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Three teenage girls were found hanging in a tree in Kachankawal Rural Municipality of Jhapa district on Sunday.

DSP Basanta Pathak of the District Police Office, Jhapa said that the three girls committed suicide by hanging themselves in a tree at Sunkoshi Tea Farm in Ballegaun of Pathamari, Kachankawal Rural Municipality-5.

Those who committed suicide have been identified as Karina (16), daughter of Pancham Ganesh, Anjali (17), daughter of Puwali Ganesh and Kalpana (16), daughter of Birbal Ganesh of Kachankawal-5.

According to locals, all of them had gone missing from the house since Saturday afternoon.

Locals informed police after they found the trio found hanging in a tree at around 7 am today.

All of them used to work at the tea garden.

Police said that they are looking into the case.

At least 22 people were killed in flash floods caused by heavy rains in Iran's southern province of Fars, a provincial official said on Saturday, Reuters reported.

There was at least one person missing, said Khalil Abdollahi, head of the province's crisis management department, quoted by the semi-official news agency Tasnim.

He said 55 people had been rescued in the flood which submerged 15 cars.

The governor of Fars province declared Sunday a day of mourning, state media said, according to Reuters.

A wildfire near Yosemite National Park in California is spreading quickly, threatening thousands of homes, BBC reported.

The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (Cal Fire) described it as being "zero per cent under control" on Saturday morning. 

"Explosive fire behaviour is challenging firefighters", Cal Fire reported on Saturday.

Central and North Eastern regions of the US are also sweltering under extreme heat. 

Temperatures of 38C (100.4 F) are forecast in Washington DC and Dallas, with New York only slightly cooler.

Dubbed the Oak Fire, the blaze in California started on Friday afternoon local time and quickly exploded in size. Thousands of people have been told to evacuate, according to BBC.

Climate change increases the risk of the hot, dry weather that is likely to fuel wildfires. 

The world has already warmed by about 1.1C since the industrial era began and temperatures will keep rising unless governments around the world make steep cuts to emissions, BBC reported.

The monkeypox outbreak has been declared a global health emergency by the World Health Organization, BBC reported.

The classification is the highest alert that the WHO can issue and follows a worldwide upsurge in cases.

It came at the end of the second meeting of the WHO's emergency committee on the virus.

More than 16,000 cases have now been reported from 75 countries, said WHO director general Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.

There had been five deaths so far as a result of the outbreak, he added.

There are only two other such health emergencies at present - the coronavirus pandemic and the continuing effort to eradicate polio.

Dr Tedros said the emergency committee had been unable to reach a consensus on whether the monkeypox outbreak should be classified as a global health emergency.

However, he said the outbreak had spread around the world rapidly and he had decided that it was indeed of international concern.

Too little was understood about the new modes of transmission which had allowed it to spread, said Dr Tedros, according to BBC.

"The WHO's assessment is that the risk of monkeypox is moderate globally and in all regions, except in the European region, where we assess the risk as high," he added.

There was also a clear risk of further international spread, although the risk of interference with international traffic remained low for the moment, he said.

Dr Tedros said the declaration would help speed up the development of vaccines and the implementation of measures to limit the spread of the virus. 

The WHO is also issuing recommendations which it hopes will spur countries to take action to stop transmission of the virus and protect those most at risk.

"This is an outbreak that can be stopped with the right strategies in the right groups," Dr Tedros said, BBC reported.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has accused Russia of "barbarism" after a missile attack on the port of Odesa, BBC reported.

A landmark deal to resume Ukraine's grain exports - signed hours before the strike - now hangs in the balance.

Moscow has not commented on the attack and Kyiv has said preparations are still underway to resume the grain exports despite the apparent breach.

But on Saturday President Zelensky said it illustrates how Moscow cannot be trusted to stick to the deal.

He vowed to do everything possible to acquire air defence systems able to shoot down such missiles in the future.

Ukraine is a major grain exporter, but because of the war, about 20m tonnes of grain is trapped in its ports, unable to leave because of Russian forces. This has lead to food shortages and price rises across Africa, which usually relies on Ukraine and Russia for wheat.

Under Friday's deal, Russia agreed not to target ports while grain shipments were in transit. 

But just hours after the agreement was signed, two Kalibr missiles hit Odesa port, according to the Ukrainian military's southern command centre. Another two missiles were shot down by air defence systems, it added.

The strike caused no significant damage to the port, the command centre said.

The attack has been widely condemned. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken accused Russia of worsening a global food crisis, and said the attack cast "serious doubt" on the credibility of Russia's commitment to the pact, according to BBC.

"Russia must stop its aggression and fully implement the grain deal to which it has agreed," he said on Saturday.

The Kremlin has so far made no public comment on the attack, however the Turkish government, which brokered the deal, said Russian officials had denied responsibility. 

"In our contact with Russia, the Russians told us that they had absolutely nothing to do with this attack and that they were examining the issue very closely and in detail," said Defence Minister Hulusai Akar.

In another development, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said Ukraine could not win against Russia. 

Speaking at an international conference of conservatives, he said the war could only be ended by peace talks between Washington and Moscow.

"A new strategy is needed, which should focus on peace negotiations instead of trying to win the war," said Mr Orban, whose views on the conflict are often at odds with those of other EU leaders.

