Asia Pacific

Desperate evacuees, huddled on plastic mats in a sports hall in Thailand, have described fleeing from thunderous artillery bombardments as heavy fighting has escalated between Thailand and Cambodia.

The worst fighting in more than a decade between the neighbouring countries has forced more than 100,000 people to evacuate from their homes across four Thai border provinces by Friday.

As artillery fire echoed on Thursday, thousands from northeastern Surin province abandoned their homes for makeshift shelters established in the town centre.

Nearly 3,000 people crowded the sports hall of Surindra Rajabhat University, packed onto rows of plastic mats covered with colourful blankets and hastily gathered possessions.

“I’m worried about our home, our animals, and the crops we’ve worked so hard on,” Thidarat Homhuan, 37, told the AFP news agency.

She evacuated with nine family members, including her 87-year-old grandmother who had just been released from hospital.

“That concern is still there. But being here does feel safer, since we’re further from the danger zone now. At least we’re safe,” she said.

Thidarat was babysitting at a local school when she heard what she described as “something like machinegun fire”, followed by heavy artillery thuds.

“It was chaos. The kids were terrified. I rushed to the school’s bunker,” she said.

Inside the shelter, evacuees slept alongside one another beneath the gym’s high ceiling, surrounded by electric fans humming and the quiet whispers of uncertainty.

Elderly residents lay wrapped in blankets, infants slept in cradles, while children played quietly. Pet cats rested in mesh crates near the public restroom.

This marks the first full activation of the university as a shelter, according to Chai Samoraphum, director of the university president’s office.

Classes were immediately cancelled, and within an hour, the campus transformed into a functioning evacuation centre.

Evacuees from four border districts were distributed across six locations throughout the campus.

“Most of them left in a hurry. Some have chronic health conditions but didn’t bring their medications, others only managed to grab a few belongings,” Chai told AFP.

The centre, with assistance from the provincial hospital, is providing care for those with chronic illnesses and offering mental health services for trauma victims, Chai explained.

The border fighting has killed at least 14 people in Thailand, including one soldier and civilians killed in a rocket strike near a Sisaket province petrol station, officials reported. One Cambodian has also been confirmed killed.

As fighting continues near the border, evacuees face uncertainty about when they can return home.

For now, the shelter provides safety and a place to await signals that it’s safe to “go back to normal life”, Thidarat said.

She already has a message for the authorities: “I want the government to take decisive action – do not wait until lives are lost.

“Civilians look up to the government for protection, and we rely on them deeply,” she said.

Across the border in Cambodia, about 20,000 residents have evacuated from the country’s northern border with Thailand, the Khmer Times news organisation said, quoting officials in Cambodia’s Preah Vihear province.

The United Kingdom government is moving to reinstate extradition cooperation with Hong Kong that was suspended five years ago due to concerns about the city’s Chinese national security laws.

The Home Office applied to Parliament to make the changes on July 17, followed by a letter to Shadow Home Secretary Chris Philp the next day.

“It is in our national interest to have effective extradition relationships to prevent criminals from evading justice and the UK becoming a haven for criminals,” the July 18 letter from Security Minister Dan Jarvis said.

The Home Office also plans to restore an extradition framework with Chile and Zimbabwe, according to the letter, which was shared on X by Conservative MP Alicia Kearns.

Cases for Hong Kong and Zimbabwe would both be considered on a “case-by-case basis,” Jarvis said.

Hong Kong, a former British colony, is a particular sticking point for the UK due to their historical relationship and the sharp decline in political freedoms in Hong Kong since China imposed controversial national security legislation in 2020.

In 2024, legislators in Hong Kong approved a new national security law ­- referred to as Article 23 – that gave the government new powers to crack down on all forms of dissent on the grounds of alleged treason, espionage, sedition and external interference in Hong Kong’s internal affairs.

At the time, Hong Kong’s government said Article 23 was needed to prevent a recurrence of the protests of 2019, and that its provisions would only affect “an extremely small minority” of disloyal residents.

The UK, Canada, Australia, France, Germany and the United States all suspended their extradition agreements in 2020 with the Chinese city due to concerns about how the laws would be used.

“In my view, reinstating extradition with Hong Kong is morally indefensible. The Chinese Communist Party has turned Hong Kong into a surveillance state where freedom of expression, rule of law, and basic civil liberties are systematically dismantled,” Kearns wrote on X.

“This move risks legitimizing a regime that imprisons critics, silences democracy activists, and uses extradition as a tool of persecution,” she said.

Here is the letter from the Home Office.

In my view, reinstating extradition with Hong Kong is morally indefensible.

The Chinese Communist Party has turned Hong Kong into a surveillance state where freedom of expression, rule of law, and basic civil liberties are… pic.twitter.com/6gb923QXKb

— Alicia Kearns MP (@aliciakearns) July 24, 2025

Ronny Tong, a Hong Kong barrister and member of the city’s executive council, told Al Jazeera that concerns about a potential extradition deal were overblown.

“Extradition is in relation to non-political criminal cases, so any fear that it’d be used to transfer persons with political crimes, eg, national security cases, is totally unfounded and only shows ignorance of the procedure,” he said. “Furthermore, it is up to judges of the transferring state to ensure the procedure will not be abused.”

He said the city was “more than ready to restart the arrangement, as we have full confidence our judges are totally independent and of highest integrity”.

Hong Kong’s 2020 national security law criminalised secession, subversion, terrorism and foreign interference, and was supplemented in 2024 to include treason, sedition, theft of state secrets, espionage, sabotage, and external interference.

Hong Kong’s government has said the laws are necessary to protect the city from political sabotage and foreign influence, following months of pro-democracy demonstrations in 2019.

Security Minister Chris Tang said in June that 326 people have been arrested under Hong Kong’s national security laws since 2020.

The government has also used international bounties to expand its reach to Hong Kong activists abroad, or cancelled their passports while they were overseas.

The moves have been seen as largely symbolic, but also chilling for a city that was once considered the freest place in Asia.

On Friday, Hong Kong issued a new list of bounties for 19 activists involved with a pro-Hong Kong democracy NGO in Canada.

Hong Kong returned to Chinese sovereignty in 1997 as a “special administrative region” and was promised special rights and freedoms until 2047, under the Sino-British Joint Declaration.

Escalation of military exchanges could move towards war, Acting Thai PM Phumtham Wechayachai says.

The death toll from clashes between Thai and Cambodian troops has risen to 15 in Thailand and one in Cambodia, according to authorities, as more than 120,000 people living along both sides of the border separating the two countries flee the ongoing fighting.

Deadly fighting continued for a second day on Friday as both countries traded heavy artillery and rocket fire, the bloodiest military confrontation between the two Southeast Asian neighbours in more than a decade.

The escalation of military exchanges could move towards war, Acting Thai PM Phumtham Wechayachai told reporters on Friday. For now, the clashes have involved heavy weapons, he added.

The ongoing clashes have taken place in 12 locations along the disputed border, up from six the day before, a Thai military official said on Friday, indicating a widening of the fighting. Rear Admiral Surasant Kongsiri, a military spokesperson, told a press conference Cambodia had continued to use heavy weapons.

“Thai forces have responded with appropriate supporting fire in accordance with the tactical situation,” the Thai military said in an earlier statement.

Thailand’s Ministry of Public Health reported that at least 14 civilians and one soldier were killed in Thailand when fighting broke out on Thursday, and a local provincial official in Cambodia’s Oddar Meanchey border province told the Reuters news agency that one person was killed and five wounded in Thai attacks.

More than 30 Thai civilians and 15 soldiers were also injured, according to Thailand’s Health Ministry, while some 100,672 people from four Thai provinces bordering Cambodia have been moved to shelters, Thailand’s Ministry of Interior was quoted by AFP news agency as saying.

