Category Archives: South and Central Asia

Fears grow for Afghanistan earthquake survivors left without shelter

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First shipments of international aid arrive in country as officials say death toll has risen to 1,150

There are growing fears for the health and wellbeing of survivors of Wednesday’s earthquake in Afghanistan, as the death toll rose to 1,150 and the first shipments of international aid arrived in the impoverished country.

“There are no blankets, tents, there’s no shelter. Our entire water distribution system is destroyed. There is literally nothing to eat,” Zaitullah Ghurziwal, 21, told an AFP team that reached his village in Paktika province.

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Afghan earthquake survivors dig by hand as rescuers struggle to reach area

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Disaster has killed more than 1,000 people and officials say toll could rise

Organised rescue efforts were struggling to reach the site of an earthquake in Afghanistan that killed more than 1,000 people, as survivors dig through the rubble by hand to find those still missing.

In Paktika province’s Gayan district, villagers stood atop mud bricks that were once a home. Others carefully walked through dirt alleyways, gripping on to damaged walls with exposed timber beams to make their way.

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Afghanistan earthquake: Taliban appeal for more aid as death toll set to mount

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The hardline Islamist leadership says help needs to be ‘scaled up’ after the quake devastated towns and villages in the country’s mountainous east

Afghanistan’s Taliban-led government has appealed for more international aid as it struggles to cope with the devastating earthquake in a mountainous eastern region that has left more than 1,000 people dead and many more injured.

With the war-ravaged country already stricken by an economic crisis, the hardline Islamist leadership said sanctions imposed by western countries after the withdrawal of US-led coalition forces last year meant it was handicapped in its ability to deal with Wednesday’s disaster in Khost and Paktika provinces.

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Aung San Suu Kyi moved to solitary confinement, says Myanmar junta

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Ousted leader, held at secret location for past year, charged with at least 20 offences and could spend rest of life in jail

Aung San Suu Kyi has been moved to solitary confinement inside a prison compound in Myanmar’s capital, Naypyidaw, according to the junta.

The former leader, who is 77, has been held by the military since 1 February last year, when it ousted her democratically elected government, plunging Myanmar into chaos.

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Sri Lanka’s prime minister says economy has ‘completely collapsed’

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Ranil Wickremesinghe’s comments come as island faces its worst crisis in recent memory, though PM didn’t cite any new developments

Sri Lanka’s debt-laden economy has “collapsed” after months of shortages of food, fuel and electricity, the prime minister told lawmakers in comments that underscored the country’s dire situation as it seeks help from international lenders.

Ranil Wickremesinghe told parliament the South Asian nation faces “a far more serious situation” than the shortages alone, and he warned of “a possible fall to rock bottom.”

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Isolated Afghanistan may face struggle for aid after earthquake

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Analysis: humanitarian appeals for Taliban-ruled country have had poor responses and there are sanctions complications

As Afghanistan reels from a powerful earthquake and starts to bury its more than 1,000 dead, the Taliban leadership in Kabul have appealed to the international community to clear any barriers created by sanctions and come to their aid.

“The government is working within its capabilities,” tweeted Anas Haqqani, a senior Taliban official. “We hope that the International Community & aid agencies will also help our people in this dire situation.”

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Afghan quake: at least 1,000 people killed after 5.9 magnitude tremor

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Toll expected to rise after deadliest quake in two decades strikes during night near Khost, 95 miles south of Kabul

A powerful earthquake in a remote area of Afghanistan’s Paktika province has killed at least 1,000 people and injured at least 1,500, with the toll expected to rise in the impoverished country.

According to Taliban officials, hundreds more were injured in what appears to have been the deadliest quake in two decades, striking during the night with heavy rain hampering rescue efforts.

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‘We want justice, not fuel’: Sri Lanka’s Tamils on north-south divide

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In the middle of a crippling economic crisis, demonstrating is a luxury the country’s Tamil minority cannot afford

For months now, the sounds of protest and anger have rung out across Colombo, Sri Lanka’s largest city. Every day, along the city’s seafront promenade of Galle Face, people have gathered in their tens of thousands to rage against the government for plunging the country into its worst financial crisis in modern history.

But 200 miles north, in the district of Mullaitivu, the streets are silent. The economic crisis has hit Sri Lanka’s Tamil minority, who are concentrated in the north and eastern provinces, as hard as those in the south; the fishermen here say they are already starving. But they will also tell you that protesting is a privilege in Sri Lanka – one they have never been afforded.

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‘Like a scene from Titanic’: floods in Assam submerge entire villages

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India’s monsoon season has been worse than usual, sweeping away possessions and leaving people huddling on raised ground

People living in Assam, in north-east India, are usually stoical about the flooding that occurs to a greater or lesser extent every monsoon season. But this year they say the situation is dramatically worse. “It was like a scene from Titanic,” one man told local media of the rising waters that have flooded all but two of the state’s districts.

In some places entire villages are under water, while across the state 114,000 hectares of crops have been submerged and 5,000 livestock have been washed away. For those that remain, fodder is running out.

