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WARSAW, Poland — A miner who was reported missing after an earthquake shook Poland's Rydultowy coal mine has been found alive more than two days after the accident that killed one of his colleagues and injured another 17, local officials said Saturday.  The miner has been airlifted to a hospital and the rescue operation has been closed, said Witold Gałązka of the coal mining group that operates the mine.  Earlier, the office of the provincial governor of the Silesia coal mining region, in southern Poland, said that the miner was conscious and was being transported to the surface.  "This is fantastic news," provincial governor Marek Wojcik said on TVN24.  The head of the Polish Coal Mining Group that operates the mine, Leszek Pietraszek, said that rescuers reached the 32-year-old miner around 2 p.m. Saturday. He was conscious and communicating but had some problems breathing. He received first aid from a doctor who also prepared him for transportation to the surface.  Hundreds of rescuers took part in the operation and at times had to be withdrawn from the corridor when more tremors were threatened or because of dangerous methane gas levels. The rescuers had to dig through the rubble by hand to reach the miner, authorities said.  Seventy-eight miners were in the area when a magnitude 3.1 tremor struck about 1,200 meters below the surface on Thursday afternoon.  One miner, age 41, was killed and 17 were hospitalized with injuries. Thirteen of the injured have since been released from the hospital.  The tremor caused a slide of rocks into the corridor at one spot, where the miner was found Saturday.  The mining group has suffered several deadly accidents this year. In May, three miners died in a cave-in at the Myslowice-Wesola coal mine, and one was killed at the same mine in April.  Two miners lost their lives in separate accidents in 2019 and 2020 in the Rydultowy mine, which was opened in 1792 and employs about 2,000 miners.  Coal mining is considered hazardous in Poland, where some mines are prone to methane gas explosions or to cave-ins. Excavation in older mines goes deep into the ground in the search for coal, increasing the job's hazards. The coal industry is among Poland's key employers, providing some 75,000 jobs.  Last year, 15 miners died in accidents. 

ISLAMABAD, pakistan — Former Prime Minister Imran Khan and his third wife were acquitted on charges of marrying unlawfully by a Pakistan court Saturday, yet he will not be freed after authorities issued fresh orders to arrest him.   The ruling came a day after his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party won more seats in parliament, ramping up pressure on the country's fragile ruling coalition which is grappling to stabilize a broken economy.  The couple were sentenced to seven years in February when a court found them guilty of breaking Islamic law by failing to observe the required interval between the divorce from a previous marriage of Bushra Khan, also known as Bushra Bibi, and her marriage to Khan.  They had filed an appeal against their convictions.  "Both the appellants are acquitted of the charges," said an order by the appeal court seen by Reuters.   "They are directed to be released forthwith if not required to be detained in any other case."   It said the prosecution failed to prove its case against the couple.   Khan's PTI party said authorities have issued fresh arrest warrants for him in three cases linked to violence against the military and other state installations that erupted following his brief arrest in May 2023.  An anti-terrorism court last week cancelled his bail in one of the May 9 cases registered against him and thousands of his supporters.   The party called it a "gimmick" aimed at prolonging his imprisonment.   Bibi is on bail in a land corruption case in which she is also co-accused with Khan, who is a free person after the latest acquittal, the party added.   All four jail sentences Khan received ahead of a February national election have now been overturned or suspended.   Jailed since last August, he was acquitted last month of charges of leaking state secrets. Two other corruption sentences have been suspended.  The PTI has warned that keeping Khan in jail despite Saturday's decision will deepen a political crisis which has crippled the country of 240 million people since he was ousted in a parliament no confidence vote in 2022.  Khan blames his ouster on the country's powerful military generals. No prime minister of Pakistan has completed a full five-year constitutional term since the country gained its independence in 1947. 

