News Headlines

HANOI: Vietnam has approved the COVID-19 vaccine jointly made by Pfizer and BioNTech for domestic emergency use, the government said on Saturday (Jun 12). It is the fourth vaccine to be endorsed in the Southeast Asian country that is tackling a new outbreak. Vietnam, which has previously approved ...

BEIJING: China’s famed wandering elephants are on the move again, heading southwest while a male who broke from the herd is still keeping his distance. The group left a wildlife reserve in the southwest of Yunnan province more than a year ago and has trekked 500km north to the outskirts of the ...

NEW DELHI: Ram Babu moved from his village to the Indian capital New Delhi in 1980, to clean cars. Soon, he learned to drive and got a job as a tour bus driver. Decades later, he set up his own company, Madhubani Tours and Travels. In March 2020, a stringent nationwide lockdown to fight the ...

The Johor skyline is now dotted with empty condominium units, due to an oversupply in the market and lack of foreign buyers.

NEW DELHI: India on Saturday (Jun 12) cut taxes on medical equipment such as oxygen concentrators and drugs used to treat COVID-19 infections, after widespread criticism over healthcare costs during a devastating second wave of the virus in April and May. The government cut taxes on medical grade ...

CARBIS BAY, England: The Group of Seven richest democracies on Saturday (Jun 12) sought to counter China's growing influence by offering developing nations an infrastructure plan that would rival President Xi Jinping's multi-trillion-dollar Belt and Road initiative. The G7, whose leaders are ...

Myanmar's junta on Saturday (Jun 12) accused some of the country's two dozen ethnic armed groups of providing training to its opponents to carry out a wave of bombings that it said had targeted public buildings including schools.  Bomb attacks have become a daily occurrence as the army struggles ...

DUBAI: Saudi Arabia has restricted the annual Haj pilgrimage to citizens and residents and set a maximum of 60,000 pilgrims in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The decision was announced on Saturday (Jun 12) by the Ministry of Hajj and Umrah in a statement carried by state media. The pilgrimage ...

ROME: Italian police said Saturday (Jun 12) they had arrested a man wanted by Britain in connection with a people-smuggling plot that led to the death of 39 Vietnamese migrants in the back of a lorry. Stefan Damian Dragos, a 28-year-old Romanian citizen, is accused of having provided the truck ...

PHNOM PENH: Cambodia's capital of Phnom Penh on Saturday (Jun 12) began overseeing the dismantling of "floating home" communities on the banks of the Tonle Sap River over the objections of longtime residents who say they have nowhere else to go. For generations, the floating wooden houseboats of ...

WASHINGTON: Japanese chemist Ei-ichi Negishi who won the Nobel prize for developing a method for creating complex chemicals necessary for manufacturing drugs and electronics has died aged 85, his US university said. Negishi died on Sunday in Indianapolis, Purdue University said in a statement on ...

COLOMBO: Sri Lanka is seeking an interim claim of US$40 million from the operator of a fire-ravaged cargo ship to cover part of the cost of fighting the blaze, officials said on Saturday (Jun 12). Sri Lanka's attorney general has sent the claim to lawyers representing X-Press Feeders, the ship’s ...

Hong Kong democracy activist Agnes Chow was released Saturday from prison on the second anniversary of the city's huge democracy rallies, with police out in force and protests now all but banned.

HONG KONG: The main representative of the Chinese government in Hong Kong said on Saturday (Jun 12) people trying to turn the city into a "pawn in geopolitics" were the "real enemies" and Beijing was the true defender of the city's special status. Luo Huining, director of China's Hong Kong Liaison ...

HONG KONG: Hong Kong bankers and lawyers will be able to search the city's companies registry under proposed exemptions to plans to tighten public access to the database, Secretary for Financial Services Christopher Hui said on Saturday (Jun 12). Business and governance experts have criticised a ...

