Asia - South China Morning Post

A man in South Korea has confessed in court to killing his girlfriend for belittling him, storing her body in a kimchi fridge and impersonating her in text messages to family members for nearly a year.

The defendant, in his 40s and who was not named by local media, strangled his girlfriend of four years on October 20 last year at a home in Gunsan, North Jeolla province, after she berated him for not following her advice on stock investment, according to prosecutors.

He then continued to exchange...

For 50 years, Sari Kartina Abdul Karim kept a secret that would reshape Malaysian history. In 1974, at the age of 26, she became one of the region’s earliest Muslim trans women to undergo gender-affirming surgery and, in a rare moment of religious recognition, married with the approval of a Johor mufti.

For five decades, she kept her story to herself. But now she says that silence has finally outlived its purpose.

“It feels like someone who was blind suddenly being told they have their eyesight...

The Penang Island City Council has ordered the unauthorised mural at a building at Chew Jetty to be removed.

In a notice dated Thursday, issued under Section 82 of the Local Government Act 1976 by the council’s Heritage Conservation Department, the building owner in the Malaysian state was instructed to erase and repaint the wall.

The mural gained fame after a video of a Chinese tourist, known as Shen Shishi, painting a picture of a panda on the mural went viral online.

She was accused of...

Cynthia Erivo performed some real magic on Thursday when she saved Wicked co-star Ariana Grande from an overeager “troll” at the premiere of the blockbuster’s second chapter in Singapore.

The Oscar nominees were walking down a yellow brick road-inspired carpet, holding hands with co-star Michelle Yeoh and posing for fans, when a man screamed and hopped the barricade, according to fan footage. The man then wrapped an arm around 32-year-old Grande, only for Erivo, 38, and a guard to cut in.

Erivo...

Singapore’s ambitions to lead the world in green shipping are picking up steam, with a new agreement with China poised to enhance the city state’s decarbonisation efforts and cement its role as a key hub for alternative fuels.

The partnership, signed last month, aims to establish a digital and green shipping corridor between the two countries, and promote maritime decarbonisation, innovation and greater supply chain efficiency.

The deal could give Singapore a competitive edge by plugging it...

South Korea has thrown its weight behind a United Nations resolution condemning the North’s dire human rights record, a choice that could complicate Seoul’s push to reopen dialogue with Pyongyang, analysts have warned.

The decision to co-sponsor the annual UN resolution – despite expectations that President Lee Jae-myung’s liberal government might step back to create a friendlier atmosphere for engagement – is likely to trigger an angry reaction from Pyongyang and narrow the already limited...

The US and China are ramping up crackdowns on cryptocurrency-related cross-border crimes with a flurry of actions against the suspected ringleaders of scam networks operating in Southeast Asia.

In recent years, the border areas between Thailand, Myanmar, Laos and Cambodia have become hubs for online fraud operations, in which syndicates either trick or coerce their targeted victims to invest in bogus schemes and transfer money via bitcoin, ether or stablecoins before these are processed through...

Bangladesh’s fugitive former prime minister, Sheikh Hasina, has expressed regret over the “needless” bloodshed as her administration tried to squash student-led protests that resulted in her losing power after 15 years, but poured scorn on a tribunal due to rule if she committed crimes against humanity by ordering the crackdown.

In a defiant interview with This Week in Asia just days before the verdict in her trial in absentia, the 78-year-old accused the interim government that replaced her of...

Juan Ponce Enrile, a shrewd political operator who helped usher in the darkest repression of the late Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos Snr’s rule, died on Thursday at the age of 101, his daughter said.

Enrile, who was being treated for pneumonia, died at home at 4.21pm “surrounded by our family”, Katrina Ponce Enrile said on her Facebook page, adding there would be a public viewing.

Known as the architect of the brutal martial law used to crush opposition to Marcos’ rule, Harvard-educated...

Thailand and Cambodia traded blame on Thursday for the breakdown of the ceasefire over their disputed border, with Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet accusing Thai soldiers of killing a civilian, as villagers on both sides prepare for the conflict to return.

His Thai counterpart, Anutin Charnvirakul, on Wednesday risked incurring the wrath of US President Donald Trump by saying he “no longer cares” about the threat of tariffs, which were trimmed as a condition for the truce, as he accused...