ISLAMABAD: Pakistan said on Thursday (Jan 18) it carried out strikes against militant targets in Iran, with Tehran reporting a death toll of seven civilians after staging its own air raid in Pakistan earlier this week. Nuclear-armed Pakistan and neighbouring Iran are both battling simmering insurgencies along their sparsely populated borderContinue Reading
China claims Taiwan as its own territory with no right to state-to-state ties, a position Taiwan strongly disputes. Worldwide, a dozen countries maintain formal diplomatic ties with Taipei. In a statement on Thursday, Marshall Islands said its ties with Taiwan were “rock solid”, and in the region’s best interest. “TheContinue Reading
JAKARTA: Indonesia’s presidential candidates have pledged to strengthen the government’s anti-corruption agency, laying out their plans ahead of the country’s Feb 14 election, to counter pervasive graft in Southeast Asia’s largest economy. The candidates’ promises, made at a dialogue late on Wednesday (Jan 17), come as experts bemoan a slowdownContinue Reading
WASHINGTON: The Biden administration on Wednesday (Jan 17) returned the Yemen-based Houthi rebels to a list of terrorist groups, US officials said, in the latest attempt by Washington to stem attacks on international shipping. Officials said the “Specially Designated Global Terrorist” (SDGT) designation, which hits the Iran-aligned group with harshContinue Reading
MOSCOW: North Korea’s foreign minister lauded comradely ties with Russia on Tuesday (Jan 16) ahead of a rare meeting in Moscow with Russian President Vladimir Putin, who has been invited by Kim Jong Un to visit the reclusive nuclear-armed country. Putin has deepened ties with North Korea since the 2022Continue Reading
TOKYO: A Korean Air Lines plane clipped a Cathay Pacific Airways aircraft at New Chitose Airport on Japan’s northern island of Hokkaido on Tuesday (Jan 16), a Korean Air official said. The accident happened when the Korean Air plane was preparing for take-off, the airline official said. No injuries wereContinue Reading
“While the Government of Nauru’s action on Jan 15 to sever its diplomatic relationship with Taiwan is a sovereign decision, it is nonetheless a disappointing one,” the State Department said. “Taiwan is a reliable, like-minded, and democratic partner. The PRC often makes promises in exchange for diplomatic relations that ultimatelyContinue Reading
Moscow and Pyongyang have denied arms deals but have said they would deepen cooperation across the board and have staged a series of high-level meetings since last year, including the summit between Putin and Kim. Peskov said Russia hoped a Putin visit to North Korea, at Kim’s invitation, would takeContinue Reading
BEIJING: China Foreign Minister Wang Yi said the war in Gaza continues to escalate and China is calling for a larger-scale, more authoritative and effective international peace conference and a concrete timetable to implement a two-state solution. Wang made the comments to reporters after talks with the Egyptian Foreign MinisterContinue Reading
HONG KONG: Chinese state media warned on Friday (Jan 12) that a report by a prominent US think tank on the military uses of Chinese scientific research across the Indian Ocean gave “ammunition” to countries bent on concocting threats from China. The report this week by the Washington-based Center forContinue Reading