Nairobi, Kenya — Kenyan police said Saturday that they had found more bags filled with dismembered female body parts in a grisly discovery at a rubbish dump that has horrified and angered the country.  Detectives have been scouring the site in the Nairobi slum of Mukuru since the mutilated corpses of at least six women were found Friday in sacks floating in a sea of garbage.    The Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) said Saturday that another five bags had been retrieved from the abandoned quarry, three of them containing female body parts, including severed legs and two torsos. "We want to assure the public that our investigations will be thorough and shall cover a wide range of areas, including but not limited to the possible activities of cultists and serial killings," the directorate said in a statement. Kenya was left reeling by the discovery last year of mass graves in a forest near the Indian Ocean coast containing the bodies of hundreds of followers of a doomsday starvation cult.    The country's law enforcement services are also under scrutiny after dozens of people were killed during anti-government demonstrations last month, with rights group accusing officers of using excessive force.    Police reported Friday of finding bodies of at least six women, while the state-funded police watchdog said nine had been found, seven of them women.    Horrendous scene  "As the government deploys all necessary resources and manpower to expedite this investigation, we appeal to the members of the public to remain calm and give our detectives a chance to deliver justice to the victims of this horrendous scene," the DCI statement said.   Tensions have been running high at the Mukuru site, with local media reports that police had fired into the air to try to disperse an angry crowd of locals.  The DCI said a team of detectives and forensic experts "were impeded by agitated members of the public from accessing the scene."   The Independent Police Oversight Authority (IPOA) had said Friday that it was investigating whether there was any police involvement in the gruesome saga.  "The bodies, wrapped in bags and secured by nylon ropes, had visible marks of torture and mutilation," it said, noting that the dumpsite was less than 100 meters (330 feet) from a police station.     The IPOA is also looking into claims of abductions of demonstrators who went missing after the widespread anti-government protests turned deadly.    Surge of disappearances  Kenya's police force is often accused of extrajudicial killings and other rights abuses, but convictions are rare.    "The discovery comes amid a troubling surge in cases of mysterious disappearances and abductions, particularly following recent protests against the finance bill," a coalition of civil society and rights groups said in a statement.  "This horrific incident is a mass fatality issue, it represents a grave violation of human rights and raises serious concerns about the rule of law and security in our country," it said.  National police chief Japhet Koome, the target of much public anger over the protest deaths and reported abductions, resigned Friday after less than two years in the post.  He is the latest head to roll as President William Ruto scrambles to contain the worst crisis of his rule, triggered by the protests over deeply unpopular plans for tax hikes.  Crowds that gathered at the dumpsite Friday chanted "Ruto must go," the slogan of Gen-Z Kenyans leading the demonstrations that have now morphed into a wider campaign against the government, corruption and alleged police brutality.   "As the police investigations unfold, IPOA is keenly independently undertaking preliminary inquiries to establish whether there was any police involvement in the deaths, or failure to act to prevent them," the agency said.    The IPOA also called for public help in its investigations into reports of abductions, unlawful arrests and disappearances during the anti-government protests.  But it did not make any link to those missing and the dumped bodies, and some people on social media have described them as victims of femicide.  On Monday, doomsday cult leader Paul Nthenge Mackenzie went on trial along with 94 co-defendants over the deaths of more than 400 followers he is accused of inciting to starve themselves to death in order to meet Jesus.   He and his co-accused also face charges of murder, manslaughter and child cruelty in separate cases over one of the world's worst cult-related massacres. 

Give us 5 minutes, and we'll give you the world. Around the clock, Voice of America keeps you in touch with the latest news. We bring you reports from our correspondents and interviews with newsmakers from across the world.

Give us 5 minutes, and we'll give you the world. Around the clock, Voice of America keeps you in touch with the latest news. We bring you reports from our correspondents and interviews with newsmakers from across the world.

Pamplona, Spain — Five runners were injured, but none were gored on the seventh day of Pamplona's running of the bulls in northern Spain Saturday, the Red Cross said.  The five injured people were hurt during Spain's traditional annual San Fermin bull running festival, with most suffering bruising, local government sources said.  The curtain went up on nine days of festivities earlier this week as thousands of revelers dressed in white clothes and red scarves filled the city's main square for the "chupinazo" — the firecracker that launches an event dating back to medieval times. The run became world famous after being immortalized by U.S. writer Ernest Hemingway in his 1926 novel "The Sun Also Rises." The festivities include concerts, religious processions and copious amounts of wine. Each day at 8 a.m., hundreds of attendees launch themselves into a dangerous 850 meters (930 yards) race, seeking to outrun — or at least avoid — six heavy fighting bulls through the city center's narrow streets. During the intense "running of the bulls" — which lasts less than three minutes — the runners try to get as close as possible to the animals in their sprint to the Pamplona bullring, where bullfights are held in the afternoon. This year's edition saw the day of San Fermin fall on a Sunday, allowing a stronger turnout than when the saint's day falls on a weekday. Anyone aged 18 or above may participate. Dozens of people are injured each year, although most are injuries resulting from falls or being stomped by animals. To date, 16 deaths have also been recorded since 1911, the last coming in 2009.

