This morning's briefing covers 29 stories selected from issue 11 of Biguan (毕观天下), weighted towards Asia. Australian independent MP Helen Haines was critically injured after being hit by a car outside her Wangaratta office, Japan launched the MMX probe to bring back a sample from Mars' moon Phobos, Singapore issued haze notices to three more Indonesian firms, and the Philippines summoned China's ambassador over his 'easy win' remarks. Elsewhere, a Houthi missile strike killed at least 53 recruits in Yemen, drone strikes killed 80 in Sudan's West Kordofan, France imposed partial curfews after riots, and Trump said 'somebody else' should negotiate for Ukraine.
Australian federal independent MP Helen Haines, member for Indi, was hit by a white Toyota Landcruiser outside her electorate office on Murphy Street in Wangaratta, north-east Victoria, at about 3:35 pm on Oct 19; she is in a critical condition and underwent surgery in Melbourne. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said the car did a U-turn and hit her in a 'deliberate act'; federal police and the security intelligence organisation are investigating the motive and counter-terrorism police are involved. Victoria Police arrested a 43-year-old man from nearby Tarrawingee at the scene and found a knife in the car; a local barber took the knife and held him until police arrived, and Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke said reports of threats or harassment against politicians rose from 951 to 1,067 in the past year.
Local authorities said Iran-backed Houthi forces fired three ballistic missiles at al-Alam camp near Ataq in Shabwa province, a training camp for security force and police recruits, killing at least 53 and injuring about 200. Rashad al-Alimi, head of Yemen's presidential leadership council, called it a 'criminal attack' and vowed a 'decisive response', while a Houthi military spokesman said the target was a gathering of 'Saudi enemy forces'; pro-government forces backed by Saudi-led coalition air power have retaken areas overlooking the Bab al-Mandab strait since early October. Reuters reported Saudi Arabia postponed its 10th 'Davos in the Desert' investment conference, set for Oct 26–29, to 2027 after a series of recent attacks.
Witnesses and medical sources said drones struck a transport hub in al-Dibab, West Kordofan, twice 10 minutes apart on the evening of Oct 18, killing 80 people, most of them passengers heading home after market day; witness Ahmed Wadi said he helped bury 50 bodies including his brother, and 30 of 47 people taken to nearby al-Mujlad died of their wounds. The RSF-declared Tasis administration blamed the Sudanese army; it is one of the deadliest single strikes since the war began in April 2023. Al Jazeera reported on Oct 19 that an RSF drone attack in eastern Khartoum killed three children under 10.
Ukraine's interior minister said a Russian drone struck the central park of Nova Vodolaha in Kharkiv region, killing six people: a man, three women and two girls. Kharkiv regional military administration head Oleh Syniehubov said the girls were 11 and just over one year old, and 15 people were injured, seven of them children. President Volodymyr Zelensky said the little girl was named Angelina, her mother Inna was also killed, and the park was hit by a Shahed drone.
Japanese media including the Yomiuri Shimbun reported that hotel staff in Fujikawaguchiko, Yamanashi Prefecture, found a female guest in her 30s, believed to be from Taiwan, lying dead in her room with apparent stab wounds at about 8 am on Oct 19, after she failed to appear at her tour group's meeting time. Police found a 27-year-old Taiwanese woman in the room holding a kitchen knife with a blade of about 12 cm and arrested her on suspicion of violating the Swords and Firearms Control Law; they are investigating the relationship between the two and how the woman died. The hotel is about 2 km north-east of Kawaguchiko Station.
Before leaving the White House for a campaign stop in Kansas on Oct 19, US President Donald Trump told reporters Zelensky was 'not very helpful', that it was time for 'somebody else' to negotiate for Ukraine, and that Zelensky could have got a better deal and 'saved a million people' had he listened. Asked about the reported US–Russia–China meeting proposed by Putin, Trump said he would meet Putin and Xi Jinping to discuss ending the war 'whether somebody is there or not', after first saying he would rather discuss denuclearization; the Wall Street Journal reported Putin raised the idea in an Oct 9 call and it could take place at the Nov 18–19 APEC summit in Shenzhen. TASS, citing Reuters, reported envoys Witkoff and Kushner will hold talks on Ukraine in Norway.
