Top Asian News Stories From Across The Continent

KANTHARALAK, Thailand (AP) – Thailand’s government said a rocket attack from Cambodia on Sunday killed a 63-year-old villager, its first civilian death reported as a direct result of combat over the past week along the border of the two Southeast Asian nations. Both countries confirmed that large-scale fighting, which was set off by a skirmish on Dec. 7 that wounded two Thai soldiers, continued Sunday. The two sides are battling over longstanding competing claims to patches of frontier land, some of which contain centuries-old temple ruins. More than two dozen people on both sides of the border have officially been reported killed in the past week’s fighting, while more than half a million have been displaced.

HONG KONG (AP) – A Hong Kong court will deliver its verdict on Monday in the trial of former pro-democracy media mogul Jimmy Lai, who’s charged with conspiracies to commit sedition and collusion with foreign forces in a case that marks how much the semi-autonomous Chinese city has changed since Beijing began a wide-ranging crackdown on dissent five years ago. Lai, 78, was arrested in 2020 under a national security law imposed by Chinese authorities to quell the massive anti-government protests that rocked the city in 2019. Lai’s 156-day trial is being closely watched by foreign governments and political observers as a test of the judicial independence and media freedom in the former British colony, which was promised it could maintain its Western-style civil liberties for 50 years after returning to Chinese rule in 1997.

SURIN, Thailand (AP) – Fighting that has flared along the Thai-Cambodian border has sent hundreds of thousands of Thai villagers fleeing from their homes close to the frontier since Monday. Their once-bustling communities have fallen largely silent except for the distant rumble of firing across the fields. Yet in several of these villages, where normally a few hundred people live, a few dozen residents have chosen to stay behind despite the constant sounds of danger. In a village in Buriram province, about 6 miles (10 kilometers) from the border, Somjai Kraiprakon and roughly 20 of her neighbors gathered around a roadside house, keeping watch over nearby homes.

WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) – In the age of dinosaurs – before whales, great whites or the bus-sized megalodon – a monstrous shark prowled the waters off what’s now northern Australia, among the sea monsters of the Cretaceous period. Researchers studying huge vertebrae discovered on a beach near the city of Darwin say the creature is now the earliest known mega-predator of the modern shark lineage, living 15 million years earlier than enormous sharks found before. And it was huge. The ancestor of today’s 6-meter (20-foot) great white shark was thought to be about 8 meters (26 feet) long, the authors of a paper published in the journal Communications Biology said.

MANILA, Philippines (AP) – Chinese coast guard ships used powerful water cannons and blocking maneuvers against 20 Philippine fishing boats off a disputed South China Sea shoal, injuring three Filipinos and damaging two of their boats in a life-threatening assault, the Philippine coast guard said Saturday. Chinese coast guard personnel aboard smaller rubber boats later deliberately cut the anchor lines of several of the Philippine boats Friday afternoon off Sabina Shoal, “endangering the vessels and their crews amid strong currents and high waves,” the coast guard said. The Chinese coast guard took “necessary control measures, including issuing verbal warnings and expelling by external means, in accordance with laws and regulations against multiple batches of Philippine vessels that deliberately intruded into the waters adjacent to Xianbin Jiao…under the pretext of fishing,” the Chinese Embassy in Manila cited coast guard spokesperson Liu Dejun as saying in China in a statement.

BANGKOK (AP) – Myanmar’s military on Saturday acknowledged there was an airstrike on a hospital in the western state of Rakhine, which a local rescuer and media reports said killed more than 30 people, including patients, medical workers and children. In a statement published by the state-run Global New Light of Myanmar newspaper, the military’s information office said armed groups used the hospital as their base. The groups included the ethnic Arakan Army, as well as the People’s Defense Force and Bamar People’s Liberation Army or BPLA, pro-democracy militias formed after the army takeover in 2021, the statement said. It said the military carried out necessary security measures and launched a counter-terrorism operation against the hospital buildings on Wednesday.

HONG KONG (AP) – Chinese demand for foreign luxury cars is waning as customers opt for more affordable Chinese brand models, often sold at big discounts, catering to their taste for fancy electronics and comfort. That is bad news for European carmakers like Porsche, Aston Martin, Mercedes-Benz and BMW that have long dominated the upper reaches of the world’s largest auto market. A prolonged property downturn in China has left many consumers with little appetite for big purchases. Meanwhile, the well-to-do are becoming increasingly shy about publicly displaying their wealth, said Paul Gong, UBS head of China Automotive Industry Research. Many car buyers have been swayed by a 20,000 yuan ($2,830) trade-in subsidy offered by the Chinese government for purchasing electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles.

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) – Australian accident investigators on Thursday released dramatic images of a skydiver’s parachute becoming entangled on an airplane’s tail, leaving him dangling at 4,500 meters (15,000 feet.) The skydiver, Adrian Ferguson, used a hook knife to cut himself free and sustained minor leg injuries during the incident on Sept. 20 that began at Tully Airport in Queensland state. The pilot and 16 other parachutists on board the Cessna Caravan that day were not hurt. The Australian Transport Safety Bureau released the video with its report on its investigation into the mishap. The plane had reached the desired altitude where the skydivers were planning to execute a 16-way formation jump.

BANGKOK (AP) – Thailand’s parliament was dissolved Friday for a new election early next year as the country engaged in deadly fighting with Cambodia. Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul dissolved the House of Representatives after getting approval from King Maha Vajiralongkorn, whose endorsement became effective Friday with its publication in the Royal Gazette. Anutin had signaled the move with a Facebook post late Thursday saying: “I’d like to return power to the people.” The election must be held 45 to 60 days after the royal endorsement, a period during which Anutin will head a caretaker government with limited powers that can’t approve a new budget.

MIDLAND, Texas (AP) – Retired Chinese official Li Chuanliang was recuperating from cancer on a Korean resort island when he got an urgent call: Don’t return to China, a friend warned. You’re now a fugitive. Days later, a stranger snapped a photo of Li in a cafe. Terrified South Korea would send him back, Li fled, flew to the U.S. on a tourist visa and applied for asylum. But even there – in New York, in California, deep in the Texas desert – the Chinese government continued to hunt him down with the help of surveillance technology. Li’s communications were monitored, his assets seized and his movements followed in police databases.