THAILAND

Siam Cement, Thailand's top industrial conglomerate, plans to invest $3.7 billion in a major petrochemical complex in southern Vietnam, state media reported on Monday.

Southeast Asian nations plan to sign a charter in Singapore next week aiming for lofty goals in areas such as free trade and human rights even as the 40-year-old group wrestles with how to handle the divisive issue of Myanmar. The West has urged the Association of Southeast Nations (ASEAN) to put more pressure on Myanmar's junta after its crackdown on pro-democracy protests, but the group's principle of non-interference in each other's internal affairs is likely to prevail.

NTT DoCoMo Inc, Japan's biggest mobile phone operator, expects to bid at least US$1 billion for a stake in Vietnam's No.2 mobile phone carrier and is eyeing investments in other Asian countries, an executive said.

Cambodia's Killing Fields court charged former Khmer Rouge Foreign Minister Ieng Sary and his wife on Monday with crimes against humanity, the latest members of Pol Pot's inner circle to face justice.

Dutch financial group ING will buy a 25.2 percent stake in Thailand's TMB Bank, TMB officials said on Wednesday after the money-losing Thai bank rejected a last-minute rival bid.

Precious metals raced higher on Tuesday, boosted by an ailing dollar and strong oil, with gold hitting 28-year highs, silver soaring to its best price in 27 years and platinum setting a record.

A tumbling dollar and strong oil prices prompted investors and speculators to buy gold heavily on Tuesday, with the metal hitting a 28-year high and trading about $30 below its record peak.

Mazda Motor Corp posted a 1.5 percent rise in quarterly operating profit as a weaker yen, cost cuts and sales growth offset a cutback in shipments to North America, and kept its full-year profit forecast unchanged.

Canadian lobster and tuna fisherman Everett Condon had never traveled further south than the United States until this year, when he spent his off-season going to tango shows and getting plastic surgery in Argentina.

Internet media company Yahoo Inc said on Tuesday it is adding media-playing features, large file transfers, new languages and other tools to its instant messaging service.

China’s second largest beer maker has agreed to invest 40 billion yuan ($5.3 million) to establish its first overseas plant in Thailand.

The Association of Southeast Asian Nations voiced "revulsion" on Thursday at the killings in Yangon demanding a stop to violence against demonstrators.

Singapore lender DBS Group's chief executive resigned on Monday, after a run of bad news battered the company's share price, leaving an unfulfilled quest to make the bank a big Asian player.

Indian outsourcing companies are shifting some of their operations to China, the Philippines, Vietnam and Kenya in a bid to stay competitive as higher wages, expensive property prices and a rising rupee eat into profits.

One-Two-Go, the budget airline whose jet crashed on the Thai resort isle of Phuket on Sunday, killing 88 people, was one of the first low-cost operators to spring up in the southeast Asian tourist haven.

Indonesia's Sumatra island was hit by a series of aftershocks on Thursday after a powerful earthquake toppled hundreds of buildings, killing at least 10 people and burying many others.

A powerful earthquake measuring 8.2 struck Indonesia's Sumatra region on Wednesday, triggering tsunami warnings in the Indian Ocean and sparking panic in coastal areas across southeast Asia.

Companies showed signs of shrugging off the caution that has enveloped the world economy since a credit crisis broke, as investors looked on Tuesday to U.S. data to gauge the likelihood of a Federal Reserve rate cut.

A new survey says 92.6 percent of affluent families in China which annual income exceeding $25,000 spend about $10,000 in leisure and entertainment every year, according to the research released on Monday by MasterCard International.

Years of economic policy mistakes after the fall of Saddam Hussein left unemployed young Iraqis easy targets for recruitment by al Qaeda and other insurgents, a U.S. Defense Department official said on Sunday.

Asia's two economic powerhouses, India and the People's Republic of China (PRC), are lagging behind in terms of economic well-being and living standards, despite accounting for 64 percent of GDP in a surveyed list of 23 Asian countries, a new study by the Asian Development Bank has revealed.