For the past 18 months, marketing expert Angela Wong has criss-crossed south-east Asia working from Airbnbs, hotels and beaches — so in theory, new digital nomad visas from a region famous for warm weather and cheap living costs should be a boon. 

In May, Thailand extended visas for self-employed remote workers from 60 days to five years, with each stay limited to 180 days, also allowing visa holders to bring spouses and children. Indonesia has offered a one-year temporary residence permit for remote workers. The Philippines has promised to introduce a digital nomad visa this year.

But for those able to rock up on a tourist visa, formal applications were not worth the effort, Wong said. “Why go through an application process that requires forms, evidence of employment, bank statements that take time to complete and months to approve when I could be on my next flight to Bangkok tomorrow morning?” she said. 

Wong’s experience highlights the difficulties faced by countries seeking to take advantage of the uptick in people wanting to work remotely. Digital nomads should boost local economies with their spending, but many stay for short periods of time. Governments are keen to entice skilled foreign workers to stay — and spend — for longer.

While Italy, Portugal, Estonia, Greece, Malta and Spain all offer digital nomad visas, south-east Asia, a popular tourist destination long attractive to budget travellers, has lagged behind, said Brittany Loeffler, co-founder of Nomads Embassy, an online organisation promoting and assisting aspiring digital nomads. 

“The region has fairly challenging approval systems compared to countries in Europe,” she said. “South-east Asian governments have been picky, processing times are long and things like tax rules are unclear or change suddenly.” Precise data on the uptake of digital nomad schemes is scarce as governments do not consistently publish numbers, she added.

Indonesia’s E33G remote worker visa allows an individual to work for one year and bring family members. Under normal business or social visas, travellers could stay for up to six months in total, assuming they leave and re-enter every two months. 

Bas de Jong, an Indonesia-based founding partner for law firm PNB, said most digital nomads interested in the popular holiday destination of Bali opted for a single-entry business or tourist visa, and then did a visa run every two months to reset the clock.

“We have had some requests, [but it is] not overwhelming. The main struggling point for most [with the E33G visa] is the annual salary requirement of $60,000.”

Thailand’s new relaxed rules are expected to be similar to the six-month, multiple-entry visa, whose requirements include $5,500 in a bank account and reserved accommodation. 

Nikorndej Balankura, director-general of Thailand’s information department and foreign ministry spokesperson, said adapting the visas would facilitate economic development and promote tourism. The government added that other measures, such as an e-visa system and the establishment of a visa policy committee, would improve efficiency.

But Sutharm Valaisathien, a Bangkok-based senior partner at international law firm ILCT, said that they had not seen much demand. Thailand wants “to attract more foreign experts in tech, which Thailand is missing”, he added. 

While Malaysia launched the Rantau Nomad Pass in 2022, the rules have been stringently applied. “The application has to be really strong and they specifically want people in IT and digital services,” said Sarah Huang, a partner at Peter Huang & Richard in Malaysia.

Malaysia Digital Economy Corp, a government agency, said it expanded the eligibility criteria in June from tech and digital professionals to include fields such as legal counsel, technical writers, business development managers, public relations professionals and accountants. The minimum income requirement for these non-digital talents is $60,000 per year.

MDEC said the Nomad Pass had received 3,218 applications, of which 1,506 were approved. The top five countries of origin were Russia, Pakistan, the UK, Japan and Australia.

“This move enhances the accessibility of the DE Rantau Nomad Pass to a broader range of professionals, putting Malaysia on par with other countries that offer digital nomad visas,” the agency said.

The governments of Indonesia and the Philippines did not respond to requests for comment.

Faustine Schricke, who has been living and working in Bali for 14 years, said Indonesia’s government had struggled to find a proper solution for people wanting to work remotely. “You still see a lot of visa runs as a lot of the rules are confusing,” she said. Many Russians arrived in the wake of the Ukraine invasion, most on tourist visas.

Ee Ming Toh, a 32-year-old Singaporean freelancer, became a digital nomad after facing high rental prices in the city-state. While Singapore is her base, she has worked in Malaysia and Vietnam this year and intends to head to Cambodia, Thailand, Japan and Nepal in the next few months.

“This arrangement works best for me,” she said, complaining of the hassle of “more complicated visas”.

Wong, the marketing expert, holds a similar view. “What digital nomads really want is a visa that is valid for six to 12 months and is effectively a long-term tourist visa. They are happy to pay a [reasonable] fee . . . and complete a simple application form.

“The minute you have to start providing proof of income, background checks and the like — forget it.”

CNN
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Former President Donald Trump said he “had a very good phone call” with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Friday.

The call between the two leaders, who have had a complicated relationship, marks their first conversation since Trump left the White House and comes the day after he formally accepted the Republican Party’s nomination for president. It also comes amid concerns in Europe about what Trump’s policy toward the Russia-Ukraine war would be if he were to win the presidential election in November.

“President Zelenskyy of Ukraine and I had a very good phone call earlier today. He congratulated me on a very successful Republican National Convention and becoming the Republican nominee for President of the United States,” Trump said in a post on Truth Social. “He condemned the heinous assassination attempt last Saturday and remarked about the American people coming together in the spirit of Unity during these times.”

