WASHINGTON -- The wave of criticism from Washington aimed at Beijing over debris from an enormous Chinese rocket that fell back to Earth over the weekend was not just motivated by safety concerns. The U.S. also has another loftier ambition -- taking the lead in writing the international rule book for space and countering any Chinese attempts at militarization.

The international community is expected to begin discussions to establish detailed norms and principles for actions in space at the United Nations as early as fall. By calling for responsible action, the

YANGON/BANGKOK -- Myanmar's military on Feb. 1 detained State Counselor Aung San Suu Kyi and President Win Myint in the country's first coup since 1988, bringing an end to a decade of civilian rule.

The Suu Kyi-led National League for Democracy had won a landslide in a general election in November . But the military has claimed the election was marred by fraud.

For all our coverage, visit our Myanmar Coup page.

Read our in-depth coverage:

-- Suu

BEIJING -- Questions have been raised about the reliability of the latest demographic numbers out of China, with critics accusing the government of manipulating data while some officials scratch their heads over numbers that do not seem to add up.

The National Population Census for 2020, released Tuesday , shows the country had 253.38 million children 14 and younger. Meanwhile, new births between 2006 and 2020 -- the period during which these youngsters were born -- total

BEIJING -- China has moved to sharply restrict the types of automotive data that companies can take beyond its borders, exercising greater control over a crucial factor in the competitiveness of Tesla and other global carmakers.

Draft rules published Wednesday by the Cyberspace Administration of China would ban unapproved overseas transfer of data on Chinese road traffic and vehicle positioning, as well as images and other information gathered by onboard camera and sensors.

The move shows China, the world's largest auto market, is looking to wall off data that could inadvertently

William Pesek is an award-winning Tokyo-based journalist and author of "Japanization: What the World Can Learn from Japan's Lost Decades."

Indonesia is gunning for a V-shaped recovery, but that will not happen. Not until President Joko Widodo gets serious about taming the two C threats to Southeast Asia's biggest economy: COVID-19 and the crisis feedback loop Jakarta has been stuck in for more than two decades.

Indonesia's 270 million people do not need a Tokyo

Katsuji Nakazawa is a Tokyo-based senior staff writer and editorial writer at Nikkei. He spent seven years in China as a correspondent and later as China bureau chief. He is the 2014 recipient of the Vaughn-Ueda International Journalist prize for international reporting.

TOKYO -- After the Group of Seven foreign ministers issued a joint statement criticizing many of China's recent actions last week, a computer-generated graphic depicting an event from 120 years ago was widely shared on the Chinese internet.

The

TOKYO -- Japanese trading house Mitsui & Co. has chosen the Philippines as the site for the company's first megasolar project in Southeast Asia.

Mitsui has formed a renewable energy joint venture with Philippine utility Global Business Power. The solar project in the northern province of Rizal is expected to cost roughly 7 billion yen ($64.4 million), with Mitsui to foot about 40% of the bill.

The megasolar farm, to be completed in March 2022, will generate 11

TOKYO -- SoftBank Group is making a quick U-turn on how it finances its tech-focused Vision Funds, opting to tap its own resources instead of seeking outside investors who take a hefty share of investment earnings.

"I think we're at a good place right now," Masayoshi Son, chairman and CEO of SoftBank Group, said during Wednesday's earnings presentation. "We don't have to beg" third-party investors for funding.

Though this shift toward independent financing can prevent much

TOKYO -- Toyota Motor scored a major profit jump for the January-March quarter even as the global semiconductor shortage squeezes its rivals by applying its flagship philosophy of kaizen -- the pursuit of continuous efficiency improvement -- to its supply chains.

But with chips only expected to increase in importance in an industry shifting toward electric and self-driving cars, the automaker is now considering taking a step further by departing from its "just-in-time" approach to plan orders years in advance to ensure access to the