Dhaka:

Bangladesh “has no obligation” to host 81 Rohingya Muslim refugees adrift for practically two weeks within the Andaman Sea and with the assistance of India, mentioned Bangladeshi Overseas Minister AK Abdul Momen.

The Indian coast guard discovered the 81 survivors and eight lifeless crammed right into a paralyzed fishing boat and had been attempting to rearrange for Bangladesh to take them away, authorities mentioned Friday.

However Momen advised Reuters late Friday that Bangladesh hopes both India, the closest nation, or Myanmar, the Rohingya’s house nation, will settle for them.

“They don’t seem to be residents of Bangladesh and, in actual fact, they’re residents of Myanmar. They had been discovered 1,700 km (1,100 miles) off the maritime territory of Bangladesh and due to this fact we’ve got no obligation to hold them,” mentioned Momen, who’s present in United States. State.

“They had been situated 147 km (91 miles) from Indian territory, 324 km (201 miles) from Myanmar,” he mentioned by cellphone, including that different nations and organizations ought to deal with the refugees.

Officers on the Indian Overseas Ministry didn’t reply to requests for remark.

Overseas Ministry spokesman Anurag Srivastava mentioned on Thursday that India was “in talks with the Authorities of Bangladesh to make sure their secure repatriation.”

New Delhi didn’t signal the 1951 Refugee Conference, which spells out the rights of refugees and state obligations to guard them. It additionally doesn’t have a regulation defending refugees, though it at present homes greater than 200,000, together with some Rohingya.

Greater than 1 million Rohingya refugees from predominantly Buddhist Myanmar dwell in camps crammed with Muslim-majority Bangladesh, together with tens of 1000’s who fled after the Myanmar army carried out a lethal crackdown in 2017.

Traffickers typically lure Rohingya refugees with guarantees of labor in Southeast Asian nations like Malaysia.

The United Nations refugee company, UNHCR, expressed alarm this week over the misplaced ship.

India mentioned on Thursday that round 47 of the ship’s occupants are in possession of identification playing cards issued by the UNHCR workplace in Bangladesh, indicating that they’re displaced Myanmar residents.

THERE IS NO “GLOBAL CONTRACT” TO HELP REFUGEES

The refugees have been adrift in worldwide waters after leaving southern Bangladesh on February 11 in hopes of reaching Malaysia.

On Saturday, they had been beneath the assistance and surveillance of India as officers held talks to return them to Bangladesh, mentioned the senior Indian official who will not be approved to talk to the media.

The ship, which left the large Cox’s Bazar refugee camp, was carrying 56 girls, eight women, 21 males and 5 boys.

Lots of the survivors, in keeping with the Indian authorities, had been sick and affected by excessive dehydration, having run out of meals and water after the ship’s engine failed 4 days after their voyage.

“Has Bangladesh been given the worldwide contract and accountability to grab and rehabilitate all of the Rohingya or ship folks of the world?” Momen mentioned. “Under no circumstances.”

Momen mentioned UNHCR must also take accountability, as many individuals on the ship have ID playing cards from the UNHCR workplace in Bangladesh.

“If (the refugees) are holders of a UNHCR card, why did they permit the traffickers to float their card holders out to sea and cause them to their deaths?

UNHCR officers weren’t instantly contacted for remark.

Washington:

America publicly accused Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman for the primary time on Friday of approving the ugly homicide of dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi, revealing a collection of punitive measures, however circuitously focusing on the highly effective inheritor obvious.

The prince, who’s the de facto ruler of the previous US ally and oil provider, “authorised an operation in Istanbul, Turkey to seize or kill Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi,” stated an intelligence report just lately declassified by the US administration. President Joe Biden.

The report stated that given the affect of Prince Mohammed, it was “extremely unlikely” that the 2018 assassination would have taken place with out his inexperienced mild. The homicide additionally suits a sample of “the crown prince’s assist for using violent measures to silence dissidents overseas.”

Khashoggi, a critic of Prince Mohammed who wrote for The Washington Put up and was a resident of the US, was lured to the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October 2018, then assassinated and hacked to items.

The Treasury Division introduced that it was freezing property and criminalizing transactions with a former intelligence official, in addition to with the Fast Intervention Drive, an elite unit that, in line with the report, “exists to defend the crown prince” and “solely responds to the”.

In honor of the murdered author, Secretary of State Antony Blinken introduced the “Khashoggi Legislation” which is able to ban foreigners who threaten dissidents or harass reporters and their households from coming into the US and instantly positioned 76 Saudis on the record. black.

“We have now made it completely clear that Saudi Arabia’s extraterritorial threats and assaults on activists, dissidents and journalists should finish. They won’t be tolerated by the US,” Blinken stated in a press release.

Not on the lookout for ‘break’

However the US fell in need of immediately focusing on the 35-year-old crown prince, identified by his initials MBS, and officers maintained there have been no precedents for sanctions towards a high-ranking ally chief.

Blinken, questioned by journalists, stated that “that is greater than anybody,” and defined that Biden is making an attempt “to not break the connection, however to recalibrate to be extra in keeping with our pursuits and values.”

An advocacy group based by Khashoggi, Democracy for the Arab World Now, known as on Biden to go additional by imposing sanctions on Prince Mohammed, and several other lawmakers from Biden’s Democratic Get together are additionally pushing for extra motion.

“We should additionally ensure that there are actual penalties for individuals like MBS, or else autocrats world wide will get the message that impunity is the rule,” stated Bob Menendez, chairman of the Senate International Relations Committee.

The Saudi Arabian International Ministry in a press release denounced the “detrimental, false and unacceptable evaluation” and rejected “any measure that violates its management.”

