Category: Politics

The Australian Parliament passed the country’s free trade agreement (FTA) with India on Tuesday, announced Prime Minister Anthony Albanese in a tweet.

India and Australia would now implement the FTA on a mutually agreed date. The agreement was signed between the two countries in April this year.

Once implemented, the FTA will provide duty-free access to the Australian market for over 6,000 broad sectors of India, such as textiles, leather, furniture, jewellery and machinery. Under the pact, Australia is offering zero-duty access to India for about 96.4% of exports (by value). This covers several products that at present attract 4-5% customs duty in Australia.

Australia’s Minister for Trade and Tourism Don Farrell said that the FTA will help businesses to grow, offer more employment opportunities, and give Australian consumers more choice. He added that Australia will work closely with the Indian government to implement the agreement “as soon as possible”.

India’s goods exports to Australia stood at $8.3 billion and imports from the country aggregated to $16.75 billion in 2021-22. The FTA would help in taking the bilateral trade from $27.5 billion currently to $45-50 billion in the next five years.

United Arab Emirates Minister Omar bin Sultan Al Olama on Wednesday said the future will have Indian fingerprints for “everyone and everywhere”, as he praised the country for its advances in the field of technology and Indians shaping the future of technology in different places across the world.

The UAE Minister of State, who holds the portfolio of Artificial Intelligence, Digital Economy, and Remote Work Applications, was speaking at the inaugural session of the 25th Bengaluru Tech Summit. According to him, there are other areas as well that will be India-driven.

“I don’t think that it’s just the future of technology that is going to be driven by India. It’s going to be the future of technology, education, finance and many other sectors (that’s going) to be reshaped by India,” he added.

The UAE minister was hopeful that the Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA) that was signed between the UAE and India earlier this year was a great stepping stone to forge together a new era of technologies. He also said that the I2U2, which stands for India, Israel, the UAE, and the US, partnership will be a one-of-a-kind role model that many countries are going to build their collaborations on.

Saudi Arabia will make an investment of about $30 billion in South Korean companies, with the leaders of both the countries pledging stronger ties on Thursday in the fields of energy, defence, and construction.

South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol held talks in Seoul with Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who arrived on Thursday from Bali, Indonesia, where both the leaders attended the summit of Group of 20 (G20) major economies.

Prince Mohammed underlined the role of South Korean companies in the development of Saudi Arabia’s national infrastructure over the years and wanted to see stronger cooperation with the Asian country.

Yoon said in a statement that he expected to see the South Korean companies’ participation in projects such as the NEOM economic zone and smart city in Saudi Arabia.

Earlier, South Korea’s industry ministry in a statement said companies such as Samsung C&T Corp and POSCO Holdings Inc signed over 20 agreements with Saudi counterparts in fields such as energy cooperation, railways, chemicals, pharmaceuticals, and gaming.

Among the new agreements signed, Korea Electric Power Corp (KEPCO) and four other Korean firms signed a memorandum of understanding with Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund to build and operate a hydrogen and ammonia production plant in the kingdom. The plant is expected to produce 1.2 million tonnes of green hydrogen and ammonia annually.

Singapore will join the Article 6 Implementation Partnership that will coordinate international capacity-building efforts to promote the trade of carbon credits to help realize carbon markets around the world, said the country at COP 27 in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt.

Carbon markets, covered under Article 6 in the Paris Agreement, will facilitate countries and companies to buy and sell carbon credits that could help them to decarbonise and slash emissions in a cost-effective manner. The Article 6 Implementation Partnership was launched by Japan’s Environment Ministry on the sidelines of the COP27 climate conference.

Singapore’s Minister for Sustainability and the Environment Grace Fu said, “This will enable high-integrity carbon markets to be set up and provide new pathways to achieve the goals of the Paris Agreement.”

The new programme, with 63 member countries so far, will also act as an information platform for the execution of Article 6 and provide the support needed to pilot initiatives in the space of carbon markets. Two aspects of Article 6 were under discussion at COP27, involving bilateral trade of carbon credits between countries or with private developers in another country, and setting up a centralised marketplace of carbon credits to be overseen by the United Nations.

The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change at the COP27 said that it will support countries by building capacity, and sharing knowledge and technical assistance, particularly for developing countries to benefit from carbon markets.

Indonesia handed over the G20 presidency to India for the coming year as the Bali summit of the grouping ended on Wednesday with the member states signing the joint declaration.

Indonesian President Joko Widodo handed over the G20 presidency to Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the handing over ceremony at the conclusion of the two-day summit. Taking over the presidency of the G20 Summit, Prime Minister Narendra Modi called it a matter of pride for every citizen in India, and said the G20 summit can be made a ‘catalyst for global welfare’. He said that India’s G20 presidency will be inclusive, ambitious, decisive, and action-oriented, and comes at a crucial time when the world is facing geopolitical tensions, economic slowdown, and rising food and energy prices.

The G20 comprises 19 countries, Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Turkey, the UK, the USA and the European Union (EU), which together account for over 80 per cent of the global GDP, 75 per cent of international trade and two-thirds of the world population.

