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TOKYO, Japan (AFP) — Japan will accept Ukrainian refugees fleeing Russia’s ongoing invasion, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said Wednesday, in a break with the country’s usual reticence to accept humanitarian arrivals. Japan typically accepts just a few dozen refugees a year out of thousands of applicants, and its borders are currently closed to virtually all foreign visitors to prevent Covid-19 infections. But Kishida said the country would now “proceed with a plan to welcome people […]
TOKYO, Japan (AFP) — Tokyo lodged a diplomatic protest with Moscow after scrambling fighter jets on Wednesday as a suspected Russian helicopter entered Japan’s northern airspace at a time of heightened tensions over Ukraine. Japan, which has volatile ties and border disputes with key neighbours China, Russia and South Korea, routinely sends jets to defend its territorial airspace. The country scrambled military jets 49 times in January, 142 times in December and 127 times in […]
COLOMBO, Sri Lanka (AFP) – Sri Lanka’s public transport was crippled Wednesday as buses ran out of diesel, officials said as the country’s foreign exchange crisis worsened with no dollars to import fuel. The Private Bus Owners’ Association said they were able to operate only about a quarter of their fleet of 20,000 vehicles, while drivers reported queuing for seven hours to top up fuel. “I could not run the bus for two days because […]
ANKARA, Turkey (AFP) — Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan called on the European Union on Tuesday to treat his country like it does Ukraine, without waiting for it to be “hit by a war”. “Show Turkey the same sensitivity that we are witnessing towards Ukraine,” Erdogan said at a press conference in Ankara. Turkey has been a candidate for EU membership since 1987 but talks have floundered in recent years, with Brussels increasingly critical of […]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XnhYwzYxkOQ
YANGON, Myanmar (AFP) — At least 17 people are feared dead after a landslide trapped dozens of workers inside a Myanmar jade mine, sources and local media said Tuesday. The incident came on Monday evening near Hpakant township in northern Kachin state — the same region where a massive landslide in 2020 entombed 300 workers in the country’s worst ever mine disaster. Pictures of the scene showed the aftermath of the landslide, with a broad […]
LOD, Israel (AFP) — A repatriation flight from Romania carrying Israelis evacuated from Ukraine landed at Ben Gurion airport outside Tel Aviv on Tuesday to the teary relief of waiting relatives. Badr Tawil, 23, a student who fled Ukraine’s under-fire second city Kharkiv, said he had escaped chaos. “We just woke up once and we heard the sounds around us. Bombs everywhere. So we decided to leave, just to leave Ukraine,” he said. Israeli Foreign […]
DAMASCUS, Syria (AFP) — A fire ripped through a shopping center in the Syrian capital Damascus early Tuesday, killing at least five people, state media reported. Firefighters have “extinguished a blaze that broke out at dawn today in the La Mirada Mall building,” the official SANA news agency said, citing a Damascus fire department official. “Four people have been rescued and five corpses have been recovered so far,” SANA added. The cause of the fire […]
BEIJING, China (AFP) — China has started evacuating its citizens from Ukraine, state media reported Tuesday, amid fears for their safety due to the invasion by Beijing’s ally Russia but also reports of resulting hostility from angry Ukrainians. Some 600 Chinese students were evacuated Monday from Kyiv and the southern port city of Odessa, the state-run Global Times newspaper reported, citing the Chinese embassy in the Ukrainian capital. They travelled by bus to neighbouring Moldova […]
by Aishwarya KUMAR Agence France-Presse NEW DELHI, India (AFP) – Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has left India’s traditional balancing act between Moscow and the West looking wobblier than ever, with experts saying New Delhi has few good diplomatic options. Last week India abstained on a UN Security Council resolution deploring Russia’s “aggression” against Ukraine, winning praise from Moscow for its “independent and balanced position”. But while New Delhi hoped this would be seen as neutrality, […]
by Nioucha ZAKAVATI Agence France Presse HONG KONG, China (AFP) — Janice Obiang stifled sobs as she packed goods to send to the Philippines, gifts for loved ones she hasn’t seen in years as life for domestic workers in virus-hit Hong Kong goes from bad to worse. Few have suffered more during Hong Kong’s pandemic restrictions than the hundreds of thousands of women from the Philippines and Indonesia who work as domestic helpers. And […]
HONG KONG, China (AFP) — Hong Kongers stripped supermarket shelves bare Tuesday as panic buying set in following mixed messaging from the government over whether it plans a lockdown this month. Uncertainty over Covid rules has sent the city’s residents flocking to supermarkets, chemists and vegetable stores to stock up, leaving shelves empty across the city. Photos circulating on social media showed people had trouble finding a variety of items including meat, vegetables, frozen foods, […]
