Philippine VP Sara Duterte faces calls for impeachment after threats to president

Philippine VP Sara Duterte faces calls for impeachment after threats to president
The impeachment complaint against Philippine Vice President Sara Duterte was filed by civil society and religious leaders, as well as former government officials critical of her father. (AFP file photo)
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Updated 03 December 2024
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Philippine VP Sara Duterte faces calls for impeachment after threats to president

Philippine VP Sara Duterte faces calls for impeachment after threats to president
  • Duterte said last month that she has contracted an assassin to kill Marcos, his wife and House speaker
  • Another coalition of civil society groups will file a new impeachment complaint against VP this week

MANILA: Philippines Vice President Sara Duterte is facing an impeachment bid filed by civil society activists in the House of Representatives over a death threat she made against the president, as well as over her alleged role in extra-judicial killings of drug suspects.

A coalition of 16 signatories comprising civil society activists, religious leaders and former lawmakers filed an impeachment complaint against Duterte on Monday, accusing her of violating the country’s constitution and mismanagement of funds, and cited the recent death threat she made against President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.

“The public/open discussion about the act of engaging an assassin to kill the incumbent President, his wife and the Speaker of the House of Representatives constitutes not only betrayal of public trust but also a High Crime which would warrant her immediate impeachment from Office,” read a copy of the complaint seen by Arab News.

“The conduct of Respondent as a public officer has clearly fallen short … thus necessitating the initiation of this process of impeachment.”

The complaint, which received its required endorsement from Rep. Percival Cendana of progressive political alliance Akbayan, will be scrutinized by the Philippine Congress in a process that could take weeks or months.

“Vice President Duterte deserves to be impeached for her abuse of power and plunder of the nation’s coffers,” Cendana said in a statement. “The Filipino people deserve a vice president who is ethical, accountable, and committed to public service–not one who weaponizes authority for personal gain.”

The daughter of former President Rodrigo Duterte has been embroiled in a row with Marcos and is the subject of an enquiry into her spending by the House of Representatives.

On Nov. 23, Duterte said in an online news conference that she had contracted someone to kill Marcos, his wife and House Speaker Martin Romualdez if she were killed. She later said that she was not threatening him, but was expressing concern for her own safety.

Monday’s complaint also accused her of being “directly involved” in extra-judicial killings of drug suspects in southern Davao City when she was mayor, continuing a deadly crackdown that was started by her father, who formerly held the same position.

The Philippines’ largest alliance of grassroots groups, BAYAN, announced it would also file an impeachment petition against Duterte this week.


Indonesia’s new sovereign fund will run with commercial mindset, official says

Indonesia’s new sovereign fund will run with commercial mindset, official says
Updated 3 sec ago
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Indonesia’s new sovereign fund will run with commercial mindset, official says

Indonesia’s new sovereign fund will run with commercial mindset, official says
  • New fund to focus on good returns in sizeable projects and creating high-value jobs
  • Risk management will paramount to address governance concerns
JAKARTA: New sovereign wealth fund Danantara Indonesia will focus on large-scale projects generating good returns as it prioritizes sectors championed by the government to increase economic growth and create jobs, its chief investment officer told Reuters. Danantara, which was launched this week and is slated to eventually manage more than $900 billion worth of assets including government stakes in state firms, has been described by officials as Indonesia’s version of Singapore’s Temasek fund.
“All the money that goes to Danantara will be used commercially and productively to generate economic activities,” chief investment officer Pandu Sjahrir told Reuters on Friday, adding the fund was not restricted to investing in state firms or projects.
President Prabowo Subianto has pledged $20 billion for Danantara’s “first wave of investment” that will target projects in natural resources processing, artificial intelligence development, and energy and food security.
The initial capital will come from the government and dividend payments from the state company stakes that it will hold. In 2025, Jakarta has said it expects dividends from state-owned enterprises of 90 trillion rupiah ($5.4 billion).
“We will be deliberate, slow, and most likely be boring in our investment activities. Because our job really is to find good returns,” Pandu said, noting risk management would be paramount given the public scrutiny the fund will face.
The government has pledged transparency, saying the fund could be audited anytime.
The company is still in a discovery stage for its cost of capital, Pandu said, and would be looking at projects with minimum acceptable rate of return close to those on Indonesian government bonds.
In its first year, Danantara will focus on domestic investment, including in private equity and debt markets, and will be open to offshore investment after that. Danantara’s size means it will look to invest in projects worth $1 billion or more, with investment decisions based on the returns and the ability to create high-value jobs, he said. A number of investors have already approached Danantara for potential partnership, including large funds from the United States, Middle East, North Asia and Southeast Asia, Pandu said.
Unlike Jakarta’s existing sovereign fund, the Indonesia Investment Authority, Danantara is not required to have partners for its investment projects, Pandu said.
Fitch Ratings said on Monday in its report the credit profile of some state-controlled firms could weaken if Danantara requires higher dividend payouts or if they were pursuing riskier projects as a result of Danantara’s approach.

