Breaking News, Latest Philippines Headlines, World, Entertainment, Politics, Weather & Video News
BANGKOK, Thailand (AFP) – Hundreds of people are missing and an unknown number believed dead after a partly-constructed hydropower dam in southeast Laos collapsed, sending flash floods surging through six villages, state media reported Tuesday. Communist Laos is traversed by a vast network of rivers and there are several dams being built or are planned in the impoverished and landlocked country, which exports most of its hydropower energy to neighbouring countries like Thailand. Laos […]
by Kyoko Hasegawa Agence France Presse TOKYO, Japan (AFP) — An “unprecedented” heatwave in Japan has killed at least 65 people in one week, government officials said Tuesday, with the weather agency now classifying the record-breaking weather as a “natural disaster.” In the week to Sunday at least 65 people died of heat stroke while 22,647 people were hospitalized, the Fire and Disaster Management Agency said in a statement. Both figures are “the worst-ever […]
WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) – North Korea appears to have started dismantling key facilities at a rocket-engine test center, a group of experts said Monday, potentially marking a significant step after last month’s summit between Kim Jong Un and US President Donald Trump. According to the respected 38 North group, commercial satellite imagery of the Sohae satellite launching station indicates Pyongyang has begun taking down a processing building and a rocket-engine test stand that had […]
KABUL, Afghanistan (AFP) — AFP driver Mohammad Akhtar, a 31-year-old father of four who was among 23 people killed in a suicide attack in Kabul, was a “great friend” known for his kindness and honesty, colleagues said Monday. Sunday’s attack, which was claimed by the Islamic State group, happened as supporters of Afghan Vice President Abdul Rashid Dostum were leaving the capital’s international airport after welcoming home the former warlord from exile. Akhtar’s death […]
TOKYO, Japan (AFP) – Japanese officials issued new warnings Monday as a deadly heatwave blankets the country, producing record high temperatures in Tokyo just two years before the city hosts the 2020 Summer Olympics. Officials said last week that the heatwave had killed at least 15 people and forced the hospitalisation of over 12,000 others in the first two weeks of July. But the death toll may be more than double that, with Kyodo News […]
SEOUL, South Korea (AFP) – A prominent South Korean lawmaker who was being probed over a bribery scandal has committed suicide, police said Monday. Roh Hoe-chan, a three-term lawmaker of the left-leaning Justice Party had been under investigation for allegedly receiving 50 million won ($44,300) from a powerful political blogger linked to many top politicians. The blogger, widely known by his online nickname “Druking”, is currently on trial for using illegal hacking programmes to sway […]
PARIS, France (AFP) — France and Russia will jointly deliver humanitarian aid to the former Syrian rebel enclave of Eastern Ghouta, the French Presidency said in a statement with Russia on Friday. A Russian cargo plane arrived late Friday in Chateauroux in central France to load 50 tons of medical equipment and essential goods provided by France, said an AFP videographer at the scene, to be transported to the former rebel area which was […]
SINGAPORE, Singapore (AFP) — Hackers have stolen health records belonging to 1.5 million Singaporeans, including Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong who was specifically targeted in the city state’s biggest ever data breach, authorities said Friday. Singapore’s health and information ministries said a government database was broken into in a “deliberate, targeted and well-planned” strike, describing the attack as “unprecedented”. “Attackers specifically and repeatedly targeted the personal particulars and outpatient information of Prime Minister Lee […]
SEOUL, South Korea (AFP) — Disgraced South Korean president Park Geun-hye was convicted of charges including illegally receiving funds from the country’s spy agency on Friday and given eight more years in prison, on top of her current term. Park, the South’s first female president, was impeached last year after huge street protests over a sprawling scandal, and was jailed for 24 years for corruption and abuse of power in April. Friday’s penalty – […]
by Jonathan Klein Agence France Presse CHIANG RAI, Thailand (AFP) — It was meant to be a fun excursion after football practice, but it turned into a life-threatening, two-week ordeal for a group of youngsters trapped in a cave with rising waters and no apparent escape route. When coach Ekkapol Chantawong led twelve members of his “Wild Boar” youth football team into the mouth of northern Thailand’s Tham Luang cave complex on 23 June, […]
SEOUL, South Korea (AFP) – The South Korean government is liable for the botched rescue of more than 300 people, mostly schoolchildren, who drowned when their overloaded ferry sank, a court ruled Thursday, ordering the state to compensate relatives. In a landmark ruling, the Seoul Central District Court awarded the next of kin of each deceased passenger from the Sewol ferry 200 million won ($177,000), a further 40 million won for each of their parents, […]
NEW DELHI, India (AFP) – The death toll from a collapsed apartment block outside Delhi rose to nine on Thursday as emergency workers pulled four more bodies from a huge pile of rubble and metal, India’s fire brigade said. The six-storey building caved in late Tuesday and crashed into a neighboring building, trapping more than a dozen people, including laborers and two families in Greater Noida, a satellite city east of Indian capital. Five bodies […]
