Japanese children in hospital after eating ‘super spicy’ crisps

At least 14 students from a Tokyo high school have been admitted to hospital after eating extra spicy crisps during their morning break.

The children experienced nausea and mouth pain after consuming the “R 18+ curry chips”. One took so ill they had to be transported in a wheelchair, Asahi Shimbun reported.

The crisps are marketed as not for consumption by children under 18 due to their intense spiciness from ghost peppers, also known as Bhut Jolokia.

They were brought to the Rokugo Koka High School by a student “just for fun” on 16 July, the report said.

Nearly 30 students ate the crisps and 14 were rushed to hospital, all but one of them girls.

According to crisp maker Isoyama Corp, the product comes with warnings on the package stating, “People aged under 18 should refrain from eating this product because it is too spicy” and “Not only people who are not good at spicy foods but also those who like spicy foods need to be cautious while eating this product”.

A company representative apologised for the incident and hoped for the speedy recovery of the students, Mainichi Shimbun reported.

The school alerted police at around 1pm saying several students were experiencing difficulties after consuming the spicy snack.

In 2007, Guinness World Records certified the ghost pepper as the world’s hottest chilli, boasting over one million Scoville Heat Units, 170 times hotter than Tabasco sauce and significantly surpassing cayenne pepper in heat intensity.

Spicy snacks have gained wide popularity recently, often as a result of social media challenges. But they have occasionally sent people to hospital and were even implicated in the death of a Massachusetts teenager last year.

Denmark recently recalled Korean ramen noodles containing high levels of chilli extract in the broth mix. The regulator said the concentration exceeded that found in chilli chips blamed for poisonings in Germany.

“Chilli in large quantities poses a risk to children and frail adults in particular,” Henrik Dammand Nielsen from the Danish Food and Drug Administration was quoted as saying by CBS News.

“Possible symptoms include burning and discomfort, nausea, vomiting and high blood pressure. That’s why we are now demanding that the shops remove the products from their shelves.”

Isis claims rare mass shooting of Shia Muslims in Oman

The Isis militant group has claimed responsibility for the killing of at least nine people in a rare attack on a Shia mosque in the wealthy Gulf state of Oman.

About 28 others also sustained injuries late on Monday when several gunmen stormed into the Ali bin Abi Talib mosque in the Wadi al-Kabir neighbourhood of the capital Muscat, located around 500 metres from an international school.

Four Pakistanis, an Indian national and a police officer were among those killed in the gun attack, the authorities said.

The Sunni extremist group claimed responsibility on Tuesday through an affiliated news agency, without providing evidence. It represents the first time Isis has purported to be behind an attack in Oman, where only 5 per cent of Muslims are believed to belong to the Shia sect.

A video showed a crowd running for cover inside the mosque as gunmen opened fire on believers gathered on the eve of Ashura — an annual period of mourning, where Shia Muslims commemorate the martyrdom of the Prophet Muhammad’s grandson, Imam Hussein, and his 72 companions in the battle of Karbala in the seventh century in present-day Iraq.

Believers could be heard crying “Oh god” and “Oh Hussein” as gunshots rang out in the background.

“There were nearly 500-600 people in the courtyard when we first heard sounds that resembled fireworks,” an unnamed Pakistani expatriate told Times of Oman.

The firing continued for more than an hour and a half as everyone tried to rush inside the mosque, the eyewitness recalled.

“We were instructed to stay silent in the hall. In that moment of despair, I messaged my friend, thinking I might not live to see the dawn. Death seemed imminent.

“We felt like hostages for nearly two-three hours before ROP (Royal Oman Police) officers finally made their way into the building,” he added.

The extremist group said three of its “suicide attackers” fired on visitors to the mosque on Monday evening and exchanged gunfire with Omani security forces until morning. It said the gunmen attacked a gathering of Shia Muslims who were “practising their annual rituals”.

Police in Oman have not said whether they have identified a motive for the attack or made any arrests.

