International news with relevance to Thai and regional readers
LONDON (Reuters) – Boris Johnson promised in his first speech as prime minister to lead Britain out of the European Union on Oct. 31 with “no ifs or buts” and warned that if the bloc refused to negotiate then there would be a no-deal Brexit. Johnson, who has been hailed by U.S. President Donald Trump
SEOUL (Reuters) – North Korea fired two short-range missiles early on Thursday from its eastern coast, South Korea’s military said, the first missile test since leader Kim Jong Un and U.S. President Donald Trump agreed to revive stalled denuclearization talks. The missiles launched from near Wonsan flew about 430 km (267 miles) and reached an
Thousands are languishing in displacement camps in Laos a year after a dam break unleashed floodwaters and killed dozens of people in the impoverished state, a new report on the anniversary of the disaster said Tuesday. For the past decade, Laos has been on a dam-building spree to serve as the “battery of Asia”, but
BEIJING (Reuters) – China accused U.S. officials on Tuesday of being behind violent protests in Hong Kong and advised them to remove their “black hands” from the territory. Foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying made the comment at a news briefing in Beijing, when asked about the Hong Kong protests. Escalating violence in the city over
LONDON (Reuters) – Britain’s incoming prime minister once boasted he could recite from heart the first hundred lines of Homer’s Iliad in ancient Greek. Boris Johnson has long spun political gold from his magniloquent tongue, using what some linguists and observers say bombastic language, esoteric vocabulary, occasional crudity and episodes of bumbling bluster. He confects
An assault on pro-democracy protesters by suspected triad gangsters that left dozens wounded sparked a firestorm of outrage in Hong Kong on Monday, in a dramatic escalation of political turmoil plaguing the Chinese city. Gangs of men — most wearing white T-shirts and carrying bats, sticks and metal poles — set upon anti-government demonstrators late
Hong Kong descended into chaos Sunday night as riot police fired tear gas and rubber bullets at anti-government protesters hours after China’s office in the city was daubed with eggs and graffiti in a vivid rebuke to Beijing’s rule. Acrid clouds of tear gas wafted through the city’s densely packed commercial district as police battled
HONG KONG (Reuters) – Tens of thousands gathered in Hong Kong on Saturday to voice support for the police and call for an end to violence, after a wave of protests against an extradition bill triggered clashes between police and activists and plunged the city into crisis. The rally, called “Safeguard Hong Kong”, comes a
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – When President Donald Trump asked Buzz Aldrin, the second human ever to walk on the moon, what he thought about the United States’ current ability to operate in space 50 years after the Apollo 11 mission, the ex-astronaut had a ready response. “Actually, I’ve been a little disappointed over the last 10
In its official statement, SBS says it has decided to withdraw an episode of “Law of the Jungle, the Lost Island” from its streaming platform and to remove its producer. The SBS executive was responding to negative viewer reaction caused by a scene, filmed in Thailand, which featured show host Lee Yeol Eum catching three
A suspected arson attack at an animation production company in Japan killed 33 people and injured dozens more on Thursday, after a man reportedly doused the building with flammable liquid and shouted “drop dead.” A motive for the apparent attack remained unclear hours after the blaze. If arson is confirmed, the attack will be among
The World Health Organization on Wednesday declared the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo a “public health emergency of international concern,” a rare designation only used for the gravest epidemics. The year-old Ebola epidemic in eastern DR Congo, the second deadliest on record, has largely been contained to remote areas, but this week
