticised South Korean President-elect Yoon Suk-yeol by describing him as a “pro-United States” and “confrontational” leader. “Yoon Suk-yeol had aroused shock with such preposterous remarks as ‘preemptive strike’ and ‘main enemy,’ and stirred up confrontational madness trumpeting a ‘stronger South Korea-US alliance’,” the website said. Yoon, who is set to take office on May 10, has vowed to take a tougher stance on Pyongyang’s repeated weapons tests. [The Straits Times]
Europe
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Thursday that Russia’s bombing campaign has devastated Ukraine’s health sector. He claimed that over 400 healthcare institutions, including hospitals, maternity wards and outpatient clinics, have been destroyed by Russia. “This amounts to a complete lack of medication for cancer patients. It means extreme difficulties or a complete lack of insulin for diabetes. It is impossible to carry out surgery. It even means, quite simply, a lack of antibiotics,” Zelensky said. [Reuters]
British authorities arrested Iranian national Hewa Rahimpur, who is accused of being a key figure in a giant human smuggling network across the English Channel from France. He now faces extradition following an investigation into his role in the criminal organisation by the National Crime Agency. [Al Jazeera]
On Thursday, the executive officer of French President Emmanuel Macron’s La République en Marche party, Stanislas Guerini, changed the party’s name to ‘Renaissance,’ saying, “[the party] wants to always make the choice of enlightenment against obscurantism.” The announcement comes ahead of next month’s French parliamentary elections, in which the party expects to field 400 candidates. [Politico]
Latin America and the Caribbean
Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro has called on state-run oil company Petrobras not to raise fuel prices anymore, saying its profits at a time when “we are at war” constitute a “rape” of the country. Petrobras pegs its prices to international crude prices instead of offering subsidies, resulting in its profits in the first quarter of 2022 multiplying by 40 times to $8.9 billion. Bolsonaro stressed, however, that he will not order any pricing changes, as it is a publicly-traded company with non-governmental shareholders as well. [Reuters]
The body of Mexican journalist Luis Enrique Ramírez Ramos was found near a junkyard in Culiacan, Sinaloa, marking the ninth journalist who has been murdered in the country this year. Ramírez Ramos had previously covered political disputes in the region, which has been interpreted as the reason behind his murder. Outside of war zones, Mexico is the world's most dangerous country for journalists. [Associated Press]
Middle East and North Africa (MENA)
United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres has called for Lebanon’s upcoming parliamentary elections to be held in a “free, fair, transparent, and inclusive” manner and urged the immediate formation of a government after the May 15 elections to address Lebanon’s economic crisis. [Associated Press]
Three Israelis were killed and four were injured in a stabbing attack in the city of Elad on Thursday. According to Israeli security forces, two Palestinian men living in Jenin, West Bank carried out the attack. Police are still on the hunt for the suspects. Thursday’s attack came following a wave of similar attacks in Israel that have killed 16 people. [Haaretz]
North America
United States President Joe Biden has announced Karine Jean-Pierre as the new White House Press Secretary. She will replace Jen Psaki, who will step down on May 13. Jean-Pierre is the first Black and openly LGBTQ+ person to hold the high-profile post. [The White House]
The United States will virtually co-host the second Global COVID-19 Summit on May 12. This year’s summit will focus on developing a more sustainable approach to building resilient public health systems. A US government official said that the goal of the summit would be to find ways to reduce transmission, deaths, and hospitalisations rather than eliminate the virus. [Voice of America]
Oceania
On Friday, Australian Defence Minister Peter Dutton reiterated that the Morrison government wants a “strong relationship” with the Solomon Islands, after the country recently signed a security pact with China that could allow Beijing to establish a military base in the region. Concerning this, Dutton said, “(Prime Minister) Manasseh (Sogavare) has said he will not allow a military base in terms of the Solomon Islands, we take him at his word.” [9 News]
Caroline Kennedy, the former United States (US) ambassador to Japan, has been appointed by the Senate as the new ambassador to Australia by the Senate. She will succeed Arthur Culvahouse, who left office in January 2021. Kennedy’s appointment comes amid expanding cooperation between the US and Australia to counter China’s growing influence in the Indo-Pacific region as well as tense economic relations between Canberra and Beijing. [The Age]
Sub-Saharan Africa
Togolese Foreign Minister Robert Dussey has said that President Faure Gnassingbé has accepted Malian junta leader Assimi Goïta's request to “facilitate fruitful dialogue” between Mali and the international community. Malian Foreign Minister Abdoulaye Diop passed on the request during his two-day visit to Lome this week. The junta is seeking assistance in convincing regional and global authorities about its two-year transition plan to return the country to civilian rule, having missed the previous deadline in February. [Africanews]
Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta received a ‘special message’ from his Angolan counterpart João Manuel Gonçalves Lourenço yesterday, the Kenyan presidency confirmed. Kenyatta did not reveal the contents of the letter but it was delivered by Angolan Ambassador Leovigildo Da Costa Silva, who joined the Kenyan leader in calling for Africa as a whole to “forge a united front at the global level to guard against external factors that have a negative effect on the continent’s progress.” [Office of the Kenyan President]