India’s capital Delhi has been pegged as the fastest growing city in Asia, ahead of Chinese cities like Shanghai, Beijing and Shenzhen. The city’s economy is projected to be almost 50 per cent larger in 2021 than in late 2016. Besides Delhi, other Indian cities also feature in the list of fastest growing Asian cities, as per a study by Oxford Economics.

The average annual GDP growth to 2021 has been forecast between six-eight per cent for Delhi, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Chennai and Bangalore in India. Among Chinese cities, Beijing, Guangzhou, Tianjin and Shanghai are the top rated cities in terms of rate of growth. But overall China’s expansion will slow.

Delhi will surpass the fastest growing Chinese city Tianjin by almost two per cent as the Indian capital is projected to grow at 8.5 per cent a year, compared to Tianjin’s 6.4 percent growth rate.

The only two cities outside India and China which feature in the list are Manila and Ho Chi Minh City.

The other Asian c ​ities  with growth rate of four to six per cent are Jakarta and Kuala Lumpur.

Brisbane, Singapore, Bangkok, Hong Kong, Seoul and Taipei figure in the list of the cities projected to witness two- four per cent growth.

Some of these cities like Singapore and Hong Kong are already known for being among the most expensive cities in Asia, with sky high property rates.

Japanese cities like Tokyo, Yokohama and Osaka, which are currently facing demographic challenges and a shrinking pool of working population, are likely to remain at the bottom, Osaka last in the rankings as its working-age population is shrinking.

The Fisheries Agency investigation will use an underwater camera to check the condition of the coral off the southern island of Kyushu.

It also aims to find evidence such as traces of fishing nets possibly used for poaching precious coral, an official said.

Precious coral, a species of coral which is usually red, pink or white in colour, and takes years to grow, is popular in parts of Asia for use in ornaments and for jewellery.

In 2014, the Japan Coast Guard reported a surge in the number of Chinese boats fishing for coral in Japanese territorial waters, prompting a similar study the following year near the southern Ogasawara islands and Okinawa.

Authorities now fear the alleged poachers may have shifted to the Kyushu coast.

“We no longer see many Chinese poachers like we used to near the Ogasawara islands, but we’re carrying out the study as we have still spotted some ships” near Kyushu, the official told AFP.

The study will take place off the western coast of the southern island of Kyushu until September 4.

To counter coral poaching, the government in 2014 revised laws on illegal fishing in the country’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ) and tripled the maximum fines to 30 million yen ($270,000).

Last month, Japan arrested a Chinese skipper off Nagasaki prefecture for allegedly violating the fisheries law after precious coral was found his ship, according to the agency.

As the 20th anniversary of her death on August 31 approaches, the brothers have opened up for the first time about their mother, her life, and her impact on them and on the causes she championed.

William was 15 and Harry 12 when Diana died in a car crash in Paris in 1997.

How deeply their loss affected them is something they have only recently begun to discuss.

“Twenty years on, Harry and I felt that it was an appropriate time to open up a bit more about our mother,” William said.

“We won’t speak as openly or publicly about her again.”

This file photo taken on August 19, 1995 shows Britain’s Diana, Princess of Wales (L), and her sons Prince Harry, (C) and Prince William, as they gather for the commemorations of VJ Day in London. 

The pair featured in a 90-minute programme entitled “Diana, Our Mother: Her Life and Legacy” broadcast by British channel ITV earlier this year.

“This is the first time that the two of us have ever spoken about her as a mother. Arguably, probably a little bit too raw up until this point. It’s still raw,” said Harry.

Harry recently revealed that he sought help in the last few years as he struggled to deal with his suppressed grief.

 – Celebrating Diana’s life –

In 2007, the princes staged a benefit concert at Wembley Stadium and a memorial service at which Harry gave a tribute.

But this year marks the first time that the brothers have spoken in such emotional depth.

In an interview with Newsweek magazine, Harry opened up about the trauma of having to walk behind his mother’s coffin through London for her funeral.

“I don’t think any child should be asked to do that, under any circumstances. I don’t think it would happen today,” he said.

In those tense days 20 years ago, many Britons voiced anger at a perceived lack of empathy from the royal establishment.

