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Three repeat offenders have been sentenced to up to two years and two months behind bars for stealing 83 Jellycat and Labubu plushies worth a total of HK$115,200 (US$14,770) from a Hong Kong shopping centre last year. The District Court heard on Friday that the three men had stolen the popular merchandise from two claw machine shops at Kwai Chung Plaza on the instructions of other suspects who rem...
Hong Kong’s push to develop into a premier gold and commodity trading hub has gained momentum, with local metal storage surpassing 30,000 tonnes, a minister has said, as the administration positions the city as the destination of choice for global capital. Secretary for Financial Services and the Treasury Christopher Hui Ching-yu also said on Friday the government would expand renminbi settlement ...
The United States has returned dozens of cultural relics to China ahead of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s coming visit to Washington, a goodwill gesture to help pave the way for a positive summit. At the handover ceremony at the Chinese embassy in Washington on Wednesday, China officials received 58 cultural relics and palaeontological fossils from the cultural property, art and antiquities progra...
The United States has returned cultural relics to China ahead of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s coming visit to Washington, a goodwill gesture paving the way for a positive summit and stabilising ties. At the handover ceremony at the Chinese embassy in Washington on Wednesday, China received 58 pieces of cultural relics and palaeontological fossils from the Cultural Property, Art and Antiquities p...
A Chinese professor has ignited controversy after asserting at a university conference that her extreme commitment to research involved sleeping less than two hours a day for a decade, investing two million yuan (US$300,000) of her own money, and completely sacrificing her personal and family life for over 20 years. The public health professor, Lu Chan, from the Xiangya School of Medicine at Centr...
China and the Philippines exchanged blame over a clash on Friday in disputed waters in the South China Sea, further fuelling tensions over the strategic waterway that has become a dangerous regional flashpoint. In a brief statement released on Friday afternoon, China’s coastguard accused a Philippine vessel of deliberately ramming a Chinese patrol vessel near the contested Sabina Shoal. “Philippin...
[The content of this article has been produced by our advertising partner.] Ken Lau, Managing Director, Greater China, & Chief Executive Officer, Hong Kong, said: “FWD Hong Kong warmly welcomes the HKSAR Government's publication of the First Five-Year Plan for Economic and Social Development of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (2026-2030) and the 2026 Policy Address. As a pan-Asian insu...
Property agent Raymond Heng had suspected True Fitness was struggling, but he did not expect the gym he had visited for more than a decade to disappear overnight. The closure was not entirely surprising given the region’s fiercely competitive fitness industry, but its abruptness left Heng, 47, in disbelief after paying S$8,800 (US$6,900) for a lifetime membership in 2013. “I guessed that they migh...
An unusual vessel taking shape at a Shanghai shipyard has been assessed as a possible mothership for China’s large uncrewed submarines – a capability that, if confirmed, could enable Beijing to operate the drones far from its own coast for sustained periods. Open-source naval analyst H.I. Sutton said satellite imagery of the roughly 200-metre (656-foot) hull at Hudong-Zhonghua showed a large inter...
Nearly one-fifth of surveyed companies in the Asia-Pacific region believe wider adoption of artificial intelligence will reduce their real estate needs, a new study by CBRE has found. More than half – 56 per cent – held a neutral view, believing either that AI had no impact on office space demand or that it was too early to determine its effect, according to the property consultancy’s poll of corp...
As Rodrigo Duterte’s crimes-against-humanity trial looms, an international tribunal faces the challenge of managing a sprawling prosecution case around the health of an 81-year-old former president of the Philippines, on top of shielding the proceedings from a highly charged media environment. Those pressures came into focus at an International Criminal Court (ICC) status conference on Wednesday, ...
Doctors in Hong Kong have been urged to arrange blood tests for patients with symptoms of chikungunya fever, regardless of their travel history, after the city recorded its first local case of the mosquito-borne disease this year. The Centre for Health Protection issued a reminder to doctors on Thursday after a 55-year-old woman with no recent travel history was reported as Hong Kong’s first local...
Chinese President Xi Jinping will travel to the US for a summit next week, which is likely to include talks about artificial intelligence (AI), tariffs and a potential trade-war truce extension. Final details will be firmed up in New York on Sunday at a meeting between US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, Trade Representative Jamieson Greer and Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng, the Financial Times r...
Chinese artificial intelligence models from seven major developers combined generate only about 10 per cent of the revenue reported for OpenAI and Anthropic, even as investor enthusiasm remains intense, according to US-based research firm Rhodium Group. The Chinese AI models earned an estimated US$10.7 billion in annual recurring revenue (ARR) from March to August, a fraction of the more than US$1...
North Korea’s underground nuclear tests have triggered a chain of seismic events, activating ancient fault lines that stretch towards one of the most dangerous volcanoes on Earth, about 100km (62 miles) away, according to a paper published by the journal Science. The joint Chinese and South Korean study, which appeared on Thursday, found that the five nuclear explosions conducted between 2013 and ...
