United News of Bangladesh

Thinly stretched rescue teams worked through the night in Turkey and Syria, pulling more bodies from the rubble of thousands of buildings toppled by a catastrophic earthquake. The death toll rose Wednesday to more than 9,500, making the quake the deadliest in more than a decade. That makes it the deadliest since a 2011 earthquake in Japan triggered a tsunami, killing nearly 20,000 people. Amid calls for the government to send more help to the disaster zone, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was to travel to town of Pazarcik, the epicenter of the quake, and to the worst-hit province of Hatay on Wednesday. Turkey now has some 60,000 aid personnel in the quake-hit zone, but with the devastation so widespread many are still waiting for help. Nearly two days after the magnitude 7.8 quake struck southeastern Turkey and northern Syria, rescuers pulled a 3-year-old boy, Arif Kaan, from beneath the rubble of a collapsed apartment building in Kahramanmaras, a city not far from the epicenter. With the boy's lower body trapped under slabs of concrete and twisted rebar, emergency crews lay a blanket over his torso to protect him from below-freezing temperatures as they carefully cut the debris away from him, mindful of the possibility of triggering another collapse. The boy's father, Ertugrul Kisi, who himself had been rescued earlier, sobbed as his son was pulled free and loaded into an ambulance. “For now, the name of hope in Kahramanmaras is Arif Kaan,” a Turkish television reporter proclaimed as the dramatic rescue was broadcast to the country. A few hours later, rescuers pulled 10-year-old Betul Edis from the rubble of her home in the city of Adiyaman. Amid applause from onlookers, her grandfather kissed her and spoke softly to her as she was loaded on an ambulance. But such stories were few more than two days after Monday's pre-dawn earthquake, which hit a huge area and brought down thousands of buildings, with frigid temperatures and ongoing aftershocks complicating rescue efforts. Search teams from more than two dozen countries joined the Turkish emergency personnel, and aid pledges poured in. But with devastation spread multiple several cities and towns — some isolated by Syria’s ongoing conflict — voices crying from within mounds of rubble fell silent, and despair grew from those still waiting for help. In Syria, the shaking toppled thousands of buildings and heaped more misery on a region wracked by the country's 12-year civil war and refugee crisis. On Monday afternoon in a northwestern Syrian town, residents found a crying newborn still connected by the umbilical cord to her deceased mother. The baby was the only member of her family to survive a building collapse in the small town of Jinderis, relatives told The Associated Press. Turkey is home to millions of refugees from the war. The affected area in Syria is divided between government-controlled territory and the country’s last opposition-held enclave, where millions rely on humanitarian aid. As many as 23 million people could be affected in the quake-hit region, according to Adelheid Marschang, a senior emergencies officer with the World Health Organization, who called it a “crisis on top of multiple crises.” Many survivors in Turkey have had to sleep in cars, outside or in government shelters. “We don’t have a tent, we don’t have a heating stove, we don’t have anything. Our children are in bad shape. We are all getting wet under the rain and our kids are out in the cold,” Aysan Kurt, 27, told the AP. “We did not die from hunger or the earthquake, but we will die freezing from the cold.” Erdogan said 13 million of the country's 85 million people were affected, and he declared a state of emergency in 10 provinces. More than 8,000 people have been pulled from the debris in Turkey, and some 380,000 have taken refuge in government shelters or hotels, authorities said. Turkey’s disaster management agency said the country’s death toll had risen to 7,108, bringing the overall total to 9,638, including fatalities reported in neighboring Syria, since Monday’s earthquake and multiple aftershocks. Another 40,910 people have been injured. The death toll in government-held areas of Syria has climbed to 1,250, with 2,054 injured, according to the Health Ministry. At least 1,280 people have died in the rebel-held northwest, according to volunteer first responders known as the White Helmets, with more than 2,600 injured. In Syria, aid efforts have been hampered by the ongoing war and the isolation of the rebel-held region along the border, which is surrounded by Russia-backed government forces. Syria itself is an international pariah under Western sanctions linked to the war. The United Nations said it was “exploring all avenues” to get supplies to the rebel-held northwest. The region sits on top of major fault lines and is frequently shaken by earthquakes. Some 18,000 were killed in similarly powerful earthquakes that hit northwest Turkey in 1999. ___ Alsayed reported from Bab al-Hawa, Syria. Fraser reported from Ankara, Turkey. David Rising in Bangkok, and Robert Badendieck in Istanbul contributed to this story.

