Magazine

The corona virus destroyed the dollar that rules the economies of the world

The US dollar witnessed a sharp decline on Wednesday amid the Corona crisis. The US dollar is said to be at its lowest level in the last two years.

At the same time, pressure has been increased on the Central Banking System of the US 'Federal Reserve' to take necessary steps such as reduction in interest rates to prevent the decline.

Although the market expects the government to remain calm for the moment, some analysts speculate that the 'Federal Reserve' may take some far-reaching steps, given the way the Corona infection in the US and the tense environment is growing.

Derek Halpenny, head of research at MUFG Bank, one of Japan's largest banks, told news agency Reuters, "These things mean that we should expect more dismal conditions of economic growth." We should also focus on the US dollar to some extent.

The US dollar fell 0.4 percent against other currencies this Wednesday. This is the lowest level of US dollar since June 2018.

The US dollar has weakened 3% since the last meeting of the 'Federal Reserve'. US consumer confidence has weakened more than expected in July.

This indicates that people are reducing expenses due to increasing cases of corona infection.

"Given the concerns of the second wave of transition, the market feels that the Federal Reserve will decide to reduce interest rates," says Yujiro Goto, market expert at Nomura Security.

Satellite test was not a weapon: Russia

Russia has said that the satellite test it did in space was not a weapon.

Russia's defense ministry dismissed the accusations of the US and Britain, accusing them of manipulating the facts.

The Russian Defense Ministry issued a statement saying, "The tests conducted on July 15 have not posed any threat to any other spacecraft. And it has not violated any international law.''

Russia said that it is using new technology to monitor and test Russia's space equipment.

Earlier Britain and America had said that they are worried about these activities of Russia.

Britain and the US had alleged that Russia launched something like a weapon from a satellite in space.

The head of Britain's space directorate issued a statement saying, "We are concerned about the way Russia has tested one of its satellites by launching something like a weapon."

The statement said that such action is a threat to the peaceful use of space.

The US had earlier expressed concern about Russia's satellite.

Air Marshal Harvey Smith, head of Britain's Space Directorate, issued a statement saying, "This type of action poses a threat to the peaceful use of space and it also poses the risk of debris accumulating in space that is the satellite and the entire space Can damage the system on which the whole world depends.''

He said, "We urge Russia to abstain from such tests further." We also urge Russia to continue to work constructively with Britain and other allies to promote responsible attitude in space.''

According to BBC Defense Correspondent Jonathan Bell, Britain has first accused Russia of carrying out satellite tests in space, and this happened just a few days after the Intelligence and Security Committee in Britain said in a report that Britain The government had failed miserably to address the threat from Russia.

Fear of space war?

After this incident, a new type of arms race in space can give rise to concern and many other countries are also investigating the technology which can be used as a weapon in space.

The US has said that it is the same satellite system of Russia about which it had expressed concern in the year 2018 and also questioned this year when the US accused Russia of having a satellite close to the US satellite. having had.

Regarding this latest development, the head of the US Space Command, General J. Raymond, said that there is evidence that Russia has tested an anti-satellite weapon in space.

General Raymond said that Russia has launched a new thing in Orbit via satellite.

He said, "This is another proof of Russia's constant efforts to develop and test space-based systems. And this is in line with Russia's public military doctrine of the use of weapons to put the US and its allies in space at risk.''

How many Nepalese expatriates are working in India and how many Indians are working in Nepal: Supreme Court

How many Nepali migrant people are working in India and how many Indian diaspora are working in Nepal at this time?

It is not easy to answer both these questions accurately. Because India and Nepal are bound in a centuries-old relationship, and especially because of the 1950 Peace and Friendship Treaty, people in both countries have been moving without any hindrance.

There is no data on the movement of people and therefore neither India nor Nepal has the right answer to both the above questions.

In such a situation, it became difficult for the Government of Nepal when the Supreme Court of Nepal issued a notice on 10 July asking him why Nepali workers working in India should not be given all the facilities and security, which other Nepali workers working in countries get.

The court has asked the government of Nepal to reply to the notice within 15 days.

