Category World News

Japanese Minister of Defence Shinjiro Koizumi has accused Chinese fighter jets of directing their fire-control radar at Japanese aircraft during two separate incidents over international waters near the island of Okinawa.

In a post on X early on Sunday, Koizumi said that Tokyo has lodged a “strong protest” about the two incidents and made “a stern demand for measures to prevent recurrence”.

“The radar illumination… was a dangerous act that exceeded the range necessary for safe aircraft flight,” he added.

There was no immediate comment from China.

A fire-control radar lock is one of the most threatening acts a military aircraft can take, because it signals a potential attack, forcing the targeted aircraft to take evasive action.

The encounters over the islands, which are close to disputed territory claimed by both Japan and China, are the most serious run-ins between the two militaries in years.

They came as relations between the two countries sour over Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi declaring in November that Tokyo could respond to Chinese military action against Taiwan if the moves also threatened Japan’s security.

Democratically governed Taiwan is claimed by Beijing and lies just 110km (68.4 miles) from Japan’s westernmost Yonaguni Island.

Japan hosts the biggest overseas concentration of United States military power, including warships, aircraft and troops, with a big chunk of that contingent, including thousands of US Marines, based in Okinawa.

There was no immediate comment from the US on Japan’s claims about China’s radar use.

According to Koizumi, the Chinese J-15 jets involved in the two incidents on Saturday were launched from China’s Liaoning aircraft carrier, which was manoeuvring south of the Okinawan islands along with three missile destroyers.

“It is extremely regrettable that such incidents have occurred,” Koizumi’s statement said.

No damage or injuries were reported from Saturday’s incidents near Okinawa, Koizumi added in his post.

The Reuters news agency, citing sources and intelligence reports, said that China deployed a large number of naval and coastguard ships across East Asian waters on Thursday. The boats at one point numbered more than 100, Reuters reported.

Taiwan’s government described that build-up as posing a threat to the Asia Pacific region. Japan said it was monitoring Chinese activity closely.

Taiwan’s coastguard said on Sunday that it was monitoring drills by three Chinese maritime safety ships on the western side of the Taiwan Strait’s median line, but said the situation in the waters surrounding Taiwan was currently “normal”.

Chinese state media said the search-and-rescue drills were in the central waters of the Taiwan Strait, patrolling “high-traffic areas, and areas with frequent accidents”.

Taiwan’s coastguard said China was using “misleading and false wording” about what it was doing, with the aim of harassing Taiwan and carrying out psychological warfare.

The bodies of at least 17 migrants and asylum seekers have been found in a partially deflated boat off the Greek island of Crete, according to the country’s coastguard.

The victims, as well as two survivors, were discovered on Saturday, some 26 nautical miles (48km) southwest of Crete.

A spokeswoman for the Greek coastguard told the AFP news agency that all of the victims were men.

“Two survivors in critical condition have been hospitalised,” the spokeswoman added. “Autopsies have to be carried out as the circumstances of the sinking are not known.”

The Athens News Agency reported that the boat was spotted by a Turkish cargo ship, which alerted the authorities. The Greek coastguard rushed two vessels to the scene, while the European Union’s border agency Frontex sent a boat, an aircraft and a Super Puma helicopter to help in the rescue effort.

The coastguard said that the two survivors had said their vessel had become unstable because of bad weather, and they had no way to cover up, nor to eat or drink anything.

The boat had also been taking on water when it was discovered.

Manolis Frangoulis, the mayor of Cretan port Ierapetra, told reporters that all the victims had been young.

“The vessel the migrants were on was deflated on two sides, which forced the passengers into a reduced space,” he added.

Coroners are looking at the possibility that the migrants died of dehydration, Greek state television channel ERT reported.

Over the last year, migrants and asylum seekers have turned their attention to the Greek island of Crete, in the eastern Mediterranean Sea, as a way of reaching EU territory from Libya, in North Africa.

According to the United Nations refugee agency, UNHCR, more than 16,770 people seeking asylum in the EU have arrived there since the start of the year.

In July, Greece’s conservative government, led by Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, suspended asylum hearings for migrants, particularly targeting those arriving on Crete from Libya.

