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Minister for Foreign Affairs Narayan Khadka, who is currently in Turkey in the course of the participation in the Antalya Diplomacy Forum and Minister of Economy from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) Abdulla bin touq Al Marri held a meeting. 

During the meeting, they discussed issues relating to bilateral relations, mutual assistance and opportunities for trade and investment between the two countries. 

Foreign Minister Khadka urged the UAE Minister to help ease the export of Nepali products and utilize the investment opportunities in Nepal.

The Foreign Ministry shared the information that augmentation of financial assistance, people-to-people level contact, and tourism promotion also featured during the discussion. 

Minister Khadka thanked the UAE for protecting the rights of Nepali workers there. UAE is one of the major labour destinations for Nepali workers.

The Foreign Minister also presented Nepal’s views on two separate sessions- one on ‘democratic governance and security’ and another on ‘New Asia for sustainable regional development’ in the Antalya Diplomacy Forum.

The Forum has been attended by foreign ministers, policymakers and experts from over 50 countries. RSS

The Nepali Congress (NC) is launching a month-long election campaign from Sunday to prepare for the upcoming local elections on May 13.

The campaign aims to create an environment conducive for the election by appealing to the voters to exercise their democratic rights by participating in the local level elections. The aim of the campaign is to increase the harmony, unity and energy within the party up to the ward and tole level to win the local elections, said NC spokesperson Prakash Sharan Mahat.

Similarly, the party office has stated that the party cadres and leaders will be oriented towards greater mobilization in the local elections by sharing various responsibilities provided in the party's statute. The objective of the campaign is to publicize the political and economic achievements of the past under the leadership of the Congress, the fact that they were forced to join the government for the defense of the constitution in spite of their responsibility to be in the opposition.

During the campaign, the success of the current government, led by party President and Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba, in getting the US-backed Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) passed by consensus in parliament will be highlighted. For this, the NC has deployed central representatives of the party in all the districts two days before the start of the campaign. The party's seven provincial working committees will play a leading role in their respective provinces to make this election campaigning effective.

Mahat also said that the provincial committees have been assigned to formulate necessary action plan for the success of the campaign, allocate necessary responsibilities for the implementation of the entire program, play a motivating role and coordinate the necessary programs to make the campaign program systematic, formulate additional programs as required in the campaign without affecting the main program. The campaign will be inaugurated in all the districts on the same day, at the same time at 1:00 pm today. RSS

UK households who open their homes to refugees from Ukraine are to be given £350 a month to do so, BBC reported.

The government's Homes for Ukraine scheme calls on people to offer a spare room or an empty property to a refugee for a period of at least six months.

But the Refugee Council said it was worried about the level of support available to those coming to the UK.

Labour said there many unanswered questions, and accused the government of "dragging its feet" over the crisis.

More than two million people have fled Ukraine because of Russia's invasion in what the UN has called the fastest-growing refugee crisis since World War Two, according to BBC.

The government has faced criticism - including from its own MPs - over the speed and scale of its response.

Announcing the new scheme, Levelling Up Secretary Michael Gove urged people to join the "national effort" and give a safe home to those in need.

It will launch on Monday, and will initially enable someone - a sponsor - to nominate a named Ukrainian individual or family to stay with them in their home, or in a separate property, for six months.

Sponsors won't be required to know them in advance - they might find them, for example, through posts on social media.

Applications would be made online, with both sponsors and refugees having to go through a home office vetting procedure. The sponsor would get a "thank you" payment of £350 a month.

In a later phase, organisations such as charities and churches will be able to do the same, though there is no start date for this yet, BBC reported.

Announcing the plan, Mr Gove said: "The crisis in Ukraine has sent shock waves across the world as hundreds of thousands of innocent people have been forced to flee their homes, leaving everything they know and love behind. 

"The UK stands behind Ukraine in their darkest hour and the British public understand the need to get as many people to safety as quickly as we can."

But the Refugee Council - a charity supporting refugees and asylum seekers in the UK - said it was concerned that people from Ukraine were facing further "bureaucratic hurdles", and said the government scheme fell short of what was needed.

"We are concerned that people from Ukraine are still not being recognised as refugees and being asked to apply for visas when they just need to be guaranteed protection. 

"By establishing a visa route and naming scheme, it will inevitably be restricted to those who are known to people in the UK and be a quite complex lengthy visa application process."

It said it was also worried about the support available to sponsors, according to BBC.

"We are talking about very traumatised women and children whose experiences are unique, and the level of support needs to match that. 

"It's like asking people to be foster carers without any robust checks, training or having a social worker in place to support them."

Labour's Lisa Nandy said it was unclear what support would be offered to vulnerable children and older people, whether provision would made for unaccompanied children, and what help would go to local government, sponsoring organisations and housing providers.

She said if Britons were required to have a prior connection to a Ukrainian family to sponsor them, that would be "a severe limitation", BBC reported.

Russian forces pounded the Ukrainian port city of Mariupol on Saturday, shelling its downtown as residents hid in an iconic mosque and elsewhere to avoid the explosions, Associated Press reported.

Fighting also raged in the outskirts of the capital, Kyiv, as Russia kept up its bombardment of other cities throughout the country.

Mariupol has endured some of Ukraine’s worst punishment since Russia invaded. Unceasing barrages have thwarted repeated attempts to bring food, water and medicine into the city of 430,000 and to evacuate its trapped civilians. More than 1,500 people have died in Mariupol during the siege, according to the mayor’s office, and the shelling has even interrupted efforts to bury the dead in mass graves.

Talks aimed at reaching a cease-fire again failed Saturday, and while the U.S. announced plans to provide another $200 million to Ukraine for weapons, a senior Russian diplomat warned that Moscow could attack foreign shipments of military equipment, according to the Associated Press.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy accused Russia of employing “a new stage of terror” with the alleged detention of a mayor from a city west of Mariupol.

Russian soldiers pillaged a humanitarian convoy that was trying to reach Mariupol and blocked another, a Ukrainian official said. Ukraine’s military said Russian forces captured Mariupol’s eastern outskirts, tightening their siege of the strategic port. Taking Mariupol and other ports on the Azov Sea could allow Russia to establish a land corridor to Crimea, which it seized from Ukraine in 2014. 

“They are bombing it (Mariupol) 24 hours a day, launching missiles. It is hatred. They kill children,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said during a video address. Satellite images released Saturday by the company Maxar showed fires in parts of the city and extensive damage to apartments, homes and other infrastructure, Associated Press reported.

An Associated Press journalist in Mariupol witnessed tanks firing on a nine-story apartment building and was with a group of hospital workers who came under sniper fire on Friday. A worker shot in the hip survived, but conditions in the hospital were deteriorating: Electricity was reserved for operating tables, and people with nowhere else to go lined the hallways.

Among them was Anastasiya Erashova, who wept and trembled as she held a sleeping child. Shelling had just killed her other child as well as her brother’s child, Erashova said, her scalp crusted with blood, according to the Associated Press.

“No one was able to save them,” she said.