Russia says it foiled Ukrainian assassination plot against senior Putin-linked Orthodox priest

Russia says it foiled Ukrainian assassination plot against senior Putin-linked Orthodox priest
Updated 49 min 21 sec ago
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Russia says it foiled Ukrainian assassination plot against senior Putin-linked Orthodox priest

Russia says it foiled Ukrainian assassination plot against senior Putin-linked Orthodox priest
  • There was no immediate reaction from Kyiv to the allegation
MOSCOW: Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) said on Friday it had foiled an attempt by Ukraine’s military intelligence service to assasinate Tikhon Shevkunov, a senior priest in Russia’s Orthodox Church.
There was no immediate reaction from Kyiv to the allegation.
Shevkunov, who has been described in Russian media reports for years as “Putin’s confessor” — something he has neither confirmed nor denied — has maintained a public acquaintance with President Vladimir Putin since the late 1990s and the Kremlin has said the two men know each other well.
In 2023, he was appointed metropolitan of Crimea, becoming one of the top Russian Orthodox Church officials on the peninsula, which Russia annexed from Ukraine in 2014.
The FSB said in a statement it had detained one Russian and one Ukrainian man in connection with the plot and had confiscated an improvised explosive device. It said the two suspects, whom it did not name, had confessed.
It said that the two men, who it said had been recruited by Ukraine using the Telegram messenger service, had been plotting the assassination attempt since mid 2024 and had planned to kill Shevkunov in Moscow.
Ukraine has taken responsibility for a number of assassinations in Russia since the start of the war in 2022, including pro-Moscow Ukrainian blogger Vladlen Tatarsky in April 2023, and the head of Russia’s Nuclear, Biological and Chemical Protection Troops, Igor Kirillov, in December 2024.

World agrees hard-fought nature funding plan at UN talks

World agrees hard-fought nature funding plan at UN talks
Updated 28 February 2025
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World agrees hard-fought nature funding plan at UN talks

World agrees hard-fought nature funding plan at UN talks
  • The agreement on Thursday is seen as crucial to giving impetus to the 2022 deal, which saw countries agree to protect 30 percent of the world’s land and seas
  • Countries have already agreed to deliver $200 billion a year in finance for nature by 2030, including $30 billion a year from wealthier countries to poorer ones

