Guterres will also be visiting the holy Sikh shrine in Kartarpur.

During his visit, the UN chief will speak at the international conference ’40 Years of Hosting Afghan Refugees in Pakistan’, Dawn news reported.

The two-day conference in Islamabad, starting on February 17, will be a recognition of Pakistan’s “tremendous generosity” in hosting millions of refugees from Afghanistan over four decades, his spokesman Stephane Dujarric said during a regular noon briefing at the UN Headquarters in New York on Friday.

The conference is being organised by the Pakistan Government and the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) and will be inaugurated by Prime Minister Imran Khan. Various senior US officials will also attend the conference.

Guterres is expected to meet with Imran Khan and other high-level government officials, according to his spokesman.

On Tuesday, he will visit Lahore where he will meet students and attend an event on Pakistan’s polio vaccination campaign.

He will also travel to Kartarpur to visit the Sikh holy site of Gurdwara Kartarpur Sahib.

He will visit Gurdwara Kartarpur Sahib before returning to New York on February 19.

Last year, the UN chief welcomed the opening of the Kartarpur Corridor between India and Pakistan and said that it paved the way for interfaith harmony and understanding.

A spokesperson for the Secretary-General took to Twitter and said, “We welcome #Pakistan and #India opening #KartarpurCorridor today connecting two key Sikh pilgrimage sites, paving way for interfaith harmony and understanding by facilitating visa-free cross border visits by pilgrims to holy shrines”.

The Kartarpur Corridor links Dera Baba Sahib in Gurdaspur in India and Gurdwara Kartarpur Sahib in Pakistan. It was opened on November 9 in a historic people-to-people initiative between the two countries.

According to the agreement between Pakistan and India, 5,000 pilgrims from India can visit the shrine daily and the number can be increased in future.

The requirement of passport and the USD 20 service fee have been waived and for last year in November by Pakistan.

Guru Nanak Dev spent the last 18 years of his life at Kartarpur Sahib, which has now become the world’s largest Sikh Gurdwara.

SEOUL (REUTERS) – North Korean leader Kim Jong Un made his first public appearance in 22 days amid an outbreak of coronavirus, state media reported on Saturday (Feb 15), to visit a national mausoleum and mark the anniversary of the late leader Kim Jong Il’s birth.

Kim Jong Un paid tribute to the statue of former leader Kim at Pyongyang’s Kumsusan Palace of the Sun, his first public appearance since he attended Chinese New Year celebrations on Jan 25, state media Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said.

North Korea has not confirmed any cases of the new coronavirus, but state media said the government was extending to 30 days the quarantine period for people showing symptoms, and all government institutions and foreigners living in the country were expected to comply “unconditionally.”

Late leader Kim’s birthday, Feb 16, is a national holiday celebrated as the Day of the Shining Star.

Accompanying Kim to the mausoleum were high ranking party officials including Choe Ryong Hae, president of the Presidium of the Supreme People’s Assembly and Pak Pong Ju, vice chairman of the State Affairs Commission.

HONG KONG (REUTERS) – The Hong Kong government will send aircraft to Japan to bring back passengers from the quarantined cruise ship Diamond Princess, where the most coronavirus infections outside China have occurred.

In a statement late on Saturday (Feb 15), the Security Bureau said chartered flights would return Hong Kong residents to the city for free once Japanese authorities had confirmed the plan.

The passengers will be required to undergo a further 14 days of quarantine after arriving in Hong Kong, the bureau added.

The cruise ship, owned by Carnival Corp and carrying 3,700 passengers and crew, has been quarantined in Yokohama since Feb 3, after a man who disembarked in Hong Kong before it travelled to Japan was diagnosed with the virus.

There are around 330 Hong Kong residents on board, including 260 holding Special Administrative Region of Hong Kong passports and roughly 70 people with foreign ones.

The cruise liner’s quarantine is set to end on Wednesday (Feb 19).

In Hong Kong, there have been 56 confirmed cases of coronavirus and one death.

Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam has called on residents to stay indoors as much as possible to curb the risk of a possible community outbreak in the global financial centre where, shopping malls, restaurants and cafes are almost deserted.

Anger has been brewing over Lam’s handling of the crisis, with critics calling on her to shut the entire border with mainland China and some medical workers going on strike.

