Category Archives: Asia Pacific

Trump insists foreign workers are ‘welcome’ days after arrest of hundreds of South Koreans

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US president says he doesn’t want to ‘disincentivize investment’ after images of workers chained and handcuffed caused widespread alarm in South Korea

President Donald Trump has said foreign workers sent to the United States are “welcome” and he doesn’t want to “frighten off” investors, 10 days after hundreds of South Koreans were arrested at a work site in Georgia.

In a post on his Truth Social platform, Trump wrote: “I don’t want to frighten off or disincentivize investment.

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Chinese carmakers told to improve locking devices for UK market

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UK insurers require critical modifications for sale in country with higher levels of car theft than China

British authorities may have certain concerns about the cyber-spying threat from vehicles made in China, but it turns out the country’s manufacturers have security worries of their own.

Insurers have told Chinese carmakers they need critical modifications for vehicles on British streets: namely, tougher locking devices to make them harder to steal.

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Billion-dollar coffins? New technology could make oceans transparent and Aukus submarines vulnerable

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Quantum sensing, satellite tracking and AI are part of an accelerating arms race in detection that should prompt a re-evaluation of Australia’s defence strategy

Military history is littered with the corpses of apex predators.

The Gatling gun, the battleship, the tank. All once possessed unassailable power – then were undermined, in some cases wiped out, by the march of new technology.

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North Korea executes citizens who distribute foreign TV shows, UN finds

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Human rights report highlights crackdown on personal freedoms in most restrictive country in the world

North Korea has executed people for distributing foreign television shows, including popular South Korean dramas, as part of an intensifying crackdown on personal freedoms, according to a UN human rights report.

Surveillance has grown more pervasive since 2014 with the help of new technologies, while punishments have become harsher – including the introduction of the death penalty for offences such as sharing foreign TV dramas, the report said.

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Fiji ant study provides new evidence of insects’ decline on remote islands

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DNA analysis of endemic specimens in museums finds 79% of ant populations in Pacific archipelago are shrinking

Island-dwelling insects have not been spared the ravages of humanity that have pushed so many of their invertebrate kin into freefall around the world, new research on Fijian ant populations has found.

Hundreds of thousands of insect species have been lost over the past 150 years and it is believed the world is now losing between 1% and 2.5% a year of its remaining insect biomass – a decline so steep that many entomologists say we are living through an “insect apocalypse”. Yet long-term data for individual insect populations is sparse and patchy.

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Flash floods in Indonesia leave at least 15 people dead and 10 missing

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Torrential rains cause flooding and landslides in East Nusa Tenggara province and on the tourist island of Bali

Rescuers have recovered the bodies of 15 people who have died in flash flooding in two Indonesian provinces, while authorities said 10 others were missing.

Torrential rains beginning on Monday caused flooding and landslides in East Nusa Tenggara province and on the island of Bali.

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Trump asks EU to impose tariffs of up to 100% on India and China

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In effort to end Russia’s war in Ukraine, US president proposes tariffs targeting Putin allies and trade partners

Donald Trump has asked the EU to impose tariffs of up to 100% on India and China as part of an effort to force the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, to end the war in Ukraine.

The US president made the demand during a meeting between US and EU officials discussing options to increase economic pressure on Russia on Tuesday, according to a White House official.

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Discovery of new campsite shows fugitive Tom Phillips had ‘outside help,’ NZ police say

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Phillips had spent nearly four years hiding in the wilderness with his three children before he was killed in an exchange of fire with police on Monday

Fugitive father Tom Phillips was receiving outside help during his years on the run before he was killed in a police shoot-out this week, New Zealand police said on Wednesday as they released images that show a newly discovered campsite.

Phillips had spent nearly four years hiding in the wilderness with his three children. He was killed in an exchange of fire with police after reports of a burglary in the remote town of Piopio, in the central North Island, on Monday.

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Junk food leads to more children being obese than underweight for first time

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Cheap ultra-processed food behind rise in overweight children, with one in 10 now obese globally, says Unicef

More children around the world are obese than underweight for the first time, according to a UN report that warns ultra-processed junk food is overwhelming childhood diets.

There are 188 million teenagers and school-age children with obesity – one in 10 – Unicef said, affecting health and development and bringing a risk of life-threatening diseases.

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Thaksin Shinawatra jailed by Thailand supreme court for one year in major blow to former prime minister

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Case centred on claims that he had not properly served a sentence for corruption and abuse of power, which was handed down in 2023

Thailand’s former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra must serve one year in jail, the country’s supreme court has ruled, in a major blow to one of the country’s most prominent and polarising politicians.

The court ruled that Thaksin had not properly served an eight-year sentence for corruption and abuse of power, which was handed down when he returned to the country from self-imposed exile in 2023. After arriving back in the country, Thaksin spent less than 24 hours in jail, but was moved to the VIP wing of a hospital on health grounds, where he stayed for six months before he was released on parole.

In its judgment, the supreme court found that the arrangement allowing Thaksin to stay at hospital was unlawful. “The defendant knows his sickness was not an urgent matter, and staying in hospital cannot count as a prison term,” said the ruling read out by a judge.

“The court will issue a jail warrant and an official from Bangkok Remand Prison will take him,” the judge said.

