TIG Post

Tag: Brussels

  • Ghana to send teachers, nurses to Jamaica under special bilateral partnership 

    Ghana to send teachers, nurses to Jamaica under special bilateral partnership 

    The Jamaican government, under a special bilateral partnership, is set to receive nurses and teachers from Ghana, the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, has announced.

    The sector minister shared the good news on his Facebook page on Saturday, May 24, following diplomatic discussions with Jamaica’s Foreign Minister, Senator Kamina Johnson Smith, during the recent Organisation of African, Caribbean and Pacific States (OACPS) summit in Brussels.

    “Ghana and Jamaica are set to expand the frontiers of our inseparable historical relations,” he wrote in his post. Mr Ablakwa added that both “Ghana and Jamaica have also agreed to hold high-level political consultations to deepen our cooperation in trade, education, agribusiness, tourism, cultural and sports exchange.”

    Presently, the Ministry of Health recruits Ghanaian registered nurses to Barbados, a small island country in the southeastern Caribbean Sea.

    Last week, the High Commissioner of Barbados to Ghana, Juliette Byone-Sutherland, called for opportunities for Barbadian nurses to undergo health training in Ghana, emphasizing the benefits of hands-on experience in the country’s healthcare system.

    During a meeting with the Minister of Health, Honourable Kwabena Mintah Akandoh, discussions centered on strengthening healthcare collaboration between the two nations.

    The minister outlined key initiatives to enhance healthcare delivery in Ghana, including incentives for rural health workers such as salary bonuses, accelerated promotions, and scholarships for further education. Plans to improve regional and teaching hospitals and the need for additional healthcare facilities in Ghana’s newly created regions were also highlighted.

    Meanwhile, the government of Germany is willing to sign a labour mobility agreement with Ghana to allow thousands of youth to be employed abroad under a special bilateral agreement.

    Mr Ablakwa has noted that the agreement, which is currently under discussion, will guarantee “safe, rewarding and dignified employment.” “We expect actual implementation soon,” Mr Ablakwa added.

    In April, Minister for Employment and Labor Relations Dr. Rashid Pelpuo made mention of work ongoing between his outfit and the Foreign Ministry to craft a strategy to export skilled Ghanaian labour to countries requiring workers to curb the rising unemployment.

    “Beyond the domestic set, what we can do to tackle unemployment is to look at how we can export Ghanaian labour to places that require our labour force,” he said in an interview on Joy FM.

    He added: “What I am working on is to get the foreign minister to sign bilateral relations with all the countries needing Ghanaian labour, and I will sign agreements with companies that want to export the labour.”

    A projection made by Fitch has it that the unemployment rate in Ghana in 2025 will remain at an average of 4.0% of the labour force.

    The Ministry of Labour, Jobs & Employment, in partnership with the Youth Employment Agency (YEA) and GIZ Ghana, has launched the Work Abroad Programme.

    The initiative seeks to address youth unemployment by facilitating access to jobs in various sectors beyond Ghana’s borders.

  • European nations commit €21bn in new military assistance to Ukraine

    European nations commit €21bn in new military assistance to Ukraine

    European countries have promised €21 billion (£18.2 billion) in new military aid to Ukraine, calling 2025 a “critical year” in the ongoing war. The pledge was made during a meeting of the Ukraine Defence Contact Group at NATO headquarters in Brussels.

    With the U.S. showing signs of shifting its focus under Donald Trump’s leadership, European nations are stepping up to help fill the gap—offering weapons, air defence systems, missiles, and other equipment to support Ukraine on the battlefield.

    Germany’s Defence Minister, Boris Pistorius, said his country would provide €11 billion in aid over the next four years. The UK’s Defence Secretary, John Healey, said the collective pledges would send a strong message to Russia that European support remains firm.

    Friday’s announcements included a £450 million package from the UK and Norway. The support will go toward drones, radar systems, anti-tank mines, and vehicle repairs.

