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A fatal earthquake hit western Colombia on Monday morning, burying people in the South American nation under rubble and causing severe destruction to buildings and infrastructure in the Pacific region and the central Andes. At least 18 people died in the western city of Pereira in the 7.4 magnitude quake, Mayor Mauricio Salazar said. “The situation is critical,” Salazar told Caracol Radio. The ear...
A major earthquake hit western Colombia on Monday morning, burying people in the South American nation under rubble and causing severe destruction to buildings and infrastructure in the Pacific region and the central Andes. The magnitude 7.4 tremor struck at 7:34 am local time near the town of San José del Palmar in Choco province, according to the US Geological Survey. There was at least one afte...
A powerful 7.4-magnitude earthquake struck western Colombia on Monday, shaking the South American nation and neighbouring Ecuador and prompting people to evacuate homes and buildings. The epicentre was in San Jose Del Palmar, a municipality in the Choco region about 400km (250 miles) west of Colombia’s capital, Bogota, the US Geological Survey and Colombia’s counterpart reported. The USGS said it ...
The China-India-Pakistan triangle has never been short on danger, but Islamabad’s new defensive alliance has added another variable to an already volatile situation. Last week, Pakistan, Turkey and Saudi Arabia signed a pact in Mecca in which they agreed to treat an armed attack on one as an attack on all. The three governments have described it as defensive and not directed at any particular stat...
Thames Water has handed a delayed £1 million (US$1.35 million) “golden handshake” payment to its chief financial officer and agreed controversial retention payouts to top bosses despite its battle to secure its financial future. The stricken supplier, which is sinking under a debt pile of more than £20 billion, disclosed in a letter to the Environmental, Food and Rural Affairs Committee that it ha...
The cost for businesses to run AI models has fallen to a yearly low, according to research by investment bank Jefferies, driven by a heated global price war and a surge in adoption of low-cost Chinese open-source tools, such as those from DeepSeek. Average inference prices – measured per million tokens, or chunks of data handled by a model – ranged between US$1.16 and US$1.18 from August 6 to 8. T...
Uber has partnered with a Hong Kong transport operator to launch its first premium service outside the United States, but local lawmakers have stressed the move is unrelated to the firm’s push for a larger licence quota under a coming regulatory regime. The US-based company partnered with Kwoon Chung Bus to introduce Uber Elite, which offers pre-booked rides in Mercedes-Benz vehicles for up to six...
China’s most advanced laser weapon has been spotted aboard a Type 071 amphibious landing ship in the South China Sea, adding near-shore anti-drone capabilities to a family of warships vital for potential conflicts in sensitive waters, according to analysts. In a People’s Liberation Army joint air and naval drill at Scarborough Shoal on August 1, a shipborne laser weapon believed to be the Liaoyuan...
Los Angeles-based yoga apparel brand Alo Yoga, a rival of Lululemon, will open its first online flagship store on Alibaba Group Holding’s e-commerce platform Tmall on Wednesday, ahead of launching bricks-and-mortar stores in China. The move comes as China’s premium “athleisure” market grows increasingly competitive, with emerging yoga brands and domestic sportswear makers targeting similar consume...
Beijing is stepping up efforts to challenge the Western concept of the “tribute system”, arguing that foreign frameworks distort ancient Chinese diplomacy and misrepresent the country’s contemporary global rise. China is redoubling efforts to define its own practices, experiences and ideas through original, home-grown social science language rather than through what it says are Western conceptual ...
Concession speeches follow a formula: the vocabulary of defiance, thanks to the faithful, a promise that the fight goes on. Last month, Brendan Carr, chairman of the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC), essentially delivered one on behalf of American robotics. Acting on findings from a White House task force, Carr added new foreign-made humanoid robots, quadrupeds and power inverters to the...
At least 13 people were killed, including a child, and 39 injured in a Ukrainian drone attack on industrial and civilian targets in the Russian city of Nizhnekamsk, authorities said on Monday, one of the heaviest civilian tolls in the country in months. The city is a major oil-refining and petrochemical centre in the Tatarstan republic, according to local officials. Its refining and petrochemical...
At least 13 people were killed, including a child, and 39 injured in a Ukrainian drone attack on industrial and civilian targets in the Russian city of Nizhnekamsk, authorities said on Monday, one of the heaviest civilian tolls in the country in months. The city is a major oil-refining and petrochemical centre in the Tatarstan republic, according to local officials. Its refining and petrochemical...
When Singaporeans tuned in to watch the annual National Day Parade on Sunday, an AI-generated short film depicting a zombie apocalypse version of the event has generated buzz in the city state. The four-minute-long Bersama Majulah, a spin-off from the human-written, artificial intelligence-generated Spore Fall video series, shows a spore pathogenic outbreak spreading across the fictional city of L...
Beijing has issued a preliminary ruling that the United States and Mexico are dumping pecans into the Chinese market and harming domestic producers, according to the Ministry of Commerce. “Over the injury investigation period, the volume of dumped imports rose by a cumulative 104.56 per cent and their share of the domestic market increased by 9.69 percentage points,” the ministry said in a stateme...
