The beaches of Gaza once represented escape and leisure. One particular beachfront is currently a temporary shelter for Palestinian refugees. Food, water, and shelter are in short supply for families. Hani Mahmoud of Al Jazeera reminisces about Gaza City.
After initially cancelling because of days of extensive protests against rising inequality, Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto has left for China, according to his presidential spokesperson, Prasetyo Hadi, in a statement.
Kim Jong Un, Russia’s Vladimir Putin, and more than 25 leaders will attend the parade in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square on Wednesday to commemorate the anniversaries of Japan’s defeat in World War II.
According to his spokesman on Tuesday, Prabowo is scheduled to meet with Xi Jinping in China for lunch. On September 3, he will return home.
Rights groups claim that at least six people were killed and over 20 were missing in Indonesia as a result of widespread protests.
Following the fatal shooting of a motorcycle taxi driver who was hit by a police car during a demonstration in the capital, protests started in Jakarta last week.
A five-storey building has been set on fire near the police compound in the central Jakarta Kwitang neighborhood after protesters have attacked the police mobile brigade headquarters.
In the easternmost Papua region, Surabaya, Solo, Yogyakarta, Medan, Makassar, Manado, Bandung, and Manokwari have also been the sites of demonstrations in other cities across the nation.
Protesters also targeted other lawmakers’ homes as well as the finance minister’s home in Indonesia.
President Subianto promised on Friday to look into the death of Affan Kurniawan, a driver for a gig motorcycle, and he also expressed his “deepest condolences and sympathy” for the government.
He stated in a statement that “I have ordered that the incident last night be thoroughly and transparently investigated and that the officers involved be held accountable.
The country’s government cut financial incentives for lawmakers on Sunday to address the protestors’ economic concerns.
President Subianto stated, “The parliament leadership informed me that they would revoke several policies, including the cap on the amount of money that lawmakers can receive from abroad,” without mentioning which cap.
The president, however, attacked the protests over the country’s economic problems on Sunday, saying some of the actions at rallies in recent days constituted “terrorism” and treason.
“Respectful and protected should be the right to peaceful assembly. In a speech at the presidential palace in the capital’s Jakarta, he said, “We cannot deny that there are signs of actions against the law, even against the law, which lean toward treason and terrorism.”
After several politicians’ homes were razed as anti-government protests spread throughout Indonesia, defense minister Sjafrie Sjamsoeddin announced at a press conference on Sunday that the country would take strong measures against “rioters and looters.” In order to improve security, the country’s armed forces were also stationed in the capital.
Rights groups claim Prabowo’s olive branch from parliament did not go far enough, despite the recent decrease in the protest rallies and the military’s deployment on Monday as a show of force.
According to Amnesty International Indonesia executive director Usman Hamid, the president’s statement was insensitive to all the complaints and aspirations the people were voicing during the demonstrations.
During Russian President Vladimir Putin’s visit to China, Russia and China have come to terms with building a new gas pipeline, Gazprom reported, underscoring the strengthening of their economic and energy ties.
A “legally binding memorandum” had been signed to develop the pipeline, according to Alexei Miller, CEO of Gazprom, Russia’s largest energy company, on Tuesday.
An additional 50 billion cubic meters (bcm) of gas could be transported by Mongolia’s Power of Siberia 2 each year from Russia’s Arctic Yamal fields to China.
Miller added that from now on, deliveries from eastern Siberia to China will increase to 44 bcm annually from 38 bcm.
The agreement would increase Beijing’s energy options while reducing its dependence on American-imported liquefied natural gas (LNG) imports.
Following high-profile meetings between President Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping, the Russian leader praised Beijing’s “unprecedented ties.”
For the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit in Tianjin, China, Xi also hosted dozens of world leaders, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The Chinese leader urged regional leaders to reject “Cold War mentality,” making explicit reference to the United States, by promoting the security bloc as an alternative to the Western-led international order.
Despite several rounds of discussions, Beijing and Washington have not yet reached a trade agreement.
US President Donald Trump stated in an interview with “Scott Jennings Radio Show” on Tuesday that he is “not concerned at all” about a growing US-to-Russia border.
Pricing for the new route is undetermined, though. Russia’s efforts to offset the decline of its European gas market, while China seeks discounts, are being met separately, according to Miller, who stated that negotiations on costs would be handled.
According to Michal Meidan, head of China Energy Research at the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, “Announcements about Power of Siberia 2 are a huge turning point in the geopolitics of energy.” The message is that China no longer cares about what the West thinks or even pretends to be complicit in US sanctions. Additionally, it is not by itself.
Russia’s sanctioned Arctic LNG 2 project has already sent liquefied natural gas to China, indicating that it is ready to defy Western pressure.
Moscow and Beijing’s trade increased to $ 240 billion in 2023, underlining their growing partnership since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
No details were provided, but officials from the Kremlin claimed that during Putin’s ongoing visit, 22 agreements, including one involving a strategic cooperation agreement between China National Petroleum Corporation and Gazprom, had been signed.
A federal appeals court has ruled that President Donald Trump’s administration can move forward with ending more than $ 16 billion in federal grants to climate change organizations.
The District of Columbia’s US Appeals Court overturned a lower court’s decision on Tuesday, with a 2 to 1 majority, to reverse the grant’s revoked status.
Judge Neomi Rao, a Trump appointee, wrote for the majority, claiming that the lower court was unable to render a decision in the matter.
Instead, she claimed that the Court of Federal Claims, which weighs contractual and monetary disputes, should have been in the hands of.
