Typhoon Neoguri headed for the Japanese mainland on Wednesday after crossing to the southern Okinawa island chain, killing two people and leaving a trail of damage.  With gusts of up to 110 miles an hour (180km/h) the typhoon was forecast to hit the southern main island of Kyushu as early as Thursday before moving east along the Japanese archipelago, the national weather agency said.  Officials said Neoguri would bring heavy rainfall and warned of the risk of flooding and landslides after the storm which has weakened from a super typhoon forced half a million people to seek shelter in Okinawa on Tuesday.  Kyushu (which is next to the biggest island of Honshu, where major cities including Tokyo and Osaka are located) experienced heavy rain and strong winds. Authorities were considering an emergency alert for residents to seek shelter ahead of Neoguri's landfall.  By Thursday lunchtime, heavy rain brought in by the Typhoon had caused three fatalities, extensive damage and forced thousands to leave their homes.  A 12-year-old boy was killed in the central farming town of Nagiso after rocks and boulders swept away his home.  Neoguri, which first threatened Japan as a super typhoon, had weakened to a tropical storm by the time it came ashore but was still gusting at up to 126 kph (78 mph).

Afghan presidential contender Abdullah Abdullah has claimed victory in last month's election, despite results giving a lead to his rival, Ashraf Ghani.  Addressing supporters in the capital, Kabul, Mr Abdullah repeated claims that the election was marred by fraud. US Secretary of State John Kerry had earlier warned against a power grab, amid reports that Mr Abdullah was planning a ‘parallel government’.  The Abdullah camp has decided to take things into their own hands and he appears to have some support.  Several influential figures - governors, district leaders, mayors, and warlords - have come out in his favour. But Afghanistan is a divided country: Mr Ghani and Mr Abdullah both command a lot of support. Preliminary results announced on Monday gave Mr Ghani 56.44% of votes in the 14 June run-off. Mr Abdullah, who fell just short of an outright majority in the first round, had 43.56%.  Both men have alleged fraud in the election. Votes are being re-checked at more than 7,000 polling stations - nearly a third of the total number.  Earlier on Tuesday, Mr Kerry said Afghanistan risked losing security and aid support if anyone tried to ‘take power by extra-legal means’.

Terror group, Hamas has vowed to continue firing rockets at Israel after an Israeli air strike on Tuesday killed seven people in a house in the Gaza Strip.  Hamas intends to step up its attacks in retaliation.  Its spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri accused Israel of perpetrating ‘massacres’ against women and children in Khan Yunis.  Referring to an Israel Air Force bombing of a house belonging to a Hamas operative, Abu Zuhri said: ‘This massacre against women and children is an ugly war crime. All Israelis have now become legitimate targets.’   Ismail al-Ashqar, a Hamas legislator, said that his movement would continue the rocket attacks until Israel succumbs to its demand and lifts the blockade imposed on the Gaza Strip

More than 60 women and girls are reported to have escaped from the Nigerian Islamist group Boko Haram, security sources say. They were among 68 abducted last month near the town of Damboa in north-eastern Borno state. But some women who made it home said they feared other escapees had been recaptured, villagers told the BBC. Boko Haram is still holding more than 200 schoolgirls abducted from Borno's Chibok town in April. Initial reports said the women escaped when the militants went to attack a military base near Damboa on Friday. Local vigilante Abbas Gava told journalists he had ‘received an alert from my colleagues that about 63 of the abducted women and girls had made it back home’. ‘They took the bold step when their abductors moved out to carry out an operation,’ he said. But 18 women who have made it back to villages around Damboa over the last three days - and are being treated at a hospital in Lasa village - said the militants were asleep when they escaped, a Lasa resident told the BBC Hausa Service.

More than 60 women and girls are reported to have escaped from the Nigerian Islamist group Boko Haram, security sources say. They were among 68 abducted last month near the town of Damboa in north-eastern Borno state. But some women who made it home said they feared other escapees had been recaptured, villagers told the BBC. Boko Haram is still holding more than 200 schoolgirls abducted from Borno's Chibok town in April. Initial reports said the women escaped when the militants went to attack a military base near Damboa on Friday. Local vigilante Abbas Gava told journalists he had ‘received an alert from my colleagues that about 63 of the abducted women and girls had made it back home’. ‘They took the bold step when their abductors moved out to carry out an operation,’ he said. But 18 women who have made it back to villages around Damboa over the last three days - and are being treated at a hospital in Lasa village - said the militants were asleep when they escaped, a Lasa resident told the BBC Hausa Service.

