The coin is designed with two faces, one face with the image of a dove, a symbol of peace, an olive branch and the flags of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) and the USA. The other face has the image of a lotus and the date of the summit, said a representative of Vietnam Philately Co which is assigned to make the coins.

The coins cost 500,000 Dong (US$21) each.

“Our designers and artisans have worked very hard to design and finish to coin’s image in only one week. We are trying to complete the coins to issue them today to welcome the historic summit,” the representative said.

Earlier, the US issued 1,000 coins on February 23 to celebrate this second summit, with each worth $100. Last year, the White House announced another coin to mark the first Trump-Kim summit in Singapore. Singapore also issued gold coins to celebrate the summit held last June in the country.

Fishermen were stunned to find a pair of the silvery fish — the bigger one measuring four metres (13 feet) — alive in their nets late last month as the number of sightings of the mysterious creature in Japanese waters continues to rise.

“I had only ever heard stories about this fish,” the Yomitan fisheries cooperative association’s Takashi Yamauchi told AFP.

“When I saw them at the port, I was quite shocked.”

    The fish, caught off Okinawa’s southwest Toya port on January 28, both subsequently died.

More than 12 elusive oarfish — known in Japanese as “Ryugu no tsukai” or the “Messenger from the Sea God’s Palace” — have washed up on shores in Japan over the past year.

Oarfish live between 200 and 1,000 metres below the surface of the Pacific and the Indian Oceans and have serpentine bodies with red fins that give them a dragon-like appearance.

Japanese folklore has it that they move to shallower seas before underwater earthquakes, possibly due to electromagnetic changes that occur with tectonic activity.

Local media reported that a spate of sightings preceded the 2011 earthquake and tsunami that left about 18,500 dead or missing in northeast Japan, strengthening the myth.

The recent oarfish discoveries have sparked renewed debate on social media about impending doom, although scientists dispute such claims.

“They looked mysterious and beautiful,” Satomi Higa of the Yomitan’s fisheries cooperative association told the Okinawa Times.

“They looked like real dragons.”

Although rarely caught in fishing nets, six oarfish were recently captured or found beached in Toyama on the western shores of central Japan.

The pair netted off Okinawa died en route to an aquarium before fishermen ate part of a fin as sashimi — although fisheries officials noted only a portion that had ripped off while loading one of the creatures onto the boat had been sampled.

    After a historic initial meeting in Singapore in June that produced only a vague statement about denuclearisation, analysts say the second date must deliver more concrete steps towards dismantling Pyongyang’s arsenal.

The normally sleepy Vietnamese border station of Dong Dang spruced itself up for Kim’s arrival after the young leader’s 4,000-kilometre (2,500-mile), two-and-a-half-day odyssey through China aboard his olive green train.

A military guard of honour in pristine white uniforms presented arms as Kim strolled down the red carpet waving and grinning, surrounded by a phalanx of aides and security personnel.

    Local official Hoang Thi Thuy said she had waited in the cold rain since before dawn for a glimpse of Kim, the first North Korean leader to visit fellow one-party state Vietnam since his grandfather Kim Il Sung in 1964.

“I was so excited when we were told to stand in place for the arrival of the train,” she told AFP. “We saw the leader from afar. I felt so happy, it’s hard to describe.”

Wearing his trademark Mao-style black suit and flanked by his troops of bodyguards, Kim was ushered into a waiting Mercedes-Benz and his motorcade rolled off towards Hanoi, where armoured personnel carriers patrolled the roads amid ultra-tight security.

He was greeted in Hanoi by cheering crowds behind barriers near the colonial-era pastel yellow Hanoi Opera House before arriving at the Melia hotel where he was expected to stay this week.

Trump was taking a more conventional route on Air Force One to the meeting and was expected to arrive in Hanoi late Tuesday. He tweeted he was looking forward to a “very productive” second summit.

The US president again dangled the carrot of economic progress for North Korea if it gives up its nuclear programme.

“With complete Denuclearization, North Korea will rapidly become an Economic Powerhouse,” tweeted Trump. “Without it, just more of the same.”

“Chairman Kim will make a wise decision!”

Relations between the two mercurial leaders have undergone a dramatic turnaround, from flinging personal insults and threats of destruction to Trump declaring he had fallen “in love” with Kim through an exchange of letters.

