Pakistan arrests former spy chief seen as ally of jailed PM Imran Khan

Pakistan has arrested its former spy chief, retired Lieutenant General Faiz Hameed, and started court martial proceedings against him.

The detention of a high-ranking officer is unusual in a country where the military has ruled for over 30 years and continues to hold considerable sway.

Mr Hameed’s arrest is widely seen as part of a crackdown on the allies of former prime minister Imran Khan, who was ousted in 2022 and jailed on corruption charges.

Mr Khan, who had reportedly handpicked Mr Hameed to head the ISI spy agency, has accused the military of orchestrating his removal at the behest of the US.

The former spy chief’s arrest was ordered by the Supreme Court, the military claimed in a statement, adding that he was also accused of violating the Pakistan Army Act. It did not specify the charges though or disclose when he was arrested.

He was reportedly implicated in a housing scheme launched by Mr Khan’s government.

“The process of field general court martial has been initiated and Lt Gen Faiz Hameed has been taken into military custody,” the statement read.

Mr Hameed, who led the ISI from 2019 to 2021, came to global attention when he was filmed sipping tea in a Kabul hotel shortly after the Taliban had taken back Afghanistan in 2021 following the withdrawal of US and other occupying Western forces.

The ISI had long been accused by Washington of backing the Taliban.

The head of the ISI is generally considered to be the second most powerful military officer in Pakistan after the army chief.

Additional reporting by agencies.

Japan’s PM Kishida quits to save his party after years of scandal

Fumio Kishida has announced he will step down as Japan’s prime minister after three years in office marred by political scandals, saying his exit is “what is best for the public”.

The 67-year-old’s surprise departure paves the way for a new leader of his governing Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), which currently controls both houses of parliament but has seen support dwindle.

“I will devote myself to supporting the new leader … as a foot soldier,” he said, urging party unity to rebuild public trust. “We need to clearly show an LDP reborn. In order to show a changing LDP, the most obvious first step is for me to bow out.”

Slumping support for Mr Kishida dipped his approval rating to below 20 per cent. The prospect of electoral defeat had seen growing calls within the party for an alternative fresh face ahead of the next general election, due by the third quarter of 2025.

“The new leader needs to be a fresh face, whether that means young or not associated with Kishida, and reform-minded,” said Rintaro Nishimura, an associate at Washington-based strategic advisory firm The Asia Group.

Mr Kishida was under scrutiny by party members for the handling of a scandal involving hidden slush funds in which more than 80 LDP lawmakers, mostly belonging to a major party faction previously led by assassinated former prime minister Shinzo Abe, are accused of being involved.

He removed a number of cabinet ministers and others from party executive posts, dissolved party factions and tightened political funding laws – but despite his efforts, public support for his government ebbed away and the party suffered losses in local elections earlier this year. Major losses in Tokyo metropolitan assembly elections in July added to the malaise.

Mr Kishida’s decision will trigger a contest within the party to replace him as party boss, and by extension as the leader of Japan.

The successor the LDP chooses is set to face challenges of increases in living costs, escalating geopolitical tensions, and the potential return of Donald Trump as US president next year.

Former defence minister Shigeru Ishiba has so far expressed his intention to run as the LDP president. He remains a popular face among the public after his stint as number two within the ruling party. Polls published by local media over the past several weeks showed Mr Ishiba, 67, was the most popular candidate.

Others who have expressed interest included digital transformation minister Kono Taro, foreign minister Yoko Kamikawa, and Shinjiro Koizumi, the son of former prime minister Junichiro Koizumi.

“He’s been a dead man walking for quite some time,” said Michael Cucek, a professor specialising in Japanese politics at Temple University in Tokyo. “There was no way to add up the numbers so that he would get re-elected,” he added.

Three of the rumoured candidates to replace Mr Kishida – something that raises hopes for a breakthrough in Japan’s male-dominated politics.

Experts say that the LDP’s need to change its image could push it to choose a female prime minister. Only three women have run for the party’s leadership in the past, two of whom ran against Mr Kishida in 2021.

Only 10.3 per cent of the members of the lower house of Japan’s parliament are women, putting Japan 163rd for female representation among 190 countries examined in a report by the Geneva-based Inter-Parliamentary Union in April.

