Israeli army removes blockades, thousands of Palestinians flee to north Gaza

Today's news: South Korea, Yoon Suk Yeol indicted for insurrection; The president and a senior executive of Fuji Media, a Japanese company, resign over a sex abuse scandal; Chinese police, with Thai help, arrest a criminal suspected of online trafficking and fraud.

GAZA - PALESTINE

Tens of thousands of Palestinians started to move towards the north of Gaza along the main roads. Israel opened roadblocks today after Hamas agreed to hand over civilian Arbel Yehud and two other hostages, including a soldier. Television images showed large crowds moving in and witnesses said the first residents arrived in Gaza City in the early hours of the morning.

SOUTH KOREA

Former South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol was finally indicted for insurrection after attempting to declare martial law on 3 December 2024. The indictment comes after a Seoul court on Saturday rejected a request to extend Yoon's detention. In South Korea, insurrection is punishable by life imprisonment or death. The latter is unlikely, as the country has not carried out executions for decades.

CHINA

China has banned imports of sheep, goats, poultry and ungulates from African, Asian and European countries due to outbreaks of livestock diseases such as sheep pox, goat pox and foot and mouth disease. The ban by the world's largest meat importer affects Ghana, Somalia, Qatar, Congo (DRC), Nigeria, Tanzania, Egypt, Bulgaria, East Timor and Eritrea. China also stated that it has halted imports of sheep, goats and related products from Palestine, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Nepal and Bangladesh due to sheep and goat pox outbreaks.

JAPAN

Japan's Fuji Media said on Monday that its president Shuji Kanoh and the head of its television unit Koichi Minato will resign following an investigation into alleged sexual abuse at an event organised by one of its executives. Fuji has been embroiled in a scandal since December, when Japanese magazines accused Masahiro Nakai, TV presenter and leader of the former boy band SMAP, of sexual abuse.

CHINA - THAILAND - MYANMAR

Chinese police with the help of Thai law enforcement agencies arrested a ‘major criminal suspect ’ who was allegedly involved in the case of a Chinese actor who travelled to Thailand for an alleged film job and then trafficked to Myanmar. After his abduction, he was taken to an online scam complex, forced to work for criminal networks running fraudulent telecommunications operations throughout the region.

KYRGYZSTAN

In Kyrgyzstan, security forces detained politician Ermek Ermatov of the Social Democratic Party, using violence on him and taking him to an unknown location, his wife, who has lost contact with him, said he was seen in hospital. The police said the arrest was due to ‘refusal to cooperate with investigations and concealment of evidence’ for alleged electoral fraud.

RUSSIA

Since the beginning of the war in Ukraine, many pharmaceutical companies have restricted deliveries of medicines to Russia, which on the other hand is trying to import fewer and fewer foreign products. As Novaja Gazeta Evropa documents, this has created a ‘black market’ for medicines, whereby Telegram chats are used to search for at least 1,280 preparations that cannot be found in Russian pharmacies, especially oncological ones.