The government of Nepal has allowed its citizens to live and work in 170 countries of the world. In recent years, Nepal has signed labor agreements with several countries.

Nepal has also created a Foreign Employment Fund, under which compensation is paid to the families of Nepali nationals working abroad when they are injured or killed.

The Nepalese government also issues foreign employment permits to its workers, through which a worker can insure up to 15 lakh Nepalese rupees.

But all these laws and facilities do not apply to those workers of Nepal who work in India or who are Indian citizens who work in Nepal.

In both countries, such workers are not well known. This has led to the apprehension that these migrant workers will not get safe migration or adequate financial compensation if needed.

Nirmal Kumar Upreti, one of the petitioners in the Supreme Court of Nepal, says that the neglect of the interests of Nepali workers working in India through the Nepalese government is an open violation of Nepal's foreign employment law.

According to Upreti, it is also a violation of the right to protect Nepali migrant workers.

According to the BBC, he said, "For Nepalese migrant workers, India is a foreign country like other countries." But due to no documentation of being a foreign laborer, these Nepali citizens are deprived of any compensation or facilities that Nepali workers working in other countries get. ''

According to Nepalese officials, about 50 lakh Nepalese people work abroad and send money from abroad for the expenses of their family living in Nepal.

During the financial year 2018-19, Nepalese citizens living abroad sent eight billion eight million US dollars to Nepal only through official sources.

It is difficult to tell how much money came to Nepal from unofficial channels like Hundi and Hawala during this time.

According to an assessment made by the World Bank in 2018, Nepalese workers working in India sent more than one billion US dollars in Nepal in a year, while Indian workers working in Nepal at the same time had about one billion 50 One million US dollars was sent to India. In this way, Nepal is a major source of cash flows (remittances) coming to India.

Now you can guess how many Nepalis are working in India and how many Indians are working in Nepal.

According to the 2019 report of the International Organization of Migration (IOM), around 30 to 40 lakh Nepalese workers live and work in India. However, Indian officials estimate that this number is much more than this.

According to the IOM, the number of Indians working in Nepal is around 5-7 lakhs.

Dr. Ganesh Gurung, a former member of Nepal's National Planning Commission and an in-depth study on Nepali workers working abroad, says, "The border is open and the workers have complete freedom of movement, so it is very difficult to tell the exact number . Many workers crossing the Indo-Nepal border visit each other only during special seasons. For example, Nepali laborers living in the Terai-Madhes region visit Punjab and Haryana at harvest time and many laborers from Bihar and Uttar Pradesh visit Nepal during this period. Many laborers of Nepal go to India to work in special weather."

While the freedom of movement on the Indo-Nepal border has many benefits, it also has some harmful aspects.

People aware of the pitiable condition of such unsafe and unregistered workers say that because of working in the unorganized sector, they are always at risk that they can be injured, abused and They can be exploited, but they have no way to avoid them.

Balakrishna Pandey, chairman of the Nepali Public Relations Committee and Friendship India, an organization that helps Nepalis living and working in India, says thinking about measures to protect Nepali workers is an issue that has been ignored for decades.

Balkrishna Pandey moved to India from Nepal at the age of 17. "He says, since 1990, I have been raising the issue that the poor laborers coming to India from Nepal need to be given some kind of registration and protection." Many Prime Ministers have visited. Many Nepalese leaders stayed here with migrant workers when they came to India, but when they came to power, the migrant Nepalis forgot. ''

According to Pandey, nearly six lakh Nepalese migrant workers have migrated from India to Nepal since the outbreak of the Corona epidemic. These include some Nepali women trapped in Manipur who were being trafficked from India to the Gulf countries, but were rescued with the help of a non-governmental organization.

Nepal's workers have been coming to India for centuries through the Indo-Nepal 1880 km border. Nepali officials say they are aware of the troubles of Nepali workers, they also know that Nepali women and children are trafficked.

Suman Ghimire, spokesman for Nepal's Ministry of Labor and Social Security, says that he and his colleagues are always discussing the safety of Nepalese migrant workers.