The Bank of Japan unexpectedly raised interest rates to around 0.25 per cent in July, as inflation took hold, leading to stock market instability and sending the yen sharply lower.

Mr Kishida’s exit could mean tighter fiscal and monetary conditions depending on the candidate, according to Shoki Omori, chief Japan desk strategist, at Mizuho Securities, Tokyo.

Reuters and Associated Press contributed to this report

Japanese has been put on a megaquake warning. People are confused

Japan, one of the most earthquake-prone nations on earth, issued its first-ever “megaquake advisory” last week after a powerful quake struck off the southeastern coast of the southern main island of Kyushu.

The magnitude 7.1 quake caused no deaths or severe damage but the advisory has led to widespread confusion and a lingering sense of worry — in a country well accustomed to regular quakes — about when the next big one will hit.

As a result of the “megaquake advisory,” Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida canceled his planned Aug. 9-12 trip to Central Asia and announced he would lead the government response and ensure preventive measures and communication with the public.

The Fire and Disaster Management Agency instructed 707 municipalities seen as at risk from a Nankai Trough quake to review their response measures and evacuation plans.

Experts and officials have urged people to stay calm and carry on their daily social and economic activities while also securing emergency food and water and discussing evacuation plans with family members.

In a reassuring note on Monday, JMA experts said they have so far found no abnormal seismic or tectonic activity that would indicate a megaquake.

The Japan Meteorological Agency issued the advisory after concluding that the magnitude 7.1 quake that struck on Aug. 8 on the western edge of the Nankai Trough increased the likelihood of another big one.

There is a 70-80% chance of a magnitude 8 or 9 quake associated with the Nankai Trough within the next 30 years, and the probability is now “higher than normal” after the latest quake, the JMA says.

But that is not a prediction that a megaquake will happen at any specific time or location, says University of Tokyo seismologist Naoshi Hirata, who heads the JMA’s experts panel. He urged people to remain cautious and prepared.

The Nankai Trough is an undersea trench that runs from Hyuganada, in the waters just off the southeastern coast of Kyushu, to Suruga Bay in central Japan. It spans about 800 kilometers (500 miles) along the Pacific coast.

The Philippine Sea Plate there slowly pulls down on the Eurasian Plate and causes it to occasionally snap back, an action that could lead to a megaquake and tsunami, JMA says.

The last Nankai Trough quake off Shikoku in 1946 recorded a preliminary magnitude of 8.0 and killed more than 1,300 people.

In 2013, a government disaster prevention team said a magnitude 9.1 Nankai Trough quake could generate a tsunami exceeding 10 meters (33 feet) within minutes, killing as many as 323,000 people, destroying more than 2 million buildings and causing economic damage of more than 220 trillion yen ($1.5 trillion) to large swaths of Japan’s Pacific coast.

The “megaquake advisory,” which is filled with scientific jargon, has worried and baffled people across the country. Some towns closed beaches and canceled annual events, which has led to challenges for travelers during Japan’s Obon holiday week, a time for festivals and fireworks across the nation.

Many people have put off planned trips and rushed to stock up on rice, dried noodles, canned food, bottled water, portable toilets and other emergency goods, leaving shelves empty at many supermarkets in western Japan and Tokyo, even though the capital is outside the at-risk area.

The Summit supermarket chain said microwavable rice is in short supply and the store is limiting purchases to one pack per customer.

Yoshiko Kudo and her husband Shinya said they had trouble understanding what exactly the advisory meant, how worried they should be and what they should do.

“We are trying not to go overboard. Too much worry is not good,” Yoshiko Kudo said.

“We don’t know how to be prepared and to still live normally like the experts tell us,” said Shinya Kudo, a caregiver in his 60s.

Yoneko Oshima, walking by a major train station in Tokyo, said: “It’s scary … They say there’s a (70-80%) chance in the next 30 years, but it could be tomorrow.” Her latest purchase is a portable toilet. She says water is indispensable for her diabetic husband, who needs to take medicine after every meal.

