EARTHQUAKE KILLS MORE THAN 4,300 IN TURKEY, SYRIA

HATAY, Turkey — Rescuers in Turkey and Syria dug with their bare hands through the freezing night Tuesday hunting for survivors among the rubble of thousands of buildings felled in a series of violent earthquakes.

The confirmed death toll across the 2 countries has soared above 4,300 after a swarm of strong tremors near the Turkey-Syria border -- the largest of which measured at a massive 7.8-magnitude.

Turkish and Syrian disaster response teams report more than 5,600 buildings have been flattened across several cities, including many multi-story apartment blocks that were filled with sleeping residents when the first quake struck.

Turkey's relief agency AFAD on Tuesday said there were now 2,921 deaths in that country alone, bringing the confirmed tally to 4,365.

There are fears that toll will rise inexorably, with World Health Organization officials estimating up to 20,000 may have died.

In Gaziantep, a Turkish city home to countless refugees from Syria's decade-old civil war, rescuers picking through the rubble screamed, cried and clamored for safety as another building collapsed nearby without warning.

The initial earthquake was so large it was felt as far away as Greenland, and the impact is big enough to have sparked a global response.

Dozens of nations from Ukraine to New Zealand have vowed to send help, although freezing rain and sub-zero temperatures have slowed the response.

Despite freezing temperatures outside, terrified residents spent the night on the streets, huddling around fires for warmth.

Monday's first earthquake struck at 4:17 a.m. (9:17 a.m. in Manila) at a depth of about 18 kilometers near the Turkish city of Gaziantep, which is home to around 2 million people, the US Geological Survey said.

More than 14,000 people have so far been reported injured in Turkey, the disaster management agency said, while Syria said at least 3,411 people were injured.

Officials said 3 major airports have been rendered inoperable, complicating deliveries of vital aid.

A winter blizzard has covered major roads into the area in ice and snow.

The UN cultural agency UNESCO expressed fears over heavy damage in 2 cities on its heritage list -- Aleppo in Syria and Diyarbakir in Turkey.

The United States, the European Union and Russia all immediately sent condolences and offers of help.

Turkey is in one of the world's most active earthquake zones.

The country's last 7.8-magnitude tremor was in 1939, when 33,000 died in the eastern Erzincan province.

The Turkish region of Duzce suffered a 7.4-magnitude earthquake in 1999, when more than 17,000 people died.

Experts have long warned a large quake could devastate Istanbul, a megalopolis of 16 million people filled with rickety homes.

BANGLADESH DEMANDS APOLOGY FROM PAKISTAN FOR 1971 GENOCIDE

Even as Pakistan removed all visa restrictions for Bangladeshi citizens to visit Pakistan, Dhaka has sought an apology for the 1971 genocide for both countries to be able to move forward. This is important in a year when Bangladesh will be celebrating 50 years of its liberation.

Shahriar Alam, Bangladesh minister of state for foreign affairs, told the new Pakistan high commissioner Imran Ahmed Siddiqui in Dhaka on Thursday that the apology along with completing the repatriation of Pakistanis stranded in Bangladesh and settling the issue of the division of assets was important for resolving the outstanding bilateral issues with Pakistan.

According to a release issued by the ministry of foreign affairs, the minister urged Pakistan to grant access to more Bangladeshi products under the SAFTA provisions and to relax the negative list and other trade barriers.

Meanwhile, the new Pakistan envoy told the Bangladeshi government that “Pakistan has already removed all restrictions on Pakistani visas for Bangladeshi citizens”. A Pakistani statement issued after a meeting between Alam and Pakistani Siddiqui on Thursday said: “The two sides agreed to intensify bilateral contact at all levels.”

The Sheikh Hasina government’s demand came after Pakistan removed all visa curbs for Bangladeshi citizens. Dhaka said an apology would help both nations move forward.

CIVILIAN PURPOSES: BEIJING CONFIRMS BALLOON FLYING OVER LATIN AMERICA IS CHINESE

Chinese authorities have confirmed that the balloon that was spotted over Latin America this past weekend is Chinese. Officials in Colombia confirmed a sighting of an airborne object similar to a balloon flying over its territory, in a statement on Saturday, Feb. 4.

According to the statement from the Colombian military, its air defense service detected the object, described as similar to a balloon, moving at a speed of 25 knots per hour entering the country’s northern airspace at an altitude of 55,000 feet. The Colombian Air Force mobilized to monitor the object until it exited the country’s airspace. The military determined that the object posed no threat to national security, defense, or air safety.

On Monday, Feb. 6, Chinese authorities confirmed that the balloon over Latin America was Chinese. “It has come to our attention that the vessel in question is from China,” Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Mao Ning said at a press conference Monday.

Mao Ning stated that the second balloon was being used for civilian flight testing. She claims that due to weather impact and limited navigation capabilities, the balloon significantly veered from its intended path.