He says, "After the Corona epidemic, Nepal's local bodies have started registering all the people coming to India from Nepal. This is the first step in protecting the Nepali migrant laborers working in India. We need to do more and we are serious about it. ''

Welcoming the steps being taken to improve the situation of Nepal's migrants, Dr. Ganesh Gurung, a former member of the Nepal Planning Commission, says, "Extremely those who cross the Indo-Nepal border to work or do seasonal work Are poor people They are always at risk, they should be protected at all costs. ''

After the coming of Narendra Modi's government in India, many efforts were made to improve the relationship between the two countries, including the movement of workers.

The Committee Eminent Persons Group (EPG), formed in 2016 to review the 1950 peace treaty, made several suggestions about the movement of people across the border. After several meetings, the committee has completed its report but neither government has accepted the report of the committee yet.

Experts say that the EPG report can be an essential basis on which measures can be suggested to improve and protect the rules of migrant workers of both countries.

During the year 2009-10 when Dr. Ganesh Gurung was a member of the Planning Commission, he made some proposals for the protection of the workers going to India but according to him, "My proposals created a ruckus in the Planning Commission. In the three-year plan It was somehow included but no action was taken on the ground.

Welcoming the Supreme Court's decision of 10 July, he says, "This is the best time to start reforms".

Suresh Raj, a Delhi-based Nepali journalist, says that both countries should take immediate steps to protect their migrant workers, register them and issue them a certificate.

Suresh Raj says, "Who is crossing the border once the officials start registering it will then make it a little easier for the officials of the Nepalese Embassy in Delhi to ensure the safety of Nepali workers working in India."

But a Nepalese embassy official says that both countries will have to work very carefully.

He says, "If we start issuing foreign employment permits to our workers, who have been crossing the border without interruption for centuries, it will affect the relations between India and Nepal." We need to be very careful. But regular and controlled migration of workers is very important.

Given such labor relations between India and Nepal, it is difficult to say how and what will the Government of Nepal respond to the notice of the Supreme Court in a few days?

Will India-China talks establish peace on the border?

A telephonic conversation between India's National Security Advisor Ajit Doval and China's Foreign Minister Wang Yi took place on Sunday amid efforts to restore peace on both sides following violent clashes in the Galvani Valley between India and China.

The details of the talks between India's National Security Advisor Ajit Doval and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi have been issued by the Chinese Embassy in India.

In his statement, Chinese Ambassador to India Sun Waidong has given details of the interaction between the two Special Representatives. He has said that the Chinese Foreign Minister told Ajit Doval that the relationship between India and China is 70 years old.

According to the Chinese Foreign Minister, what has happened in the Galvan Valley on the western sector border between India and China, it is clear what is right and what has gone wrong.

The Chinese Foreign Minister also said that China wants to protect its sovereignty as well as restore peace in the area.

Wang Yi also stressed in his talk that development is the top priority of both China and India, so both countries should focus on reducing tensions.

According to the Chinese ambassador, there was a detailed discussion between the two representatives. In this conversation, broadly agreed on four things -

- The consensus between the top leaders of the two countries will be implemented. The two leaders have agreed to work together for a long time for peace and development in the border areas.

- The two countries will jointly try to reduce the tension on the border according to mutual agreement.

- Through dialogue between special representatives, both sides will improve mutual dialogue. The system of working mechanism for advising and combining border matters between India and China will be improved by regularizing it. This will strengthen the trust between the two sides.

The two sides welcomed what was agreed in the recent Commander-level meeting. At the Commander-level meeting on July 1, the two sides agreed to reduce the tension on the border.

Earlier, the Indian Foreign Ministry had issued a statement saying that there has been a clear and detailed talk between Doval and Wang Yi about the recent activities on the western sector border between India and China.

It has been agreed on both sides that to strengthen bilateral relations, both countries must restore peace on the border and prevent differences from taking the form of a dispute.

In this direction, both sides have worked on the process of reducing the tension on the border, that is, the situation is not as it was when the soldiers of both sides came face to face. Both sides have agreed to do it step by step in a phased manner.

The statement also said that in this conversation of the two special representatives, it has been agreed to continue the dialogue between the military and diplomatic officials of the two countries.

