KABUL -- Two explosions were reported in Afghanistan on Thursday, leaving four children killed and one child wounded, authorities confirmed.

In the country's national capital of Kabul, a bomb struck a civilian vehicle at a busy traffic circle in Karte Parwan locality, Police District 2 at about 4:15 p.m. local time, causing no casualties, Qari Saeed Khosty, spokesman of the Afghan Ministry of Interior, wrote on Twitter. (Afghanistan-Blasts-Casualties)

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COLOMBO -- Fourteen people were killed and one person missing after strong winds and heavy rains lashed out across Sri Lanka since last week, the Disaster Management Center (DMC) has said.

According to the latest figures from the DMC, over 100,000 families had been affected in the nine districts due to adverse weather conditions while 114 people had been relocated to safe locations and 22 people had been injured.

Sri Lanka's Meteorology Department earlier on Thursday said that a red alert had been issued for 19 districts as heavy showers of over 100 mm were expected in 19 districts. (Sri Lanka-Rains-Casualties)

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HONG KONG -- The Office of the Commissioner of the Chinese Foreign Ministry in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) on Thursday strongly disapproved of and firmly rejected the so-called Human Rights and Democracy Reports updated by the British Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office.

The reports had irresponsible comments about the human rights situation in 31 countries including China, pointed fingers at Hong Kong affairs and interfered in China's internal affairs, said a spokesperson of the office. (Hong Kong-Commissioner's Office-Reports)

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JAKARTA -- In the current international environment, European and Asian countries will not achieve shared growth without having each other's back, thus multilateralism will be the international mainstream in the new development paradigm, said Bambang Suryono, chairman of Indonesian think tank Asia Innovation Study Center.

He also praised China's proposal of building a global community of health for all. China has provided over 1.5 billion doses of vaccines for countries across the world, aiming at supplying 2 billion doses for the whole year, which has helped many other countries, especially developing countries, to prevent the spread of COVID-19. (Indonesia-ASEM Summit-Cooperation)