At least two people have been killed and 21 remain unaccounted for following a landslide in Indonesia, according to officials, as rescuers continue to search for the missing.
Several days of heavy rainfall in the region led to landslides that hit dozens of houses in three villages in the Cilacap district, Central Java province, on Thursday evening, officials said in a statement released on Friday.
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“As of Friday morning, the joint team has rescued 23 people alive. Two people were found deceased, and 21 others are still being searched for,” Abdul Muhari, spokesman of the National Disaster Management Agency, said in a statement.
A search and rescue operation was under way to look for the missing victims, Muhari said.
He added that unstable terrain had hindered rescue efforts, and heavy equipment had been deployed to assist the operation.
Footage released by the National Search and Rescue Agency showed rescuers searching for victims buried under the rubble of the houses.
Rescuers are using heavy equipment, extraction tools and manual tools to reach difficult areas.
An extreme weather warning was issued earlier this week by the Meteorology, Climatology, and Geophysics Agency.
The agency warned it could cause hydrometeorological disasters and that several regions of Indonesia could experience high rainfall over the coming weeks.
The annual monsoon season from about October to March frequently causes flooding and landslides in Indonesia, an archipelago of 17,000 islands where millions of people live in mountainous areas or near fertile floodplains.
Climate change has affected storm patterns, including the length and severity of the season, leading to heavier rain, flash flooding, and stronger wind gusts.
Earlier in November, flash floods and landslides in a remote area of the restive region, Papua, killed at least 15 people and left eight missing.
A “massive” Russian attack on Kyiv has killed one person and wounded at least 24, Ukraine’s state emergency service said.
More than 40 people also had to be rescued as a result of the overnight assault into Friday, it added, with fires or damage to residential buildings reported in most of the Ukrainian capital’s 10 districts.
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An elderly woman was killed, while a 10-year-old boy was among the injured, Kyiv police said.
Kyiv Mayor Vitaly Klitschko described it as a “massive enemy attack”, saying a pregnant woman and a man in an “extremely serious condition” were among the hospitalised.
A 55-year-old man in Bila Tserkva who suffered thermal burns was rushed to hospital, according to Mykola Kalashnyk, the head of the Kyiv region, who said Russian missiles and drones had targeted critical infrastructure in Kyiv.
Klitschko confirmed that the Russian attack had damaged part of the city’s heating networks, noting that some buildings in the northeastern Desnianskyi district were temporarily left without heat.
Before another punishing winter of war, Moscow has intensified its attacks on targets including Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, increasing the risk of heating outages.
Friday morning’s attack also struck residential buildings throughout the Ukrainian capital.
“Russians are hitting residential buildings. There are a lot of damaged high-rise buildings throughout Kyiv, almost in every district,” said Tymur Tkachenko, the head of the city’s military administration.
Meanwhile, the Russian Ministry of Defence said its forces had shot down more than 200 Ukrainian drones overnight.
“During the past night, air-defence assets intercepted and destroyed 216 Ukrainian unmanned aerial vehicles,” it wrote on Telegram.
The latest attack on Kyiv comes two days after G7 foreign ministers reiterated their “unwavering” support for Ukraine’s territorial integrity and demanded an immediate ceasefire.
As part of international efforts to hold Russia to account for its actions since it launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Canada unveiled new sanctions against Moscow on Wednesday.
South Africa has allowed more than 150 Palestinian airline passengers to disembark, after they were kept on a plane for almost 12 hours by the country’s border police, authorities said.
South Africa’s Ministry of Home Affairs authorised the passengers to get off the plane on Thursday night after a local humanitarian organisation guaranteed to provide the passengers with accommodation during their stay in South Africa if needed.
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“Given that Palestinians are eligible for 90-day visa-exempt travel to South Africa, they have been processed as per normal and will be required to adhere to all conditions of entry,” South Africa’s Border Management Authority (BMA) said in a statement late on Thursday.
The chartered plane carrying 153 Palestinians landed shortly after 8am (06:00 GMT) on Thursday morning at OR Tambo International Airport, which serves the cities of Johannesburg and Pretoria.
