KATHMANDU: Wearing a baseball cap and knee-length traditional Gho robe, carrying a backpack, Bhutan's king has walked through jungles infested with leeches and snakes, trekked mountains and quarantined several times in a hotel in the capital. For 14...

JAKARTA: Indonesia’s Health Minister Budi Gunadi Sadikin said on Friday (Jun 25) that more hospitals and beds have been prepared in Jakarta to cope with another surge of COVID-19 cases, while assuring the public that there is sufficient oxygen s...

TAIPEI: Taiwan will tighten border controls to keep out the highly contagious Delta variant of the coronavirus, authorities said on Friday (Jun 25), requiring arrivals from five countries, including Britain, to be placed in centralised quarantine fac...

KATHMANDU: A ventilator "bank" where hospitals can rent critical care machines for COVID-19 patients has given Nepal's cash-strapped healthcare system a much needed lifeline. The Himalayan nation, like its South Asian neighbours, experienced a spike...

Wang Ying is young, educated and an unquestioning believer in the Communist Party's sole right to rule China -? exactly what the increasingly conformist institution seeks as it enters a new century.

Each morning, a group of Filipinos rakes up piles of trash on the banks of one of the world's most polluted rivers, filling sacks in an endless pursuit to clean a waterway that is also a major source of ocean plastics.

China reported 24 new coronavirus cases in the mainland for Thursday, compared with 16 a day earlier, the health authority said.

SHANGHAI: The virus that causes COVID-19 could have started spreading in China as early as October 2019, two months before the first case was identified in the central city of Wuhan, a new study showed on Friday (Jun 25). Researchers from Britain's ...

The security of Taiwan is directly linked with that of Japan, Japan's Defense Minister Nobuo Kishi said in an interview with Bloomberg News. "The peace and stability of Taiwan is directly connected to Japan and we are closely monitoring ties between...

Judge keeps India terror attack suspect in US custody

Colombia's antigovernment protests could grow in the second half of the year if neither the government nor Congress meet the economic and social demands driving them, a union leader said on Thursday.

The country’s messy pandemic situation was brought on by sheer incompetency, internal squabbling and a naked pursuit of power, says a political science lecturer.

A blinkered approach premised on maintaining national security led by US elites, evident at the NATO summit, is counterproductive, say Andrew Sheng and Xiao Geng.

Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan was facing a growing backlash on Thursday (Jun 24) after he blamed victims of rape for wearing "very few clothes".

The United States plans to evacuate at least some Afghan interpreters who have worked with US forces before the full withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan, a senior official said on Thursday (Jun 24).

An estimated 230,000 people have been displaced by fighting and violence in Myanmar this year and are in need of assistance, the United Nations humanitarian agency said on Thursday (Jun 24). Myanmar has been in crisis since a Feb 1 coup ousted an el...

KUALA LUMPUR: A Malaysian government task force on Friday (Jun 24) proposed amendments to Syariah law that would allow action to be taken against social media users for insulting Islam and "promoting the LGBT lifestyle". Sodomy and same-sex acts are...

The world's highest luxury hotel, boasting a restaurant on the 120th floor and 24-hour personal butler service, has opened in Shanghai to guests with deep pockets and a head for heights.

JAKARTA: Indonesia recorded its biggest daily increase in coronavirus cases on Thursday (Jun 24) with 20,574 infections, taking the country's total tally to 2,053,995 cases, according to data from the country’s health ministry. The data also showe...

Sri Lanka's president pardoned 16 men linked to the Tamil Tiger rebels on Thursday, as the country faced renewed pressure from the UN over detentions without charge under an anti-terrorism law.

SYDNEY: The Pacific island of Nauru is negotiating for the construction of an undersea communications cable that would connect to an Australian network, two sources with knowledge of the talks told Reuters, after the earlier rejection of a Chinese pr...

HONG KONG: Apple Daily cub reporter Yau Ting-leung could not sleep much. Tired, he lay in bed on Wednesday (Jun 23) morning checking the news. The 23-year-old had been in his dream job at the pro-democracy tabloid for less than a year, but now thing...

