Hong Kong’s hygiene authorities are investigating two officers caught smoking in public while in uniform, an act that is strictly prohibited, adding that such behaviour will result in disciplinary action. A viral clip circulating on social media platform Threads shows two men in uniform smoking cigarettes in what appears to be a back alley during daytime. The Food and Environmental Hygiene Department confirmed on Monday evening that the men seen in the video clip belonged to one of its district...

Taiwan has signed a deal with US defence start-up Vatn Systems to develop autonomous underwater vehicles and strengthen its asymmetric warfare capabilities amid growing military pressure from Beijing. The agreement with the National Chung-Shan Institute of Science and Technology (NCSIST) – the island’s government-funded top weapons developer – is the latest in a series of moves to expand Taiwan’s unmanned underwater capabilities. Under the memorandum of understanding signed last week, NCSIST and...

Last month, two Chinese companies released artificial intelligence models most people outside the industry know little about: Kimi K3 by Moonshot AI and Qwen3.8-Max by Alibaba Group Holding (which owns the South China Morning Post). The markets reacted even before publicly auditable evidence about the performance claims – detailed benchmark table, model card and licence – was made fully available. In the weeks that followed, global chip stocks shed about US$3 trillion in market value. That...

Russia is looking into a solution for a problem that has become hard for India to ignore: how to keep oil and other strategic goods moving when sanctions, war and maritime chokepoints threaten the world’s busiest energy routes. Moscow’s proposal for a direct rail link to India through Central and South Asia remains exploratory, but analysts say it points to a wider scramble by major powers to build trade corridors beyond the reach of the Strait of Hormuz, the Bosphorus and Western pressure. The...

Chinese researchers have engineered a probiotic that could make diabetes care as simple as drinking a cup of yogurt or swallowing a capsule. The “smart” bacterium, designed to sense high blood sugar and automatically release a glucose-lowering hormone, performed on par with the blockbuster drug Ozempic in animal tests, according to a study published in Nature last week. The team at East China Normal University in Shanghai has already filed patents and is now scaling up production to meet...

The European Union intends to significantly expand sanctions against Russia in the coming months over its war in Ukraine, the bloc’s foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas, told a ‌German newspaper. “EU sanctions have already cost Russia dearly, depriving Russia’s war machine of over €1 trillion (US$1.16 trillion) and for autumn I am putting forward the most far-reaching sanctions listings since the start of the war,” she told Die Welt. “Once adopted, they would immediately raise the total number of...

Chinese billionaire Li Shufu has relinquished his role as chairman of Geely Auto, describing the planned succession as the foundation for the future sustainable growth of the country’s second-largest carmaker. Li, the 63-year-old founder of the automotive group, announced his resignation just after Hong Kong-listed Geely reported record first-half revenue in China’s cutthroat car market on Monday. Andy An Conghui, 56, an executive director, would fill in the vacancy left by Li, effective on...

Hong Kong authorities have slashed the time required for environmental impact assessments by up to half using artificial intelligence, with an official saying that AI adoption reduced wait times for some public services by up to 90 per cent. The first batch of 30 projects aimed at enhancing efficiency was announced on Monday. It involves 13 government departments, covering transport and food business licensing, leisure and sports facilities, environmental hygiene, complaint handling, and...

Donald Trump’s envoy and son-in-law Jared Kushner met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem on Monday, a day after holding a rare meeting with Hamas’ leader in Cairo in a bid to push forward the US president’s Gaza ‌plan. Netanyahu, whose ruling coalition is trailing in Israeli opinion polls ahead of an October national election, publicly rejected this month a US-backed agreement that would see Hamas surrender its arms in exchange for Israel withdrawing from Gaza. Trump had...

US President Donald Trump’s call to “substantially” reduce US-South Korea military drills has revived speculation that he is trying to persuade North Korea’s leader Kim Jong-un to attend another summit between them even though Kim has expressed no such interest. Trump’s comments in a social media post on Sunday came as South Korea and the US began their annual Ulchi Freedom Shield exercise on Monday, putting Seoul in an awkward position of defending the alliance while not undercutting his latest...

China’s pharmaceutical contractors are showing financial resilience in the face of Washington’s push to curb reliance on Chinese supply chains. Analysts said investors were bullish because the US government’s recent measures to curb Beijing’s rise as a global pharmaceutical supplier had met resistance from industry players reluctant to give up China’s cost advantages. Hong Kong-listed shares of WuXi AppTec, Asia’s largest provider of contract pharmaceutical research, gained 3 per cent on Monday...