A steady stream of injured flowed into an overwhelmed hospital in the town of Darkush, in rebel-held northwestern Syria on Monday, after a deadly earthquake struck the region. Mothers hovered over crying children. Amid the chaos, one man sat with a dazed expression, his face covered with abrasions. The man, Osama Abdul Hamid, barely made it out alive with his wife and four children from his apartment building in the nearby village of Azmarin. Many of their neighbors were not so lucky. “The building is four stories, and from three of them, no one made it out,” Abdul Hamid said, breaking down in tears. “God gave me a new lease on life.” At an equally overwhelmed hospital in Idlib city, Shajul Islam, a British doctor who works with several non-governmental organizations, was having the worst day of his seven years working in Syria. “I’m literally taking a patient off a ventilator to give another patient a chance, having to decide which patient has more of a chance of surviving or not,” Islam said. The hospital, already struggling with weak health infrastructure and funding cuts, he said, was particularly overburdened after the earthquake because other hospitals in the area were out of commission. “We’ve got quite a lot of hospitals that had been previously hit in the war. So they had already the foundations, everything had already been weakened,” he said. With the added blow of the earthquake, he said, "We’ve had at least three or four hospitals that I know of that have been put out of service." The powerful 7.8 magnitude quake that struck before dawn on Monday wreaked new damage and suffering in Syria’s last rebel-held enclave after years of fighting and bombardment. Hospitals and clinics were flooded with injured people. The enclave, centered in Idlib province, houses millions of displaced Syrians who had fled their homes during the country’s civil war. Many of the displaced live in dire conditions in makeshift camps. Many others there and in neighboring government-held areas are housed in buildings weakened by past bombings, leaving them even more vulnerable to shocks from earthquakes. The quake caused total or partial damage to buildings in at least 58 villages, towns and cities in northwestern Syria, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based war monitor. More than 4,000 people were killed in Turkey and Syria, with the toll expected to climb. In the opposition-held territory in Syria, at least 450 were reported dead, but hundreds more were believed be buried under the rubble of their homes. “This disaster will worsen the suffering of Syrians already struggling with a severe humanitarian crisis,” Carsten Hansen, the director for the Middle East at the Norwegian Refugee Council, said in a statement. “Millions have already been forced to flee by war in the wider region and now many more will be displaced by disaster.” In the hospital in Darkush in western Idlib, Abdel Hamid said his family were sleeping in their apartment when they were roused by powerful, prolonged shaking. They ran from the apartment, but “before we reached the door of the building, the whole building came down on us,” he said. A wooden door shielded them from the worst force of the collapse — they all got out alive. He and his wife and three of the children suffered head injuries, but are all in stable condition. The scale of the casualties quickly overwhelmed the hospital’s resources, said Majdi al-Ibrahim, a general surgeon at the hospital. “We need urgent help. The danger is beyond our capacity,” he said. The Syrian American Medical Society, which runs hospitals in northern Syria and southern Turkey, said in a statement that its facilities are “overwhelmed with patients filling the hallways” and called urgently for “trauma supplies and a comprehensive emergency response to save lives and treat the injured.” The opposition territory in the northwest corner of Syria has held out for years even after Syrian government forces retook most rebel-held areas around the country. Fighting still flares from time to time with Russian-backed Syrian forces nearby. Parts of the territory are run by rebel groups, including a dominant al-Qaida-linked militant faction, while parts are under a Turkish-backed administration known as the Syrian Interim Government. The disaster came on the heels of severe winter storms, further adding to the misery of those left without shelter. “There is rain and the weather is very cold, there is snow in some of the areas,” Abdel Hakim al-Masri, economy minister with the Turkish-backed regional administration, told The Associated Press. He noted that some of the displacement camps in the area had been decimated by the quake. Al-Masri said that efforts have begun to find temporary shelter for the people now doubly displaced by the earthquake, but that the magnitude of the response required is well beyond the local resources available. “There is a huge amount of suffering, and this will increase it,” he said. "This matter calls for rapid action by all countries of the world.” ___ Sewell reported from Beirut.  

A South Korean court on Tuesday ordered the government to pay 30 million won ($24,000) to a Vietnamese woman who survived a gunshot wound but lost several relatives when South Korean marines rampaged through her village during the Vietnam War in 1968. In awarding the compensation to 62-year-old Nguyen Thi Thanh, the Seoul Central District Court dismissed the government’s argument that it was unclear whether South Korean troops were responsible for the slaughter in the village of Phong Nhi. The court also rejected the government’s argument that civilian killings were unavoidable as the Korean troops were dealing with Viet Cong guerrillas who often blended with locals, according to Thanh's lawyer, Lim Jae-sung. The ruling marks the first time a South Korean court found the country’s government responsible for mass killings of Vietnamese civilians during the war, and could potentially open the way for similar lawsuits. Then ruled by anti-communist military leaders, South Korea sent more than 320,000 troops to Vietnam, the largest foreign contingent fighting alongside U.S. troops. South Korea’s Justice Ministry didn’t immediately respond to a query whether the government will appeal. According to U.S. military documents and survivors, more than 70 people were killed and around 20 others injured after South Korean marines allegedly fired at unarmed civilians during search operations at Phong Nhi and the nearby village of Phong Nhut in February 1968. Thanh, then 7 years old, was treated for gunshot wounds in her stomach while five of her family members died, including her mother, sister and brother. She filed the lawsuit against the South Korean government in 2020 and testified at the Seoul court last August. The trial also included the testimonies of other Vietnamese villagers and South Korean war veteran Ryu Jin-seong, a member of the marine unit linked to the attacks in Phong Nhi and Phong Nhut. He provided a first-hand account of how the Korean soldiers shot at unarmed civilians, many of them children and women. Thanh, who awaited the ruling in Vietnam, said she was “overjoyed” by her court win. “I think that the souls (of those who died in Phong Nhi) were always with me and supported me,” she said in a video message translated by her legal team. “I am overjoyed because I think that the souls can now rest easy.” The South Korean government had argued there was no conclusive evidence that South Korean troops were responsible for the killings, even suggesting that the aggressors may have been Viet Cong fighters disguised in Korean uniforms and attempting psychological warfare. The government also insisted that even if Korean soldiers were involved, their aggressive response was understandable when they were facing constant threats from Viet Cong guerrillas, who often hid themselves among locals and actively recruited young women.

