South Korea’s Supreme Court recognises rights of same-sex partners in landmark ruling

South Korea’s Supreme Court has upheld that same-sex partners are eligible for the same insurance benefits as heterosexual couples, a ruling that is being heralded as a significant legal victory for the country’s LGBT+ community.

The decision marks the culmination of more than three years of legal battles and could set a precedent for the recognition of same-sex relationships in South Korea’s federal systems.

The landmark ruling upheld a decision by the Seoul High Court early last year that the National Health Insurance Service is obligated to provide equal spousal coverage to a gay couple, who filed a lawsuit in 2021 against the agency after it cancelled their spousal benefits.

Chief justice Jo Hee-de on Thursday said that the denial of spousal insurance coverage to a gay couple because of their gender constitutes discrimination based on sexual orientation.

“It is an act of discrimination that violates human dignity and value, the right to pursue happiness, freedom of privacy and the right to equality before the law, and the degree of violation is serious,” Mr Jo said in a televised hearing.

The couple, So Sung-wook and Kim Yong-min, began their lawsuit in the lower courts, which ruled against the couple on the grounds that a same-sex relationship could not be considered a common law marriage under the current laws in South Korea.

In February 2023, the Seoul High Court overturned the lower court’s ruling and recognised that the couple should have the right to equal benefits in the first such recognition for a same-sex couple in South Korea.

The court had said that protecting the rights of minorities is the “biggest responsibility” of the court as the “last bastion” of human rights.

The National Health Insurance Service appealed the decision in the Supreme Court, bringing the case to its final hearing.

Jubilant scenes followed after the top court’s ruling, as the emotional couple chanted: “Love wins!”

“I couldn’t believe when I heard the ruling. I was extremely happy and I started crying,” Kim Yong-min told Reuters outside the court.

“It took four years to earn this dependent status and we need to fight harder to legaliSe same-sex marriage going forward,” he said.

The ruling represents a significant step for a country that does not recognise same-sex marriages and where such couples are often excluded from government benefits.

Amnesty International’s East Asia researcher Boram said: “Today’s ruling is a historic victory for equality and human rights in South Korea.

“The court has taken a significant step towards dismantling systemic discrimination and ensuring inclusivity for all.

“While this decision is a major milestone, the case itself is a sobering reminder of the lengthy judicial processes that same-sex couples must endure to secure basic rights that should be universally guaranteed.”

He added that it is “disheartening that in 2024, same-sex couples still face such significant barriers to equality”.

The Supreme Court’s ruling is a “stepping stone for progress” towards marriage equality, said activist Horim Yi from Marriage For All, an LGBT+ campaign group.

“(Dependent status for health insurance) is one of the various rights that you can enjoy as a family, so it’s going to be a very hopeful ruling for same-sex couples living in South Korea.”

Instagram star dies trying to shoot reel at waterfall in India

An Indian Instagram influencer died after falling into a 300-foot gorge while shooting a video at the Kumbhe waterfall in the western state of Maharashtra.

Aanvi Kamdar, 26, on a trip with seven friends, fell into the gorge near Raigad at around 10.30am on 16 July, police said. Officers said she is believed to have been shooting a reel for her Instagram account when she slipped.

Police and local emergency crews, including one from the Coast Guard, responded to the accident on Tuesday.

“She had fallen about 300-350 feet. Despite reaching her, rescuing her was challenging due to her injuries and heavy rain, so we used a vertical pulley,” a rescuer was quoted as saying by NDTV.

Authorities in Raigad said she was brought out of the gorge after a six hour rescue operation but died late on Tuesday at a local hospital.

A chartered accountant by training, Kamdar used the handle @theglocaljournal on Instagram to post photos of her travels, as well as tips and hacks for others. She was well-known for her love of monsoon tourism, and her page has more than 260,000 followers.

Local officials in Maharashtra have urged tourists to prioritise safety and avoid risky behaviour.

This incident is not the first involving social media influencers losing their lives or getting injured seemingly during the pursuit for new content.

Gigi Wu, known as the “Bikini Climber”, died in 2019 after falling into a ravine during a solo hike in Taiwan.

Ryker Gamble, Alexey Lyakh and Megan Scraper of the travel vlogging group “High on Life” died in 2018 after falling from Shannon Falls in British Columbia while attempting to take photos near the waterfall’s edge.

