Category Archives: South and Central Asia

Indian court rejects Rahul Gandhi’s plea to suspend defamation conviction

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Judge calls conviction of opposition leader ‘just, proper and legal’ as lawyer vows to take case to supreme court

India’s most well-known opposition leader Rahul Gandhi is facing another setback after a high court judge refused to suspend his conviction for defamation, a case critics allege is politically motivated.

The judge in Gujarat high court called Gandhi’s conviction “just, proper and legal” and said “no injustice” would be done to the politician by refusing to grant his plea.

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At least 50 dead in Pakistan monsoon floods since end of June

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Most of the deaths were in Punjab province and mainly caused by electrocution and building collapses

At least 50 people, including eight children, have been killed by floods and landslides triggered by monsoon rains that have lashed Pakistan since last month, officials have said.

The summer monsoon between June and September brings 70-80% of south Asia’s annual rainfall every year. It is vital for the livelihoods of millions of farmers and food security in a region of about 2 billion people – but it also triggers landslides and floods.

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Ten jailed in India over torture and lynching of Muslim man

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Tabrez Ansari was tied to a pole in Jharkhand, tortured for 12 hours and made to chant Hindu slogans widely used by Hindu hardliners

An Indian court has sentenced 10 men to 10 years each in jail for the lynching of a Muslim man, who died after being tortured and forced to chant Hindu slogans.

Tabrez Ansari was tied to a pole and tortured for 12 hours in 2019, as he cried and pleaded with a mob that accused him of burglary in the eastern state of Jharkhand.

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Indian police bulldoze home of man accused of urinating on Indigenous youth

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Police said man charged with assault, which could see him fined and jailed for a year

Indian authorities on Wednesday demolished the home of a man accused of publicly urinating on a member of a tribal community after footage of the alleged assault sparked public condemnation.

A video shared widely on social media appeared to show Pravesh Shukla urinating on his young victim in a dark street in the central Sidhi district while smoking a cigarette. The attack took place last year but came to public attention only this week.

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SAS must be named in inquiry into alleged unlawful killings, says Afghan families’ lawyer

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MoD acknowledged at preliminary hearing that ‘UK special forces’ were present in Afghanistan

A partial admission by the defence secretary that UK special forces were present in Afghanistan risks discrediting a public inquiry investigating allegations of unlawful killings by the SAS, according to a lawyer representing victims’ families.

Richard Hermer KC said Ben Wallace had made only “a semi-concession” in a preliminary hearing on Wednesday, when the minister made a rare acknowledgment that “UK special forces” were present in Afghanistan.

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Taliban order closure of beauty salons in Afghanistan

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Morality ministry decrees another reduction of Afghan women’s access to public spaces

The Taliban administration in Afghanistan has ordered beauty salons to close within a month, the morality ministry said, in the latest shrinking of access to public places for Afghan women.

“The deadline for the closing of beauty parlours for women is one month,” Mohammad Sadiq Akif, a spokesperson for the Ministry for the Prevention of Vice and Propagation of Virtue, said on Tuesday, referring to a ministry notice.

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Russia is more united than ever, Putin tells allies after failed mutiny

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President also told leaders from China, Pakistan and India that Russia would stand up to western sanctions

Vladimir Putin has said that Russia remains “united as never before” in the wake of the failed mutiny by the Wagner mercenary group and claimed the country continued to flourish in the face of heavy western sanctions over his invasion of Ukraine.

In an address from the Kremlin to a virtual gathering of leaders from the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), a group founded by Russia and China to counter western influence, the Russian president attempted to rebuff any suggestion that he had been weakened by last week’s chaotic but short-lived rebellion led by Yevgeny Prigozhin.

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Greek shipwreck does little to dissuade Pakistanis leaving for Europe

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Officials in Punjab say they can’t to stop the exodus, as families tell of loved ones lost on the perilous route via Africa and the Mediterranean

In one of the busiest hubs for trafficking in Pakistan, would-be migrants are continuing to leave for Europe despite hundreds of people drowning after a trawler sank off the Greek coast last month, the Guardian has found.

In the past week, at least two more people from the district of Mandi Bahauddin, in eastern Pakistan, have left with the help of traffickers. The continued migration comes as families mourn loved ones believed to be on the Greek shipwreck, most of whose passengers were from Pakistan, and those missing after previous forlorn attempts to reach Europe.

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Eighty Afghan civilians may have been summarily killed by SAS, inquiry told

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Lawyers for bereaved families allege British soldiers carried out policy of terminating all fighting-age men

Eighty Afghans may have been victim of summary killings by three separate British SAS units operating in the country between 2010 and 2013, lawyers representing the bereaved families have told a public inquiry.

One of the elite soldiers is believed to have “personally killed” 35 Afghans on a single six-month tour of duty as part of an alleged policy to terminate “all fighting-age males” in homes raided, “regardless of the threat they posed”.

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Dozens dead in western India bus crash

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Bus was travelling on expressway to city of Pune when it hit a pole, overturned and caught fire

At least 25 people were killed and eight others injured after a bus caught fire on an expressway in western India, police said.

The bus was travelling to the city of Pune when it hit a pole and overturned in the early hours of Saturday, causing its diesel tank to catch fire, a senior police officer told the Agence France-Presse news agency.

