 On Tuesday, Hezbollah leader Syed Hassan Nasrallah delivered his annual address on the occasion of the day of wounded and captured. Nasrallah's speech was of significance at a time when Hezbollah and Israel have been exchanging fire regularly while stopping short of an outright escalation. Over 250 Lebanese, mainly civilians have been killed in Israeli strikes and Hezbollah is retaliated by striking consistently at Israeli military targets. So what did Nasrallah say and what is the current situation on the Lebanon-Israel border? We go to Abdul to find out. Abdul Hassan and Syed Nasrallah's speeches are very looked forward to in both that region and across the world because the stand Hezbollah is likely to take a very dynamic situation, a very delicately poised situation at this point of time. So what is the occasion of his speech and what did he say regarding what is happening in West Asia? Well, Nasrallah was speaking on the occasion of one of the, you can say, annual celebrations or day of commemoration related to the fighters Hezbollah fighters wounded or in captivity somewhere. So in memory of them, this annual day is celebrated in or you can say commemorated, sorry, among Hezbollah fighters in Lebanon. He was basically on this particular occasion. He was apart from the fact that he remembered the you can scores of Hezbollah fighters who are wounded, who have been wounded since the in the Israeli attacks, which have been carried out inside Lebanon, particularly in southern Lebanon since October 7 and 8. And the numbers are quite high around hundreds of them. So in kind of that, and apart from that, of course, it is also a kind of occasion to basically kind of talk about the war, which is basically Hezbollah claims Israel has raised against the Lebanese people as in, you can say in connection with their war in Gaza against the Palestinian people. So that is the occasion on which basically Nasrallah was speaking. And if you see his speech is basically addressing the basic issues which basically have been speculated in the regional media and in the global media ever since the war in Palestine, the war in Gaza, Israeli war in Gaza started, whether Hezbollah will be a part of regional escalation, whether Hezbollah will be dragged into the war, whether the war will extend to the neighboring countries. And in the on the earlier, if you compare this speech with the speeches he had given in the past, which last month and previously, it seems that this is the most, you can say, radical assertion of Hezbollah's role in the entire situation, which is unfolding, which has been unfolding in the last 130 days in the region. Nasrallah said that Hezbollah's kind of participation in solidarity with the Palestinians is its moral duty and it has been doing so and it will continue to do so until the war in Gaza stops. And it is independent too, of course, related in a way, but independent too, Israeli attacks on southern Lebanon because that is also whether one likes it or not, that is also a part of the escalation which is happening at this moment between Hezbollah and Israel. Right, Abdul also in between this talk of some French proposal that has come up, what is the reason for France to come up with this kind of a proposal at this stage and what are the terms and conditions, so to speak? Well, we have discussed this before that the US and its allies in the West do not want Israel to be trapped into a regional war, though whether Israel wants the same thing or not, that is a separate question altogether. And therefore, they think that Hezbollah's passivity is important in the northern Lebanon and for that French delegates have been, delegates has been visiting, sorry, have been visiting Lebanon ever since the war began. And apparently they have proposed that Hezbollah will withdraw from southern Lebanon in return of a negotiation on finalizing the border between Israel and Lebanon. That would mean addressing the status of Cebaphon, status of different other villages on the border which are disputed and kind of fixing the border. But of course, that would mean a kind of 10 day ceasefire on the border and then carrying forward the negotiation. But the details of the proposal which were presented by the French have been disputed by Hezbollah, which basically has claimed that they are not withdrawing at this moment from the southern Lebanon. And that there is no talk of any ceasefire between Hezbollah and Israel until there is a ceasefire in Gaza. And in fact, it basically, Nasrallah quotes Israel's defense minister Yorov Galan's statement, which he made a few days back that even if there is a ceasefire in Gaza, the Israel will continue to attack Lebanon and therefore he said that if that happens, of course Hezbollah will escalate its attacks on northern Israel. And that would mean the displacement of millions of Israeli settlers, which are hundreds of thousands are already displaced because of the Hezbollah retaliation to the Israeli attack. And this, if Israel tries to escalate the situation, they will face the consequences. That's exactly what Nasrallah is saying. So he said that there is no, Nasrallah claimed that there is no point of negotiating with Israel at this moment until there is a ceasefire in Gaza. And there is some attempt made to address the root causes of the conflict in the region. And by the way that he mentioned that Israel has been the root cause for the regional conflicts, for the problems in