Here are a few stories from around Asia you may have missed this week.

Malaysia has passed a law on Wednesday that requires the country's biggest energy consumers to implement power-saving measures. Malaysia has pledged to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 45 percent across the economy by 2030, and reach net-zero emissions by 2050. The new Energy Efficiency and Conservation Act is projected to save 2,017 million gigajoules of energy use, equivalent to $20 billion by 2050, Natural Resources and Climate Change Minister Nik Nazmi Nik Ahmad said in Parliament on Tuesday. The measures will apply to about 1,500 industrial consumers and 500 commercial consumers.

Record rainfall triggered floods in the Myanmar city of Bago, killing at least one person and displacing more than 14,000. Almost 5,600 people have been accommodated in government relief centers, according to state-owned Global New Light of Myanmar. On Sunday, the authorities reported 200mm of rain in the previous 24 hours in Bago, a record for October. Bago region suffers seasonal flooding but the current crisis is the worst in 60 years, submerging 80 percent of Bago City, according to locals. "We have to travel by boat in some places. People can't walk in some areas," said U Tun Myat Nyunt, head of the Wonyan Hmue rescue foundation.

China's first comprehensive solar probe, the Advanced Space-based Solar Observatory (ASO-S), has been put into scientific observation, according to the Purple Mountain Observatory of the Chinese Academy of Sciences on Monday. The ASO-S was delivered to the observatory on September 25 after the completion of the summary of in-orbit tests and the beginning of routine observations of payloads. The probe has been in orbit for 365 days as of October 9, completing a total of 5,294 orbits around Earth. More than 2 TB of scientific data were downloaded from the probe since it was opened to download on April 12, 2023, said the Purple Mountain Observatory.

Another 6.3-magnitude earthquake struck Afghanistan's western province of Herat on Wednesday, claiming at least one life and causing panic among residents already suffering from a series of tremors that killed around 2,000 people last Saturday. The World Food Programme (WFP) on Wednesday called the recent Afghanistan earthquakes a "disaster on top of a disaster", urging the international community to provide humanitarian aid to the war-torn nation.

At least four people were killed and 80 others injured when an express train derailed in the Indian state of Bihar on Wednesday. Twenty-one coaches of the North-East Express train, which runs from Delhi to Assam state, derailed in Bihar state's Buxar district at around 9:35 p.m. on Wednesday, a district official told Reuters. "Railway officials, and local residents are all working as one team. Injured shifted to hospital. War room operating," Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw posted on X.

(Cover: FILE: Night view of Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur city center. /CFP)