ASEAN

BIREUEN, Indonesia — A strong undersea earthquake rocked Indonesia's province of Aceh early Wednesday, causing several deaths and building collapses in districts near the epicenter.

Muslim Rohingya face discrimination and violence from the Buddhist majority in the country, also called Burma. Their plight generally goes unnoticed by the world at large, even though some rights activists say their persecution amounts to ethnic cleansing. Here are several things to know about the group.

BANGKOK — Over the years, there were times Saiful Huq Omi felt documenting Rohingya fleeing persecution from Myanmar was an exercise in futility that he wanted to stop.

BANGKOK — Fishing boats used high-tech systems to find vast schools of fish for decades, depleting stocks of some species and leading to the complete collapse of others. Now more than a dozen apps, devices and monitoring systems aimed at tracking unscrupulous vessels and the seafood they catch are being rolled out — high-tech solutions some say could also help prevent labor abuse at sea.

BANGKOK — Thai Muslims expressed condemnation Friday in the capital and Deep South for the ongoing clashes in western Burma which have killed an estimated 80 ethnic Rohingya.

PHNOM PENH — A court in Cambodia has charged an Australian woman and two Cambodians with violating the country's new ban on providing commercial surrogacy services.

HO CHI MINH CITY — It was mid-morning the day 20 police officers from the Vietnam People’s Public Security barged into a downtown Saigon kindergarten and laid their gazes on Pham Chi Dung. Before the startled looks of parents, teachers and children, he was taken away. Among those staring was his three-year-old son, who he had just dropped off moments earlier.

UNITED NATIONS — A U.N. official is calling on Myanmar to investigate allegations of sexual assault in northern Rakhine state following recent border attacks.

BANGKOK — Media outlets in East Asia scrambled Thursday to make sense of Donald Trump’s surprise presidential victory.

WASHINGTON — The United States called Wednesday for restoration of full humanitarian access in a strife-hit region of western Myanmar where the United Nations says more than 150,000 people, including 3,000 malnourished children, are being denied aid.