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Indian police: grenade launcher seized from suspects in rapper’s murder

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Hip-hop star Sidhu Moose Wala was shot dead in his car in Punjab last month

Indian police say have arrested three men accused of murdering hip-hop star Sidhu Moose Wala and that they have seized a cache of weaponry including a grenade launcher from the suspects.

Moose Wala – also known by his birth name Shubhdeep Singh Sidhu – was shot dead in his car in the northern state of Punjab last month.

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Visa delays leave UK families with adopted babies stranded in Pakistan

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Home Office accused of leaving mothers and traumatised children stranded for months while priority is given to Ukraine refugees

British couples who travelled to Pakistan to adopt children have been left stranded after the Home Office told them to expect months of delays in processing visas because of the Ukraine refugee crisis.

The delays are part of wider failings in visa processing that have left families around the world stuck waiting to return to the UK.

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Father-in-law charged with murder after Australian woman Sajida Tasneem killed in Pakistan

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Tasneem was allegedly killed in front of her father after being taken to northern Pakistan from Perth with her three children

An Australian woman has allegedly been bludgeoned to death by her father-in-law with an axe in northern Pakistan after an argument about moving back to Australia with her children.

Sajida Tasneem was allegedly killed in front of her father at a home she shared with her in-laws in the city of Sargodha, 250km south of Pakistan’s capital, Islamabad, on 11 June.

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Largest freshwater fish ever recorded caught in Cambodia

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Giant stingray snagged by local fisher in Mekong River weighs nearly 300kg

The world’s largest recorded freshwater fish, a giant stingray, has been caught in the Mekong River in Cambodia, according to scientists.

The stingray, captured on 13 June, measured almost four metres from snout to tail and weighed just under 300kg, according to a statement on Monday by Wonders of the Mekong, a joint Cambodian-US research project.

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Taliban release five British nationals held for six months

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Foreign Office diplomats secured their freedom but sources say nothing was given in return except an apology

Five British nationals held by the Taliban since last December including the former BBC cameraman and Afghanistan expert Peter Jouvenal were released on Monday after backroom diplomacy by the British Foreign Office (FCDO).

It is understood that the five had been seized separately, and British sources said nothing was given in return for their release except an apology by them. However, the British government on Sunday had released a statement renouncing violence in Afghanistan and saying there was no alternative to pragmatic engagement with the current administration.

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UN urged to impose travel ban on Taliban leadership over oppression of women

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Campaigners say curtailing of women’s rights in Afghanistan means Trump-era waiver must be removed

Human rights groups are urging the UN to end a Trump-era waiver that allows Taliban members most responsible for the oppression of women in Afghanistan to travel abroad.

In a test for the international community’s willingness to isolate the Taliban, critics argue that those Taliban members curtailing women’s right to leave their homes within Afghanistan should at minimum be banned from leaving their country.

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Sri Lankan troops open fire to contain unrest over fuel shortages

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Seven wounded after motorists protest petrol shortage as government declares two-week school shutdown to conserve fuel

Sri Lanka’s military have opened fire to quell rioting at a fuel station, officials say, as unprecedented queues for petrol and diesel were seen across the bankrupt country.

Troops fired in Visuvamadu, 365km (228 miles) north of Colombo on Saturday night as their guard point was pelted with stones, army spokesperson Nilantha Premaratne said.

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Thousands ransack railway station as protests intensify over India’s military hiring plan

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Government announces concessions to scheme as police arrest at least 260 people and hundreds of train services cancelled due to unrest

Protesters in India’s eastern state of Bihar have damaged public property and ransacked offices in a railway station, expressing outrage at a new military recruitment plan and demanding the government reverse course.

The government of the prime minister, Narendra Modi, has introduced a scheme called Agnipath, or “path of fire”, designed to bring more people into the military on four-year contracts to lower the average age of India’s 1.38 million-strong armed forces.

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Pervez Musharraf’s wish to return to Pakistan reopens debate about his rule

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The exile who once led a military dictatorship is in hospital and a spokesperson has said his wish to come home should be granted

The possible return to Pakistan of its former president Pervez Musharraf for the first time since he left the country in 2016 has reopened a bitter debate about the military dictatorship he led for more than a decade.

Musharraf came to power in a coup in 1999 that toppled Nawaz Sharif’s government, and went on to hold the presidency from 2001 to 2008, when he resigned to avoid impeachment. Since then he has spent most of his time in self-imposed exile in the UK and the Middle East.

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Afghanistan: gunmen storm Sikh temple in Kabul

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At least two people killed and seven wounded, officials say after attack in capital claimed by Islamic State

Gunmen have stormed a Sikh temple in the Afghan capital, killing at least two people and wounding seven more, officials say.

The interior ministry said the attacker used at least one grenade during the attack on Saturday, setting off a blaze in the complex. Minutes later, a car bomb was detonated in the area but caused no casualties, it added.

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At least 59 dead and millions stranded as floods devastate India and Bangladesh

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Lightning kills 21 and millions of homes submerged while armed forces asked to help amid continuing storms

At least 59 people died as floods cut a swatch across north-eastern India and Bangladesh, leaving millions of homes underwater, authorities said on Saturday.

In India’s Assam state, 18 people died in the floods or landslides and 2 million others had seen their homes submerged in flood waters since Thursday, the state disaster management agency said.

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