Give us 5 minutes, and we'll give you the world. Around the clock, Voice of America keeps you in touch with the latest news. We bring you reports from our correspondents and interviews with newsmakers from across the world.

Give us 5 minutes, and we'll give you the world. Around the clock, Voice of America keeps you in touch with the latest news. We bring you reports from our correspondents and interviews with newsmakers from across the world.

ISLAMABAD — Thousands of supporters of a Pakistani radical political party rallied near the capital, Islamabad, on Saturday, denouncing Israeli strikes in Gaza and urging the government to send more aid to the Palestinians. The protesters also demanded that Pakistan declare Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “a terrorist.” There was no immediate response from the government following the rally in the garrison city of Rawalpindi. Pakistan has no diplomatic relations with Israel. Pakistan has been calling for a cease-fire in the nine-month Israel-Hamas war, and in recent months has sent relief items for the Palestinians in Gaza. Saad Rizvi, head of the Islamist Tehreek-e-Labiak Pakistan party, which led the rally, said the sit-in at the protest would continue as long as its demands are not accepted by the government. Hundreds of police were deployed near the rally, which took place as militant attacks have surged in Pakistan.

Phnom Penh, Cambodia — A Cambodian military helicopter has gone missing following an "accident" in bad weather in the southwest of the country, its Defense Ministry said Saturday.  The ministry said in a Facebook post that the chopper went missing in the rugged Cardamom Mountains, which are cloaked in dense rainforest.  "A helicopter has lost contact with the headquarters of the air force ... during a training [session]," it said.  "The accident happened due to bad weather," it added.  The ministry did not say when the chopper went missing, what model it was, or how many people were on board.  But air force sources told AFP that a Chinese-made Z-9 chopper with at least two people aboard disappeared Friday during a training exercise.  The Defense Ministry said rescue teams began searching for the missing chopper Saturday morning, but the chopper had not been found.  Local press reports said the search was focused on Pursat province.  Cambodia bought 12 Z-9 helicopters from China in 2013 to boost its military capacity.  Four Cambodian soldiers died, and one was injured in 2014 when a Z-9 exploded in midair before crashing into a water-filled quarry during military training on the outskirts of the capital Phnom Penh.  In 2008, Cambodia's chief policeman, Hok Lundy, was killed in a helicopter crash along with the deputy army commander and two pilots when their chopper went down in bad weather. 

