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JAKARTA, June 9, 2023 (AFP) — Indonesia’s Anak Krakatoa volcano erupted on Friday, belching a column of ash more than three kilometers into the sky, officials said. The volcanic island emerged from the sea at the beginning of the last century from the crater formed after the 1883 eruption of Mount Krakatoa — one of the deadliest and most destructive in history. Anak Krakatoa, which means “Child of Krakatoa”, spewed thick ash over the strait […]
PARIS, June 8, 2023 (AFP) – Record-high greenhouse gas emissions and diminishing air pollution have caused an unparalleled acceleration in global warming, 50 top scientists warned Thursday in a sweeping climate science update. From 2013 to 2022, “human-induced warming has been increasing at an unprecedented rate of over 0.2 degrees Celsius per decade,” they reported in a peer-reviewed study aimed at policymakers. Average annual emissions over the same period hit an all-time high of 54 […]
MANILA, June 8, 2023 (AFP) – Philippine scientists said that a “hazardous eruption” of a volcano in the archipelago could be days or weeks away, and urged the evacuation of nearby residents from their homes. Hundreds of families living around Mount Mayon in central Albay province are expected to be moved to safer areas after the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology raised the alarm. Mayon, a near-perfect cone located about 330 kilometres (205 miles) […]
BEIJING, China, June 7, 2023 (AFP) — Millions of Chinese students sit for notoriously tough college entrance exams on Wednesday, the first since the country lifted zero-Covid rules that forced classes online for months on end. China’s education ministry says nearly 13 million students, a record, are registered to take the “gaokao” exams — billed by state media as the “world’s toughest” — this year. “I’ve been waking up at 4 am every day, except […]
TEHRAN (AFP) – Iran’s Revolutionary Guards unveiled an intermediate range ballistic missile Tuesday capable of travelling at hypersonic speeds of up to 15 times the speed of sound, state television reported. President Ebrahim Raisi hailed the new missile’s hypersonic capability, saying it would boost Iran’s “power of deterrence” and “bring peace and stability to the countries of the region”. The official IRNA news agency published photographs of the ceremony in a closed area it did […]
HSINCHU, Taiwan, June 6, 2023 (AFP) — Taiwanese semiconductor giant TSMC said Tuesday its production of ever-smaller microchips will remain on the island, hopeful that the critical industry will have a “stabilizing effect on global geopolitical conflicts”. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company — whose clients include Apple and Intel — controls more than half the world’s output of silicon wafers, used in everything from smartphones to cars and missiles. Recent years have seen it navigating geopolitical […]
By Ashraf KHAN, Cyril BELAUD, Lehaz Ali Agence France-Presse DADU, Pakistan, June 6, 2023 (AFP) — Noor Bibi lost her mother, her daughter and the roof over her head in the catastrophic floods that drowned Pakistan last summer. One year later she remains homeless, living with the remnants of her family in spartan tents marking where the village of Sohbat Khosa was gutted by the deluge in southern Sindh province. Noor, a farm worker approaching […]
BISHKEK, Kyrgyzstan, June 6, 2023 (AFP) — More than 30 people accused of a coup plot have been arrested in Kyrgyzstan, the national security service said Tuesday. The impoverished Central Asian country with ties to Russia and China has seen three presidents resign over political crises fueled by corruption, nepotism and disputed votes since gaining independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. The GKNB state security agency said it dismantled the preparations of a group […]
HANOI, June 3, 2023 (AFP) – Hanoi residents flocked to the Vietnamese capital’s air-conditioned shopping malls on Saturday to escape power cuts at home, as the grid struggled to cope with the high demand caused by soaring heat. Vietnam is one of many countries across South and Southeast Asia experiencing record-high temperatures in recent weeks. As the temperature rose to 36 degrees Celsius, Bui Manh Duc Tai and his napping girlfriend were among those at […]
DHAKA, June 5, 2023 (AFP) – Cash-strapped Bangladesh shut its biggest power plant Monday because it was unable to afford the coal to fuel it, as a sweltering heatwave creates surging electricity demand. The 1,320-megawatt government-run Payra Power Plant in southern Bangladesh had already slashed production last month due to fuel shortages, but it was forced to go a step further on Monday, manager Shah Abdul Mawla told AFP. “Due to the coal shortage, the […]
WASHINGTON, June 4, 2023 (AFP) – A Chinese Navy ship maneuvered in an “unsafe manner” near an American destroyer transiting the Taiwan Strait, the US military said Saturday. It is the second close encounter between American and Chinese military assets in less than 10 days, following what the US military said was an “unnecessarily aggressive maneuver” by one of Beijing’s fighter’s near one of Washington’s surveillance planes last week. The Chinese ship “executed maneuvers in […]
JAKARTA, June 5, 2023 (AFP) – The United States and China have sent warships to the multinational naval drills that began in Indonesia on Monday, despite the rifts between the two powers. Washington and Beijing are engaged in fierce competition on diplomatic, military, technological and economic fronts. The US military has stepped up its Asia-Pacific operations to counter an increasingly assertive China, which has recently staged several rounds of war drills around Taiwan. But both […]
