Author: viking

Vietnamese authorities have ordered monks at a popular Buddhist pagoda to stop “soul summoning” and “bad karma eviction” ceremonies after an investigation found the rituals were a scam.Tens of thousands of worshippers have been paying the 18th century Ba Vang pagoda in northern Quang Ninh province between 1 million and several hundred million dong (US$45-US$13,500) to have their bad karma vanquished, according to the state-run Lao Dong newspaper.The Committee for Religious Affairs, a government…

A review of aggregates levy launched by the UK government should address “patchy and sometimes illogical aggregates levy exemptions which result in too many infrastructure projects being caught”, an expert has said.

Tackling sexual harassment within the financial services industry will require cultural change from firms, from senior leadership down, an expert has said.

Rules on access to and use of genetic data need updating to support the growth of genomics medicine, the health secretary in England has said.

Vietnam has lodged an official protest with China following the sinking of a Vietnamese fishing vessel in the contested South China Sea, the foreign ministry said late on Thursday.The two countries have long been embroiled in a dispute over the potentially energy-rich stretch of waters, called the East Sea by Vietnam.The fishing vessel was moored near Da Loi island in the Paracel archipelago on March 6 when a China Maritime Surveillance Vessel chased it and fired a water cannon at it, the…

Proton, Malaysia’s national carmaker, is set to build an assembly plant near Karachi in Pakistan with local partner Alhaj Automotive, in a move that economists believe will bring positives for both nations.The carmaker, which was struggling before Chinese company Geely bought a 49.9 per cent stake in 2017, recently launched a premium SUV believed to be signalling its recovery. Now, its regional ambitions are coming to fruition sooner than expected, even as Geely’s sales within China stutter…

Plans to introduce the UK’s first collective defined contribution (CDC) pension scheme, proposed by Royal Mail and the Communication Workers Union (CWU), have been backed by the UK government.

British actor Benedict Cumberbatch’s company has cut business ties with Mokhzani Mahathir over anti-Semitic remarks made by his father, Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, local media reported.In an interview with BBC last October, Mahathir described Jews as “hook-nosed” and blamed them for troubles in the Middle East.“If you are going to be truthful, the problem in the Middle East began with the creation of Israel. That is an old truth. But I cannot say that,” on BBC’s Hard Talk.The 93…

Lion Air has started preparations for a domestic initial public offering, people with knowledge of the matter said, as Indonesia’s biggest private carrier seeks to move past an October crash that triggered the crisis surrounding Boeing’s 737 MAX plane.The company is working with advisers on the planned share sale, which could take place as soon as this year, the people said.Lion Air has been discussing a fundraising target of around US$1 billion, though it hasn’t set precise terms for the deal,…

The use of anti-suit injunctions to stop foreign court rulings from interfering with arbitrations should be made early in the process, Singapore’s Court of Appeal (CoA) has said. But even if a foreign court case has run its course anti-enforcement injunctions can be made “in exceptional circumstances”, it said.