Asia - South China Morning Post

A growing number of late-night cafes across Japan are opening their doors to mothers struggling with babies who will not stop crying, offering a rare refuge during the most isolating hours of parenting.

The idea of a “nighttime crying cafe”, which appeared in an online comic nearly a decade ago, first resonated with readers and is now gaining real-world traction as spaces inspired by that vision are spreading under small, community-led initiatives.

The creator of the original concept said she...

South Korea’s military is exploring a strategic partnership with Hyundai Motor to potentially deploy robotics to the front lines as Seoul accelerates investment in AI-powered, unmanned systems to tackle a deepening troop shortage.

The defence ministry said it was discussing cooperation with Hyundai as part of efforts to respond to changes in the battlefield environment and develop a “hi-tech, science-driven force”, though specific details have yet to be finalised.

The Korea Economic Daily first...

Clothes seller Lata Solanki used to face a devastating choice when India’s summer heat hit dangerous levels: risk her health going door-to-door for sales, or lose her income?

But now the 42-year-old is part of an insurance scheme that pays out when temperatures hit a threshold, so she can stay home without jeopardising her finances.

The “parametric” model pays out automatically when specific triggers are breached, in Solanki’s case after two consecutive days at 43.72 degrees Celsius (110 degrees...

The prison cell, it turns out, is no obstacle to running a criminal empire. All you need is a smartphone, an encrypted messaging app and an overwhelmed corrections system, even if it is thousands of kilometres away.

That was the conclusion law enforcement officials in South Korea and Japan reached after tracing a string of drug deals, home invasions and brazen robberies to inmates already serving time in the Philippines.

The cases exposed a darkly inventive new chapter in Southeast Asia’s...

A teenager was charged on Monday with assaulting controversial blogger Amos Yee over the weekend at an anime convention in Singapore.

Bosco Chun Ho Wang, an 18-year-old Chinese national and Singapore permanent resident, was given one charge each of public nuisance and voluntarily causing hurt.

The incident occurred at about 2.10pm on Saturday at level 4 of Suntec City Convention Centre.

Chun is accused of punching and kicking the 27-year-old Singaporean. These acts, along with shouting,...

Speaking about her stepbrother Timothy Heng, Tessa Oh said that his family knew him to be someone who put others before himself and showed up for the people in his life.

Early on, hearing that he was still on Indonesia’s Mount Dukono after it erupted while most of his fellow hikers had been evacuated, “my first thought was that he must have [run] back and tried to help someone”, the 30-year-old journalist said.

More details about his last movements that emerged in a media report and accounts...

Thailand’s former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra was released on parole on Monday after serving eight months in jail for an abuse of power conviction, a return to the spotlight for a tycoon formerly at the fulcrum of Thai politics but whose two-decade spell over the electorate appears to have evaporated.

Looking slimmer with a short trimmed haircut, the 76-year-old was greeted with hugs by his three children, including daughter and former prime minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra, and roses from...

On April 28, the United Arab Emirates informed the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) it was leaving. Three days’ notice. No call to Riyadh beforehand, apparently. The grievance about production quotas was years old: Abu Dhabi had threatened to quit in 2021. What’s changed has nothing to do with the barrel count. It is about who underwrites Abu Dhabi’s security when it acts on a decision Riyadh opposes.

After Iran struck UAE infrastructure, Abu Dhabi sent only a foreign...

A South Korean cargo ship hit in the Strait of Hormuz six days ago was struck by unidentified aircraft, the foreign ministry in Seoul said on Sunday, days after the fire-damaged HMM Namu arrived in Dubai.

US President Donald Trump has claimed that Iran had “taken some shots” at the Panama-flagged vessel and urged South Korea to join US operations aimed at restoring normal shipping through the strait.

The vital waterway has been virtually closed since the United States and Israel launched a war...

More than 300 foreign nationals were arrested in a raid on an alleged online gambling operation in the Indonesian capital of Jakarta, police said on Saturday, in one of the country’s largest crackdowns on illegal digital betting networks.

The 321 foreigners, mainly from Vietnam, were arrested at a commercial building near the city’s Chinatown section that investigators described as a hub for more than 70 online gambling websites, targeting players outside Indonesia, based on marketing records...