Some feel the royals have been happy to see Diana replaced in the limelight.

Patrick Jephson, Diana’s former private secretary, said the princess had been airbrushed out.

“There had been a period since her death during which the royal establishment has been uncertain how to treat the memory of Diana,” he told AFP.

“For much of the last two decades she has been the name that cannot be spoken in royal circles.

“Therefore it is with a note of slight defiance and determination that her children have said ‘no, there’s lots of good to remember, let’s celebrate her life’.”

– Kensington statue planned –

The brothers have commissioned a statue of Diana which will go in the public grounds of Kensington Palace, their home which was also their mother’s base.

A garden has been created at the London palace in her honour.

The princes also attended a private service on July 1 to rededicate their mother’s grave at her ancestral home on what would have been her 56th birthday.

Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, the spiritual leader of the world’s Anglicans, officiated at the grave, to which the public does not have access.

In their royal duties, William, 35, and Harry, 32, have also taken up the baton for their mother’s causes.

Diana’s visit to a minefield in Angola helped the movement towards the 1997 landmine ban treaty.

In the 1980s, during bedside visits to Aids patients, she made a point making physical contact. It was a remarkable gesture at the time that helped break down the stigma attached to the disease.

Harry’s push on landmine clearance and HIV testing are directly aimed at continuing his mother’s campaigns, as is William’s work with homeless shelters and on child bereavement.

Their joint work on mental health — which saw Harry reveal his need for treatment to cope with the trauma of her death — also touches a cause Diana championed.

Harry said the princes wondered what Diana would be doing now were she still alive.

“There’s not a day that William and I don’t wish that she was still around. We wonder what kind of a mother she would be now and what kind of a public role she would have and what a difference she would be making,” he said.

Jephson said Diana’s greatest legacy was her sons themselves.

He said: “We can see in them many of the attributes that she had — principally her ability to combine royalty with the common touch.”

 The men, identified in Dutch media reports as Martin van de B., 31 and Mathijs IJ, 24, briefly appeared before a judge at the Overijssel District Court in the central Dutch city of Zwolle, in a hearing that was closed to the public.

“The judge decided that there is currently enough suspicion to keep the men in custody,” the court said in a statement.

“The public prosecution service suspects the two managers of a disinfection company of using fipronil at poultry farms in the Netherlands,” it said.

“Thereby they endangered public health, and there are suspicions they knew that the biocide was banned,” the court said.

The two men were arrested Thursday as agents raided eight premises — including the two men’s company, Chickfriend — in the Netherlands as well as in Belgium.

Dutch farmers and retailers this week began counting the costs stemming from fipronil scandal, which has now affected 17 European countries and stretched as far as Hong Kong.

Initial damages to poultry farms were estimated at at least 150 million euros ($175 million), a spokesman for the ZLTO federation of southern Dutch farmers and gardeners said Monday.

Millions of eggs have been pulled from supermarket shelves and destroyed across Europe and dozens of poultry farms closed since the discovery of contamination with fipronil, which can harm human health, was made public on August 1.

This photo shows egg shells left over as Members of the World Brotherhood of the Huge Omelet create a 6500 egg omelet in Malmedy on August 15, 2017. 

Commonly used to get rid of fleas, lice and ticks from animals, fipronil is banned by the European Union from use in the food industry.

The issue has sparked a row between Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany, the three countries at the centre of the crisis, about how long officials knew about the problem.

Belgium became the first country to officially notify the EU’s food safety alert system about the presence of tainted eggs on July 20, followed by the Netherlands and Germany.

The EU insists there is no threat to humans, but the World Health Organization says that when ingested in large quantities fipronil can harm people’s kidneys, liver and thyroid glands.

Members of the World Brotherhood of the Huge Omelet crack eggs to create a 6500 egg omelet on August 15, 2017 in Malmedy. 

Addressing the media in the Regent hilltop community of Freetown, one of the areas hit hardest by a mudslide that has destroyed homes, Koroma fought back tears as he said the devastation “was overwhelming us”.

“Entire communities have been wiped out,” Koroma said at the disaster site, where heavy rains streaming down the hillside engulfed homes three or four stories high on Monday, many of them built illegally.