Apart from this, there has been an agreement to keep regular interactions between Doval and Wang Yi.

At the same time, according to news agency AFP, China's Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian told reporters in Beijing on Monday, "There has been positive progress on both sides to reduce the tension on the border."

Lijian has expressed hope that the Indian side will step forward with China to implement the things that have been mutually agreed upon.

Officials watching the India-China border dispute have told the BBC that the process to reduce the border tension has started from Monday morning.

Officials said that this work is going on in three places, these places are Galvan, Gogra and Hot Springs. The official briefing the BBC made it clear that they were not talking about Depsang or Pangong Tso Lake.

Another official said, "Both the tents and temporary structures are being removed and the troops are retreating. But this does not mean the withdrawal or the end of the episode."

Indian officials said that these activities are constantly being monitored, for which the help of satellite images and high platforms is being taken.

In response to the question of how many Chinese soldiers have been withdrawn, several media reports said, the official refused to give any distance.

He said this much, "This is the beginning of the process that was decided after the meeting of the commanders of both sides in Chusul on 30 June".

However, according to reports coming in the media, the Chinese soldiers are going backwards two kilometers from where the violence took place in Galvan.

It is noteworthy that on June 15, there was a violent clash between the soldiers of India and China in the Galvan Valley, in which 20 Indian soldiers were killed.

Subsequently, on July 1, there was a commander-level dialogue between the armies of the two countries and in that negotiation, it was agreed to reduce the tension on the India-China LAC.

Then a week ago, the Government of India announced the closure of 59 mobile apps, including UC Browser of WeChat Ali Baba Group, the well-known social platform TikTok.

Although the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting of India did not take the name of China, it was clear that the complaint was received that these apps on Android and iOS were also interfering with the personal data of the people. Restrictions on these apps will secure India's mobile and Internet users. It is essential for India's security, integrity and sovereignty.

Will the 'Stop Hate for Profit' campaign end Facebook?

Can boycott damage Facebook? The answer is 'yes'.

The 'Abolitionist Movement', which took place in the 18th century, prevented the British people from buying enslaved goods.

This movement had a big impact. Nearly three lakh people stopped buying sugar, which increased the pressure to abolish slavery.

'Stop Hate for Profit' is the latest campaign in which 'boycott' is being used as a political weapon. The campaign claims that Facebook does not do enough to remove hateful and racist content on its platform.

The 'Stop Hate for Profit' campaign has persuaded many large companies to remove their advertisements from Facebook and some other social media platforms.

After Coca-Cola, Unilever and Starbucks, now well-known companies such as Ford, Adidas and HP have also joined their advertisers.

Microsoft also stopped advertising on Facebook and Instagram in May, according to news website 'Axius'. Microsoft has stopped advertising on Facebook due to unknown 'inappropriate content'.

Meanwhile, other online platforms such as Reddit and Twitch have also taken anti-hate steps on their own and have increased the pressure on Facebook.

So can such a boycott cause huge damage to Facebook?

The short answer to this question is yes. Because a large part of Facebook's revenue comes from advertisements.

David Cumming of Aviva Investors told the BBC that Facebook had lost people's trust and that users found a lack of moral values ​​in Facebook's attitude. Davim Cumming believes that these assumptions can hurt Facebook's business badly.

On Friday, the share price of Facebook was down by eight percent. As a result, the company's CEO Mark Zuckerberg lost at least five and a half trillion rupees.

But can the damage be bigger? Could this threaten the existence of Facebook in the coming days? There are still clear answers to these questions.

The first thing is that Facebook is not the first social media company to face boycott.

In the year 2017, many big brands announced that they will not advertise on YouTube. This happened because an ad for a particular brand was shown after a racist and homophobic (hateful against homosexuality) video.

The boycott of this brand is now almost forgotten. YouTube changed its advertising policies and now YouTube's parent company Google is also doing fine in this regard.

This boycott may not have caused much damage to Facebook. There are other reasons for this.

The first thing is that many companies have talked about boycotting Facebook only for the month of July. Secondly, a large part of Facebook's revenue also comes from advertising by small and medium companies.

