PYEONGTAEK, South Korea: North Korea on Friday returned the remains of what are believed to be US servicemen killed during the Korean War, the White House said, with a USmilitary plane making a rare trip from a US base in South Korea to a coastal city in the North to retrieve the remains.
The handover follows through on a promise Kim Jong Un made to President Donald Trump when the leaders met in June and is the first tangible result from the much-hyped summit.
An Associated Press journalist at Osan Air Base outside of Seoul saw the plane land, and the White House earlier confirmed that a US Air Force C-17 aircraft containing remains of fallen service members had departed Wonsan, North Korea, on its way to Osan. A formal repatriation ceremony will be held there Aug. 1.
At Osan, US servicemen and a military honor guard lined up on the tarmac to receive the remains, which were carried in boxes covered in blue United Nations flags.
Details of what specifically the US had picked up were unclear, but reports said previously that Pyongyang would return about 55 sets of remains from the 1950-53 Korean War.
About 7,700 US soldiers are listed as missing from the Korean War, and 5,300 of the remains are believed to still be in North Korea. The war killed millions, including 36,000 American soldiers.
Despite soaring rhetoric about denuclearization ahead of their meeting, Trump and Kim’s summit ended with only a vague aspirational goal for a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula without describing when and how that would occur. Friday’s handover will be followed by a lengthy series of forensic examinations and tests to determine if the remains are human, and whether they are actually American or allied troops killed in the conflict.
Officials in North Korea had no immediate comment on the possible return of the remains Friday, the 65th anniversary of the end of the Korean War, which the country celebrates as the day of “victory in the fatherland liberation war.”
Friday’s repatriation could be followed by strengthened North Korean demands for fast-tracked discussions with the United States on reaching a declaration to formally end the war, which was stopped with an armistice and not a peace treaty. South Korea’s Defense Ministry also said that the North agreed to general-level military talks next week at a border village to discuss reducing tensions across the countries’ heavily armed border.
The remains are expected to be flown to Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam in Hawaii for scientific testing to identify them.
The US military last month said that 100 wooden “temporary transit cases” built in Seoul were sent to the Joint Security Area at the Korean border as part of preparations to receive and transport remains in a dignified manner. US Forces Korea spokesman Col. Chad Carroll also said, at the time, that 158 metal transfer cases were sent to a US air base and would be used to send the remains home.
The remains are believed to be some of the more than 200 that North Korea has held in storage for some time, and were likely recovered from land during farming or construction. The vast majority of the war dead, however, have yet to be located and retrieved from cemeteries and battlefields across the countryside.
Efforts to recover American war dead had been stalled for more than a decade because of a standoff over North Korea’s nuclear program and a previous US claim that security arrangements for its personnel working in the North were insufficient.
From 1996 to 2005, joint US-North Korea military search teams conducted 33 recovery operations that collected 229 sets of American remains. The last time North Korea turned over remains was in 2007, when Bill Richardson, a former UN ambassador and New Mexico governor, secured the return of six sets.
The North marked Friday’s anniversary with ceremonies at war-related memorials; the capital Pyongyang and other cities were decked out in national flags and bright red banners. For the first time since 2015, Kim Jong Un has announced a general amnesty will be granted for prisoners who have committed crimes against the state.
North Korea has held out the return of remains as a symbol of its goodwill and intention to improve ties with Washington. Officials have bristled, however, at criticism from the US that it seeks to profit from the repatriations by demanding excessive fees for handling and transporting the remains.
Pyongyang has nevertheless expressed its willingness to allow the resumption of joint search missions in the country to retrieve more remains. Such missions had been held from 1996 until they were canceled by President George W. Bush amid heightening tensions over the North’s nuclear program in 2005.
Post Kim-Trump summit talks between US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and senior North Korean officials got off to a rocky start earlier this month, with the North accusing the Americans of making “unilateral and gangster-like” demands on denuclearization. The North also said US officials came up with various “conditions and excuses” to backtrack on the issue of formally ending the war.
“The adoption of the declaration on the termination of war is the first and foremost process in the light of ending the extreme hostility and establishing new relations between the DPRK and the US,” the North’s Korean Central News Agency said in a statement on Tuesday, referring to North Korea by its official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. “Peace can come only after the declaration of the termination of war.”
