Former mathematics lecturer Pham Minh Hoang was put on a plane to Paris late Saturday, weeks after his Vietnamese citizenship was revoked — a rare move that has sparked outrage among critics of the communist government who accuse it of quashing dissent by any means available.

“I am very sad,” Hoang told AFP by phone after his arrival in Paris.

“I tried to do the best I can but today I lost the battle,” he said, adding he would continue fighting for democracy in Vietnam.

Hoang said police surrounded his house on Friday night and took him away with no prior warning.

He met French consular officials and a lawyer before his deportation but was unable to say goodbye to his wife Le Thi Kieu Oanh.

“I feel totally defeated… when my husband left, I couldn’t say any farewell words, I also feel very angry,” Oanh told AFP.

After speaking to Hoang on arrival in France, Oanh said she was at least reassured he no longer faced political persecution.

While authoritarian Vietnam routinely jails critics of its regime, 62-year-old Hoang is the first Vietnam-based dissident to have his citizenship revoked in recent history.

Human Rights Watch called the revocation an “unprecedented and shocking action”.

“(It) crosses many human rights red lines on freedom of expression, right to nationality and exercise of basic civil and political freedoms,” HRW said in its statement.

Hoang found out his Vietnamese citizenship had been stripped early this month after he received a letter dated May 17 and signed by the president, a decision he unsuccessfully tried to appeal.

He was convicted in 2011 of attempted subversion for publishing a series of articles which prosecutors said were aimed at overthrowing the government.

Hoang was released from jail after 17 months and ordered to serve three years of house arrest. He continued to post articles critical of the government on social media following his release from prison.

Hoang moved to France in 1973 and lived there for 27 years before returning to Vietnam to work as a mathematics lecturer at the Polytechnic University of Ho Chi Minh City.

He told AFP this month he had to stay in Vietnam to care for his disabled brother and elderly mother in law, whom his wife will now look after.

“We regret to inform you that the board of directors… has decided to terminate the employment contracts with the employees,” board chairman Adel al-Maskati wrote in English in a message addressed to “all staff” on Saturday.

The information ministry banned Al-Wasat in early June “until further notice” for its “violation of the law and repeatedly publishing information that sows division in society and affects Bahrain’s relations with other states,” said BNA state news agency.

That came after the paper published an article that was “offensive to a sisterly Arab state,” BNA said, an apparent reference to an article that praised protests in Morocco’s neglected Rif region.

In his message on Saturday, which was seen by AFP, Maskati said the paper had halted its activities in accordance with the ban, which had “caused losses” to its owner, Dar Al-Wasat for Publishing and Distribution.

Al-Wasat had some 160 staff including 30 expats.

The London-based Bahrain Institute for Rights and Democracy said the ban on the paper was “the latest in an escalated crackdown on independent civil society”.

Bahrain has been rocked by sporadic unrest since March 2011, when security forces crushed an Arab Spring-inspired uprising.

Authorities suspended the online edition of Al-Wasat for several days in January over accusations of sowing sedition and harming national unity.

The newspaper was also suspended for two days in August 2015 on similar charges.

At the height of the 2011 uprising, Al-Wasat was suspended and its chief editor Mansoor al-Jamri tried and fined for publishing false information.

The paper’s suspension came days after five demonstrators were killed when police opened fire on a long-running sit-in outside a prominent Shiite cleric’s home.

In late May a Bahrain court dissolved the secular opposition party Waed, months after the main party representing the kingdom’s Shiite majority, Al-Wefaq, was also outlawed.

Tiny but strategic Bahrain, which lies just across the Gulf from Iran, is a key regional ally of the United States and home to its Fifth Fleet.

It has come under frequent criticism from international human rights groups.

The administration of Barack Obama often criticised Manama authorities for not doing more to reconcile with the opposition.

However President Donald Trump made a clear break from that policy during a visit to the region in May, telling Bahrain’s King Hamad in neighbouring Saudi Arabia “there won’t be strain with this administration”.

 “We are united in the demand of respect for our rights, and united in a call for justice for the 15 members of our community who were murdered over the past year,” said Joaquin Caceres one of the leaders of a gay rights group in El Salvador.

In neighboring Guatemala, hundreds of marchers from the gay community marched in downtown of Guatemala City, demanding equal rights and an end to discrimination.

