Tag: United States

Hamas Palestinian Biden

US Make Efforts To Counter China’s Growing Influence In Pacific

By LokMarg

To counter China’s growing influence in the Pacific, the United States has dialed up every effort and made attempts that would reduce the possibility of other countries in the Pacific region getting into China’s orbit, Global Strat View reported.

Recently, US president Joe Biden held a summit with 14 Pacific Island where they issued an 11-point Declaration on US-Pacific Partnership, declaring that they shared a vision for a region where “democracy will be able to flourish.”
“We share a vision for a resilient Pacific region of peace, harmony, security, social inclusion, and prosperity, where individuals can reach their potential, the environment can thrive, and democracy will be able to flourish,” read the declaration on US-Pacific Partnership.

Washington’s plan to deepen diplomatic engagement with the Pacific comes as concerns about China’s expanding influence in the region.

During the summit, US President said, “The security of America, quite frankly, and the world depends on your security and the security of the Pacific islands.”

According to the Global, Strat View citing Derek Grossman, an analyst with the global think tank RAND Corporation, earlier, Washington had not been that active in strengthening the ties with Pacific countries. Still, the latest summit shows that the US is changing its outlook, especially in the wake of China’s expanding influence in the region.

“We are still all working from, generally speaking, the same sheet of music, which is we don’t want the Chinese establishing a military foothold in the region, and we don’t want them corrupting the institutions of the region,” he said as quoted by Global Strat View.

Biden announced that Pacific island nations will receive around USD 810 million in funds under the ‘Pacific Partnership Strategy.

The US is working at a micro level in order to remain strong in the Pacific region. This involves financial investments, defense cooperation, police training, COVID assistance, and climate support.

One of the highlights of the summit is the participation from the Solomon Islands as it has recently, in May, met Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi.

In the recent summit, Solomon Island opposed China’s reference to US Pacific Partnership Declaration. It had previously denied US and UK ships access, resulting from Beijing’s influence. All this has added to the US concerns about the Solomon Islands became a China ally, reported Global Strat View. (ANI)

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Hamas Israel

India Objects To US Envoy Blome’s Visit To POK

By LokMarg

India has objected to US Ambassador to Pakistan Donald Blome’s visit to Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) where he repeatedly referred to the region as “Azad Jammu and Kashmir.”

During a weekly presser, Ministry of External Affairs Spokesperson Arindam Bagchi said, “Our objections to the visit and meetings in PoK by the US envoy have been conveyed to the US side.”
US ambassador to Pakistan Blome during his visit to PoK throughout mentioned PoK as AJK (Azad Jammu and Kashmir). India has conveyed to the United States its objections over the US diplomat’s visit and controversial reference to PoK as Azad Kashmir.

This is the second high-profile visit by a US diplomat to Pakistan-occupied Kashmir. Earlier this year US Congresswomen Ilhan Omar visited PoK. India in a strongly worded statement had then said, “She visited a part of Jammu and Kashmir illegally occupied by Pakistan. If such a politician wishes to practice her narrow-minded politics at home that may be her business, but violating our territorial integrity in its pursuit makes it ours.”

India in 1994 had passed a resolution saying PoK is part of India and Pakistan must vacate and end its illegal occupation. A few months ago, Defence minister Rajnath Singh said ” Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir (PoK) is a part of Indian territory and will continue to be so.”

Earlier, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) had said that the government has seen reports about third countries participating in the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) Projects, and any such activity by any party directly infringed on India’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.

Bagchi had said India firmly and consistently opposes projects in the “so-called CPEC, which are in Indian territory that has been illegally occupied by Pakistan”. “Such activities are inherently illegal, illegitimate, and unacceptable, and will be treated accordingly by India,” the official statement added. (ANI)

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Indian-Origin People Abducted

Bhagwant Grieves Over Murders Of Indian-Origin Family In US

By LokMarg

Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann expressed condolences over the death of an Indian-origin family, who were found dead in California, a few days after they were abducted at gunpoint earlier this week in the US state.

In a Twitter post on Thursday, Mann also made an appeal to External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar to conduct a high-level inquiry into the death of the family who had origins in the state of Punjab.
“There was news of kidnapping and murder of four Indians in California, in which an 8-month-old girl has also been murdered. Very sad to hear this news. I share my grief with the families of the victims… and also appeal to the Union Minister of External Affairs @DrSJaishankar to conduct a high-level inquiry into the matter,” CM Mann tweeted.

The Punjab CM’s request came shortly after Merced county police informed that the Indian-origin family, including an eight-month-old baby girl, were found dead in an orchard in California.

