Top Asian News 4:19 a.m. GMT

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka (AP) — Sri Lanka police are bracing for a big protest Saturday by thousands of Buddhist monks and opposition supporters against a government decision to lease a major seaport to a Chinese-controlled venture. The government has signed a framework agreement for a 99-year lease of the Hambantota port with a company in which China will have 80-percent ownership. The protest against the deal is taking place as Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe visits the area on Saturday to inaugurate an industrial zone surrounding the port. A court has issued a restraining order on the protest saying it could lead to unrest.

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — A lawyer for South Korea's disgraced president has compared her impeachment to the deaths of Jesus Christ and the ancient Greek thinker Socrates. While that may be over the top, the impeachment trial of President Park Geun-hye is of critical importance for the world's 11th largest economy as the government tries to boost jobs, restore confidence among furious citizens and navigate relations with a new administration in its close ally, the United States, as well as its always belligerent archrival, nuclear-armed North Korea. A caretaker prime minister now tries to steer the country while the Constitutional Court decides whether Park — who spends her days, powerless, in the presidential palace — should permanently step down over a corruption scandal or be reinstated.

ACH SEH ISLAND, Cambodia (AP) — A 7-inch creature with a head resembling a horse and a monkey-like tail glides gracefully out of a dark coral crevice off the Cambodian coast. Master of camouflage, unrivaled as a hunter and a much-loved figure of ancient myths and legends, the seahorse may be spiraling toward annihilation after surviving beneath the waves for some 40 million years. Taking photographs and detailed notes, two divers swim through turbid water to spot the male in the crevice and a nearby female, both hanging on in a once-pristine habitat turned to withered coral beds and ragged remnants of seagrass meadows.

TOKYO (AP) — Japan announced Friday that it would recall its ambassador to South Korea and suspend economic talks in response to the placing of a "comfort woman" statue representing wartime sex slaves in front of its consulate in the Korean port city of Busan. Both Ambassador Yasumasa Nagamine in Seoul and the consul-general in Busan will be temporarily recalled, Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga told reporters after a Cabinet meeting. Many Korean and other women in Asia were forced into sexual slavery in front-line brothels for the Japanese military during World War II in what was called the "comfort woman" system.

MANILA, Philippines (AP) — Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte toured one of the two Russian warships docked in Manila on Friday in another gesture of warming ties with Moscow as he shifts his country's foreign policy away from long-time ally, the United States. Rear Adm. Eduard Mikhailov, deputy commander of Russia's Pacific Fleet, and Russian Ambassador Igor Khovaev and escorted Duterte and several cabinet members around the anti-submarine ship Admiral Tributs. At one point during the hourlong visit, Duterte looked out from the ship's deck and pumped his fist in the air. He was also shown equipment and weapons on board the ship and peered from binoculars from a chair.

SHANGHAI (AP) — In a sign of improving cooperation between the U.S. and China to fight the global drug trade, the Drug Enforcement Administration will open a new office there and its top chief will visit next week for the first time in more than a decade. The DEA said acting administrator Chuck Rosenberg will visit Beijing, Guangzhou and Hong Kong Monday through Thursday, at the invitation of China's Ministry of Public Security. The last time the head of the DEA visited the country was 2005. The planned new office in the city of Guangzhou will likely be staffed with two special agents, pending final approvals, said Russell Baer, a DEA special agent in Washington.

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korea will form a special military brigade this year tasked with removing North Korea's leadership in the event of war as Seoul looks for options to counter its rival's nuclear weapons and missiles, an official said Thursday. The brigade will aim to remove the North's wartime command and paralyze its function if war breaks out, according to an official from Seoul's Defense Ministry, who refused to be named, citing office rules. The brigade was originally planned to be ready by 2019. The official refused to say whether the brigade will train to execute pre-emptive strikes.

NEW DELHI (AP) — Noted Indian character actor Om Puri, who worked in films at home and abroad, has died in the western city of Mumbai. He was 66. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and a host of leading movie stars tweeted condolence messages shortly after Puri's death was announced Friday morning. "The artists will all miss him and it's a big loss to the industry. His name was taken along the great artists of the world, not just India," film director Prakash Jha said, as he joined several people from the Indian film industry outside Puri's Mumbai home. Puri had won a slew of national awards and international fame for his work in several critically acclaimed films.

ISLAMABAD (AP) — Pakistan's foreign ministry says Islamabad has handed over a dossier to the United Nations over the alleged involvement of India in acts of terrorism in the Islamic nation. In a statement, it said Pakistani ambassador Maleeha Lodhi on Friday delivered a set of documents regarding India's alleged role in fomenting terrorism in Pakistan to U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres. The announcement comes months after Pakistan captured an Indian spy, Kulbhushan Jadhav, saying he was behind acts of terrorism in the country. So far, Islamabad has not granted consular access to Jadhav following India's request. Pakistan and India have a history of bitter relations.

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — The provincial governor of Afghanistan's Baghlan province has said that an unknown gunman has killed 12 coal miners. Abdul Satar Barez said the Friday attack occurred in the province's Tala Wa Barfak district as the miners were on their way back to their villages after work. The unknown gunman killed 12 and wounded five, Barez said, adding that an investigation was underway in the area bereft of security posts. He did not elaborate. Faiz Mohammad Amiri, the district's governor, put the number of miners killed at seven and blamed the attack on the Taliban. He said all the miners were from the minority Shiite Hazara group.