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3 easy wins to modernise Hong Kong’s education system
SCMP

3 easy wins to modernise Hong Kong’s education system

Much has been said about Hong Kong’s vitality as a higher education hub. Yet, a radical rethink of our primary and secondary school system is equally necessary. The need for a blueprint has never been clearer. Our world is increasingly defined by the powerful forces of automation enabled by artificial intelligence (AI), geopolitical tensions and flux, as well as conflicting values and perspectives...

Chinese teachers publicly shamed on stage for students’ low test scores, sparking outrage
SCMP

Chinese teachers publicly shamed on stage for students’ low test scores, sparking outrage

An impoverished county in southwestern China issued an apology for arranging its primary and junior secondary school teachers on stage to pose for photos alongside prominent characters depicting humiliation due to their students’ low test scores. The images, which went viral on social media, sparked widespread public condemnation. They were captured at an internal meeting organised by the Leibo Co...

Cats and mind-full mechanics: what happens when quantum physics meets the brain
SCMP

Cats and mind-full mechanics: what happens when quantum physics meets the brain

Cats are wonderful gymnasts. Their ability to land on their feet – even when dropped upside-down – caught the attention of two of the nineteenth century’s greatest mathematical physicists, Sir George Gabriel Stokes and James Clerk Maxwell. The remarkable feats of cats inspired these theorists to perform, in the 1850s, legendary experiments in “cat-turning”, as Maxwell later described: “There is a ...

How China’s AI race is shrinking job market, forcing workers into low-paid, manual roles
SCMP

How China’s AI race is shrinking job market, forcing workers into low-paid, manual roles

For four years, Beijing-based Clare Zhang worked as a research analyst at a corporate advisory firm, helping companies assess technologies and competitors for projects they planned to list – until late last year, when she was told that artificial intelligence had reduced the number of analysts the company needed and could afford. Her job involved combing through company filings and public records ...

Faster and cheaper: why Hongkongers are heading north for medical care

Faster and cheaper: why Hongkongers are heading north for medical care

SCMP

Soon after becoming a mother, Hong Kong resident Sarah Tam enjoyed eight hours of sleep a night and yoga sessions at a post-partum care centre in neighbouring Shenzhen, where carers looked after her newborn around the clock. Tam, a 30-year-old social worker who gave birth in mid-July, spent a month at the facility in mainland China, recovering from delivery with total peace of mind. She said she f...

‘Point of grievance’: Philippines urged to rethink school safety approach

‘Point of grievance’: Philippines urged to rethink school safety approach

SCMP

As pressure mounts in the Philippines for authorities to act on strengthening school security after two fatal shootings in eight weeks, safety experts say any measure must look at mitigating violence much earlier, even before a child brings a weapon to the campus gate. A bill pushed by lawmaker Bam Aquino will require schools to establish a comprehensive safety framework, including localised safet...

Another Chinese national dies in US immigration custody, raising profiling fears

Another Chinese national dies in US immigration custody, raising profiling fears

SCMP

The Chinese-American community expressed anger and concern on Thursday over the death in custody of a Chinese national by the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement [ICE] on US territory. Wei Lianyong, 51, reportedly died in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI) on August 23, although the scandal-plagued agency did not disclose the death until this week. “Asian-Americans, Chinese...

Chinese-American community alarmed after China national dies in ICE custody

Chinese-American community alarmed after China national dies in ICE custody

SCMP

The Chinese-American community expressed anger and concern on Thursday over the death in custody of a Chinese national by the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement [ICE] on US territory. Lianyong Wei, 51, reportedly died in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI) on August 23, although the scandal-plagued agency did not disclose the death until this week. “Asian-Americans, Chinese...

Chinese-American community alarmed after Chinese national dies in ICE custody

Chinese-American community alarmed after Chinese national dies in ICE custody

SCMP

The Chinese-American community expressed anger and concern on Thursday over the death in custody of a Chinese national by the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement [ICE] on US territory. Lianyong Wei, 51, reportedly died in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI) on August 23, although the scandal-plagued agency did not disclose the death until this week. “Asian-Americans, Chinese...

Hong Kong poised to top New York, London in finance-hub ranking: GFCI creator

Hong Kong poised to top New York, London in finance-hub ranking: GFCI creator

SCMP

An Asian city will eventually overtake London and New York as the world’s leading financial centre, with Hong Kong well placed to compete for the top spot given its legal predictability and low tax burden, according to the creator of a closely watched ranking of financial hubs. “It’s going to happen because it’s so tight,” said Michael Mainelli, chairman of London-based think tank Z/Yen Group, in ...