On Saturday, hundreds of anti-government protesters, many wearing surgical masks and dressed in black, marched in multiple neighbourhoods against plans to potentially turn some buildings into coronavirus quarantine centres. They also reiterated calls for the closure of the mainland China border.

Lam has said such a move would be “inappropriate”, “impractical” and “discriminatory”.

Latest figures from Beijing on Sunday (Feb 16) showed 68,500 cases of the illness and 1,665 deaths, mostly in Hubei province.

Malaysia’s health director-general Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said two cases involved Chinese nationals – a 27-year-old businessman and a 32-year-old woman who is married to a Malaysian – while the third involved an 83-year-old American female.

The man was found to have fever at the Bukit Kayu Hitam border checkpoint on Thursday and was referred to Hospital Sultanah Bahiyah in Alor Setar the same day.

He had arrived in Malaysia on February 1 for business and on February 12 he travelled to Thailand and returned to Malaysia the following day.

Test results on February 14 showed that he was Covid-19 positive.

The woman, who has been living in Malaysia, was in China from January 22 to 30 to visit family members.

On February 13, she had a sore throat and was referred to a hospital for further checks.

She was screened for Covid-19 and was confirmed positive the following day.

Subsequently, she was admitted to Hospital Sultanah Maliha in Langkawi, Kedah, for treatment and monitoring.

The American female was a passenger of a cruise ship that docked in Cambodia on February 13.

Following this, 145 passengers from the ship flew to Malaysia on February 14.

The woman and her husband were picked up by thermal scanners at Kuala Lumpur International Airport, and referred to the Hospital Sungai Buloh for detailed screening, which then found the woman positive on Saturday.

The woman is in stable condition and in isolation while her husband, also an American, who tested negative, is placed under observation at the same hospital.

Of the 22 confirmed Covid-19 cases, 15 are Chinese nationals, one American and six Malaysians.

As of 4pm on Saturday, there were 67,088 confirmed cases globally, according to Corona Tracker.

As many as 8,283 people have recovered while 1,526 deaths were reported.

Hyundai Motor Co. and its affiliate Kia Motors Corp., the country’s two biggest carmakers, restarted production at their domestic plants Tuesday, mainly using auto components shipped from Southeast Asia.

“Some parts from Southeast Asia arrived at the plants Monday, which helped Hyundai and Kia partially resume production at their plants. As South Korean suppliers that have plants in China also resumed production this week, the carmakers expect to normalize their production next week,” a Hyundai Motor Group spokesman said over the phone.

The carmakers halted all production at their plants on Feb. 7 and kept them suspended through Feb. 10 as their China-based suppliers had suspended their production since Jan. 24 when China’s Lunar New Year holiday began.

It was the first time that Hyundai Motor suspended all of its domestic plants since 1997, when the Asian financial crisis affected local manufacturers and Mando Corp. stopped supplying parts to the carmaker.

Hyundai and Kia said they will keep some of their production lines operating and others suspended until they receive an ample amount of auto parts from China.

They plan to import auto parts from companies in Southeast Asia for the time being as it may take time for their suppliers in China to fully operate their production lines amid the coronavirus called COVID-19.

The Chinese authorities had called on manufacturers to stop operations until Feb. 9, a week after the end of the holiday, to keep the deadly respiratory illness from spreading further.

Three other local carmakers — SsangYong Motor Co., Renault Samsung Motors Corp. and GM Korea Co. — expect parts problems will be resolved sooner or later.

SsangYong Motor and Renault Samsung said their plants will resume operations Thursday and next Monday, respectively, as their Chinese suppliers began production this week.

SsangYong Motor stopped the operation of its sole plant in Pyeongtaek, 70 kilometers south of Seoul, last Tuesday and will maintain the suspension until Wednesday. Renault Samsung plans to halt production at its sole plant in Busan, 453 km south of Seoul, from Tuesday to Friday.

GM Korea said its production has not been affected by the coronavirus outbreak though it is closely monitoring the situation involving the virus to avoid any impact on its production.

If the suspension period does not exceed a week, industry people and analysts expect no major drag on the carmakers’ business results for the January-March period as they will be able to fill the output gap through overtime work.