Trump continued, “I appreciate President Zelenskyy for reaching out because I, as your next President of the United States, will bring peace to the world and end the war that has cost so many lives and devastated countless innocent families. Both sides will be able to come together and negotiate a deal that ends the violence and paves a path forward to prosperity.”

In a post on X describing the call, Zelensky said he congratulated Trump on his nomination and condemned the “shocking assassination attempt in Pennsylvania.”

“I wished him strength and absolute safety in the future,” he said. “I noted the vital bipartisan and bicameral American support for protecting our nation’s freedom and independence.”

Zelensky concluded, “We agreed with President Trump to discuss at a personal meeting what steps can make peace fair and truly lasting.”

Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Trump has repeatedly said he could settle the Ukraine war in a day, but it remains unclear how he would pursue peace.

In last month’s CNN presidential debate, Trump said that Putin’s terms for an agreement – which would include Ukraine ceding the four territories currently occupied by Russia – are “not acceptable.” But the former president and his allies have also criticized sending US military aid to Kyiv.

But the former president and his allies have also criticized US military aid to Kyiv.

Trump has long been critical of NATO defense spending. In February, the former president said he would encourage Russia to do “whatever the hell they want” to any NATO member country that doesn’t meet spending guidelines on defense, alarming many leaders in Washington and Europe.

Trump and Zelensky also have their own history. Nearly five years ago, Trump repeatedly pushed for Zelensky to investigate his political rival Joe Biden and his son, Hunter, on a call ahead of the 2020 election. That “perfect phone call,” in Trump’s words, led to his first impeachment.

European diplomats have been preparing for Trump’s potential return to the White House, CNN previously reported, working to set up guard rails for NATO and trying to ensure lasting support for Ukraine in its war with Russia.

Last week, when Zelensky was in the US, he said that “everyone is waiting for November,” including Putin. He also said that Biden and Trump are “very different” but both support democracy, which is why he claimed: “I think Putin will hate both of them.”

This story has been updated with additional reporting.

CNN’s Kylie Atwood and Mariya Knight contributed to this report.

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Eight more Democratic lawmakers, including a third US senator, have called for Joe Biden to withdrawn from this year’s White House presidential race, deepening the peril for his campaign for re-election.

In a joint statement on Friday morning, four US House members — Jared Huffman, Mark Pocan, Chuy Garcia and Marc Veasey — said it was time for the 81-year-old president to “pass the torch to a new generation of Democratic leaders”.

“We must face the reality that widespread public concerns about your age and fitness are jeopardising what should be a winning campaign,” the politicians added. House Democrats Sean Casten, Greg Landsman and Zoe Lofgren also called on Biden to drop out on Friday morning.

Meanwhile, New Mexico senator Martin Heinrich became the third Democratic member of the upper chamber of Congress to urge Biden to drop out, joining Jon Tester of Montana and Vermont’s Peter Welch.

“This moment in our nation’s history calls for a focus that is bigger than any one person,” Henrich said, adding it was “in the best interests of our country” for the president to end his campaign.

Biden insisted on Friday that he would remain in the race, saying in a statement he “look[ed] forward to getting back on the campaign trail next week to continue exposing the threat of Donald Trump’s Project 2025 agenda”.

The president has been isolating at his holiday home in Delaware since testing positive for Covid-19 on Wednesday. White House doctor Kevin O’Connor said on Friday that Biden’s symptoms had “improved meaningfully” and he would continue taking Paxlovid, the antiviral drug.

The new wave of lawmakers calling for Biden to quit comes as Democratic party grandees such as former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, as well as the megadonors crucial to funding his campaign, heap pressure on him behind the scenes.

The Financial Times reported on Thursday that donors and other senior party operatives believe Biden is very close to a decision to exit.

Chris Coons, the Democratic senator and close Biden ally, said on Friday that the president was getting the necessary advice to make a decision about his political future.

“I am confident he is hearing what he needs to hear,” he said while speaking on a panel at the Aspen Security Forum.

But Coons — who insisted Biden was “strong” and “capable” enough to carry on — acknowledged the unease within the Democratic party, saying: “There is a lot of concern and anxiety because the stakes are so significant.”

The latest interventions came a day after Trump formally accepted the Republican party’s nomination for president, less than a week after he narrowly escaped assassination in Pennsylvania.

The former president has surged ahead of Biden in the polls despite his recent criminal convictions, building a lead across the crucial swing states that will decide November’s vote.

About 30 members of Congress have now said Biden needs to drop his re-election bid, a view shared privately by many more who have not yet gone public.

However, some Democrats, including many progressives, have supported him. Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez used an Instagram livestream in the early hours of Friday to fiercely defend the president and accuse “donors” and “elites” of trying to cast him and vice-president Kamala Harris aside.

Biden’s disastrous debate performance against Trump last month sparked panic in the Democratic party over his age and fitness for office. After testing positive for Covid in Nevada he was seen apparently struggling to ascend a staircase into Air Force One to return home.