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Russia-Ukraine Conflict
Russia-Ukraine Conflict

Ukraine drones target Russian alcohol plants, Russian officials says

Ukraine drones target Russian alcohol plants, Russian officials says
Ukrainian servicemen conduct a training flight with a first-person view drone at an undisclosed location on Aug. 23, 2024. (AFP)
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Updated 51 min 51 sec ago
Reuters
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Ukraine drones target Russian alcohol plants, Russian officials says

Ukraine drones target Russian alcohol plants, Russian officials says
  • A blast shook the Biokhim biochemical plant in Russia’s Tambov region, sparking a short-lived fire
  • Biokhim is one of Russia’s oldest manufacturers of ‘products of strategic importance for the state’
Updated 51 min 51 sec ago
Reuters
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Ukraine overnight drone attacks caused an explosion and a fire at an ethanol manufacturing plant and damaged two other alcohol producing enterprises in Russia, Russian officials said on Tuesday.
A blast shook the Biokhim biochemical plant in Russia’s Tambov region, sparking a short-lived fire, Tambov governor Maxim Yegorov said on the Telegram messaging app.
“According to preliminary information, there are no casualties, Yegorov said.
Russia’s defense ministry said that its air defense units destroyed a total of 18 Ukrainian drones, but it did not mention Tambov in its tally.
Biokhim in the Tambov region, some 450km southeast of Moscow, is one of Russia’s oldest manufacturers of “products of strategic importance for the state,” chiefly ethanol, according to the company’s website.
The governor of the Tula region, which borders Moscow to its north, said on Tuesday that a Ukraine drone attack damaged two distilleries, in the town of Yefremov and the village of Luzhkovskyi.
There were no injuries, Tula governor Dmitry Miliayev said Telegram, adding the situation was “under control.” It was not immediately clear how big the attacks were and Miliayev did not give any further details.
Another Ukraine drone attack damaged a boiler house and a non-residential building in Russia’s western region of Bryansk, which borders Ukraine, its governor said.
There were no injuries as a result of the attack, Bryansk governor Alexander Bogomaz said Telegram.
Reuters could not independently verify the reports. There was no immediate comment from Ukraine. Kyiv has often said that its air attacks inside Russia target infrastructure key to Russia’s war efforts and are a response to Moscow’s relentless bombing of Ukrainian territory.

Topics: Russia-Ukraine Conflict Russia Ukraine

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Taiwan again rejects South African demand to move its representative office from Pretoria

Taiwan again rejects South African demand to move its representative office from Pretoria
Updated 5 min 6 sec ago
AP
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Taiwan again rejects South African demand to move its representative office from Pretoria

Taiwan again rejects South African demand to move its representative office from Pretoria
  • Demand to move or shut the office entirely violates a 1997 agreement between the sides
  • South Africa maintains a liaison office in Taiwan’s capital, Taipei, and the sides have a strong commercial relationship
Updated 5 min 6 sec ago
AP

TAIPEI: Taiwan has again rejected South Africa’s demand that it move its representative office in the country from the capital, Pretoria, to the commercial center of Johannesburg.
Taiwan Foreign Ministry spokesperson Jeff Liu said at a news conference on Tuesday that the demand to move or shut the office entirely violated a 1997 agreement between the sides on the location of their mutual representative offices following the severing of formal diplomatic relations.
“Facing this kind of unreasonable demand, our side cannot grant our acceptance,” Liu said.
South Africa maintains a liaison office in Taiwan’s capital, Taipei, and the sides have a strong commercial relationship. Liu repeated Foreign Minister Lin Chia-lung’s avowal at the legislature on Monday that Taiwan “was prepared for all eventualities” over the issue. The office is Taiwanese property and Taipei retains the right to determine its location and status, Lin and Liu said.
China, which claims Taiwan as its own territory that must be annexed by force if necessary, relentlessly seeks to minimize Taiwan’s international representation, although the self-governing island republic maintains robust unofficial relations with the US and other major nations.
South Africa confirmed last week that it had asked Taiwan to move its liaison office, in a demand seen purely as a concession to China, which has used its influence to keep Taiwan out of the United Nations and affiliated branches such as the World Health Organization, and limit its formal diplomatic partners to just 11 countries and the Vatican.
In addition to diplomatic and economic pressure, China has stepped up its military threats against Taiwan, most recently holding large-scale live-fire drills just off the Chinese coastal province of Fujian, which faces Taiwan.
South Africa’s demand that Taiwan move its office has also drawn attention in the US Congress, with Tennessee Republican Sen. Marsha Blackburn posting on the social platform X that “the United States should not tolerate this behavior from South Africa.”
“I am calling on ... the Biden administration to make it clear that there will be consequences if South Africa works with the (Chinese Communist Party) to bully Taiwan,” including removing South Africa from a key trade program, Blackburn said.
“The United States must not provide trade benefits to countries that prioritize China’s influence over democratic partnerships,” she added.