ROME: Nations cheered a last-gasp deal to map out funding to protect nature Thursday, breaking a deadlock at UN talks seen as a test for international cooperation in the face of geopolitical tensions.
Rich and developing countries hammered out a delicate compromise on raising and delivering the billions of dollars needed to protect species, overcoming stark divisions that had scuttled their previous meeting in Cali, Colombia, last year.
Delegates stood and clapped in an emotionally charged final meeting that saw key decisions adopted in the final minutes of the last day of rebooted negotiations at the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization headquarters in Rome.
COP16 President Susana Muhamad of Colombia hailed the fact that countries worked together for a breakthrough, enabling progress “in this very fragmented and conflicted world.”
“This is something very beautiful because it’s around protecting life that we have come together, and there cannot be anything higher than that,” she added.
The decision comes more than two years after a landmark deal to halt the rampant destruction of nature this decade and protect the ecosystems and wildlife that humans rely on for food, climate regulation, and economic prosperity.
Scientists have warned that action is urgent.
A million species are threatened with extinction, while unsustainable farming and consumption destroys forests, depletes soils and spreads plastic pollution to even the most remote areas of the planet.
The agreement on Thursday is seen as crucial to giving impetus to the 2022 deal, which saw countries agree to protect 30 percent of the world’s land and seas.
Talks were also seen as a bellwether for international cooperation.
The meeting comes as countries face a range of challenges, from trade disputes and debt worries to the slashing of overseas aid — particularly by new US President Donald Trump.
Washington, which has not signed up to the UN’s Convention on Biological Diversity, sent no representatives to the meeting.
“Our efforts show that multilateralism can present hope at a time of geopolitical uncertainty,” said Steven Guilbeault, Canada’s Minister of Environment and Climate Change.
Ousseynou Kasse of Senegal, speaking on behalf of the Africa Group, also threw support behind global cooperation.
“We believe that this is the way that can save the world, and we must continue down this path,” he said.
Countries must be “accountable to our children, to the generations to come,” he added, saying he was thinking of what he would tell his own son when he returns home.
“I will give him good news that we have a compromise, we have a deal.”
The failure to finalize an agreement in Cali was the first in a string of disappointing outcomes at environmental summits last year.
A climate finance deal at COP29 in Azerbaijan in November was slammed by developing countries, while separate negotiations about desertification and plastic pollution stalled in December.
Muhamad, who has resigned as Colombia’s environment minister but stayed on to serve until after the Rome conference, was given a standing ovation as the talks drew to a close in the early hours of Friday.
Countries have already agreed a goal to deliver $200 billion a year in finance for nature by 2030, including $30 billion a year from wealthier countries to poorer ones.
The total for 2022 was about $15 billion, according to the OECD.
The main debate in Cali and later Rome was over developing countries’ calls for the creation of a specific biodiversity fund, which has seen pushback from the EU and other wealthy nations, who have argued against multiple funds.
Thursday saw intense closed-door talks based on a “compromise attempt” text that Brazil put forward on behalf of the BRICS country bloc that includes Russia, China and India.
The agreement reached in Rome leaves it to the 2028 COP to decide whether to set up a specific new fund under the UN biodiversity process, or to name a potentially reformed existing fund to play that role.
Georgina Chandler, Head of Policy and Campaigns at the Zoological Society of London, said the finance roadmap was a “key milestone,” but stressed that money is needed urgently.
Other decisions sought to bolster monitoring to ensure countries are held accountable for their progress toward meeting biodiversity targets.
One achievement in Cali was the creation of a new fund to share profits from digitally sequenced genetic data from plants and animals with the communities they come from.
The fund, officially launched on Tuesday, is designed for large firms to contribute a portion of their income from developing things like medicine and cosmetics using this data.
Delegates in Cali also approved the creation of a permanent body to represent the interests of Indigenous people.


Parents rush to vaccinate children after measles outbreak hits Texas

Parents rush to vaccinate children after measles outbreak hits Texas
Updated 28 February 2025
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Parents rush to vaccinate children after measles outbreak hits Texas

Parents rush to vaccinate children after measles outbreak hits Texas
  • Measles is a highly contagious respiratory virus spread through droplets when an infected person coughs, sneezes or simply breathes

