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The death toll from record rains that have devastated parts of Japan rose Sunday to at least 57, officials said, as rescue workers and troops struggled in the mud and water to save lives.Local media put the toll at 67, with dozens more people missing and the number of fatalities expected to rise.

Earlier Sunday, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe warned of a "race against time" to rescue flood victims as there were still many people whose safety has yet to be confirmed. The torrential downpours have caused flash flooding and landslides across central and western parts of the country, prompting evacuation orders for more than two million people. 

The rain has completely blanketed some villages, forcing desperate residents to take shelter on their rooftops with flood water swirling below as they wait for rescue. Over two million people have been told to evacuate, but the orders are not mandatory and many remained at home, becoming trapped by rapidly rising water or sudden landslides. The meteorological agency issued its highest level alert for two new regions on Sunday, before lifting them after rains began subsiding later on the day. 

Roads turned into rivers 

In the town of Mihara, in the south of the Hiroshima region, a let-up in rain laid bare the devastation wrought by the downpours.Roads were transformed into muddy flowing rivers, with dirt piled up on either side as flood water gushed around the wheels of stranded cars.

"The area became an ocean," said 82-year-old Nobue Kakumoto, a long-time resident. "I'm worried because I have no idea how long it will stay like this."Several dozen residents descended into the village to inspect the damage after spending the night in a tiny shelter on higher ground. 

Masanori Hiramoto, a 68-year-old farmer, didn't bother observing the Japanese custom of removing his shoes when he entered his ravaged home, the woven tatami mat floors carpeted with mud. 
"I don't even know where to start cleaning. I don't know what is where," he told AFP. Elsewhere, work crews tried to clear multiple small landslides that coated roads, rendering them virtually impassable. 
"We are carrying out rescue operations around the clock,

" Yoshihide Fujitani, a disaster management official in Hiroshima prefecture, told AFP. "We are also looking after evacuees and restoring lifeline infrastructure like water and gas," he added. "We are doing our best." In western Okayama prefecture, rescue operations were underway to evacuate several hundred people including children and the elderly from a hospital, some by helicopter. 

Those in the building became trapped when a nearby river burst its banks and flooded the area, and a nurse inside told local media there was no power or water, and food was running short. "Around 1,000 people were seeking rescue by Sunday morning, but we don't yet have a complete picture of the disaster, which is enormous," Mutsunari Imawaka, a spokesman for the prefecture's disaster management office, told AFP. "We are working hard to rescue them as quickly as possible. Time is running out. " 

Homes washed away 

Over 50,000 rescue workers, police and military personnel have been mobilised to respond to the disaster, which has left entire villages submerged by flooding, with just the top of traffic lights visible above the rising waters."I was in a car and massive floods of water gushed towards me from the front and back and then engulfed the road.

I was just able to escape, but I was terrified," 62-year-old Yuzo Hori told the Mainichi Shimbun daily in Hiroshima on Saturday.Though the rains began last week when a typhoon made landfall, the worst downpours hit from Thursday, when a construction worker was swept away by floodwaters in western Japan.The toll has risen steadily since then, and the conditions have made rescue operations difficult, with some desperate citizens taking to Twitter to call for help.

The floods have halted production at plants across the affected region, with reports of electricity, water and mobile phone network outages. The disaster is the deadliest rain-related crisis in Japan since 2014, when at least 74 people were killed in landslides caused by torrential downpours in the Hiroshima region. AFP

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Six boys among a group of 13 trapped in a flooded Thai cave for more than a fortnight were rescued on Sunday, authorities said, raising hopes elite divers would also quickly save the others. The first two boys emerged about nightfall from the Tham Luang cave complex after navigating a treacherous escape route of more than four kilometres (2.5 miles) through twisting, narrow and jagged passageways. They were followed shortly afterwards by four others, leading to an explosion of jubilation on social media in Thailand and around the world as the rescued boys were rushed to hospital.

