Nepal, UK sign agreement on health partnership
Nepal and the UK signed a health partnership agreement on Monday. Following the deal, Nepal can now send the Nepali nurses to work in the UK. Secretary at the Ministry of Labour, Employment and Social Security, Ek Narayan Aryal and British Ambassador to Nepal, Nicola Pollitt signed the agreement amidst a program held at the Ministry today. The nurses going to the UK for employment need not have to pay any fees. They can work there for five years.
CEC Thapaliya seeks media support to ensure huge voters turnout
Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Dinesh Kumar Thapaliya has said the media should play a vital role to enhance public trust in the electoral system and ensure a huge turnout in the voting process.
During an interaction held with the media persons on Sunday, CEC Thapaliya called for continued debates and news dissemination adding that periodic election enlivens democracy. Journalists covering election issues were invited for the interaction on the backdrop of upcoming federal and provincial assembly polls. Stating that unwanted and forceful acts to win the polls were inappropriate for free, fair, and fearless elections, Thapaliya added the EC was learning lessons from the recently held local level polls in the name list of voters, invalid votes, the format of the ballot paper and other poll-related ideas. On the occasion, he announced to form a mechanism to disseminate news in an integrated approach. All the commissioners of the EC and secretary were present in the event where the journalists suggested that the EC should ensure the information dissemination system further systematic, effective and prompt.
US, S. Korea open biggest drills in years amid North threats
The United States and South Korea began their biggest combined military training in years Monday as they heighten their defense posture against the growing North Korean nuclear threat, Associated Press reported.
The drills could draw an angry response from North Korea, which has dialed up its weapons testing activity to a record pace this year while repeatedly threatening conflicts with Seoul and Washington amid a prolonged stalemate in diplomacy.
The Ulchi Freedom Shield exercises will continue through Sept. 1 in South Korea and include field exercises involving aircraft, warships, tanks and potentially tens of thousands of troops.
While Washington and Seoul describe their exercises as defensive, North Korea portrays them as invasion rehearsals and has used them to justify its nuclear weapons and missiles development.
Ulchi Freedom Shield, which started along with a four-day South Korean civil defense training program led by government employees, will reportedly include exercises simulating joint attacks, front-line reinforcements of arms and fuel, and removals of weapons of mass destruction. The allies will also train for drone attacks and other new developments in warfare shown during Russia’s war on Ukraine and practice joint military-civilian responses to attacks on seaports, airports and major industrial facilities such as semiconductor factories.
The United States and South Korea in past years had canceled some of their regular drills and downsized others to computer simulations to create space for the Trump administration’s diplomacy with North Korea and because of COVID-19 concerns, according to Associated Press.
Tensions have grown since the collapse of the second meeting between former President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in early 2019. The Americans then rejected North Korean demands for a major release of crippling U.S.-led sanctions in exchange for dismantling an aging nuclear complex, which would have amounted to a partial surrender of the North’s nuclear capabilities. Kim has since vowed to bolster his nuclear deterrent in face of “gangster-like” US pressure.
South Korea’s military has not revealed the number of South Korean and US troops participating in Ulchi Freedom Shield, but has portrayed the training as a message of strength. Seoul’s Defense Ministry said last week that Ulchi Freedom Shield “normalizes” large-scale training and field exercises between the allies to help bolster their alliance and strengthen their defense posture against the evolving North Korean threat, Associated Press.
377A: Singapore to end ban on gay sex
Singapore will repeal a law that bans gay sex, effectively making it legal to be homosexual in the city-state, BBC reported.
The decision, announced by Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong on national TV, comes after years of fierce debate.
LGBT activists in Singapore have hailed the move as "a win for humanity".
The city-state is known for its conservative values, but in recent years an increasing number of people have called for the colonial-era 377A law to be abolished.
Singapore is the latest place in Asia to move on LGBT rights, after India, Taiwan and Thailand.
The government's previous stance was to keep 377A - which bans sex between men - but it also promised not to enforce the law in an effort to appease both sides.
But on Sunday night, Mr Lee said they would abolish the law as he believed "this is the right thing to do, and something that most Singaporeans will accept".
He noted that "gay people are now better accepted" and scrapping 377A would bring the country's laws in line with "current social mores, and I hope, provide some relief to gay Singaporeans".
"We finally did it, and we're ecstatic that this discriminatory, antiquated law is finally going to be off the books. There's a sense that maybe it took a little too long, but it had to happen, you know. Today we are very, very happy," gay activist Johnson Ong told the BBC.
A coalition of LGBT rights groups called it a "hard-won victory and a triumph of love over fear", adding it was the first step towards full equality.
But they also expressed concern over another announcement Mr Lee made in the same speech.
He had said the government would ensure better legal protection for the definition of marriage as one between a man and a woman. This would effectively make it harder for gay marriage to be legalised.
He said Singapore remains a traditional society with many keen on maintaining family and social norms, according to BBC.
LGBT activists called this "disappointing" and warned that it would only further entrench discrimination in society.
Meanwhile Protect Singapore, a conservative group, said they were "deeply disappointed" that the repeal was going ahead without assurance of "comprehensive safeguards".
They called for the definition of heterosexual marriage to be fully enshrined in the constitution, as well as laws banning "LGBT promotion" to children.
