Briefly

AFRICA

Millions facing worst food crisis in decades

Millions of people across southern Africa are going hungry because of a historic drought that risks causing a full-scale humanitarian catastrophe, the World Food Programme warned on Tuesday. Five countries — Lesotho, Malawi, Namibia, Zambia, and Zimbabwe — have declared a state of national disaster as the drought has destroyed crops and livestock. "The worst food crisis in decades" has devastated more than 27 million lives across the region and some 21 million children are malnourished, said Tomson Phiri, WFP spokesperson for southern Africa.

PAKISTAN

Indian FM makes rare visit, attends forum

Indian Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar arrived in Pakistan on Tuesday in the first such visit in almost a decade for a meeting of governments of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. Pakistan's Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Jaishankar shook hands and had a brief exchange while Sharif was welcoming SCO leaders ahead of the conference on Wednesday. It has been nearly a decade since a foreign minister from India has visited amid frosty relations between the neighbors. Both sides have said no bilateral meeting is planned.

UNITED KINGDOM

Robot artist's work to go on auction

The robot artist Ai-Da, a humanoid powered by artificial intelligence, will be the first of its kind to have a painting sold at a major auction house, organizers said on Wednesday. The work, due to go under the hammer at Sotheby's in London next month, is described as a "haunting" portrait of the English mathematician Alan Turing, considered one of the fathers of modern computing. Titled AI God, the 2.2-meter high portrait is expected to fetch between 100,000 and 150,000 pounds ($130,000 and $196,000).

Agencies Via Xinhua