At least seventeen people, including three children, have died after a gas leak at a South African slum near Johannesburg, possibly linked to illegal mining operations.

This is according to emergency services.

Initially, authorities had given a toll of around two dozen deaths from the leak, although it had later been revised down to 16.

Panyaza Lesufi, premier of Gauteng province that encompasses South Africa’s biggest city, said at the site of the disaster that one more person had died after being taken to hospital.

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UNITED STATES PLANS TO SEND CONTROVERSIAL CLUSTER MUNITIONS TO UKRAINE

The United States is planning to send Ukraine a cluster munitions package to help in its counteroffensive against Russia.

Ukraine has been asking for the weapons for months amid an ammunition shortage.

Cluster munitions which are banned by more than 100 countries are a class of weapons that contain multiple explosive bomblets called submunitions.

The Biden administration is expected to announce the package Friday.

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TWO PALESTINIANS KILLED BY ISRAELI FORCES IN WEST BANK.

Two Palestinian militants have been shot dead by Israeli forces during a raid in the occupied West Bank, as tensions surge in the region.

Locals reported hearing heavy gunfire as Israeli troops surrounded a house in Nablus.

The men killed have been named locally as Khayri Shahin, 34, and Hamze Maqbool, 32.

Israel said they were wanted gunmen who fired on their forces before they could be detained.

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CHINA EXTENDS BAN ON SOME JAPANESE FOOD OVER WASTEWATER RELEASE PLAN.

China says it will maintain a ban on some Japanese food imports over the plan to release water from the wrecked Fukushima nuclear plant into the ocean.

China’s customs administration said it would also implement radiation tests on food from other parts of the country.

South Korea is also maintaining a similar ban but says the proposed release meets international standards.

United Nations nuclear watchdog had Wednesday said it would have “negligible impact” on the environment.

On Friday Japan’s nuclear regulator also gave its approval.

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YELLEN CRITISES CHINESE CURBS AGAINST UNITED STATES FIRMS.

United States Treasury Secretary, Janet Yellen criticised Chinese curbs against US firms while on a diplomatic visit to Beijing to improve bilateral ties.

Yellen says Washington and its allies will fight back against Beijing’s “unfair economic practices”.

She also struck a conciliatory note, saying the United States seeks to diversify rather than decouple from China.

Her visit follows that of Secretary of State Antony Blinken as the United States and China resume talks amid tensions.

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TWITTER RIVAL THREADS CROSSES TEN MILLION USERS HOURS AFTER LAUNCH.

More than ten million people have signed up to Threads, Meta’s rival to Twitter, within the first few hours of its launch.

This is according to the Facebook parent’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg.

Threads is the biggest challenger yet to Elon Musk-owned Twitter, which has seen a series of potential competitors emerge but not yet replace one of social media’s most iconic companies, despite its epic struggles.

The app went live on Apple and Android app stores in one hundred countries and will run with no ads for now.

Accounts were already active for celebrities such as Jennifer Lopez, Shakira and Hugh Jackman, and media outlets including The Washington Post and The Economist.

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TWITTER THREATENS TO SUE META OVER THREADS.

Twitter threatened to sue Meta just hours after the Instagram parent company launched Threads, an app it hopes will beat out the struggling site owned by Elon Musk.

In a letter to Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Musk lawyer Alex Spiro accused the company of “unlawful misappropriation of Twitter’s trade secrets and other intellectual property.

The letter accused Meta of hiring dozens of former Twitter employees who “had and continue to have access to Twitter’s trade secrets and other highly confidential information.”

Threads is the biggest challenger yet to Musk-owned Twitter, which has seen a series of potential competitors emerge but not yet replace one of the world’s biggest social media platforms, despite its struggles.

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