Asia

6 days agoShareSaveCherylann MollanBBC News, MumbaiShareSaveA new Bollywood film – Mrs – has once again laid bare a stark reality: even in well-educated households in India a woman’s role is often confined to unpaid domestic work.
The protagonist, married to a gynaecologist, finds herself trapped in an endless cycle of cooking, cleaning and caregiving. Her dreams are sidelined not by force, but by relentless criticism and quiet coercion.
While the film, which is a remake of the hit Malayalam movie The Great Indian Kitchen, has sparked conversation – and pushback, especially from men on social media – its themes resonate with hard data.
A recent government survey reveals that Indian women spend over seven hours a day on unpaid domestic and caregiving work – more than twice the time men do. Data shows that women spend 289 minutes on unpaid domestic work and 137 minutes on unpaid caregiving, whereas men spend 88 minutes on chores and 75 minutes on care work.
They also spent less time than..

22 hours agoShareSaveKaty WatsonAustralia correspondentReporting fromThe Gold CoastMallory Moench and Ian AikmanBBC NewsReporting fromLondonShareSaveAustralian authorities say a body has been found in floodwaters and 13 military workers injured in a vehicle crash as wild weather from a tropical storm lashes the country’s eastern coast.
Cyclone Alfred, which was downgraded to a tropical low on Saturday, made landfall near the Queensland capital city of Brisbane in the evening local time.
Officials have warned residents to stay indoors and remain vigilant, saying the storm’s threat is “not over”.
Winds have brought down trees and power lines and flooded low-lying roads. More than 300,000 properties are without power in the region.
Police said on Saturday they had discovered a body in the search for a 61-year-old man who went missing on Friday after his car was caught in floodwaters in Dorrigo, northern New South Wales (NSW).
Emergency responders witnessed the man escaping his car and cli..

5 days agoShareSaveKoh EweBBC NewsReporting fromSingaporeThanyarat DoksoneBBC NewsReporting fromBangkokShareSaveAfter years of wrangling with authorities, students in Thailand can now let their hair down. Literally.
On Wednesday, Thailand’s Supreme Administrative Court annulled a 50-year-old directive by the education ministry, which had previously set out rules on hairstyles for school students: short hair for boys and ear-length bobs for girls.
In practice, hairstyle rules have been gradually relaxed across many schools. But some still used the 1975 junta-issued directive as a guideline, and would cut the hair of students who didn’t adhere.
The 1975 directive violated individual freedoms protected by the constitution and was out of touch with today’s society, the court said.
The court decision this week came in response to a petition, filed by 23 public school students in 2020, which argued that the 1975 directive was unconstitutional.
Student activists have long campaigned for hairs..

2 days agoShareSaveRichard KimBBC KoreanReporting fromSeoulGavin ButlerBBC NewsReporting fromSingapore ShareSaveHan Dong-Hoon was driving home from dinner in Seoul on December 3, scanning the radio, when he heard a breaking news update: President Yoon Suk-Yeol was preparing to deliver an emergency address.
Han, then the leader of Yoon’s People Power Party (PPP), was widely seen as one of the presiden’t closest allies. Yet that was Han’s first hint that Yoon was about to do something unprecedented.
By midnight, the president had plunged the country into a political maelstrom, declaring martial law as part of a self-proclaimed bid to eliminate “anti-state forces” and North Korea sympathisers.
“When I first heard the news of martial law, I thought, ‘We must stop it, because if it isn’t lifted that very night, a bloodbath might occur,'” Han tells BBC Korean.
“The fear and terror that South Korea’s decades-long, hard-won achievements might suddenly collapse were overwhelming.”
Soon after ..

