Three pairs of the Indonesian presidential and vice presidential candidates have officially signed a "Declaration of the 2024 Election Participants for a Peaceful, Orderly and Law-Abiding Campaign" at the General Election Commission (KPU) Jakarta Building, Monday (27/11). The three capres and cawapres are Anies Baswedan-Muhaimin Iskandar, Prabowo Subianto-Gibran Rakabuming Raka, and Ganjar Pranowo-Mahfud MD.
The victory of the far-right party - Partij voor de Vrijheid (PVV) or the Party for Freedom led by Geert Wilders in the Dutch election on November 22, 2023 left people flabbergasted. PVV was ensured to have 37 of 150 chairs of the Dutch House of Representatives. The party was led by the controversial senior politician Geert Wilders who was known for his racist and anti-Islam statements.
Earlier this month, Israel's Minister of Heritage, Amihai Eliyahu, issued a statement that the Israeli government was considering the possibility of dropping a nuclear bomb on the Gaza Strip to combat the Palestinian Hamas group.
US President Joe Biden was very enthusiastic after a four-hour meeting with the President of China Xi Jinping in California, the US on Wednesday (15/11). The meeting was held amid the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation - APEC Summit 2023. In his posting on X, President Joe Biden said that a real development in a constructive and productive talk was achieved. The US and China had achieved agreements to continue military communication and cooperation in fighting the drug trade.
Indonesian commemorates the Youth Pledge every October 28. One of the legacies of the Youth Pledge is Indonesian as the language that unifies the nation. Language is a characteristic of a country and through language, we can get to know a nation. Indonesian people should be proud as they live in a country that has a unifying language, namely Indonesian.
This pride increased further with the naming of Indonesian language as an official language at the General Conference of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization or UNESCO on Monday (20/11) at UNESCO Headquarters Paris, France. This determination makes Indonesian the 10th official language recognized
by the UNESCO General Conference, alongside English, Arabic, Mandarin, French, Spanish, Russian, Hindi, Italian and Portuguese.
The establishment of Indonesian as one of the official languages of the UNESCO General Conference certainly strengthens Indonesian on the international stage.
Reporting from detikEdu citing the page of the Language Service Center in Florida, Lingua Edu, in terms of the number of speakers, Indonesian is ranked 10th. Indonesian is also used by more than 275 million speakers. Apart from that, Indonesian has also gone global with the inclusion of the Indonesian language curriculum in 52 countries and there are at least 150,000 foreign speakers who actively speak Indonesian.
Apart from being proud, Indonesian is also a challenge for the Indonesian people. Can the Indonesian people glorify and use Indonesian properly and correctly in the midst of globalization and the onslaught of foreign language terms or lingua franca that are widely used in everyday conversations? Of course, Indonesian, like other
languages in the world, is not completely pure and closed from foreign influences.
Hopefully the establishment of Indonesian as the Language of the UNESCO General Conference can have a positive impact on the Indonesian nation and state.
The armed conflict situation occurring in the Gaza Strip is increasingly worrying, and it has caused an extraordinary number of victims. Rocket attacks, accompanied by a hail of gunfire in the Gaza Strip, according to Head of Hamas Media Office Salama Marouf as quoted from AA.com, Sunday (5/11), killed 9,500 people, including 3,900 children and 2,509 women.
The Israeli attack also caused 55 mosques, three universities, three churches and five buildings belonging to the Ministry of Endowments and Religion in Gaza to be completely destroyed. Around 16 hospitals, 32 primary care centers and 27 ambulances were damaged.
This condition is certainly very worrying for the world, including Indonesia. It is unimaginable how the Palestinian people are suffering, especially women and children who are victims of the war.
The Indonesian government and society moved quickly to condemn the Israeli attacks on Palestine. Indonesian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Retno Marsudi, in a special session of the United Nations (UN) General Assembly on Thursday (26/10), strongly condemned Israel's attacks on Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. The support of the Indonesian people was also shown by the solidarity actions of thousands of people, including national figures who gathered together at the National Monument area in Central Jakarta, Sunday (5/11).
Apart from strongly condemning Israel's attacks on Palestinians, the Indonesian people and government also sent humanitarian aids to Palestine on Saturday (4/11), which was released directly by President Joko Widodo at the Halim Perdanakusuma Air Force Base in Jakarta.
