In the first round of Brazil’s elections on Oct. 4, 2026, Flávio Bolsonaro, of the right wing Liberal Party (PL), came in first with 47.03% of the valid votes, compared with 45.16% for the current leftist president and Workers’ Party (PT) candidate, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. The margin was just over 2.2 million votes, […]

The post JD Vance-founded, Korea-tied firm now influencing Brazil election appeared first on Asia Times.

Reports that SpaceX temporarily restricted its satellite internet service for Ukraine’s armed forces have generated serious concern in Kyiv and among the country’s allies. SpaceX operates the civilian Starlink system and its lesser-known military-grade counterpart, called Starshield. But many news stories leave an important question unanswered: what does a Starshield “slowdown” mean on the battlefield? […]

The post Why Starshield’s slowdown really hurts Ukraine appeared first on Asia Times.

Successive Australian governments have reacted with alarm at China’s influence-building activities in Southeast Asia and the Pacific. They have passed foreign interference laws, tightened foreign investment regulations, and regulated university collaborations with institutions overseas. They have executed a Pacific Step-Up and a plan for greater trade and investment with Southeast Asia. And they have tightened […]

The post What Australia could learn from SE Asia about managing China appeared first on Asia Times.

In recent days, a Ukrainian drone strike hit Russia’s largest data center, owned by bank and technology company Sberbank. The strike came after Ukraine hit three data centers belonging to the tech giant Yandex, which is often referred to as “Russia’s Google.” After those attacks, Yandex’s traffic dropped 94%. Its users experienced heavy disruption to […]

The post Data centers in the line of fire of Ukraine war appeared first on Asia Times.

More than 25,000 police officers were deployed across New Delhi recently to prevent demonstrations led by India’s new youth-led political movement, the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP). Government authorities had denied the CJP permission to protest on public-order grounds. The ensuing security operation saw the authorities shut one in six metro stations in the capital, barricade […]

The post Can a cockroach movement reverse India’s democratic decline? appeared first on Asia Times.

The Australian government has introduced its digital duty of care legislation to parliament today. The bill includes an “off switch” to allow social media users to opt out of recommender algorithms. If passed, Australians could choose to switch off their algorithmic recommendation and consume a news feed populated by the accounts they subscribe to. It’s […]

The post China previews a world where the algorithm is switched off appeared first on Asia Times.

The drone has become the signature weapon of the Russo-Ukraine war. On any day in Ukraine, tens of thousands of drones are out hunting the battlefield for targets. These could be individual enemy soldiers or vehicles, or they could be larger targets such as depots, headquarters, bridges or power plants. Yet, this drone war has […]

The post When the US slows down Starlink in Ukraine appeared first on Asia Times.

The Earth got its Moon when a small planet collided with our planet more than four billion years ago. This impact hurled molten rock into space, which eventually coalesced to form the satellite we can see every night from across our planet. But what of our neighbor, Mars? The Red Planet has two small, irregularly […]

The post Japan’s MMX space mission probes how Mars got its moons appeared first on Asia Times.

American audiences will be able to watch an English-dubbed version of “Ramayana,” a Hindi film based on a South Asian epic tradition, in theaters in November 2026. The Sanskrit “Ramayana,” or “Journey of Rama,” is an epic poem that was composed sometime between 400 BCE and 400 CE. The epic follows Rama, an exiled prince […]

The post How Hollywood films have reimagined the South Asian epic Ramayana appeared first on Asia Times.

Russia’s drone and missile attacks on Ukraine’s population and infrastructure continue to dominate coverage of the conflict. But on the ground, Ukraine has been making significant, if still limited, gains. In mid-September, Ukraine formally announced the existence of Operation Vivaldi, which has retaken territory near Lyman and disrupted a Russian advance toward the fortified cities […]

The post Operation Vivaldi: Ukrainian gain on a drone-filled battlefield appeared first on Asia Times.

Two giant pandas recently landed in Atlanta, a week after Donald Trump and Xi Jinping met in Washington. The summit produced no immediate breakthrough on trade deals, Taiwan or AI, but it did produce something cuddly for the American public: a pair of giant pandas, Ping Ping and Fu Shuang, which are on a ten-year […]

The post How Beijing combines conservation and trade in panda diplomacy appeared first on Asia Times.

The deal struck by Donald Trump with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, on October 9 to allow Russia to sell millions of tonnes of diesel is a major departure from US policy and runs counter to Ukrainian and European interests. It also directly contradicts a law signed by the US president in September to authorize […]

The post Trump aligns with Putin yet again, squeezing Ukraine and Europe appeared first on Asia Times.

When people think about what ChatGPT or other large language models are doing behind the scenes, it’s common to reach for the language of computing. You might assume there is a database, or a logical series of steps being executed, in order to provide a response to your query. Picturing AI responses as akin to […]

The post Mind games: AI behaves more like a brain than a database appeared first on Asia Times.

The Middle East has seen many explosions of violence in recent years. But while the US-Iran war has grabbed the headlines this year, the rapidly escalating conflict between the Houthis and Yemen’s internationally recognized government and Saudi Arabia risks becoming just as consequential for the region. The complexity of Yemen’s internal conflict cannot be underestimated. […]

The post How Yemen’s renewed civil war could set the whole region ablaze appeared first on Asia Times.

The apparent attempted hijacking of a Flydubai flight carrying 170 mostly Israeli passengers was another reminder to Israelis of the constant threat of terror and war. Only the bravery of the chief pilot and passengers prevented a major disaster. A few hours earlier, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu released a video warning of attempts to harm […]

The post Flydubai attack feeds Netanyahu’s ‘protector’ line as polls near appeared first on Asia Times.

The air war between Russia and Ukraine has evolved constantly since the start of the conflict. The latest example is Russia’s deployment of a new type of long-range, jet-powered drone, which is having a significant effect on Ukraine’s ability to defend its cities against aerial attack. In an interview on September 14, Ukrainian Air Force […]

The post Russia’s jet-powered drones mark a deadly evolution in Ukraine war appeared first on Asia Times.

The global bond markets are a sensitive lot. And they’ve been having a particularly tricky time lately. Spooked by high inflation, high interest rates and high levels of government debt across the world, those markets have become less stable over the summer. The prices of government bonds – what governments sell to investors – have gone down. […]

The post Blame AI for global bond market tremors appeared first on Asia Times.

When Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Pakistan agreed to a mutual defense pact in August, it was principally seen as a political commitment. The “Mecca alliance,” as it was dubbed, stipulated that an armed attack on one would be treated as an attack on all three, accompanied by deeper military cooperation. That pact is no longer […]

The post Baptism of Houthi fire for Mecca mutual defense pact appeared first on Asia Times.

In a recent phone call, Donald Trump urged Volodymyr Zelensky to stop Ukrainian attacks on Russian oil refineries. Whether a request or a demand, this appears, certainly at first glance, fundamentally different from the Biden administration’s policy of restricting the use of US long-range missiles to hit targets inside Russia. The US president has justified […]

The post Trump’s bid to stop Ukraine’s Russia strikes a strategic disconnect appeared first on Asia Times.

Less than two months after his government hosted the NATO summit — which was framed as proof of Turkey’s pivotal role in transatlantic security — President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has proposed full Turkish membership in the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, an entity that has been described as being anti-NATO or a “rogue NATO.” The apparent contradiction […]

The post Erdogan playing East and West, winning room to maneuver appeared first on Asia Times.