China has begun mass production of a super-coating that can cut wall temperatures by 25 degrees Celsius in summer, according to the state-run Science and Technology Daily. The material, which has undergone six months of real-world testing at a petrochemical plant in the southern island province of Hainan, uses the principles of radiative cooling. It requires neither electricity nor cooling agents ...
South Korean President Lee Jae Myung has drawn a clear line against any US request for Seoul to join the war against Iran, explicitly ruling out the dispatch of troops or military assets that could involve his country in the conflict. The stance comes amid mounting public opposition to any military deployment and growing pressure from Washington for Seoul to contribute to efforts to secure freedom...
China has set its sights on becoming a global biomedicine powerhouse by 2030, targeting key technological breakthroughs and at least a quarter of the world’s first-in-class drugs market under a new five-year plan for the sector. By the end of the decade, China would “firmly rank at the global forefront” in biopharmaceutical research and development and applications, with its “core competitiveness”...
Indonesia welcomed its first aircraft carrier on Friday, a former Italian warship that the government says will strengthen the archipelago nation’s maritime security and disaster response capabilities. The 41-year-old former ITS Giuseppe Garibaldi, with capacity for short take-off and vertical landing aircraft and helicopters, was welcomed with a military ceremony upon its arrival at a naval base ...
Three students were killed in a school shooting in the southern Philippines on Friday, including a 16-year-old suspected gunman who turned the gun on himself, provincial officials said. Eight others were injured, with four in critical condition. All the victims – students at Banga National High School – were aged 14 to 17, said Albert Palencia, mayor of Banga town in South Cotabato, where the sho...
At least one person was killed and four were injured in a shooting at a high school in the southern Philippines on Friday, a provincial governor said. The incident took place at Banga National High School in South Cotabato, Governor Reynaldo Tamayo said. Philippine police confirmed the shooting. “We have injuries. Not just one but we are verifying more details,” Police Chief Ma...
Philippine police confirmed a shooting at a high school in the southern Philippines on Friday, with injuries reported. “We have injuries. Not just one but we are verifying more details,” Police Chief Master Sergeant Reggie Faderon said. More to follow …
The US Federal Reserve raised its benchmark interest rate by a quarter of a percentage point this week, followed by the Hong Kong Monetary Authority and the Bank of Japan, while the 10-year US Treasury yield fell back below 5 per cent. Here are some of the figures that have drawn the most market attention this week. Fed raises interest rates for first time since 2023 The US Federal Open Market Com...
Senior bankers at HSBC are facing a double blow of losing a key employment benefit while also confronting potential job losses as the lender carries out a range of measures to cut costs and achieve fair treatment for all staff, according to sources. HSBC, the biggest lender in Hong Kong, will scrap an education subsidy programme for all newly hired or newly promoted senior executives from Friday, ...
For generations, the narrative of New Zealand’s human settlement has held that Polynesian voyagers – the ancestors of the Maori – arrived and settled the islands in the 13th century, followed by European explorers in the 17th century. This timeline underpins New Zealand’s history and its political model. The Treaty of Waitangi, signed in 1840 between the British Crown and about 540 Maori chiefs, s...
Hong Kong’s leader has said he does not plan to change the government’s annual target for attracting talent despite the city admitting more than 300,000 people since expanding its drive four years ago. Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu said on Friday that about 20 per cent of overall arrivals came from places outside mainland China. “We have met our targets better than we set,” Lee told a phone-in ...
Talent attracted to Hong Kong under various admission schemes could add about 1.2 per cent to the city’s gross domestic product (GDP) each year, the city leader has said, adding that more than half of those reaching the three-year mark are willing to stay. Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu said on Friday the government had attracted more than 300,000 people through its talent measures, with about 2...
Talent attracted to Hong Kong under various admission schemes could add about 1.2 per cent to the city’s gross domestic product (GDP) each year, according to the city leader, who said more than half of those reaching the three-year mark were willing to stay. Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu said on Friday the government had attracted more than 300,000 people through its talent measures, with aroun...
Heavy rains triggered flooding and landslides across northern Vietnam, killing three people and damaging thousands of homes as well as more than 22,000 hectares (54,000 acres) of crops. The northern region has experienced downpours since Monday, with some areas receiving as much as 653mm (26 inches) of rain, according to a statement on the government’s website. More than 16,000 houses have been in...
Polling stations opened Friday in Russia’s Far East, kicking off a three-day election that President Vladimir Putin’s party is all but guaranteed to win in the fifth year of war with Ukraine. It will be Russia’s first parliamentary election since Moscow sent troops to Ukraine in February 2022. The conflict has since killed hundreds of thousands. Only parties that support Putin and the Kremlin’s dr...