Trump takes mail-in ballot fight to US Supreme Court

Trump takes mail-in ballot fight to US Supreme Court

SCMP

President Donald Trump’s administration asked the Supreme Court on Thursday to let it enforce a new US Postal Service rule tightening the use of mail-in ballots, moving swiftly after a judge temporarily blocked the regulation ahead of November’s midterm elections. In an emergency request, the Justice Department asked the Supreme Court to lift Boston-based US District ‌Judge Indira Talwani’s order ...

US urged to consider military strikes to stop China achieving AGI first

US urged to consider military strikes to stop China achieving AGI first

SCMP

The United States should start preparing for scenarios where extreme measures must be taken to stop China from achieving artificial general intelligence (AGI), according to a former White House official, including state-backed espionage and military strikes on Chinese data centres. Jacob Stokes, deputy director of the Indo-Pacific Security Program at the Centre for a New American Security (CNAS), ...

Ecuador’s ex-president and Chinese ambassador seek to avoid jail over belt and road dam

Ecuador’s ex-president and Chinese ambassador seek to avoid jail over belt and road dam

SCMP

Former Ecuadorian president Lenin Moreno and a former Chinese ambassador to Quito asked the country’s highest court on Thursday to spare them the five-year sentences handed down last week over a US$76 million bribery scheme. Moreno was convicted of bribery by a three-judge panel of the National Court of Justice over contracts for Ecuador’s largest hydroelectric project secured by a Chinese state c...

Holdout juror preventing verdict in Lindsay Clancy’s US child murder trial, lawyer says

Holdout juror preventing verdict in Lindsay Clancy’s US child murder trial, lawyer says

SCMP

A single juror in Lindsay Clancy’s murder trial is preventing the jury from reaching a unanimous verdict, her lawyer said in court on Thursday, after deliberations stretched into a sixth day over whether to convict the Massachusetts woman of killing her three young children. Defence lawyer Kevin ‌Reddington made that statement shortly after the jury sent Judge William Sullivan in Plymouth, Massach...

Holdout juror preventing verdict in Lindsay Clancy’s murder trial, lawyer says

Holdout juror preventing verdict in Lindsay Clancy’s murder trial, lawyer says

SCMP

A single juror in Lindsay Clancy’s murder trial is preventing the jury from reaching a unanimous verdict, her lawyer said in court on Thursday, after deliberations stretched into a sixth day over whether to convict the Massachusetts woman of killing her three young children. Defence lawyer Kevin ‌Reddington made that statement shortly after the jury sent Judge William Sullivan in Plymouth, Massach...

Scientists studying cockroach milk and nose-blowing win Ig Nobel prizes

Scientists studying cockroach milk and nose-blowing win Ig Nobel prizes

SCMP

Ten research teams were honoured on Thursday at a satirical science awards ceremony that was hosted outside the US for the first time due to travel concerns. Researchers who studied milk from cockroaches and analysed soil health using underwear received Ig Nobel prizes celebrating unusual and imaginative contributions to science. The awards organised by a digital magazine called the Annals of Impr...

ICE officer charged with lying to investigators in shooting of Venezuelan man

ICE officer charged with lying to investigators in shooting of Venezuelan man

SCMP

Federal prosecutors have charged a US Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer with lying to investigators about the events leading up to the shooting of a Venezuelan man during the Minneapolis immigration crackdown earlier this year, according to a person familiar with the matter. The person was not authorised to publicly discuss the investigation and spoke on condition of anonymity. The perso...

Mercury-bound spacecraft on home stretch of nearly decade-long voyage: ‘brilliant moment’

Mercury-bound spacecraft on home stretch of nearly decade-long voyage: ‘brilliant moment’

SCMP

Two Mercury-bound spacecraft left their mother ship behind on Thursday and headed down the home stretch of their nearly decade-long voyage to the solar system’s smallest and closest-to-the-sun planet. The linked European and Japanese spacecraft separated as planned from their cruiser, but controllers had to wait two anxious hours to receive confirmation via radio signals. The crucial operation was...

Just 4 of 28 lifts at Queen Mary Hospital block set for service once repairs done

Just 4 of 28 lifts at Queen Mary Hospital block set for service once repairs done

SCMP

Only four of the 28 lifts at Queen Mary Hospital’s new clinical block will operate normally following minor repairs, while work must be carried out on the rest until the end of the year, according to Hong Kong’s architectural authorities. The Architectural Services Department said on Thursday only four lifts serving non‑clinical facilities at the HK$13.5 billion (US$1.72 billion) block were in acc...

Hong Kong Nepalese man searches for cousin missing in flood: ‘I cannot sleep’

Hong Kong Nepalese man searches for cousin missing in flood: ‘I cannot sleep’

SCMP

A Hong Kong Nepalese man is searching for his cousin who is missing after the catastrophic flood struck the Himalayan border between Nepal and Tibet. Y.B. Gurung, a 64-year-old retiree, told the South China Morning Post that he last spoke with his tour guide cousin Raju Gurung, 40, at 8am on August 26, shortly before a massive glacial collapse triggered the flash flood that washed away villages an...

