America’s two most powerful allies in the Pacific are taking their defense ties to new heights amid increasing concerns over China’s assertiveness in the region and North Korean threats, Japan’s top general said Thursday.

Before a trilateral meeting with US Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Gen. CQ Brown and South Korean Adm. Kim Myung-soo, Japanese Gen. Yoshihide Yoshida said China was trying to “change the status quo by force” in the East China and South China seas, while North Korea was carrying out “repeated ballistic missile launches and continuous arms transfers” to Russia.

Yoshida called on Japan, South Korea and the United States to “demonstrate our strong unity domestically and globally to ensure regional peace and stability.”

But bilateral cooperation between Japan and South Korea is the most noteworthy result of this week’s meeting in Tokyo.

On Wednesday, Yoshida met South Korea’s Kim for the first such meeting between the East Asian defense chiefs in six years – a moment a US defense official stressed was significant.

Kim said he and Yoshida “share a lot of the same thoughts,” an acknowledgment of the mutual perspective on the regional threat posed by China and North Korea.

“We developed strong trust between us,” said Yoshida, adding the meeting sets the stage for the Japan-South Korea bilateral “defense cooperation to achieve a new height.”

Regional analyst James Brown said the Japan-South Korea meeting showed just how far the bilateral relationship has come under South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol, who succeeded Moon Jae-in in 2022.

“The political mood has improved significantly, and now we’re having the defense side of things aligning with that,” said Brown, an associate professor of political science at Temple University in Tokyo.

“The Japanese government’s feeling about this is that this is the relationship they’ve always wanted.”

Japan felt the previous administration in Seoul was “fixated on historical issues” as it “demonized Japan” and tried to improve relations with North Korea, Brown said.

Last month, Japan and South Korea joined the US in the inaugural Freedom Edge in the Pacific, a military exercise that focused on ballistic missile and air defense, anti-submarine warfare and more. The goal of the exercise, which is set to expand in future years, was to allow the militaries to better work together against a common adversary.

For years, historical acrimony between the two East Asian countries prevented high-level meetings and cooperation, with decades of deep mistrust dating back to Japan’s colonial occupation of the Korean Peninsula a century ago. But as the countries faced an increasingly assertive China and threats from North Korea, efforts to cooperate quickly supplanted past animosity, driven in large part by the efforts of US President Joe Biden’s administration.

In March 2023, the two countries promised to resume ties at a fence-mending summit in Tokyo. Four months later, Biden hosted the leaders of Japan and South Korea at Camp David, where they pledged to “inaugurate a new era of trilateral partnership.”

Then last month, US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin met his Japanese and South Korean counterparts on the sidelines of a security conference in Singapore, where they announced joint military exercises – nearly unthinkable just a few years ago.

The trilateral meeting of the chiefs of defense at the Japanese Defense Ministry on Thursday, held for the first time in Tokyo, underscored the rapidly developing cooperation.

“I expect that the three of us sitting here in Tokyo today will send a message to the regional threats but also more globally on the strength of our relationship, our alliances, and the work that we need to continue to do,” said Gen. Brown, sitting alongside his counterparts at the beginning of the meeting.

The meeting comes on the heels of the NATO summit held last week in Washington, on the 75th anniversary of the alliance. The NATO communique specifically mentioned the importance of the Indo-Pacific, “given that developments in that region directly affect Euro-Atlantic security.”

Leif-Eric Easley, a professor of international studies at Ewha Womans University in Seoul, said there was some sense of urgency behind the rapidly developing cooperation. The East Asian nations, he said, want to triangulate a coordinated response to common adversaries before potential changes in Seoul or Washington could put the relationship in jeopardy.

“Domestic politics remain complicated in Seoul and Tokyo, but policymakers and military professionals want to lock in coordinated responses to North Korea, Russia, and China before any major political changes occur in Washington,” Easley said.

America’s two most powerful allies in the Pacific are taking their defense ties to new heights amid increasing concerns over China’s assertiveness in the region and North Korean threats, Japan’s top general said Thursday.

