Asia Pacific

Sinner rebounds from his recent US Open final defeat to Carlos Alcaraz with a third title of the season in Beijing.

Jannik Sinner has won the 21st title of his career by thrashing American teenager Learner Tien 6-2, 6-2 in the China Open final.

The Italian lifted the trophy for the second time on Beijing’s hard courts on Wednesday, having done so on his tournament debut in 2023, and is eyeing a return to world number one.

The 24-year-old’s only loss on Beijing’s centre Diamond Court has been to great rival and top-ranked Carlos Alcaraz, who won last year’s final in three gripping sets.

“A very, very special place for me,” said the victorious Sinner, a four-time Grand Slam champion and top seed this week.

Alcaraz was not defending his title in the Chinese capital and on Tuesday won the Japan Open in Tokyo.

Sinner broke immediately in the first set on the way to outclassing the 19-year-old Tien, who was in his first ATP final.

“Congrats to Jannik on a great week, another title, an honour to share the court with you today,” he told the world number two afterwards.

The world number 52 got a rare chance to break in the second game of the second set but Sinner quickly retook control, ending a one-sided match with 10 aces over the 1h, 12min final.

Sinner eyes the number 1 ranking

Tien would have been Beijing’s lowest-ranked champion in tournament history.

At 19 years and nine months old, Tien would also have been the second-youngest American Tour champion since Andy Roddick in 2002.

As it was, he was never really in it, despite some flashes of his rich potential.

“You are showing throughout the whole season what a talent you are,” Sinner said in the aftermath.

Sinner’s emphatic win was his third title this season, after victories at the Australian Open and Wimbledon.

Sinner may now have a chance to snatch back the top ranking before the season ends after Alcaraz pulled out of the Shanghai Masters injured on Tuesday.

The Spaniard took the world number one ranking from Sinner when he defeated the Italian in the US Open final on September 7.

Sinner will be the top seed in Shanghai, which began this week.

At least 69 people were killed in a powerful earthquake that struck the central Philippine province of Cebu.

The magnitude 6.9 earthquake, which occurred at about 10pm (14:00 GMT) on Tuesday, trapped an unspecified number of residents in collapsed houses, nightclubs, and other businesses in Bogo City and outlying rural towns within Cebu, officials said.

Rescuers scrambled to find survivors on Wednesday. Army troops, police, and civilian volunteers, supported by backhoe diggers and sniffer dogs, were deployed to conduct house-to-house searches for survivors.

The epicentre of the earthquake — triggered by movement along an undersea fault line at a dangerously shallow depth of 5km (3 miles) — was about 19km (12 miles) northeast of Bogo, a coastal city of about 90,000 people in Cebu province, where about half of the deaths were reported, officials said.

The death toll in Bogo was likely to rise, according to officials, who noted that intermittent rain and damaged bridges and roads were hampering efforts to save lives.

“We’re still in the golden hour of our search and rescue,” Office of Civil Defence deputy administrator Bernardo Rafaelito Alejandro IV said during a news briefing. “There are still many reports of people who were pinned or hit by debris.”

Deaths were also reported in the outlying towns of Medellin and San Remigio, where three coastguard personnel, a firefighter, and a child were killed separately by collapsing walls and falling debris while attempting to flee to safety from a basketball game in a sports complex that was disrupted by the quake, town officials said.

The earthquake was one of the most powerful to hit the central region in more than a decade.

Cebu and other provinces were still recovering from Typhoon Bualoi, which battered the central region on Friday, killing at least 27 people — mostly due to drownings and falling trees — knocking out power in entire cities and towns, and forcing the evacuation of tens of thousands.

Schools and government offices were closed in the affected cities and towns while the safety of buildings was assessed. More than 600 aftershocks have been detected since Tuesday night’s earthquake, said Teresito Bacolcol, director of the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology.

Rain-soaked mountainsides were more susceptible to landslides and mudslides following a major earthquake, he warned.

“This was really traumatic to people. They have been lashed by a storm and then jolted by an earthquake,” Bacolcol said. “I don’t want to experience what they’ve gone through.”

The Philippines, one of the world’s most disaster-prone countries, is frequently affected by earthquakes and volcanic eruptions due to its position on the Pacific “Ring of Fire”, an arc of seismic faults around the ocean. The archipelago is also battered by about 20 typhoons and storms each year.

New York – Members of the Rohingya community who fled violence in Myanmar have addressed a United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) conference seeking to bring attention to the suffering of the persecuted Muslim minority, as fighting continues in Myanmar’s Rakhine state.

Maung Sawyeddollah, the founder of the Rohingya Student Network, addressed his fellow Rohingya in a livestreamed speech in the vast UNGA hall in New York City on Tuesday, telling them: “Dear brothers and sisters, you are not forgotten. You might feel that the world doesn’t see your suffering. Rohingya see you.”

“Now this message is for the world leaders and the United Nations: It has already been more than eight years since the Rohingya genocide was exposed. Where is justice for the Rohingya? Where?” Sawyeddollah asked.

He then held up a photograph of the bodies of several people lying in a river, who he said had been killed in a drone attack by Myanmar’s rebel Arakan Army in August 2024.

“These are not isolated cases; they are part of a systematic campaign,” said Sawyeddollah, a student who spent seven years in Cox’s Bazar refugee camp in southeastern Bangladesh after fleeing Myanmar in 2017.

“Why is there no prevention of these inhumane atrocities by Arakan Army?” he asked.

Wai Wai Nu, the executive director of the Women’s Peace Network-Myanmar, who also addressed the high-level UNGA meeting, told Al Jazeera that the event was a “historic moment”, which she hoped would “draw the attention back to the UN on the issue of Rohingya”.

Wai Wai Nu used her speech to highlight several pressing priorities, including that humanitarian aid has been blocked from flowing to Rakhine State, where Rohingya communities are located, an issue she said was discussed on the sidelines of the conference.

“If we get this, the conference is worth it,” she said.

“We need to save Rohingya inside Rakhine state.”

I delivered opening remarks at the #UN General Assembly conference on the Rohingya and other minorities in Myanmar this morning.

