PAKISTAN
In Pakistan's capital, Islamabad, police and supporters of Imran Khan clashed yesterday. The former prime minister has been in prison for over a year. Several people who took to the streets to protest once again against the current government were arrested. The city is on high alert due to a series of diplomatic events scheduled for the coming days, including the visit, the first since 2015, of an Indian foreign minister. Mr S Jaishankar is in Pakistan for a meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation.
MALAYSIA – BANGLADESH
Malaysia's Prime Minister, Anwar Ibrahim, on a visit to Dhaka, Bangladesh, announced plans to welcome 18,000 Bangladeshi workers who missed a deadline for employment last May. The Malaysian premier's visit is the first by a Malaysian head of government to Bangladesh since Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus formed a provisional government. The two leaders also discussed the repatriation of Rohingya to Myanmar.
JAPAN
The approval rating of Japan’s new Prime Minister, Shigeru Ishiba, stood at 51 per cent in a Nikkei-TV Tokyo poll, the lowest result since 2002. When he took office, Ishiba’s predecessor, Fumio Kishida, had an approval rating of 59 per cent. The survey also pointed out that negative comments towards the new government outnumbered those in favour by a margin of 44 per cent to 32 per cent.
THAILAND
The city of Chiang Mai in northern Thailand has been submerged by water due to monsoon rains. Yesterday, the Ping River reached the highest level ever recorded. Th e Elephant Nature Park, home to pachyderms rescued from abusive situations, is among the most affected areas. Some of the animals drowned, but 117 were saved, the authorities report.
ISRAEL – LEBANON
As Israeli attacks in Lebanon intensified, several countries announced the evacuation of their citizens, including China, which evacuated 200 people, including people from Hong Kong and Taiwan. South Korea also repatriated about a hundred of its own citizens with a military aircraft. A recent Israeli attack on the Beddawi refugee camp in northern Lebanon killed an official with Hamas’s military wing, his wife and two daughters. So far, about 2,000 people have been killed across Lebanon.
RUSSIA
Russian authorities plan to invest 95 billion roubles (US$ 1 billion) to isolate Runet, Russia’s patriotic Internet, to assert “Internet sovereignty" by 2025-2027. Another goal is to propagate "moral and spiritual values” online. Some 60 billion will be devoted to fighting VPN services, the rest will go to developing desired values.
KYRGYZSTAN – RUSSIA
The Prime Minister of Kyrgyzstan, Akylbek Japarov, spoke out in defence of the rights of migrants in Russia, in the face of new pushbacks and consequent crowding at Russian railway stations and airports, stating that "all citizens of the Eurasian Economic Union must have equal treatment in all member states”, Russia included.
