South East Asia

Unknown gunmen have opened fire on Bassel Haswani, the son of prominent business man George Haswani, who was recently implicated in the purchase of the ammonium nitrate that exploded at Beirut port reports Alhurra.

Japan strongly protested Chinese vessels’ repeated intrusions into its waters near the Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea at their senior diplomats’ videoconference on Wednesday, the Japanese Foreign Ministry said.

Experts say the terrorism label will complicate efforts to secure a decaying oil tanker in the Red Sea that could rupture at any moment and unleash another humanitarian and environmental catastrophe. Off war-battered Yemen’s western coast lies a rapidly deteriorating storage vessel that could at any moment become an oil …

The United States on Thursday blacklisted Chinese oil giant CNOOC and slapped visa restrictions on officials of the Chinese navy, ruling party and state-owned enterprises over land reclamation and “coercion” of Southeast Asian claimants in the disputed South China Sea.

The U.N. humanitarian chief is urging the United States to reverse its decision to declare Yemen’s Houthi rebels a terrorist group, warning that the designation will likely lead to “a large-scale famine on a scale that we have not seen for nearly 40 years.”

China’s WJ-700, a high-altitude, long-endurance and high-speed armed reconnaissance drone said to be able to create a new pattern for drone combat, successfully conducted a maiden flight test recently, as military experts said the unmanned aircraft is characterized by its large payload and ability to launch large munitions from outside …

Wang Yi’s visit added two new partners for the BRI, among other agreements. Over the weekend, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi concluded his tour to five countries in Africa, upholding a 30-plus year tradition of China’s top diplomat starting the new year with the first international visit to the continent. …

[M]uch of the world is organizing to roadblock China’s march to dominance in 5G telecommunications. That is, to get China’s spying out of our system – although we are far from done, there is a lot of 2020 to build on in 2021.

“It is a massive strategic blunder at a time when President Biden will be seeking to put together an international partnership of liberal democracies to deal with the bullying loutish behavior and assault on our international rules by Chinese Communists.” — Former Hong Kong Governor Lord Patten, Daily Mail, January …

A senior Indonesian MP has said that his country will never normalise relations with Israel, confirming that the US offered it $2 billion to make such a move, Shehab news agency reported yesterday.