Macron: Keep order intact
Sensational sights: Macron (centre) with Lam and their respective wives Brigitte Macron and Ngo Phuong Ly visiting the Temple of Literature in Hanoi. — AFP
France's Emmanuel Macron called in Vietnam for the preservation of a world order 'based on law', as he started a tour of South-East Asia, a region caught up in the confrontation between the United States and China.
During a press statement alongside his Vietnamese counterpart Luong Cuong in Hanoi, Macron said a rules-based order was necessary at 'a time of both great imbalance and a return to power-driven rhetoric and intimidation'.
The president presented France as a reliable alternative for Vietnam, caught between Washington, which is threatening to impose enormous levies on its exports to the United States, and Beijing, an important trade partner with which it is also embroiled in territorial disputes in the South China Sea.
After his arrival in Hanoi late Sunday, the first stop of a six-day trip that will take in Indonesia and Singapore, Macron emphasised a shared vision with Vietnam, a country of 100 million people experiencing stellar growth.
Yesterday, around a dozen agreements were signed between the two countries, including in the field of nuclear power, which Hanoi is keen to develop as it seeks to meet soaring energy demands.
Budget airline Vietjet also announced an order for 20 widebody Airbus A330-900 planes, doubling its purchases of the model from the aviation giant in a deal worth an estimated US$8bil (RM33.8bil).
'It is truly a new page being written between our two countries ... a desire to write an even more ambitious page of the relationship between Vietnam and France, between Asean and the European Union,' Macron said.
After paying tribute at a Hanoi war memorial to those who fought against French colonial occupation, Macron met his counterpart Cuong.
Macron later had lunch with Communist Party general secretary To Lam at the capital's star attraction, the Temple of Literature. Lam is considered the most powerful leader in Vietnam, a one-party state which tolerates no dissent and moves quickly to suppress any criticism.
Ahead of Macron's first official visit to the country, Human Rights Watch pressed him to voice concerns about 'the Vietnamese government's worsening rights record'.
Vietnam has more than 170 political prisoners who have been charged and convicted under 'draconian laws' that criminalise free expression and peaceful activism for human rights and democracy, HRW said.
A public appeal would be out of character for the French president, who regularly says he prefers to raise sensitive issues behind closed doors.
Macron hopes to sell Hanoi his offer of a 'third way' between Washington and Beijing.
Macron's 'Indo-Pacific strategy' – which proposes a third way to the countries of the region – has gained new relevance due to Trump's trade war, according to the aide.
He said the president was 'defending the idea of international trade rules, we don't want a jungle where the law of the strongest prevails'. — AFP
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Free Malaysia Today
18 minutes ago
- Free Malaysia Today
North Korea condemns US strike on Iran as violation of sovereign rights
North Korea has taken unprecedented steps in the past year to deepen military assistance to Russia. (EPA Images pic) SEOUL : North Korea said today it strongly condemns the US strikes against Iranian nuclear facilities as a grave violation of a sovereign state's security interests and territorial rights, the North's state media reported. The US and Israel are the culprits of the current tensions in the Middle East, born out of Jerusalem's 'ceaseless war moves and territorial expansion,' accepted and encouraged by the West,' North Korea's foreign ministry said. '(North Korea) strongly denounces the attack on Iran by the US, which … violently trampled down the territorial integrity and security interests of a sovereign state,' the unnamed spokesman said in a statement carried by KCNA news agency. 'The just international community should raise the voice of unanimous censure and rejection against the US and Israel's confrontational acts,' the statement said. Iran and nuclear-armed North Korea have maintained friendly ties and have been suspected for decades of military cooperation, including in developing ballistic missiles. A now-defunct panel of experts monitoring UN sanctions said in 2021 that the two countries had resumed cooperation on long-range missile development projects, including the transfer of critical parts. 'Pyongyang could provide important assistance in helping Iran reconstitute destroyed missile production facilities, including at new sites to avoid scrutiny, perhaps,' said Ankit Panda, of the US-based Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. 'Whether either country would be interested in substantively cooperating on any efforts to rebuild or accelerate Iran's nuclear weapons programme is less certain, given the political and military sensitivities over such technology,' he said. 'There are certain matters pertaining to weapons design that the North Koreans would not want to proliferate because once in Iran, they could be discovered by the US and potentially assist the US in undermining its deterrent,' Panda said. 'However, Pyongyang has substantive experience in weaponisation and could be able to assist in the non-fissile components of a nuclear bomb, such as the conventional explosives,' he added. North Korea has taken unprecedented steps in the past year to deepen military assistance to Russia, another partner of Iran, by sending thousands of troops as well as ballistic missiles and other weapons for use in fighting Ukraine, according to US, Ukrainian, and other intelligence sources.