The bodies of four members of the family, who originally hail from Punjab in India were discovered lying close to each other by a farm worker in a remote orchard in Merced county, Sheriff Vern Warnke said on Wednesday.

“Tonight our worse fears have been confirmed,” the Sheriff said addressing a press conference. “We found four people from the kidnapping. They are in fact deceased,” Sheriff Vern Warnke said.

“The family (of the victims) have been notified. We have made arrangements through other contacts to try and get them,” he said. The police will process the scene of crime to determine the motive for the killings, he said.

The Sheriff described it as a “horribly senseless” act and said that the police did not know the “motivation yet.” “We have a whole family wiped out and for what? We don’t know yet,” he said.

36-year-old Jasdeep Singh, 27-year-old Jasleen Kaur, their eight-month-old child Aroohi Dheri, along with 39-year-old Amandeep Singh were abducted, police said.

The news of the missing family was reported on Monday after local authorities found the missing victims’ truck on fire in a rural area outside the Merced County.

A surveillance video that was released by the Twitter handle of the Merced County Sheriff’s office showed the suspect leading Jasdeep Singh who was carrying baby Aroohi in his arms into a truck and driving away. (ANI)

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Israel Protests Mahsa Amini

Iran’s Khamenei Blames the US, Israel For Protests Over Mahsa Amini

By LokMarg

Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei, has blamed the United States for the ongoing protest in the country following the death of Mahsa Amini, who died in custody after being arrested for allegedly violating the strict dress code.

Speaking at a graduation ceremony on Monday, Khamenei said he was heartbroken at the death of the 22-year-old girl in police custody. However, he did not approve of the large-scale demonstrations following the death of Amini.

“We were heartbroken, too. But the reaction to this incident, while no investigation has been done and nothing has been certain, should not have been this that some people come and make the streets insecure, cause the people to feel unsafe, harm the security, burn the Quran, remove the hijab of a woman, burn mosques and hussainiyahs, and arson banks and people’s cars,” he was quoted as saying by news agency IRNA.

Ayatollah Khamenei alleged that this chaos was planned by the United States and some Iranians who are living abroad have helped them.

Amini, 22, was arrested by Iran’s “morality police” in the capital, Tehran, on September 13, for allegedly not wearing a hijab in full compliance with mandatory requirements. According to the authorities, she fell into a coma shortly after collapsing at a detention center and died three days later from a heart attack.

Since her death, thousands have joined anti-government demonstrations throughout the country. Security forces have responded at times with live ammunition, and many people have been killed, injured, and detained in the protests.

More than 100 people have been killed in nationwide protests over the death of Mahsa Amini, according to the Norway-based group Iran Human Rights (IHR) NGO. The group said the international community has a duty to investigate this crime and prevent further crimes from being committed by Iran.

Last week, the UN chief Antonio Guterres said he was becoming “increasingly concerned” about reports of the death toll rising, “including women and children.”

In his statement released via his Spokesperson, UN Secretary-General said he had been following events closely, and he called on security forces to stop using “unnecessary or disproportionate force”.

He appealed for restraint, to avoid any escalation: “We underline the need for a prompt, impartial, and effective investigation into Mahsa Amini’s death by an independent competent authority.” (ANI)

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Putin Provoke Colour Revolution

West Ready To Provoke Colour Revolution In Any Country: Putin

By LokMarg

Accusing the West of provoking colour revolution in any country for geopolitical gains, Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday said that the West has “plundered” countries like India in contradiction to the values of “truth, freedom and justice.”

“The West … began its colonial policy back in the Middle Ages, and then followed the slave trade, the genocide of Indian tribes in America, the plunder of India, of Africa, the wars of England and France against China … What they did was hooking entire nations on drugs, deliberately exterminate entire ethnic groups,” said Putin in the St George’s Hall at a Kremlin ceremony where he declared the annexation of four regions – Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhia.
“For the sake of land and resources, they hunted people like animals. This is contrary to the very nature of man, truth, freedom and justice,” he added as he condemned West for stirring up new conflicts.

Putin said that the West stands ready to provoke revolution in any country. “Following their goals, our geopolitical opponents – our opponents as we called them until quite recently – are prepared to put anyone, any country, in the line of fire; to turn it into the epicenter of a crisis; to provoke a “color revolution” and unleash a bloodbath.”

“We have seen all this on more than one occasion. We also know that the West works on scenarios to stir up new conflicts in the CIS (Commonwealth of Independent States) area. But we have enough of them as it is. You need but look at what’s happening now between Russia and Ukraine, what’s happening on the borders of some other CIS countries.”

