BEIJING: When Russian President Vladimir Putin walked shoulder to shoulder with Chinese President Xi Jinping on Wednesday, a hot mic caught them discussing organ transplants and the possibility that humans could live to 150 years old.

The moment came as Putin and Xi walked with North Korea’s Kim Jong Un at the head of a delegation of more than two dozen foreign leaders to view a military parade in Beijing marking the 80th anniversary of the end of World War Two.

The moment was carried on the livestream provided by state broadcaster CCTV to other media, including AP and Reuters. China’s radio and TV administration said CCTV’s coverage of the event was viewed 1.9 billion times online and by more than 400 million on TV.

As Putin and Xi walked toward the Tiananmen rostrum where they viewed the parade with Kim, Putin’s translator could be heard saying in Chinese: “Biotechnology is continuously developing.”

The translator added, after an inaudible passage: “Human organs can be continuously transplanted. The longer you live, the younger you become, and (you can) even achieve immortality.”

In response, Xi, who was off camera, can be heard responding in Chinese: “Some predict that in this century humans may live to 150 years old.”

Kim was smiling and looking in the direction of Putin and Xi, but it was not clear if the conversation was being translated for him. Putin cannot be heard speaking clearly in Russian in the CCTV clip.

Putin confirmed later that he and Xi had discussed the subject on Wednesday.

“I think when we went to the parade, the chairman talked about it,” Putin told reporters in Beijing when asked about the leaked conversation.

“Modern means of health improvement, medical means, even surgical ones related to organ replacement, they allow humanity to hope that active life will continue differently than it does today,” he said.

China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and CCTV did not immediately respond to requests from Reuters for comment.

As Xi began speaking, the video cut to a wide shot of Tiananmen Square and the audio faded.

Just over 30 seconds later, Xi, Putin and Kim reappeared on camera as they walked on the steps toward the viewing platform for the parade.

At the event, Xi told a crowd of more than 50,000 spectators the world faced a choice of “peace or war” as he inspected troops and cutting-edge military equipment, including hypersonic missiles and naval drones.

Putin arrived in China on Sunday to attend a summit organised by Beijing that convened more than 20 leaders of non-Western countries, including Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Putin and Xi signed more than 20 agreements on subjects ranging from energy to artificial intelligence, and agreed to build a major new gas pipeline, without announcing key details on financing or the pricing of the gas to be sent to China.

• Toll stands at 1,457 deaths, 3,394 injuries.
• WFP warns food aid will run out in four weeks.
• Entire households wiped out.
  

Afghanistan airdropped commandos on Wednesday to pull survivors from the rubble in areas ravaged by earthquakes that have killed more than 1,400 this week, as a UN agency warned that food aid for victims would run out soon without urgent funding.

Dozens of commando forces were being airdropped at sites where helicopters cannot land, to help carry the injured to safer ground, in what aid groups said was a race against time to rescue those still stuck under rubble.

Time was also running out for those who survived the two devastating quakes in the remote eastern region of the impoverished country, the UN World Food Programme (WFP) warned on Wednesday.

John Aylieff, the head of WFP in Afghanistan, told Reuters that the agency only has enough funding and stocks for the next four weeks.

“Four weeks is just not enough even to meet the basic, essential needs of the population struck by the earthquake, let alone put the victims on a path back to rebuilding their lives,” Aylieff said.

WFP funding for Afghanistan this year is just under $300 million, according to UN financial data, down from $1.7 billion in 2022, the first full year the country was ruled by the Taliban.

Resources for rescue and relief work are tight in the nation of 42 million people hit by war, poverty and shrinking aid. It has received limited global help after the disaster.

The first earthquake of magnitude-6, one of Afghanistan’s deadliest in recent years, unleashed widespread damage and destruction when it struck the provinces of Kunar and Nangarhar around midnight on Sunday at a shallow depth of 10km.

A second quake of magnitude-5.5 on Tuesday evening caused panic and interrupted rescue efforts as it sent rocks sliding down mountains and cut off roads to villages in remote areas.

The toll stands at 1,457 deaths, 3,394 injuries and more than 6,700 destroyed homes, the Taliban administration said. The UN has said the toll could rise, with people still trapped under rubble.

