WASHINGTON: US President Joe Biden and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Monday (Aug 3) discussed China's "arbitrary detention" of two Canadian citizens. In a telephone conversation, the two leaders discussed Beijing's two-year detention of...

HONG KONG: One of Hong Kong's best known artists confirmed on Tuesday (Aug 3) that he had moved to Taiwan in search of "100 per cent freedom" from the government's crackdown on dissent. Kacey Wong's departure is the latest blow to Hong Kong's reputa...

MUMBAI :India's industrial hub of Maharashtra state eased COVID-19 restrictions in most districts on Tuesday, including in the financial capital of Mumbai, after a steady decline in new cases.

Japan will shift policy to focus on hospitalising patients who are seriously ill with the COVID-19 and those at risk of becoming so, officials said, to avoid strain on the medical system as cases surge in Olympics host city Tokyo and elsewhere.

The IOC said on Tuesday it was waiting for a report later in the day from the Belarusian National Olympic Committee on the case of sprinter Krystsina Tsimanouskaya, after launching an investigation into the incident that has rocked the Games.

ENOSHIMA: It’s been a journey that has taken them all across to the globe, through rough winds and sometimes stormy seas, but Kimberly Lim and Cecilia Low’s effort shone through as they recorded Singapore’s best finish in a sailing event at the...

Authorities in Wuhan on Tuesday said they would test its entire population for Covid-19 after the central Chinese city where the coronavirus emerged reported its first local infections in more than a year.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un requested that South Korea reconnect hotlines which Pyongyang severed a year ago, a South Korean lawmaker said on Tuesday after being briefed by his country's intelligence agency.

South Korea has detected its first two cases of the new Delta Plus COVID-19 variant, the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) said on Tuesday, as the country battles with its fourth wave of infections nationwide.

In the year since making an unprecedented, taboo-breaking speech openly calling for discussion on the role of Thailand's powerful king, human rights lawyer Arnon Nampa has spent months in jail, charged with the crime of defaming the monarchy.

WASHINGTON: The United States said on Monday (Aug 2) that Myanmar's junta was playing for time with a two-year election timeframe as Secretary of State Antony Blinken prepared to encourage ASEAN to appoint an envoy. Blinken is participating virtual...

Thinking it had COVID-19 under control, Vietnam was reluctant to enter the global vaccine market. Now it's behind in the queue even as cases rise, says this researcher.

From a persistent lack of financial resources to baseless accusations from the Philippine government, weightlifter Hidilyn Diaz beat all odds to bag her country’s first Olympic gold medal.

Thousands more Afghans who may be targets of Taliban violence due to their US affiliations will have the opportunity to resettle as refugees in the United States under a new program announced by the State Department on Monday (Aug 2).

JAKARTA: Indonesian President Joko Widodo announced on Monday (Aug 2) that the current restrictions put in place to curb the spread of COVID-19 will be extended until Aug 9. Several cities and regencies, including the Indonesian capital Jakarta, ha...

BANGKOK: Thailand will increase the number of people required to isolate at home with COVID-19 to 100,000, health officials said on Monday (Aug 2), as capacity in healthcare facilities dwindles amid a surge in cases driven by the Delta variant of the...

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia's health ministry reported 219 coronavirus deaths on Monday (Aug 2), a daily record, bringing the Southeast Asian country's total toll since the start of the pandemic to 9,403 deaths. The ministry also reported 15,764 new COVI...

BEIJING: The Delta variant poses new risks for the world's second-biggest economy as it spreads from the coast to China's inland cities and presents fresh challenges to authorities who have for months managed to avert any widespread outbreak of the c...

Hong Kong civil servants, teachers and healthcare workers must get vaccinated against COVID-19 or pay for regular testing, the city's leader announced on Monday (Aug 2), as her administration adopted a push into mandatory inoculations.

BEIJING: More than 300 people died in recent flooding in China's Henan province, authorities said on Monday (Aug 2), three times the previously announced toll.  The Henan provincial government said 302 people died and 50 remain missing. The vast m...