As its plants resumed operations, Hyundai Motor said it will initially focus on the production of popular models, such as the flagship Palisade SUV and the GV80 SUV, sold under Hyundai’s independent Genesis brand to meet rising demand and for exports to the United States.

South Korean officials and Hyundai Motor Group had asked the Chinese authorities to help Chinese manufacturers resume operations this week to avoid supply chain disruption for their corporate customers.

The Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy said last week it will take all necessary steps to minimize the economic fallout of the supply disruptions on local carmakers.

To tackle supply shortages, the ministry said it will seek to simplify the import processing for auto parts from Vietnam, Cambodia and the Philippines; provide financial subsidies to local auto part makers, including loans for the expansion of production lines; and fund their research and development projects.

South Korea had reported 28 confirmed cases of the deadly virus as of Saturday.

Nguyen Do Anh Tuan, director of the Department of International Cooperation, Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development said the newly-ratified EU-Vietnam Free Trade Agreement (EVFTA) offers plenty of opportunities.

He said as the EU imports about US$150 billion agricultural products each year so the EVFTA would open up a potential market for the local export agricultural products.

Tuan told a discussion hosted by the Government Electronic Portal on the EVFTA in Ha Noi yesterday that: “There is room for Vietnamese agricultural products.”

Agreeing with Tuan, chairman of Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry (VCCI) Vu Tien Loc said: “The EU is a large market with the world’s leading purchasing powers and the EVFTA Agreement marks a new phase for Viet Nam with favourable conditions for the local enterprises, including the agriculture firms, to increase exports.”

However, Luong Hoang Thai, director general of the Multilateral Trade Policy Department, under the Ministry of Trade and Industry raised a number of challenges for the industry as the strict conditions from the EU market such as the regulation of origin, quality and labour relating to the agriculture production.

Thai added: “Local livestock industry would face increasing competitive pressure from imported products from the EU.”

He thought the small scale of the husbandry would make farmers and local livestock cooperatives fall behind imported products from EU.

As frozen pork meat would be duty-free after seven years, dairy products after five years, and processed food after seven years, and chicken after 10 years, Thai said: “Viet Nam should take time to improve the local livestock.”

Currently the EU’s livestock products exported to Vietnam are subject to tariffs of 10-40 per cent. The reduction of import tariff on livestock products from the EU will improve their penetration of the Vietnamese market and pose significant competition to domestic products.

Thai added the country should apply further modern technology to ensure clean production as well as avoid child labour in the production to improve agriculture production to better grasp the chance from the EVFTA.

Gov’t to issue lists of preferential tariffs under EVFTA

The Ministry of Finance said on February 13 that it will build and submit the draft decree to the Government.

When the agreement takes effect, Viet Nam will immediately remove 48.5 per cent of import tariff lines, equivalent to 64.5 per cent of its imports from the EU. The respective rates will reach about 99 per cent and 99.8 per cent after 10 years.

Regarding the remaining tariffs, the elimination roadmap will last for more than 10 years, or Viet Nam will give preferential treatment to the EU on the basis of the World Trade Organisation (WTO)’s tariff quota.

Meanwhile, the country pledged to erase tariffs on exports to the EU according to a 15-year roadmap, except for some products such as crude oil and coal.

On February 12, the European Parliament ratified the EVFTA with 401 votes in favour, 192 against and 40 abstentions. The EU-Vietnam Investment Protection Agreement was also passed the same day.

Both agreements were officially signed in Ha Noi on June 30, 2019.

The European Parliament will later issue an announcement on the completion of the EVFTA ratification process and transfer the ratification dossier back to the European Council to complete final procedures.

Vietnamese agencies are also working on procedures to submit the EVFTA to the National Assembly at the session in May. If the parliament adopts the deal in May and the two sides inform each other about procedure completion in June, the EVFTA will become effective on July 1 this year. —VNS

They made the commitment at a workshop this week where the Mekong River was named as one of the 10 which channelled plastic into the ocean.

Fifty government officials and researchers from the four Mekong countries – Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam – met from February 11-12 at a regional workshop in Vientiane hosted by the Mekong River Commission (MRC) Secretariat and UN Environment Programme (UNEP) Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific.

The meeting served to discuss assessment methodologies to study plastic debris and its sources across the Mekong, a press release said on Wednesday.

