At least 14 dead after bus carrying Indian pilgrims plunges into river

At least 14 people were killed, 16 others injured, and several more believed to be missing after a bus carrying dozens of Indian pilgrims drove off a key highway on Friday in Nepal, officials said.

The bus veered off the Prithvi Highway and rolled toward a fast-flowing river, stopping on the rocky bank. The top part of the bus was ripped, but the wreckage did not plunge into the Marsyangdi river.

Armed police force spokesperson Shailendra Thapa said that among those pulled out of from the bus, 14 were declared dead and 16 were injured in the accident.

Officials could not yet say how many more were missing or the exact number of people on the bus when it crashed, but they estimated there were some four dozen on board at the time of the accident.

Police and army rescuers were helping to pull people from the wreckage near Abukhaireni, a town about 120km (75miles) west of the capital, Kathmandu.

At least 29 passengers were rescued from the bus bearing the Uttar Pradesh state number plate UP 53 FT 7623, reported the Times of India newspaper.

The bus from neighbouring Indian town of Gorakhpur was heading toward Kathmandu from the resort town of Pokhara on Friday when it drove off the highway midway in the journey.

In July, two buses were swept by landslides not too far from Friday’s accident site. Of the 65 people on board those two buses, only three survived and only about half the bodies were recovered. The wreckage of those buses have not been found yet but authorities have continued to search.

Bus accidents in Nepal are mostly due to poorly maintained roads and vehicles and much of the country is covered by mountains with narrow roads.

All 9 passengers and crew feared dead in Thailand plane crash

All nine people on board a small passenger plane are believed to be dead after the aircraft crashed shortly after takeoff from Bangkok’s main airport in Thailand on Thursday afternoon.

There were five tourists from Hong Kong on board, as well as two cabin crew members and a pilot and co-pilot, all four from Thailand.

The crash occured 11 minutes after departure, the country’s civil aviation authority confirmed.

The plane, a Cessna Caravan C208B, reportedly lost contact with air traffic control and crashed in a mangrove swamp in Chachoengsao province.

The plane was on its way to Trat, a coastal province located about 275km (171 miles) southeast of Bangkok.

The Civil Aviation Authority of Thailand reported that the turboprop plane, operated by the Thai Flying Service Company, took off from Bangkok’s Suvarnabhumi Airport at 2.46pm local time. However, 11 minutes later, air traffic control lost radio and radar contact with the aircraft, which was about 35km southeast of the airport at that point.

According to the Bangkok Post, search and rescue efforts continued into Thursday night.

It stated that the wreckage of the small plane was discovered in the muddy terrain of a mangrove forest and search and rescue teams found women’s clothing and a photo of three foreign women at the crash site.

Local police said search teams were collecting the wreckage, but as of Thursday evening, no sign of the plane’s occupants had been found. However, the Associated Press, citing a provincial government spokesperson, stated that after approximately an hour of searching rescuers discovered fragmented body parts in the swampy terrain.

The search efforts have also been hampered by high tide flooding the area near the mouth of the Bang Pakong River.

The cause of the crash is still unknown.

Thailand confirms Asia’s first case of dangerous new mpox variant

Thailand has confirmed Asia’s first known case of a new, more dangerous strain of mpox in a European traveller.

The patient, a 66-year-old man who arrived from an unnamed African country on 14 August, has tested positive for the Clade 1b variant, which is deadlier and more transmissible.

“Thailand’s Department of Disease Control wishes to confirm the lab test result which shows mpox Clade 1b in a European patient,” the department said in a statement.

The man had minimal contact with other people after he arrived in Thailand and sought medical attention the following day after he experienced symptoms similar to mpox, authorities said.

“We have monitored 43 people who have been in close contact with the patient and so far they have shown no symptoms, but we must continue monitoring for a total of 21 days,” the department said.

Earlier, Thongchai Keeratihattayakorn, head of the Department of Disease Control, told Reuters: “After he arrives from the flight there is very little timeframe where he comes into contact with others.

“He arrived around 6pm and on the next day, 15 August, he went to see the doctor at the hospital.”

