World Round up June 18

• Source: Global Times
• [07:29 June 18 2009]
• Comments

China, Russia ties flourishing

The leaders of China and Russia yesterday in Moscow hailed flourishing ties that they said were defying the economic crisis.

“In the midst of the global financial crisis, we are actively developing practical cooperation in every sphere,” Chinese President Hu Jintao told Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.

“Despite the global financial crisis, relations between our countries are immune to economic or political ruptures,” Putin said.

India to lease Russian sub

The Nerpa, an Akula-class attack submarine, in which 20 people died after a toxic gas accident in November 2008, will be leased to India.

“On June 20 the vessel should finish all its tests. We are planning to hand the nuclear submarine over to India by the end of this year,” Russian deputy Defense Minister Vladimir Popovkin said yesterday.

Refugee camp overflowing

The world’s largest refugee camp is bursting at the seams, aid groups warn, asking that Kenya grant more land to host the hundreds of Somalis arriving in the UN-run Dadaab cluster every day.

Famine and unabated fighting between pro-government forces and insurgents in Somalia continue to drive large groups of displaced civilians over the officially closed but porous border with Kenya.

Most of them pour straight into the Dadaab refuge camp, which was built in the 1990s for a capacity of 90,000 but now shelters 280,000.

Rapist gets life imprisonment

A South Korean court yesterday sentenced a 32-year-old man to life imprisonment for raping 57 women, including teenagers, over a seven-year period.

The court in the southern city of Changwon ruled that the man should be “isolated from society forever.”

Agencies