Asia

Singapore’s Home Affairs and Law Minister K. Shanmugam and Manpower Minister Tan See Leng said on Tuesday they would donate to charity the damages awarded to them in their defamation suit against Bloomberg. In separate social media posts published on Tuesday night, hours after the High Court delivered its judgment, the ministers reiterated that the lawsuit was about protecting their integrity and reputations, as well as the standing of their ministerial offices. Earlier on Tuesday, the High...

Thousands of Indonesian free meals kitchens complained on Tuesday they had ⁠been left in the lurch ⁠by the government’s move to scale ⁠down President Prabowo Subianto’s flagship free meals programme to save money. Jakarta is considering a potential budget cut of more than US$2 billion with reductions in the number of beneficiaries and kitchen operators. There are currently nearly 28,000 kitchens ‌and the National Nutrition Agency (NNA) plans to temporarily halt the addition of 13,000 new...

An American marine biologist was shot and killed by three men who barged into his house in the central Philippines over the weekend and efforts were underway to apprehend the suspects, police said on Tuesday. Police said Kent Carpenter, 73, was with his Filipino companion in a house in the coastal town of Sibulan in Negros Oriental province on Sunday night when three men, whose faces were covered, forced their way in. One drew a gun and shot Carpenter in the head, killing him instantly, police...

Indonesia’s Ministry of Religious Affairs is drafting educational material aimed at discouraging what officials call the spread of “LGBT culture”, after a presidential regulation listed the issue among the country’s non-military security threats. Officials said the content, which was still under discussion, could be included in religious education in regular and Islamic schools, as well as Friday prayer sermons, family development programmes and other religious events. The government has said...

India summoned Iran’s senior diplomat in New Delhi on Tuesday to protest against attacks on two commercial vessels in the Strait of Hormuz that killed an Indian seafarer and wounded several others. The Indian foreign ministry said it had summoned the deputy chief of mission of the Iranian embassy in the capital to register “a strong protest” against the attacks reported early on Tuesday. The two vessels had a total of 46 crew members, including 30 Indians, one of whom has “tragically lost his...

Asia’s economies are once again staring down the barrel of the Strait of Hormuz as the latest breakdown of the US-Iran ceasefire and Washington’s decision to impose a blockade-cum-toll threaten to keep energy costs elevated and shipping flows under strain. But economists and shipping analysts say the region is better placed to absorb the blow this time round. Oil prices jumped to a one-month high of US$84.78 a barrel on Tuesday morning as renewed fighting between Iran and the US over control of...

Singapore President Tharman Shanmugaratnam’s first state visit to Malaysia this week comes amid strengthening ties between the neighbours and a greater willingness on both sides to let go of historical “baggage”, analysts say. Observers add that the new generation of Southeast Asian leaders also possesses a heightened awareness of mutual needs in an increasingly fragmented world order. Tharman, who was elected president in 2023 after stepping down as senior minister, is on a state visit to Kuala...

The High Court in Singapore has awarded two cabinet ministers S$230,000 (US$177,860) each in damages following a defamation trial involving financial news outlet Bloomberg and one of its reporters over the officials’ property transactions. In January last year, K. Shanmugam, the coordinating minister for national security, and Tan See Leng, the manpower chief, filed separate suits against Bloomberg and its reporter Low De Wei over a story titled “Singapore mansion deals are increasingly shrouded...

Rosmah Mansor has slapped Malaysian comedian Harith Iskander with a defamation lawsuit over a stand-up comedy routine that allegedly mocked and insulted her. Rosmah, the wife of former Malaysian prime minister Najib Razak, filed the writ of summons at the High Court on June 9. According to her statement of claim, the alleged defamation occurred during Harith’s performance, titled “Harith Iskander: The Outspoken Comedy Tour”, at the Swiss-Garden Hotel in Melaka on January 17. Rosmah claimed that...

If you have been holding out for cheaper durians, you may not want to wait much longer. Just weeks after a bumper harvest sent durian prices tumbling across Singapore, sellers said the unusually abundant supply has begun easing since last week as Malaysian state Johor’s durian season winds down. They believe the days of heavily discounted durians and free giveaways have come to an end. “The supply is still there, but not much,” Alvin Teoh, owner of popular Geylang fruit shop Durian 36, said. The...