Before a trilateral meeting with US Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Gen. CQ Brown and South Korean Adm. Kim Myung-soo, Japanese Gen. Yoshihide Yoshida said China was trying to “change the status quo by force” in the East China and South China seas, while North Korea was carrying out “repeated ballistic missile launches and continuous arms transfers” to Russia.

Yoshida called on Japan, South Korea and the United States to “demonstrate our strong unity domestically and globally to ensure regional peace and stability.”

But bilateral cooperation between Japan and South Korea is the most noteworthy result of this week’s meeting in Tokyo.

On Wednesday, Yoshida met South Korea’s Kim for the first such meeting between the East Asian defense chiefs in six years – a moment a US defense official stressed was significant.

Kim said he and Yoshida “share a lot of the same thoughts,” an acknowledgment of the mutual perspective on the regional threat posed by China and North Korea.

“We developed strong trust between us,” said Yoshida, adding the meeting sets the stage for the Japan-South Korea bilateral “defense cooperation to achieve a new height.”

Regional analyst James Brown said the Japan-South Korea meeting showed just how far the bilateral relationship has come under South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol, who succeeded Moon Jae-in in 2022.

“The political mood has improved significantly, and now we’re having the defense side of things aligning with that,” said Brown, an associate professor of political science at Temple University in Tokyo.

“The Japanese government’s feeling about this is that this is the relationship they’ve always wanted.”

Japan felt the previous administration in Seoul was “fixated on historical issues” as it “demonized Japan” and tried to improve relations with North Korea, Brown said.

Last month, Japan and South Korea joined the US in the inaugural Freedom Edge in the Pacific, a military exercise that focused on ballistic missile and air defense, anti-submarine warfare and more. The goal of the exercise, which is set to expand in future years, was to allow the militaries to better work together against a common adversary.

For years, historical acrimony between the two East Asian countries prevented high-level meetings and cooperation, with decades of deep mistrust dating back to Japan’s colonial occupation of the Korean Peninsula a century ago. But as the countries faced an increasingly assertive China and threats from North Korea, efforts to cooperate quickly supplanted past animosity, driven in large part by the efforts of US President Joe Biden’s administration.

In March 2023, the two countries promised to resume ties at a fence-mending summit in Tokyo. Four months later, Biden hosted the leaders of Japan and South Korea at Camp David, where they pledged to “inaugurate a new era of trilateral partnership.”

Then last month, US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin met his Japanese and South Korean counterparts on the sidelines of a security conference in Singapore, where they announced joint military exercises – nearly unthinkable just a few years ago.

The trilateral meeting of the chiefs of defense at the Japanese Defense Ministry on Thursday, held for the first time in Tokyo, underscored the rapidly developing cooperation.

“I expect that the three of us sitting here in Tokyo today will send a message to the regional threats but also more globally on the strength of our relationship, our alliances, and the work that we need to continue to do,” said Gen. Brown, sitting alongside his counterparts at the beginning of the meeting.

The meeting comes on the heels of the NATO summit held last week in Washington, on the 75th anniversary of the alliance. The NATO communique specifically mentioned the importance of the Indo-Pacific, “given that developments in that region directly affect Euro-Atlantic security.”

Leif-Eric Easley, a professor of international studies at Ewha Womans University in Seoul, said there was some sense of urgency behind the rapidly developing cooperation. The East Asian nations, he said, want to triangulate a coordinated response to common adversaries before potential changes in Seoul or Washington could put the relationship in jeopardy.

“Domestic politics remain complicated in Seoul and Tokyo, but policymakers and military professionals want to lock in coordinated responses to North Korea, Russia, and China before any major political changes occur in Washington,” Easley said.

Sixteen people were killed after a fire broke out at a shopping mall in southwest China on Wednesday, according to Chinese state media.

Dramatic images showed a huge column of black smoke billowing from the 14-story building in the city of Zigong, Sichuan province. Several people were also seen gathered on a balcony.

