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Two major Japanese chemical manufacturers could halt production of a gas crucial to AI chipmaking starting next month, as supply tightens and prices surge amid Beijing’s export controls on tungsten. The price of tungsten hexafluoride has jumped more than 200 per cent year on year because of supply bottlenecks, coupled with rising chip demand, market data showed. The gas is a critical precursor in ...
A woman swimmer was seriously injured in a shark attack at a Sydney beach on Saturday, authorities said, in the latest of a spate of such encounters off Australia’s coast. Emergency services were called to Coogee Beach in the east of Sydney, Australia’s largest city, in the morning on reports that the 35-year-old had been bitten by a large shark about 30 metres (100 feet) from the shore. “The w...
Mainland China’s fourth-ranking official has hailed the “enthusiastic” participation of people from Taiwan at a cross-strait forum despite the “obstacles” placed in their way. The independence-leaning Democratic Progressive Party this year tightened restrictions on the Straits Forum in Fujian province, imposing the first outright ban on local officials attending the event. Senior officials had alr...
Peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait needs a “joint answer” from people on both sides, Beijing’s top Taiwan affairs official said on Saturday. “As profound changes unseen in a century accelerate across the world, the international landscape is becoming increasingly turbulent and complex, the situation in the Taiwan Strait remains complex and severe,” Wang Huning told the Straits Forum, an annu...
Bangladesh’s new leader is set to visit Malaysia and China later this month in a trip that Dhaka says reflects its independent foreign policy – with the decision to skip India seen less as a snub than a bid to strike a diplomatic balance. Tarique Rahman, who became Bangladesh’s 11th prime minister in February, plans to visit Malaysia on June 21–22 before a three-day official visit to China from Ju...
A Hong Kong intern doctor arrested on suspicion of unauthorised access to patient data has been released on bail after about 21 hours in custody and has reportedly been taken back to her former workplace for evidence collection. A source told the South China Morning Post that the 24-year-old woman, surnamed Lai, was released from Cheung Sha Wan Police Station at around 4.30pm on Saturday. She was ...
A Hong Kong intern doctor arrested on suspicion of unauthorised access to patient data has been released after about 21 hours in custody and has reportedly been taken back to her former workplace for evidence collection. A source told the South China Morning Post that the 24-year-old woman, surnamed Lai, was released from Cheung Sha Wan Police Station at around 4pm on Saturday. She was arrested at...
A Hong Kong intern doctor arrested on suspicion of unauthorised access to patient data remains in custody, the South China Morning Post has learned. A source familiar with the matter told the SCMP that the 24-year-old woman, surnamed Lai, was arrested at about 7pm on Friday and was still being held at Cheung Sha Wan Police Station on Saturday morning She was arrested on suspicion of access to a co...
The United States and Iran could finalise an agreement to end the Middle East war “within 24 hours”, key mediator Pakistan said on Saturday, after both sides expressed optimism about the chances of concluding a deal. The foes and mediators of the conflict have claimed a long-awaited accord is in its final throes, despite new skirmishes in the Strait of Hormuz in the months-long war that has roiled...
The United States said it downed multiple Iranian drones targeting commercial ships in the Strait of Hormuz early on Saturday, hours after both sides said a deal to end the Middle East war was closer than ever. The interception came after weeks of halting talks between Tehran and Washington, mediated by Pakistan, that have been marked by threats and exchanges of fire despite a fragile truce agreed...
Washington has ordered Anthropic – a leading entity in America’s AI sector – to block all foreign nationals from accessing its latest models, Fable 5 and Mythos 5, citing national security concerns, according to the Silicon Valley-based firm. The unprecedented export-control measure – the first to target specific AI models – came just days after Anthropic released the models, underscoring Washingt...
The letters spelling out US President Donald Trump’s name on the facade of the Kennedy Centre are now gone, the executive director of the performing arts venue said in a legal filing on Saturday with the court that had ordered the removal. A tarp continued to hang over the scaffolding constructed for workers to remove Trump’s name from the building, making it impossible to immediately detect wheth...
Workers began removing President Donald Trump’s name from the facade of the Kennedy Centre early on Saturday, hours after a court-ordered Friday deadline to remove references to Trump from the building and other aspects of the iconic performing arts venue’s operations. Scaffolding was erected on Friday around a section of the building that includes Trump’s name, but shortly after midnight, the Ken...
The Kennedy Centre was running out of options on Friday evening to keep President Donald Trump’s name on the facade of the iconic performing arts venue. A judge earlier in the afternoon rejected a request to pause a court-ordered deadline of Friday to remove references to Trump from the building and other aspects of the Kennedy Centre’s operations. The institution appealed that ruling, an effort t...
With more than 20 years of experience as a light goods van driver, Hongkonger Fung Fu only started considering switching to becoming a private driving instructor when he noticed the economic outlook was getting gloomier. “Many restaurants have closed down, and companies are making fewer orders of goods. Besides, more drivers are joining the logistics industry, resulting in keener competition,” the...