China’s ability to set its own technological course in the face of sustained US export restrictions may be the key factor in the two countries’ contest over artificial intelligence (AI), a prominent analyst has argued. Zheng Yongnian, dean of the school of public policy at the Chinese University of Hong Kong (Shenzhen), made the case in his preface to The Rise of Atlas, a new book about the development of Huawei Technologies’ Atlas 950 SuperPoD computing system. The system, which Huawei...

A Hong Kong court has dismissed an appeal by a senior police officer against his 6½-year jail sentence for fraudulently securing more than HK$26 million (US$3.3 million) in mortgages by concealing his affiliation with the force. In a written judgment delivered on Monday, the Court of Appeal upheld Superintendent Harbour Chan Hoi-kong’s conviction on two counts of fraud, finding that he must have knowingly made false claims in two mortgage applications that he was the general manager of a food...

Alibaba Group Holding has agreed to sell its wholly owned gaming business Lingxi Games to Trustar Capital as the Chinese technology giant pivots away from noncore sectors to prioritise e-commerce and artificial intelligence, according to an internal letter issued on Monday. “As part of Alibaba’s broader strategy to sharpen its focus, the group has decided to entrust Lingxi to Trustar Capital,” stated the letter seen by the South China Morning Post and signed by Lingxi CEO Zhou Bingshu. The...

Controversial “parent awakening camps” are attracting anxious Chinese mothers willing to invest significantly in confronting gaming addiction and poor academic performance. Promoted by an increasing number of family-education services on mainland social media, these programmes promise to transform parenting practices and mend strained family relationships. Reports from mainland media indicate two primary models: traditional courses and lectures led by certified counsellors, and expensive schemes...

Hong Kong’s sports sector helped to generate an extra HK$46 billion (US$5.9 billion) in value for the economy in 2024, the year local athletes clinched two gold and two bronze Olympic medals, with a lawmaker calling for targeted policies to build on that success. The Census and Statistics Department on Monday released an analysis of contributions to Hong Kong’s economy by sports and related activities in 2024, including the operation of facilities, manufacturing and retail, tourism and...

Malaysia may finally scrap the university law that generations of students have blamed for stifling campus dissent, but activists and academics say the harder fight will be over what comes next. Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim has promised to abolish the Universities and University Colleges Act 1971, better known by its Malay acronym AUKU, a law that has long sat at the centre of arguments over how much freedom Malaysian students should have to protest, organise and challenge university...

China’s retail sales growth trailed expectations, the pace of industrial output expansion slowed and a drop in investment worsened as its economy struggled to regain pace at the start of the second half of the year. July retail sales rose by 0.6 per cent, missing the 1.3 per cent expectation among economists polled by financial data provider Wind, and slowing from June’s 1 per cent rate. Industrial output rose by 4.5 per cent, trailing the 4.9 per cent forecast and June’s 5.3 per cent pace,...

Shares of ChangXin Memory Technologies (CXMT), China’s leading DRAM maker, jumped 12 per cent on Monday to close at a record 61.80 yuan (US$9.16), lifting its market capitalisation to 4.13 trillion yuan and extending its lead as China’s most valuable listed company. The Hefei-based chipmaker first overtook Hong Kong-listed Tencent Holdings on Thursday as China’s most valuable listed company, when CXMT’s market value reached about 3.54 trillion yuan. It had already become the most valuable...

Hong Kong recorded about 4.5 million visitor arrivals in July, up 3 per cent from a year earlier, as major international conventions boosted business travel while bad weather weighed on growth from mainland China, according to the Tourism Board. The board said on Monday that a series of major international meetings, incentives, conventions and exhibitions (MICE), including the 108th Lions International Convention and the technology exhibition LEAP East, helped drive an increase in business...

Global commercial real estate investment markets are roaring back to life. In the first half of this year, direct investment in commercial property rose 27 per cent in annualised terms. The sharpest increase was in the Asia-Pacific, where transaction volumes were up 38 per cent to US$92.5 billion, the strongest half-yearly performance on record, according to data from JLL. While there have been many positive surprises in Asian real estate since the eruption of the Covid-19 pandemic, the...

Thousands of people have rallied in Singapore against plans to build homes on two forested sites in a large public display of concern over how the land-scarce city state should balance housing demand with conservation. The projects have brought renewed urgency to a long-running debate over land use: activists say remaining mature forests should be protected, while the government says conserving more greenery would mean fewer homes for Singaporeans. Residents, nature lovers and conservation...

