Following is a summary of current world news briefs.

Up to 3 people dead in blast at Bulgarian arms workshop – company boss

As many as three people may have died in an explosion on Tuesday at a workshop belonging to Bulgaria’s largest weapon maker Arsenal, state news agency BTA quoted the plant’s chief executive as saying. “There are victims. Most probably three people have died. The site has not been cleared yet,” Arsenal’s chief executive Nikolay Ibushev told BTA. “The number of the injured people is yet to be clarified,” he said.

UK’s Truss refuses to rule out welfare cuts to fund economic plan

Britain’s new Prime Minister Liz Truss triggered a fresh row in her party on Tuesday by suggesting that she could limit increases in benefit payments by less than soaring inflation as she seeks ways to fund her tax-cutting growth plan. Britain’s new leader has endured a tumultuous time since she came to power on Sept. 6, first leading national mourning for Queen Elizabeth before releasing an economic package that immediately roiled financial markets.

Most of Bangladesh left without power after the national grid failure

Large swathes of Bangladesh were left without electricity on Tuesday after a partial grid failure, a government official said, adding that authorities were working to gradually restore the power supply in the country of 168 million people. The country’s power grid malfunctioned at around 2 p.m. (0800 GMT) on Tuesday, leading to blackouts across 75-80% of Bangladesh, Bangladesh Power Development Board official Shameem Hasan told Reuters.

Grim winter looms as wartime Ukraine braces for infrastructure attacks

In an abandoned tower block damaged by Russian shelling in Ukraine’s second city, Olga Kobzar plans to tough out winter for as long as she can without electricity, water and central heating by lighting the gas stove in her kitchen for warmth. The 70-year-old, who lives alone in a devastated district of northern Kharkiv where the temperature can fall to -20 Celsius (-4 Fahrenheit), is at the sharp end of what Ukrainian officials say will be the grimmest winter in decades.

Russian men take the long road out to escape mobilization

As soon as Vladimir Putin announced his military call-up for the faltering war in Ukraine, Timofey and Andrey, two brothers from Moscow, tried to book flights out of the country. But by the time they had logged on, prices had already shot up so fast that they couldn’t afford the last remaining tickets out. Instead, they jumped in the car. Their father drove them through the night some 700 km (450 miles) to Minsk in neighboring Belarus. There, they got a flight the next morning to Tashkent, the capital of Uzbekistan.

Bulgaria’s former-PM Borissov seeks path to coalition in a fractured parliament

Bulgaria’s former prime minister Boyko Borissov said on Tuesday his center-right GERB party would seek talks with political rivals to try to form a government after an election win that offered no clear path to a coalition. GERB won the Oct. 2 election with 25.3% of the vote, but it faces a hung parliament, raising the risk of another snap poll as the Black Sea country seeks to contain the impact of Europe’s energy crisis and surging inflation amid war in Ukraine.

North Korea conducts longest-range missile test yet over Japan

Nuclear-armed North Korea test-fired a ballistic missile farther than ever before on Tuesday, sending it soaring over Japan, for the first time in five years, and prompting a warning for residents there to take cover. It was the first North Korean missile to follow such a trajectory since 2017, and its estimated 4,600 km (2,850 mile) range was the longest traveled by a North Korean test missile, which are usually “lofted” high into space to avoid flying over neighboring countries.

Ukraine forces break through Russian defenses in south, advance in east

Ukrainian forces have broken through Russian defenses in the south of the country while expanding their rapid offensive in the east, seizing back more territory in areas annexed by Russia and threatening its troops’ supply lines. Making their biggest breakthrough in the south since the war began, Ukrainian forces recaptured several villages in an advance along the strategic Dnipro River on Monday, Ukrainian officials and a Russian-installed leader in the area said.

Nobel physics prize won by sleuths of ‘spooky’ quantum science

Scientists Alain Aspect, John Clauser and Anton Zeilinger won the 2022 Nobel Prize in Physics for their advances in quantum mechanics on the behavior of subatomic particles, opening the door to work on supercomputers and encrypted communication. The awards were for given “experiments with entangled photons, establishing the violation of Bell inequalities and pioneering quantum information science”, the award-giving body said on Tuesday.

UK COVID inquiry begins, vowing to expose any culpable conduct

A public inquiry into Britain’s response to and handling of the COVID-19 pandemic got underway on Tuesday, with a promise it would get to the truth, and expose any wrongdoing or culpable conduct. Britain has recorded almost 20 million COVID infections and more than 166,000 deaths – the seventh highest fatality total globally – and former Prime Minister Boris Johnson and his ministers have faced criticism for their handling of the crisis.

(With inputs from agencies.)