I urged ending impunity, immediate action to protect the #Rohingya, advancing justice,& addressing root causes for lasting solutions.#UNGA80 #Myanmar pic.twitter.com/PtSqCf2afM

— Wai Wai Nu (@waiwainu) September 30, 2025

Nu also told Al Jazeera that “many member states also emphasised or highlighted addressing the root causes, and advancing justice and accountability”, in their speeches.

However, she added, the UN event also illustrated that a “coherent and cohesive approach” to finding a solution to the Rohingya crisis is “lacking leadership and coordination, including in the ASEAN region“, a grouping of states in Southeast Asia.

She also told Al Jazeera that it was important for countries to implement targeted sanctions on Myanmar and “all the perpetrators, including military and other armed sectors, including Arakan Army”, as well as a “global arms embargo” to protect the Rohingya.

‘Massive aid cuts’

Speaking on behalf of the UN secretary-general, Chef de Cabinet Earle Courtenay Rattray, told the meeting of UN member states that “massive aid cuts” have further worsened conditions for the Rohingya, including more than 1 million who fled ethnic cleansing by the military in Myanmar and who have sought refuge in neighbouring Bangladesh.

“In the past 18 months alone, 150,000 Rohingya have fled to Bangladesh, which has generously kept its borders open and given them refuge,” Rattray said.

Yet, while Rattray said Bangladesh has shown “remarkable hospitality and generosity”, the chief adviser of Bangladesh, Muhammad Yunus, said his country is struggling to continue assisting Rohingya refugees, eight years into the crisis.

“Eight years since the genocide began, the plight of the Rohingya continues,” said Yunus, who jointly convened the meeting as well as another similar summit in Cox’s Bazar last month, to try to bring attention back to the plight of the Rohingya in Myanmar and Bangladesh.

“Bangladesh is a victim of the crisis,” said Yunus.

“We are forced to bear huge financial, social and environmental costs,” he said.

“As funding declines, the only peaceful option is to begin their repatriation.”

“The Rohingya have consistently pronounced their desire to go back home”, he said, adding that “as an immediate step, those who recently crossed into Bangladesh escaping conflict must be allowed to repatriate”.

Yunus also told the meeting that, unlike Thailand, Bangladesh could not offer work rights to Rohingya, given his own country’s “developmental challenges, including unemployment and poverty”.

Charles Harder, the United States special envoy for best future generations, was among several speakers to thank Bangladesh and Thailand for hosting Rohingya refugees.

He also announced that the US would “provide more than $60m in assistance for Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh”, which he said would be tied to Bangladesh making “meaningful” changes to allow access to work.

But funding refugees in Bangladesh was “not a burden the United States will bear indefinitely”, he said.

“It is long past time for other governments and actors in the region to develop sustainable solutions for Rohingya,” Harder said.

About 50 other UN member states also addressed the meeting on Tuesday, although few announced specific measures they were taking, aside from the United Kingdom, which announced $36m in aid for Rohingya refugees.

Dawda Jallow, The Gambia’s minister of justice, also addressed the meeting, saying that his country hopes to see a judgement from the International Court of Justice (ICJ) “soon after” an oral hearing scheduled for January next year on its case accusing Myanmar of perpetrating genocide against its Rohingya population.

“We filed our case in November 2019, almost six years ago. Now, we are preparing for the oral hearing on the merits in this case, which the court has scheduled for mid-January 2026,” Jallow said.

“The Gambia will present its case as to why Myanmar is responsible for the Rohingya genocide and must make reparations to its victims,” he added.

China is rolling out a new visa aimed at attracting foreign talent in the fields of science and technology.

The K visa comes into effect from Wednesday, following a proclamation last month by the State Council, China’s cabinet.

The visa has attracted particular attention in light of United States President Donald Trump’s tightening of the eligibility rules for the H-1B, which Silicon Valley heavily relies on to recruit skilled labour from overseas.

What is the goal of the K visa, and how does it work?

The Chinese government has cast the visa as part of its efforts to attract foreign talent to boost the country’s competitiveness in science and technology.

Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Guo Jiakun on Tuesday said the visa’s purpose was to “promote exchanges and cooperation” between science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) talent from China and other countries.

The visa is the latest in a series of recent reforms intended to make China more attractive to foreigners, including streamlined visa processing and the introduction of a redesigned permanent residency card.

“From the 1980s to the 2010s, China used to lose talent to developed countries such as the United States,” Zhigang Tao, a professor of strategy and economics at Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business in Beijing, told Al Jazeera.

“Now the task is to keep local talent and also attract some global talent.”

Chinese officials have said the K visa, which will be open to graduates of recognised universities and young professionals engaged in STEM-related fields, will offer more flexible conditions than existing options.

The main advantage of the visa is that, unlike previous skilled migrant programmes, it does not require sponsorship by an employer.

However, many key details of the visa remain unclear, including duration of stay and unspecified requirements related to age, educational background and work experience.

Is the K visa likely to attract foreign talent?

Edward Hu, immigration director at consultancy Newland Chase in Shanghai, said there has been strong interest in the visa, with inquiries up more than 30 percent since August.

Hu said there has been particularly strong interest from prospective applicants in India, Southeast Asia, Europe, and the US.

“The K visa fills a gap in China’s talent system by lowering entry barriers for younger STEM talents – complementing the existing R visa, which targets top-tier experts,” Hu told Al Jazeera, referring to the visa as a “strategic move” to position China as a top destination for early-career STEM talent.

The R visa, introduced in 2013, is aimed at “high-level and professional” foreigners who are “urgently needed” by the state, and requires sponsorship by an “inviting organisation”.

Still, China’s drive to expand its talent pool with the K visa faces challenges.

While China has made moves to open to foreigners, the country is still far less internationalised than the US.

Unlike the US, China rarely grants citizenship to foreigners.

While Chinese permanent residency is more feasible to obtain, it is still only granted to a tiny fraction compared with the roughly one million non-US citizens who receive green cards each year.

Chinese work environments also present a language barrier for English-speaking applicants when compared with their Silicon Valley counterparts.