“I plan to take this opportunity to make a list and make sure we have everything at hand,” Oshima said. She hasn’t changed her holiday plans this week, but her daughter canceled a planned trip to Mount Fuji.

In Matsuyama city on the island of Shikoku, which has many hot springs, hotels and resorts reviewed their evacuation procedures and emergency equipment and launched a radio communication system for emergency use. They have received hundreds of cancellations since the advisory was issued, said Hideki Ochi, director of the Dogo Onsen Ryokan Association.

Rail companies serving the region said their trains are operating at slightly reduced speeds as a precaution.

A crisis management task force in the coastal town of Kuroshio in Kochi prefecture, where a tsunami as high as 34 meters (111 feet) was predicted in the government risk analysis, initially set up 30 shelters across town. But only two are still open following Monday’s JMA statement that there has been no indication of an impending megaquake.

Higashi Osaka urged residents on the town website not to engage in “unnecessary and non-urgent” travel in case of a major quake.

The popular seaside town of Shirahama in Wakayama prefecture said its four outdoor hot springs, parks and other facilities would be closed for a week. Saturday’s annual fireworks festival was also canceled.

Doctor’s brutal rape and murder leads to protest in India

The brutal rape and murder of a resident doctor during her 36-hour shift at a prominent state-run hospital in eastern India has led to an outbreak of protests and calls for a nationwide strike.

Hospital services across India have been disrupted as hundreds of thousands of doctors, nurses, and other medical staff launched an indefinite strike.

Protesters demanded “justice for our didi [elder sister]” outside the RG Kar Medical College and Hospital in Kolkata where the 31-year-old postgraduate trainee was found dead. The Independent spoke to doctors who unanimously agreed that the facility lacked safety measures for medical workers.

The demonstrations ensued last week after the resident doctor was found dead inside a seminar hall of the hospital on Friday. An autopsy later confirmed she had been sexually assaulted.

“She was very close to me – taught me most of the work I know today,” a student at the medical college, who did not want to be named, told The Independent. “I was working in the same department as an intern last year where she was found dead. This could happen to any of us in the future due to lack of security measures,” she said.

“We want the hospital authorities to take responsibility. What are they hiding?”

The local police arrested a civil volunteer associated with the Kolkata Police, Sanjay Roy, and remanded him to 14 days of custody. The suspect has been charged with rape and murder.

The protesting doctors in Kolkata and elsewhere have called for an unbiased investigation into the killing, the resignation of all responsible hospital authorities, adequate security for all medical staff, and speedy ratification of a healthcare protection law.

The victim was last seen after midnight on 9 August before she went to a third-floor seminar hall of the pulmonology department in the emergency building of the hospital during her 36-hour on-call duty.

Her partially naked body with visible marks of abuse was discovered by fellow students after 7am (local time) on Friday, who informed the police.

The victim’s family alleged they were initially informed by a senior police official over the phone that their daughter had died by suicide. “We want justice for our daughter. She did not deserve this. We want the truth to come out,” the father told The Telegraph Online.

The local police expanded their investigation into the suspected rape and murder to include resident doctors, hospital staff, and the assistant superintendent, who made the first call to the victim’s parents.

“We are absolutely transparent as far as this is concerned. We have nothing to hide,” Kolkata police commissioner Vineet Kumar Goyal told reporters amid allegations of evidence tampering.

A 24-year-old nursing student, who has been part of the demonstration since Friday, said the protest was for “seeking justice for the junior doctor and for safety of all the present and future healthcare workers”.

“There is nobody protecting the people who save lives in this country. This should have never happened,” Jhanvi Pandey told The Independent.

West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee has set a deadline for the city police to complete the investigation by 17 August, failing which it would be handed over to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), a federal investigative agency.

“If they fail [police] to complete the probe by Sunday, because of insider involvement, we will not keep the case with us,” she said after visiting the bereaved parents.

Sandip Ghosh, the principal of the medical college, resigned following public outrage over his remarks. He reportedly said: “It was irresponsible of the girl to go to the seminar hall alone at night.”

The pan-India doctors’ strike was in response to a call by the Federation of Resident Doctors Association (Forda) in solidarity with the agitation in Kolkata. The resident doctors association of the RG Kar Medical College ceased work on the emergency services last week.