    Healey clarified that this amount is part of the £4.5 billion the UK had already committed earlier this year—the largest single pledge to Ukraine in 2025 so far.

    Air defence was a key topic at the meeting. Healey noted that Russia had dropped 10,000 glide bombs on Ukraine and launched about 100 attack drones per day in the first three months of the year.


    At this stage in the war, battlefield casualties on both sides inflicted by drones “way outnumber those inflicted by artillery”, the UK defence secretary said.
    “In our calculations, 70% to 80% of battlefield casualties are now caused and inflicted by drones,” he added.
    Defence ministers from 50 nations gathered in Brussels for the 27th gathering of the UDCG.


    US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth joined the meeting remotely, telling allies that America appreciated all the work “you guys” are doing.
    Pistorious said it Hegseth’s decision was a matter of “schedules” rather than “priorities”, and that the “most important fact was that he took part”.

  • Four detained for allegedly planning terror assault on concert arena in Brussels

    Four detained for allegedly planning terror assault on concert arena in Brussels

    Belgian police arrested four people who they think were planning to attack a concert hall in Brussels, the federal prosecutor’s office announced on Monday.

    The arrested person has been accused of being involved with a terrorist group and planning to carry out an attack. Three young people who are not old enough to be considered adults were also taken into custody by the police.

    The investigation found that a concert hall in Brussels was the intended target of a planned attack in a few weeks. The office did not provide more information.

    Recently, Belgium has been hit by violent attacks from extremists. In October, two fans of Swedish soccer were killed in Brussels.

    Last year, a group of people were found guilty of terrorist murder for attacking the Brussels airport and a subway station. The attacks killed 32 people in Belgium in 2016. These attacks were part of a series of violent incidents in Europe that were connected to the Islamic State group.

    Some people were found guilty for planning a suicide bombing in 2016. One of them is Salah Abdeslam, who is already serving a life sentence without the possibility of being released in France for his involvement in attacks on Paris cafes, the Bataclan music venue, and France’s national stadium in 2015.

    The attacks in Paris and Brussels were connected to the same IS group.

  • Attacker who killed Swedes in Brussels shot dead by police

    Attacker who killed Swedes in Brussels shot dead by police

    The police in Brussels have killed the man who murdered two people from Sweden on Monday night.

    Abdesalem Lassoued, who is 45 years old, was shot while he was in a café located in the Schaerbeek neighborhood.

    On Monday, two people from Sweden died and another person got hurt in a shooting with a machine gun.

    It happened on a street called Boulevard d’Ypres, which was 5 kilometers away from the stadium where Belgium was playing against Sweden to try and qualify for the Euro 2024 football tournament.

    Brussels is currently at the highest level of terror alert.

    The person who shot people is thought to be a man from Tunisia who was not allowed to stay in Belgium because his request for protection was denied.

    He uploaded a video on the internet claiming that he murdered people for the sake of God, and the authorities think that he was motivated by the Islamic State Group.

    Belgium’s Interior Minister Annelies Verlinden said to Flemish public broadcaster VRT that the weapon found on him was the same as the one used in Monday’s attack.

    On Tuesday, Prime Minister Alexander De Croo called Monday’s shooting a very scary act of terrorism during a press conference.

    The lawyer in charge of the case believes that the victims were targeted because they were from Sweden.

    Mr De Croo said: “The people who do bad things are trying to make us scared, not trust each other, and separate us in our societies where we have freedom. ” Terrorism is the act of using violence and fear to intimidate and harm innocent people. Terrorists need to realize that they won’t ever achieve what they want.

  • Iran serves Belgian aid worker a 28 years prison sentence

    A bitter debate over a stalled prisoner exchange agreement between Tehran and Brussels has been sparked by Iran’s 28-year prison sentence for a Belgian aid worker.