Michael Feller, chief strategist at Sydney-based business consultancy Geopolitical Strategy, said Chinese companies would need to offer English-language roles and “international-style” work schedules to compete with US firms.

“I can’t imagine many foreign graduates interested in the ‘9-9-6’ work-life balance that many Chinese firms are known for,” Feller told Al Jazeera, referring to the 72-hour workweek famously endorsed by Alibaba founder Jack Ma.

What does the K visa have to do with the H-1B?

While China’s drive to recruit talent has cast Trump’s crackdown on immigration in sharp relief, there is no direct link between the introduction of the K visa and his moves to rein in access to the H-1B.

Beijing officially unveiled its visa on August 7, weeks before Trump announced the introduction of a $100,000 fee on H-1B applications, sending shockwaves through the tech sector, especially in India, the source of about 70 percent of visa recipients.

However, many observers have suggested that the US’s inward turn could be to the benefit of other countries seeking to attract talent, including China.

“The K visa is incredible timing from China’s perspective,” Feller said.

“It’s unlikely that Beijing knew that Washington was about to hike the fees for its own H-1B visa category, but it certainly gives the K visa added impetus in the global war for talent.”

Hu of Newland Chase said he expected the shift in policy around the H-1B to “significantly boost” the appeal of the K visa, “positioning it as a timely alternative for affected talent”.

“The K visa offers a low-cost, sponsor-free pathway – aligning with the global surge in STEM talent demand and making China a more accessible option,” he said.

Earthquake sends people running into the streets, damages buildings after hitting off Cebu island.

A magnitude 6.9 earthquake has struck off the coast of the central Philippines, sending people running into the streets and knocking power out in some areas.

The quake struck at sea on Tuesday off the northern tip of Cebu island and near Bogo, a city of more than 90,000 people, the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology said, adding that it expected both damage and aftershocks.

The institute urged residents in the provinces of Cebu, Leyte and Biliran to stay away from the coast due to a “minor sea level disturbance” and told them to “be on alert for unusual waves”.

However, there was no tsunami threat after the tremor, the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center said.

“We are still assessing the damage,” Pamela Baricuatro, the governor of Cebu, said in a video posted on social media.

“But it could be worse than we think,” said Baricuatro, adding that she has been in touch with the president’s office and is asking for aid.

No casualties were immediately reported by the Philippine authorities.

The Cebu provincial government said a commercial building and a school in Bantayan had collapsed, however, while a number of village roads had also sustained damage.

“There could be people trapped beneath collapsed buildings,” provincial rescue official Wilson Ramos told the AFP news agency, adding that he didn’t know how many people are missing.

The US Geological Service also recorded four earthquakes of magnitude 5.0 or higher in the area following the first tremor.

‘Shock and panic’

Cebu firefighter Joey Leeguid told AFP from the town of San Fernando that he felt the quake at his fire station.

“We saw our locker moving from left to right. We felt slightly dizzy for a while, but we are all fine now,” Leeguid said.

Martham Pacilan, a 25-year-old resident of the resort town of Bantayan near the epicentre, said he was at the town square near a church when the quake struck.

“I heard a loud booming noise from the direction of the church. Then I saw rocks falling from the structure. Luckily, no one got hurt,” he told AFP.

“I was in shock and in panic at the same time, but my body couldn’t move. I was just there waiting for the shaking to stop.”

The Archdiocesan Shrine of Santa Rosa de Lima, a church in Daanbantayan, a town in Cebu province, said the structure had partially collapsed. Power also went out in Daanbantayan.

The Philippines experiences near-daily earthquakes, and a powerful magnitude 7 quake in July 2022 killed at least five people and injured 60 others.

In December 2023, another large earthquake shook the southern Philippines, killing at least one person and forcing thousands to evacuate.

A typhoon that ripped roofs from homes has killed dozens of people across Vietnam and the Philippines, officials from both countries said, as a weakened Storm Bualoi crossed into neighbouring Laos.

The typhoon battered small islands in central Philippines last week, toppling trees and power pylons, unleashing floods, and forcing 400,000 people to evacuate. A Philippine civil defence official on Monday said the death toll there had more than doubled to 27, with most victims either drowning or being struck by debris.

Scientists warn that storms are becoming increasingly powerful as the planet warms due to human-induced climate change.

In Vietnam, Bualoi made landfall as a typhoon late on Sunday, generating winds of up to 130 kilometres per hour (80 miles per hour). At least 13 people were killed, while a search is ongoing for 20 others, disaster authorities stated in an online update.

More than 44,200 houses were damaged, including many with roofs torn off, predominantly in the central province of Ha Tinh. At least 800 homes were flooded and nearly 6,000 hectares (15,000 acres) of crops were inundated, according to the update.

At least nine people died when a typhoon-related whirlwind swept through the northern Vietnamese province of Ninh Binh early on Monday, according to the local disaster agency. One person was killed in the province of Hue and another in Thanh Hoa, with about 20 people reported missing by local and national disaster authorities.

More than 53,000 people were evacuated to schools and medical centres converted into temporary shelters before Bualoi made landfall in Vietnam, the Ministry of Agriculture and Environment said.

Four domestic airports, as well as parts of the national highway, were closed on Monday. More than 180 flights were cancelled or delayed, according to airport authorities. Parts of Nghe An and the steel-producing central province of Ha Tinh were without power, and schools were closed in affected regions.

Since making landfall in Vietnam, Bualoi has weakened as it moved across the border into Laos. It came in the wake of Super Typhoon Ragasa, which killed 14 people across northern Philippines. The country is struck by an average of 20 storms and typhoons each year, routinely affecting disaster-prone areas where millions of people live.

In Vietnam, 175 people were killed or went missing due to natural disasters from January to August this year, according to the General Statistics Office. Total damages were estimated at $371m, almost triple the amount during the same period in 2024, it said.

Typhoon Yagi killed hundreds of people in Vietnam in September last year and caused economic losses worth $3.3bn.

Indonesia’s National Agency for Disaster Management says 77 victims taken to hospitals for treatment.

A student has been killed and dozens are missing following the collapse of an Islamic boarding school in Indonesia’s East Java province, authorities have said.

