Japan’s push to expand industrial and port cooperation with Bangladesh could transform the South Asian country into a regional trade gateway, analysts say, connecting markets in Southeast Asia and the wider Indo-Pacific while diversifying Dhaka’s economic ties. The plan was announced during Bangladeshi Prime Minister Tarique Rahman’s official visit to Japan this week. Rahman welcomed Tokyo’s pledge of US$6 billion in investment over the next five years, which could help revive an economy hit by...
Read full articleHuawei Technologies is already integrating elements of the Tau Scaling Law – a new chip design principle that helps the company overcome US export controls – into its wireless communications network, as it pushes for broader adoption across its products. The Chinese tech giant is using the “time compression” concept based on its Tau Scaling Law in its next-generation wireless base stations, according to a company statement released on Wednesday, and the new design is already delivering tangible...
Jio Platforms shares surged on their first day of trading, even as questions mount about the telecom firm’s growth prospects and a new generation takes charge.
The Philippines is in talks with Saudi Arabia, Russia and the United States to store oil in the fuel-import-dependent nation, in a bid to hedge against fuel price spikes driven by the Iran war. The Southeast Asian nation, which imports nearly all its energy needs, also planned to increase diesel and gas-fired power output to make up for an estimated 60 per cent decline in hydropower and 20 per cent fall in solar output in the first half of 2027 due to the El Nino weather phenomenon, Energy...
China said it would seek India’s help to “maintain peace and stability in the border areas” after new stand-offs in a long-disputed region threatened to undermine improved relations. “We hope that India will work with China in the same direction by jointly implementing the common understandings between the two sides,” Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Guo Jiakun said at a daily media briefing on Monday. China “strictly abides by the relevant agreements”, he said. Guo also said that China...
For three decades, Lao Gan Ma’s glass jars, bearing the stern portrait of founder Tao Huabi, have been a fixture on Chinese dinner tables and a symbol of traditional food manufacturing. This week, however, the iconic chilli sauce has become an unlikely focus of public anxiety over artificial intelligence. Online rumours that the Guizhou-based company had replaced hundreds of factory workers with AI went viral, prompting boycott threats and highlighting growing public unease over the impact of...
Australia’s national broadcaster ABC called on the far-right One Nation party on Wednesday to stop using children’s TV character Bluey in its political cartoons. Bluey is the popular star of an Australian cartoon series featuring canines navigating childhood and parenting in the suburbs. Pauline Hanson’s One Nation party has come under fire for a 2024 political cartoon depicting Bluey driving a car over an Australian politician. That cartoon in particular has come into the spotlight since a man...
Malaysia’s Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim is up against it in next month’s Melaka state poll, as his ruling Pakatan Harapan (PH) coalition risks yet another electoral wipeout at the hands of its federal partner Umno. The two are competing head-to-head in nearly all of the 28 state assembly seats up for grabs on November 14, in a contest widely seen as favouring an incumbent state administration led by the United Malays National Organisation’s Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition. Whether BN holds onto...
Malaysia will still lose tens of billions of ringgit to the 1MDB scandal even after further overseas asset recoveries, its second finance minister said on Wednesday, as disgraced former prime minister Najib Razak prepares to move to house arrest. Najib has been imprisoned since 2022 following his conviction for corruption and money laundering tied to SRC International, a former subsidiary of 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB). The sovereign wealth fund was co-founded by Najib in 2009 during his...
Malaysian customs said on Wednesday that it had seized about 49.5 million ringgit (US$12 million) worth of advanced artificial intelligence chips this month, as authorities close in on a syndicate suspected of smuggling high-performance semiconductors through the country’s main airport. Malaysia imposed export controls last year on the movement of advanced AI chips of US origin, following pressure from the United States to stem their flow into China. On October 15, authorities found 30 server...
A heated disagreement over recent land mine explosions is part of the legacy of the truce that halted the Korean War 73 years ago.
A Singaporean behavioural therapist who was repeatedly hit in the face by a four-year-old boy with special needs grabbed his hand and dragged him off his chair and onto the floor. Tricia Lee Hsien, 29, was fined S$5,000 (US$3,900) by a court on Wednesday. She pleaded guilty to one charge of voluntarily causing hurt to a minor. The prosecution sought only a fine, saying this was an “exceptional case” as the harm caused was low and the woman’s culpability was low in this isolated act of...