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By Peter CATTERALL BEIJING, Nov 14, 2023 (AFP) – A humble restaurant on a Beijing street serving up a hearty dish of pork liver, lungs and intestines was once the site of an unconventional China-US rapprochement. On a 2011 visit, then US vice president Joe Biden went for lunch at Yaoji Chaogan, sparking a social media craze over his “noodle diplomacy”. Outside the eatery in one of the capital’s historic hutong neighbourhoods this week, Chinese […]
SEOUL, Nov 14, 2023 (AFP) – Nineteen South Koreans who were held captive in Myanmar have been rescued, Seoul’s foreign ministry said Tuesday, with a source from Myanmar’s main airport confirming the victims were flying home. South Korea has been working on its citizens’ release since being notified in early October that they had been detained by an unknown “illegal company” in Tachileik, which is situated in Myanmar’s Shan state near the border with Thailand. […]
TAIPEI, Nov 14, 2023 (AFP) Taipei’s national security chief has said a Chinese tax probe into Taiwan tech giant Foxconn is “political”, as its billionaire founder Terry Gou is running for president of the democratically ruled island. Gou, who gave up Foxconn’s management reins four years ago, launched his presidential bid in August as an independent candidate in Taiwan’s January polls. Chinese state-run Global Times reported last month that Foxconn — one of the world’s […]
SAN FRANCISCO, Nov 14, 2023 (AFP) – President Joe Biden’s administration signaled Monday it would postpone a draft of an Asia trade pact that had been set to be unveiled at a summit in San Francisco, after facing domestic criticism. Biden, welcoming 20 other members of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum to San Francisco where he will meet on the sidelines with Chinese President Xi Jinping, had been expected to announce substantial progress on […]
SYDNEY, Nov 13, 2023 (AFP) – A Malaysian former bodyguard convicted in the 2006 murder of a Mongolian translator has been released after eight years in Australian immigration detention, his lawyer said Monday. Sirul Azhar Umar fled Malaysia after being sentenced to hang for the gruesome slaying of Altantuya Shaariibuu, who worked as an interpreter on a $2 billion French submarine deal that was mired in allegations of corruption. Sirul has long insisted the killing […]
NEW DELHI, Nov 13, 2023 (AFP) – More children in South Asia are struggling due to severe water scarcity made worse by the impacts of climate change than anywhere else worldwide, the United Nations said Monday. “A staggering 347 million children under 18 are exposed to high or extremely high water scarcity in South Asia, the highest number among all regions in the world,” the UN children’s agency said in a report. The eight-nation region, […]
KATHMANDU, Nov 13, 2023 (AFP) – Nepal said Monday it will ban TikTok, citing the app’s negative effects on the country’s social harmony. The popular video-sharing platform, which has around one billion monthly users, has faced restrictions in many countries for allegedly breaking data rules and for its potential harmful impact on youth. “The decision to ban was made today, and relevant authorities are currently addressing the technical issues,” Minister for Communications and Information Technology […]
SEOUL, Nov 13, 2023 (AFP) – US and South Korean defence chiefs on Monday updated a key military agreement against nuclear-armed North Korea for the first time in a decade as they hailed their “stronger than ever” alliance. US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin is in Seoul for an annual security meeting with his South Korean counterpart Shin Won-sik, as the allies ramp up their defence cooperation in the face of growing missile and nuclear […]
YANGON, Myanmar, Nov 13, 2023 (AFP) – A Myanmar ethnic armed group has launched attacks on security force outposts in the west of the country, local media reported Monday, as the junta struggles to beat back fighting in the north. Arakan Army (AA) fighters later seized border guard bases near Rathedaung in western Rakhine state, local media cited an AA spokesman as saying. The AA has for years fought a war for the autonomy of […]
By Sara HUSSEIN BANGKOK, Nov 10, 2023 (AFP) – An elusive echidna feared extinct after disappearing for six decades has been rediscovered in a remote part of Indonesia, on an expedition that also found a new kind of tree-dwelling shrimp. The Zaglossus attenboroughi, a kind of long-beaked echidna named for famed British naturalist David Attenborough, had last been seen in 1961. Echidnas are nocturnal and shy, making them difficult to find at the best of […]
By Danny KEMP WILMINGTON, United States, Nov 13, 2023 (AFP) – US President Joe Biden will urge Indonesian counterpart Joko Widodo to take on a larger role in resolving the Israel-Hamas conflict in talks at the White House Monday, US officials said. The meeting had been aimed at showing unity ahead of Biden’s summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping in San Francisco this week, with Washington trying to counter Beijing in the Asia-Pacific region. But […]
By Pam Castro and Jamillah Sta Rosa SOUTH CHINA SEA, Nov 11, 2023 (AFP) – As a Philippine Coast Guard rubber boat carrying journalists sped towards Filipino troops on a grounded navy vessel in the disputed South China Sea, three Chinese speed boats gave chase. The high-seas pursuit near Second Thomas Shoal in the Spratly Islands on Friday ended when Philippine Navy inflatable speed boats deployed from the crumbling BRP Sierra Madre and blocked the […]