Indian premier Narendra Modi told leaders from Jammu & Kashmir that elections would be held there after the region's constituencies were reconfigured following the revocation of its semi-autonomous statehood, meeting participants said.

HONG KONG: Hong Kong cyber activists are backing up articles by Apple Daily on censorship-proof blockchain platforms after the newspaper was forced to shut down as it became embroiled in a national security law crackdown. The latest drive to preserv...

MANILA: Philippine defence secretary Delfin Lorenzana on Thursday (Jun 24) ordered the grounding of the military's fleet of Black Hawk helicopters after a crash during training mission in an province north of the capital Manila killed six people. Th...

BEIJING: When a prefecture in northwestern China's Xinjiang region ordered a halt on cryptocurrency mining projects this month, Chris Zhu scrambled to move clients' machines southward, spending over a week to reassemble in Sichuan. But after the shi...

TOKYO: Japanese Emperor Naruhito appears "concerned" about the possibility the Olympic Games could cause the coronavirus to spread as feared by many in the public, Kyodo News quoted an official at the Imperial Household Agency (IHA) as saying. "The ...

BANGKOK: A former soldier fired gunshots in a coronavirus field hospital in Thailand on Thursday (Jun 24), killing a 54-year-old patient after earlier shooting dead a convenience store employee, police said. The suspect, 23, believed that the patien...

China has lodged a complaint with the World Trade Organization (WTO) over Australia's anti-dumping and anti-subsidy measures against Chinese railway wheels, wind towers and stainless steel sinks, the commerce ministry said on Thursday.

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysian oil services firm Serba Dinamik Holdings Bhd said on Thursday it has received notice from its external auditor KPMG handing in its resignation with immediate effect. In a stock exchange filing, Serba said KPMG stated in t...

JAKARTA: An influential firebrand cleric was sentenced to another four years in prison in Indonesia on Thursday (Jun 24) for concealing information about his coronavirus test result. The three-judge panel at East Jakarta District Court, which was un...

A Sydney-based Chilean woman accused of Pinochet-era crimes lost a court appeal Thursday against extradition to Chile to face seven counts of aggravated kidnapping.

BANGKOK: Hundreds of protesters rallied in Bangkok on Thursday (Jun 24) to call for the government's resignation, defying warnings from authorities about the kingdom's soaring COVID-19 caseload. The marches came on the 89th anniversary of the Siames...

JAKARTA: Generous Indonesians donating their spare change to the poor and needy are unwittingly helping finance deadly terror attacks and militant training camps in a scam that has netted big money for extremist groups. Former radical Khairul Ghaza...

HONG KONG: The Hong Kong government said on Wednesday (Jun 23) it will ban passenger flights from Indonesia from Friday, deeming the country's arrivals "extremely high risk" for COVID-19.  Authorities said flights would be suspended after the numb...

Former Philippines President Benigno Aquino, the son of two of the Southeast Asian country's democracy icons, died in a Manila hospital on Thursday (Jun 24) of renal failure as a result of diabetes, his family said.

SINGAPORE: Singapore Foreign Minister Vivian Balakrishnan has stressed the importance of advancing economic integration and maintaining trade and investment flows by strengthening supply chain resilience.  Dr Balakrishnan was speaking at the virt...

Hong Kongers queued Thursday for the final edition of the city's beloved pro-democracy tabloid Apple Daily after it was forced to close under a sweeping new national security law, ending a 26-year run of taking on China's authoritarian leaders.

Chinese audiences are no longer as fascinated by Hollywood films as they were 20 years ago and are increasingly embracing homegrown movies, says a media studies professor.

The beginnings of a G7 policy on China must reconcile many pushs and pulls, given interests within the western block may not always sync up, says Shruti Pandalai.

Phuket’s travel “sandbox” has the potential to be a game changer for the long-term suffering travel industry in Thailand, says NUS Business School’s Jochen Wirtz.

