Mahakali Highway reopens for traffic

The Mahakali Highway, which was blocked by landslides triggered by the incessant rainfall on Sunday night, reopened late this morning.

According to Darchula's Chief District Officer Anil Paudel, landslides had occurred at Terchalek in Mallikarjun Rural Municipality-3 and at Ranebas in Shailyashikhar Municipality-6 along the Gokuleshwor–Darchula road section, causing obstruction.

Authorities have successfully cleared the debris, allowing traffic to resume. 

Following the reopening, the vehicles and passengers who had been stranded now began their journey towards destinations.

 

Russia strikes on Kharkiv kill three, injure 17, Ukraine says

A Russian air attack overnight on a residential area in Kharkiv killed three people, including a toddler, and injured 17, Ukrainian authorities said on Monday, as the United States presses Kyiv to take a quick deal to end a war Moscow started, Reuters reported.

A drone attack killed the two-year-old boy in Ukraine's second-largest city early on Monday, after a ballistic missile strike the previous night, Oleh Synehubov, the governor of the wider Kharkiv region, said on messaging app Telegram.

The number of the injured from the Kharkiv attack was "continuously increasing", Synehubov added.

Also on Telegram, Mayor Ihor Terekhov said two more were killed and 17 injured in both attacks, among them six children aged from six to 17, according to Reuters.

At least 20 killed and 134 people injured in blast at factory in Russia's Ryazan region

The death toll from an unexplained blast last week at a production facility in Russia's Ryazan region has jumped to at least 20 dead with another 134 people injured, local emergency services said on Monday, Reuters reported.

Pavel Malkov, governor of the Ryazan region that lies just southeast of Moscow, said on Friday that the incident had been triggered by a fire breaking out inside a workshop at the factory.

But it was unclear from Russian media reports what caused the fire or what exactly the factory was producing. Official Russian sources gave no details beyond efforts to find and treat the injured, according to Reuters.

Air Canada grounded as striking union defies order to get back to work

Air Canada's fleet of hundreds of planes remained grounded on Monday morning after striking flight attendants refused a government-backed order to get back to work and called on the airline to return to the bargaining table, Reuters reported.

The carrier, which normally carries 130,000 people daily and is part of the global Star Alliance of airlines, had planned to start ramping up operations on Sunday evening, after a labor relations board ordered the union to return to work and start binding arbitration.

The union said no, setting up an almost unprecedented standoff with the Canadian government, which had requested the back-to-work order.

The Canadian Union of Public Employees, which represents 10,000 Air Canada cabin crew, had pushed for a negotiated solution, saying binding arbitration would take pressure off the airline, according to Reuters.

Sudan army torturing people to death, says rights group

A prominent Sudanese human rights group has accused the country's army and security forces of torturing people to death and operating "execution chambers".

The Emergency Lawyers group said it had documented hundreds of arrests in the capital Khartoum. It said that in the "worst cases", some captives had later been found dead with evidence of torture, BBC reported.

The Sudanese army recaptured the city from the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in March, against which it is fighting a bitter civil war that has killed tens of thousands in two years.

The army did not respond to the BBC's request for comment on Sunday.

South Korean and US militaries begin annual summertime drills to cope with North Korean threats

South Korea and the United States began their annual large-scale joint military exercise on Monday to better cope with threats by nuclear-armed North Korea, which has warned the drills would deepen regional tensions and vowed to respond to “any provocation” against its territory, Associated Press reported.

The 11-day Ulchi Freedom Shield, the second of two large-scale exercises held annually in South Korea, after another set in March, will involve 21,000 soldiers, including 18,000 South Koreans, in computer-simulated command post operations and field training. 

The drills, which the allies describe as defensive, could trigger a response from North Korea, which has long portrayed the allies’ exercises as invasion rehearsals and has often used them as a pretext for military demonstrations and weapons tests aimed at advancing its nuclear program, according to Associated Press.

'No going into Nato by Ukraine,' says Trump as Zelensky prepares for White House talks

Donald Trump has said the Ukrainian president can end Russia's war "if he wants to", but there would be "no going into Nato by Ukraine" as part of a peace deal, BBC reported.

Hours before he was due to host Volodymyr Zelensky at the White House, Trump also said there would be "no getting back" of the Crimean peninsula, which Moscow illegally annexed in 2014, eight years before launching its full-scale invasion.

Trump's remarks follow his summit with Russian leader Vladimir Putin in Alaska that resulted in the US president dropping a demand for a ceasefire and calling instead for a permanent peace deal.

After arriving in the US late on Sunday, Zelensky reiterated his call for allies' effective security guarantees, according to BBC.

Tamghas-Ridi road section obstructed

The Tamghas-Ridi road section along the Madan Bhandari Highway in Gulmi district has remained obstructed from early morning today due to a landslide triggered by rainfall. 

The landslide, which brought down large rocks, has blocked the road in Resunga Municipality-13, according to the District Police Office, Gulmi.

Vehicular movement on both sides has come to a standstill, leaving passengers and vehicles stranded. Efforts to clear the landslide depositions have started, said Ganga Bahadur Saru, the Information Officer at the District Police Office.