About 30 people were rescued from the blaze after nearly 300 emergency workers and dozens of vehicles were dispatched from the local fire department to the scene, state broadcaster CCTV reported.

Preliminary investigations suggest the fire was caused by construction work, CCTV said, citing local authorities.

In a statement Thursday, China’s Ministry of Emergency Management urged rescue workers and provincial officials to determine the cause of the fire as soon as possible, and to learn lessons to ensure greater security in the future.

Such incidents are not uncommon in China, where enforcement of safety standards is often lax.

In January, a fire at a mixed-use building in southeast China killed at least 39 people just days after another blaze at a boarding school in central Henan province killed 13 children.

This story has been updated with additional developments.

Japan’s Prime Minister Fumio Kishida has formally apologized to a group of plaintiffs who were forcibly sterilized under the country’s decades-long former eugenics law following their lengthy campaign for justice.

The Eugenic Protection Law, in place from 1948 to 1996, allowed authorities to forcibly sterilize people with disabilities, including those with mental disorders, hereditary diseases or physical deformities and leprosy. It also allowed forced abortions if either parent had those conditions.

At least 25,000 people were sterilized under the law, Kishida told a meeting at his official residence of about 130 survivors, many now elderly and in wheelchairs, public broadcaster NHK reported Wednesday.

“I decided to meet with you today in order to personally express my remorse and apology for the tremendous physical and mental suffering that many people have endured based on the former Eugenic Protection Law,” Kishida said.

The law was unconstitutional and had violated individuals’ human rights and dignity, the prime minister said, adding he had ordered authorities to prepare a new compensation plan for survivors, without sharing the details.

Plaintiffs and their supporters have argued that a previous government compensation offer of 3.2 million yen (about $20,000) each was too low. They won a significant victory earlier this month, when Japan’s Supreme Court ordered the government to pay 16.5 million yen (about $105,000) each in damages to plaintiffs of several lawsuits and 2.2 million yen ($14,000) to their spouses.

One plaintiff, Kikuo Kojima, described being taken to the hospital when he was 19, where he said he was “given the nickname ‘Schizophrenic’ and forced into eugenic surgery.”

“I will never forget that,” he said, according to NHK.

Other plaintiffs said they were bedridden for years following their operations, faced a lifetime of discrimination, were unable to work due to the physical and mental toll, and wished their bodies could return to their “original” state, NHK reported.

Eugenics law

Japan experienced a brief baby boom after World War II, alarming authorities as they struggled to deal with severe nationwide food shortages and a war-ravaged economy, according to academics and Japanese medical associations.

The government leapt to implement population control measures, including a national campaign to promote contraception – and the Eugenic Protection Law, which “made abortions and sterilizations available,” and was described as “government policy in the population field” in a 1972 report by the government-run Institute of Population Problems.

The legislation aimed to “prevent the increase of the inferior descendants from the eugenic point of view and to protect the life and health of the mother,” according to a copy of the law – which listed “remarkable abnormal sexual desire” and “remarkable clinical inclination” among the conditions targeted.

Besides an official apology, the plaintiffs have also demanded a compensation law that would benefit all survivors, even those who haven’t filed lawsuits.

They also urged authorities to quickly conclude ongoing related legal cases, stressing that most plaintiffs were reaching the end of their lives, NHK reported.

“I heard the apology directly from the prime minister to the victims, but I think we could have heard it earlier,” said Koji Niisato, an attorney for plaintiffs, according to NHK. “Today, I hope that you will listen to the actual conditions of the victims and their real voices and do your utmost to achieve a full resolution for them.”

Some plaintiffs also said they were not fully satisfied with the government’s apology and the Supreme Court ruling.

“It has been really hard for a long time, and even after hearing the verdict, I cannot put my mind at ease,” one plaintiff said, according to NHK.

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has told his supporters he must win reelection this month if the country is to avoid a possible “bloodbath.”

