Diplomatic Briefing
Your exclusive news aggregator handpicked daily!Archive for November 24, 2022
Newsline: China, Arab Nations Eye Intensified Diplomacy at Summit in Saudi Arabia Next Month
China and Arab nations will hold a summit in Saudi Arabia early next month, setting up the possibility that Chinese President Xi Jinping will visit the key energy partner for the first time in nearly seven years. Li Xuhang, China’s consul-general in Dubai, said the gathering would happen in early December, according to a statement posted on the consulate’s website. The statement didn’t provide any other details. (https://news.yahoo.com/china-arab-nations-hold-summit-084421260.html) The envoy told a newspaper in the United Arab Emirates that the summit would involve face-to-face exchanges between leaders from China and Arab nations, according to a separate Foreign Ministry statement. Xi is likely to use the visit to Saudi Arabia to shore up ties given his last visit was in January 2016. Saudi Arabia was China’s largest source of foreign oil ahead of Russia in October, according to customs data from the world’s No. 2 economy.
Newsline: UN rights council to focus on Iran
The UN Human Rights Council is holding an urgent meeting Thursday to discuss whether to launch a high-level international investigation into the deadly crackdown on mass protests rocking Iran. The special session on Iran’s “deteriorating human rights situation” is due to kick off at 10:00 am (0900 GMT) in Geneva, with the new UN rights chief Volker Turk set to open the proceedings in his first appearance before the council. (https://news.yahoo.com/iran-crackdown-spotlight-un-rights-064528438.html) The meeting, requested by Germany and Iceland with the backing of more than 50 countries, follows two months of protests in Iran sparked by the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, after she was arrested for an alleged breach of the country’s strict dress rules for women based on Islamic sharia law.
Newsline: Moldova summons Russia ambassador over blackout
Russian Ambassador Oleg Vasnetsov was summoned by the Moldovan Ministry of Foreign Affairs, following the outage that occurred amidst Russian attacks on the Ukrainian power grid. “Russia’s attacks on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure have left Moldova in the dark, again. Massive blackouts across the country, including Chisinau and the @MoldovaMFA [Foreign Ministry] building. I instructed that Russia’s ambassador be summoned for explanations,” Moldovan Deputy Prime Minister Nicu Popescu noted in a Twitter post. (https://www.teletrader.com/moldova-summons-russia-ambassador-over-outage/news/details/59019860?ts=1669226818236) Parts of the country were left without electricity earlier today after it was reported that Russian shelling in Ukraine caused the outage. Two mobile phone networks were also reported as unavailable.
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