Headline

North Korea Threatens To Down US Spy Planes Violating Its Airspace

Published

2 years ago

July 11, 2023

North Korea on Monday threatened to shoot down any US spy planes violating its airspace and condemned Washington’s plans to deploy a nuclear missile submarine near the Korean peninsula.

A spokesperson for the North’s Ministry of National Defence said the United States has “intensified espionage activities beyond the wartime level”, with “provocative” flights made by US spy aircraft over eight straight days this month, and one reconnaissance plane intruding into its airspace over the East Sea “several times”.

“There is no guarantee that such shocking accident as downing of the US Air Force strategic reconnaissance plane will not happen in the East Sea of Korea,” the spokesperson said in a statement, carried by the official Korean Central News Agency.

The spokesperson cited past incidents when Pyongyang shot down US aircraft, and warned the United States would pay for its “frantically staged” air espionage.

Late on Monday, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s powerful sister Kim Yo Jong said that a US spy aircraft had violated the country’s eastern airspace twice on Monday morning, according to a statement.

Kim Yo Jong said that the North would not respond directly to US reconnaissance activities outside of the country’s exclusive economic zone, but warned that it would take “decisive action” if the US military crosses its maritime military demarcation line.

In a separate statement carried by KCNA Tuesday, Kim Yo Jong warned that the US military would face “a very critical flight” in case of a new intrusion by a US aircraft.

The earlier KCNA statement also slammed the planned deployment of US strategic nuclear assets to the Korean peninsula as “the most undisguised nuclear blackmail” against North Korea, saying it posed a grave threat to regional and global security.

“The present situation clearly proves that the situation of the Korean peninsula is coming closer to the threshold of nuclear conflict due to the US provocative military action,” it read.

Washington said in April that it would send a nuclear-armed ballistic submarine to make the first visit to a South Korean port in decades, without specifying the exact timing.

North Korea has conducted multiple sanctions-defying launches this year, including test-firing its most powerful intercontinental ballistic missiles, and in May attempting to put a military spy satellite into orbit.

South Korea’s President Yoon Suk Yeol has ramped up defence cooperation with Washington in response, staging joint military exercises with advanced stealth jets and powerful US strategic assets.

Yoon is set to attend a NATO summit in Lithuania this week, seeking stronger cooperation with NATO members over North Korea’s growing nuclear and missile threats, his office said.

Headline

Welcome Home, Israel Confirms Return Of 20 Hostages From Gaza

Published

22 hours ago

October 13, 2025

Editor

Israel said that the last 20 living hostages released by Hamas on Monday had arrived in the country.

“Welcome home,” the foreign ministry wrote in a series of posts on X, hailing the return of Matan Angrest, Gali Berman, Ziv Berman, Elkana Bohbot, Rom Braslavski, Nimrod Cohen, David Cunio, Ariel Cunio, Evyatar David, Guy Gilboa Dalal, Maxim Herkin, Eitan Horn, Segev Kalfon, Bar Kuperstein, Omri Miran, Eitan Mor, Yosef Haim Ohana, Alon Ohel, Avinatan Or and Matan Zangauker.

AFP

Headline

20 Members Of Gang Blacklisted By US Escape Guatemala Prison

Published

1 day ago

October 13, 2025

Editor

Twenty members of a gang designated a “foreign terrorist organisation” by the United States have escaped from detention in Guatemala, a prison chief said Sunday.

The members of the Barrio 18 gang “evaded security controls” at the Fraijanes II facility, prison director Ludin Godinez said at a news conference.

He received “an intelligence report” on Friday warning about the “possible escape” from the prison, which is southeast of the capital, Guatemala City.

Godinez said they were investigating possible acts of corruption.

Washington last month blacklisted Barrio 18, an El Salvador-based gang which has a reputation for violence and extortion, as part of its crackdown on drug trafficking.

The US embassy in Guatemala condemned the prison escape as “utterly unacceptable.”

“The United States designated members of this heinous group as the terrorists they are and will hold accountable anyone who has provided, provides, or decides to provide material support to these fugitives or other gang members,” the embassy said on X.

It called on the Guatemalan government to “act immediately and vigorously to recapture these terrorists.”

According to Interior Minister Francisco Jimenez, there are about 12,000 gang members and collaborators in Guatemala, while another 3,000 are in prison.

The country’s homicide rate has increased from 16.1 per 100,000 inhabitants in 2024 to 17.65 this year, more than double the world average, according to the Centre for National Economic Research.

According to the Salvadoran government, the gangs Barrio 18 and Mara Salvatrucha, better known as MS-13, are responsible for the deaths of about 200,000 people over three decades.

The two gangs once controlled an estimated 80 percent of El Salvador, which had one of the highest homicide rates in the world.

Headline

South Africa Bus Crash Kills 40 Including Malawi, Zimbabwe Nationals

Published

1 day ago

October 13, 2025

Editor

At least 40 people, including nationals of Malawi and Zimbabwe, were killed when a passenger bus rolled down an embankment in South Africa, a provincial transport minister said Monday.

The bus travelling to Zimbabwe crashed around 90 kilometres (55 miles) from the border on Sunday after the driver apparently lost control, Limpopo province transport minister Violet Mathye said.

“They are still working on the scene, but 40 bodies have already been confirmed to date,” Mathye told the Newzroom Afrika channel. The dead included a 10-month-old girl, she said.

Thirty-eight people were in hospital and rescuers were searching for other victims, she told eNCA media.

The bus was travelling from the southern city of Gqeberha, around 1,500 kilometres away, and its passengers included Malawians and Zimbabweans who were working in South Africa. The crash may have been caused by driver fatigue or a mechanical fault, the minister said.

South Africa has a sophisticated and busy road network with a high rate of road deaths, blamed mostly on speeding, reckless driving and unroadworthy vehicles.

AFP