Arsit Sampantharat, the Thai Interior Ministry’s permanent secretary, was quoted by the country’s Channel 3 television channel as saying that more than half of those evacuated were from Surin province, while the rest were from the provinces of Sisaket, Buriram and Ubon Ratchathani.

Citing officials in Cambodia’s Preah Vihear province, the Khmer Times news organisation said that about 20,000 residents have evacuated from the country’s northern border with Thailand.

Shelling from Thailand was also reported before dawn on Friday, the Khmer Times quoted the Cambodian military as saying.

Cambodia’s Ministry of Culture and Fine Arts claimed that Thailand’s strikes had caused “substantial damage” to the Preah Vihear temple, a UNESCO-listed World Heritage Site, according to The Phnom Penh Post.

Diplomatic sources told the AFP news agency that the United Nations Security Council will hold an emergency meeting on Friday to discuss the border fighting.

On Thursday, Thailand said it scrambled an F-16 fighter jet to bomb targets in Cambodia, while Cambodian forces launched long-range rockets towards civilian areas along the Thai border, Thailand’s military said.

Both countries have blamed each other for starting the clashes in a disputed area of the border, which quickly escalated from small arms fire to heavy shelling.

The United States, a longtime treaty ally of Thailand, has called for an immediate end to the hostilities.

China, a close ally of Cambodia, said it was deeply concerned about the ongoing conflict and hoped that both countries “will properly solve their dispute through dialogue and consultation”.

Taiwan’s opposition Kuomintang (KMT) party is in a moment of crisis as nearly two-thirds of its legislators risk losing their posts through a mass referendum.

Starting this weekend, voters across 31 districts in Taiwan will weigh in on whether they want to keep or remove their members of parliament.

The “Great Recall”, as it has been dubbed locally, is the largest vote of its kind in Taiwan’s history and, depending on the results, could cost the KMT its majority coalition in the country’s legislature.

The outcome will set the tone for Taiwan’s domestic politics for the next three years and also shape the ability of President William Lai Ching-te’s government to act on key issues, such as defence spending.

When will the recall election take place?

On Saturday, eligible voters can participate in recall votes for 24 KMT legislators, followed by a second round of voting for seven KMT legislators in late August.

The recall has been called following a wave of successful petition campaigns earlier this year. Under Taiwan’s election laws, organisers must secure signatures from 10 percent of a district’s registered voters to hold a recall vote.

For a recall vote to succeed, 25 percent of registered voters in each district must participate, and the recall must receive more votes in favour than against.

If voters choose to recall a legislator, a by-election must be held within three months.

The KMT’s traditional stronghold is in the north of the country and notably around the capital city of Taipei, but recall votes will be held across Taiwan this weekend.

The KMT won 52 out of 113 seats in the legislature in 2024, and with the Taiwan People’s Party and two independent legislators, holds a 62-seat majority coalition.

That coalition has been strong enough to block the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), which holds 51 seats, and stall the agenda of the country’s DPP President Lai during his first year in office.

Can the recall succeed?

Taiwan typically has high voter turnout during major elections, but recall votes are much more of a wildcard, said Lev Nachman, an expert in Taiwanese politics at National Taiwan University.

“Our prior experience should tell us that these should not pass. However, we’ve never seen mobilisation work like this at recalls before,” he told Al Jazeera, citing the widespread involvement of common people. “We are in a bit of unprecedented times.”

Ho Chih-yung, KMT member and former party spokesperson, told Al Jazeera the recall campaign had created a “national election-like atmosphere” that would test the mobilisation and engagement of Taiwan’s major political parties.

The weather could also tip the scales, he said, as a tropical storm is passing north of Taiwan, and the bad weather may discourage the KMT’s older voter base from going out to vote.

Why is the recall vote international news?

The vote will determine if Lai will be a lame-duck president for the next three years, and whether he has the ability to carry out key defence and foreign policy initiatives, Nachman said.

“Unfortunately, it’s a really big deal because every question that foreign policy people have is contingent upon whether these recalls are successful or not successful,” he said.

The issue carries global significance due to Taiwan’s contested political status and the threat of a future conflict involving China in the Taiwan Strait.

“The classic Taiwan problem is that it’s not just that society is split, it’s that society is split, and the clock is ticking about whether or not there’s going to be a war over this place,” he added.

“Everything here is infinitely more existential.”

Why are voters targeting the KMT?

Despite its success in the last election, picking up 14 seats, the KMT has angered voters and even alienated traditional supporters by trying to expand legislative powers and targeting President Lai’s budget.

The KMT majority in the legislature was able to freeze or cut 207.5 billion New Taiwan dollars (then worth $6.3bn) from Lai’s 2025 budget – impacting everything from Taiwan’s submarine and drone programmes to its Council of Indigenous Peoples.

The budget fight was headline news across Taiwan, but it piqued international interest when the KMT targeted $3.1bn in defence spending.

Brian Hoie, a non-resident fellow at the University of Nottingham’s Taiwan Research Hub and a frequent commentator on Taiwanese politics, said some of the cuts angered a cross-section of voters and groups traditionally aligned with the KMT, such as farmers and Indigenous voters.

“The KMT has done very badly and angered all these random demographics by cutting the budget,” he said.

“That was just very unstrategic,” he added.

What about the China factor?

The KMT is one of the oldest political parties in Asia, but a generational divide over Taiwan’s relationship with China is challenging its longstanding position in Taiwanese politics. Some voters believe that the party has been co-opted by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in Beijing.

The CCP has threatened to one day annex Taiwan by peace or by force, and Taiwan’s two main political parties offer different approaches for how to respond to Beijing’s threat.

President Lai’s DPP has taken a more outspoken approach by advocating for Taiwan on the international stage and ramping up defence spending, while the KMT follows a more conciliatory approach that favours ongoing dialogue with China.

Fears surrounding China have in the past unseated some of the KMT’s most prominent members, such as party whip Fu Kun-chi, who controversially led a delegation of lawmakers to Beijing last year at a time of significant political tension in the Taiwan Strait.

What does the KMT say?

Party member and former KMT spokesperson Ho said the recall supporters were abusing a system designed to remove individuals deemed unfit for holding their posts for serious reasons, such as corruption.

“This ‘mass recall’ campaign is not driven by the individual performance of KMT legislators, but is instead a blanket attempt to unseat opposition lawmakers across the board,” Ho said.

“To advance this effort, the DPP has deliberately framed the KMT as ‘pro-China’ and accused it of ‘selling out Taiwan’, a tactic designed to inflame ideological divisions and mobilise its base through fear and hostility, thereby increasing the likelihood that the recall votes will pass,” he said.

A senior KMT party member also told Al Jazeera that voters may be looking for an outlet for their frustrations amid a rising cost of living and the economic stress resulting from United States President Donald Trump’s trade war and threat of tariffs on Taiwan.

Trump has threatened to impose tariffs of up to 32 percent on the island-nation’s export-driven economy. Over the past six months, the New Taiwan dollar has appreciated 11 percent, impacting the bottom line of thousands of small and medium domestic manufacturers who must compete with foreign goods becoming cheaper for Taiwan’s consumers as their dollars go further in terms of spending power.

President Donald Trump promised to shake up global trade – and he says that is now paying off.

The United States has signed an investment deal with Japan, worth more than half a trillion dollars.

That follows Washington’s new trade agreements with the Philippines and Indonesia – all touted as wins by the administration from Trump’s policy of applying pressure through tariffs.

But are these short-term gains that could mask longer-term risks?

And who is winning – and who is losing?

Presenter: Adrian Finighan

Guests:

Tomohiko Taniguchi – Special adviser at the Fujitsu Future Studies Centre

Eric Ham – Political analyst

Nathalie Tocci – Director of Instituto Affari Internazionali

At least 11 people have been killed in deadly clashes along the Thai-Cambodian border between both countries’ troops and involving heavy weapons, rockets and fighter jets on Thursday.