In an all-out attack on the West, Putin in the ceremony formally announced the annexation of four regions – Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhia and claimed that “this is the will of millions of people.”

He also attacked the West as ‘satanic’ and hailed ‘traditional’ Russian values.

“Do we really want in our schools, from the elementary grades, that children were imposed perversions that lead to degradation and extinction? That they were taught that besides a man and a woman there were some other genders and were offered sex-change operations? Do we really want this for our country, for our children? All this is unacceptable for us, we have our own, different future,” he said as he slammed western values.

“There are four new regions of Russia,” Putin said in a lengthy speech declaring the annexation of Ukrainian territories in the St George’s Hall at a Kremlin ceremony. The speech was filled with highly critical rhetoric about Ukraine and its Western allies, reported Al Jazeera.

Putin said the residents in the four annexed regions will now be Russia’s “citizens forever”.

While denying seeking revival of the Soviet Union by the said annexation, Putin accused Western states – which have imposed sweeping sanctions on Moscow over its invasion of Ukraine.

Moreover, in a strong statement, Putin also added that Russia would now defend its new territory “with all the means at its disposal.”

Defending its decision to go ahead with the referendum and announce the annexation of the region, the Russian President argued it was the “integral right” of people in Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhia to join Russia, reported Al Jazeera.

Speaking further, Putin claimed that the people in eastern Ukraine made up of Donetsk and Luhansk – had been “victims of inhumane terrorist attacks conducted by the Kyiv regime”.

He also called the result of the referendum “the will of millions of people.”

In a major move by Russia, President Vladimir Putin had signed a decree recognizing the so-called “independence” of the Ukrainian regions Zaporizhzhia and Kherson.

Moreover, the UN Security Council is set to vote Friday on a resolution that would seek to condemn Russia for its referenda in four regions under Russian control but claimed by Ukraine, media reports said.

The US-sponsored resolution would call on all countries not to recognise the change in the status of the four regions, CNN reported. The resolution, which is also backed by Albania, would reaffirm the UN commitment to Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said any annexation of a state’s territory by another state resulting from a “threat or use of force” is a violation of the UN charter and international law. Moreover, US has slapped new sanctions on Russia after Moscow declared independence of the seized Ukrainian territories and separatist regions. (ANI)

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Meta Influence Campaigns

Meta Shuts Down Russia, China-Based Influence Campaigns

By LokMarg

Meta, the parent company of Facebook, on Tuesday took down two separate covert influence networks operating from China and Russia.

Meta publicly detailed the takedown as it remains on high alert for foreign interference in the US midterm elections, a Meta spokesperson told CNN.
The Chinese network was small and received barely any attention, but it did include some accounts that posed as Americans on both sides of the political spectrum, according to a Meta report.

Ben Nimmo, Meta’s global threat intelligence lead, told CNN it was the first time the company had seen Chinese accounts targeting Americans in this way.

“They were running fake accounts that pretended to be Americans and try to talk like Americans and they were talking about really divisive domestic issues like abortion and gun control,” he said.

The company has shared details of the Chinese accounts with the FBI, a Meta spokesperson said.

The Russian campaign, on the other hand, was vast. It pushed pro-Kremlin narratives about the war in Ukraine, included thousands of accounts and pages across multiple social media platforms and spent more than USD 100,000 on ads on Facebook and Instagram.

Meta did not attribute either campaign to specific entities within China or Russia, or to the Chinese and Russian governments, instead saying only the accounts that were part of the campaigns were run out of the respective countries, reported CNN.

Meta said the network of Russian accounts it had taken down was the “largest and most complex Russian operation we’ve disrupted since the war in Ukraine began, it ran a sprawling network of over 60 websites impersonating news organizations, as well as accounts on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Telegram, Twitter,” and other sites, according to the report.

The operation included websites that were designed to mimic real Western news outlets, including The Guardian. According to a list of website addresses included in the Meta report, the Russian campaign also registered fake sites designed to look like The Daily Mail and the German outlets Bild and Der Spiegel, reported CNN.

The sophistication of the effort was demonstrated in its attempts to promote disinformation about the Bucha massacre.

The Chinese effort only consisted of about 80 Facebook accounts and barely had any following. Meta said the accounts primarily targeted audiences in the United States and the Czech Republic but posted during working hours in Beijing.

Meta said, “these accounts largely stuck to a shift pattern that coincided with a nine-to-five, Monday-to-Friday work schedule during working hours in China — 12 hours ahead of Florida and six hours ahead of Prague,” according to the report. (ANI)

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China In Air Defence

US Losing Out To China In Air Defence Superiority: Report

By LokMarg

Ageing and fewer US fighters flown by undertrained pilots have already fallen behind China’s rapid fleet expansion, giving air superiority to Beijing in the Pacific region.

