Category Archives: Asia Pacific

Myanmar model who criticised junta stuck in limbo after being denied entry to Thailand

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Han Lay appealed for help on social media after being stopped at Bangkok airport, saying Myanmar police there want to speak to her

A Myanmar model who has spoken out against the military junta that seized power last year says she has sought help from the UN’s refugee agency after she was denied entry to Thailand.

Han Lay, who was stopped at Suvarnabhumi airport in Bangkok this week, asked for help in a Facebook post on Thursday night, saying Myanmar police were at the airport and trying to speak with her.

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China ready for ‘fight’ over international action on Xinjiang human rights abuses

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Threat comes as UN member states meet in Geneva amid pressure to take action on a damning report on abuse of Uyghurs

A Chinese envoy to the United Nations has warned western nations and allies that Beijing is ready for a “fight” amid growing pressure for global action against China over its human rights abuses in Xinjiang.

The threat follows the release of a report by the UN office of the high commissioner for human rights which found the government was likely committing crimes against humanity with its abuses of Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslims in Xinjiang.

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Calls for stalking law overhaul in South Korea as woman’s murder shocks nation

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Stabbing triggers accusations that authorities are failing to take violence against women seriously

The murder of a South Korean woman who had been stalked by her alleged killer for years has sparked outrage and demands for changes in the law to better protect women.

The woman’s murder in a bathroom at the subway station where she worked earlier this month has shocked South Korea, coming a day before her alleged attacker, named by police as 31-year-old Jeon Joo-hwan, had been due to be sentenced for stalking her.

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China’s former justice minister faces life in prison amid purge of security officials

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Fu Zhenghua, who had led several high-profile investigations into corruption, was accused of accepting bribes

Former Chinese justice minister Fu Zhenghua, who had headed several high-profile investigations into corruption, has been jailed for life for accepting bribes, state media says, as a purge of officials intensified ahead of a key Communist party congress.

Fu, 67, was handed a suspended death sentence that will be commuted to life imprisonment after two years, with no possibility of parole, according to state media on Thursday.

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Water found in asteroid dust may offer clues to origins of life on Earth

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Discovery offers new support for the theory that life may have been seeded from outer space

Specks of dust that a Japanese space probe retrieved from an asteroid about 186 million miles (300m kilometres) from Earth have revealed a surprising component: a drop of water.

The discovery offers new support for the theory that life on Earth may have been seeded from outer space.

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Patience with Putin may be ebbing among friendlier countries

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Turkey, India and China respond cooly to news of planned referendums in Ukrainian regions occupied by Russia

Signs that some countries willing to tolerate Russia’s invasion of Ukraine are losing patience have emerged as Turkey, India and China responded cooly to the announcement that four Ukrainian regions occupied by Russia were planning referendums on joining the Russian Federation.

Turkey, which has been at the centre of mediation between the west and Russia, issued a sharp rebuke, saying in a statement that it was concerned by attempts to stage unilateral referendums.

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Hong Kong journalist allowed to travel to UK after court grants bail

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Ronson Chan was arrested in September as part of an ongoing crackdown on dissent and free expression in the city

The head of Hong Kong’s journalists’ association will be allowed to travel to the UK for an Oxford fellowship after a court granted him bail and declined to place restrictions on his movement over a charge of obstructing police officers.

Ronson Chan was arrested on 7 September while he was covering a residence meeting at a Hong Kong housing estate. Police allege he refused to provide ID and behaved in an “uncooperative” way despite multiple warnings, and he was charged this week. Chan has claimed innocence, saying he was within his rights to ask police for identification before he produced his.

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Chinese police detain ‘godfather of film industry’ over abuse claims

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Du Yingzhe, a well-known tutor at a prestigious teaching academy, accused of abusing at least 19 students

Chinese police have detained a man over the alleged abuse of at least 19 former students at a prestigious tutoring academy, after a viral article outlined one of the country’s most shocking #MeToo cases in years.

Du Yingzhe, 40, was a well-known tutor at Shadow Road, which assists high school students to get into the country’s best art and film schools. On Monday Du was accused by a former student of harassing, grooming and raping students, including some who were underage and a 17-year-old girl who fell pregnant.

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Cambodia court rejects genocide appeal of last surviving Khmer Rouge leader

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Judge upholds conviction of Khieu Samphan, 91, in what is likely to be UN-backed court’s last judgment

Cambodia’s UN-backed tribunal for the Khmer Rouge has upheld a genocide conviction against the regime’s last surviving leader, more than 40 years after Pol Pot’s brutal communist regime fell.

The tribunal, known as the extraordinary chambers in the courts of Cambodia (ECCC), rejected an appeal by Khieu Samphan, 91, in what was expected to be the final judgment by the court. Khieu Samphan, who was a former head of state, was found guilty in 2018 of crimes against humanity, and grave breaches of the Geneva conventions, and of the genocide of ethnic minority Vietnamese.

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‘Fat Leonard’, fugitive contractor in US navy’s worst corruption scandal, arrested in Venezuela

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Malaysian defence contractor fled before sentencing in US over bribery scheme that lasted more than a decade and involved dozens of US navy officers

A Malaysian defence contractor nicknamed “Fat Leonard” who orchestrated one of the largest bribery scandals in US military history has been arrested in Venezuela after fleeing before his sentencing, authorities say.

The international manhunt for Leonard Glenn Francis ended with his arrest by Venezuelan authorities on Tuesday morning at the Caracas airport as he was about to board an airplane for another country, the US Marshals Service said on Wednesday.

