CNN – Asia/Pacific

By Kathleen Magramo, CNN Filipinos living abroad are snapping up books about the late Philippine dictator Ferdinand E. Marcos, not just to read about history but to preserve it. The rush to buy books documenting Marcos’ destructive 21-year reign comes as his son, Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr., assumes office after a landslide election victory in

By Brad Lendon, CNN A US Navy warship on Saturday challenged Chinese claims to disputed islands in the South China Sea, the US 7th Fleet said in a statement — the second operation of its kind this week. The guided-missile destroyer USS Benfold sailed near the Spratly Islands — known as the Nansha Islands in

By Heather Chen, CNN For years it had been one of Sri Lanka’s grandest and most heavily guarded buildings, serving as the official residence and state office of the President. But all that changed on July 9, when protesters stormed in and took control, demanding the resignation of President Gotabaya Rajapaksa before turning the palace

By Jessie Yeung, Iqbal Athas and Kunal Sehgal, CNN Sri Lanka’s President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, who fled the country earlier this week, has formally resigned, the parliamentary speaker confirmed Friday, capping off a chaotic 72-hours in the crisis-hit nation that saw protesters storm the capital. The President’s departure from office marks a major victory for the

By Brad Lendon, CNN More than 50 US and Japanese warplanes flew over waters near Japan this week as the two allies put on a show of force amid rising tensions in the region with China and Russia. A dozen of the US Air Force’s top-of-the-line F-22 stealth fighters, four F-35 stealth jets and 13

By Iqbal Athas, Rhea Mogul and Rukshana Rizwie, CNN Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa has tendered his resignation in a letter sent by email to parliamentary speaker Mahinda Yapa Abeywardenena, according to an announcement from the speaker’s office Thursday. Rajapaksa landed in Singapore on a flight from Maldives earlier after fleeing his country in the

By Jessie Yeung, CNN Sri Lanka has plunged into chaos and its president has fled to Singapore, before emailing his resignation, as questions swirl about the country’s future. Embattled President Gotabaya Rajapaksa arrived in Singapore on a flight from Maldives on Thursday, according to a high-ranking security source in Colombo. He had been in Maldives

By Heather Chen, CNN Angry protesters who stormed the official residences of Sri Lanka‘s President have forced him to flee the country, but his sudden departure has plunged the South Asian state deeper into crisis. Demonstrators furious about economic mismanagement and a spiraling financial crisis have demanded that both President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and Prime Minister

By Rhea Mogul, CNN They were once seen as heroes of the nation, the almost mythical warrior-king leaders who defeated the separatists in a bloody civil war. Yet the final days of Sri Lanka’s Rajapaksa dynasty tell a very different tale. In the early hours of Wednesday, embattled President Gotabaya Rajapaksa made a hurried exit

By Nectar Gan, CNN Millions of Shanghai residents braved sweltering heat Tuesday to wait in line for compulsory Covid tests, as growing case numbers and the emergence of a highly infectious Omicron subvariant spurred new fears of a return to mass lockdown. Shanghai authorities have ordered the majority of the city’s 16 districts to undergo

By Brad Lendon, CNN A US Navy destroyer sailed near a disputed South China Sea island chain on Wednesday, challenging the restrictions imposed by China and others on transit through the area. Lt. Nicholas Lingo, a spokesperson for the US Navy’s 7th Fleet headquartered in Japan, said it was the second so-called freedom of navigation

By Kathleen Magramo, CNN A Hong Kong court on Tuesday sentenced a veteran activist to nine months in jail under a colonial-era sedition law for planning to protest against the Beijing Winter Olympics earlier this year. Koo Sze-yiu, 75, had planned to carry a homemade wooden coffin to China’s Liaison Office in the city on

By Jessie Yeung and Shawn Deng, CNN A heat wave is sweeping through China, with residents resorting to air raid shelters and public fountains to stay cool, as 84 cities across the country on Wednesday issued their highest-level red alert warnings. A red alert means temperatures are expected to reach over 40 degrees Celsius (104

By Iqbal Athas, Rukshana Rizwie, Tara John and Hannah Ritchie, CNN Sri Lanka’s political and economic crisis escalated as protesters stormed the prime minister’s office on Wednesday, demanding the country’s leaders step down after President Gotabaya Rajapaksa fled to the Maldives without resigning. Rajapaksa had been expected to formally resign Wednesday but instead left the

By Rhea Mogul and Jessie Yeung, CNN Family and close friends attended the funeral of former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in Tokyo on Tuesday, with crowds gathering on the streets of the capital to pay their last respects, four days after the shock of his assassination reverberated across the world. The private funeral was