Asia

FamilyMart in Malaysia has taken immediate disciplinary action by suspending an employee who allegedly threw hot soup at a delivery rider, as seen in a viral video. The popular Japanese convenience store chain has apologised for the employee’s actions and for the delay in providing an update. “We have attended to the well-being of the delivery rider, cooperating fully with the authorities in their investigation and continued our own internal investigation and Domestic Inquiry in accordance with...

As South Koreans brace for another sweltering summer, a grim joke has taken hold in casual conversation: “This will be the coolest summer for the rest of our lives.” For many young people, that line is no longer dark humour but a blunt summary of how the climate crisis feels – relentless, immediate and deeply personal. Among South Korea’s young generations, a wave of what experts call “climate anxiety” is reshaping their daily lives, from how they exercise and shop to whether they plan to marry...

North Korean ruler Kim Jong-un’s recent display of nuclear-processing capabilities appears timed with reports of an impending visit by China’s leader and fuelled by insecurities about Seoul’s nuclear submarine talks with Washington. Analysts also say that mounting trilateral talks involving the United States, Japan and South Korea have galvanised Kim into doubling down on Pyongyang’s status as a nuclear-armed state. The state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) announced on Friday that Xi...

Listening to US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth at the recently concluded Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore, I thought of the iconic Sichuan opera act of face-changing, where performers switch masks in an instant. Last year, Hegseth’s speech at the event was filled with blatant attacks on China. This year, he put on a completely different face, declaring that: “Under President Trump’s leadership, relations between the United States and China are better than they’ve been in many years.” Why this...

Japanese homemaker Maki Watanabe carefully ⁠pours into a plastic bottle the oil she used to cook her ⁠deep-fried aubergines, doing her part in her Tokyo kitchen for a national effort to ramp up production of eco-friendly jet fuel. “It would take a tremendous amount to make an aircraft fly, so I hope we can collect more,” said Watanabe, whose penchant for cooking allows her to donate about 40 litres (10 gallons) a year. Her contribution is pooled at a nearby supermarket that is among roughly 300...

For Beijing-based METiS TechBio CEO Lai Tsai-ta, ageing is comparable to bugs building up in a complex software system – it happens once errors begin to accumulate in the genetic code of human cells, such as their DNA sequences. “Those errors can be reprogrammed. It becomes possible to use AI to read, rewrite and reverse cells, or at least slow the ageing process,” Lai said in an interview with the South China Morning Post. The process could begin by fixing “immune cells, such as T cells, as...

Waves break along Cenang Beach as the sun drops over the Andaman Sea, washing Langkawi’s white sand in gold. Tourists sip fresh coconuts beneath rows of bright umbrellas, gazing out at the “Jewel of Kedah”: a duty-free archipelago long sold as one of Malaysia’s premier tropical escapes. Out on the water, meanwhile, small boats traverse the 8km (five miles) of open water that separates Langkawi from Thailand’s Koh Tarutao. On fast boats, the crossing takes a matter of minutes. No navigation...

Indonesia is considering buying hi-tech policing equipment from China, setting out a shopping list for technology ranging from drones to tactical armoured vehicles at a police equipment trade show in Beijing. The Indonesian National Police is particularly interested in counterterrorism equipment, including intelligence technology, tactical weapons, bomb disposal gear and special purpose vehicles, according to a list of requirements released at a forum held at the expo on Thursday. Most of this...

While a wave of job cuts across Asia’s finance and other industries due to wider use of artificial intelligence has spurred concerns, a new study shows that the technology’s net impact on employment is not as clear-cut. Recruiters and industry observers say many companies are adding AI-related roles without having to lay off workers. A study by professional services firm Aon released on Wednesday shows that 74 per cent of 504 companies surveyed across industries in the Asia-Pacific region have...

