Taiwan is planning to stage live-fire drills on the Dongsha Islands in the South China Sea later this month in preparation for a possible attack by mainland Chinese forces, amid reports the PLA has sent drones to gather intelligence about the Taipei-...

More than 400 Hong Kong district councillors will soon have to take a new oath of office pledging allegiance to the city and swearing to uphold the Basic Law, a move already causing ripples across the opposition camp. The councillors could find them...

Britain’s increased rates of Covid-19 immunity has raised the prospect of moving on from the worst of the pandemic, with some scientists saying the country could cross the so-called herd immunity threshold as soon as Monday.According to researchers...

Hong Kong health authorities, acting on the advice of experts, have expanded the scope of a partial evacuation at a Tuen Mun housing estate at the centre of a new coronavirus cluster after two more cases were confirmed there on Saturday. The fresh ev...

Cheap, highly effective and easier to distribute than rival jabs, the AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccine was hailed as a game-changer in the global fight against Covid-19.Months after it was first approved for use in Britain in December, a public relations c...

Thailand has approved a list of eight Covid-19 vaccine makers, including Sinovac Biotech and Pfizer, for foreign visitors seeking to shorten a mandatory quarantine on arrival.Visitors to Thailand will need to upload copies of the vaccination certific...

I was watching a movie the other day about a convicted super-hacker who is released from prison to help track and bring down a cyberterrorist in an international joint effort between the Chinese government and the FBI.  Blackhat is a rather obscur...

The shootings in Atlanta that left eight people dead, including six women of Asian descent, have saddened many people. The Asian-American community has experienced heightened vulnerability during the past year, with nearly 3,800 incidents of anti-Asi...

Elon Musk’s start-up devoted to meshing brains with computers moved closer to its dream on Friday, having got a monkey to play the video game Pong using only its mind.Musk has long contended that merging minds with machines is vital if people are g...

China’s antitrust regulators slapped a record fine on one of the country’s largest technology conglomerates, closing a months-long investigation that began last Christmas Eve and setting the precedent for the government to use anti-monopoly rules...

China is on course to produce its own version of the revolutionary new vaccines that use genetic technology to stimulate the immune system by the end of the year, according to a senior industry figure.The two available mRNA vaccines designed to tackl...

China’s central government has told the leaders of five cities to rein in their overheated residential property markets in a move analysts believe signals Beijing is prepared to intervene directly where required.The deputy housing minister summoned...

When the conductor gestures for the ensemble to start playing, classical violinist Ding Yi-jie, cued by a tap on the arm from a fellow musician, starts sliding her bow smoothly along the instrument’s strings, despite not being able to see.The 20-ye...

The recent Suez Canal blockage highlighted the vital role Egypt plays in the global trade system and to China’s trade plans. The blockage, which lasted for six days, held up trade valued at over US$9 billion per day, according to data from Lloyd’...

Women are going loopy for lippy at a Chengdu restaurant offering customers a dessert of ‘edible lipstick’A video published on pearvideo.com shows the dessert being prepared by pouring melted red-coloured chocolate into lipstick-shaped moulds. The...

There had been murmurs for a while about whether Singapore’s deputy prime minister Heng Swee Keat would be the country’s next leader after a poor showing in last year’s general election. Yet Singaporeans were still shocked by Thursday’s annou...

International companies are relocating back to Central, Hong Kong main’s business district, where rents are down by a quarter from two years ago, giving organisations the opportunity to get an address in the city’s trophy buildings. S&P is reloca...

The most daunting challenge Chinese tech firms faced abroad used to be convincing consumers of the quality of their products. But the rapid rise of big names such as TikTok and Xiaomi has given way to a new obstacle that experts say is harder to beat...

Security guard Mona Tsang* was distraught when her first grandchild was born in January and she could not be present for the birth. Her elder son and daughter-in-law live in Guangdong, and the Covid-19 pandemic stopped her from going to be with them....

Airlines pulled dozens of Boeing 737 MAX aircraft out of service for inspections after the manufacturer told them about a possible electrical problem, the latest setback for the plane.Boeing said on Friday that the issue affected planes used by 16 ai...

Every five years, Germany’s Robert Koch Institute hosts a summer open day for the public featuring party games, a barbecue, and the chance to meet real scientists from among the 450 working at one of Europe’s oldest centres for research into infe...

The US Senate’s new legislation, the Strategic Competition Act of 2021, lays out a wide-ranging strategy for the first time to contain China’s global expansion, providing a significant milestone as the relationship between the two economic and hi...

The reigning Mrs World on Friday relinquished her title while defending her decision to pull the crown off the head of this year’s Mrs Sri Lanka title holder, whom she claimed was unqualified to take part in the contest because she is divorced.Car...

Nineteen people have been sentenced to death in Myanmar for killing an associate of an army captain, the military owned Myawaddy TV station said on Friday, the first such sentences announced in public since a February 1 coup and crackdown on proteste...

