One minister says authorities ‘undeniably failed’ in the face of violence as the PM says police did a good job

YANGON - Myanmar's Aung San Suu Kyi received a package from Britain's King Charles III on Monday, authorities said, releasing the first pictures of the detained Nobel laureate in two months and describing her as a "special female prisoner".

A self-proclaimed Kenyan preacher and his associates were on Monday found guilty of murdering 191 people, mostly children, in an infamous starvation cult. Hundreds of bodies have been discovered since 2023 at the cult base inland from the Kenyan beach resort of Malindi, in what became known as the "Shakahola Forest Massacre." Self-proclaimed pastor Paul Mackenzie was alleged to have incited his acolytes to starve to death in order to "meet Jesus." He was impassive in the Mombasa courtroom as he and 28 others were found guilty of murder. "I am satisfied that the prosecution has proved the case against all the 29 accused persons for the murder of 190 children and one adult," the judge said. In the three years since the grisly discovery, more bodies of children, women and men have been unearthed, bringing the total to well over 400. Mackenzie has also denied charges of manslaughter and terrorism in separate cases. Relatives of the victims were in court, many making their way to Mombasa from rural communities along the coast. Francis Wanje, 62, lost eight family members, including his daughter and two grandchildren, in Shakahola. "This day, to me, is a very, very important day," he said before the session started. "We are expecting a ruling that will be a lesson to the whole public, so that such kinds of things will not happen again," he said, expressing anger over the initial government inaction. There have been calls in Kenya for tougher regulations on religious organisations after it emerged that Mackenzie had been arrested twice in the past but released. The prosecution said Mackenzie "initiated and directed" extreme fasting at his 800-acre ranch in Shakahola Forest, claiming there was a "structured hierarchy of death" which said children should die first, followed by teenagers, women, and then men. The children mostly died from starvation, but also from "asphyxia, neck compression and traumatic head injury", prosecutors said, based on post-mortems and police reports. Mackenzie was arrested in April 2023, after a rights group tipped off authorities and some followers were rescued. The subsequent police operation exposed hundreds of shallow mass graves, with a soaring death toll that required a pause in excavations as local morgues ran out of space. The Kenya National Commission on Human Rights said in 2024 that the death toll was 429. Some victims are still unidentified. In January, Mackenzie was charged over a further 52 bodies found at a nearby village. The self-styled pastor has a history of extremism and evaded law enforcement for years. He established the Good News International Church in 2003, and set up branches in Nairobi and along Kenya's coast that attracted thousands of devotees, though he claimed it closed in 2019. He was arrested in 2017 over charges of "radicalisation" but was acquitted. He was arrested again in 2019 in relation to two child deaths at Shakahola, but released on bail. (AFP) Edited by Cecil Wong

Japan launched an uncrewed spacecraft toward the Martian moon Phobos on Tuesday on a mission intended to become the first to collect samples from the small rocky body and return them to Earth for analysis. The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's Martian Moons eXploration spacecraft lifted off aboard an H3 rocket before dawn from the Tanegashima Space Centre in southwestern Japan. The spacecraft is expected to reach Mars in August 2027 and return samples to Earth in 2031. Jaxa hopes the mission will shed light on the origin of the two moons of Mars and deepen the understanding of our solar system's early stages. Jaxa aims to collect at least 10 grammes of material from its surface and return it to Earth for analysis. The launch marked the first interplanetary mission for Japan's H3 rocket. The country's flagship launcher experienced a high-profile failure on its inaugural flight in 2023 when its second-stage engine failed to ignite, but has since completed a series of mostly successful launches. The mission – which aims to be the first round trip to the Martian region – is a collaboration with US and European space agencies, as well as numerous universities and tech companies. Those involved hope it will help lay the groundwork for eventual human exploration. Jaxa hopes the mission will reveal how Mars and its two moons formed, a key piece of knowledge in working out how the Solar System was born. One theory for the origin of the moons – the "giant impact" hypothesis – is that they formed after a celestial body collided with Mars. The "capture" hypothesis, meanwhile, postulates that the moons are asteroids pulled in by Mars's gravity. Determining which theory is correct will help reveal "how a habitable environment for life might have arisen on the terrestrial planets", Jaxa said, referring to the four rocky worlds closest to the Sun – Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars. Jaxa said the mission will also explore the possibility of using Phobos as a "natural space station" by establishing the requirements for a round trip – something "essential for crewed Mars exploration." It will also observe the planet's other moon, Deimos, although it will not land on it. US and Chinese space agencies have also been vying to be the first to return rock samples from the surface of Mars back to Earth. Nasa's Perseverance rover, which has been roaming across Mars since 2021, has already collected samples. The return mission, however, was effectively cancelled by the administration of US President Donald Trump following a vote by Congress in January. China's Tianwen-3 spacecraft is scheduled for launch around 2028 and hopes to return Mars samples to Earth as early as 2031 – potentially before the Japanese mission's return. (Agencies) Edited by Cecil Wong