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Japan’s next PM will face a problem that won’t go away with Shigeru Ishiba’s resignation

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The ruling Liberal Democratic party is still grappling with the fallout from a years-old funding scandal that may see it go into opposition for just the third time in its history

The precise timing of Japanese prime minister Shigeru Ishiba’s resignation announcement – on a Sunday evening – took many by surprise; but the countdown to his departure arguably began just weeks after he took office.

Having won the presidency of the Liberal Democratic party (LDP) – a formidable political force that has governed Japan for much of the past seven decades – Ishiba called a snap election in search of a public mandate after a major funding scandal, and to silence his opponents on the right of the party.

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Fugitive father shot dead by police – as it happened

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This blog is now closed. Our full report is here: Tom Phillips shot dead after attempted burglary, NZ police confirm

The mayor of Waitomo, John Robertson, told the Guardian this morning’s events were the worst possible outcome for the community.

“I’m shattered, to be honest, and there will be many in the community that are devastated that this was the outcome after three and a half, four years,” he said.

So it’s just devastating news. Really the worst outcome we could have expected.

No day that goes by that I don’t think about all four of them.

It hurts every time I see photos of the children and of you, and see some of your stuff that is still here, thinking what could have been if you had not gone away.

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Tom Phillips, fugitive father on run with children for nearly four years, shot dead by NZ police in exchange of fire

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Phillips, who has been on the run with his children for four years, was shot by police after officers came under fire while investigating burglary in Piopio, authorities said

A fugitive father who had been hiding in New Zealand’s rugged wilderness with his three children for nearly four years has been shot dead by police investigating an armed burglary, police said on Monday.

The whereabouts of Tom Phillips has attracted headlines around the world since just before Christmas 2021, when he fled into the Waikato wilderness with his children Ember, now 9, Maverick, 10, and Jayda, 12, following a custody dispute with their mother.

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300 South Koreans detained at Hyundai plant in US to be released, says Seoul

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Footage of raid by US immigration officials showed detained workers in handcuffs and with chains around their ankles

South Korea announced on Sunday that the roughly 300 of its nationals detained during an immigration raid in Georgia would be released and flown home, as the sudden detention of workers appeared to strain the longstanding diplomatic and economic relationship between the two nations.

Nearly 500 workers, among them at least 300 South Koreans and at least 23 Mexicans, were arrested at the Hyundai-LG battery plant in the city of Ellabell on Thursday.

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Japan PM Shigeru Ishiba to resign amid fallout from disastrous elections

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Public broadcaster says prime minister has made decision to avoid divide within his Liberal Democratic party

Japan’s prime minister, Shigeru Ishiba, is to resign less than a year after taking office, throwing the country’s politics into turmoil and setting in motion a potentially messy contest to replace him as leader of the ruling Liberal Democratic party (LDP).

The softly spoken centrist has presided over two disastrous elections since being elected to lead the LDP last autumn. In October, the party and its junior coalition partner Komeito lost their majority in the lower house and met the same fate in upper house elections this July.

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China’s military follows Australian and Canadian warships in Taiwan Strait accusing them of ‘provocation’

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Strait is considered an international waterway by countries including the US, Canada, Britain and Taiwan

Australian and Canadian warships sailing through the sensitive Taiwan Strait have been followed and warned by China’s military, with Beijing describing the incident as a provocation.

The People’s Liberation Army’s Eastern Theatre Command said the Australian guided-missile destroyer Brisbane and the Canadian frigate Ville de Quebec were engaged in “trouble-making and provocation”.

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Japan’s second in line to emperor’s throne comes of age amid succession debate

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Teenage Prince Hisahito’s elaborate ceremony overshadowed by questions over royal family’s male-only succession rules

Japan has heralded the coming of age of Prince Hisahito with an elaborate ceremony at the Imperial Palace, where a succession crisis is brewing.

The nephew of Emperor Naruhito, Hisahito received a black silk and lacquer crown at Saturday’s ceremony in Tokyo, which marks the beginning of his royal adult life.

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Japan’s second in line to emperor’s throne comes of age amid succession debate

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Teenage Prince Hisahito’s elaborate ceremony overshadowed by questions over royal family’s male-only succession rules

Japan has heralded the coming of age of Prince Hisahito with an elaborate ceremony at the Imperial Palace, where a succession crisis is brewing.

The nephew of Emperor Naruhito, Hisahito received a black silk and lacquer crown at Saturday’s ceremony in Tokyo, which marks the beginning of his royal adult life.

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Samoa’s first female PM fails to win re-election after months of political infighting

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Fiame Naomi Mata’afa, known as the ‘Iron Lady of the Pacific’, likely to be replaced by leader of opposition Fast party

Samoa’s first female leader, Fiame Naomi Mata’afa, has failed to win a majority in the Pacific nation’s elections this week, capping months of political infighting.

Official results published by the electoral commission on Friday showed the opposition Fast party won 30 out of the 50 contested seats in parliament.

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US Navy Seals killed North Korean civilians in botched 2019 mission, report says

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New York Times says Trump authorized mission to plant listening device; team killed fishers they encountered

US Navy Seals shot and killed a number of North Korean civilians during a botched covert mission to plant a listening device in the nuclear-armed country during high-stakes diplomatic negotiations in 2019, the New York Times reported on Friday.

Citing unidentified sources, including current and former military officials with knowledge of the still-classified details, the newspaper said Donald Trump approved the operation during his first administration, as he was involved in historic talks with the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un.

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