Pakistan identified four of the dead as its citizens. “This is a very unprecedented event … the likes of it we have not seen in Oman’s history,” Pakistan’s ambassador to Muscat, Imran Ali, said after visiting some victims in hospital.

Pakistan’s prime minister Shehbaz Sharif offered condolences and “instructed the Pakistan embassy in Muscat to extend all possible assistance to the injured”. “Pakistan stands in solidarity with the Sultanate of Oman and offers full assistance in the investigation,” he added.

Nearly two million migrants, mostly from South Asia, help power Oman’s economy by filling low-skilled jobs in construction and other fields.

The US embassy in Muscat issued a security alert following the shooting and asked its citizens to remain vigilant and monitor local news.

Analysts described the rare shooting as the latest example of Isis returning to carrying out random international attacks after losing its fief in Iraq and Syria.

“It makes them more resilient in some ways,” Aaron Y Zelin, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, told the Associated Press. “It’s part of their reorganisation from being a group with most of its actions in Iraq and Syria to using their resources in a global network.”

Isis have long targeted Shia Muslims in their violent attacks and propaganda, describing them as heretics. The group claimed responsibility for an attack in Shia-majority Iran that killed 84 people in January.

In March, the group said it was behind an attack that killed more than 140 people at a concert hall near Moscow.

Rare virus kills 8 in India and sparks encephalitis outbreak concerns

At least eight Indian children have died in the past week from suspected infection by the relatively unknown Chandipura virus, sparking concerns about an encephalitis outbreak.

Seven children are fighting for their lives in hospital, Rushikesh Patel, health minister in the western Gujarat state, said.

Chandipura virus, or CHPV, is named after Chandipura village in coastal Maharashtra state where it was first identified during an investigation into a dengue and chikungunya outbreak in 1965.

An RNA virus of the Rhabdoviridae family, which includes the rabies virus, it primarily affects children and is associated with outbreaks of acute encephalitis in India.

“This disease occurs by the sting of a vector-infected sandfly and mainly affects children aged 9 months to 14 years,” Mr Patel was quoted as saying by India Today.

“It is seen more in rural areas. Fever, vomiting, loose motion and headache are the main symptoms.”

The virus “has garnered significant attention in recent years due to its potential to cause severe and often fatal illnesses in humans, particularly children”, Dr Neha Rastogi Panda, an infectious diseases specialist at the Fortis Memorial Research Institute in Gurugram, told IANS.

The virus lives in the salivary glands of the sandfly and the Aedes aegypti mosquito. It can move into the central nervous system after infecting a child, causing encephalitis or inflammation of the active brain tissue.

It initially presents symptoms like fever, body ache and headache but progresses to seizures, altered sensorium and encephalitis within 24 to 72 hours.

Although the disease is not contagious, it requires early diagnosis and supportive care due to the rapid onset of severe symptoms, lack of specific antiviral treatments or vaccines, making it a severe challenge for doctors and public health officials.

“Only symptomatic treatment is possible in the absence of any antiviral and proper care of the patient in an intensive care unit,” Dr Sayan Chakraborty, infectious diseases consultant at Manipal Hospital, Kolkata, told Telegraph India.

The Chandipura virus caused a major encephalitis outbreak in India in the early 2000s, killing 322 children.

The virus is endemic to Gujarat, Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh, which appear to have higher sandfly and mosquito populations.

“A lot of houses also use cow dung paint or maybe make cow dung cakes, which in turn attracts sandflies,” Dr Rajesh Jeswani, a paediatrician in Gujarat, told The Indian Express.

“Additionally, outbreaks are more pronounced because sandflies multiply more during the monsoon season.”

Doctors have voiced concerns about the changing nature of the vector and symptoms.

“Sandflies usually do not fly at a height more than three feet from the ground but this time, during surveillance, sandflies have been found on terraces and higher heights,” Dr Sandipkumar Trivedi, a former executive board member of the Indian Association of Pediatrics, told the newspaper. “Additionally, of the six suspected deaths so far, two presented with brain haemorrhages, which is a new presentation.”