The outbreak of fighting between the South Asian neighbours follows weeks of tensions which have been brewing since May, when a Cambodian soldier was killed in an armed confrontation on the border. In February, a dispute over Prasat Ta Moan Thon, a Khmer temple close to the border in Thailand, intensified when Thai police stopped Cambodian tourists from singing their national anthem at the contested site.

Shelling damaged hospitals and other civilian locations in Thailand during Thursday’s fighting, resulting in deaths and injuries, according to statements from the government. Thailand said it had retaliated with air attacks, but it is not yet clear if there have been casualties in Cambodia.

Each side blames the other for launching the first attack, as they have cut diplomatic relations with each other. Thailand said it had closed all border crossings with Cambodia.

Here’s what we know about the clashes so far:

What has happened and where?

Armed fighting broke out on Thursday morning near the disputed, ancient Prasat Ta Moan Thom Temple in Surin province, Thailand, very close to the border with Cambodia, where tensions have been running high in recent weeks.

It’s unclear yet who fired the first shot, with each side blaming the other.

The Thai military accused Cambodian soldiers of “provocation”.

Cambodian troops deployed a surveillance drone at 7:35am (00:35 GMT) before soldiers with rocket launchers approached a Thai military post, according to the Thai military. Thereafter, Cambodian forces opened fire towards the eastern side of the temple, 200 metres (650ft) from the Thai military base, and also targeted a local community with rockets, the Thai military said.

Deputy army spokesperson Richa Suksuwanon told reporters that air attacks were launched in response, including six F-16 fighter jets which attacked sites over the border in Cambodia and reportedly destroyed two military targets.

However, Cambodian defence officials denied that their troops fired first and said the country only responded after Thai troops launched an “armed assault on Cambodian forces”.

Spokeswoman Maly Socheata accused Thailand of violating Cambodia’s territorial integrity and said Cambodian troops “exercised their right to defend their sovereignty” after Thai fighter jets dropped two bombs on a road.

How many casualties have there been?

At least 11 people have been killed in Thailand – mostly civilians – the Ministry of Public Health said. An eight-year-old child was among the dead.

Six people were killed and 10 were wounded in one strike when a Cambodian rocket hit a busy gas station in Sisaket province, the Thai army said in a statement.

Three other deaths were recorded in Surin and Ubon Ratchathani provinces.

It is still unknown if there have been any casualties in Cambodia.

Why has fighting broken out?

Thai-Cambodia relations are at their worst in more than a decade.

The 818km (508-mile) border between the two countries has long been a source of tension and rivalry, as they both dispute demarcations drawn in 1907, during French colonial rule in Cambodia. There have been skirmishes before, but this is the first time fighter jets have been involved, marking a significant escalation.

The border areas are replete with centuries-old historical temples, some of which are claimed by both sides.

Although the establishment of a demilitarised zone has been discussed in the past, there are no formal zones in place now.

Troops from both sides clashed in 2011 near the Preah Vihear temple, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, killing 15-20 people and causing the displacement of thousands.

Cambodia first took the issue to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in 1963. In 2011, Cambodia again went to the ICJ in relation to the Preah Vihear Temple. The ICJ ruled in Cambodia’s favour and handed it control of the immediate area around the temple in 2013.

However, the court did not address any of the other disputed areas, especially those within the “Emerald Triangle”, a shared border region between Cambodia, Laos and Thailand, where troops also frequently clash.

Thailand has refused to acknowledge the ICJ’s jurisdiction in this issue. Tensions have simmered until this year’s escalation.

“The whole situation has been spiralling downwards for weeks, with Cambodia laying landmines that injured Thai soldiers, and Bangkok’s expulsion of the Cambodian ambassador was apparently the last straw,” Phil Robertson, director of the Asia Human Rights and Labour Advocates Consultancy, told Al Jazeera.

“So now the question is really how long will both sides continue fighting, and how many civilians will get killed in the indiscriminate crossfire that is already apparent,” he added.

How have tensions escalated between Thailand and Cambodia this year?

• On February 13, Cambodian soldiers escorted 25 civilians to the Prasat Ta Moan Thon Temple, where they reportedly sang the Cambodian national anthem. Thai military officials said they stopped the tourists from singing, on the basis that it violated mutual agreements about tourist protocols.
• On February 17, the Thai army sent a warning letter to the Cambodian military, accusing it of “inappropriate behaviour” and instructing it not to repeat the incident of February 13. In a statement, the Thai Ministry of National Defence said the temple was officially in Thai territory and that while Cambodian citizens could visit, singing the country’s national anthem “raises concerns”.
• On May 28, both sides clashed in the disputed border area of the Emerald Triangle, leaving one Cambodian soldier dead. The tri-border area connects Cambodia, Thailand, and Laos. Again, each side blamed the other for starting the violence.
• On June 12, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet announced that Cambodia would stop relying on Thai electricity and internet infrastructure due to “threats”. Cambodian TV stations stopped broadcasting Thai movies, and Cambodia also blocked imports of fuel and gas, as well as fruit and vegetables, from Thailand.
• On June 14, officials from both countries met in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, for talks. However, no concrete agreement for peace was reached. Both countries instead boosted border security and tightened checks at crossings.
• On June 15, Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra, who is the country’s youngest premier at 38, held a call with former Cambodian leader Hun Sen and discussed the tensions. Hun Sen is the father of the current prime minister, Hun Manet.
• On June 26, Thailand ordered operators to stop providing broadband and mobile internet connections to Cambodia.
• On July 1, Shinawatra was suspended after her phone call with Hun Sen was leaked to the public. In it, Shinawatra appeared to criticise the Thai military’s actions, signalling discord between the government and the army. Pro-military protesters have since called for her resignation.
• On July 16, a Thai soldier lost a leg in a landmine explosion while on patrol in First was in the Chong Bok area of Nam Zuen district, Ubon Ratchathani, Thailand, escalating tensions.
• On July 23, a second blast injured five Thai soldiers near Chong An Ma point, in Ubon Ratchathani province, causing a second soldier to lose a leg. Thailand immediately recalled its ambassador to Cambodia and shut border checkpoints at Chong An Ma, Chong Sa-ngam, Chong Chom and Chong Sai Takoo. Ta Moan Thom and Ta Kwai temples were also closed.
• On July 24, violence erupted between the two sides, involving heavy weapons and air attacks. Cambodia also recalled its diplomatic staff in Thailand.

What does each side say about the conflict?

Thailand’s acting premier, Phumtham Wechayachai, said in a statement on Thursday that the dispute was “delicate” and must be resolved according to international law.

Suspended Prime Minister Shinawatra – who is also the culture minister – condemned Cambodia, in a news briefing, for opening fire and accused the country of allowing the situation to escalate beyond diplomatic levels.

“We have always respected international protocols, but now Cambodia has forced our hand. We may have to take actions we have tried to avoid in the past,” she said.

For his part, Cambodia’s prime minister, Hun Manet, has urged an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) to stop “Thailand’s aggression”. Manet said Thai forces launched “unprovoked, premeditated and deliberate attacks” on the Cambodian border, violating international law.

“Facing this flagrant aggression, Cambodian troops had no option but to respond in self-defence in order to safeguard Cambodia’s sovereignty and territorial integrity,” Manet wrote in a letter to UNSC President Asin Iftikhar Ahmad.

“It is profoundly reprehensible that this act of aggression occurs while Cambodia is actively pursuing peaceful and impartial legal avenues to resolve outstanding border issues with Thailand through both bilateral and international mechanisms,” he added.

Both countries have closed borders and announced evacuations of their citizens from the border zones. The Thai embassy in Phnom Penh urged citizens to leave Cambodia.

