At least 30 passengers were killed and several others injured on Sunday evening when their bus fell off a bridge and plunged into a river along the highway in Tharaka Nithi, Kenya, local police said. The bus, traveling from Meru town to the coastal city of Mombasa, plunged into the Nithi River about 40 meters below along the Meru-Nairobi highway at around 6:40 p.m. (1540 GMT), Eastern Regional Police Commander Rono Bunei said on Monday. Bunei said the bus must have developed brake failure because it was at a very high speed when the accident happened. Also read: 22 killed in Egypt traffic accident The wreckage of the bus could be seen strewn on the hillside near the black spot. Alex Mugambi, Tharaka Nithi County Rescue team manager, said the death toll may rise. The accident is among a series of deadly crashes in the country. On July 8, more than 20 passengers were killed in an accident along the Nairobi-Mombasa highway. Also read: 13 killed in India bus accident

Sri Lanka on Monday reopened government-owned public and state-approved private schools, which were closed for nearly a month due to fuel shortages. However, schools will be open only three days a week on Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday, and students will be taught online on the other two days of the school week. The Ministry of Education also extended the first school term until September 7. Also read: Sri Lanka: The state strikes back Schools will also not conduct examinations at the end of the first term, and principals have been instructed to conduct alternative forms of evaluation. Sri Lankan President Ranil Wickremesinghe has instructed officials to provide fuel to school buses from all state-run fuel depots. There are close to 40,000 vehicles that are engaged in transporting students to schools in Sri Lanka.  Also read: Group seeks ex-Sri Lankan president's arrest in Singapore

Eight people were killed and over 30 others injured after a double-decker bus crashed into another in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh on Monday. The accident occurred on the Purvanchal Expressway near Narayan Pur village in the state's Barabanki district, some 600 kms from the national capital. Police said both the ill-fated buses were travelling to Delhi from the eastern Indian state of Bihar when the tragedy occurred. "When one of the buses stopped suddenly in the middle of the high-speed corridor, the second one hit it from behind at cruise speed," a police officer told the local media. Read: India's top court frees leading Muslim journo The impact of the crash was such that eight passengers of the buses died on the spot, he said, adding that the injured were rushed to nearby hospitals. Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath took to social media to express his grief and extend condolences to the families of the deceased. "A probe has been ordered into the crash," the police officer said. Road accidents are common in India, with one taking place every four minutes. These accidents are blamed on poor roads, rash driving and scant regard for traffic laws.  The Indian government's implementation of stricter traffic laws in recent years has failed to rein in accidents, which claim over 100,000 lives every year.

Myanmar's government announced Monday it had carried out its first executions in nearly 50 years, hanging a former National League for Democracy lawmaker, a democracy activist and two men accused of violence after the country's takeover by the military last year. The executions, detailed in the state-run Mirror Daily newspaper, were carried out despite worldwide pleas for clemency for the four political prisoners, including from United Nations experts and Cambodia, which holds the rotating chairmanship of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations. The four were executed “in accordance with legal procedures” for directing and organizing "violent and inhuman accomplice acts of terrorist killings,” the newspaper reported. It did not say when the executions were carried out. The military government issued a brief statement confirming the report while the prison where the men had been held and the prison department refused comment. Aung Myo Min, human rights minister for the National Unity Government, a shadow civilian administration established outside Myanmar after the military seized power in February 2021, rejected the allegations the men were involved in violence. “Punishing them with death is a way to rule the public through fear,” he told The Associated Press. Among those executed was Phyo Zeya Thaw, a former lawmaker from ousted leader Aung San Suu Kyi’s party, also known as Maung Kyaw, who was convicted in January by a closed military court of offenses involving explosives, bombings and financing terrorism. His wife, Thazin Nyunt Aung, told the AP she had not been informed his execution had been carried out. “I am still trying to confirm it myself,” she said.

