International

FORT MYERS: Hurricane Ian inundated cities, turned out the lights on millions of residents and left migrants from an overturned boat missing on Thursday as Florida assessed damage from what the state governor described as a “500-year flood event.” Officials launched a major emergency response after one of the most intense US storms in years, with helicopter crews plucking survivors …

KARACHI: Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari said on Thursday that Islamabad had so far not requested a restructuring, deferment or swap of debt owed to China in the wake of the catastrophic floods that hit the country. Insisting that whenever such a conversation takes place, it would be on Pakis­tan’s own terms, he said that he would like the country to …

KABUL: Taliban forces on Thursday used gunfire to disperse a women’s rally in the Afghan capital in support of protests in Iran over the death of a woman in morality police custody. Neighbours Afghanistan and Iran are both run by hardline Islamist governments that use religious police to enforce strict dress codes on women. Dozens of people have been killed …

Indonesia has approved its first locally developed Covid-19 vaccine for emergency use, the head of the country’s public health agency said on Friday, hailing it as a step toward “the nation’s independence in access to medicine”. Jakarta has stressed the importance of developing national vaccines since the beginning of the pandemic but it currently relies on China’s Sinovac and the …

Chinese regulators have approved the country’s first domestically produced large passenger jet, local media said, with Beijing hoping the plane will challenge foreign models such as the Boeing 737 MAX and Airbus A320. The C919 narrow-body jet, built by state-owned Commercial Aircraft Corp of China (COMAC), was certified at Beijing Capital Airport in an official ceremony Thursday, according to reports …

SEOUL: North Korea fired two short-range ballistic missiles off its east coast on Wednesday, South Korea’s military said, a day before US Vice President Kamala Harris is set to arrive in Seoul. The launch came two days after South Korea and US forces conducted a military drill in waters off the South’s east coast involving an aircraft carrier. On Sunday, …

DUBAI: Nationwide protests in Iran over the death of young woman Mahsa Amini in police custody continued to pile pressure on authorities on Wednesday amid reports of internet disruption in the country that is feared to herald more bloodshed. Meanwhile, Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi, who last week said the protests over Amini’s death were unacceptable “acts of chaos”, was set …

PARIS: Italy’s Samantha Cristoforetti on Wednesday became the first European woman to take over command of the International Space Station during a ceremony broadcast live from space. The outgoing commander, Russian cosmonaut Oleg Artemyev, used the occasion to seemingly make a rare space-bound reference to the war in Ukraine, saying that “despite the storms on Earth, our international cooperation continues”. …

PARIS: Planet-heating methane spewing into the atmosphere from the damaged Nord Stream pipelines only has a modest impact on climate change, say scientists, but sharply highlights the risks of fossil-fuel driven greenhouse gas emissions. The European Union has said it believes the leaks to the strategically important pipelines, Nord Stream 1 and 2, were caused by a “deliberate act”. While …

ISLAMABAD: The World Health Organisation (WHO) and the International Labour Organisation (ILO) have called for concrete actions to address mental health concerns in the working population, saying that an estimated 12 billion workdays are lost annually due to depression and anxiety, costing the global economy nearly $1 trillion. Two new publications, aimed at addressing the issue, were published on Wednesday, …