What reactions have there been from other nations and international bodies?

The United States and China issued warnings to their citizens to be vigilant in the border areas.

The US embassy in Thailand urged Americans to heed advice from Thai authorities, who commenced evacuation from the worst-hit areas on Thursday.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun told reporters at a news conference on Thursday that China is “deeply concerned” about escalating tensions between its neighbours, and stressed the importance of “maintaining friendly relations” with “long-term interests on both sides”.

China will “continue to play a constructive role in promoting peace and dialogue to help ease tensions”, the spokesperson said.

Anwar Ibrahim, the prime minister of Malaysia and current chairman of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), of which Thailand and Cambodia are members, said he would engage both sides in negotiations.

“I have sent messages to both prime ministers and look forward to speaking with them later today or tonight,” he told reporters.

“The least we can expect is for them to stand down and hopefully try to enter into negotiation,” Ibrahim said, calling the situation “worrying” and describing Thailand and Cambodia as key ASEAN members.

Will this situation escalate further?

Robertson of AHRLA said the situation would likely “get worse before it gets better”.

Bad blood between Cambodian PM Hun Sen and former Thai PM Thaksin Shinawatra, respectively the fathers of both countries’ current leaders, could add to the political will to continue fighting, Robertson said.

Although Thaksin and Hun Sen were longtime allies, Robertson said Hun Sen’s leaking of the recording of  the damaging phone call between him and Thaksin’s daughter, suspended PM Shinawatra, means “the gloves are now off between the two sides.

“Right now, neither side wants to be seen as conceding any ground to the other, so the fighting is likely to continue for some time, primarily in the form of firing across the border with artillery and firefights across the border in disputed areas,” he said.

Robertson added: “We’re not going to see either side invade the other, but the damage will be lasting and it’s hard to see how this will be mediated towards peace, at least in the short-to-medium term.”

Chinese President Xi Jinping and top EU officials mark 50 years of diplomatic ties in Beijing at a rocky time in relations.

Chinese President Xi Jinping has said Europe and China must make the “correct strategic choices” in the face of recent global challenges during a summit with top European Union officials, which comes at a particularly rocky time in their relationship.

“Faced with the rapidly evolving global changes of a century and the international situation of intertwined turmoil, Chinese and European leaders must … make correct strategic choices that meet the expectations of the people and stand the test of history,” Xi said, according to state news outlet CCTV.

Xi’s remarks on Thursday followed a meeting with EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and European Council President Antonio Costa, who are in Beijing for the 25th EU-China summit.

The EU and China are marking 50 years of diplomatic relations amid thorny disagreements ranging from the EU-China trade deficit to Beijing’s ongoing support for Russia’s war machine.

The event is the first in-person summit for Chinese and EU leaders since 2023, and more modest than initial plans for a two-day meeting in Europe.

While expectations were low heading into the meeting, the EU and China are expected to sign an agreement on climate change and carbon emissions, Reuters news agency reported, citing European diplomats.

Chinese state media and officials have also billed the summit as a chance for Beijing and the EU to normalise relations at a time of global uncertainty, stirred by United States President Donald Trump and others.

Von der Leyen cast the EU-China meeting in a similarly positive light in a post on X on Thursday.

“This Summit is the opportunity to both advance and rebalance our relationship. I’m convinced there can be a mutually beneficial cooperation,” she wrote. “One that can define the next 50 years of our relations.”

📍Touchdown in Beijing, as we mark 50 years of ties between Europe and China.

This Summit is the opportunity to both advance and rebalance our relationship.

I’m convinced there can be a mutually beneficial cooperation.

One that can define the next 50 years of our relations. pic.twitter.com/0SA3YS4k6V

— Ursula von der Leyen (@vonderleyen) July 24, 2025

Canberra says restrictions will be lifted following a ‘rigorous science and risk-based assessment’.

Australia has announced that it will lift tough restrictions on beef imports from the United States, removing measures singled out for criticism by US President Donald Trump.

Agriculture Minister Julie Collins said the government would remove the biosecurity restrictions after a “rigorous science and risk-based assessment” found the risks were being managed on the US side.

“Australia stands for open and fair trade – our cattle industry has significantly benefitted from this,” Collins said in a statement.

Australia, which has some of the world’s toughest biosecurity measures, has until now not accepted beef from cattle raised in Canada and Mexico but slaughtered in the US.

Canberra lifted a ban on beef from cows raised and slaughtered in the US, introduced in response to an outbreak of mad cow disease, in 2019.

The move comes after Trump called out Australia’s restrictions on US beef in his April 2 “Liberation Day” announcement of sweeping tariffs on dozens of countries.

“Australia bans – and they’re wonderful people and wonderful everything – but they ban American beef,” Trump said.

“They won’t take any of our beef,” Trump added.

“They don’t want it because they don’t want it to affect their farmers and you know, I don’t blame them but we’re doing the same thing right now starting at midnight tonight, I would say.”

Australia, which exports about 70 percent of its beef, is among the main suppliers of red meat to the US, but consumes little US beef.

Australia exported about 26,000 tonnes of beef and veal to the US in the first three weeks of July, according to government statistics.

Meat & Livestock Australia, a producer-owned company that supports the local beef industry, said the changes would have a minimal effect on the market.

“The potential for US beef to be imported into Australia in large volumes is minimal, given the high demand for beef in the US, the low US cattle herd, the strength of the Australian dollar, our competitive domestic supply, and most importantly Australians’ strong preference for high-quality, tasty and nutritious Australian beef,” the company said.

“In fact, demand for Australian beef in the US continues to grow. In June 2025, exports to the US rose 24 percent year-on-year, despite a 10 percent tariff introduced in April.”

Brussels, Belgium – Just before the summer lull hits Brussels, the European Union and China will hold a top-level summit in Beijing on Thursday, commemorating 50 years of diplomatic ties.

The mood before the meeting on Thursday, however, has not been particularly celebratory but, rather, tense with low expectations for any concrete bilateral deals. The summit which was meant to be a two-day affair, was also condensed into a single day’s event by Beijing earlier this month, citing domestic reasons.

A series of trade disagreements, particularly over market access and critical rare earth elements, and geopolitical tensions, primarily Russia’s ongoing war in Ukraine, have marred EU-China relations.

Gunnar Wiegand, the former managing director for Asia and the Pacific at the European External Action Service (EEAS) and currently a distinguished fellow at the Indo-Pacific Program of the German Marshall Fund’s  Brussels Office, told Al Jazeera that the EU’s current partnership with China is complex.

“The EU views China as a partner for global challenges, an economic competitor when it comes to developing new technologies and also a systemic rival because of Beijing’s governance system and its influence on global affairs,” he said, adding that the question of whether China is also a threat to European security has come up over the last few years in the context of Russia’s ongoing war in Ukraine.

Who is attending the summit?

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and European Council President Antonio Costa will visit China on Thursday, seeking to address these disputes at the summit.

“This Summit is an opportunity to engage with China at the highest level and have frank, constructive discussions on issues that matter to both of us. We want dialogue, real engagement and concrete progress,” Costa said in a statement in advance of the summit.

The EU leaders will meet Chinese President Xi Jinping on Thursday morning, and Premier Li Qiang will co-chair the 25th summit between the two parties, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs told reporters in Beijing on Monday.

A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson added that after 50 years of EU-China development, their ties “can cope with the changing difficulties and challenges”.

Is Russia’s war in Ukraine on the agenda?

According to EU officials, discussions with President Xi on Thursday morning will focus on global affairs and bilateral relations, followed by a banquet lunch.

However, the Russia-Ukraine war is likely to arise because of Beijing’s close ties with Moscow, which has been a thorny issue for Brussels.

“You can expect the EU addressing Russia’s war in Ukraine,” a senior EU official told reporters in Brussels on July 18. “China, of course, talks to us often about core issues. Well, this is a core issue for Europe. It’s an issue fundamental to European security,” the official added.

