Connect with us

World

Former Chinese President Jiang Zemin dies at 96

Published

on

(Last Updated On: November 30, 2022)

Former Chinese President Jiang Zemin, who led the country for a decade of rapid economic growth after the Tiananmen crackdown in 1989, died on Wednesday at the age of 96, Chinese state media reported.

Jiang died in his home city of Shanghai just after noon on Wednesday of leukaemia and multiple organ failure, Xinhua news agency said, publishing a letter to the Chinese people by the ruling Communist Party, parliament, Cabinet and the military, Reuters reported.

“Comrade Jiang Zemin’s death is an incalculable loss to our Party and our military and our people of all ethnic groups,” the letter read, saying its announcement was with “profound grief”.

According to Reuters Jiang’s death comes at a tumultuous time in China, where authorities are grappling with rare widespread street protests among residents fed up with heavy-handed COVID-19 curbs nearly three years into the pandemic.

The zero-COVID policy is a hallmark or President Xi Jinping, who recently secured a third leadership term that cements his place as China’s most powerful leader since Mao Zedong and has taken China in an increasingly authoritarian direction since replacing Jiang’s immediate successor, Hu Jintao.

China is also in the midst of a sharp economic slowdown exacerbated by zero-COVID, read the report.

Numerous users of China’s Twitter-like Weibo platform described the death of Jiang, who remained influential after finally retiring in 2004, as the end of an era.

“I’m very sad, not only for his departure, but also because I really feel that an era is over,” a Henan province-based user wrote.

“As if what has happened wasn’t enough, 2022 tells people in a more brutal way that an era is over,” a Beijing Weibo user posted.

The online pages of state media sites including People’s Daily and Xinhua turned to black and white in mourning, read the report.

Wednesday’s letter described “our beloved Comrade Jiang Zemin” as an outstanding leader of high prestige, a great Marxist, statesman, military strategist and diplomat and a long-tested communist fighter.

Jiang was plucked from obscurity to head China’s ruling Communist Party after the bloody Tiananmen crackdown on pro-democracy protesters in 1989, but broke the country out of its subsequent diplomatic isolation, mending fences with the United States and overseeing an unprecedented economic boom.

He served as president from 1993 to 2003 but held China’s top job, as head of the ruling Communist Party, from 1989 and handed over that role to Hu in 2002. He only gave up the position as head of the military in 2004, which he also assumed in 1989.

According to Reuters when Jiang retired, it was said by sources close to the leadership at the time that everywhere Hu looked he would see the supporters of his predecessor.

Jiang had stacked China’s most powerful leadership body, the Politburo Standing Committee, with his own protégées, many of them from the so-called “Shanghai Gang”.

But in the years after Jiang retired from his final post, the military commission chairmanship in 2004, Hu consolidated his grip, neutralised the Shanghai Gang and successfully anointed Xi as a successor, Reuters reported.

Advertisement

World

North Korea fires ballistic missiles as Blinken visits Seoul

Published

on

(Last Updated On: March 18, 2024)

North Korea fired short-range ballistic missiles into the sea on Monday for the first time in two months, as U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited Seoul for a conference hosted by President Yoon Suk Yeol on advancing democracy, Reuters reported.

South Korea’s military said several short-range missiles flew about 300 km (186 miles) after being fired between 7:44 a.m. and 8:22 a.m (2244 to 2322 GMT Monday) from Pyongyang, the North’s capital, landing off the east coast.

It condemned the launches as a “clear provocation” and said it was sharing information on them with the United States and Japan.

Japan’s defence ministry said three missiles were launched and travelled about 350 km, with a maximum altitude of 50 km, read the report.

Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida condemned the launches after his country’s coast guard also reported the firing of what it said appeared to be a ballistic missile and specified that it had already ended its flight.

Japan later said that it had detected what appeared to be a second ballistic missile launch by the North, and that both fell outside its exclusive economic zone area.

“North Korea’s series of actions threaten the peace and security of our region and the international community, and are absolutely unacceptable,” Kishida said, calling the launch a violation of U.N. resolutions.

North Korea’s military has been conducting exercises using conventional weapons in recent weeks, often personally overseen by the isolated state’s leader, Kim Jong Un.

The show of force by Pyongyang comes just after the militaries of South Korea and the United States finished 10 days of large-scale annual joint military drills last Thursday.

On Sunday, the South Korean military also mobilised marines, attack helicopters and amphibious assault vehicles in drills aimed at surging troop numbers to reinforce western islands near the sea border with North Korea. The North shelled the islands in 2010.

