PHILIPPINES
The approval and trust rating of Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. suffered a drastic decline in March, according to the results of a survey by Pulse Asia Research, Incorporated. Based on data collected from 23 to 29 March and released today, the consensus stood at a meagre 25% approval rating, with 53% of Filipino adults disapproving of his actions and 22% declaring themselves undecided. This is a drop of 17 percentage points compared to the 42% approval rating of the previous month. Between the two surveys, former President Rodrigo Duterte was arrested with the political repercussions that followed.
HONG KONG – UNITED STATES
Hong Kong Post will stop accepting parcels for delivery to the United States. The suspension comes as the United States prepares to increase tariffs on postal items from Hong Kong and China starting on 2 May, according to an executive order signed by Trump. The order eliminates the ‘de minimis’ exemption that exempts small packages valued at less than $800 from duties.
MALAYSIA - VIETNAM - CHINA
Chinese President Xi Jinping arrived in Kuala Lumpur yesterday, where he was received by Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim. This is the second stop on his tour of Southeast Asia, after Vietnam, and the last stop will be Cambodia. On the table is the escalation of the trade war with the United States triggered by US President Donald Trump's tariffs. The signing of memoranda of understanding and bilateral agreements with the head of government is scheduled for this afternoon.
INDIA
The opposition leader Rahul Gandhi and his mother Sonia, senior members of the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty, are accused of money laundering by the financial crime agency, the Enforcement Directorate (Editor's note). The Gandhis - who deny the charges - are alleged to have set up a shell company to appropriate 300 million dollars belonging to a company that published the newspaper National Herald. The Congress talks of a ‘policy of revenge and intimidation’.
CHINA - TIBET
The Chinese authorities have interrogated and arrested the Tibetans ‘guilty’ of having published photos and messages on the internet to honour the memory of the Buddhist leader Tulku Hungkar Dorje , who died at the age of 56 while in custody in Vietnam. In addition, officials from Gade County, Golog Prefecture, Qinghai Province have placed the monastery under surveillance.
IRAN - UNITED STATES
Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei said yesterday that he was neither ‘overly optimistic nor pessimistic’ about the talks with the United States on the nuclear programme. This is a move by Tehran to meet the growing public expectations for an agreement. After last weekend's talks between Tehran and Washington, which both sides described as positive, expectations have risen. The two sides agreed to hold further meetings on 19 April, again in Oman.
RUSSIA
In the Siberian region of Kemerovo, the number of underage girls who have become pregnant has increased by a third over the last year, as reported by the local children's rights officer Valentina Bogatenko. There are 515 girls under the age of 18, including four under the age of 15, compared to 388 in 2023. Furthermore, the regional authorities have decided to further increase the compensation for the pregnancies of female students with sums of up to 100 thousand roubles (almost one thousand euros).
ARMENIA - TURKEY
The ‘torchlight procession’ will be organised again this year in Yerevan on 23 April, in memory of the 110th anniversary of the Armenian genocide in the Ottoman Empire. An initiative of the Arfd youth union and the ‘Nikol Agbanyan’ student association, to symbolically insist on the international recognition and condemnation of the genocide ‘against any attempt to deny and forget it’.