The Red Cross has said it was struggling to bring enough equipment to the site to excavate those buried deeply in the mud, but several bodies were extracted by available machinery at the site on Tuesday morning, according to an AFP journalist at the scene.

In Nepal, severe flooding has left tens of thousands of homes totally underwater in the populous southern lowlands, with nearly 20 per cent of the population affected.

“As per the data we have received so far, 111 have been killed, 35 are still missing and a search operation is underway,” Home Minister Janardan Sharma told parliament Tuesday.

A third of neighbouring Bangladesh is flooded, with at least 29 dead as relentless monsoon rains pound the densely-populated riverine country.

“Another 1.5 million people have been marooned,” Reaz Ahmed, head of Bangladesh’s disaster management department told AFP.

Almost 1,200 shelters have been erected across Bangladesh, while the army has been deployed to reinforce weakened river embankments and to assist with search and rescue operations.

In the border district of Lalmonirhat, roughly 600 Indian nationals took shelter in Bangladeshi villages along with their stricken livestock, the district’s government administrator Shafiul Atif told AFP.

India has also suffered from torrential downpours and flash flooding, worsening a monsoon that has already claimed lives.

At least 81 people have died in the eastern states of Bihar and West Bengal, and northeastern Assam state, over the last few days, a government official told AFP on Tuesday.

Train services have been cut entirely to the northeast, and at least 200,000 people are living in emergency camps in Assam, a remote state that suffers frequent flooding during the annual rains.

In Nepal, residents in hard-hit Saptari district blamed the government for failing to solve the seasonal floods and quickly send aid to those in need.

“Many have lost their homes. Families don’t have food or shelter. We are just helping each other,” said local resident Pankaj Mishra.

“What we need is for the government to solve this problem. We have been suffering for decades every year. The river troubles us every year.”

Kathmandu has been criticised for enacting a “one-door” policy requiring all aid for flood victims to flow through a government-run central disaster agency.

The diktat threatens to delay the delivery of relief supplies say volunteers and aid agencies, which have warned Nepal faces a humanitarian crisis if food and water does not reach the worst-affected areas.

“Unless there is an effective model of rescue and relief operation, one-door policy will only kill or aggravate the situation,” said local volunteer Arpan Shrestha.

Some analysts suggested Kim’s comments opened a possible path to de-escalating a growing crisis fuelled by bellicose words between US President Donald Trump and the North Korean leadership.

Their recent exchanges were focused on a North Korean threat to fire a volley of four missiles over Japan towards the US territory of Guam, which hosts a number of strategic military bases.

The North’s official KCNA news agency said Kim was briefed on the “plan for an enveloping fire at Guam” during an inspection on Monday of the Strategic Force command in charge of the nuclear-armed state’s missile units.

But Kim said he would “watch a little more the foolish and stupid conduct of the Yankees” before executing any order.

If they “persist in their extremely dangerous reckless actions on the Korean peninsula,” then North Korea would take action “as already declared,” he was quoted as saying.

“In order to defuse the tensions and prevent the dangerous military conflict on the Korean peninsula, it is necessary for the US to make a proper option first,” he added.

China said Tuesday that the North Korean nuclear crisis had reached a “turning point” and it was time to enter peace talks.

Beijing, which is Pyongyang’s main diplomatic ally, has repeatedly called on the United States and North Korea to tone down their rhetoric in recent days.

“We now hope that all the concerned parties, in what they say and what they do, can contribute to extinguishing the fire (of the tense situation), rather than adding fuel to the fire,” foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said.

– ‘De-escalating’ –

The remarks from Pyongyang would appear to bring into play the large-scale military exercises held every year by South Korea and the United States that are expected to kick off later this month.

The North has always denounced the drills as provocative rehearsals for invasion and has in the past offered a moratorium on further nuclear and missile testing in exchange for their cancellation — a trade-off promoted by Beijing, but repeatedly rejected by Washington and Seoul.

Some analysts said Kim was seeking a similar quid-pro-quo this time around, using the Guam missile threat as leverage.

“This is a direct invitation to talk reciprocal constraints on exercises and missile launches,” said Adam Mount, senior fellow at the Center for American Progress.