Blinken is among senior officials from around the world attending the Summit for Democracy conference, which opens on Monday. He will also meet his South Korean counterpart, foreign minister Cho Tae-yul.

The summit is an initiative of U.S. President Joe Biden aimed at discussing ways to stop democratic backsliding and erosion of rights and freedoms worldwide.

In its last ballistic launch on Jan. 14, North Korea fired what it said was an intermediate range hypersonic missile using solid fuel on to test new booster engines and a manoeuvrable warhead.

A month later, it launched multiple cruise missiles off its east coast, including what it said was a new anti-ship missile, Reuters reported.

Continue Reading

World

Iceland volcano erupts again, spewing fountains of lava

Published

on

(Last Updated On: March 17, 2024)

A volcano in Iceland erupted on Saturday for the fourth time since December, the country’s meteorological office said, spewing smoke and bright orange lava into the air in sharp contrast against the dark night sky.

In a video shot from a Coast Guard helicopter and shown on public broadcaster RUV, fountains of molten rock soared from a long fissure in the ground, and lava spread rapidly to each side.

The eruption began at 2023 GMT and the fissure was estimated to be about 2.9 kilometres long, roughly the same size as the last eruption in February, the Icelandic Meteorological Office said in a statement.

Authorities had warned for weeks that an eruption was imminent on the Reykjanes peninsula just south of Iceland’s capital Reykjavik.

The site of the eruption was between Hagafell and Stora-Skogfell, the same area as the previous outbreak on Feb. 8, the Met Office said.

“This was definitely expected,” said Rikke Pedersen, head of the Nordic Volcanological Centre.

“Of course the exact time of the eruption is impossible to predict. The first cues of this moving towards the surface actually only happened about 15 minutes in advance,” she said.

Reykjavik’s Keflavik Airport’s website showed it remained open both for departures and arrivals.

Lava appeared to be flowing rapidly south towards the nearby Grindavik fishing town, where a few of the nearly 4,000 residents had returned following earlier outbreaks, the Met Office said.

The town was again being evacuated, public broadcaster RUV reported. An outbreak in January burned to the ground several of its homes.

“We’re just like, this is business as usual,” Kristin Maria Birgisdottir, who was evacuated from Grindavik in November, told Reuters.

“My son…just called me and said, Mamma, did you know the eruption has started? And I was like, yeah, I did know. Oh, my grandma just told me. So it’s like we don’t even bother telling each other anymore,” she said.

Icelandic police said they had declared a state of emergency for the area.

The nearby Blue Lagoon luxury geothermal spa immediately shut its doors, as it did during previous eruptions.

Iceland, roughly the size of the U.S. state of Kentucky, boasts more than 30 active volcanoes, making the north European island a prime destination for volcano tourism – a niche segment that attracts thousands of thrill seekers.

In 2010, ash clouds from eruptions at the Eyafjallajokull volcano in the south of Iceland spread over large parts of Europe, grounding some 100,000 flights and forcing hundreds of Icelanders to evacuate their homes.

Volcanic outbreaks in the Reykjanes peninsula are so-called fissure eruptions, which do not usually cause large explosions or significant dispersal of ash into the stratosphere.

Gases from the eruption were travelling westwards out at sea, the meteorological office said.

Scientists fear the eruptions could continue for decades, and Icelandic authorities have started building dykes to divert burning lava flows away from homes and critical infrastructure.

The February eruption cut off district heating to more than 20,000 people as lava flows destroyed roads and pipelines.

Located between the Eurasian and the North American tectonic plates, among the largest on the planet, Iceland is a seismic and volcanic hot spot as the two move in opposite directions. – Reuters

 

 

 

 

Continue Reading

World

At least 34 migrants missing off Tunisia, two die after boat sinks

Published

on

(Last Updated On: March 16, 2024)

At least 34 migrants were missing and two died after their boat sank off Tunisia as they tried to cross the Mediterranean to Italy, the Tunisian national guard said on Friday.

The boat which sailed from Libya coast was carrying 70 people, and 34 people were rescued off the southern town of Zarzis.

This week, Tunisian coast guard also recovered five bodies of migrants.

With improving weather in the last weeks, the flow of African migrants, including Tunisians, in boats heading for Italy has increased.

A record 1,313 migrants were reported to have died or went missing off the Tunisian coast last year, a rights group said on last month, highlighting the unending migrant crisis in the North African country.

Continue Reading

Trending

Copyright © 2022 Ariana News. All rights reserved!