Asia

North Korea blew up an inter-Korean liaison office building just inside its border in an act Tuesday that sharply raises tensions on the Korean Peninsula amid deadlocked nuclear diplomacy with the United States. Seoul’s Unification Ministry said the building in the North Korean border town of Kaesong was destroyed at …

Two employees at India’s embassy to Pakistan have been released after they were detained in relation to an alleged hit-and-run incident in the capital Islamabad. An alarm was raised Monday when the Times of India reported that two diplomatic staffers were “missing in Pakistan,” with a suggestion the case was …

Three Indian soldiers have died in a skirmish along the border with China, New Delhi has said. Beijing claims that the incident occurred after Indian forces crossed the border and attacked Chinese troops. An Indian Army officer and two soldiers were killed in a clash with Chinese troops on Monday …

North Korea’s military on Tuesday threatened to move back into zones that were demilitarized under inter-Korean peace agreements as the country continued to dial up pressure on rival South Korea amid stalled nuclear negotiations with the Trump administration. The General Staff of the Korean People’s Army said it’s reviewing a …

China reported 40 more coronavirus infections Tuesday as it increased testing and lockdown measures in parts of the capital to control what appeared to be its largest outbreak in more than two months. The new cases included 27 in Beijing where a fresh outbreak has been traced to the city’s …

The Indonesian Air Force fighter crashed in a residential area in Riau province on the island of Sumatra, the pilot ejected and survived, learned Alghadeer.com citing the Jakarta Post newspaper. According to him, the Hawk 209 fighter took off on Monday morning from the Rusmin Nuriyadin airbase in Pekanbaru and …

Beijing is reintroducing strict lockdown measures and rolling out mass testing after a fresh cluster of novel coronavirus cases emerged from the city’s largest wholesale food market, sparking fears of a resurgence of the deadly outbreak. The Chinese capital reported 36 new Covid-19 cases on Monday, bringing the total number …

Officials in Pakistan have estimated that nationwide confirmed cases of COVID-19 infections could reach up to 1.2 million by the end of July, urging the nation to strictly comply with safety guidelines to help reverse the rising trajectory of new cases. The national tally of infections has surpassed 140,000, with …

Sri Lanka staged a mock election on Sunday to test measures aimed at preventing the spread of the coronavirus during a parliamentary vote in August. According to AFP, the poll was due to be held on April 25 but was put off and then postponed indefinitely due to the epidemic, …

Thousands of protesters in Tokyo took part in a Black Lives Matter march on Sunday, calling for an end to racial discrimination and police abuse after the killing of African American George Floyd in Minneapolis last month. Demonstrators marched through the streets of the capital’s Shibuya and Harajuku districts chanting …

The Taliban has killed or wounded more than 400 Afghan security personnel over the past week, the interior ministry said, accusing the group of increasing attacks in the run-up to expected peace talks. Violence dropped across much of Afghanistan since the Taliban announced a three-day ceasefire on May 24 to …

India’s federal government said on Sunday it will provide New Delhi’s city authorities with 500 railway coaches that will be equipped to care for coronavirus patients, after a surge in the number of cases led to a shortage of hospital beds. The coaches will increase Delhi’s capacity by 8,000 beds, …

Beijing on Sunday reported a record 36 new cases of COVID-19 in China’s capital, all linked to a major food wholesale market, raising concerns about the spike in a country that had sharply reduced its infections. The city has ordered testing of anyone linked to the Xinfadi market after the …

The sister of North Korea’s leader has warned of retaliatory measures against South Korea that could involve the military, in the latest escalation of tensions over defectors from the North who have been sending back propaganda and food. Kim Yo Jong, who serves unofficially as one of Kim Jong Un’s …

An explosion was reported at Honda Motor Co Ltd’s plant in central Japan, police said on Sunday, with two workers sent to the hospital with burns. The explosion at a switchboard occurred at around 9:15 am local time (0015 GMT) in Honda’s plant in Suzuka city, Mie prefecture, an officer …

A dashboard camera has caught the moment a powerful explosion happened, reportedly in China’s Zhejiang Province. The blast’s force apparently propelled a large piece of debris, as if launched from a cannon. Reports say the tank, which apparently was seen in the shocking video, flew several hundred meters before landing …

An Australian man has been sentenced to death in China, authorities said on Saturday, a development that could further escalate tensions between the two countries. Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade said it was providing consular assistance to the man, without identifying him. Australian and Chinese media have identified …

A district in central Beijing has gone into “wartime mode” after discovering a cluster of coronavirus cases around the biggest meat and vegetable market in the city, raising the prospect of a second wave of infections in the sensitive capital, the seat of the Chinese Communist Party. The discovery of …

A powerful explosion ripped through a crowded bazaar in Pakistan’s garrison city of Rawalpindi on Friday, killing at least one person and wounding 15, police said. The source of the blast was unclear and police said bomb disposal experts were still trying to determine whether it was a low-intensity bomb …

An explosion in a Kabul mosque during Friday Prayers killed at least four people and wounded many more, Afghanistan’s Interior Ministry said on June 12. “Explosives placed inside the Shir Shah-E-Suri Mosque exploded during Friday Prayers,” the ministry said in a statement, adding that the West Kabul mosque’s mullah was …