The Star
24 minutes ago
- The Star
Would you hail a 'robotaxi'? Musk bets cabs will give Tesla a lift after boycotts and sales plunge
NEW YORK: Elon Musk promised in 2019 that driverless Tesla "robotaxis' would be on the road "next year,' but it didn't happen. A year later, he promised to deliver them the next year, but that didn't happen either. Despite the empty pledges the promises kept coming. Last year in January, Musk said, "Next year for sure, we'll have over a million robotaxis.' Would you settle for 10 or 12? Musk appears to be on the verge of making his robotaxi vision a reality with a test run of a small squad of self-driving cabs in Austin, Texas, that began Sunday. Reaching a million may take a year or more, however, although the billionaire should be able to expand the service this year if the Austin demo is a success. The stakes couldn't be higher, nor the challenges. While Musk was making those "next year' promises, rival Waymo was busy deploying driverless taxis in Los Angeles, San Diego, Austin and other cities by using a different technology that allowed it to get to market faster. It just completed its 10 millionth paid ride. Boycotts related to Musk's politics have tanked Tesla's sales. Rival electric vehicle makers with newly competitive models have stolen market share. And investors are on edge after a US$150bil (RM642bil) stock wipeout when Musk picked a social media fight with a US president overseeing federal car regulators who could make the robotaxi rollout much more difficult. The stock has recovered somewhat after Musk said he regretted some of his remarks. Tesla shareholders have stood by Musk over the years because he's defied the odds by building a successful standalone electric vehicle company – self-driving car promises aside –and making them a lot of money in the process. A decade ago, Tesla shares traded for around US$18. The shares closed Friday at US$322 (RM 1,378) . Musk seemed jubilant Sunday morning, posting on X, "The @Tesla_AI robotaxi launch begins in Austin this afternoon with customers paying a US$4.20 (RM18) flat fee!' The test is beginning modestly enough. Tesla is remotely monitoring the vehicles and putting a person in the passenger seat in case of trouble. The number of Teslas deployed will also be small – just 10 or 12 vehicles – and will only pick up passengers in a limited, geofenced area. Musk has vowed that the service will quickly spread to other cities, eventually reaching hundreds of thousands if not a million vehicles next year. Some Musk watchers on Wall Street are skeptical. "How quickly can he expand the fleet?' asks Garrett Nelson, an analyst at CFRA. "We're talking maybe a dozen vehicles initially. It's very small." Morningstar's Seth Goldstein says Musk is being classic Musk: Promising too much, too quickly. "When anyone in Austin can download the app and use a robotaxi, that will be a success, but I don't think that will happen until 2028," he says. "Testing is going to take a while.' Musk's tendency to push up the stock high with a bit of hyperbole is well known among investors. In 2018, he told Tesla stockholders he had "funding secured' to buy all their shares at a massive premium and take the company private. But he not only lacked a written commitment from financiers, according to federal stock regulators who fined him, he hadn't discussed the loan amount or other details with them. More recently, Musk told CNBC in May that Tesla was experiencing a "major rebound' in demand. A week later an auto trade group in Europe announced sales had plunged by half. Musk has come under fire for allegedly exaggerating the ability of the system used for its cars to drive themselves, starting with the name. Full Self-Driving is a misnomer. The system still requires drivers to keep their eyes on the road because they may need to intervene and take control at any moment. Federal highway safety regulators opened an investigation into FSD last year after several accidents, and the Department of Justice has conducted its own probe, though the status of that is not known. Tesla has also faced lawsuits over the feature, some resulting in settlements, other dismissed. In one case, a judge ruled against the plaintiffs but only because they hadn't proved Musk "knowingly' made false statements. Musk says the robotaxis will be running on an improved version of Full Self-Driving and the cabs will be safe. He also says the service will be able to expand rapidly around the country. His secret weapon: Millions of Tesla owners now on the roads. He says an over-the-air software update will soon allow them to turn their cars into driverless cabs and start a side business while stuck at the office for eight hours or on vacation for a week. "Instead of having