While You Were Sleeping: 5 stories you might have missed, Aug 19
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US President Joe Biden (centre) welcomes South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol (left) and Japanese Prime Minister Kishida Fumio to Camp David.
PHOTO: NYTIMES
Biden salutes united Japan, S. Korea in face of China
US President Joe Biden and the leaders of Japan and South Korea said they saw a “new chapter” with greater three-way security cooperation as they met for a first-of-a-kind summit that has already rattled China.
Going tieless in the Camp David presidential retreat, Mr Biden praised the “political courage” of South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida in turning the page on historical animosity.
“Our countries are stronger – and the world will be safer – as we stand together. I know that’s a belief that we all three share,” he told them, as he opened the talks in the wooded hills outside Washington.
Mr Biden said the three would pursue “this new era of cooperation and renew our resolve to serve as a force of good across the Indo-Pacific and, quite frankly, around the world.”
Latest North Korean missile sparks debate over Russian role
AFP
North Korea’s latest Hwasong-18 intercontinental ballistic missile - its first ICBM to use solid rocket fuel - has ignited new debate over a possible Russian role in the nuclear-armed state’s dramatic missile development.
In a report published on Thursday by the Washington-based Centre for Strategic and International Studies, Dr Theodore Postol, professor emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, argued that the Hwasong-18 ICBM is likely the result of technical cooperation sourced to Russia.
The Hwasong-18 has been tested twice, including on July 12 in what was the longest flight time ever for a North Korean missile test.
Total troop deaths, injuries in Ukraine nearing 500,000
NYT
The number of Ukrainian and Russian troops killed or wounded since the war in Ukraine began in Feb 2022 is nearing 500,000, the New York Times reported on Friday, citing unnamed US officials.
The officials cautioned that casualty figures remained difficult to estimate because Moscow is believed to routinely undercount its war dead and injured, and Kyiv does not disclose official figures, the newspaper said.
Russia’s military casualties are approaching 300,000, including as many as 120,000 deaths and 170,000 to 180,000 injuries, the newspaper reported. Ukrainian deaths were close to 70,000, with 100,000 to 120,000 wounded, it added.
British police investigate ex-Myanmar envoy for trespass
REUTERS
British police are investigating Myanmar’s former ambassador to the United Kingdom for trespassing on a diplomatic residence in London that he has refused to leave since being ousted for opposing Myanmar’s 2021 military coup, his lawyer told Reuters.
Mr Kyaw Zwar Minn was locked out of his embassy a few months after the February 2021 coup, and later replaced by the junta’s representatives, after calling for the release of Myanmar’s civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
Since his protest, praised by the British government at the time, Mr Kyaw Zwar Minn has stayed at the north-west London ambassador’s residence, a mansion surrounded by razor wire and CCTV cameras. He has refused to hand it back to the embassy which he says is now run by representatives of an illegitimate government.
Tuchel toasts Kane’s ‘impressive’ Bayern debut
AFP
Bayern Munich manager Thomas Tuchel lavished praise on English striker Harry Kane after his Bundesliga debut ended in a 4-0 away win at Werder Bremen on Friday.
Tuchel, who was instrumental in bringing the England captain to Munich, lauded the striker who scored one and set up another in his first Bundesliga match.
“He had a constant influence,” the former Chelsea manager said, “he’s simply very, very smart.”