BERLIN — Spain and England will play the European Championship final on Sunday in an imposing stadium with a dark history. Built for the 1936 Olympic Games, Berlin's Olympic stadium still bears the scars of World War II and contains relics from its Nazi past. But the Olympiastadion, as it's known in German, is also associated with the rebirth of a democratic Germany after the war. It hosted matches during the 1974 World Cup in what was then West Germany and again at the 2006 World Cup, 16 years after German reunification. Hitler’s involvement Adolf Hitler was personally involved in the design and construction of the 100,000-seat track-and-field stadium after the Nazis assumed power in 1933, two years after Germany had been awarded the 1936 Games. Initially unenthused by the idea of hosting the Games, the Nazi dictator changed his mind after being convinced of their potential for propaganda. Plans to remodel the existing national stadium were quickly scrapped in favor of constructing a whole new sports complex, the Reich Sports Field, on the same site. Werner March is credited as the architect of Olympiastadion. Drawing inspiration from the Colosseum in Rome, the stadium was designed to impress. The Olympic Square in front of the main entrance is tapered, with flagpoles and lines of trees on either side heightening the sense of perspective. The idea was to increase the dramatic effect, raising visitors’ expectations and making them feel part of the event. Up to 2,600 workers toiled on the Reich Sports Field at one stage to have it ready in time for the Games, which started August 1, 1936. The Nazi regime's racist ideology deeply influenced the project as construction companies were told to only hire “complying, nonunion workers of German citizenship and Aryan race.” A propaganda victory Hitler watched from his stadium-balcony as Jesse Owens, a Black American athlete, won four gold medals to become the star of the Games, dealing a blow to Hitler's notions of racial superiority. However, the Games also delivered a propaganda victory for Nazi Germany. It won more medals than any other country and presented to the world a carefully crafted image of peace and tolerance that Hitler and his associates wanted to show. It was arguably the world’s first major case of “sportswashing.” Olympiastadion was decked with hundreds of Nazi flags for the Games, and a swastika adorned one of the two towers holding the Olympic rings above the entrance. The swastika was removed in 1945. Members of the Nazi paramilitary SA, commonly known as the Brownshirts, were ordered to stop their attacks against Jews during July and August 1936. The Nazis were already pushing Jewish athletes out of German sports, and there were only two the Nazis considered half-Jewish who were allowed compete on the German team — fencer Helene Mayer and hockey player Rudi Ball. “It was done to try and silence the critics a little bit,” said Ryan Balmer, a tour guide with degrees in modern history and literature who has lived in Berlin since 2008. The Nazis also used the Reich Sports Field complex after the Olympics. Italian dictator Benito Mussolini visited in 1937, when he was welcomed by thousands of torch-carrying Nazis on the May Field behind the stadium. Up to 800,000 people reportedly took part. Olympiastadion survives WWII Olympiastadion and the Reich Sports Field were damaged in the war, although the stadium escaped relatively unscathed compared to the devastation wrought by Allied bombers in more central areas of Berlin. Many surviving buildings were reused with their Nazi iconography removed. Olympiastadion fell in the British sector after the city was divided between the four victorious powers — the Soviet Union, the U.S., France and Britain. The British reopened the stadium in 1946 and maintained their military headquarters in the former Reich Sports Field until 1994. Little was done to Olympiastadion after the war. It and the former the Reich Sports Field were given protected status in 1966, when Hitler's balcony was shortened by 1 meter. The biggest renovations were made before Germany's 2006 World Cup, when the stadium was crowned with a roof. The stadium today There are no attempts to hide the stadium’s Nazi past — modern-day Germany is adamant that the atrocities of the Nazi era should not be forgotten. Information signs in English and German are placed around the stadium to inform visitors about the site’s history. While the swastikas have been removed, some Nazi relics remain. An eagle adorns a pillar beside what is now the training ground of Hertha Berlin, which plays its home games in the stadium. The old bell from the Bell Tower still displays a Nazi eagle and Olympic rings, but the swastika has been partially covered. In a sign of Germany's post-war rehabilitation, a large conference room in the stadium and a road running along the sports field's southern perimeter have been named after Owens. Visitors have mixed feelings about the stadium, which has a capacity of 71,000 during the European Championship. Many fans who attend matches at Olympiastadion are preoccupied with their respective teams' fortunes and pay little attention to the information signs. Balmer said the stadium could use "a more prominent reminder of how and why places like this were built.”