According to a CNN report, Facebook earned nearly three trillion rupees from the top 100 brands spent last year and it was just six per cent of the total advertising revenue.

Matt Morrison, head of the advertising agency Digital Whiskey, told the BBC that it is not possible for many small companies to 'not advertise'.

Says Morrison, "For companies that cannot afford to pay huge amounts of money for advertising on television, Facebook is a necessary medium. Business can succeed only when companies reach their potential customers. So they will continue to advertise. ''

Furthermore, Facebook's structure is such that it gives Mark Zuckerberg the power to make any kind of changes. If they want to change a policy, they can change it. For this, only their views need to be changed. If Zuckerberg does not want to take action, he will not.

However, in the last few days, Mark Zuckerberg has indicated changes. Facebook announced on Friday that it would begin tagging hate comments.

On the other hand, other companies are taking action on their own.

On Monday, social news website Reddit announced that it was banning a group called 'The Donald Trump Forum'. Members of this group are accused of making hate and threatening comments. The group was not directly associated with President Trump, but its members shared their supporting mimes.

In addition, Amazon-owned video streaming platform Twitch has also temporarily banned an account run by 'Trump Campaign'. Twitch has said that two of the videos from President Trump's rallies were said to promote hatred.

One of these videos was in the year 2015 (before Trump was elected president). In this video, Trump said that Mexico is sending rapists to the United States.

Twitch said in his statement, "If there is any hateful feeling in any political comment or news, we do not consider it an exception. We stop it."

This year is going to be a challenge for all social media companies and Facebook is also not outside the scope of these challenges. However, companies always take decisions keeping their balance sheet in mind. So if this boycott prolongs and more companies join, then this year will change a lot for Facebook.

Seven lakh Indians may have to leave Kuwait if new law is made

The law being made in Kuwait about migrants has rekindled the concerns of Indians living in the Gulf country when two years ago, hundreds of Indian engineers had to lose their jobs due to a change in rules.

According to the English newspaper 'Arab News', the legal committee of the National Assembly of Kuwait has accepted the provision of a bill being prepared on migrants as legitimate.

According to reports, this proposal is going to be sent to other committees for approval. The draft of this law says that the number of Indians living in Kuwait should be limited to 15 percent of the country's total population.

It is believed that out of the nearly 10 lakh overseas Indians living there, seven lakh people may have to return in case the bill passes.

The native Kuwaitis have a population of only thirteen-and-a-half million, out of a total population of about forty five lakhs of this small country in the north of Saudi Arabia and south of Iraq.

Egypt, Philippines, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and other countries have the highest number of migrants present here.

According to the news, the proposed law has been said to reduce the number of people living in Kuwait from other countries. It has been said that the number of migrants will be reduced from the present level to 30 percent of the total population.

Nasir Mohammed (name changed), who works in a Kuwait national company, is forced to work as a supervisor despite having an engineering degree.

He says, "Indians living here are wondering what will happen if the bill becomes law?"

Nasir Mohammed still considers himself lucky that he got a job in the new company instead of the old company, or because of being excluded from the scope of the new Kuwaiti rules that came in 2018, IIT and BITS Pilani have only seen jobs from engineers passed to BITS Pilani. - She had gone to see.

India's former foreign minister Sushma Swaraj had also raised the matter of engineers with the government of Kavat but no solution could be found.

Says Nasir Mohammed, "The situation is that a lot of Indians who have obtained engineering degrees are working on the salaries and ranks of supervisors, foremen, etc. in Kuwait while on duty they have to play an engineer."

Mohammad Ilyas, a resident of Hyderabad, living in Kuwait, says that the new expatriate law-like rule has been recurring since the 2008 economic downturn and intensified in 2016 when Saudi Arabia implemented the law. .

According to Nitaqat law, the job rate of local people in Saudi Arabia government departments and companies has to be raised.

Last year, a Kuwaiti MP, Khalid al-Saleh, issued a statement demanding the government to "stop the storm of migrants who have seized jobs and services provided by government."

A second MP, Safa al-Hashem, said a few years ago that "the law should be brought to allow migrants not to give driving licenses for a year and keep a car."

