Category Archives: Asia Pacific

Beijing reopens mass isolation centre in fight against Covid

Posted on by

Chinese capital ramps up efforts to control Omicron outbreak and avoid lockdowns

Beijing has reopened a mass isolation centre as authorities seek to contain an outbreak of Covid-19 in the city.

The Xiaotangshan Fangcai hospital, which holds at least 1,200 beds and testing facilities, was first opened during the 2003 Sars epidemic, and used again in early 2020 to treat Covid patients. Its reopening signals a ramp up in efforts by China’s capital to manage the rising number of cases without going into a city-wide lockdown.

Continue reading...

North Korea launches suspected ballistic missile

Posted on by

Kim Jong-un had earlier vowed to quickly bolster nuclear arsenal and threatened to use it against rivals

North Korea launched a suspected ballistic missile toward its eastern waters on Wednesday, South Korean and Japanese officials said, a few days after the North Korean ruler, Kim Jong-un, vowed to bolster his nuclear arsenal “at the fastest possible pace” and threatened to use nuclear weapons against other countries.

The launch, the North’s 14th round of weapons firing, also came six days before a new South Korean president takes office for a single five-year term.

Continue reading...

Expert warned against wrist X-rays used by AFP to prosecute children as adult people smugglers

Posted on by

Radiologist James Christie’s court evidence said technique had no scientific validity and was never intended to assess age

An expert radiologist says Australian federal police continued to use wrist X-rays to prosecute children as adult people smugglers after he had given unequivocal evidence of the technique’s unreliability, something he now says was “just wrong” and akin to “child abuse”.

Last week, six Indonesian boys won a major case overturning their convictions as adult people smugglers in 2010 amid the highly charged political atmosphere around border protection.

Sign up to receive an email with the top stories from Guardian Australia every morning

Continue reading...

Erosion of abortion rights gathers pace around the world as US signals new era

Posted on by

A leaked supreme court draft ruling shows the US is set to end 50 years of a woman’s right to choose. Elsewhere, the battle still rages

In 2022, abortion remains one of the most controversial and bitterly contested ethical and political battlegrounds. It is illegal for women to terminate their pregnancies in any circumstance in 24 countries, with a further 37 restricting access in any case except when the mother’s life is in danger.

As a leaked document signals that the US supreme court is poised to strike down the landmark 1973 ruling in Roe v Wade, millions of American women face losing their access to legal abortions, joining millions more living in those countries rejecting a woman’s right to choose.

Continue reading...

‘Supersonic ballet’: helicopter briefly catches falling rocket

Posted on by

Rocket Lab test successfully hooks booster in midair before having to drop it into South Pacific

A space company has briefly managed to catch a falling rocket using a helicopter and a hook in a test described by its chief executive as “something of a supersonic ballet”.

The test was part of Rocket Lab’s attempts to find relatively low-cost ways of recovering rockets for multiple missions to space.

Continue reading...

Three children in Indonesia die from unidentified form of hepatitis

Posted on by

Health ministry says symptoms match those of acute liver disease of ‘unknown origin’ found in almost 170 children worldwide

Three children in Indonesia have died from a mysterious liver disease, the country’s health ministry has said, raising the global death toll to at least four.

A severe type of acute hepatitis has been identified in almost 170 children across 11 countries in recent weeks, raising concerns from the World Health Organization (WHO) of the disease’s “unknown origin”.

Continue reading...

Fiji court rules US can seize yacht said to belong to Russian oligarch

Posted on by

Vessel docked in port of Lautoka is believed to be owned by Suleiman Kerimov, who is facing sanctions

Fiji’s high court has ruled that the US government can seize a superyacht believed to be owned by a Russian oligarch who faces sanctions from the US and the EU, which is docked in the Fijian port of Lautoka.

