Foreign News
Singapore executes man for supplying cannabis
BBC reported that Singapore has executed a man for conspiring to traffic cannabis despite pleas for clemency from his family, activists and the United Nations.
Tangaraju Suppiah, 46, was hanged at Changi Prison at dawn on Wednesday, his family said.
Activists said he had been convicted on weak evidence and had had limited legal access during his prosecution. The authorities said he had received due process and criticised activists for questioning the courts.
Singapore has some of the world’s toughest anti-drug laws, which it argues are a necessary deterrent to preventing drug crime.
Last year the country executed 11 people on drugs charges, including an intellectually impaired man for trafficking heroin.
On Wednesday, Tangaraju Suppiah’s family had gathered at the prison in the city’s east. “The family said they weren’t going to give up on him right until to the end. It has been such a harrowing experience for them,” anti-death penalty activist Kirsten Han told the BBC on Wednesday. “They still have a lot of unresolved questions about his case, and the evidence against him.”
Singapore’s stringent drug laws and use of capital punishment put it increasingly at odds with other countries in the region, activists say. Its neighbour Malaysia abolished mandatory death sentences earlier this month, saying they were not an effective deterrent to crime. Cannabis has been decriminalised in many parts of the world including in neighbouring Thailand where its trade is encouraged.
On Tuesday, Singapore’s courts had rejected a last-minute appeal from Tangaraju Suppiah’s family against his 2018 conviction.
In recent days they and activists had delivered letters to Singapore’s President Halimah Yacob in a last-minute plea for clemency, while British billionaire Sir Richard Branson had called for a halt of the execution and a review of the case.
“I know that my brother has not done anything wrong. I urge the court to look at his case from the beginning,” the condemned man’s sister, Leela Suppiah, had told reporters on Sunday.
Tangaraju Suppiah was convicted of “abetting by engaging in a conspiracy to traffic” about 1kg (35oz) of cannabis from Malaysia to Singapore in 2013. He was not found with the drugs or during the delivery. But prosecutors said he had been responsible for co-ordinating it, and they traced two phone numbers used by a deliveryman back to him. He claimed he was not the person communicating with others connected to the case. He said he had lost one of the phones and denied owning the second one.
Singapore law mandates the death penalty for drug trafficking and has lesser penalties for couriers.
In Tangaraju Suppiah’s last appeal, the judge agreed with the prosecution that he had been responsible for co-ordinating the delivery, which made him ineligible for a more lenient sentence.
Activists had raised concerns that he had not been given adequate access to a Tamil interpreter and had had to argue his last appeal on his own since his family was unable to secure a lawyer. Singapore authorities say he requested an interpreter only during the trial, and not earlier. They add that he had access to legal counsel throughout the process.
Sir Richard, who had previously criticised the 2022 execution of intellectually impaired Nagaenthran Dharmalingam, said the latest case was “shocking on multiple levels”.
Rebutting his allegations, Singapore’s Home Affairs Ministry accused him of “disrespect for Singapore’s judges and our criminal justice system”. It said that the death penalty was “an essential component” in a multi-pronged approach that had been “effective in keeping Singapore safe and secure”.
A drone attack on the town of Kalogi, in Sudan’s South Kordofan region, is said to have hit a kindergarten and killed at least 50 people, including 33 children.
The Rapid Support Forces (RSF), the paramilitary group battling the army in Sudan’s civil war, was accused of Thursday’s attack by a medical organisation, the Sudan Doctors’ Network, and the army.
There was no immediate comment from the RSF.
The RSF in turn accused the army of hitting a market on Friday in a drone attack in the Darfur region, on a fuel depot at the Adre border crossing with Chad.
Sudan has been ravaged by war since April 2023 when a power struggle broke out between the RSF and the army, who were formerly allies.
The reports could not be verified independently.
According to the army-aligned foreign ministry, the kindergarten was struck twice with missiles from drones.
Civilians and medics who rushed to the school were also attacked, it added.
Responding to reports of the attack in Kalogi, a spokesman for the UN children’s agency Unicef said: “Killing children in their school is a horrific violation of children’s rights.”
“Children should never pay the price of conflict,” Sheldon Yett added.
The agency, he said, urged “all parties to stop these attacks immediately and allow safe, unhindered access for humanitarian assistance to reach those in desperate need”.
