Month: December 2021

Malaysia is seeking US$3 million from the UN Green Climate Fund (GCF) to develop a national plan to adapt to climate change, the environment ministry said last week, amid deadly floods that have displaced nearly 70,000 people this month.The funds requested are paltry relative to the amount the country has pledged to spend on flood mitigation efforts, though experts say the plan’s implementation would likely cost much more.Since December 18, torrential rain has caused severe flooding that killed…

The World Bank (WB) has recommended that Indonesia do more to encourage private investment in renewables as part of work to deliver on its energy transition.

Fully vaccinated travellers from Singapore have been allowed to fly into India without serving quarantine since 9 December.

Japan has opened an auction to select operators for a new offshore wind power project in Happo-Noshiro zone off Akita prefecture.

Stella Monica Hendrawan thought nothing of it when she took to Instagram to complain about a bad experience she’d had at a beauty clinic in Indonesia two years ago.In her post, the 26-year-old Chinese-Indonesian claimed the acne treatment she received for six months in 2019 at a skin care clinic in the second-largest city of Surabaya actually made her condition worse – prompting her to later consult a dermatologist who put her on a different course of treatment.“I merely talked about my…

Covid-19 cases across the world have surged over the Christmas holiday period, with New Zealand’s cases more than doubling in the two days since Friday. On Sunday, the country reported 126 new infections in the community with 45 people hospitalised, eight in intensive care.In neighbouring Australia, the country’s most populous state reported a record number of new cases on Sunday and a sharp jump in hospitalisation while thousands of people were isolating at home after contracting the virus or…

A total of three members of the K-pop superstar group BTS have now been infected with the coronavirus after returning from abroad, their management agency said.RM and Jin were diagnosed with Covid-19 on Saturday evening, the Big Hit Music agency said in a statement. It earlier said another member, Suga, tested positive for the virus on Friday.All three took their second jabs in August, the agency said.The BTS is a seven-member boy band. The four other members are J-Hope, Jungkook, V and Jimin…

The charred remains of more than 30 people, including women and children, were found in burnt-out vehicles in Myanmar on Saturday, a rebel group and a monitor said, accusing the junta of the attack.Myanmar has been in chaos since the February coup, with more than 1,300 people killed in a crackdown by security forces, according to a local monitoring group.“People’s Defence Forces” (PDF) have sprang up across the country to fight the junta, and have drawn the military into a bloody stalemate of…

As a long-time fan of K-pop who had been teaching herself Korean since her early teens, Sichuan native Liu Yue took what appeared to be a logical step and applied to a university in South Korea in 2018.Fast forward to December, the 22-year-old is still in South Korea and is in her final year studying business administration. But her life looks nothing like what she had dreamt about.“I always had high expectations about attending university in South Korea, thinking that it will be so fun. I was…

The International Finance Corporation (IFC) has approved a US$30 million financing package for a waste-to-energy (WtE) power plant in Vietnam.