North Korea: Worse drought in a century

South Korea Vows to Quickly Send Aid to Drought-Hit North Korea

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North Korean leader Kim Jong Un (L) and South Korean President Moon Jae-in (R) walk on a bridge during the Inter-Korean Summit in Panmunjom, South Korea on April 27, 2018.

Korea Summit Press Pool/Getty Images

BY ASSOCIATED PRESS

UPDATED: MAY 20, 2019 4:31 AM ET

(SEOUL, South Korea) — South Korea vowed Monday to move quickly on its plans to provide $8 million worth of humanitarian aid to North Korea while it also considers sending food to the country that says it’s suffering its worst drought in decades.

Lee Sang-min, spokesman of Seoul’s Unification Ministry, said the government will discuss its plans with the World Food Program and the United Nations Children’s Fund, through which the aid would be provided, so it reaches North Korean children and pregnant women quickly. South Korea is also trying to build public and political support for providing food aid to the North, either directly or through an international organization.

North Korea’s state media said last week that the country was suffering its worst drought in more than a century amid reported food shortages.

“The government will first discuss with international organizations over the provision of aid and take measures so that the support arrives (in the North) quickly,” Lee said. “On the matter of direct aid, we will consider the matter while sufficiently garnering the opinions of our citizens.”

South Korean President Moon Jae-in has expressed hopes that aid will help revive diplomacy and engagement with Pyongyang, which tapered off following a high-stakes nuclear summit between North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and President Donald Trump in February that broke down over mismatched demands in sanctions relief and disarmament.

But Moon’s government has yet to decide on concrete plans amid growing public frustration over North Korea, which resumed short-range missile tests recently that were apparently aimed at pressuring Washington and Seoul.

North Korea’s official Korean Central News Agency said last Wednesday that an average of 54.4 millimeters (2.1 inches) of rain fell in North Korea from January to early May in 2019, which it said represented the lowest level since 1982. That was two days before the state-run Rodong Sinmun newspaper said the average precipitation of 56.3 millimeters (2.2 inches) from January to May 15 was the country’s lowest since 1917.

U.N. food agencies said earlier this month that about 10 million people were facing “severe food shortages” after one of the North’s worst harvests in a decade.

North Korean state media are currently campaigning to urge farmers to do their best with what they have, to grow as much as possible this year. The Rodong Sinmun on Saturday urged North Korean farmers to meet state goals in food production in face of “hostile forces who don’t want us to become prosperous and … are seeking to make our people undergo shortage of food, bring to collapse their faith in socialism.”

“At our farm, we got an announcement about the dry weather conditions from our party and our state authorities, so we have taken advance measures to save water, like preparing the fields earlier than before, because we have to save water as much as we can,” said Kim Chang Jun, vice chairman of a cooperative farm in the village of Sambong, just outside the capital.

The last time South Korea provided humanitarian aid to North Korea through an international agency was in 2015, when it gave $800,000 to the U.N. Population Fund project to evaluate North Korean public health conditions.

The South has not provided direct food aid to the North since 2010.

Moon’s government first proposed providing $8 million to the WFP and UNICEF to help North Korean children and pregnant women in 2017, but the plans were halted amid a torrid run in North Korean weapons tests that year. An abrupt turn toward diplomacy in 2018 saw Kim meet with Trump twice and three times with Moon.

Above is from:  http://time.com/5591918/south-korea-aid-north-korea/

US Base at Diego Garcia may change ownership

Chagos Islands dispute: UN backs end to UK control

• 5 hours ago

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Image copyrightSCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARYImage captionOne of the Chagos Islands - Diego Garcia - is home to a US military base

The UN has passed a resolution demanding the UK return control of the Chagos Islands to Mauritius.

In the non-binding vote in the General Assembly in New York, 116 states were in favour and only six against, a major diplomatic blow to the UK.

Fifty-six states, including France and Germany, abstained.

Mauritius says it was forced to give up the Indian Ocean group - now a British overseas territory - in 1965 in exchange for independence.

In a statement to the BBC, the UK's Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) said Britain did not recognise Mauritius' claim to sovereignty, but would stand by an earlier commitment to hand over control of the islands to Mauritius when they were no longer needed for defence purposes.

• Mauritius country profile
• UK 'threats' over Indian Ocean islands
• UK defeated in UN vote on Chagos Islands

The US, Hungary, Israel, Australia and the Maldives were the states voting with the UK against the resolution.

It comes months after the UN's high court advised that the UK should leave the islands "as rapidly as possible".

UK warns of setting precedent

Nada Tawfik, BBC News, New York

The fundamental question before the General Assembly was whether the decades-long dispute was at its heart a matter of decolonisation, or a bilateral sovereignty issue to be worked out between the UK and Mauritius alone.

The vote was decisive, with 115 countries standing with Mauritius.

Former colonies were also clear in their position. India said support for decolonisation was one of the most significant contributions that the UN had made towards the promotion of fundamental human rights.

UK Ambassador to the UN Karen Pierce, along with the United States, warned that the vote would set a precedent that should be of concern to all member states with their own sovereignty disputes.

Britain purchased the Chagos Archipelago from Mauritius in 1965 for £3m, creating a region known as the British Indian Ocean Territory.

Between 1967 and 1973, it evicted the islands' entire population to make way for a joint military base with the US, which is still in place on Diego Garcia.

US planes have been sent from the base to bomb Afghanistan and Iraq. The facility was also reportedly used as a "black site" by the CIA to interrogate terrorism suspects. In 2016, the lease for the base was extended until 2036.

"The joint UK-US defence facility on the British Indian Ocean Territory helps to keep people in Britain and around the world safe from terrorism, organised crime and piracy," the FCO said.

Before Wednesday's vote, Mauritian Prime Minister Pravid Kumar Jug-Nauth told the General Assembly the forcible eviction of Chagossians was akin to a crime against humanity.

However, he said Mauritius would allow the military base to continue operating "in accordance with international law", if it were given control of the islands.

Mr Jug-Nauth said this would give the facility a "higher degree of legal certainty" for the future.

The UK has maintained that Mauritius gave up the territory freely in return for a range of benefits.

Ambassador Pierce has insisted that the issue should be resolved only by the countries involved.

Above is from:  https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-48371388