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Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi is considering visiting India early next month to meet with her counterpart Narendra Modi to discuss cooperation on strengthening supply chains of critical goods given concerns about China’s economic coercion, government sources said on Thursday. Takaichi aims to deepen bilateral collaboration in a wide range of fields covering defence, economic issues and cu...
Soon after Donald Trump concluded a visit to China he hailed as a great success, America’s top diplomat joined his Indian, Japanese and Australian counterparts in New Delhi for a meeting of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and the foreign ministers on May 26 launched the Quad Critical Minerals Initiative Framework, a strategic push to curb global reliance on B...
A new India-US pact on critical minerals has put the spotlight on New Delhi’s potential as an alternative to China, but analysts say despite the country’s significant resources, it is unlikely to dent Beijing’s dominance in the sector any time soon. Delhi and Washington signed a framework agreement on May 26 during US Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s visit to India to secure supplies of critical m...
A dozen people have died in a fire at a home for older people in Sri Lanka, police said on Thursday, while another eight have been hospitalised. The fire, which broke out at a home in Anguruwatota 55km (34 miles) from the commercial capital Colombo, has been put out and the director of the establishment has been arrested, police said. “A total of 51 people were rescued from the home an...
Four New Zealand lawmakers who were handed travel bans by Beijing for visiting Taiwan have been accused of crossing a “red line” by the Chinese embassy in Wellington. The ban – which covers mainland China, Hong Kong and Macau – was condemned by the New Zealand and Australian governments, which said they would lodge a formal protest. The party, which visited the island in early May, included three ...
The Chinese motorcycle brand ZXMOTO and its founder Zhang Xue have become one of the most-mentioned topics online in April following their unprecedented victory in a world-class race. Zhang’s wife, who has been with him since she was a teenager, has also become famous. Chen Xingyi, 38, was Zhang’s junior secondary school classmate. She began dating him when they were both poor youngsters and was b...
Hong Kong police are searching for a 76-year-old man who went missing in Ma On Shan on Wednesday. Liu Yim-kwan left his home at Yan On Estate on Hang Chi Street in the small hours Wednesday and failed to return, police said on Thursday. Liu is about 1.7 metres tall with a lean build. He has short black hair and a sallow complexion. He was last seen wearing a black jacket, black trousers and white ...
China is wasting a huge amount of green energy as the world grapples with an energy shortage because of the Strait of Hormuz crisis. The “wasted” wind and solar energy stems from inflexible grid management that continues to rely on coal for baseload power and stymies a clean energy expansion that could otherwise generate electricity equivalent to the needs of France, according to analysis by the C...
China is wasting a huge amount of green energy as the world grapples with an energy shortage because of the Strait of Hormuz crisis. The “wasted” wind and solar energy stems from inflexible grid management that continues to position coal as a stabilising source of power and stymies a clean energy expansion that could otherwise generate electricity equivalent to the needs of France, according to an...
The EU and China were due to hold talks to defuse escalating trade tensions after Europe voted last week to adopt a tough new approach. EU trade chief Maros Sefcovic was set to meet China’s top trade envoy, Li Chenggang, on the sidelines of an Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) meeting on Thursday, the South China Morning Post reported. Talks will focus on establishing a...
South Korean President Lee Jae Myung’s ruling party swept most of the country’s major local elections, but a narrow defeat in Seoul has given conservatives a foothold to challenge his reform agenda. The loss in the capital, South Korea’s political and property-market centre, has taken the shine off an otherwise dominant performance by the ruling Democratic Party of Korea (DPK), dealing a blow to L...
China has rejected a recent OECD report that said its firms receive far higher government subsidies than international peers, calling the findings “one-sided and arbitrary” at a time when EU concerns over Beijing’s industrial policy are intensifying. “The report’s definition of ‘subsidies’ lacks a unified standard and statistical framework, and deviates from consensus under multilateral frameworks...
Thailand’s shrimp industry is reeling from the latest blow to its once market-dominant business after Malaysia this week suspended imports from its northern neighbour, triggering fresh despair from a sector whose revenue has nosedived in the 15 years since it claimed the crown as the world’s largest exporter. Malaysia’s temporary ban on five shrimp species – as well as tightened import requirement...
Chinese academics specialising in Tibet must find more creative ways to shape the global conversation about the region while remaining strictly aligned with the Communist Party’s ideology. That was the message Li Ganjie, head of the Communist Party’s United Front Work Department, had for researchers who gathered to mark the 40th anniversary of the China Tibetology Research Centre on Wednesday. Acc...
For a sign of how the fierce demand for memory chips triggered by the boom in artificial intelligence (AI) is benefiting technology-driven economies, look no further than South Korea. Last month, exports from Asia’s fourth-largest economy grew at a blistering rate of 53 per cent in annualised terms, the fastest pace since 1984. Shipments of semiconductors, which are used to store and funnel the hu...