Hong Kong influencer Sofia Cheung, 32, lost her life after falling from a waterfall in Ha Pak Lai park while taking a selfie in 2021.

Hong Kong scribe says WSJ fired her for leading press advocacy group

The new head of a Hong Kong journalists’ association has claimed she was fired by The Wall Street Journal soon after being elected to the post.

Selina Cheng was told her job with the American newspaper had been terminated due to restructuring in the company.

She, however, said she believed the termination was linked to her supervisor’s request to withdraw from the election to chair the Hong Kong Journalists Association, or HKJA, a trade union that also advocates for press freedom.

“I am appalled that the first press conference I’m giving as HKJA’s new chair is to announce that I was fired for taking up this position in a press union,” Ms Cheng said on Wednesday. She was elected last month.

Ms Cheng claimed she was pressed by her employer about three weeks ago to withdraw from the election and quit the board of the association, which she had been on since 2021.

After declining the request, Ms Cheng said, she was told the role would be “incompatible with my employment at The Wall Street Journal”.

“The editor said that the employees of the Journal shouldn’t be seen as advocating for press freedom in a place like Hong Kong even though they can in Western countries where it is already established,” she said.

The media industry in the former British colony returned to China in 1997 has suffered major setbacks since it imposed a national security law in 2020 following mass street protests.

Ms Cheng noted that the Journal has been supportive of Evan Gershkovich, a reporter for the newspaper who has been jailed in Russia on espionage charges that he, his employer and the US government vehemently deny.

“This is why I’m deeply shocked that senior editors at the paper would actively violate their employees’ human rights by preventing them from advocating for press freedom that the Journal’s reporters rely on to work,” she said.

Dow Jones, which publishes the paper, confirmed on Wednesday that it made “some personnel changes” but refused to comment on individual cases.

“The Wall Street Journal has been and continues to be a fierce and vocal advocate for press freedom in Hong Kong and around the world,” the company said in a statement.

Ms Cheng covered China’s automobile and energy sectors for the Journal, which plans to move her role out of Hong Kong, The Guardian reported.

After the imposition of the draconian security law, which has allegedly been weaponised to silence dissent in the city, two local news outlets known for critical coverage of the government, Apple Daily and Stand News, were forced to shut down after the arrest of senior management, including Apple Daily publisher Jimmy Lai.

In March, Hong Kong enacted another security law to punish espionage, disclosure of state secrets and “collusion with external forces”. It left many journalists worried about further erosion in media freedom.

A week after the law was enacted, Radio Free Asia, which is funded by the US, announced its Hong Kong bureau had been closed because of safety concerns.

In June, secretary for security Chris Tang said HKJA lacked legitimacy and accused it of having stood with the protesters in 2019.

The Journal faced pressure from the city’s government last July when it received three letters by Mr Tang over its editorial or opinion pieces.

The paper announced in May that its staff was shifting “its centre of gravity” in the region from Hong Kong to Singapore. The decision resulted in some staffers losing their jobs in the Chinese financial hub.

Ms Cheng, however, was not affected.

The HKJA said the Journal risked hastening the decline of what space remained for independent journalism by pressuring its employees to not take part in the association.

Other board members of the association have also been pressured by their employers to stand down, it said in a statement without giving details.

Hong Kong was ranked 135th out of 180 countries and territories in the latest World Press Freedom Index by Reporters Without Borders.

Japanese PM apologises to victims of forced sterilisation programme

Japanese prime minister Fumio Kishidi bowed in apology to the victims of forced sterilisation just weeks after Japan’s top court ruled that a defunct eugenics law under which thousands of people were forcibly sterilised between 1948 and 1996 was unconstitutional.

Mr Kishida apologised to the victims on Wednesday and said: “The government, which enforced the law, bears extremely grave responsibility. I am deeply sorry and I offer an apology on behalf of the government.”

He said: “I decided to meet with you today in order to personally express my remorse and apology for the tremendous physical and mental suffering that many people have endured based on the former Eugenic Protection Law.”

People who were forcibly sterilised had filed lawsuits across the country claiming the treatment meted out to them was unconstitutional and sought state compensation.