The federation demanded the implementation of the central healthcare protection act, which prohibits acts of violence against healthcare service personnel including doctors, nurses, para-medical workers, medical students, and ambulance drivers.

“The strike is in response to a tragedy that has never happened in the history of the medical profession in India. It is not that we want to do it but the situation demands we set an example that the doctors’ can also take to the streets,” Aviral Mathur, president of Forda, told The Independent.

Dr Mathur said the association has received “overwhelming support”, with doctors and healthcare professionals of all levels across the nation joining the strike. The protest is expected to swell on Tuesday with more states participating.

“We demand that the investigation of the RG Kar Medical College should be done by an unbiased central agency, and the family of the victim should get due compensation,” he said, adding that the “too far” Sunday deadline raised the risk of evidence tampering.

“If there have been allegations of investigation getting botched up, swapped or tampered with, then there will be sufficient window.”

The doctors’ strike has left thousands of low-income patients in distress across state-run hospitals. Shyamal Guha, 78, was one such patient at the RG Kar hospital, who was made to return after spending more than two hours in the ambulance at the hospital.

“My father had a heart attack yesterday, now due to more complications the hospital asked us to move him here. They are now refusing to take him to the emergency room. If this continues, he will die,” Mr Guha’s son, Pradip, said.

While a series of ambulances made their way into the hospital premises, the patients inside the vehicle were forced to wait for hours and eventually return to find another hospital. “It is 4.30pm and RG Kar is the third hospital to have refused me treatment,” said a woman in anguish.

Dr Mathur said the strike was not called in haste without considering the patients. “Our profession is such that some patients will be left unattended but we have tried our best to continue emergency services,” he added.

A survey by the Indian Medical Association in 2015 found that 75 per cent of doctors in India faced some form of violence, with 12 per cent being physical assault.

Food bank distributes candy made from lethal amount of meth

A charity working with homeless people in Auckland, New Zealand unknowingly distributed candies filled with a potentially lethal dose of methamphetamine in its food parcels after the sweets were donated by a member of the public.

Auckland City Mission told reporters on Wednesday that staff had started to contact up to 400 people to track down parcels that could contain the sweets — which were solid blocks of methamphetamine enclosed in candy wrappers. New Zealand’s police have opened a criminal investigation.

The amount of methamphetamine in each candy was up to 300 times the level someone would usually take and could be lethal, according to the New Zealand Drug Foundation — a drug checking and policy organization, which first tested the candies.

Ben Birks Ang, a Foundation spokesperson, said disguising drugs as innocuous goods was a common cross-border smuggling technique and more of the candies might have been distributed throughout New Zealand.

The sweets had a high street value of NZ$ 1,000 ($608) per candy, which suggested the donation by an unknown member of the public was accidental rather than a deliberate attack, Birks Ang said.

The City Missioner, Helen Robinson, said eight families, including at least one child, had reported consuming the contaminated candies since Tuesday. No one was hospitalized and Robinson said the “revolting” taste meant most had immediately spat them out.

The charity’s food bank only accepts donations of commercially produced food in sealed packaging, Robinson said. The pineapple candies, stamped with the label of Malaysian brand Rinda, “appeared as such when they were donated”, arriving in a retail-sized bag, she added.

Auckland City Mission was alerted Tuesday by a food bank client who reported “funny-tasting” candy. Staff tasted some of the remaining candies and immediately contacted the authorities.

The candies had been donated sometime in the past six weeks, Robinson said. It was not clear how many had been distributed in that time and how many were made of methamphetamine.

Some of those who had received the food parcels were clients of the charity’s addiction service and the news that drugs had been distributed had provoked distress.

“To say that we are devastated in an understatement,” Robinson said, adding that the food bank — which distributes parcels five days a week — was closed Wednesday.

Interim leader says Bangladesh is a mess but ‘the monster is gone’

Bangladesh’s interim leader Muhammad Yunus has declared that his first priority is to secure law and order after former prime minister Sheikh Hasina left the country in a “complete mess”.