But many North Korea watchers dismissed the Singapore summit as a piece of political theatre that failed to produce a concrete roadmap to denuclearisation and stressed that the Hanoi meeting must deliver more.

“The window for diplomatic progress with North Korea will not remain open indefinitely. The second summit… must emphasise substance over pageantry,” said Kelsey Davenport from the Arms Control Association.

Concrete details about the summit have been few and far between but White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders told reporters aboard Air Force One the two leaders would dine together Wednesday with close advisors.

 – ‘No testing, we’re happy’ –

Diplomatic progress since Singapore has stalled over the definition of denuclearisation, with Stephen Biegun, the US special representative for North Korea, admitting there was no “shared agreement” of what that means.

The United States has repeatedly demanded the North give up its nuclear arsenal in a final, fully verifiable way.

But Pyongyang sees denuclearisation more broadly, seeking an end to sanctions and what it sees as US threats — usually taken to include the American military presence in the South, and sometimes in the wider region.

In the run-up to the summit, Trump appeared to lower US demands for Pyongyang, repeatedly saying there was no rush to rid the North of its arsenal as long as missile and nuclear tests stopped.

“I don’t want to rush anybody. I just don’t want testing. As long as there’s no testing, we’re happy,” said Trump.

He also hinted more summits could follow the Hanoi meeting, reducing expectations of a dramatic breakthrough in the Vietnamese capital.

Pyongyang insists it has already taken major steps, by not testing ballistic missiles or nuclear weapons for more than a year, and blowing up the entrances to its atomic test site.

The North also wants increased security guarantees, which could come in the form of a declaration of an end to the 1950-53 Korean War — that culminated with an armistice instead of a full peace treaty — or opening liaison offices.

Opening liaison offices would signal the first stage of normalising US-North Korean relations, said Go Myong-hyun of the Asan Institute of Policy Studies, and would be an ideal “politically symbolic step” rather than prematurely agreeing to sanctions relief.

Harry Kazianis of the Center for the National Interest said: “Nothing would be worse than for either side to come out of the meeting as if it was a waste of time.”

    The raid on the Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) camp was launched because India believed suicide attacks were “imminent”, Foreign Secretary Vijay Gokhale told a media briefing.

“A very large number of Jaish-e-Mohammad terrorists, trainers, senior commanders and groups of jihadis who were being trained for fidayeen (suicide) action were eliminated,” he said.

JeM, a Pakistan-based group, claimed responsibility for a February 14 suicide bomb attack in Kashmir that killed 40 Indian paramilitaries.

    “Credible intelligence was received that JeM was attempting another suicide terror attack in various parts of the country, and the fidayeen jihadis were being trained for this purpose,” said Gokhale.

“In the face of imminent danger, a preemptive strike became absolutely necessary. In an intelligence-led operation, in the early hours of today, India struck the biggest training camp of JeM in Balakot.”

Pakistan had earlier said Indian warplanes crossed the ceasefire line in Kashmir and dropped payloads.

India regularly accuses Pakistan of supporting radical groups who stage operations in Indian-administered Kashmir.

The Himalayan region has been divided between India and Pakistan since the end of British colonial rule in sub-continent in 1947. They have fought two of their three wars over the region.

Pakistan denies supporting militants.

“The existence of such massive training facilities capable of training hundreds of jihadis could not have functioned without the knowledge of Pakistan authorities,” said the foreign ministry official.

“India has been repeatedly urging Pakistan to take action against the JeM to prevent jihadis from being trained and armed inside Pakistan,” he added.

“Pakistan has taken no concrete actions to dismantle the infrastructure of terrorism on its soil,” he added.

(Yonhap)

Nkuka Lulendo, his wife and four children aged under 10 arrived in South Korea on a tourist visa on Dec. 28. They have been staying at the transit zone, fighting the immigration office’s decision to refuse their entry.

Upon arrival, the family legally requested from the government for a chance to apply for refugee status here, but they were denied on the basis the Angolans had no “clear” reason to seek asylum.

“We cannot accept how the (Justice) Ministry came to conclude there is no clear reason for the Lulendos to claim asylum in Korea,” said the family’s legal representative Lee Sang-hyun from Duroo Association for Public Interest Law.

