India has refused to sign a joint statement at the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit in China as it did not reflect the country’s concerns on terrorism, India’s foreign ministry has said.
Spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said on Thursday that India’s desire for its concerns to be reflected was “not acceptable to one particular country”.

While he did not share more details, Indian media reported that Delhi refused to sign the statement after it omitted the Pahalgam attack, a deadly militant attack that killed 26 tourists in Indian-administered Kashmir.

India has blamed its neighbour Pakistan for sheltering a militant group it blames for the attack. Pakistan has rejected the allegations.

China, Russia and four Central Asian countries formed the SCO in 2001 as a countermeasure to limit the influence of the West in the region. India and Pakistan joined in 2017.

The latest signing ceremony took place during the SCO defence ministers’ meeting in China, held ahead of the leaders’ annual summit this autumn.

According to media reports, India perceived the joint statement as being “pro-Pakistan” after it omitted the Pahalgam attack but mentioned militant activities in Balochistan.

Pakistan has accused India of backing the Balochistan freedom movement, which India denies.

After the meeting, India’s Defence Minister Rajnath Singh urged the SCO to hold the perpetrators of cross-border terrorism accountable, though he didn’t explicitly mention Pakistan.

“Some countries use cross-border terrorism as an instrument of policy and provide shelter to terrorists. There should be no place for such double standards. SCO should not hesitate to criticise such nations,” he said in a statement.

India and Pakistan have fought three wars over Kashmir, which they claim to own in full but administer in parts.

The Pahalgam attack in April brought the two nuclear-armed countries to the brink of another war.

In May, India launched a series of airstrikes, targeting sites it called “terror infrastructure in Pakistan and Pakistan-administered Kashmir”.

Pakistan denied the claim that these were terror camps and also responded by firing missiles and deploying drones into Indian territory.

The hostilities between the two countries continued until 10 May when US President Donald Trump announced that India and Pakistan had agreed to a “full and immediate ceasefire”, brokered by the US.

India has, however, consistently denied any intervention by the US.

(BBC News)

Continuous heavy rainfall and upstream inflows have triggered severe flooding in two counties of Guizhou Province in southwest China, prompting mass evacuations.

As of 2:30 p.m. Tuesday, 48,900 residents were temporarily evacuated in Rongjiang County and 32,000 in Congjiang County. The flood control emergency response has been escalated to Level I, the highest, in both counties.

Rongjiang, a county known for Cun Chao — a rural football league covering over 100 village teams and drawing numerous fans across the country, saw heavy rainstorms from 8 p.m. Monday, with a venue at the Duliu River exceeding the warning level by 6.68 meters as of 2 p.m. Tuesday.

The football field at the Cun Chao stadium was submerged under three meters of water.

Long Tian, a resident near the stadium, recalled that when he woke up at 8 a.m. Tuesday, the water downstairs was already thigh-deep.

“The water rose very quickly, so I stayed on the third floor waiting for rescue. By the afternoon, I had been transferred to safety,” Long said.

Rescue teams, including firefighters and volunteers, deployed boats and other equipment for the rescue work in the two counties.

As of 4 p.m. Tuesday, the provincial emergency department had allocated disaster relief items, including 30,000 bottles of drinking water and 10,000 bowls of instant noodles, to the two counties via high-speed rail and road transport.

Also in Guizhou, rain-triggered landslides caused the collapse of part of a bridge on an expressway in the county of Sandu. No casualties have been reported so far.

(Xinhua)

The Israeli government has said it agreed to the ceasefire proposal after “achieving the objectives” of its attacks on Iran.
According to the statement, Israel has removed Iran’s “dual immediate existential threat” from nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles.

It also says Israel has “inflicted severe damage on the military leadership, and destroyed dozens of central Iranian government targets”.

The statement goes on to say that Israeli forces, in the last day, have “severely struck government targets in the heart of Tehran, eliminating hundreds of Basij operatives” – a militia the Iranian government often uses to suppress protests – and “eliminating another senior nuclear scientist”.

“Israel thanks President Trump and the United States for their support in defence and their participation in eliminating the Iranian nuclear threat,” the statement adds.

Earlier, Iran state TV news channel IRINN says a ceasefire has been “imposed” on Israel following the “successful” Iranian attack on the US base in Qatar.

State TV said in a statement that Trump “begged” for a ceasefire following Iran’s attack. The statement was read aloud by the presenter.

The statement also hailed Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and the Army and praised the “resistance” of Iranians.

The statement also called Iran’s attack on the US base in Qatar as the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ “successful” response to the US attacking three Iranian nuclear sites, while Qatar said all missiles were intercepted.

(Excerpts : BBC News)