Rescuers are searching for 38 people believed to be trapped under the rubble following the building collapse, Indonesia’s National Agency for Disaster Management said on Tuesday.

Eleven people have been rescued from the rubble, and 91 others managed to escape, the disaster management agency said.

Seventy-seven victims were taken to several hospitals in the area for treatment for their injuries, according to the agency.

“Efforts to assess the site, monitor the remaining building structure, and prepare evacuation routes for victims are the primary focus of the teams on the ground,” the agency said in a statement on social media.

The agency added that the incident called attention to the need for the “strict implementation of construction safety standards”.

“The public and managers of multistorey buildings are urged to ensure technical supervision during construction to prevent similar occurrences in the future,” it said.

Indonesia’s National Search and Rescue Agency, a separate body, had earlier reported that “provisional data” indicated that 100 students were caught up in the collapse, of whom all but one had been located alive.

Al-Khoziny Islamic Boarding School, in Sidoarjo, East Java, collapsed at about 3pm on Monday as students were gathering for afternoon prayers.

Authorities say the school’s foundation pillars gave way as crews were concreting the fourth floor of the building, trapping dozens of people under debris.

The incident is the second building collapse in Indonesia in less than a month.

At least three people were killed and dozens were injured when a community hall hosting a Quran recital collapsed in West Java’s Bogor district on September 3, according to officials.

In a rare appearance at the United Nations, North Korea’s Vice Foreign Minister Kim Son Gyong staunchly defended the country’s nuclear programme. It was the first time North Korea had dispatched an official from Pyongyang to address the UN General Assembly since 2018.

EXPLAINER

From tournament format to venues and top players to watch, here’s Al Jazeera’s guide to the Women’s Cricket World Cup.

Women’s cricket will take centre stage when eight nations compete in the International Cricket Council’s (ICC) Women’s World Cup 2025 in India and Sri Lanka from Tuesday.

Australia are the defending champions and record seven-time winners of the one-day international (ODI) competition , but in-form India are favourites to break their World Cup drought at home.

Here’s everything you need to know about the tournament:

When are the first match and final of the Women’s World Cup?

The World Cup begins when India host Sri Lanka in Guwahati on Tuesday and will conclude with the final on Sunday, November 2.

Why will some World Cup games be played in Sri Lanka if India is the official host?

While India was confirmed as the tournament’s official host earlier this year, Sri Lanka was added as a neutral venue for games involving Pakistan.

It came as a result of an ICC-brokered agreement between India and Pakistan that allows both countries the option of playing their games at a neutral venue for a tournament hosted by either South Asian nation. The neighbours have not visited each other for a bilateral cricket competition in 13 years and shared an intense four-day military and aerial conflict in May.

Guwahati is set to host the first semifinal but the venue will change to Colombo if Pakistan qualify for the last four.

Navi Mumbai will host the second semifinal, which will be India’s designated last-four clash if they qualify.

The venue for the final can also be moved to Colombo should Pakistan enter their first Women’s World Cup final.

Where are the venues of the Women’s World Cup?

• Dr DY Patil Sports Academy, Navi Mumbai, India
• Barsapara Cricket Stadium, Guwahati, India
• Holkar Stadium, Indore, India
• Dr YS Rajasekhara Reddy ACA-VDCA Cricket Stadium, Visakhapatnam, India
• R Premadasa Stadium, Colombo, Sri Lanka

Which teams are in the Women’s World Cup, and how did they qualify?

• Australia
• Bangladesh
• England
• India
• New Zealand
• Pakistan
• South Africa
• Sri Lanka

India qualified on the basis of their hosting rights, while Australia, England, New Zealand, South Africa and Sri Lanka qualified as the top five teams in the ICC Women’s Championship 2022-25.

Bangladesh and Pakistan entered the tournament by finishing first and second in the World Cup qualifiers.

When and where is the India vs Pakistan match in the Women’s World Cup?

The archrivals will face-off on Sunday at the R Premadasa Stadium in Colombo.

India have beaten Pakistan in all ODI matches played between the two nations since 2005, with their last win coming at the ICC World Cup 2022 in South Africa.

What’s the format and schedule of the Women’s World Cup?

The tournament’s main round will be played in the round-robin format between September 30 and October 26.

The top four teams at the end of the group stage will qualify for the semifinals on 29 and 30 October.

The final will be played on November 2.

The updated match schedule for #CWC25 is out now 🏆

All the action starts on 30 September! 🗓️

✍️: https://t.co/EArFubvvlg pic.twitter.com/yqYfPbHzbM

— ICC Cricket World Cup (@cricketworldcup) August 22, 2025

Which teams are favourites to win the Women’s World Cup?

• Australia: The Southern Stars’ supremacy in women’s cricket is undeniable, with their record seven titles in the ODI World Cup and six in the T20 World Cup proof of their status as the world’s best team. Alyssa Healy’s team is packed with the world’s top batters, bowlers and all-rounders and will be the favourite to defend the title they won in South Africa.
• India: The hosts came very close to lifting their first World Cup trophy in 2017, when they lost the final to England, and will look to go one better on home turf. India enjoy the services of arguably the world’s best batter in Smriti Mandhana, as well as some in-form bowlers and all-rounders. They have won 10 of their last 14 ODIs, including three against higher-ranked opponents.

Who are the players to watch at the Women’s World Cup?

• Smriti Mandhana (India)
• Deepti Sharma (India)
• Chamari Athapaththu (Sri Lanka)
• Sophie Ecclestone (England)
• Megan Schutt (Australia)
• Ellyse Perry (Australia)
• Laura Wolvaardt (South Africa)
• Amelia Kerr (New Zealand)
• Sidra Amin (Pakistan)
• Nahida Akter (Bangladesh)

Which are the five best group-stage matches of the World Cup?

• India vs Pakistan on October 5 at 09:30 GMT
• India vs Australia on October 12 at 09:30 GMT
• India vs England on October 19 at 09:30 GMT
• Australia vs England on October 22 at 09:30 GMT
• Australia vs South Africa on October 25 at 09:30 GMT

Who are the past champions of the Women’s World Cup?

