MONTH IN BRIEF – DECEMBER 2024
MONTH IN BRIEF
Alarming expansion
Satellite images indicate that North Korea is expanding a key weapons manufacturing complex that assembles a type of short-range missile used by Russia in Ukraine, according to researchers at a US-based think-tank. The facility, known as the February 11 Plant, is part of the Ryongsong Machine Complex in Hamhung, North Korea’s second-largest city. A research associate at the James Martin Centre for Non-proliferation Studies said the plant was the only one known to produce the Hwasong-11 class of solid-fuel ballistic missiles. Ukrainian officials say these munitions – known as the KN-23 in the West – have been used by Russian forces in their assault on Ukraine.
Khan clashes
Violence erupted in Pakistan, resulting in at least one dead and dozens injured, as supporters of jailed former prime minister Imran Khan clashed with security forces outside the capital Islamabad on November 25. The authorities enforced a two-day security lockdown to block the protesters, whom Khan called on to march on Parliament for a sit-in demonstration to demand his release, while highways into the city were barricaded. The government used shipping containers to block major roads and streets in Islamabad, with patrols of police and paramilitary personnel in riot gear.
China keeps watch on Taiwan Strait
The Chinese military has said it deployed naval and air forces to observe and warn a US Navy patrol aircraft that flew through the sensitive Taiwan Strait, as Beijing censured the US for trying to ‘mislead’ the international community. About once a month, US military ships or aircraft pass through or above the waterway that separates democratically governed Taiwan from China – missions that always anger Beijing, which claims sovereignty over Taiwan and says it has jurisdiction over the strait. This is disputed by Taiwan and the US, who claim it is an international waterway.
ICG drug bust
India’s coast guard has seized its biggest ever haul of illicit drugs after apprehending a fishing boat smuggling 5.5 tonnes of methamphetamine from Myanmar. The incident began when an Indian Coast Guard (ICG) reconnaissance air patrol spotted a small fishing boat in the Andaman Sea – which lies between India and Myanmar – ‘operating in a suspicious manner’. A coastguard vessel was sent out, with officers boarding at dawn on Nov. 24, when the fishing boat with a crew of six Myanmar citizens entered Indian territorial waters. The boat was later taken to an Indian naval base.
Apology
A senior Japanese public prosecutor has bowed in apology to Mr Iwao Hakamada, the world’s longest-serving death row prisoner, whose conviction was quashed in 2024.
Mr Hakamada, 88, spent 46 years on death row for a 1966 quadruple murder, but a court acquitted him in September, ruling that evidence had been fabricated. Both the local police chief and regional chief prosecutor Hideo Yamada have visited Mr Hakamada at his home to offer their profuse apologies. He is the fifth death row inmate granted a retrial in Japan’s post-war history, and all four previous cases also resulted in exonerations
Boost for South Korean birth rate
South Korea’s birth rate is projected to reach 0.74 this year, which would mark the first rise in nine years, according to a government body addressing the country’s declining fertility rate and ageing society. According to Dr Joo Hyung-hwan, vice-chairman of the Presidential Committee on Ageing Society and Population Policy, who announced the estimate during a keynote address at the Global Symposium on Low Fertility and Ageing organised by Statistics Korea and the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), marriage rates have increased for five consecutive months and the number of births has risen for two consecutive months.
Deadly blast in Quetta
At least 26 people – including 16 soldiers – have been killed and more than 40 injured following a November 9 bombing at a railway station in Quetta in south-western Pakistan, which targeted army personnel from the city’s Infantry School. The Baloch Liberation Army (BLA), a separatist militant group, has claimed responsibility for the blast. Pakistan is grappling with a surge in attacks by separatist ethnic militants in the resource-rich Balochistan province in the south and Islamist militants in its north-west.
Taken by Thai tigers
Two rare golden tigers have become Thailand’s latest sensation, drawing huge crowds of visitors to the zoo where they are housed. The world was introduced to three-year-old siblings Eva and Luna via two Facebook posts by Chiang Mai Night Safari in October and November. The posts have garnered more than 40,000 likes, as netizens expressed delight at the tigers’ striking ginger-white fur and wide eyes. There are only around 50 to 100 of these animals worldwide, according to the Chiang Mai Night Safari.