KUALA LUMPUR: The five-day special parliamentary meeting which began last Monday (Jul 26) was supposed to allow the Malaysian government to brief lawmakers about its COVID-19 response and pave the way for an eventual hybrid parliament sitting. Howev...

MANILA: The Philippines will extend a night curfew in the capital, Manila, amid a tightening of curbs in the Southeast Asian country to combat a potential surge in cases of the Delta variant of COVID-19, a government official said on Monday (Aug 2). ...

JAKARTA: Indonesia's devastating second coronavirus wave, which saw the Southeast Asian country become the epicentre of Asia's COVID-19 outbreak, has peaked, its health minister said on Monday (Aug 2). Driven by the highly transmissible Delta varian...

JAKARTA: Indonesia's foreign minister urged Myanmar on Monday (Aug 2) to approve the appointment of an Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) special envoy and said little progress had been made on a plan to promote talks between Myanmar's ri...

HONG KONG: Hong Kong's anti-corruption watchdog on Monday (Aug 2) charged a singer and prominent pro-democracy activist, Anthony Wong, with "corrupt conduct" at a 2018 election rally, the latest legal action against dissent by authorities in the city...

NEW DELHI: Two states in India's north-east have agreed to resolve their differences peacefully after their long-running border dispute erupted into deadly violence last week. Last Monday (Jul 26) clashes on the demarcation between Assam and Mizoram...

JAKARTA: A 5.9-magnitude quake struck off the coast of Indonesia's easternmost Papua region on Monday (Aug 2), the United States Geological Survey said, but there was no tsunami warning or immediate reports of damage. The quake hit at a relatively...

Kai Koyama was standing outside Tokyo's Olympic Stadium as fireworks burst overhead during the opening ceremony but unlike many of those around him he wasn't cheering, but protesting.

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysian opposition leaders including Mr Anwar Ibrahim and Dr Mahathir Mohamad gathered at the Merdeka Square on Monday (Aug 2), after they were blocked by the authorities from entering the parliament building. Monday’s special parl...

SEOUL: South Korea said on Monday (Aug 2) no decision has yet been made on its joint military exercises with the United States but they should not create tension, after North Korea warned the South against holding the exercises amid signs of a thaw ...

Tokyo Olympics organisers reported on Monday 17 new Games-related COVID-19 cases including one athlete, bringing the total number since July 1 to 276.

US shot putter Raven Saunders has risked disciplinary action after making the first podium protest of the Olympic Games.

On the one hand, Malaysia is embracing shifts bringing forth more renewables and electric vehicles. But on the other, it’s opening big oil facilities, says Renato Lima-de-Oliveira.

Foreign ministers from members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) are under pressure to appoint a special envoy to Myanmar this week after months of negotiations failed to find a consensus candidate.

Indonesia extended restrictions outside Java island by another week in efforts to control the spread of the coronavirus, local media reported on Sunday citing an interior ministry senior official.

China's world's number two Chen Yu Fei took badminton women's singles gold, beating Taiwan's Tai Tzu-ying 21-18 19-21 21-18 in Sunday's final.

Kim Yo Jong, the sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, said on Sunday that if South Korea carries out a planned joint military exercise with the United States it will damage the resolve of the two Koreas to rebuild relations, state media KCNA re...

The International Olympic Committee does not plan to call for a moment of silence at the Tokyo Games on Aug. 6, the anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima in 1945, instead aiming to honour it in the Tokyo 2020 closing ceremony, organisers sai...

Thailand on Sunday extended tighter containment measures in the capital and high-risk provinces until the end of August, government sources said, to slow the spread of COVID-19 as the country deals with its biggest outbreak to date.

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia on Sunday (Aug 1) reported 17,150 new COVID-19 cases - the country's fourth-highest daily tally to date.  The new cases have brought the national tally of coronavirus infections to 1,130,422, said health director-general...

