VIETNAM
Rescuers found in landslide
Rescuers have recovered the bodies of 11 army personnel and two others who were buried in a landslide while trying to reach victims of another landslide, state media reported yesterday. The army officers were resting at a forest ranger outpost when part of a hill collapsed and engulfed the building with earth, rock and debris on Tuesday. Only eight people in the team escaped, Vietnam News reported. They were on their way to a landslide at a hydroelectric plant construction site in Thua Thien-Hue Province that left dozens missing. Flooding in central Vietnam has killed at least 36 people since last week. Floods are receding but the country is bracing for another rain spell this weekend as a tropical depression heads toward the region.
FINLAND
PM enters self-isolation
Prime Minister Sanna Marin yesterday left an EU summit to self-isolate as a precaution after attending a meeting this week with a Finnish member of parliament who has since tested positive for COVID-19, the government said. “The prime minister has today left the European Council and asked the Swedish Prime Minister, Stefan Lofven, to represent Finland during the final meeting,” the government said in a statement.
JAPAN
Wastewater to be released
The government is to release more than 1 million tonnes of treated radioactive water from the stricken Fukushima Da-ichi nuclear power plant into the sea in a decades-long operation, reports said yesterday, despite strong opposition from local fishers. The release of the water, which has been filtered to reduce radioactivity, is likely to start in 2022 at the earliest, national dailies the Nikkei, the Yomiuri and others said. The decision ends years of debate over how to dispose of the liquid that includes water used to cool the power station after it was hit by a massive tsunami in 2011. Environmental activists have expressed strong opposition to the proposals, and fishers and farmers have voiced fears that consumers would shun seafood and produce from the region.
GERMANY
Court rules against closures
A Berlin court yesterday suspended an order for bars and restaurants to close from 11pm to 6am, finding that “it was not apparent” such a measure could help fight COVID-19. Ruling on a case brought by 11 restaurant owners, the administrative court said that new infections in Germany stem from private gatherings of family and friends, at community facilities, meat-processing plants, religious gatherings or in connection with travel. Closing food and drink establishments was therefore a “disproportionate encroachment on the freedom” of the industry, the court ruled.
MINERAL DEPOSITS: The Pacific nation is looking for new foreign partners after its agreement with Canada’s Metals Co was terminated ‘mutually’ at the end of last year Pacific nation Kiribati says it is exploring a deep-sea mining partnership with China, dangling access to a vast patch of Pacific Ocean harboring coveted metals and minerals. Beijing has been ramping up efforts to court Pacific nations sitting on lucrative seafloor deposits of cobalt, nickel and copper — recently inking a cooperation deal with Cook Islands. Kiribati opened discussions with Chinese Ambassador Zhou Limin (周立民) after a longstanding agreement with leading deep-sea mining outfit The Metals Co fell through. “The talk provides an exciting opportunity to explore potential collaboration for the sustainable exploration of the deep-ocean resources in Kiribati,” the government said
The head of Shin Bet, Israel’s domestic intelligence agency, was sacked yesterday, days after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he no longer trusts him, and fallout from a report on the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack. “The Government unanimously approved Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s proposal to end ISA Director Ronen Bar’s term of office,” a statement said. He is to leave his post when his successor is appointed by April 10 at the latest, the statement said. Netanyahu on Sunday cited an “ongoing lack of trust” as the reason for moving to dismiss Bar, who joined the agency in 1993. Bar, meant to
Indonesia’s parliament yesterday amended a law to allow members of the military to hold more government roles, despite criticisms that it would expand the armed forces’ role in civilian affairs. The revision to the armed forces law, pushed mainly by Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto’s coalition, was aimed at expanding the military’s role beyond defense in a country long influenced by its armed forces. The amendment has sparked fears of a return to the era of former Indonesian president Suharto, who ex-general Prabowo once served and who used military figures to crack down on dissent. “Now it’s the time for us to ask the
The central Dutch city of Utrecht has installed a “fish doorbell” on a river lock that lets viewers of an online livestream alert authorities to fish being held up as they make their springtime migration to shallow spawning grounds. The idea is simple: An underwater camera at Utrecht’s Weerdsluis lock sends live footage to a Web site. When somebody watching the site sees a fish, they can click a button that sends a screenshot to organizers. When they see enough fish, they alert a water worker who opens the lock to let the fish swim through. Now in its fifth year, the
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