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NEW YORK — Dr. Ruth Westheimer, the diminutive sex therapist who became a pop icon, media star and best-selling author through her frank talk about once-taboo bedroom topics, has died. She was 96. Westheimer died on Friday at her home in New York City, surrounded by her family, according to publicist and friend Pierre Lehu. Westheimer never advocated risky sexual behavior. Instead, she encouraged an open dialogue on previously closeted issues that affected her audience of millions. Her one recurring theme was that there was nothing to be ashamed of. “I still hold old-fashioned values, and I'm a bit of a square,” she told students at Michigan City High School in 2002. “Sex is a private art and a private matter. But still, it is a subject we must talk about.” Westheimer's giggly, German-accented voice, coupled with her 4-foot-7 frame, made her an unlikely looking — and sounding — outlet for “sexual literacy.” The contradiction was one of the keys to her success. But it was her extensive knowledge and training, coupled with her humorous, nonjudgmental manner, that catapulted her local radio program, "Sexually Speaking," into the national spotlight in the early 1980s. She had a nonjudgmental approach to what two consenting adults did in the privacy of their home. Her radio success opened new doors, and in 1983 she wrote the first of more than 40 books: “Dr. Ruth’s Guide to Good Sex,” demystifying sex with rationality and humor. There was even a board game, Dr. Ruth’s Game of Good Sex. She soon became a regular on the late-night television talk-show circuit, bringing her personality to the national stage. Her rise coincided with the early days of the AIDS epidemic, when frank sexual talk became a necessity. “If we could bring about talking about sexual activity the way we talk about diet — the way we talk about food — without it having this kind of connotation that there’s something not right about it, then we would be a step further. But we have to do it with good taste,” she told Johnny Carson in 1982. She normalized the use of words such as “penis” and “vagina” on radio and TV, aided by her Jewish grandmotherly accent, which The Wall Street Journal once said was “a cross between Henry Kissinger and Minnie Mouse.” People magazine included her in their list of “The Most Intriguing People of the Century.” Westheimer defended abortion rights, suggested older people have sex after a good night’s sleep and was an outspoken advocate of condom use. She believed in monogamy. In the 1980s, she stood up for gay men at the height of the AIDS epidemic and spoke out loudly for the LGBTQ community. She said she defended people deemed by some far-right Christians to be “subhuman” because of her own past. Born Karola Ruth Siegel in Frankfurt, Germany, in 1928, she was an only child. At 10, she was sent by her parents to Switzerland to escape Kristallnacht — the Nazis’ 1938 pogrom that served as a precursor to the Holocaust. She never saw her parents again; Westheimer believed they were killed in the gas chambers at Auschwitz. At the age of 16, she moved to Palestine and joined the Haganah, the underground movement for Israeli independence. She was trained as a sniper, although she said she never shot at anyone. Her legs were severely wounded when a bomb exploded in her dormitory, killing many of her friends. She said it was only through the work of a “superb” surgeon that she could walk and ski again. She married her first husband, an Israeli soldier, in 1950, and they moved to Paris as she pursued an education. Although not a high school graduate, Westheimer was accepted into the Sorbonne to study psychology after passing an entrance exam. The marriage ended in 1955; the next year, Westheimer went to New York with her new boyfriend, a Frenchman who became her second husband and father to her daughter, Miriam. In 1961, after a second divorce, she finally met her life partner: Manfred Westheimer, a fellow refugee from Nazi Germany. The couple was married and had a son, Joel. They remained wed for 36 years until “Fred” — as she called him — died of heart failure in 1997. After receiving her doctorate in education from Columbia University, she went on to teach at Lehman College in the Bronx. While there she developed a specialty — instructing professors how to teach sex education. It would eventually become the core of her curriculum. “I soon realized that while I knew enough about education, I did not really know enough about sex,” she wrote in her 1987 autobiography. Westheimer then decided take classes with the renowned sex therapist, Dr. Helen Singer Kaplan. It was there that she had discovered her calling. Soon, as she once said in a typically folksy comment, she was dispensing sexual advice “like good chicken soup.” In 1984, her radio program was nationally syndicated. A year later, she debuted in her own television program, “The Dr. Ruth Show,” which went on to win an Ace Award for excellence in cable television. She also wrote a nationally syndicated advice column and later appeared in a line of videos produced by Playboy, preaching the virtues of open sexual discourse and good sex. She even had her own board game, “Dr. Ruth’s Game of Good Sex,” and a series of calendars. Her rise was noteworthy for the culture of the time, in which then-President Ronald Reagan’s administration was hostile to Planned Parenthood and aligned with conservative voices.