This statement of Safa al-Hashem was also condemned in some circles.

In Kuwait's National Assembly, 50 MPs are elected, although the emir is believed to be in a decision-making role there.

Recently, when there is talk of new law, some local people have also been seen making statements against it.

From the end of the 19th century to 1961, Indians had begun to visit Kuwait, which had been under the 'protection' of Britain for a long time. At this time Indians are present there in almost all areas from business, the number of people working in Kuwaiti homes, from drivers to cooks to Aya (women maids), is said to be three and a half lakh. People believe that it will not be easy to fill their space with other people in a hurry.

Revan D'Souza's family migrated from India to Kuwait in the 1950s, and he too has been born there.

Revan D'Souza is the editor of the local English newspaper Times Kuwait.

During a conversation with the BBC, he says, "The bill on migrants has just been accepted by the legal committee as being compatible with the constitution, yet it has to go through many more committees such as the Human Resources Committee and other phases. Only then will it be passed as a bill Will be able to present it. It is possible only after that it becomes law.''

Revan D'Souza also sees it from another perspective.

He says that in the midst of the crisis arising out of the Covid-19 and the government of India ignoring the demand of the local government to take back the illegal people living there, there is anger in some circles of Kuwaiti government and now that someone do not want to depend on the working people of a country.

Will ICMR make Corona's indigenous vaccine by 15 August?

The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has now issued a clarification on the matter related to fixing the last date for the Corona virus vaccine to be made by August 15 in India. The ICMR has said that the fast track vaccine will be made only under globally accepted regulations.

ICMR has tweeted its two-page statement that the safety and interest of the people of India is a top priority.

Actually the debate on the date of August 15 started after a memo written by ICMR Director General Dr. Balram Bhargava this week. In this, he had asked India's top clinical research agencies to launch the corona virus vaccine by Independence Day.

Now ICMR has issued a clarification on the statement of the Director General, saying, "The DG-ICMR letter was meant to avoid unnecessary red-tapism from researchers doing clinical trials so that necessary procedures are not missed and new participants can be recruited.''

Also, the red-tapism was not a hindrance in fast track permission to market new indigenous testing kits or Covid-19 related medicines. In the process of developing indigenous vaccine, it was also asked to avoid slow pace so that this phase can be completed soon and a population-based trial can be started.''

The ICMR has stated that the process of developing a fast track vaccine is being carried out under globally accepted regulations.

The ICMR states that the vaccine can be tested simultaneously on animals and humans.

Also, the trial of the vaccine will be conducted with hardly any difficulty and the Data Safety Monitoring Board can review it if required.

The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has hoped that the Corona vaccine being made in India should be launched by 15 August. ICMR said this by writing a letter to the institutions associated with the trial of this vaccine.

The indigenous vaccine is co-produced by ICMR and Hyderabad-based Bharat Biotech Company.

ICMR says that once the clinical trial is complete, this vaccine can be launched for the common people on 15 August, ie, the day of India's independence.

12 institutes in India have been selected for clinical trials. ICMR director Dr Balaram Bhargava wrote a letter to these 12 institutes on 2 July and said that they should take the clinical trials by 7 July.

In his letter, Dr. Bhargava wrote, "An agreement has been reached with the Bharat Biotech company for the fast-track trial of the vaccine created through ICMR to prevent corona. This vaccine has been created by extracting a strain from the coronavirus.

"After clinical trials, ICMR wants to provide this vaccine to the people by August 15. Bharat Biotech is also working on a war footing. But the success of this vaccine depends on the cooperation of the institutes that have been selected for clinical trial.''

America's statement on the Army: What does Mike Pompeo's statement mean for India?

Amidst the India-China border tension, a new statement by US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has emerged.

Mike Pompeo said in the Brussels forum that in view of the increasing threats from China to India and Southeast Asia, the US has decided to reduce its military strength from Europe.

On 15-16 June on the Indo-China Ladakh border, there was a violent clash between the soldiers of the two countries in the Galwan Valley, in which 20 Indian soldiers were killed. A round of meetings are going on to resolve the dispute between the two countries. But it is being discussed all over the world.

