Park Geun-hye is at the centre of a corruption scandal and she ordered some of her top aides to quit.
South Korean leaders are known for controversial scandals, and the current row over alleged corruption is no exception.
There are mounting calls for President Park to resign.
Protesters are angry about her close friendship with a woman named Choi Soon-sil, who has allegedly helped her with political appointments and policy decisions, even though she's a private citizen without security clearance. Park has apologised, sacked several advisers, including her chief of staff, and cancelled meetings to deal with the unrest.
But seven out of ten South Koreans still say they want her to step down or be impeached.
Beginning with the election of Kim-Young sam in 1995 South Koreans have called for their various presidents to resign over scandals involving their family members or themselves. Not a single one resigned.
101 East explores why over 300 Australian children are abducted by a parent and taken overseas every year.
Five years ago, Kennedy Kembo arrived home to find his daughter missing. His wife had secretly taken her to Indonesia.
But Indonesia has not signed The Hague Convention, meaning there is little Australian authorities can do to bring abducted children home.
Australia has the highest rate per capita of international parental child abductions in the world, averaging two a week.
But for Kennedy and many other parents, there is hope. He has hired private investigators that specialise in retrieving kidnapped children. After months of surveillance, they could be close to making a recovery.
Clinton emails: FBI chief may have broken law, says top Democrat
The Democratic leader in the US Senate says the head of the FBI may have broken the law by revealing the bureau was investigating emails possibly linked to Hillary Clinton.
Harry Reid accused FBI director James Comey of violating an act which bars officials from influencing an election.
News of the FBI inquiry comes less than two weeks before the US election.
The bureau has meanwhile obtained a warrant to search a cache of emails belonging to a top Clinton aide.
Emails from Huma Abedin are believed to have been found on the laptop of her estranged husband, former congressman Anthony Weiner.
Fear and suspicion haunt Sinjar a year after liberation from Isis
Yazidi community still feels ghostly and abandoned, its lack of recovery and shattered trust serving a bleak warning of challenges ahead for Mosul region
Beside the sun-bleached bones, the tangles of human hair and greying piles of clothes exposed by wind and rain, a leaflet newly dropped by the Iraqi army fluttered in the wind. “We are coming to save you from Isis!” the text announced, two years too late for those buried in the mass grave below.
Ten minutes’ drive away is the ruined city of Sinjar, where whole streets lie in rubble, shop shutters are still branded with the religion of their owners – Islamic State marked them so that militants knew where to loot – and every tangle of steel and stone could hide an unexploded bomb.
Sinjar and the region around it in northern Iraq, a centre for the minority Yazidi group and symbol of their suffering under Isis, was liberated nearly a year ago. But since then there has been little clearance, no rebuilding, and no formal investigation of the mass graves that have been found – although some are now marked by wire fence or tape. There has been no restoration of public services or call for refugees to return.
Turkey detains editor of secular opposition newspaper Cumhuriyet
The government has also shut more than 100 media outlets and detained dozens of journalists since the coup
Turkish police have detained the editor-in-chief of the secularist opposition newspaper Cumhuriyet and have issued detention warrants for 13 of the paper's journalists and executives, state media and CNN Turk reported.
Murat Sabuncu was detained while authorities searched for executive board chairman Akin Atalay and writer Guray Oz, the official news agency Anadolu said.
Police were searching the homes of Mr Atalay and Mr Oz, the agency added.
The detentions are the latest in a massive crackdown following a failed coup in July by a rogue faction of the military to oust President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
Teenage filmmaker highlights the struggle for young LGBTIs in Mali
Being gay is still a taboo in Mali, a country where the LGBTI community still only exists in the shadows. A young filmmaker, however, recently dared to address the topic. His short film chronicles the everyday life of a young gay man who faces humiliation and physical violence at school.
The film's lead character is a young, effeminate Malian, Fayçal, who is widely suspected of being gay by his classmates. The five-minute production captures how school has turned into a living nightmare for Fayçal, complete with insults, mockeries and physical violence. Heavy silences punctuate the sequences to create an unsettling atmosphere. In one disturbing scene, two classmates corner Fayçal, then beat him and urinate on him. At the tragic end of the film, the students who treated Fayçal so badly are forced to face up to the cruelty that they inflicted.