Industry bodies and associations representing key low-carbon technologies, wind, solar, hydropower, green hydrogen, energy storage and geothermal sectors, have joined hands to found a new global alliance, Global Renewables Alliance, at the 2022 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Egypt, to help accelerate the use of renewable energy globally.

The International Geothermal Association, Global Wind Energy Council, Long Duration Energy Storage Council, Green Hydrogen Organisation, International Hydropower Association, and the Global Solar Council are part of the Global Renewables Alliance that signed the memorandum of understanding between the member organizations was signed at the eighth day of COP27.

The alliance will serve to accelerate the energy transition, reduce reliance on fossil fuels, and help accomplish the 1.5C limit of the Paris Agreement through collective efforts on advocacy, education, market intelligence and data and engagement with international energy, economic and environmental institutions. The unprecedented alliance will also ensure that targets are met, and vital coordination and planning takes place between producers and consumers of renewable energy.

The International Renewable Energy Agency says that many terawatts of installed renewable energy capacity will be needed by 2050 to meet global climate targets.

World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus on Tuesday thanked Prime Minister Narendra Modi for joining forces with the world health body on hosting and building the global traditional health centre.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, World Health Organisation chief Ghebreyesus and Mauritius Prime Minister Pravind Jugnauth laid the foundation stone for the WHO Global Centre for Traditional Medicine (GCTM) in Gujarat’s Jamnagar city in April this year.

The centre, supported by India’s investment of $250 million, aims at exploiting the potential of traditional medicine from around the world through modern science and technology to improve the health of people and the planet, says the WHO.

In a tweet, Ghebreyesus said, “Thank you #India Prime Minister @narendramodi for your collaboration with @WHO on hosting and building the global traditional health centre. Together for #HealthForAll! #G20.” The WHO chief, who is in Bali to attend the ongoing G20 summit, also posted a picture of him with the Prime Minister at the summit.

In response, the Prime Minister tweeted, “Happy to have met you in Bali, @DrTedros! India is committed to doing everything possible to build a healthier planet.”

According to WHO, around 80% of the global population is estimated to use traditional medicine. To date, 170 of the 194 WHO members with reported use of traditional medicine have asked for its support in creating a body of reliable evidence and data on traditional medicine practices and products.

Seven countries – Bangladesh, Costa Rica, Fiji, Ghana, Pakistan, the Philippines and Senegal – will be the first recipients of immediate funding from the G7 ‘Global Shield’ initiative launched to support countries suffering from climate disasters. The initiative was launched on Monday at the ongoing United Nations’ COP27 climate summit in Egypt.

Coordinated by the G7 president nation Germany, the Global Shield programme aims to provide rapid access to funds for insurance and disaster protection after flooding, drought and hurricanes. The programme was developed in collaboration with V20, a group of 58 climate-vulnerable countries chaired by Ghana.

The funding packages to the seven countries would be developed in the upcoming months. Germany has contributed $175.17 million in funding to Global Shield so far, while other countries such as Denmark and Ireland have given a little over $41 million. The V20 countries proposed that this fund should not be “operationalised” by November 2024.

Germany’s Economic Cooperation and Development Minister Svenja Schulze said that the aim of these funding packages is to add to but not replace the progress on loss and damage. “Global Shield isn’t the one and only solution for loss and damage… We need a broad range of solutions,” said Schulze.

Liberal rights advocate Natasa Pirc Musar has won a run-off vote to become Slovenia’s first female president since the country became independent after the break-up of Yugoslavia in 1991.

Since no candidate won an outright majority in the first round of the Slovenian election on October 23, a run-off was held on November 13 between conservative candidate Anže Logar and lawyer Natasa Pirc Musar. With nearly all of the votes counted, Pirc Musar led Slovenia’s conservative former Foreign Minister Anze Logar by 54 percent to 46 percent.

A prominent lawyer, Pirc Musar, 54, had represented former US First Lady Melania Trump in copyright and other cases in her native country, Slovenia. Musar trailed Logar in the first round of voting two weeks ago. But since none of the seven contenders who competed in the first round managed to gather more than 50 percent support to claim victory, Logar and Pirc Musar went to a run-off.

Pirc Musar will succeed President Borut Pahor, a centrist politician who has served two terms. Her election is seen as a boost to the country’s liberal bloc after the centre-left coalition’s victory in Slovenia’s parliamentary election in April.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is on a formal visit to Bali, Indonesia, from November 14-16, to attend the 17th G20 Summit. The summit is also likely to be attended by US President Joe Biden, British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, among others.

The summit will see G20 leaders deliberating extensively upon key global issues under the Summit theme of “Recover Together, Recover Stronger”. The three working sessions will be on food and energy security; health; and digital transformation.

The Indian Prime Minister will hold bilateral meetings with some of his counterparts on the sidelines of the summit. He is also scheduled to address and interact with the Indian community in Bali.

At the closing session of the G20 summit, Indonesian President Joko Widodo​will symbolically hand over the G20 Presidency to Prime Minister Narendra Modi. India will formally assume the G20 Presidency from December 1, 2022. Last week, the Prime Minister unveiled the logo, theme and the website of India’s G20 presidency.

The G20 is the premier forum for international economic cooperation representing around 85 per cent of the global GDP, over 75 per cent of the global trade, and about two-thirds of the world population.