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India’s Minister for External affairs minister S Jaishankar has warned nations not to get sucked into a debt trap by accepting Chinese aid.

The Indian minister made the remarks while participating in a discussion on the theme “Regional order and security in the Indo-Pacific” at the Munich Security Conference on February 19.

Bangladesh foreign minister AK Abdul Momen, who was in the audience, raised the issue of his country requiring funds for infrastructure projects to meet the aspirations of the people, and China offering a “basket of money” and aggressive and affordable proposals while aid from other partners came with a lot of strings, The Hindustan Times reported.

According to The Hindustan Times, Jaishankar responded by cautioning countries against getting caught in a debt trap while accepting China’s assistance. “International relations are competitive, every country will look for opportunities and see what it can do but while doing so, it’s in their own interest to be prudent about what they’re getting into,” he said.

“We have seen countries, including in our region, being saddled with large debts. We have seen projects which are commercially unsustainable – airports where an aircraft doesn’t come, harbours where a ship doesn’t come. I think people would be justified in asking themselves what am I getting into,” he said.

Nepal Teen Leaders (NTL), an exclusive student-centric year-long program designed for teenage students, has opened forms for the batch of 2022. Find the link to the form here.

NTL is an initiation of Career Point Education Services Pvt. Ltd. with an objective of enabling students’ growth in behavioral attributes and interpersonal skills to the best of their competencies.

This program prioritizes career-building, choosing the right career path, personality development, social and communication skills enhancement amongst the participants intending a positive impact upon their decision making ability and develop analytical perspectives over respective issues. In addition, this program has been primarily designed to create a noteworthy impact in their lives through active involvement in different tasks and activities that will be conducted through distinct expertise in respective sectors. 

“Our aim is to provide proper guidance and help participants to achieve their life goals together with behavioral progress through different planned activities,” says Bishal KC, Executive Director of Career Point.

For eligibility, the candidates must have cleared class 11 or equivalent level, should have the interest to work in leadership and social issues. They must bear the commitment to participate actively in every activity. Participants should also be initiative, laborious and focused while the selected ones will be fully funded throughout the program.

KATHMANDU: Chairperson of Media Action Nepal (MAN) Laxman Datt Pant has been elected to co-lead a key global network to defend and promote press freedom across the world.

Elections of the Media Freedom Coalition-Consultative Network (MFC-CN), consisting of 22 organizations from different countries, held to elect a vacant co-chair yesterday (February 8, 2022) elected Pant to the influential global post. The MFC-CN is a group of national, regional and international organizations that provides advice to the Media Freedom Coalition (MFC), a partnership of countries working together to advocate for media freedom and safety of journalists and hold to account those who harm journalists for doing their job.

With this, MAN Chairperson Pant, an internationally acclaimed media scholar and trainer as well as a fighter for press freedom, joins two other co-chairs Silvia Chocarro of Article 19 and Rachael Kay of IFEX to coordinate MFC-CN activities globally and represent the network in global meetings that MFC organizes to defend media freedom. 

Commenting on his elections, Pant said, “Being the new-chair comes with great responsibility. At a time when press freedom is under increasing attack in many countries including Nepal, we must collectively do everything we can to defend it.” “We need bold actions to promote media freedom where it is under attack. For that, I will work together with other co-chairs and members MFC-CN as well as with other like-minded organizations and individuals to better coordinate our actions and increase effectiveness.”

Members of MFC-CN are ARTICLE 19, International Federation of Journalists, International Press Institute, Reporters sans Frontières, Association of International Broadcasting, World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers, The Guardian, International Media Support, Committee to Protect Journalists, Public Media Alliance, Internews Europe, IFEX, South East European Network for Professionalization of Media and Media Monitoring Africa. The other eight members are MAN, Free Press Unlimited, Cambodian Center for Human Rights, Pakistan Press Foundation, Comité por la Libre Expresión, DW Akademie, Fundación para la Libertad de Prensa and Maharat Foundation.

Last month, MAN, a media rights advocate and research organization working across Nepal and also in South Asia, was selected as a member of MFC-CN. “This new global responsibility has made me personally and MAN further committed to work everything in our capacity to promote press freedom and improve safety of journalists,” Pant said.

Kathmandu- India-Nepal Centre (INC)  in association with the Confederation of Nepalese Industries (CNI) and Nepal SBI Bank Ltd (NSBL), PHD Chamber of Commerce and Industry (PHDCCI) hosted the India-Nepal Startup Summit 2022. The key purpose of the Summit was to bring the important stakeholders of bilateral economic cooperation on a common idea platform from both India and Nepal to discuss some of the most crucial aspects concerning investment and partnership to support the thriving Startup Ecosystem in both India and Nepal.

The session was attended by the key policymakers from both the government and industry to ideate the way forward for ever closer cooperation between India and Nepal with a focus on fostering the startup ecosystem in both countries.

K V Rajan, Chair, India-Nepal Centre, PHDCCI & India’s Former Ambassador to Nepal mentioned that we must constantly revisit the critically important aspects like simplification, handholding and funding aspects of startups.

Ram Prasad Subedi, Chargé D'Affaires, Embassy of Nepal in India reflected on the broad trends concerning the bilateral economic cooperation between India and Nepal and identified startup cooperation as a very important factor of economic development.

 Dipak Kumar De, MD & CEO, Nepal SBI Bank Ltd (NSBL) said that India continues to be the most formidable economic partner due to deepen bilateral ties. Foreign investments and approval are the real issues. However, Indian investment in Nepal has been significantly impressive. NSBL is the partner in Nepal’s progress and it looks forward to supporting the startups, he said.  The Summit was curated and coordinated by  Atul K Thakur, Nodal Coordinator, India-Nepal Centre, PHDCCI.