INDIA
Tank sinks, killing five
Five soldiers were killed when a military tank they were traveling in sank while crossing a river in Ladakh, which borders China, officials said yesterday. The tank sank early yesterday due to sudden increase in the water levels of Shyok River during a military training activity, an Indian army command center statement said. The accident took place in Saser Brangsa near the Line of Actual Control that divides India and China in the Ladakh region, it said. Minister of Defence Rajnath Singh called it an “unfortunate accident.”
IRAQ
Five bombs found in al-Nuri
The UN has said it discovered five bombs in a wall of Mosul’s iconic Great Mosque of al-Nuri, planted years ago by the Islamic State group, during restoration work. Five “large-scale explosive devices, designed to trigger a massive destruction of the site,” were found in the southern wall of the prayer hall on Tuesday by the UNESCO team working at the site, a representative for the agency said late on Friday. “The Iraqi armed forces immediately secured the area and the situation is now fully under control,” UNESCO said. One bomb was removed, but four others “remain connected to each other” and are expected to be cleared in the coming days, it said.
UNITED STATES
Crew ‘not stranded’: NASA
The first astronauts to fly Boeing’s troubled Starliner are not “stranded” at the International Space Station, NASA said on Friday despite having no clear timeframe for bringing them home. In an unusually defensive press call, officials attempted to put a positive spin on where things currently stood after weeks of negative headlines due to the spaceship’s delayed return. Astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams blasted off on June 5 following years of delays and safety scares affecting Starliner. They docked the following day for what was meant to be a week-long stay, but their return has been pushed back multiple times because of thruster malfunctions and helium leaks that came to light during the journey. “Butch and Suni are not stranded in space,” NASA commercial crew program manager Steve Stich said. The pair were “enjoying their time on the space station” and “our plan is to continue to return them on Starliner and return them home at the right time,” he added. Before that can happen, ground teams need to run more testing to better understand the root causes.
UNITED STATES
Comedic actor Mull has died
Martin Mull, whose droll, esoteric comedy and acting made him a hip sensation in the 1970s and later a beloved guest star on sitcoms including Roseanne and Arrested Development, has died, his daughter said on Friday. Mull’s daughter, TV writer and comic artist Maggie Mull, said her father died at home on Thursday after “a valiant fight against a long illness.” Known for his blonde hair and well-trimmed mustache, Mull often played slightly sleazy, somewhat slimy and often smarmy characters as he did as Teri Garr’s boss and Michael Keaton’s foe in 1983’s Mr. Mom. He played Colonel Mustard in the 1985 movie adaptation of the board game Clue, which, like many things he appeared in, has become a cult classic. “He was never not funny. My dad will be deeply missed by his wife and daughter, by his friends and coworkers, by fellow artists and comedians and musicians, and — the sign of a truly exceptional person — by many, many dogs,” Maggie Mull wrote on Instagram.
A fire caused by a burst gas pipe yesterday spread to several homes and sent a fireball soaring into the sky outside Malaysia’s largest city, injuring more than 100 people. The towering inferno near a gas station in Putra Heights outside Kuala Lumpur was visible for kilometers and lasted for several hours. It happened during a public holiday as Muslims, who are the majority in Malaysia, celebrate the second day of Eid al-Fitr. National oil company Petronas said the fire started at one of its gas pipelines at 8:10am and the affected pipeline was later isolated. Disaster management officials said shutting the
US Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday accused Denmark of not having done enough to protect Greenland, when he visited the strategically placed and resource-rich Danish territory coveted by US President Donald Trump. Vance made his comment during a trip to the Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told a news conference. “You have under-invested in the people of Greenland, and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this
Japan unveiled a plan on Thursday to evacuate around 120,000 residents and tourists from its southern islets near Taiwan within six days in the event of an “emergency”. The plan was put together as “the security situation surrounding our nation grows severe” and with an “emergency” in mind, the government’s crisis management office said. Exactly what that emergency might be was left unspecified in the plan but it envisages the evacuation of around 120,000 people in five Japanese islets close to Taiwan. China claims Taiwan as part of its territory and has stepped up military pressure in recent years, including
UNREST: The authorities in Turkey arrested 13 Turkish journalists in five days, deported a BBC correspondent and on Thursday arrested a reporter from Sweden Waving flags and chanting slogans, many hundreds of thousands of anti-government demonstrators on Saturday rallied in Istanbul, Turkey, in defence of democracy after the arrest of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu which sparked Turkey’s worst street unrest in more than a decade. Under a cloudless blue sky, vast crowds gathered in Maltepe on the Asian side of Turkey’s biggest city on the eve of the Eid al-Fitr celebration which started yesterday, marking the end of Ramadan. Ozgur Ozel, chairman of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), which organized the rally, said there were 2.2 million people in the crowd, but
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