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Opposition leader Rahul Gandhi begins two-day visit to unrest-hit Manipur

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Congress party accused Narendra Modi of ‘abject failure’ over two-month long crisis between majority Meitei and Kuki groups

Rahul Gandhi, the leader of India’s main opposition Congress party, has visited a north-eastern state beset by two months of violence as a shootout there claimed two more lives.

The shooting on the outskirts of Imphal, the state capital of Manipur, also left four wounded.

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UK foreign secretary calls for expansion of UN security council

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James Cleverly says global south deserves more powerful voice at top table and review needed into five permanent members’ veto

The global south deserves a more powerful voice at the world’s top table by expanding the UN security council, the UK foreign secretary, James Cleverly, has said.

Cleverly also called for a review of the use of the veto by the council’s five permanent members, adding that the world’s poorest countries feel their voice is not heard even on issues of direct concern to them.

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Bangladeshi labour leader beaten to death while trying to resolve dispute

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Shahidul Islam died in an assault on Sunday in Dhaka after meeting garment factory employees fighting for unpaid salaries

Police in Bangladesh are investigating the murder of a prominent trade union leader who was fatally beaten while trying to settle a dispute between a garment factory owner and workers over unpaid wages.

Shahidul Islam, 45, a top labour organiser for the Bangladesh Garment and Industrial Workers Federation (BGIWF), was attacked on Sunday evening in Gazipur, a major garment industry hub on the outskirts of Dhaka, after intervening on behalf of workers who had gathered to demand back pay.

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Keir Starmer promises to ease tensions between Labour and India

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Party leader seeks to win back British Indian voters after anger over party’s perceived support for Pakistan in Kashmir dispute

Keir Starmer has promised to reset relations between the Labour party and India after years of tension between the two.

The Labour leader said on Monday that his party had made mistakes in its approach to relations with the world’s most populous country, and that it would seek closer ties if elected to power next year.

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Obama remarks on India’s treatment of Muslims ‘hypocritical’ – minister

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Indian finance minister hits out after former US president said Modi government should protect rights of Muslims

India’s finance minister has derided comments by the former US president Barack Obama that Narendra Modi’s government should protect the rights of minority Muslims, accusing Obama of being hypocritical.

During the Indian prime minister’s state visit to the US last week, Obama told CNN that the issue of the “protection of the Muslim minority in a majority-Hindu India” would be worth raising in Modi’s meeting with the US president, Joe Biden.

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Disbelief and anger among Greek shipwreck victims’ relatives as millions spent on Titan rescue effort

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Disparity between rescue responses has sparked debate in Pakistan about double standards

Anees Majeed, who lost five relatives in the boat that sank off Greece on 14 June, watched in disbelief and growing anger as a frantic, multimillion-dollar rescue effort played out for five other men lost at sea last week.

Like thousands of others across Pakistan, Majeed, a law student from Pakistan-administered Kashmir, grieved at funeral prayers without a body to bury. At least 350 Pakistani citizens were on the overcrowded craft, the interior minister, Rana Sanaullah, confirmed on Friday.

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India secretly works to preserve reputation after ‘flawed democracy’ rating

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Exclusive: Democracy Index downgrades country amid backsliding under nationalist rule of Narendra Modi

The Indian government has been secretly working to keep its reputation as the “world’s largest democracy” alive after being called out by researchers for serious democratic backsliding under the nationalist rule of Narendra Modi, according to internal reports seen by the Guardian.

Despite publicly dismissing several global rankings that suggest the country is on a dangerous downward trajectory, officials from government ministries have been quietly assigned to monitor India’s performance, minutes from meetings show.

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Guest spends 603 nights at five-star Indian hotel ‘without paying’

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Ankush Dutta was meant to check out after one night but reportedly stayed for nearly two years

Indian police are investigating a suspected fraudster who spent nearly two years in a five-star hotel without paying, local media have said.

Ankush Dutta booked a room at Roseate House hotel in Delhi on 30 May 2019 and was supposed to check out the next day. But he extended his stay for 603 nights until 22 January 2021, leaving behind unpaid bills of $70,000 (£55,000).

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Indian minister invites opposition for talks over ‘dire’ Manipur situation

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Ethnic violence in north-eastern state has led to more than 100 deaths since breaking out in early May

India’s home affairs minister, Amit Shah, has called opposition parties for talks on Saturday to discuss an outbreak of ethnic violence in Manipur state in the north-east, in a sign that the government has acknowledged the situation has spun out of its control.

More than 100 people have died and 50,000 have been displaced since clashes broke out in early May between members of the Kuki ethnic group, who mostly live in the hills, and the Meitei people, the dominant community in the lowlands. Churches, temples, shops and businesses have been destroyed.

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‘India is now a linchpin’: US looks to Narendra Modi’s visit to counter China

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The Biden administration will try to strengthen US-India ties while the Indian leader looks to shore up votes for next year’s election

The symbolism of the visit will be hard to avoid. As Narendra Modi arrives in Washington DC on Wednesday – the capital of a country he was once prohibited from visiting for almost 10 years – he will join the ranks of Winston Churchill, Nelson Mandela and Volodymyr Zelenskiy as one of the few leaders to address a joint session of Congress more than once.

Statements from US officials ahead of the visit have been rapturous on the subject of US-India relations, praising the “significant defence partnership” and describing it as “a unique connection between the world’s oldest and largest democracies”. Before his departure from India, Modi said: “This special invitation is a reflection of the vigour and vitality of the partnership between our democracies.”

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