India on Monday got its youngest and first tribal President, as a former female school teacher from a remote village shattered the glass ceiling for holding the country's top constitutional office. Droupadi Murmu was sworn in as India's 15th President by the Chief Justice at an imposing and colourful ceremony in Parliament, as millions clustered around TV screens in public squares, offices and living rooms to witness the event live. "Coming from a remote village and being a tribal, I am really honoured to hold this post. This proves that even a poor can dream of becoming India's President. This is the beauty of our democracy," she said, in her inaugural speech. Indian Vice-President M Venkaiah Naidu, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Ministers, and lawmakers attended the oath ceremony at Parliament. Earlier the 64-year-old was accorded a guard of honour and driven to Parliament in a ceremonial procession accompanied by soldiers mounted on horses. Read:Droupadi Murmu elected India's first tribal President On Thursday, Murmu scripted history by being the youngest and first tribal politician to win the presidency.  Murmu, a former state governor who was fielded by India's ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, defeated her main challenger and opposition candidate Yashwant Sinha, a former finance minister, by a huge margin. Voting to elect India's 15th President was held on Monday, where more than 95% of the eligible 4,500-plus lawmakers across the country exercised their franchise. In India, the President is elected not directly by the people but by the members of both Houses of Parliament -- the Rajya Sabha and the Lok Sabha -- and state assemblies and federal government-ruled Territories. Like in Bangladesh, the Indian President is the ceremonial head of state who does not exercise executive powers. Who's Murmu? Born in independent India on June 20 in 1958, Murmu completed her graduation in 1979 and began her career as a government employee before becoming a school teacher. She subsequently made a foray into the eastern Indian state of Odisha's politics, first as a local civic body councillor and then as a legislator. The two-term legislator went on to become a minister in the Odisha government in 2000. And some 15 years later, Murmu was sworn in as the first woman Governor of the neighbouring eastern state of Jharkhand. In her personal life, Murmu lost her husband and their two sons. While her husband died of a cardiac arrest, one of her two sons was found dead under mysterious circumstances in 2009. She has a daughter.

A human rights group said Sunday it had filed a criminal complaint with Singapore’s attorney general to seek the arrest of Sri Lanka’s former president for alleged war crimes during his country’s civil war. Gotabaya Rajapaksa was ousted from office over his country's economic collapse and fled to Singapore earlier this month. He was defense secretary during Sri Lanka’s civil war, which ended in 2009. The International Truth and Justice Project — an evidence-gathering organization administered by a South Africa-based nonprofit foundation —said its lawyers filed the complaint requesting Rajapaksa’s immediate arrest. The complaint alleges Rajapaksa committed grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions during the civil war "and that these are crimes subject to domestic prosecution in Singapore under universal jurisdiction.” Sri Lanka's economic crisis has left the nation’s 22 million people struggling with shortages of essentials, including medicine, fuel and food. Months of protests have focused on the Rajapaksa political dynasty, which has ruled the country for most of the past two decades. Read: Sri Lankan president urged not to use force on protesters “The economic meltdown has seen the government collapse, but the crisis in Sri Lanka is really linked to structural impunity for serious international crimes going back three decades or more,” said the ITJP’s executive director, Yasmin Sooka. “This complaint recognizes that it’s not just about corruption and economic mismanagement but also accountability for mass atrocity crimes,” she added. Sri Lanka’s civil war killed 100,000 people, according to conservative United Nations estimates. The actual number is believed to be much higher. A report from a U.N. panel of experts said at least 40,000 ethnic minority Tamil civilians were killed in the final months of the fighting alone. Tamil Tiger rebels fought to create an independent state for ethnic minority Tamils. The country’s ethnic Sinhala majority credited Gotabaya Rajapaksa and his elder brother Mahinda Rajapaksa with the war victory, cementing the family's political dominance, though accounts of atrocities, autocratic governance and nepotism persisted. Efforts to investigate allegations of war crimes were largely suppressed under Rajapaksa leaders. After Gotabaya Rajapaksa fled the country earlier this month, lawmakers elected Ranil Wickremesinghe to serve the remainder of his presidential term. He declared a state of emergency with broad powers to act to ensure law and order, and a day after he was sworn in, hundreds of armed troops raided a protest camp outside the president’s office, attacking demonstrators with batons. Rights groups have urged the president to immediately order troops and police to cease use of force and said Friday's display seemed to follow a pattern of Sri Lankan authorities forcefully responding to dissent. The political turmoil has threatened Sri Lanka's potential for economic recovery. Wickremesinghe recently said bailout talks with the International Monetary Fund were nearing a conclusion.