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia is expected to spend 8 billion ringgit (US$1.95 billion) on fuel and cooking oil subsidies this year, more than double the 3.78 billion ringgit originally allocated, the finance ministry said on Saturday (Jun 12). The announcement comes as Malaysia looks to boost public ...

NEW DELHI: India on Saturday (Jun 12) reported 84,332 new COVID-19 infections over the past 24 hours, the lowest in more than two months, data from the health ministry showed. The South Asian country's total COVID-19 case load now stands at 29.4 million, while total fatalities are at 367,081, data ...

LONAVLA, India: Indian start-up Mylab Discovery Solutions hopes that its inexpensive COVID-19 home test kit - the country's first - will help the massive South Asian nation better track the pandemic's spread among its 1.3-billion people. CoviSelf was launched earlier this month and is the first ...

CARBIS BAY, United Kingdom: G7 leaders are on Saturday (Jun 12) set to agree a joint declaration aimed at preventing another pandemic, as they resume wide-ranging talks at their first in-person summit in almost two years. The group of leading economies - Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy ...

SHANGHAI: China reported 35 new coronavirus cases in the mainland for Jun 11, up from 22 a day earlier, the country's health authority said on Saturday (Jun 12). Of the new cases, eight were local transmissions, compared with nine the previous day, the National Health Commission said. All of the ...

The groups Pakistan has nurtured in supporting the Taliban could strike at its own breast, says Shashi Tharoor.

CARBIS BAY, England: British Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Friday (Jun 11) gave the Tokyo Olympics a show of public support at a meeting with Japan's Yoshihide Suga and welcomed efforts to ensure the Games can take place safely. The Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games, which were postponed last year due to ...

If you're planning a trip to Japan, here's what you'll need to know and expect if you want to visit during the global coronavirus pandemic.

WASHINGTON: The United States and China clashed in rare talks on Friday (Jun 11) as President Joe Biden made his international debut at the Group of Seven (G7) summit, with his administration pressing Beijing on COVID-19, Taiwan and human rights. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, joining Biden at ...

Pakistan announced a budget Friday of 8.4 trillion rupees ($54 billion) for the next fiscal year, basing it on an ambitious growth target of 4.5 percent and tripling spending on public sector development with an election just two years away.

MANILA: A polio outbreak in the Philippines has ended, according to the World Health Organization (WHO) and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), which praised government efforts to fight the disease despite the coronavirus pandemic. The UN agencies said in a joint statement on Friday (Jun ...

BEIJING: China has punished 27 government officials deemed responsible for last month's ultramarathon deaths, the state-run People's Daily said on Friday (Jun 11), one of the world's deadliest sporting tragedies in recent history. Twenty-one people died of hypothermia when extremely cold weather ...

BEIJING: China has punished 27 government officials deemed responsible for last month's ultramarathon deaths, the state-run People's Daily said on Friday (Jun 11), one of the world's deadliest sporting tragedies in recent history. Twenty-one people died of hypothermia when extremely cold weather ...

A firebrand Pakistani scholar has been detained for making death threats against Nobel prize laureate Malala Yousafzai over her comments on marriage, officials said Friday.

A firebrand Pakistani scholar has been detained for making death threats against Nobel prize laureate Malala Yousafzai over her comments on marriage, officials said Friday.

A firebrand Pakistani scholar has been detained for making death threats against Nobel prize laureate Malala Yousafzai over her comments on marriage, officials said Friday.

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia's movement control order, known as MCO 3.0, will be extended for another two weeks from Jun 15 to Jun 28. Senior Minister for Defence Ismail Sabri Yaakob announced in a statement on Friday (Jun 11) that the decision to extend the MCO 3.0 was made as daily case numbers still ...

JAKARTA: Indonesia is preparing to receive thousands of deportees from Malaysia, a government official said on Friday (Jun 11), amid a crackdown there on undocumented workers and as the country suffers its most severe coronavirus outbreak so far. Malaysia will send back about 7,200 people to ...