In an address to the European Parliament earlier this month, von der Leyen also accused China of “de facto enabling Russia’s war economy”.

Brussels has sanctioned several Chinese companies for facilitating the supply of goods which are used for weapons production in Russia, and on July 18, the EU also slapped sanctions on Chinese banks for the first time, for reportedly financing the supply of such goods.

China has rejected such accusations and warned of retaliations. Beijing has also reiterated that its position on the Ukraine war is all about “negotiation, ceasefire and peace”.

But according to an article by the South China Morning Post, during a meeting with the EU’s foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas, in early July, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said Beijing did not want to see Russia lose the war in Ukraine, since the United States would then focus on China.

Wiegand said Europe should have no illusions.

“For China, having good and close relations with Russia is of utmost importance to increase its own strength in the global context. They will not sacrifice this relationship,” he said.

“This is the most important negative factor which has impacted the overall [EU-China] relationship,” he added.

Besides the Ukraine war, EU officials in Brussels said, the 27-member bloc will also discuss tensions in the Middle East and other security threats in Asia.

How difficult will trade discussions be?

Another contentious issue between Brussels and Beijing is trade. This is likely to be central to the summit’s agenda in the afternoon with Chinese Premier Li Qiang, followed by a dinner, EU officials involved in planning the summit told reporters in Brussels on July 18.

China is the EU’s third-largest trading partner, but the two have recently been squabbling over a series of trade issues, including 45 percent European tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles (EVs) and Beijing’s control of rare earth minerals, which are vital for chip making and producing medical devices.

In her speech at the European Parliament earlier this month, von der Leyen accused Beijing of “flooding global markets with subsidised overcapacity – not just to boost its own industries, but to choke international competition”.

The EU has a trade deficit with China of more than 300 billion euros ($352bn) as of 2024. EU exports to China amounted to 213 billion euros ($250bn), while EU imports from China amounted to 519 billion euros ($609bn), according to figures from the European Commission.

EU officials say Chinese companies are benefitting from massive government subsidies and, due to sluggish demand for goods locally, cheap Chinese goods like EVs are being shipped to the EU instead.

To protect European interests, Brussels has begun taking action and imposed tariffs of up to 45 percent on Chinese EVs last October. The bloc also barred Chinese companies from medical devices tenders in June, among other trade barriers, after concluding that European firms were not being granted access to Chinese markets.

The EU is also concerned about Beijing’s export controls on rare earth minerals.

At the Group of Seven summit in Canada in June, von der Leyen accused China of “blackmail” and said, “No single country should control 80-90 percent of the market for essential raw materials and downstream products like magnets.”

“The present situation is not sustainable. We need rebalancing … China benefits from our open market but buys too little,” a senior EU official told reporters in Brussels before the summit. “Trade access is limited and export controls are excessive. We will go there [to Beijing] with a positive and constructive attitude … but China has to acknowledge our concerns.”

In her speech at the European Parliament in July, the European Commission president said the 27-member bloc is “engaging with Beijing so that it loosens its export restrictions” on rare earth minerals.

Wiegand said while trade negotiations have been ongoing, achieving common ground or any trade deal at the summit this week looks unlikely.

“There is a constructive tone [from the EU] when it comes to ‘de-risking’, not ‘de-coupling’ from China. The Chinese, however, don’t like the term ‘de-risking’. They think it is disinformation. But it is simply the process of reducing trade vulnerabilities by diversifying and improving our own capacities,” he said.

How does China view trading relations with the EU?

China wants the EU to view their trading partnership “without emotion and prejudice”, according to the Foreign Ministry.

He Yongqian, a spokeswoman for the Chinese Ministry of Commerce, told a news conference in Beijing on Monday that China hopes that Brussels will also “be less protectionist, and be more open”.

In an email statement to Al Jazeera before the forum, the Chinese Chamber of Commerce to the EU (CCCEU) said it hopes the summit will “address critical challenges, including market and investment barriers faced by Chinese companies in the EU”.

“Recent EU measures, such as the Foreign Subsidies Regulation (FSR) and International Procurement Instrument (IPI), have disproportionately impacted Chinese firms in clean tech, high-tech, and medical devices. We urge constructive dialogue to ensure fair treatment,” CCCEU noted.

Will human rights be discussed at the summit?

EU-China relations have also been icy over human rights issues. In 2021, Brussels slapped sanctions on Chinese officials over reported human rights abuses against Uighur Muslims in China’s Xinjiang region.

Beijing denied these allegations and retaliated by sanctioning EU lawmakers. The tit-for-tat sanctions were accompanied by a halt in bilateral dialogues between the European Parliament and the National People’s Congress (NPC) of China.

Sarah Brooks, Amnesty International’s China director, told Al Jazeera that on the 50th anniversary of EU-China diplomatic relations, there is “little to celebrate” when it comes to talking about human rights in China in 2025.

“Amnesty International has regularly documented serious and widespread human rights violations, from arbitrary detention and persecution in the Uighur region, for which no official has been held to account; to assaults on the rule of law and the chipping away of civil and political freedoms in Hong Kong, despite international treaties guaranteeing those rights; to the systematic use of national security legislation to target rights defence and criticism, at home and increasingly abroad. The EU, at least on paper, has also come to similar conclusions,” she said.

“At the summit, the EU’s leadership needs to ensure that those words become action and use every tool at their disposal to create positive human rights change for people – not more empty promises at the negotiating table or the speaker’s podium,” she added.

While China lifted some of its sanctions in April this year and hinted at resuming political dialogues between the European Parliament and the NPC, the 2021 EU sanctions remain in place. The bloc said last week that it had “not observed changes in the human rights situation in China/Xinjiang”.

“Promoting and protecting human rights is important to the EU. We will raise the EU’s concern on the deterioration of rights in Xinjiang, Tibet, and other regions,” an EU official said.

Will the issue of US tariffs arise?

The meeting between the EU and China comes amid US President Donald Trump’s global tariff war, which both Brussels and Beijing are trying to navigate.

Trump has announced imposing a tariff of 30 percent on goods EU imports from August 1, and Brussels has been holding trade negotiations with Washington, seeking to strike a trade deal.

China and the US agreed to slash tit-for-tat heavy tariffs for 90 days in May. That suspension expires on August 12. In June, the US said it would impose 55 percent tariffs on Chinese goods, down from the 145 percent Trump had imposed in April. In return, Beijing said, it will impose a 10 percent tariff on goods it imports from the US, down from 125 percent. But trade negotiations are ongoing.

Earlier this year, some analysts in Brussels hinted that tariff tensions with Washington could improve Brussels-Beijing trade ties.

The CCCEU also told Al Jazeera that with US tariffs looming, “China and the EU share a responsibility to uphold free trade and multilateralism while mitigating external pressures” and pushed Brussels to improve its business environment for foreign companies and enhance supply chains.

But in the run-up to the summit, expectations remain low.

“It is quite clear the US tariff issue is an over-encompassing issue … we are negotiating with the US at present. It is clear that there is a need to find and engage with other actors worldwide due to the impact of US tariffs,” a senior EU official told reporters in Brussels before the summit.

“But with China, we are certainly not agreeing to compromise on our values,” the official stressed.

Wiegand also pointed out that Europe’s economic relationship with the US is stronger than that with China since they are also NATO allies.

“With Russia’s war in Ukraine threatening Europe, Brussels will not be pushed closer to Beijing,” he said.

“But as Brussels negotiates tariffs with Washington, certainly there will be an important China dimension in the finalisation of a deal with the US administration.”

BREAKINGBREAKING,

The clash is the latest in a long-running deadly border dispute between the Southeast Asian neighbours.