The family barely gets three meals a day due to a lack of money, and must wash in the airport’s restrooms and sleep within its confines as well, with their health not in good condition, he added.

“We are living in conditions that we have never experienced before. Our children are shivering due to winter chills they have never gone through. We are also human beings,” the family said in a letter revealed by an association of 15 human rights groups. “Please help us to get out of this life at the airport.”

Lulendo, who was born in Angola and moved to the Democratic Republic of the Congo at an early age for better opportunities, fears persecution in Angola from the government for having left the country for Congo, according to lawyer Lee.

Their stay at the airport is expected to be prolonged as the family filed a lawsuit against the Justice Ministry earlier this month to invalidate the immigration office’s decision. The first hearing will take place March 7, with the ruling expected in May or June.

Human rights activists condemned the Korean government for abusing its authority and depriving the Angolan family of a fair right to claim asylum, while anti-refugee activists slammed the Angolan family for defying the government’s deportation order.

Under the Refugee Act that came into effect in 2013, all asylum seekers are allowed to apply for refugee status at the port of entry. The immigration office has up to seven days to decide whether to allow them into the country for the process.

Asylum seekers who are denied entry must return to their home countries or fight the government’s decision while living at the airport — be it in the deportation room or transit zone.

According to the Justice Ministry, 756, or more than half of the 1,428 asylum seekers who applied for refugee status at the port of entry in Korea, had their application rejected between July 2013 and December 2018.

The ministry has underscored the need to prescreen refugee applicants at the airport to distinguish “genuine” refugees from economic migrants seeking to abuse the system and earn money on a work permit issued for asylum seekers.

It will take due action regarding the Lulendo family once the court makes its ruling in the coming months, the ministry added.

Wearing his trademark Mao-style black suit, Kim disembarked from his olive green armoured train surrounded by a crush of security and aides as the guards presented arms.

Emerging from the station, he was met by a military band and a swarm of press that had waited overnight in the rain for his arrival.

He was quickly ushered into a waiting black Mercedes-Benz, his arm emerging from a rolled-down window to wave to crowds before briefly stopping in front of a group of students in school uniforms gleefully brandishing North Korean and Vietnamese flags.

Twelve bodyguards jogged alongside Kim’s car as he left the train station, believed to be en route to Hanoi and a highly-anticipated second summit with US president Donald Trump over Pyongyang’s nuclear arsenal.

Kim’s motorcade of 20 or so cars took to the road after his brief swing through the normally sleepy Dong Dang train station in northern Vietnam — a stone’s throw from the China border — which has been abuzz with activity in recent days.

Armed guards and sniffer dogs have been spotted at the station, which got a last-minute facelift with lick of fresh paint and new potted plants for Kim’s brief welcoming ceremony on Tuesday.

In a last minute-scramble, a guard noticed some of the yellow-starred Vietnamese banners were upside-down and quickly righted them to avoid a diplomatic gaffe.

Joining Kim from Pyongyang was his sister Kim Yo Jong, one of his closest aides, who peeled off into a waiting car as her brother walked behind her waving.

Kim’s de-facto chief of staff Kim Chang Son — dubbed his “Butler” — who has been in Hanoi for pre-summit preparations, was also seen at the station as Kim made his Vietnam bow.

– ‘Strong message’ –

This is Kim’s first visit to the country, and the first time a North Korean leader has been here since his grandfather Kim Il Sung — a close ally of Vietnam’s revolutionary leader Ho Chi Minh — travelled to the country in 1964.

Observers say he took the train to send a message to North Koreans — and the world — that he is falling in step with his grandfather, whom he frequently echoes in looks and mannerisms, and even his handwriting.

“It sends a strong message to North Koreans that Kim Jong Un has inherited his grandfather’s good qualities, and the Kim dynasty is stronger than ever,” said Koh Yu-hwan, a professor at Seoul’s Dongguk University.

Kim will be hosted for an official state visit and is expected to visit two provinces to examine examples of Vietnam’s post-war economic successes — a glittering turnaround Washington hope Pyongyang can emulate.

One of those provinces is Quang Ninh, where Vinfast, Vietnam’s first homegrown car manufacturer is located. The other is Bac Ninh, home to a Samsung factory, one of Vietnam’s leading investors and top exporters.