South Korea asks North for help in finding missing sailor
A South Korean sailor is believed to have drifted across the maritime border with North Korea overnight, and South Korea is now asking its neighbor for help in the search, Yonhap reports.
The sailor was last seen at midnight and was reported missing when he failed to show up for the frigate's morning patrol. A major search operation involving about a dozen ships, aircraft and civilian boats is underway.
"As the South Korean navy is currently searching for the missing sailor, we are asking for North Korea's cooperation - for humanitarian reasons - in the search," South Korean authorities said.
Putin's Russia
Sources: Japan has become Putin's most important spy hub
Since the Russian invasion, Japan has unexpectedly become a hub for Kremlin spies, a New York Times review shows. According to Ukraine, about 90 percent of Russian missiles and drones contain Japanese components, despite Japan banning such exports.
A dozen Russian agents are said to be operating in Japan, according to several countries' intelligence services. Their secret operations are conducted from an office in central Tokyo. The spies pose as diplomats or businessmen, but in reality work to buy or steal sensitive technology that is then smuggled to Russia, according to the newspaper's investigation.
Ukraine has repeatedly pressured the Japanese government to act, but so far the authorities have not done enough to stop the spying activities, experts say.
Scientists skeptical when record-breaking T-rex is auctioned
This week, the 67-million-year-old tyrannosaurus skeleton "Gus" is auctioned at Sotheby's in London, writes the BBC. The auction has revived a recent debate in the scientific community - should certain finds be reserved for science?
"Gus" is valued at a record-high 30 million dollars. That’s far from what many museums can afford, says Susannah Maidment, a dinosaur researcher at the Natural History Museum in London. She says it’s very problematic that such a well-preserved, historically important fossil is ending up in the hands of the richest person.
Research into past life on Earth is fundamental to understanding the mass extinction that the world seems to be facing now, says Maidment.
“The past is really the only form of empirical data we have for understanding what’s happening right now and in the future,” she says.
McConnell Breaks Silence: “I Fell”
US Senator Mitch McConnell has made his first statement since being hospitalized on June 14, American media reports.
The written statement is published together with a picture of McConnell in the hospital. He writes that he was hospitalized after falling and losing consciousness.
The senator adds that he has no serious health problems, but that it will be some time before he returns to the Senate. In the meantime, he is working from his sickbed, he continues and writes:
“I will continue to work hard to return to the Senate as soon as possible.”
The 84-year-old senator’s long hospitalization, and the scant information from his staff, have given rise to a wave of speculation and demands for transparency about his health.
Driver crashes into street festival, killing at least six
At least six people have died and seven others were injured when a driver crashed into a street festival in the coastal city of Viña del Mar in Chile on Sunday, local police said.
According to the initial police report, the driver is believed to have lost control of the vehicle due to rain on the road, an official told AFP.
Chilean President José Antonio Kast expressed his condolences to the victims' families, writing on the X platform that the tragedy "has put the entire country in mourning."
