SCMP Asian News

A ruling, expected later this year, to allow same-sex couples to marry would be a huge boost to India’s trillion-rupee (US$12 billion) industry LGBTQ wedding industry.

Kathleen Drew-Baker’s work helped Japanese scientists and nori farmers to use oyster shells to help seaweed thrive, kick-starting nori commercial farming in Japan.

In tweets that were later deleted, Home Minister Clare O’Neil called the former US president’s son ‘a big baby, who isn’t very popular’.

Chinese organiser iME Entertainment’s website is under scrutiny over criticism from fans that it shows a map of the waterway with disputed boundaries.

From carbon absorption to reducing methane emissions from cattle, research into new applications for the marine plant is flourishing.

Some hospitals have shut children’s emergency rooms as paediatricians abandon a field they think has no future amid the country’s plunging birth rate.

The IAEA endorsement is ‘ridiculous’ as the agency cannot be considered an independent arbiter given its role to ‘advance nuclear power’, one activist says.

A Singaporean bank’s cardholders have exclusive access to presales for Taylor Swift concert tickets, which has prompted some Swiftie bachelors to jokingly search for dates who happen to be cardholders.

Pita Limjaroenrat’s pro-democracy Move Forward Party netted the most seats at the May 14 election but there are no guarantees it will be able to form government or that he will lead the country.

Nepali women are branching out from managing the nation’s community forests to local, national politics to ‘show the way for the state’.

TikTok Shop is a fast-growing feature within China’s short-video app, with a burgeoning fan base in Southeast Asia, Indonesia the successful launch pad, and Chinese entrepreneurs part of the action.

The new legislation grants authorities the power to issue social media platforms and internet service providers different types of directions to stop malicious activity.

The delay is weighing on the government’s hopes for a swift conclusion of the investigation to safeguard the tourism sector’s image.

The regional polls will not directly impact Anwar’s two-thirds majority in parliament, but any significant losses for his coalition could lead to questions about his leadership and destabilise his ruling bloc.

It follows a similar move by Vietnam over a scene showing a map of the ‘invalidated nine-dash line’ that China uses to assert claims in the South China Sea.

The latest near miss in the South China Sea follows a tense face-off in April when a Chinese coastguard ship was witnessed blocking a Philippine vessel as it carried journalists near a Manila-claimed atoll.

The last survivors of a bygone age remember when Konyak warriors in the Myanmar borderlands severed the heads of their enemies to keep as trophies.

The social media giant, which also owns WhatsApp, has agreed to work with Malaysian police on combating online crime and controversial posts touching on subjects relating to race, religion and royalty.

Amman Mineral is the biggest newcomer to Indonesia’s stock exchange since GoTo Group in April 2022. IPOs in Jakarta have raised US$2.2 billion since the start of the year, surpassing activity in Hong Kong.

The blacklisting is the latest twist in a row that has seen Cambodia’s long-time leader Hun Sen, once a prolific Facebook user, switch to rival social media platform Telegram.