Structural engineers, soldiers, paramedics and handlers with trained search dogs are heading to Turkey and Syria to help locate and rescue survivors of Monday’s earthquake. Here's a glance at the assistance that's being provided: — The European Union has mobilized search and rescue teams to help Turkey, while the bloc's Copernicus satellite system has been activated to provide emergency mapping services. At least 13 member countries have offered assistance. — The United States is coordinating immediate assistance to Turkey, including teams to support search and rescue efforts. In California, nearly 100 Los Angeles County firefighters and structural engineers, along with six specially trained dogs, were being sent to Turkey. — Russian rescue teams from the Emergencies Ministry were sent to Syria, where Russian military deployed in that country already has sent 10 units comprising 300 people to help clear debris and search for survivors. The Russian military has set up points to distribute humanitarian assistance. Russia also has offered help to Turkey, which has been accepted. — War-ravaged Syria called for the United Nations and its members to help with rescue efforts, health services, shelter and food aid. Both government-held territory and the last opposition-held enclave were damaged by the earthquake. — The International Committee of the Red Cross has sent enough surgical material to treat 100 people to one of the public hospitals in the Syrian city of Aleppo. More medical equipment is on its ways to Aleppo, Latakia and Tartous. The Red Cross also is donating canned food, blankets, mattresses and other essential items for distribution in the many shelters being set-up in affected areas. — The Israeli army is sending a search and rescue team of 150 engineers, medical personnel and other aid workers to render lifesaving aid in Turkey. The two countries are mending ties after years of tensions. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he has also approved a request for humanitarian aid for Syria. Israel and Syria do not have diplomatic relations. — Palestinian Foreign Minister Riad Malki said the Palestinian Authority will dispatch two humanitarian missions to assist in Syria and Turkey. The aid missions will include civil defense and medical teams. — Neighbor and historic rival Greece is sending Turkey a team of 21 rescuers, two rescue dogs and a special rescue vehicle, together with a structural engineer, five doctors and seismic planning experts in a military transport plane. — The Lebanese army says it will send a team of 15 members of the miltiary’s engineering regiment to neighboring Syria to help in rescue operations in government-held parts of the country. Tuesday’s announcement came a day after the army sent 20 members of the same regiment to Turkey to help rescuers there who are racing to find survivors. — One of Libya’s rival governments said it will dispatch a 55-member team to Turkey to help in rescue efforts. The government of Prime Minister Abdel Hamid Dbeibah said the team would include rescuers, medical members along with four dogs. — Spanish medical workers will set up a field hospital in Turkey to treat the wounded. Spain has mobilized troops and drones from the country’s Military Emergency Unit to Malatya airport, where the Turkish authorities have installed an international aid center. Spain will also contribute to aid efforts through the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies. Spain will also contribute to rescue efforts in Syria through NGOs operating there. — Germany’s THW civil protection agency is sending a 50-member rescue team to Turkey on Tuesday. A team from the group International Search and Rescue Germany, with 42 experts and seven dogs, has arrived in Turkey and is heading to Kirikhan, near the Syrian border. Germany also has been readying deliveries of emergency generators, tents, blankets and water treatment equipment. — South Korea will dispatch a 60-person search and rescue team and 50 troops and send medical supplies to Turkey. The government also says it is providing an initial $5 million in humanitarian support, and the Gyeonggi provincial government plans to provide $1 million in humanitarian assistance. — Pakistan has sent one flight of relief supplies and another carrying a 50-member search and rescue team. The government says daily aid flights to Syria and Turkey will start Wednesday. — Britain is sending 76 search-and-rescue specialists with equipment and dogs, as well as an emergency medical team, to Turkey. The U.K. also says it’s in contact with the U.N. about getting support to victims in Syria. — India is sending 100 search and rescue personnel from its Natural Disaster Response Force to Turkey, as well as specially trained dog squads and equipment for relief efforts. Medical teams with trained doctors, paramedics and essential medicines are also ready, the Ministry of External Affairs said in a statement. — Taiwan is sending 130 rescue squad members, five search dogs and 13 tons of equipment to Turkey. Interior Minister Lin Yu-chang said the first group left for Turkey late Monday and another was sent Tuesday. Taiwan earlier said it would donate $200,000 to Turkey. — Swiss rescue dog service REDOG is sending 22 rescuers with 14 dogs to Turkey. The government said it would also send 80 search and rescue specialists to the country, including army disaster experts. — The Czech Republic is sending Turkey a team of 68 rescuers, including firefighters, doctors, structural engineers and also experts with sniffer dogs. — Japan is sending a group of about 75 rescue workers to Turkey. — Austria has offered to send 84 soldiers from a military disaster relief unit to Turkey. — Poland is sending Turkey 76 firefighters and eight trained dogs, with equipment. — Romania is sending specialized personnel and material to Turkey on two military aircraft. — Croatia is sending 40 personnel and 10 dogs, rescue equipment and vans to Turkey. — Serbia is sending 21 rescuers and three liaison officers to Turkey. — Montenegro is sending at least 24 firefighters to Turkey. — Moldova's president says 55 rescue workers have been sent to Turkey. — France is dispatching rescue teams to Turkey. — Jordan is sending emergency aid to Syria and Turkey on the orders of King Abdullah II. — Mexico’s foreign affairs secretary said the country will send equipment and rescue specialists to Turkey. — Egypt has pledged urgent humanitarian aid to Turkey. — Italy’s Civil Protection Agency has offered assistance to Turkey. A firefighting team was preparing to leave from Pisa, and the Italian military says transport flights will carry equipment as well as health and other personnel. — New Zealand is providing $632,000 to the Turkish Red Crescent and $316,000 to the Syrian Arab Red Crescent to deliver items such as food, tents and blankets, as well as provide medical assistance and psychological support. — China’s Red Cross Society is providing the Turkish Red Crescent and the Syrian Red Crescent with $200,000 each in humanitarian assistance.