“If they do not want Venezuela to fall into a bloodbath, into a fratricidal civil war,” the ruling party must win the presidential elections on July 28, Maduro told a campaign event in Caracas on Tuesday.

Only a win for his party would ensure “peace” in the country, Maduro said, adding that he expects “irreversible results” in his favor.

The Venezuelan strongman has been in power in Venezuela for more than a decade, having assumed the presidency following the death of predecessor Hugo Chavez in 2013, during which time his government has often been accused of rigging votes and silencing the opposition.

The 2018 election that returned him to office was described as illegitimate by an alliance of 14 Latin American nations, Canada and the United States, as a “farce” by the Organization of American States, and was largely boycotted by the opposition.

There were hopes that the 2024 election might be different after he promised the United States last year in a historic agreement that he would hold free and fair elections in exchange for sanctions relief.

However, more recently the opposition have accused him of reneging on that promise. Two opposition candidates – Maria Corina Machado and Corina Yoris – have been barred from running while a report this week by a human rights group suggested there had been a spate of “arbitrary detentions” since the beginning of the campaign season on July 4.

Human rights NGO Laboratorio de Paz reported Monday that there had been 71 arbitrary detentions in the first 10 days of campaigning, the majority of them involving people who had provided some type of service to the campaign command of the opposition candidate Edmundo González Urrutia, of the Democratic Unitary Platform.

Two days after Laboratorio’s report came out, the barred opposition leader Machado said in a post on X that her security chief had also been arrested.

Machado said her security chief Milciades Ávila was “kidnapped” on Wednesday “by the Maduro regime and accused of gender violence against some women.”

The opposition leader said the women who accuse Ávila of gender violence tried to “attack” her and González Urrutia in a restaurant last Saturday.

“There are dozens of witnesses and videos that demonstrate that this was a planned provocation to leave us without protection 11 days before July 28,” Machado wrote.

The governments of Costa Rica, Ecuador, the Dominican Republic, and Panama called on Venezuelan authorities to guarantee that elections are “free, fair, and transparent,” in a joint statement released on Wednesday by the Alliance for Development in Democracy.

Maduro is one of 10 candidates vying for the presidency, however, several of them have minimal support and are viewed by the main opposition as government allies.

Israel’s ultra-Orthodox Shas party urged potential conscripts Wednesday to ignore a call-up from the Israel Defense Forces, as political divisions over the controversial issue showed signs of widening.

Ultra-Orthodox Jews, or Haredi, have traditionally been exempt from military service so as to be able to study the Torah. But a Supreme Court ruling in June said the Israeli government must enlist draft-age ultra-Orthodox Jews into the military, reversing a de facto exemption in place since the country’s founding 76 years ago.

The move sparked fierce protests among Haredi communities.

Shas described summons for military service as outrageous, and added: “The Great Rabbis have instructed, categorically, that as of now, as a new law defining the status of Yeshiva students has not been passed, there shall be no response to any summons or even summons for a first order, and therefore, not to show up to the recruitment stations.”

“It’s our duty now to stand strong, like a wall that can’t be breached, and make clear for the world to know, that there’s no force in the world that will, God forbid, succeed in detaching the students of the Torah from their studies.”

The IDF said this week that it will begin issuing initial summonses on Sunday to those designated for security service from among the ultra-Orthodox sector “for screening and evaluation processes in preparation for the recruitment” for the upcoming year.

The IDF said it “works to recruit to its ranks from all parts of this society in light of the conscription obligation in the state of Israel, by virtue of being the people’s army and in light of the increased operational needs at this time, in view of the security challenges.”

The announcement sparked further protests. Nine people were arrested Tuesday for blocking a highway.

On Monday, senior IDF officers were assaulted by dozens of ultra-Orthodox protesters, who threw bottles and other objects at them, after they’d had a meeting in Bnei Brak.