Judge Deepthi Amaratunga granted the request from Fijian authorities to register and enforce US warrants to seize the Amadea, which has been docked in Lautoka since 13 April and which is believed to belong to Suleiman Kerimov, who is considered a close ally of Vladimir Putin.

Continue reading...

NZ’s former deputy PM banned from parliament for visiting anti-vaccine-mandate protest

Posted on by

Winston Peters condemned two-year ban as ‘dictatorial behaviour’ that ‘should be reserved for third world banana republics’

New Zealand’s former deputy prime minister, Winston Peters, has been banned from parliament grounds for two years for visiting anti-vaccine-mandate protesters who occupied the grounds.

The weeks-long February protests, modelled on the Canadian truckers’ “freedom convoy”, took over parliament grounds and blocked off a number of surrounding streets. In the first days of the occupation, the speaker issued a trespass notice to all attendees. But efforts by police to disperse the gathering were repeatedly repelled, until it descended into a violent riot, with at least 40 injured, while tents, piles of rubble and a playground were set aflame.

Continue reading...

Outcry in Shanghai as person declared dead and put in body bag found to be alive

Posted on by

Incident prompts concerns over city’s overwhelmed medical system during weeks-long Omicron lockdowns

Six people are under investigation in Shanghai after an elderly nursing home resident was mistakenly declared dead, put in a body bag and taken by coroners to a waiting van before mortuary workers noticed they were still alive.

The incident, which took place on Sunday afternoon, was filmed by onlookers and footage quickly spread online, sparking a furious backlash in the city which has been under a gruelling lockdown for five weeks. It also prompted concerns over the city’s overwhelmed medical system.

Continue reading...

New Zealand finance minister tightens the belt for first post-Covid budget

Posted on by

Grant Robertson announces plans for new rules on spending and borrowing in first major pre-budget speech

After two years of big spending to weather the storm of Covid-19, New Zealand’s finance minister is tightening the belt, committing to limits on borrowing, introducing new debt caps and looking ahead to long-term spending on infrastructure over short-term cash injections.

The finance minister, Grant Robertson, gave a glimpse of the vision for New Zealand’s post-Covid economy in his first major pre-budget speech on Tuesday. This year’s budget will also help set the political scene as the country heads towards a 2023 election.

Continue reading...

Square Enix sells its western studios and hits such as Tomb Raider for $300m

Posted on by

Japanese gaming company behind Final Fantasy series secures deal with Sweden-based Embracer

The Japanese gaming company behind Final Fantasy is selling off three studios, including the rights to hit franchises including Tomb Raider, in a $300m (£240m) deal.

Tokyo-based Square Enix has sold US-headquartered Crystal Dynamics and Canada-based Eidos Montreal and Square Enix Montreal to the Nasdaq-listed Swedish gaming group Embracer.

Continue reading...

Rare ‘Wicked’ bible that encourages adultery discovered in New Zealand

Posted on by

First copy of the 1631 bible, which mistakenly reads ‘thou shalt commit adultery’, to be found in the southern hemisphere

An extremely rare bible famous for an unfortunate error that encourages adultery has been discovered in New Zealand.

The 1631 “Wicked” Bible, as it has become known, omits the word “not” from its seventh commandment, informing readers “thou shalt commit adultery”. One thousand copies of the text, which also came to be known as the Adulterous or Sinners’ Bible, were printed, with the error only discovered a year later.

Continue reading...

Songs, tears and reunions: New Zealand welcomes back visitors as border reopens after two years

Posted on by

Vaccinated people from about 60 visa-waiver countries now able to enter as part of pandemic reopening plan

Māori songs, tearful embraces and a beloved New Zealand chocolate bar awaited international visitors arriving in New Zealand on Monday – the first foreign guests, other than Australians, to set foot in Aotearoa in more than two years.

Since March 2020, the arrival terminals at New Zealand’s international airports have been desolate as the country swiftly closed the border to prevent the arrival of Covid-19.

Continue reading...

