Kumbh fake testing: Data uploaded on ICMR portal even after contract ended
New Delhi: Recent investigations have revealed that the private agency accused of irregulaties in COVID-19 tests during the recently concluded Kumbh Mela, continued to upload data on the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), portal even after its agreement with the Mela administration concluded, police said.
According to the police, the period of the contract for corona investigations signed between the Kumbh Mela Health Officer’s office and the private agency Max Corporate as well as the two private laboratories Dr Lalchandani Lab and Nalwa Laboratories was valid only till the month of April.
As per law, the labs should have stopped conducting COVID-19 tests after this period, but during an investigation by the special investigation team (SIT) constituted a day after a day after a case was registered against Max Corporate Service and the two private laboratories for the alleged fake Covid tests during Kumbh, it was revealed that the labs kept uploading the test data on the ICMR portal till May 16.
DGP Ashok Kumar said, “I have instructed the Haridwar SSP that the SIT should investigate in depth whatever five to six serious points have come up in the RTPCR Testing Scam, No person found guilty would be spared. Further investigation by the special investigation team is underway. It is investigating all other angles as well.”
Earlier, sources said that the SIT had issued notices to Max Corporate Service New Delhi, Nalwa Laboratories Pvt Ltd of Haryana, and Dr Lalchandani Lab for questioning. The SIT has given them four days to appear before it.
For the last two days, SIT CMO Dr S N Jha has been recording the statements of Kumbh Mela CMO Dr Arjun Singh Sengar.
Haridwar District Magistrate said investigations should be done to find out if the private laboratories engaged by the state government to conduct tests during the Kumbh had been approved by the ICMR before their empanelment.
“The whole matter will also be probed by CO rank level officer. There seems to be a flaw also in the process of empanelling the labs. It should have been probed if they were approved by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) before their empanellment. But this was not done. This is a matter of investigation,” the DM C Ravi Shankar said.
“The matter was being investigated on the district administration level and on Dehradun level as well. In the district-level probe, many inconsistencies have been found in the COVID test reports during Mahakumbh. In this connection, a case has been lodged against Max corporate agency and two private labs,” he added.
The officer said that after the preliminary investigation, the further probe is underway and it can take up to 10 more days. Other sections will also be added to the case on the basis of the report.
He informed that in the Dehradun-level investigation, it was found that as many as 1 lakh test reports were produced by only one lab which is impossible, adding that discrepancies in data entry have also been found.
Uttrakhand government registered a case against two private labs and Max Corporate Limited agency in this connection. The state health department lodged an FIR at Nagar Kotwali police station against Max corporate agency, Lalchandani Labs, and Nalwa Lab in Nagar Kotwali, according to Senior Superintendent of Police in Haridwar Senthil Avoodai Krishna Raj. Business Standard
Pandemic fallout to be felt ‘for years’: UN drug agency
Vienna: The coronavirus pandemic is pushing more people into drug use, while illicit cultivation could also get a boost, the UN said Thursday, warning that the crisis’s fallout was likely to be felt “for years to come”.
The Vienna-based United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), which each year pulls together data from its wide network of member countries in its annual report, said it also feared illicit opium poppy and coca leaf cultivation could rise as the economic crisis caused by the pandemic led to joblessness and other problems around the globe.
“The new report shows that drug markets have swiftly resumed operations after the initial disruption at the onset of the pandemic” last year, a statement by agency said.
Top opium producer Afghanistan reported a 37 percent jump in the amount of land used for illicit poppy cultivation during 2020 compared with the previous year, the report said.
Inequality, poverty and mental health conditions — known factors that push people into drug use — are also on the rise across the world, it said in a chapter entitled “Covid-19 fallout likely to be felt in drug markets for years to come”.
Most countries have reported a rise in the use of cannabis during the pandemic, it said, noting generally people decreasingly saw risks in its use.
The crisis has also seen an increase in the non-medical use of pharmaceutical drugs, while consumption of drugs that are “typically used in social settings”, such as cocaine, has dropped.
UNODC noted ever bigger shipments of illicit drugs and increased smuggling amid disruption to commercial air traffic.
Record global cocaine manufacture
Even before the pandemic, global cocaine manufacture doubled in output between 2014 and 2019, when it reached a new record of an estimated 1,784 tons, according to the report.
It has reached all-time highs in recent years, which is also in line with increasing global drug use in part due to the growing world population.
Cocaine supply chains to Europe are “diversifying, pushing prices down and quality up and thereby threatening Europe with a further expansion of the cocaine market”, it said.
