Latest News

Sunday, March 27, 2022

Without Russia, science going solo on world's woes, dreams

Without Russian help, climate scientists worry how they’ll keep up their important work of documenting warming in the Arctic. Europe’s space agency is wrestling with how its planned Mars rover might survive freezing nights on the Red Planet without its Russian heating unit.

In scientific fields with profound implications for mankind’s future and knowledge, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine is causing a swift and broad decaying of relationships and projects that bound together Moscow and the West. Post-Cold War bridge-building through science is unraveling as Western nations seek to punish and isolate the Kremlin by drying up support for scientific programs involving Russia.

The costs of this decoupling, scientists say, could be high on both sides. Tackling climate change and other problems will be tougher without collaboration and time will be lost. Russian and Western scientists have become dependent on each other’s expertise as they have worked together on conundrums from unlocking the power of atoms to firing probes into space. Picking apart the dense web of relationships will be complicated.

The European Space Agency’s planned Mars rover with Russia is an example. Arrays of Russian sensors to sniff, scour and study the planet’s environment may have to be unbolted and replaced and a non-Russian launcher rocket found if the suspension of their collaboration becomes a lasting rupture. In that case, the launch, already scrubbed for this year, couldn’t happen before 2026.

“We need to untangle all this cooperation which we had, and this is a very complex process, a painful one I can also tell you,” the ESA director, Josef Aschbacher, said in an Associated Press interview. “Dependency on each other, of course, creates also stability and, to a certain extent, trust. And this is something that we will lose, and we have lost now, through the invasion of Russia in Ukraine.”

International indignation and sanctions on Russia are making formal collaborations difficult or impossible. Scientists who became friends are staying in touch informally but plugs are being pulled on their projects big and small. The European Union is freezing Russian entities out of its main 95 billion euro ($105 billion) fund for research, suspending payments and saying they’ll get no new contracts. In Germany, Britain and elsewhere, funding and support is also being withdrawn for projects involving Russia.

from latest-news - SUCH TV https://ift.tt/qH1yn5M

We are going to Islamabad to say goodbye to PM Imran Khan: Maryam

As PML-N’s “Mehngai Mukao March” kick-started on Saturday from Lahore's Model Town, PML-N Vice President Maryam Nawaz said that the government has "already been ousted" and the Opposition was heading to Islamabad to say "goodbye" to PM Imran Khan.

“[Prime Minister] Imran Khan‘s government has gone he is shouting every day. The government has gone we are going to say goodbye to it,” Maryam said.

The PML-N leader said that the “people are echoing” the name of party supremo Nawaz Sharif due to the “incompetent government and inflation”.

“The government has gone a goodbye is left only. He’s (Imran Khan) is pleading but nothing will happen now,” said the PML-N leader. She added that move to oust PM Imran was taken by the government and not the Opposition.

Talking about the government allies who are yet to make a decision, Maryam said that no one will stand with the premier as his own party members were ditching him.

“Imran Khan is the nation’s culprit, not Nawaz Sharif or Maryam Nawaz,” said the PML-N vice-president. She added that no matter comes to power, it will take time to fix the “destruction” done by PM Imran Khan.

“If there is an external conspiracy against Imran Khan, then the name of this conspiracy is Imran Khan himself. Imran Khan is not such a big personality that the world would conspire against him,” said Maryam in response to the claim made by the premier that the Opposition was being backed by foreign powers.

Maryam is leading the “Mehngai Mukao March” with Opposition Leader in the Punjab Assembly Hamza Shahbaz. They had kicked off the march from Lahore's Model Town, earlier today. Their final destination is Islamabad and the duo will arrive in the federal capital after multiple stops along the way.

The PML-N march will join the Opposition's rally in Islamabad that is set to be held on March 28.

The march is being held amid a no-confidence motion submitted against Prime Minister Imran Khan. The Opposition had submitted the motion on March 8 at the National Assembly secretariat.

Since then all eyes have been on Islamabad as the Opposition is trying to cajole the PTI allies to leave the government, while PM Imran Khan and his ministers are trying to ensure that the allies do not jump ship.

Apart from the allies, many PTI lawmakers have also come out in the open and started to express their frustrations against PM Imran. However, they are yet to decide whether they would support the motion or go against it.

from Latest Pakistan News - SUCH TV https://ift.tt/ymhQv8e

Closed since 2019, Khunjerab to reopen for trade from 1st

After remaining closed for more than two and a half years, a key land border crossing between Pakistan and China at Khunjerab is being reopened for trade activities from April 1.

Khunjerab Pass was closed in November 2019 to contain the transmission of the coronavirus between the two countries.

The pass was temporarily opened in July and September 2020 and again in November 2021, only to facilitate the transportation of the containers loaded with goods that had been stranded in China.