Rescuers raced Tuesday to find survivors in the rubble of thousands of buildings brought down by a 7.8 magnitude earthquake and multiple aftershocks that struck eastern Turkey and neighboring Syria, with the discovery of more bodies raising the death toll to more than 5,000. Countries around the world dispatched teams to assist in the rescue efforts, and Turkey's disaster management agency said more than 24,400 emergency personnel were now on the ground. But with such a wide swath of territory hit by Monday’s earthquake and nearly 6,000 buildings confirmed to have collapsed in Turkey alone, their efforts were spread thin. Attempts to reach survivors were also impeded by temperatures below freezing and close to 200 aftershocks, which made the search through unstable structures perilous. Nurgul Atay told The Associated Press she could hear her mother's voice beneath the rubble of a collapsed building in the city of Antakya, the capital of Hatay province, but that her and others efforts to get into the ruins had been futile without any rescue crews and heavy equipment to help. “If only we could lift the concrete slab we'd be able to reach her,” she said. “My mother is 70-years-old, she won't be able to withstand this for long.” Across Hatay province, just southwest of the earthquake's epicenter, officials say as many as 1,500 buildings were destroyed and many people reported relatives being trapped under the rubble with no aid or rescue teams arriving. In areas where teams worked, occasional cheers broke out through the night as survivors were brought out of the rubble. The quake, which was centered in Turkey’s southeastern province of Kahramanmaras, sent residents of Damascus and Beirut rushing into the street and was felt as far away as Cairo. Sebastien Gay, the head of mission in Syria for Doctors Without Borders, said health facilities in northern Syria were overwhelmed with medical personnel working around “around the clock to respond to the huge numbers of wounded.” In Turkey's Hatay province, thousands of people sheltered in sports centers or fair halls, while others spent the night outside, huddled in blankets around fires. Turkey has large numbers of troops in the border region with Syria and has tasked the military to aid in the rescue efforts, including setting up tents for the homeless and a field hospital in Hatay province. Defense Minister Hulusi Akar said a humanitarian aid brigade based in Ankara and eight military search and rescue teams had also been deployed. A navy ship docked on Tuesday at the province's port of Iskenderun, where a hospital collapsed, to transport survivors in need of medical care to the nearby city of Mersin. Thick, black smoke rose from another area of the port, where firefighters have not yet been able to douse a fire that broke out among shipping containers that were toppled by the earthquake. In the Turkish city of Gaziantep, a provincial capital about 33 kilometers (20 miles) from the epicenter, people took refuge in shopping malls, stadiums, mosques and community centers. Turkey’s Vice President Fuat Oktay said the total number of deaths in Turkey had risen to 3,419, with another 20,534 people injured. The death toll in government-held areas of Syria climbed to 812 people, with some 1,450 injured, according to the Health Ministry. In the country’s rebel-held northwest, the opposition’s Syrian Civil Defense, or White Helmets, the paramedic group leading rescue operations, said that at least 790 were killed and more than 2,200 injured. That brought the overall total to 5,021. Authorities fear the death toll will keep climbing as the rescuers look for survivors among tangles of metal and concrete spread across the region beset by Syria’s 12-year civil war and refugee crisis. In the latest pledges of international help, South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol said he was preparing to swiftly dispatch a 60-person search and rescue team as well as medical supplies and 50 soldiers. Pakistan's government sent a flight carrying relief supplies and a 50-member search and rescue team early Tuesday, and said there will be daily aid flights to Syria and Turkey from Wednesday. India said it would send two search and rescue teams, including specially trained dogs and medical personnel. Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif will travel to Ankara Wednesday to express his condolences and solidarity, according to a statement from Islamabad. U.S. President Joe Biden called Erdogan to express condolences and offer assistance to the NATO ally. The White House said it was sending search-and-rescue teams to support Turkey’s efforts. The quake piled more misery on a region that has seen tremendous suffering over the past decade. On the Syrian side, the affected area is divided between government-controlled territory and the country’s last opposition-held enclave, which is surrounded by Russian-backed government forces. Turkey is home to millions of refugees from the Syrian civil war. In the rebel-held enclave, hundreds of families remained trapped in rubble, the opposition emergency organization known as the White Helmets said in a statement. The area is packed with some 4 million people displaced from other parts of the country by the war. Many live in buildings that are were already damaged by military bombardments. Strained medical centers quickly filled with injured people, rescue workers said. Some facilities had to be emptied, including a maternity hospital, according to the SAMS medical organization. More than 7,800 people were rescued across 10 provinces, according to Orhan Tatar, an official with Turkey’s disaster management authority. The region sits on top of major fault lines and is frequently shaken by earthquakes. Some 18,000 were killed in similarly powerful earthquakes that hit northwest Turkey in 1999. The U.S. Geological Survey measured Monday’s quake at 7.8, with a depth of 18 kilometers (11 miles). Hours later, another quake, likely triggered by the first, struck more than 100 kilometers (60 miles) away with 7.5 magnitude. The second jolt caused a multistory apartment building in the Turkish city of Sanliurfa to topple onto the street in a cloud of dust as bystanders screamed, according to video of the scene. Thousands of buildings were reported collapsed in a wide area extending from Syria’s cities of Aleppo and Hama to Turkey’s Diyarbakir, more than 330 kilometers (200 miles) to the northeast.