John Delury of Yonsei University in Seoul said Kim was “de-escalating, putting Guam plan on ice” — at least for now.

The United States and South Korea insist their annual joint exercises are purely defensive, and cannot be linked to the North’s missile programme, which violates a host of UN resolutions.

North Korea Tuesday also appeared to link the fate of its US prisoners to ongoing tensions, saying now is not the right time to discuss their release.

Three Americans, accused of various crimes against the state, are behind bars in the hermit nation.

– ‘Fire and fury’ –

The North Korean announcement prompted joy in Guam, where officials described themselves as “almost ecstatic that Kim Jong-Un has backed off”.

Tensions have been mounting since the North tested two intercontinental ballistic missiles last month, which appeared to bring much of the US within range.

Responding to the tests, US President Donald Trump warned Pyongyang of “fire and fury like the world has never seen”, while the North responded with the Guam threat.

South Korean President Moon Jae-In weighed in on Tuesday, saying Seoul would avoid a second Korean War at all costs and “no one may decide to take military action without the consent of the Republic of Korea”.

But he added there could be no dialogue before the North halts its “nuclear and missile provocations”.

Moon’s comments came after US Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson penned an opinion piece in the The Wall Street Journal insisting that America has “no interest” in regime change in Pyongyang.

“We do not seek an excuse to garrison US troops north of the Demilitarized Zone,” they wrote. “We have no desire to inflict harm on the long-suffering North Korean people, who are distinct from the hostile regime in Pyongyang.”

Mattis and Tillerson called on China, which is North Korea’s main trading partner, to take advantage of an “unparalleled opportunity” to assert its influence on Pyongyang, and bring its errant neighbour to heel.

President Donald Trump’s decision to order the investigation comes on top of strains between the two nations over how to handle Beijing’s ally North Korea.

Trump on Monday signed a memorandum directing US Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer to determine whether Chinese policies hurt American investors or companies — with retaliatory measures a possible outcome.

“We will stand up to any country that unlawfully forces American companies to transfer their valuable technology as a condition of market access. We will combat the counterfeiting and piracy that destroys American jobs,” Trump said.

“Washington will turn a blind eye no longer,” Trump said, vowing to safeguard copyrights, patents and other intellectual property that are “vital to our security and to our prosperity”.

The president said the US would no longer tolerate Beijing’s “theft” of US industrial secrets, long a concern of major foreign corporations seeking a share of the huge Chinese market.

“We will engage in a thorough investigation and, if needed, take action to preserve the future of US industry,” Lighthizer said.

China’s commerce ministry issued a statement voicing “serious concern” and warning that any US trade protectionism “will definitely harm bilateral trade relations”.

“If the US side take actions that impair the mutual trade relations, disregarding the facts and disrespecting multilateral trade rules, China will not sit idle,” the statement said.

The ministry said the country “is definitely going to adopt all appropriate measures to vigorously defend the lawful rights and interest of China.”

The United States is China’s second-largest trading partner after the European Union, but Washington and Beijing have seen their relations grow increasingly fraught since a promising summit between Trump and China’s Xi Jinping in April.

Multiple trade disputes

The new intellectual property inquiry joins numerous investigations launched by Washington into Chinese trade practices, notably those concerning steel and aluminum and their national security consequences, which the Trump administration began earlier this year.

However, the start of a US probe will not immediately result in open confrontation.

Lighthizer will first need to reach a preliminary finding of unfair practices by China before opening a formal investigation, which could take as much as a year, administration officials said.

The Chinese commerce ministry said the country has “always been paying high attention to intellectual property right protection, continuously perfecting the legislation”, and that the progress it has made on that front is “obvious to all”.

Yang Zhao, chief China economist at Nomura research firm, said a US tariff penalty would only cause minor impacts on the Chinese economy and fall short of a full blown trade war.

“The decision to launch this probe may raise the risk of tit-for-tat trade protectionism,” Zhao said in a note.

“But we believe the Trump administration’s strategy is more likely to be one that looks to raise its bargaining power to reach a better longer-lasting solution over the start of, or the threat of, a real trade war.”

Since launching his successful run for the White House and then taking office, Trump has frequently accused China of undermining the US economy.