Four churches have been attacked and scores of people killed in the latest bout of violence by suspected Boko Haram members. Gunmen fired at worshippers gathered in Kwada village just 6 miles from Chibok in Borno state, where more than 200 schoolgirls were kidnapped and taken hostage on 14 April. The militants then set fire to the buildings, which included the Protestant Church of Christ in Nigeria and the Pentecostal Deeper Life Bible Church, before heading to nearby Kautikari village where they continued their rampage; shooting local civilians and setting fire to their homes. The death toll is reported to be at least 30 in Kwada, though this figure is expected to climb. President Goodluck Jonathan declared a state of emergency in Muslim-majority Adamawa, Borno and Yobe States in May 2013 and has authorised an increased military presence in an attempt to combat extremism.

A truck has exploded in a huge fireball, killing at least 17 people in the northeast Nigerian city of Maiduguri, the latest attack in a city repeatedly hit by Boko Haram fighters. Tuesday's bomb rocked Maiduguri's largest roundabout near the crowded Market where elderly women line the road selling peanuts and kola nuts as snacks to morning commuters. The Defence Ministry said in a tweet that an ’improvised explosive device’ went off in ‘a van loaded with charcoal’ and that the area had been cordoned off. One witness said the bomb went off just after the market opened at 8am before most traders or customers had arrived. Unruly crowds tried to attack fire-fighters deployed to the scene, accusing them of arriving too slowly and hindering their efforts to put out the raging blaze, the AFP news agency reported.

Israel has vowed retribution against Hamas, the militant Palestinian group it says kidnapped and murdered three teenagers in the occupied West Bank. The bodies of Naftali Frenkel, Gilad Shaar and Eyal Yifrach were found on Monday evening, after they had been missing for more than a fortnight. Israel PM Benyamin Netanyahu said: ‘Hamas is responsible and Hamas will pay.’ Hamas denies any involvement. Israel launched more than 30 air strikes on the Gaza Strip overnight. The strikes came in response to 18 rocket attacks on southern Israel from Gaza since Sunday night, the Israeli military said. Israeli troops also flooded into the Palestinian town of Halhul. The bodies were found under a pile of rocks near the town. An Israeli official said it appeared the teenagers were shot soon after their abduction. (See also Prayer Alert 23-2014) Tensions rise further after Israeli police found the body of a Palestinian teenager on Wednesday, apparently a revenge attack.

Jihadist militant group ISIS has said it is establishing a caliphate, or Islamic state, on the territories it controls in Iraq and Syria. It also proclaimed the group's leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, as caliph and ‘leader for Muslims everywhere’. Setting up a state governed under strict Islamic law has long been a goal of many jihadists. Meanwhile, Iraq's army continued an offensive to retake the northern city of Tikrit from the ISIS-led rebels. The city was seized by the insurgents on 11 June as they swept across large parts of north-western Iraq. In a separate development, Israel called for the creation of an independent Kurdish state in response to the gain made by the Sunni rebels in Iraq. The Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIS) announced the establishment of the caliphate in an audio recording posted on the internet on Sunday.

Despite the Central Africa Republic (CAR)’s increasing level of chaos, a glimmer of hope has been developing in its northern town Bozoum - which is peaceful and prosperous thanks to mediation efforts. This town of about 26,000 inhabitants enjoys a relative calm which ensures the functioning of vital services such as the hospital, schools and market, thanks to mediation efforts of people of good will under the leadership of an Italian priest, Father Aurelio Gazzera, the bishop of St. Michael Parish of Bozoum. Since Seleka rebels took over power in March 2013, numerous armed men claiming to be from the Seleka rebels or opposing anti-Balaka militia have been looting and committing other forms of abuse against the population, in Bangui and elsewhere across the country.