    Belgian ministers informed the distressed family of 41-year-old Olivier Vandecasteele about the verdict late on Tuesday after speaking with Iran’s justice minister.

    “At the end of November we learned he would be sentenced in Iran to a prison term of 28 years for a series of fabricated crimes,” justice minister Vincent Van Quickenborne told parliament.

    Vandecasteele was arrested in February and is reportedly being held in Tehran’s notorious Evin prison, in conditions Van Quickenborne described as “inhumane”.

    Belgium insists he is innocent, effectively held as a hostage in Tehran’s efforts to force Belgium to release an Iranian agent convicted of terrorism.

    Prisoner exchange programme

    The justice minister told the Belgian parliament’s justice committee, “Mr. Vandecasteele’s arrest is a direct consequence of the condemnation of the [Iranian] diplomat by our country.

    “Since the arrest of this person … the threat emanating from Iran has greatly increased,” he added.

    News of Vandecasteele’s sentence, which has not been publicly confirmed by Iranian authorities, has revived debate in Belgium over a prisoner exchange treaty with Iran.

    In the past, Prime Minister Alexander De Croo’s government has described this as the only option for a transfer.

    The treaty was signed with Iran earlier this year and, while not tailored explicitly for Vandecasteele, the justice minister confirmed that he would have been eligible for exchange.

    But last week, Belgium’s constitutional court suspended the implementation of treaty pending a final ruling on its legality within the next three months.

    Family ‘devastated’

    A spokesman for Vandecasteele’s family has said they are devastated by the sentence, underlining “There’s no Plan B.”

    “If there’s no solution he could stay in prison until 2050. He’ll be almost 70,” he said, urging Belgium to find a way to revive the prisoner exchange treaty.

    No details on the charges against Vandecasteele have been given by the Iranian authorities.

    Meanwhile, some Belgian opposition MPs and foreign policy experts have warned that the prisoner exchange treaty would only increase the threat posed by rogue regimes seeking to kidnap Belgian citizens as collateral.

    However, the Belgian government has no other option on how to free the aid worker.

     

  • ASEAN summit: EU pledges $10bn investment in Southeast Asia

    In light of the conflict in the Ukraine and China’s challenges, Brussels is the spot for the leaders of Southeast Asian nations.

    In Southeast Asia, the EU has pledged to invest billions of dollars as leaders sought to strengthen ties at a summit in the face of the conflict in the Ukraine and challenges from China.

    In Brussels on Wednesday, the European Union and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) held their first formal summit.

    “There might be many, many miles that divide us, but there are much more values that unite us,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen told the gathered leaders.

    But different opinions about Russia’s war in Ukraine and concerns about tensions with China over a key shipping route for global trade loomed over the meeting.

    The EU has been on a diplomatic push to galvanise a global front against Moscow as its invasion has sent economic and political shock waves around the world.

    ASEAN’s 10 nations – nine of which were represented, after Myanmar’s military leadership was not invited – have been divided in their response to the Kremlin’s war on Ukraine.

    Singapore has gone along with the West on Russia, while Vietnam and Laos, which have close military ties to Moscow, have remained more neutral.

    Along with Thailand, they abstained from a United Nations vote in October condemning Russia’s attempted annexation of regions of Ukraine seized since February.

    Final declaration

    The diverging views led to intense wrangling over a final declaration from the summit as the EU pushed for stronger language to condemn Moscow.

    A draught of the final statement said “most members” decried Russia’s war, but conceded there were also “other views and different assessments”.

    While Europe pressed for a tougher response to Russia, another global giant figured prominently at the summit.

    Chinese claims over the South China Sea have set it against some neighbours and sparked fears in Europe over trade flows through the key global thoroughfare.

    But China remains the biggest trade partner for ASEAN and many in the region are wary of distancing themselves from their giant neighbour.

    The EU is eager to pitch itself as a reliable partner for southeast Asia’s dynamic economies amid the growing rivalry between Beijing and Washington.

