MANILA (Reuters) -Philippine authorities halted flights in and out of Manila on New Year’s Day due to a malfunction of air traffic control, which also prevented airlines bound to other destinations from using the country’s airspace. A total of 282 flights were either delayed, cancelled or diverted to other regional airports, affecting around 56,000 passengers at Manila’s Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA), the airport operator said on Sunday.  Transportation Secretary Jaime Bautista apologized for the inconvenience to passengers as he blamed a power outage for the breakdown of the central air traffic control system that also affected operations at other airports in the country.

 

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KAMPALA (Reuters) - At least nine people including a 10-year-old boy suffocated to death as crowds rushing to see a New Year’s firework display got stuck in a narrow corridor in a shopping mall near Uganda’s capital, police said. People started pushing through a passage in the Freedom City Mall just after clocks struck midnight, the force said. “Very many people got stuck as they were entering in large numbers to see fireworks. In doing so, many people suffocated to death. So far nine people are confirmed dead,” the police statement read.

 

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BOGOTA (Reuters) - Colombian President Gustavo Petro, a leftist and former guerrilla, announced a January ceasefire with five illegal armed groups to support peace talks. Petro has pledged to end the Andean nation’s internal conflict, which has run for almost six decades and left at least 450,000 dead between 1985 and 2018. “This is a bold act,” Petro wrote on Twitter. “The bilateral ceasefire obliges the armed organizations and the state to respect it. There will be a national and international verification mechanism.” Among the groups are leftist guerrilla group the National Liberation Army (ELN) as well as dissident groups run by former members of the now-demobilized Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), Segunda Marquetalia and Estado Mayor Central.

 

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PARIS (AFP) - Several people have been killed and others injured in anti-government protests in the southeast of the breakaway region of Somaliland, the head of an opposition party and local officials said. Since Tuesday, protests have been held in the town of Las Anod, about 500 kilometres (310 miles) east of the Somaliland capital Hargeisa, following the killing of a politician by gunmen. Saleban Ali Kore, communications minister of Somaliland, the self-proclaimed Horn of Africa republic, on Saturday offered “condolence” to victims’ families.

 

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TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan’s Ministry of Defense is arranging to develop multiple long-range missiles with a range of up to about 3,000 kilometers (1,860 miles) and aims to deploy them in the 2030s, Kyodo news reported, citing a source familiar with the matter. The government is looking to deploy a 2,000-km range missile by the early 2030s and a 3,000-km hypersonic missile, Kyodo said. Japan this month unveiled its biggest military build-up since World War Two with a $320 billion plan that will buy missiles capable of striking China and ready it for sustained conflict.