According to the BMA, the Palestinian passengers were not allowed to disembark from the aircraft after it was discovered they “did not have the customary departure stamps in their passports”. The passengers also did not indicate how long they intended to stay in South Africa or the address of their accommodation, the BMA said.
“Following their failure to pass the immigration test and given that none of the travellers expressed an intention to apply for asylum, they were initially denied entry,” it added.
News that the Palestinians were forced to wait on the tarmac at the airport for hours reportedly caused outrage among the public in South Africa, which is a strong supporter of the Palestinian cause and has led the charge at the International Criminal Court to prosecute Israel for perpetrating genocide in Gaza.
pic.twitter.com/2YEQG4W0Kh
The order to finally allow the Palestinian passengers to leave the plane came after the country’s Home Affairs Ministry received a commitment from a humanitarian aid organisation – Gift of the Givers – to accommodate the visitors during their stay.
A total of 130 Palestinians subsequently entered the country, while 23 transferred from South Africa to other destinations, from the airport, according to the BMA.
The AFP news agency said the plane was a charter flight operated by South African airline Global Airways and had travelled from Kenya.
Founder of Gift of the Givers, Imtiaz Sooliman, told public broadcaster SABC that he did not know who had chartered the aircraft and that a first plane carrying 176 Palestinians had landed in Johannesburg on October 28, with some of the passengers departing for other countries.
“The families of this first group told us yesterday their family members are coming on a second plane, and nobody knew about that plane,” Sooliman said.
“Those people are really distraught coming from two years of genocide,” Sooliman said of the passengers.
Based on “feedback” from those who have arrived already in South Africa, Sooliman said Israel appears to be “removing people from Gaza … and sending them on chartered planes” without stamping their passports.
“Israel deliberately did not stamp the passports of these poor people to exacerbate their suffering in a foreign country,” he added in a post on social media.
Other humanitarian groups are also now offering to provide support for the Palestinian visitors, he added.
Nigel Branken, a South African social worker who assisted those held on the plane, said the passengers from Gaza had told him of being ordered by Israeli authorities to leave all their belongings behind before boarding an unmarked plane at an Israeli air force base.
“Very clearly all the marks of Israel involved in this operation to take people…to displace them,” Branken told Al Jazeera.
BREAKING NEWS | About 160 Palestinian refugees have landed at OR Tambo International Airport this morning. The Gift of the Givers’ Imtiaz Sooliman says their passports don’t have stamps, and among them are children and pregnant women. pic.twitter.com/X68TXjGpgn
Ivory Coast has reinforced its border security after the arrival of “several unusual flows of refugees” from neighbouring Mali, officials in the West African country have said.
Ivory Coast’s National Security Council (NSC) said in a statement on Thursday that the “influx appears to be due to attacks against civilians by armed terrorist groups in several areas of southern Mali”.
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“The National Security Council has instructed its Executive Secretary to take all necessary steps to register these asylum seekers,” the statement said.
“Furthermore, the Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces has been instructed to take appropriate measures to strengthen security at our country’s northern borders,” it added.
The al-Qaeda-linked Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM) has waged an almost decade-long rebellion in Mali.
The armed group, the most active in West Africa according to conflict monitor ACLED, was formed in 2017 as a result of a merger with al-Qaeda of the Islamic Maghreb, Ansar Dine, the Macina Liberation Front and al-Mourabitoun.
JNIM’s operations started in Mali, but they have since expanded to nearby countries of Burkina Faso, Niger, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Benin and Togo.
Most recently, in late October, the militant group launched its first attack in Nigeria, killing a soldier and seizing ammunition and cash.
The group has killed thousands of people since 2017, though the overall death toll is unclear.
The group also seeks regime change in Mali, and JNIM has warned foreigners against doing business with the ruling military government – in power since it overthrew the country’s democratically elected government in a 2020 coup d’etat – without its “authorisation”.
Seeking to pressure the military government to negotiate, in September, JNIM sealed off major highways used by tankers and targeted fuel trucks attempting to reach the landlocked Sahel country from Ivory Coast and Senegal.