A clash has taken place between Thai and Cambodian troops at a disputed area of their border, Thailand’s military has said.

In a statement, the Thai military said Cambodian troops opened fire in an area near the disputed Ta Moan Thom temple – located on the countries’ shared border in northwestern Cambodia’s Oddar Meanchey Province – early on Thursday.

It said Cambodia had deployed a surveillance drone before sending troops to the area with heavy weapons.

In May, a long-running border dispute between Thailand and Cambodia boiled over into military clashes that left one Cambodian soldier dead.

The continuing border dispute has soured relations between the Southeast Asian neighbours, with the two sides trading barbs and tit-for-tat retaliatory measures, including the closure of border crossings.

Cambodia has also blocked imports of fuel and gas, as well as fruit and vegetables, from Thailand.

Most recently, on Wednesday, a Thai soldier sustained injuries and lost his right leg in a landmine incident.

In response, Thailand’s governing Pheu Thai Party said it had recalled Thailand’s ambassador to Cambodia and will expel Cambodia’s ambassador from the country. Thailand has also downgraded diplomatic relations with Cambodia, the party said.

In response, Cambodia has withdrawn all of its diplomats from Thailand and ordered all Thai diplomats to leave the country.

The Cambodian government also downgraded diplomatic relations with Thailand to the “lowest level”, reducing it to the rank of “second secretary”, according to local news outlet the Phnom Penh Post.

Earlier, Thailand had accused Cambodia of placing landmines on the Thai side of the disputed border area between Thailand’s Ubon Ratchathani Province and Cambodia’s Preah Vihear Province, after three soldiers were injured while on a patrol on July 16.

Cambodia claims the soldiers, one of whom lost his foot in the explosion, veered off agreed routes and triggered a mine left behind from decades of war.

UN chief Antonio Guterres says ‘the fossil fuel age is flailing and failing’ as renewable energy becomes cheaper.

The global switch to renewable energy has passed a “positive tipping point”, and solar and wind power will become even cheaper and more widespread, according to two reports.

Last year, 74 percent of the growth in electricity generated worldwide was from wind, solar and other green sources, according to a report compiled by multiple United Nations agencies called Seizing the Moment of Opportunity. It was published on Tuesday.

It found that 92.5 percent of all new electricity capacity added to the grid worldwide in 2024 came from renewables. Meanwhile, sales of electric vehicles were up from 500,000 in 2015 to more than 17 million in 2024.

The three cheapest electricity sources globally last year were onshore wind, solar panels and new hydropower, according to an energy cost report by the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA), an intergovernmental organisation. Solar power now is 41 percent cheaper and wind power is 53 percent cheaper globally than the lowest-cost fossil fuel, the reports said.

“The fossil fuel age is flailing and failing,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said in a speech at the UN headquarters in New York City.

“We are in the dawn of a new energy era. An era where cheap, clean, abundant energy powers a world rich in economic opportunity.”

“Just follow the money,” Guterres said, quoting the reports, which showed last year there was $2 trillion in investment in green energy, which is about $800bn more than in fossil fuels.

Renewables are booming despite fossil fuels getting nearly nine times the government consumption subsidies as they do, Guterres and the reports said.

In 2023, global fossil fuel subsidies amounted to $620bn, compared with $70bn for renewables, the UN report said.

Still, the UN warned that the switch to renewable energy is not happening fast enough.

Despite the boom in renewables, fossil fuel production globally is still increasing instead of going down in response. UN officials said that’s because power demand is increasing overall, spurred by developing countries, artificial intelligence data centres and the need for cooling in an ever warmer world.

Guterres warned nations that are hanging on to fossil fuels that they were heading down a dangerous path that would make them poorer not richer.

“Countries that cling to fossil fuels are not protecting their economies. They [are] sabotaging them – driving up costs, undermining competitiveness, locking in stranded assets,” Guterres said.

The global renewables growth has been mostly in countries like China – where one-tenth of the economy is tied up in green energy – as well as countries such as India and Brazil.

Africa represented less than 2 percent of the new green energy capacity installed last year despite having great electrification needs, the reports said.

“The Global South must be empowered to generate its own electricity without adding to already unsustainable level of debts,” Bahamian climate scientist Adelle Thomas of the Natural Resources Defense Council, who did not work on the reports, told The Associated Press news agency.

Guterres called on major technology firms to power data centres completely with renewables by 2030.

“A typical AI data centre eats up as much electricity as 100,000 homes,” Guterres said. “By 2030, data centres could consume as much electricity as all of Japan does today.”

“The future is being built in the cloud,” the UN chief said.

“It must be powered by the sun, the wind and the promise of a better world.”

When John Warmington first began diving the reefs outside his home in Vanuatu’s Havannah Harbour 10 years ago, the coral rose like a sunken forest – tall stands of staghorns branched into yellow antlers, plate corals layered like canopies, and clouds of darting fish wove through the labyrinth.

“We used to know every inch of that reef,” he said. “It was like a friend.”

Now, it is unrecognisable.

After Cyclone Pam battered the reef in 2015, sediment from inland rivers smothered the coral beds. Crown-of-thorns starfish swept in and devoured the recovering polyps.

Back-to-back cyclones in 2023 crushed what remained. Then, in December 2024, a magnitude 7.3 earthquake shook the seabed.

What remains is a coral graveyard – bleached rubble scattered across the seabed, habitats collapsed, and life vanished.

“We have come out of the water in tears,” said Warmington, who has logged thousands of dives on this single reef. “We just see heartbreak.”

That heartbreak is becoming more common across this Pacific island nation, where intensifying cyclones, rising seas, and saltwater intrusion are reshaping coastlines and threatening daily life.

Since 1993, sea levels around Vanuatu’s shores have risen by about 6mm (0.24in) per year – significantly faster than the global average – and in some areas, tectonic activity has doubled that rate.

On Wednesday, Vanuatu will have its day in the world’s highest court. The International Court of Justice (ICJ) will issue an advisory opinion on what legal obligations nations have to address climate change, and what consequences they may face if they do not.

The case, led by Vanuatu and backed by more than 130 countries, is seen as a potential turning point in international climate law.

The opinion will not be legally binding, but could help shape future efforts to hold major emitters accountable, and secure the funding and action small island nations need to adapt or survive.

It comes after decades of frustration for Pacific nations that have watched their homelands disappear.

In Tuvalu, where the average elevation is just two metres (6.6ft), more than a third of the population has applied for a climate migration visa to Australia.

By 2100, much of the country is projected to be under water at high tide.

In Nauru, the government has begun selling passports to wealthy foreigners – offering visa-free access to dozens of countries – in a bid to generate revenue for possible relocation efforts.

Vanuatu has already sought opinions from other international courts, and is pushing for the recognition of ecocide – the destruction of the environment – as a crime under the International Criminal Court.

Not all of these effects can be attributed solely to climate change, said Christina Shaw, chief executive of the Vanuatu Environmental Science Society.

Coastal development, tectonic subsidence, volcanic eruptions, deforestation, and pollution are also contributing to ecosystem decline.

“Vanuatu’s environment is quite fragile by its very nature in that it is young with narrow reefs, has small amounts of topsoil, and is impacted regularly by natural disasters,” she said. “But we do have to think about the other human impacts on our environment as well.”

The damage is not limited to homes, gardens, and reefs – it is reaching into places once thought to be untouchable.

On the island of Pele, village chief Amos Kalsont sits at his brother’s grave as waves lap against broken headstones half-buried in sand.

At high tide, both his brother’s and father’s graves sit just a few arm’s lengths from the sea. Some homes and gardens have already been moved inland, and saltwater intrusion has tainted the community’s primary drinking water source.

Now, the community is considering relocating the entire village – but that would mean leaving the land their grandparents cleared by hand.

Many in Vanuatu remain committed to building something stronger and hope the rest of the world will support them.