The Saudi authorities, which within the early days stated it had no details about Khashoggi, says it accepts duty for the homicide, however considers it a rogue operation that didn’t contain the prince.

Biden’s resolution to launch the report, which was first accomplished below Donald Trump, was a pointy departure from his predecessor, who had promised to proceed working with Saudi Arabia because of the kingdom’s lavish US arms purchases and hostility. shared in the direction of Iran.

Biden spoke by telephone Thursday night time with King Salman, 85, after the White Home made it clear that he had no intention of talking with the crown prince, who had as a substitute fashioned a friendship with him. Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner.

Deadly appointment on the consulate

The Saudi Arabian ambassador to the US advised Khashoggi, a veteran Saudi journalist who had gone into exile on his personal, to go to the dominion’s consulate in Istanbul if he needed to acquire paperwork for his upcoming marriage to a Turkish girl, Hatice Cengiz.

Inside minutes of coming into the constructing on October 2, 2018, the 59-year-old man was strangled and his physique dismembered by a 15-member staff allegedly dispatched from Riyadh below the course of a senior aide to Prince Mohammed, Saud al- Qahtani.

The intelligence report stated that seven of the 15 Saudis got here from the Fast Intervention Drive, which stated it had beforehand acted to suppress dissent within the kingdom and overseas.

The Central Intelligence Company shortly concluded with nice confidence that Prince Mohammed ordered the assassination, however Trump refused to publish the report and requested to go forward.

A US official stated it was “clearly a actuality” that the brand new administration will nonetheless should cope with the prince, who can also be protection minister, on points like oil, Iran and Yemen, the place Biden has lower assist for the devastating offensive. from Saudi Arabia.

Few Saudi Arab watchers imagine the assassination may have taken place with out the data of Prince Mohammed, a calculating strongman who has jailed a number of critics and locked up rival factions within the royal household.

Beneath heavy stress from the US and the worldwide group, the Saudi authorities introduced a number of the perpetrators to justice.

The closed-door trial exonerated the 2 officers extensively seen because the masterminds: Qahtani, a media adviser to the royal court docket, and deputy intelligence chief Ahmed al-Assiri, who was sanctioned by the Treasury Division on Friday.

5 unidentified defendants have been sentenced to demise and three others acquired harsh jail phrases. 9 months later, the court docket withdrew the demise sentences and changed them with sentences of as much as 20 years.

Human rights teams known as the case a sham, but it surely happy the Trump administration, which blacklisted 17 suspects, together with Qahtani, however not Assiri.

(Aside from the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV workers and is posted from a syndicated channel.)

Beijing, China:

China on Friday voiced help for Sri Lanka on the UNHRC over a decision expressing severe concern over the rights scenario within the island nation, saying Beijing opposes using human rights points to intervene in inside affairs. from different nations.

China’s help got here three days after Sri Lankan International Minister Dinesh Gunawardena, on February 24, made a fervent attraction to member states of the UN Human Rights Council (HRC) to reject the decision on the rendering of accounts and the reconciliation of human rights of the island nation, describing it as “pure” political motion “in opposition to the nation.

Addressing just about a session of the HRC on Tuesday, Mr. Gunawardena urged the Council to reject the decision and shut it.

Gunawardena’s statements got here after the nation’s rejection of the report by the UN human rights commissioner, Michelle Bachelet, which referred to as for drastic measures, similar to selective sanctions and worldwide legal judicial procedures in opposition to these allegedly chargeable for rights violations over the last section of the armed battle with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in 2009.

Ms. Bachelet stated the report signifies that just about 12 years after the top of the armed battle, nationwide initiatives have repeatedly failed to ensure justice to victims and promote reconciliation.

Regardless of the commitments made in 2015, the present authorities, like its predecessor, has not adopted real processes of accountability, he stated.

The earlier Sri Lankan authorities, led by the Sri Lankan Freedom Get together, had co-sponsored the decision in 2013, calling for accountability for alleged battle crimes dedicated by authorities forces and the LTTE in the course of the remaining section of almost three many years. . lengthy civil battle in Might 2009.

The present authorities, led by the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna occasion, has formally withdrawn from the decision.

When requested about his response to criticism from numerous nations in opposition to Sri Lanka’s rights file, Chinese language International Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin stated: “We recognize the efforts of the (Sri Lankan) authorities to advertise human rights and financial and social growth, shield susceptible teams and advance nationwide reconciliation and combat in opposition to terrorism. “

“We’re in opposition to politicizing human rights and making use of double requirements or utilizing it to intervene within the affairs of different nations,” he stated.

Wang additionally stated that nations ought to respect the needs and ideas of the UN Constitution, respect the sovereignty and political independence of a rustic, its efforts to guard human rights, and cease interference and political strain.

China, which was elected to the 47 members of the HRC final 12 months together with Pakistan, faces costs of genocide in opposition to Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang.

Chinese language International Minister Wang Yi, addressing the UNHRC on February 23, rejected allegations of genocide or oppression in Xinjiang and stated China would welcome the UN human rights chief to go to the area.

Wang’s assertion got here as worldwide strain mounted over allegations of rights abuses in China.

“There has by no means been something like genocide, pressured labor and spiritual oppression. These sensational claims are rooted in ignorance, prejudice and purely libelous political publicity,” Wang stated.

Human rights teams and UN rights specialists have maintained that there are not less than 1 million Muslims belonging to ethnic minorities being arbitrarily detained in mass internment camps, the Hong Kong-based South China Morning Publish reported.

China has denied the claims, saying it was as a substitute taking steps to fight extremism and supply vocational coaching.