The commander of the IDF Training Command, Major General David Zini, and Major General Shay Tayeb, were attacked at the end of a meeting with Rabbi David Label, who has been working in recent days to establish the ultra-Orthodox division in the IDF.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s fragile government coalition relies on two Haredi parties – United Torah Judaism and Shas – to govern. Netanyahu has been trying to advance legislation through Israel’s parliament, the Knesset, that would enshrine in law a draft exemption for Haredi men.

Previous reporting by Mick Krever.

Hamas-led armed groups committed “numerous war crimes and crimes against humanity” against civilians during the October 7 attack in southern Israel, according to a Human Rights Watch (HRW) report released Wednesday.

In a 236-page report titled “‘I Can’t Erase All the Blood from My Mind’: Palestinian Armed Groups’ October 7 Assault on Israel,” the rights watchdog said that the October 7 attack was “directed against a civilian population,” and that “killing civilians and taking hostages were central aims of the planned attack, not an afterthought, a plan gone awry, or isolated acts.”

“The Hamas-led assault on October 7 was designed to kill civilians and take as many people as possible hostage,” said Ida Sawyer, crisis and conflict director at HRW.

The assault was led by Hamas’ military wing – the Qassam Brigades – but included at least four other Palestinian armed groups, the report said.

The report details several dozen cases of serious violations of international humanitarian law by Palestinian armed groups at most civilian attack sites on October 7, when militants killed 1,200 people in Israel and took more than 250 people hostage, according to Israeli authorities.

The rights group said it interviewed 144 people, including 94 Israeli and other nationals, who witnessed the October 7 assault, which targeted at least 19 kibbutzim (agricultural communes) and five moshavim (cooperative communities). The cities of Sderot and Ofakim, two music festivals, and a beach party were also targeted, HRW added.

“The armed groups committed numerous violations of the laws of war that amount to war crimes,” the report said. These include “attacks targeting civilians and civilian objects, willful killing of people in custody, cruel and other inhumane treatment.” Palestinian fighters committed summary killings and hostage-taking along with murder and wrongful imprisonment, HRW added.

Sexual and gender-based violence

The report also highlighted “crimes involving sexual and gender-based violence, hostage-taking, mutilation and despoiling bodies, use of human shields, and pillage and looting.”

Israel and the United Nations have also accused Hamas-led militants of committing sexual violence on October 7.

In March, the UN special envoy on sexual violence in conflict, Pramila Patten, said her team found “reasonable grounds to believe that conflict related sexual violence, including rape and gang rape occurred” that day. It was the UN’s most definitive finding on allegations of sexual assault in the aftermath of the attack.

HRW said that Hamas responded to its questions, stating that its forces were instructed not to target civilians and to abide by international human rights and humanitarian law. “In many cases, Human Rights Watch investigations found evidence to the contrary,” the watchdog said.

Hamas rejected the findings of the report and called for it to be retracted, according to a statement on Wednesday.

“We reject the lies and blatant bias towards the occupation and the lack of professionalism and credibility in the Human Rights Watch report. We demand its withdrawal and an apology,” the Palestinian group said.

‘Atrocities do not justify atrocities’

In response to the October 7 attack, Israel launched an air and ground offensive on Gaza that has killed more than 38,000 people in the enclave, according to Palestinian authorities. The war has displaced almost all of Gaza’s population of 2 million, turned swathes of the territory into rubble and triggered a massive humanitarian crisis.

Previous HRW reports have addressed several alleged serious violations by Israeli forces in Gaza since October 7. In its Wednesday report, HRW called on all parties involved in the conflict to abide by international humanitarian law.

“The Palestinian armed groups in Gaza should immediately and unconditionally release civilians held hostage,” the report said, adding that both parties “should surrender for prosecution anyone facing an International Criminal Court (ICC) warrant.”

In May, the ICC said it was seeking arrest warrants for Yahya Sinwar, the Hamas leader in Gaza, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, among other Israeli and Hamas officials, on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity over the October 7 attacks and the subsequent war in Gaza.  A case is also being heard by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) over an accusation by South Africa that Israel is committing genocide in its war in Gaza.