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China’s Lipstick King reappears, months after Tiananmen ‘tank cake’ row

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Celebrity livestreamer Li Jiaqi returns to screen after nearly four months of silence following a broadcast showcasing a tank-shaped dessert

China’s leading shopping livestreamer, Li Jiaqi, has returned to online commerce platforms almost four months after his feed was suddenly cut, which viewers suspected was linked to the errant appearance of a tank-shaped cake.

Li, also known as the Lipstick King for his ability to move huge amounts of product on his sales channels, briefly appeared on Alibaba Group’s Taobao marketplace on Tuesday evening.

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Shinzo Abe: man sets himself alight in protest at state funeral for killed Japan PM

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Protester sustains widespread burns as Japan wrestles with legacy of leader whose death revealed scale of politicians’ links to Unification church

A man has set himself alight near the Japanese prime minister’s office, apparently in protest against next week’s state funeral for the country’s former prime minister, Shinzo Abe.

The man, who has not been named, was initially unconscious and sustained burns over his entire body after the incident in Tokyo on Wednesday morning, less than a week before the controversial send-off for Abe, who was shot dead in July.

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Australia to pay controversial US prisons operator $4.6m for 52 days of transition work on Nauru

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MTC, which has been accused of ‘gross negligence’ that allegedly led to gang rape, will be paid during same period as previous contractor Canstruct

The Australian government will pay $4.6m to a controversial US private prisons operator for 52 days of preparatory work ahead of its expected takeover of the offshore processing regime on Nauru, despite a range of serious allegations made against the company abroad.

The US-based Management and Training Corporation (MTC) has been accused in civil suits of “gross negligence” and “egregious” security failures that allegedly led to the gang-rape of a woman in detention, the murder of two retirees by escaped prisoners, and the months-long solitary confinement of a US citizen wrongfully held in immigration detention. It has also paid a multi-million dollar fine over a government bribery scandal.

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Will China’s plan for a ‘green silk road’ live up to environmental promises?

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China has pledged to make its Belt and Road initiative greener, but critics say environmental guidelines ‘nonexistent’

In July 2019, China rolled out the red carpet for the Bangladeshi prime minister, Sheikh Hasina. Flown to Beijing by the Chinese government, she was greeted with an honour guard and banquet and received by the president, Xi Jinping, and the prime minister, Li Keqiang. Three days later, she returned to her capital, Dhaka, with nine agreements worth billions of dollars to build power plants and provide other development assistance.

Hasina’s short visit benefited both countries. Big new infrastructure projects would help lift living standards in Bangladesh, but also enable China to strengthen its influence on its fast-growing neighbour of more than 160 million people.

This article was originally published by Ensia

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Hong Kong journalist charged days before leaving for Oxford fellowship

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Ronson Chan was due to travel to the UK when he was arrested for ‘obstructing police’

The head of Hong Kong’s journalist union was charged with obstructing police on Monday, 10 days before he was set to leave the city and begin an overseas fellowship at Oxford University.

Ronson Chan, chairman of the Hong Kong Journalists Association (HKJA), was arrested on 7 September over a dispute with two officers who asked to see his identification while he was covering a residents’ meeting at a public housing estate.

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Warnings over floods and landslides in Japan in wake of Typhoon Nanmadol

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Two dead and thousands without power as storm dumps heavy rain and authorities warn six million to evacuate

Two people have died and more than 100 were injured after Typhoon Nanmadol slammed into Japan on Monday, dumping heavy rain, paralysing traffic and leaving tens of thousands of homes without power.

The worst of the rainfall was seen in the southernmost island of Kyushu, where two people died, according to the fire and disaster management agency, before the typhoon was downgraded to a tropical storm as it made its way to the Pacific Ocean.

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Antarctic researchers gain insights from on high as they count seals from space

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Scientists used satellite images and more than 300,000 volunteers to count Weddell seals, a key Southern Ocean indicator species

Researchers believe they have accurately estimated Antarctica’s Weddell seal population for the first time – using images from space and the eyes of hundreds of thousands of citizen scientists.

Weddell seals are a key indicator species in the Southern Ocean, for both sea ice fluctuations and shifts in the food web. They can live up to 30 years in the harsh conditions of the coastal sea ice of Antarctica, but until recently, counting them has been risky and cost-prohibitive.

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Indian government accused of ceding land in Himalayas to China

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Locals claim ‘buffer zones’ have been established in areas previously under Indian control

Indian people living near the country’s disputed Himalayan border with China have accused their government of giving away swathes of land after both sides agreed to withdraw troops from some contested areas and create buffer zones.

Earlier this month, Indian and Chinese troops, who have been locked in a tense border dispute since June 2020, began to draw back from the contested area of Gogra-Hot Springs after an agreement was reached to disengage.

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Weather tracker: Deadly floods batter Italy’s Adriatic coast

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Ten people confirmed dead with three missing; Typhoon Nanmadol forces millions to flee homes in Japan

European countries around the Adriatic Sea were experiencing extreme flooding towards the end of last week.

The Italian region of Marche was particularly badly affected after a thunderstorm on Thursday afternoon strengthened into the night. Some areas faced more than 400mm of rain, with much of the deluge falling in a couple of hours.

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West weighs calling for China Uyghur abuses inquiry at UN

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Battle over influence at Human Rights Council, with Beijing warning of ‘politicisation of human rights’

Western powers are weighing the risk of a potential defeat if they table a resolution at the UN Human Rights Council calling for an independent commission to investigate alleged human rights abuses by China in Xinjiang.

The issue is a litmus case for Chinese influence at the UN, as well as the willingness of the UN to endorse a worldview that protects individual rights from authoritarian states.

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