Live headlines from trusted global sources. Click any story to open it on the original website.
As the US prepares to host the G20 summit in Miami in December, Americans’ views of participating countries vary, with China viewed more favourably than Russia, although both rank near the bottom, according to the latest Pew Research Centre report. Americans gave China an average rating of 37 out of 100, compared with 27 for Russia, Pew found in a report released on Friday. Canada, Australia, Japa...
A Republican lawmaker is requesting the Pentagon blacklist 58 Chinese universities and 62 technology labs as national security threats, a move Beijing calls Cold War-style overreach and critics warn could freeze US-China scientific collaboration and ultimately undermine American innovation itself. In a letter to US Secretary of Defence Pete Hegseth, House Select Committee on China Chairman John Mo...
Katie Zacharia was “let go” as White House press secretary on Friday, a White House official said, five days into a tenure dominated by questions over her claimed legal career in China, where she said she had passed a bar exam. Her exit came on the same day Beijing invited her to visit China more often, responding to her remark that the country “doesn’t even have proper toilets”. US President Dona...
Katie Zacharia was “let go” as White House press secretary on Friday, a White House official said, five days into a tenure dominated by questions over her claimed legal career in China, where she said she had passed a bar exam. Her exit came on the same day Beijing invited her to visit China more often, responding to her remark that the country “doesn’t even have proper toilets”. US President Dona...
White House Press Secretary Katie Zacharia was “let go” from the role, a White House official said on Friday, after US President Donald Trump said he had told her to reconsider the job following public scrutiny. Speaking to reporters on the White House lawn as he left for a rally in Georgia, Trump said he had spoken to Zacharia and that he felt she did not deserve what he called negative media c...
US President Donald Trump signalled on Friday that his embattled new press secretary, Katie Zacharia, may be on her way out – a mere week after he picked her for the post. Speaking to reporters on the White House lawn as he left for a rally in Georgia, Trump said he had spoken to Zacharia and that he felt she did not deserve what he called negative media coverage. Recounting what was said in that ...
Pope Leo spoke with Russian President Vladimir Putin by phone on Friday, calling for a ceasefire in a Russian-occupied city in southern Ukraine, as he recovers in hospital from a lung cancer operation. The Vatican said that Pope Leo “expressed his deep concern about the grave humanitarian situation in the city of Oleshky, in the Kherson region, and called for a ceasefire to allow the delivery of f...
Tesla CEO Elon Musk unveiled what he described as a “flying” car, equipped with thrusters, during a live-streamed event at his SpaceX rocket company’s facility on Thursday. Technical and regulatory challenges have so far prevented the much-hyped flying car sector from getting off the ground. Musk revealed his new Roadster sports car during a launch event at a SpaceX test facility in Texas. During ...
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Friday asked European Union leaders to provide Kyiv an extra 70 billion euros (US$79 billion) in funding next year to help it keep fighting Russia. “The war will cost 155 billion euros next year. And we need at least 70 billion euros more from you – for defence, for weapons and for our resilience,” Zelensky said in a speech at an EU summit in Brussels. “Th...
China and America are talking again. There are leaders’ meetings, phone calls and a new channel for discussing artificial intelligence. Officials are cautiously trying to keep the relationship from veering into crisis. And yet some of the hardest questions remain untouched. Neither side is giving much ground on advanced chips, export controls remain a battlefield and neither Washington nor Beijing...
Hong Kong police have arrested two men over their alleged involvement in at least six break-ins across Kowloon over the past three months, with total losses amounting to HK$1.7 million (US$216,629). The pair – a 54-year-old mainland Chinese man and a 34-year-old Hong Kong resident – were arrested separately on Thursday in Sham Shui Po and Tsim Sha Tsui, respectively. Police identified and located ...
Japan is increasingly turning to foreign companies to accelerate its military modernisation, drawing on overseas technology, expertise and production capacity to plug defence gaps that could prove critical in a potential regional conflict involving China. The push has gathered momentum over the past week, with Tokyo confirming a contract for Ukrainian interceptor drones and a multinational fighter...
Hong Kong’s Fire Services Department will launch three new AI-assisted drone technologies to strengthen fire detection and its response to heightened risks during tomb-sweeping activities ahead of the Chung Yeung Festival on Sunday. Wong Tak-fai, acting divisional officer for information and communications technology, said on Friday that the technology would improve the speed and accuracy of fire ...
China’s R&D investment grew by 8.2 per cent last year – fuelled by double-digit growth in fundamental science and university funding – in sharp contrast with deep budget cuts across the US research sector. Total investment in research and experimental development crossed 3.9 trillion yuan (US$583 billion) in 2025, “maintaining a trajectory of steady growth”, the National Bureau of Statistics said ...
While Washington’s efforts to block Chinese electric vehicles (EVs) were originally intended to protect its domestic automotive industry, they have sparked concerns the strategy is hurting America’s carmaking competitiveness. With a lack of a coherent industrial policy discouraging long-term investment, the protectionist approach was backfiring on Detroit’s EV transition, said David Zhang, a macro...
