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Malaysia would not be intimidated into changing its decades-old policy of not allowing Israeli nationals into the country, Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said on Wednesday. Anwar said Malaysia was also not in contravention of any international laws for having such a policy in place. “I would like to respond to the United States lawmakers, some of them at least, who stated categorically that Malaysia...
Hong Kong police have arrested four boys as young as 12 years old after they allegedly pelted wet tissue balls and splashed water at passers-by while cycling along Tsuen Wan’s waterfront and in a public park. Chief Inspector Leung Wai-yee said on Wednesday the arrests followed the circulation of videos of the incidents on social media, which took place between July 18 and 20. Four local boys, aged...
For the first time, an artificial intelligence model has achieved a perfect score at the International Mathematical Olympiad (IMO) – and it was developed by Chinese social giant RedNote. The model, dots-note-3.0, solved all six puzzles and secured a perfect score of 42 at this year’s IMO, which concluded in Shanghai on Monday. The note variant, still in beta phase, is currently the lightest model ...
Why haven’t Ukraine’s drone and missile attacks on Russia triggered Moscow’s use of tactical nuclear weapons, as it has threatened? When Russia is attacked time and again, one wonders what purpose it serves to have the world’s largest nuclear arsenal. The Ukraine war is at a stalemate. Though roughly 90 per cent of the territory in East Donbas is under Russian control, its ground advances have slo...
An award-winning mathematician has called for Asia to set up its own maths union after Hong Kong lost out to Glasgow to host a top international meeting in the field. Tsinghua University professor Shing‑Tung Yau, a member of the Hong Kong bid committee, made the call after he said the International Mathematical Union (IMU) awarded the hosting rights for the 2030 International Congress of Mathemati...
India’s student-led “cockroach” protests, which began as anger over alleged entrance exam leaks, are now becoming a broader test of whether Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government can contain young Indians’ frustration over education, jobs and accountability. The fast-growing movement gained political momentum on Tuesday when opposition leader Rahul Gandhi of the Congress party and his sister Pr...
More than 1,000 people have died in the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo, according to Africa’s top health body, a grim toll in the fastest Ebola outbreak in history, as conflict, community resistance and an uneven response fuel its spread. Speaking at a health summit in Ghana on Wednesday, Dr Jean Kaseya, director general of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention,...
At least 999 people have died from the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo, according to official data published overnight into Wednesday, a grim toll in what has already been declared the fastest Ebola outbreak in history. The latest update from DR Congo’s Ministry of Health shows that as of Monday, 2,473 cases have been recorded in the latest outbreak, and 999 people have died. At...
At least 999 people have died from the Ebola outbreak in Congo, according to official data published overnight into Wednesday, a grim toll in what has already been declared the fastest Ebola outbreak in history. The latest update from Congo’s Ministry of Health shows that as of Monday, 2,473 cases have been recorded in the latest outbreak, and 999 people have died. At least 737 patients were curre...
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi met his Philippine counterpart in Manila on Wednesday, with both sides highlighting the need for “reducing the risk of miscalculation” and maintaining stability in the South China Sea. The meeting on the sidelines of the Asean foreign ministers’ gathering marked the first formal talks between the top diplomats since Maria Theresa Lazaro assumed office in July last ...
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi met his Philippine counterpart in Manila on Wednesday, with both sides highlighting the need for “reducing the risk of miscalculation” and maintaining stability in the South China Sea. The meeting on the sidelines of the Asean foreign ministers’ gathering marked the first formal talks between the top diplomats since Maria Theresa Lazaro assumed office in July last ...
Japanese cities are experiencing “cruelly hot days”, a new meteorological term devised this year to warn people of intense heat above 40 degrees Celsius (104 Fahrenheit), with emergency officials describing the soaring temperatures on Wednesday as “a disaster”. Heatstroke alerts were issued across almost the whole country and emergency officials said at least 14 people had died from heat-related c...
Hongkongers will be able to upload orders specifying which life-sustaining treatments they do not wish to receive when terminally ill to the city’s electronic health record platform from next Friday, when the new law comes into effect. The move marks a significant step in formalising end-of-life care arrangements, more than 20 months after the Advance Decision on Life-sustaining Treatment Ordinanc...
A judge on Wednesday set a June 1, 2027, trial date for ousted Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores on US drug-trafficking charges, while a defence lawyer vowed to seek dismissal of the case on the grounds that Maduro is immune from prosecution as the head of a sovereign state. Maduro and his wife, wearing beige prison garb, appeared during a hearing lasting about 20 minu...
A judge on Wednesday set a June 1, 2027, trial date for ousted Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores on US drug-trafficking charges, while a defence lawyer vowed to seek dismissal of the case on the grounds that Maduro is immune from prosecution as the head of a sovereign state. Maduro and his wife, wearing beige prison garb, appeared during a hearing lasting about 20 minu...