Pompeo said Wednesday that a great deal of work remains ahead of a North Korea denuclearization deal, but he dodged requests to identify a specific denuclearization timeline in testimony to members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
Experts say a declaration to officially end the war, which could also involve Seoul and Beijing, would make it easier for Pyongyang to direct the discussions with Washington toward a peace treaty, diplomatic recognition, security assurance and economic benefits. Some analysts believe that North Korea would eventually demand that the United States withdraw or dramatically reduce the 28,500 troops it keeps in South Korea as a deterrent.
Washington has maintained Pyongyang wouldn’t get sanctions relief and significant security and economic rewards unless it firmly commits to a process of completely and verifiably eliminating its nuclear weapons. There are lingering doubts on whether Kim would ever agree to fully relinquish his nukes, which he may see as a stronger guarantee of survival than whatever security assurance the United States could offer.
White House says North Korea returns remains of US war dead
White House says North Korea returns remains of US war dead
- North Korea transfers remains of soldiers from 1950-53 Korean War
- Transfer seen as positive gesture after landmark June summit
700 foreigners flee Iran to Azerbaijan, Armenia; evacuation from Israel begins
- A Czech plane carrying 66 people landed in Prague on Tuesday a day after a Slovak plane had taken 73 evacuees to Bratislava from Amman
BAKU: More than 700 foreign nationals have crossed from Iran into neighboring Azerbaijan and Armenia since Israel began striking the country last week, government officials in Baku and Yerevan said on Tuesday.
The Caucasus countries border Iran’s northwest, with the closest crossing into Azerbaijan around 500 km from Tehran by road.
“Since the start of the military escalation between Israel and Iran, more than 600 citizens of 17 countries have been evacuated from Iran via Azerbaijan,” a government source said on Tuesday.
The evacuees, who crossed the border via the Astara checkpoint on the Caspian Sea coast, are being transported to Baku airport and “flown to their home countries on international flights,” the source said.
Among those evacuated are citizens of Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, as well as Germany, Spain, Italy, Serbia, Romania, Portugal, the US, the UAE, China and Vietnam. Azerbaijan shut its land borders in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic and has kept them closed ever since.
“In light of the evacuation need, Azerbaijan has temporarily opened its border for those leaving Iran,” the official said.
India also evacuated 110 of its citizens from Iran through Armenia, Ani Badalyan, Yerevan’s Foreign Ministry said. Poland’s Foreign Ministry said it would evacuate part of its embassy staff in Tehran via Baku.
“We have decided to evacuate or support the departure of staff who do not need to remain in the country, so-called non-essential personnel,” Deputy Foreign Minister Henryka Moscicka-Dendys said.
“Our colleagues will try to reach the border with Azerbaijan,” she said, without specifying how many people were involved.
Turkmenistan — one of the world’s most closed-off countries — said it had also allowed the transit of around 120 people evacuated from Iran through its territory, mainly citizens of Central Asian countries.
The Czech Republic and Slovakia have taken 139 people home on government planes from Israel because of its conflict.
A Czech plane carrying 66 people landed in Prague on Tuesday a day after a Slovak plane had taken 73 evacuees to Bratislava from Amman.
“I am glad they are all OK. The transport was really demanding in the difficult environment,” Czech Defense Minister Jana Cernochova said about the Czech flight on social media site X.
The Defense Ministry said most of the 66 evacuees were Czech nationals. “It was not possible to send the army plane straight to Israel,” the ministry said, citing the air-space closure.
“The evacuees were taken to the airport in the neighboring country by buses. They crossed the border on foot.”
Czech media said a convoy with the evacuees had left Tel Aviv on Monday morning and boarded the plane in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt.
A Slovak government plane with 73 passengers, mostly Slovaks, landed in Bratislava on Monday.
France urged to apologize for Polynesia nuclear tests
- Tens of thousands of people in the French overseas territory are estimated to have been exposed to harmful levels of radiation
- France conducted 193 nuclear tests in French Polynesia from 1966 until 1996
PARIS: Paris should apologize to French Polynesia for the fallout of nuclear tests there over three decades, which led to harmful radiation exposure, a French parliamentary report released on Tuesday said.
France conducted 193 nuclear tests in French Polynesia from 1966, especially at the Pacific archipelago’s Moruroa and Fangataufa atolls, to help build up its atomic weapon arsenal. These included atmospheric and underground tests which had severe health impacts.
Tens of thousands of people in the French overseas territory are estimated to have been exposed to harmful levels of radiation, leading to a significant public health crisis that has been largely ignored.
