Top Russian, Chinese officials to visit North Korea this week

SEOUL—North Korea will this week welcome Russia’s defense minister and a high-level Chinese delegation to Pyongyang for Korean War armistice anniversary celebrations, state media said Tuesday, a sign it could be reopening its borders to high-level visitors after a lengthy pandemic closure.

“A military delegation of the Russian Federation led by Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu will pay a congratulatory visit to the DPRK,” the Korean Central News Agency said, a day after it confirmed a Chinese delegation would also

Protesters in Guatemala want free polls

GUATEMALA CITY—Guatemalan protesters took to the streets again on Monday (Tuesday in Manila) demanding that the attorney general and a handful of prosecutors step down over their alleged efforts to impede the upcoming presidential runoff election.

Marchers called for the ouster of Attorney General Maria Consuelo Porras, whose office is seeking to disqualify the Semilla (Seed) Party of Bernardo Arevalo, a social democrat who surged into one of two August 20 runoff spots, shocking many in the nation.

Banners raised at a boisterous demonstration in the center of the capital carried slogans including “We want free elections” and “I refuse to live in a dictatorship.”

“The people of Guatemala are vigilant and we are going to demand compliance with the laws, the constitution and the result at the polls,” protester Allan Ramirez told reporters.

Judge Fredy Orellana and prosecutor Rafael Curruchiche have also drawn the ire of protesters since the June 25 first-round vote.

On Curruchiche’s orders, Orellana directed the Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE) to disqualify the Semilla Party, alleging anomalies in how it was created in 2017. The Tribunal did not comply with the order.

In response, judicial agents have twice raided the TSE, and sought to arrest a functionary there. On Friday they searched the headquarters of Semilla in Guatemala City. Outside the capital, there were protests in the western part of the country, including the city of Quetzaltenango and in Mayan municipalities in the departments of Quiche and Totonicapan, according to local media. AFP attend the Thursday event.

Russia, one of Pyongyang’s historic allies, remains one of a handful of nations that maintains friendly relations with the North, and its leader Kim Jong Un has recently been steadfast in his support for Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, including, Washington says, supplying rockets and missiles.

“This visit will contribute to strengthening Russian-North Korean military ties and will be an important step in the development of cooperation between the two countries,” the Russian Defense Ministry said in a statement.

China, North Korea’s main trading partner, also confirmed Tuesday it would send a delegation led by Politburo member Li Hongzhong.

The foreign visitors are set to attend events in Pyongyang to mark 70 years since the signing of the armistice, known as Victory Day in the North, which KCNA said would be celebrated in a “grand manner that will go down in history.”

A large-scale military parade and other events are expected to be held this week, with satellite images indicating that soldiers and civilians have been training for the parade for months, Seoul-based specialist site NK News reported.

Leader Kim’s biggest nuclear-capable missiles and other military capabilities are likely to roll through Kim Il Sung Square during the event, it added. AFP

Singapore to execute first woman in nearly 20 years

SINGAPORE – Singapore is set to hang two drug convicts this week, including the first woman to be sent to the gallows in nearly 20 years, rights groups said Tuesday, while urging the executions be halted.

Local rights organization Transformative Justice Collective said a 56-year-old man convicted of trafficking 50 grams (1.76 ounces) of heroin is scheduled to be hanged on Wednesday at the Southeast Asian city-state’s Changi Prison. A 45-year-old woman convict who TJC identified as Saridewi Djamani is also set to be sent to the gallows on Friday.

She was sentenced to death in 2018 for trafficking around 30 grams of heroin.

If carried out, she would be the first woman to be executed in Singapore since 2004 when 36-year-old hairdresser Yen May Woen was hanged for drug trafficking, said TJC activist Kokila Annamalai.

TJC said the two prisoners are Singaporeans and their families have received notices setting the dates of their executions. Prison officials have not answered emailed questions from AFP seeking confirmation.

On March 17, 1995, Filipino domestic worker Flor Contemplacion, 42, was executed at the Changi Women’s Prison and Drug Rehabilitation Center in Singapore.

She was convicted by a Singaporean court of killing another Filipina maid, Delia Maga and Nicholas Huang, the three-year-old Singaporean son of her employer on May 4, 1991.

Singapore imposes the death penalty for certain crimes, including murder and some forms of kidnapping.

It also has some of the world’s toughest anti-drug laws: trafficking more than 500 grams of cannabis and 15 grams of heroin can result in the death penalty.