The Eugenic Protection Law, in place for 48 years until 1996, permitted doctors to sterilise people with mental or intellectual disabilities. The law was brought in to curb the population during food shortages after the Second World War.

According to The Mainichi, the prime minister met with more than 130 plaintiffs, lawyers and supporters and said “it is with deep regret that at least 25,000 people have suffered the grave harm of being sterilised”, under the now-defunct law.

Around 25,000 people were sterilised under the law, including some who consented under pressure.

Former prime minister Shinzo Abe had also issued a public apology to the victims and said the eugenics law had caused “great suffering”.

Meanwhile, Mr Kishida also announced that he had directed authorities to prepare a new compensation plan for survivors, but did not provide any details.

Plaintiffs and their supporters have contended that a previous government compensation offer of 3.2m yen (about £15,700) per person was insufficient.

They achieved a significant victory earlier this month when Japan’s Supreme Court ordered the government to pay 16.5m yen (about £80,000) each to the plaintiffs of several lawsuits and 2.2m yen (about £10,000) to their spouses.

As per a parliamentary report released last year, children as young as nine were among those sterilised under the now-defunct eugenics law in Japan.

Though forced sterilisation was outlawed in 1996, high school textbooks as recently as 1975 stated that Japan’s government was making efforts for the “country’s eugenics to improve and enhance the genetic predisposition of the entire public”.

“I heard the apology directly from the prime minister to the victims, but I think we could have heard it earlier,” Koji Niisato, an attorney for plaintiffs was quoted as saying by NHK.

“Today, I hope that you will listen to the actual conditions of the victims and their real voices and do your utmost to achieve a full resolution for them.”

Suzuki Yumi from Kobe City believed that the meeting was a significant first step towards eliminating discrimination against people with disabilities. However, she noted that many forms of discrimination still persist in Japan.

Kojima Kikuo from Sapporo City shared that Mr Kishida held his hands and acknowledged his hardships. But he was not ready to forgive so soon. He told NHK that what was done to him remains “unforgivable”.

Japan is not the only country to have conducted forced sterilisations.

In 1997, records were uncovered showing Sweden sterilised 60,000 women between 1935 and 1976, some due to physical or mental disabilities, others because they were seen to be “inferior racial types”. The government later passed legislation giving £14,250 in compensation to each of the victims of the programme.

This is not the first time Japan has apologised for its past excesses and wartime actions. Japan apologised for the forced recruitment of “comfort women” during World War II, but it was an apology that did not satisfy South Korea. Then again, it expressed “deep remorse” and a “heartfelt apology” for Japan’s wartime actions, including the 1937 Nanjing Massacre. Japan has also apologised to Australian prisoners of war (PoWs) who suffered under Japanese captivity during World War II.

However, Tessa Morris-Suzuki, an Australian historian noted in the East Asia Forum in a 2016 piece titled “The ever-shifting sands of Japanese apologies” that despite acknowledgements and apologies, Japan’s consistency in recognising the full extent of its historical responsibility is questionable.

At least 16 killed in huge fire at China shopping mall

At least 16 people were killed as a massive blaze tore through a shopping centre in the southwestern Chinese province of Sichuan.

The fire broke out in a 14-storey commercial building in the high-tech zone city of Zigong, located 1,900km from capital Beijing. The city is home to about 2.5 million people.

Firefighters responded to an emergency call shortly after 6pm on Tuesday at the building and pulled around 75 people to safety, state news agency Xinhua reported. The rescue operation continued overnight and ended at 3am (local time).

It was not immediately known what caused the fire or how many people were in the building when the fire broke out but preliminary investigation showed the fire erupted was due to construction operations.

The building houses a department store, offices, restaurants and a movie theater.

Videos showed clouds of thick black smoke coming out of windows from the building’s lower levels and engulfing the entire building as they rose to the sky.

Fire department authorities have reportedly called on the public to “not believe or amplify rumours” about the blaze. China‘s Ministry of Emergency Management has dispatched a team of experts to Sichuan for an investigation.

Fire hazards remain a problem in China, which reported 947 fire fatalities in this year’s first several months ending on 20 May, up 19 per cent from the same period of the previous year, Li Wanfeng, a spokesperson for the National Fire and Rescue Administration, told the Associated Press.

He said the number of fires in public places such as hotels and restaurants rose 40 per cent and that the most common causes were malfunctioning in electrical or gas lines and carelessness.

