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The Hong Kong government will lift resale restrictions on replacement homes for flat owners displaced by the Tai Po fire and provide them with two-year vouchers to purchase second-hand subsidised housing, according to an official buy-back document seen by the South China Morning Post on Tuesday. The document states that original owners who opt for the special sales scheme will have greater flexibi...
The Hong Kong government will lift resale restrictions on replacement homes for flat owners displaced by the Tai Po fire and provide them with two-year vouchers to purchase second-hand subsidised housing, according to an official buy-back document seen by the South China Morning Post on Tuesday. The document states that original owners who opt for the special sales scheme will have greater flexibi...
A surge in stock offerings by quantum computing firms suggests 2026 could be a breakout year for technologies still in their early stages of commercial viability. Investor exuberance is soaring as governments and industry anticipate significant milestones that could transform global power structures, as artificial intelligence is doing. China’s dual-core quantum computer, the world’s first, is the...
A Hong Kong court has acquitted a former HSBC banker of assaulting his wife at their home in a luxury seaside estate last year, suggesting she may have framed him to gain an advantage in divorce proceedings. Kenneth Tung Hoi-yi, who previously led the bank’s financial sponsors group in Asia-Pacific, was also awarded legal costs on Tuesday, after Eastern Court decided that he did not draw suspicion...
A 38-year-old Hong Kong air-conditioner repairman has died after falling off a building in Kowloon City while working without any protective gear, the South China Morning Post has learned. A source said police received a report at 12.15pm on Tuesday of a man falling from Billionnaire Avant, a high-rise residential block, in Kowloon City. “Earlier in the day, the deceased went to a flat on the 11th...
A 38-year-old Hong Kong air conditioner repairman has died after falling off a building in Kowloon City while doing repair works without any protective gear, the South China Morning Post has learned. A source familiar with the matter said police received a report at 12.15pm on Tuesday of a man falling from Billionaire Avant residential estate in Kowloon City. “Earlier in the day, the deceased went...
China will actively participate in settling international conflicts and improve mechanisms to resolve them, a Chinese diplomat has said, stressing that the recently established mediation body in Hong Kong will help bolster the international rule of law. Speaking separately at the Global Prosperity Summit in Hong Kong on Tuesday, local political heavyweight Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee proposed establishi...
China will actively participate in settling international conflicts and improve mechanisms for resolving them, a former Chinese diplomat has said, stressing that Hong Kong could serve as an “important bridge” for exchanges and that a recently established mediation body in the city would bolster international rule of law. At the Global Prosperity Summit in Hong Kong on Tuesday, Han Zhiqiang, vice-p...
Hong Kong actors Nick Cheung and William Chan have become the latest high-end homeowners to sell their units amid a strengthening recovery in the city’s luxury property market. Transactions in the segment more than doubled in the first quarter of the year, compared with the same period in 2025, according to consultancy CBRE. Cheung sold his flat at Grenville House in Mid-Levels for HK$132 million ...
Moonshot AI, the Chinese AI unicorn behind the popular Kimi chatbot, has informed shareholders that it intends to dismantle its offshore structure to pave the way for an initial public offering, likely in Hong Kong, according to people familiar with the matter. The Beijing-based start-up, with assets held by a Cayman Islands parent company, has proposed a plan to remove its variable interest entit...
President Vladimir Putin said Tuesday that Russia’s relationship with China had reached “a truly unprecedented level”, pledging mutual support on core interests including sovereignty and national unity, just hours before arriving in Beijing. During his two-day trip, which will begin only days after US President Donald Trump left Beijing, Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping are expected to discu...
Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim is considering calling a snap election before a mounting fuel subsidy crisis forces him to make spending cuts that would strip him of the conditions needed to win one. A national vote is not due until early 2028, but the political logic of going early is becoming harder to dismiss. Anwar’s Pakatan Harapan (PH) alliance is fraying at the edges, coalition partn...
In ancient China, summer heat could be deadly long before the advent of air conditioning. To survive it, people resorted to remedies ranging from imperial ice sculptures and water-powered fans to the more carefree practice of dressing minimally. One of the most devastating examples occurred during the reign of Emperor Qianlong in the Qing dynasty (1644–1912), when an extreme heatwave swept across ...
Few relationships among world leaders have been portrayed as personally as that between President Xi Jinping and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin. Xi, who rarely publicly reveals much about his personal life or emotions, once described Putin as his “best and most intimate friend”. Over the years, their rapport has been defined not only by summits and state visits, but also a growing catalogu...
The number of ride-hailing vehicle licences will be determined based on Hong Kong’s unique conditions and the need to maintain passenger experience, the city’s leader has said, adding that the proposed subsidiary legislation will be submitted for approval on schedule. Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu also said on Tuesday that a mechanism would be established to monitor market operations and data, ...