The Nobel laureate economist is the face of the south Asian country’s new leadership, having taken over as chief adviser of the interim government after a street agitation forced Ms Hasina, who ruled with an iron fist for 15 years, to flee to India.

Mr Yunus has described the agitation, driven by students, as a “revolution”.

“Law and order is the first priority so that people can sit down or get to work,” the new leader said in a briefing in the capital Dhaka.

He also promised to oversee broader reforms such as strengthening the freedom of speech after years of near authoritarian rule which was “a mess, complete mess”.

“Even the government, what they did, whatever they did, just simply doesn’t make sense to me,” he said. “They didn’t have any idea what administration is all about.”

But now there is hope, he claimed. “We are a fresh new face for them, for the country,” Mr Yunus said. “Finally, this moment, the monster is gone.”

Almost 500 people have been killed in violent protests that began as a demand to roll back a contentious jobs quota and soon turned into an anti-government agitation.

As Ms Hasina fled on a military helicopter earlier this month, law and order collapsed. To make the situation worse, police officers went on a strike in protest against the killing of over a dozen of their comrades during the violence.

This past weekend, leaders of the agitation demanded the resignation of Supreme Court chief justice Obaidul Hassan. He quickly resigned along with five other judges of the top court.

Mr Yunus outlined ensuring “independence of the judiciary” as another of his priorities. He said the previous system was not and acted at the behest of “some superior authority”.

“In technical terms, he was the chief justice,” the new leader said, referring to Mr Hassan. “But actually he was just a hangman.”

Mr Yunus faced a legal crackdown during Hasina’s rule after he was charged in a number of cases that his supporters denounced as “politically motivated vendetta”.

He was convicted earlier this year for violating the country’s labour law and sentenced to six months in jail. He was released on bail, however, and, recently just before taking over as the new leader, acquitted of the charges.

Ms Hasina claimed her ouster was engineered by the US, which was furious with her for refusing to hand over control of Saint Martin island in the Bay of Bengal, the Economic Times reported.

Washington has denied the allegation.

“We have had no involvement at all. Any reports or rumours that the United States government was involved in these events is simply false,” White House spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre said at a press briefing on Monday.

Asian shares mixed as jitters calm over global markets while uncertainty lingers

Asian shares traded mixed Wednesday, as Japan’s benchmark perked but quickly ran out of steam from news the prime minister won’t seek re-election as head of the ruling party.

Japan’s benchmark Nikkei 225 was down 0.1% in morning trading at 36,192.93. Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 gained 0.5% to 7,869.40. South Korea’s Kospi added 0.7% to 2,640.10. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng lost 0.3% to 17,127.65, while the Shanghai Composite shed 0.4% to 2,857.90.

Japan’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party controls the majority in the lower house of parliament, which picks the nation’s leader. Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s public support ratings are sagging lately amid a scandal involving shady money, as well as his overall lack of popularity with voters, according to Japanese media polls.

“We must show the Liberal Democratic Party will change. This will be the first step that will demonstrate that clearly,” Kishida said in announcing his decision.

Speculation is rife the party will turn to a younger politician as the next leader, with names like Shinjiro Koizumi, the son of former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, being tossed around. The younger Koizumi is still in his 40s, marking a departure from the elderly prime ministers of the past.

The overnight rise on Wall Street also boosted investor optimism. Although Japanese share prices rose at one point in morning trading, they sank on profit-taking, although prices soon recovered.

A cautious mood remains on global markets amid uncertainty about the U.S. economy. Next week brings a slew of economic data about Japan, including machinery orders, trade statistics, tallies on travelers from abroad, unemployment and consumer prices. Analysts think the Japanese economy basically remains on solid ground, thanks to the strong performance of some Japanese companies.

U.S. stocks rallied to one of their best days of the year after the first of several highly anticipated reports on the economy this week came in better than expected.

The S&P 500 jumped 1.7% for its third-best day of 2024 after the U.S. government reported inflation at the wholesale level slowed last month by more than economists expected. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 408 points, or 1%, and the Nasdaq composite clambered 2.3% higher.

Inflation in the U.S., which has been a worry for years, finally appears to be slowing. That means the U.S. Federal Reserve may ease up on high interest rates.