In January, a fire killed 39 people in a commercial building in the southeastern Chinese province of Jiangxi. It was caused by unauthorized welding in the basement.

Another 15 people were killed in a residential building in the eastern city of Nanjing in February, after an attached parking lot that had electric bikes caught fire.

10 dead as students and police clash over job quota in Bangladesh

India asked its citizens in Bangladesh to avoid local travel as police clashed with anti-reservation protesters amidst a call for a nationwide shutdown following the death of at least 10 people.

Hundreds of people have sustained injuries in the weeks-long protests which turned violent this week following clashes and incidents of arson that led to the death of at least three students among other victims.

People in the South Asian country stayed home on Thursday as few shops and offices opened for business in the capital Dhaka. The call for the national shutdown by students, demanding the abolition of 30 per cent reservation in government jobs, drew limited response.

The Indian embassy, in an advisory to its citizens currently living or visiting Bangladesh, asked them to “avoid local travel and minimise their movement outside their living premises”.

Thousands of students have called on the Sheikh Hasina government to abolish the reservation in government jobs for family members of freedom fighters from the 1971 War of Independence. The quota system also reserves jobs for women, disabled people, and ethnic minority groups.

Four people died in the clashes with police in Dhaka on Thursday as hundreds more suffered injures, according to local reports.

Police fired tear gas to scatter stone-throwing protesters as the students showed no sign of slowing the agitation. Sporadic clashes were reported in several places as demonstrators blocked major highways. Witnesses said the riot police fought pitched battles with protesters in several places in Dhaka.

Law enforcement authorities have used “unlawful force” against students during the ongoing ‘Bangla-Blockade’ protest, rights group Amnesty International said, citing witnesses and video evidence. Abu Sayed, a 25-year-old university student, was found dead with bullet wounds in the north-western city of Rangpur.

Mobile services were halted across most of the country while internet services were cut for the first time since 2021, according to cybersecurity company Surfshark. The last time Bangladesh witnessed internet restrictions were during the protests over Indian prime minister Narendra Modi’s visit to the neighbouring country.

The US embassy in Dhaka said it would close on Thursday and advised its citizens to avoid demonstrations and large gatherings.

A US State Department spokesperson earlier this week condemned the violence against peaceful protesters. “The freedom of expression and peaceful assembly are essential building blocks of any thriving democracy … Our thoughts are with those who have been impacted by this violence,” Mathew Miller said.

On Wednesday the protests led to traffic halts on a major road as police fired tear gas and rubber bullets at protesters, who set fire to a toll booth, blocked streets and detonated explosives, Somoy TV reported.

The protesters announced they would enforce “a complete shutdown” across the country on Thursday in response to security officials’ continued attacks on the campus demonstrators. The main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) said that it would do what it could to make the shutdown a success.

The Bangladesh government on Tuesday shut all public and private universities indefinitely and sent riot police and the Border Guard paramilitary force to university campuses to keep order.

Ms Hasina is the daughter of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the man who led Bangladesh to independence. She has so far refused the protesters’ demands but promised her government would set up a judicial panel to investigate the deaths after police fired bullets and tear gas to scatter protesters.

Her law minister, Anisul Huq, said the government was willing to talk to the protesters “whenever they want to sit in the discussion, it will happen”.

The protests are the first major challenge to Ms Hasina since she secured a fourth consecutive term early this year in an election boycotted by the opposition parties.

The quota system was suspended in 2018, ending similar protests against it. However, a High Court last month asked for the 30 per cent quota for descendants of freedom fighters to be restored.

The Supreme Court last week stayed the High Court’s order for four weeks and the country’s chief justice asked the student protesters to return to their classes.

“Bangladeshi authorities must fully respect people’s right to freedom of peaceful assembly in line with its commitments under international law and its own Constitution and protect peaceful protesters from further harm,” said Taqbir Huda, regional researcher for South Asia at Amnesty International.

Cambodia breeding programme marks comeback of endangered crocodile

At least 60 baby crocodiles of the rare Siamese species were born in Cambodia marking a hatching record for the endangered species in this century.

The crocodile eggs successfully hatched in Cambodia’s Cardamom National Park, conservationists said, adding that the record birth marked a “real sign of hope”.