After an emergency cabinet meeting on Oct 19, Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu said the government was determined to restore public order and would impose 'partial' curfews where needed, not city-wide ones. Four northern cities including Lille have 8 pm–6 am curfews on Monday and Tuesday nights, Paris police imposed an 11 pm–6 am curfew with a ban on gatherings around Place de la République and the looted Les Halles area, and Marseille banned all gatherings and demonstrations. Reuters reported Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez offered to resign but President Macron refused; art students blockaded the Louvre, which closed on the first anniversary of its jewel heist, and unions called a new strike for Nov 5.
A court in Mombasa on Oct 19 found Good News International Church leader Paul Mackenzie guilty of murdering 191 people, all but one of them children, in the 2023 Shakahola forest starvation cult case; 28 other sect leaders were also convicted of murder. Judge Mochache, reading the verdict over more than eight hours, said Mackenzie ordered followers to starve their children to 'meet Jesus' and taught that education was forbidden and modern medicine 'evil'. After his 2023 arrest, authorities exhumed more than 400 bodies from shallow graves, only 26 identified; the defendants denied the charges.
Voters in Alberta went to the polls on Oct 19 to decide whether the province should stay in Canada or hold a binding independence referendum later. Premier Danielle Smith called the vote after a grassroots group gathered about 300,000 signatures; a counter-petition opposing separation drew more than 400,000, and polls show most of the roughly 5 million residents favour staying. Smith said a binding referendum could be held in 2027 at the earliest if the vote passes; she did not campaign for independence and estimated in June that transition costs would be about C$400 billion plus C$25–50 billion a year. Results were not out at time of writing.
The US Department of Homeland Security made public on Oct 19 a directive barring federal civilian agencies from procuring IT products and services developed by Hangzhou-based DeepSeek and its affiliates, and requiring removal of its products and of third-party products built with DeepSeek technology. The ban has been in effect since the end of July and covers agencies including the Treasury, State and Justice departments, but not Department of Defense agencies. The directive did not specify the security concerns; DHS, DeepSeek and the Chinese embassy did not immediately respond to the BBC.
In a statement carried by KCNA on Oct 19, Kim Yo-jong, sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, said the situation on the southern border was 'very unstable' and that Pyongyang was considering resuming loudspeaker propaganda broadcasts into South Korea and deploying additional tactical strike assets on the border. She said that from Oct 15 to 17 South Korean troops issued about 350 loudspeaker warnings and fired about 60 warning shots at North Korean troops reinforcing the border, and that the Lee Jae Myung government's schemes to provoke confrontation surpass those of the Yoon Suk Yeol administration.
The UN World Food Programme said funding has fallen by more than half from 2025, forcing it to cut Gaza assistance from October: monthly recipients drop from about 1.6 million to 1.1 million, more than 500,000 people lose aid, and community kitchens' daily hot meals fall from 250,000 to 150,000. Families in hard-to-reach areas such as near the 'Yellow Line' marking the Israeli military-controlled zone now get a meal every other day. Nearly all of Gaza's 2.1 million people remain displaced and two-thirds depend on food aid; WFP Palestine director Shaun Hughes said more than £300 million is needed over six months to restore and sustain key programmes.
The Philippine foreign ministry said on Oct 19 that Foreign Secretary Maria Theresa Lazaro summoned Chinese Ambassador Jing Quan to express serious concern and strong objection to his remarks to media last week, calling them provocative, unacceptable and conveying a threat of force. Jing had said China would win easily in any conflict but loves peace and would not use force, and that the Philippines should feel fortunate to have China as a neighbour, after the Philippine defence secretary called China a regional troublemaker. RFI reported the presidential palace said it would not declare Jing persona non grata.
A BTG/Nexus poll released on Oct 19 for the Oct 25 presidential runoff showed Senator Flávio Bolsonaro at 46.5% and incumbent President Lula at 45.9%, a 0.6-point gap. The same day Brazil's Superior Electoral Court (TSE) ordered Meta to show within 24 hours that its content feeds do not favour either candidate, and raised the daily fine for continued non-compliance with earlier orders from 500,000 reais (about $100,000) to 1 million reais. The case stems from a complaint by Lula's campaign that Meta limited promotion and search visibility of his Instagram profile.