During the temporary opening of the border, stranded containers from China were unloaded at Khunjerab Top instead of the port at Sost.

A notice issued by the district administration of Kashgar of the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region said that according to an agreement signed by China with the government of Pakistan on May 22, 2013, the Khunjerab Pass will be officially upgraded on April 1, 2022.

According to officials, Chinese authorities have shared a letter with Pakistan regarding the reopening of the pass from April 1.

It is also mentioned in the letter that measures would be in place to prevent the spread of Covid-19.

Port authorities on the Chinese side have been instructed to take all necessary coronavirus preventive measures before the start of the arrival of goods from Pakistan.

Similarly, Pakistani border authorities have also been instructed to ensure the containment of the disease.

Under the protocol agreement signed between the two countries, trade and travel activities through Khunjerab pass continue from April to November.

Gilgit Baltistan is considered the gateway of CPEC, and locals say it is important to open regular trade through Khunjerab Pass to ensure the success of the One Belt One Road project.

from Latest Pakistan News - SUCH TV https://ift.tt/MpvyWq9

We are going to Islamabad to say goodbye to PM Imran Khan: Maryam

“[Prime Minister] Imran Khan‘s government has gone he is shouting every day. The government has gone we are going to say goodbye to it,” Maryam said.

The PML-N leader said that the “people are echoing” the name of party supremo Nawaz Sharif due to the “incompetent government and inflation”.

Talking about the government allies who are yet to make a decision, Maryam said that no one will stand with the premier as his own party members were ditching him.

The PML-N march will join the Opposition's rally in Islamabad that is set to be held on March 28.

The march is being held amid a no-confidence motion submitted against Prime Minister Imran Khan. The Opposition had submitted the motion on March 8 at the National Assembly secretariat.

from latest-news - SUCH TV https://ift.tt/ymhQv8e

Russia signals less ambitious goals in Ukraine war

Russia has signalled it may dial back its war aims to focus on eastern Ukraine after failing to break the nation’s resistance in a month of fighting and attacks on civilians, including up to 300 feared killed in the bombing of a theatre.

Russian President Vladimir Putin had ordered the February invasion to destroy Ukraine’s military and topple pro-Western President Volodymyr Zelensky, bringing the country under Russia’s sway.

But Sergei Rudskoi, a senior general, suggested a considerably reduced “main goal” of controlling Donbas, an eastern region already partly held by Russian proxies.

His surprise statement came as a Western official reported that a seventh Russian general, Lieutenant General Yakov Rezanstev, had died in Ukraine and that a colonel had been “deliberately” killed by his own demoralised men.

Complicating Moscow’s challenges, invasion troops were facing a counteroffensive in Kherson, the only major Ukrainian city under Russian control.

Zelenskyy at Doha Forum

Ukraine’s president made a surprise video appearance on Saturday at Qatar’s Doha Forum, calling on the energy-rich nation and others to boost their production to counteract the loss of Russian energy supplies.

Volodymyr Zelenskyy called on the United Nations and world powers to come to his aid, as he has in a series of other addresses given around the world since the start of the war Feb 24. He compared Russia’s destruction of the port city of Mariupol to the Syrian and Russian destruction wrought on the city of Aleppo in the Syrian war. Zelenskyy called on countries to increase their exports of energy something particularly important as Qatar is a world leader in the export of natural gas. Western sanctions have deeply cut into Russian exports, which are crucial for European nations.

Also on hand was Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan, the top diplomat for the world’s biggest oil exporter. Saudi Arabia so far has said it would stick with an OPEC+ production schedule the cartel struck with Russia and other producers.

The kingdom also said it wouldn’t be responsible for higher prices as it deals with attacks from Yemen’s Houthi rebels amid its yearslong war in the Arab world’s poorest country.

Zelenskyy criticised Russia for what he described as threatening the world with its nuclear weapons, raising the possibility of tactical nuclear weapons being used on the battlefield.

Russia occupies Chernobyl staff town

Russian forces took control of a town where staff working at the Chernobyl nuclear site live and briefly detained the mayor, sparking protests, Ukrainian officials said on Saturday.

“I have been released. Everything is fine, as far as it is possible under occupation,” Yuri Fomichev, mayor of Slavutych, said, after officials in the Ukraine capital Kyiv announced earlier he had been detained.

Earlier, Kyiv announced that Russian troops had entered Slavutych and occupied the municipal hospital.

Residents took to the streets, carrying a large blue and yellow Ukrainian flag and heading towards the hospital, the administration said, adding that Russian forces fired into the air and threw stun grenades into the crowd.

from latest-news - SUCH TV https://ift.tt/JR0Huk9