Asia

5 days agoShareSaveGavin ButlerBBC NewsShareSaveA portable power bank likely caused a fire that engulfed and destroyed a passenger plane in South Korea in January, according to local authorities.
The Air Busan plane caught fire at Gimhae International Airport in the country’s south on 28 January – causing three people on board to sustain minor injuries.
On Friday, South Korea’s transport ministry said that interim investigation results indicate the fire may have started because insulation inside a power bank battery had broken down.
The power bank was found in an overhead luggage compartment where the fire was first detected, and its debris had scorch marks, according to the statement.
Investigators could not say what may have caused the battery breakdown, it added.
The update is also based only on interim findings, and is not a final accident report on the aircraft, an Airbus A321ceo.
Airlines around the world have banned power banks from checked luggage for years due to safety concer..

3 hours agoShareSaveSimon AtkinsonBBC NewsReporting fromAustraliaKoh EweBBC NewsReporting fromSingaporeShareSaveSam Jones, a US influencer who briefly snatched a baby wombat from its distressed mother, and uploaded the footage to social media has left Australia.
Australia’s Home Affairs minister Tony Burke had earlier said his department was reviewing whether it could revoke Ms Jones’s visa, but the BBC understands that she left the country of her own accord.
“There has never been a better time to be a baby wombat,” Burke said in a short statement on Friday celebrating Jones’s departure.
Anger erupted across Australia after Jones posted a video of her taking a baby wombat from the side of a road while laughing and running away from the distraught mother wombat.
The video also shows the baby wombat hissing in distress before Jones then returns it to the bush.
Jones, who also goes by the name Samantha Strable, has nearly 100,000 followers and describes herself as an “outdoor enthusiast..

5 days agoShareSaveShareSaveMillions of Indians are celebrating Holi, the festival of colours.
The spring festival symbolises the victory of good over evil and marks the end of winter.
People light a bonfire, smear or spray friends and family members with colour and water, and feast on traditional sweets prepared for the occasion.
It’s one of India’s biggest festivals, with millions returning to their hometowns to celebrate with loved ones.
The festival honours the divine love of Hindu deities Radha and Krishna, and boisterous celebrations are held in the northern Indian cities of Mathura and Vrindavan, believed to be their birthplace.
Historical texts suggest the festival has long been celebrated to mark good harvests and seek fertile land.
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6 days agoShareSaveSamira HussainBBC South Asia CorrespondentShareSaveWhen Kajol contracted tuberculosis in January, USAID kept her alive. Now she and her family are in danger again after the Trump administration ordered most US aid spending to end.
TB can be fatal if left untreated. The highly contagious bacterial disease, which usually infects the lungs, is not prevalent in rich countries, because treatment is relatively cheap. But in Bangladesh, it is a scourge.
That’s especially so in neighbourhoods such as Mohammadpur, a slum in the capital Dhaka where Kajol,17, lives.
“We are poor people,” she says. She is the sole breadwinner for herself, her mother and little brother. Her job in a garment factory keeps them all afloat.
So when she fell ill in January, it could have been catastrophic.
Instead, help arrived through Dipa Halder. For the last three years, she has been canvassing the residents of Mohammadpur about TB and getting people the treatment they so desperately need, free o..

5 days agoShareSaveBBC UrduReporting fromQuettaGavin ButlerBBC NewsReporting fromSingaporeShareSaveMehboob Hussain was riding the train home on Tuesday when the tracks under the front car exploded.
In the depths of central Pakistan’s Bolan Pass, a pocket of wilderness so remote that there is no internet or mobile network coverage, the nine-coach Jaffar Express ground to a halt. Then the bullets started flying.
“I was a passenger on the train that was attacked,” Mr Hussain told BBC Urdu.
He, along with some 440 others, had been travelling from Quetta to Peshawar through the heart of the restive Balochistan province when a group of armed militants struck – they bombed the tracks, fired on the train and then stormed the carriages.
The Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA) quickly claimed responsibility for the siege, and threatened to kill many of those on board if Pakistani authorities did not release Baloch political prisoners within 48 hours.
The group, which many countries have des..

