Asia - South China Morning Post

Public opinion in Japan is souring towards the United States, as US President Donald Trump’s strong-arm trade tactics and divisive domestic policies test the bonds of an alliance that has endured for eight decades.

The Cabinet Office’s latest annual survey, released on Friday, revealed that 70.8 per cent of Japanese respondents viewed Japan-US relations as “good” or “quite good”, tumbling 14.7 percentage points from a year earlier.

It marked the second-lowest reading since the question was...

A majority of Australians, Japanese and Indians believe US President Donald Trump’s second term has been bad for their countries, and more Australians see the US as harmful than helpful in Asia, a survey of people in the four countries reported on Thursday.

The United States Studies Centre at the University of Sydney polled 1,000 people in each of the four Quad nations: Australia, Japan, India, and the US. It found the region has been shaken by disruptive US developments but still backs...

A former Indonesian minister has dismissed claims of giving preferential treatment to Chinese firms and wooing investors with policies undermining the country’s sovereignty, amid furore over an airport inside a major industrial cluster that risks becoming a “state within a state”.

Luhut Pandjaitan, a key architect of ex-president Joko Widodo’s mineral downstreaming strategy, said China’s technological prowess and deep pockets made it an ideal partner for propelling the local economy as others...

China’s role in any future reunification of the Korean peninsula should not be assumed, a South Korean analyst has warned at a peace forum in Hong Kong after being asked if Bejing is a reliable partner to help advance the goal.

Sung Ki-young, chief research fellow at the Institute for National Security Strategy, told the Korean Peninsula Peace Forum on Wednesday that both China and the United States were reluctant to rapidly or radically alter peace and stability on the peninsula, meaning major...

Yoon Suk-yeol’s botched attempt to impose martial law last year plunged South Korea into its worst political crisis in decades, providing fertile ground for disinformation to grow.

A common refrain, posted on right-wing forums, amplified by YouTubers and echoed by lawmakers: China was to blame.

Yoon supporters claimed Beijing had infiltrated protests, funded his impeachment campaign and manipulated online opinion ahead of the June snap election that brought opposition leader Lee Jae-myung to...

The Philippines’ first family has signalled its readiness to open its finances to scrutiny after allegations that President Ferdinand Marcos Jnr’s son received a disproportionate share of public works funding, deepening a political crisis that has already forced several senior officials from office.

Such financial inspections – known locally as lifestyle checks and used to detect unexplained wealth among public officials – have taken on new urgency as the government confronts the widening...

More than 1,400 people have been killed across South and Southeast Asia in a week of catastrophic floods, exposing how rising global temperatures are amplifying extreme weather, even as international negotiations to phase out fossil fuels stall.

Successive storms, cyclones and relentless rains have triggered catastrophic flash floods and landslides in Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Vietnam and Malaysia, overwhelming local authorities already operating at the limits of their capacity.

While...

HSBC Holdings, the biggest lender in Hong Kong and Europe, has appointed veteran accountant Brendan Nelson as group chairman, according to its filing to the Hong Kong stock exchange on Wednesday.

Nelson, 75, has been serving as interim chairman since October 1, replacing Mark Tucker, who stepped down to become non-executive chairman of insurer AIA.

The appointment surprised the market after HSBC CEO Georges Elhedery said a day earlier at a global banking summit in London that Nelson was not...

Thailand and Cambodia took their renewed border dispute to a United Nations forum on landmine prohibition in Geneva this week, each vying for international support as their ties continued to unravel.

Both governments used the meeting of the Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention, also known as the Ottawa Convention, to appeal to the international community.

Cambodian Senior Minister Ly Thuch met International Committee of the Red Cross vice-president Gilles Carbonnier on the sidelines of the...

Police in New Zealand are waiting for nature to take its course after a man allegedly tried to smuggle a NZ$33,000 ($19,000) pendant out of a jewellery store by swallowing it.

The 32-year-old man, who has not been publicly named, is accused of eating an ornate Faberge octopus pendant at Partridge Jewelers in Auckland on Friday.

Evidence of the alleged theft had yet to emerge, police said on Wednesday.

“At the time of his arrest he underwent a medical assessment, and an officer is assigned to...