Furthermore, she claimed that the aircraft had “accidentally entered Latin American and Caribbean airspace.” Speaking to journalists, Ning mentioned that the second balloon had “deviated greatly” from its course due to the aircraft’s “limited maneuverability.” She stated, “The unmanned airship in question that came from China is of a civilian nature and used for flight tests,” further adding, “China is a responsible country and has always strictly abided by international law in order to inform and properly deal with all parties concerned, without posing any threat to any country.”

UKRAINE DEFENCE MINISTRY IN TURMOIL AS RUSSIA READIES OFFENSIVE

Kyiv : Ukraine sent mixed messages over the fate of its defence minister on Monday, leaving akey post in its war effort in doubt even as it braces for a new Russian offensive.

The questions left dangling over defence minister Oleksii Reznikov were the first public sign of serious disarray in Ukraine’s wartime leadership, until now remarkably united during almost a year of all-out Russian military assault.

Aday after announcing that Reznikov would be sidelined, a top ally of President Volodymyr Zelensky appeared to row back for now, saying no personnel changes in the defence sector would be made thisweek.

David Arakhamia, chief of the parliamentary bloc of Zelensky’s party, had said the head of military intelligence, Kyrylo Budanov, would take over the defence ministry, while Reznikov would be made minister of strategic industries.

But Zelensky remained silent on the issue, while Reznikov said on Sunday he had not been informed of any move and would reject the strategic industry job if offered it.

The confusion caps a twoweek purge of the Kyiv leadership, the biggest shakeup since the Russian invasion. Zelensky has touted the crackdown as an opportunity to demonstrate that Kyiv can be a safe steward of billions of dollars of Western aid. But it risks destabilising the leadership after nearly ayear in which Kyiv’s political class had solidly united against Russia’s invasion.

ISRAELI TROOPS KILL FIVE PALESTINIANS IN JERICHO RAID

Israel said its forces killed on Monday five alleged Palestinian gunmen in a raid in the occupied West Bank, after a days-long search for suspects in a shooting near Jericho. Hamas Islamists confirmed its fighters were among the dead, saying in a statement the Gaza-based group was mourning members of its military wing killed “in an armed clash with the Zionist occupation”.

The early morning Israeli raid came amid a spike in Israeli-Palestinian violence and after days of what Jericho authorities have described as a “siege” on the city since the shooting attack late last month.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the two suspected assailants and three others were killed on Monday by agents from the Shin Bet domestic security agency and soldiers. Israeli forces “took out five of those terrorists, two of whom had tried to carry out the attack” on January 28, the premier said.

An Israeli security official said the army was holding the bodies of the Palestinian dead.

CHINA, AUSTRALIA TRADE MINISTERS HOLD THEIR FIRST MEETING SINCE 2019

CANBERRA: Australian and Chinese Trade Ministers held their first bilateral meeting in three years on Monday as Australia urged China to lift barriers that cost exporters $14 billion a year. China has thawed its diplomatic freeze on Australia since PM Anthony Albanese’s Labour Party was elected for the first time in nine years.

FORMER MILITARY RULER MUSHARRAF'S BODY TO BE FLOWN TO PAKISTAN

ISLAMABAD: The body of Pakistan’s exiled former military ruler Pervez Musharraf, who became a key U.S. ally during the “war on terror”, is expected to be repatriated on Monday. Musharraf, who fled Pakistan in 2016 for medical treatment after a travel ban was lifted, died on Sunday aged 79 in Dubai after a long illness.

6 MONTHS AFTER KNIFE ATTACK, RUSHDIE RELEASES NEW NOVEL

London : Six months after being stabbed, British author Salman Rushdie on Tuesday publishes his new novel “Victory City”, an “epic tale” of a 14thcentury woman who defies a patriarchal world to rule acity.

Written before the US knife attack that nearly took the Indian-born author’s life, the novel purports to be a translation of a historical epic originally written in Sanskrit. The much-anticipated work tells the tale of young orphan girl PampaKampana who is endowed by a goddess with magical powers and founds the city, in modernday India, of Bisnaga, which translates as Victory City.

Rushdie, 75, will not promote his 15th novel due to his physical condition, although his agent Andrew Wylie told The Guardian that his “recovery is progressing”. He was attacked as he was about to speak at a conference in Chautauqua in upstate New York, near Lake Erie, on August 12. The author had lived in hiding for years after Iran’s first supreme leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini ordered his killing for what he deemed the blasphemous nature of “The Satanic Verses”. The stabbing suspect, Hadi Matar was arrested after the attack.

Rushdie lost sight in one eye and the use of one hand, Wylie said in October. His new work follows a heroine on a mission to “give women equal agency in a patriarchalworld”, according to per publisher Penguin Random House’ssummary.

US author Colum McCann wrote in The New York Times that his friend Rushdie was saying “something quite profound” in Victory City. “He’s saying, ‘You will never take the fundamental act of storytelling away from people. ’ “In the face of danger, even in the face of death, he manages to say that storytelling is one currency we all have”.