Gabriel Honrada, writing in Asia Times said that China’s jet fighter force may have already caught up with the quality and quantity of the US, prompting new urgent calls in Washington to build up and modernize the US fighter fleet.

US Air Combat Command Chief General Mark Kelley said that America’s combat air forces are 12 squadrons short of multiple aircraft types at the US Air Force Association’s annual Air, Space, and Cyber Conference this month, as reported by the Air and Space Forces Magazine.

He cautioned that the US had departed the era of conventional overmatch, with US combat air forces less than half of what they were during the 1991 Gulf War, reported Asia Times.

However, exact aircraft numbers are highly classified; fighter squadrons generally consist of between 18 and 24 jets.”When you have conventional overmatch, strategic risk is low. But that’s not where we’ve arrived in terms of conventional deterrence,” Kelly said.

He noted that while the US Air Force needs 60 fighter squadrons, it has only 48 of those to carry out its missions for homeland defence, overseas contingencies, overseas presence and crisis response, said Honrada.

He added that while the US Air Force has nine A-10 ground-attack aircraft squadrons, they lack air-to-air and multirole combat capability.

Kelly said these fighter shortages are most acutely felt in the Pacific, noting that the US needs 13 fighter squadrons in the region but now has only 11.

Apart from squadron shortages, Kelly mentions that only three out of eight squadrons are transitioning to new aircraft, resulting in a fighter force that is smaller, older and less capable, reported Asia Times.

He pointed out that the US fighter fleet is, on average, 28.8 years old compared to 9.7 years in 1991, with readiness levels plummeting as pilots get only 9.7 flight hours a month, compared to 22.3 just before the 1991 Gulf War.

Kelly makes a case for a fighter force that will dissuade any opponent from contemplating war with the US, making the case that no country in its proper frame of mind would pick a fight with a country with 134 modernized, well-trained and well-equipped fighter squadrons.

To achieve these force numbers, Kelly states that the US must maintain a production target of 72 fighters per year and keep its allies at a comparable level of capability, as the latter will be critical force multipliers, said Honrada.

He proposes a 4+1 fighter force mix for the 2030s, consisting of F-22s, F-35s, F-15EXs, F-16s, and A-10s. The F-22 will be the primary air superiority platform to be supplanted by the upcoming Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) fighter.

Moreover, in terms of qualitative improvements to its fighter jets, China has been steadily improving the quality of its jet engines, which were a significant handicap for its fighters, and substantially improving its air-to-air missiles to the point of exceeding Western models in some cases. (ANI)

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blinken

Need for Peace And Stability In Taiwan Strait: Blinken

By LokMarg

Amid the tension between US and China, Secretary of State Antony Blinken met his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi on Friday and stressed for preserving peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait.

Blinken, who is in New York to attend the 77th sessions of UNGA, “stressed that preserving peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait is critical to regional and global security and prosperity,” State Department spokesperson Ned Price said in a statement.
Over an hour-long meeting, Blinken emphasized that the United States is committed to maintaining peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait, consistent with its longstanding one-China policy.

Both leaders discussed the need to maintain open lines of communication and responsibly manage the US-PRC relationship.

“He also reiterated the United States’ condemnation of Russia’s war against Ukraine and highlighted the implications if the PRC were to provide support to Moscow’s invasion of a sovereign state. He underscored that the United States remains open to cooperating with the PRC where our interests intersect,” Ned Price said as quoted by the statement.

Earlier also, the US had repeatedly raised their voice on China-Taiwan relations. On September 19, CBS released their interview with US President from its “60 minutes programme”, where Joe Biden said that American forces would defend Taiwan from a Chinese invasion.

Responding to a query over defending Taiwan in the event of a Chinese invasion, Biden said the US would defend Taiwan “if in fact there was an unprecedented attack,” according to The Washington Post.

Scott Pelley, the interviewer in the 60-minute programme pressed Biden on whether the situation would be different in the event of an attack on Taiwan.

“So unlike Ukraine, to be clear, sir, U.S. forces — U.S. men and women — would defend Taiwan in the event of a Chinese invasion?” Pelley asked.

“Yes,” Biden replied.

The relations between China and US deteriorated after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi visited Taiwan. That trip angered China’s ruling Communist Party — which views Taiwan as part of its territory, despite never having governed it — and it responded by launching unprecedented military drills around the island, sending warplanes across the Taiwan Strait and firing missiles over the main island. (ANI)

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