JAKARTA: President Joko Widodo has been criss-crossing vaccination centres in Jakarta, keeping tabs on the national vaccination programme and rallying those in the capital city to get inoculated quickly. “I have conveyed to the governor of Jakart...

In the chaotic, final hours of the Vietnam War, the US evacuated thousands of South Vietnamese who supported the American mission and were at risk under the communist government.

There is no meeting planned between US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi at a G20 gathering in Italy next week, a State Department official said on Wednesday, after the Financial Times reported that Beijing and W...

Chilean researchers have repurposed a carbon dioxide detector model to warn of the risk of contracting COVID-19 in enclosed spaces.

North Korea said it is not considering any contact with the United States, state media KCNA reported, citing Foreign Minister Ri Son Gwon on Wednesday.

Trade power tensions, regulatory hurdles and attempts by the West to counter Chinese competition are delaying a return of the 737 MAX in China, frustrating Boeing Co as a potential rival demonstrates its growing influence.

BANGKOK: Thai authorities warned demonstrators on Wednesday (Jun 23) against gathering to mark the anniversary of the Siamese Revolution, citing the kingdom's soaring COVID-19 infections. Key pro-democracy groups have announced plans for demonstrati...

TOKYO: A second COVID-19 case linked to the Ugandan Olympic team has been detected after a coach tested positive on arrival in Japan, a city official told AFP on Wednesday (Jun 23). The announcement comes as Olympic officials marked one month until ...

KUALA LUMPUR: Johor ruler Sultan Ibrahim Iskandar said on Wednesday (Jun 23) that he has given consent for the state assembly to reconvene on Aug 12. A statement issued by the Royal Press Office said that the sultan will open the state assembly ...

KUALA LUMPUR: Singapore sovereign wealth fund GIC will invest RM 750 million (US$180 million) in Sunway's healthcare business, the Malaysian conglomerate said on Wednesday (Jun 23). GIC will buy a 16 per cent stake in an agreement that values Sunw...

TOKYO: Japan's daily rate of COVID-19 vaccinations has reached a crucial milestone of 1 million, government data showed on Wednesday (Jun 23), as authorities scramble to recover lost time in inoculating the population. The figure is a critical thres...

Japan's top court on Wednesday ruled a law requiring married couples to have the same family name is constitutional, rejecting plaintiffs who sought the right to keep separate surnames, local media said.

MOSCOW: Myanmar's junta chief on Tuesday (Jun 22) thanked Russia, a major weapons supplier to the troubled Southeast Asian country, for strengthening the army which seized power in a coup earlier this year. Myanmar has been in turmoil since the mili...

KATHMANDU: Nepal’s Supreme Court delivered a fresh blow to embattled communist Prime Minister K P Sharma Oli by removing 20 recently appointed ministers, pending a ruling on whether a caretaker prime minister can make such sweeping cabinet changes....

BENGALURU: India on Tuesday (Jun 22) declared a new coronavirus variant to be of concern, and said nearly two dozen cases had been detected in three states. The variant, identified locally as "Delta plus", was found in 16 cases in the state of Maha...

TAIPEI: Taiwan will extend its coronavirus curbs by two more weeks until Jul 12, as the situation has yet to reach a point where they can be relaxed, Health Minister Chen Shih-chung said on Wednesday (Jun 23). Taiwan has been dealing with a rise in...

"Pride of China" Sun Yang is "a victim of political posturing" and did not break doping rules, his lawyer said, after a ban of more than four years forced the swimming star out of the Tokyo Olympics.

BENGALURU: India reported on Wednesday (Jun 23) 50,848 new COVID-19 infections over the past 24 hours, health ministry data showed. The nation's total infections now stand at 30.03 million, according to a Reuters tally. India also recorded another 1...

HONG KONG: Hong Kong's most vocal pro-democracy newspaper Apple Daily said it will print its last edition on Thursday (Jun 23) after a stormy year in which it was raided by police and its tycoon owner and other staff were arrested under a new nationa...