Topics: Taiwan South Africa

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Indian troops kill five Maoist rebels

Indian troops kill five Maoist rebels
Updated 33 min 36 sec ago
AFP
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Indian troops kill five Maoist rebels

Indian troops kill five Maoist rebels
  • More than 10,000 people have died in the decades-long insurgency waged by the Naxalite movement
  • The Naxalites inspired by the Chinese revolutionary leader Mao Zedong
Updated 33 min 36 sec ago
AFP

NEW DELHI: Indian commandos shot dead five Maoist rebels in the dense jungles of central India, police said Tuesday, as security forces intensify a government bid to crush the long-running armed conflict.
More than 10,000 people have died in the decades-long insurgency waged by the Naxalite movement, who say they are fighting for the rights of marginalized indigenous people of India’s remote and resource-rich central regions.
The insurgency has drastically shrunk in recent years and a crackdown by security forces has killed nearly 200 rebels this year, according to government data.
The clash took place Monday in Maharashtra, which holds state elections next month.
“Five Naxalites were killed after they opened fire on security forces,” police superintendent Neelotpal was quoted as saying by local media.
The Times of India newspaper reported that three of those killed were women, and that a commando wounded in the firefight had to be pulled out by helicopter while under fire.
In September, Indian interior minister Amit Shah warned the Maoist rebels to surrender or face an “all-out” assault, saying the government anticipated eradicating the Naxalite movement by early 2026.
The Naxalites, named for the district where their armed campaign began in 1967, were inspired by the Chinese revolutionary leader Mao Zedong.
They demanded land, jobs and a share of the region’s immense natural resources for local residents, and made inroads in a number of remote communities across India’s east and south.
The movement gained in strength and numbers until the early 2000s when New Delhi deployed tens of thousands of security personnel against the rebels in a stretch of territory known as the “Red Corridor.”
Authorities have pumped in millions of dollars for investments in local infrastructure projects and social spending.

Topics: insurgency India

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North Korea UN representative denies Pyongyang sent troops to Russia

North Korea UN representative denies Pyongyang sent troops to Russia
Updated 58 min 31 sec ago
AFP
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North Korea UN representative denies Pyongyang sent troops to Russia

North Korea UN representative denies Pyongyang sent troops to Russia
Updated 58 min 31 sec ago
AFP

UNITED NATIONS, United States: North Korea has not sent troops to Russia to help Moscow fight Ukraine, one of its United Nations representatives said Monday, dismissing Seoul’s claims as “groundless rumor.”

Seoul’s spy agency said Friday that Pyongyang sent a “large-scale” troop deployment to help its ally, claiming that 1,500 special forces were already training in Russia’s Far East and ready to head soon for the frontlines of the Ukraine war.

“As for the so-called military cooperation with Russia, my delegation does not feel any need for comment on such groundless stereotyped rumors,” a North Korean representative said at a committee meeting during the UN General Assembly.

Seoul’s claims were “aimed at smearing the image of the DPRK and undermining the legitimate, friendly and cooperative relations between two sovereign states,” the representative told the meeting, held late Monday in New York.

Pyongyang and Moscow have been allies since North Korea’s founding after World War II, and have drawn even closer since Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, with Seoul and Washington long claiming that Kim Jong Un has been sending weapons for use in Ukraine.

North Korean state media have not commented on the purported troop deployment.

Russia has also not confirmed the troop deployment, but defended its military cooperation with the North.

After Seoul summoned Moscow’s ambassador in South Korea to complain, the envoy “stressed that cooperation between Russia and North Korea ... is not directed against the interests of South Korea’s security.”

Neither NATO nor the United States have confirmed the deployment, but both have cast it as a potentially dangerous escalation in the long-running Ukraine conflict.

“We have seen reports the DPRK has sent forces and is preparing to send additional soldiers to Ukraine to fight alongside Russia,” Robert Wood, US ambassador to the United Nations, told the Security Council.

“If true, this marks a dangerous and highly concerning development and an obvious deepening of the DPRK-Russia military relationship,” Wood said.

The United States and its allies have already voiced concern about North Korea providing weapons to Russia, which invaded Ukraine in February 2022.

