Oita (Japan) (AFP) – One of the strongest typhoons to hit Japan in recent decades dumped torrential rain across southern regions on Thursday, with authorities warning of life-threatening flooding and landslides.
Caracas (AFP) – Venezuela’s opposition leader Maria Corina Machado leads a mass rally in Caracas to press for recognition of the election “victory”, one month after a presidential vote it claims was stolen by incumbent Nicolas Maduro. IMAGES
Beijing (AFP) – China says it is “willing to engage” with the UN Human Rights Office over the northwestern Xinjiang region, but rejects the “politicisation of human rights” and efforts to “suppress or smear” the country. The comments come after the UN warned that “problematic” policies continued in the region, two years after a report citing possible “crimes against humanity” relating to China’s alleged treatment of Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities.
Madrid (AFP) – Real Madrid coach Carlo Ancelotti says French forward Kylian Mbappe’s two-week goal drought is not “enough time to worry,” describing the 25-year-old as “very satisfied, very happy.”
Sao Paulo (AFP) – Images of the Israelita Albert Einstein Hospital, where Uruguayan football player Juan Manuel Izquierdo died, in Sao Paulo, on August 27. IMAGES
Berlin (AFP) – German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer announce a planned new treaty between their countries, with Starmer calling it a “once-in-a-generation opportunity”. Speaking in Berlin, Scholz says he is “delighted” that the UK leader will “seek a fresh start in relations with the European Union.”
Mumbai (AFP) – Among the swanky skyscrapers of Mumbai, India’s financial capital, families risk their lives staying in dilapidated buildings as they try to escape the city’s high rents. Hundreds of residential buildings face demolition, with authorities fearing they could collapse — as some have already — due to heavy monsoon rains.
Deir el-Balah (Palestinian Territories) (AFP) – When 10-month-old Abdel Rahman Abu al-Jedian contracted polio in July, he became the Gaza Strip’s first case of the disease in 25 years. It had previously been detected in water in the war-torn territory, raising the concerns of health services and aid agencies, who are now grappling with how to roll out a mass vaccination program in such a hostile environment.
Jakarta (AFP) – While gambling is illegal in the world’s most populous Muslim-majority nation — with sentences of up to six years in prison — government figures show around 3.7 million Indonesians engaged in it last year, placing more than $20 billion in bets. The stats prompted President Joko Widodo in June to set up a task force headed by the country’s security minister and that month the government ordered telecoms providers to block overseas gambling websites — typically in Cambodia and the Philippines. In Bogor, south of the capital Jakarta, a clinic at a psychiatry hospital has been treating patients struggling to break their gambling addiction since the beginning of the year. ARRANGED IN SEQUENCES
Kolpur (Pakistan) (AFP) – Pakistani forces hunt separatist militants who killed dozens when they pulled passengers off buses, blew up a bridge and stormed a hotel. The attack on August 26 was one of the worst in the region’s history.