The tests remain a source of deep resentment in French Polynesia, where they are seen as evidence of racist colonial attitudes that disregarded the lives of islanders.
“The inquiry has strengthened the committee’s conviction that a request for forgiveness from France to French Polynesia is necessary,” the report said.
“This request is not merely a symbol, nor a request for repentance. It must be a... fundamental step in the process of reconciliation between French Polynesia and the State,” the authors said.
The report said the apology must be added to a 2004 law on French Polynesia’s semi-autonomous status.
Residents in the south Pacific Ocean islands are hoping for compensation for radiation victims.
The investigative website Disclose, citing declassified French military documents on the nearly 200 tests, reported in March that the impact from the fallout was far more extensive than authorities let on.
Only a few dozen civilians have been compensated for radiation exposure since the tests ended in 1996, Disclose said.
Four heavy US bombers stationed at key Indian Ocean base: image analysis
- The Pentagon said it was sending 'additional capabilities' to the Middle East amid an escalation of the Iran-Israel conflict
PARIS: Four US Stratofortress bombers are currently stationed at the Diego Garcia base in the Indian Ocean, according to an AFP analysis of satellite imagery, as the conflict between Israel and Iran extended to its fifth straight day.
The base, leased to the United States by Britain, is one of its key military facilities in the Asia-Pacific region, and was used as a hub for long-range bombers and ships during the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
The four B52H Stratofortresses, which can carry nuclear weapons or other precision-guided munitions, were spotted on a southern tarmac at Diego Garcia on Monday at 0922 GMT.
Images provided by Planet Labs indicate they arrived in mid-May.
A C-17 Globemaster III troop and cargo transport plane is also at the base, according to the AFP analysis, as well as six jets likely to be KC-135 airborne refueling tanker.
The Pentagon said Monday that it was sending “additional capabilities” to the Middle East amid an escalation of the Iran-Israel conflict, while the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz canceled a Vietnam visit to head toward the Indian Ocean according to Marine Traffic, a ship-tracking site.
Washington has also redeployed around 30 refueling planes toward bases in Europe.
US spies said Iran wasn’t building a nuclear weapon, Trump dismisses that assessment
- The country was not building a nuclear weapon, the national intelligence director told lawmakers
- Gabbard brushed off the inconsistency, blaming the media for misconstruing her earlier testimony and asserting that “President Trump was saying the same thing that I said“
WASHINGTON: Tulsi Gabbard left no doubt when she testified to Congress about Iran’s nuclear program earlier this year.
The country was not building a nuclear weapon, the national intelligence director told lawmakers, and its supreme leader had not reauthorized the dormant program even though it had enriched uranium to higher levels.
But President Donald Trump dismissed the assessment of US spy agencies during an overnight flight back to Washington as he cut short his trip to the Group of Seven summit to focus on the escalating conflict between Israel and Iran.
“I don’t care what she said,” Trump told reporters. In his view, Iran was “very close” to having a nuclear bomb.
Trump’s statement aligned him with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has described a nuclear-armed Iran as an imminent threat, rather than with his own top intelligence adviser. Trump was expected to meet with national security officials in the Situation Room on Tuesday as he plans next steps.
Gabbard brushed off the inconsistency, blaming the media for misconstruing her earlier testimony and asserting that “President Trump was saying the same thing that I said.”
“We are on the same page,” she told CNN. Asked for comment, Gabbard’s office referred to those remarks.
In her March testimony to lawmakers, Gabbard said the intelligence community “continues to assess that Iran is not building a nuclear weapon and Supreme Leader Khamenei has not authorized the nuclear weapons program he suspended in 2003.”
She also said the US was closely monitoring Iran’s nuclear program, noting that the country’s “enriched uranium stockpile is at its highest levels and is unprecedented for a state without nuclear weapons.”
Trump’s contradiction of Gabbard echoed his feuds with US spy leaders during his first term, when he viewed them as part of a “deep state” that was undermining his agenda. Most notably, he sided with Russian President Vladimir Putin in 2018 when asked if Moscow had interfered in the 2016 election, saying Putin was “extremely strong and powerful in his denial.”
The latest break over Iran was striking because Trump has staffed his second administration with loyalists rather than establishment figures. Gabbard, a military veteran and former Democratic congresswoman from Hawaii, was narrowly confirmed by the Republican-controlled Senate because of her scant experience with intelligence or managing sprawling organizations.
