MYANMAR
Group seizes border gate
An ethnic minority armed group has seized control from the country’s ruling junta of a lucrative border crossing to China, local media and a security source said yesterday. Clashes have raged across Myanmar’s northern Shan state, close to the Chinese border, after an armed alliance of three ethnic minority groups launched an offensive against the military last month. An offensive by the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA) — one of the three allied groups — captured the Kyin San Kyawt border gate, a local media outlet affiliated with the group said. “MNDAA also reported they seized one more border trade gate, which is called Kyin San Kyawt, in Mongko area, Muse district this morning,” Kokang News reported yesterday. It added that the alliance — including the Arakan Army and Ta’ang National Liberation Army — had taken other positions in the border trade zone after the assault began on Friday.
INDIA
Four die in stampede
At least four people were killed and dozens injured on Saturday evening in a stampede at a university in southern India, local officials and media reported. The stampede occurred at an outdoor auditorium in the Cochin University of Science and Technology (CUSAT) in southwest Kerala state, where a concert had been planned. Kerala Governor Arif Mohammed Khan wrote on X that he was “deeply shocked and grieved to know about the sad demise of four students” at CUSAT. Four more people were in a critical condition and 60 people had been injured, the Press Trust of India (PTI) reported. A local police official told PTI that a crowd outside the auditorium had rushed for cover during a sudden downpour when a number of people slipped on some stairs and were trampled.
RUSSIA
Ex-PM Kasyanov blacklisted
The Minsitry of Justice on Friday classified former prime minister Mikhail Kasyanov, who left the country to denounce the offensive in Ukraine, as a “foreign agent.” The name of Kasyanov, who was the first head of President Vladimir Putin’s government in the early 2000s, now appears in the justice ministry’s register of “foreign agents,” a term reminiscent of the Soviet-era “enemy of the people.” The ministry accused Kasyanov of having “opposed the special military operation in Ukraine” and of being “a member of the Russian Anti-War Committee, an association whose activities are aimed at discrediting Russian foreign and domestic policy.”
MEXICO
Three journalists freed
Three journalists recently kidnapped in Mexico’s southern state of Guerrero have been freed unharmed after search operations by security authorities, the office of the state’s attorney general said on Saturday. The three journalists released on Saturday were among five people whose disappearance in the tourist town of Taxco the state attorney general’s office had this week said it was investigating. Silvia Arce and Alberto Sanchez, who lead the digital platform RedSiete, were freed early on Saturday, free-speech group, Article 19 said, after having been taken on Wednesday by armed men who entered the outlet’s central Taxco offices. Another journalist freed on Saturday was Marco Toledo, director of the weekly El Espectador de Taxco, authorities said. Toledo’s wife and son had also been kidnapped by five armed men who entered their home last Sunday, Article 19 said. Although Toledo’s wife has been freed, authorities are still searching for his son.
The Philippines yesterday said its coast guard would acquire 40 fast patrol craft from France, with plans to deploy some of them in disputed areas of the South China Sea. The deal is the “largest so far single purchase” in Manila’s ongoing effort to modernize its coast guard, with deliveries set to start in four years, Philippine Coast Guard Commandant Admiral Ronnie Gil Gavan told a news conference. He declined to provide specifications for the vessels, which Manila said would cost 25.8 billion pesos (US$440 million), to be funded by development aid from the French government. He said some of the vessels would
Hundreds of thousands of Guyana citizens living at home and abroad would receive a payout of about US$478 each after the country announced it was distributing its “mind-boggling” oil wealth. The grant of 100,000 Guyanese dollars would be available to any citizen of the South American country aged 18 and older with a valid passport or identification card. Guyanese citizens who normally live abroad would be eligible, but must be in Guyana to collect the payment. The payout was originally planned as a 200,000 Guyanese dollar grant for each household in the country, but was reframed after concerns that some citizens, including
Airlines in Australia, Hong Kong, India, Malaysia and Singapore yesterday canceled flights to and from the Indonesian island of Bali, after a nearby volcano catapulted an ash tower into the sky. Australia’s Jetstar, Qantas and Virgin Australia all grounded flights after Mount Lewotobi Laki-Laki on Flores island spewed a 9km tower a day earlier. Malaysia Airlines, AirAsia, India’s IndiGo and Singapore’s Scoot also listed flights as canceled. “Volcanic ash poses a significant threat to safe operations of the aircraft in the vicinity of volcanic clouds,” AirAsia said as it announced several cancelations. Multiple eruptions from the 1,703m twin-peaked volcano in
A plane bringing Israeli soccer supporters home from Amsterdam landed at Israel’s Ben Gurion airport on Friday after a night of violence that Israeli and Dutch officials condemned as “anti-Semitic.” Dutch police said 62 arrests were made in connection with the violence, which erupted after a UEFA Europa League soccer tie between Amsterdam club Ajax and Maccabi Tel Aviv. Israeli flag carrier El Al said it was sending six planes to the Netherlands to bring the fans home, after the first flight carrying evacuees landed on Friday afternoon, the Israeli Airports Authority said. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also ordered
RSS