Asian Legal Review

No fast-food chain has ever meant quite what Jollibee means to Filipinos.
Forget McDonald’s and KFC, Jollibee – with its sweet spaghetti and crispy Chickenjoy – is something else entirely: a cultural anchor for a diaspora scattered across every continent on Earth.
With more than a million Filipinos leaving the Philippines every year in search of greener pastures abroad, the chain has followed them almost everywhere they have gone, building a brand that taps into deep emotions by offering a taste…

Singapore has seized over 830kg (1,800 lbs) of Asian pangolin scales hidden in a shipment bound for Cambodia, authorities said on Saturday, calling it the largest haul of its kind discovered in the city state.
Falsely declared as “dried fish skin”, the scales – estimated to be from more than 2,200 pangolins – were found in 30 bags on December 29 after officials intercepted an inbound truck carrying sea cargo, Singapore’s National Parks Board said in a statement.
The announcement came as…

Indonesia on Saturday began implementing a new government regulation approved earlier this month that bans children younger than 16 from access to digital platforms that could expose them to pornography, cyberbullying, online scams and addiction.
With the move, Indonesia became the first country in Southeast Asia to ban children from having accounts on YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, Threads, X, Bigo Live and Roblox. It follows measures that Australia took last year in a world-first social…

There are limitations to EU member state governments relying on national security grounds to block components from certain suppliers being used in national telecoms networks, according to a legal adviser at the EU’s highest court.

Publication of new homes and buildings standards for England is welcome in supporting efforts to decarbonise UK real estate, according to an expert – but she said the “long overdue” finalisation of the standards, and the time it will take to implement them, put the UK’s climate commitments at risk.

People with a disability cannot access most e-commerce platforms in the Netherlands because they are not “digitally accessible”, the Authority for Consumers and Markets (ACM) has said.

A cornucopia of bargains is lighting up booking sites for Thailand, where five-star luxury hotel rooms are going for huge discounts during the peak holiday season – the unplanned spin-off from the Iran war which threatens to hit international tourist arrivals at a crucial time of the year.
At the same time, the surge in diesel costs caused by the choking of the Strait of Hormuz has forced many Thais to pause or scrap domestic travel plans, fearing such expenses will continue to rise during the…

Four weeks into the US-Israeli war on Iran, the crisis is beginning to bite in Malaysia, where Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim has cut the monthly quota for subsidised petrol and food manufacturers are warning that surging diesel costs could force them to close or raise prices.
The move reflects how a distant geopolitical shock is beginning to feed directly into Malaysia’s fuel bill, food supply chain and inflation outlook, analysts note.
In a special televised address on Thursday, Anwar said the…

Conditions that MEPs seek to build into a prospective trade deal between the EU and US are designed to reduce European business’ exposure to geopolitical risks, according to an expert in international trade.

Rescue teams including navy divers in Bangladesh have recovered 24 bodies from a bus that plunged into a river at a ferry crossing, officials said on Thursday.
The bus sank into the deep waters of the Padma river in Goalanda on Wednesday, about 65km (40 miles) west of the capital Dhaka. It had around 50 passengers on board, many of whom managed to escape.
A fire service report said that 24 bodies, including those of five children, had been recovered by midday on Thursday.
Some were pulled out by…