Gabbard, who left the Democratic Party in 2022 and endorsed Trump in last year’s election, is expected to testify Tuesday in a closed session on Capitol Hill, along with CIA Director John Ratcliffe, during a previously scheduled budget hearing.
Both officials likely would face questions about their views on Iran and Trump’s latest statements. A representative for the CIA did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency has repeatedly warned that Iran has enough enriched uranium to make several nuclear bombs should it choose to do so. Iran maintains its nuclear program is peaceful.
An earlier intelligence report, compiled in November under then-President Joe Biden, a Democrat, also said Iran “is not building a nuclear weapon.”
However, it said the country has “undertaken activities that better position it to produce one, if it so chooses,” such as increasing stockpiles of enriched uranium and operating more advanced centrifuges. The report did not include any estimates for a timeline for how quickly a bomb could be built.
Trump’s immigration agenda is another place where he’s split with intelligence assessments. He cited the Alien Enemies Act, a 1798 wartime law, to deport Venezuelan migrants, which he justified by claiming that the Tren de Aragua gang was coordinating with the Venezuelan government. However, an intelligence assessment in April found no evidence of that.
Gabbard fired the two veteran intelligence officers who led the panel that created the assessment, saying they were terminated because of their opposition to Trump.
In response to those reports, the White House released a statement from Gabbard supporting the president.
“President Trump took necessary and historic action to safeguard our nation when he deported these violent Tren de Aragua terrorists,” the statement said. “Now that America is safer without these terrorists in our cities, deep state actors have resorted to using their propaganda arm to attack the President’s successful policies.”
India evacuates students from Tehran as Israel hits civilian sites
- About 6,000 Indian students are enrolled in Iranian universities
- So far 110 studying in Urmia have left the country through Armenia
NEW DELHI: India’s Foreign Ministry said on Tuesday it was moving Indian students out of Tehran, as many sought safety after their universities were shut down amid ongoing Israeli airstrikes.
Israeli attacks on Iran started on Friday, when Tel Aviv hit more than a dozen sites — including key nuclear facilities, residences of military leaders, and of scientists — claiming they were aimed at preventing Iran from developing nuclear weapons.
Daily attacks have been ongoing for the past five days after Iran retaliated with ballistic missile strikes against Israel.
As the Israeli military intensified its bombing of civilian targets, hitting Iran’s state broadcaster on Monday, stranded foreigners — including 6,000 Indian students — have been struggling to leave.
“Most of the students here were living in apartments, including me and my friend. The first blast in Tehran happened in Sa’adat Abad district, where me and my friend were living,” Hafsa Yaseen, a medical student at Shahid Beheshti University, told Arab News.
“One of our university’s nuclear scientists was martyred in these blasts. Situation is really bad.”
According to the Iranian Ministry of Health and Medical Education, at least 224 people have been killed and 1,481 wounded in Israeli attacks since Friday. Most of the casualties have been reported in Tehran.
India’s Ministry of External Affairs confirmed in a statement that it was moving those studying at universities in the Iranian capital “out of the city for reasons of safety.”
Yaseen was among a group of a few hundred students moved on Monday to Qom, 140 km south of the capital city.
“Me and my friend were frightened, and we just thought it’s our turn now to die. We were literally calling our parents and telling them goodbye,” she said.
“We are not even safe here, because we are still in Iran (and) anything can happen ... We are in constant fear that we might die and our families are more stressed than us. I just want to request the government of India to evacuate us from here as soon as possible.”
A group of 110 Indian students from Urmia University of Medical Sciences in northwestern Iran has already been assisted by the Indian authorities to leave through the land border with Armenia.
“All the Indian students who had crossed the Iran-Armenia border have now safely reached the capital city, Yerevan. This includes around 90 students from Kashmir Valley, along with others from various Indian states,” said Nasir Khuehami, national convenor of the Jammu and Kashmir Students Union.
“Their flight from Armenia to Delhi is scheduled for tomorrow, with all necessary arrangements being facilitated in coordination with the Indian authorities. This comes as an immense relief to the families.”
The families of those remaining in Iran have been pleading with Indian authorities to also bring them home.
“Please save my daughters. My two daughters study (at) Shahid Beheshti University. They are in great panic — the situation in Tehran is so bad that students are in great panic,” one of the mothers, Mubeena Ali, told Arab News through tears.
“They have been shifted to Qom but they feel afraid ... They are greatly distressed. They want to be evacuated.”
