News in Brief

Date: 05 July 2021 - 21:38

News ID: ۹۲۰۹۱

TOKYO (Reuters) -- Rescuers in Japan searched on Monday for 80 people believed to be missing two days after landslides tore through the seaside city of Atami, destroying houses and burying roads under mud and rock. The official death toll from the landslides that hit early on Saturday is four, according to Atami city spokesperson Hiroki Onuma, while the number of missing had come down from 113 earlier. Two people were found alive and unharmed on Monday, the NHK public broadcaster reported. Atami, with a population of 36,000, is 90 km (60 miles) southwest of Tokyo, set on a steep slope leading down to a bay. It is famous for a hot springs resort. The landslides are a reminder of the natural disasters - including earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and tsunami - that haunt Japan, where the capital Tokyo is to host the summer Olympics beginning this month.

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TUNIS (Dispatches) -- The Tunisian coastguard retrieved 21 bodies after a migrant boat capsized, a security official told Reuters on Monday, the second such incident in the past two days. At least 43 migrants drowned in a shipwreck off Tunisia also on Saturday, as they tried to cross the Mediterranean from Libya to Italy, while another 84 undocumented people “of various nationalities” including people from Bangladesh, Chad, Egypt, Eritrea and Sudan, were rescued. The survivors picked up off Zarzis were aged between three and 40, the defense ministry said. It added that the boat had departed the port of Zuwara, in northwestern Libya, on Monday night. In late June, Tunisia’s defense ministry said that it had rescued 178 people trying to cross the Mediterranean from Libya to reach Europe. According to the UN, at least 760 people have died trying to cross the Mediterranean between January 1 and May 31.

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BANGKOK (AP) — A massive explosion at a factory on the outskirts of Bangkok early Monday killed at least one person and injured 11 more, while prompting the evacuation of a wide area, including the hospital where casualties were initially treated, over fears of poisonous fumes from burning chemicals and the possibility of additional denotations. The fire broke out at around 3 a.m. at a foam and plastic pellet manufacturing factory just outside Bangkok near Suvarnabhumi Airport, blowing out windows of surrounding homes and sending debris raining from the air. Firefighters used helicopters to dump water on hard-to-access areas in the large complex. By mid-morning the main blaze at the Ming Dih Chemical factory had been brought under control, but a massive tank containing the chemical styrene monomer continued to burn, said local disaster prevention official Chailit Suwannakitpong.

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LUXEMBOURG (Reuters) -- Luxembourg’s Prime Minister Xavier Bettel was admitted to hospital on Sunday following a positive COVID-19 test at the end of June, according to local media reports. He was undergoing additional tests and would remain under observation for 24 hours as a precaution, broadcaster RTL reported, citing Luxembourg’s ministry of state. Bettel took part in a two-day EU summit in Brussels at the end of June, where participants included French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi and other European leaders. Luxembourg’s state ministry could not immediately be reached for comment on Monday.

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BAKU (Reuters) -- Azerbaijan’s state energy company, SOCAR, said its offshore gas platforms in the Caspian Sea were safe after media reports of a large fire in the area. Videos and photos published online showed smoke rising above the sea off the coast. Russia’s RIA news agency cited SOCAR as saying that an eruption of mud was the most likely reason for that, although it did not explain how it could cause a fire. “No incidents have happened at the offshore fields and industrial structures controlled by SOCAR, work continues normally,” SOCAR spokesman Ibrahim Akhmedov said. Azerbaijan’s Oil Workers’ Rights Protection Committee said fire had broken out at the Umid gas field at an old exploration site. SOCAR denied this. Offshore fields are the main source of Azeri gas output, the bulk of which the former Soviet republic exports to Europe.

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BEIJING (AP) — Two astronauts made the first spacewalk outside China’s new orbital station to set up cameras and other equipment using a 15-meter-long (50-foot-long) robotic arm. Liu Boming and Tang Hongbo were shown by state TV climbing out of the airlock as Earth rolled past below them. The third crew member, commander Nie Haisheng, stayed inside. Liu and Tang spent nearly seven hours outside the station, the Chinese space agency said. The astronauts arrived June 17 for a three-month mission aboard China’s third orbital station, part of an ambitious space program that landed a robot rover on Mars in May. Their mission comes as the ruling Communist Party celebrates the 100th anniversary of its founding. The station’s first module, Tianhe, or Heavenly Harmony, was launched April 29. That was followed by an automated spacecraft with food and fuel. Liu, Nie and Tang arrived June 17 aboard a Shenzhou capsule.