Asia (except ME & Indian SC)

BANGKOK, Oct 27 (Reuters) - Thailand held a dry-run on Wednesday for its long-awaited, quarantine-free reopening to vaccinated travellers, as the country rushes to reboot an industry battered by an 18-month hiatus in international tourism.

At Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi airport, Thailand's main gateway, airport staff and health and immigration officials ran a simulation of the arrival of a plane full of visitors, to test out electronic screening measures.

TAIPEI, Oct 27 (Reuters) - Taiwan is not seeking to get into an arms race with China but does need to defend itself and will not submit to pressure, its defence ministry said in a report to parliament on Wednesday.

Tensions between Taiwan and China, which claims the democratically-governed island as its own territory, have spiked over the past year as Beijing ups its military and political pressure to force Taipei to accept Chinese sovereignty.

BANDAR SERI BEGAWAN, Oct 27 (Reuters) - President Joe Biden said on Wednesday the United States would stand with Southeast Asian allies in defending freedom of the seas, democracy and human rights and backed efforts to hold the Myanmar junta accountable to its commitments to peace.

Southeast Asia has become a strategic battleground between the United States and China, which controls most of the South China Sea and has turned up military and political pressure on fiercely democratic Taiwan, a self-ruled island it considers its own.

SINGAPORE, Oct. 27 (Xinhua) -- Despite being one of the first countries in the world to provide COVID-19 vaccines to its citizens and having an ample supply, the United States has been overtaken by quite a number of countries regarding vaccination rate, local media have said.

The Chinese-language newspaper Lianhe Zaobao published a report on Monday which was initially carried by The New York Times.

Only 57 percent of Americans have been fully vaccinated, according to data tracked by The New York Times, even though the country has more vaccine stocks than it needs.

BEIJING, Oct. 27 (Xinhua) -- It is an ironclad fact that the future of Taiwan lies in the complete reunification of China, a Chinese mainland spokesperson said Wednesday.

Ma Xiaoguang, a spokesperson for the State Council Taiwan Affairs Office, made the remarks when commenting on the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) authority's presumptuous claim that the so-called constitutional amendments conform to the trends on the island.

Behind the so-called constitutional amendments lies the DPP authority's malicious intention to seek "Taiwan independence," said Ma.

BEIJING, Oct. 27 (Xinhua) -- China will extend the preferential tax policy for overseas investors investing in the mainland bond market, as part of its efforts to promote opening-up and attract foreign investment, the State Council's executive meeting chaired by Premier Li Keqiang decided on Wednesday.

BEIJING (AP) — U.S. regulators are expelling a unit of China Telecom Ltd., one of the country’s three major state-owned carriers, from the American market as a national security threat amid rising tension with Beijing.

BEIJING (AP) — Asian stock markets fell Wednesday after Australian inflation increased, highlighting global pressure for prices to rise, while investors looked ahead to U.S. economic growth data due out this week.

Shanghai, Tokyo and Hong Kong all retreated.

Wall Street’s S&P 500 index rose 0.2% on Tuesday to its second high in two days, driven by strong earnings reports by some major companies.

TOKYO (AP) — The defense for former Nissan executive Greg Kelly said Wednesday there was no evidence or motives linking him to alleged under-reporting of his ex-boss Carlos Ghosn’s compensation.

Kelly’s chief defense lawyer, Yoichi Kitamura, said in wrapping up the defense’s arguments that Kelly is innocent and he had no knowledge of the complex calculations over Ghosn’s unpaid remuneration, tabulated and updated by Nissan Motor Co. secretariat official Toshiaki Ohnuma.

BEIJING, Oct 26 (APP): China is a huge potential market for Pakistani goods and the country should find ways to continuously expand exports to China to reduce bilateral trade imbalance, said Cheng Xizhong, Visiting Professor at Southwest University of Political Science and Law.