Earthquake kills over 900 in Afghanistan, toll likely to rise

Australia's Defence Minister Richard Marles held talks with his Indian counterpart Rajnath Singh on Wednesday in New Delhi to enhance bilateral defence cooperation. India's ruling Bharatiya Janata Party has nominated Droupadi Murmu, a female Indian politician from a tribal community as the presidential candidate. Efforts were intensified in Bangladesh by authorities on Wednesday for delivering food and drinking water as millions of people continue to struggle due to floods triggered by heavy rains. Political activists and locals recently held a massive protest rally in Gilgit Baltistan over rising inflation in the illegally-occupied region, that has made life difficult especially for the poor. An earthquake of magnitude 6.1 killed at least 920 people in Afghanistan on Wednesday, officials said, with more than 600 injured. The toll was expected to rise as information trickled in from remote mountain villages. Sri Lanka’s Prime Minister Ranil wickremesenghe on Wednesday told the parliament that the country will call India, China, and Japan to a donor conference to drum up more foreign assistance to find a way out of its worsening crisis. Hundreds students held demonstrations in Nepal's capital Kathmandu on Tuesday and burnt effigies of Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba to demand the rollback of recent hike in fuel prices.