South Korea's central bank Thursday froze its key interest rate for the eighth straight month, amid competing pressures from a cooling economy and high inflation expectations.

Malaysia said Thursday it posted record trade activity in 2011 as China became the country's largest export market, helping blunt the impact of global economic weakness.

Australian Treasurer Wayne Swan Thursday said action by the European Central Bank has bought breathing space for the global economy but eurozone countries must act quickly on structural reforms.

South Korea's parliamentary speaker resigned on Thursday over a bribery scandal which has tarnished the conservative ruling party in a key election year.

Pilloried by neighbors, laughed at in freak shows and spurned by the women he admired from afar, Chandra Bahadur Dangi has always seen his tiny stature as a curse.

Singapore on Wednesday urged the United States to be careful in comments on China, warning that suggestions of a strategy to contain the rising power could cause strife in Asia.

A Maldives court issued an arrest warrant Thursday for former President Mohamed Nasheed, who resigned this week but later insisted he had been ousted by coup plotters in a political dispute that sparked rioting.

The Philippines' richest man is in talks to take control of one of the country's main real estate firms, which has major parcels of undeveloped land in the nation's capital, his company said Thursday.

Indonesia cut its benchmark interest rate to a record low of 5.75 percent on Thursday, as Southeast Asia's biggest economy tries to keep growth on track amid a global slowdown.

A six-story building that collapsed and killed 115 people during last year's New Zealand earthquake did not meet construction standards and was held up by significantly weak columns, according to a government report released Thursday.