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The Land Problem Settlement Commission district committee has handed over land ownership certificates to 259 landless Dalit, landless squatters and unmanaged settlers in Chitwan.

Commission Chair Iman Singh Moktan informed that land ownership certificates were distributed to 130 families from Ratnanagar Municipality and 129 from Bharatpur Metropolitan City.

A total of 51,000 persons had applied for land ownership certificates at the commission.

Work is under progress in a way to distribute certificates to 400 landless families, it is shared.

Land ownership certificates for 150 families have been prepared so far.

The target is to prepare certificates for 400 families by the end of Ashoj (October 17), Chair Moktan said.

The Commission is working in coordination with the local level.

Most of the motorized vehicles operating in Nepal bear hand-written number plates, a unique practice in this day and age of digital technology.

The government of Nepal wants to switch to embossed number plates as part of the concept of a Digital Nepal and plans to install 2.5m embossed plates in as many vehicles out of 4m vehicles in operation across the country.

As per a revised agreement with the government, a US-Bangla joint venture company tasked with installing the new plates has to install 2.49m embossed plates in the first phase—within November 27 this year.

But stakeholders like transporters, commoners, linguistic rights groups and data security specialists have a lot of reservations regarding the government plan.

For their part, transporters have urged the public not to switch to embossed plates till the government addresses their concerns, including practical difficulties involved and the lack of supporting infrastructure. They have warned that the government will be solely to blame for the consequences if it tries to enforce its will.

Other concerns include a tardy service, high charges associated with installation of embossed plates, the use of English language instead of Nepali, given that traditional number plates are in Nepali, and data security of motorists, bikers and drivers in a day and age where technology has become a double-edged sword. Also, there’s a feeling among members of the public that the use of English language in number plates is part of a sinister design to undermine and discourage the use of Nepali, the official national language of Nepal that uses the Devnagari script.

The government’s intent to enforce the embossed system, come hell or high water, with no regard for public concerns has made the citizenry more suspicious vis-à-vis the former’s designs, perceived or otherwise.

Granted that the new system is likely to contribute to traffic management, curb theft of vehicles,  lead to the recovery of stolen vehicles and improve road safety. Instead of a top-down approach, the government should have taken a bottom-up approach, sensitizing the people about this technology, its benefits and shortcomings, and bothered to address the concerns of the stakeholders to a maximum possible extent. The government, instead, chose to impose its plan in a manner befitting benevolent dictators, who impose their ‘pious wishes’ on the citizenry every now and then.  

It's time for the government to eat the humble pie once again and address the concerns of the stakeholders by giving up its my way or highway attitude. 

South Korea and the United States have agreed to begin talks on nuclear fuel reprocessing, South Korean Foreign Minister Cho Hyun said.

Currently barred under a US agreement to prevent nuclear proliferation, South Korea seeks reprocessing for industrial and environmental purposes, not weapons development, Cho emphasized.

According to Reuters, he talks aim to explore ways to allow safe reprocessing within existing agreements, with potential implications for future nuclear energy cooperation between the two nations.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has called on European nations to provide clear and concrete security guarantees for Ukraine amid ongoing Russian aggression.

In a virtual meeting with leaders from Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Denmark, Zelenskiy stressed the need for defined roles in Ukraine’s defense across land, air, and sea, urging a coordinated response to ensure effective protection, Reuters reported.

Highlighting the persistent threat from Russia, he criticized President Vladimir Putin’s apparent lack of interest in ending the conflict and emphasized the importance of united European support.

According to Reuters, senior Ukrainian officials are also scheduled to meet with US counterparts in New York to discuss further security arrangements and potential coordination of measures, as Europe and the US consider responses to the evolving situation.

US will permanently end the $800 tariff exemption on package shipments starting Friday, aiming to boost customs revenue and curb illegal goods like narcotics, Reuters reported.

A six-month transition allows postal services to charge a flat duty of $80–$200 per package based on the country of origin, with full value-based duties mandatory by February 28, 2026. The exemption, in place since 1938 and raised to $800 in 2015, had been heavily used for direct shipments from China and Hong Kong, which surged after earlier US tariff hikes.

US Customs and Border Protection reported that exempted packages grew from 139m in 2015 to 1.36bn in 2024. Express carriers like FedEx, UPS, and DHL will handle duties, while some foreign postal services have temporarily suspended shipments, though deliveries from Britain, Canada, and Ukraine continue, according to Reuters.

NASA’s InSight mission has detected giant fragments of rock from massive impacts 4.5bn years ago deep within Mars’ mantle, Xinhua reported.

Up to four kilometers across, these lumps reveal that Mars’ interior has evolved slowly, preserving ancient features that would have been erased on Earth. The impacts melted large areas of crust and mantle, embedding debris deep in the planet.

According to Xinhua, InSight recorded over 1,300 marsquakes, providing the detailed data behind this discovery.

The US State Department has approved a possible $825m sale of air-delivered munitions and related equipment to Ukraine. The package, with Zone 5 Technologies and CoAspire as the main contractors, is aimed at strengthening Ukraine’s defense capabilities amid the ongoing war.

Funding for the purchase will come from US foreign military financing as well as contributions from Denmark, the Netherlands, and Norway. Washington noted that no offset agreements are connected to this potential sale, Xinhua reported.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned Thursday that Israel’s assault on Gaza City marks a “new and dangerous phase,” forcing exhausted civilians into deeper peril. He said famine is already unfolding, with people dying of hunger as food, water and healthcare systems collapse, Xinhua reported.

Guterres condemned Israeli strikes on hospitals and urged Israel to allow urgent humanitarian aid, protect civilians and stop obstructing relief efforts. He also voiced concern over rising violence and settlement expansion in the West Bank, calling new housing plans an “existential threat” to a two-state solution.

He appealed for an immediate ceasefire, release of hostages, and unimpeded aid. “Starvation must never be a weapon of war,” he said, according to Xinhua.