 
"Six of them came out," a defence ministry official, who asked not to be named, told AFP. 
Foreign elite divers and Thai Navy SEALS on Sunday morning began the complex operation to extract the 12 boys and their football coach as they raced against time, with imminent monsoon rains threatening more flooding that would doom the mission. 
"Today is the D-day. The boys are ready to face any challenges," rescue chief Narongsak Osottanakorn told reporters near the cave site on Sunday morning. 
The group became trapped in a cramped chamber deep inside Tham Luang in a mountainous area of northern Thailand on June 23, when they went in after football practice and got caught behind rising waters. 
Their plight transfixed Thailand and the rest of the world, as authorities struggled to devise a plan to get the boys -- aged between 11 and 16 -- and their 25-year-old coach out

. 
- 'Mission Impossible' -  

The rescue of the first six was a stunning victory in an operation Narongsak had earlier dubbed "Mission Impossible", and led to cautious optimism that the others would also be saved. Another official involved in the rescue operation said the initial six who had been saved formed a first group. 
A second group made up of the others had also begun the journey from the chamber where they had been trapped, a rescue worker told AFP.  The quick extraction came as a surprise after one of the operation commanders said on Sunday morning the rescue efforts could take several days to complete. The group was found dishevelled and hungry by British cave diving specialists nine days after they ventured in. Initial euphoria over finding the boys alive quickly turned into deep anxiety as rescuers struggled to find a way to get them out.  The death of a former Thai Navy SEAL diver who ran out of oxygen in the cave on Friday underscored the danger of the journey even for professionals. After a short deluge of rain on Saturday night and with more bad weather forecast, Narongsak on Sunday said authorities had to act immediately. 
"There is no other day that we are more ready than today," he said. "Otherwise we will lose the opportunity." Between the base camp inside the cave and the trapped boys were twisting, turning cave passageways with torrents of water gushing through. The water in the cave was muddy and unclear, with one diver comparing it to a cafe latte. Ropes were installed to help guide the boys through the darkness. Narongsak said Sunday morning two divers would escort each of the boys out of the cave. 

- Rescue efforts -

 
Officials had looked at many different ways to save the boys and their coach. One early potential plan was to leave them there for months until the monsoon season ended and the floods subsided completely, but that idea was scrapped over concerns about falling oxygen levels and waters rising too high. More than 100 exploratory holes were also bored -- some shallow, but the longest 400 metres deep -- into the mountainside in an attempt to open a second evacuation route and avoid forcing the boys into the dangerous dive. American technology entrepreneur Elon Musk even deployed engineers from his private space exploration firm SpaceX and Boring Co. to help. 
Meanwhile rescuers fed a kilometres-long air pipe into the cave to restore oxygen levels in the chamber where the team was sheltering with medics and divers. 
 

- Emotional notes - 

On Saturday, Thai Navy SEALs published touching notes scrawled by the trapped footballers to their families, who had been waiting for them agonisingly close by outside the cave entrance. The boys urged relatives "not to worry" and asked for their favourite food once they were safely evacuated, in notes handed to divers. In one, Pheerapat, nicknamed "Night", whose 16th birthday the group were celebrating in the cave when they became stuck on June 23, said: "I love you, Dad, Mum and my sister. You don't need to be worried about me." AFP
 

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The Home Ministry has recent­ly endorsed the Foreign Cit­izens Monitoring Guidelines to strictly monitor the entry, stay and exit of foreigners coming to Nepal for different purposes. With the endorsement of the guidelines, monitoring foreign nationals in Nepal and penalizing and deport­ing those involved in illegal activities has become easier for the ministry. With the Director General of the Department of Immigration as its head, the guidelines committee can monitor foreign nationals and immediately apprehend and penal­ize those involved in “suspicious activities”. The committee, creat­ed at the central level under the chairmanship of the Home Minis­ter, can independently issue search and arrest warrants as well as take foreigners into custody for investi­gation. The committee consists of members from the National Plan­ning Commission, Secretaries of Home, Finance, Tourism, Industry, Labor and Foreign Affairs minis­tries, chiefs of all three security agencies as well as the chief of the Peace and Security division of the Home Ministry.

