14/09/2025

theSun on Sunday SEPT 14, 2025

WORLD 7

Nepal names interim PM, sets elections for March

PHNOM PENH: Myanmar anti-narcotics agents have smashed a drug ring believed to be behind the smuggling of drugs into Malaysia. The syndicate was crippled following the arrest of six men during raids in Shwepyitha Township in Yangon on Sept 5, The Global New Light of Myanmar reported yesterday. Police seized 1,840kg of ice (methamphetamine), four million stimulant tablets and 14kg of heroin from a warehouse. “The group was trafficking drugs to pay for its operations and buy weapons and ammunition. “The drugs from Shan State were to be shipped to Malaysia,” said authorities. The report said the arrested individuals were linked to the Arakan Army, which is fighting the military in Rakhine. The Arakan Army said yesterday an airstrike in Rakhine killed at least 19 students, including children. It posted a statement on Telegram saying the attack on two private high schools in Kyauktaw township happened just after midnight on Friday, killing 19 students between the ages of 15 and 21 and wounding 22 more. Unicef condemned the “brutal attack”, which it said “adds to a pattern of increasing violence in Rakhine State, with children and families paying the ultimate price”. AFP was unable to reach people on the ground around Kyauktaw where internet and phone services are patchy. The military is struggling to fight rebel groups in Myanmar and it has been accused of using air and artillery strikes to hit civilian communities. – Bernama/AFP Myanmar seizes drugs packaged for Malaysia US backs Philippines on atoll dispute MANILA: The United States stands with the Philippines, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Friday, rejecting China’s plans for a disputed atoll in the South China Sea. “Beijing claiming Scarborough Reef as a nature preserve is yet another coercive attempt to advance territorial and maritime claims in the South China Sea at the expense of its neighbours,” Rubio said in a statement. Filipino fishermen fear Beijing’s plan to create the nature reserve could make it harder for them to operate in the atoll, which is under the constant watch of Chinese vessels. Scarborough Shoal lies within the Philippine exclusive economic zone but has been under Beijing’s control since 2012. China claims almost all the South China Sea despite overlapping claims by the Philippines, Brunei, Malaysia and Vietnam. Rubio said China’s actions continue to undermine regional stability, calling on Beijing to abide by the Arbitral Tribunal unanimous 2016 decision that China had unlawfully prevented Filipinos from fishing at Scarborough Reef. The Philippines said on Saturday it had sailed with the US Indo-Pacific Command and Japan’s navy off islands in Zambales province, whose coast is about 222km from Scarborough Shoal. Global Times reported on Friday that Manila had held a “joint patrol” in the South China Sea with unnamed countries outside the region. – Reuters

Country inches back towards normalcy

Karki being sworn in as interim prime minister. – AFPPIC

KATHMANDU: President Ramchandra Paudel dissolved parliament and called for fresh elections on March 5, his office said on Friday, following a week of deadly violence that culminated in the appointment of the country’s first woman prime minister in the interim. The announcement came just hours after Paudel appointed former chief justice Sushila Karki to lead the country, following the anti graft protests that forced Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli to resign. The president “dissolved the House of Representatives ... and fixed March 5, 2026, Thursday for the elections”, according to a statement from the president’s office. Karki was appointed after two days of intense negotiations between Paudel, army chief Ashok Raj Sigdel and the protest leaders behind Nepal’s worst upheaval in years, which left at least 51 people killed and more than 1,300 injured. Nepal’s southern neighbour, India, said it hoped that the

developments would help foster peace and stability. “Heartfelt congratulations to the Honorable Sushila Karki Ji on assuming the office of prime minister of Nepal’s interim government. “India is fully committed to the peace, progress and prosperity of Nepal’s brothers and sisters,” Prime Minister Narendra Modi said in a post on X. The protests were sparked by a social media ban that has since been rolled back. The violence subsided only after Oli resigned on Tuesday. Nepal has grappled with political and economic instability since the abolition of its monarchy in 2008, while a lack of jobs drives millions of young people to seek work in other countries like the Middle East, South Korea and Malaysia. The country of 30 million people, tucked between China and India, inched back towards normalcy on Friday – with shops reopened, cars back on roads, and police replacing the guns they wielded earlier in the week with batons. – Reuters

Baby gorilla rescued from crate at airport to return home ISTANBUL: Shinning down a lamp-post, the tiny gorilla almost seems to be laughing as he dodges past his keeper at an Istanbul zoo he has called home since being rescued from traffickers.

Zeytin takes a swig at Polenezkoy Zoo in Istanbul. – AFPPIC

He was five months old when he was discovered, days before Christmas, crammed into a wooden crate in the cargo section of a Turkish Airlines plane en route from Nigeria to Thailand, his terrified face making headlines across Turkiye and beyond. Nearly nine months on and Zeytin (Turkish for olive), as he was named, is a different creature from the traumatised infant brought to Polonezkoy Zoo in the hills outside Istanbul to recover from his trafficking ordeal. His recovery means he will soon be sent back to Nigeria, where he began his journey, Turkish officials say. Zeytin is believed to be a Western lowland gorilla, a critically endangered subspecies native to the rain forests of central Africa, whose numbers have plummeted in recent decades because of deforestation, hunting and disease. West and Central Africa are major sources of trafficking, with a 2013 UN environment programme report (the latest official figures available) saying 3,174 great apes were lost annually to illegal trade, based on the numbers seized, with many more going undetected. “It was the first time a gorilla has been confiscated at Istanbul airport,” said Fahrettin Ulu, regional director of Istanbul’s Nature Conservation and

races across the grass like an energetic toddler, swinging from nearby tree branches and playing tag with his keeper, only occasionally slowing down to munch on a piece of cucumber or orange. Ulu explained that under the CITES treaty limiting the trade of protected species, animals rescued from trafficking must be sent back to the exporting country. He said the repatriation process was being coordinated with the Nigerian authorities and the CITES Secretariat. – AFP

National Parks directorate. “He was found inside a small box and he was terrified. You could see it in his eyes.” The baby gorilla was moved into a special section within the zoo where he was “nurtured with motherly affection”, he said. “When he first arrived, he weighed 9.4kg and now weighs 16kg. His height has increased also from 62.5cm to 80cm. In other words, Zeytin, who was once a baby, has become a young gorilla.” Inside an open area of the zoo, Zeytin