It said: In a bid to reduce plastic waste and fight plastic pollution in the Mekong region, government officials and researchers from the four Mekong countries agreed to assess plastic waste leakage into the

Mekong River system in order to inform about the current state of plastic pollutants in the region and offer policy recommendations to address the challenges.”

Ministry of Environment spokesman Neth Pheaktra welcomed the agreement to have a joint mechanism to reduce plastic being channelled into the Mekong River. He said Cambodia could not do it alone.

“The Ministry of Environment supports the study of mechanisms to prevent the flow of plastic waste into the Mekong River. So far, we have taken no concrete action apart from educating the people along the

Mekong River not to dump rubbish and improper packaging that can flow into the river during floods.

“We have to have a clear set of rules by joint agreement because the Mekong River is not the only one that crosses Cambodia. Therefore, there needs to be a mechanism and approval from other countries to find a solution for plastic pollution in the Mekong River.

“The pollution of the Mekong River is not only toxic to it but also to the sea,” he said.

According to a study on the export of plastic debris by rivers into the sea published in an academic journal Environmental Science & Technology in November 2017, the Mekong River was one of the 10 that collectively carried between 88–95 per cent of plastics into the world’s oceans.

There are also other reports around the plastic lifestyle that proliferates across the Mekong neighbourhoods without basin-wide countermeasures.

In Cambodia, about four million tonnes of waste is generated each year, about 20 per cent of which is plastic. Phnom Penh generates the largest amount of rubbish with more than 3,000 tonnes per day or over 10 million plastic bags full a day.

The MRC and UNEP are implementing the project as part of a larger technical collaboration that both parties signed last December.

“The assessment will provide the four Mekong countries with scientific evidence and information on plastic debris and plastic pollution and their threat to the environment and people,” Kakuko Nagatani-Yoshida, the UNEP regional coordinator for chemicals, waste and air quality said when she addressed the meeting.

Ying was also appointed as a member and Standing Committee member of the CPC Hubei Provincial Committee, it said.

Jiang Chaoliang will no longer hold the office, it added.

Ying, 62, a native of Zhejiang province, began his career in 1976 and has rich working experience in Chinese political and legal affairs, including in the public security bureau and the courts.

He became Shanghai mayor in early 2017.

HÀ NỘI — A special task force and two working teams will be sent to the northern province of Vĩnh Phúc from Thursday (February 13) to help with the fight against the acute respiratory disease caused by the new coronavirus (COVID-19), the Ministry of Health has said.

Deputy Minister Đỗ Xuân Tuyên said the national steering committee for prevention and control of acute pneumonia caused by COVID-19 has set up a special task force to work on the prevention and control of the epidemic in Vĩnh Phúc Province.

The teams will work round-the-clock from February 13, assisting in zoning off high-risk areas and environmental hygiene, as well as medical treatment, he said.

Vĩnh Phúc is one of the first localities in the country to confirm cases of the virus. By Thursday, 11 cases of COVID-19 infection have been confirmed, including nine in Bình Xuyên District, one in Tam Đảo District and one in Tam Dương District.

The latest case to test positive for coronavirus on Thursday was a 50-year-old man in Sơn Lôi Commune, Bình Xuyên District in Vĩnh Phúc Province. He is the father of a 23-year-old patient among eight Vietnamese workers sent to Wuhan for training last November and confirmed positive for the virus in January.

The patient, as well as other family members, had been quarantined. During the quarantine period, the patient showed no symptoms of fever, coughing or breathing difficulty.

Earlier, the 49-year-old mother and 16-year-old sister of the patient were infected with the virus and are being treated at a local health centre.

Tuyên said the priority was zoning off and quarantining affected areas to stamp out the epidemic.

Seven checkpoints have been set up along all roads of the affected areas. Vehicles must be sprayed with disinfectant to prevent the virus from spreading, he said.

All activities with large crowds have been suspended and schools will be shut until February 22.

A public awareness campaign has been launched to encourage people to regularly wash their hands and wear medical masks, while schools, hospitals, households and residential areas are being disinfected.

From February 13, the province will zone off and quarantine affected areas in Sơn Lôi Commune, Bình Xuyên District, for 20 days.

As of Thursday, the death toll from the coronavirus has climbed to 1,363, nearly all of the fatalities in China, and total confirmed cases worldwide surpassed 60,100.