UNICEF: Air pollution kills 600,000 children yearly
By Ralph Ellis, CNN
Updated 0047 GMT (0847 HKT) October 31, 2016
UNICEF is calling on world leaders to reduce air pollution, saying it leads to the deaths of more children yearly than malaria and HIV/AIDS combined.
Around 600,000 children under age 5 die every year from diseases caused by or exacerbated by outdoor and indoor air pollution, especially in poor nations, UNICEF Executive Director Anthony Lake said in the introduction to a report titled "Clear the Air for Children."
Air pollution also hurts children it doesn't kill, including the unborn, he said.
Woman in scandal roiling S. Korea says she 'deserves death'
FOSTER KLUG,Associated Press
Telling reporters Monday that she "deserves death," the woman at the center of a scandal roiling South Korea met prosecutors examining whether she used her close ties to President Park Geun-hye to pull government strings from the shadows and amass an illicit fortune.
"Please, forgive me," Choi Soon-sil, a cult leader's daughter with a decades-long connection to Park, said through tears inside the Seoul prosecutor's building, according to Yonhap news agency. Using a common expression of deep repentance, she added, "I committed a sin that deserves death."
Choi, wearing a hat and a scarf, her hand pressed to her mouth, was nearly knocked off her feet several times as she tried to walk through a massive crowd of 300 journalists, as well as protesters and security, surrounding the building's entrance. YTN TV station said that Choi, 60, lost her shoe as the throng converged on her, and a protester reportedly tried to enter the building with a bucket full of animal feces.
With conflicts in the Middle East ongoing, it's up to the media to inform us about what is happening on the battlefield. Both, Mosul in Iraq and Aleppo in Syria are cities held by armed groups, surrounded by avenging armies and bombarded by international air power. But with all the geopolitics in play, reporting from the field is seldom black and white.
Talking us through the story are: Dmitry Babich, journalist, Sputnik International; Howard Amos, independent journalist, Russia; Lina Khatib, head of the MENA programme, Chatham House; and Kim Sengupta, defence editor, The Independent (UK).
Italy quake: Powerful tremor near Norcia destroys buildings
A strong earthquake has struck near Norcia in central Italy, destroying numerous buildings.
The quakes come nearly two months after a major earthquake killed almost 300 people and destroyed several towns.
Sunday's quake measured magnitude 6.6, larger than August's quake and aftershocks last week, and was at a depth of only 1.5km (0.9 miles).
There were no immediate reports of casualties. Many local people had been evacuated after last week's quakes.
Tremors were felt in the capital Rome, and as far away as Venice in the north.
The US Geological Survey said the epicentre of the quake was 68km south-east of the regional centre of Perugia and close to the small town of Norcia.
Monks at the monastery of San Benedetto, an international Benedictine community in Norcia, tweeted an image of the Basilica of St Benedict destroyed by the earthquake.
The cunning and cruel explosive devices Isis improvises to stall Mosul attack
Booby traps hidden in brightly coloured children’s toys are among the terrorist group’s many ploys
The teddy bear, garish but cuddly, is propped on top of the explosives it was designed to hide and detonate. An adult would probably have walked by, but to a child the wide eyes and fuzzy orange fur would have been irresistible.
“Why would Isis use something nice, like a bear or a rabbit? They used this toy because they know the peshmerga [Kurdish fighters] will not touch it, but children will,” said Colonel Nawzad Kamil Hassan, an engineer with the Kurdish forces, who says his unit has cleared more than 50 tonnes of explosives from areas once controlled by the militants.
As a broad coalition of forces tries to push Isis out of Mosul, its last major stronghold in Iraq, Hassan has decided to preserve some of the most creative, cruel and unusual of those homemade bombs to use as training aids for new recruits to one of the most dangerous jobs in the world. The homemade explosive devices provide a lesson in the depths of ingenuity, intelligence and resources that Isis devotes to spreading murder and fear even when its fighters can no longer terrorise in person.
