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...
Read full articleA 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...
Hundreds of Indonesian security personnel were deployed on Wednesday in anticipation of student protests against several of President Prabowo Subianto’s policies, as well as his government’s handling of forest fires. Students from the University of Indonesia said they were set to stage protests in several spots in the capital Jakarta. They are calling on the government to declare the ongoing wildfires in Sumatra and Borneo a national disaster, and to halt spending on populist programmes...
India has emerged as a major exporter of ammunition and other weapons to Europe since the outbreak of the Ukraine-Russia war, but analysts caution that New Delhi has yet to secure a lasting foothold in Europe’s defence market. Defence Secretary Rajesh Kumar Singh cited a Bloomberg report last Friday stating that India had become the third-largest arms exporter to Europe under the “ReArm Europe” initiative – also known as Readiness 2030 – largely because of ammunition demand. Bloomberg, citing...
A total of 2,097 Malaysian police officers and personnel have been arrested for drug-related offences, robbery and corruption between 2021 and August this year, according to Home Minister Saifuddin Nasution Ismail. Of the total, 1,551 were arrested for drug offences, 64 for robbery and 482 by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC). Saifuddin Nasution said in a written parliamentary reply to Kepong MP Lim Lip Eng on Tuesday that the drug-related arrests were made under the Dangerous...
Residents say a proposed Chinese car plant in northern Spain will create new jobs. Others say it’s a long-term risk, distilling a debate about the costs and perks of ties to China.
In the city’s “apartment horror” films, one of the world’s least affordable housing markets is a backdrop for exploring superstition and socioeconomic anxiety.
Japan is bracing for a more unpredictable ally in Washington, as the US midterm elections threaten to deepen political gridlock and complicate Tokyo’s long-term security calculations, analysts say. Observers warn that post-election political battles, ranging from a possible repeat of impeachment proceedings to the mounting legal battles ensnaring the administration of US President Donald Trump, risk diverting the White House’s attention from foreign policy and its long-standing commitments to...
ByteDance is accelerating its push into embodied artificial intelligence, stepping up recruitment for robotics talent as it seeks to move cutting-edge research out of the laboratory and into physical hardware. The Beijing-based owner of TikTok and Douyin is hiring for around a dozen robotics positions across hardware and software within its Seed team, the internal unit dedicated to AI research and large language model development, according to postings released on the company’s career website...
Parents in Japan are taking an increasingly active role in their children’s lives – helping them find marriage partners, navigate job hunting and secure housing – as the line between parental support and personal decision-making continues to blur. In a practice known as “proxy matchmaking”, parents attend social events armed with photos and profiles of their children, hoping to find suitable marriage partners through conversations with other parents. The Association of Parents of Marriage...
Ferocious winds and torrential rain lashed India’s southeastern coast as Cyclone Arnab made landfall on Wednesday, forcing nearly 100,000 people to evacuate their homes in two states, authorities said. Arnab hit Andhra Pradesh as a “very severe cyclonic storm”, with winds of 125-135km/h (78-84 mph) and gusts reaching 150km/h, the India Meteorological Department (IMD) said. A storm surge of 1.5 to 2.5 metres (5-8 feet) above normal tide is very likely to inundate low-lying areas of the state...
Immigration restrictions, rising living costs and strains in US-India relations are testing support for President Donald Trump among some Indian-Americans who backed the Republican Party in 2024, analysts say, ahead of November’s midterm elections. A survey released in August by AAPI Data and Asian and Pacific Islander American Vote found that 66 per cent of Indian-American respondents favoured Democratic candidates for the US House of Representatives, compared with 18 per cent for Republicans....