JAPAN

House dissolved, polls set for Feb 8

Japan's House of Representatives was formally dissolved on Friday at the outset of the ordinary parliamentary session, with the general election set for Feb 8. The official campaign will start next Tuesday, creating a mere 16-day campaign period, the shortest in Japan's postwar history. Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi announced her decision on Monday to dissolve the 465-seat lower house for a snap election, aiming to capitalize on her cabinet's current high approval ratings. With more than two years left in the current lower house term, Takaichi has justified her decision to call a snap election by arguing she has yet to receive public backing for her premiership that began in October and the new ruling coalition of her Liberal Democratic Party and the Japan Innovation Party formed the same month.

IRAN

Tehran says 'finger on trigger' amid unrest

The commander of Iran's Revolutionary Guards warned Washington on Thursday that the force had its "finger on the trigger" in the wake of unrest, as US President Donald Trump said Tehran still appeared interested in talks. Trump has repeatedly left open the option of new military action against Iran after Washington backed and joined Israel's 12-day fighting in June aimed at degrading Iranian nuclear and ballistic missile programs. Trump said on Thursday a US naval "armada" was heading toward the Gulf, adding: "We're watching Iran." The USS Abraham Lincoln, along with three destroyers, was spotted making its way to the Middle East from Asia, according to Tuesday's ship-tracking data. Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, in a speech on Thursday, accused the United States and Israel of stoking the protests as a "cowardly revenge … for the defeat in the 12-Day War".

SOUTH KOREA

Seoul repatriates 73 scam suspects

South Korea has repatriated 73 people suspected of involvement in online scam operations in Cambodia and will question them over allegations they had defrauded more than 800 South Koreans of about $33 million, officials said. The plane carrying the suspects, the largest such group to be returned so far, landed at Incheon International Airport on Friday. Footage from South Korean broadcasters showed the suspected scammers, wearing masks and mostly clad in shorts and sandals, being escorted by police from the plane to a waiting bus. "It's a big mistake if you think you can evade punishment if you commit a crime outside the country," a South Korean police official told a briefing at the airport. A foreign ministry official told the briefing that South Korea would continue to cooperate with Cambodia "until transnational scam crimes were eradicated".

EUROPE

Denmark, NATO seek to boost security

Denmark's Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said on Friday she had agreed with NATO chief Mark Rutte that the alliance needs to boost security in the Arctic following weeks of turmoil over US President Donald Trump's threat to take Greenland. Governments of Denmark and Greenland, a Danish semiautonomous territory, insist that sovereignty over the island is not up for discussion, but have said they are open to talks on a wide range of other topics. Trump said on Thursday that he had secured total and permanent US access to Greenland after talks with Rutte.