He had earlier told AFP that the department had done a test and “they definitely have mpox and it’s definitely not Clade 2”.

“We are convinced the person has the Clade 1 variant, but we have to wait to see the final result in the lab for two more days.”

Thailand previously detected 800 cases of the Clade 2 variant but not any of Clade 1 or Clade 1b.

The European traveller had been placed in quarantine after his arrival in Bangkok, and lab tests were conducted to confirm the strain.

The department added that anyone travelling to Thailand from the 42 designated “risk countries” must register and undergo testing upon arrival.

There are two distinct clades or natural groups of the mpox virus: Clade 1 and Clade 2.

Clade 2 was responsible for the global outbreak which started in 2022. Clade 1 is considered more severe and is classified as a high consequence infectious disease.

The WHO has declared a public health emergency due to a new mpox outbreak in several African nations, with at least three cases now reported outside the continent.

More than 17,000 cases and 571 deaths have been confirmed in Africa so far this year.

In Thailand, authorities have mandated that all international airport disease control checkpoints and ports, particularly at Don Muang and Suvarnabhumi airports and Laem Chabang port, screen passengers arriving from Africa, the Bangkok Post reported.

The Philippines also recently reported its first mpox case of the year, involving a 33-year-old Filipino male with no travel history, the Department of Health announced on Monday. The patient is currently recovering in a hospital.

“We’re lucky because this mpox we found [here] was the original variety, clade 2. Mpox entered the country and [is] probably circulating in our community,” country’s health secretary Teodoro Herbosa was quoted as saying by news channel ANC.

Elsewhere in the region, Indonesia is implementing screening measures at its entry points. The Malaysian health ministry also announced it will start preventive measures, including increased surveillance at international entry points, requiring travellers from countries with mpox cases to monitor their health for 21 days.

Vietnam’s health ministry stated in a directive on Monday that it will monitor for “suspected cases at the border” and report them to a central database.

At least 12 Pakistan police officers killed in ambush by bandits

At least 12 police officers have been killed in Pakistan’s deadliest attack of its kind by bandits in the eastern province of Punjab, officials said.

The toll rise by one on Friday after a wounded officer died in hospital.

Thursday’s attack with guns and rocket-propelled grenades also wounded eight officers. It took place in the Kacha area in Rahim Yar Khan district, which is known for hideouts along the Indus River where hundreds of heavily armed bandits evade police.

Punjab police chief Usman Anwar said police killed a bandit leader who was behind the attack named Bashir Shar. In a statement, Anwar said the operation against the robbers is still ongoing, and it will continue until the last bandit is eliminated in the province.

Senior police and government officials will attend the funerals of slain officers later Friday.

Bandits often rob people traveling on highways in Punjab and elsewhere in the country. Some areas in Punjab are so dangerous that people avoid traveling after sunset to avoid getting robbed, though police have cleared most of the so-called “no-go areas.”

According to police, the bandits ambushed police when one of the vehicles carrying officers broke down while passing through flooded farm fields. Pakistan has been lashed by monsoon rains since July.

The attack was denounced by President Asif Ali Zardari, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi, who released statements to express sorrow and described the slain officers as martyrs.

Pakistan has witnessed a surge in violence, mostly blamed on militants, in recent years but the death of so many police officers in one attack in unprecedented.

Police said the robbers took advantage of the darkness to attack police. In a statement, they said that the “morale of the police is high, and such cowardly actions by robbers cannot lower the morale of the police.”

Two dead after jumping to escape hotel fire as air mattress fails

A fire at a hotel in Bucheon, South Korea, killed seven people and injured dozens of others on Thursday.

Two of the victims reportedly died after jumping from the eighth floor of the hotel onto an air mattress provided by the fire department, which flipped upon impact.

The fire was first reported at about 7.39pm local time on Thursday. Of the seven people who died, five were killed by smoke inhalation, according to Cho Seon-ho, chief of the Gyeonggi provincial fire services.

The other two victims died after jumping from a window, trying to land on an inflatable mattress set up by firefighters. The first person hit the edge of the cushion, causing it to flip and fatally injure the second person, who jumped immediately after.

