India’s Prasada Urges Skoda Auto to Expand Investment in Indian Auto Sector India’s Minister of State for Commerce and Industry Prasada met with executives of Czech automaker Skoda Auto and urged the company to expand investment in India’s automotive industry, PTI reported on the 23rd. Prasada held the talks while on an official visit to the Czech Republic from the 22nd to the 23rd. Skoda’s vehicle sales in India in January-March rose 17% from a year earlier to 20,028 units. During his stay, Prasada also visited leading local companies in automobiles, transport April 28, 2026

South Korea Envoy Says North Korea Nuclear Issue Is Top Challenge to NPT Jeong Yeon-du, South Korea’s senior representative for North Korea nuclear diplomacy, reaffirmed the government’s goal of the “complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula” and stressed the urgency of resolving the North’s nuclear issue at a meeting of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, the Foreign Ministry said. In a keynote address on April 27 (local time) at the 11th NPT Review Conference in New York, Jeong, director-general of the ministry’s Foreign Strategy and Information April 28, 2026

Automakers Warn U.S. Low-Cost Models Could Exit Without USMCA Deal as Tariffs Bite Foreign automakers including Hyundai have warned the Trump administration that they may pull low-priced models from the U.S. market if the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement is not maintained or if a new deal does not sufficiently reduce tariff burdens on North American vehicles and parts. The Wall Street Journal reported April 27, citing people familiar with the matter, that Nissan, Hyundai and Toyota conveyed those concerns to the administration’s economic advisers. The companies are amon April 28, 2026

Iran Central Bank Opens Rial, Yuan, Dollar and Euro Accounts to Collect Strait of Hormuz Tolls Iran’s central bank has opened four dedicated currency accounts to collect tolls from ships transiting the Strait of Hormuz. Arab Times and other outlets reported on the 27th (local time) that Alaeeddin Boroujerdi, a member of Iran’s parliament on the National Security and Foreign Policy Committee, said the central bank set up accounts in the rial, Chinese yuan, U.S. dollar and euro to manage toll revenue. The funds are expected to be managed in cooperation with the Islamic Revolutionar April 28, 2026

Shinkin Central Bank to Open Ho Chi Minh City Representative Office on May 1 Shinkin Central Bank will open a representative office in Ho Chi Minh City in southern Vietnam on May 1. It will be the bank’s first new overseas representative office in 13 years, since it established a base in Bangkok in 2012. The Ho Chi Minh City office will be located in Tower 1 of Saigon Centre, a mixed-use complex in the city center. It is near the Opera House Station on Metro Line 1, offering convenient access. The surrounding area has many office buildings and commercial facilitie April 28, 2026

Celltrion Launches Autoimmune Drug Aptozma in Japan as First Mover Celltrion said April 28 that it has launched Aptozma (tocilizumab), an autoimmune disease treatment, in Japan as a first mover. The launch comes about seven months after the drug won marketing approval from Japan’s Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare in September. Celltrion said it has secured approvals for key indications including rheumatoid arthritis, juvenile idiopathic arthritis, Castleman disease and cytokine release syndrome. Celltrion’s Japan unit plans to supply the product t April 28, 2026

Cha Biotech Partners With Miltenyi Biotec to Develop Allogeneic CAR-NK Cancer Therapy Cha Biotech said on the 28th it will work with Miltenyi Biotec, a global cell and gene therapy company, to develop an allogeneic chimeric antigen receptor-expressing natural killer cell (CAR-NK) therapy. Under the collaboration, Miltenyi Biotec will produce lentiviral vectors and supply them to Cha Biotech. The company said Miltenyi brings expertise including its BaEV platform, designed to improve gene-delivery efficiency while lowering manufacturing costs. The BaEV platform targets ASC April 28, 2026

Macau Visitor Arrivals Rise 13.7% in First Quarter of 2026 Macau welcomed 11,213,904 visitor arrivals in the first quarter of 2026 (January-March), up 13.7% from a year earlier, according to the Macau government’s Statistics and Census Service. Same-day visitors rose 20.3% to 7,007,320, while overnight visitors increased 4.1% to 4,206,584. Average length of stay slipped to 1.0 day from 1.1 days a year earlier. Overnight visitors averaged 2.2 days, unchanged. By origin, visitors from mainland China climbed 16.4% to 8,388,921, accounting for 74.8 April 28, 2026

LG Electronics Shares Jump 7% on Expectations of Nvidia Physical AI Partnership LG Electronics shares rose more than 7% on expectations of cooperation with Nvidia on physical AI. According to the Korea Exchange, as of 11:04 a.m. on the 28th, LG Electronics was trading at 139,600 won, up 9,600 won (7.38%) from the previous session. A Seoul Economic Daily report published the previous day said Ryu Jae-cheol, LG Electronics’ CEO, and Madison Huang, Nvidia’s senior director of Omniverse and robotics product marketing and the eldest daughter of Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, w April 28, 2026

China’s Industrial Firms’ Profits Rise 15.5% in Q1 on AI, Chip-Related Gains China’s National Bureau of Statistics said on the 27th that profits at industrial firms above a designated size rose 15.5% in the first quarter of 2026 (January-March) from a year earlier to 1.69604 trillion yuan (about 39.5 trillion yen). The growth rate was 0.3 percentage points higher than in January-February, as rapid expansion in artificial intelligence and semiconductors boosted profits at related parts makers. In March alone, profits increased 15.8% from a year earlier, with the gr April 28, 2026