In the fields of central Luzon, farmers who planted their rice in June are watching the sky with worry. Out over the Pacific, a familiar spectre is gathering strength – and with it, the threat of empty granaries and hungry households. The Philippines has a plan for this year’s “super” El Nino, on paper at least. But to the Filipinos out actually working the paddies, that plan is barely perceptible. “We don’t see anything visible, it’s all talk,” said Raul Montemayor, national manager of the...

A man suspected of repeatedly stalking a 22-year-old university student has been arrested in Malaysia after CCTV footage showing him sniffing her shoes outside her flat went viral on social media. The footage shows a man in a black T-shirt loitering in a corridor outside what is believed to be the victim’s home in Shah Alam, before reaching through a grille to grab her footwear and sniff it. The victim lodged a police report on Sunday after the post drew widespread attention, claiming to have...

We have selected seven stories from the SCMP’s coverage of Asia over the past week that resonated with our readers and shed light on topical issues. If you would like to see more of our reporting, please consider subscribing. 1. Why South Korea is celebrating a Canada submarine deal it lost South Korea may have lost Canada’s multibillion-dollar submarine order, but analysts say its close-run contest with Germany has handed Seoul a different prize: proof that it can challenge one of the world’s...

Jeju’s renewed push to allow Chinese tourists to drive rental cars on the South Korean resort island is reigniting a decade-old debate over safety, insurance and legal loopholes. On July 2, the island’s Vice-Governor Park Cheon-su said allowing Chinese tourists to drive could boost visitor spending during a live-streamed meeting with senior provincial government officials. “A large portion of independent foreign travellers are Chinese, but they cannot use rental cars at the moment,” Park said....

Mark Wahlberg shed the aura of a Hollywood star when he savoured street food and mingled with locals in Penang while filming Netflix’s The Big Fix. His trip delighted Malaysians and highlighted the country’s growing appeal to global productions. Videos of Wahlberg, who played a former Boston police detective in Spenser Confidential, filming around the Malaysian state went viral on social media over the weekend. Some clips showed the 55-year-old walking through a market, waving to onlookers and...

India’s nuclear energy ambitions hinge not only on reactors and reforms but also on an unresolved fuel question: where the uranium will come from. A deal finalised with Australia last week could provide part of the answer, giving New Delhi access to the world’s largest known uranium reserves after years of delay linked to concerns over nuclear safeguards. Analysts said the agreement would help India shore up fuel security for its planned nuclear expansion, while also signalling deeper strategic...

On July 6, a Chinese strategic nuclear submarine fired a missile carrying a training dummy warhead into a designated area of the Pacific. Beijing described the launch as routine, said relevant countries had been notified and insisted that it targeted no state. The regional reaction was immediate, with Australia, Japan, the United States and Pacific nations raising concerns around insufficient notification and the politics of nuclear-free zones. Those reactions matter because they show how far...

Concern that foreign spies can operate with impunity in Japan has deepened following a media report that dozens of Russian agents ordered to leave Western European countries have entered Tokyo and are buying components for Moscow’s war on Ukraine. The New York Times reported on Sunday that Moscow’s agents were taking advantage of Tokyo’s failure to enact a law specifically designed to combat espionage and the large number of companies manufacturing components critical to the Kremlin’s war...

Interior minister Shabana Mahmood announced plans on Monday to change UK law to allow a convicted paedophile who led a so-called grooming gang to be deported following his release from prison. Shabir Ahmed was jailed in 2012 for 22 years for multiple child sexual offences including rape when he was the ringleader of a gang of similarly predatory men targeting girls in Rochdale, northern England. He left prison on licence earlier this month under the country’s early release programme. He was...

A university symposium in Guangzhou has placed the Philippines’ northernmost province of Batanes at the centre of a new argument over history, geography and sovereignty, after scholars at the event claimed the islands belonged to Taiwan and, on that basis, fell under overall Chinese sovereignty. The claim, made at a June 30 symposium hosted by Jinan University in Guangzhou, has been rejected by Philippine historians and officials, who dispute the scholars’ reading of geography, dynastic...