At least 13 people have been hanged so far since the government resumed executions following a two-year hiatus in place during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Rights watchdog Amnesty International on Tuesday urged Singapore to halt the impending executions. AFP

Greece faces new heatwave of high temperatures as wildfires rage on

ATHENS—Greece braced for a new wave of soaring temperatures Tuesday, as wildfires raged on two popular tourist islands.

In the capital city of Athens the mercury is expected to soar to 41 degrees Celsius, and reach up to 44C in central Greece, according to the national weather forecaster EMY.

The very hot weather comes after a weekend of intense heat and after thousands of locals and tourists fled for- est fires in Rhodes and Corfu, with the prime minister warning the heat-battered nation is “at war” with the flames.

The mercury hit 46.4C in Gythio, in the southern Peloponnese peninsula on Sunday, though failed to reach the hottest temperature nationally on record of 48C.

Authorities evacuated nearly 2,500 people from the Greek island of Corfu on Monday, after tens of thousands of people had already fled blazes on the island of Rhodes, with many fright- ened tourists scrambling to get home on evacuation flights.

More than 260 firefighters were still battling flames for an eighth consecutive day on Rhodes, supported by two helicopters and two planes.

Fires were also raging on Greece’s second largest island of Evia, where Greek civil protection authorities issued an overnight evacuation order in one northern locality.

“We are at war and are exclusively geared towards the fire front,” Greek

Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis told parliament on Monday.

He warned that the country faced “another three difficult days ahead” before high temperatures are forecast to ease.

Vassilis Kikilias, Greece’s civil protection minister, said crews had battled over 500 fires around the country for 12 straight days.

Many regions of the country were on “red alert” Tuesday, meaning there is an extreme risk of forest fires, exacerbated by strong winds. AFP

BEIJING—China has insisted it “strictly” implements UN sanctions resolutions, after G7 nations, the European Union and three other countries urged Beijing to expel oil tankers from its waters that appeared to be taking fuel to North Korea.

A letter, addressed to Beijing’s UN envoy Zhang Jun, raised concerns over the “continuing presence of multiple oil tankers” using Chinese waters to “facilitate their trade of sanctioned petroleum products to the DPRK”, referring to North Korea by its official name.

Ambassadors from the G7 nations signed the letter, seen by AFP on Friday, as did envoys from the European Union, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand.

In response, Beijing said it was “strictly implementing UNSC resolutions and seriously fulfilling international obligations”.

“China urges relevant parties to fully implement UNSC resolutions on the DPRK, especially provisions related to resuming dialogue, strengthening diplomatic efforts, and promoting political settlement,” the spokesperson for its mission to the UN said in a tweet on Monday.

Asked about the letter at a regular briefing Monday, China’s foreign ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning said: “When it comes to the implementation of the Security Council’s resolutions, China has always earnestly fulfilled its international obligations.”

The letter noted that the presence and movement of the tankers had been observed by the UN group of experts tasked with monitoring sanctions compliance by North Korea.

North Korea has been subject to UN sanctions since 2006 over its ballistic missile launches and nuclear programs. Additional sanctions in 2017 limited its crude oil imports.

The Security Council has been unable to reach a united position since then.

In May 2022, China and Russia vetoed a resolution imposing new sanctions on Pyongyang, and no Council resolution or statement has been adopted since then despite several ballistic missile tests by North Korea.

The United States regularly accuses Beijing and Moscow of shielding the North Korean regime and encouraging further launches by preventing a united response from the Council. AFP

BUCHAREST—Romania’s President Klaus Iohannis has warned that security in the Black Sea is at risk after Russia hit Ukrainian port infrastructure on the Danube river at the border with the NATO member.

Amateur footage posted on social media by a Romanian showed an explosion just across the Danube, as drones appeared to hit the Ukrainian port of Reni on the river.

Ukrainian officials reported a fourhour Russian drone attack on port infrastructure in the southern Odesa region.

Reni is a Ukrainian port town where the Danube forms a natural frontier with Romania, and is also near the Moldovan border.

The Danube delta region, which spans Romania and Ukraine, is being used as an export route for Ukrainian grain.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken discussed the blast with Romanian Foreign Minister Luminita Odobescu on Monday, State Department spokesman Matthew Miller told journalists in Washington.

“We will defend every inch of NATO territory. The secretary made that clear in his call with the Romanian Foreign Minister today,” Miller said.

“I strongly condemn the recent Russian attacks against the Ukrainian civilian infrastructure on (the) Danube, very close to Romania,” President Iohannis wrote on Twitter.

“This recent escalation poses serious risks to the security in the Black Sea. It also affects further Ukrainian grain transit, thus the global food security,” he added. AFP