Insecticide sprays could help eliminate the vector, public health experts said and called for measures to prevent the spread of the virus by controlling sandfly populations and mosquito bites.

“Strategies include the use of insect repellents, bed nets and insecticides as well as raising awareness about the risks and symptoms of the disease,” Dr Panda said.

Six killed as protests over jobs quota turn violent in Bangladesh

Six people have been killed in the ongoing unrest in Bangladesh over government job reservations, prompting authorities to shut down all universities in the country indefinitely.

Hundreds of people have sustained injuries in the protests which turned violent after demonstrators clashed with police and pro-government agitators this week. Three of the dead have been identified as students aged between 22 and 32.

They have been protesting against a 30 per cent 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.

The policy has angered students suffering from high unemployment in a country where some 32 million young people are not in work or education. Bangladesh has a total population of 170 million.

The protests escalated after prime minister Sheikh Hasina refused to address the demands of the students, citing ongoing court proceedings, and labelled those opposing the quota system as “razakar“, or volunteer, a term used for those who allegedly collaborated with the Pakistani army during the 1971 war.

The demonstrators claimed the prime minister’s statement incited her party’s student wing — Bangladesh Chhatra League, or BCL — to attack thousands of people rallying against the quota system.

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. Her government has a track record of deploying brute force against critics to throttle dissent.

The government has deployed riot police along with the Border Guard Bangladesh paramilitary force across university campuses to maintain law and order.

The protesters have been demanding an end to the quota system, arguing that people should be selected for the sought-after government jobs based on merit.

“We were protesting peacefully until we were attacked by the BCL goons. It is our right to continue protesting, it is embedded in the history of this country and we shall continue to do so for our right,” a Dhaka university student who did not want to be named for fear of persecution told The Independent.

On Tuesday, the University Grants Commission ordered all universities to shut down and instructed students to vacate the campuses immediately “to protect the students”.

High schools, colleges and other educational institutions were also shut.

Police arrested seven activists, including a former leader of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party’s student wing, during a raid at the main opposition party’s headquarters in Dhaka.

“The ruling party members are targeting non-protesting students inside the campus as well. Men, women, anyone who refuses to side with the government quota is being assaulted,” Rubina Khatun, a student at Dhaka University, told The Independent.

She said the students have been given time till 6pm today to vacate the university premises but some have decided to stay back, defying the order. “This puts us in so much danger. There is violence everywhere, how would we go home,” she said.

Police fired rubber bullets and tear gas to disperse the protesters as at least two buses were set ablaze amid reports of sporadic clashes across the country.

“We have no issue with them protesting against the quota. However, if they engage in vandalism or destructive activities, under anyone’s influence or leadership, we will not spare them,” said home minister Asaduzzaman Khan. “Wherever there is vandalism, killing, or bloodshed, law enforcement will do their duties.”

Nahid Islam, a coordinator of the protests, said students will hold processions on Wednesday carrying coffins in solidarity with those who lost their lives. The paramilitary paraded through the streets of Dhaka and other big cities as stray protests continued at some universities.

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.

Mummified crocodile’s gut sheds light on Egyptian sacrifice ritual

Advanced scans of a mummified crocodile have revealed it was likely killed as an offering to the god Sobek, shedding more light on the practice of animal sacrifice in ancient Egyptian rituals.

Archaeologists said the mummy, kept at Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery, could be between 2,000 and 3,000 years old, when the practice of mummifying animals was at its peak.

They found the 2.2-metre-long reptile had swallowed stones to break down chunks of meat and regulate its buoyancy.

The stones were higher up in the gut, indicating the animal attempted to break down its last meal, a fish still tied to its hook, but died before the food could reach its stomach.

The findings led scientists to suspect the crocodile was caught in the wild and processed for mummification, likely as an offering to the crocodile god Sobek.