Some protesters carried rainbow banners as well as the flag of Guatemala. Others carried signs, some in English, with slogans such as “Love is not a crime” and “Sorry girls I like boys.”

The tragedy came one day before Pakistan was due to begin Eid ul-Fitr celebrations marking the end of the holy fasting month of Ramadan, with many roads crowded as people travel home for the holidays. Images of the crash showed rising flames and a thick plume of smoke, along with charred vehicles. The crash happened near the town of Ahmedpur East, some 670 kilometres (416 miles) south of the capital Islamabad.

“At least 123 people have been killed and more than 100 wounded in a fire which erupted after an oil tanker turned over and victims rushed to collect spilt fuel,” senior local government official Rana Mohammad Saleem Afzal told state television.

The military said it was sending army helicopters to evacuate the wounded and hospitals were put on high alert. The nearest burn centre is believed to be more than 150 kilometres away. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif expressed his grief and directed the government of Punjab province, run by his brother Shabhaz Sharif, to provide “full medical assistance”. Pakistan has an appalling record of fatal traffic accidents due to poor roads, badly maintained vehicles and reckless driving.

At least 62 people including women and children were killed in southern Pakistan in 2015 when their bus collided with an oil tanker, starting a fierce blaze that left victims burnt beyond recognition. The country has also long struggled to contain a chronic energy crisis, with regular blackouts suffocating industry and exacerbating anger against the government.

The crash came days after a series of militant attacks killed at least 57 people across the country Friday, unnerving many Pakistanis, with authorities ordering a security crackdown. On social media Sunday users posted messages of grief and solidarity with the victims of the oil tanker crash as well as Friday’s attacks, as many prayed for a safe Eid.

Rescuers have pulled 15 bodies from the avalanche of rocks that crashed into 62 homes in Xinmo, a once picturesque mountain village nestled by a river in Sichuan province.

Only three survivors — a couple and their one-month-old baby — have been found since heavy rain brought down a side of the mountain early Saturday, officials said. At least 118 people remain missing, according to the local government — the Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous Prefecture of Aba.

The official Xinhua news agency cited geological experts at the site as saying the chance of finding any survivors “was really slim”. Qiao Dashi, the surviving baby’s father, said he had woken up after 5:00 am to change his crying son’s diaper when he “heard a big noise coming from the back”.

“The house shook,” he told state broadcaster CCTV from his hospital bed. “Rocks were in the living room. My wife and I climbed over, took the baby, and got out.” “I have superficial injuries. Overall, I’m okay.

But psychologically, it’s hard. The entire village, with dozens of families, was flattened,” he said, with a bandage around his head. Rescuers with lights on their helmets and sniffer dogs searched for people through the night as lamps illuminated the grey rubble, according to images on state media. Excavators removed debris as the search continued on Sunday morning.

Some 3,000 workers with life-detection instruments were taking part in the search, Xinhua said. The landslide blocked a two-kilometre (one-mile) stretch of river and 1.6 kilometre of road.

– Quake ‘weakened’ mountain –

No sign of the village could be seen in aerial footage, which showed a grim and grey rock-strewn landscape covering the area where it once existed by a river.

“It’s the biggest landslide in this area since the Wenchuan earthquake,” said Wang Yongbo, one of the officials in charge of rescue efforts, referring to the disaster that killed 87,000 people in 2008 in a town in Sichuan. Xu, the deputy governor, said there had been 142 tourists visiting the village on Friday but that none of them were buried.

Local police captain Chen Tiebo said the heavy rains that hit the region in recent days had triggered the landslide, burying the village under several tonnes of rock. “It’s a seismic area here. There’s not a lot of vegetation,” Chen said.

Trees can help absorb excess rain and prevent landslides. Tao Jian, director of the local weather service, told CCTV that the 2008 earthquake had “weakened the mountain” and that even a small amount of rain could provoke a geological catastrophe.

– Past disasters –

President Xi Jinping called for rescuers to “spare no effort” in their search for survivors and prevent more disasters.

More than 100 people living close to the landslide were being evacuated, Xinhua reported.

Landslides are a frequent danger in rural and mountainous parts of China, particularly at times of heavy rains. At least 12 people were killed in January when a landslide crushed a hotel in central Hubei province. More than 70 were killed by a landslide in the southern commercial hub of Shenzhen in December 2015, caused by the improper storage of waste.