    The EU and ASEAN are each other’s third-largest trading partner and Europe sees the region as a key source of raw materials and wants to increase access to its booming markets.

    Europe’s vulnerabilities

    EU nations are pushing to diversify key supply chains away from China as the war in Ukraine has highlighted Europe’s vulnerabilities.

    Von der Leyen offered an investment package over the next five years worth 10 billion euros ($10.6bn) under the EU’s Global Gateway strategy designed as a counterweight to China’s largesse.

    “There is a battle of offers today in the geopolitical arena, not only a battle of narrative,” said EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell. “We have to offer more.”

    Heads of State pose for a family picture at the EU-ASEAN summit
    Heads of state pose for a family picture at the EU-ASEAN summit [John Thys/AFP]

    ASEAN and the EU suspended their push for a joint trade deal more than 10 years ago, but the bloc’s top officials said they hoped to relaunch efforts for a broad agreement.

    So far, deals with Vietnam and Singapore are in place, and the EU is looking now to make progress with ASEAN’s largest economy Indonesia and to resume talks with Malaysia, the Philippines and Thailand.

    One issue that risked clouding discussions was a new law in Indonesia criminalising sex outside marriage that has sparked fears for foreign visitors to the country.

    Indonesia’s President Joko Widodo insisted though that the EU-ASEAN relationship needed to be based more on “equality”.

    “There must be no imposition of views,” he said. “There must not be one who dictates over the other and thinks that my standard is better than yours.”

    Source: Aljazeera.com 

  • Suicide bombings: Trial of 10 begins in Belgium over 2016 attacks

    The trial is expected to last seven months, with the judgement delivering its verdict after hearing from approximately 370 witnesses.

    Ten men are on trial in Belgium on charges of involvement in two suicide bombings that killed 32 people and injured over 300 in Brussels in 2016.

    The ISIL (ISIS) armed group claimed responsibility for the attacks, in which three of the group’s alleged perpetrators – Khalid el-Bakraoui, Ibrahim el-Bakraoui, and Najim Laachraoui – were killed.

    Presiding Judge Laurence Massart will confirm the identities of all parties to the case, including the defendants and lawyers representing approximately 1,000 people affected by the attacks, on Monday.

    She will then address the jury, selected from a pool of 1,000 Belgians last week in a process lasting 14 hours.

    The event will take place at the Court of Assizes – the one which deals with the country’s biggest criminal cases and was also NATO’s former headquarters in Belgium.

    Link to Paris attacks

    The Brussels bombings trial has clear links to the French trial over the November 2015 Paris attacks.

    Six of the Brussels bombings accused were sentenced to jail terms of between 10 years and life in France in June, but the Belgian trial will be different in that it will be settled by a jury, not judges.

    People pay their respects at the monument for the victims of the 2016 three suicide bombings on the fifth anniversary of the attacks, in central Brussels, Belgium March 22, 2021. REUTERS/Yves Herman/Pool
    People pay their respects at the monument for the victims of the 2016 suicide bombings in central Brussels [File: Yves Herman/Reuters]

    The twin bombings at Brussels Airport and a third bomb on the city’s metro on March 22, 2016 killed 15 men and 17 women – Belgians, Americans, Dutch, Swedish, British, Chinese, French, German, Indian, Peruvian and Polish, many based in Brussels, the home to EU institutions and military alliance NATO.

    Nine men are charged with multiple murders and attempted murders in a “terrorist” context, with potential life sentences, and all 10 with participating in the activities of a “terrorist group”.

    They include Mohamed Abrini, who prosecutors say went to the airport with two suicide bombers but fled without detonating his suitcase of explosives, and Osama Krayem, a Swedish national accused of planning to be a second bomber on the Brussels metro.

    Salah Abdeslam, the main suspect in the Paris trial, is also an accused, along with others prosecutors say hosted or helped certain attackers.