Brazil saw more violent deaths than civil-war torn Syria in 2015, report says
'As the world is discussing how to avoid the tragedy that has taken place in Aleppo, in Brazil we pretend that the problem does not exist'
More people died from violent crime in Brazil than in the Syrian conflict in 2015, a Brazilian monitor has claimed.
There were 58,383 violent deaths in Brazil that year, according a report by the Brazilian Forum for Public Security, while the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights documented 55,219 deaths in the conflict-ridden country.
However, Syria is a much smaller nation with a pre-war population of 22 million – now believed to be around 16 million – while Brazil is home to 200 million people.
The report demonstrated the grim extent of violence in the Latin American country. The Forum’s numbers did not just include murders but also other violent deaths, such as people who died at the hands of the police.
Social media in Iran: 'Good Shia kids' can be cool, too
OBSERVERS
shima
You can be an observant Muslim and also want to have fun on social media. In Iran, more and more young conservatives are blending religion and Internet culture and sometimes breaking taboos while doing so. Some of them have been creating faith-based emojis and stickers that also show physical contact between men and women, which is officially banned in Iran and which has not made religious authorities too happy.
While Facebook and Twitter are officially banned in Iran, they and other social media sites – especially Instagram and Telegram – are hugely popular in the country. Facebook has an estimated 17 million users in Iran (many of them connecting via VPN to get around the ban). Some 33 Million Iranians are active on Instagram and more than 20 million on Telegram, an instant-messaging site prized for its speed and security.
Instagram and Telegram are both fully legal in Iran, for now. While most of the younger users appear to be from the moderate, secular part of Iranian society, more and more accounts are appearing with religious symbols and themes. Portraits of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei adorned with hearts find themselves next to tips on how to be a “good Shia kid”, with drawings inspired by Disney cartoons and Japanese manga. Young religious users push the boundaries of what is acceptable, designing emojis and Telegram “stickers” that depict physical contact between (married) men and women.
Texas on trial for using fictional character in death penalty cases
The US state of Texas has come under fire for its use of a character from "Of Mice and Men" in determining if defendants are mentally ill. The so-called "Lennie Standard" has put several men on death row.
At the center of the upcoming "Moore versus Texas" is not only the state's reliance on outdated medical parameters, but the use of the so-called "Lennie Standard." This is the name Texas Court of Criminal Appeals Judge Cathy Cochran gave "an unscientific seven-pronged test … based on the character Lennie Smalls from John Steinbeck's 'Of Mice and Men,'" according to the Death Penalty Information Center.
'Eight fairies' and a shaman could spell the end for South Korea's president Park
Anna Fifield and Yoonjung Seo
South Korea's president is engulfed in a political scandal with plotlines straight out of a soap opera: rumours of secret advisers, nepotism and ill-gotten gains, plus a whiff of sex. There's even a Korean Rasputin and talk of a mysterious clique called the "Eight Fairies".
Park Geun-hye, South Korea's first female president and daughter of the military dictator who turned the country into an industrial powerhouse, is facing the biggest challenge of her turbulent tenure.
It has emerged that Park, notoriously aloof even to her top aides, has been taking private counsel from Choi Soon-sil, a woman she's known for four decades. Despite having no official position and no security clearance, Choi seems to have advised Park on everything from her wardrobe to speeches about the dream of reunification with North Korea.
ISIL 'using thousands as human shields' in Iraq's Mosul
Fears grow for Iraqi civilians held hostage near Mosul after mass execution of more than 200 people.
Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant appears to be using tens of thousands of people as "human shields" in and around Mosul, where Iraqi forces are waging an offensive aimed at retaking the country's second biggest city.
The UN human rights office also said on Friday it received reports of more than 200 people being killed for refusing to follow orders from ISIL, also known as ISIS, or previously belonging to Iraqi security forces.
It said "credible reports" suggested ISIL had been forcing tens of thousands from their homes in districts around Mosul.
South Korea: president orders 10 staff members to resign amid worsening crisis
Park Geun-hye under investigation over claims she let an old friend and daughter of a religious cult leader interfere in important state affairs
Saturday 29 October 2016 06.20 BST
South Korean President Park Geun-hye has ordered 10 of her senior secretaries to resign after she admitted letting an old friend and daughter of a religious cult leader to interfere in important state affairs.
