Six In The Morning Thursday 26 September 2024

 

Israel strikes Beirut after Netanyahu tells military to fight with 'full force' in Lebanon

Footage indicates Beirut attack was another targeted assassination

Nafiseh Kohnavard
BBC Persian Middle East correspondent, Beirut

The footage posted from the building that was hit by Israel’s air strike today indicates that this was another targeted assassination.

Only two rooms on the second and third floors of an eight-story was badly damaged.

It is very similar to the damage I saw on the building that Saleh al Arouri, Hamas deputy leader, was killed back on 2 January in Dahieh.

Japanese man who spent 46 years on death row cleared of murders

Iwao Hakamada found not guilty of 1966 murder of his boss and his family after a retrial was ordered a decade ago

Justin McCurry in Tokyo

Thu 26 Sep 2024 08.08 BST

Japanese man who spent 46 years on death row cleared of murders

Iwao Hakamada found not guilty of 1966 murder of his boss and his family after a retrial was ordered a decade ago

Justin McCurry in Tokyo

Thu 26 Sep 2024 08.08 BST

A Japanese man who spent almost half a century on death row has been found not guilty of multiple murders, in a closely watched trial that has raised questions about Japan’s use of the death penalty.

Iwao Hakamada, 88, was sentenced to hang in 1968 after being found guilty of murdering his boss, his wife and their two teenage children, and setting fire to their home two years earlier.

Hong Kong: Stand News editor sentenced to 21 months in jail

The landmark sedition case is seen as a barometer for press freedom in Hong Kong. Stand News was one of the last media outlets in the former British colony that dared to criticize authorities amid a crackdown by Beijing.

A Hong Kong court on Thursday sentenced Stand News former editor-in-chief Chung Pui-kuen to 21 months in prison, while former acting editor-in-chief Patrick Lam was released after his sentence was reduced because of ill health. 

Last month, the two were the first journalists to be convicted under a colonial-era sedition law since Hong Kong returned to Chinese rule in 1997.

Chung and Lam were found guilty of conspiracy to publish and reproduce seditious publications.

They faced up to two years in prison and a fine of 5,000 Hong Kong dollars (about $640; €574).

Survivor of Mexican mass disappearance fights for truth

Manuel Vazquez Arellano counts himself lucky to have survived the mass disappearance of 43 Mexican students a decade ago. Now a lawmaker, he says he is determined to uncover the truth about what happened.

"Even if I were a priest, I would still be talking about the missing 43," the former student leader, a member of congress with the ruling left-wing Morena party, told AFP ahead of the 10th anniversary Thursday of the tragedy.

Now 36, Vazquez Arellano said that when he was invited to become a federal legislator in 2021, he accepted on the condition "that I could say anything" about the case, which drew international condemnation.

Sudan’s army launches major offensive to retake Khartoum

The army lost control of most of the capital to the paramilitary RSF at the start of the conflict last April.

Sudan’s army has launched a major offensive in the capital, Khartoum, to regain ground held by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), military sources have told Al Jazeera.

The army carried out air raids on Thursday against RSF positions in the capital and north of Khartoum in its biggest such assault in months.

‘Education of hatred’: Killing of Japanese boy sparks soul searching in China over rising nationalism

The killing of a Japanese schoolboy in China has sparked an outpouring of anger and soul searching over the rise of extreme nationalism in the country, with some accusing the government of fanning anti-Japan sentiment and even the “education of hatred.”

The tragic loss of a young life has once again thrown a spotlight on the complex relationship between Asia’s two biggest economies, which has been shaped by their wartime history and changing power dynamics brought about by China’s rise.

The 10-year-old, born to a Japanese father and Chinese mother, was fatally stabbed on his way to school by a man in the southern city of Shenzhen last Wednesday. It was the second knife attack on Japanese children and third assault on foreigners in China in recent months.