The move has effectively created an economic and fuel blockade on the capital, Bamako, bringing the city to breaking point and causing desperation among residents, many of whom have fled to neighbouring Ivory Coast.
On Wednesday, JNIM militants attacked the town of Loulouni, about 50km (30 miles) from the Ivory Coast border, causing hundreds more people to flee.
While Shohei Ohtani had his greatness reconfirmed, Cal Raleigh learned not even the greatest season by a catcher in Major League Baseball history could stop Aaron Judge from adding another Most Valuable Player (MVP) award to his trophy case.
Minutes after Ohtani secured his third consecutive MVP award and fourth in the last five years – leaving him just three shy of Barry Bonds for the most in MLB history – Judge was announced as the American League’s MVP in a close vote with Raleigh on Thursday night.
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Ohtani and Judge became the first duo to win the Most Valuable Player Award in the same back-to-back seasons.
The New York Yankees outfielder secured 17 of a possible 30 first-place votes and 355 points. The Seattle Mariners catcher claimed the other 13 first-place votes and finished with 335 points.
In the end, the Baseball Writers’ Association of America voters determined that Judge’s MLB-leading batting average (.331), on-base percentage (.457) and slugging percentage (.688) outweighed Raleigh’s AL-best 60 homers and 125 RBIs.
New York Yankees’ Aaron Judge belted 53 home runs and led the major leagues with a .331 batting average [Frank Franklin II/AP Photo]
“It’s pretty wild,” Judge said. “You try not to think about it during the season. I try to keep my head down through all 162 and do whatever I can in today’s game to help our team win.”
For the 33-year-old Judge, it marks his third MVP award. That puts him in an exclusive neighbourhood with the likes of Mickey Mantle, Joe DiMaggio, Stan Musial, Mike Trout and a handful of others – but Ohtani no longer resides there.
The 31-year-old Japan native received all 30 first-place votes for the National League MVP.
Ohtani earned his latest honour after piling up a career-high 55 homers, a majors-best 146 runs and an NL-high .622 slugging percentage and 1.014 OPS in 158 games.
He also returned to the mound after taking 18 months off and forged a 1-1 record with a 2.87 ERA in 14 starts. He registered 62 strikeouts versus just nine walks over 47 innings.
“It was a great year,” Ohtani said on MLB Network via translator. “Like I said, I’m grateful to my teammates, the coaching staff … but not only them. The fans were the ones who really rooted us on and supported us.”
Ohtani added eight home runs in 17 postseason games while leading the Dodgers to their second consecutive World Series title, though his playoff exploits did not factor into the BBWAA voting.
Philadelphia Phillies designated hitter Kyle Schwarber, who produced a league-high 56 homers and 132 RBIs while playing in all 162 games, finished second in the balloting. He was followed by New York Mets outfielder Juan Soto (43 homers, 38 stolen bases), Arizona Diamondbacks shortstop Geraldo Perdomo (.290 average, 20 homers, 100 RBIs, 27 steals) and Phillies shortstop Trea Turner (league-leading .304 average with 36 steals).
In the American League, Cleveland Guardians third baseman Jose Ramirez (30 homers, 44 steals) finished a distant third.
Islamabad, Pakistan – Pakistan has codified the most ambitious restructure of its military and judiciary in decades after President Asif Ali Zardari signed his assent to ratify the country’s 27th Constitutional Amendment on Thursday.
The amendment, which passed in both houses of parliament earlier in the week amid opposition protests and criticism from a range of civil society activists and sitting judges, makes major changes to Pakistan’s higher judiciary.
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But many analysts believe that its most consequential feature is a sweeping overhaul of Article 243, the constitutional clause defining the relationship between Pakistan’s civilian government and the military.
The changes grant lifetime immunity from criminal prosecution to the country’s top military leaders, significantly reshape the military’s command structure, and further tilt the balance of the tri-services – the army, navy and air force – heavily in the army’s favour.
Analysts warn that this contentious reform risks colliding with entrenched institutional cultures and could rock the country’s fragile civilian–military equilibrium.
Al Jazeera has sought comment from the military’s media wing on the changes and the debate over them, but has received no response.
