Month: December 2020

South Korea has reported 950 new coronavirus cases, its largest daily increase since the emergence of the pandemic, as fears grow about overwhelmed hospitals in the greater capital area.The latest figures released on Saturday brought the country’s caseload to 41,736, after health officials added more than 8,900 cases in the last 15 days alone. The death toll rose by six in the past day to reach 578.Nearly 680 of the new cases came from the densely populated Seoul metropolitan area, where health…

China, which used to be the world’s salvage king, is shutting its door to all waste imports starting the first day of the new year. The recent announcement triggered the same kind of anxiety among waste-exporting countries as in 2018, when China enacted its “Operation National Sword” policy, which banned the import of 24 types of solid waste, including plastic waste.The 2018 policy switch caused the world’s major waste-exporting countries – Europe, Britain, the US and Australia – to scramble…

The ‘diversity in action’ initiative, launched by influential US-based organisation the Institutional Limited Partners Association (ILPA), highlights support for advancing diversity and inclusion amongst both fund managers and institutional investors, encourages actions to be taken now, and provides a platform for shaping and adopting best practice over time.

The UK government is to consult on proposed changes to the regulation of digital markets in early 2021 after a major overhaul was recommended by regulators.

As the roll-out of Covid-19 vaccination begins in the UK, employers will be considering the implications for their staff and workplace.

For more than two decades, Pham Van Thuoc has scoured Europe in search of historical church clocks, bringing them back to his home in Vietnam where he lovingly restores them.He now has 20 clocks – many of which are more than a hundred years old and including one so big it weighs a tonne – housed in a warehouse in northern Thai Binh province where they fill the air with a cacophony of whirring noises, ticking and chimes.Thuoc, who believes his collection is one of the largest in the world, said…

For more than a decade, Park Sang-hak has flown leaflets attacking North Korea’s ruling Kim dynasty across the heavily militarised border that divides the Koreas.Like other North Korean defectors-turned-activists in South Korea, Park believes the key to bringing down his homeland’s totalitarian system lies in arming his former compatriots with information about the outside world. After years of attracting controversy in his adopted home, Park’s activism could soon land him in jail.Under…

The Housing Grants, Construction and Regeneration Act, also known as the ‘Construction Act’, has been an important part of the law affecting the construction industry since it came into force on 1 May 1998.

A 37-year-old foreign domestic worker from Myanmar grew emotional several times in court in Singapore on Wednesday as she testified that her married employer, whom she saw as a brother or father, had touched and molested her three times within a month.The worker, who cannot be named because of a court order to protect her identity, took the stand on the first day of Pal Muhammad Irzuan Mokhtar’s trial in a district court.Irzuan, a 34-year-old Singaporean, is contesting one charge of using…

The optimism on display just two months ago when Singapore Transport Minister Ong Ye Kung pledged to reopen the city state and its tourism-reliant economy has taken a beating after a possible local coronavirus case was found aboard one of Royal Caribbean ships.In the early hours of Wednesday morning, the 1,680 passengers and 1,148 crew on Quantum of the Seas – enjoying day three of a four-day “cruise to nowhere” – were alerted to an announcement that a suspected case of Covid-19 had been…