Venezuela’s ousted president Nicolas Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores are due back in a US court on Wednesday for a hearing over the upcoming schedule in their drug trafficking case, including a possible June 2027 trial start date. The hearing before US District Judge Alvin Hellerstein, scheduled to start at noon local time in Manhattan federal court, could shed light on the next steps in one of ...
The Chinese Medicine Hospital of Hong Kong is set to launch two strategic treatment programmes for stroke and lower back pain next week, with bookings opening on Wednesday. Bian Zhaoxiang, the hospital’s chief executive, told reporters on Wednesday that the two treatments were part of 23 special disease programmes to be rolled out over five years as part of the institution’s strategic development ...
The Chinese Medicine Hospital of Hong Kong is set to launch two strategic treatment programmes for stroke and lower back pain next week, with bookings open on Wednesday. Bian Zhaoxiang, the hospital’s chief executive, told reporters on Wednesday that the two treatments were part of 23 special disease programmes to be rolled out over five years as part of the institution’s strategic development pla...
Families of victims who died in Hong Kong’s Lamma ferry disaster 14 years ago have withdrawn their application for a judicial review against a coroner’s findings in an inquest, marking the end of a long legal battle. High Court Judge Herbert Au-yeung Ho-wing said on Wednesday that the proceedings had ceased after the plaintiffs informed the court two days ago that they would not continue the legal...
Singapore’s Prime Minister Lawrence Wong stepped up the pace of renewal of his cabinet on Wednesday by confirming two acting ministers and reinstating a former minister who was defeated in 2020 but won in last year’s poll. Coordinating Minister for National Security K Shanmugam was promoted to senior minister, joining the ranks of former leader Lee Hsien Loong. Shanmugam, a senior counsel, entered...
Beijing is ramping up its computing power and unveiling new policies to boost the city’s “token economy”, as China accelerates AI adoption across key industries in its tech race with the US. The Chinese capital aims to add another 50,000 petaflops of intelligent computing power in the second half of 2026, pushing its total capacity over 130,000 petaflops by the end of the year, the Beijing Municip...
The United States has turned to a career Middle East diplomat for its next ambassador to Malaysia, a sharp change in tone after an earlier nominee known for his “alpha male” bravado, pro-Israel posts and culture-war commentary drew protests in the Muslim-majority country. US President Donald Trump nominated Joshua Harris for the Kuala Lumpur posting after his previous nomination of Australian-born...
The top Chinese and American diplomats discussed President Xi Jinping’s planned visit to the US later this year and the dispute between Beijing and Manila in the South China Sea during their bilateral meeting on Wednesday. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi and US Secretary of State Marco Rubio are in Manila for a series of Asean meetings from Monday to Thursday, including the Asean foreign minister...
The top Chinese and American diplomats discussed President Xi Jinping’s planned visit to the US later this year and the dispute between Beijing and Manila in the South China Sea during their bilateral meeting on Wednesday. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi and US Secretary of State Marco Rubio are in Manila for a series of Asean meetings from Monday to Thursday, including the Asean foreign minister...
Canada has been given a front-row seat to a British-Italian-Japanese effort to develop a sixth-generation fighter aircraft, allowing Ottawa to diversify its defence partnerships as the US and China vie for an edge in future air power. In London on Tuesday, Canadian Defence Minister David McGuinty joined his British, Italian and Japanese counterparts – Wes Streeting, Guido Crosetto and Shinjiro Koi...
A 71-year-old grandmother in eastern China jumped into a river to save a young man who tried to drown himself because of his relationship problems, winning widespread admiration on social media. The man was filmed on July 13 climbing onto a bridge’s railing before decisively jumping into a river in Suixi county in Anhui province, the Anhui Daily reported. Liu Defang, a white-haired retiree, was ch...
Chinese regulators moved on Tuesday to improve the quality of credit ratings for panda bonds – a yuan-denominated asset class that has seen a surge in interest from foreign sovereign and institutional investors this year as a key tool to bolster Beijing’s yuan-internationalisation push. Credit-rating agencies must adhere to the principles of independence, objectivity and prudence, according to a c...
US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent signalled potential action against open source artificial intelligence (AI) models amid accusations that Chinese developers are creating low-cost systems using stolen US intellectual property. “This administration supports open source models, but what we do not support is IP theft,” Bessent said on Fox Business on Tuesday. “If we see, especially, that overseas m...
At the remote, mountainous frontier where the mighty Mekong carves the border between Myanmar and Laos, planners have sketched the outline of a mega dam. It would be the largest hydropower project ever built on the river’s mainstream outside China, but analysts suspect the study into it may matter more than the dam itself. A 34-month joint feasibility study for the 2,790-megawatt project was agree...
A flagship model from China’s Zhipu AI has helped contain an autonomous cyberattack by OpenAI’s frontier systems targeting popular developer platform Hugging Face, as concerns grow over the security risks posed by advanced AI models. OpenAI’s latest flagship models – including GPT-5.6 Sol and an unreleased, “even more capable” system – recently breached Hugging Face’s infrastructure during interna...
