Asia - South China Morning Post

Ahead of US President Donald Trump’s second term, conservative groups in Japan – from right-leaning media outlets to politicians – celebrated his return to the White House as a golden opportunity for Tokyo to deepen trade with the world’s largest economy and cement its role as Washington’s key security partner in Asia.

Just over a year later, that optimism has faded. The same commentators who once predicted that Japan and the US would prosper together under Trump’s leadership, marching in...

Businesses in Malaysia’s Johor state are gearing up for an influx of shoppers from Singapore ahead of Lunar New Year.

They said the number of customers had risen gradually in recent weeks, with a sharper increase in sales expected.

Hamper store owner Loo Chok Nan said he began getting Lunar New Year orders from Malaysian and Singaporean buyers about two weeks ago.

“We would normally deliver the orders as soon as they have been wrapped and packed, so that we have enough room to pack more coming...

About one in six men who use Tokyo’s trains and railway stations say they have been groped, a new survey by the metropolitan government has found – a figure experts describe as unexpectedly high and a reminder that women are not the only victims of Japan’s notorious chikan molesters.

While women are disproportionately affected – 54.3 per cent reported being touched inappropriately on public transport in the same survey – the 15.1 per cent figure for male victims challenges long-held assumptions...

Vietnam’s Communist Party five-yearly congress is set to consolidate more power for General Secretary To Lam, whom observers say has behaved like he “expects a mandate”.

But term and age limits on the leadership are expected to remain, they add, leaving Lam as just a “first among equals” when the conclave concludes on Sunday.

The congress – where the one-party state’s highest decisions are made – opened on Monday and will set key economic targets for the country as well as pick new...

A red stencil of a hand pressed against the wall of an Indonesian cave is the oldest rock art ever discovered, scientists said on Wednesday, and sheds light on how humans first migrated to Australia.

The cave art dates back at least 67,800 years, according to research published in the journal Nature by a team of Indonesian and Australian archaeologists.

“We have been working in Indonesia for a long time,” study co-author Maxime Aubert of Australia’s Griffith University said.

This time they...

Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco) on Wednesday restarted its first nuclear reactor since the 2011 Fukushima disaster, with the utility’s safety measures set to be closely watched as it seeks to turn around its business amid ongoing clean-up efforts from the accident.

Tepco brought back online the No 6 reactor at the seven-unit Kashiwazaki-Kariwa complex in Niigata Prefecture, northwest of Tokyo – the world’s largest nuclear power plant by output when fully operational – making it the 15th...

Competition between the United States and China could help drive global progress, but only if both powers exercise restraint in sensitive areas such as nuclear technology and artificial intelligence, Singapore President Tharman Shanmugaratnam has said.

Speaking at the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos on Wednesday, Tharman stressed that broad innovation benefits could come from rivalry between the two superpowers.

He added that innovations born of competition could lead to...

Frontier research lab MiroMind, a subsidiary of the China-founded multinational firm Shanda Group, has asked some of its staff in Shanghai to relocate to Singapore, according to people with knowledge of the matter, raising comparisons to artificial intelligence start-up Manus’ pull-out from China last year.

Those actions came amid Sunday’s reorganisation announcement by Shanda and Singapore-based MiroMind, which said its research on artificial general intelligence (AGI) and fundamental...

Police in Indian Kashmir have asked at least three journalists working in the region to sign a pledge vowing ‌not to “disturb peace” in the region, two of them told Reuters on Wednesday.

A third ‍journalist, an assistant editor with the Indian Express newspaper, was summoned to a police station in Srinagar, the capital of the federal territory, but did not sign the pledge, the newspaper said in a report published on Wednesday.

India has imposed ⁠several restrictions in the troubled...

Indonesian police have dismantled an alleged baby trafficking ring that used social media to sell newborns in Medan after neighbours reported suspicious activity at a rented house.

Medan police chief Jean Calvijn Simanjuntak said nine people had been arrested and three others were being sought, according to a report by The Jakarta Post on Tuesday.

The suspects were believed to have sold at least two babies for between 9 million and 25 million rupiah (US$530 to US$1,475) each and were preparing...