Smoke billows from the Singapore-registered container ship MV X-Press Pearl, which had been burning for eleven consecutive days, while vessels try to extinguish the fire in the sea off Sri Lanka's Colombo Harbor on May 30, 2021.
ASIA PACIFIC / Crime & Legal
Sep 23, 2025
Singapore shipper rejects $1B damages over Sri Lanka's worst pollution incident
The company operated the MV X-Press Pearl that sank off Colombo Port in 2021 while carrying 81 containers of hazardous goods and hundreds of metric tons of plastic pellets.
Han Hak-ja, the leader of the Unification Church, arrives at a court to attend a hearing to review her arrest warrant requested by special prosecutors in Seoul on Monday.
ASIA PACIFIC / Crime & Legal
Sep 23, 2025
Leader of South Korea's Unification Church jailed after court issues warrant
Han Hak-ja, 82, has been accused of directing the church to bribe the country's former first lady for favors for the church's business interests.
ChatGPT owner OpenAI says it "actively works to identify and disrupt scam-related misuse of ChatGPT.”
ASIA PACIFIC / Crime & Legal
Sep 19, 2025
ChatGPT was used ‘to help scammers do their thing’ at Asia fraud compound
Scammers used the artificial intelligence tool to craft convincing messages designed to trick people into parting with their money.
Han Hak-ja, the leader of the Unification Church, arrives at the special prosecutors' office for questioning over allegations, which she has denied, that she instructed the church to bribe the wife of ousted President Yoon Suk Yeol and a politician close to him, in Seoul on Wednesday.
ASIA PACIFIC / Crime & Legal
Sep 17, 2025
Unification Church head questioned in probe on South Korea's ex-first lady
Han Hak-ja was quizzed over her alleged involvement in bribing Kim Keon Hee, wife of ousted South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol.
North Korean hackers used ChatGPT to craft a fake draft of a South Korean military identification card to create a realistic-looking image meant to make a phishing attempt seem more credible, a South Korean cybersecurity firm found.
ASIA PACIFIC / Crime & Legal
Sep 15, 2025
North Korean hackers used ChatGPT to help forge deepfake ID
The document was used in a phishing attack on a target in South Korea, according to cybersecurity researchers.
Detainees are made to stand against a bus during a raid by federal agents on a Hyundai facility in Ellabell, Georgia, last week.
ASIA PACIFIC / Crime & Legal
Sep 11, 2025
Many arrested at Hyundai's U.S. facility appear to be working legally: lawyer
"They just arrested everyone who wasn't a citizen or a resident and figured they would sort it out later," said a lawyer representing more than a dozen workers.
A building slated for demolition that was once a clinic for sex workers hired to serve U.S. soldiers protecting Seoul from North Korea
ASIA PACIFIC / Crime & Legal
Sep 10, 2025
South Korean women target U.S. military in landmark forced prostitution lawsuit
Historians and activists say tens of thousands of South Korean women worked for state-sanctioned brothels from the 1950s to 1980s, serving U.S. troops stationed in the country.

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