Back in Havannah Harbour, John Warmington still dives the reef he considers part of his family. While much of it has gone, he and his wife Sandy have begun replanting coral fragments in the hope of restoring what remains.

Alistair Kitchen is a writer from Australia who was blocked from entering the US in June 2025.

In this Unmute, Kitchen describes how he endured hours of interrogation and had his phone confiscated and forensically downloaded by Customs agents before he was deported back to Australia. He believes it was over his writing on the pro-Palestine protests at Columbia University and his views on Israel-Palestine.

Vietnam is bracing for Typhoon Wipha, expected to make landfall Tuesday with winds up to 166 km/h. Mass evacuations, flight cancellations, and flood alerts are underway as the country prepares for deadly floods and landslides. The storm killed three in the Philippines.

US State Department says the employee was slapped with an exit ban while visiting the country in a ‘personal capacity’.

A United States government employee has been prevented from leaving China after visiting the country for personal reasons, Washington has said.

The employee of the US Patent and Trademark Office, an agency within the US Department of Commerce, was subject to an “exit ban” while travelling in China in a “personal capacity”, the US Department of State said on Monday.

“The Department of State has no higher priority than the safety and security of American citizens,” a State Department spokesperson said in a statement.

“We are tracking this case very closely and are engaged with Chinese officials to resolve the situation as quickly as possible.”

The statement comes after The Washington Post on Sunday reported that a Chinese-American man employed by the US Commerce Department was barred from leaving China after failing to disclose his work for the government on a visa application.

The report, which cited four unnamed people familiar with the matter, said the employee had travelled to China several months ago to visit family.

The Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post on Sunday reported that the man, a naturalised US citizen, was detained in Chengdu, Sichuan, in April over “actions Beijing deemed harmful to national security”.

The Post’s report cited an unnamed “source familiar with the matter”.

The Chinese Embassy in Washington, DC, referred Al Jazeera to remarks by Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson Guo Jiakun, who on Monday told journalists he had “no details to share” on the case.

“China upholds the rule of law and handles entry and exit affairs in accordance with the law,” Guo said at a regular media briefing.

Washington’s confirmation of the exit ban comes after Beijing on Monday said it had blocked the departure of a US citizen employed by the banking giant Wells Fargo.

China’s Foreign Ministry said that Chenyue Mao, an Atlanta-based managing director, was subject to an exit ban due to her involvement in an unspecified criminal case.

Washington and Beijing have long traded accusations of espionage and meddling in each other’s domestic affairs.

On Monday, the US Department of Justice said that a Chinese-born US researcher had pleaded guilty to stealing trade secrets, including blueprints for infrared sensors designed to detect nuclear missile launches and track ballistic missiles.

Prosecutors said Chenguang Gong, a dual US-Chinese citizen, transferred more than 3,600 company files to his personal storage devices during his employment with a Los Angeles-based research and development firm.

Before taking up work with the company, Gong had travelled to China several times to seek funding to develop technology with military applications, prosecutors said.

Vietnam is expecting 500mm of rainfall as Typhoon Wipha approaches the northern coast after skirting the Philippines, where five people were killed and several are missing.

Rainfall and flooding, which left five people dead and displaced thousands over the weekend, have continued in the Philippines following Typhoon Wipha, which is now barrelling towards the coast of northern Vietnam as a severe tropical storm.

As of 6am local time in Vietnam on Tuesday (23:00 GMT), Wipha was situated 60km (37 miles) off the coast of Haiphong City, with wind speeds of up to 102 kph (63 mph), and was moving southwest at a speed of 15 kph (9.3 mph), according to Vietnam’s national weather forecast agency.

No casualties or damage have been reported so far, while an estimated 350,000 Vietnamese soldiers are on standby as the country’s weather agency expects up to 500mm (20 inches) of rainfall, which could cause dangerous flooding and landslides.

Expected to make landfall in Hung Yen and Ninh Binh provinces, located south of the capital, Hanoi, Wipha is forecast to weaken to a low-pressure event on Tuesday night, the agency said.

Floodwaters driven by torrential rains in the aftermath of Typhoon Wipha brought much of life in the Philippine capital, Manila, to a halt on Tuesday, with tens of thousands evacuated from their homes and at least two people believed missing.

Schools and government offices remained closed in Manila and surrounding provinces after a night of rain that saw the region’s Marikina River burst its banks.

More than 23,000 people living along the river were evacuated and took shelter in schools, village halls and covered courtyards. Another 25,000 more were evacuated in the metropolitan area’s Quezon and Caloocan cities.

An elderly woman and her driver were swept down a swollen stream as they attempted to cross a bridge in Caloocan, John Paul Nietes, an emergency operations centre assistant supervisor, told the AFP news agency.

“Their car was recovered last night. The rescue operation is continuing, but as of today, they haven’t found either of them,” he said.

According to the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council in the Philippines, five people have been reported killed as of Monday, and at least another five were reported injured following Typhoon Wipha, local news outlet Enquirer.net reported. Seven people are also missing, according to the council.

At least 20 storms or typhoons strike or come near the Philippines each year, with the country’s poorest regions typically the hardest hit. Their impact has become more deadly and destructive as storms grow more powerful due to climate change.

Earlier this year, Super Typhoon Yagi hit Vietnam, killing about 300 people and causing some $3.3bn in damage.

The project on a river that runs through Tibet and India downstream could dwarf the Three Gorges Dam when completed.

China has started building a mega-dam on the Yarlung Zangbo River in Tibet, which could become the world’s largest source of hydroelectric power when completed, according to Chinese officials.

The mega-project in the foothills of the Himalayas will include five hydropower stations on the river, which is also known as the Brahmaputra, further downstream in India, and the Jamuna River in Bangladesh.

China’s Xinhua state news agency reported that Premier Li Qiang attended a commencement ceremony for the dam on Saturday.

Beijing had planned the project for several years, and approval was given in December last year, linking the development to the country’s carbon neutrality targets and economic goals in the Tibet region.

“The electricity generated will be primarily transmitted to other regions for consumption, while also meeting local power needs in Tibet,” Xinhua reported after the groundbreaking ceremony in southeastern Tibet’s city of Nyingchi.

The project is expected to cost an estimated 1.2 trillion yuan ($167.1bn), Xinhua said.

India said in January that it had raised concerns with China about the project, saying it would “monitor and take necessary measures to protect our interests”.

India’s Ministry of External Affairs said at the time that China “has been urged to ensure that the interests of the downstream states of the Brahmaputra are not harmed by activities in upstream areas”.

In December, Beijing’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said the project would not have any “negative impact” downstream, adding that China “will also maintain communication with countries at the lower reaches” of the river.

China annexed Tibet in 1950, and has built several dams on the region’s rivers, prompting concerns from Tibetans about the potential impacts on the unique ecosystems of the Tibetan Plateau.

Tibet’s vast glaciers and major rivers provide fresh water to 1.3 billion people in 10 countries, according to Yale’s E360 environmental magazine.

The Yarlung Tsangpo is the world’s highest river, reaching some 5,000 metres (16,404 feet) above sea level, and is considered sacred to Tibetans.

The new dam is also being built just 30km (18 miles) from China’s vast border with India, much of which is disputed, with tens of thousands of soldiers posted on either side.

Once built, the dam could provide as much as three times as much energy as the Three Gorges Dam on the Yangtze River in central China.

The Three Gorges Dam, which was completed in 2003, controversially displaced some 1.4 million people.

Tibet is much more sparsely populated, with some 2,000 people displaced for the construction of the Yagen Hydropower Station in 2015, according to local media reports.

Leaders expected to hold talks on bilateral trade days before US tariffs on Philippine goods set to take effect.

Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr will meet United States President Donald Trump this week, hoping Manila’s status as a key Asian ally will secure a more favourable trade deal.