When Natasha Ann Lum was growing up, there was no place for Singlish – an English-based creole language in Singapore – at home. Her father was adamant that Lum and her brother not speak with broken grammar or use conversational markers such as “lah”, “lor” or “eh”. “He didn’t have the luxury of education and felt like he missed out on work opportunities because he didn’t speak English at a level t...
China activated the world’s first three-band optical fibre communication system early this month, technology that its developers say could expand the carrying capacity of future AI networks. According to the project team, a single fibre can carry more than five times the traffic of conventional systems, while transmission capacity per core increases by nearly half. The project, completed in Qingda...
The International Criminal Court ordered a medical assessment of former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte to determine whether he is fit to stand trial, with proceedings set to start in November. It is the second time that Duterte, who is facing charges of crimes against humanity over his drug war that killed thousands of people, will undergo a health check ordered by the court. The ICC’s pre-t...
A possible meeting next week between Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and US President Donald Trump offers a chance to reset ties following a year of strained relations over tariffs, Pakistan, and now, the Iran war. US forces this week attacked three Indian-crewed vessels in the Gulf of Oman region, killing at least three sailors and prompting protests from New Delhi. Modi and Trump would likel...
This story has been made freely available as a public service to our readers. Please consider supporting SCMP’s journalism by subscribing. The Hong Kong Observatory cancelled the amber rainstorm warning for a second time on Saturday, after the city was hit by heavy showers and thunderstorms under the combined influence of a southwest monsoon trough and a low-pressure trough. The earlier downpours ...
This story has been made freely available as a public service to our readers. Please consider supporting SCMP’s journalism by subscribing. The Hong Kong Observatory has cancelled an amber rainstorm warning for the second time on Saturday, after the city was hit by heavy showers and thunderstorms under the combined influence of a southwest monsoon trough and a low-pressure trough. The earlier downp...
Hong Kong has been hit by heavy showers and thunderstorms under the combined influence of a southwest monsoon trough and a low-pressure trough, with an amber rainstorm warning issued twice on Saturday. The downpours prompted the Hong Kong Observatory to issue an amber rainstorm warning – the lowest in a three-tier system – at 5am on Saturday, before cancelling it at 8.45am and restoring it at 2.15...
Hong Kong has been hit by heavy showers and thunderstorms under the combined influence of a southwest monsoon trough and a low-pressure trough, damaging part of a public swimming pool, with adverse weather to continue into Monday. The downpours prompted the Hong Kong Observatory to issue an amber rainstorm warning – the lowest in a three-tier system – at 5am on Saturday, before cancelling it at 8....
Hong Kong has been hit by more heavy showers and thunderstorms as a trough of low pressure moved over the Pearl River Estuary. The downpours prompted the Hong Kong Observatory to issue an amber rainstorm warning – the lowest in a three-tier system – at 5am on Saturday, before cancelling it at 8.45am. More than 30mm of rainfall was recorded in many areas during the morning. Tsuen Wan was among the ...
After seven years working in the shadows, He Tingbo stepped back into the limelight last month. The head of Huawei Technologies’ secretive semiconductor business – widely dubbed the company’s “chip queen” – had been out of the public view since 2019, when Washington severed the Chinese company’s global access to advanced technology, including semiconductors. Her retreat into the background became ...
President Donald Trump said late on Friday that a “swift and lethal kinetic” US strike has killed Tren de Aragua gang leader Hector Rusthenford Guerrero Flores. “At my direction, the United States Southern Command delivered a swift and lethal kinetic strike to successfully execute Nino Guerrero, the infamous leader of Tren De Aragua, one of the most bloodthirsty Terrorist Organisations on Planet,...
President Donald Trump said late on Friday that the US had carried out a lethal strike on Hector Rusthenford Guerrero Flores, also known as Nino Guerrero, the leader of Venezuelan prison gang Tren de Aragua. Tren de Aragua has been labelled by the United States as a terrorist organisation. Guerrero Flores was charged in a New York federal court with racketeering conspiracy and other crimes...
As Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi heads to the G7 meeting in France next week, she is expected to hear rumblings of discontent over Tokyo’s apparent diplomatic outreach to Moscow. With European Union member states and most Nato nations united in their resolve to push back on Russia’s ongoing aggression against Ukraine and isolate Moscow, Japan’s very different approach to Vladimir Putin’s ...
Let me pick up where I left off in a previous column. On sabbatical in China, I was reeling from being pored over by parents at the Shanghai marriage market, and judged to be too old and overqualified. But if no vigilant parent would have me for their offspring, perhaps someone in my more permanent home of London would? So I began again. Although nine months away from British dating apps had not c...
Hong Kong’s Development Bureau will test whether heavy-duty drones, weighing nearly 150kg (330.6lbs) each, can carry essential items across up to six sites over the next 12 months, the South China Morning Post has learned. In response to queries from the SCMP, the bureau revealed it was partnering with two companies to test whether the devices could carry heavy materials such as cement and manhole...
