Top Asia Pacific Breaking News: Latest Updates

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) - An Australian woman charged with joining the Islamic State group expressed views supporting terrorist acts and killing of non-believers, attempted to indoctrinate her children and recruited others to join her in Syria, according to allegations made in court Monday. A defense lawyer for Rayann El Houli said expert evidence would be produced in court that her views had changed. "She renounces ISIS and violent jihad," Peter Morrissey said, using an acronym for the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria. "She wants nothing to do with it: not now directly or indirectly. Not in the future. Not for herself.

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (AP) - Malaysia on Monday began enforcing rules barring millions of children younger than 16 from having social media accounts, joining a growing global effort to tighten safety protections. Not all families approved, and critics raised concerns about data protection and potential surveillance. Social media platforms with at least 8 million users in Malaysia, including Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and YouTube, must implement age-verification systems and block users under 16 from creating accounts. Malaysia's Communications and Multimedia Commission said age verification for existing users will be rolled out over the next six months. Users identified as under 16 will have a month to download or transfer data, including photos and videos, before restrictions or other actions are applied.

MANILA, Philippines (AP) - A Philippine senator was arrested Monday on a charge of plunder after he allegedly pocketed a huge kickback in a flood-control project. It is the latest crisis to hit the country's Senate, the upper chamber where a battle for control of the country's political future is playing out. The special Sandiganbayan anti-graft court had initially issued a warrant for Sen. Jinggoy Estrada's arrest Friday on a graft charge. He surrendered but was soon released on bail. The new charge for which he was arrested Monday carries no right to bail. Estrada, 63, has strongly denied allegations mainly by a former government public works engineer, that he received more than 570 million pesos ($9.3 million) in kickbacks from flood control projects.

KHUJAND, Tajikistan (AP) - It's 5:30 a.m. and the bustle has already begun at the Panjshanbe Bazaar, one of the largest in Tajikistan. Vendors unload vans of cabbages. Pigeons flock outside the mosque next door. A portrait of President Emomali Rahmon looms above. Rahmon has been in power since 1992, overseeing the Central Asian country since shortly after its independence from the dissolving Soviet Union. Mountainous and the poorest of the 15 countries that emerged, Tajikistan saw a five-year civil war between the Russian-backed government and an opposition composed largely of democratic reformers and Islamists. Khujand was in the heartland for pro-government forces.

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - An explosion and fire occurred at a defense company in South Korea on Monday, killing five people and injuring two others, officials said. The deadly incident happened at a worksite run by Hanwha Aerospace in the South Korean city of Daejeon. Other details, including the cause of the explosion, were not immediately available. Emergency official Yoon Seong-su said that the area is a government-designated security facility. Local medical official Kim Ju-yeon said one of the two injured people was in a critical condition. She said authorities haven't yet identified the dead people. The site is one of Hanwha Aerospace's key facilities where it develops large-sized propellants and surface-to-surface weapons systems, according to Yonhap news agency.

NEW DELHI (AP) - India said it will continue engaging with Myanmar after Prime Minister Narendra Modi held talks Monday with the leader of the country's military-backed government, despite Western sanctions imposed after the military seized power in 2021. Indian Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri told reporters in New Delhi that India's policy is "not intended to be a commentary on the internal political arrangements" in Myanmar and that New Delhi believes engagement is the best way forward. Western nations have sought to isolate Myanmar's military rulers since they ousted the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi in a 2021 coup that triggered a crackdown on opponents and a nationwide conflict and humanitarian crisis.

TOKYO (AP) - Eight crested ibises were released into the wild in a north-central Japanese town, decades after the birds went extinct in the country. The endangered birds took off from each of their wooden cages at a ceremony Sunday in Hakui city in the Noto region, where they were last seen in the wild. Residents cheered when the birds soared into the sky the moment Crown Prince Akishino, his wife Kiko and other officials cut a ribbon around the cages. The eight birds have been raised at a conservation center on Sado Island in the neighboring prefecture of Niigata following a successful captive-breeding program.

BANGKOK (AP) - Rescue workers in Laos searched Monday for an alternative passage into a flooded cave where two people are believed to have been trapped for nearly two weeks after heavy rainfall flooded the main entrance, making it impassable. The two people remain unaccounted for since a search and rescue operation began last month in a rugged area of Xaisomboun province, about 120 kilometers (75 miles) north of the capital, Vientiane. Five of the seven people initially trapped inside the cave have been rescued. Malaysian diver Lee Kian Lie, who is involved in the operation, said workers were pumping water out of the cave.

BANGKOK (AP) - More than a dozen rescue and charity groups used excavation machinery on Monday to recover bodies following a massive blast from stored mining explosives in northeastern Myanmar. The explosion occurred Sunday at noon in Kaungtup village, Namhkam township in Shan State near the Chinese border. The Ta'ang National Liberation Army, the ethnic rebel group that controls the area, said in a statement released on Monday evening that the death toll from the blast has reached 43, including seven children. Previous estimates from rescue workers had ranged from 38 to 45. The group said 112 people, including 25 children, were injured, with 37 in critical condition, raising concerns that the number of fatalities could increase.

BANGKOK (AP) - A blast on Sunday at a building in northeastern Myanmar said to have been storing explosives for mining has killed more than 45 people, according to rescue workers and independent media reports. About 70 other people were injured in the explosion that took place around noon in the village of Kaungtup, in Namhkam township. The area, located about 3 kilometers (2 miles) south of the Chinese border, is under the control of the Ta'ang National Liberation Army, an ethnic armed group which has engaged in sporadic fighting against Myanmar's central government. A rescue worker who rushed to the site of the blast told The Associated Press that 46 bodies, including six children, had been recovered by Sunday evening and taken for cremation.