SEOUL: Eight journalists from South Korea departed for rival North Korea on Wednesday after the North allowed them to join the small group of foreign media in the country to witness the dismantling of its nuclear test site this week, Seoul officials said.
North Korea had earlier refused to grant entry visas to the South Korean journalists, raising worries about the prospect for recently improving ties. Their exclusion followed Pyongyang cutting off high-level contact with Seoul to protest joint US-South Korean military exercises that it calls an invasion rehearsal.
The dismantling of the North’s Punggye-ri nuclear test site, where all of its six nuclear bomb test explosions occurred, is expected to happen Thursday or Friday depending on weather.
On Wednesday morning, North Korea accepted the list of the South Korean journalists to attend via a cross-border communication channel. The journalists from the MBC television network and News1 wire service took a special government flight later Wednesday to go to the North’s northeastern coastal city of Wonsan, according to Seoul’s Foreign Ministry.
The other journalists from the US, the UK, China and Russia, including an Associated Press Television crew, had arrived in Wonsan on Tuesday. The group is to travel by train to the Punggye-ri site at Mount Mantap, also in the northeast, to observe the closing.
When North Korea announced it would dismantle the Punggy-ri site, it said it would invite media from five countries including South Korea to watch, but it didn’t respond to South Korea’s notifications of which journalists would attend until Wednesday morning. The South Korean journalists went to Beijing to travel with the full group but were left behind and eventually returned to Seoul as the North refused to grant them visas.
It was unclear why the North changed course and decided to let South Korean journalists in the country. The development came hours after President Donald Trump met South Korean President Moon Jae-in in Washington seeking to keep the highly anticipated summit between Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un on track.
The summit could offer a historic chance for peace on the Korean Peninsula. But there has been increasing pessimism about the meeting after North Korea scrapped the inter-Korean talks and threatened to do the same for the Kim-Trump summit in protest of the South Korea-US military drills and what it calls Washington’s push for “one-sided” disarmament. Trump said during his meetings with Moon the summit may not happen as scheduled.
The North’s decision to close the Punggye-ri nuclear test site has generally been seen as a welcome gesture by Kim to set a positive tone ahead of his summit with Trump.
But it is mainly just a gesture.
If North Korea decides to conduct more nuclear tests, it could build a new site or dismantle the existing tunnels at Mount Mantap in a reversible manner. Details of what will actually happen during the closure are sparse, but observers have expressed concern that Pyongyang is showing the closure of the site to journalists but not to international nuclear inspectors.
Pyongyang allows South Korean journalists to cover nuclear test site closure
Pyongyang allows South Korean journalists to cover nuclear test site closure
- The dismantling of the North’s Punggye-ri nuclear test site, where all of its six nuclear bomb test explosions occurred, is expected to happen Thursday or Friday depending on weather
- If North Korea decides to conduct more nuclear tests, it could build a new site or dismantle the existing tunnels at Mount Mantap in a reversible manner
Filipinos honor their dead with flowers, food in All Saints’ Day rites
- All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day are jointly referred to in the Philippines as Undas
- Around 4 million Filipinos are expected to head to their native provinces this weekend
Manila: Millions of Filipinos flocked to cemeteries across the country on Friday, braving massive crowds, traffic, and extreme weather to honor their departed loved ones during the annual holidays dedicated to the dead.
The threats posed by a tropical storm in parts of the Philippines this week could not stop the throngs of people at seaports, airports, and bus terminals as they rushed from the main cities to their family towns and villages for Undas — the All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day celebrations.
In Manila, school and work stopped at noon on Oct. 31 to give people enough time to travel and avoid heavy traffic, as authorities expected around 4 million to head to their native provinces this weekend.
Preparations for the holiday usually begin days in advance, with families cleaning their ancestral graves, lighting candles, and placing flower bouquets on the tomb markers.
“We visit our dearly departed every chance we get. It’s just that on this day, everyone in the family is present,” said Maria Imelda Austria, a 51-year-old teacher for whom Undas was also an occasion to uphold her mother’s tradition.
“I make sure my parents get the nicest flower arrangements to keep my promise to them (to do so) when they were still alive. Also, we try to do what my mother used to do, that is pray the rosary and pray for the poor souls in purgatory.”
The tradition in the Catholic-majority nation is one of the many religious practices passed on by the Spanish who colonized the Philippines for over 300 years.
The Filipino word “Undas” stems from the Spanish phrase “Dia de los Todos Santos” or “All Saints’ Day.”
Food plays a significant role in the observance, with more traditional communities preparing their deceased relatives’ favorite dishes and serving them on their graves as an offering. Some households spread grains of uncooked rice on the floor to track the brief earthly visits of the departed, which are believed to occur during Undas. A change in the grain placement signifies that the spirits of their relatives have passed through.
For most, however, the holiday becomes an opportunity for family reunions, making it a highly anticipated event for Filipinos that usually calls for feasts.
“It is a happy occasion because we get to see our relatives and bond with them while enjoying food,” Anna Maria Batungbacal, a 46-year-old civil servant, told Arab News.
“But it can be sad as well when you remember those that aren’t with you anymore, especially when someone has just recently passed.”
For Criena House, the Undas reunions were like a “potluck,” with everyone bringing food.
“Everyone from different parts of the Philippines will come home. Sometimes they’ll be from other countries,” the 34-year-old actress-entrepreneur said.