The RSF accused the army of attacking the Adre crossing because it was used for the “delivery of aid and commercial supplies”.
According to the Sudan War Monitor, a group of researchers tracking the conflict, the attack caused civilian casualties and significant damage to a market.
The military did not immediately comment on the reports from Darfur.
Wedged between Sudan’s capital Khartoum and Darfur, the region made up of North Kordofan, South Kordofan and West Kordofan has been a frontline in the civil war.
The battle for the Kordofans – which have a population of almost eight million – has intensified as the army pushes towards Darfur.
[BBC]
Border clashes have erupted again between Pakistan and Afghanistan’s Taliban forces, with each sides accusing the other of breaking a fragile ceasefire.
Residents fled the Afghan city of Spin Boldak overnight, which lies along the 1,600-mile (2,600 km) border between the two countries.
A medical worker in the nearby city of Kandahar told BBC Pashto that four bodies had been brought to a local hospital. Four other people were wounded. Three were reportedly wounded in Pakistan.
There has been sporadic fighting between the two countries in recent months, while Afghanistan’s Taliban government has also accused Pakistan of carrying out air strikes inside the country.
Both sides have confirmed they exchanged fire overnight but each blamed the other for initiating the four hours of fighting.
Mosharraf Zaidi, a spokesperson for Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, accused the Taliban of “unprovoked firing”.
The statement continued: “An immediate, befitting & intense response has been given by our armed forces. Pakistan remains fully alert & committed to ensuring its territorial integrity & the safety our citizens.”
Meanwhile, a Taliban spokesperson said Pakistan had “once again initiated attacks” and said it was “forced to respond”.
Residents on the Afghan side of the border said the exchange of fire started at around 22:30 (18:00 GMT) on Friday.
Footage from the area showed a large number of Afghans fleeing on foot and in vehicles.
Ali Mohammed Haqmal, head of Kandahar’s information department, said Pakistan’s forces had attacked with “light and heavy artillery” and civilian homes had been hit by mortar fire.
The latest clashes came less than two months after both sides agreed to a ceasefire mediated by Qatar and Turkey.
It ended more than a week of fighting in which dozens were killed – the worst clashes between Pakistan and the Taliban since the group returned to power in 2021 – though tensions have remained high.
The government in Islamabad has long accused Afghanistan’s ruling Taliban of giving shelter to armed groups which carry out attacks in Pakistan.
The Taliban government denies the accusation and has accused Pakistan of blaming others for their “own security failures”.
The Pakistan Taliban have carried out at least 600 attacks on Pakistani forces over the past year, according to the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project.
Last week delegations from both sides met in Saudi Arabia for a fourth round of negotiations on a wider peace settlement, but did not reach an agreement.
Sources familiar with the talks told BBC News that both sides had agreed to continue with the ceasefire.
[BBC]
Ireland, Spain, the Netherlands and Slovenia will boycott the 2026 Eurovision Song Contest, after Israel was allowed to compete.
They were among a number of countries who had called for Israel to be excluded over the war in Gaza, as well as accusations of unfair voting practices.
Spanish broadcaster RTVE led calls for a secret ballot on the issue at a meeting in Geneva. It said organisers denied that request – a decision that “increased [our] distrust of the festival’s organisation”.
Ireland’s RTÉ said it felt that its “participation remains unconscionable given the appalling loss of lives in Gaza and the humanitarian crisis there which continues to put the lives of so many civilians at risk.”
Spain is one of Eurovision’s “Big Five” countries along with France, Germany, Italy and the UK.
Their artists are allowed straight into the final, as their broadcasters provide the largest financial contribution to the EBU.
Approximately 50 broadcasters, including the BBC, attended a meeting of the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) on Thursday to discuss the future of the contest, which is watched by more than 150 million people each year.
They were asked to back new rules intended to discourage governments and third parties from organising voting campaigns for their acts, after allegations that Israel unfairly boosted its entrant, Yuval Raphael, this year.
BBC News understands that voting to accept those measures was tied to a clause whereby members agreed not to proceed with a vote on Israel’s participation.
“This vote means that all EBU Members who wish to participate in the Eurovision Song Contest 2026 and agree to comply with the new rules are eligible to take part,” the EBU said.
[BBC]
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