“Atrocities do not justify atrocities,” Sawyer said. “To stop the endless cycle of abuses in Israel and Palestine, it’s critical to address root causes and hold violators of grave crimes to account. That’s in the interests of both Palestinians and Israelis.”

Britain’s new Labour government promised to end an “era of politics as performance” in Wednesday’s ceremonial King’s Speech, unveiling a sweeping agenda that targets house building, crime and illegal migration and grapples with a breakdown in trust that was exposed during the country’s general election.

At a grandiose event that brings together Britain’s royal pageantry and political class, King Charles III formally opened a new parliament by reading out the plans of his new Prime Minister, Keir Starmer, whose landslide election win earlier this month brought a 14-year era of Conservative rule to an emphatic end.

They were focused around Starmer’s central pitch of “national renewal,” and included a pledge to nationalize Britain’s railways and tackle a housing crisis by changing planning laws to build more affordable homes.

Starmer also made tough new promises to tackle illegal migration, and more broadly took swipes at the Tory governments that had ruled Britain since 2010, and at the swell of populism that has rippled across the UK and Europe.

“The era of politics as performance and self-interest above service is over,” Starmer declared in an introduction to the agenda, which includes 40 new bills his government will seek to pass. “The fight for trust is the battle that defines our political era.”

His agenda straddles the center ground of British politics that Starmer has sought to lay claim to, pitching the public on pragmatism and including measures crafted to appeal to both older and younger generations. “The snake oil charm of populism may sound seductive, but it drives us into the dead end of further division and greater disappointment,” Starmer wrote.

But while the speech fleshed out much of the growth-orientated vision Starmer pitched during the summer’s election campaign, the question remained of how quickly Britons can expect to see a boost to their beleaguered public services.

Pomp and politics collide

The state opening of parliament is a rare collision of pomp and politics, featuring a series of centuries-old flourishes and conventions that catch even many of Britain’s lawmakers off guard.

The production began when King Charles III and his wife, Camilla, made their way by carriage from Buckingham Palace to the Houses of Parliament, before MPs were summoned by Black Rod – a role established in the 1300s – to watch his speech in the House of Lords chamber.

Starmer and his defeated rival, Conservative leader Rishi Sunak, shared a warm conversation before and after the speech, their roles dramatically reversed after the election on July 4 that saw Labour win a landslide in parliament, although with a modest share of the votes.

Once the speech began, focus shifted to the first Labour legislative plan in a decade and a half. It put at its heart an effort to build, after a decade of stalled growth that had seen housing and infrastructure projects scuppered across Britain.

Starmer also formalized plans to renationalize Britain’s rail network in the coming years, and to create a publicly-owned energy company.

Other parts of the speech continued Labour’s efforts to appeal to traditionally conservative voters who have lost faith in the Tory party after a tumultuous stretch in government.

In particular, Starmer promised a clampdown on illegal migration and small boat crossings across the Channel – an issue that plagued successive Conservative governments and gave rise to a surge in support for Reform UK, a populist anti-migrant bloc that won more than 4 million votes in the election.

The speech pledged extra powers for law enforcement to investigate people smuggling, including stopping and searching at the border, and the creation of a new Border Security Command. It also promised to clear Britain’s vast asylum backlog.

At home, a number of institutions were targeted for modernization – most awkwardly, the very room in which Charles gave his speech. Under government plans, hereditary peers will no longer be able to sit and vote in the House of Lords, in a “first step in wider reform” to the chamber.

A new draft Race Equality Bill will meanwhile make it mandatory for large employers to report ethnicity and disability pay in the same way they currently report gender pay.

And legislation for a long-awaited ban on both gay and transgender conversion therapy – efforts to change someone’s sexual orientation or gender identity – was announced, having been first trailed by Theresa May in 2018 but never brought to light.

Starmer acknowledged a breakdown in belief among the British public that politics can be a force for good – trust in politics is at record lows, studies have suggested, after a lengthy period dominated by scandal in Westminster.