The fire reportedly started on the eighth floor, likely due to an electrical fault. The hotel has nine storeys.

The damage is believed to be extensive because the rooms lacked sprinklers, the local fire officials said on Friday. The hotel was built before sprinklers were legally required. The fire, however, did not spread throughout the building.

Videos from the site of the fire showed smoke billowing from the eighth floor. The name of the hotel was not immediately available.

At the time of the fire, more than 20 guests were inside the hotel, according to Yonhap news agency. Pictures from the site also showed several fire tenders and ambulances outside the hotel.

Those injured in the fire have been taken to a nearby hospital for treatment.

The victims’ bodies were reportedly found lying in staircases and halls. In June this year, a massive fire at a lithium battery factory in Hwaseong, located 45km south of Seoul, killed 23 people.

Nepal lifts TikTok ban imposed for disrupting ‘social harmony’

Nepal on Thursday decided to lift its ban on Tiktok, nine months after it restricted the video-sharing social media app for disrupting “social harmony”.

The government’s decision came about during a cabinet meeting, reported the state-run National News Agency.

“A decision to remove the ban on TikTok has been made,” the minister for communications and information technology, Prithvi Subba Gurung, told reporters.

This comes a week after TikTok’s South Asia division requested Gurung that the ban be lifted and that it would follow Nepal’s regulations, according to ministry spokesperson Gajendra Kumar Thakur.

However, TikTok has to fulfil certain conditions before it can resume operations, and has been given three months to do so.

“Now onwards, TikTok has to help promote Nepal’s tourism; invest in digital literacy efforts; support to uplift Nepal’s public education system; and be mindful of the language used on its platform,” said Gurung.

“After TikTok assured the government that it would fulfil these conditions, we decided in principle to allow TikTok to resume operations in Nepal.”

“We’re excited to be able to continue enabling Nepali voices and creativity,” said a spokesperson for TikTok.

TikTok was banned in Nepal in November 2023 by the then prime minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal-led government, on the grounds that it “disturbs social harmony and disrupts family structures and social relations,” according to former minister for communications and information technology Rekha Sharma.

At the time, there was no further discussion or clarity on what had triggered the ban.

There were dozens of protests in Kathmandu when the ban was announced, with several saying the ban had not only cut off a source of income for multiple influencers, it also shut down an avenue for free speech.

“My life changed a lot because of TikTok, a lot. So many recognise me because of TikTok wherever I go,” said 39-year-old Nepalese influencer Anjana Aryal, whose TikTok had nearly 600,000 followers.

Aryal made close to $3,000 (£2,287) in a single month from endorsement deals and even sold her own brand of pickles, all of which came to a stop once the ban came into effect.

“People were earning, running businesses or just being entertained on TikTok. Everyone has been affected now and they don’t know what to do,” she said.

China’s ByteDance-owned TikTok is banned in several countries, including India and Afghanistan, with the UK, Australia, and the European Union restricting its use.

It was reported last year when the ban took effect that more than 1,600 TikTok-related cyber crime cases had been registered over the last four years in Nepal.

According to the Internet Service Providers’ Association of Nepal (ISPAN), TikTok had about 2.2 million users in Nepal.

While TikTok has not managed to catch up to the number of users on Meta’s social media apps – Facebook and Instagram – it is far more popular with users between the ages of 16 and 24.

Manish Adhikari, another influencer whose content followed cars and Nepalese start-ups, said he had moved to Instagram, but was struggling to fulfil his endorsement deals with brands because his views and audience were nowhere close to the reach he enjoyed on TikTok.

“Brands started to call me … and I wondered if I was getting out of business, is my work going to stop?” Adhikari said.

Earlier this year, researchers aimed to figure out how TikTok’s algorithm worked, in an effort to understand its appeal.

However, researchers weren’t able to figure it out entirely, referring to the platform’s algorithm as a “black box”.

“The algorithm is such a black box to the public and regulators. And to some extent, it probably is to TikTok itself,” Franziska Roesner, a computer scientist at the University of Washington, said.