Rao wrote that “district courts have no jurisdiction to hear allegations that the federal government arbitrarily or with impunity terminated a grant agreement.” “Claims of arbitrary grant termination are primarily contractual,” says the statement.
She continued, district courts should concentrate on settling legal disputes or constitutional issues.
Judge Gregory Katsas, a fellow Trump appointee on the bench, joined Rao in making her choice.
Former US President Barack Obama appointed Cornelia Pillard as the only dissentioning judge on the appeals court.
She claimed that the Trump administration’s opposition to green-energy initiatives was reflected in the federal grant rollback as a political move.
Pillard also pointed out that the Inflation Reduction Act, a law passed by Congress in 2022 that included the single largest investment in climate change initiatives in US history, contained federal funding.
According to Pillard, the Trump administration made the decision to revoke federal grants “without giving any court any compelling evidence or coherent justification for its interference with plaintiffs’ money and its sabotage of Congress’s laws.”
The Inflation Reduction Act, a landmark piece of legislation passed under former President Joe Biden, was the continuation of a lawsuit brought by five of the eight nonprofits on Tuesday.
The Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, a program to fund “green bank” projects designed to build clean-energy infrastructure, reduce air pollution, and reduce greenhouse gas emissions, had designated that money.
The funding was kept at Citibank, a well-known US financial institution, in advance of their distribution.
However, Lee Zeldin, Trump’s choice to lead the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), publicly denounced the funds as a source of government waste in a video released on social media in February.
The Biden EPA reportedly parked roughly $20 billion of your tax dollars at an outside financial institution, Zeldin said. Just eight organizations were given the authority to distribute your money to NGOs and other organizations at their discretion, according to the statement.
He continued, “The days of recklessly handing over large sums of money to far-left activist groups in the name of climate justice and climate equity are over.”
The Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund’s disbursement was halted by Zeldin by the EPA’s inspector general by March, and the funds had already been withdrawn.
One of the five organizations fighting for access to their roughly $16 million investment has been The Climate United Fund.
The Justice Climate Fund, Power Forward Communities, Inclusiv, and the Coalition for Green Capital are other plaintiffs.
The Climate United Fund reiterated in a statement that the Trump administration “broke the law” by recovering the funds following Tuesday’s ruling.
Our company’s CEO, Beth Bafford, stated, “While we are depressed by the panel’s decision, we stand firm on the merits of our case: EPA unlawfully froze and terminated funds that were legally obligated and disbursed.”
She continued, “Our road is not over now,” adding.
A lower-court decision from Obama appointee Judge Tanya Chutkan was overturned by Tuesday’s appeals court decision.
She requested Citibank’s release of the $20 billion in the form of a preliminary injunction against Zeldin’s decision on April 15. This injunction prevents Trump’s EPA from recouping the funds.
She argued that the EPA “gave no legal justification for the termination” and that the EPA’s choice to axe the funds posed a threat to the authority of Congress to make spending decisions.
Following a police investigation into his purchase of a supplement that might have broken the country’s stringent drug laws, Suntory Holdings CEO Takeshi Niinami, one of Japan’s most well-known businessmen, resigned from the beverage company.
Niinami, who frequently appeared at corporate Japan events at Davos and other international events, told Suntory he believed the supplement was legal, according to the company’s statement on Tuesday. He has advised several Japanese prime ministers.
“I didn’t know it was a prohibited supplement. In a report released on Tuesday evening, he claimed innocence in front of the Asahi newspaper. He added that if he did not step down, he said, the business would not be able to unite. Niinami could not be reached for comment right away.
Nobuhiro Torii, the company’s founder’s great-grandson Shinjiro Torii, announced in a press briefing that he would now be in full charge of the business.
Torii referred to Niinami as a “brave, determined leader who accomplished things,” and I sincerely respect him. It’s a real shame that we couldn’t continue as a team in that regard, which I also told him yesterday.
The powerful Keizai Doyukai business lobby is led by Niinami, who speaks English fluently. According to the Asahi report, he claimed he had no intention of leaving that position. Officials from the Keizai Doyukai were unavailable for comment right away.
On Wednesday afternoon, he is expected to give his regular press conference at the business lobby, in which he will provide more details about his resignation.
In addition to being outspoken, Niinami frequently expressed his opinions on how the Japanese economy should be run and how the central bank should act.
According to the Tokyo Shimbun daily, Fukuoka prefecture police were looking into whether marijuana-containing supplements had been delivered to Niinami’s home, a case that has ties to a July arrest suspect.
Other Japanese media reported that the supplements allegedly contained THC, a psychoactive substance found in Japan. However, cannabis is legal as a distinct chemical compound, and there are products made in Japan made of it.
Niinami informed Suntory on August 22 that he was the subject of a police investigation, making the company the maker of whisky, beer, and other soft drinks like Orangina-branded soda. On September 1, he resigned.
Niinami, 66, took over Suntory as president in 2014 after purchasing US spirits company Beam for $ 16 billion, including debt, to significantly increase its revenue and profits.
No illegal drug use or possession has been confirmed, despite police questioning and searching Niinami’s Tokyo home. On the reports, there was no immediate access to a Fukuoka Police official.
Before becoming Suntory’s boss, the first person to lead the business from a non-familian background, Niinami was a graduate of Harvard Business School and previously held the position of chief executive of law enforcement company Lawson.
There are strict drug regulations in Japan. After an allegation that he had purchased illegal drugs, Japanese endoscope manufacturer Olympus Corp fired then-CEO Stefan Kaufmann, a German national.