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Facebook Tweet Email Link Sudden floods triggered by heavy rains have killed more than 400 people across parts of Pakistan, India-administered Kashmir and Nepal, authorities have said, with scores of people still missing. In northwestern Pakistan, at least 321 people were killed in the space of 48 hours, local authorities reported Saturday, with more than ten villages in the Buner region of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province devastated by flash flooding. Washed out roads and landslides have prevented emergency workers from accessing the affected communities in Buner, where dozens more people are feared to be buried under rubble, according to Bilal…

Facebook Tweet Email Link AP  —  Bolivia’s charismatic, long-serving ex-President Evo Morales told The Associated Press on Saturday that he didn’t know what to do about threats by the right-wing presidential candidates to arrest him if they came to power. From his stronghold in Bolivia’s tropics of Chapare, where he has been holed up for months under the protection of die-hard supporters, he repeated his call for voters to deface their ballots in Sunday’s high-stakes elections in defiance of the race from which he is barred due to a contentious constitutional court ruling. “What are we going to do? Not…

Facebook Tweet Email Link Reuters  —  US President Donald Trump said on Friday that Chinese President Xi Jinping told him China would not invade Taiwan while Trump is in office. Trump made the comments in an interview with Fox News, ahead of talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin over Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine. “I will tell you, you know, you have a very similar thing with President Xi of China and Taiwan, but I don’t believe there’s any way it’s going to happen as long as I’m here. We’ll see,” Trump said during an interview on Fox News’ “Special Report.”…

Facebook Tweet Email Link Reuters  —  The African Union has backed a campaign to end the use by governments and international organizations of the 16th-century Mercator map of the world in favor of one that more accurately displays Africa’s size. Created by cartographer Gerardus Mercator for navigation, the projection distorts continent sizes, enlarging areas near the poles like North America and Greenland while shrinking Africa and South America. “It might seem to be just a map, but in reality, it is not,” AU Commission deputy chairperson Selma Malika Haddadi told Reuters, saying the Mercator fostered a false impression that Africa…

Facebook Tweet Email Link More than 360 people fell ill in Indonesia’s town of Sragen in Central Java after consuming school lunches, an official said on Thursday, in the largest food poisoning case to hit President Prabowo Subianto’s flagship free meals program. Since its launch in January, the free school meals program has been marred by mass food poisoning cases across the archipelago, affecting over 1,000 people. Sragen government chief Sigit Pamungkas told Reuters 365 people fell ill and a food sample was being tested in a lab. The government would pay for any medical treatment if needed. Wizdan Ridho…

Facebook Tweet Email Link US President Donald Trump is threatening an additional 25% tariff on India as well as higher tariffs on other countries that buy Russian oil, in an attempt to pressure Moscow to end the war in Ukraine. But the United States and Europe themselves are still doing billions of dollars in trade with Russia – although that’s a fraction of the trade that took place before the war. India has argued that it’s being unfairly targeted with the tariff increase, calling it “unjustified” given that other nations also do business with Moscow. Trade between Russia and the…

Facebook Tweet Email Link The writing has been on the wall for a long time: South Korea’s birth rate has dropped throughout much of the past decade, spelling trouble for the military as regional threats and global conflicts simmer. Now, a new report has found that the number of South Korean troops declined by 20% in the past six years, in large part because of the dwindling pool of young men – reflecting the shrinking workforce and swelling elderly population in one of the world’s most rapidly aging countries. The Defense Ministry report attributed the drop to “complex factors” including…

Facebook Tweet Email Link Jerusalem  —  Israel has given final approval to a controversial plan to build thousands of new housing units in the occupied West Bank that effectively cuts the territory in two. Plans for settlement in E1, an area east of Jerusalem, had been frozen for decades in the face of international opposition, since it would make a contiguous Palestinian state with a capital in East Jerusalem virtually impossible. But confirming the scheme, far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich made it clear that was his goal, saying in a statement, “The Palestinian state is being erased from the table…

Facebook Tweet Email Link Tel Aviv, Israel AP  —  Israel is in discussions with South Sudan about the possibility of resettling Palestinians from the Gaza Strip to the war-torn East African country, part of a wider effort by Israel to facilitate mass emigration from the territory left in ruins by its 22-month offensive against Hamas. Six people familiar with the matter confirmed the talks to The Associated Press. It’s unclear how far the talks have advanced, but if implemented, the plans would amount to transferring people from one war-ravaged land at risk of famine to another, and raise human rights…

Facebook Tweet Email Link Is there any food more intrinsic to America’s on-the-move lifestyle than the grab-and-go sandwich? The deep, diverse array of US sandwich options owes much of its greatness to the creativity and resourcefulness of immigrant communities. Cities and states from coast to coast claim their classics. New Orleans’ olive salad-studded muffaletta was invented by Italian immigrants who settled in the city’s Lower French Quarter. The Cuban sandwich as we know it today evolved in Florida and was shaped by immigrant communities from Cuba, Spain, Italy and Germany. And both Miami and Tampa take credit for it. Feeling…