Your Tuesday Briefing

Earthquake, Saudi Arabia, Malaysia | View in [Browser]( | Add nytdirect@nytimes.com to your address book. [The New York Times]( [The New York Times]( Tuesday, August 7, 2018 [NYTimes.com »]( Asia Edition [Your Tuesday Briefing]( By PENN BULLOCK Good morning. Picking up the pieces in Indonesia, hitting the streets in Bangladesh, and letting loose in India. Here’s what you need to know: EPA, via Shutterstock • “No house anymore. Just land.” [Twenty thousand people are homeless]( after the devastating 7.0 earthquake that struck near the resort island of Lombok in Indonesia, according to the authorities. And 98 people are dead, including two on nearby Bali. [Here is video from the scene.]( Aftershocks are rattling the area as search-and-rescue teams scour the rubble for survivors. Beaches are empty and most hotels are shut as tourists swarm the Lombok airport, hoping for a flight out. Tents and makeshift shelters are sprouting across the landscape. But life presses on. The Indonesian Red Cross said a mother whom it helped in childbirth named the baby Gempa, or earthquake. _____ Munir Uz Zaman/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images • Bangladesh is convulsing. For a ninth straight day, [student protesters raged against the government]( in the capital, Dhaka. The revolt was catalyzed by the traffic deaths of two teenagers, killed by a bus racing a rival bus to a stop on July 29. Protesters, mostly middle- and high-schoolers, are demanding safety on the country’s clogged and anarchic roads, and say they have been met with rubber bullets and tear gas. The government claims that provocateurs are piggybacking on the movement, but repression is a “trademark” of the governing Awami League, a rights activist told us. _____ Pedro Pardo/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images • A turbulent day for the Middle Eastern region. The Trump administration said that it would restore [sanctions on Iran]( by midnight Eastern on Monday, a consequence of the U.S.’s unilateral withdrawal from the Iranian nuclear accord. The European Union is moving to protect its business in Iran from any domino effects, setting the stage for a trans-Atlantic showdown. And Saudi Arabia sent a message to the world, [expelling the Canadian ambassador]( and freezing “new business” between the two countries, after Canada called for the release of two rights activists. Above, Canada’s foreign minister, Chrystia Freeland. Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, 33, Saudi Arabia’s de facto ruler, has somewhat loosened social strictures in the absolute monarchy, but critics say he has offered little more than an iron fist in a velvet glove. _____ Anthony Wallace/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images • “Completely unsuitable.” Carrie Lam, Hong Kong’s top official, has condemned the Foreign Correspondents’ Club for planning to host a speech by Andy Chan, above, [the leader of the Hong Kong National Party]( a pro-independence group of, at most, a few dozen members. China has weighed in, too, asking the club to call off the event. The tiny party has become the talk of the town since Hong Kong moved to ban it under a law usually reserved for organized crime. The controversy is raising further doubt about the durability of the territory’s political freedom under Chinese rule. And in proudly multicultural Singapore, there are worries that China [is branding itself as supreme “motherland”]( to the city-state’s ethnic Chinese, who make up 75 percent of the population of 5.6 million. _____ YouTube • It’s called the Kiki Challenge. Last month, a New Yorker filmed himself dancing to Drake’s “In My Feelings” in a pink sweatsuit, and, in the inexplicable way these things happen, a global craze began. People all over the world started filming themselves dancing to the song, and, yes, there have been injuries. (“Desist from public nuisance or face the music!” the Mumbai police warned cheekily.) But stars were born in an Indian village when two young men rocked out in a muddy rice field behind their plodding yoked oxen. Their clip has been watched millions of times. “Suddenly this one small video became the rage,” said the director, Sriram Srikanth. “My father was flummoxed and asked me, ‘Why did this click?’ ” Maybe [you just have to see it](. _____ Business Ruben Sprich/Reuters • Shrinking the ranks of major female chief executives, Indra Nooyi [will step down as CEO of Pepsi]( in early 2019 after a 12-year run, in which she steered the company away from sugary drinks toward more healthful options. • Two of the biggest U.S. steel makers — both with deep ties to the Trump administration — [have successfully objected to hundreds of requests]( by American companies for exemptions from tariffs on foreign steel. • Indonesia said it had handed over to Malaysia [a]( million yacht]( at the center of a multibillion-dollar Malaysian corruption scandal. • U.S. stocks [were up](. Here’s a snapshot of [global markets](. In the News Pool photo by Alexei Druzhinin/Kremlin, via Epa/Shutterstock • This is real life: Russia named the American action-movie star Steven Seagal as a special representative for improving relations with the U.S. [[The New York Times]( • Rick Gates began testifying against his former business partner, Paul Manafort, the one-time Trump campaign chairman on trial on charges of tax and bank fraud. Mr. Gates is considered the prosecution's most important witness. [[The New York Times]( • Imran Khan, the former cricket star who will be the next prime minister of Pakistan, will have his work cut out for him as he confronts a struggling economy wedged between a big creditor, China, and a possible short-term savior, the International Monetary Fund. [[The New York Times]( • “They are ‘unproductive.’” A Japanese lawmaker is the focus of national protests and a rebuke from the governing Liberal Party after she disparaged gay people as childless drains on society. [[Asahi Shimbun]( • Across the divide: Families split by the Korean War have been selected for reunions scheduled for this month — the first reunions in nearly three years and a sign of a continuing thaw between North and South Korea. [[The Guardian]( Smarter Living Tips for a more fulfilling life.  • How to read [a food label](. • Recipe of the day: This recipe for [pasta with Chinese broccoli]( comes straight from David Chang’s Los Angeles restaurant. Noteworthy Isaac Lawrence for The New York Times • Baseball arrived in Taiwan when the Japanese seized the island in 1895, and has grown into one of its most potent instruments of soft power. What goes on in the stands is [unlike anything seen, or heard, in America](. • Honey, I shrunk the fauna: The Indonesian island of Flores has given rise to smaller hominins, humans and even elephants. [Scientists aren’t exactly sure why](. “Whatever the ecological factors are for island dwarfism are, they are present in spades on this island,” one expert said. • Raised on rugby: The New Zealand All Blacks dominate their sport worldwide by [carefully nurturing young talent](. Back Story Brian Lawless/PA Wire, via Associated Press This year, Countess Constance Markievicz finally took her place in the British Parliament. A century after she beame the first woman elected to the House of Commons, [her portrait went on display]( there. It will be up until early October, [to commemorate the anniversary]( of the acts of Parliament that allowed some women to vote and hold office. Despite her historic election, Countess Markievicz never took her seat, in keeping with the abstentionist policy of her party, Ireland’s Sinn Fein, which refused to swear an oath of allegiance to the king. Before she was elected, she had taken up the cause of women’s rights, labor and Irish nationalism. Her participation in the [1916 Easter Rising]( an armed rebellion against British rule, led to a death sentence that was commuted because she was a woman. After her release, she was again arrested but won election to the House of Commons from prison. [A letter she received]( from 10 Downing Street after her election began, “Dear Sir …” She said of women’s rights in 1922, “I would work for it anywhere, as one of the crying wrongs of the world, that women, because of their sex, should be debarred from any position or any right that their brains entitle them a right to hold.” Countess Markievicz died in Dublin in 1927 at the age of 59. Aodhan Beirne wrote today’s Back Story. _____ This briefing was prepared for the Asian morning. You can also [sign up]( to get the briefing in the Australian, European or American morning. [Sign up here]( to receive an Evening Briefing on U.S. weeknights. Browse our full range of Times newsletters [here](. What would you like to see here? 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