A new command structure
The revised Article 243 establishes a new post, the Chief of Defence Forces (CDF), to be held concurrently by the Chief of Army Staff (COAS). This effectively gives the army chief command authority over the Pakistan Air Force (PAF) and Pakistan Navy (PN).
The incumbent COAS is Field Marshal Asim Munir, who assumed command in November 2022 and was elevated to a five-star rank on May 20 this year, just 10 days after Pakistan ended its four-day conflict with India.
Munir became only the second Pakistani military officer – after Field Marshal Ayub Khan in the 1960s – to receive the five-star designation. The air force and navy have never had a five-star official so far.
The amendment also abolishes the office of Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee (CJCSC) at the end of this month. The role is currently held by four-star General Sahir Shamshad Mirza, who retires on November 27. Another major change is the creation of the Commander of the National Strategic Command (CNSC), a post overseeing Pakistan’s nuclear command. The position will be limited to only an army officer, appointed in consultation with the CDF, with a three-year term extendable by another three years.
The amendment effectively transforms five-star titles from what were honorary recognitions into constitutionally recognised offices with expansive privileges.
Under the new arrangement, five-star officers will enjoy lifetime immunity from criminal prosecution and will “retain rank, privileges and remain in uniform for life.”
Removing a five-star officer will require a two-thirds parliamentary majority, whereas an elected government can be dismissed by a simple majority.
“While government spokespersons refer to these titles as ‘honorary’, given to ‘national heroes’ to celebrate their services,” Reema Omer, a constitutional law expert, said, the amendment “implies actual power, not just honorary significance”.
Omer told Al Jazeera that lifelong immunity from criminal proceedings was “concerning from a rule of law perspective”.
A former three-star general, speaking on condition of anonymity, acknowledged that the changes appeared to be “meant to consolidate” the army chief’s power.
Hours after the president’s ratification on Thursday evening, Pakistan’s government brought amendments to the laws governing the three services.
Under the revised Army Act, the clock on the tenure of the army chief will now restart from the date of his notification as CDF.
Last year, parliament had increased the tenure of the service chiefs from three to five years, which meant Munir’s term would run until 2027. Following the new changes, it will now extend even further. Once the revised rules take effect at the end of this month, Munir will hold both posts – COAS and CDF – at least until November 2030.
President Asif Ali Zardari, centre, and Prime Minister Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif, right, jointly conferred the baton of Field Marshal upon Chief of Army Staff (COAS) Field Marshal Syed Asim Munir, left, during a special investiture ceremony at the Presidency in Islamabad in May this year [Handout/Government of Pakistan]
Military dominance – and the role of the India conflict
Since independence in 1947, Pakistan’s military, especially the army, has been the most powerful institution in national life.
Four coups and decades of direct rule have been accompanied by significant influence, even when civilian governments have been in power. The army chief has long been widely viewed as the country’s most powerful figure.
No prime minister has ever completed a full five-year term, while three of four military rulers have governed for more than nine years each.
General Qamar Javed Bajwa, Munir’s predecessor, acknowledged this history in his farewell address in November 2022, conceding that the military had interfered in politics for decades, and promising to break with that legacy.
But three years later, rights groups and opposition parties allege that little has changed, and some claim that the military has further strengthened its grip over state institutions.
The military restructure under the 27th Amendment also comes six months after Pakistan’s brief conflict with India in May, raising questions over whether the reforms were linked to that fight.
Aqil Shah, professor of international affairs at Georgetown University in Washington, DC, argued that the confrontation with India created the opening for this “unprecedented role expansion” for the army chief.
The changes “formalise the army’s de facto hegemony over the other two wings of armed forces in the guise of the ‘unity of command’ as a necessity for war fighting,” Shah told Al Jazeera.
But supporters of the amendment disagree. Aqeel Malik, state minister for law and justice, said that the amendment aims to “plug holes” in Pakistan’s national security architecture.
“The amendment granted constitutional cover to defence integration and improved coordination. We have also provided a constitutional cover to the honour bestowed upon our national heroes and have addressed a long overdue cohesive and better coordination within the forces for a swift response,” Malik said.