2 rare Sumatran tigers recovering after catching COVID-19

The 430-metre glass-bottomed pedestrian bridge, designed by Israeli architect Haim Dotan and opened in August 2016, was once the longest glass-bottomed suspension bridge in the world.

Cambodia will begin offering a booster shot against Covid-19, switching between the AstraZeneca and Chinese COVID-19 vaccines in an effort to fight the spread of the coronavirus in the Southeast Asian country.

Chinese cities rolled out mass testing of millions of people and imposed fresh travel restrictions as health authorities battled Sunday to contain the country's most widespread coronavirus outbreak in months.

TOKYO: South Korea's An San was ice-cool as she defied online sexist abuse to seal a hat-trick of gold medals at the Tokyo Olympics, but the ace archer has been fighting discrimination since she was a child. An's three golds in three archery events ...

Afghan government forces struggled against Taliban assaults on several major cities Sunday as the insurgents stepped up a nationwide offensive that saw a key airport in the south come under rocket fire overnight.

Myanmar has endured six months of turmoil since the military deposed Aung San Suu Kyi's government and ended the country's decade-old experiment with democracy.

BANGKOK: Myanmar's military ruler Min Aung Hlaing on Sunday (Aug 1) again promised new multi-party elections and said his government is ready to work with any special envoy named by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). He also saidÂ...

Bangkok: As COVID-19 cases surge in Thailand, some Buddhist monks are donning personal protective equipment over their distinctive robes, delivering oxygen cylinders, taking nasal samples to help with testing, and even helping carry the dead to the c...

BOGOR, Indonesia: Panas begitu menyengat saat empat sukarelawan dari gugus tugas COVID-19 setempat, berlapiskan alat pelindung diri lengkap, turun ke kawasan padat penduduk di Bogor, salah satu kota satelit Jakarta. Bermandikan keringat, dengan kaca...

BOGOR, Indonesia: The sun was blazing hot when four volunteers from the local COVID-19 task force, draped in full personal protective gear, descended on a densely populated neighbourhood in Bogor, one of Jakarta’s satellite cities.  Soaking in sw...

WASHINGTON: US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will meet virtually with Southeast Asian officials every day next week, a senior state department official said on Saturday (Jul 31), as Washington seeks to show the region it’s a US priority whi...

Top Indian and Chinese army commanders met on Saturday (Jul 31) after a gap of three months to discuss the expeditious disengagement of thousands of forces in a bid to ease the 15-month border tensions and clashes.

The mastermind behind a 2019 attack that killed 40 Indian paramilitary troops has been killed in a shootout with security forces, Indian police in Kashmir said on Saturday.

The former member of Korean boy band EXO was accused earlier by a teenager of having sex with her while she was drunk. Wu denied the accusation.

Bishop: Albany diocese covered up priest abuse for decades

BANGKOK: A Thai hospital morgue overwhelmed by COVID-19 deaths has begun storing bodies in refrigerated containers, resorting to a measure it last took in a devastating 2004 tsunami, as the country grapples with its biggest coronavirus outbreak. Tha...

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia’s special parliamentary meeting next Monday (Aug 2) will be postponed to a future date due to COVID-19 cases being detected in parliament, said the secretary of the House of Representatives. In a statement issued on Saturday...

SHIMULIA, Bangladesh: Hundreds of thousands of Bangladeshi garment workers rushed back to major cities on Saturday (Jul 31), besieging train and bus stations, after the government said export factories could reopen despite a deadly coronavirus wave. ...

KUALA LUMPUR: Hundreds of black-clad Malaysians staged an anti-government protest on Saturday (Jul 31) in defiance of a ban on public gatherings under coronavirus curbs, piling pressure on the embattled prime minister to resign. The mostly young pro...

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia's king extended a state of emergency in the eastern state of Sarawak until February 2022 to suspend regional elections amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Malaysia is under emergency rule nationally to prevent the spread of COVID-19 ...

BEIJING: China's worst COVID-19 outbreak in months has spread to two more parts of the country, health authorities said on Saturday (Jul 21), including a sprawling megacity of 31 million people. The National Health Commission reported 55 new cases...

