Top Asian News 1:32 a.m. GMT

Storm slowly heads toward Japan’s capital, leaving mudslides and broken bridges in its path

TOKYO (AP) — Tropical Storm Shanshan slowly made its way northeast through Japan toward the capital Saturday, setting off a mudslide that killed three people, halting trains and leaving underground passages brimming with water. Meteorological officials warned of torrential rains they compared to a waterfall in major cities like Osaka and Tokyo. The storm, packing winds of up to 65 kilometers (40 miles) per hour, crawled over the southwestern island of Shikoku and the main Honshu island at a speed of 10 kph (6 mph), forecast to affect parts of Japan through Sunday and Monday, although its exact route was uncertain, the Japan Meteorological Agency said.

When the US left Kabul, these Americans tried to help Afghans left behind. It still haunts them

The United States’ longest war is over. But not for everyone. Outside of San Francisco, surgeon Doug Chin has helped provide medical assistance to people in Afghanistan via video calls. He has helped Afghan families with their day-to-day living expenses. Yet he remains haunted by the people he could not save. In Long Beach, California, Special Forces veteran Thomas Kasza has put aside medical school to help Afghans who used to search for land mines escape to America. That can mean testifying to Congress, writing newsletters and asking for donations. In rural Virginia, Army veteran Mariah Smith housed an Afghan family of four that she’d never met who had fled Kabul and needed a place to stay as they navigated their new life in America.

Pakistani troops kill 37 militants in raids on their hideouts

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AP) — Pakistani security forces have killed 37 insurgents in multiple raids over more than a week on militant hideouts in a former stronghold of the Pakistani Taliban, the military said Friday. Troops also killed five insurgents elsewhere in the country’s restive southwest. Pakistan has stepped up operations against Islamic militants and a small separatist group since insurgents killed more than 50 people in the Balochistan province in multiple attacks on police, security forces and civilians. The military said in a statement that a dozen militants were killed overnight in Tirah Valley in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province bordering Afghanistan.

Japan’s defense ministry seeks record budget as it faces growing threat from China

TOKYO (AP) — Japan’s Defense Ministry on Friday sought a record 8.5 trillion yen ($59 billion) budget for the next year to fortify its deterrence on southwestern islands against China’s increasing threat. Defense officials were also focusing on unmanned weapons and artificial intelligence to make up for the declining number of servicemembers as a result of the country’s shrinking population. The ministry’s request for 2025 marks the third year of Japan’s rapid five-year military buildup plan under the government’s ongoing security strategy. Japan aims to spend 43 trillion yen ($297 billion) through 2027 to double its annual military spending to around 10 trillion yen, making it the world’s No.

New Zealand’s Māori King dies after 18-year reign

NUKU’ALOFA, Tonga (AP) — New Zealand’s Māori King, Kiingi Tuheitia Pootatau Te Wherowhero VII, died Friday at age 69, days after the celebration of his 18th year on the throne. He was the seventh monarch in the Kiingitanga movement, holding a position created in 1858 to unite New Zealand’s Indigenous Māori tribes in the face of British colonization. Tuheitia died in hospital after heart surgery, said Rahui Papa, a spokesperson for the Kiingitanga, the Māori King Movement, in a post on Instagram. The movement’s primary goals were to end the sale of land to non-Indigenous people, stop inter-tribal warfare, and provide a springboard for the preservation of Māori culture, the Waikato-Tainui tribe website said.

UN releases $100 million for humanitarian emergencies in 10 countries around the world

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The United Nations released $100 million on Friday for humanitarian emergencies in 10 countries in Africa, the Middle East, Asia and the Caribbean. Acting U.N. humanitarian chief Joyce Msuya said a lack of funding in these countries is preventing aid agencies from providing life-saving assistance, “and that is heart-wrenching.” More than one-third of the new funding from the Central Emergency Response Fund known as CERF will go to Yemen, where a civil war is now in its 10th year, and Ethiopia, where government forces are fighting several rebel groups in its regions as well as ethnic-related insurgencies.

Searchers recover 3 bodies from Thai rail tunnel that collapsed during construction

BANGKOK (AP) — The bodies of three foreign workers who were trapped for days in a railway tunnel in northeastern Thailand that collapsed during construction have been retrieved after an intensive rescue effort, Thai officials said Friday The tunnel is a part of a Thai-Chinese high-speed railway project linking the capital Bangkok to the northeastern province of Nong Khai, bordering Laos. Part of it collapsed on Saturday night while three foreign workers, one from Myanmar and two from China, were inside. The tunnel is in Nakhon Ratchasima province, 250 kilometers (155 miles) northeast of Bangkok. Investigation of the accident is ongoing, but Thai media reported that Deputy Transport Minister Surapong Piyachote said Monday that it appeared that the earth above the tunnel had become especially heavy due to days of rain.

The first election in a decade is planned in Indian-controlled Kashmir. Here’s what to know

SRINAGAR, India (AP) — Residents of Indian-controlled Kashmir are gearing up for their first regional election in a decade that will allow them to have their own truncated government, also known as a local assembly, instead of remaining under New Delhi’s direct rule. Muslim-majority Kashmir is divided between nuclear-armed rivals India and Pakistan and claimed in its entirety by both. The Indian-administered part has been on edge since Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government ended its special status in 2019 and also scrapped its statehood. The three-phased polls will take place amid a sharp rise in rebel attacks on government forces in parts of Hindu-dominated Jammu areas that have remained relatively peaceful in the three decades of armed rebellion against Indian rule.

East Timor celebrates 25th anniversary of UN-backed vote for independence

DILI, East Timor (AP) — East Timor on Friday celebrated the 25th anniversary of a U.N.-backed referendum that secured its independence from its major neighbor Indonesia, which invaded the former Portuguese colony in 1975. Crowds cheered as their leaders and state guests, including U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres, traveled by motorcades to a stadium in the country’s capital for a ceremony kicking off festivities across the impoverished nation of 1.3 million people. Commemorative banners and posters filled the streets of the capital, Dili, where thousands gathered for the celebration that included speeches, musical performances and fireworks. Dili residents recalled the harrowing moments during the country’s darkest days when Indonesia’s military responded to the 1999 referendum results with a scorched-earth campaign before departing.

UN to deploy team to Bangladesh to probe rights abuses, violations during mass uprising

GENEVA (AP) — The U.N. human rights office said Friday that it will deploy a fact-finding team to Bangladesh to investigate alleged rights abuses and violations through use of excessive force by security forces to quell protests led by students against the former government this summer. The office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk said he had received an invitation from the country’s interim leader Muhammad Yunus, to send the team to Bangladesh. The visit is set to take place in coming weeks. Yunus, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate, took over this month as head of the government after former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina stepped down and fled the country to India amid a mass uprising.