Treasury yields eased in the bond market following the inflation data, as traders remain convinced the Fed’s meeting next month will bring the first cut to interest rates since the COVID crash of 2020. The yield on the 10-year Treasury fell to 3.84% from 3.91% late Monday.

Investors still have their eyes on the U.S. government’s update on inflation, expected later in the day. A report showing how much U.S. shoppers are spending at retailers comes Thursday.

The economy is still growing, and many economists don’t expect a recession, but a sharp slowdown in U.S. hiring last month raised questions about its strength.

Starbucks soared 24.5% after it convinced Brian Niccol to leave his job as CEO of Chipotle Mexican Grill to take over the coffee chain. Chipotle, meanwhile, dropped 7.5%. Niccol has been its chief executive since 2018 and its chairman since 2020, and he helped its stock rise more than 240% for the five years through Monday.

All told, the S&P 500 rose 90.04 points to 5,434.43. The Dow added 408.63 to 39,765.64, and the Nasdaq composite gained 407.00 to 17,187.61.

In energy trading, benchmark U.S. crude rose 50 cents to $78.85 a barrel. Brent crude, the international standard, gained 44 cents to $81.13 a barrel.

In currency trading, the U.S. dollar inched down to 146.82 Japanese yen from 146.84 yen. The euro cost $1.0994, virtually unchanged from $1.0995.

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Yuri Kageyama is on X: https://x.com/yurikageyama

Elon Musk draws fire for playing down atomic bombing of Japan by US

Elon Musk has been accused of underplaying America’s atomic bombing of Japan’s Hiroshima and Nagasaki in World War II during his interview of Donald Trump.

Mr Musk was talking about nuclear power with the former president when he said people have an unfounded fear of nuclear electricity generation. It is the “safest form of electricity generation”, he argued.

“People were asking me in California, are you worried about a nuclear cloud coming from Japan? I am like no, that’s crazy. It is actually, it is not even dangerous in Fukushima. I flew there and ate locally grown vegetables on TV to prove it,” he said during the interview on his social media platform X on Monday.

“Hiroshima and Nagasaki were bombed but now they are full cities again,” the multibillionaire owner of Tesla, SpaceX and X said.

“That’s great, that’s great,” Mr Trump responded.

“It is not as scary as people think, basically,” Mr Musk added.

They joked about nuclear power facing a “branding problem”.

“We will have to rebrand it,” the former president told Mr Musk. “We will name it after you or something.”

America dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima on 6 August 1945, destroying the city and killing 140,000 people. Three days later, it nuked Nagasaki and killed 70,000 more people.

Japan surrendered on 15 August, ending World War II.

Mr Musk’s remarks understating the gravity of the atomic bombing of Japan and the Fukushima meltdown triggered an uproar on social media.

“Musk is minimising what happened in Fukushima. I am as big a fan of nuclear power as there is but this is a completely dumba** thing to say,” academic and author Tom Nichols said on X.

A towering tsunami slammed into the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in 2011, destroying its power supply and cooling systems and sparking meltdowns in three of its six reactors. The tsunami and the 9.0 magnitude earthquake that triggered it killed about 20,000 people and the meltdown left large parts of Fukushima prefecture uninhabitable.

“But he topped it by noting that Hiroshima and Nagasaki are fine now,” Mr Nichols said, referring to Mr Musk.

“Great job boys, just lost one of our most important allies in Asia,” said writer Kevin Xu.

At a ceremony marking the anniversary of the atomic bombing last week, Nagasaki mayor Shiro Suzuki called on countries with nuclear weapons and those under their nuclear umbrellas, including Japan, to abolish them.

“You must face up to the reality that the very existence of nuclear weapons poses an increasing threat to humankind,” Mr Suzuki said, “and you must make a brave shift toward the abolition of nuclear weapons.”

The ceremony was boycotted by ambassadors of the US, UK and several European countries in protest against Israel not being invited.

Japan’s prime minister Fumio Kishida reiterated his pledge to pursue a nuclear weapons-free world. But his critics, many of them survivors of the atomic bombings, criticised it as a hollow pledge as Japan relies on the American nuclear umbrella while building up its own military.