AL JAZEERA: Australia’s prime minister said on Monday that resettlement to the US of many of the 1,200 asylum seekers held in prisons on Papua New Guinea and the Pacific island of Nauru would begin after president-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration in January. Whether Trump honours the deal Australia reached with the outgoing Obama administration, and announced earlier this month, will… Read more »
BBC: Gross domestic product rose at an annualised rate of 2.2% in the three months to September, the third consecutive quarter of expansion. Japanese firms have relied on overseas sales to make up for lacklustre domestic demand.
AL JEZEERA: South Korean prosecutors will question President Park Geun-hye over a burgeoning political corruption scandal engulfing her presidency. It will be the first time a sitting South Korean president will be interviewed by prosecutors over a criminal case.
Al Jazeera: One person was killed as Indonesian police fired tear gas and water cannon to disperse tens of thousands of protesters who rallied to demand the resignation of the Christian governor of Jakarta for allegedly insulting the Quran. At least seven people were injured in clashes between demonstrators and police, Jakarta police spokesman Awi Setiyono said on Friday.
Al Jazeera: China effectively barred two elected pro-independence MPs from Hong Kong’s legislature after they deliberately misread their oaths, saying that they could not now be sworn in again. Pro-independence legislators Baggio Leung and Yau Wai-ching misread their oaths of office for seats on the Legislative Council (Legco) last month. An oath that did not conform to Hong Kong’s law “should… Read more »
Al Jazeera: Hundreds of thousands of South Koreans have taken to the streets of Seoul to demand the resignation of scandal-hit President Park Geun-hye, in one of the largest anti-government protests in decades. On the back of official appeals for calm, police deployed around 25,000 officers on Saturday for the third instalment in a series of weekly mass demonstrations in the… Read more »
BBC: The Myanmar army says it shot dead at least 25 people in Rohingya Muslim villages in restive Rakhine state on Sunday. It said the people killed had been armed with machetes and wooden clubs.
The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea and the Republic of Korea have been at war with one another since 1950, though open conflict ended in 1953 with a truce. During this time, the DPRK has been developing nuclear weapons and forming increasingly strained relations with the rest of the world. Another major player in the region, Japan, has reached a… Read more »
BBC: A senior Chinese official has been elected head of global police co-operation agency Interpol. Vice Minister of Public Security Meng Hongwei is the first Chinese citizen to hold the four-year post. His appointment begins immediately. Amnesty International fears the move could help China pursue political dissidents who have fled the country. But Mr Meng said he was ready to… Read more »
Reuters: China will never allow any part of its territory to break off, President Xi Jinping said on Friday, within a week of reining in Hong Kong independence moves and ignoring Taiwan’s urging to heed democratic aspirations in the Asian financial hub. Xi made the comments at an event in Beijing’s Great Hall of the People to mark 150 years… Read more »