The announcement by Park’s office came on the eve of large anti-government protests planned in Seoul on Saturday over the scandal that is likely to deepen the president’s lame duck status ahead of next year’s elections.
Park has been facing calls to reshuffle her office after she admitted on Tuesday that she provided longtime friend Choi Soon-sil drafts of her speeches for editing. Her televised apology sparked huge criticism about her mismanagement of national information and heavy-handed leadership style many see as lacking in transparency.
Massacre of innocents: As Syria and Russia bombard eastern Aleppo children are also dying in the west of the city
As the world rightly decries the savagery committed in eastern Aleppo, in the west of the city there is also suffering as 'rebel' shells rain down, writes Robert Fisk
There is a problem with the story I am about to tell you. It is bloody. It is about the massacre of innocents – six of them, the youngest a little girl of two – blasted to death by shell fire in Aleppo.
Three of them were killed in their junior school, a teenage boy blown clean off the roof next to his classroom four stories down into the street where he lay in a pool of blood. The shrapnel tore into his friends and when I reached the school, I was walking across floors swamped with crimson liquid.
But reader, bare with me. For the problem with my grim – some might say gruesome – but certainly tragic report is that the victims were slaughtered by the guns of the ‘rebels’ of eastern Aleppo. These children were killed in western Aleppo, in the sector of the city held by the Syrian regime and its army. And that is why you will not know their names. The suffering of the survivors, one of the wounded child survivors, groaning in agony as a doctor picked a piece of metal from his face with a scalpel in the Al-Razi Hospital, will be quite unknown to you.
'Tired' of war, young South Sudanese artists form 'Ana Taban' movement
OBSERVERS For much of its five-year existence, South Sudan has been torn apart by conflict and civil war. A group of young artists and creatives are tired of the situation. They’ve banded together to spread grassroots messages of peace, often in artistic ways.
Last summer, a group of South Sudanese people who work in creative fields planned a collaborative workshop to be held in July. Their country had achieved a fragile peace under a deal signed in August 2015 after three years of civil war between forces loyal to current President Salva Kiir and his former vice-president, Riek Machar, whom Kiir accused of plotting a coup. The artists were full of hope and eager to both exchange and create. However, to their horror, as the date grew closer, the situation in the country began to deteriorate. In July, violence between forces loyal to Machar and those loyal to the president broke out across the capital, Juba.
The artists had to move their workshop to Kenya, where they were welcomed by the Pawa 254, a hub for artists and activists.
Rohingya women raped, homes destroyed as Myanmar cracks down on militants
Bangkok: Myanmar security forces have shot scores of people, raped women, burnt the Koran and looted and burnt shops and houses in western Rakhine state in the biggest upsurge in violence against Rohingya Muslims in four years, according to multiple reports.
The United States and United Nations have voiced their concern and human rights groups are demanding a prompt impartial investigation into the escalating violence almost one year after the party of Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi won power in the country also known as Burma.
The Myanmar Times has cited credible reports that dozens of Muslim women have been raped by security forces, including 30 in a single village. Some were as young as 16.
Arrest of iconic “Afghan girl” highlights the never-ending suffering of Afghans
Life doesn’t always have a happy ending. For the millions of Afghans who have suffered through more than four decades of war in their country, happy endings are rarer still.
The story of Sharbat Gula, the young Afghan refugee whose stunning green eyes and unforgiving gaze glared out at readers from the cover of the June 1985 issue of National Geographic, is a tragic case in point.
On Wednesday, Pakistani authorities arrested Gula, now in her 40s, on charges of fraudulently claiming Pakistani citizenship to obtain national identity cards for herself and two men who claimed to be her sons. She faces up to 14 years in prison if convicted.
The story of Somalia's decline from stability to chaos and the problems facing its people at home and abroad.
Somalia's modern history is a tale of independence, prosperity and democracy in the 1960s, military dictatorship in the 1970s and 1980s - followed by a desperate decline into civil war and chaos almost ever since.
