22 January 2024 —India’s decision to fence its entire border with Myanmar has raised concerns among cross-border communities and refugees fleeing conflict. Once India’s border side is closed off and its Free Movement Agreement with its neighbor to the far east is terminated, border residents could face massive disruptions to their livelihoods as well as cultural and religious ties across border communities, while refugees – from Myanmar and Manipur in India – will be further trapped in limbo. (Photo: Shutterstock.com)

29 January 2024 —In the ongoing Gaza conflict, Asia’s stance presents a paradox. While Indonesia and other Muslim-majority nations are pressuring Israel to halt the violence in the beleaguered Palestinian territory, China – previously advocating an end to Israeli occupation in Gaza – is now accused of arming Hamas after China-made weapons were found in their stockpiles. This turns the spotlight, yet again, on the Asian giant while much of the world is hankering for peace. (Photo: Shutterstock.com)

15 January 2024 — Southeast Asia confronts escalating climate change impacts, with the Philippines anticipating a record-breaking drought from El Niño and Cambodia battling dry season-air pollution. Faced with similar challenges, Indonesia mobilizes local communities for sustainability. Now comes the critical question: Will the region’s countries, counted among the world’s most vulnerable to disasters, finally take decisive steps and muster the political will to enforce measures like banning coal and fossil fuels toward more effective climate change mitigation? (Photo: Shutterstock.com)

20 February 2023 — A recent Seoul court ruling against the family of a South Korean man who was enslaved by a Japanese company during World War II has reignited conversations of closure and reparations. During the Japanese colonial period, thousands upon thousands of South Koreans were taken from their families and forced into manual labor for corporations. Years later, their bodies remain in Japan and families continue to fight in vain for their repatriation rights. As relations between the two Northeast Asian countries improve, families and survivors hold out hope that they will get recompense they are rightfully owed. (Photo: Shutterstock.com)

30 January 2023 — Even though COVID-19 closed borders, human trafficking worsened across Southeast Asia. Many jobseekers in the region, especially those from the Philippines and Cambodia, have been duped into bogus employment opportunities by syndicates and scam recruitment agencies. Left in a foreign land and without any reliable support from their home country’s government, these applicants are often subjected to workplace abuse and even forced labor. Strategies and safeguards, including more stringent vetting processes for employers and agencies, are needed to ensure safer opportunities for workers in the region. (Photo: Shutterstock.com)

6 February 2023 — After Cambodia’s spineless stand on the Myanmar crisis as ASEAN chair, Indonesian President Joko Widodo is finally standing up to the military junta. This week, he announced plans to send one of his top generals to Myanmar to help resolve the country’s political crisis. Widodo has also recently blocked a Tatmadaw officer from attending an ASEAN tourism conference in Yogyakarta. This, after he proposed to the regional bloc in November last year that Myanmar should be barred from ASEAN activities until it starts aligning with the bloc’s Five-Point Consensus. But two years into a blood coup and more than 2,500 civilian deaths, isn’t it time for more drastic measures against the junta? (Photo: Shutterstock.com)

9 January 2023 — While the rest of the world progresses forward in terms of women’s rights and gender equality, Afghanistan seems stuck in place and, worse, is taking several strides backward. Despite warnings from the US envoy that women are integral to the stability of the country, the brutal Taliban rule has not only reneged on their previous promise to respect women’s rights, but has even taken extra steps to up the oppression of Afghan women. As the Taliban continues to exclude women from society, rights groups are worried that this might have dire consequences on children, who will be forced into labor to help families make ends meet. (Photo: Shutterstock.com)

9 January 2023 — China is forcing the world to rethink COVID-19 travel again. As the Asian giant reopens its airways amid a surge in cases, its neighbors and other popular tourist destinations grow weary. Different countries have imposed differing degrees of restriction. Some have started restricting flights, others have been asking for proof of vaccination, while a few have only required testing upon arrival. But across the board, the influx of tourists from China have forced a tough but potentially flawed choice between lives and livelihoods. But is there really no other way than to think of COVID-19 as a trade-off between the health of the public versus that of the economy? (Photo: Shutterstock.com)