On Friday, officials from Kyiv and Moscow signed a deal to allow millions of tonnes of grain trapped in Ukraine to be exported. 

The agreement was hailed as a "beacon of hope" by the UN after months of fighting. 

The deal - which took two months to reach - is set to last for 120 days, with a co-ordination and monitoring centre to be established in Istanbul, staffed by UN, Turkish, Russian and Ukrainian officials. It can be renewed if both parties agree, BBC reported.

Strategic Affairs Nepal, a Kathmandu-based think-tank, organized a talk program titled Climate Change and Monsoon-induced Disasters in South Asia, on July 24.

The renowned environmental scientist Dr. Uttam Babu Shrestha delivered his presentation on it. He highlighted the challenges ushered by climate change. He emphasized that one of the three global crises that mankind is now experiencing is climate change. He presented an overview of climate change in the global and South Asian settings serving as the main starting point. 

Both natural and artificial systems have been influenced by climate change. Climate-related catastrophes including floods, droughts, landslides, and coastal erosion have harmed billions of people over the past 30 years and cost hundreds of billions in property and infrastructure losses. No location on earth is more susceptible to more than 800 million people in South Asia being at risk of dying due to climate change as the environment changes, and income (rise in temperature, erratic rainfall, and drying up water sources). 

He further enhanced these challenges with case studies in terms of Nepal’s context. The talk detailed on the changes in temperature and precipitation indicators' intensity, duration, frequency, and extremes during the past century on both national and global scales. In the context of South Asia and Nepal and their connections with climate change, it will present the spatiotemporal changes in climate-induced catastrophes. Future climatic changes and the threats they bring will be covered towards the conclusion of the discussion.

Kamal Dev Bhattarai, Kathmandu-based diplomatic and environment journalist spoke about the need of regional frameworks to tackle the climate-induced disaster in South Asia. He said regional organizations like SAARC and BIMSTEC can play a pivotal role to mitigate the effects of climate change. He said without political stability in this region, climate change issues will not get a priority.

Nepal reported 456 new Covid-19 cases on Friday.

According to the Ministry of Health and Population, 2,168 swab samples were tested in the RT-PCR method, of which 384 returned positive. Likewise, 1, 670 people underwent antigen tests, of which 72 were tested positive.

The Ministry said that no one died of virus in the last 24 hours. 

As of today, there are 2, 841 active cases in the country.

A research think tank based in Kathmandu held a seminar on ‘Geopolitics and Military Diplomacy in Nepal-US Relations,’ at ALICE Conference in Bakhundole, Lalitpur on Friday to hold a discussion on Nepal-US relations and the role of military cooperation. 

The discussion was aimed to positively impact Nepal’s diplomatic practice, read a statement issued by the Centre for Social Inclusion and Federalism.

The seminar consisted of two sessions.

The first session held on ‘Military Diplomacy of Nepal’ consisted of the panel involving Gen. Gaurav Shumsher Jung Bahadur Rana, Former Chief of Nepal Army; Hon’ble Upendra Yadav, Chairperson of Janata Samajbadi Party and Former Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs; Hon’ble Dr. Deepak Prakash Bhatt, Member of the House of Representative and Member of Foreign Affairs Committee in the Lower House; Maj. Gen. Purna Bahadur Silwal (Retd.), Nepal Army.

General Gaurav Shumsher Jung Bahadur said that while Military is known as a hard power tool, it can also be used as a soft power tool to achieve broader foreign policy objectives.

Chairperson of Janata Samajbadi Party and former Foreign Minister Upendra Yadav said that Nepal must abide by its non-alignment policy and reject proposals for military partnership with foreign countries, the statement read.

Dr. Deepak Prakash Bhatt mentioned that Military Diplomacy is a very relevant topic in the discourse in present context when the world continues to change geopolitically. Maj. Gen Purna Bahadur Silwal also said that strong military ties between two countries can be leveraged to achieve broader foreign policy objectives.

The second session on ‘Geopolitics and Nepal-US Relations’ consisted of the panel involving Dinesh Bhattarai, former Foreign Affairs advisor to the Prime Minister Suresh Chalise, former ambassador to the USA and the UK Ajaya Bhadra Khanal, senior Journalist and research director at CESIF and Mamta Siwakoti, lawyer and researcher.

Speaking in the seminar, Dinesh Bhattarai mentioned that Nepal is caught in a geopolitical maneuvering between global powerhouses like the US and China and their conflict for hegemony.

Similarly, Dr. Suresh Chalise said that the US involvement in Nepal has been influenced by its regional interests.

To protect its sovereignty, Nepal should confine its relationship with the US to strictly bilateral, he said, the statement further read.

Meanwhile, Ajay Bhadra Khanal said that the US has used investments as a tool for diplomatic relations and political influence.

With growing geopolitical interests of powerhouses, Nepal will face increasing pressure in the future, he said.

Siwakoti speaking at the event signaled that Nepal’s domestic political narrative perceives ourselves as small and insignificant and we are quick to consider any external interest a threat. Negotiating with countries like the US for investment and aid is a strategy of economic pragmatism, she said.

Distinguished dignitaries, diplomats, military officials as well as academicians took part in the event.