On Tuesday, the Yonhap agency reported that the South Korean government is considering sending a team of personnel to Ukraine to monitor North Korean troops being deployed, citing a government source.

According to the source, if deployed the team will likely consist of military personnel from intelligence divisions to analyze North Korean battlefield strategies and participate in interrogating any captured prisoners of war.

Yonhap also reported that a pro-Russia Telegram account posted a photo showing the Russian and North Korean flags side by side on a Ukrainian battlefield.

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Indian doctors call off protest hunger strike over medic’s murder

Indian doctors call off protest hunger strike over medic’s murder
Updated 22 October 2024
Reuters
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Indian doctors call off protest hunger strike over medic’s murder

Indian doctors call off protest hunger strike over medic’s murder
  • “Our movement for justice and a healthy, secure health care system will continue,” Halder said, adding that the doctors would track progress on her assurances and orders for change
Updated 22 October 2024
Reuters

KOLKATA: Junior doctors in India’s eastern city of Kolkata called off on Monday a 17-day-old hunger strike launched in protest against the rape and murder of a colleague, they said, in response to an appeal by the victim’s parents.
Protesters also met the chief minister of the opposition-led state, which has drawn scrutiny for its handling of sex crimes, to press their demand for better security and conditions at government hospitals, as well as justice for the woman.
A police volunteer was arrested for the crime, which sparked nationwide protests in August and September, after the woman’s body was found at the city’s R.G. Kar Medical College and Hospital on Aug. 9.
“They (the victim’s parents) expressed their worries about the fasting junior doctors’ health as well as the defunct health care services that must have affected hundreds of ordinary citizens,” said Dr. Debasish Halder, a spokesman for the doctors.
Some strike participants suffered severe dehydration and had to be admitted to hospital.
The doctors said Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee agreed to most of their demands when she met them on Monday.
“Our movement for justice and a healthy, secure health care system will continue,” Halder said, adding that the doctors would track progress on her assurances and orders for change.
Government hospitals across India lack basic amenities such as restrooms for doctors, security personnel, and closed circuit television cameras (CCTV), doctors say.
India’s Supreme Court also took up the matter, but junior doctors say its efforts have not been sufficient to ensure justice.
Reuters has reported that the government of West Bengal state has been slow to set up new tribunals for such crimes, while failing to deliver on its promises of better safety measures, made to doctors in 2019.
India adopted tougher laws to protect women after the horrific gang rape and murder of a woman in its capital New Delhi in 2012, but activists say women are still prey to sexual violence.

Topics: India

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China holds live-fire drills opposite Taiwan, a week after large-scale exercise

China holds live-fire drills opposite Taiwan, a week after large-scale exercise
Updated 22 October 2024
AP
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China holds live-fire drills opposite Taiwan, a week after large-scale exercise

China holds live-fire drills opposite Taiwan, a week after large-scale exercise
  • The live-fire drills were being held near the Pingtan islands off Fujian province
  • China has increased its presence in the waters and skies around Taiwan
Updated 22 October 2024
AP

TAIPEI: China is holding live-fire drills off the coast of its southern Fujian province facing Taiwan, just a week after a massive air-and-sea drill it called punishment for Taiwan’s president rejecting Beijing’s claims of sovereignty.
The live-fire drills were being held near the Pingtan islands off Fujian province from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., according to a notice from the Maritime Safety Administration. It warned ships to avoid the area. It did not offer additional details.
Taiwan’s Defense Ministry said China’s drills were part of an annual exercise and was tracking them. “It cannot be ruled out that it is one of the ways to expand the deterrent effect in line with the dynamics in the Taiwan Strait,” the statement added.
Taiwan is a self-ruled island that Beijing claims is part of China. Tensions around the issue has flared in recent years. China has increased its presence in the waters and skies around Taiwan. It now increasingly sends large amounts of warplanes and navy vessels in military exercises near Taiwan and its coast guard carries out patrols.
Last week, China held a one-day military exercise aimed at practicing the “sealing off of key ports and key areas.” Taiwan counted a record one-day total of 153 aircraft, 14 navy vessels, and 12 Chinese government ships.
In response to Chinese moves, the US has continued to host what it calls “freedom of navigation” transits through the Taiwan Strait. On Sunday, the destroyer USS Higgins and the Canadian frigate HMCS Vancouver transited the narrow band of ocean that separates China and Taiwan.
Germany sent two warships through the Taiwan Strait last month as it seeks to increase its defense engagement in the Asia-Pacific region.

Topics: China Taiwan

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