Thailand said on Friday it will join a UN arbitration process chosen by Cambodia to resolve a festering maritime boundary dispute, but put on hold for now other two-way efforts to settle their contested borders. This week Cambodia launched a compulsory conciliation process under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (Unclos), after Bangkok decided last month to unilaterally end a ‌2001 framework pact for talks on a disputed maritime belt. For more than 25 years, both have claimed...

China-Canada relations are undergoing a thaw after years of estrangement and recrimination. China and India are seeking a rapprochement despite deep-seated distrust and sometimes violent border disputes. Both cases share a common element: Donald Trump. Meanwhile, following the US president’s visit to Beijing, his defence secretary Pete Hegseth avoided mentioning Taiwan at the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore. He sounded almost conciliatory by hailing ties with Beijing as “better than they’ve...

Asia’s governments have spent years promising to protect the seas that feed their people, shelter their coasts and support some of the world’s richest marine life. World Ocean Day on Monday will put those promises back in the public spotlight, but the more consequential test will come days later in Mombasa, Kenya, where governments, donors, companies and conservation groups will gather for the 11th annual Our Ocean Conference from June 16 to 18. The conference has become a key stage for global...

The Philippines’ landslide defeat to Kyrgyzstan for a UN Security Council seat has dealt a blow to Manila’s long-running campaign to raise its international diplomatic profile through the prestigious body, prompting questions about President Ferdinand Marcos Jnr’s foreign policy legacy. Analysts said the loss reflected the appeal of having under-represented Central Asia play a role in the council, Kyrgyzstan’s perceived neutrality and the geopolitical baggage attached to the Philippines as a...

Pig farmers in the central state of Selangor have spent years trying to keep their business out of Malaysia’s culture wars. A royal decree has dragged them straight into one. The state’s decision to shut down pig farms, prompted by Sultan Sharafuddin Idris Shah, Selangor’s hereditary ruler, has transformed a long-standing local dispute over pollution and odour into a flashpoint touching on royal influence, the livelihoods of a minority community and the delicate balancing act facing Malaysia’s...

China and South Korea will allow 70 more flights per week between the two countries in view of fast-growing, two-way tourism and a drop in Chinese group travel to Japan. The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport in Seoul said in a statement Thursday that passenger flight capacity would grow from 608 to 664 per week and that maximum air freight flights would expand from 54 to 68 per week. These expansions, the first since before the Covid pandemic, reflect a surge in two-way tourism,...

A proposal by the Quad to build a port in Fiji, seen by analysts as a move to counter China’s rising economic clout in the Pacific region, has fuelled doubts about whether the four-member security bloc is committed to completing the project amid differing policy priorities. At a meeting of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, or Quad, in New Delhi last week, the foreign ministers of Australia, India, Japan and the United States – Penny Wong, S. Jaishankar, Toshimitsu Motegi and US Secretary of...

A race to dig rare earths and metals in the mineral-rich mountains of eastern Myanmar is polluting waterways that millions of people living downstream depend on after a new tungsten mine reportedly began operations near the Thai border, according to environmental groups. Myanmar is among the top three producing nations of rare earths and other critical minerals used to make magnets and other components that power products ranging from smartphones to electric vehicles, with most of its output...

Malaysia is heading into a run of state elections, including two triggered by early assembly dissolutions, after Negeri Sembilan became the latest state to call a snap poll amid fraying ties inside Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim’s ruling alliance. While the polls will not directly affect Anwar’s parliamentary majority, they will test whether his federal partners can keep their coalition functioning at the state level or whether local disputes will deepen the fractures between them. On Friday,...

Brunei’s Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah has named one of his youngest sons as foreign minister in a major cabinet reshuffle – largely seen as a move to prepare for the next generation of leaders in the oil-rich kingdom. As the 10th child and fourth son of the sultan, Prince Abdul Mateen is down the line of succession, but his matinee idol looks have earned him more than 3 million followers on Instagram, providing a modern face to the royal family. Another younger son, Prince Abdul Malik, was also...

