Death toll in Japan earthquake climbs to 18
Tokyo, Sep 7 : The number of people killed in the powerful earthquake that struck the island of Hokkaido in northern Japan climbed to 18 while 24 people remain missing, the government said on Friday.
In a press conference after an emergency Cabinet meeting, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said that rescue efforts were underway in the affected areas as he urged people to exercise caution amid warnings of more rains and landslides.
Around 40,000 members of the Japan Self-Defence Forces, police, firefighters and Coast Guard were tirelessly working to locate the 24 missing people in Atsuma, the epicentre of the quake, chief government spokesperson Yoshihide Suga was cited as saying by Efe news.
Many were feared buried under rubble after the magnitude 6.7 quake triggered landslides on Thursday. "We've heard there are people still stuck under the mud, so we've been working around the clock but it's been difficult to rescue them," a rescue worker in Atsuma told public broadcaster NHK.
Japanese authorities said that close to 50 per cent of the electricity supply on the island had been restored and power returned to 1.5 million homes and buildings.
Production restarted in several power plants affected by the quake on Hokkaido, which was receiving electricity from the main island of Honshu after the central government sought support from other power companies of the country to resolve the outages.
The earthquake had triggered an immediate shutdown of the main Tomato thermal power plant in Atsuma, which accounted for half of the electricity production on the island, and other power plants, leaving 2.95 million houses and buildings without electricity.
The island's main airport resumed flights on Friday and train services were also scheduled to restart before the weekend.
The earthquake came on the heels of a deadly typhoon lashing the west of Japan over the past few days. Jebi, the strongest typhoon to hit the country in 25 years, killed at least 10 people and caused widespread damage and disruption.
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MP: Woman, lover conspire to get husband killed; police looking for contract killer
Dhar (MP) (PTI): A 25-year-old woman and her lover have been arrested in the district for allegedly conspiring to kill her husband by hiring a contract killer, police said on Thursday.
The case was solved within 36 hours of the murder though the woman initially tried to mislead the police by claiming that robbers killed her husband, an official said.
Dev Krishna Purohit (28) was stabbed to death on the intervening night of Monday and Tuesday at his house in Gondikheda Charan village, about 60 km from here.
Superintendent of Police Mayank Awasthi told reporters that accused Priyanka Purohit (25) was married to Dev Krishna when she was around 15 years old. Priyanka moved to her matrimonial home after attaining adulthood but was unwilling to live with her husband, leading to frequent disputes between them.
During investigation, it emerged that she was in a relationship with Kamlesh (32), the SP said.
The duo allegedly hatched a plan to kill Dev Krishna and hired a man identified as Surendra for Rs 1 lakh do the job, he said
After Dev Krishna was killed, Priyanka told police that unidentified persons broke into the house, attacked her husband with a sharp weapon while holding her captive in another room, and fled with valuables.
But the inconsistencies in her statements raised suspicion, and eventually she confessed to hatching the murder conspiracy, the SP said.
While she and Kamlesh were arrested, police are looking for the contract killer, the official added.
