Communists get provoked if DMK is criticised, remain unconcerned for people: Palaniswami
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Hindustan Times
5 hours ago
- Hindustan Times
Top China diplomat, in line for foreign minister role, detained for probe
Liu was taken away in late July after arriving in Beijing after an overseas trip, the paper said, adding the reason for the detention was unclear. Liu heads the Communist Party's International Department, an agency for outreaches to foreign political parties and in parallel to China's foreign ministry. He has held the role since May 2022. Liu was widely expected to take over from Wang Yi as China's foreign minister. Wang was reappointed as foreign minister in July 2023 after Qin Gang was abruptly ousted less than a year into his role. Qin hasn't been seen in public since his dismissal. 'It's a big deal. Liu was seen as someone who could replace Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi in the future,' said Alfred Wu, an associate professor at the National University of Singapore's Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy. Beijing's crackdown on corruption, especially targeting high-ranking officials, also serves to boost Xi's legitimacy and popularity among ordinary people by demonstrating his determination to fight corruption, he said. While Wu cautioned that the details surrounding the detention are unclear — and may never be revealed — he said when senior Chinese government officials are questioned the most likely reason is for corruption-related issues. The ministry of foreign affairs didn't respond immediately to a WeChat message seeking comment outside of regular business hours. The WSJ said Liu and the International Department couldn't be reached for comment. The International Department's official website showed Liu's last public activity was on July 29, when he met with local officials in Algeria. Liu has a long history at the foreign affairs ministry. After studying international relations at Oxford University from 1986-1987, he worked as a translator before rotating through the bureaucracy, eventually ending up at the information department. He was promoted to ambassador to the Philippines in 2009, a traditionally important position in the Chinese diplomatic corps. In 2015, he was moved from the foreign ministry to the international affairs wing of the party's top anti-corruption unit. Liu leveraged his foreign policy background to coordinate with other countries, including the US, in helping track down corrupt officials overseas as Xi accelerated his flagship graft campaign. Liu's graft-buster resume was boosted when he became Zhejiang province's corruption chief in 2017. There he served under Xia Baolong, who once worked alongside Xi and is now Beijing's point person on Hong Kong and Macau. In 2018, Liu returned to Beijing as a deputy director of the new Office of the Central Foreign Affairs Commission. Led by Yang Jiechi, the commission was part of Xi's efforts to consolidate the party's control over diplomacy. Liu was promoted to head of the International Department in June 2022. Traditionally, the agency was in charge of maintaining ties with parties from fellow Communist countries like North Korea and Vietnam, and other friendly nations such as Cambodia and Russia. Under his watch, the department has taken on a more public profile, with Liu hosting ambassadors and meeting with foreign ministers from Western countries, including Australia and the US.
Express Tribune
13 hours ago
- Express Tribune
Religion becoming the governing philosophy in Pak neighborhood?
Listen to article The question asked in the title of this essay is important to answer for Pakistan. This I will do in the article that will follow in this space next week. Today, I will look at the way governance is understood in the country's neighborhood. Of the country's four neighbours, three have used religion in order to gain political legitimacy. China is the only neighbour that is using social and economic growth for attracting political support from the citizenry. The other three – Afghanistan, India and Iran – have turned to religion to provide the basis of governance. I will first write about the three states in the country's neighbourhood, before speculating about Pakistan's political future. After a struggle that lasted for more than two decades and involved military actions by two superpowers: first what was then the Soviet Union and then followed by the United States. Moscow sent its troops in 1979 to save from collapse of the Communist regime it had installed in Kabul. The Soviet invasion was resisted by several Islamic groups called "mujahedeen" who came together and fought against Moscow's troops. After losing a large number of soldiers and spending a fortune to win the struggle, Mikhail Gorbachev, then the leader of Soviet Union, signed what history was to be called the "Geneva accord". This was in 1989 which allowed Moscow to pull out its troops without being challenged by the Islamic fighters. The accord did not have any provision about the form of governance that would succeed the Soviet pullout. President Ziaul Haq, Pakistan's third military ruler, had told me in a meeting with him that he had used the provision in the Constitution that he had inserted before bringing civilian leadership into the government. Article 58-2(b) in the amended Constitution allowed the president to fire the prime minister and his entire cabinet and dissolve the national assembly. This he could do if he was not satisfied with the way the government was operating. He said he removed the government headed by Prime Minister Muhammad Khan Junejo after he had advised him not to sign the Geneva Accord before it was determined who would head the government in Kabul and how the new rulers would govern. "By getting the Soviet Union to pull out its troops, a political vacuum would be created and the mujahedeen who had vanquished the Soviet Union would fall on one another," said Zia. History was to prove that he had made the correct prediction. After a prolonged internal struggle which also involved American intervention, Kabul was to be ruled by the Taliban. This was a group made up of the students who had been taught in the seminaries established in the tribal belt that lay between Afghanistan and Pakistan. "Taliban" is the Arabic word for students. The Taliban governed from Kabul after imposing what they believed was the right way to govern a Muslim-majority state. The most prominent part of Taliban's governance is the severe reduction in the status of women in the Islamic society. Religion was also behind the movement that pushed out the ruling monarch from power in Iran and introduced a form of government in which clerics subscribing to Shiism became the rulers with total power. The clerics have an ayatollah as the supreme leader who is the