The effect of the war has been to scatter the Somali people in their millions to refugee camps and neighbouring countries - and in their hundreds of thousands to the UK, Canada and the United States.
Somalia gained independence from Britain, France and Italy in 1960. It held free and fair elections and was ruled democratically from 1960 to 1969.
Oregon wildlife refuge occupiers in shock acquittal
Seven leaders of an armed militia who led a 41-day stand-off at a US federal wildlife refuge in Oregon have been cleared of the charges against them.
The surprise verdict acquitted them of conspiracy and firearms offences.
A lawyer for one of the leaders, Ammon Bundy, was tackled to the ground by US marshals after shouting at the judge.
The militia occupied the refuge in early January, accusing the government of unlawful interference in the affairs of ranchers.
One protester was shot dead by police during a confrontation outside the refuge, before the weeks-long occupation was brought to a peaceful end in February.
The stand-off highlighted the simmering resentment among rural communities in the US West over federal control of land.
Record levels of assault, abduction and torture reported in Zimbabwe
NGO records hundreds of cases of political violence, which it says are mostly perpetrated by state security forces
Around 654 cases of political violence were recorded by a local NGO, the Counselling Services Unit (CSU), as of 21 October, compared to 476 cases in the whole of 2015.
The CSU found that assaults were overwhelmingly perpetrated by the state’s security forces – including police, military and the secretive Central Intelligence Organisation – while opposition supporters and civil society activists had been on the receiving end of the increasingly violent treatment.
Global warming to turn parts of Europe into desert by end of the century, report warns
Affected regions include southern Spain, Portugal, Italy and Turkey
Global warming is on track to disrupt the Mediterranean region more than any droughts or heatwaves in the past 10,000 years, turning parts of southern Europe into desert by the end of the century, scientists said on Thursday.
Average temperatures in the region have already risen by 1.3 degrees Celsius (2.3 Fahrenheit) since the late 19th century, well above the world average of 0.85C (1.5F), according to the study led by France's Aix-Marseille University.
Man-made climate change “will likely alter ecosystems in the Mediterranean in a way that is without precedent” in the past 10,000 years unless governments quickly reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the researchers wrote in the journal Science.
UN committee votes to initiate process that would outlaw nuclear weapons
The measure now goes for a vote before the UN General Assembly, probably sometime in early December. A majority of members may vote to support the resolution but Security Council members are expected to block it.
A UN General Assembly committee voted overwhelmingly Thursday to support a resolution that would ultimately outlaw nuclear weapons, but many nuclear-armed nations opposed the measure.
The disarmament and international security committee saw 123 countries vote in favor of the measure, while 38 opposed it and 16 abstained.
Despite the opposition, the measure sponsored by Austria, Brazil, Ireland, Mexico, Nigeria and South Africa will now head to the full General Assembly, where a vote is expected in December.
Machete-armed militia ‘hunt for migrants’ in Bulgaria
A far-right Bulgarian militia armed with machetes has been stalking the country's border with Turkey, provoking fear in migrants, and attempting to chase out those trying to reach Europe. The group uses social media to post videos of its patrols and any migrants unlucky enough to have been caught by them. Our Observer accuses local authorities of turning a blind eye to what should be considered an illegal activity.
This official video, which was published by the group on October 22, shows its members seeking to emulate the military. The men wear military fatigues while carrying out military drills, standing at attention and marching in formation. Other images show militiamen- some wearing balaclavas and carrying machetes- marching through fields and a forest, then crawling along the ground and shooting at targets.
The video also uses language common to far-right activists. During the video, the group accuses migrants of being 'invaders', 'vandals' and 'rapists', and calls on viewers to join its 'army of volunteers'.
China: Japanese military jets using 'dangerous' tactics
Japanese military aircraft are increasingly engaging in dangerous intercepts of Chinese planes, putting the safety of Chinese fliers at risk and damaging bilateral relations, China's Defense Ministry said Thursday.
Japan reported earlier this month that it has scrambled its warplanes 407 times between April 1 and September 30 in reaction to increased Chinese military flights near Japanese airspace.
That's almost double the number of intercepts Japan's Air Self Defense Force made on Chinese aircraft in the same period in 2015.
