The Canadian Parvasi - Issue 46

The International News Weekly World
05
May 18, 2018 | Toronto
N Korea threatens to call off talks with US
Says Won’t Be Pushed Into A Corner With Unilateral Denuclearisation Demands
Washington: North Korea
warned on Wednesday that it
would bail out of a scheduled
June 12 summit between its
leader Kim Jong-un and US
President Trump if Washington
attempted to corner
Pyongyang with unilateral denuclearisation
demands and
continued its military drills
with South Korea that it sees
as part of an existential threat.
The North Korean backsliding,
apparently in response
to aggressive US talk
on the need for “complete
verifiable irreversible denuclearisation”
by Pyongyang
before Washington eased any
pressure, put the Singapore
summit on skids, suggesting
the celebratory commentary
about bringing the reclusive
communist regime to heel is
premature.
US commentators of
conservative hue had gone
overboard with Trump’s diplomatic
triumph in engaging
North Korea, but the quixotic
country provided a stark reminder
that it was not about
to roll over in a one-sided capitulation
that much of the
world read into its decision
to engage directly with US.
Apparently, North Korea has
demands too from the US and
South Korea.
“If the Trump administration
approaches the summit
with sincerity… it will receive
a deserved response from us,”
North Korea’s vice foreign
minister Kim Gye Gwan said
in a statement on Wednesday,
adding, “However, if the
US is trying to drive us into a
corner to force our unilateral
nuclear abandonment, we
will no longer be interested in
such dialogue and cannot but
reconsider our proceeding to
the DPRK-US summit.”
The North Korean reservations
came even as New
Delhi sent minister of state for
external affairs V K Singh to
Pyongyang on Wednesday on
a surprise visit, presumably
to build bridges with a country
India has long disdained
because of its nuclear proliferation
ties to Pakistan. Singh’s
unscheduled visit came after
US interlocutors, including
the new national security
adviser John Bolton and secretary
of state Mike Pompeo,
had telephonic exchanges
last week with their Indian
counterparts Ajit Doval and
Sushma Swaraj respectively.
It was not clear immediately
if Singh was acting as an intermediary
or pursuing New
Delhi’s own agenda, but the
surprise visit came just as
North Korea backtracked
from what was seen as a lockin
of the Signapore summit.
Trump supporters had
gone so far as to lobby for a
Nobel Peace Prize for him despite
cautionary advise from
sections of the diplomatic
community that Kim could
be playing American for suckers.
The North Korean ire
was apparently provoked by
continued US-South Korea
air force drills that it said was
ruining the build-up to the
Singapore summit, and tough
statements from US leaders,
including the view of the new
NSA Bolton that Pyongyang’s
denuclearisation should follow
what was imposed on
Libya in 2004 when he was an
undersecretary for arms control.
“This is not an expression
of intention to address
the issue through dialogue. It
is essentially a manifestation
of awfully sinister move
(s) to impose on our dignified
state the destiny of
Libya or Iraq, which had
been collapsed due to the
yielding of their countries to
big powers,” the North Korean
minister said, expressing
“repugnance” towards
Bolton, a US hawk it had
once described as “human
scum”. Times News Network
If immigration was slashed, Canada’s economy would feel the pinch : report
Continued from page 01
One expert however,
warned against increasing
immigration levels too fast,
as native-born Canadians
continue to out-earn immigrants
in the labour force
by a margin of almost 20 per
cent in their early 20s.
Christopher Worswick,
a professor at Carleton
University, explained that
while there are several viable
reasons to increase Canadian
immigration, he’d
caution against increasing
levels too drastically, too
quickly.
“I worry a little bit
when people say we need
one per cent immigration to
solve all our problems. Well,
that’s a very high level,” he
explained.
He clarified that while
he believes there are “huge
benefits to immigration,”
there are many variables to
consider when discussing
what percentage of the total
population they should comprise.
Some of these include
projected salary milestones
that immigrants in Canada
were expected to meet over
the past few decades that
they’ve yet to achieve, and
the risks that automation
pose to Canada’s entire
workforce.
“If self-driving cars are
realistic inside 15 years,
suddenly both taxi drivers
and Uber drivers aren’t going
to have work,” he said
as an example. If whole
populations are forced out
of work due to automation,
immigrants that came to
Canada to work will likely
wind up among the newly
unemployed.
“Without immigration,
our labour force would
shrink. Immigrants contribute
significantly to the
labour force because they
come in at a fairly young
age, and they have many
years of work ahead of
them,” Esses explained.
She notes however,
that with an increase in
immigration levels, it’s important
for governments to
dedicate time and resources
into integrating them into
Canadian society.
“It is important to increase
immigration levels. I
think that will be beneficial
if we do a good job of integrating
immigrants. One
thing that’s happening now
is that immigrants will be
far less likely to have English
and French language
skills. Immigrants are underemployed,”
she said
She emphasized that
the federal government has
done a good job at introducing
the necessary support
systems like language training
and career mentorship.
This past November, the
Canadian government released
an updated immigration
plan, which sought to
bring a total of 310,000 additional
newcomers to Canada
in 2018, with increases
every year thereafter until
2020. By 2020, the yearly total
will hit 340,000. This will
still represent less than one
per cent of Canada’s population,
and remains short
of recommendations made
two years earlier by the
federal government’s economic
advisory council — a
group of advisers to Finance
Minister Bill Morneau.
The council previously
recommended that boosting
immigration by 50 per cent
(from 300,000 to 450,000 people
annually) over the following
five years, a number
which a previous Conference
Board of Canada report
suggests is both achievable
and necessary.
26/11 Mumbai terror attack
trial resumes in Pakistan
Continued from page 01
The statements of two more Pakistani witnesses, Federal
Investigation Agency (FIA) Additional Director General
Wajid Zia and another official, Zahid Akhter, needed to be
recorded. The prosecutors, however, sought adjournment
due to engagements at the accountability courts. The court
asked Zahid Akhter to appear in the next hearing while Wajid
Zia will be summoned for prosecution evidence on May
23. The prosecution completed the testimonies of 68 Pakistani
witnesses last year. The court "observed with concern
that since January 2016 upon the request of the prosecution,
government functionaries sitting at the helm of affairs were
directed repeatedly for producing 27 Indian nationals so as
to give evidence in instant case, but till date no serious and
final response has been given by the government". In January
2016, the government had contacted New Delhi asking it
to send the witnesses to Pakistan to testify against the Mumbai
attack suspects. A total of 166 Indians and foreigners
were killed in the bloodbath. Lakhvi and the other suspects
- Abdul Wajid, Mazhar Iqbal, Hammad Amin Sadiq, Shahid
Jameel Riaz, Jamil Ahmed and Younus Anjum - are being
tried by the ATC since 2009. Earlier, the Lahore High Court
released prime suspect Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi on postarrest
bail in 2015 after he furnished Rs 2 million in surety
bonds. Lakhvi's request for exemption from appearing in
the court was also accepted on Wednesday.