The threat by the US to impose additional tariffs on imports from India over forced labour supply-chain concerns is a “pressure” tactic deployed by Washington to drive a harder bargain in its trade talks with New Delhi, according to analysts. Following a Section 301 unfair trade practices investigation, the Trump administration proposed that products from India, China, Japan, South Korea, Brazil and Switzerland would be subject to a 12.5 per cent levy, while a 10 per cent rate would apply to...

Homes in New Zealand’s capital were flooded with faeces and sanitary products on Friday after an overnight storm blocked waste water pipes, the city’s utilities company said. Wellington Water said the waste water overflow in the picturesque suburb of Island Bay was the result of a blocked main. It said five properties were affected by the overflow and its crews were working to remove the faeces and sanitary products and disinfect the homes. “There is a suction truck on-site at the overflow,”...

A revision to Malaysia’s public university admissions rules has reopened one of the multicultural country’s most sensitive political debates: how far its national education system should accommodate Chinese-language schooling. Malaysia’s government on May 15 said students from Chinese independent secondary schools could apply to public universities through specified pathways using the Unified Examination Certificate (UEC), the school-leaving qualification used by those institutions. The decision...

Asia-Pacific is expected to drive global retail sales over the next five years, even as the Middle East conflict is hurting consumer confidence, according to business analysts. The war could continue to weigh on consumer and business sentiment for now due to higher energy prices and supply chain disruption, Anand Ramanathan, Deloitte Asia-Pacific’s retail and consumer products sector leader, said in an interview. “As borrowing costs rise and financial conditions tighten, consumers and businesses...

South Korea’s Ministry of Justice on Tuesday sought to defuse criticism over a 1.2 billion won (US$779,162) plan to install air conditioning in prisons, clarifying the equipment will cool corridors, not inmates’ cells. The ministry framed the installation as a minimal measure to protect vulnerable inmates and correctional officers from extreme heat, while online critics condemned the taxpayer-funded project as an unfair convenience for criminals. The ministry said the equipment will be installed...

The recent deaths of two men from crocodile attacks in North Sumatra have put a spotlight on Indonesia’s record as the country with the world’s highest number of such killings annually, raising questions over whether habitat destruction is pushing people and wildlife into increasingly dangerous contact. Environmental groups said the deaths reflected a wider pattern across the archipelago, where logging, plantations and other land-use changes had destabilised ecosystems. The first incident was on...

Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi is considering visiting India early next month to meet with her counterpart Narendra Modi to discuss cooperation on strengthening supply chains of critical goods given concerns about China’s economic coercion, government sources said on Thursday. Takaichi aims to deepen bilateral collaboration in a wide range of fields covering defence, economic issues and cutting-edge technologies such as semiconductors and artificial intelligence, according to the...

A new India-US pact on critical minerals has put the spotlight on New Delhi’s potential as an alternative to China, but analysts say despite the country’s significant resources, it is unlikely to dent Beijing’s dominance in the sector any time soon. Delhi and Washington signed a framework agreement on May 26 during US Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s visit to India to secure supplies of critical minerals and rare earths, including their mining and processing. According to a US embassy statement,...

A ⁠dozen people ⁠have died in a fire at a home for older people in ‌Sri Lanka, police said on Thursday, while another eight have been hospitalised. The fire, which broke out at ⁠a home in Anguruwatota 55km (34 miles) from the commercial capital Colombo, ‌has been put out and ⁠the ⁠director of the establishment has ‌been arrested, police said. “A total of 51 ‌people were ‌rescued from the ‌home and they are being ⁠looked after by the military ⁠and public officials in the area,” police...

South Korean President Lee Jae Myung’s ruling party swept most of the country’s major local elections, but a narrow defeat in Seoul has given conservatives a foothold to challenge his reform agenda. The loss in the capital, South Korea’s political and property-market centre, has taken the shine off an otherwise dominant performance by the ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK), dealing a blow to Lee’s plans for tougher real estate taxation, according to observers. Across the country, the DPK won...