• 1973: England
• 1978: Australia
• 1982: Australia
• 1988: Australia
• 1993: England
• 1997: Australia
• 2000: New Zealand
• 2005: Australia
• 2009: England
• 2013: Australia
• 2017: England
• 2022: Australia

What’s the prize money for the Women’s World Cup?

• Total prize money for the tournament: $13.88m
• Champions: $4.48m
• Runners-up: $2.24m
• Losing semifinalists: $1.12m each
• Fifth and sixth place finishers: $700,000 each
• Seventh and eighth place finishers: $280,000 each.

How can I buy tickets for the Women’s World Cup?

Tickets for all group-stage games are available on the ICC’s ticketing website, and prices start at $1.

Several people are dead or missing in Vietnam where thousands of residents were still being evacuated as Typhoon Bualoi made landfall sooner than forecast.

Tensions over border disputes had sharply escalated in July during a five-day conflict between the neighbouring countries.

Thailand’s new prime minister has said his government will propose a referendum to address an ongoing dispute with its neighbour, Cambodia, over a demarcation agreement.

Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul told reporters on Monday that “in order to avoid further conflict”, the government will push for a vote on whether Thailand should revoke the existing memorandum of understanding on border issues with Cambodia.

Thailand and Cambodia have long argued over undemarcated points along their 817km (508-mile) land border, but tensions sharply escalated in July during a five-day conflict. The fighting ended after a ceasefire was brokered by Malaysia on July 28.

In the worst fighting between the two countries in a decade, at least 48 people were killed and hundreds of thousands were temporarily displaced.

But for years, the two countries have relied on an agreement, signed in 2000, which sets out the framework for joint survey and demarcation of the land boundary.

In another agreement in 2001, it provided a framework for cooperation and potential resource sharing in maritime areas claimed by both countries.

However, in Thailand, the agreements have come under public scrutiny over the past decade, especially following the latest clashes.

According to Charnvirakul, the new referendum would provide a clear mandate on the matter of the agreements.

Panitan Wattanayagorn, a political scientist at Bangkok’s Chulalongkorn University, cautioned against the revocation of the agreements as solving the issue.

“Their revocation may not be a direct solution to the conflict between Thailand and Cambodia, because it could create a vacuum,” he told the Reuters news agency.

“The government must make clear what will replace them, and this has to be agreed by Cambodia as well,” he said.

At the same time, Charnvirakul also pledged in his inaugural speech in Parliament to address the country’s economy and push for a new and more democratic constitution as he faces a self-imposed deadline to call for elections in four months.

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi holds talks with his North Korean counterpart, Choe Son Hui, in Beijing.

China and North Korea have pledged to work together to counter “hegemonism” and “unilateralism” in international affairs, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs has said, in a veiled reference to the countries’ confrontations with the United States.

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi held talks with his North Korean counterpart, Choe Son Hui, in Beijing on Sunday, weeks after North Korean leader Kim Jong Un travelled to China to join an event marking the anniversary of Japan’s defeat in World War II.

“China is willing to strengthen coordination and collaboration with North Korea on international and regional affairs, oppose all forms of hegemonism, and protect their shared interests and international fairness and justice,” Wang told Choe, according to a readout by the Chinese Foreign Ministry.

Choe, in turn, told Wang that North Korea viewed China’s concept of a “community with a shared future for mankind”, and its Global Governance Initiative, as important contributions to the “promotion of a multipolar world”, according to the ministry.

“North Korea strongly supports these initiatives and is willing to work closely with China in multilateral collaboration to jointly resist unilateralism and power politics and promote the establishment of a more equitable and just world order,” Choe said, according to the readout.

“North Korea also wishes the Chinese people greater achievements under the leadership of the Communist Party of China through unity and struggle.”

Choe cited Kim as saying that the “bonds of friendship” between Pyongyang and Beijing “cannot be altered,” and that their relations should be developed “in line with the demands of the times”, the state-run Korean Central News Agency said.

Beijing is embroiled in a fierce rivalry with Washington, which spans sectors ranging from trade to artificial intelligence.

Pyongyang has been at odds with Washington for decades over its illicit nuclear and ballistic missile programmes.

Wang and Choe’s talks came after Chinese President Xi Jinping, North Korea’s Kim and Russian President Vladimir Putin appeared together earlier this month at a military parade to mark the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II. Many observers saw this gathering as a challenge to US dominance in international affairs.

Carlos Ulberg dropped Dominick Reyes in the opening round for his ninth straight win at UFC Fight Night in Australia.

New Zealand’s Carlos Ulberg made short work of the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) light heavyweight title challenger Dominick Reyes on Saturday night with an effortless first-round stoppage at 4:27 at UFC Fight Night in Perth, Australia.

Ulberg (13-1 MMA) kept his messaging simple following his ninth consecutive UFC win, confirming his attendance for next Saturday’s UFC 320 title fight rematch in Las Vegas between Russian Magomed Ankalaev (21-1, 1 NC, or no contest) and ex-light heavyweight champion Alex Pereira (12-3) of Brazil.

“I’m coming [for the belt],” Ulberg said following the fight.

Ulberg dominated the main event bout from the outset, relentlessly coming forward and stifling Reyes’s punches.

Following a straight left punch that appeared to stun Reyes, Ulberg then seized his opportunity with less than a minute remaining in the opening round, unleashing a huge right hook that knocked the American to the ground, ending the fight.

Reyes’s (15-4 MMA) loss on Sunday snapped his three-fight winning streak, and it was his first knockout/technical knockout (KO/TKO) loss since November 2022 to Ryan Spann.

“My goal with Reyes was to box him, and he felt the power early, and I saw in his eyes that he didn’t want to feel that again, so the next opportunity I went with the two and dropped him,” Ulberg said.

 The co-headliner event at light heavyweight saw the home country’s Jimmy Crute (14-4-2) win back-to-back fights, this time beating Croatia’s Ivan Erslan (14-6) by rear-naked-choke at 3:19 of the first round.

Erslan is still without a UFC win through three appearances, last coming away with a victory in February 2024. Meanwhile, Crute’s submission was the sixth of his career.