ultimate decision-maker. When the ruler came under pressure from a religiously inclined population, the emperor fled from the country. That was the right moment for Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini to return to the country he had left. In 1976, he flew back on a plane from Paris to Tehran and was greeted upon his arrival by a wildly enthusiastic crowd. He founded the Islamic State of Iran and appointed himself as the Supreme Leader. This system came into being when Emperor Reza Shah Pahlavi who had ruled over the country for decades was not able to control the rising religious movement that wanted a system of governance based on religion. The founder of the state headed by Islamic clerics had a provision for selecting a new leader if the one who was the leader died. The successor when the founder died was chosen by a council of senior clerics. The council chose Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as the new supreme leader after the death of the founder. Following the tradition set by his predecessor, the new head of the state expressed disdain for Iran's pre-Islamic past, calling that a time of "illusion, not a source of pride that was afflicted by corruption and dictatorship". However, after attacks by Israel and the United States in the late spring of 2025, Khamenei gave a speech in which he repeatedly praised the country's "ancient civilisation" and boasted that Iran has "cultural and civilisational wealth" far greater than that of America. The verbal attack on the United States followed the American bombing of the sites where Iran was reported to be producing enriched uranium that could be used for making a nuclear bomb. By stressing Iran's cultural rather than religious identity, Ayatollah Ali Khamanei "sought to rally a population that was not only rattled by the 12 days of Israeli strikes but that also has, in large measure, soured on the clerics who rule the Islamic republic and the religious ideology that defines how society is governed," wrote Yeganeh Torbati in an assessment of the Iranian situation for The Washington Post. "This new nationalist tone comes at a time when top officials have repeatedly cited what they say is 'national cohesion and unity', emerging in the country in response to the Israeli and U.S. strikes in June." While developments in Afghanistan and Iran have brought religion into governance, India is also headed in that direction. Narendra Modi who had led the Hindu nationalist Bhartiya Janata Party, the BJP, to victory in the elections held in 2014 vowed to bring what he called "Hindutva" as the principle of governance. Modi was reelected in 2019 and 2024 and would govern India at least until 2029. By the end of his current term, he would have served in this position for 15 years, the second longest rule after Jawaharlal Nehru who was the founder of the independent state of India. Nehru was prime minster for 17 years. Nehru believed in an inclusive state that served India's very diverse population. Modi has opted to create a Hindu state in which those who subscribe to other religions will have a lower status.
News18
21 hours ago
- News18
China's War On Mosquitoes To Eradicate Chikungunya Revives Covid Lockdown Memories: Report
Chinese authorities have mobilised their entire health apparatus in a "war on mosquitoes" to eradicate a Chikungunya outbreak in Guangdong province. Authorities in China have launched what is believed to be a 'war on mosquitoes" to eradicate a growing outbreak of the Chikungunya virus in Guangdong province. The country's health apparatus has mobilised in a way not seen since the mass lockdowns during the Covid-19 pandemic. The campaign involves drones and even other predatory creatures to eliminate mosquitoes and fumigators are searching every village, reflecting the seriousness of the Chinese government in this endeavour. Officials in Guangdong have reported more than 7,000 cases of the virus since last month, according to the Financial Times. The outbreak is primarily concentrated in Foshan, a major manufacturing city home to approximately 9 million people, but officials have located cases in Hong Kong, Macau and the neighbouring Hunan province. While Chikungunya is rarely fatal and authorities have not reported any deaths from the ongoing outbreak, the Chinese government has sprung into action to contain the disease by conducting regular fumigation and entering homes to check for stagnant water in which mosquitoes can breed. Officials in the Guangdong province are even breeding sites with drones and are introducing carp species and the larvae of giant mosquitoes, which eat mosquitoes that carry the chikungunya virus. As part of public awareness measues, red-and-yellow banners can be seen in Tengchong, bearing rhyming slogans that remind residents of the dangers of stagnant water and mosquitoes. Last week, provincial governor Wang Weizhong reportedly called on officials to encourage residents to light mosquito coils, install gauze netting and apply bug spray as part of a 'patriotic health campaign" to prevent the spread of the virus. Why Is It Being Compared To Covid-19? However, China's relentless campaign against mosquitoes has been compared to its extreme efforts to control the Covid-19 pandemic, notably by officials in Foshan instructing pharmacies to record the names of customers buying medicines for Chikungunya symptoms like rashes, joint pain and fevers. Two cities in the neighbouring Fujian province have issued reminders to visitors from Foshan to undergo 14 days of self-monitoring, FT reported citing state media. Medics in at least one affected area are registering the details of infected individuals with the local Communist party committee, which sends them to a special 'quarantine" hospital wards in which patients are separated by gauze netting, according to a health worker. Residents are tested via nucleic acid testing, sometimes conducted by health workers under temporary outdoor shelters that evoke memories of Covid-19 mass swabbing sites. A patient's stay in the quarantine hospital is dependent on these tests. However, some citizens have welcomed these steps. 'I hope the government can continue to implement all of these measures and keep exterminating mosquitoes frequently, so that we don't have to deal with the trouble that they bring," said Liu, a Tengchong resident who made a full recovery after contracting Chikungunya. view comments Location : Beijing, China First Published: August 10, 2025, 17:20 IST News world China's War On Mosquitoes To Eradicate Chikungunya Revives Covid Lockdown Memories: Report Disclaimer: Comments reflect users' views, not News18's. Please keep discussions respectful and constructive. Abusive, defamatory, or illegal comments will be removed. News18 may disable any comment at its discretion. By posting, you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.