Singapore's National Environment Agency on Oct 19 issued preventive-measure notices under the Transboundary Haze Pollution Act to three more Indonesian companies — Buana Megatama Jaya, Mananjung Hayak and Baratama Putra Perkasa — taking the total to 10, citing indications that smoke from fires on their concession land in Kalimantan reached Singapore; the notices require them to deploy firefighters, stop burning and submit fire-prevention plans. Nine of the 10 are pulp plantations and four are linked to Asia Pulp & Paper (APP). Senior Minister Shanmugam said Singapore would use every legal and regulatory lever against haze-linked firms, amending or enacting laws urgently if needed; the 24-hour PSI in the west was 122 at 5 am on Oct 20, the highest of all regions.
Storm system Adam hit Spain's Valencia region early on Oct 19, with up to 700 litres per square metre of rain in some areas; emergency services carried out more than 1,000 rescues and the military hoisted residents from rooftops by helicopter. Government sources said a 79-year-old woman with limited mobility who lived alone was found dead in Oliva, Valencia province, and a 64-year-old man died of a heart attack at a campsite there; with one death each in Cabrera de Mar (Barcelona province) on Saturday and Sagunto on Sunday, the storm has killed four. The regional government lifted stay-at-home orders in eight municipalities in Valencia and Alicante provinces at about 8 pm.
H2O Retailing, parent of Hankyu Hanshin Department Stores, said on Oct 19 that personal data of all 1.26 million H2O ID members was leaked, with no fraud use found so far. It detected unauthorised third-party access to the customer management system of the stores' reservation site on Oct 16 and shut it that day; on Oct 17 the HANKYU HANSHIN E-STORES online mall and the Remo Order service were also breached, leaking some order, credit card and point-card data, and the case was reported to the Personal Information Protection Commission and police. NHK reported hometown-tax site Furusato Choice also suspended service over a suspected intrusion, and a GMO Internet Group security subsidiary said it confirmed Chinese AI was used in some of the recent string of intrusions in Japan.
US Forces Korea and UN Command commander Xavier Brunson told a seminar in Washington last Wednesday that from the UN Command's perspective South Korea begins at the southern fence of the DMZ, because he manages that area to maintain the armistice. The DMZ, set up under the 1953 Korean Armistice Agreement, is about 250 km long, with its southern boundary 2 km from the Military Demarcation Line and South Korean villages inside. South Korea's ruling party said the remark denied Korean sovereignty over the DMZ's southern half and the army chief of staff disagreed; UN Command then issued a statement saying South Korea's sovereignty is not in question.
Western Sydney International Airport, a A$5.6 billion (about $4 billion) project 50 km west of Sydney's city centre, began commercial operations with a Jetstar flight to the Gold Coast as its first passenger service. Aviation data firm Cirium said it has attracted only a handful of airlines and has six or fewer scheduled flights a day for the next 12 months. Australia's biggest aviation infrastructure project in decades opened after more than half a century of political delay, environmental protests and funding shortfalls, as the Iran war pushes up fuel costs and fares and carriers including Qantas cut domestic capacity.
Japan's Taiwan-friendly lawmakers' league announced at a task force meeting in Tokyo on Oct 19 that since Oct 1 Taiwanese holders of Japanese national qualifications can apply to change their nationality listing from China to Taiwan, with the field renamed 'nationality, etc.' or 'nationality/region'. Japan has 322 national qualifications, about 100 of which include a nationality field. League head Keiji Furuya said about 70,000 Taiwanese in Japan have identity documents registered as China, and Japan already allows Taiwan on household registers; task force head Hirofumi Takinami said existing licence holders can apply to the relevant authority, such as local public health centres for medical licences, and asked that no deadline be set.
The Kremlin press service and Meduza reported that Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin met Vladimir Putin on Monday morning and proposed a cabinet reshuffle: Finance Minister Anton Siluanov would also become deputy prime minister, a post he held from 2018 to 2020; Primorsky Krai Governor Oleg Kozhemyako would become deputy PM and presidential envoy to the Far Eastern Federal District, replacing Yuri Trutnev; Transport Minister Andrei Nikitin would become deputy PM, succeeded by Rosaviatsia head Dmitry Yadrov; and First Deputy Finance Minister Irina Okladnikova would become deputy PM and head of the government apparatus, replacing Dmitry Grigorenko. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Putin supported the proposals, which under the constitution require State Duma approval.
