Hong Kong’s health facilities have been overloaded by an “onslaught” of Covid-19 infections, its leader said, even as authorities cling to a “zero-Covid” policy despite an unprecedented rise in cases fuelled by the Omicron variant.

Armed men stormed the home of a high-profile Sri Lankan television journalist critical of the government yesterday, police said, sparking condemnation by local media rights groups.

The Trinamool Congress yesterday made a clean sweep in the civic polls to four municipal corporations in West Bengal — Bidhannagar, Siliguri, Chandernagore and Asansol — as per data available on the State Election Commission’s website.

Pakistan’s Prime Minister Imran Khan yesterday dispelled the impression that Pakistan was more inclined towards China than any other country, clarifying that the country’s strategic direction was to “maintain relations with everyone”.

A mob lynched a man because he had allegedly burnt pages of the Holy Quran in central Pakistan and dozens of people have been arrested, police and officials said on Sunday.

Five United Nations staff have been abducted in southern Yemen while returning to Aden after a field mission, the United Nations said on Saturday.

Celebrated philosopher and social critic Noam Chomsky has said the “pathology of Islamophobia”, now growing throughout the West, is “taking its most lethal form in India where the Modi government is systematically dismantling Indian secular democracy and turning the country into a Hindu ethnocracy”.

China yesterday said it had given “conditional” approval for Pfizer’s Covid-19 drug Paxlovid to treat adults with mild to moderate illness and a high risk of developing severe disease.

India yesterday reacted sharply to the comments coming from some countries on the hijab controversy in the southern state of Karnataka and said “motivated comments” on its internal issues “are not welcome”.

Sri Lanka’s president banned strikes in the health and electricity sectors yesterday as trade union action that has crippled state-run hospitals entered its sixth day.

In the wake of the row over hijab in the southern Indian state of Karnataka, writer Taslima Nasreen said burqa-hijab is no different from "chastity belt from the dark ages" and hoped that women will soon realise that.

India today reacted sharply to the comments Emanating from some countries on the hijab controversy in the southern state of Karnataka and said “motivated comments” on its internal issues “are not welcome”.

Two international journalists who were on an assignment for the UN refugee agency have been detained in the Afghan capital, the UNHCR said yesterday.

India is hoping to cut diesel use by farms to zero and migrate the agriculture sector to renewable energy as early as 2024, the country's power ministry said on Friday, as a part of its broader plan to transition to cleaner energy sources.

With Uttar Pradesh legislative assembly elections beginning, speculation is on whether Yogi Adityanath, the incumbent chief minister of the state, will be reelected to make a stronger bid to succeed Narendra Modi.

A student has moved to India’s Supreme Court challenging the direction of the Karnataka state High Court that asked students not to wear any religious clothes on campuses of educational institutions which can instigate people till the matter is resolved.

Indonesia yesterday signed a deal with France to buy six Rafale warplanes as part of an anticipated total order of 42, Jakarta’s defence minister said, as Paris

South Korea’s leader warned yesterday that the peninsula could slide back into a “state of crisis” if Pyongyang follows through on threats to resume testing

People in India’s most populous state of Uttar Pradesh yesterday voted in the first of a series of local elections that will be a key test of the popularity of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his ruling party.

India’s Karnataka State High Court today asked the students not to wear any religious cloth, whether hijab or saffron scarves, on campuses of educational institutions till the matter is resolved.