2 January 2023 — North Korea rang in the new year with an explosive display of arrogance, firing a short-range ballistic missile that has put its Southern neighbor, and the entire region at large, on edge. Amid powder keg tensions across the Korean Demilitarized Zone, the Kim government has pushed to exponentially increase not only its military might, but also its nuclear arsenal. What will these weapons mean for peace and stability in the region in the hands of a megalomaniac leader? (Photo: Shutterstock.com)

26 December 2022 — As Singapore and Malaysia reopen their borders to each other, so do the neighbors reawaken the issues that had long plagued — and had been overlooked — both countries. With cross-country travel now available, families planning to reunite over the holidays have been met with sky-high transportation costs, cramped airports and gridlock traffic. Syndicates have also taken advantage of the opened border, using the allure of high pay to trick Malaysians into illegally working as cyber-fraud slaves in Singapore. (Photo: Shutterstock.com)

19 December 2022 — At the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan sits the Friendship Gate, which acts as a portal going from one country to the other. But in recent days, death has surrounded the Gate, with seven civilians being the latest casualties of indiscriminate gunfire and artillery shelling by the Taliban. Months of military back-and-forth from both countries have put civilians in a dangerous crossfire. Fearing for their lives and futures, the people can only hope for a resumption of peace and safer days. (Photo: mimmikhail/Shutterstock.com)

12 December 2022 — For merely watching South Korean TV dramas, North Korea’s ruthless totalitarian government deemed it justified to end the lives of three teenagers. This was enabled under a draconian 2020 law that outlaws the distribution of South Korean media content, a morbid reminder of the total control that the government wants to exercise over every small facet of its peoples’ lives. The executions were carried out months ago, in October, but the news is trickling out just now. With such a tight lid on the truth, how many more similar incidents have taken place but have gone unreported? (Photo: Shutterstock.com)

5 December 2022 — Amid the atrocities in Xinjiang, the U.S. has filed a bill that would appoint a human rights expert to monitor cases of abuse in the region in hopes that it would facilitate faster aid to victims. However, despite China’s consistently despicable human rights record and the unrelenting public criticism, most of the international community remain lukewarm, content with releasing tepid statements of concern. What else will it take for more countries to start doing more than just voice out their displeasure at China? (Photo: Howard Cheng/Shutterstock.com)

14 November 2022 — Its hypocrisy in full display, China makes a flaccid call to “reject unilateralism and acts of bullying,” even as the Northeast Asian giant trains its emerging imperial designs on the West Philippine Sea, despite the Philippines’ decisive win at the Permanent Court of Arbitration. Instead of asserting this victory and his country’s rights during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting, President Ferdinand Marcos, Jr. chose to play it safe and side-step the subject altogether, citing his own flimsy excuse of diplomacy. (Photo: OPS-OIC Undersecretary Cheloy Velicara-Garafil, Nov 17, 2022, Public Domain)

14 November 2022 — An existential question looms ever-large over the ASEAN. During its recent Summit, the regional bloc has failed yet again to resolve key regional issues. Regarding Myanmar, the ASEAN continues to drag its feet, baring just how powerless it is to stand up against the brutal Tatmadaw, leaving the Burmese people hopeless. Organized crime, China’s increasing incursions into the South China Sea, and other pressing issues have also largely been unaddressed in the recent Summit — which begs the question: What good is this regional meeting for, anyway? (Photo: Shutterstock.com)

7 November 2022 — Flowers and notes near the Itaewon subway station from mourners honoring those who perished in the South Korean Halloween crowd crush. Twin tragedies in South Korea and India have shone a harsh light on media ethics and its effects on mental health. The Itaewon Halloween crowd crush and the collapse of the Morbi bridge each claimed more than 100 lives — photos and videos from both were indiscriminately shared on social and broadcast media. Alarmed, experts have warned that, without the appropriate content warnings, these visuals may have potential triggering effects on audiences who have suffered from similar traumas in the past. Media houses and social media users are advised to be more mindful of what they share. (Photo: yllyso/Shutterstock.com)