Cambodia has been running conservationist programmes, like breeding the crocodiles captively and then releasing them in the wild, for two decades to save the species from extinction.

The Siamese crocodile is one of the world’s rarest crocodiles, largely due to decades of hunting and habitat loss. They are categorised as Critically Endangered on the IUCN Red List – an inventory of the global conservation status and extinction risk of biological species.

The birth of 60 new crocodiles gives a “massive boost” for the survival prospects of the species, conservation group Flora and Fauna said in a statement.

Characterised by its olive-green colour and distinct bony crest at the back of its head, these crocodiles can grow up to nearly 10ft in length.

Once widespread throughout Southeast Asia, they have disappeared from 99 per cent of its former range. These freshwater reptiles have faced decades of hunting and habitat loss, leading to their classification as a critically endangered species.

Now only 400 crocodiles are estimated to be left, mostly in Cambodia.

Conservationists have been engaging with the local Indigenous communities to protect the species and help them thrive. Locals patrol the regions where the new crocodiles are released.

“The local Indigenous People revere this reptile, and it is taboo to kill or hurt one,” Flora and Fauna said in a statement.

Community-led monitoring and anti-poaching activities are helping to protect key breeding sites, the group said, adding that its a collaborative effort with the Cambodian government to bolster the surviving wild crocodile population through a conservation-breeding and reintroduction programme.

Since 2012, the programme has successfully released a total of 196 captive-bred Siamese crocodiles in safe areas and suitable habitats in the Cardamom Mountains.

Tourists in hospital after two bus crashes on same road in New Zealand

Two buses carrying Chinese tourists veered off the same stretch of road in perilous weather conditions on New Zealand’s South Island on Thursday, with 15 passengers taken to hospital, two of them seriously hurt.

The buses were traveling in the same direction on a stretch of highway popular with tourists when they slid from the road and overturned, at about the same time and only 100 meters (yards) apart, New Zealand’s police said. Temperatures in the area were freezing and others driving on the highway reported heavy fog and black ice on the road at the time.

Their cause was not known, New Zealand officials said. A spokesperson would not confirm the nationality of those on board, but a post by the Chinese consulate in Christchurch on the social media platform WeChat said the buses were carrying Chinese tourists.

The local ambulance service said 15 people were taken to hospital, two by helicopter in a serious condition. Eight of those in hospital were moderately hurt and five had minor injuries. Officials did not say how many others were treated at the scene or how many people were on the buses.

Grace Duggin, an Australian tourist, was traveling in a car behind one of the vehicles and saw it veer off the road, rolling multiple times before landing in a field. Conditions before the crash were made treacherous by slippery black ice, she said, which regularly closes the South Island’s tourist highways in winter.

A passenger pulled bloodied passengers out through a hatch in the roof of the bus, Duggin said.

“It was mostly the little kids who had severe head lacerations,” she said. “All the windows were completely smashed out on both sides and the windscreen, so obviously there’s been a lot of glass injuries.”

Duggin said the other bus appeared to have veered off the road at the same time, a short distance further along the highway on the same side of the road.

Neither bus appeared to have been involved in the other’s crash, she said. The two vehicles appeared identical, though no logo or company name was visible on either.

The country’s transport agency had earlier issued a warning about wintry conditions on the road, State Highway 8. The stretch where Thursday’s crash happened — between the township of Lake Tekapo and the town of Twizel — had been closed days earlier after another crash on a snowy, icy morning.

Like many of the South Island’s tourist highways, the road traverses the pristine mountain and lakefront vistas that draw visitors to New Zealand — but can be dangerous in the Southern Hemisphere winter, especially to travelers unused to winding, slippery roads. Tourists and locals have died on the same stretch before; in April, four were killed — including two Malaysian students studying in New Zealand — in a three-car crash.

In 2019, an American tourist pleaded guilty to driving charges after he drifted onto the wrong side of the road, hitting another car and killing a man who was visiting from Australia.

Elsewhere in the country, tourist buses have plunged from New Zealand’s highways — which outside of the main cities are often winding, narrow or mountainous — in deadly crashes before. In one of the worst episodes, a bus flipped in rainy conditions north of Rotorua, on the North Island, in 2019 killing five tourists from China.

In 2008, eight tourists and their driver were killed when their bus hit a logging truck.