The Daejeon District Court on Oct 19 sentenced Jeong Myeong-seok, 81, leader of the Christian Gospel Mission (JMS), to 33 years in prison on charges including quasi-rape for sexually assaulting 16 female followers between 2018 and 2022 at sites including the Wolmyeong-dong retreat in Geumsan, South Chungcheong Province. The court found he used his status to brainwash followers into believing he was the messiah so they could not resist, and ordered disclosure of his personal information, a 10-year ban from working at institutions for children, adolescents and people with disabilities, and 15 years of electronic tagging. The case is separate from his earlier 17-year sentence for assaulting three followers, including a Hong Kong woman and an Australian woman.
Hong Kong police said that as of 9 am on Oct 19 they had received 130 reports of unauthorised credit card transactions linked to online pre-orders of the foldable iPhone Duo, involving HK$5 million (about $637,000) in total, with nearly 20 new cases over the weekend. The cases are classified as obtaining property by deception and are being handled by the Cyber Security and Technology Crime Bureau. Pre-orders opened at 8 pm last Friday and reports began arriving on Saturday; the South China Morning Post reported the incident was linked to Apple not enabling 3D Secure verification.
Official trade data released on Oct 19 showed Argentina's September exports reached a record $10.036 billion, up 23.5% year on year (prices up 16.4%, volumes up 6.1%), with a monthly trade surplus of $2.976 billion, $2.039 billion more than a year earlier, while import volumes fell. The same day JPMorgan's Argentina country risk index rose 27 points, or 4.17%, to 675 basis points, its highest since late October last year; it had fallen to 402 in early July, the lowest of the current government's term. The government attributed the rise to global uncertainty.
Finland's national news agency STT and AFP reported Finland plans to spend €100 million (about $112 million) on one million anti-personnel mines. Finland left the Ottawa Convention banning such mines last year, as did Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland, citing a potential threat from Russia. Colonel Riku Mikkonen of the Army Command said officials are gathering information from suppliers and would prefer domestic production, with a contract by end-2027 and production from 2028; about six Finnish companies qualify.
Taiwan's High Prosecutors' Office indicted four people for helping Chinese contacts pay Taiwanese military personnel who leaked military secrets. Retired military police captain Yu Cheng-yu, already indicted separately for selling secrets for Tether, is accused of receiving Chinese transfers into his own crypto wallet from March to October 2024, converting them to cash and depositing it in accounts of a retired serviceman surnamed Li and a coast guard officer surnamed Tsai to disguise the source, earning NT$430,403 himself. The other defendants are retired servicemen surnamed Li and Sen; prosecutors asked for heavy sentences and the case has gone to the High Court.
Hong Kong's Centre for Health Protection said a previously healthy 6-year-old girl developed fever, vomiting and poor appetite in mid-October and was admitted to Tuen Mun Hospital; her condition worsened and she was moved to paediatric intensive care on Oct 17, her respiratory specimen tested positive for influenza A (H1), and she is in critical condition with influenza A complicated by shock. She had not travelled during the incubation period, had not received the 2026/27 seasonal flu vaccine, and her household contacts have no symptoms. The CHP said Hong Kong entered the flu season in late June, activity remains high after more than three months, and influenza A (H1) is the predominant virus.
JAXA's Martian Moons eXploration (MMX) probe lifted off on H3 rocket No. 10 from the Tanegashima Space Center in Kagoshima Prefecture at 4:41 am Japan time on Oct 20 and separated from the rocket at 5:53 am, entering a trajectory to Mars. The roughly five-year round-trip mission will attempt the first sample return from a Martian moon, Phobos, to study the origins of the solar system and life on Earth. The Asahi Shimbun reported the mission costs about ¥55.3 billion.
Mukesh Ambani's Reliance Industries said on Oct 19 that investors including the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, BlackRock and Fidelity took part in the anchor book of Jio Platforms' $3.2 billion IPO, India's largest ever. Two sources said anchor demand exceeded $25 billion, more than 30 times the allotment; Jio allocated more than 81 billion rupees (about $853 million) of shares to anchor investors, and public subscription opens on Wednesday. Jio upended India's telecom market in 2016 with free calls and cheap data and now has more than 500 million users.