Top Asia Pacific Breaking News: Latest Updates

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - North Korea on Saturday fired about 10 ballistic missiles toward the eastern sea, South Korea's military said, staging its own show of force as the rival South conducts a joint military exercise with the United States. South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff said the missiles were fired from an area in Sunan, the site of Pyongyang's international airport, and flew about 350 kilometers (220 miles). Japanese Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi said the weapons landed outside the country's exclusive economic zone and that there were no reports of damage to planes or ships. The South's Joint Chiefs said the military has stepped up surveillance and is maintaining readiness against possible additional launches while closely sharing information with the U.S.

ISLAMABAD (AP) - Pakistan's president on Saturday warned neighboring Afghanistan's Taliban government that it had " crossed a red line " by launching drone attacks on civilian areas in Pakistan and said the administration in Kabul has brought "grave consequences upon itself." The statement by Asif Ali Zardari was the latest in what has become the deadliest fighting yet between the two neighbors. The cross-border clashes, which erupted late last month, have shown no signs of abating despite efforts by China and Turkey to broker a ceasefire. Pakistan said its forces intercepted the drones launched on Friday but that falling debris injured two children in the city of Quetta and two people elsewhere in the country.

BEIJING (AP) - Air China will resume flights flying between Beijing and North Korea from March 30, the airline's website said Saturday, after passenger train services running between the two nations restarted earlier this week . According to the website of the stated-owned airline, flights from China's capital to Pyongyang, North Korea's capital will run every Monday until May 18, but would scale down to two Mondays in June. In 2020 with the start of the coronavirus pandemic, North Korea banned tourists, jetted out diplomats and severely curtailed border traffic in one of the world's most draconian COVID-19 restrictions. Two years later, Pyongyang started slowly easing curbs and reopening its borders.

BEIJING (AP) - Over the years, a regular Chinese campaign of sending warplanes flying toward Taiwan - the self-governing island it claims as its territory - has raised alarm from Taipei to Washington. Now, a sharp drop in the number of flights in the past two weeks has analysts scratching their heads about what China's military may be up to. And that mystery carries risks, former U.S. defense official Drew Thompson said. "There are so many theories and the lack of understanding of China's intentions is what's disconcerting," said Thompson, now a senior fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore.

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) - A Sydney business consultant was convicted Friday of breaking Australia's foreign interference laws by providing reports to two people he should have suspected were Chinese spies. Alexander Csergo, 59, is only the second person to be convicted under Australian laws against covert interference and espionage that angered China when they were legislated in 2018. The jury that heard the trial in New South Wales District Court in Sydney found Csergo should have suspected that a man and woman he knew only as Ken and Evelyn were working for China's ministry of state security. He was found guilty of the charge of reckless foreign interference and was released on bail for the weekend to return to court Monday, when prosecutors will argue for him to be placed in custody.

SIEM REAP, Cambodia (AP) - Cambodia said Friday it has drafted its first law targeting online scam centers, after vowing to shut them down by the end of April. Cambodia is a major hub for scam operations, which extort money from victims online through bogus investment schemes and feigned romances. Victims around the world are estimated to have been cheated out of tens of billions of dollars annually. At the same time, thousands of people, especially from other Asian nations, have been recruited with false job offers and then forced to work in scam centers in conditions of near-slavery. "This law is the most important legal instrument for Cambodia in combating scams online, fighting money laundering and demonstrating that Cambodia is not a paradise or a safe haven for criminals," Information Minister Neth Pheaktra said in a statement.

BANGKOK (AP) - Myanmar's military has commissioned new combat aircraft to boost its air capacities, state media reported Friday, as the army steps up efforts to regain territory from resistance forces in the country's civil war. The state-run Global New Light of Myanmar newspaper did not specify the number or types of the newly commissioned aircraft, but photos released by the military suggest it received four jet fighters, including two Russian-made Su-30 aircraft widely used for bombing and combat missions. It was the sixth time the miliary had commissioned new aircraft since it seized power from the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi in February 2021, triggering armed resistance across the country.

COLOGNE, Germany (AP) - A mirror room dappled with colored dots. Contorted, bright sculptures of flowers on a rooftop at the foot of Cologne's famed cathedral. A vast showroom with giant octopus-like tentacles that offer up a mesmerizing meander through space and obstacles. The renowned Museum Ludwig in the western German city is celebrating its 50th anniversary by opening a nearly five-month exhibit on Saturday, with more than 300 works of the famed Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama. The trek through the time and transformation of the now nonagenarian artist assembles works ranging from her first drawing in the mid-1930s to a newly commissioned "Infinity Mirror Room" made for the show.

BEIJING (AP) - While much of the world's attention is on the Iran war, that hasn't stopped China from moving ahead with national priorities with global repercussions. Not that China doesn't care about the war and its impact on energy supplies and geopolitics. But for the world's second largest economy, its growing rivalry with the United States revolves around a different battle: the development of the cutting-edge technologies shaping the 21st century. That message came through in a five-year plan formally endorsed Thursday by the National People's Congress at the end of its annual meeting, the nation's biggest political event of the year.

BEIJING (AP) - China adopted a sweeping law Thursday to promote what it calls "ethnic unity," a measure that critics say would further erode the rights of some minority groups as authorities cement a push toward assimilation. The law, approved by the country's ceremonial legislature, is designed to foster "a stronger sense of community among all ethnic groups in the Chinese nation," said Lou Qinjian, a delegate to the National People's Congress who introduced the proposal to the whole body. The proposed law lays out the need to promote ethnic unity by all government bodies and private enterprises, including local governments and state-affiliated groups like the All-China Women's Federation.