AirAsia X has called recent media reports claiming its Philippine operations were being grounded “coordinated and sensationalised” and part of a “deliberate smear campaign”. In a statement, the airline group said the smear campaign had long been occurring in an attempt to undermine fair competition in the Philippine aviation sector. “Such narratives serve only the interests of those seeking to lim...
For Chinese parents worn down by exam pressure, the solution now being offered by many creators on RedNote is not another tutoring strategy but another country: Malaysia. On the Chinese lifestyle app, several mainland creators living in Malaysia are pitching the country as a softer landing for family life. They highlight international schools, Mandarin-speaking clinics, familiar food, and lower li...
Direct flights between Hong Kong and Kazakhstan could save travellers up to 10 hours and open the city’s shorelines to tourists from landlocked Central Asia, lawmakers have said after the flag carrier announced plans to launch an Almaty route next year. Lawmaker Jonathan Stuart Lamport, who represents the business sector, on Thursday said the announcement had received widespread support from the i...
Direct flights between Hong Kong and Kazakhstan could save business travellers up to 10 hours and open the city’s shorelines to tourists from landlocked Central Asia, lawmakers have said after the flag carrier announced plans to launch an Almaty route next year. Lawmaker Jonathan Stuart Lamport, who represents the business sector, on Thursday said the announcement had received widespread support f...
A Chinese scientist behind China’s BeiDou Navigation Satellite System rejects the “goddess” label, asserting that research transcends gender. Xu Ying, 43, hails from Sichuan province in southwestern China, born to a maths teacher mother and an agricultural technician father. As a gifted child with a passion for physics and mathematics, Xu began primary school at the age of four, entered university...
A Nepali climbing guide who went missing on Mount Everest for six days and was feared dead has been found alive after crawling back to Base Camp, officials said on Thursday. The experienced Hillary Dawa Sherpa vanished on the upper reaches of the world’s highest mountain early on May 30. He was found on Thursday morning close to Base Camp by the Sagarmatha Pollution Control Committee (SPCC), a Nep...
The group leading the charge in the search for extraterrestrial life has given the all-clear: an interstellar comet looks to be completely natural and free of any alien tech. The SETI Institute said Wednesday that extensive radio scans by its telescope in Northern California found no signs of otherworldly technology from our solar system’s latest interstellar visitor. The object labelled 3I/ATLAS ...
A direct flight between Hong Kong and Uzbekistan will be launched this year, the South China Morning Post has learned, in another move to strengthen ties between Central Asia and the city. The new route follows closely on the heels of Hong Kong flag carrier Cathay Pacific’s plan to launch a service to Almaty in Kazakhstan in the first quarter of next year, one of the outcomes of Chief Executive Jo...
Hong Kong and Uzbekistan have begun talks on a reciprocal agreement that would allow visitors from both sides visa-free access for up to 30 days. Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu arrived in Tashkent from Kazakhstan on Wednesday evening and met Uzbekistan’s Foreign Affairs Minister Bakhtiyor Saidov, with the two witnessing officials from both sides confirm the establishment of the deal. “Following ...
Indonesia’s free meals programme has long been beset with governance problems, quality issues and mass food poisoning cases. Now, allegations of corruption and the arrests of top former officials overseeing Prabowo Subianto’s flagship scheme risk turning it into a political hot potato for the president. Prabowo sacked former National Nutrition Agency chief Dadan Hindayana and his two ex-deputies, ...
A massive coastal development project linked to Jared Kushner, the son-in-law of US President Donald Trump, is facing growing resistance from protesters in Albania. The government says the development on the Adriatic coast would be transformational for the former communist nation as it seeks to enter the high-end tourism market and pushes for European Union membership. But the venture, spanning an...
Hong Kong should introduce new rules to ensure the health and safety of newborns delivered at home, lawmakers have said, after a couple were arrested for allegedly neglecting their baby’s welfare by not registering his birth. The father, Tsang Wai-bong, told the South China Morning Post that he had scheduled a meeting with government social workers on Saturday regarding the guardianship of his two...
Hong Kong authorities have confirmed that an unmarried couple arrested on suspicion of child neglect are the biological parents of undocumented infant Danny. A police source told the South China Morning Post on Thursday that Tsang Wai-bong and Kwan Pui-sin were the parents of the two-month-old, citing DNA test results. Danny was born at home in Hong Kong and was not registered with the Immigration...
Hong Kong authorities have confirmed that an unmarried couple arrested on suspicion of child neglect are the biological parents of an undocumented infant, Danny. A police source told the South China Morning Post on Thursday that Tsang Wai-bong and Kwan Pui-sin were the parents of the two-month-old, citing DNA test results. Danny was born to the unmarried couple at home in Hong Kong and was not reg...
