China flaunts purchasing power with soybean buys ahead of US midterms

Malaysia’s two-time prime minister Mahathir Mohamad has been admitted to hospital for observation, his office confirmed on Wednesday, in the latest health scare involving the 101-year-old. Mahathir was admitted to the National Heart Institute on Tuesday night, barely a day after his wife of 70 years, Siti Hasmah Mohamad Ali, died at the same hospital. It is unclear why the former leader was admitted. Sufi Yusoff, Mahathir’s long-time aide, told reporters that they were awaiting diagnosis by his...

Japanese BitTorrent users who thought they were simply downloading adult videos for free are increasingly receiving court notices and demands for hundreds of thousands of yen, as copyright holders step up efforts to identify users through their IP addresses. One self-employed man in his 40s living in Tokyo began using the file-sharing software after reading about it online. He would start downloading adult videos before going to bed and switch the software off the next morning, giving him access...

A Singapore-based education financing programme is testing whether income-linked funding can widen access to higher education without an unmanageable debt burden, a model analysts say could help ease repayment pressure faced by graduates across Southeast Asia. Global Financing for Education’s (GFE) Pay It Forward scheme, publicly launched in September, provides students with funding for their education in return for 3 to 10 per cent of their subsequent income for one to 10 years. The...

American rapper Macklemore lost his spot on British pop star Ed Sheeran’s US tour after speaking up for Palestinians, but in Malaysia it was Sheeran’s music which ended up being pulled from the airwaves. In neighbouring Singapore, British band Massive Attack faced a different kind of fallout, barred from returning after members displayed a Palestinian flag during a July concert. The contrasting cases highlight the competing pressures on foreign artists in Southeast Asia, where political...

At an Indonesian prison complex near Jakarta, inspectors found expensive cars, spacious quarters with flat-screen TVs and a golf simulator under construction.

An airstrike on a bustling market in rebel territory left at least 50 people dead, in one of the deadliest attacks on civilians in months.

In Turkey, People who have recently lost loved ones hire doughnut makers to hand out fried dough balls, known as lokma, to honor the dead and spread their blessings.

The fact that Trump didn’t give anything new away on Taiwan shouldn’t obscure how much ground he has already conceded to Xi.

The UNGA voted to delete those sections 20 years ago. But the issue has acquired renewed political significance as Sino-Japanese relations have deteriorated.

So far, incumbent President Sadyr Japarov and Omurbek Suvanaliev – a politician and former minister of internal affairs – have announced their intentions to run.

A blueprint for building resilience in the Hindu Kush Himalaya.

The recurring clashes represent the failure of months of diplomacy and external mediation. Where does the Afghanistan-Pakistan relationship go from here?