Top Asian News 3:30 a.m. GMT

Vietnam’s top security official To Lam confirmed as president

BANGKOK (AP) — Vietnam’s top security official To Lam was confirmed Wednesday as the nation’s new president. He oversaw police and intelligence operations over a period when rights groups say basic liberties have been systematically suppressed, and its secret service was accused of violating international law. Lam was confirmed by Vietnam’s National Assembly after his predecessor resigned amid an ongoing anti-corruption campaign that has shaken the country’s political establishment and business elites and has resulted in multiple top-level changes in government. Vietnam’s presidency is largely ceremonial, but his new role as head of state puts the 66-year-old in a “very strong position” to become the next Communist Party general secretary, the most important political position in the country, said Nguyen Khac Giang, an analyst at Singapore’s ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute.

Australia and New Zealand evacuate scores of their citizens from New Caledonia

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — The Australian military had flown 115 passengers in two flights from the restive French Pacific territory of New Caledonia and would continue to work with France to repatriate all Australians who want to leave, an Australian government minister said Wednesday. Australian citizens accounted for 84 of the passengers who were flown in two Royal Australian Airforce C-130 Hercules from the capital Noumea to the Australian east coast city of Brisbane late Tuesday, Pacific Minister Pat Conroy said. Conroy did not say what nationalities were among the remaining 31 passengers. But he said Australia had reciprocal arrangements with Canada and Japan to help their citizens in crises.

Severe turbulence during Singapore Airlines flight leaves several people badly injured. One man died

BANGKOK (AP) — A Singapore Airlines flight hit severe turbulence over the Indian Ocean and descended 6,000 feet (around 1,800 meters) in about three minutes, the carrier said Tuesday. A British man died and authorities said dozens of passengers were injured, some severely. An airport official said the 73-year-old man may have had a heart attack, though that hadn’t been confirmed. His name wasn’t immediately released. The Boeing 777 flight from London’s Heathrow airport to Singapore, with 211 passengers and 18 crew members aboard, was diverted and landed in stormy weather in Bangkok. British passenger Andrew Davies told Sky News that the seatbelt sign was illuminated but crew members didn’t have time to take their seats.

Resigned to a fate of constant displacement, India’s river islanders return home in between floods

MORIGAON, India (AP) — Yaad Ali is dreading the rainy season’s arrival this year. The 56-year-old farmer from northeastern India’s Assam state lives with his wife and son on Sandahkhaiti island on India’s Brahmaputra River. The island, like two thousand others on the river, floods with increasing ferocity and unpredictability as human-caused climate change makes rain heavier and more erratic in the region. The family move away with every flood, and move back to their house every dry season. Ali said politicians in the region have made promises to provide relief for them, including during the current election, but little has changed for his family.

Indian voters dissect Modi’s politics while traversing the country by train

ABOARD THE THIRUKKURAL EXPRESS, India (AP) — The 1,800-mile (2,900-kilometer) journey south from New Delhi to Kanyakumari is one of the longest train rides in India, passing through cities, villages, scrub forests and deep ravines. The 22-car Thirukkural Express is a microcosm of India, carrying passengers from different castes and religions and with wide-ranging ambitions and grievances — from migrants crammed into sweltering no-frills cars to well-heeled families luxuriating in air-conditioned sleeper cabins, and everyone in between. Passengers can also be divided by their politics, a topic that is top of mind with a consequential election underway. The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party is likely to win and reappoint Prime Minister Narendra Modi — the leader for the past decade — for another five years.

A man charged with helping the Hong Kong intelligence service in the UK has been found dead

LONDON (AP) — A man charged with assisting Hong Kong authorities with gathering intelligence in the United Kingdom has died in unexplained circumstances, British police said Tuesday. Matthew Trickett, 37, was one of three men charged earlier this month with agreeing to engage in information gathering, surveillance and acts of deception that were likely to materially assist the Hong Kong intelligence service from late 2023 to May 2. Prosecutors also alleged that the men forced entry into a U.K. residential address on May 1. The men had all been bailed and were next due to appear at London’s Central Criminal Court for a hearing on Friday.

Judge dismisses felony convictions of 5 retired military officers in US Navy bribery case

SAN DIEGO (AP) — A federal judge on Tuesday dismissed the felony convictions of five retired military officers who had admitted to accepting bribes from a Malaysian contractor nicknamed “Fat Leonard” in one of the Navy’s biggest corruption cases. The dismissals came at the request of the government — not the defense — citing prosecutorial errors. Retired U.S. Navy officers Donald Hornbeck, Robert Gorsuch and Jose Luis Sanchez, and U.S. Marine Corps Col. Enrico DeGuzman pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of disclosing information on Tuesday, while U.S. Navy officer Stephen Shedd’s entire case was thrown out. Their defense lawyers could not be immediately reached for comment.

China is accelerating the forced urbanization of rural Tibetans, rights group says

TAIPEI, Taiwan (AP) — China is accelerating the forced urbanization of Tibetan villagers and herders, Human Rights Watch said, in an extensive report that adds to state government and independent reports of efforts to assimilate rural Tibetans through control over their language and traditional Buddhist culture. The international rights organization cited a trove of Chinese internal reports contradicting official pronouncements that all Tibetans who have been forced to move, with their past homes destroyed on departure, did so voluntary. The relocations fit a pattern of often-violent demands that ethnic minorities adopt the state language of Mandarin and pledge their fealty to the ruling Communist Party in western and northern territories that include millions of people from Tibetan, Xinjiang Uyghur, Mongolian and other minority groups.

Thailand welcomes home trafficked 1,000-year-old statues returned by New York’s Metropolitan Museum

BANGKOK (AP) — Thailand’s National Museum hosted a welcome-home ceremony Tuesday for two ancient statues that were illegally trafficked from Thailand by a British collector of antiquities and were returned from the collection of New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art. The objects — a tall bronze figure called the Standing Shiva or Golden Boy and a smaller sculpture called Kneeling Female — are thought to be around 1,000 years old. This most recent repatriation of artwork comes as many museums in the U.S. and Europe reckon with collections that contain objects looted from Asia, Africa and other places during centuries of colonialism or in times of upheaval.

No more cute snaps of Mount Fuji over a convenience store. A screen was built to stop tourist crowds

TOKYO (AP) — Sorry, the screen is now up — no more snapping cute photos of Mount Fuji from a popular sidewalk spot in the Japanese town of Fujikawaguchiko. Known as a place that offers some of the best views of the iconic Japanese mountain, the town last month started erecting a large black screen on a stretch of a street to block the view and deter tourists from overcrowding the place. A particularly popular photo location was outside a Lawson convenience store, from where a photograph taken at a particular angle would make it seem as if Mount Fuji was sitting atop the store roof.