“Our work revealed a great amount of information, both about the life of the crocodile and the postmortem treatment of its remains,” Egyptologist Lidija Mcknight said.

“Mummies have long been a source of fascination for museum visitors of all ages. Our work provides a unique opportunity to connect visitors to the story of this animal,” Dr Mcknight, a co-author of the study published in the journal Digital Applications in Archaeology and Cultural Heritage, said.

The study also showed the promise of imaging technology to peer inside mummies without damaging them as opposed to more invasive techniques like autopsy which were previously used.

Using special software and 3D X-ray scans, scientists could virtually reconstruct the hook attached to the fish.

“We took the process a step further by replicating the hook in its original material, bronze,” Dr Mcknight said.

“Egyptians probably used a hardened clay mould into which the molten metal, melted over a charcoal-based heat source, would have been poured. Despite the passing of several millennia between the production of the ancient fish hook and the modern replica, the casting process remains remarkably similar.”

North Korean diplomat posted in Cuba defects to South Korea

A North Korean diplomat in Cuba defected to South Korea with his family in November last year, the South Korean spy agency has said, in what would be the highest-profile defection in recent years.

In a brief statement, the National Intelligence Service confirmed a South Korean newspaper’s report that Ri Il Kyu, 52, North Korean counsellor of political affairs in Cuba, defected last year.

As a counsellor, Mr Ri was tasked with blocking rival South Korea and old ally Cuba from forging diplomatic ties, Chosun Ilbo reported.

The two countries established diplomatic ties in February this year, weakening Pyongyang’s thin network of allies.

Mr Ri said he did not reveal his plan even to his family until hours before he pulled off the high-risk escape. “I bought flight tickets and called my wife and kid to tell them about my decision, six hours before the defection,” he said. “I didn’t say South Korea, but said, let’s live abroad.”

Mr Ri told Chosun Ilbo that he defected because of disillusionment with the North Korean political system.

But the Yonhap news agency, citing an unidentified South Korean official, reported that Mr Ri escaped after clashing with North Korean foreign ministry officials about his job evaluation.

Mr Ri’s is the latest defection from isolated North Korea. Those caught attempting to defect from the country face severe punishment, including death, according to human rights groups and defectors who have been successful.

The last high-profile defection from North Korea to South Korea was that of Tae Yong-ho, a former deputy ambassador to the UK, who escaped in 2016, drawing rebuke from Pyongyang.

Mr Tae said he fled because he did not want his children to live “miserable” lives in North Korea and that he felt “despair” after watching Kim Jong-un order the executions of officials and pursue the development of nuclear weapons.

North Korea called Mr Tae “human scum” and accused him of embezzling government money and committing other crimes. Mr Tae had been elected to South Korea’s parliament in 2020.

Mr Ri was inducted into North Korea’s foreign ministry in 1999 and applauded by the North Korean leader for successfully negotiating with Panama to end the detention of a North Korean ship caught carrying arms from Cuba in 2013, Chosun Ilbo said.

Mr Ri said North Korea denying his request to travel to Mexico for medical treatment last year was the final nail in the coffin in his decision to leave North Korea.

The death of his parents and parents-in-law, who might have faced reprisals for his defection, also helped him make up his mind, he said.

According to human rights groups, fewer North Korean defectors have been able to escape to the South in recent years due to strict limits on border crossings into China and hefty broker fees.

Last year, 196 North Korean defectors came to Seoul, down from nearly 2,700 a decade ago, according to data from the South Korean government.

In 2020, North Korean diplomat Jo Song-gil and his wife were reported to be living in South Korea after having disappeared in Italy. Mr Jo was working in the North Korean embassy in Rome as acting ambassador.

The year before, North Korea’s acting ambassador to Kuwait left for South Korea with his family. South Korean lawmakers said the diplomat changed his name to Ryu Hyun-woo after arriving in South Korea.