Category Archives: SECURITY

A verdict by Japan ’s top court in a case involving a group of South Koreans who sought to have their relatives’ names removed from the highly controversial Yasukuni shrine has reopened wounds of Tokyo’s colonial rule over the Korean peninsula. In a final ruling on Friday, the Supreme Court in Tokyo said the names could not be removed from Yasukuni as the plaintiffs’ relatives were Japanese nationals. The case was originally filed in 2013 by 27 South Koreans whose relatives had died fighting for Japan during World War II . Speaking outside the court in Tokyo on the same day, Yonhap News quoted Park Nam-soon, one of the plaintiffs, as saying: “I am completely at a loss and dumbfounded. I do not know what to say.” Park said her

Two senior Iranian judges have been shot dead in an apparent assassination in the country’s supreme court. Ali Razini and Mohammad Moghiseh were killed after an armed man entered the court, in the capital Tehran, on Saturday morning. The attacker is said to have then killed themselves while fleeing the scene, according to the judiciary’s news website, Mizan. A bodyguard was also injured in the attack. The motive for the attack is unclear, but both judges are said to have played a role in the persecution and killing of opponents of the Islamic regime throughout the 1980s and 1990s. In a statement to state news agency IRNA, the judiciary’s media office described the attack as premeditated assassination. It also said that, according to initial findings, the attacker had not been

The US State Department has approved a possible Foreign Military Sale (FMS) to Zambia for Bell 412 helicopters at an estimated cost of US$100 million. Zambia has asked to buy the medium-lift transport helicopter primarily to conduct peacekeeping, regional security, humanitarian aid and disaster response missions over long distances and in all weather conditions. The contract also includes requests for qualification and transition training for pilots and maintainers, ground support equipment and contractor field support. The purchase of the helicopters would be facilitated by a combination of foreign military funds and Zambian national funds, according to the US Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA). Bell will be the principal contract for the sale, based in Fort Worth, Texas. The sale will also, according to the DSCA, help to “improve the security

More than two weeks since Jeju Air Flight 2216 crashed at South Korea ’s Muan International Airport, grieving families of the 179 people killed in the disaster face another hurdle – online hate. Since the December 29 crash, social media and online communities had been filled with hateful comments and disinformation about the victims and their families, The Korea Herald reported. Comments included how families were “delighted” about receiving compensation from the government, with a man in his thirties being arrested for saying that those who lost multiple loved ones “must be thrilled” about getting the money. Jeju Air has said it will commit to fully supporting the funeral expenses of those who died in the crash, but has yet to disclose the amount of compensation for the victims’ families.

Taiwan’s military is grappling with a personnel shortage as a growing number of volunteer soldiers and officers opt for early discharge, despite the financial penalties. In 2020, 401 personnel applied for early discharge, having agreed to pay the fees to leave. Last year, that figure rocketed to 1,565 personnel, according to figures obtained through a legislative query submitted to the island’s cabinet last week. Taiwan’s volunteer soldiers are expected to be the main fighting force in a conflict because they receive more extensive training compared to the mandatory military service force, which has a set service duration of one year. Wan Mei-ling, a legislator from the main opposition Kuomintang (KMT) party, called the trend “alarming”. She warned that the ongoing personnel shortages risked undermining Taiwan’s defences amid escalating military threats

German authorities have said an oil tanker stuck in German waters belongs to Russia’s “shadow fleet”, which Berlin says is used to avoid sanctions. Germany’s maritime authorities (CCME) said on Friday that the Panamanian-flagged ship, known as Eventin, had lost power and steering, meaning tugboats were deployed to secure the vessel. German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock blamed Moscow, accusing Russian President Vladimir Putin of “circumventing” sanctions and threatening European security by “ruthlessly deploying a fleet of rusty tankers”. Russia, which previously declined to respond to accusations that it uses a shadow fleet, has not yet commented on this incident. The US, UK and the EU have imposed sanctions on Russia’s oil industry following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. In its first report of the tanker drifting in German

Washington, DC – The detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, turns 23 on Saturday. For Mansoor Adayfi, a former inmate at the prison, the anniversary marks 23 years of “injustice, lawlessness, abuse of power, torture and indefinite detention”. Only 15 prisoners remain at the United States military prison, known as Gitmo, which once held about 800 Muslim men — a dwindling number that gives advocates hope that the facility will eventually be shut down, turning the page on the dark chapter of history it represents. But Adayfi, who now serves as a coordinator for the Guantanamo Project at the advocacy group CAGE International, says truly closing down Gitmo means delivering justice to its current and former detainees. “The United States must acknowledge its wrongdoing, must issue a formal, official apology to

Nato is increasing its surveillance operations in the Baltic Sea region with two ships deployed to the area following the suspected sabotage of undersea cables between Finland and Estonia. The move was unveiled on Friday by Finland’s Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen, who called on policymakers to increase technical surveillance of the area, noting that it is impossible to monitor all submarine activity with ships. A wider presence in the area by the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation has a “calming and stabilising effect and we are very pleased about the decision”, Valtonen told reporters in Helsinki. The decision comes after Finland retrieved the anchor of a tanker, Eagle S, from the seabed as it probes aggravated criminal mischief and aggravated interference of communications in the cable breach incident that happened in

The property previously owned by former president Nelson Mandela in Houghton, Johannesburg, where his grandson Mbuso was arrested with four hijacking suspects on Wednesday, is not rented out.  Mbuso’s elder brother Ndaba told TimesLIVE the property had been neglected by his younger brother who had been living there for years.  Mbuso is expected to appear in the Johannesburg magistrate’s court on Friday with four other suspects arrested with him.  According to Johannesburg metro police (JMPD) spokesperson Xolani Fihla, the arrests followed information from a vehicle tracking company regarding the location of a white Toyota Corolla hijacked on Wednesday on Louis Botha Avenue in Oaklands.  Fihla said at the time JMPD officers recovered the hijacked vehicle and apprehended four men and one woman and a subsequent search of the premises resulted

Zorena Jantze THE bail hearing of Wentzel Maasdorp, who stands accused of murdering his domestic partner, Delia Weimers-Maasdorp, was a sombre environment, with the deceased woman seeming to speak from the grave, as the State presented texts from her journal showcasing how she struggled to end her relationship with Wentzel Maasdorp, who she claimed in her diary stole her bank cards as well as money from her purse to buy drugs. State Prosecutor Eric Naikaku also presented evidence of WhatsApp messages, provided by the State’s first witness, Raymond Lorenzo Maasdorp, the ex-husband of the deceased Weimers-Maasdorp, who is also a relative of Wentzel Maasdorp. Raymond added that he separated from the deceased in 2022, due her addiction issues and that the deceased started dating his relative Wentzel in August 2023