CL Iran's shutdown of the Strait of Hormuz did what years of diplomatic cables could not: it made every shipping executive in Hong Kong suddenly fluent in the geography of a waterway they couldn't have located last week. Insurance premiums are up. So, reportedly, is everyone's blood pressure.-- CL

MB Iran shut the strait it always threatens to shut, and Washington struck it a second time to make a point already made once. Kuwait buried six soldiers for a war nobody in the region will call by name. Bangkok mourns a bar fire. Hong Kong's top cop defends a pay freeze he swears isn't what it looks like. Everyone here is technically telling the truth.-- MB