Foreign News

N Korea tests new underwater nuclear attack ‘drone’: State media

Published

2 months ago

2023/03/24

Priyan

North Korea's leader Kim Jong Un, centre, and his daughter, left, observe a warhead missile launch exercise in this image released by the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) on March 20, 2023

North Korea has tested a new underwater nuclear-capable attack drone designed to unleash a “radioactive tsunami” that would destroy enemy naval vessels and ports, state media has reported.

During a military exercise conducted this week under the guidance of the country’s leader Kim Jong Un, North Korea’s military deployed and test-fired the new weapons system, the mission of which was to test the ability to set off a “super-scale” destructive blast and wave, the country’s state news agency KCNA said on Friday.

“This nuclear underwater attack drone can be deployed at any coast and port or towed by a surface ship for operation,” KCNA said.

The news agency said that during the exercise, the drone was put in the water off South Hamgyong province on Tuesday and cruised underwater for 59 hours and 12 minutes, at a depth of some 80 to 150 metres (260 to 490 feet), before detonating in waters off its east coast on Thursday.

KCNA did not elaborate on the drone’s nuclear capabilities.

The underwater drone system is intended to make sneak attacks in enemy waters and destroy naval striker groups and major operational ports, the news agency said.

All News Advertisement

Foreign News

Developing and underdeveloped countries are paying the price for the wrong policies of some developed nations – Narendra Modi

Published

14 hours ago

2023/06/5

Priyan

(pic PTI)

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday (05) said developing and underdeveloped countries are paying the price for the “wrong policies” of some developed nations, and asserted that India has raised the issue of climate justice with every such advanced country.

In his video message at a World Environment Day event, Modi said for the protection of the world climate, it is important that all countries think, rising above vested interests. “For a long time, the model of development in big and advanced countries was contradictory. In this developmental model, the thinking was that we first develop our country then we can think about the environment,” the prime minister said. “With this, they achieved the goals of development, but the world’s environment had to pay the price for their development. Today also, the developing and underdeveloped countries of the world are paying the price for the wrong policies of some developed countries,” he said. For decades, no one was there to object to this attitude of some developed countries, Modi said. “I am happy that India has raised the question of climate justice with all these countries,” he said.

In the thousands of years old Indian culture, there is nature as well as progress, Modi said as he credited this to the country’s attention to ecology and economy.

The prime minister said as India is investing unprecedentedly in its infrastructure, it is focusing equally on the environment.

(PTI)

Foreign News

More than 260 dead after Odisha accident

Published

3 days ago

2023/06/3

Priyan

(pic PTI)

At least 261 people have been killed and 650 injured in a crash involving three trains in India’s eastern Odisha state, officials say.

One passenger train derailed and its coaches fell on to the adjacent track where they were struck by an incoming train on Friday evening. A freight train was stationary.

The rescue operation at the crash site has ended, officials said.

The cause of India’s worst train crash this century is not yet clear. Officials said several carriages from the Shalimar-Chennai Coromandel Express derailed at about 19:00 (13:30 GMT) in Balasore district, hit a stationary goods train and several of its coaches ended up on the opposite track. Another train – the Howrah Superfast Express travelling from Yesvantpur to Howrah – then hit the overturned carriages.

“The force with which the trains collided has resulted in several coaches being crushed and mangled,” Atul Karwal, chief of the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) told news agency ANI.

It was the third deadliest crash in the history of Indian railways, he said.

More than 200 ambulances and hundreds of doctors, nurses and rescue personnel were sent to the scene, the state’s chief secretary Pradeep Jena said.

Sudhanshu Sarangi, Director General of Odisha Fire Services, had earlier said` 288 had died. The rescue operation recovering people from the wreckage has finished and work to restore the site of the crash begun, India’s South Eastern Railway company said on Saturday.

Residents of the neighbouring villages were among the first to reach the site of the accident and start the rescue operation. Some surviving passengers were seen rushing in to help rescue those trapped in the wreckage.Local bus companies were also helping to transport wounded passengers.

India has one of the largest train networks in the world with millions of passengers using it daily, but a lot of the railway infrastructure needs improving.

India’s worst train disaster was in 1981, when an overcrowded passenger train was blown off the tracks and into a river during a cyclone in Bihar state, killing at least 800 people.

(BBC)

Foreign News

233 killed, around 900 injured in Odisha triple train crash

Published

3 days ago

2023/06/3

Priyan

At least 233 people have been killed and about 900 injured after two passenger trains collided in the eastern Indian state of Odisha – the country’s deadliest rail accident in more than a decade.

The Coromandel Express, which runs from Kolkata to Chennai, collided with another passenger train, the Howrah Superfast Express, about 7pm local time, railway officials said on Friday.

The Howrah Superfast Express derailed and crashed into the Coromandel Express, South Eastern Railway authorities said. Media reports had earlier said the crash was between the Coromandel Express and a goods train.

(PTI)