-
2 weeks ago | 
straitstimes.com | Li Xueying
Synopsis: Every first Friday of the month, The Straits Times catches up with its foreign correspondents about life and trends in the countries they’re based in. Peonies have been grown for centuries in China, prized for their medicinal properties and ornamental value. The Straits Times’ foreign editor Li Xueying and China correspondent Joyce Lim take us to Heze, a city in Shandong province, where peonies aren’t just admired by tourists - they drive a multi-billion yuan industry.
-
2 weeks ago | 
straitstimes.com | Li Xueying
SINGAPORE - Europe’s top diplomat Kaja Kallas has rejected calls from the United States that the continent should limit its role in Asia, saying that the security theatres of Indo-Pacific and Europe are intimately connected. Secretary of Defence Pete Hegseth had suggested at the Shangri-La Dialogue that allies in Europe focus on security in Europe, so that Washington could focus on Asia.
-
2 weeks ago | 
sg.news.yahoo.com | Li Xueying
Europe’s top diplomat Kaja Kallas said she had made her views known to US Secretary of Defence Pete Hegseth after his speech. SINGAPORE – Europe’s top diplomat Kaja Kallas has rejected calls from the United States that the continent should limit its role in Asia, saying that the security theatres of the Indo-Pacific and Europe are intimately connected.
-
1 month ago | 
straitstimes.com | Li Xueying
The Straits Times’ Indonesia bureau chief Arlina Arshad has lived in Jakarta for 16 years - and moved five times. What are the lessons that she’s picked up in searching for the right apartment in Indonesia’s capital city? In this city of contrasts, private-sector developers are on a tearing streak to build high-end condominiums for an expanding middle class. At the same time, graveyards and slums are just round the block from these homes.
-
2 months ago | 
straitstimes.com | Li Xueying
Synopsis: Every first Friday of the month, The Straits Times catches up with its foreign correspondents about life and trends in the countries they’re based in. In six of the 10 years between 2014 and 2023, Xi’an had the poorest air quality among China’s new top-tier cities, which are the most commercially attractive cities after Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen.
-
Mar 14, 2025 | 
straitstimes.com | Li Xueying
Synopsis: Every first Friday of the month, The Straits Times catches up with its foreign correspondents about life and trends in the countries they’re based in. Talk about what’s new with Johor nowadays and one usually ends up with a five-letter acronym - JSSEZ, or the Johor-Singapore Special Economic Zone. But all the excitement about rising opportunities has also hastened the demise of what traditionally has juiced up Johor’s economy - pineapple farms.
-
Feb 17, 2025 | 
straitstimes.com | Li Xueying
The woods are Maia Sandu’s sanctuary. On the rare weekends when she can get away from the unceasing work of running a country, she heads out into the countryside of Moldova – to feel the soil beneath her, and to breathe. Sometimes, she is with her sister Veronica; at other times, with her dog, a rescue stray aptly called Codrut – “Little Forest” in Romanian, the main language used in the eastern European nation of some 2.5 million wedged between Ukraine and Romania.
-
Feb 7, 2025 | 
straitstimes.com | Li Xueying
Synopsis: Every first Friday of the month, The Straits Times catches up with its foreign correspondents about life and trends in the countries they’re based in. Trichy in southern India has no direct flights to the capital city New Delhi, but it has five daily flights to Singapore. The planes are packed, underscoring the rich flows of people both ways. It is a relationship that stretched back to the early 19th century, when migrants from Tamil Nadu settled down in Singapore.
-
Jan 25, 2025 | 
thestar.com.my | Li Xueying
DUSK in wintry Davos is a lovely thing. The sun dips behind the alpine town’s mountains, and the glare of the daylight bouncing off the snow fades into a gentle sheen. And that was how it was here, before 5.43pm in Switzerland on Jan 20, as a smiling Donald Trump walked into the Capitol Rotunda in Washington to take his oath to become the United States’ 47th president. As the sky darkened, some people gathered in a tiny room at Hotel Meierhof.
-
Jan 24, 2025 | 
straitstimes.com | Li Xueying
Shortly after returning home in Bangkok from his trip to Davos, Switzerland, as part of Thailand’s official delegation to the World Economic Forum (WEF), he will soon be packing his suitcase again – this time for Washington, DC. Join ST's Telegram channel and get the latest breaking news delivered to you.
