By Ben Westcott and Eric Cheung, CNN Taiwan’s Defense Minister, former general Chiu Kuo-cheng, stood in front of the island’s legislature last week and made a dire prediction — by 2025, China will be able to mount a “full-scale” invasion of Taiwan. The dramatic statement came after China sent its highest number of warplanes yet
Continue ReadingBy Jessie Yeung and Steven Jiang, CNN China’s three-person crew arrived at its new space station Saturday morning — a major step for the country’s young space program, which is rapidly becoming one of the world’s most advanced. The three astronauts had lifted off on the Shenzhou-13 spacecraft just past midnight local time, launched by
Continue ReadingBy Ehsan Popalzai and Mostafa Salem, CNN A suicide attack at the largest Shia mosque in the southern Afghan city of Kandahar killed 32 people and injured at least 68 more, the government-owned Bakhtar News Agency said Friday. It is the second week running that an attack has targeted Friday prayers at a Shia mosque.
Continue ReadingBy Jessie Yeung, CNN A Chinese man who set his ex-wife on fire as she livestreamed to her online followers was sentenced to death on Thursday, concluding a murder case that received nationwide notoriety. The victim, 30-year-old Lhamo, was a farmer and livestreamer in a Tibetan autonomous prefecture in southwestern Sichuan province. She was streaming
Continue ReadingCNN By CNN’s Beijing Bureau and Hannah Ritchie China has denied a report that it tested a nuclear-capable hypersonic missile in August, saying on Monday that the test was instead a “routine spacecraft experiment.” The Financial Times reported Sunday that “China tested a nuclear-capable hypersonic missile in August that circled the globe before speeding towards
Continue ReadingBy Eric Cheung, Will Ripley and Ben Westcott, CNN China has stepped up pressure on Taiwan in recent weeks, flying dozens of warplanes near the self-ruled island in a show of strength that has put the entire region on edge. But at a park in the Taiwanese capital on Thursday, the topic of conversation was
Continue ReadingBy Sophia Saifi, CNN Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) announced Thursday that it was suspending flights to Afghanistan due to what it described as unworkable conditions imposed by the Taliban. The airline said conditions had worsened since the Taliban formed a new Afghan government last month and that “PIA and its staff position in Kabul were
Continue ReadingCNN By Eric Cheung, CNN At least 46 people died and dozens were injured after a major fire broke out in a building in southern Taiwan on Thursday, authorities said. The blaze started in the 13-story commercial and residential building at 2:54 a.m. local time (2:54 p.m. ET) in Kaohsiung city’s Yancheng district, according to
Continue ReadingBy Eric Cheung, CNN At least 46 people died and dozens were injured after a major fire broke out in a building in southern Taiwan on Thursday, authorities said. The blaze started in the 13-story commercial and residential building at 2:54 a.m. local time (2:54 p.m. ET) in Kaohsiung city’s Yancheng district, according to Taiwan’s
Continue ReadingBy Emiko Jozuka, CNN Suicides among Japanese schoolchildren hit a record high during the last school year, according to an education ministry report published Wednesday. Japan recorded 415 suicides among schoolchildren aged 6 to 18 during the 2020 school year — the highest number since records began in 1974. A range of factors were behind
Continue ReadingBy Emiko Jozuka, CNN Japan’s Prime Minister Fumio Kishida dissolved Parliament’s lower house on Thursday, setting the stage for a general election this month as he seeks to rouse support for his newly formed government. The vote, to be held on October 31, will be Kishida’s first major test after he won the ruling party’s
Continue ReadingBy Nic Robertson and Tim Lister, CNN The Taliban are the most unlikely of populists: brutal, myopic, the epitome of intolerance. During five years in power until 2001, they banished women to their homes, banned music and most sport and imposed pitiless punishments on offenders. Adulterers were stoned in public; thieves had their hands amputated.
Continue ReadingBy Brad Lendon, CNN China’s increased military activity in the Taiwan Strait may have grabbed all the headlines in recent weeks, but thousands of miles to the west, another simmering territorial dispute on the country’s borders looks more likely to boil over first. Just 16 months ago, Chinese and Indian troops fought a deadly hand-to-hand
Continue ReadingExclusive by Nick Paton Walsh, International Security Editor China is preparing to test tens of thousands of blood bank samples from the city of Wuhan as part of a probe into the origins of Covid-19, according to a Chinese official. The move comes amid increasing calls for transparency over the emergence of the virus. The
Continue ReadingCNN Exclusive by Nick Paton Walsh, International Security Editor China is preparing to test tens of thousands of blood bank samples from the city of Wuhan as part of a probe into the origins of Covid-19, according to a Chinese official. The move comes amid increasing calls for transparency over the emergence of the virus.
Continue ReadingBy Yoonjung Seo and Gawon Bae, CNN North Korea’s weapons are needed to defend the country against a “hostile” United States, said leader Kim Jong Un, state media KCNA reported Tuesday. Kim made the comments as he stood against a backdrop of missiles at the Defense Development Exhibition to mark the 76th anniversary of North
Continue ReadingBy Julia Hollingsworth, CNN At least 15 people were killed after heavy rain and flooding battered China’s northern province of Shanxi, destroying thousands of homes and forcing more than 120,000 people to relocate to safer areas, local officials said Tuesday. The province experienced its worst flooding this month since records began, meteorological official Wang Wenyi
Continue ReadingBy Brent Swails and Clarissa Ward, CNN The blood-stained bodies of the four accused kidnappers were hung off construction cranes with heavy chains, one with a warning sign strung around his neck, “Abductors will be punished like this.” In the public spaces in the western Afghan city of Herat, the crowds squinted into the sun,
Continue ReadingCNN By Sophia Saifi, CNN Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) announced Thursday that it was suspending flights to Afghanistan due to what it described as unworkable conditions imposed by the Taliban. The airline said conditions had worsened since the Taliban formed a new Afghan government last month and that “PIA and its staff position in Kabul
Continue ReadingCNN By Sophia Saifi, CNN Abdul Qadeer Khan, the man known as the father of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons program, has died in the Pakistani capital Islamabad, according to the country’s Ministry of Information. He was 85 years old. Khan was given a state funeral at Islamabad’s Faisal Mosque on Sunday. The funeral, attended by thousands
Continue Reading