Bodies of 15 Palestinians returned by Israel
Khan Younis, Nov 14: Israel returned the bodies of 15 Palestinians to Gaza on Friday, officials at Nasser hospital in Khan Younis said, in the latest step to fulfilling the terms of the fragile US-brokered ceasefire agreement. The bodies were returned after militants late Thursday handed over the body of one of the last four remaining Israeli hostages taken during the October 7, 2023, attack that launched the war in Gaza. Israel identified the returned body as that of Meny Godard, who was abducted from Kibbutz Be’eri in southern Israel. His wife, Ayelet, was killed during the attack. The armed wings of Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad said Godard’s body was recovered in southern Gaza. The remains of 25 hostages have been returned to Israel since the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas began on October 10. There are still three more in Gaza that need to be recovered and handed over. Hamas returned 20 living hostages to Israel on October 13. For each hostage returned, Israel has released the remains of 15 Palestinians, an exchange central to the ceasefire’s first phase. Overall, the number of bodies of Palestinians received so far is 330, of which only 95 have been formally identified. (AP)
Police wound knife-wielding man at a Paris train station
Paris, Nov 14: A man wielding a knife at the Montparnasse train station in Paris was shot and wounded by police on Friday, the city’s prosecutor’s office said. At least one shot was fired during the incident involving a man “known for domestic violence,” a statement said. It added that the man then apparently inflicted knife wounds on himself, and emergency services were called. The authorities stressed that initial communications made no mention of terrorism being suspected as a motive. The shooting came a day after the November 13 anniversary of coordinated attacks in Paris in 2015 in which 132 people were killed. (AP)
Tibetan climate crisis gains global attention at COP30 in Brazil
Brasilia, Nov 14: The Sweden based-Stockholm Center for South Asian and Indo-Pacific Affairs (SCSA-IPA) at the Institute for Security and Development Policy participated in the 30th session of the Conference of the Parties (COP 30) in Brazil’s Belem city, followed by high-level dialogues in Rio de Janeiro, to highlight one of the world’s most neglected ecological flashpoints and the rapidly worsening climate crisis across Tibet and the Himalayan region. The delegation, led by Jagannath Panda, Head of SCSA-IPA, and joined by Richard Ghiasy, Senior Associate Fellow at SCSA-IPA and Director of GeoStrat (The Netherlands), attended COP30 as observers, focused on expanding global awareness of high-altitude climate vulnerabilities. The delegation highlighted that the Tibetan Plateau, Asia’s “Third Pole”, is undergoing an ecological breakdown, which the global climate governance can no longer ignore. In meetings with climatologists, indigenous rights specialists, and environmental researchers in Belem, Panda emphasised that the consequences of Tibet’s environmental deterioration extend far beyond China’s borders. (PTI)