Authorities have set up a camp to coordinate supplies and emergency aid, while two centres were overseeing transfer of the injured, burial of the dead and the rescue of survivors, Ehsanullah Ehsan, the head of disaster management in Kunar, said in a text message.

“What we really need is air support, helicopters. Tragically WFP had a helicopter … until a few months ago when funding cuts put an end to that,” Aylieff said.

Afghanistan has been badly hit by US President Donald Trump’s funding cuts to foreign aid, while donor frustration over the Taliban’s restrictive policies towards women and curbs on aid workers have worsened its isolation.

Entire households wiped out

In some villages in Kunar province, entire households were wiped out. Survivors sifted through rubble looking for families, carried bodies on woven stretchers and dug graves with pickaxes.

In Lulam village, one of the hardest-hit, Darbar, a 63-year-old woman who goes by one name, said she and her family had been waiting for aid for three days since the earthquake destroyed their house.

“No one even hears our voices,” she said, perched on a traditional wood-and-rope bed, adding that she had been injured on the chest. “Now we are just sitting with hope in God. We have no house, nothing to eat.”

On the nearby mountain road, trucks carrying sacks of flour or men with shovels could be seen on their way to villages even worse hit.

Ruhila Mateen from Aseel, a humanitarian tech platform that has teams on the ground, said conditions were worsening by the hour for survivors, with women and children especially vulnerable.

Flimsy or poorly-built homes made of dry masonry, stone and timber gave little protection from the quakes, in ground left unstable by days of heavy rain, said the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).

The agency, which is pulling together the global disaster effort, called for emergency shelter, food assistance and sanitation facilities, along with drinking water, critical medical supplies and other items.

An official of international group Doctors without Borders (MSF), which distributed trauma kits at two hospitals in the affected areas, also called for more humanitarian assistance.

Afghanistan is prone to deadly earthquakes, particularly in the Hindu Kush mountain range, where the Indian and Eurasian tectonic plates meet.

• Around 10,000 evacuated in Delhi, says local media.
• More thunderstorms expected on Wednesday.
• 130 people killed in August alone in north India.

Flooding across northern India killed at least five people on Wednesday, officials said, with more thunderstorms expected and local media reporting that 10,000 people have been evacuated from the river banks in capital Delhi.

The monsoon season in India has been particularly intense this year, killing at least 130 people in August alone in north India, wiping out villages and destroying infrastructure.

The latest round of flooding has hit northern Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Punjab, where the Chenab and Tawi rivers have risen above the danger mark at several spots.

The swollen rivers have triggered landslides and damaged many roads, disconnecting parts of the mountainous regions of Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK) and Himachal from the rest of India.

At least five people were killed on Wednesday after landslides battered Rajouri and Mandi districts in IIOJK and Himachal Pradesh respectively, officials said.

The India Meteorological Department warned of heavy to very heavy rain in the region on Wednesday, with more downpours expected in Uttarakhand and Uttar Pradesh.

The Central Water Commission said the swollen Yamuna had breached its danger mark on Tuesday in Delhi.

Local media reported that nearly 10,000 people had been evacuated to relief camps set up by the government along the main highways as a precautionary measure for those living in low-lying areas.

Residents living along the Yamuna in Delhi were evacuated in 2023 as well after floodwaters entered their homes and the river hit its highest level in 45 years.

Many tourist spots in Himachal Pradesh have been hit by landslides in recent weeks, as raging rivers damaged infrastructure.

Educational institutions were ordered shut, authorities said, asking people to remain indoors due to flood warnings.

In neighbouring Punjab, the government said 30 people have been killed and nearly 20,000 evacuated since August 1.

Water gushing through the plains in India’s breadbasket Punjab state has destroyed 150,000 hectares of crops, the government said on Tuesday.

Continuous rain prompted authorities to release water from dams, which has caused flooding in plains in India and Pakistan in recent days.

On the other side of the border, Pakistani authorities issued an alert for more floods in the eastern heartland province of Punjab on Wednesday, after India warned it would release water downstream from its dams, officials said.

New Delhi has previously given four such warnings to Islamabad, the officials said.

The worst floods in four decades have killed at least 43 people in Punjab, with more than 3.3 million affected since August 26, the provincial disaster management authority said.

The death toll across the country since the start of the monsoon season in late June stands at 881, according to the National Disaster Management Authority.