China and Vietnam have agreed to work together to improve trust amid simmering tensions between the two neighbours over their territorial claims in the South China Sea.The commitment was made at a defence and security consultation in the south China ...

Hong Kong’s top children’s rights advocate has criticised the government’s slow-moving efforts to reform child protection laws in the wake of a trial over the murder of a young girl that shocked the city. Priscilla Lui Tsang Sun-kai, chairwoma...

The residents of a village in northeast China had a frightening experience on Friday when a Siberian tiger wandered into town and attacked a woman and a car filled with passengers, local media reported.The big cat was first spotted at about 7am by Zh...

Hong Kong’s labour minister has defended the government’s imposition of a 14-day flight ban on the Philippines amid a rise in imported Covid-19 cases, saying fewer than a thousand domestic workers have been affected, contrary to claims from emplo...

One of the first questions many people ask when meeting a Parsee woman is “How many garas do you own?” The intricately-designed sari is considered the small Indian community’s traditional dress and has long been admired for its unique handiwork...

Alice* was working in a public-facing civilian job in one of Hong Kong’s disciplined services when she was transferred last year to the back office of another government department after her bosses received anonymous complaints about her.The abrupt...

Germany must increase pressure on Russia following its military build-up at the Ukrainian border and strive for a policy of “dialogue and toughness” towards China, according to Greens chancellor candidate Annalena Baerbock.She announced on Monday...

Out of office for a dozen years and still castigated for his “war on terror”, former US president George W Bush has resurfaced as a passionate immigration advocate just as his Republican Party careers in the opposite direction.The 74-year-old Te...

Growing up as someone who does not conform to traditional gender norms is not easy in Indonesia. Just ask Christine*, a 35 year-old transgender woman in West Java who has been made to undergo conversion therapy no fewer than four times. While the pse...

Beijing lawyer Stella Wan left on Thursday for the resort city of Sanya in the southern island province of Hainan to beat the crowds expected to flock to “China’s Hawaii” for the five-day public holiday which starts on May 1.“I applied for se...

The United States says it is “deeply concerned” about the coronavirus situation in India and is planning to quickly deploy support to authorities and health workers, as the South Asian nation reels from an explosion of infections.“We are in act...

It is guaranteed to be an Oscars like no other: broadcast live from a railway station, honouring films few saw in cinemas, and reuniting Hollywood’s A-listers for the first time in more than a year due to Covid-19.China-born director Chloe Zhao, wh...

Faced with a declining consumer base at home, Japan’s traditional sake brewers have been struggling for a decade or more. Their product has long fallen out of popularity among younger people and Japan has seen an influx of foreign alcohol with exot...

Inside a packed hall at the Yiwu International Expo Centre, located in the same city in central Zhejiang province as the world’s largest small commodities market, hundreds of merchants gathered on April 11 for a presentation by executives from Byte...

The number of Covid-19 vaccine shots administered globally surpassed the one-billion mark on Saturday, offering hope after months of pandemic misery, even as the number of coronavirus cases worldwide hit a new daily record, mainly to an explosion of ...

The regular incursions by Chinese warplanes into Taiwan’s southwest air defence identification zone serve multiple purposes, according to military observers. As well as helping to train its pilots and intimidate Taiwan while wearing down its air f...

Researchers from the University of Hong Kong want a deserted World War II site in western Hong Kong Island to be turned into a conservation park instead of being left neglected and covered by overgrown vegetation. They say Jubilee Battery, a complex ...

On a late afternoon in Phu Quoc, Vietnam’s largest island, couples and families relax on beanbag chairs at a Middle Eastern-themed beach bar, clinking their glasses while watching the sun set on the horizon. A few metres away, children build sandca...

Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro has suggested that the army might be called into the streets to restore order if lockdown measures against Covid-19 that he opposes lead to chaos.In a television interview on Friday night with TV Criticia in the Ama...

China will have been put on alert by the US’ latest sanctions on Russia, but would be equipped to withstand the economic measures among them if they were used against Beijing, Chinese observers said.Washington last week announced an array of sancti...

Fresh clashes broke out late on Saturday between Palestinians and police after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called for “calm on all sides” after several nights of unrest in Israeli-annexed east Jerusalem.But the premier also warned t...

Excuse my focusing partly on a personal topic today, but I just became a grandfather for the first time. At a time when sociologists and politicians love racial silos, I need space for this child of the Eurasian land mass. My grandson is one-quarter ...

English football clubs will stage a three-day social media boycott next weekend as part of a protest against racism, various national governing bodies announced on Saturday.The blackout, encompassing England’s governing Football Association, clubs ...

The Turkish army has launched a new ground and air offensive against outlawed Kurdish militants in northern Iraq, officials and local media reported on Saturday.Turkish media said commando forces landed in the Metina region from helicopters while war...

A Lebanon-made electric car made its debut on Saturday, the first time the Mediterranean country has manufactured an automobile, despite struggling amid a dire economic crisis with frequent power cuts.The red sports car – named “Quds Rise”, usi...