Here’s where things stand on Sunday, December 7:

Fighting

• Russian forces launched a “large-scale” attack on the central Ukrainian city of Kremenchuk overnight on Sunday, the Kyiv Independent reported, citing local officials. The extent of the damage was not immediately clear, it said.
• A large-scale Russian drone and missile attack damaged power facilities in eight Ukrainian regions, causing blackouts and forcing nuclear power plants to cut power output, officials and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said.
• The Ukrainian military said Russia had launched 653 drones and 51 missiles on Ukraine in the overnight attack, adding that its forces downed 585 drones and 30 missiles.
• Power and heat generation facilities in the Chernihiv, Zaporizhia, Lviv, and Dnipropetrovsk regions were targeted in the attack, while port facilities in the Black Sea city of Odesa were also damaged, according to the Ukrainian government.
• The Ukrainian state railway company, Ukrzaliznytsia, a railway hub near the capital, Kyiv, was also hit, with damage caused to the depot and railway carriages. The were no reports on casualties from the attack in the town of Fastiv.
• The IAEA said Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, which is under Russian control, temporarily lost all off-site power overnight due to the widespread military activities. It said the plant reconnected to a 330 kilowatt power line after a half hour outage, but that a 750 kilowatt line is still disconnected.
• The Russian Ministry of Defence confirmed the attack on Saturday, saying its forces launched a “massive strike” in response to what it called Ukrainian assaults on civilian targets in Russia. The ministry said the strike used high-precision, long-range air- and ground-based weapons, including Kinzhal hypersonic missiles and long-range drones.
• The ministry also said its air defences had shot down 116 Ukrainian drones over Russian territory overnight into Saturday.
• Poland also announced scrambling jets due to the Russian attacks on Ukraine on Saturday, but the Operational Command of the Armed Forces said there were no airspace violations.
• Ukraine’s military, meanwhile, said that its forces had hit the Russian Ryazan oil refinery, as well as a shell-casing manufacturing plant located in Alchevsk, in the Russian-occupied Luhansk region.
• Ukraine’s military also denied Russian claims that it had encircled the embattled towns of Pokrovsk and Myrnohrad in the Donetsk region, according to the Kyiv Independent. The military said that its defence units were expanding logistics routes and maintaining control over key positions in the area.

Chornobyl

• A protective shield at Ukraine’s Chornobyl nuclear plant, built to contain radioactive material from the 1986 disaster, can no longer perform its main safety function due to drone damage, the IAEA said after a strike that Kyiv blamed on Moscow.

Politics and diplomacy

• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he had a long and “substantive” phone call with United States President Donald Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff, and Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, on the push to end Russia’s war on Ukraine.
• “Ukraine is determined to keep working in good faith with the American side to genuinely achieve peace. We agreed on the next steps and formats for talks with the United States,” Zelenskyy wrote on X.
• The call followed talks between Witkoff, Kushner and Ukraine’s negotiator, Rustem Umerov, in the US city of Miami. Ukraine’s envoy to the US, Olha Stefanishyna, told the Axios news website that “the main challenging issues concern territorial matters and security guarantees”.
• Zelenskyy is set to meet British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz in London on Monday, according to media reports.
• French President Emmanuel Macron said he would also travel to London for Monday’s meeting to discuss the situation in Ukraine and the ongoing negotiations with Russia under US mediation.

• Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban announced dispatching a business delegation to Russia in the coming days in preparation for the end of the Ukraine war. Orban addressed the situation during a rally in the central city of Kecskemet, ahead of legislative elections in the spring.

At least 23 people have been killed in the Indian state of Goa when a gas cylinder exploded at a popular nightclub, according to officials and media reports.

The fire broke out at about midnight on Sunday in the village of Arpora in the district of North Goa, the Press Trust of India reported, citing police and officials.

Several tourists and many kitchen workers were killed in the blaze, according to Chief Minister Pramod Sawant.

“Today is a very painful day for all of us in Goa. A major fire incident at Arpora has taken the lives of 23 people,” Sawant wrote on X.

“I visited the incident site and have ordered an inquiry into this incident,” he said. “Those found responsible will face most stringent action under the law – any negligence will be dealt with firmly.”

Images circulating on social media showed rescue personnel rushing several people into emergency vehicles. Video clips posted online also showed balls of fire and thick smoke rising from a low-rise building.

Sawant told journalists at the scene that “three to four” tourists had died.

Three people died from burn injuries, while the others died from suffocation, he said. At least three of the victims were women, he added.

The PTI, citing the police, reported that the fire was caused when a gas cylinder exploded. The ANI news agency reported that the fire was now under control.

Alok Kumar, the director general of police in Goa, told ANI that the bodies of all of the victims have been recovered.

Goa, a former Portuguese colony on the shores of the Arabian Sea, lures millions of tourists every year with its nightlife, sandy beaches and laid-back coastal atmosphere.

Fires are common in India due to poor building practices, overcrowding and a lack of adherence to safety regulations.

In May, at least 17 people died after a fire ripped through a three-storey building in the Indian city of Hyderabad.

A month before that, a fierce blaze broke out in a hotel in Kolkata, killing at least 15 people. Some people clambered out of windows and onto the rooftop to escape.

And last year, at least 24 people died after a fire broke out at a packed amusement park arcade in the western state of Gujarat.