Top Asian News 2:52 a.m. GMT

DHAKA, Bangladesh (AP) — Hazardous, heavily polluting tanneries, with workers as young as 14, supplied leather to companies that make shoes and handbags for a host of Western brands, a nonprofit group that investigates supply chains says. The report by New York-based Transparentem, released to The Associated Press on Friday, didn't say leather from the tanneries ends up in American and European companies' products, only that the manufacturers of some of those goods receive it. Some companies say they're certain the leather used to make their products was imported from outside Bangladesh, and the manufacturers concur. Still, in response to the report most brands had switched factories, banned Bangladesh leather or demanded improvements and audits.

HONG KONG (AP) — Hong Kong is poised to choose a new leader on Sunday when members of a committee dominated by elites favored by Beijing cast their ballots in the first such vote since 2014's huge pro-democracy protests. Here's a look at the electoral system, which critics have dubbed a "small-circle" or "fake" election because of its strict limits on popular participation: ___ THE BACKGROUND: Current leader Leung Chun-ying, a deeply polarizing and highly unpopular figure, said he would not seek a second term after his current one expires on June 30, citing family reasons. Political analysts suspect he had to make a face-saving exit because Beijing asked him to step aside for someone better liked.

HONG KONG (AP) — On Sunday morning, a select group of tycoons, business leaders, politicians and trade and industry group representatives will gather in a cavernous exhibition center to vote for the next leader of Hong Kong. Three candidates are on the ballot but there's little uncertainty about who the winner will be, with China's communist leaders already signaling early on their preference to the election committee, which is stacked with pro-Beijing loyalists. The winner will replace the outgoing leader, deeply unpopular Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying, who won with barely half the committee's votes five years ago. The system was at the heart of 2014's unprecedented pro-democracy protests, with student leaders demanding full democracy but Beijing insisting that candidates be screened.

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — Salvage crews towed a corroded 6,800-ton South Korean ferry and loaded it onto a semi-submersible transport vessel Saturday, completing what was seen as the most difficult part of the massive effort to bring the ship back to shore. Government officials say it will take a week or two to bring the vessel to a port 90 kilometers (55 miles) away so that investigators could search for the remains of nine missing people, who were among the 304 who died when the Sewol capsized on April 16, 2014. Most of the victims were students on a high school trip, touching off an outpouring of national grief and soul searching about long-ignored public safety and regulatory failures.

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — How do you lift a corroded, 6,800-ton ferry lying more than 40 meters (130 feet) undersea, keeping it in one piece? It's a massive, delicate operation. Salvaging the Sewol ferry which sank off South Korea's coast in April 2014 began Wednesday, and by Thursday morning, some parts of the ship emerged above the surface and were visible on live TV footage. But fully retrieving the ship and moving it to port will still take two weeks. An overview of the salvaging process for the Sewol: ___ THE SITE The ferry sank in the Maenggol Channel off the southwestern coast.

TOKYO (AP) — International sanctions on North Korea are taking a serious toll on humanitarian aid activities, according to a United Nations-led report. The report issued this week by the U.N.'s senior resident official in Pyongyang said sanctions are inadvertently hindering legitimate operations on the ground and have indirectly contributed to a "radical decline" in donations it said are badly needed by millions of North Korean women and children. It said "chronic food insecurity, early childhood malnutrition and nutrition insecurity" continue to be widespread in the North, which it noted ranked 98th out of 118 countries in the 2016 Global Hunger Index.

GENEVA (AP) — The U.N.-backed Human Rights Council on Friday approved a resolution by consensus to "dispatch urgently" an international fact-finding mission to Myanmar to probe alleged abuses by military and security forces, particularly against the minority Rohingya Muslim community. In a move bound to put pressure on State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi's government, the 47-member body threw its weight behind existing efforts to investigate alleged rights abuses such as torture, rape, arbitrary killings and forced displacement of the Rohingya in western Rakhine state. Zaw Htay, a presidential spokesman, said Myanmar "cannot accept" the council's decision. "What the U.N. Human Rights Council did to us is totally not fair and not right under international practices," Htay said by phone, citing a domestic investigation.

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — Australia does not have to choose between the United States and China, the Australian prime minister said Friday as he announced a new beef export deal with the Chinese. Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and Chinese Premier Li Keqiang oversaw signing of bilateral agreements that will expand their two-year-old free trade pact. China also agreed to remove a cap that allows only 11 Australian beef exporters to sell 400 million Australian dollars ($300 million) in frozen meat to the burgeoning ranks of the Chinese middleclass. China will be open to all eligible Australian beef exporters. "Australia is the only country in the world with this market access," Turnbull told reporters.

BEKASI, Indonesia (AP) — Indonesian police fired tear gas on Friday to disperse hard-line Muslims protesting against the construction of a Catholic church in a satellite city of the capital, Jakarta. Several hundred protesters from a group called Forum for Bekasi Muslim Friendship staged a rowdy demonstration in front of the Santa Clara church in Kaliabang, a neighborhood of Bekasi city, after Friday prayers. Witnesses said police fired tear gas as the protesters tried to force their way into the church, which has been under construction since November. Some also threw rocks and bottles into the site. Raymundus Sianipar, a Catholic priest, said police asked him to leave the area for safety reasons.

CHICAGO (AP) — A teenage blogger from Singapore whose online posts blasting his government landed in him jail was granted asylum to remain in the United States, an immigration judge in Chicago ruled Friday. Amos Yee has been detained by federal immigration authorities since December when he was taken into custody at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport. Attorneys said the 18-year-old could be released from a Wisconsin detention center as early as Monday. Judge Samuel Cole issued a 13-page decision more than two weeks after Yee's closed-door hearing on the asylum application. "Yee has met his burden of showing that he suffered past persecution on account of his political opinion and has a well-founded fear of future persecution in Singapore," Cole wrote.