the region. And there is a high, this is high time to address that problem. It would mean the addressing the Palestinian question and the Palestinian statehood. Thank you so much. A disastrous landslide in southern Philippines has brought attention to the mining industry in the country and the region. More than a week after the landslide, which occurred near a gold mine in Mako in the Dawaw Dioro province, rescue operations have given up hope of finding any survivors. The death toll continues to rise with dozens still feared buried under the debris. Environmental groups have called for an independent investigation into the disaster and even the shutting down of the mine. We talked to Anish for details. Anish, thanks so much for joining us. Before going into some of the demands of the environmentalist groups, could you maybe take us to what itself happened in the Philippines with the landslide? What exactly was it told, etc.? Yes, so of this month, there was a landslide that happened. An area that is usually the landing site for the workers to the gold mine in Dawaw Dioro region, where this landslide happened. Now, this area has been suffering through continuous rains for days before the landslide actually happened. But this is a largely mining town known for its gold mine. And when it actually did happen, if you see the death toll and also the number of people missing, most of them are workers to the mines. So it actually happened very close to the mines, even though it is not technically part of the mines itself. Now, it has been more than a week now. The government officials have just given up hope at this point. They do not expect survivors. Now, it has turned into from a rescue mission to a retrieval mission. And the death toll has reached about 71 from the last report that we are seeing as of today, February 14. Now, so it's a massive disaster in itself. While there has been no talks about how it happened, why it happened, the conditions around this landslide. There are definitely voices that are raising concerns about the fact that there was a mine so close to the place to the disaster site. And also obviously for the fact that a place like this, which sees frequent rains, is a place where a massive mine was constructed. So we'll get into the demands later, but definitely from the official standpoint, they are trying to avoid mentions of the mine itself. Even though initial reports did have that, you know, later reports and later communications from officials just did not want to consider that. And also Apex mining, which is the one who held the gold mine in question, continue to insist that this happened outside of its mining premises. But it will definitely continue to cooperate with the local authorities and whatever. So there is some level of attempt to take away the mines from, you know, culpability at this point in time. And that is something that comes to be more suspect from whatever we know so far. Anish, now coming to the key point, what are environmental groups demanding at this point of time considering this brutal death toll? Right now, in immediate measures need to be taken, including compensation for casualties, for the kin of those who died so far, including those who have suffered injuries, you know, the covering of medical costs. Now, there has been talks so far from officials that there will be compensation or at least, you know, support to the victims of the disaster. But there has been no official policy of how much they're going to, how much support they're going to offer to the victims itself. On top of that, you do trade union movements, environmentalists and, you know, grassroots movement, we have to remember it's not just the environmentalists because this is, we are talking about grassroots organisers as well and trade unions. They're demanding a very clear independent probe on the matter and investigation into, you know, the circumstances that actually cause the landslide, because the landslide doesn't really just happen because of rains. There are environmental factors to it and we have to ascertain whether or not these environmental factors could have been mitigated if, you know, the mining company or the mining site itself were more responsible with how they conducted their activities. On top of that, there are definitely some levels of calls to shut down or at least a rethink of mining activities across Philippines. Now, Philippines is a tropical country. It is one of those places which, you know, every year there is a hurricane or a cyclone that hits much of the region, but it is also one of the places which sees significant mining activities. And obviously this, the fact that this disaster happened so close around this time when there is all this talk about a constitutional amendment or a charter change on, especially on the economic losses which includes protections against foreign capital interventions on industries that includes mining. This is something that really like Philippines, it should push Philippines as a nation to rethink its policies, rethink not just constitutional change, but also rethink how it wants to conduct the entire mining sector as a whole. Because this is not the first time that workers, mining workers have been killed in disasters, natural or otherwise. There is something that is far wider that needs to be taken into account and that is precisely what movements and trade unions and environmentalist groups are calling for at the moment.