The United States on Thursday urged U.S. citizens to leave Afghanistan immediately using available commercial flight options, a notice on the website of U.S. Embassy in Kabul said, amid a speedy Taliban advance across the country.

Amid rapid gains by the Taliban and after they took control of the 10th provincial capital of Afghanistan, the Ghani administration has offered them a share in power, Pakistani media ARY news reports quoting Afghan media.

A northeastern Indian state that has for years been a big transit point for illicit drugs originating in neighbouring Myanmar has launched a massive crackdown on the trade, seizing record amounts and arresting nearly 2,000 people since May.

The Taliban on Wednesday denied targeting and killing civilians during an offensive against Afghan government troops, calling for an independent investigation and seeking to assure Afghans that "no home or family shall face any threat from our side."

A powerful magnitude 7.1 earthquake struck off the Philippines on Thursday, the US Geological Survey (USGS) said, as initial warnings about the risk of tsunamis were lifted and with no immediate reports of casualties or major damage.

Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan accused the United States of seeing his country as useful only in the context of the "mess" it is leaving behind in Afghanistan after 20 years of fighting.

China’s tighter social restrictions to fight its latest Covid-19 outbreak, now in its fourth week and involving more than a dozen cities, are hitting the services sector especially travel and hospitality in the world’s second-largest economy.

China will ban karaoke songs perceived to “endanger national security”, as state controls attempt to muzzle the mics of a KTV-obsessed nation.

Rescuers were working to clear tonnes of rocks and mud Wednesday after a landslide buried about 60 people in India’s Himalayan north, killing at least 10.

Taliban fighters could isolate Afghanistan's capital in 30 days and possibly take it over in 90, a U.S. defence official told Reuters on Wednesday citing U.S. intelligence, as militants took control of an eighth provincial Afghan capital.

Myanmar’s junta had “nothing to do” with an alleged plot to attack the country’s ambassador to the UN Kyaw Moe Tun, who has defied the military and backed the pro-democracy movement, state-backed Global New Light of Myanmar newspaper said yesterday.

1966 - A treaty to end three years of hostilities between Malaysia and Indonesia was signed in Jakarta.

The influential sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un yesterday called Seoul authorities “perfidious” over the South’s joint military exercises with the United States, and demanded Washington withdraw its forces from the peninsula.

All Indian Visa Application Centres (VACs) in Bangladesh  resume operations today as the Covid-19 lockdown restrictions have been eased.

The Taliban seized another Afghan provincial capital yesterday -- the seventh in less than a week -- as tens of thousands of people fled their homes in the north for the relative safety of Kabul and other centres.

China yesterday demanded Lithuania recall its envoy to Beijing, after Vilnius allowed Taiwan to set up an office under its own name in a move seen as provocative by the Chinese government.

Giant pumps whir deep underground at a plant in Singapore that helps transform sewage into water so clean it is fit for human consumption while reducing ocean pollution. 

India today asked all citizens living in and around Afghanistan’s third largest city Mazar-e-Sharif to return home by a special flight this evening, amidst reports that the Taliban are preparing to launch an attack to capture the city.

The United States said it was up to Afghan security forces to defend the country after Taliban militants captured a sixth provincial capital on Monday, along with border towns and trade routes.

South Korea’s health minister apologised for Covid-19 vaccine shortages yesterday, saying US drugmaker Moderna Inc would deliver less than half its planned shipment this month due to production issues.