Asian Legal Review

The US announced a set of secondary sanctions against 16 Chinese and Russian entities as part of its efforts to cut off trade with North Korea and starve the country’s military of the cash it needs to develop nuclear weapons. The move opened a new rift with China, which blasted the US for its “long-arm jurisdiction” and demanded that Washington “immediately correct its mistake”. The US government’s action also expanded the scope of sanctions to include oil…

After the Pentagon ordered a full-scale investigation into the latest in a string of accidents involving US warships, Chinese analysts have warned that China should be alert to the potential risk to its own naval and commercial fleets. “The US Navy has been flexing its muscles all around the world, and has even intruded into our waters in the South China Sea,” Beijing-based naval expert Li Jie said. “This could pose a danger to maritime encounters between our two…

Directors at the UK’s top 350 businesses are not always given all the information they need to discuss cyber risks posed to the company, according to a new survey.

An IT lecturer at the University of Sydney has apologised for using an out-of-date map that showed a region of Tibet as being Indian territory.
The image upset some Chinese students after it was used by Khimji Vaghjiani during a course titled “Professional Practice in IT”.
The mistake was spotted by The Australian Red Scarf, a WeChat group run by Chinese international students, which ran an article about it last week.
China blames India for latest skirmish in disputed border region…

The US warship involved in the collision off Singapore before dawn on Monday has a name many Americans recognise – but not for its father-and-son namesakes.
Most know Senator John S. McCain III, the Vietnam war hero who ran for president in 2000 and 2008. But it was his father and grandfather – both naval commanders who served during the second world war – who inspired the naming of the 154-metre guided-missile destroyer.
The USS John S. McCain was damaged in a collision with…

When Taro Kono was named as Japan’s new foreign minister on August 3, advocates of a closer relationship with China were delighted – but conservatives winced at the appointment.
Kono is the son of Yohei Kono, a former foreign minister and deputy prime minister, and there were many who assumed he would follow in the political footsteps of his liberal-minded father and reach out to Beijing and Seoul.
Foreign media clearly made the same assumption, with the internet version of the…

Malaysia apologised on Sunday for the upside-down printing of Indonesia’s flag in the souvenir guidebook for the Southeast Asia Games, which officials said is being withdrawn and reprinted.
The mistake, spotted at the games’ opening in the Malaysian capital, Kuala Lumpur, on Saturday, sparked an outcry in Indonesia and the hashtag #ShameonyouMalaysia was trending on social media.
Indonesian President Joko Widodo told reporters in Jakarta the incident concerned “national pride…

At least 23 people were killed and 40 others were injured when several cars of a passenger train derailed in northern India Saturday, police said.
The Utkal Express was travelling from the eastern seaside town of Puri to the northern hill town of Haridwar when the train derailed at 5:46 p.m. local time near the town of Khatauli in Uttar Pradesh.
The injured were taken to nearby hospitals and several were in critical condition, IANS news agency reported. Cranes were deployed to lift the coaches…

Much was hidden from the tourists visiting Sinet Chan in her rundown Cambodian orphanage.
When they returned to their hotels, cameras full and best intentions sated, they remained oblivious to the reality of what they had just supported.
Chan, the nine-year-old who sang and danced for them, was being starved. She and the other children hunted and ate mice to survive.
The orphanage’s director beat and raped her, repeatedly, over the course of several years. She was forced to toil in his…

North Korea’s official media sharply criticised South Korea and the United States for pressing ahead with joint military exercises next week amid heightened tensions on the peninsula.
North Korea has long criticised the annual military exercises the US conducts with South Korea, regarding them as a rehearsal for an invasion of the North.
North’s Korea’s Central News Agency said the joint exercises would “further drive the situation on the Korean Peninsula into a…