NEPAL: The leader of the country’s largest communist party was named as the new prime minister today, following the collapse of a previous coalition government.

Khadga Prasad Oli will head a coalition made up of his Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist Leninist) and the Nepali Congress party, the two biggest parties in Nepal.

It is his fourth stint as prime minister.

CHINA: Chinese and Russian naval forces began a joint exercise today at a military port in southern China.

The Chinese Defence Ministry said in a brief statement that forces from both sides had ecently patrolled the western and northern Pacific Ocean and that the operation had nothing to do with international and regional situations and didn’t target any third party.

CAMBODIA: A military helicopter has gone missing while flying over the heavily forested Cardamom Mountain range in the south-west, the Defence Ministry announced on Saturday, confirming earlier media reports that contact with the aircraft had been lost on Friday.

A statement said the helicopter was a training flight in bad weather when air force headquarters lost touch with it. How many people were aboard was not stated. 

SOMALIA: Five prisoners and three soldiers were killed on Saturday morning in a failed attempt by some inmates to break out of a prison in the capital Mogadishu.

Twenty-one people were wounded in the incident, said Somali army Custodial Corps spokesman Colonel Abdikani Khalaf.

Media reported that an elite police unit had intervened to thwart the attempted jailbreak.