your car sit in the parking lot, your car could be earning money,' Musk said earlier this year, calling it an Airbnb model for cars. "You will be able to add or subtract your car to the fleet.' Musk says Tesla also can move fast to deploy taxis now because of his decision to rely only on cameras for the cars to navigate, unlike Waymo, which has gone a more expensive route by supplementing its cameras with lasers and radar. "Tesla will have, I don't know,' Musk mused in an conference call with investors, '99% market share or something ridiculous.' Given Waymo's head start and potential competition from Amazon and others, dominating the driverless market to that extent could be a reach. But Dan Ives, a Wedbush Securities analyst and big Musk fan, says this time Musk may actually pull it off because of Tesla's ability to scale up quickly. And even skeptics like Morningstar's Goldstein acknowledge that Musk occasionally does gets things right, and spectacularly so. He upended the car industry by getting people to buy expensive electric vehicles, brought his Starlink satellite internet service to rural areas and, more recently, performed a gee-whiz trick of landing an unmanned SpaceX rocket on a platform back on earth. "Maybe his timelines aren't realistic," Goldstein says, "but he can develop futuristic technology products.' – AP
The Sun
an hour ago
- The Sun
Ukraine says ‘massive' Russian drone attack on Kyiv
KYIV: Ukraine said Monday 'another massive attack' on Kyiv by Russian drones was underway, a day after the country's top military commander vowed to increase the 'scale and depth' of strikes on Russia. Diplomatic efforts to end the three-year war have stalled, with the last direct meeting between the two sides almost three weeks ago and no follow-up talks scheduled. 'Another massive attack on the capital. Possibly, several waves of enemy drones,' said a statement from Tymur Tkachenko, head of Kyiv's military administration. Two people were hospitalised in the Solomianski district, said Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko, and two others were injured near a metro station in the Sviatochinski district, Tkachenko later said. AFP journalists in Kyiv heard the buzzing of a drone flying over the city centre and explosions, as well as gunfire. They saw around 10 people sheltering in the basement of a residential building in central Kyiv waiting for the attack to end, most of them scrolling their phones for news. The latest strikes came after Ukrainian commander-in-chief Oleksandr Syrsky vowed to intensify strikes on Russia. 'We will not just sit in defence. Because this brings nothing and eventually leads to the fact that we still retreat, lose people and territories,' he told reporters, including AFP. Syrsky said Ukraine would continue its strikes on Russian military targets, which he said had proved 'effective'. 'Of course, we will continue. We will increase the scale and depth,' he said. Fair response Ukraine has launched retaliatory strikes on Russia throughout the war, targeting energy and military infrastructure sometimes hundreds of kilometres from the front line. Kyiv says the strikes are a fair response to deadly Russian attacks on Ukrainian infrastructure and civilians. At least four people were killed in an overnight Russian strike on an apartment building in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kramatorsk, while a strike on a Ukrainian army training ground later in the day killed three others, officials said. In wide-ranging remarks, Syrsky conceded that Russia had some advantages in drone warfare, particularly in making fibre-optic drones that are tethered and difficult to jam. 'Here, unfortunately, they have an advantage in both the number and range of their use,' he said. He also claimed that Ukraine still held 90 square kilometres (35 square miles) of territory in Russia's Kursk region, where Kyiv launched an audacious cross-border incursion last August. 'These are our pre-emptive actions in response to a possible enemy offensive,' he said. Russia said in April that it had gained full control of the Kursk region and denies that Kyiv has a presence there. Russia occupies around a fifth of Ukraine and claims to have annexed four Ukrainian regions as its own since launching its invasion in 2022 -- in addition to Crimea, which it captured in 2014. Kyiv has accused Moscow of deliberately sabotaging a peace deal to prolong its full-scale offensive on the country and to seize more territory. The Russian army said Sunday that it had captured the village of Petrivske in Ukraine's northeast Kharkiv region. Russian forces also sent at least 47 drones and fired three missiles towards Ukraine between late Saturday and early Sunday, the Ukrainian air force said.