The hunt for a missing Indonesian submarine with 53 crew on Sunday turned into a salvage effort after recovered debris suggested it broke apart as it sank off the coast of Bali.Warships, planes and hundreds of military personnel had led a frantic sea...

Authorities in France on Saturday detained a fourth person as anti-terrorism investigators questioned three others, seeking to establish a motive and uncover any possible ties to extremism after a police official was fatally stabbed at a police stati...

The International Space Station’s population swelled to 11 on Saturday with the jubilant arrival of SpaceX’s third crew capsule in less than a year. It is the biggest crowd up there in more than a decade.All of the astronauts – representing the...

Indian authorities are scrambling to get oxygen tanks to hospitals where Covid-19 patients are suffocating in the world’s worst coronavirus surge, as the government comes under increasing criticism for its handling of the pandemic.For the third day...

US President Joe Biden has recognised the 1915 killings of Armenians by Ottoman forces as genocide, a watershed moment for descendants of the hundreds of thousands of dead as he defied decades of pressure by Turkey.Biden became the first US president...

An elderly couple were found dead in their Hong Kong home on Saturday night. According to police, the couple’s son called for help around 7pm after finding his 83-year-old father hanging from a curtain by a window in the flat in the Wiseman Buildin...

China has commissioned its first type 075 amphibious assault ship, which is expected to be deployed in the disputed South China Sea.Military observers said the ship, named the Hainan, may also be deployed in missions around Taiwan but was likely to c...

ByteDance, the developer of TikTok and its Chinese sibling app Douyin, has put its initial public offering plan on the back burner for now, as it has difficulties coming up with a business structure that can please both Beijing and Washington, accor...

The United States Air Force has concluded it can repel a mainland Chinese invasion of Taiwan using next-generation technology to achieve control of the skies, but victory would come at a heavy cost, according to media reportsAnalysts said the US mili...

Aprilyn Racca’s world was turned upside down after a news alert popped up on her phone during the eight-hour bus ride to Manila from her hometown in Illocos Sur, in the northern Philippines.The 34-year-old Filipino boarded the bus at 10.30pm on Apr...

Anti-terrorism investigators questioned three people who were detained after a police official was fatally stabbed on Friday at a police station outside Paris, seeking on Saturday to establish a motive, if the the attacker had ties to an extremist gr...

China has offered to help India battle its Covid-19 outbreak after the United States declined a request to lift a ban on exporting vaccine raw materials.The olive branch from the Chinese foreign ministry comes as tensions between the two nations cont...

Myanmar’s coup leader Min Aung Hlaing on Saturday met leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) in Jakarta for crisis talks, where the junta chief was urged to immediately halt a bloody post-coup crackdown on protesters and to r...

Hong Kong’s university entrance exams entered their second day on Saturday, with more candidates taking the tests, but about 80 students were forced to use a backup venue after a school closed because of Covid-19 risks.The affected candidates took ...

A government proposal to restrict public access to the personal information of company directors has sparked concerns that it could lead to unscrupulous individuals getting away with illegal activities such as money laundering, fraud and debt evasion...

China’s internet watchdog and six other regulators have jointly released new rules to regulate live streaming in the country’s booming e-commerce sector, set to go into effect on May 25, in Beijing’s latest move to tighten oversight of the powe...

The United States has yet to find the right way to deal with China, and should focus on its domestic issues rather than clashing with Beijing as a rival, according to two of China’s senior officials.At an event on Saturday in Beijing to mark the 50...

Almost all of the roughly 7,000 cross-border truck drivers actively in business were expected to be fully vaccinated against Covid-19 by late April, Hong Kong’s transport minister said on Saturday, hinting that a higher inoculation rate could bring...

When Sunil Gupta arrived to start work at India’s largest prison on May 8, 1981, the 24-year-old was surprised to learn that the position he was appointed for wasn’t available anymore  – that was until a bespectacled, balding man dressed in ...

The United Nations’ new envoy to China has defended international cooperation under the platform, saying it is still crucial for resolving global challenges even though it has been criticised as an inefficient talk shop.Siddharth Chatterjee said th...

Sri Lankan police on Saturday arrested a prominent Muslim lawmaker and his brother over suspected connections to the Easter Sunday suicide bombings in 2019 that killed 269 people.Rishad Bathiudeen is a former Cabinet minister who currently leads an o...

When Myanmar railway switch operator Ko Thet, 34, and his family were evicted on March 22 from the home they had lived in for generations, they did not have time to pack much.The family of six took “only our essentials: clothes, some pots, and bowl...

Hongkong Post has released a food-themed series of stamps featuring local snacks such as fish balls, buttered pineapple buns, peanut candy and steamed rice rolls, but the choice of menu items has left some craving more as critics decry other signatur...

An Indonesian submarine that went missing off the coast of Bali has sunk, the navy said on Saturday, dashing hopes of rescuing any of its 53 crew.The navy’s chief said a search party had recovered fragments from the KRI Nanggala 402 including items...

On April 14, Ana Patricia Non set up a small bamboo cart on a pavement in a Quezon City village, stocking it with 800 pesos (US$16.50) worth of groceries, including vegetables, packs of rice and noodles, canned food, and bottles of water.The 26-year-...