Lubbock: Five-year-old Shado is one of dozens of children being rushed to a health center in the US state of Texas to get the measles vaccine, after the recent death in the area of a child who was not immunized against the highly contagious virus.
“Look at you, you’re so brave,” the nurse administering the shot tells the young girl, who is sitting on her father’s lap.
The death came as immunization rates have declined nationwide, with the latest cases in the west Texas town of Lubbock concentrated in a Mennonite religious community that has historically shown vaccine hesitancy.
Mark Medina brought his children, Shado and her brother Azazel, after they heard about that death.
“It kind of sparked fear and we’re like, ‘Alright, it’s time to go get vaccinated. Let’s go,’” the 31-year-old father told AFP.
Rachel Dolan, a Lubbock health official, said the initial outbreak spread rapidly through the community south of the town, potentially fueled by a lack of vaccination.
“It’s the most contagious virus that we know of, and so just that one little spark, you know, really caused a lot of cases and rapid spread among that population,” she said.
This year more than 130 measles cases already have been reported in west Texas and neighboring New Mexico, the vast majority in unvaccinated children.
Around 20 have been hospitalized in Texas, and officials warn the outbreak is likely to grow.
The disease’s spread comes as Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has long spread falsehoods about the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine, begins his tenure as President Donald Trump’s health secretary.
Kennedy has downplayed the outbreak, saying: “It’s not unusual. You have measles outbreaks every year.”
'The safe side'
Nationwide immunization rates have been dropping in the United States, fueled by misinformation about vaccines.
The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends a 95 percent vaccination rate in order to maintain herd immunity.
However, measles vaccine coverage among kindergartners has dropped from 95.2 percent in the 2019-2020 school year to 92.7 percent in 2023-2024, leaving around 280,000 children vulnerable.
News of the death in Lubbock, however, has spurred some into action.
“Well, I heard about this little kid... That’s one of the reasons, just to be on the safe side,” said Jose Luis Aguilar, a 57-year-old driver who was encouraged by his boss to get vaccinated.
Dolan, the health official, said there was an increase in people seeking the vaccine since the death.
“There are pockets of our population that are hesitant toward vaccination,” she said.
“We have seen some of those people realize that this threat is more imminent and have made that decision to vaccinate.”
The CDC says the MMR vaccine is “very effective” at protecting people against those illnesses.
Two doses of the vaccine are 97 percent effective at preventing measles, the agency says.
The last US measles-related death was in 2015, when a woman in Washington state died from pneumonia caused by the virus. She had been vaccinated but was taking immunosuppressive medication.
Before that, the previous recorded measles death was in 2003.
Measles is a highly contagious respiratory virus spread through droplets when an infected person coughs, sneezes or simply breathes.
Known for its characteristic rash, it poses a serious risk to unvaccinated individuals, including infants under 12 months who are not ordinarily eligible for vaccination, and those with weakened immune systems.
While measles was declared eliminated in the US in 2000, outbreaks persist each year.


Russian divers found dead near popular Philippines resort

Russian divers found dead near popular Philippines resort
Updated 28 February 2025
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Russian divers found dead near popular Philippines resort

Russian divers found dead near popular Philippines resort
  • While three of the group were able to surface and return to the boat, the others were found by rescuers hours later
  • Shark attacks in the waters around the Philippines are exceedingly rare, with none recorded in at least a year

MANILA: Two Russian divers were found dead, one in the jaws of a shark, after a strong current separated them from their group in a popular Philippine scuba spot, a coast guard official said Friday.
Four Russian men aged 18 to 57 were diving Thursday afternoon near the resort area of Batangas on the main island of Luzon when they and their dive master were pulled apart by the current, coast guard district chief Airland Lapitan said.
While three of the group were able to surface and return to the boat, the others were found by rescuers hours later, according to Lapitan, who said the first man discovered was pronounced dead on arrival at a local hospital.
“The other one was found at about 4-5:30 p.m. (0800-0930 GMT Friday) and retrieved around 5-6 p.m.,” he said. “When the rescuers found him, he was being pulled by a shark. He was eventually retrieved but his arm was missing.”
It was unclear if the man had been killed by the shark or was already dead, Lapitan said, as the bodies were turned over to family members without an autopsy.
Shark attacks in the waters around the Philippines are exceedingly rare, with none recorded in at least a year, according to a global database.
The Russian embassy did not immediately respond to a request for comment.