WORLD

Dominican Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit broke his silence on the ongoing saga involving fugitive diamantaire Mehul Choksi, who arrived in Dominica from Antigua on May 23, by referring to him as an "Indian citizen" for the first time.

At the same time, Skerrit stated that Choksi's rights would be respected and the courts would decide on the next course of action.

"The matter with this Indian citizen is before the courts, the courts will decide what happens to the gentleman and we will allow the court process to go through, I do not like to get involved by making a public statement in these matters," Skerrit said in a public statement.

Republicans are fighting to seize control of Congress. Just don’t ask what they’d do if they win.

Look no further for evidence of the GOP’s muddled governing agenda than battleground North Carolina, where party leaders packed into a convention hall Saturday night to cheer former President Donald Trump. Even with a high-stakes U.S. Senate election looming, the Republicans there were united not by any consistent set of conservative policies or principles, but by Trump’s groundless grievances about the 2020 election and his attacks against critics in both parties.

The lack of a forward-looking agenda stands in stark contrast to successful midterm elections of past years, particularly 1994 and 2010, when Republicans swept into power after staking clear positions on health care, federal spending and crime, among other issues. Without such a strategy heading into 2022, Republicans on the ballot risk allowing themselves to be wholly defined by Trump, who lost his last election by 7 million votes nationally and has seen his popularity slide further, even among some Republicans, since leaving office in January.

Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan has expressed India’s concern over the issue of “vaccine passport” proposed by UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson ahead of the G7 Summit.

In the G7 Plus Ministerial session on Friday, Harsh Vardhan included the matter in his address. He expressed India’s strong opposition to “vaccine passport” at this juncture of the pandemic, as per the minister’s tweet. He added that with “vaccine coverage as a percentage of population in developing countries is still low compared to developed countries, such an initiative could prove to be highly discriminatory.”

Media has learnt that UK is believed to have acknowledged that vaccine passports would make sense only when vaccines were themselves available.

The Ministry of External Affairs on Thursday (June 3) said that India's abstention at the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) vote calling for probe into Gaza violence is not a new stand, a day after it emerged that Palestine's FM has written a strong letter to EAM over the issue.

MEA's Arindam Bagchi, in response to questions during weekly virtual presser, said, "I understand Palestine has written a similar letter to all countries who abstained during UNHRC vote. The position we took is not a new position and we have abstained on the previous occasions."

A miffed Palestine has raised its concern with India's abstention at the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) resolution that called for a probe into the violence in Gaza. The resolution saw India among the 14 countries abstaining on the issue of the probe.

The matter was raised by Palestinian foreign minister Riad Malki with External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar. In the letter accessed by WION, expressing "concern" over the "position taken by India" at the Human Rights Council's special session, FM Malki said, "The Republic of India missed an opportunity to join the international community at this turning point" both "crucial and long overdue on the path to accountability, justice and peace"