    One of the 10, presumed killed in Syria, will be tried in absentia.

    In accordance with Belgium court procedure, the defendants have not declared whether they are innocent or guilty.

    Prosecutors are expected to start reading from the 486-page indictment on Tuesday before hearings of about 370 experts and witnesses can begin.

    The trial is expected to last seven months and is estimated to cost at least 35 million euros ($36.9m).

  • Police officer stabbed to death in Brussels

    In a knife attack in Brussels, one police officer was killed and another was injured.

    The two officers were stabbed near Brussels North railway station on Thursday evening and taken to the hospital.

    Prosecutors claim the suspect had previously walked into a police station and requested psychological assistance.

    The motive of the attacker is unknown, but anti-terrorist officials have taken over the investigation.

    The two police officers were on patrol in the Schaerbeek area of northern Brussels on Thursday evening when they came under attack. The officer who was fatally stabbed in the neck was just 20 years old, Belgian media report.

    Police say another patrol arrived at the scene and “neutralised” the attacker. He was shot in the legs and abdomen before being taken to hospital. Initial reports that he had died have since been denied.

    One local resident told the BBC they had heard “five or six shots” fired shortly after the attack, which occurred at around 19:15 (18:15 GMT).

    “I was coming from work and I was on the phone with my dad and then I heard five or six gunshots,” the witness, named Kremel, said.

    “My father asked me ‘what’s going on?’ I said it’s probably fireworks. He told me, ‘No, these are gunshots’.”

    The motive for the attack is unknown but the public prosecutor later said that the suspect had entered Evere police station in the Schaerbeek area on Thursday morning, making incoherent remarks and speaking of hatred of the police.

    He was escorted to a psychiatric unit for treatment but when police contacted the hospital later he had apparently left the hospital, the prosecutor said.

    The suspect was reportedly on a list of potentially violent extremists.

    In a tweet sending condolences to the dead officer’s family and friends, Belgium’s Prime Minister Alexander De Croo wrote: “Our police officers risk their lives every day to ensure the safety of our citizens. Today’s drama demonstrates this once again.”

    “My sincere hope is that his hospitalised colleague will be well,” he added.

    Police tape, sealed-off streets and flashing blue lights bring back bad memories for Brussels.

    It was six years ago, but Brussels still bears the marks of a co-ordinated terrorist attack – at the main airport and on the metro – that killed 32 people in 2016.

    In the coming weeks, nine alleged members of a cell of the so-called Islamic State group are due to go on trial for their involvement in the attacks.

  • Ghana, Ivory Coast boycott cocoa meeting in Brussels over farmers’ pay

    The world’s top cocoa producers, Ghana and Ivory Coast, are boycotting meetings in Brussels of the World Cocoa Foundation on cocoa sustainability this Wednesday and Thursday (October 26 and 27).

    Authorities in the two West African countries accuse multinational chocolate companies and traders of blocking measures to improve cocoa farmers’ incomes.

    Ghana and Ivory coast’s grievances concern the Living Income Differential (LID) set at a standard of $400 per tonne and charged on top of world prices. The LID was introduced in 2019 to guarantee cocoa farmers a minimum price that would improve the income of farmers, many of whom live in poverty.

    But commodity traders set a negative differential for the two nations at 260 dollars per tonne.

    In July 2022 a further decision was taken to no longer sell their cocoa with negative country differentials.

    Both countries account for about two-thirds of global cocoa production, but farmers in those countries earn less than 6% of revenues in a chocolate industry valued at more than $100 billion a year.

    Arguing that farmers have always been given a raw deal when it comes to pricing, four civil society organizations in Ghana and Ivory Coast have thrown their weight behind the boycott.

    The World Cocoa Foundation, a group representing 80% of the global market, says its 2022 meetings are to discuss steps to improve farmer pay, combat child labor and end deforestation linked to cultivation of the crop.

     

    Source: African News