This article was first published on August 18, 1971. Ferry disaster: no hope for missing crew by T. S. Koo A large but undetermined number of the crew of the Hongkong-Macao ferry Fatshan, including her master and senior British officers, were feared drowned when she capsized off Lantao during the typhoon early yesterday (August 17, 1971). So far four survivors have been picked up, and four bodies found. The Governor, Sir David Trench, last night expressed deep sympathy to the families of those...

A Taiwan-based streaming platform has removed Japanese anime series Chainsmoker Cat for Hong Kong audiences because the programme is in breach of the city’s ban on online smoking advertisements. Animation Crazy, a streaming platform launched by Bahamut, a Taiwanese internet forum and news website, said on Monday that it recently received a letter from Hong Kong’s Department of Health concerning Chainsmoker Cat. The show’s content contravened rules that prohibited advertising smoking products on...

All pilots working for flag carrier Malaysia Airlines tested negative for drugs, owner Malaysia Aviation Group (MAG) said on Monday, adding that its cabin crew would be tested next. The mandatory screening process was ⁠ordered after a Malaysian Airlines pilot was arrested in Indonesia on drug trafficking charges on July 28. Authorities found 26kg (57lbs) of the mind-altering drug MDMA in his luggage upon his arrival in Jakarta from Kuala Lumpur. Urine tests also showed the pilot had been under...

China’s autonomous-driving ambitions are winning growing recognition in Europe, with Deutsche Bank raising its target price for Momenta following a key regulatory breakthrough, and Pony.ai expanding its European robotaxi roll-out alongside Uber Technologies. In a research note released on Monday, Deutsche Bank analyst Bin Wang saw Momenta as the “No 1 independent autonomous-driving solution provider globally”, particularly in the urban “navigation on autopilot” (NOA) segment. “Momenta’s market...

A Chinese research team has unveiled an aerodynamic model for a massive flying-wing passenger aircraft that could carry more than 800 people, marking a bold new entry in the country’s large aircraft programme. Unlike conventional aircraft that have separate fuselage, wings and tail, a flying wing merges most of the structure into a single broad lifting body. The proposed design is 85 metres (280 feet) wide and 43 metres long, with a wingspan roughly 1.6 times that of the B-2 Spirit stealth...

Chinese artificial intelligence chipmaker Biren Technology projects that its first-half revenue could shoot up by up to 2,107 per cent amid the AI hardware boom, joining industry peers like Hygon Information Technology and Cambricon Technologies in reporting accelerating demand for home-grown chips. The Shanghai-based graphics processing unit (GPU) maker, which debuted on the Hong Kong stock exchange in January, estimated revenue for the first six months of 2026 to reach between 1.15 billion...

A simple pat on a child’s head has sparked debate in Singapore after an elderly man was shoved to the ground by a girl’s father. Police said on Sunday they had identified a 40-year-old man in connection with the incident at a food court on Saturday afternoon, CNA reported. “Members of the public are advised not to speculate on the incident or its circumstances, and to allow the police to conduct investigations and establish the facts of the case,” they told the broadcaster. The incident on...

A deadly stampede broke out at a Hindu temple in eastern India’s Bihar state on Monday after a snapped electric wire reportedly triggered panic among worshippers, officials said, killing seven people and injuring more than a dozen. The incident occurred near Ashok Dham Temple in Lakhisarai district, as thousands of devotees gathered to offer prayers on the third Monday of Shravan, one of the holiest months in the Hindu calendar. The period, which usually falls between July and August, is...

Hong Kong innovators have won the top prize, eight special awards and 35 medals at a major international invention competition in Silicon Valley, with a solar-powered fertiliser production system claiming the event’s highest honour. The city’s delegation secured 22 gold and 13 silver medals at the Silicon Valley International Invention Festival (SVIIF), which concluded at the Santa Clara Convention Centre in California on Sunday. Amonova’s regenerative, solar-powered air-to-fertiliser production...

The Philippines is looking to India as a model of defence self-reliance as it continues building its capabilities to manage maritime disputes following the purchase of its first BrahMos missiles from Delhi. While India’s experience is useful, it is more practical for Manila to cooperate with Delhi in stages than push quickly to manufacture its own weapons, according to analysts. Speaking at a forum organised by Indian think tank Observer Research Foundation on August 12, the Philippine...

Hayden Panettiere, star of popular television series including Heroes and Nashville, has died. She was 36. Panettiere’s father, Skip, announced the actress’ death in a statement provided to ABC News on Sunday. “It is with profound sadness that we share the tragic passing of our beloved Hayden. She was an incredible light and a force of nature who brought immeasurable love and joy to all who knew her – and to the millions who watched her onscreen,” his statement said. No cause of death was...

