In the latest set of restrictions against women, local Taliban officials have reportedly banned girls over ten years of age from attending primary school classes in some provinces of Afghanistan. BBC Persian reported that the Taliban-ruled Ministry of Education told principals of schools and short-term training classes in the Ghazni province not to allow girls over 10 to study in primary schools.
A New York Times report has alleged that Indian news portal NewsClick is among organisations funded by a network linked to US millionaire Neville Roy Singham for pushing Chinese propaganda. A similar claim was made by the Indian Enforcement Directorate in 2021, when it searched NewsClick’s premises and probed the remittances received by the company, allegedly linked to Singham.
The 7th Foreign Office Consultations between India and Thailand were held in Bangkok on Monday. The two sides reviewed the bilateral relations and agreed to further strengthen the cooperation in trade, investment, MSMEs, defence, security, connectivity, health, culture, and science and technology. During the meeting, India and Thailand noted the growth in bilateral trade in recent years and exchanged views on regional and global developments.
Ukraine’s security service (SBU) announced Monday that it had detained a woman from the country’s Mykolaiv region, suspecting her of attempting to gather intelligence for Russia on President Volodymyr Zelensky’s activities. According to the agency, the accused informant “tried to establish the time and range of locations” involved in a visit Zelensky would be heading to the Mykolaiv area of southern Ukraine.
Russia announced on Monday that it would launch its first lunar landing mission in 47 years this week, competing with India to reach the moon’s south pole in search of a potential water supply for a future human presence. The official launch from the Vostochny Cosmodrome, 3,450 miles (5,550 km) east of Moscow, comes four weeks after India launched its Chandrayaan-3 lunar lander, scheduled to touchdown at the lunar pole on 23 August.
The US government on Monday authorised the shipment of the first batch of Abrams tanks to Ukraine, which will be delivered by the fall, according to media sources citing Army Acquisition chief Douglas Bush. Additionally, Bush stated that “now [the shipment has] to go Europe, and then to Ukraine, along with [...] ammunition, spare parts, fuel equipment, and repair facilities.” However, Bush did not disclose how many tanks would be included in the initial batch.
US Deputy Secretary of State Victoria Nuland, visited the coup-hit West African country of Niger on Monday for talks with the ruling junta. After the two-hour meeting with some of the coup leaders in Niamey, the senior US diplomat revealed that her request to meet the ousted president, Mahmoud Bazoum, who is under “virtual house arrest,” had been rejected, and that the junta was unwilling to reverse the coup and reinstate constitutional order. “They were quite firm about how they want to proceed, and it is not in support of the constitution of Niger,” Nuland told reporters.