US Secretary of State Mike has expressed condolences on this tension before. US President Donald Trump said that he is monitoring the ongoing tension between India and China and wants to help.

In such a situation, the new statement of the US Secretary of State has again brought the India-China border dispute into the headlines.

Mike Pompeo said, "We want to make sure that we are prepared to face China's People's Liberation Army." We feel that this is the challenge of our times and we are going to ensure that our preparations are complete. ''

US President Donald Trump recently announced that the US would reduce its military strength in Germany. The European Union expressed displeasure over the decision by President Trump.

Donald Trump's opponents in the United States are opposing the proposal. In the politics there, it is being presented as a statement that weaken the US militarily. Elections are to be held there in November this year. In this context, this statement becomes even more important.

But in India too, this statement is being given much importance in view of the border dispute with China.

Mike Pompeo has not said this only in the context of India. However, India is an important partner for America in this area.

After the India-China border dispute, Mike Pompeo was the first to make a statement on behalf of America. Be it the US elections in November or defense matters or the Quad Group. India-US relations have been friendly on all fronts. This is the reason why Donald Trump has visited India before the election.

There is a good relationship between the two countries in the economic field also. But in recent times, India was excluded from the US trade priority list. Social relations between the two countries are also good. This is the reason that Indians are also the largest number of H1B visa seekers. The United States knows that India's support is necessary to stop the increasing pressure on China.

America is working two interests together with this statement. The first wants to convey Germany through it.

Secondly, when China's behavior was getting worse with India, Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia, Taiwan and Philippines, America felt that this was the right time.

Then America feels that the use of military power should be shifted from Germany to these countries. It is to be remembered here that all these countries are alliance partners or strategic partners of America. If China dominates all these countries then it will be financially damaged, as well as the partnership will be affected.

Therefore, this statement of America should be viewed as a growing concern of America due to the threat of increasing Chinese proliferation in Asia.

Behind the Glitter: Mica and Child Mining in India

From nail polish to lipstick, mica is found in cosmetics that millions of people use every day.

But unknown to consumers, the mineral that gives these products their shine is often extracted using antiquated methods in slave-like conditions, in one of the poorest regions of the world.

In the dusty hills of Jharkhand, India, deep crevices have been cleaved into the hard earth. Men, women and children rummage through the dirt, using their bare hands and a few rudimentary tools to scrape the ground.

They work under the constant threat of landslides and toxic dust, risking their lives in the hope they will find and sell enough mica to survive.

"I would rather work in the mines than die of starvation," says a woman as she digs through the earth.

At another mine, Anil, 25, is searching through the rubble with his wife and their two young children. They live in a village at the foot of the mines, where there is no running water or electricity. Anil used to be a farmer, but a severe drought has left most of the land barren.

"Mica is the only option for us," he says. "We have all come here to work … so we can buy rice and feed ourselves."

From the impoverished miners to the mine owners and exporters who turn a blind eye to shocking conditions, 101 East traces the mica supply chain from the Indian countryside to the laboratories of major cosmetic brands in Europe.

Who should look after refugees during the corona virus pandemic?

The coronavirus pandemic is having a devastating impact on refugees around the world.

Preventative measures like social distancing and frequent hand washing are often difficult to implement in crowded camps.

The aid agencies helping the refugees are struggling as well.
Wealthy nations in Europe, North America and the Middle East are slashing donations, and keeping that money at home to tackle the economic fallout of the pandemic.

Oxfam, one of the world's largest charities, laid off nearly 1,500 staff and pulled out of 18 countries last month.

A recent survey estimated that global government aid will drop by 25 billion dollars by 2021.

So how do we ensure protection for some of the world's most vulnerable people?

Presenter: Imran Khan

Guests:

Heba Aly - Director of The New Humanitarian, a non-profit Journalism organisation focused on humanitarian crises.

Ole Solvang - Director of Partnerships and Policy at the Norwegian Refugee Council.

Nasser Yassin - Associate Professor of Policy and Planning at the American University of Beirut and Chair of the AUB4Refugees Initiative.