Asia - South China Morning Post

Indonesia’s President Prabowo Subianto has called for a nationwide drive to replace corrugated zinc roofs with clay tiles, saying he wants to shed what he describes as a “rusty” image while cooling homes, reviving a struggling industry and boosting the country’s appeal to tourists.

But analysts warn that the plan – dubbed gentengisasi, or “mass roofing” – could burden the environment, require costly structural upgrades and face resistance outside Java island.

“I see in all our cities,...

Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi pledged on Friday to make Japan “strong and prosperous”, while hitting out at China and pledging to keep “hitting the growth button” following her party's landslide election win.

“China is intensifying its attempts to unilaterally change the status quo by force or coercion in the East China Sea and the South China Sea, while also expanding and stepping up its military activities in the areas surrounding our country,” Takaichi told parliament in a policy...

Singapore street performer Bryan Wong may have performed all around the world, but few gigs can compare to the one where Senior Minister Lee Hsien Loong randomly turned up in the audience.

The 29-year-old acrobatics artist was performing his Circles In Circus act at Rainforest Wild Asia when he spotted Lee and his wife, Ho Ching, watching from the crowd.

In a video later posted to social media, Wong zoomed in to Lee’s face, joking: “Sir, I’m sorry, I’m going to zoom in to your face, thank you...

Twelve police officers have been arrested in Malaysia for allegedly extorting about 200,000 ringgit (US$51,000) in cryptocurrency from a group of Chinese nationals during a midnight raid on a house in Selangor, the country’s wealthiest state.

The arrests, announced on Thursday, came just days after Malaysia’s king had issued a blunt warning about corruption within the civil service and police ranks, cautioning that such practices were on his “radar”.

Selangor police chief Shazeli Kahar said the...

Once a rival, always a rival.

As Prime Minister Narendra Modi kicked off the busiest day of India’s AI Summit in New Delhi, he orchestrated a photo op with 13 other business and political leaders, all standing in a line and holding each other’s hands above their heads.

Well, all of them except two.

Sam Altman and Dario Amodei, CEOs of rivals OpenAI and Anthropic, were positioned next to each other and, awkwardly, refused to clasp each other’s hands. Instead, they stood with their arms crossed in...

The 18-year ordeal of Norida Akmal Ayob, 45, has cast a spotlight on a silent crisis: an unknown number of Malaysian women remain stranded in “dire straits” across Indonesia, unable to afford the journey home.

According to Kosmo, many of these women share a similar ­trajectory – falling into financial ruin after marrying local men in Lombok and finding themselves trapped by the high costs of returning home.

“Money remains the main ­factor, as earning is difficult. My children and I were at the...

When Sanae Takaichi strode into her first press conference as Japan’s reappointed prime minister on Wednesday, she delivered a clear message to the economists and editorial boards warning her away from her signature tax pledge.

Food consumption tax is going to be scrapped, and nothing is going to stop her.

Formally confirmed in office after the Diet voted to reappoint her – following a landslide victory in the House of Representatives election on February 8 – Takaichi reiterated her commitment...

The White House announced a reciprocal trade agreement with Indonesia on Thursday while President Prabowo Subianto was in Washington to attend the first meeting of President Donald Trump’s “Board of Peace”.

Under the agreement, Southeast Asia’s largest economy will eliminate tariffs for 99 per cent of American goods while the US would maintain tariffs on most Indonesian goods at 19 per cent, the White House said. That is the same rate the US has set for Cambodia and Malaysia.

Indonesia also...

For nearly three decades, Washington and Tokyo have pledged to close a controversial US airbase in Okinawa, located in the middle of a densely populated island. But the plan is now facing new uncertainty.

The US military would not return its Futenma airbase to Japanese control until Tokyo builds a longer runway than the one being built at a replacement site in the northeast of Okinawa prefecture, according to a report.

Japan’s national broadcaster NHK reported on Wednesday that the US Department...

A prominent leader of an independent resistance group in Myanmar that had come under attack by rivals who are loyal to the mainstream opposition force has surrendered to the country’s military authorities, state media reported on Thursday.

The surrender of Bo Nagar, a leader of the Burma National Revolutionary Army (BNRA), in the upper-central region of Sagaing was a dramatic reminder of fractures within the armed resistance movement, which has led to sporadic clashes over control of territory...