Gen. Pervez Musharraf, who seized power in a bloodless coup and later led a reluctant Pakistan into aiding the U.S. war in Afghanistan against the same Taliban fighters his nation murkily backed even as Islamic militants twice targeted him for assassination, has died, an official said Sunday. He was 79. Musharraf, a former special forces commando, became president through the last of a string of military coups that roiled Pakistan since its founding amid the bloody 1947 partition of India. He ruled the nuclear-armed state after his 1999 coup through tensions with India, an atomic proliferation scandal and an Islamic extremist insurgency. He stepped down in 2008 while facing possible impeachment. Later in life, Musharraf lived in self-imposed exile in Dubai to avoid criminal charges, despite attempting a political comeback in 2012. But it wasn’t to be as his poor health plagued his last years. He maintained a soldier’s fatalism after avoiding a violent death that always seemed to be stalking him. “I have confronted death and defied it several times in the past because destiny and fate have always smiled on me,” Musharraf once wrote. “I only pray that I have more than the proverbial nine lives of a cat.” Musharraf’s family announced in June 2022 that he had been hospitalized for weeks while suffering from amyloidosis, an incurable condition that sees proteins build up in the body’s organs. “Going through a difficult stage where recovery is not possible and organs are malfunctioning,” the family said. They later said he also needed access to the drug daratumumab, which is used to treat multiple myeloma. That bone marrow cancer can cause amyloidosis. Shazia Siraj, a spokeswoman for the Pakistani Consulate in Dubai, confirmed his death and said diplomats were providing support to his family. Pakistan, a nation nearly twice the size of California along the Arabian Sea, is now home to 220 million people. But it would be its border with Afghanistan that would soon draw the U.S.′ attention and dominate Musharraf’s life a little under two years after he seized power. Al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden launched the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks from Afghanistan, sheltered by the country’s Taliban rulers. Musharraf knew what would come next. “America was sure to react violently, like a wounded bear,” he wrote in his autobiography. “If the perpetrator turned out to be al-Qaida, then that wounded bear would come charging straight toward us.” By Sept. 12, then-U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell told Musharraf that Pakistan would either be “with us or against us.” Musharraf said another American official threatened to bomb Pakistan ”back into the Stone Age” if it chose the latter. Musharraf chose the former. A month later, he stood by then-President George W. Bush at the Waldorf Astoria in New York to declare Pakistan’s unwavering support to fight with the United States against “terrorism in all its forms wherever it exists.” Pakistan became a crucial transit point for NATO supplies head to landlocked Afghanistan. That was the case even though Pakistan’s powerful Inter-Services Intelligence agency had backed the Taliban after it swept into power in Afghanistan in 1994. Prior to that, the CIA and others funneled money and arms through the ISI to Islamic fighters battling the 1980s Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. The U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan saw Taliban fighters flee over the border back into Pakistan, including bin Laden, whom the U.S. would kill in 2011 at a compound in Abbottabad. They regrouped and the offshoot Pakistani Taliban emerged, beginning a yearslong insurgency in the mountainous border region between Afghanistan and Pakistan. The CIA began flying armed Predator drones from Pakistan with Musharraf’s blessing, using an airstrip built by the founding president of the United Arab Emirates for falconing in Pakistan’s Balochistan province. The program helped beat back the militants but saw over 400 strikes in Pakistan alone kill at least 2,366 people — including 245 civilians, according to the Washington-based New America Foundation think tank. Though Pakistan under Musharraf launched these operations, the militants still thrived as billions of American dollars flowed into the nation. That led to suspicion that still plagues the U.S. relationship with Pakistan. “After 9/11, then President Musharraf made a strategic shift to abandon the Taliban and support the U.S. in the war on terror, but neither side believes the other has lived up to expectations flowing from that decision,” a 2009 U.S. cable from then-Ambassador Anne Patterson published by WikiLeaks said, describing what had become the diplomatic equivalent of a loveless marriage. “The relationship is one of co-dependency we grudgingly admit — Pakistan knows the U.S. cannot afford to walk away; the U.S. knows Pakistan cannot survive without our support.” But it would be Musharraf’s life on the line. Militants tried to assassinate Musharraf twice in 2003 by targeting his convoy, first with a bomb planted on a bridge and then with car bombs. That second attack saw Musharraf’s vehicle lifted into the air by the blast before touching the ground again. It raced to safety on just its rims, Musharraf pulling a Glock pistol in case he needed to fight his way out.   