It added that a rising number of smaller groups, including some originating in the Balkans, was now involved in cocaine trafficking, leading to “increased competition and efficiency”.
In a positive development seen by UNODC the area under coca bush cultivation declined globally by five percent in 2019.
This was largely driven by the first significant fall in cultivation in six years in Colombia though the South American country continued to be by far the largest source of cocaine globally. Reuters
China touts role in UN peacekeeping, Middle East peace
Beijing: Foreign Minister Wang Yi said China remains deeply committed to United Nations peacekeeping efforts, where more than 2,400 Chinese troops and police are serving — a contribution that underscores China’s increasing prominence in the world body.
Speaking on Friday (Jun 25) at a symposium to mark the 50th anniversary of China’s entry into the UN, Wang Yi said China had made good on its pledge to establish a stand-by peacekeeping force of 8,000 troops and 300 police officers ready to be deployed for UN missions “at any time when needed safeguard peace”.
Its influence enables China to rally wide support among developing nations, but the US and other Western democracies are increasingly wary about its role, particularly in squelching criticism of its human rights record and controlling the World Health Organization’s efforts to investigate the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Chinese officials loyal to the ruling Communist Party serve in numerous influential roles in the UN, and China sends more peacekeepers into the field than any other permanent Security Council member and provides the second-largest amount of funding for such operations after the US.
Also, Chinese diplomats routinely cite the UN charter and what it calls the accepted norms of international relations in rejecting criticisms of its detention of Muslim minorities and crackdown on free speech democracy in Hong Kong.
The People’s Republic of China was accepted into the world body on Jun 25, 1971, with the backing of developing nations and the Soviet bloc, replacing the Nationalist government of Chiang Kai-shek that had fled to the island of Taiwan amid civil war in 1949.
Chiang’s Republic of China, now better known simply as Taiwan, had been among the founders of the UN and a permanent member of the Security Council, but has since been excluded by it and related groups such as the World Health Organization.
Wang said China has participated in 29 former and ongoing peacekeeping operations, contributing more than 50,000 personnel, 24 of whom have died while in deployment.
China has the world’s largest standing military, with more than 2 million members, and has 600,000 paramilitary police. The world’s second-largest military budget after the US allows it to expand its forces and add advanced fighter jets and a third aircraft carrier now nearing completion.
China denies being an expansionist power, despite its moves to shore up its claims to the South China Sea by building artificial islands, recent border skirmishes with India and vows to conquer Taiwan and take control of East China Sea islands held by Japan.
“China has met its responsibilities for upholding world peace,” Wang said. “Over the past 50 years, China has taken the side of fairness, upholding equality and opposing interference in other countries’ internal affairs, power politics and hegemonism.”
Wang also said China, as holder of the rotating Security Council presidency, had been active in helping end recent fighting between Israel and Gaza, holding five sessions to broker peace and calling on all parties to fully adhere to the cease-fire agreement. AP
More than a dozen UN peacekeepers wounded in Mali car bomb explosion
Bamako: At least 13 UN peacekeepers, 12 of them from Germany, were wounded in northern Mali in a car bomb attack, the UN mission in Mali and the German government said.
The attack targeted a temporary base set up by the peacekeepers near the village of Ichagara in the northern Gao region, where insurgents linked to Al Qaeda and Daesh are active.
Three of the German soldiers were severely wounded, Defence Minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer said in a statement. Two of them are in a stable condition and the third is still in surgery, she said.
Kramp-Karrenbauer said one non-German peacekeeper was also wounded. A UN mission spokesperson said 15 peacekeepers in all were wounded. It was not immediately clear what explained the discrepancy.
The UN mission in Mali, known as MINUSMA, has deployed over 13,000 soldiers to contain violence by armed groups in the north and centre of the West African nation.
Armed attacks by militants and other groups are rampant across vast swathes of Mali and its neighbours Burkina Faso and Niger despite the presence of the peacekeepers and thousands of other international troops in the region.
MINUSMA has recorded about 230 fatalities since 2013, making it the deadliest of the UN’s more than dozen peacekeeping missions. Germany contributes up to 1,100 troops to MINUSMA. Most of them are based in Gao. Reuters
Explosions were negligence in technical exploitation – Technical Expert IAF
Srinagar: Sources in the outer security at Indian Air Force Station, Jammu said that there were no remnant of the drone found from the two sites of the incidents. He continued that IAF technical experts ruled out that an act of terrorism. It was claimed that neither it was that drone carried out payload of explosion and dropped at the sites nor the drone was used as explosives as nothing other than splinters were found.