“You just eat, you catch up with family, you can play music depending on where you are … It’s not rude to do that. It’s okay to smile and take pictures and pose with your family and the dead behind you.”
Undas is also an experience of learning about her community and its history — something she remembers from childhood, when her mother would take her around to the different grave sites of people she knew or who had a significant impact on their lives.
Her mother would point to a grave, exclaiming “that used to be my teacher over there, that used to be the ex-mayor over there,” she said.
The tradition is something House is keen to pass on to her Filipino-American husband and 2-year-old son.
“I had to explain to my husband that this is not just a day, it’s also kind of like a special week, like Thanksgiving or Christmas,” she said.
“He’s still adjusting to it, but for me it’s very fun because I’m seeing everyone, even if I don’t know the people around me. It’s like you’re getting to know your community.”
North Korean foreign minister arrives in Moscow for talks
- The visit comes after Pyongyang tested a new intercontinental ballistic missile this week
- Washington says there are 10,000 North Korean troops in Russia
MOSCOW: North Korean Foreign Minister Choe Son Hui has arrived in Moscow and will hold strategic consultations with her Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov on Friday, the Russian Foreign Ministry said.
Maria Zakharova, a spokeswoman for the ministry, in a post on her official Telegram channel, published photographs of Lavrov meeting Choe at a Moscow train station.
“Today, talks between the heads of Russia and the DPRK (Democratic People’s Republic of Korea) will be held in Moscow. Sergei Lavrov greeted his counterpart with a bouquet of flowers,” said Zakharova.
“The meeting began at the Yaroslavsky railway station (in Moscow), where a memorial plaque was unveiled to mark the occasion of Kim Il Sung’s 1949 visit to the USSR,” she said, referring to the founder of the DPRK.
The visit, Choe’s second in six weeks, comes after Pyongyang tested a new intercontinental ballistic missile this week and as Washington says there are 10,000 North Korean troops in Russia, including as many as 8,000 deployed in Russia’s Kursk region where Ukrainian troops have dug in.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Thursday that the United States expected the North Korean troops in Kursk region to enter the fight against Ukraine in the coming days.
Moscow has neither denied nor directly confirmed the presence of North Korean troops on its soil. President Vladimir Putin has said it is for Russia to decide how to implement a treaty he signed with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in June that includes a mutual defense clause.
Shootout in western France wounds five: minister
- 15-year-old boy is between life and death after the gunbattle erupted in front of a restaurant overnight
Paris: A drug trafficking-related shooting has left a teenager and four others seriously wounded in the western French city of Poitiers, Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau said Friday.
The 15-year-old boy is between life and death after the gunbattle erupted in front of a restaurant overnight, Retailleau told BFMTV/RMC radio.
Drone crashes on oil depot in Russia’s Stavropol region
- There were no casualties in the incident at the Svetlograd oil depot, Vladimirov said on Telegram
MOSCOW: A drone fell on an oil depot in Russia’s southern Stavropol region, local governor Vladimir Vladimirov said on Friday.
It was the second suspected Ukrainian attack in consecutive days on Russian fuel and energy targets, following a lull of about seven weeks since a fuel facility in Tula was attacked on Sept. 10.
There were no casualties in the incident at the Svetlograd oil depot, Vladimirov said on Telegram.
Baza Telegram channel, which is close to Russia’s security services, posted a CCTV video purportedly showing the attack on the oil depot. The video showed that at least one of several fuel tanks was swiftly engulfed by a fireball.
On Thursday, several fuel and energy facilities were targeted in a Ukrainian drone attack on the central Russian region of Bashkortostan, home to Bashneft, a major oil company controlled by Russia’s leading oil producer, Rosneft .
Bashneft operates several refineries in the region, playing a significant role in Russia’s energy infrastructure.
The attacks come days after the Financial Times reported early-stage talks between Ukraine and Russia about potentially halting airstrikes on each other’s energy facilities. The Kremlin dismissed the report.
Russia has called such attacks terrorism, while Ukraine, which stepped up the drone strikes on Russian energy facilities since the start of the year, has said it is striking back in retaliation for attacks on its energy infrastructure.
Andrei Kartapolov, chairman of Russia’s lower house of parliament’s defense committee, said in comments to Life media channel earlier this week, that there were no talks on halting the attacks.
“We are not going to spare anyone,” he said.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said in September that Russia had knocked out the gigawatt equivalent of over half of Ukraine’s energy infrastructure. The European Union aims to restore 2.5 GW of capacity, about 15 percent of the country’s needs, she said, referring to proposed EU-funded repairs.
Eight dead as huge fire engulfs cooking oil factory near Jakarta
- The factory is operated by PT Primus Sanus Cooking Oil Industrial (Priscolin)
JAKARTA: Eight people died in a large fire at a cooking oil factory near the Indonesian capital Jakarta, local fire authorities said on Friday.
Around 20 firefighting trucks are at the site and have contained the blaze in most areas of the factory, authorities said.
Footage from Metro TV showed flames and billowing black smoke coming out of a building in the center of an industrial complex in Bekasi, a city on Jakarta’s eastern edge. The report said roads had been closed around the factory.
All of the bodies had been evacuated from the site, Suhartono, head of Bekasi’s fire department SAID, adding that three other people were injured.
But the number of casualties could still rise, he said.
Local authorities are investigating the cause of the fire.
The factory is operated by PT Primus Sanus Cooking Oil Industrial (Priscolin), said Suhartono.