It wasn’t until his wife, Sehba, saw the car covered in gore that the scale of the attack dawned on him. “She is always calm in the face of danger,” he recounted. But then, “she was screaming uncontrollably, hysterically.” Born Aug. 11, 1943, in New Delhi, India, Musharraf was the middle son of a diplomat. His family joined millions of other Muslims in fleeing westward when predominantly Hindu India and Islamic Pakistan split during independence from Britain in 1947. The partition saw hundreds of thousands of people killed in riots and fighting. Musharraf entered the Pakistani army at age 18 and made his career there as Islamabad fought three wars against India. He’d launch his own attempt at seizing territory in the disputed Himalayan region of Kashmir in 1999 just before seizing power from Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. Sharif had ordered Musharraf’s dismissal as the army chief flew home from a visit to Sri Lanka and denied his plane landing rights in Pakistan, even as it ran low on fuel. On the ground, the army seized control and after he landed Musharraf took charge. Yet as ruler, Musharraf nearly reached a deal with India on Kashmir, according to U.S. diplomats at the time. He also worked toward a rapprochement with Pakistan’s longtime rival. Another major scandal emerged under his rule when the world discovered that famed Pakistani nuclear scientist A.Q. Khan, long associated with the country’s atomic bomb, had been selling centrifuge designs and other secrets to countries including Iran, Libya and North Korea, making tens of millions of dollars. Those designs helped Pyongyang to arm itself with a nuclear weapon, while centrifuges from Khan’s designs still spin in Iran amid the collapse of Tehran’s nuclear deal with world powers. Musharraf said he suspected Khan but it wasn’t until 2003 when then-CIA director George Tenet showed him detailed plans for a Pakistani centrifuge that the scientist had been selling that he realized the severity of what happened. Khan would confess on state television in 2004 and Musharraf would pardon him, though he’d be confined to house arrest after that. “For years, A.Q.’s lavish lifestyle and tales of his wealth, properties, corrupt practices and financial magnanimity at state expense were generally all too well known in Islamabad’s social and government circles,” Musharraf later wrote. “However, these were largely ignored. ... In hindsight that neglect was apparently a serious mistake.” Musharraf’s domestic support eventually eroded. He held flawed elections in late 2002 — only after changing the constitution to give himself sweeping powers to sack the prime minister and parliament. He then reneged on a promise to stand down as army chief by the end of 2004. Militant anger toward Musharraf increased in 2007 when he ordered a raid against the Red Mosque in downtown Islamabad. It had become a sanctuary for militants opposed to Pakistan’s support of the Afghan war. The weeklong operation killed over 100 people. The incident severely damaged Musharraf’s reputation among everyday citizens and earned him the undying hatred of militants who launched a series of punishing attacks following the raid. Fearing the judiciary would block his continued rule, Musharraf fired the chief justice of Pakistan’s Supreme Court. That triggered mass demonstrations. Under pressure at home and abroad to restore civilian rule, Musharraf stepped down as army chief. Though he won another five-year presidential term, Musharraf faced a major crisis following former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto’s assassination in December 2007 at a campaign rally as she sought to become prime minister for the third time. The public suspected Musharraf’s hand in the killing, which he denied. A later United Nations report acknowledged the Pakistani Taliban was a main suspect in her slaying but warned that elements of Pakistan’s intelligence services may have been involved. Musharraf resigned as president in August 2008 after ruling coalition officials threatened to have him impeached for imposing emergency rule and firing judges. “I hope the nation and the people will forgive my mistakes,” Musharraf, struggling with his emotions, said in an hourlong televised address. Afterward, he lived abroad in Dubai and London, attempting a political comeback in 2012. But Pakistan instead arrested the former general and put him under house arrest. He faced treason allegations over the Supreme Court debacle and other charges stemming from the Red Mosque raid and Bhutto’s assassination. The image of Musharraf being treated as a criminal suspect shocked Pakistan, where military generals long have been considered above the law. Pakistan allowed him to leave the country on bail to Dubai in 2016 for medical treatment and he remained there after facing a later-overturned death sentence. But it suggested Pakistan may be ready to turn a corner in its history of military rule. “Musharraf’s resignation is a sad yet familiar story of hubris, this time in a soldier who never became a good politician,” wrote Patterson, the U.S. ambassador, at the time. “The good news is that the demonstrated strength of institutions that brought Musharraf down — the media, free elections and civil society — also provide some hope for Pakistan’s future. It was these institutions that ironically became much stronger under his government.”

