KATHMANDU: A Nepalese woman, excited to be voting for the first time, told yesterday how she went into labour and gave birth at a polling station during elections in the Himalayan nation. Parbati Bhandari said she was so keen to take part in polls on Tuesday to elect a constituent assembly that she walked 30 minutes to a polling station just six days before her due date. “As this was my first time, I was excited to vote, but about an hour after I reached the polling station I had sudden pain in my lower belly,” the 20-year-old housewife said by phone. Officials began counting yesterday, with analysts hailing the high turnout seen as vital for stabilising the country and cementing a peace process seven years after a civil war ended.
Vietnam floods toll rises to 42
HANOI: Vietnamese authorities yesterday raised the death toll from severe floods that swept central provinces to 42, with five people still missing. Nearly 430,000 houses have been inundated, damaged or destroyed, the flood and storm control department said in an online report, adding rains have now slackened and water has receded in some areas. Media reports said water discharged by several hydropower plants in the region contributed to the scale of the flooding.
N Korea ‘can make N-arms’
SEOUL: North Korea is believed to be capable of producing nuclear weapons from enriched uranium and its existing plutonium stockpile, South Korea’s defence minister said yesterday. “We evaluate that North Korea can produce nuclear weapons using uranium,” Kim Kwan-Jin was quoted by Yonhap news agency as telling MPs. He did not give details but it marked a rare assessment by a top official of the North’s nuclear capability. North Korea has carried out three nuclear tests since 2006, the last, and most powerful, this February. Agencies