Featherweight Jack Jenkins of Australia used his volume striking and forward movement to overcome the always durable Ramon Taveras of the United States by unanimous decision: 30-27, 30-27, 29-28.

Jenkins (14-4) has won five of his last seven, while Taveras (10-4) has lost three of his last five and has gone more than 20 months without a win.

For the second straight fight, UFC welterweight veteran Neil Magny of the US kept the submission trend rolling with a D’arce choke against Australian fan favourite Jake Matthews at 3:08 of the third round.

Magny (31-14) survived an early onslaught from Matthews (22-8) before rallying to secure his 24th UFC win and improve his winning streak to two.

Putrajaya, Malaysia – When Malaysia’s former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad turned 100 earlier this year, he marked his birthday by following a lifelong routine of discipline: he ate little, worked a lot, and did not succumb to the lure of rest.

“The main thing is that I work all the time. I don’t rest myself,” Mahathir told Al Jazeera.

“I am always using my mind and body. Keep your mind and body active, then you live longer,” he said.

From a desk at his office in Putrajaya city, south of the capital, Kuala Lumpur, he spent his centenary like most days: penning his thoughts on the Malaysian economy, the country’s political situation and unfolding world events, particularly the situation in Gaza.

Sitting down with Al Jazeera for an interview after recovering from a spell of exhaustion around the time of his birthday, Mahathir predicted that Israel’s ruthlessness against the Palestinian population of Gaza would be etched into world history.

Israel’s killing of nearly 66,000 Palestinians in Gaza, the majority women and children, will be remembered for generations, possibly for “centuries”, Mahathir said.

“Gaza is terrible. They killed pregnant mothers… babies just born, young people, boys and girls, men and women, the sick and the poor… How can this be forgotten?” he asked.

“It will not be forgotten for maybe centuries,” Mahathir said.

Describing the war in Gaza as a genocide that parallelled the killing of Muslims during the war in Bosnia in the early 1990s and the Jews by Nazi Germany during World War II, Mahathir said he was confounded that the people of Israel, who had experienced genocide, could, in turn, perpetrate a genocide.

“I thought people who suffered like that would not want to visit it on other people,” he said. Victims of a genocide should “not want to wish their fate to befall other people”.

However, in the case of Israel, he was wrong, he said.

At the height of his power in the 1980s and 1990s, Mahathir earned a reputation on the world stage as an outspoken voice for the Global South, and a vocal critic of Western imperialism and its contemporary exploitation of developing countries through flows of financial capital.

A staunch and lifelong supporter of the Palestinian cause, Mahathir was also roundly criticised for making “anti-Semitic” statements alongside his tirades against the West, particularly the United States.

But, as he told Al Jazeera, he had sympathised deeply with the Jewish people when the horrors of the Nazis became known after World War II.

Israelis, he now says, “did not learn anything from their experience”.

“They want the same thing that happened to them, they want to do it to the Arabs,” he said.

Now, the only “reasonable” way to address the conflict between Israel and the Palestinian people is to implement a two-state solution, he added. But Mahathir said that such a solution – which received a major boost when Palestinian statehood was recently recognised by Australia, Belgium, Canada, France and the United Kingdom, among other countries – is still a very long way off, and he would not live to see it.

“In my lifetime, no. Too short a time,” he said.

China: ‘Number one country in the world’

A survivor of three heart attacks who pulled off a stunning political comeback in Malaysian public life when he was over 90 years of age, Mahathir held power for a combined total of 24 years, and earned himself what is likely to be the unassailable title as Malaysia’s longest-serving leader.

When he was born on July 10, 1925, in the northern Malaysian state of Kedah, the king of England was George V, the grandfather of the late Queen Elizabeth II, and Malaysia was a British colony known as Malaya.

He entered politics in the 1960s and became prime minister from 1981 to 2003 before stepping down, for the first time.

He then made an astonishing return to power in 2018, when he led a coalition of opposition parties to beat the long-governing Barisan Nasional party to be re-elected prime minister at the sprightly age of 92, becoming the world’s oldest leader as a result.

But he stepped down under a cloud for the last time in 2020 after losing support due to political machinations from inside his own political party, Bersatu.

A medical doctor by training, even Mahathir’s critics acknowledged that he laid the economic foundations that transformed Malaysia’s agricultural economy of the 1960s into the modern industrialised state of today, with the iconic twin Petronas Towers crowning the skyline of its thriving modern capital city, Kuala Lumpur.

Despite having lived past the age when most politicians would have retreated from the spotlight, Mahathir at 100 remains as vocal, sharp and acerbic as ever.

He also had some surprising memories of a bygone China and predictions about the future of the United States to share.

Among his prized recollections are his impressions of visiting China in the 1970s, when it was “very poor” and there were few cars on the streets.

Being Malaysia’s deputy prime minister at the time, authorities in Beijing rolled out the red carpet and their “Red Flag” model car to chauffeur him around, he said.

“It was a very big Chinese car which China produced themselves. They called it The Red Flag,” Mahathir said, recounting how that vehicle was among the first to be independently produced by the Chinese.

Fast forward to today, China’s economy has come a very long way, and so too has its thriving car industry, which is giving Western-produced cars a run for their money, particularly with electric vehicles.

China’s surpassing of the US to become the “number one country in the world” is inevitable, he said, due to its huge domestic market and hard-working population.

“It will take China 10 years to catch up with America. After that, China will overtake America,” Mahathir said.

“China by itself is bigger than Europe and America. It’s a huge market. It is quite rich. And Chinese people are very smart in business,” he said, recounting how, as a youth, he witnessed new Chinese migrants to Malaysia take on “very heavy work” to earn a living. Within a generation or two, those families had managed to improve their lives, give their children a good education, and some of their grandchildren had gone on to become quite wealthy.

‘America will not be able to compete with the rest of the world’

Contrasting contemporary China with the US under the presidency of Donald Trump, Mahathir said that Trump’s “tariff war” was “very damaging”, and his plans to bring production back to the US would increase costs and pave the way for China’s further rise.