Five people have been injured after a taxi and three private cars collided on Tsing Kwai Highway in Hong Kong. Police said the four vehicles crashed on the Kowloon-bound carriageway near Lai King MTR station at 8.40am on Monday, leaving four men and one woman with minor injuries. The Fire Services Department said all five injured people were taken to Princess Margaret Hospital in Kwai Chung for treatment. The Transport Department said the fast lane of the Kowloon-bound Tsing Kwai Highway was...

Australia is slowing the issuance of new “working holiday” visas popular with backpackers as the government looks at policies to cut migration to the country. “They are still being processed, but they are being processed more slowly than they were previously,” Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke said on Sunday. The visas allow people to come to Australia to work and travel for a set period of time, and are popular with European and Japanese citizens. Applications for people from 24 nations with an...

Hong Kong will hold two more drills later this month at the revamped Huanggang border crossing, with up to 20,000 civil servants to be involved in testing the new immigration clearance gates under “harsher scenarios”, according to the city’s security chief. Secretary for Security Chris Tang Ping-keung said on Monday that authorities had identified problems, including a lack of notices and benches, as well as crowd congestion at the transport interchange, following two earlier large-scale drills...

A Hong Kong merchant has been jailed for five years and four months for attempting to murder his wife and three daughters by burning charcoal in their public rental flat after struggling to repay debts totalling nearly HK$900,000 (US$115,000). The High Court on Monday sentenced Wong Pak-ting in what the presiding judge described as a “tragic” case. The 45-year-old pleaded guilty in May to four counts of attempted murder after spiking food and drinks prepared for his family with sleeping pills...

An extremist Israeli lawmaker in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s coalition publicly advocated for killing “30 to 40” people in Gaza each night, comments that surfaced Sunday and were quickly shared by Palestinian media. Minister of National Security Itamar Ben-Gvir made the statement while speaking to a former Gaza-held hostage, Rom Braslavski, on Braslavski’s podcast. The two were discussing Israel’s recovery from the Hamas attack of October 7, 2023, when Ben-Gvir criticised Israel’s recent...

We have put together stories from our coverage last weekend to help you stay informed about news across Asia and beyond. If you would like to see more of our reporting, please consider subscribing. 1. Why Chinese youth are turning to an 84-year-old Cambridge professor for support 2. Chinese officials rattled by White House chaos weeks ahead of Xi-Trump summit 3. How Southeast Asia’s monarchies stay relevant in a volatile region 4. Hong Kong policewoman facing probe over viral video of her...

“Horrific, horrendous, unbearable, unsafe.” That is how medical professionals describe the impact of this year’s heatwaves on Britain’s healthcare system, in response to a survey by the Doctors’ Association UK. In hospitals built for a cooler climate, staff are now dealing with patients too sweaty to receive intravenous drips, medication at risk of degrading in high temperatures and colleagues collapsing on the job with heat fatigue. The past few months have revealed the extent to which...

Indonesia’s President Prabowo Subianto is presiding over celebrations marking the 81st anniversary of the country’s independence, with a flag-raising ceremony at the presidential palace in Jakarta, followed by a military parade.

The operator of a Hong Kong “maid cafe” has been arrested for allegedly molesting a 14-year-old employee multiple times, beginning on her first day at work. Police said on Monday that the operator, a 35-year-old man surnamed Cheung, was arrested on Saturday on suspicion of molesting a girl under 16 at the cafe in Mong Kok’s Dundas Square. Officers also found some pornographic pictures of children at the cafe, police said, with Cheung accused of the “use, procurement or offer of persons under the...

South Korean shipbuilders could be among the first US partners to benefit from President Donald Trump’s push to rebuild America’s naval industrial base, analysts have said. Trump last week signed a National Security Presidential Memorandum allowing foreign shipbuilders with US investments to build up to two vessels at their parent shipyards – a move aimed at quickly addressing gaps in US Navy capacity while restoring the country’s own shipbuilding sector. The directive comes as Washington seeks...

President Xi Jinping led commemorations of the 100th anniversary of the birth of former state leader Jiang Zemin at a grand ceremony in Beijing, in a show of political continuity and party unity ahead of next year’s major power reshuffle. In a 40-minute speech, Xi addressed thousands of officials and delegates from various sectors at the ceremony, held in the Great Hall of the People, delivering a speech that highlighted Jiang’s contribution to the party and the country. A large portrait of...