4 days agoShareSaveKelly NgBBC NewsShareSaveChina’s biggest hotpot chain Haidilao has offered to compensate more than 4,000 diners who visited one of its Shanghai branches, where two teens urinated into their hotpot broth.
A video of the boys peeing into their broth pot while dining in a private room was widely shared online last month. It is not clear who might have filmed the incident.
Police said the 17-year-olds, who were drunk at the time, were detained soon after the incident.
There is no suggestion anyone consumed the affected broth. Haidilao has apologised to customers, saying it has replaced all hotpot equipment and dining utensils, as well as disinfecting other crockery and utensils.
The incident happened late in February, though the company’s management only found out about it days later, after videos circulated on social media.
Haidilao said the staff on duty at the time had failed to stop the teens.
It took another week to find out which outlet it was, the company sai..

5 days agoShareSaveArchana Shukla and Nikhil InamdarBBC News, MumbaiShareSaveWith Donald Trump’s tit-for-tat tariffs on India looming next month, millions of Americans may have to brace for steeper medical bills.
Last week, Indian Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal made an unscheduled trip to the US for discussions with officials, hoping to strike a trade deal.
It followed Trump’s announcement that he would impose tariffs – which are government taxes on foreign imports – on India by 2 April, in retaliation to India’s tariffs on American goods.
Goyal wants to stave off tax increases on India’s critical export industries like medicinal drugs.
Nearly half of all generic medicines taken in the US come from India alone. Generic drugs – which are cheaper versions of brand-name medications – imported from countries like India make up nine out of 10 prescriptions in the US.
This saves Washington billions in healthcare costs. In 2022 alone, the savings from Indian generics amounted to a staggering..

5 days agoShareSaveYvette TanBBC NewsShareSaveA Taiwanese actor who was earlier arrested for allegedly dodging mandatory military duties has now begun his conscription service.
Darren Wang, who shot to fame for his breakout role in the 2015 teen rom-com Our Times, allegedly used forged medical documents to try to get a military service exemption, according to local news outlets.
All men in Taiwan have to undergo compulsory military service for one year. The government raised this from four months in 2022, citing growing threats from mainland China.
Taiwan sees itself as distinct from the Chinese mainland, but China sees the self-ruled island as a breakaway province that will eventually be under Beijing’s control.
News of the 33-year-old Wang’s alleged military evasion had earlier sparked debate on Chinese social media with some Taiwanese netizens accusing him of evading his duties, and others asking him to “become a citizen [of the People’s Republic of China]”.
Wang is popular in the ..

5 days agoShareSaveAnna HolliganReporting fromThe HagueShareSaveOutside the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) detention centre, where former Philippines president Rodrigo Duterte has been taken, his supporters gathered on Wednesday night, waving national flags and shouting, “Bring him back!” as a vehicle thought to be carrying him was driven through the imposing iron gates at speed.
Shortly before he landed in the Netherlands, the 79-year-old unapologetically defended his bloody “war on drugs” for which the ICC says there are “reasonable grounds” to charge him with murder as a crime against humanity.
Small-time drug dealers, users and others were killed without trial on his watch as mayor and, later, as president.
The official toll stands at 6,000, though activists believe the real figure could run into the tens of thousands.
Duterte said he cracked down on drug dealers to rid the country of street crimes.
However, rights groups allege that the campaign was rife with police abuse, ..

3 days agoShareSaveKelly NgBBC NewsShareSaveAustralia’s Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is the latest to criticise a US influencer whose video of her taking a wild baby wombat away from its distressed mother has angered conservationists.
Albanese suggested that the woman, Sam Jones, tries doing so with animals that “can actually fight back”: “Take a baby crocodile from its mother and see how you go there.”
Ms Jones, who calls herself an “outdoor enthusiast and hunter”, was filmed picking up the joey by the road and running across it to a car, while its mother ran after them.
The man filming can be heard laughing: “Look at the mother, it’s chasing after her!” The video, which was filmed in Australia, has since been deleted.
Immigration officials are reviewing Ms Jones’s visa, Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke told the BBC, following calls for her to be deported.
An online petition supporting Ms Jones’s deportation has received 10,500 signatures so far.
“Given the level of scrutiny that ..