World roundup: September 15 2023

Stories from China, Niger, Guatemala, and elsewhere

TODAY IN HISTORY

September 15, 1821: The Captaincy-General of Guatemala—encompassing the modern states of Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua—declares its independence from Spain. The date is commemorated as independence day in all five of those countries.

September 15, 1894: The Imperial Japanese Army captures the city of Pyongyang from Qing Dynasty China in one of the earliest engagements of the First Sino-Japanese War. China opted to abandon Korea to the Japanese, and when the war ended with a Japanese victory the Korean peninsula came under Japan’s regional sphere of influence.

MIDDLE EAST

SYRIA

The Syrian Democratic Forces group is saying that a Turkish drone strike killed two of its fighters on Friday and wounded two more. The strike took place near Manbij, in northern Syria’s Aleppo province. Both of the deceased were women as was one of the wounded fighters, so they may have been part of the Kurdish YPJ militia.