Nearly 70 per cent of Gen Z in Hong Kong have retouched photos of themselves before posting on social media, while about half rate their well-being below the international standard, according to a survey exploring self-criticism among the city’s youth. The survey, released on Monday, polled 983 residents aged 11 to 30 to examine the relationship between young people’s photo-editing habits, self-co...
China’s AgiBot has surpassed its domestic rival Unitree Robotics to become the world’s largest humanoid robot vendor in the first half of 2026, according to new research, as both industry heavyweights prepare for public listings amid a physical AI boom. Shanghai-based Agibot captured 44 per cent of the global market after shipping roughly 8,400 humanoid robots from January to June, San Francisco-b...
The head of the Chinese Communist Party’s International Department, Liu Haixing, hailed China and Cuba as “good brothers” during a meeting with Cuban officials in Havana, in a show of solidarity as Washington ramps up pressure on the island. According to an official Chinese readout, Liu on Sunday held talks with Emilio Lozada Garcia, the Communist Party of Cuba’s international relations chief, des...
Taiwan is conducting its first-ever mobile network throttling exercise this week to test how the public responds to wartime communications disruptions, a new civil defence measure that has sparked criticism over the government’s preparedness. The exercise, held in central Taiwan on Monday and planned for northern Taiwan on Thursday, will simulate severe mobile network congestion by reducing 4G and...
Taiwan is conducting its first-ever mobile network throttling exercise this week to test how the public responds to wartime communications disruptions, a new civil defence measure that has sparked criticism over the government’s preparedness. The exercise, held in central Taiwan on Monday and planned for northern Taiwan on Thursday, will simulate severe mobile network congestion by reducing 4G and...
The Philippines and the United States are marking the 75th anniversary of their defence alliance with a renewed pledge to step up joint drills as geopolitical tensions in the region continue to simmer. While the allies are moving towards more frequent planning for maritime security cooperation and deterrence, there are still questions about Washington’s long-term commitment towards the security of...
A string of deadly motorcycle accidents around Malaysia’s biggest Yamaha RX-Z gathering has intensified calls for the annual event to be scrapped, but enthusiasts say the backlash unfairly conflates a vast owners’ community with illegal street racers. More than 200,000 devotees of the discontinued motorcycle converged on Terengganu, on Malaysia’s east coast, earlier this month for RXZ Members 8.0,...
A buyer with the same name as the founding chairwoman of a global immigration consultancy has bought a detached house in a luxury residential development in southern Hong Kong for over US$19 million, adding to a string of big-ticket deals as demand for trophy homes remains resilient despite a broader slowdown. Yi Bing signed an agreement for the purchase of House 11 at One Stanley on Wong Ma Kok R...
A Hong Kong man has been sentenced to three years and nine months in jail for unwittingly suffocating his girlfriend to death while trying to dispose of her body after she passed out during a supposed weight-loss programme that required her to avoid sleeping. The High Court on Monday accepted that former abattoir worker Ng Ka-sing was genuinely remorseful and had little likelihood of reoffending, ...
A Hong Kong man has been sentenced to three years and nine months in jail for unwittingly suffocating his girlfriend to death while trying to dispose of her body after she passed out during a supposed weight-loss programme that required her to avoid sleeping. The High Court on Monday accepted that former abattoir worker Ng Ka-sing was genuinely remorseful and had little likelihood of reoffending, ...
A Hong Kong man has been sentenced to three years and nine months in jail for unwittingly suffocating his girlfriend to death while trying to dispose of her body after she passed out during a supposed weight-loss programme that required her to avoid sleeping. The High Court on Monday accepted that former abattoir worker Ng Ka-sing was genuinely remorseful and had little likelihood of reoffending, ...
The United States is not disengaging from Asia and is instead “digging in” to maintain a favourable balance of power in the Indo-Pacific, but wants its partners to shoulder more responsibility for their defence, a senior Pentagon official said on Monday. Seeking to counter concerns about Washington’s reliability, Elbridge Colby, Undersecretary of Defence for Policy, reiterated the US interest ...
New Delhi has issued names for 27 locations in Arunachal Pradesh on its official maps, including sensitive sites near the disputed border with China, in a move that an analyst warned could complicate efforts to repair bilateral ties. The Indian government announced the move on Friday, just a day after officials from the two countries held a working-level consultation in New Delhi to discuss border...
The story of a devoted couple from central China, where the husband has lovingly cared for his severely paraplegic wife for 25 years, has touched the hearts of millions on social media throughout mainland China. The couple live in Pingdingshan, Henan province. In 2001, 36-year-old Jia Fang suffered a horrific fall from a cliff while riding a pedicab, resulting in paralysis from the chest down, as ...
Contemporary Amperex Technology Ltd (CATL), the world’s largest electric vehicle (EV) battery maker, has thrown its weight behind flying cars after its aviation battery system cleared a major safety test. A successful roll-out of passenger-carrying drone batteries, backed by CATL’s innovation drive and manufacturing heft, would bolster China’s leading position in the renewable energy sector and th...
