Asia - South China Morning Post

China-Canada relations are undergoing a thaw after years of estrangement and recrimination. China and India are seeking a rapprochement despite deep-seated distrust and sometimes violent border disputes. Both cases share a common element: Donald Trump.

Meanwhile, following the US president’s visit to Beijing, his defence secretary Pete Hegseth avoided mentioning Taiwan at the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore. He sounded almost conciliatory by hailing ties with Beijing as “better than they’ve...

Asia’s governments have spent years promising to protect the seas that feed their people, shelter their coasts and support some of the world’s richest marine life.

World Ocean Day on Monday will put those promises back in the public spotlight, but the more consequential test will come days later in Mombasa, Kenya, where governments, donors, companies and conservation groups will gather for the 11th annual Our Ocean Conference from June 16 to 18.

The conference has become a key stage for global...

The Philippines’ landslide defeat to Kyrgyzstan for a UN Security Council seat has dealt a blow to Manila’s long-running campaign to raise its international diplomatic profile through the prestigious body, prompting questions about President Ferdinand Marcos Jnr’s foreign policy legacy.

Analysts said the loss reflected the appeal of having under-represented Central Asia play a role in the council, Kyrgyzstan’s perceived neutrality and the geopolitical baggage attached to the Philippines as a...

Pig farmers in the central state of Selangor have spent years trying to keep their business out of Malaysia’s culture wars. A royal decree has dragged them straight into one.

The state’s decision to shut down pig farms, prompted by Sultan Sharafuddin Idris Shah, Selangor’s hereditary ruler, has transformed a long-standing local dispute over pollution and odour into a flashpoint touching on royal influence, the livelihoods of a minority community and the delicate balancing act facing Malaysia’s...

China and South Korea will allow 70 more flights per week between the two countries in view of fast-growing, two-way tourism and a drop in Chinese group travel to Japan.

The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport in Seoul said in a statement Thursday that passenger flight capacity would grow from 608 to 664 per week and that maximum air freight flights would expand from 54 to 68 per week.

These expansions, the first since before the Covid pandemic, reflect a surge in two-way tourism,...

A proposal by the Quad to build a port in Fiji, seen by analysts as a move to counter China’s rising economic clout in the Pacific region, has fuelled doubts about whether the four-member security bloc is committed to completing the project amid differing policy priorities.

At a meeting of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, or Quad, in New Delhi last week, the foreign ministers of Australia, India, Japan and the United States – Penny Wong, S. Jaishankar, Toshimitsu Motegi and US Secretary of...

A race to dig rare earths and metals in the mineral-rich mountains of eastern Myanmar is polluting waterways that millions of people living downstream depend on after a new tungsten mine reportedly began operations near the Thai border, according to environmental groups.

Myanmar is among the top three producing nations of rare earths and other critical minerals used to make magnets and other components that power products ranging from smartphones to electric vehicles, with most of its output...

Malaysia is heading into a run of state elections, including two triggered by early assembly dissolutions, after Negeri Sembilan became the latest state to call a snap poll amid fraying ties inside Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim’s ruling alliance.

While the polls will not directly affect Anwar’s parliamentary majority, they will test whether his federal partners can keep their coalition functioning at the state level or whether local disputes will deepen the fractures between them.

On Friday,...

Brunei’s Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah has named one of his youngest sons as foreign minister in a major cabinet reshuffle – largely seen as a move to prepare for the next generation of leaders in the oil-rich kingdom.

As the 10th child and fourth son of the sultan, Prince Abdul Mateen is down the line of succession, but his matinee idol looks have earned him more than 3 million followers on Instagram, providing a modern face to the royal family.

Another younger son, Prince Abdul Malik, was also...

The threat by the US to impose additional tariffs on imports from India over forced labour supply-chain concerns is a “pressure” tactic deployed by Washington to drive a harder bargain in its trade talks with New Delhi, according to analysts.

Following a Section 301 unfair trade practices investigation, the Trump administration proposed that products from India, China, Japan, South Korea, Brazil and Switzerland would be subject to a 12.5 per cent levy, while a 10 per cent rate would apply to...