New Delhi: Several soldiers from North Korea crossed the Korean Demilitarised Zone (DMZ), the country’s border with South Korea, leading its neighbour and rival to fire warning shots in two separate incidents this week.
On Tuesday and Friday, over 20 soldiers crossed the border into South Korean territory and retreated after warning shots. A similar incident had previously occurred on 9 June.
The motive behind the breach could be “a mistake” as the North Korean soldiers retreated soon after the shots were fired, the South Korean chief of staff said.
The DMZ, established in 1953 by the US-led United Nations command at the end of the Korean War to bring about a truce between the two warring sides, is heavily guarded but not fortified. “The demarcation line, in many parts of the DMZ, is simply a sign mounted on a stick or a slice of concrete,” a Firstpost report read.
Activity in the region has increased as North Korea is working on building capabilities, removing streetlights and railway tracks to install mines. South Korea has also alleged that numerous North Korean soldiers have been killed or injured by landmines in the DMZ since late last year when North Korea resumed construction work in the buffer zone, the New York Times reported.
These incidents amid heightened tensions between the two nations and with the backdrop of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s visit to North Korea this week.
The two Koreas are engaged in a “balloon” war. South Korean activists sent balloons with leaflets about human rights violations in the North, leading North Korea to launch over 1,000 trash-filled balloons in response. The signing of a mutual defence pact between DPRK and Russia has led South Korea to lodge a protest with the Russian ambassador and consider sending weapons to Ukraine in response.
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Kenya’s ‘Gen Z’ protest against tax hikes on bread, vehicles
The young in Kenya are protesting. They are filming clashes with officers on mobile phones and publishing them online. The hashtag — #OccupyParliament — which started as a protest on social media, has brought hundreds to the streets to retaliate against the unpopular tax reforms in the Finance bill, which will allow the President William Ruto-led government to raise $2.7 billion in additional taxes, equivalent to 1.9 percent of the gross domestic product.
The new taxes would include a 2.75 percent levy on income for the national medical insurance plan, as well as increased taxes on vegetable oil and fuel, which would raise the cost of production and trickle down to the consumer, Al Jazeera reported. They will include a 16 percent tax on bread and an annual 2.5 percent tax on vehicles, according to a BBC report.
“Trainer-wearing protesters” were the highlight of this mass protest that grappled the Kenyan state this week. In response, authorities mobilised riot police that used tear gas, rubber bullets and water cannons to disperse the crowds gathered near the parliament building in Nairobi. Protests were witnessed in 19 of the 47 counties in the country, including cities of Nakuru, Eldoret, Kisumu, and Nyeri.
Over 200 people have been injured and over 105 arrested in Nairobi alone, according to Amnesty International. While the government Tuesday claimed that concessions will be made, they still plan to proceed with the tax hike.
Sudan accuses UAE of providing weapons to RSF
Sudan has accused the UAE of ‘meddling’ in the crisis in the African country by arming the paramilitary group Rapid Support Forces (RSF). The comments by Sudanese UN Ambassador Al-Harith Idriss al-Hirath Mohamed came in during a UN Security Council meeting this week.
“I ask your esteemed council to speak bravely and to take the last required step, which is to openly mention and condemn the UAE so that it would stop this war,” Ambassador Mohamed said, while addressing the UN.
Meanwhile, the UAE’s ambassador, Mohamed Abushahab called these allegations “false” and “ludicrous”
This is not the first time the UAE has been accused of interference in Sudan’s civil war. In November 2023, General Yasser al-Atta, the deputy to Army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, had publicly criticised the United Arab Emirates, labelling it a “state mafia”.
Earlier this year, a leaked UN report suggested that UAE cargo planes delivered arms, ammunition and medical supplies to the RSF in eastern Chad, and experts have suggested that the Sudanese conflict has become a proxy war for Gulf nations.
At the UNSC meeting, Martha Pobee, Assistant Secretary-General, issued warnings against ethnic-based atrocities in Sudan’s western Darfur region, urging an urgent ceasefire in El Fasher, the capital of North Darfur.
Bloodshed continues in Sudan leaving one-sixth of Sudan’s population displaced so far. An estimated 4.9 million people have been found to be acutely malnourished in 2024, as previously reported by ThePrint.
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Tensions flare up in South China Sea, US renews warning
The Philippines has accused the Chinese coast guard of using bladed weapons — knives and spears — during a confrontation between the two countries’ ships in the South China Sea. The two countries clashed near the Second Thomas Shoal in the contested Spratly Islands Monday, when the Chinese seized two Philippine rubber boats that were delivering food and other supplies to a military outpost in the disputed waters.
“Only pirates do this. Only pirates board, steal, and destroy ships, equipment, and belongings,” Gen. Romeo Brawner Jr, Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces of the Philippines, said in a statement. Filipino soldiers were outnumbered and injured including a Filipino sailor who lost a thumb, the military said.
CSAFP: ‘OUR TROOPS FOUGHT BACK’
General Romeo Brawner Jr, Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces of the Philippines, said that soldiers conducting a rotation and resupply mission at the BRP Sierra Madre (LS57) at Ayungin Shoal on June 17 fought back with “everything that they had.” pic.twitter.com/fu6Ep4CPjp
— Armed Forces of the Philippines (@TeamAFP) June 19, 2024
The incident led to the United States issuing a warning, iterating its obligation to defend the Philippines, according to the 1951 mutual defence treaty. The Philippines has however denied any such plans to invoke the treaty and take the country’s help against China.
The US Ambassador to China, Nicholas Burns, in an interview to BBC, said that Washington was in talks with China to avoid a conflict in the South China Sea waters. “Our militaries are operating in very close proximity to one another in the South China Sea and in the Taiwan Strait. You don’t want to send the wrong signal,” he told BBC.
The Chinese have denied any impropriety and have claimed that the resupply mission by Filipino soldiers was “illegal”.
This is not the first time a confrontation between China and the Philippines has taken place in the disputed waters. The last few months have seen numerous incidents near the Second Thomas Shoal, part of the Philippines Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), and Sierra Madre.
(Edited by Mannat Chugh)
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