‘They were tiny’: the Indonesians still fighting their conviction as adults in Australia

Posted on by

Anto and Samsul Bahar were 15 when they were jailed in a maximum security facility in Western Australia

Staring at the camera, Anto’s face, wide-eyed and child-like, invites a simple question.

How could anyone, let alone Australia’s federal crime fighting agency, see an adult gazing back at them?

Continue reading...

China says Nato has ‘messed up Europe’ and warns over role in Asia-Pacific

Posted on by

In response to British foreign secretary’s warning that Beijing must ‘play by the rules’, ministry of foreign affairs says Nato is stirring conflict

China’s ministry of foreign affairs has accused Nato of messing up Europe and stirring up conflicts in the Asia-Pacific region, after the UK’s foreign secretary told China it should “play by the rules”.

In a speech at Mansion House in London on Wednesday, Liz Truss renewed calls to boost Nato in the wake of the Ukraine war, and said the coordinated moves to isolate Russia from the world economy proved that market access to democratic countries was no longer a given. Truss also delivered a direct warning to China.

Continue reading...

Solomon Islands PM suggests Australia’s reaction to China security deal is hysterical and hypocritical

Posted on by

Manasseh Sogavare says he wasn’t told about Aukus pact until it was public while Scott Morrison accuses counterpart of parroting China’s lines

The prime minister of Solomon Islands has accused the Australian government of hypocrisy over his country’s security deal with China, saying the Aukus pact was far from transparent but he “did not become theatrical and hysterical”.

Manasseh Sogavare said Solomon Islands and other countries in the region “should have been consulted to ensure that this Aukus treaty is transparent since it will affect the Pacific family by allowing nuclear submarines in Pacific waters”.

Continue reading...

‘They’re so sneaky’: New Zealand homeowners battle plague of smelly cluster flies

Posted on by

Changing climate means infestations of pesky insects could become more common, experts say

They smell like sweet meat, destroy vacuum cleaners and are wreaking havoc across rural New Zealand.

An unusually wet summer has brought joy to farmers and grief to residents, as a plague of cluster flies descends on homes in the Canterbury and Wairarapa regions.

Continue reading...

Climate crisis – not China – is biggest threat to Pacific, say former leaders

Posted on by

Pacific Elders Voice group says military tension ‘created by China and the US and its allies’ are secondary to rising seas and catastrophic cyclones

Growing military tensions in the Pacific between China, the US and Australia do not address the most significant security threat to the region – climate change – former leaders of Pacific nations have warned.

In a statement on Friday, the Pacific Elders Voice group, which includes former leaders of the Marshall Islands, Palau, Kiribati and Tuvalu, as well as Dame Meg Taylor, the former secretary general of the Pacific Islands Forum secretariat, said that “the primary security threat to the Pacific is climate change”, rather than geo-strategic tensions.

Continue reading...

‘Relentless’ destruction of rainforest continuing despite Cop26 pledge

Posted on by

Tropics lost 11.1m hectares of tree cover in 2021, including forest critical to limiting global heating and biodiversity loss, finds World Resources Institute

Pristine rainforests were once again destroyed at a relentless rate in 2021, according to new figures, prompting concerns governments will not meet a Cop26 deal to halt and reverse deforestation by the end of the decade.

From the Brazilian Amazon to the Congo basin, the tropics lost 11.1m hectares of tree cover last year, including 3.75m ha of primary forest critical to limiting global heating and biodiversity loss.

Continue reading...

Beijing halts weddings and funerals and closes schools in Covid fightback

Posted on by

Stockpiling rife as city acts in attempt to avoid Shanghai-style lockdown

Beijing has closed schools and suspended weddings and funerals in the city of 22 million in a whirlwind effort to avoid plunging China’s capital into a Shanghai-style Covid lockdown.

Fears that Beijing could soon be in lockdown have already prompted widespread stockpiling, leading to shortages in some supermarkets.

Continue reading...