The bilateral US trade deficit with China approached $350 billion in 2016, and Trump has repeatedly blamed Chinese imports for gutting employment in US sectors such as steel.

Last week, Washington announced preliminary sanctions against Chinese imports of aluminium foil. But so far, the US has not imposed heavier trade measures on Chinese goods.

North Korea a bargaining chip?

On Thursday, Trump reiterated the suggestion that he could soften his position on trade if Beijing were to do more to help rein in nuclear-armed North Korea.

China said it would halt iron, iron ore and seafood imports from North Korea starting Tuesday, in accordance with new UN sanctions that Beijing voted to approve.

US administration officials, however, have denied any link between the latest trade action and Pyongyang’s nuclear ambitions.

Beijing echoed this view Monday, with the foreign ministry saying the two matters were “totally different.”

Despite Monday’s expected action, Trump has so far refrained from making good on threats of retaliatory trade measures against China.

This includes in particular concerns over Beijing’s requirement that foreign companies establish local joint ventures. According to Washington, this can mean surrendering technological know-how to Chinese partners.//AFP

Philippine authorities announced on Monday that they would suspend Uber for one month for failing to have the proper permits to license its drivers.

Uber initially obeyed the order and shut down its app on Tuesday morning, triggering anger from commuters who lashed out at the government for taking away what had become a trusted alternative to notoriously bad public transport.

But on Tuesday afternoon Uber relaunched the app, telling commuters via Twitter that it had launched a legal appeal and would continue operations until the dispute was settled.

In its motion for reconsideration to the transport authority, it said the suspension was a “blatant violation of USI’s (Uber’s) right to due process”.

The government replied immediately, saying the suspension was still in force and threatening to arrest Uber drivers who violated it.

“The order stands,” said Aileen Lizada, spokeswoman of the transport authority.

“Uber is online again, let us apprehend,” she told reporters, narrating her order to traffic enforcers.

Uber officially launched in Manila in 2014 and the service was later rolled out to a few provincial cities.

The transport authority requires Uber to get permits for its drivers and vehicles, in the same way taxi companies must. However, Uber insists the drivers are independent contractors and thus do not have to get the permits.

The dispute is Uber’s latest hurdle in Asia, where it also faced a two-month in hiatus in Taiwan this year. It has operated illegally in Thailand since 2014, though law enforcement has been patchy, with roughly 1.5 million people downloading the app.

The firm is currently lobbying for a tweak to the decades-old motor law to allow ride-sharing apps in the kingdom.

The Philippines suspension enraged many local commuters who find Uber and similar companies a better alternative to taxi drivers, who often demand higher fares than what is on their metres, decline to pick up customers and drive shoddy vehicles.

“To the LTFRB, quit being scumbags and open your eyes to what people need,” Twitter user @sodachar said in reference to the transport authority.

Politicians also weighed in.

“The decision of the LTFRB to suspend Uber is both cruel and absurd,” said Senator Grace Poe, who heads the upper chamber’s transport committee.

Uber has 66,000 drivers in the Philippines, company representatives told a Senate hearing this month.

President Rodrigo Duterte’s spokesman on Tuesday defended the transport authority’s decision.

“We affirm the positive and beneficial service offered by the transport network companies. However as per LTFRB, Uber Systems unduly challenged its rules and instructions,” Ernesto Abella said told reporters.

Several concerned listeners were reported to have called police after the stations triggered the Emergency Alert Broadcast System, issuing “a civil danger” warning at 12:25 am that was later confirmed to be a mistake.

North Korea had said it would finalise plans by mid-August on whether to fire missiles at Guam in response to “fire and fury” threats from US President Donald Trump.

But Pyongyang’s official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) on Tuesday reported that Kim had examined the plans but made no move towards an immediate strike.

“Residents and visitors are reminded to remain calm,” said Guam’s homeland security adviser George Charfauros.

“There is no change in threat level, we continue business as usual.”

Homeland Security confirmed in a statement that the “unauthorised test was not connected to any emergency, threat or warning” and it was working with the radio stations “to ensure the human error will not occur again”.

Kim on Tuesday hinted he would hold off on the missile strike, saying he would “watch a little more the foolish and stupid conduct of the Yankees spending a hard time of every minute of their miserable lot”.