Immigration officers now can raid any place if they suspect illegal activities, without prior notice. The exact data on foreigners in Nepal is not available but the Immigra­tion Department suspects a large number of foreigners are living in Nepal without proper documents. Previously, foreigners could not be effectively monitored in the absence of proper mechanisms. Director General of the Department of Immi­gration Dipak Kafle informs that the guidelines will “ensure that the foreigners staying here are aware of our rules and regulations.”

The Home Ministry endorsed the guidelines following reports that many foreigners in Nepal are not abiding by their visa rules, over­staying their visa or are involved in religious conversions—which the government banned this year. The new guidelines, according to the ministry, are aimed at maintaining peace, security, border protection, and rule of law. The Guidelines com­mittee has the right to raid private residences as well as organizations/institutions linked to ‘suspicious foreigners’. Any person obstructing the investigation will also be penal­ized. The information of arrested foreigners will be handed over to the respective countries and depor­tations made by following due diplo­matic process.

The implications of the guide­lines on the expats who have made Nepal their second home for years is unclear. Nepal has strict rules on citizenships for foreign nation­als, making it difficult for them to permanently stay here as citizens. Nevertheless, there are hundreds, perhaps thousands, of expats living in Nepal under different visas and permits. They appear anxious.

Refusing to be named, a Euro­pean national living in Nepal for more than 20 years told APEX, “We just read the news but we have no idea what’s going on. Are they going to come to our homes to check our documents anytime they want? Will it get unsafe for the foreigners living here on legitimate visas?” she asks. “We’re still waiting to hear from our embassies on this matter.”

“I am a little concerned,” says another expat who works for a Kath­mandu-based INGO. “But I am also in a wait-and-see mode. I want to see if the new foreigner guidelines are pure political rhetoric or if there is some substance to it.”

Dipak Kafle, DG of the Department of Immigration, however, assures that the guidelines have been intro­duced only to check illegal activities of undocumented foreigners and those who are working or living here with proper visas and those who are abiding by the law have no cause for concern. “Nor is this entirely new. The DG’s office has always had the responsibil­ity of monitoring foreigners,” says Kafle. “But with the number of foreigners coming into Nepal cross­ing a million a year, it had become impossible for us to do all the monitoring alone”. Thus the guidelines to “decentralize our authority and create a more effective network”.

The said network, which involves officials from the stakeholder min­istries also comprise of all 77 Chief District Officers. With decentralized responsibility and authority, the Department of Immigration aims to secure Nepal from foreign ele­ments working against the country’s peace, security and national integ­rity. Kafle also informs that some points in the said guidelines are still under review.

The Foreign Citizens Monitoring Guidelines come as another “bold” decision of the current coalition gov­ernment. But like most of its recent decisions, the real purpose behind it remains murky. Perhaps the gov­ernment is really serious about safeguarding the country’s interest. Or perhaps it wants to hound its western critics in the name of strict monitoring. Only time will tell.

The quality of air in Pokhara metropolis, long known for its pristine natural beauty, is deteriorating by the day. The major contributors to air pollution in Pokhara are vehicle exhaust, incineration of plastic wastes and wildfire. According to Shankar Prasad Poudel, the information officer of the Department of Environ­ment, smoke rather than dust is the main air-pollutant in Pokhara. Smoke is considered more harmful to human health compared to dust.

“But the level of air pollution we see in Pokhara is still less compared to other urban cen­ters in Nepal like Kathmandu, Lumbini and some cities in Tarai-Madhes,” Poudel said.

According to the govern­ment’s benchmark based on the Environment Protection Rules (1997), ambient air should have no more than 40 g/m³ of particulate mat­ter (PM 2.5). These days the level of PM 2.5 in Pokhara often crosses that level. The level is particularly high (twice as much as recommended) between September-October and December-January peri­ods. Likewise, pollution is also high around March-April, largely due to wildfires.