But his agenda will be underpinned by a large dealing of skepticism that Britain’s public services can be revived without a much larger infusion of cash than the government is offering.

Little in the speech focused on Britain’s National Health Service (NHS), or on its social care sector, where the priority will be management rather than new legislation.

Later on Wednesday, the plan will be debated in the House of Commons, the first official session of the new parliament. That will see Sunak, in his new role as Leader of the Opposition, press Starmer on his promises. He is expected to frame his party’s unfamiliar role as an effort to provide constructive opposition on the country’s behalf while acknowledging that the public had felt a yearning for change.

Six people, including two US citizens, who were found dead inside a luxury hotel room in central Bangkok likely drank from tea and coffee cups laced with cyanide following a dispute linked to bad investments, Thai police said Wednesday.

The grisly discovery was made on Tuesday when staff at the five-star Grand Hyatt Erawan in the Thai capital entered the fifth-floor suite after the guests missed check out by more than 24 hours.

When police arrived at the scene, they found the bodies of three men and three women, a table full of untouched food wrapped in plastic and used cups with traces of a white powder. The door was locked from the inside, police said, though a backdoor was left unlocked.

Authorities initially said they were searching for a seventh person who was part of the hotel booking. But on Wednesday they dismissed this line of inquiry, saying they believe one of the deceased poisoned the others with the deadly fast-acting chemical cyanide.

Among the dead are two Vietnamese Americans and four Vietnamese nationals including a married couple aged between 37 and 56, Thai police said.

Chief of the Police Forensic Office Trairong Phiewphan said in a press conference that cyanide was found in mugs and cups in the hotel room and at least one of the blood samples collected from a deceased man had traces of the chemical.

“Cyanide was found in the liquid inside the teapot, in all six coffee cups,” Trairong said.

Images issued by the Royal Thai Police showed cups on a coffee table next to two metal thermos flasks and a dining table laden with plates of food, prepared as if people were about to sit down to eat.

The question police are now trying to answer is whether the victims were murdered or chose to take their lives. Wednesday’s press conference suggested police were leaning toward the former.

Deputy Metropolitan Police Commissioner Noppasin Poonsawat told reporters they believe one of the members of the group may have poisoned the five others.

That person, police said, had ordered the food and tea to the room and “looked under stress” when staff arrived.

Noppasin said from interviews with hotel staff, one of the members of the group was alone in the room when the food arrived and was later joined by the other guests.

He added that the incident was likely linked to a “personal matter” and not related to organized crime as interviews carried out with relatives of the dead indicated a dispute over debt.

“One of the relatives said one of the deceased was an investment agent and all (the deceased) invested, but the business was not going as expected. They made an appointment to discuss the matter in Thailand,” Noppasin said.

Two of the deceased were found in the bedroom, another at the dining table, and police believe one member of the party tried to reach the door but fell before they were able to do so.

Police said the group had arrived in Thailand on various dates and had booked separate rooms at the hotel. On July 15, the party all moved into the same room and had room service delivered at about 2 p.m. local time. No one left or entered the suite after 2:17 p.m., according to police.

The Grand Hyatt hotel, where the deaths occurred, is located in a bustling tourist area in the heart of Bangkok that’s home to luxury shopping malls and restaurants.

Next to the hotel is the Erawan shrine, a famous landmark popular with Buddhist, Hindu and Sikh communities and tourists. The shrine, a preferred spot for those seeking good luck, was also the target of a bombing in 2015 that killed at least 20 people.

The US State Department said it was “aware of reports of the deaths of two US citizens in Bangkok” and Reuters reported that Vietnam’s government said its embassy in the Thai capital was closely coordinating with Thai authorities.

“We offer our sincere condolences to the families on their loss. We are closely monitoring the situation and stand ready to provide consular assistance to those families,” US State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller told a briefing Tuesday.

Last year Sararat Rangsiwuthaporn, a Thai woman who was arrested on suspicion of murdering her friend with cyanide, was charged with at least 13 counts of premeditated murder, in a separate poisoning case that stunned the country.