Meanwhile one of the slightly injured personnel, who was among the three personnel injured in the explosion said, “In the process of technical exploitation which involved placing at dump, these IEDs exploded”. However, witnessed said that some facts are purposely being held due to security reasons.
Meanwhile witnessed said after the first explosion everyone came out but there were no noise of drone at all. One witness said that first explosion was herd at 1:37 am while the second was with the delay of five minutes at 1:42 am (Indian Standard Times). None of the witness even heard hovering or other noises of drone.
Analysts at Jammu said that the media hype was aimed to put pressure on Pakistan and China as both the countries have stained relations with India. Web Desk
Iran yet to decide on extending monitoring deal with IAEA
Dubai: Iran said it has yet to decide whether to extend a monitoring deal with the UN nuclear watchdog which lapsed last week, amid Washington’s warning that Tehran’s failure to renew it would complicate talks to revive its 2015 nuclear accord.
“No decision has been made yet, either negative or positive, about extending the monitoring deal with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA),” foreign ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh told a televised weekly news conference.
Iran and world powers are in negotiations to revive the 2015 nuclear deal, under which Iran accepted curbs to its nuclear programme in return for the lifting of international sanctions.
Washington abandoned the deal in 2018, and Tehran responded by violating some of its nuclear restrictions. In February, Iran halted an agreement with the IAEA that allowed additional inspections of Iranian nuclear sites. Some inspections were extended under temporary deals, but those expired last Thursday.
The IAEA demanded an immediate reply from Iran on whether it would extend the agreement, While US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said any failure to extend it would be a “serious concern” for broader negotiations.
France’s foreign ministry said in a daily briefing that it regretted Iran’s lack of response, but declined to say whether it would have any broader consequences for the wider talks. “Iran must resume cooperation with the IAEA and immediately restore its full access,” it said.
Iran said last week that the country’s top security body, the Supreme National Security Council, would decide whether to renew the temporary agreements, under which data and footage were still collected in some places where inspections stopped.
“Also there has been no new decision about deleting the data and footage from the IAEA’s cameras,” Khatibzadeh said.
Earlier, the speaker of Iran’s parliament said Tehran will never hand over images from inside of some Iranian nuclear sites to the IAEA, as the agreement with the agency had expired.
Iran’s talks with world powers on the nuclear pact, under way since April 9, were paused last week and are expected to resume in coming days. The parties said last week that major gaps remain. “Many issues have been negotiated sufficiently … Now the other parties must make their tough decisions if they want to reinstate the deal,” Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator Abbas Araqchi was quoted as saying by state media. AFP
UN human rights chief calls for reparations over racism
New York: The United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) has urged global action including reparations to “make amends” for racism against people of African descent.
Its new report also urges educational reform and apologies to address discrimination.
The findings cite concerns in about 60 countries including the UK, Belgium, France, Canada, Brazil and Colombia. The study began after the murder of George Floyd, an unarmed black man, in US police custody in 2020.
The findings say protests over the Minnesota man’s death and the conviction of a white policeman were a “seminal point in the fight against racism”.
In a statement, UN high commissioner for human rights Michelle Bachelet called “on all states to stop denying – and start dismantling – racism” and to “listen to the voices of people of African descent”.
The UN’s report is based on discussions with more than 300 experts and people of African descent and seeks to push nations to take actions to end racial injustices.
It found that police use of racial profiling and excessive force was systemic in much of North America, Europe and Latin America.
The report said racism was the biggest problem in countries associated with the former trade of many millions of Africans for slavery.
The findings conclude that in order to achieve racial justice countries should “make amends for centuries of violence and discrimination… including through formal acknowledgment and apologies, truth-telling processes, and reparations in various forms”.
It praises Black Lives Matter and says the group should “receive funding, public recognition and support”.
Ms Bachelet, a former president of Chile, said reparations must not only be financial in nature, but include other “guarantees” to prevent future injustices.
She said: “States must show stronger political will to accelerate action for racial justice, redress and equality through specific, time-bound commitments to achieve results.
“This will involve reimagining policing, and reforming the criminal justice system, which have consistently produced discriminatory outcomes for people of African descent.”
Ms Bachelet welcomed a “promising initiative” by US President Joe Biden to address racial inequity, which involves attempting to level the playing field by treating racial groups differently based on perceived need. AFP