“[Trump] wants companies to shift their factories to America. The wages are very high there. The work attitude there will be very different from Chinese workers, who can stay for hours and do the work,” he said.

“American workers cannot do that. Anything produced in America in the future, if they do move the factories there, will be costly,” he added.

“America will not be able to compete with the rest of the world.”

Importantly, Trump does not have the time to follow through on his promised economic vision, as it would take a minimum of three to eight years to move manufacturing facilities to the US, he said.

“And Trump will not be president any more after three years,” he added.

Despite being 100 years old , Mahathir walks unaided, exercises daily, goes to work every day and receives visitors.

He uses social media and travels outside of Malaysia whenever he receives invitations to be a guest speaker.

The key to longevity, Mahathir said, is to stay physically and mentally active and not overeat .

“Don’t eat so much,” he told Al Jazeera.

“My mother’s best advice to me was, ‘When the food tastes nice, stop eating.’”

Kim Jong Un references ‘new important nuclear strategy’ in high-level meeting with scientists and military officials.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has directed top officials to strengthen the nation’s “nuclear shield and sword”, saying only a “nuclear counteraction” could safeguard his country’s security.

In a meeting with nuclear scientists and technicians on Friday, including Hong Sung-mu, a senior official believed to have spearheaded North Korea’s nuclear programme, Kim said the production of nuclear materials and weapons was an “essential top priority”, according to state media.

“The powerful deterrent, namely, the logic of peacekeeping and security by force with nuclear forces as its backbone is the invariable stand of the DPRK,” Kim was quoted as saying by the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA). The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) is North Korea’s official name.

Kim also made reference to “main tasks” that had been carried out by the country’s nuclear weapons research institute with regard to “a new important nuclear strategy”, South Korea’s official Yonhap news agency reported.

The North Korean leader did not provide details regarding that new strategy.

“Comrade Kim Jong Un said we must constantly sharpen and renew the nuclear shield and sword that can reliably guarantee national sovereignty, security and interests and the right to development,” KCNA added.

Kim’s meeting with his nuclear scientists and military officials follows just days after South Korea said Pyongyang was presumed to possess as much as 2,000kg (2 tonnes) of highly-enriched uranium.

South Korea’s Unification Minister Chung Dong-young said on Thursday that just 10-12kg (22-26lbs) of enriched uranium was adequate to build a nuclear bomb.

“Even at this very hour, uranium centrifuges at four locations (in North Korea) are running, probably accumulating nuclear materials,” Chung said, according to Yonhap.

The minister also said it was now impossible to convince North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons programme through the forces of sanctions, but the resumption of talks between Pyongyang and Washington could offer a “breakthrough” to denuclearisation efforts.

“It will be desirable for [talks] to take place as soon as possible,” the minister said.

Kim said recently there was no reason to avoid dialogue with the US if Washington ceased insisting that his country give up nuclear weapons.

“Personally, I still have fond memories of US President Trump,” Kim said, according to KCNA, referring to meeting Trump three times during the United States president’s first administration.

“If the United States drops the absurd obsession with denuclearising us and accepts reality, and wants genuine peaceful coexistence, there is no reason for us not to sit down with the United States,” Kim was quoted as saying.

“The world already knows full well what the United States does after it makes a country give up its nuclear weapons and disarms,” Kim said.

“We will never give up our nuclear weapons,” he added.

Chinese Premier Li Qiang says protectionist measures, including hikes in tariffs, are a major cause of global economic stagnancy.

Super Typhoon Ragasa, among the most powerful storms to strike Asia in recent years, has hurled waves higher than lampposts across Hong Kong’s promenades and churned coastal waters along southern China after leaving a trail of devastation in Taiwan and the Philippines.

The death toll in Taiwan reached 14 after floodwaters submerged roads and swept away vehicles, while 10 fatalities were confirmed in the northern Philippines.

In Guangdong province, China’s southern economic hub, more than two million residents were evacuated, according to state-run Xinhua news agency.

As Ragasa continues its westward trajectory, authorities suspended select train services in the Guangxi region on Thursday. Chinese officials have allocated tens of millions of dollars towards disaster relief efforts.

Initially, schools, factories and transportation services were suspended across approximately 12 cities, but some areas farther from the landfall site began preparations to resume operations as wind intensity diminished.

Before reaching China, Ragasa inflicted casualties and destruction in Taiwan and the Philippines as it tracked between the two territories.

In Taiwan, the death toll reached 14 after torrential rain caused a barrier lake in Hualien County to overflow on Tuesday, unleashing muddy floodwaters that destroyed a bridge and transformed Guangfu township roads into violent currents carrying away vehicles and furniture.

Of Guangfu’s approximately 8,450 residents, more than half were able to seek refuge on higher floors or elevated terrain.

Rescue teams established contact with more than 100 previously unreachable individuals in Hualien and conducted door-to-door checks on the remaining 17 residents. Across the self-ruled island, 32 people sustained injuries.

In the northern Philippines, at least 10 deaths were reported, including seven fishermen who drowned on Monday when massive waves and fierce winds capsized their boat off Santa Ana in northern Cagayan province. Five additional fishermen remain missing, according to provincial officials.

Nearly 700,000 people were affected by the catastrophic storm, with 25,000 seeking shelter in government emergency facilities.

Paraguay is one of just 12 countries that maintains diplomatic ties with Taiwan, not China.

But is Beijing using unofficial channels to extend its influence into the South American nation?

In our three-year undercover investigation, we meet a shadowy Chinese businessman who says he is a proxy for Beijing, a claim that China denies.

Our undercover researchers reveal that the alleged middleman has his own agenda.

He is plotting to build a secret scam compound near the Paraguayan capital, a safe haven for Chinese crime bosses fleeing crackdowns in Southeast Asia.

In a special exclusive report, 101 East investigates China’s Paraguay connection.

You can read the full statements given to 101 East below:

South Korea reports Pyongyang building up enriched uranium supplies, insists ‘stopping’ its nuclear development ‘urgent’.

North Korea is believed to have accumulated large quantities of weapons-grade uranium, according to South Korea.