24 October 2022 — This week, China’s abhorrence of dissent reached the streets of Manchester, England, when protesters outside the Chinese Consulate were allegedly dragged and beaten behind its gates. The incident has pushed the British government to call on Chinese authorities to respect peaceful dissent. Will President Xi Jinping heed this advice, or will it only further deteriorate the already-strained relations between the two countries? Recently, Xi reaffirmed his iron grip on the Northeast Asian superpower during the Chinese Communist Party’s congress and clinched a historic third term. (Photo: Shutterstock.com)

17 October 2022 — The US has slapped Afghanistan anew with visa sanctions, restricting the mobility of former and current Taliban members, over the extremist group’s brutal treatment of women. Rather than face the violence and humiliation of public punishment — just for leaving their homes — women in Afghanistan are driven to take their own lives. Meanwhile, girls continue to be barred from going to school. While efforts by the international community to hold the Taliban accountable are welcome, they are unlikely to be impactful enough to change ground realities in the country. How many generations of brave women will it take to win back the progress gained before the Taliban returned to power? Image shows Afghan women in front of the British Houses of Parliament protesting against the Taliban. (Photo: Kamil Kaczmarczyk/Shutterstock.com)

10 October 2022 — Will the exclusion of Myanmar from the ASEAN Summit resolve the mounting problems of the military-led nation? Junta atrocities have frustrated neighbor nations, who have been at a loss of how to handle the Tatmadaw’s takeover of government, brutal dispersal of protesters and freedom fighters, and executions of political prisoners. The regional bloc has moved to keep Myanmar’s military representatives out of the roundtable, which could be signal that the ASEAN, after more than a year of lethargy, is finally taking concrete steps to help end the crisis in Myanmar? (Photo: Shutterstock.com)

3 October 2022 — After the recent devastation of typhoon Karding (international name: Noru), environmental activists and defenders have called on the Philippine government and world leaders to finally wake up to the climate crisis and take action. This echoes cries across Southeast Asia, where some of the most brutal effects of the climate crisis are felt, despite the region being among the least responsible for irreparable environmental damage. Still, the world’s richest, most exploitative, and most extractive nations continue to play deaf, ignoring the outsized role they’ve played in the planetary meltdown. (Photo: Shutterstock.com)

26 September 2022 — Japan this week turned its back on its controversial training program for Myanmar’s cadets and severed ties with other Burmese institutions. It also sent a stern diplomatic signal by barring Myanmar’s military delegation from Shinzo Abe’s funeral — but is it playing too late the hero? It took the Northeast Asian giant more than a year and the execution of four activists in Myanmar to take action, even if the brutal junta had violently silenced countless other protesters and human rights defenders. (Photo: Shutterstock.com)

12 September 2022 — Three years into the pandemic, but COVID-19 continues to expose governance gaps across the Korean peninsula. South Korea, despite its early success against the virus, is now struggling to keep it at bay while also having to contend with an impending influenza outbreak. This puts it in a compromised position to help its Northern neighbor, who is only now realizing the value of vaccines in curbing coronavirus spikes. As South Korea continues to curb pandemic restrictions, North Korea, hard-pressed to find vaccines, has little choice but to keep its overly strict movement restrictions. (Photo: Evelyn Jung/Shutterstock.com)

5 September 2022 — In a massive show of force, the U.S. and South Korea this week held the largest combined military drills in years. In light of the growing tensions with its northern neighbor, South Korea continues to pump funds into its armed forces, beefing up its defenses. These budget increases for the military come amid a wave of crises that reveal the fraying societal fabric of South Korea. The most recent floods that submerged huge swaths of the country exposed deep social divides, while the current pandemic shows no signs of abating. Can such a battered people still handle the heavy toll of war? (Photo: MaxG Photography/Shutterstock.com)