Marcos will be the first Southeast Asian leader to meet Trump during the US leader’s second term.

Trump has already struck trade deals with two of Manila’s regional partners, Vietnam and Indonesia, driving tough bargains in negotiations even with close allies that Washington wants to keep onside in its strategic rivalry with China.

“I expect our discussions to focus on security and defence, of course, but also on trade,” Marcos said in a speech before leaving Manila and arriving in Washington on Sunday, with hopes to reach a deal before August 1, when Trump says he will impose 20 percent tariffs on goods from the Philippines.

“We will see how much progress we can make when it comes to the negotiations with the United States concerning the changes that we would like to institute to alleviate the effects of a very severe tariff schedule on the Philippines,” Marcos said.

The US had a deficit of nearly $5bn with the Philippines last year on bilateral goods trade of $23.5bn.

Trump this month raised the threatened “reciprocal” tariffs on imports from the Philippines to 20 percent from 17 percent threatened in April.

Although US allies in Asia such as Japan and South Korea have yet to strike trade deals with Trump, Gregory Poling, a Southeast Asia expert at Washington’s Center for Strategic and International Studies, said Marcos might be able to do better than Vietnam, with its agreement of a 20 percent baseline tariff on its goods, and Indonesia at 19 percent.

“I wouldn’t be surprised to see an announcement of a deal with the Philippines at a lower rate than those two,” Poling told the Reuters news agency.

Marcos visited the Pentagon on Monday morning for talks with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and will see Secretary of State Marco Rubio later in the day, before meeting Trump at the White House on Tuesday.

He will also meet US business leaders investing in the Philippines.

Philippine officials say Marcos’s focus will be on economic cooperation and Manila’s concerns about Trump’s tariffs.

They say he will stress that Manila must become economically stronger if it is to serve as a truly robust US partner in the Asia Pacific.

Philippine Assistant Foreign Secretary Raquel Solano said last week that trade officials have been working with US counterparts seeking to seal a “mutually acceptable and mutually beneficial” deal for both countries.

China tensions

Trump and Marcos will also discuss defence and security, and Solano said the Philippine president would be looking to further strengthen the longstanding defence alliance.

Philippine media quoted Manila’s ambassador to Washington, Jose Manuel Romualdez, as saying on Sunday that the visit would see a reaffirmation of the seven-decade-old mutual defence treaty and “discussions on how we can continue to cooperate with the United States, our major ally”.

With the Philippines facing intense pressure from China in the contested South China Sea, Marcos has pivoted closer to the US, expanding access to Philippine military bases amid China’s threats towards Taiwan, the democratically governed island claimed by Beijing.

The US and the Philippines hold dozens of annual exercises, which have included training with the US Typhon missile system, and more recently, with the NMESIS antiship missile system, angering China.

Manila and the US have closely aligned their views on China, Poling said, and it was notable that Rubio and Hegseth made sure their Philippine counterparts were the first Southeast Asian officials they met.

Poling said Trump also seemed to have a certain warmth towards Marcos, based on their phone call after Trump’s re-election.

Unification ministry in Seoul says allowing individual tours will not violate international sanctions.

South Korea is considering allowing individual tours to North Korea as it studies ways to improve relations with its neighbour, a spokesperson for South Korea’s Ministry of Unification says.

“The government is formulating and pursuing North Korea policies with the goal of easing tensions on the Korean Peninsula and improving inter-Korean ties with various measures under consideration in the process,” the ministry said in a statement on Monday.

The announcement was made as Seoul takes more steps to ease tensions with its northern rival after the election of President Lee Jae-myung, who has pledged to improve strained ties with Pyongyang.

In a bid to ease tensions, Lee suspended anti-North Korea loudspeaker broadcasts along the border and ordered a halt to leaflet campaigns criticising the North’s leaders by anti-Pyongyang activists.

Koo Byung-sam, spokesperson for the Unification Ministry, which handles inter-Korean affairs, refused to comment on a “particular issue”. But he said he understood individual tours were not in violation of international sanctions, according to a report by the Reuters news agency.

South Korea’s Dong-A Ilbo newspaper also said Lee’s administration is considering resuming individual trips to North Korea as a negotiating card to reopen dialogue with Pyongyang.

It reported that Lee mentioned the proposal during a National Security Council meeting on July 10. The government subsequently began a review of the plan, the report added, quoting a senior official.

Tourism is one of a narrow range of cash sources for North Korea that are not targeted under United Nations sanctions imposed over its nuclear and weapons programmes.

Citing anti-Pyongyang broadcasters, South Korea’s Yonhap News Agency also reported on Monday that the National Intelligence Service this month had suspended all of its decades-old broadcasts targeting the North Korean regime.

Lee said he will discuss further plans with top security officials to resume dialogue with North Korea, which technically is still at war with the South after the 1950-1953 Korean War ended with an armistice and not a peace treaty.

North Korea recently opened a beach resort in the city of Wonsan, a flagship project driven by leader Kim Jong Un to promote tourism. But the tourist area is temporarily not accepting foreign visitors, according to a note on Wednesday by DPR Korea Tour, a website operated by North Korea’s National Tourism Administration.

North Korea’s tourism industry appears to be struggling even after it lifted COVID-19 border restrictions, allowing rail and flight services with Russia and China.

Asked if South Koreans would travel to Wonsan, Koo said North Korea first needs to open the area to the outside world.

South Korea once ran tours to North Korea’s Mount Kumgang area but suspended them in 2008 when a South Korean tourist was shot dead by a North Korean soldier.

Social media videos show terrified passengers jumping into sea as flames and black smoke billow from burning vessel.

Three people have died and more than 500 others have been rescued after a ferry caught fire off the Indonesian island of Sulawesi, emergency officials said.

Passengers jumped overboard the KM Barcelona 5, as it sailed from Melonguane port in Talaud Islands district towards the city of Manado, the capital of North Sulawesi province, after the fire broke out on Sunday, said the Indonesian coastguard.

Photos and videos circulated on social media showed terrified passengers, mostly wearing life jackets, jumping into the sea as orange flames and black smoke billowed from the burning vessel.

A video released by the Manado rescue agency showed a coastguard vessel spraying water on the ferry, which was emitting black smoke.

Indonesian authorities previously reported five people died in the accident, but later revised the death toll to three after two passengers initially reported as dead were saved in a hospital, including a two-month-old baby whose lungs were filled with seawater.

At least 568 people were rescued from the ferry, the national search and rescue agency said in a statement on Monday.

A coastguard ship, six rescue vessels and several inflatable boats were deployed in the rescue operation, Franky Pasuna Sihombing, chief of the Manado navy base, told The Associated Press news agency.

According to officials, the blaze is believed to have started on the upper deck.

“Until now, the joint rescue team is still conducting the search and rescue operation because the data is still developing,” Manado rescue agency head George Leo Mercy Randang told the AFP news agency on Monday. “Our post is still open 24 hours a day, in case families want to report about their missing relative.”

One survivor described waking up to smoke filling the passenger deck.

“The air was full of smoke and everyone started panicking,” Johan Rumewo told Kompas TV after being evacuated to Manado port. “I managed to grab a life jacket and jumped into the sea. I floated for about an hour before being rescued.”

The ferry’s log had registered only 280 passengers and 15 crew on board. Local media reported that the ship had a capacity for 600 people.

Marine accidents are a regular occurrence in the Southeast Asian archipelago of about 17,000 islands, in part due to lax safety standards or bad weather.

Sunday’s fire came just weeks after another ferry sank off the popular resort island of Bali due to bad weather, killing at least 19 people.

In March, a boat carrying 16 people capsized in rough waters off Bali, killing an Australian woman and injuring another person. In 2018, more than 150 people drowned when a ferry sank in one of the world’s deepest lakes on Sumatra Island.