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By Patpicha Tanakasempipat BANGKOK (Reuters) – Thai masters student Dhidhaj Sumedhsvast didn’t believe in fortune-telling or supernatural powers until the coronavirus pandemic started two years ago. Now, he regularly seeks the advice of fortune-tellers, wears lucky amulets, and has pictures of tarot cards as wallpaper on his phone. “The pandemic has brought so many uncertainties …

COVID to crypto-amulets: young Thais seek fortune-telling upgrades Read More »

By SungHyuk An, Yeni Seo and Josh Smith SEOUL (Reuters) – For people in many countries, living in a penthouse is the dream. In North Korea? Not so much. Leader Kim Jong Un keeps building outwardly glamorous high-rise apartment buildings in the capital, Pyongyang, with the latest being an 80-storey skyscraper completed this week. But …

Penthouses in North Korea are mainly for the unfortunate few Read More »

TAIPEI (Reuters) -A Taiwanese activist jailed in China returned to Taiwan on Friday after completing a five-year sentence. Li Ming-che, a community college lecturer and activist at a human rights non-governmental organisation in Taiwan, disappeared while visiting China in 2017. Later that year, a Chinese court found him guilty of subversion in a trial that …

China releases jailed Taiwanese activist, sends him home Read More »

By Ben Blanchard and Yew Lun Tian TAIPEI/BEIJING (Reuters) -China said it conducted military drills around Taiwan on Friday as a U.S. Congressional delegation visited the island in a show of support to a fellow democracy, with Beijing blaming the lawmakers for raising tensions with their “provocative” trip. China’s military sent frigates, bombers and fighter …

China holds drills around Taiwan as U.S. lawmakers visit Read More »

SEOUL (Reuters) – The U.S. envoy for North Korea will visit Seoul next week for meetings with South Korean counterparts to discuss the international response to the North’s recent intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM) launches, the State Department said. U.S. Special Representative Sung Kim has said he is open to talks with North Korea at any …

U.S. special representative for N.Korea to visit Seoul to discuss missile launches Read More »

By Eduardo Baptista BEIJING (Reuters) – Sun Jian, a 37-year-old master’s degree student in the Chinese city of Yantai, for months staged a solo campaign against his university’s COVID-19 prevention measures, including blistering criticism on social media. The last straw for authorities came on March 27, when Sun walked around his campus carrying a placard …

Growing defiance of COVID curbs in China brings wave of arrests Read More »

BEIJING (Reuters) – China’s military said it conducted military drills around Taiwan on Friday, according to state broadcaster. The drills are targeted at the “wrong signal” the United States has sent about Taiwan, a spokesman for the People’s Liberation Army Eastern Theater Command said on Friday, CCTV reported. (Reporting by Yew Lun Tian)

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The U.S. government has linked North Korean hackers to the theft of hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of cryptocurrency tied to the popular online game Axie Infinity, according to digital forensics firms. Ronin, a blockchain network that lets users transfer crypto in and out of the game, said digital cash worth almost …

US ties North Korean hacker group Lazarus to huge cryptocurrency theft Read More »

By Asif Shahzad ISLAMABAD (Reuters) -Pakistan’s powerful military on Thursday dismissed ousted Prime Minister Imran Khan’s accusation that the United States had conspired to topple him in a parliamentary vote of confidence. Khan, 69, who led the nuclear-armed South Asian country of 220 million people for 3-1/2 years, accused Washington of backing his ouster because …

Pakistan military dismisses Khan’s theory U.S. conspired to oust him as PM Read More »