Relatives of passengers killed when Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 was shot down over Ukraine gathered with officials at Australia’s Parliament House on Wednesday to mark the 10th anniversary of the tragedy that claimed 298 lives.

One of those relatives, Paul Guard, mostly blames the conflict raging in eastern Ukraine a decade ago for the missile attack that killed 38 Australian citizens and permanent residents including his parents, Toowoomba doctors Roger and Jill Guard.

“I don’t think anyone intended to bring down a passenger plane. So in that sense, I’m heartbroken that the conflict continues,” Paul Guard told Australian Broadcasting Corp (ABC).

“But I think that a lot of families would really have just liked an acknowledgement that what happened was wrong and that Russia should not have been waging war,” the son added.

The conflict has since escalated into a full-scale war with Russia’s invasion of its smaller neighbor in February 2022.

The pro-Russia rebel-held border region from where a Soviet-era Buk surface-to-air missile was fatefully launched and the fields where much of the debris landed after the Boeing 777 disintegrated is now territory controlled by the Russian military.

Moscow has repeatedly denied responsibility for MH17’s destruction and refused to hand over two Russians and a Ukrainian convicted by a Dutch court in absentia in 2022 of murder.

Russia continues to be pursued under international law by the Netherlands through the European Court of Human Rights and by Australia and the Netherlands jointly through the International Civil Aviation Organization Council, or ICAO, over its alleged role in bringing down MH17.

Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong told Wednesday’s service she was “appalled” that Russia had withdrawn from the ICAO proceedings in June.

“The case will continue and we will not be deterred in our commitment to hold Russia to account,” Wong told the gathering that included foreign diplomats.

“Today, on behalf of the Australian government, I recommit again to our collective pursuit of truth, justice and accountability for the outrages perpetrated on 17th July, 2014,” she added.

A commemoration is also planned in the Netherlands later Wednesday at a monument near Schiphol Airport, from where MH17 left on its way to the Malaysian city of Kuala Lumpur.

Australian Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus will represent Australia at that monument, where 298 trees were planted to commemorate each victim and sunflowers like those that grew at the crash site.

He expected the Netherlands-Australia case against Russia would be back before the ICAO in October despite Moscow’s withdrawal.

“We won’t let this go until we’ve brought Russia to account,” Dreyfus said.

The Netherlands was home to 196 victims. As well as Australia, victims also came from Malaysia, Indonesia, the United Kingdom, Belgium, Germany, the Philippines, Canada, New Zealand, Vietnam, Israel, Italy, Romania, the United States and South Africa.

An international investigation initiated in the U.N. Security Council by the Netherlands, Malaysia and Australia concluded that the Buk missile system that destroyed MH17 belonged to the Russian 53rd Anti-Aircraft Missile Brigade. The investigation concluded the missile was driven into Ukraine from a Russian military base near the city of Kursk and returned there after the plane was shot down.

Tony Abbott was Australia’s prime minister when MH17 was shot down. Abbott recalled on Wednesday that Russian President Vladimir Putin became physically aggressive when the Australian raised MH17 and the Ukraine conflict on the sidelines of an Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation leaders’ summit in Beijing in 2014.

Putin said through an interpreter that Ukrainians were all fascists, had brought down MH17 themselves and that Ukraine had no right to exist, Abbott said.

“Then as we were going back into the conference — and this was really quite an extraordinary thing — he suddenly turned, grabbed the elbows and tried to shake me and then pushed me away. And he said in English, where he’s quite fluent: ‘Look, you are not a native Australian but I am a native Russian,’ and pushed me away,” Abbott told ABC.

“I think what he was trying to say to me in his own rather blunt and brutal way was that how could I as a citizen of a settler society understand the blood and soil and mystical attachment that he had to every last inch of Mother Russia?” Abbott said.

“So it was pretty obvious to me right back then what he was on about. I just think it’s a pity that more wasn’t done to arm up the Ukrainians in the meantime,” Abbott added.