Sri Lanka marked its 75th independence anniversary on Saturday as a bankrupt nation, with many citizens angry, anxious and in no mood to celebrate. Many Buddhists and Christian clergy had announced a boycott of the celebration in the capital, while activists and others expressed anger at what they see as a waste of money in a time of severe economic crisis. Despite the criticism, armed troops paraded along the main esplanade in Colombo, showcasing military equipment as navy ships sailed in the sea and helicopters and aircraft flew over the city. Catholic priest Rev. Cyril Gamini called this year's ceremony commemorating independence from British rule a “crime and waste” at a time when the country is experiencing such economic hardship. “We ask the government what independence they are going to proudly celebrate by spending a sum of 200 million rupees ($548,000),” said Gamini, adding the Catholic Church does not condone spending public money on the celebration and that no priest would attend the ceremony. About 7% of Sri Lanka’s 22 million people in this Buddhist-majority nation are Christians, most of them Catholics. Despite being a minority, the church’s views are respected. Prominent Buddhist monk Rev. Omalpe Sobitha said there is no reason to celebrate and that the ceremony is just an exhibition of weapons made in other countries. Sri Lanka is effectively bankrupt and has suspended repayment of nearly $7 billion in foreign debt due this year pending the outcome of talks with the International Monetary Fund. The country’s total foreign debt exceeds $51 billion, of which $28 billion has to be repaid by 2027. Unsustainable debt and a severe balance of payment crisis, on top of lingering scars from the COVID-19 pandemic, have led to a severe shortage of essentials such as fuel, medicine and food. The shortages led to protests last year that forced then-President Gotabaya Rajapaksa to flee the country and resign. Read more: Sri Lanka’s government cuts expenses as economy tanks There have been signs of improvement under President Ranil Wickremesinghe, but power cuts continue due to the fuel shortages, hospitals face medicine shortages and the treasury is struggling to raise money to pay government employees’ salaries. The economic crisis has made people angry and apathetic toward political leaders. To manage the country's expenses, the government has increased income taxes sharply and has announced a 6% cut in funds allocated to every ministry this year. Also, the military, which had swelled to more than 200,000 members amid a long civil war, will be downsized by nearly half by 2030. A group of activists began a silent protest on Friday in the capital, condemning the government’s independence celebration and failure to ease the economic burden.

Southeast Asian foreign ministers vowed to finalize negotiations with China over a proposed pact aimed at preventing conflicts in the disputed South China Sea in their annual retreat on Saturday in Indonesia’s capital. In the final session of their two-day meeting, the ministers from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations also agreed to unite in their approach to implement a five-step agreement made in 2021 between ASEAN leaders and Myanmar’s military leader, Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, that seeks to end that country’s worsening crisis. China and the ASEAN member states, which include four rival claimants to territories in the South China Sea, have been holding sporadic talks for years on a “code of conduct,” a set of regional norms and rules aimed at preventing a clash the disputed waters. Indonesian Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi said that Indonesia, this year’s ASEAN chair, is ready to host more rounds of negotiations over the proposed pact, the first of which will be held in March. She said ASEAN members are committed to concluding the discussions “as soon as possible." “Members are also committed to promote implementation of a declaration of conduct,” Marsudi added. Marsudi did not elaborate, but in the past, China has accused Washington of meddling in what it calls an Asian dispute. The U.S. has deployed ships and jets to patrol the waters to promote freedom of navigation and overflight. It has often raised alarm over China’s assertive actions, including its construction of islands where it has placed weapons including surface-to-air missiles. Sidharto Suryodipuro, head of ASEAN Cooperation at Indonesia’s Foreign Ministry, told reporters in Jakarta that ASEAN member states will push negotiations this year and explore new approaches. “All of us agreed that it has to be an effective implementable in accordance with international law, and the code of conduct must fulfill this criteria,” Suryodipuro said, adding that Indonesia is going to involve more countries besides China in the negotiation process. “It’s an exploratory stage. We don’t know what shape it will take, but as you know negotiation is a key process that is something we intend to intensify,” he said. China has come under intense criticism for its militarization of the strategic waterway but says it has the right to build on its territories and defend them at all costs. Vietnam, one of the four ASEAN claimant states, has been vocal in expressing concerns over China’s transformation of seven disputed reefs into man-made islands, including three with runways, which now resemble small cities armed with weapons systems. Read more: MPs urge ASEAN to put strong pressure on Myanmar ASEAN members Cambodia and Laos, both Chinese allies, have opposed the use of strong language against Beijing in the disputes. Indonesia is not among the governments challenging China’s claim to virtually the entire South China Sea but expressed opposition after China claimed part of Indonesia’s exclusive economic zone in the northern region of the Natuna Islands. The edge of the exclusive economic zone overlaps with Beijing’s unilaterally declared “nine-dash line” demarking its claims in the South China Sea. On the Myanmar issue, Marsudi told a news conference Saturday that ASEAN foreign ministers reiterated the urgent need for Myanmar's military junta to implement the five-point consensus, saying it is “very important for ASEAN.” On Friday, the ministers urged Myanmar’s military rulers to reduce violence and allow unhindered delivery of humanitarian aid to pave the way for a national dialogue aimed at ending the crisis. Myanmar is also an ASEAN member, but its foreign minister was excluded from Friday’s annual ministers’ retreat because of his country’s failure to implement the five-step consensus. Marsudi said the ministers agreed that an inclusive national dialogue “is key to finding a peaceful resolution to the situation in Myanmar,” and that reducing violence and providing humanitarian assistance are “paramount for building trust and confidence.” She said the lack of progress in Myanmar “tests our credibility” as a group, and that ASEAN’s efforts toward peace would be coordinated with those of other countries and the United Nations. Myanmar’s military leader promised in the five-point agreement to allow a special ASEAN envoy to meet with jailed ousted leader Aung San Suu Kyi and others to foster a dialogue aimed at easing the crisis, set off by the military’s seizure of power two years ago. But Myanmar refused to let an ASEAN envoy meet with Suu Kyi last year, resulting in Min Aung Hlaing’s exclusion from an ASEAN summit last November. "The public should expect that Indonesia could provide fresh air for finding a political solution to the worsening conflict in Myanmar,” said Dinna Prapto Raharja, an international relations analyst from Synergy Policies, an independent think tank. “The fragmentation of power in Myanmar is worse and so managing the violence has become more complex,” she said.

