Myanmar Junta set elections for ‘December 2025 or January 2026’

Today's news: Dhaka police disperse participants in an Islamist march; Four ships with Ethiopian migrants capsize off the coast of Yemen; Four men imprisoned in raid on a house church in Huainan, China; In Thailand, the Supreme Court has cancelled a 1975 directive regulating student hair.

MYANMAR

The military government of Myanmar will hold general elections in December 2025 or January 2026, state media reported on Saturday. The head of the junta was quoted as providing for the first time a specific time frame for this vote, which the opposition considers to be a forced move in a country that has been devastated by civil war for more than four years, after the military overthrew the elected government at the beginning of 2021, triggering a protest movement that turned into an armed rebellion. The leader of the National League for Democracy, Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi, is still under arrest.

BANGLADESH

Dhaka police used tear gas and stun grenades to disperse hundreds of members of the militant group Hizb-ut-Tahrir, who were trying to march to demand that the country's secular democracy be replaced by an Islamic caliphate. Hundreds of activists chanting the slogan ‘Khilafat, Khilafat’ gathered for the ‘March for the Caliphate’ procession at the Baitul Mukarram mosque after Friday prayers, defying police barricades.

YEMEN

Four boats carrying migrants from Africa capsized in the waters off Yemen and Djibouti, causing at least two deaths and leaving 186 missing, according to the United Nations Migration Agency. The IOM's Yemen mission chief said that most of the people on board were thought to be Ethiopian migrants, while five were thought to be Yemeni crew members. At least 57 people from both vessels were women.

CHINA

Chinese authorities raided the Protestant house church in Xinyi, Huainan district, Anhui province, as part of a nationwide security crackdown during the annual National People's Congress in Beijing. Nine members were arrested, including Pastor Zhao Hongliang. Four men, including Zhao, are now in ‘criminal detention’, while the other five have been released on bail, the group said.

THAILAND

The Supreme Administrative Court of Thailand has cancelled a directive from the Ministry of Education that had been in force for 50 years, establishing the rules on hairstyles for students: short hair for boys and hairnets at ear height for girls. Some continued to use the directive issued by the military junta in 1975 as a guideline and cut the hair of students who didn't respect it. The court declared that the 1975 directive violated the individual freedoms protected by the Constitution.

RUSSIA - USA

The first result of the negotiations between the USA and Russia was the appointment of Aleksandr Darčiev as the Moscow ambassador to Washington. Darčiev was head of the Russian delegation at the talks in Istanbul, and had been the ambassador from 2017 to 2024, following the resignation of Anatolij Antonov, a strong supporter of the invasion of Ukraine, who had held the post for six months after it fell vacant.

AZERBAIJAN - ARMENIA

Azerbaijan has closed the office of the International Red Cross, the only organisation that could inform the families of Armenian prisoners in Baku about their conditions and send them humanitarian aid packages. The government accuses the Red Cross of ‘smuggling’, transporting materials in ambulances without state permission.