‘I cannot sleep’: Hong Kong Nepalese man searches for cousin missing in flood

‘I cannot sleep’: Hong Kong Nepalese man searches for cousin missing in flood

SCMP

A Hong Kong Nepalese man is searching for his cousin who is missing after the catastrophic flood struck the Himalayan border between Nepal and Tibet. Y.B. Gurung, a 64-year-old retiree, told the South China Morning Post that he last spoke with his tour guide cousin Raju Gurung, 40, at 8am on August 26, shortly before a massive glacial collapse triggered the flash flood that washed away villages an...

China-Singapore security team claims breakthrough in hacking Starlink terminals

China-Singapore security team claims breakthrough in hacking Starlink terminals

SCMP

A team of cybersecurity experts has announced they successfully compromised the latest Starlink user terminals, crossing the security boundaries of the world’s largest satellite constellation. In a post on its social media account on Tuesday, Darknavy, an independent cybersecurity research institute headquartered in Singapore and Shanghai, said it had used sophisticated hardware attacks to gain fu...

Outcry over ‘weapons of love’ forces Hong Kong charity to scrap student contest

Outcry over ‘weapons of love’ forces Hong Kong charity to scrap student contest

SCMP

A leading Hong Kong charity has called off a student eco-bag design contest meant to counter domestic violence following public backlash over its directive for pupils to draw inspiration from objects commonly linked to household abuse. Po Leung Kuk confirmed on Thursday that it had scrapped the competition, which was organised by its family crisis support service and funded by the Social Welfare D...

Extra funds push Taiwan’s defence spending past NT$1 trillion for the first time

Extra funds push Taiwan’s defence spending past NT$1 trillion for the first time

SCMP

Taiwan’s cabinet approved a supplementary defence budget of NT$145.7 billion (US$4.6 billion) on Thursday, pushing the island’s total defence-related spending for this year above NT$1 trillion for the first time. The additional funding is expected to raise this year’s overall defence spending from 3.32 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP) to about 3.83 per cent, the highest level in decades. T...

Over 1,700 Indonesians get food poisoning after eating state-issued free meals

Over 1,700 Indonesians get food poisoning after eating state-issued free meals

SCMP

Another 777 students and teachers contracted food poisoning in Indonesia’s Central Java after consuming government-issued free meals, a school principal said on Thursday, bringing the total number of people made ‌ill by the scheme to more than 1,700 in just a week. In separate incidents in three other locations this week, 950 Indonesians had fallen ill as a result of food poisoning linked to the p...

Above 1,700 Indonesians get food poisoning after eating state-issued free meals

Above 1,700 Indonesians get food poisoning after eating state-issued free meals

SCMP

Another 777 students and teachers contracted food poisoning in Indonesia’s Central Java after consuming government-issued free meals, a school principal said on Thursday, bringing the total number of people made ‌ill by the scheme to more than 1,700 in just a week. In separate incidents in three other locations this week, 950 Indonesians had fallen ill as a result of food poisoning linked to the p...

MTR Corp sues Opatra operator over HK$347,000 unpaid rent and fees at Sha Tin mall

MTR Corp sues Opatra operator over HK$347,000 unpaid rent and fees at Sha Tin mall

SCMP

Hong Kong’s railway operator has sued the local distributor behind embattled beauty brand Opatra London for allegedly failing to pay more than HK$347,000 (US$44,248) in rent and other fees at one of its shopping malls. A court document reviewed by the South China Morning Post on Thursday showed the MTR Corporation, as the landlord of Citylink Plaza in Sha Tin, suing Sayles Retail, the local operat...

Moonshot AI – creator of Kimi K3 model – has filed for Hong Kong IPO: sources

Moonshot AI – creator of Kimi K3 model – has filed for Hong Kong IPO: sources

SCMP

Chinese artificial intelligence start-up Moonshot AI – developer of the leading Kimi K3 model – has confidentially filed for an initial public offering in Hong Kong, according to two people with knowledge of the matter, as the firm seeks to tap public markets to fund its rapid expansion. The Beijing-based company was targeting a Hong Kong listing as early as the first quarter of 2027, the sources ...

Defendant knew sexual acts with sister as teen ‘seriously wrong’, court told

Defendant knew sexual acts with sister as teen ‘seriously wrong’, court told

SCMP

A man who engaged in sexual acts with his younger sister when he was just a teenager knew his behaviour was “seriously wrong”, prosecutors have told Hong Kong’s High Court. Senior Public Prosecutor Karen Ng Ka-yuet said on Thursday that the older sibling, believed to have been aged between 11 and 14 at the time of the alleged offences, was fully aware that the acts involving his sister, who is thr...