TAIPEI: A major Taiwanese Buddhist group said on Wednesday (Jun 23) that it was hoping to buy 5 million doses of Pfizer-BioNTech's COVID-19 vaccine, joining Foxconn and TSMC in trying to secure vaccines for the island. Taiwan's government has millio...

The stripped-back Tokyo Games, held despite the ongoing pandemic, will highlight the Olympics' "true values", Tokyo 2020 chief Seiko Hashimoto said as organisers mark a month to go.

A panda at Tokyo's Ueno zoo gave birth to twins on Wednesday, weeks after news of Shin Shin's pregnancy sent stocks in nearby restaurants soaring.

China on Wednesday reported 24 new coronavirus cases in the mainland for June 22, compared with 25 cases a day earlier, the health authority said.

The first trial under Hong Kong's new national security law begins on Wednesday (Jun 23) without a jury, a landmark moment for the financial hub's fast-changing legal traditions.

BANGKOK: Underreporting from strained medical systems and extensive social lockdowns could explain why many Southeast Asian countries have recorded substantially fewer cases of dengue fever in 2021 than previous years, said experts. Data from the W...

The favourable market conditions for IPOs might be coming to an end and could pose a problem for SoftBank’s Vision Fund, says David Kuo.

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysian conglomerate Sunway has agreed to sell around a 15 per cent stake in its healthcare unit to Singapore sovereign wealth fund GIC for RM700 million to RM800 million (US$168.3 million to 192.3 million), two sources familiar with ...

NAYPYIDAW: Deposed Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi appeared in a junta court again Tuesday (Jun 22) on trial for sedition and for flouting COVID-19 restrictions during an election her ousted party won in a landslide. A mass uprising in Myanmar again...

HONG KONG: An American lawyer working in Hong Kong was convicted of assaulting a policeman on Tuesday (Jun 22) when he intervened in a confrontation between the officer and members of the public during political unrest two years ago. Samuel Phillip ...

More than 40 countries led by Canada voiced grave concerns at the UN Human Rights Council on Tuesday about China's actions in Xinjiang, Hong Kong and Tibet - triggering a fierce backlash from Beijing.

TOKYO: The head of a major inquiry into Japan's nuclear disaster and a former senior Cabinet adviser have sounded alarm over plans this week to restart a 44-year old reactor, saying that the industry and government have not taken on board the lessons...

BEIJING: The vice mayor of Tianjin told financial institutions on Tuesday (Jun 22) he expected no additional state companies to default in the northern Chinese city and promised to maintain a healthy credit environment, three sources told Reuters. S...

Thai authorities on Tuesday (Jun 22) greenlighted a pilot model for quarantine-free travel to ultra-popular beach destination Phuket, a first step towards the tourist-hungry kingdom's goal of resuscitating its pandemic-battered economy.

The ill-fated inaugural World Test Championship final between India and New Zealand resumed at Southampton on Tuesday after an hour's delay following the latest rain interruption to blight the showpiece match.

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan has made an agreement to procure 13 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine from Pfizer, the country's health minister said on Tuesday (Jun 22). An exact timeline was not yet available, health minister Faisal Sultan told Reuters, but s...

KATHMANDU: Hong Kong resident Tsang Yin-Hung, who made the fastest ascent of Mount Everest by any woman, and dozens of other mountaineers from China are unable to get out of Nepal because of COVID-19 restrictions imposed by Beijing, they said. Nepal...

BENGALURU: India's COVID-19 vaccinations over the next few weeks could fall short of the blistering pace set on the first day of a federal campaign, unless it makes inroads in a vast hinterland and bridges a shortage of doses, experts said on Tuesda...

One million doses of AstraZeneca's COVID-19 vaccine will be transferred to Vietnam weekly starting next month to fulfil its order of 30 million doses within this year, state media reported on Tuesday.

China's longest-serving ambassador to Washington, Cui Tiankai, announced on Tuesday (Jun 22) that he will be leaving his post after eight years.

A Thai medical committee has agreed to narrow the gap between doses of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine to eight weeks from 10-12 weeks previously in places where there has been outbreaks of the Delta variant, an official said on Tuesday.