A South Korean court on Friday sentenced a former justice minister, Cho Kuk, to two years in prison, after he was found guilty of creating fake credentials to help his children get into prestigious schools, a scandal that rocked the country’s previous government and sparked huge protests. Cho was also found guilty of abusing his powers while serving as a senior aide to former President Moon Jae-in, by blocking an investigation into a former Financial Services Commission official seen as close to Moon who was eventually arrested for taking bribes from businesspeople. But the Seoul Central District Court decided not to place Cho under immediate arrest, saying he wasn’t a threat to flee and that his wife was already serving a prison term over the charges related to their children. Cho told reporters after the ruling that he plans to appeal, and if he does within seven days he will stay out of prison until at least the appellate ruling. The ruling culminated the public demise of the former Seoul National University law professor and liberal icon, whose political rise during the Moon government had him considered as a future presidential contender for the liberals. After initially serving as Moon’s senior secretary of civil affairs, Cho was appointed as justice minister in 2019 but was forced to resign months later after allegations emerged that he colluded with his wife to forge documents and certificates to help their daughter get into a medical school. The couple later faced similar accusations surrounding the education of their son. Cho’s wife, Chung Kyung-shim, had already been serving a four-year prison sentence before the Seoul court on Friday added another year to her term, after finding her guilty of additional charges related to her son. Read more: International court sentences Congo warlord to 30 years Cho apologized for the perks his daughter has received as he stepped down as justice minister but has steadfastly denied legal wrongdoing. The charges struck a nerve in a country grappling with widening rich-poor gaps and where teenagers toil in hyper-competitive school environments because graduating from elite universities is seen as crucial to career prospects. Cho’s legal saga also tarnished the reformist image of Moon, who vowed to restore faith in fairness and justice after winning a presidential by-election in 2017 to replace his conservative predecessor, Park Geun-hye, who was impeached and jailed for corruption. “I will appeal the charges that I was found guilty of and put up a more sincere argument (in court),” Cho told reporters after the ruling. He left without taking any questions.  

Troops raided a militant hideout in a former Pakistani Taliban stronghold near the border with Afghanistan on Friday, triggering a shootout that killed two insurgents, the military said. Pakistani Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif summoned the country's opposition leader to forge a response to the recent surge in violence, including a mosque bombing that killed 101 people. Troops on Friday recovered a cache of weapons in a militant hideout in North Waziristan, a district of the northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, the military said in a statement. The militants killed during the raid had been involved in past attacks on security forces, it added. The statement provided no further details, and the identity of the slain militants was not immediately known. Troops routinely carry out such raids to trace and arrest the Pakistani Taliban, who are also known as the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan. The Pakistani Taliban are a separate group but are allies of the Afghan Taliban, who seized power in Afghanistan a year ago as U.S. and NATO troops were in the final stages of their pullout. The Taliban takeover in Afghanistan has emboldened the Pakistani Taliban, who have stepped up attacks since November when they ended the ceasefire with the government. The latest development comes days after a suicide bomber attacked a mosque on the compound of police in the northwestern city of Peshawar, killing 101 people. Authorities say the bomber wore a police uniform and the guards at the site assumed he was a police officer — their colleague — and did not search him. Read more: -Peshawar, the city of flowers, becomes epicenter of violence On Friday, Sharif said in a televised address that he had invited his predecessor and now opposition leader, Imran Khan, and other officials to a conference Tuesday to discuss next steps. There was no immediate response from Khan, who was ousted in a no-conference vote in Parliament in April last year. Sharif said Monday's attack inside the mosque was carried out by a suicide bomber, and there was no truth in allegations and claims that it was a drone attack. Pakistan blames the Pakistani Taliban, who maintain sanctuaries in Afghanistan, for orchestrating the bombing that wounded 225 wounded. Police say most of the casualties were not caused by the detonation of the bomber’s explosives but by the collapse of the roof of the 50-year-old Peshawar mosque. The force of the blast caused the roof, which was supported by outside walls but no pillars, to cave in.