TEHRAN, Iran — Iran’s newly elected president said his government will create "balance in relations with all countries” in line with national interests and the prerequisites for peace but stressed to the United States that his country “will not respond to pressure.” Masoud Pezeshkian penned “My Message To The New World” in the country's state-owned Tehran Times late Friday, praising the latest presidential election that “demonstrated remarkable stability” and vowing to uphold “promises I made during my campaign.” Pezeshkian, a 69-year-old heart surgeon and longtime lawmaker, bested hard-liner former nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili to clinch the July 5 runoff election to replace President Ebrahim Raisi, who was killed in a helicopter crash in May. He said in his message his administration would “prioritize strengthening relations with our neighbors” and urged Arab countries to use “all diplomatic leverages” to push for a lasting cease-fire in the ongoing Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip that started October 7. Iran has long supported the militant group Hamas, and Pezeshkian on Wednesday expressed his all-out support of “the Palestinian resistance” in a message to the group's chief, Ismail Haniyeh. Pezeshkian, in the letter Friday, hailed his country's relations with Russia and China, which “consistently stood by us during challenging times.” He said Moscow was “a valued strategic ally” and his government would expand bilateral cooperation. He also expressed willingness to “support initiatives aimed at” achieving peace between Russia and Ukraine in the ongoing war. The president also said he looked forward to furthering cooperation with Beijing and applauded it for brokering a deal to normalize relations between Iran and Saudi Arabia after seven years of diplomatic tensions. Pezeshkian said he looks forward to engaging in constructive dialogue with European countries “based on principles of mutual respect" despite a relationship that has known “its ups and downs.” In May 2018, the U.S. unilaterally withdrew from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action — a nuclear agreement that also included Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany. Since then, Western powers have accused the Islamic Republic of expanding its nuclear program and enriching uranium to an unprecedented 60% level, near-weapons-grade levels. The U.S. has issued severe, mainly economic, sanctions against Iran. Pezeshkian accused the European countries of reneging on commitments made, following the U.S. withdrawal, to ensure "effective banking transactions, effective protection of companies from U.S. sanctions, and the promotion of investments in Iran.” However, he added there were still many opportunities for collaboration between Iran and Europe. He then addressed the U.S., underscoring his country’s refusal to “respond to pressure,” adding that Iran “entered the JCPOA in 2015 in good faith and fully met our obligations.” Pezeshkian said the U.S. backing out has inflicted “hundreds of billions of dollars in damage to our economy” and caused “untold suffering, death and destruction on the Iranian people — particularly during the COVID pandemic” due to sanctions. Pezeshkian said Western countries “not only missed a historic opportunity to reduce and manage tensions in the region and the world, but also seriously undermined the Non-Proliferation Treaty.” He emphasized that “Iran’s defense doctrine does not include nuclear weapons.” Iran has held indirect talks with U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration, although there’s been no clear movement toward constraining Tehran’s nuclear program for the lifting of economic sanctions. Pezeshkian also accused the U.S. administration in his open letter of escalating “hostilities” by assassinating General Qassem Soleimani, the architect of Iran’s regional military activities, who was killed in a U.S. drone strike in neighboring Iraq in 2020. Besides regional turmoil and tense relations over Iran's nuclear program, Iran's president faces many challenges locally. He must now convince an angry public — many under financial duress due to sanctions, stubbornly high inflation and unemployment — that he can make the changes promised while dealing with an administration still largely governed by hard-liners. Pezeshkian has aligned himself with other moderate and reformist figures since his presidential campaign. His main advocate has been former Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, who reached the 2015 JCPOA. Pezeshkian appointed Zarif as the head of the Strategic Council for the administration's transition period. The council, comprised of experts and advisers, will focus on assessing potential candidates for key cabinet positions and ensuring a seamless handover of leadership.

Istanbul, Turkey — President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced Saturday the imminent end to the Turkish forces' operation against Kurdish PKK fighters in northern Iraq and Syria.   Turkey launched Operation Claw-Lock in April 2022 to secure its border with northern Iraq, from where it accused Kurdish separatists of launching attacks against Turkish territory.  "We will very soon complete the lockdown of the area of operation in northern Iraq," the president said, adding that Kurdish forces were now "incapable of acting inside our borders."  Erdogan said that the Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK, had been "completely trapped" in Iraq and Syria, telling young military academy graduates that Turkish forces were "all over them."  "We will complete the missing points of the security belt along our southern border with Syria," he said.  Since 2016, Ankara has also carried out successive ground operations to expel Kurdish forces from border areas of northern Syria.   The PKK — designated a terrorist group by Turkey, the United States and the European Union — took up arms against the Turkish state in 1984. More than 40,000 people have been killed in the insurgency.