One of the deadliest landslides took place in 1991, when 216 were killed in southwestern Yunnan province.

It will be Xi’s first visit to Hong Kong since the head of the Communist Party became president in 2013.

Xi will be in the city from Thursday to Sunday to attend a ceremony marking the anniversary of the handover, which took place on July 1, 1997. The Chinese leader will also take part in the inauguration of the fifth administration of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, the semi-autonomous city’s government.

Xinhua did not provide more details about the trip. Carrie Lam, a former career civil servant, was chosen in late March as the city’s new chief executive and will be sworn in on July 1. Xi’s visit comes at a time when Beijing stands accused of squeezing the city’s freedoms and frustrations have led to the emergence of a new independence movement calling for Hong Kong to break from the mainland.

Protesters say they are preparing to gather during the handover celebrations and Xi’s visit will be shrouded in a huge security operation. The Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post newspaper gave a detailed itinerary of the trip last week.

Xi, who will be accompanied by his wife Peng Liyuan, will tour the garrison of China’s People’s Liberation Army in central Hong Kong and an infrastructure project, the Post said. Hong Kong was handed back to China by colonial power Britain in 1997 under a “one country, two systems” deal designed to protect its freedoms and way of life for 50 years.

But a number of incidents, including the disqualification from parliament of two pro-independence lawmakers and the alleged abduction of five Hong Kong booksellers, have raised fears that Beijing is trampling the agreement.

The two attackers shouted “Allahu Akbar”, or God is great, as they entered a security post in North Sumatra’s police headquarters in Medan city where they stabbed a police officer, officials said. Several police officers fought back against the militants, killing one and critically injuring another. “We suspect the attackers have links with IS and Bahrun Naim, because we found a IS flag, books and CDs linked to IS in the house of one attacker,” national police spokesman Setyo Wasisto told AFP.

Bahrun Naim, an Indonesian who is fighting with IS in Syria, has been accused of directing a series of mostly botched terror plots in his homeland in recent years. Hundreds of radicals from Indonesia have flocked abroad to fight with IS, and the country has seen a surge in plots and attacks linked to the jihadists over the past year.

The attack happened just hours before Eid prayers were held, including at the North Sumatra police headquarters, as part of the Eid al-Fitr celebrations that mark the end of the holy fasting month of Ramadan. Police are also investigating whether Sunday’s incident was linked to the recent capture of three militants accused of plotting to attack police, Wasisto added.

In May suicide bombers killed three police officers at a bus station in Jakarta in the deadliest attack in Indonesia since January 2016, when a suicide blast and gun assault claimed by IS left four assailants and four civilians dead in the capital.

Indonesia has long struggled with Islamic militancy and has suffered a series of fatal attacks in the past 15 years, including the 2002 Bali bombings that killed 202 people. A sustained crackdown weakened the country’s most dangerous networks but the emergence of IS has proved a potent new rallying cry for radicals.

Isnilon Hapilon, a veteran Filipino militant said to be the leader of the Islamic State (IS) group in Southeast Asia, has not been seen in the battle zone in Marawi City, said Lieutenant General Carlito Galvez, head of the military’s Western Mindanao Command.

An attempt by government troops to arrest Hapilon in Marawi on May 23 triggered a rampage by Islamist militants flying black IS flags and backed by some foreign fighters who seized parts of the mainly Muslim city.

Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte declared martial law in Marawi and the entire southern region of Mindanao, unleashing an offensive to crush what he said was an attempt by the jihadist group to establish a province in the area.

“He (Hapilon) has not been seen in the area. We have some reports that he was already able to slip somewhere but as of now we are still confirming the reports,” Galvez said in an interview with DZBB radio station.

Asked if Hapilon was on the run, he said: “Yes, yes because reportedly he suffered a lot of casualties. Majority of his group, more than half, were casualties.”

$5 million bounty

Hapilon was indicted in Washington for his involvement in the 2001 kidnapping of three Americans in the Philippines, and has a $5-million bounty on his head from the US government, which has his name on its “most wanted” terror list.

He leads a faction of the Philippine militant group Abu Sayyaf that has pledged allegiance to IS.

