Former Chinese premier Li Keqiang has died at 68, state media has reported. He was the second most powerful man in the ruling Chinese Communist Party until he retired last year. State media said had been “resting” in Shanghai when he suffered a sudden heart attack on Thursday.He passed away ten minutes past midnight on […]

Tens of thousands of women in Iceland, including Prime Minister Katrín Jakobsdóttir, will refuse to work on Tuesday. The “kvennafri”, or women’s day off, has been called in protest at the gender pay gap and gender-based violence. Fields in which women form the majority of workers, such as healthcare and education, will be especially affected. […]

This week, China is throwing a huge party to celebrate one of its biggest experiments in engaging with the world: its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). Officials and leaders from all over the globe are in Beijing to attend a high-level summit marking the BRI’s 10th anniversary. Participants expected to show up range from Vladimir […]

The first section of Kenya’s Chinese-built railway was opened with much fanfare in 2017 – but two years later work on the tracks stopped in the middle of the country and the master plan of linking it to other landlocked countries in East Africa seems to have derailed. This means the project is not bringing […]

A blackmail scam is using instant loan apps to entrap and humiliate people across India and other countries in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. At least 60 Indians have killed themselves after being abused and threatened. A BBC undercover investigation has exposed those profiting from this deadly scam in India and China. Astha Sinhaa woke […]

This year’s Nobel economics prize has been awarded to Claudia Goldin, an American economic historian, for her work on women’s employment and pay. Prof Goldin’s research uncovered key drivers behind the gender pay gap, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said. She is only the third woman to receive the prize, and the first to […]

Property giant Evergrande has filed for bankruptcy protection in the US as the real estate crisis in China deepens. It will allow the heavily-indebted company to protect its assets in the US as it works on a multi-billion dollar deal with creditors. Evergrande defaulted on its huge debts in 2021, which sent shock-waves through global […]

Prime Minister Narendra Modi said his government was making every effort to restore peace in the state of Manipur as he addressed the country on its 77th independence day. “I want to tell the people of Manipur that the country is with you,”  Modi said. On Tuesday, he unfurled the national flag at the historic […]

By Jayantha Somasundaram (This articlecontinued from yesterday (25) is based on reporting by the international media on the events in Sri Lanka forty years ago.) “For day after day Tamils were beaten, hacked or burned to death in the streets, on buses, on trains – sometimes in the sight of horrified foreign tourists. Their homes […]

(Excerpted from volume ii of the Sarath Amunugama autobiography) During one of my visits to Colombo I got a call to see the President at ‘Breamar’. Gamini Dissanayake had told him of my friendship with Parathasarathy and he wanted me to help him repair the damage done to their friendship due to the abuse heaped […]

Udeni Kaluthantri, a 54-year-old port worker, became an overnight sensation last year for reasons that had nothing to do with his job. Days after protesters stormed the presidential palace in the Sri Lankan capital Colombo, a video surfaced of Mr Kaluthantri lounging on a bed draped with the presidential flag. Pictures of young men jumping […]

Crisis-hit Pakistan has reached a staff-level agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) over $3bn (£2.4bn) of funding. The deal, which still needs to be approved by the global lender’s board, comes after an eight-month delay. The South Asian nation is facing its worst economic crisis since independence from Britain in 1947. To help secure […]

The muted, panicked voice came through the phone of a friend who croaked she was very confidentially warning Cassandra and advising her. Yours truly was immediately panic infected. With deep emphasis and concern the friend took her time to advise that Cass withdraws all money from banks. Cass was for once glad she was poor […]

BBC reported that the International Monetary Fund (IMF) says it has reached an agreement with Ukraine on funding worth $15.6bn (£12.8bn). The organisation’s first loan to a country at war is expected to be approved in the coming weeks. It would also be one of the largest financing packages Ukraine has received since Russia’s invasion. […]

The man nominated as China’s next premier by President Xi Jinping has been formally elected by parliament. Li Qiang, the former Communist Party leader of the country’s biggest city of Shanghai, will now lead the government, replacing retiring Li Keqiang. The 63-year-old received almost every vote from more than 2,900 delegates at the National People’s […]