Olympic organisers plan to allow the sale of alcohol to Tokyo 2020 spectators, Kyodo News reported on Tuesday (Jun 22), drawing criticism from residents of the capital who face curbs on bars to prevent the spread of COVID-19.

Myanmar security forces backed by armoured vehicles clashed on Tuesday (Jun 22) with a newly formed militia group in the second-biggest city of Mandalay resulting in at least two casualties, according to members of the group and media reports. Since...

BERLIN: Germany needs an honest discussion about how to deal with trading partners such as China and must not duck confrontation if red lines on human rights are crossed, the head of the influential BDI industry association said on Tuesday (Jun 22). ...

HONG KONG: Hong Kong's embattled pro-democracy newspaper Apple Daily has been hit by a wave of resignations as authorities push to silence the outspoken tabloid and staff mull whether to leave or stay until the bitter end. On late Monday (Jun 21) ...

HONG KONG: Media outlets in Hong Kong must not "subvert" the government, the city's leader said on Tuesday (Jun 22), rejecting US criticism of recent action against a pro-democracy newspaper under a powerful new security law. Hong Kong has long host...

An aviation firm has carried out the first tests in India of longer-range drone deliveries, as hopes grow that they could deliver medicines as well as Covid-19 vaccines to remote areas.

SEOUL: An anonymous messaging app called Blind used by South Korean employees to air their grievances is helping change management attitudes towards workers in some of the nation's biggest companies. The bosses have taken note as the app's popularit...

SEOUL: The influential sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un said on Tuesday (Jun 22) that Washington had "wrong" expectations for dialogue with Pyongyang and was facing "greater disappointment", state media reported. Kim Yo Jong's comments came...

JAKARTA: Flag carrier Garuda Indonesia, which last week defaulted on a US$500 million sukuk, is considering a court supervised debt restructuring process and is in talks to slash its fleet size, company executives said on Monday (Jun 21). Sukuk is a...

TOKYO: From a state-of-the-art aquatics centre to a historic martial arts arena whose roof resembles Mount Fuji, Tokyo's Olympic sites are ready for action after a year's COVID-19 delay. The 43 venues are located in two main areas: The "Tokyo Bay Zo...

BANGKOK: An elephant broke into a house in the Thai resort town of Hua Hin in the early hours of Sunday (Jun 20), using its trunk to search for food through a hole in the kitchen wall. Resident Ratchadawan Puengprasopporn said her family was asleep ...

SHANGHAI: His bald head glistening with sweat, Zhi Xiang peers into the eyes of a stray dog whose coat has become matted in heavy rain and says soothingly: "Let me cut your hair, cutie." The bedraggled pooch is among scores of dogs hauled off the st...

China reported 25 new confirmed COVID-19 cases in the mainland for June 21, up from 17 infections a day earlier, the health authority said on Tuesday.

The United States and South Korea have agreed to consider scrapping a working group established to coordinate North Korea policy, Seoul's foreign ministry said on Tuesday, after it became seen as a way for Washington to block inter-Korean projects.

Reported deaths from COVID-19 in Colombia passed 100,000 on Monday (Jun 21), the country's health ministry said, amid warnings of potential scarcity of treatment drugs and oxygen in hospitals during a long and brutal third peak of infections and deat...

PHNOM PENH: A Cambodian court has charged four environmental activists with insulting the king and plotting against the government, an official said on Monday (Jun 21), after three of them were arrested for documenting waste run-off into a river. Un...

Thousands of Japanese companies began distributing COVID-19 vaccines to workers and their families on Monday (Jun 21) in an employer-led drive reaching more than 13 million people that aims to rev up the nation's slow vaccine rollout.

President Rodrigo Duterte threatened to jail people who refuse to be vaccinated against the coronavirus as the Philippines battles one of Asia's worst outbreaks, with over 1.3 million cases and more than 23,000 deaths.

Lawyers for Myanmar's ousted leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, said on Monday (Jun 21) she told them some of the testimony against her was wrong in her trial on criminal charges that could send her to prison and end her political career.