Security analysts say he has been recognised by IS as its “amir”, or leader, in Southeast Asia, a region where the group wants to establish a caliphate.

The military says Hapilon’s group had joined forces with another armed militancy, the Maute Group, to launch the Marawi siege, now on its second month.

On Saturday, security forces continued intense air raids and artillery fire on pockets of Marawi still occupied by the militants, while troops fought house-to-house gunbattles on the ground.

“The operation is going on, the firefights are intense. We have gained substantial ground,” said Galvez, the military commander.

Nearly 300 militants and 67 government troops have been killed in the fighting, according to official figures.

Galvez said there are “strong indications” that two or three of the Maute brothers — among the key players in the siege — had been killed, including Omarkhayam Maute, believed to be the group’s top leader.

Only one brother, Abdullah, has been visible in the fighting, Galvez added.

Foreign fighters

Presidential spokesman Ernesto Abella said in Manila the military is “validating an intelligence report” that Malaysian Mahmud bin Ahmad, who helped lead and finance the Marawi siege, died from wounds he had sustained in the early days of the fighting.

Abella said he would not officially confirm the death unless government troops recovered the remains.

When asked about Mahmud’s reported death, Malaysia’s Inspector General of Police Khalid Abu Bakar told AFP in a text message in Kuala Lumpur: “Not true. He is still alive.”

Abella said authorities were also verifying another intelligence report that 89 foreign fighters are in Mindanao, entering the region through the Philippines’ porous maritime borders with Malaysia and Indonesia.

Galvez said troops on Friday recovered two decomposing corpses that bore features of people from the Middle East.

Eight other militants, including those from Chechnya, Indonesia and Malaysia, had been killed earlier in the fighting, defence chief Delfin Lorenzana has said.

Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines on June 19 launched joint patrols on their maritime borders to block the movement of the militants.

Australia said Friday it will send two high-tech spy planes to help Filipino troops fight the militants, joining the US which has also provided similar help.

A couple and a baby were rescued and taken to hospital after more than 40 homes in the village of Xinmo were swallowed by huge boulders when the side of a mountain collapsed, according to the Maoxian county government.

At least 141 people and 46 homes were buried, the People’s Daily said, citing a Maoxian county government spokesman. The landslide blocked a two kilometre (one mile) stretch of river and 1.6 kilometre of road.

Rescuers used ropes to move a massive rock while dozens of others searched the rubble for survivors, according to videos posted by the Maoxian government on its Weibo social media account.

Bulldozers and heavy diggers were also deployed to remove boulders, the images showed. Medics were seen treating a woman on a road.

Wang Yongbo, one of the local officials in charge of rescue efforts, said the vital signs of one of the survivors “are weak”.

“It’s the biggest landslide in this area since the Wenchuan earthquake,” he said, referring to the disaster that killed 87,000 people in 2008 in a town in Sichuan.

Local police captain Chen Tiebo said the heavy rains that hit the region in recent days had triggered the landslide.

“There are several tonnes of rock,” he told the state broadcaster CCTV.

“It’s a seismic area here. There’s not a lot of vegetation,” Chen said.

Trees can help absorb excess rain and prevent landslides.

Some 500 people were taking part in rescue efforts, according to CCTV.

More rain forecast

An emergency response “to the first class catastrophic geological disaster” is under way, the local government’s statement said, adding that the full extent of the landslide was at yet unclear.

A report from the state news agency Xinhua said that the landslide came from a high part of a mountain in the Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous Prefecture of Aba had collapsed.

The landslide struck the village at around 0600 am local time (2200 GMT).

President Xi Jinping called for rescuers to “spare no effort” in their search for survivors, according to CCTV.

China’s national weather observatory said more heavy rain was expected in parts of Sichuan and other southwestern provinces.

Past disasters

Landslides are a frequent danger in rural and mountainous parts of China, particularly at times of heavy rains.

At least 12 people were killed in January when a landslide crushed a hotel in central Hubei province.

In October landslides battered eastern China in the wake of torrential rains brought by Typhoon Megi, causing widespread damage and killing at least eight.

More than 70 were killed by a landslide in the southern commercial hub of Shenzhen in December 2015, caused by the improper storage of waste.

One of the deadliest landslides took place in 1991, when 216 were killed in southwestern Yunnan province.