A gunman opened fire on university campus in the Philippine capital region on Sunday, killing a former town mayor and two others in a brazen attack ahead of a graduation ceremony, police said. The suspect was armed with two pistols and was captured in a car he commandeered trying to escape the Ateneo de Manila University in suburban Quezon City, police said. He was blocked by witnesses and authorities outside the university gates. The sprawling university was put under lockdown and the graduation rite at the law school on campus was canceled, police said. Supreme Court Chief Justice Alexander Gesmundo, who was supposed to be a speaker at the ceremony, was advised to turn back en route to the event, officials said. Read:Philippines affirms news site shutdown order: Maria Ressa Newly elected President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. promised to have the attack swiftly investigated and those behind the killings brought to justice. He is scheduled to address a joint session of Congress at the House of Representatives on Monday also in Quezon city, where police and other law enforcers had imposed a gun ban and heightened security before the shooting. “We are shocked and saddened by the events at the Ateneo graduation today,” Marcos Jr. said. “We mourn with the bereaved, the wounded and those whose scars from this experience will run deep." Those killed in the attack included Rosita Furigay, a former mayor of Lamitan town in southern Basilan province, her aide and a university guard. Furigay’s daughter, who was supposed to attend the graduation, was wounded and taken to a hospital, a police report said. A picture from scene showed one of the victims sprawled on the ground near a bouquet of flowers. Investigators were trying to determine a motive for the attack, but Quezon City police chief Brig. Gen. Remus Medina said the suspect, apparently a medical doctor, had a long-running feud with Furigay.

A Nigerian man, who has contracted monkeypox and fled Thailand recently, was found here in the capital of Cambodia on Saturday evening, a deputy governor said. The 27-year-old man, identified as Osmond Chihazirim Nzerem, was found at Phsar Deum Thkov area in the Chamkarmon district after a report from the Thai authority, said Koeut Chhe, deputy governor of the Phnom Penh Municipality. "The Nigerian man was detained and sent to the Khmer-Soviet Friendship Hospital," he told Xinhua via telephone. "We have also deployed our police force at the hospital to monitor the man as he does not cooperate with health staff." The Nigerian man was confirmed to be infected with monkeypox by the Thai health authority on Thursday. The patient, who entered Thailand's southern tourist island of Phuket in October 2021 with no departure record, had been sick for more than a week, developing symptoms including fever, sore throat, coughing and rashes, and sought treatment at a local hospital as an outpatient last week. Read: UN health agency chief declares monkeypox a global emergency According to the Phuket health authority, after the test result turned out to be positive, the patient refused to receive treatment, turned off his phone, did not contact the hospital and fled to Cambodia.  

Ten employees of a coal company died in northwestern China on Saturday when a mountainside slope collapsed on them, state media reported. Rescuers spent all day to retrieve the workers who were buried in their vehicle en route to a mine site in Jingtai county in Gansu province, CCTV reported. Read: Mountain collapses on township in China's remote southwest, killing two Ten died and seven were found alive with light injuries. Operations stopped around 8 p.m. Saturday The workers were employed by Shanxi Coking Coal Minbao group. An investigation into the incident was underway.

A senior Minister in the eastern Indian state of West Bengal was arrested on Saturday for his alleged involvement in a school teacher recruitment scam. Partha Chatterjee, also a high-ranking functionary in Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's ruling Trinamool Congress party, was taken into custody by India's Enforcement Directorate, following hours of questioning. Read: Droupadi Murmu elected India's first tribal President "He will be produced in a court and we will seek his remand for custodial interrogation," an official of the federal agency told the local media. In fact, the Minister was questioned for hours by sleuths of the federal agency after they seized over Rs 20 crore during a raid at one of his female friend's house on Friday. "Cash worth more than Rs 20 crore was seized from a house which belongs to Arpita Mukherjee. It is being suspected that the cash was proceeds of the recruitment scam,” another ED official said on Friday.