Tokyo Olympics organisers on Saturday reported 21 new Games-related COVID-19 cases.

With the pandemic worsening, CNA looks back at how the situation unfolded from one that seemed to be under control, to record cases after the Idul Fitri holiday.

WASHINGTON: The first flight evacuating Afghans who worked alongside Americans in Afghanistan brought more than 200 people, including scores of children and babies in arms, to new lives in the United States on Friday (Jul 30), and President Joe Bide...

SHANGHAI: China has opened the doors to what it bills as the world's largest planetarium, a slick new Shanghai facility showcasing the nation's recent extra-terrestrial exploits while notably downplaying those of space pioneers like the United States...

BEIJING: A reactor at a nuclear plant in southern China has been shut down because it is damaged, the operator said on Friday (Jul 30), but it insisted there were no major safety issues. Chinese authorities last month blamed minor fuel rod damage fo...

SINGAPORE: US Vice President Kamala Harris will make her first official visit to Singapore and Vietnam next month, the White House announced on Friday (Jul 30), adding that the trip is aimed at strengthening ties with "two critical Indo-Pacific part...

COLOMBO: Sri Lanka announced Friday (Jul 30) it was ending its work-from-home option for civil servants, ordering all 1.2 million back to the office from Monday despite a surge in coronavirus infections. The island's top bureaucrat, PB Jayasundera, ...

HONG KONG: Hong Kong police said on Friday (Jul 30) they had arrested a 40-year-old man for booing China's national anthem in a shopping mall broadcasting live the city's first Olympic gold medal win in 25 years earlier this week. More than 100 peop...

GYODA: From the ground, there's not much to distinguish the rice stalks in a field in Japan's Gyoda. It's only seen from above that a massive artwork marking the Olympics emerges. The huge, living installation features iconic Japanese images: The fa...

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia marked a record 183,706 active COVID-19 cases as of Friday (Jul 30) as health authorities also grappled with an all-time high of critically ill patients. A total of 1,055 patients are now warded in the intensive care unit, th...

NEW DELHI: The Indian state of Assam has advised its residents to avoid travelling to neighbouring Mizoram after six policemen were shot dead in a rare border clash between the two regions. India's northeast has been a hotbed of ethnic tensions sinc...

SHANGHAI: China's eastern city of Nanjing reported 13 new domestically transmitted COVID-19 cases on Thursday (Jul 29), bringing the total to 184 since Jul 20, as the country's latest major outbreak caused by the more contagious Delta variant persi...

BANGKOK: Thailand on Friday (Jul 30) banned the dissemination of "false messages" that affect security, drawing accusations from media groups that it is trying to crack down on criticism of its handling of the coronavirus pandemic. Prime Minister Pr...

SEOUL: South Korea announced on Friday (Jul 30) plans to expand its coronavirus vaccine rollout to people aged 18 to 49, as the country grapples with record high daily cases driven mostly by infections in the unvaccinated younger population. South K...

COX'S BAZAR, Bangladesh: Monsoon floods and landslides have cut off more than 300,000 people in villages across southeast Bangladesh and killed at least 20 people including six Rohingya refugees, officials said Friday (Jul 30). The region along the...

HANOI: Vietnam's health ministry issued an urgent appeal on Friday (Jul 30) for private hospitals to treat COVID-19 patients as the Southeast Asian country battles a surge in infections driven by the highly contagious Delta variant. After successful...

PUTRAJAYA: Eleven COVID-19 cases were detected on Thursday (Jul 29) at a special sitting of Malaysia's Dewan Rakyat, the lower house of parliament.  Ten of these cases were detected using antigen saliva test kits, health director-general Noor His...

KUALA LUMPUR: A former media adviser to former Malaysia prime minister Najib Razak has had money laundering charges dropped after agreeing to pay US$1.7 million to scandal-hit sovereign wealth fund 1MDB, officials said on Friday (Jul 30). Briton Pau...