6 days agoShareSaveGeeta PandeyBBC News•@geetapandeybbcShareSaveIt is often said that marriages are made in heaven.
But in India, where a majority of marriages are arranged, the process of match-making can feel like a passage through hell for a woman and her family.
That’s the premise of Sthal: A Match, the 2023 gritty Marathi-language film that has won several prestigious awards at festivals in India and abroad. It is releasing for the first time in theatres in India on Friday.
Set in rural Maharashtra state, the film centres around Savita, a young woman striving for an education and a career in a patriarchal society, and the attempts by her father Daulatrao Wandhare – a poor cotton farmer – to find a good husband for his daughter.
“He wants a good price for his crop and a good match for his daughter,” says director Jayant Digambar Somalkar.
The film is notable for the unflinching way it portrays what its lead actress calls the “very humiliating” experience of many young women, unlike..

3 days agoShareSaveAleks PhillipsBBC NewsShareSavePolice in Australia have charged a 17-year-old who got on a plane with a shotgun and ammunition.
He was filmed being wrestled to the ground by passengers and crew as the aircraft prepared to take off from Avalon Airport, near Melbourne, carrying 160 people bound for Sydney on Thursday afternoon.
Police believe the teenager got onto the airport tarmac by breaching a security fence, before climbing the front steps to the plane, where he was tackled to the ground near the front door.
The 17-year-old – who has not been identified – was taken into custody and will appear in youth court to face eight charges.
Among them are unlawfully taking control of an aircraft, endangering the flight’s safety and creating a bomb hoax.
Victoria Police said a bomb specialist had to be brought in to search a car and two bags which were located nearby.
Footage published by Australian outlet 7News showed the suspect being restrained by a passenger, while a mem..

7 hours agoShareSaveKaty WatsonAustralia correspondentReporting fromSouthern QueenslandShareSaveA tropical storm is expected to make landfall on Australia’s eastern coast on Saturday morning as tens of thousands of people have been evacuated and more than 230,000 households left without power.
Initially called Cyclone Alfred, the weather front was downgraded to a tropical low with winds set to reach up to 85km/h, less strong than first forecast.
The Bureau of Meteorology said the storm is currently sitting off Bribie Island and is moving slowly north, and expected to cross the mainland coast between the island and Maroochydore.
Authorities are still warning people to stay indoors, with fines for those who visit beaches, as heavy rain and flooding is still expected.
On Saturday morning, senior meteorologist Miriam Bradbury from the Bureau of Meteorology, said there is an ongoing risk of widespread severe weather, especially rainfall.
“Our 24-hour rainfall totals could easily exceed 200..

It’s the first cyclone expected to land as far south since Cyclone Zoe in 1974.

3 days agoShareSaveKelly NgBBC NewsShareSaveNew Zealand has fired its most senior envoy to the United Kingdom over remarks that questioned US President Donald Trump’s grasp of history.
At an event in London on Tuesday, High Commissioner Phil Goff compared efforts to end the war between Russia and Ukraine to the 1938 Munich Agreement, which allowed Adolf Hitler to annex part of Czechoslovakia.
Mr Goff recalled how Sir Winston Churchill had criticised the agreement, then said of the US leader: “President Trump has restored the bust of Churchill to the Oval Office. But do you think he really understands history?”
His comments were “deeply disappointing” and made his position “untenable”, New Zealand’s Foreign Minister Winston Peters said.
His comments came after Trump paused military aid to Kyiv following a heated exchange with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in the Oval Office last week.
He contrasted Trump with Churchill who, while estranged from the British government, spoke aga..

3 days agoShareSaveJean MackenzieSeoul correspondentKelly NgBBC NewsShareSaveNorth Korea has stopped tourists from visiting, just weeks after the first Western tourists entered the country for the first time in five years.
North Korea sealed itself off at the start of the Covid-19 pandemic in early 2020, and started to scale back restrictions in the middle of 2023.
It opened up to Russian visitors in 2024, but it was only last month that Western tourists were allowed into the remote, eastern city Rason.
However several tour companies now say that trips to the reclusive country have been cancelled until further notice. Pyongyang has not given a reason for the sudden halt.
“Just received news from our Korean partners that Rason is closed to everyone. We will keep you posted,” China-based KTG Tours, which specialises in North Korean tours, said Wednesday on Facebook.
Young Pioneer Tours and Koryo Tours were among the other agencies that have announced the suspension.
Those planning tour..