A decade after a tribunal in The Hague ruled on July 12, 2016, that Beijing’s sweeping South China Sea claims had no legal basis, Philippine officials and analysts say Manila remains heavily outmatched at sea but has begun turning its landmark legal victory into a more credible form of deterrence. The Philippines brought the case in 2013 under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (Unclos), challenging Beijing’s nine-dash line and other claims. The tribunal ruled that China’s...

Myanmar’s gradual return from the diplomatic deep freeze continued over the weekend as Southeast Asian foreign ministers met their counterpart from the junta-run nation in Bangkok, a re-engagement that analysts warn lends legitimacy to a government still at war with its own people, without any commitment to end the violence. Thousands have been killed in the nationwide civil conflict resulting from the military’s 2021 coup, a power grab that prompted Asean to take the unprecedented step of...

Filipino domestic workers continue to endure widespread labour exploitation and sexual abuse in Saudi Arabia, according to a new Amnesty International report. The rights watchdog found conditions had barely improved despite years of promised reforms, including last year’s abolition of the kingdom’s notorious “kafala” sponsorship system. The report, based on interviews conducted in March with 19 Filipino women who worked as domestic staff in Saudi Arabia, found consistent patterns of abuse, from...

A South Korean court sentenced former president Yoon Suk-yeol on Monday to two years in prison for illegally receiving free opinion polls in exchange for political support, adding to his growing legal woes. Yoon, 65, is already in detention while appealing against a separate life sentence for leading an insurrection through his declaration of martial law in 2024. In a separate case, a court handed Yoon a 30-year prison sentence for sending drones into North Korea to “manufacture” a crisis ahead...

Rows of gold bars, stacks of US and Singapore dollars and seven suitcases found inside a locked safe have become the defining images of one of the biggest scandals to hit Indonesia’s law-enforcement establishment in years. Police said they recovered 74kg (160lbs) of gold, plus more than US$15 million in multiple currencies from a house linked to Febrie Adriansyah, who until last week served as Indonesia’s deputy attorney general for special crimes, and is now suspected of corruption. Authorities...

Sam Neill, a smoothly elegant and versatile actor whose career moved from art film to blockbuster as he dodged velociraptors in Jurassic Park to playing Holly Hunter’s husband in The Piano, has died. He was 78. In 2023, Neill disclosed he had been diagnosed with angioimmunoblastic T-cell lymphoma, a rare type of non-Hodgkin lymphoma. Neill died on Monday in Sydney, according to a statement posted to the actor’s social media page. His death was “sudden and unexpected,” the statement said, adding...

Malaysian lawmaker Syed Saddiq Syed Abdul Rahman walked free on Monday after the Federal Court dismissed the prosecutors’ final appeal in his corruption case, ending a six-year legal battle that had threatened to derail the future of one of the country’s most recognisable young politicians. The decision was reached by a 2-1 majority, with Federal Court judges Che Mohd Ruzima Ghazali and Collin Lawrence Sequerah upholding last year’s acquittal of the former youth minister on four charges linked...

North Korea rarely airs its dirty laundry in public, but Kim Jong-un’s latest purge of a senior military official was staged for maximum visibility – a warning, analysts say, to generals growing too comfortable with their expanding economic power that they answer to him alone. “Kim is effectively telling military and party leaders: ‘Don’t even think about it. You are under round-the-clock surveillance,’” said Yang Moo-jin, a professor at the University of North Korean Studies. On Friday, Kim...

A Tokyo ward has installed outdoor AI cameras with facial recognition capabilities to help locate missing children and elderly people, a move aimed at improving public safety but also raising privacy concerns in Japan. Arakawa ward installed 33 artificial intelligence-equipped security cameras on pylons along the main street and elsewhere near the JR Nippori Station in April to test whether the technology could speed up searches for missing persons. The busy area around the station is frequented...

South Korea’s navy said on Monday it had recovered the body of a sailor off the east coast, a day after the seaman disappeared near the de facto sea border between the two Koreas. Authorities launched a large search involving 10 ships and aircraft after the sailor failed to report for duty on Sunday morning while the vessel was on patrol near the Northern Limit Line, the de facto maritime border between the neighbours. “A patrol boat participating in the search operation found the missing sailor...