29 August 2022 — Cambodia and Vietnam may have recently bolstered their diplomatic relationships — in part by sprucing friendship monuments between the two countries. But beneath the sheen of closer ties are cross-border problems that give the lie to appearances of diplomatic progress. A video that went viral last week showed dozens of Vietnamese workers escaping from a casino due to its abusive labor practices. Despite continued efforts between the governments of both countries, the human trafficking situation in the region is only getting worse, pushing authorities from another neighboring country, Thailand, to issue a warning against job offers in Cambodia that were too good to be true.

22 August 2022 — In a country where mere possession of cannabis can be met with the death sentence, Malaysia is now studying legalizing marijuana for medicinal uses, putting it in the running to be the second country in the region to remove weed from its narcotic list. Malaysian Public Health Minister, Khairy Jamaluddin is keen to study Thailand’s cannabis policy during the 75th World Health Assembly in May, paying particular focus to the glitches and pitfalls, which have led to the hospitalization of many for weed overuse.

15 August 2022 — Artists and activists from Thailand and Myanmar showed their leaders what the word unity meant. Despite the clear and obvious atrocities of the Myanmar junta, governments under the ASEAN have been spineless and lukewarm in their condemnation. But on Aug. 8, in commemoration of the 34th anniversary of Myanmar’s 8888 uprising, Thai and Burmese activists gathered in Chiang Mai, Thailand, to condemn General Min Aung Hlaing and his ruthless rule — as well as to pay tribute to democracy fighters executed by the junta. Demonstrators also slammed the ASEAN’s inaction and called for greater international recognition of and action on their plight. (Photo: Adirach Toumlamoon/Shutterstock.com)

8 August 2022 — U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s recent visit to Taiwan has triggered much military posturing from China, in turn raising alarm bells for the international community. While formal U.S. policy continues to be ambiguous, Pelosi has been an outspoken critic of China and supporter of Taiwan’s sovereignty. Aside from the intensified defense drills, which global powers such as the U.S. and Japan have condemned, China has also terminated some channels of formal communication with the U.S. following Pelosi’s trip. These include high-level climate and military talks, further imperiling global cooperations and escalating geopolitical tensions.

1 August 2022 — Despite much objection from the international community, Myanmar’s military junta has executed four pro-democracy activists. This highlights the colossal and continued failure of the ASEAN, chaired by Cambodia, to resolve the crisis, and help restore democracy, in the war-torn country. The regional bloc has previously come up with a Five-Point consensus in an attempt to put an immediate end to the violence of the junta — but this proven to be completely toothless. Many activists continue to languish in Myanmar’s jails, while thousands more remain in fear of arrest and assault. (Photo: R. Bociaga/Shutterstock.com)

25 July 2022 — Alarmed that some 25 million children had missed their scheduled immunizations, the WHO and UNICEF declared a “red alert for child health. This announcement appears to be a more reactive than proactive measure, given that it comes nearly three years after the COVID-19 pandemic ravaged health systems worldwide. Developing countries — often the last to receive vaccine shipments from their wealthy counterparts — have always struggled to maintain good immunization coverage. Despite this handicap, however, many Asian nations such as India and Pakistan are ramping up vaccination drives and have even successfully arrested their backslides.

18 July 2022 — To celebrate five decades of diplomatic relations, Bangladesh and Indonesia are reaffirming both of their commitments to alleviate the plight of Rohingya refugees. This time around, the partnership is seeking the cooperation of the ASEAN, too. After all, before they were denied their citizenship, the Rohingya were originally from Myanmar, a member state of the regional bloc. In the meantime, Indonesia has granted refuge to more than 900 Rohingya, allowing them to come ashore in its southern Aceh province. (Photo: Sk Hasan Ali/Shutterstock.com)