Ahmed Saeed, a former vice admiral, similarly described the reform as a “forward-looking institutional change”.
He said the conflict with India exposed that Pakistan’s command model was rooted in a 1970s framework, unsuitable for “multi-domain, hybrid warfare of the 21st century”.
“The amendment is not about ‘fixing what is broken’ but about modernising what is functioning to ensure sustained effectiveness in future contingencies,” Saeed told Al Jazeera.
Fears of imbalance
Other critics, including former senior officials and security analysts, believe the amendment is less about modernisation and more about institutional consolidation.
They argue that creating the CDF post cements the army’s dominance over the other branches.
Many question why the command structure should be overhauled when, by the government’s own narrative, the existing system delivered what Pakistan claims was an “outright victory” against India.
A retired three-star general who served in senior roles before retiring in 2019 said the abolished CJCSC role, despite being largely symbolic, provided a mechanism for balancing perspectives across the army, navy and air force.
“The PAF and PN may lose autonomy in strategic planning and most probably senior promotions, which has the potential to breed resentment,” he said.
“These risks institutional imbalance, undermining the very cohesion the amendment claims to enhance,” the former general added.
The CJCSC – a four-star post and the principal military adviser to the prime minister – can theoretically be filled by any service, but the last non-army officer to hold the position was Air Chief Marshal Feroz Khan in 1997.
Security analyst Majid Nizami said that while the amendment aims to codify five-star ranks, it may create challenges for “cohesion and synergy” among the services.
If the goal was to modernise warfare strategy, he argued, there should have been a dedicated officer focused solely on integration, not the army chief assuming dual authority.
“There is a lack of clarity on rules and terms of reference for the CDF,” Nizami said.
Shah, the Georgetown academic and author of The Army and Democracy, said the amendment “formalises the de facto power” of the COAS over the other branches.
Saeed, the former navy official who retired in 2022, however, disagreed with critics, arguing that the amendment simply clarifies the CDF’s strategic coordination role.
“The amendment retains the PAF and PN’s distinct command structures within their domains of responsibility, and the CDF’s function is limited to integration at the strategic level, not administrative control or operational interference,” he said.
He added that claims of “army dominance” stem from “legacy perceptions, not from constitutional reality.”
Control of nuclear command
The amendment also codifies the army’s control of Pakistan’s nuclear programme, including research, development and deployment, responsibilities that fall under the strategic command structure.
The former three-star general who spoke to Al Jazeera said the new system’s operational details remain unclear. Under the current model, the Strategic Plans Division (SPD) manages Pakistan’s ballistic and cruise missile programmes and nuclear assets.
Nizami said that although the CJCSC nominally oversaw the SPD, operational authority has long rested with the army. The amendment now formalises this reality.
Saeed, however, countered by arguing that in effect, even with the changes, “the entire nuclear enterprise operates under civilian-led oversight with constitutional clarity”.
Political fallout
Critics have described the amendment as a “constitutional surrender” by political parties to the military, and an attempt to institutionalise the “supremacy of the uniform over the ballot”.
US President Donald Trump, left, met with Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, second from left, and Field Marshal Asim Munir, second right, in Washington, DC, in September [Handout/The White House]
It also comes at a time when Field Marshal Munir’s public profile has risen significantly. He has undertaken multiple foreign trips, including several to the United States, and has been described by President Donald Trump as his “favourite field marshal”.
Meanwhile, former Prime Minister Imran Khan, jailed for the past two years, accuses Munir of orchestrating the crackdown on him and his party, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), since their ouster in 2022 through a no-confidence vote – a charge that the military has rejected outright.
In Pakistan’s February 2024 election, the PTI was barred from contesting as a party. But its candidates, contesting independently, secured the most seats even though they failed to secure a majority. Instead, the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) of Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif formed the government with allies. The government and military rejected widespread accusations of election rigging.
Shah argued that the political class supported the amendment out of necessity.
“Lacking democratic legitimacy and faced with the political challenge posed by the PTI and Khan, the ruling PML-N government sees Munir as the key guarantor of their power and political interests,” he said.
