More than 80 Rohingya people seeking to travel by boat to Malaysia have been detained in Myanmar’s southeast after traffickers abandoned them, a security source told AFP yesterday.

Mahathir Mohamad, the nearly 100-year-old elder statesman of Malaysian politics, yesterday filed his candidacy in what is likely to be his final race, as campaigning for upcoming general elections began.

Myanmar’s military government is responsible for a lack of progress on a peace plan agreed with Asean, Indonesia’s foreign minister said yesterday, adding the regional bloc has done its part in trying to end hostilities in the strife-torn country.

Afghanistan’s opium poppy cultivation this year is up by a third, the UN’s drugs agency said yesterday, in its first report on the issue since the hardline Taliban took power in 2021.

South Korean police yesterday admitted their emergency response to a deadly Halloween crush had been “insufficient”, with top officials saying crowd management failures had likely contributed to the disaster.

Former Pakistan prime minister Imran Khan won another national assembly seat in a weekend by-election, officials said yesterday, as he leads a so-called “long march” of thousands of supporters to Islamabad.

A Pakistani known for being the oldest detainee at the US-run Guantanamo Bay detention facility in Cuba was released to his home country yesterday, the South Asian country’s foreign ministry said.

North Korea fired two short-range ballistic missiles (SRBMs) off its east coast yesterday, South Korea’s military said, while South Korean forces were wrapping up nearly two weeks of exercises aimed at deterring their northern neighbour.

The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) is gravely concerned about escalating violence in Myanmar, the bloc’s chair Cambodia said, in remarks

Tightening markets for liquefied natural gas (LNG) worldwide and major oil producers cutting supply have put the world in the middle of “the first truly global energy crisis”, the head of the International Energy Agency (IEA) said yesterday.

Myanmar was added on Friday to a global financial blacklist while Russia was sidelined by the international money-laundering watchdog FATF.

Australia and Japan agreed to share sensitive intelligence and deepen defence cooperation yesterday, signing a security pact to counter China’s military rise.

Myanmar was added on Friday to a global financial blacklist while Russia was sidelined by the international money-laundering watchdog FATF.

Sri Lanka’s parliament yesterday voted to curtail the powers of the president, a partial concession to the protest movement that forced the island nation’s former head-of-state into exile.

Pakistan has been removed from an international grey list that warrants increased surveillance for terrorism financing, the head of the international money laundering watchdog which makes the list said yesterday.

At least two bombs exploded outside a prison in Myanmar's commercial hub Yangon on Wednesday, killing eight people and wounding 18.

South Korea’s troops kicked off their annual Hoguk defence drills yesterday, designed to boost their ability to respond to North Korea’s nuclear and missile threats amid simmering tension over both sides’ military activities.

Japan’s Prime Minister Fumio Kishida ordered a government probe into the Unification Church yesterday, after the assassination of former premier Shinzo Abe renewed scrutiny of the sect.

Former Pakistan prime minister Imran Khan won six of eight national assembly seats he stood for in a weekend by-election, unofficial results showed yesterday, a vote he has called a referendum on his popularity.

Pakistan’s foreign minister yesterday said he had summoned the US ambassador after President Joe Biden questioned the safety of Pakistan’s nuclear programme.