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A girl died after a scooter knocked her down in Gwarko of Lalitpur on Thursday.

The deceased has been identified as six-year-old Anushka Jaiswal of Rautahat. 

Critically injured in the incident that occurred around 7 pm yesterday, Jaiswal was rushed to the B & B Hospital in Lalitpur but breathed her last during the course of treatment. 

Police said that they are searching for the scooter rider who fled the scene after the incident.

The price of the gold has increased by Rs 900 per tola in the domestic market on Friday.

According to the Federation of Nepal Gold and Silver Dealers' Association, the yellow metal is being traded at Rs Rs 99,900 per tola today.

It was traded at Rs 99,000 per tola on Thursday, the Association said.

Similarly, the price of silver is being traded at Rs 1,380 per tola.

Russian forces pressed their attack on a crucial energy-producing Ukrainian city by shelling Europe’s largest nuclear plant early Friday, sparking a fire and raising fears that radiation could leak from the damaged power station, Associated Press reported.

The assault on the eastern city of Enerhodar and its Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant came as the invasion entered its second week with Russian forces gaining ground in their bid to cut off the country from the sea. Elsewhere, another round of talks between the two sides yielded a tentative agreement to set up safe corridors inside Ukraine to evacuate citizens and deliver humanitarian aid.

Nuclear plant spokesman Andriy Tuz told Ukrainian television that shells were falling directly on the facility and had set fire to one of its six reactors. That reactor is under renovation and not operating, but there is nuclear fuel inside, he said.

Firefighters cannot get near the flames because they are being shot at, he said, and Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba tweeted a plea to the Russians to stop the assault and allow fire teams inside.

“We demand that they stop the heavy weapons fire,” Tuz said in a video statement. “There is a real threat of nuclear danger in the biggest atomic energy station in Europe.”

The attack renewed fears that the invasion could result in damage to one of Ukraine’s 15 nuclear reactors and trigger another emergency like the 1986 Chernobyl accident, the world’s worst nuclear disaster, which happened about 110 kilometers (65 miles) north of the capital.

The American Nuclear Society condemned the attack but said the latest radiation levels remained within natural background levels.

“The real threat to Ukrainian lives continues to be the violent invasion and bombing of their country,” the group said in a statement from President Steven Nesbit and Executive Director and CEO Craig Piercy.

The plant’s reactor is a different type than the one used at Chernobyl, and there should be little risk if the containment vessel is not damaged and outside power can be restored, said Jon B. Wolfsthal, a former senior director for arms control and nonproliferation at the National Security Council and former special adviser to then-Vice President Joe Biden.

“Everyone needs to take a step back and not jump to conclusions,” Wolfsthal, now a senior adviser at Global Zero, said on Twitter.

The International Atomic Energy Agency said it was in contact with authorities in Ukraine. The agency’s director general, Mariano Grossi, urged military forces to refrain from violence near the plant.

Nepal Oil Corporation (NOC), the state-owned monopoly, hiked the prices of petroleum products.

The NOC has decided to increase Rs 5 per litre each in petrol, diesel and kerosene.

As per the new revised rate, the petrol will now cost Rs 150 per litre and diesel and kerosene will cost Rs 133 per litre.

The NOC has also decided to increase the price of aviation fuel for domestic airlines by Rs 10 and international carriers by $100 per kilo liter.

The NOC, however, has not increased the price of Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG).

The decision will come into effect from today midnight.

Russian and Belarusian athletes were barred from the Winter Paralympics in Beijing on the eve of the Games following threats of boycotts by other teams over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) said, Associated Press reported.

Belarus has been a key staging area for the invasion, which was launched a week ago.

Thursday’s decision comes a day after the IPC gave athletes from the two countries the green light to participate in the March 4-13 Games as neutrals, saying the “athletes were not the aggressors”.

But that led to an outcry and threats from other countries’ National Paralympic Committees (NPC) to boycott the Games, IPC President Andrew Parsons told a news conference in Beijing.

“They told us that if we do not reconsider our decision, it is now likely to have grave consequences for the Winter Games,” Parsons said.

“Multiple NPCs, some of which have been contacted by their governments, teams and athletes, are threatening not to compete.”

Ukraine’s paralympic committee welcomed the decision and thanked the sporting community for rallying around them.

“A fair decision, a decision against a country that started this war,” committee president Valeriy Sushkevych told a news conference.

A 71-member Russian contingent and 12-member team from Belarus are in Beijing.

“Now Russia must leave the Games as soon as possible … we would also like to thank everyone for their support. I have received so many messages in the last few days … it’s time to stop this terrible war,” Sushkevych said.

Officials from the two banned teams were not immediately available for comment.

Parsons said it was clear the situation put his organisation in a “unique and impossible position” so close to the start of the Games, adding that an overwhelming number of members had been in touch and been forthright in their objections to Russia and Belarus taking part.

Parsons said the Russian and Belarusian athletes were victims of the actions of their governments.

“Athlete welfare will always be a priority for us,” he said.

“If Russian and Belarusian athletes stayed in Beijing, nations were likely to withdraw, and a viable Games would not have been possible.

“The atmosphere in the Games village is not pleasant. The situation there is escalating and has now become untenable … The Games are not only about gold, silver and bronze, but also about sending a strong message of inclusion.”

Parsons said the IPC was likely to face legal consequences but was confident that the right decision had been made.