Washington — Thousands of people gathered for a glimpse of the funeral procession of the slain Pakistani rights activist Gilaman Wazir as his casket passed through towns and cities from Islamabad to his native village in the restive Waziristan region bordering Afghanistan about 250 miles away. The procession was not covered by Pakistan’s mainstream media. A member of the Pashtuns’ rights movement — Pashtun Tahafuz Movement, or PTM — Wazir (his name in documents was Hazrat Naeem) advocated for the rights of his people on digital platforms, using prose and poetry to convey his messages in short reels and TikTok videos and on social media platform X. He was attacked in Islamabad on July 7 and succumbed to head injuries after four days. Police officials told VOA they have not found the men involved in the attack. PTM says it will investigate why he was killed. Wazir’s activism on digital platforms incurred Pakistan’s anger when he was working as a laborer in Bahrain. Interpol arrested him in Bahrain at Pakistan’s request in 2020, and he was handed over to Pakistani authorities the same year. “He was doing labor work in Bahrain. He was deported through Interpol and was put in jail. He was then kept in an internment center. He was bitten by dogs and was given electric shocks,” PTM leader Manzoor Pashteen said in his address to mourners gathered for a view of Wazir’s casket in different towns on July 11 and 12. Pakistani officials have not responded to Pashteen’s charges. Wazir has a series of reels, Facebook posts and TikTok videos that describe in his own poetry, in Pashto, his ordeal in the prisons. PTM claims Wazir was picked up again by Pakistani authorities in July 2023, in Peshawar, but government officials did not confirm his whereabouts for about six months. He was later handed over to police and was released in late January 2024. PTM says he was on the Exit Control List till his death. Anyone on the list is subject to restrictions on their movements outside the country. Pakistani television networks and media outlets often cover protests and funeral processions, but there was silence in the mainstream media on the killing of Wazir. Afrasiab Khattak, former head of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, told VOA there is a ban on covering PTM activities in media. An army spokesperson told the media in April 2019 to stop reporting on the group. "When the media cannot report the news about killings, like Gilaman's, or the dead bodies of Baloch, or missing people, then there will be questions,” said Peshawar-based author and academic Irfan Ashraf. Social media platforms have filled the vacuum of information about Wazir. The hashtag #GilamanWazir was trending on the social media platform X in Pakistan on Thursday. Pakistan has banned X in the country, but more than 32,000 tweets mentioned Wazir in one day. Among others, former Afghan Presidents Hamid Karzai and Ashraf Ghani offered condolences on Wazir’s killing in their tweets. Government leaders in Islamabad have made no comment on the issue. PTM staged huge pro-peace rallies after Islamabad announced last month it was launching a new military operation against terrorism. Wazir and Pashteen questioned the dividends of Pakistan’s dozen-plus previous military operations in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. Khattak said there is a trust deficit between the state and the people. “The government is like a thin layer of onion on the face of [the] military. The army makes the decisions, and people don’t trust the generals,” he said. Tens of thousands of people attended Wazir’s funeral in North Waziristan on Friday. They chanted against the Pakistan army, and some waved the three-color Afghan national flag, a message to Islamabad that they don’t accept Taliban in Kabul.

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KATHMANDU, Nepal — Rescuers in Nepal on Saturday recovered the first body after a landslide swept away two buses, pushing them into a raging river a day earlier, authorities said. The buses, carrying more than 50 people, fell into the Trishuli River, which was swollen by continuous rainfall over the past few days as heavy monsoon downpours turned their waters murky brown, making it even more difficult to see the wreckage. The body was that of a man and was found some 50 kilometers (31 miles) from where the buses fell, said government administrator Khima Nanda Bhusal. He added that rescuers found a bank card and were in the process of identifying the man, whose body was transported to a nearby hospital. Rescuers are now expanding their search area toward the southern region from the landslide area where the man's body was found, Bhusal said. Weather conditions improved Saturday, and search teams were able to cover more ground in the hunt for the missing buses and passengers. Heavy equipment had cleared much of the landslides from the highway, making it easier to reach the area. Soldiers and police teams were using rubber rafts, divers and sensor equipment to try to locate the buses. Three people were ejected from the buses and were being treated in a nearby hospital. Nepal’s rivers generally are fast-flowing due to the mountainous terrain. Heavy monsoon downpours in the past few days have swollen the waterways. The buses were on the key highway connecting Nepal's capital to southern parts of the country when they were swept away Friday morning near Simaltal, about 120 kilometers (75 miles) west of Kathmandu. A third bus was hit by another landslide Friday morning a short distance away on the same highway. Authorities said the driver was killed, but it was not clear if there were other casualties.

Give us 5 minutes, and we'll give you the world. Around the clock, Voice of America keeps you in touch with the latest news. We bring you reports from our correspondents and interviews with newsmakers from across the world.