China was first and foremost on the minds of American politicians, planners and military officials during Thursday's congressional hearing on the Pentagon's defense authorization request for the forthcoming fiscal year.

GENEVA: The United Nations rights chief said on Friday (Jun 11) that violence was escalating across Myanmar, warning that the country had plunged into a "human rights catastrophe" since the Feb 1 coup. Pointing to reported military build-up in several regions of the country, UN High Commissioner ...

BEIJING: Congestion at container shipping ports in southern China is worsening as authorities step up disinfection measures amid a flare-up in COVID-19 cases, causing the biggest backlog since at least 2019. More than 150 coronavirus cases have been reported in Guangdong province, a key ...

KUALA LUMPUR: United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) has pleaded with the king to not extend Malaysia's state of emergency beyond Aug 1, its president Ahmad Zahid Hamidi said after an audience with the ruler on Friday (Jun 11).  The party also wanted the parliament to reconvene again to ensure ...

KUNMING: A herd of wild elephants trekking across China took a break to forage and play in a forest in China's Yunnan province, after one animal became separated from the group. The main herd of 14 foraged and played in the forest after passing through Yuxi city on Friday (Jun 11). The group had ...

BEIJING: A new Chinese law against foreign sanctions is designed to boost Beijing's power against international pressure, but could spark compliance dilemmas for foreign businesses operating in the world's second-largest economy. It comes just a week after US President Joe Biden expanded a ...

BEIJING: Solar panel "wings" spread out and two camera "eyes" pointing ahead, China's Mars rover Zhurong struck a birdlike pose as it explored the Red Planet in photos released by the country's space agency on Friday (Jun 11). Zhurong's touchdown in May was the first ever successful probe landing ...

BANGKOK: Thailand has signed a purchase order for 20 million doses of the COVID-19 vaccine develop by Pfizer and BioNTech to be delivered before the end of this year, its health minister said. Details of the deal, delivery time frame and the vaccine's approval by the Food and Drug Administration ...

Thailand is prioritising AstraZeneca Plc COVID-19 vaccines produced in the country for itself due to the severity of the pandemic there, which has delayed deliveries to Taiwan, President Tsai Ing-wen said on Friday.

MANILA: The Philippines will exempt elderly people who have been fully vaccinated from stay-at-home orders to encourage more to get inoculated and help authorities meet COVID-19 immunisation targets, officials said on Friday (Jun 11). Seniors living in areas under looser quarantine restrictions ...

Hong Kong censors are to vet all films for national security breaches under expanded powers announced on Friday, in the latest blow to the financial hub's political and artistic freedoms.

NEW DELHI: Another spat between India's government and US big tech has exacerbated disillusion among firms which have spent billions to build hubs in their largest growth market, to the extent some are rethinking expansion plans, people close to the matter said. The government on Saturday (Jun 5) ...

South Korean President Moon Jae-in was set to depart Friday for the Group of Seven summit in Britain where talk of countering China could overshadow Seoul's efforts to be seen as a bigger player on issues such as climate change and the COVID-19 pandemic.

SOMA: Tamio Hayashi, 77, doubted he could ever navigate the Internet systems set up to register for COVID-19 vaccines across most of Japan. He hated the idea of using the "troublesome" systems that have broken down and befuddled other older residents, hobbling Japan's inoculation push. Luckily ...

Beijing has broken its legal obligations by undermining Hong Kong's high degree of autonomy and used a national security law to "drastically curtail freedoms" in the global financial hub, according to a report by Britain on its former colony.

KUALA LUMPUR: Recent festive celebrations in Malaysia sparked 60 COVID-19 clusters involving 3,511 cases, the health ministry said on Thursday (Jun 10). From May 13 to Jun 10, authorities said 58 clusters linked to Hari Raya Puasa and two clusters linked to Hari Gawai were detected. A total of 13 ...