Dutch semiconductor equipment giant ASML is expanding into next-generation hybrid bonding, a technique that creates dense electrical connections by directly joining chips or silicon wafers, according to a new report. Major Chinese companies are also adopting the technology to improve chip performance. ASML submitted 27 patent families related to hybrid bonding tools between December 2022 and Novem...
The awarding of the 2026 Nobel Peace Prize to South African jurist Navanethem “Navi” Pillay matters for reasons that go well beyond the laureate herself. The award does three things at once. First, it restores credibility to the prize. Second, it rejects in unambiguous terms the Thrasymachian doctrine that might is right, which has become the operating philosophy of major powers. Third, it highlig...
Police detained India’s ‘cockroach’ movement founder Abhijeet Dipke on Friday, live images from his group showed, ahead of a protest called by him in capital New Delhi’s central business district, the latest rally to demand the resignation of India’s election chief. The youth-led ‘Cockroach Janta Party’ (CJP), opposition groups and student organisations have held almost daily protests this month ...
Chinese scientists have unearthed a fossil of the earliest known flightless bird, offering compelling evidence that not all early birds evolved to take to the skies. The discovery could also challenge long-held assumptions – including ideas dating back to evolutionary theorist Charles Darwin – that flightlessness in birds arose only as a secondary adaptation after earlier species had mastered flig...
Hong Kong authorities have found that lifts in another 39 buildings are lacking proper door-frame components following an investigation into faulty replacement works carried out by a contractor involving missing fire-safety parts. The South China Morning Post also learned on Friday that police had arrested a director and two registered lift engineers from the lift contractor, Taizoom Elevator, on ...
Hong Kong police have arrested a director and two registered lift engineers on suspicion of deception in connection with faulty replacement works on 48 lifts at two housing estates, the South China Morning Post has learned. A source said on Friday that the three suspects were from Taizoom Elevator, which replaced nine lifts at Tsui Ping (North) Estate in Kwun Tong and 39 lifts at Pok Hong Estate i...
Singapore has identified seven companies it says were involved in wildfires in Indonesia that are choking the city state with haze, and plans to issue notices requiring them to take preventive measures, the Business Times reported. The companies will receive notices under the Transboundary Haze Pollution Act requiring them to stop or refrain from burning and submit plans to prevent a recurrence, t...
In talks with Israel’s president on Thursday, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi called for an immediate easing of the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and for Israel to reverse its West Bank settlement expansion. “The imperative priority is to fully open access routes into Gaza. Two million civilians must not be left to struggle on the brink of survival, nor can this humanitarian catastrophe be allowed ...
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi urged Israel to halt and reverse West Bank settlement expansion and called for an immediate easing of the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, in a meeting with Israel’s president on Thursday. “The imperative priority is to fully open access routes into Gaza. Two million civilians must not be left to struggle on the brink of survival, nor can this humanitarian catastrophe ...
A Malaysian ruler known for being reserved has publicly berated his chief minister over efforts to unseat him, telling the politician to “go away” and withdraw his claim that the monarch no longer holds the throne. Negeri Sembilan, south of Kuala Lumpur, has been caught in a dispute since April over who is its rightful ruler, bringing down one state government aligned with Prime Minister Anwar Ibr...
Beijing has invited White House press secretary Katie Zacharia to visit the country more often after she said in an interview that China “doesn’t even have proper toilets”. The newly appointed spokeswoman for the Trump administration made the controversial remarks in an interview on Thursday with conservative commentator Jack Posobiec, when talking about the perception around 2016 that “the gold d...
Hong Kong authorities have ordered the developer of the One Stanley luxury estate to inspect eight more houses – including one acquired by a Mongolian mining tycoon’s family – and the common area of a flat, in the wake of a scandal involving alleged substandard works at a building in the residential development. The details of the inspection were announced in a sales brochure updated on Friday by ...
The former father-in-law of slain Hong Kong socialite Abby Choi Tin-fung failed to repay a HK$250,000 loan from her partner’s father and asked for help in hiring lawyers after he was remanded in custody for allegedly killing the model three years ago, a court has heard. Tam Chak-kwan, founder of the popular restaurant chain TamJai Yunnan Mixian, testified in the High Court on Friday about his inte...
European leaders on Friday rallied around Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelensky as Kyiv’s ties with US President Donald Trump have nosedived and worries grow that US leader is increasingly siding with Russia. Relations between Kyiv and Washington have soured since last week, when Trump eased sanctions on Russia in exchange for Moscow releasing large amounts of diesel onto global markets. Zelensky infuriate...
European leaders on Friday rallied around Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelensky as Kyiv’s ties with US President Donald Trump have nosedived and worries grow that US leader is increasingly siding with Russia. Relations between Kyiv and Washington have soured since last week, when Trump eased sanctions on Russia in exchange for Moscow releasing large amounts of diesel onto global markets. Zelensky infuriate...