Seoul’s Unification Minister Chung Dong-young on Thursday cited an assessment that Pyongyang possesses 2,000kg (about 4,400 pounds) of highly enriched uranium “at a purity of 90 percent or higher”.

If confirmed, the amount would also signal a sharp increase in North Korea’s stockpile of nuclear material.

Intelligence provided by civilian experts reveals that North Korea is operating four enrichment plants, he added.

“Even at this very hour, North Korea’s uranium centrifuges are operating at four sites,” Chung told reporters, only mentioning the known site of Yongbyon, which Pyongyang purportedly decommissioned after talks but later reactivated in 2021.

Foreign experts believe North Korea has built additional uranium-enrichment sites as leader Kim Jong Un has been pushing hard to expand his nuclear arsenal.

The North has long been known to hold a “significant” amount of highly enriched uranium, the key material used to produce nuclear warheads, according to South Korea’s defence ministry.

Enrichment must be pushed to more than 90 percent, the concentration termed weapons-grade, to ensure that the critical mass sets off the chain reaction leading to a nuclear explosion.

According to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), 42kg (92.6 pounds) of highly enriched uranium is needed for one nuclear weapon; 2,000kg would be enough for roughly 47 nuclear bombs.

Chung said “stopping North Korea’s nuclear development is an urgent matter”, but argued that sanctions will not be effective and that the only solution lies in a summit between Pyongyang and Washington.

International diplomacy on ending North Korea’s nuclear programme has stalled since 2019, when high-stakes summitry between Kim and United States President Donald Trump fell apart without any agreement.

Kim said recently that he was open to talks with the US as long as the demand that the North surrender its nuclear arms remains a condition.

North Korea, which conducted its first nuclear test in 2006 and is under a raft of United Nations sanctions for its banned weapons programmes, has never publicly disclosed details of its uranium enrichment facilities.

South Korea’s President Lee Jae Myung, who took office in June, has promised a more dovish approach towards Pyongyang compared with his hawkish predecessor, Yoon Suk-yeol, saying he will not seek regime change.

Chung said, by designating Pyongyang as the “main enemy” and insisting on denuclearisation first, the previous administration had effectively allowed North Korea’s nuclear capabilities “to expand without limit”.

China’s new target for cutting greenhouse-gas emissions has been branded “disappointing” and “underwhelming” by climate experts, who warn the pledge falls far short of the action needed to avert climate catastrophe.

But the goal also raised hopes that China, which until now has only promised to stop emissions from rising, may be underpromising the level of cuts it can deliver amid a massive expansion in the country’s renewable energy capacity.

In a video address to the United Nations on Wednesday, Chinese President Xi Jinping said China would lower its emissions by 7-10 percent from their peak by 2035.

It was the first time that China, the world’s biggest polluter, outlined a goal for cutting emissions outright.

Xi, who called the shift away from carbon “the trend of our time”, also pledged to raise the share of non-fossil fuel sources in energy consumption to more than 30 percent, and increase wind and solar capacity sixfold compared with 2020.

While a significant moment in the global fight against climate change at a time when the United States is abandoning efforts to cut emissions, China’s target fails by some distance to align with the goals of the Paris Agreement, said some analysts.

“It’s unfortunately very disappointing: This target will not drive down emissions – it is below what China is likely to achieve already under its current climate policies,” Bill Hare, CEO of Berlin-based policy institute Climate Analytics, told Al Jazeera.

“China can do a lot better than this, and it hardly reflects its highest possible ambition.”

The Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA) has estimated that China would need to cut emissions by about 30 percent to be consistent with the Paris accord.

The agreement, adopted by 195 countries in 2015, calls for the rise in the average global temperature to be limited to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels.

China’s actions on climate are viewed as especially critical following the US’s exit from the Paris accord under President Donald Trump, who used his UN speech this week to call the scientific consensus on climate change the “greatest con job ever perpetrated on the world”.

“China’s underwhelming headline target misses a chance to deliver real leadership,” Li Shuo, director of China Climate Hub at the Asia Society Policy Institute, told Al Jazeera.

“Beijing is choosing to tiptoe forward when science calls for a full sprint. The pledge would, unfortunately, still put the world on a pathway to catastrophic climate impacts.”

Xi’s announcement left key questions about the emissions target unanswered, including how Beijing would define peak emissions.

Many climate experts believe that China’s emissions have already peaked or will do so this year, though some observers caution that the trend has been driven as much by the decline in business activity during the COVID-19 pandemic as the rollout of renewable energy.

China has had a paradoxical influence on global efforts to address climate change.

While responsible for roughly one-third of global emissions, the country is also a leader in green energy.

China produces about 80 percent of the world’s solar panels and 70 percent of its electric cars, according to the International Energy Agency.

The country also manufactures about 60 percent of wind turbines worldwide, according to London-based energy think tank Ember.

At the same time, China has continued to invest heavily in coal.

Last year, construction began on nearly 100 gigawatts (GW) of new or suspended coal power projects, the most in a decade, according to the CREA.

“China’s new pledge clearly falls short of expectations. Despite President Xi’s earlier promise to strictly control new coal power, the country has just approved more projects than at any point in nearly a decade,” Andreas Sieber, the associate director of policy and campaigns at 350.org, told Al Jazeera.

“The targets announced today, which are vague on the base year and conservative on renewables, leave ample room for continued emissions growth from coal-heavy sectors.”

Still, climate experts expressed hope that China’s target could be a signal of more transformative change to come.

While China’s announcement fell short of expectations, Beijing has a tendency to set targets that it can “confidently deliver”, said Yao Zhe, a Beijing-based policy adviser to Greenpeace East Asia.

“What’s hopeful is that the actual decarbonisation of China’s economy is likely to exceed its target on paper,” Yao said in a statement responding to the target, adding that her organisation’s latest analysis showed that emissions from China’s power sector could peak this year.

In a world “increasingly driven by self-interest”, China is in a stronger position than most to spur climate action, the Asia Society’s Li said.

“The country has emerged as a global clean tech superpower, and its dominant role in this sector could enable it to surpass current targets,” he said.

“Over time, this could push China toward a more proactive role on the international stage.”