Indonesia has proposed hosting an Asean oil storage hub to reinforce the region’s emergency fuel reserves, as supply disruptions from the Middle East lay bare the region’s vulnerability to energy shocks. But analysts say the plan, while attractive in principle, is likely to be hampered by political distrust, uneven national priorities and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations’ record of rolli...
Asian airlines need government support to cope with the more than doubling of jet fuel prices that otherwise risks some carriers collapsing like US-based Spirit Airlines, according to the new head of the region’s industry body. Wong Hong, who took over as director general of the Association of Asia Pacific Airlines last month, said carriers needed varying levels of help and relief, from direct fin...
We have selected seven stories from the SCMP’s coverage of Asia over the past week that resonated with our readers and shed light on topical issues. If you would like to see more of our reporting, please consider subscribing. 1. ‘Godzilla El Nino’: Southeast Asia warned of punishing climate whiplash Southeast Asia must brace itself for a punishing spell of climate whiplash, with an expected El Nin...
Hong Kong’s economy and trade with the United States will benefit from greater stability and certainty brought by the summit between Chinese President Xi Jinping and his US counterpart Donald Trump, the city’s leader has said. “Hong Kong is an externally oriented economy, susceptible to the influence of the main market,” Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu said on Tuesday. “More certainty and stabili...
Manila should not use “geographical proximity” and a “large population of migrants” as an excuse to interfere in another country’s internal affairs or meddle in its sovereign affairs, China’s foreign ministry spokesman Guo Jiakun said on Tuesday. When asked about earlier comments made by Philippine president Ferdinand Marcos Jnr during a daily press conference, Guo said the Philippine leader had r...
The Philippines is likely to be involved in any conflict over Taiwan because of its proximity and the nearly 200,000 Filipinos working there, President Ferdinand Marcos Jnr told Japanese media on Monday, ahead of a state visit to Japan next week. He said Manila did not want to be involved in any war over Taiwan, but would be forced to because of its geography. “Except that if there is actual confr...
The Philippines is likely to be involved in any conflict over Taiwan because of its proximity and the nearly 200,000 Filipinos working there, President Ferdinand Marcos Jnr told Japanese media on Monday, ahead of a state visit to Japan next week. He said Manila did not want to be involved in any war over Taiwan, but would be forced to because of its geography. “Except that if there is actual confr...
A study from Tsinghua University has opened a new front in the global technology race by asking a question that may have profound implications for industrial powers. When commanding an artificial intelligence (AI) model to, say, design a better aircraft, does it matter whether you speak to it in English or Chinese? The answer, according to the research published in China’s top aviation journal Act...
South Korea’s food conglomerate Shinsegae Group has fired the head of Starbucks Korea after a promotion campaign sparked public uproar on the anniversary of pro-democracy protests. Shinsegae, the South Korean licensee of the US coffee chain, said in a statement on Monday that chairman Chung Yong-jin sacked Sohn Jeong-hyun, the head of Starbucks Korea, for carrying out “inappropriate marketing”...
Hong Kong’s leader will travel to Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan next month to explore and seize new business opportunities, making Central Asia his latest area of focus and with the largest delegation accompanying him. After several years of promoting the city in the Middle East and Southeast Asia amid geopolitical uncertainties, Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu said on Tuesday that he was eyeing Cent...
Hong Kong’s leader will travel to Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan next month to explore and seize new business opportunities, making Central Asia his latest area of focus and with the largest delegation accompanying him. After several years of promoting the city in the Middle East and Southeast Asia amid geopolitical uncertainties, Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu said on Tuesday that he was eyeing Cent...
Chinese electric vehicle (EV) maker Xpeng has begun mass production of autonomous cabs powered by its own chips, likely to mount yet another challenge on Tesla as both companies pursue a leading position in self-driving. Robotaxi has become the latest area where the two firms could go head-to-head, after smart EV and humanoid robot, as the booming development of physical artificial intelligence (A...
A boy began sexually abusing his younger sister from when she was five and he was 12, continuing the assault for seven years and raping her repeatedly. At times when she resisted, the boy punched her, slapped her and pinched her. The offender, now 26, was sentenced in Singapore on Monday to 18 years’ jail and 24 strokes of the cane. He pleaded guilty to two counts of aggravated sexual assault and ...
A Russian hiker was seriously injured in the mountainous west of Tokyo on Sunday morning, raising fears that Japan could be heading for another record year of human-bear encounters. Police said a bear attacked the man as he was hiking along a forest road near Mount Sanukido, close to the town of Okutama. The man, who has not been named, sustained severe injuries to his face and arms and was airlif...
In February, a landmark study in the journal Science delivered rare good news for conservation: a five-year fishing ban in the Yangtze River had halted seven decades of biodiversity near-collapse. Fish biomass has surged, and the critically endangered finless porpoise has begun to rebound. Researchers showed that sustained, collective action can revive an ecosystem. The lesson for Hong Kong is bot...