The IPC said earlier in a statement that following a specially convened meeting, its Governing Board has decided not to allow athletes from Russia and Belarus to take part.

The ban got support of the Polish Paralympic Committee, which said it would have been unimaginable for athletes from Ukraine, Russia and Belarus to compete in the same place.

Indian student Abrar Sheikh has been waking up to the loud thuds of bombs that have pummeled Sumy, a city in northeastern Ukraine near the Russian border, for the last three days. When he hears the sounds of shelling, he rushes to a nearby bunker, praying the bombs don’t find him, Associated Press reported.

On Tuesday, the blare of the bombs became louder. The food inside the bunker got scarcer and the cries of children inside grew.

“At that moment, all I could think of was my family,” Sheikh, 22, said by cellphone from the underground bunker on Wednesday, his voice thick with fear.

“Sometimes the bunker goes all silent after we hear the sound of the bombs and I think, ‘Is this it?’” he said. “At night we pull the curtains in our rooms to keep them dark, hoping Russian troops don’t know we are inside.”

Thousands of Indians studying in Ukraine have suddenly found themselves in the midst of the war after Russia invaded the country last week, with many hunkered inside bunkers and fearful of what lies ahead.

Pressure on the Indian government to pull out its citizens has intensified in recent days, especially after one student died in shelling in Kharkiv on Tuesday. The government says about 17,000 out of an estimated 20,000 Indian citizens in Ukraine have left the country and that India is trying to evacuate the rest to nearby countries from where they can be flown back home. Many of those who remain stranded are in conflict areas such as Kharkiv and Sumy.

Sheikh, a medical student at Sumy State University, has been trying to leave the city for several days. But shelling by Russian forces has left him and about 500 other Indian students in the city trapped.

They are about 50 kilometers (30 miles) from the Russian border. But they are hundreds of kilometers and at least 10 hours away from Ukraine’s western border, considered to be safer, where Indian officials have so far focused their evacuation efforts. Evacuation flights have taken off from countries bordering western Ukraine, such as Poland, Slovakia, Hungary and Romania, with more scheduled. A group of Indian Cabinet ministers has flown to these countries to help with rescue efforts.

But for those stuck in the eastern region, there appears no safe way out yet. India has sent a team from its embassy in Moscow to Belgorod, a Russian city close to the border with Ukraine, foreign secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla said Tuesday. “This team is in place and ready to see whatever we can do to extract our students and citizens from the Kharkiv and Sumy area,” he said.

India has asked all its citizens to immediately leave Kharkiv after receiving information from Russia, External Affairs Ministry spokesman Arindam Bagchi said. They have been advised to move to three safe zones about 15 kilometers (9 miles) away using any means, including on foot, he said. Bagchi did not describe the information provided by Russia.

In Sumy, about 180 kilometers (110 miles) from Kharkiv, an oil depot was reportedly bombed, railway tracks have been destroyed, and there is fighting in the streets, students said.

“We cannot leave. We have no way of getting to the western part. There is no train or bus or any transport to take us there,” said Chandra Reddy, 22, another medical student at Sumy State University.

Reddy said he was in touch with Indian authorities, who urged him to stay put for now.

He said he risked his life on Tuesday to go to a nearby grocery store, leaving the bunker where he has spent most of his time over the last six days. He quickly bought packets of rice, vegetables and fruit — enough to last a few days — before rushing back.

On the same day, Indian student Naveen S. Gyanagoudar was killed in Kharkiv when he left his bunker to go buy food.

“When I heard that, it hit me that I had just done the same thing, that this can be me next,” Reddy said.

Approximately 18,000 Indian students were in Ukraine, most of them studying medicine. The state-run universities are popular with Indian students for their high-quality education at affordable prices, and as an alternative to India’s overcrowded and competitive public universities.

Young people risk hearing loss from loud music in venues such as nightclubs and concerts, the World Health Organization (WHO) said as it issued a new global standard for safe listening, Reuters reported.

Nearly 40% of teenagers and young adults aged 12–35 years in middle and high-income countries are exposed to potentially damaging sound levels in venues such as nightclubs, discotheques and bars, the WHO said in a statement, adding that it recommended a maximum average sound level of 100 decibels.

The risk of hearing loss is intensified because most audio devices, venues and events do not provide safe listening options, Bente Mikkelsen, WHO director for the department for noncommunicable diseases said on Wednesday.

The WHO also said that it recommended live monitoring of sound levels and designated “quiet zones” at venues.

The new recommendations are in addition to guidelines the WHO issued in 2019 outlining how individuals can limit hearing damage due to prolonged exposure to loud music on devices such as mobile phones and audio players.

Nepal logged 105 new Covid-19 cases and three deaths on Thursday. 

With this, the country's active caseload mounted to 1,116,761. Similarly, the death toll has climbed to 11,943. 

According to the Ministry of Health and Population, 2, 448 swab samples were tested in the RT-PCR method, of which 70 returned positive. Likewise, 2,476 people underwent antigen tests, of which 35 tested positive.

The Ministry said that 320 infected people recovered from the disease in the last 24 hours.

As of today, there are 7, 517 active cases in the country. 

The Ministry said that 7, 349 people are staying in home isolation while 168 are in institutionalized isolation.

Among the infected, 61 are in Intensive Care Units and nine are on ventilators.