Asia Media Centre: The Best of 2025
23 December 2025
If 2025 showed us anything, it’s that Asia is constantly in motion. Across the region, political systems were tested, communities responded to pressure, extreme weather reshaped lives, and culture continued to evolve.
Asia Media Centre’s reporting this year followed those shifts closely. The stories ranged from breaking news to long-form features, from clear explainers to more personal reporting, offering New Zealand readers context on events unfolding across the region — and why they mattered.
What follows is a selection of the stories that defined our year.
Biggest Headlines
Coverage in 2025 often focused on moments when politics across Asia shifted abruptly — and rarely neatly. Reporting on South Korea’s political crisis and the election of a so-called “fresh start” candidate unpacked the uncertainty facing one of the region’s most closely watched democracies.
In Thailand, a familiar pattern re-emerged as courts, governments, and institutions once again collided. This culminated in the suspension of Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra, alongside a brief but volatile border clash with Cambodia that ended in a short-lived ceasefire.
Beyond domestic politics, several pieces examined Asia’s place in a shifting global order. Reporting on the return of US tariffs under Donald Trump explored how decisions made in Washington ripple across Asian economies.
Other stories examined emerging alignments, including the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, and what they signal about changing power dynamics.
Profiles such as the examination of Rodrigo Duterte’s political rise — and fall — highlighted how past leadership styles continue to shape present-day realities.
Thailand and Cambodia Agree to Immediate and Unconditional Ceasefire
China’s 80th Victory Parade and the Politics of Power and Symbolism
SCO Summit 2025: Optics, Alliances, and a Shifting World Order
Resources and Explainers
As the news cycle sped up, explainer pieces helped provide context and clarity.
Throughout the year, readers returned to practical stories that broke down complex issues — from how to do business in China and navigate everyday consumer trends there, to tracking the growth of Indonesia’s digital economy.
Other explainers examined how Southeast Asian governments manage relations with major powers, often balancing competing interests rather than taking clear sides.
Several pieces focused on the drivers shaping politics at ground level. Reporting on Gen Z-led protests, meme-driven campaigning, and broader regional trends explained how political messages are formed and spread.
An On the Radar explainer on trade, tariffs, and negotiations between the United States and Southeast Asia set out key terms, processes, and timelines, and was used as a reference for understanding these issues, translating technical language and policy jargon into clear, accessible reporting.
The Psychology of Gen Z’s Uprising: Protest, Play, and Purpose
Memes, Ballots and Bollywood: The Rise of Relatable Politics
Listen to our latest Asia Insight podcast episode - interview with Dr Samir Saran. Photo: Asia Media Centre
Insights and Opinion
Asia Media Centre’s analysis and opinion pieces this year tackled difficult subjects head-on. Essays on Thailand’s recurring political instability, Japan's first female prime minister, Timor-Leste’s long and careful journey toward ASEAN membership, and Sri Lanka’s efforts to recover from economic collapse reflected a desire for nuance over noise.
Other contributions brought readers closer to the realities on the ground. Reporting on Rohingya refugees in Malaysia highlighted the human consequences of informal policy approaches, while first-hand accounts from the South China Sea offered insight into the risks faced by journalists and observers covering one of the world’s most contested waterways.
These were not quick takes, but considered reflections shaped by experience.
Thousands of Rohingya find refuge under Malaysia’s informal refugee policy
Soft Power, Hard Truths: The Case for Saving American Aid Diplomacy
Sri Lanka’s Two-Year Transformation: From Crisis to Lift-Off
Between Renewal and Retreat: Thailand’s Fractured Coalition and the Struggle for Political Survival
In Search of Thailand’s Strategy: ASEAN and the Thai-Cambodia Question
Takaichi Sanae and the Shifting Foundations of Japanese Politics
Features
Our features this year allowed space for stories that don’t fit neatly into a headline. This year’s long-form pieces explored culture, identity, and connection — from diaspora love stories linking Aotearoa and Asia, to deep dives into food, arts, and culture.
Stories examining shared values, such as manaakitanga alongside Asian concepts like renqing, sat alongside profiles of communities like the Lambani and explorations of creative industries and beyond. These pieces reminded us that understanding Asia is not only about politics or economics, but about people and everyday life.
Manaakitanga and Renqing (人情): Linking Māori and Chinese Business Models
From Hawke’s Bay to Mumbai: The New Zealand Apple That Sold Out in a Day
New Zealand’s Hawke’s Bay Rouge apples were launched in India on September 4, 2025, and were sold out in one day. Photo: Rohan Satish Ursal.
Intern and Grant Stories
Some of the most personal reporting this year came from the Asia Media Centre's media interns and grant recipients working across the region. From Indonesia and Taiwan to South Korea, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and India, these stories reflected what it means to report while learning — adjusting to unfamiliar newsrooms, working across languages, and navigating different cultural expectations.
Whether exploring food security, tourism resilience, or the experience of reporting outside their home country, these pieces brought fresh perspectives shaped by on-the-ground reporting and lived experience.
Discovering Indonesia through the lens of a Kiwi-Indian media intern
Inside the Philippines: A Stuff special report on tourism, tensions, and resilience
Inside Singapore's World-Class Education System – TVNZ's Kate Nicol-Williams Explores
Inside the Jefferson Fellowship: Food Security Across the Asia Pacific
TVNZ’s reporter Kate Nicol-Williams and cameraperson Casey Higbi meet Yangzheng Primary School and Ministry of Education Singapore staff. Photo: Kate Nicol-Williams
Sports
Sport appeared less often than politics or climate in Asia Media Centre’s 2025 coverage, but it offered a different kind of insight. Reporting on Asia’s growing role in world bowls examined how the sport is developing across the region.
Learnings in a new league followed a Kiwi adjusting to a new sporting environment in Asia, focusing on the realities of training, competition, and cultural difference. Rather than centring on outcomes, the story looked at what it takes to adapt — learning new systems, expectations, and ways of doing things. Together, these pieces showed how sport can reveal everyday forms of exchange and adjustment that are easy to overlook but central to understanding life in another place.
World Bowls President Brett O’Riley applauds the medallists at the Asia Bowls championships. Photo: Supplied
Most Read
Every year, when we look back at the stories we’ve published, a few clearly stay with readers more than others. In 2025, those tended to be stories about corruption, climate disasters, and civic resistance.
Reporting on alleged flood-control corruption in the Philippines, coverage of severe flooding in southern Thailand, and stories tracking anti-corruption movements across Southeast Asia reflected concerns many readers recognised — questions about accountability, how governments respond in moments of crisis, and who bears the cost when systems fail.
OTR: Corruption Sparks Unrest Across Indonesia, Philippines, and Malaysia
Flood-Control Corruption and Youth Uprising in the Philippines
Recognised Stories
Some stories also reached audiences beyond the Asia Media Centre this year. Analysis examining the role of middle powers in the South China Sea, alongside reporting on Nepal’s youth-led revolt, was shared and acknowledged across academic, policy, and media circles after publication.
Taken together, Asia Media Centre’s Best of 2025 brings together a year’s worth of questions, disruptions, and turning points. These stories capture moments when developments across Asia asked for closer attention — and when taking the time to understand what was really happening, and why, made a difference.
-Asia Media Centre