The Capitals: Sudan's capital on boil, Washington's 'American Pie' for Seoul, and more

Hello and Welcome. This is The Capitals. Your weekly recap of some of the biggest stories from capitals around the world.

In New Delhi and rest of India, Olympic athletes are often associated with one defining moment. When the country's flag goes up, the national anthem is heard and the world stands up in the honour of two. All this happens amid spontaneous welling up of eyes of the patriots, including the one standing on the podium.

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Indian wrestler Sakshi Malik got emotional after winning Gold medal in Women's 62kg freestyle wrestling in Commonwealth Games, Birmingham in August 2022 | Twitter

This week, the capital of the world's most populous nation saw some of its top athletes welling up, for the second time in the last four months as they relaunched their protest against alleged sexual abuse within India's wrestling federation.

Indian wrestlers Vinesh Phogat (L) and Sakshi Malik (R) break down while speaking to the reporters in New Delhi earlier this week | PTI

Read this, and more, in The Capitals this week.

Khartoum, Sudan

An aerial view of black smoke rising over Khartoum | AFP

The fighting between Sudanese army and paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) entered third week, as the two warring sides failed to honour the 72-hour truce that was agreed upon earlier this week. Reports of prison break amid the conflict have gripped the country, stoking speculations related to the revival of Sudan's political Islamic movement.

So far, neither side has gained the control of capital Khartoum.

Meanwhile, thousands of foreign nationals, including nearly 3000 Indians, have been evacuated from conflict-ridden Sudan so far.

Washington D.C., United States of America

US President Joe Biden hosted South Korean President Yoon Suk-Yeol in the White House this week | Twitter/@JoeBiden

US President Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. aka Joe Biden, 80, announced his presidential bid for 2024.

But Biden's ageing profile and a prospective presidential contest against former US President Donald Trump was not the biggest story from the US capital this week.

Instead, the state visit of South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol became the geopolitical event with most consequential optics in the power corridors of the United States.

Yoon and Biden signed a landmark deal to deter nuclear belligerence in the Korean peninsula.

With that the two leaders, for now, have managed to limit the nuclear proliferation as South Korea reiterated its commitment to the Nuclear non-proliferation treaty.

Dubbed 'Washington declaration', the deal assured Seoul that the United States will regularly deploy its strategic assets in the region. The declaration also called for the advancement of achieving the 'complete denuclearisation of the Korean Peninsula.'

South Korean president's visit's high was a state dinner hosted by Biden. President Yoon Suk Yeol belted out his own rendition of Don McClean’s classic song, 'American Pie'. The impromptu performance went viral, and became a diplomatic highlight of Seoul-Washington ties on social media.

Asunción, Paraguay

A municipal worker removes a political advertising in Asunción on April 29, 2023 | AFP

Paraguay went to polls this Sunday as 4.8 million eligible voters in the South American nation geographically triangulated between Brazil, Bolivia and Argentina began stamping their ballets.

But a new president in Asunción may mean geopolitical consequences two oceans away in the Taiwanese capital of Taipei, the self-ruled island which China claims as its own.

Paraguay is one of the only 13 countries that recognises Taipei over Beijing.

Lawyer Efrain Alegre, 60, of the Concertacion center-left coalition is leading narrowly in opinion polls against the ruling Colorado Party's Santiago Pena.

Alegre has vowed to reconsider country's diplomatic positioning of choosing Taipei over Beijing.

"Relations with Taiwan mean the loss of one of the largest markets, which is China," Alegre told news agency AFP.

"Paraguay makes a very big effort, a very big sacrifice to have relations with Taiwan, but we are not seeing from Taiwan the same effort."

Baku, Azerbaijan-Yerevan, Armenia

French foreign minister Catherine Colonna and Armenian foreign minister Ararat Mirzoyan hold a press conference following their talks in Yerevan on April 28, 2023 | AFP

French foreign minister Catherine Colonna visited the capitals of Azerbaijan and Armenia this week in an effort to cool down the reignited tensions between two West Asian rivals. Colonna's visit ensured that the two nations sit across each other in Washington on Sunday, when the Azeri and Armenian foreign ministers are scheduled to discuss the "agreement on normalisation of relations."

Both the countries went to war over disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region in 2020 in which Baku emerged overwhelmingly victorious. The mountain region is now internationally recognised as part of Azerbaijan but populated mainly by ethnic Armenians.

The tensions reignited after Azerbaijan set up a new checkpoint last Sunday on the road to Karabakh, the Lachin corridor, in a move that Armenia that called a gross violation of a 2020 ceasefire.

Tokyo, Japan

Employees of 'ispace'bow their heads after the company announced they lost signal from the lander in HAKUTO-R lunar exploration program | Reuters

World's first private moon landing failed this week. Japan's commercial space startup ispace lost contact with its Hakuto-R Mission 1 (M1), and said that it probably crashed on the lunar surface.

The M1 lander was launched on December 11, 2023 from Cape Canaveral, Florida on a SpaceX rocket.

Soon after ispace lost contact with its L1 lander, its employees at a venue in Tokyo bowed their heads in respect of the lost lander.

The Japanese government expressed disappointment at the failure of ispace mission. But said that the country wants ispace to "keep trying" as its efforts were significant to the development of a domestic space industry.

New Delhi, India

Indian wrestlers Vinesh Phogat, left, Bajrang Punia, centre, and Sakshi Malik take part in a sit-in New Delhi demanding the arrest of the Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) chief | Reuters

In New Delhi, thirty Indian wrestlers, including country's Olympic medalists, relaunched their sit-in protest against Wrestling Federation of India president Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh, also a lawmaker of ruling Bharatiya Janata Party. Led by Vinesh Phogat, Sakshi Malik, Anshu Malik and Bajrang Punia, the protesting athletes have accused Singh of sexual abuse of vulnerable female wrestlers for years.

After the grapplers approached India's Supreme Court this week, the police in New Delhi filed two First Information Reports (FIRs) against the wrestling federation boss. One of the incidence reports have been filed under the charges related to India's Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, meaning the supposed victim was less than 18 when the sexual abuse allegedly took place.

The wrestlers had first launched their protest earlier this year on January 18. Back then, Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government quickly sprung into action, formed an investigation body led by some of India's most decorated athletes, and sought a report in four weeks.

While the findings of the investigation into sexual assault accusations have not been made public, soon after wrestlers relaunched their protest this week, the government released its "major findings". One of them point to the absence of a duly constituted Internal Complaints Committee (ICC) in the federation mandated within India's sexual harassment prevention law.

Amid the second round of protest in over three months, Singh continues to be the chief of India's Wrestling federation.

The wrestlers have vowed they will continue to protest until Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh is arrested and a host of reforms are brought within the wrestling federation.

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