Asia (except ME & Indian SC)

BEIJING/SHANGHAI, Dec 23 (Reuters) - China is expecting a peak in COVID-19 infections within a week, a health official said, with authorities predicting extra strain on the country's health system even as they downplay the disease's severity and continue to report no new deaths.

In the face of a surging outbreak and widespread protests against its "zero-COVID" regime of lockdowns and testing, China began dismantling it this month, becoming the last major country to move towards living with the virus.

KATHMANDU, Dec 23 (Reuters) - Charles Sobhraj, a convicted killer who police say is responsible for a string of murders in the 1970s and 1980s, was released from a Nepal prison on Friday after nearly two decades behind bars.

The 78-year-old French national is suspected of killing more than 20 Western backpackers on the "hippie trail" through Asia, usually by drugging their food or drink in the course of robbing them.

He left Nepal early on Friday evening on a regular flight to Doha en route to Paris, said Katak Rawal, a Kathmandu airport official.

SINGAPORE, Dec. 23 (Xinhua) -- Singapore reported 1,073 new cases of COVID-19 on Friday, bringing the total tally to 2,194,963.

A total of 99 cases are currently warded in hospitals, with five of them held in intensive care units, according to statistics released by the Ministry of Health.

No new deaths from COVID-19 were reported on Friday, leaving the total death toll unchanged at 1,710.

KUALA LUMPUR, Dec. 23 (Xinhua) -- Malaysia's inflation rate, as measured by the consumer price index (CPI), remained unchanged at 4 percent in November, official data showed Friday.

Inflation for the food group increased 7.3 percent and remained as the main contributor to the rise in the inflation for the month, the Department of Statistics Malaysia said in a statement.

Meanwhile, restaurants and hotels inflation edged up to 7 percent as against 6.8 percent in October.

TOKYO, Dec. 23 (Xinhua) -- Japan posted a record 371 coronavirus-related deaths on Friday as the country faced an eighth wave of infections ahead of the holiday season.

The number marked the highest daily figure since the pandemic began in Japan, compared to the previous high of 347 reported on Sept. 2 during the seventh wave, according to the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare.

Among prefectures, Kanagawa on Friday reported the highest number of coronavirus-related deaths with 28, followed by Hokkaido with 25, Tokyo with 24, and Osaka with 19.

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — North Korea fired two short-range ballistic missiles toward its eastern waters on Friday, its latest weapons demonstration that came days after U.S. and South Korean warplanes conducted joint drills that North Korea views as an invasion rehearsal.

BAZHOU, China (AP) — Nearly three years after it was first identified in China, the coronavirus is now spreading through the vast country. Experts predict difficult months ahead for its 1.4 billion people.

China’s unyielding “zero-COVID” approach, which aimed to isolate all infected people, bought it years to prepare for the disease. But an abrupt reopening, which was announced without warning on Dec. 7 in the wake of anti-lockdown protests, has caught the nation under-vaccinated and short on hospital capacity.

TOKYO/BEIJING, Dec 22 (Reuters) - The government in Tokyo is investigating a report that China has set up covert police stations inside Japan, amid similar checks by authorities in European countries, the United States and Canada.

Safeguard Defenders, an Asia-focused rights group based in Spain, has published two reports since September alleging that Chinese authorities have established 102 overseas police stations in 53 countries, including Japan.

China has dismissed the allegations and on Thursday its foreign ministry denied that such police stations existed.

TAIPEI, Dec 22 (Reuters) - Taiwan scrambled combat jets to warn away 39 Chinese aircraft that entered its southeastern air defence zone, the island's defence ministry said on Thursday.

Taiwan has complained of repeated missions by the Chinese air force over the last two years, often in southern areas of its air defence identification zone, or ADIZ.

SHANGHAI/BEIJING, Dec 22 (Reuters) - A Shanghai hospital has told its staff to prepare for a "tragic battle" with COVID-19 as it expects half of the city's 25 million people will get infected by the end of next week, while the virus sweeps through China largely unchecked.

After widespread protests against strict mitigation measures, China this month began dismantling its "zero-COVID" regime, which had taken a great financial and psychological toll on its 1.4 billion people.