Top Asia Pacific Breaking News: Latest Updates

NEW DELHI (AP) - A fire swept through a building in a New Delhi neighborhood Wednesday, killing at least 21 people and injuring several others, police said. The building in the Malviya Nagar neighborhood in the southern part of the city had a restaurant on the ground floor and a hotel above. The predominantly residential area is densely populated and is popular with students and young professionals. The blaze was extinguished with the help of eight fire engines, and more than 40 people were rescued and taken to nearby hospitals, Delhi police said in a statement. The cause of the blaze was not immediately known.

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) - The Solomon Islands will review its secretive security treaty with China, the South Pacific nation's new Prime Minister Matthew Wale said Wednesday. The pact struck in 2022 with the Solomons' then-Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare created fears in the United States and among allies including Australia that it would allow the Chinese navy to build a base in the South Pacific. Before Wale became prime minister in a parliamentary vote May 15, he had called for the detail of the treaty to be made public. Wale said Wednesday he had only been provided with a copy a few days ago and after he had "removed certain people from key positions." He didn't identify those people.

JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) - Indonesia's recently dismissed head of the National Nutrition Agency was arrested on Wednesday on corruption charges related to a multi-billion-dollar free-meals program. The program delivered on a campaign promise of President Prabowo Subianto and aimed to fight malnutrition by feeding nearly 90 million children and pregnant women. But it has come under steep criticism due to high costs and cases of food poisoning among schoolchildren who consumed the meals. Prabowo fired Dadan Hindayana on Tuesday and replaced him with the agency's deputy chief. Investigators searched the agency's offices early Wednesday. Before Indonesia's Attorney General's Office made Wednesday's arrest announcement, Hindaya could be seen being led out in handcuffs, wearing a detainee red vest and a black shirt, and escorted into a green prison van.

WASHINGTON (AP) - The Trump administration is proposing double-digit tariffs on products from dozens of major U.S. trading partners after an investigation into imports of goods allegedly made with forced labor. Under the proposal released in Washington late Tuesday, 16 economies - including Canada, Mexico, the European Union, Taiwan and the United Kingdom - would face 10% levies for allegedly failing to enforce bans on forced labor. Dozens of others - including China, Japan, India, South Korea and Switzerland - would be hit with 12.5% import taxes. The tariffs are part of President Donald Trump's effort to replace revenue lost when the U.S.

DHAKA, Bangladesh (AP) - With his shock of golden hair and trim 700-kilogram (1,500-pound) build, Donald Trump has been drawing crowds from across Bangladesh since he arrived at the national zoo last week. The rare albino buffalo became a sensation when a farmer noticed that his blond tuft of hair resembled the distinctive locks of the U.S. president. After a video of the pale horned mammal went viral on social media, large numbers of people started showing up at the farm outside Dhaka to see him for themselves. The animal was originally meant to be slaughtered for the Muslim festival of sacrifice.

HONG KONG (AP) - A performance artist on Wednesday sought to display a thin red thread in downtown Hong Kong to remember the victims of Beijing's 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown, 37 years on from the event. But he was quickly stopped by police, in the latest sign of the city's shrinking freedom of expression. Sanmu Chen tried to tie the red thread to a street signpost in Causeway Bay, a busy shopping district, close to a park that for decades hosted an annual candlelight vigil on June 4 to mourn the victims of the crackdown that ended student-led protests in Beijing in 1989.

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - South Korea's ruling liberal party was projected to win a landslide victory in Wednesday's mayoral and other local elections, exit polls and ongoing vote counts suggested, a result that if confirmed would give President Lee Jae Myung a firmer political mandate to advance his agenda. A victory by Lee's Democratic Party had been widely expected because its main rival, the conservative People Power Party, remains in disarray after President Yoon Suk Yeol was removed from office and sentenced to life in prison over his martial law debacle in late 2024. The joint exit polls by South Korea's three major TV stations - KBS, MBC and SBS - showed the Democratic Party was forecast to win at least 11 of the 16 mayoral and provincial gubernatorial posts up for grabs in Wednesday's elections.

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) - Three Australian appeals court judges reserved their decision Wednesday on whether an activist can prosecute Britain's King Charles III for alleged genocide of Australia's Indigenous people. Uncle Robbie Thorpe, 68, turned to the Supreme Court of Appeal in Victoria state after two lower courts rejected his bid to launch a private prosecution against the king in the Melbourne Magistrates' Court. Indigenous Australians use the titles uncle and aunt as marks of respect for community elders. His case alleges the monarch, who is also Australia's head of state, the Australian government and its institutions were perpetuating a genocide of Indigenous people by maintaining systemic disadvantages on multiple socioeconomic levels, making them the most underprivileged minority in the country.

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) - A 63-year-old man was banned on Wednesday from contacting Norway's Princess Ingrid Alexander or her family for two years as she studies at a university in Australia. David James Cook appeared in court where he was issued with a two-year Apprehended Violence Order that prevents him from entering the Sydney University campus, searching the 22-year-old royal online or contacting her or her family. Such orders are intended to prevent an individual from subjecting another person to acts of violence, intimidation or harassment. Cook told reporters as he left the Newtown Court House, in Sydney, that the order stemmed from a card he sent to Ingrid, who is second in line to the Norwegian throne.

TOKYO (AP) - A tropical storm dumped heavy rain and raised flood risks around east-central Japan as it moved into the heavily populated Tokyo region Wednesday. Heavy rain already paralyzed street traffic in the city, hundreds of flights were cancelled and train services were suspended or delayed. More than 5,000 homes lost power, according to Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings, which serves the capital region. In downtown Tokyo, residents near the Zenpukuji River were advised to take shelter. Television footage showed the swollen muddy water on the verge of overflowing. Tropical Storm Jangmi was east of Shima city and moving northeast around midmorning while packing maximum sustained winds of 90 kph (55 mph), the Japan Meteorological Agency said.