TOKYO: A Frenchman who went on hunger strike in Tokyo seeking access to his children said on Friday (Jul 30) he had ended his protest to undergo surgery on his finger after a fall. For three weeks, Vincent Fichot sat outside a train station near the...

HONG KONG: Hong Kong police on Friday (Jul 30) said they had launched an investigation into Olympic Games fans who booed China's national anthem and drowned it out with chanting during a public screening at a mall. The international finance hub ha...

HONG KONG: The first person convicted under Hong Kong's national security law was sentenced to nine years for terrorist activities and inciting secession, judges said on Friday (Jul 30), in a watershed ruling with long-term implications for the city...

India reported 44,230 new COVID-19 cases on Friday, the most in three weeks, the latest evidence of a worrying trend of rising cases that has forced one state to lock down amid fears of another wave of infections.

MANILA: Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte on Friday (Jul 30) approved the imposition of lockdown measures in the capital region, in a bid to contain the spread of the Delta coronavirus variant and to shield the country's medical system. The Manil...

BANGKOK: Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha on Thursday (Jul 29) downplayed the COVID-19 situation Thailand, while claiming that other nations are dealing with higher caseloads. In a special interview held at the Government House, he said: “If we...

Activists allege Myanmar leaders are 'weaponizing' COVID-19

The Philippines has fully restored a crucial agreement governing the U.S. troop presence in the country, the Southeast Asian nation's defence minister Delfin Lorenzana said on Friday.

In Beijing's exclusive Haidian district, Zhao says she ploughs $10,000 a year into extra classes for her eight-year-old, a leg up in the competitive scramble of modern China -- and an advantage the state now wants to restrict.

JAKARTA: Indonesia is hoping to ramp up its COVID-19 vaccination drive to administer up to 2.5 million jabs a day by September and eventually achieve a daily rollout of 5 million doses, its Coordinating Minister for Maritime Affairs and Investment Lu...

YANGON: Imprisoned by the military, detained Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi is isolated from the young protesters now forging their own struggle for democracy outside of her shadow. Sunday (Aug 1) marks six months since her National League for Dem...

SEMARANG: Pedalling through the Indonesian city of Semarang, Arrahman Surya Atmaja stops at a pharmacy to pick up some vitamins before hitting the road again to deliver them to a person isolating at home. The 35-year-old is part of a small group of ...

The United States is "deeply concerned with the increasingly harsh surveillance, harassment, and intimidation of U.S. and other foreign journalists" covering recent floods in China's Henan province, the State Department said on Thursday.

TOKYO: Tokyo Olympics organisers on Friday (Jul 30) reported 27 new Games-related COVID-19 cases, including three athletes. The latest daily cases, up from 24 on Thursday, have brought the total Games-linked infections since Jul 1 to 220. Japan's g...

SHANGHAI: China reported on Friday (Jul 30) 64 new COVID-19 cases in the mainland for Jul 29, compared with 49 cases a day earlier, the health authority said. The National Health Commission said in a statement 21 of the new infections were local ca...

TOKYO: Japan on Friday (Jul 30) extended a state of emergency in Tokyo and expanded the measure to four more regions as it battles a surge in COVID-19 cases a week into the pandemic-postponed Olympics.   "We will issue a state of emergency for Sai...

TOKYO: The Tokyo Olympics is running a village for athletes and coaches where more than 80 per cent are vaccinated against the coronavirus, testing is compulsory and movement is stringently curtailed. None of that is true for the giant Japanese capi...

As COVID-19 rages in Southeast Asia, regional governments are racing to roll out their national vaccination programmes. In the third and final part of a series, CNA looks at how Malaysia is banking on a high vaccination rate to tackle the pandemic.

Taliban assassinations of Afghan pilots detailed by Reuters this month mark another "worrisome development" for the Afghan Air Force as it reels from a surge in fighting, a US government watchdog said in a report released on Thursday (Jul 29).

Britain warned the United Nations Security Council Thursday that half of coup-wracked Myanmar's population of 54 million could become infected with Covid-19 within the next two weeks.