The government will immediately coordinate and prepare the next delivery of aids, considering the high enthusiasm of the Indonesian people to help the Palestinian people. The government through the Public Service Agency of the Ministry of Finance, namely the International Development Cooperation Fund (LDKPI) or also known as Indonesian AID, is preparing the second phase of humanitarian assistance for Palestine. It is hoped that this assistance can be sent next week, following the first stage of assistance which was carried out on Saturday (04/11).
Support from the international community, including from Indonesia, is really needed by Palestinian citizens due to increasingly heated Israeli-Palestinian tensions. This second phase of humanitarian assistance is part of Indonesia's commitment to help Palestine, as stated by President Joko Widodo when releasing the first batch of aid at Halim Perdana Kusuma Air Base in Jakarta.
Indonesia's support represents all elements of the nation. The government through the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Defense, Indonesian Military and Police, and also the community collaborated to collect various types of aid materials.
Humanitarian assistance is also an expression of the solidarity of the Indonesian people and government towards the Palestinian people who live in difficult situations. While humanitarian assistance is important, what is more important is finding a long-term solution to the conflict so that the Palestinian people can live in peace and stability.
The United States and South Korea again conducted large-scale air exercises starting last Monday (30/10), using 130 fighter aircraft from both countries to simulate wartime operations for 24 hours.
This annual exercise, called Vigilant Defense, ran until Friday (03/11/2023), featuring variants of the F-35 stealth fighter from the United States and South Korea, among other aircraft.
This exercise aimed to improveoperational capabilities between the militaries of the two countries by carrying out major air missions,such as air-to-surface live fire exercises, defensive counter-air operations, and other emergency training.
According to the South Korean military, it would maintain the best combat readiness to immediately respond and harshly punish any provocation by the enemy through intensive training by simulating actual situations.
The joint military drills between South Korea and the United States took place as North Korea increased military cooperation with Russia. This has been criticized by the United States and its Asian allies as an attempt by Pyongyang toenhanceits military capabilities in return for arms support to Moscow.
Previously, North Korean Foreign Minister,Choe Son Hui expressed Pyongyang's "strong desire" to expand ties with Russiaat the weekend. According to Minister Choe,relations between North Korea and Russia willbecome a "strong strategic" element if security in the regionisthreatened.
North Korea has long condemned joint drills between the United States and South Korea as a rehearsal for invasion and evidence of hostile policies by Washington and Seoul.
In 2023, North Korea carried out a number of weapons tests which made relations with South Korea and the United States (US) increasingly tense.
Additionally, North Korea's legislature has incorporated the country's nuclear weapons status into law. This means that Pyongyang's nuclear power development policy is madeasthe permanent basic law of the State. A policy that the United States,of course,opposes.
The United States and its traditional ally,South Korea have an annual joint military exercise agenda that has been going on for years. However, this time the exercise took place when tensions between the two sides were increasing, both due to issues on the Korean Peninsulaandtheir opposing positions on the conflict in Ukraine and Israel's invasion of the Gaza Strip.
Hopefully,both parties can restrain themselves so that armed conflict does not occur.
The latest regulation in China which tightens the use of internet for underage children, will be applied on January 1, 2024. This is expected to bring many benefits in the short term, and the habits of users can change over time. The regulation is Beijing's effort to tackle internet addiction among underage children, including tight regulation on video games.
According to the Chinese Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC), the number of internet users under 18 years old in 2021 was more than 191 million. The analysts predicted the new regulation's impact on local big tech companies will be limited to the short term, but can reduce the number of users along with time.
Internet limitation for children under 18 aims to open a conducive cyber space for physical and mental health while protecting their rights and interests. According to the government, this is the responsibility of smart device makers and cellular service providers in China, as well as the regional government, education institution, and parents.
Meanwhile, in Indonesia, the study conducted by the Child Growth Deputy at Women Empowerment and Child Protection Ministry in 2016 revealed that 70 percent of children were found to bring smartphones to school. From the number, some 61 percent among them were using gadgets for chatting and online games, 29% for browsing class-related info, and 10 percent for communication with parents or friends. Gadget addiction on children can cause some issues starting from physical to social. Alternative activities are needed so children can be distracted from gadget addiction for it is affecting childrens' mentality and emotion. To protect the children from gadget addiction, it needs parents' role, like limiting the time of use.
Hopefully, parents and stakeholders can protect the next generation from the bad influence of the internet.