HONG KONG -- The Civil Human Rights Front, the main organizer of annual July 1 protest marches in Hong Kong, will disband, after the group came under intense pressure from the authorities including the threat of prosecution under the national security law enacted by China.

A CHRF statement issued on Sunday said that member groups in the front had agreed unanimously on Friday night to disband, according to their Facebook.

Absent from the meeting was the front's current convenor, Figo Chan, who was sentenced in May to 18

KABUL -- As the Taliban advanced across Afghanistan with lightning speed, life in the northern city of Kunduz became unbearable for Fareba Mohammadi.

"Now that the Taliban controls our province, I was not allowed to go outside without the chadri or a male family member," the 22-year-old said, referring to the head-to-toe shroud for women. "My husband was arrested in Turkey for being an illegal immigrant. It became very difficult for me to cope with the situations, so I

HONG KONG -- The Civil Human Rights Front, the main organizer of annual July 1 protest marches in Hong Kong, will disband, after the group came under intense pressure from the authorities including the threat of prosecution under the national security law enacted by China.

A CHRF statement issued on Sunday said that member groups in the front had agreed unanimously on Friday night to disband, according to their Facebook.

Absent from the meeting was the front's current convenor, Figo Chan, who was sentenced in May to 18

TOKYO -- Despite belonging to the most mainstream political party in Japan and coming from a family of politicians, Taro Kono has long been viewed as a lone wolf in Japanese politics. His aloofness has always been why no one would have ever taken his prime ministerial ambitions seriously till a few years ago.

"It's important to focus on the work I have to do first," said Kono, choosing his words carefully in a news program last month when asked whether he would support Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga in the

TOKYO -- Ninety companies, including Toyota Motor and Nissan Motor, will form a consortium to protect connected cars from cyberattacks, Nikkei has learned.

The companies will check their automotive software for security flaws and share information such as cyberattack trends to prevent hijacking and data theft. Companies are stepping up such efforts as self-driving cars come closer to reality.

Information technology companies such as Microsoft Japan, Trend Micro, NTT Communications and Sompo Japan Insurance will join a group of carmakers, including Toyota and Nissan, and parts manufacturers

TOKYO -- Japan's Generation Z, raised by parents who believed in the benefit of sunblock and moisturizers, is naturally into cosmetics and skin care products -- regardless of gender.

Gen Z men -- those born in or after the late 1990s -- spend about 20% more a month on cosmetics than the overall population. Top sellers among this group are priced over 2,000 yen ($18), signaling their willingness to shell out more than women.

HONG KONG -- The Hong Kong government is considering a law targeting "fake news" that would allow authorities to demand retractions or corrections from news organizations, a move seen as an attempt to further stifle press freedom.

John Lee Ka-chiu, Hong Kong's chief secretary for administration, and the territory's security secretary, Chris Tang Ping-keung, are pushing the effort, citing the mass pro-democracy protests in 2019. Both men insist that unverified information circulated online fueled hatred toward

KABUL (Reuters) -- Taliban forces captured a major city in northern Afghanistan on Saturday, sending Afghan forces fleeing, and drew closer to Kabul, where Western countries scrambled to evacuate their citizens from the capital.

The fall of Mazar-i-Sharif, confirmed by a provincial council official, was another major capture for the hardline militants, who have swept through the country in recent weeks as U.S.-led forces withdrew.

The U.S. and Britain are now rushing several thousand troops back into

Dave Sharma is a member of Australia's House of Representatives. He chairs the Joint Standing Committee on Treaties.

Credibility is a slippery concept in statecraft. Frequently cited, yet poorly understood, it can be used to justify all manner of poor policy choices.

It is a close companion of the sunk costs fallacy: where the continuation of a policy is justified not by its prospects of future success, but by reference to all that has been spent in supporting it to date. The debate over the U.S.