It made perfect sense for Hong Kong Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu to hold public consultations on both the city’s first five-year plan and the last policy address of his current term at the same time. Many have been putting forward views that warrant serious consideration. It is clear that Lee needs to be bolder when it comes to the “new chapter” he promised in 2022 when he was elected. The Northern Metropolis is only one part of the city’s transformation; his coming policy address must lay...

Thousands of people were still waiting for aid on the Indonesian island of Flores as the country marked its 81st Independence Day on Monday, days after a powerful earthquake killed at least 68 people, injured more than 200 others and damaged hundreds of homes and other buildings. Many residents on Flores Island in East Nusa Tenggara province spent the day mourning victims and waiting for aid to arrive to communities still cut off by the deadly quake. During Indonesia’s Independence Day ceremony...

A top US military commander said mental health was a valid concern after meeting crew deployed on the USS Abraham Lincoln, where conditions aboard the aircraft carrier have led to complaints during its long deployment in the Iran war. Admiral Brad Cooper’s visit to the carrier in the Arabian Sea followed outrage among family members about reports of food shortages, water contamination, mouldy showers and long shifts in wartime aboard the vessel, which has been deployed without a port call for...

As dark tourism gains traction, some Chinese youth are embracing a related form of experiential travel, paying to confront simulated typhoons, floods, and other disasters while acquiring survival skills. Also referred to as grief tourism, dark tourism involves visiting sites linked to death, catastrophe, and human suffering. Its origins trace back centuries, including connections to 17th century Britain, where public executions often attracted large crowds. This phenomenon has surged across...

The rise of Chinese open-weight models has shaken up the global artificial intelligence (AI) market in recent months. With China’s systems offering high performance at a lower cost, businesses around the world are looking at shifting away from Silicon Valley’s leading providers. Now, a new Hong Kong-based company aims to turn that trend into a billion-dollar business. The “neo-cloud” provider Antimatter is helping firms switch from the dominant US models – and the cloud systems that serve them –...

The percentage of non-Chinese-speaking students who sat Hong Kong Diploma of Secondary Education (DSE) exams and were admitted to the city’s public universities has remained persistently low over the past five academic years, with no clear signs of a change in sight. Veteran educators who teach such pupils, classified by the government as NCS students, attributed the trend to three main factors: high failure rates in core mathematics; deficiencies in Chinese-language studies; and a lack of...

Japan is looking beyond the United States to enhance its defence capabilities, as mounting doubt over American munitions supplies pushes Tokyo to seek deeper industrial ties on this front with Australia and India. Defence Minister Shinjiro Koizumi’s visits to the two countries this week are set to advance cooperation spanning warships to stealth technology and drones, analysts say, pointing to how prolonged conflict in the Middle East and the Ukraine war could drain stockpiles for US...

Hong Kong homebuyers flocked to the first batch of units at a major residential project in the Northern Metropolis with 44 – or more than half – of the 82 flats made available via regular sale finding buyers as of 7.30pm on Sunday, according to agents. Wheelock Properties’ Park Silicon project in Kwu Tung North also sold eight units via tender worth more than HK$78.43 million (US$9.99 million), the developer said. The units were among the 18 available via tender starting Sunday. The positive...

South Korea’s defence ministry said on Monday that its joint military exercise with the United States had started after President Donald Trump’s announcement it would be scaled back. “The UFS exercise is proceeding as planned,” the ministry said in a brief statement to reporters, referring to the annual drill named Ulchi Freedom Shield. As always, North Korea has reacted sharply to the annual exercise involving about 18,000 South Korean military personnel. The 11-day joint drill is scheduled to...

Welcome to Open Dialogue, a series from the South China Morning Post where we bring together leading voices to discuss the stories and subjects occupying international headlines. In this edition, we invited a leading Chinese scholar of South Asian affairs and a former Indian foreign secretary and ambassador to China to reflect on the deep fault lines in India-China relations. They debate whether the biggest barrier is history or politics, clash over the border, Pakistan and India’s ties with the...

In 2022, Ukraine asked SpaceX CEO Elon Musk to activate Starlink coverage around Sevastopol to support an attack on Russia’s Black Sea Fleet. He refused, saying SpaceX would become “explicitly complicit in a major act of war”; he later also cited US sanctions covering Crimea. At the moment that mattered, one private actor had the final say. It exposed a question hidden inside every chokepoint. We usually ask where dependence is concentrated: a strait, mineral, technology, network. But three...