The US State Department announced on Friday a new policy to “encourage” engagement between American and Taiwanese government officials, a move made to bring Washington into compliance with a law signed by former president Donald Trump. The new gu...

Late last month, the Biden administration unveiled a US$2.3 trillion programme to modernise US infrastructure. The American Jobs Plan can be broken down into four major spending components over the next decade or so: US$621 billion on upgrading and r...

Britain’s Prince Harry and his wife Meghan Markle, the duke and duchess of Sussex, have marked the passing of Harry’s grandfather, Prince Philip, with a message on their website.“In loving memory of His Royal Highness The Duke of Edinburgh, 192...

US President Joe Biden’s upcoming budget proposal will seek US$715 billion for the Pentagon this year, in part to counter the “top challenge” of China.The proposal was the latest signal from the new administration that it sees competition with ...

This story is published in a content partnership with POLITICO. It was originally reported by Nick Niedzwiadek on politico.com on April 9, 2021.US President Joe Biden signed an executive order on Friday empanelling a commission to examine possible re...

DMX, the hardcore hip-hop star whose ominous, snarling raps chronicled the violence and struggles of the American street, has died. He was 50 years old.The rapper’s long-time lawyer confirmed DMX’s death after a statement from his family widely s...

La Soufriere volcano on the eastern Caribbean island of St Vincent erupted on Friday after decades of inactivity, sending dark plumes of ash and smoke billowing into the sky and forcing thousands from surrounding villages to evacuate.Dormant since 19...

Economic crises often spur breakthroughs, and this may again prove to be the case as a long-delayed plan to overhaul global corporate taxes gains momentum.Group of 20 (G20) finance ministers and central bank governors added impetus to the plan on Wed...

New US sanctions will cut supplies of the most advanced hardware China needs to develop the world’s fastest computers, but their impact on the country’s military technology may be limited, observers say.The US Department of Commerce on Thursday b...

Myanmar’s junta refused on Friday to let a UN envoy visit the country, despite mounting international efforts for a diplomatic solution to the post-coup crisis.The UN’s special envoy for Myanmar, Christine Schraner Burgener, is on a tour of Asian...

China’s embassy in Yangon said on Friday it had been in touch with “all parties” in Myanmar, when asked about a report that a diplomat had spoken to a parallel government representing Aung San Suu Kyi’s ousted administration.A counsellor from...

China has accused the United States of causing humanitarian disasters with its “aggressive wars” and military interventions as it continues to hit back at attacks on its human rights record.On Friday a report issued by the China Society for Human...

Prince Philip’s remark to British students in China about them turning “slitty-eyed” always tops his list of gaffes, though the story behind it is far less well-known.The comment that kept coming back to haunt the Duke of Edinburgh, who died ag...

A total of HK$13.3 million (US$1.7 million) in end-of-service gratuities were paid to the 19 Hong Kong opposition lawmakers who resigned last year, 16 of them in protest against a decision from Beijing that led to the ousting of four fellow pan-democ...

Hong Kong officials are pushing ahead with a long-delayed scheme to build a massive columbarium complex near the border with mainland China, but the city’s largest pro-establishment party has warned the move would be a “major land-planning blunde...

Ninety per cent of the buildings in Xinjiang identified by a Canberra-based research institute as internment facilities were incorrectly labelled, authorities said on Friday as China continues to fight back against international criticism of its poli...

Large groups of choreographed dancers, often called “damas”, with speakers blaring, a leader chanting and participants shouting and laughing, are a common sight in urban China’s public parks. But in Anting Town’s Old Street in Jiading Distri...

China’s toy sector is booming, and the United States remains the top destination for those toys despite the impact of the coronavirus and protracted bilateral tensions between the world’s two largest economies. With the pandemic fuelling a “sta...

The Hong Kong government has lashed out at countries harbouring criminals, especially fugitives involved in the social unrest that rocked the city in 2019, saying no society should allow anyone to break the law without facing legal consequences.“Th...

An illegal foreign worker has been detained as a second suspect in Taiwan’s worst train derailment in seven decades in Hualien county on the east coast that killed 50 people and injured more than 200 others, authorities said on Thursday.Chief prose...

Hong Kong police arrested nine people on suspicion of laundering more than HK$900 million (US$116 million) through 300 bank accounts over the past six months, part of which was conned from 55 victims of romance and investment scams.Investigations sho...

Chinese scientists have carried out deep-sea drilling in the disputed South China Sea to obtain sediment core, according to state media, a move that is expected to fuel tensions in the region. They retrieved the sediment core – measuring 231 metre...

Hong Kong Commissioner for Tourism Joe Wong Chi-cho is set to be seconded to the loss-making Ocean Park to serve as its chief executive for about six months starting in May, as the struggling resort presses ahead with a planned revamp.Ysanne Chan, th...

Prince Philip, husband of Queen Elizabeth, has died aged 99, Buckingham Palace said on Friday.“It is with deep sorrow that Her Majesty The Queen announces the death of her beloved husband, His Royal Highness The Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh,”...

Thursday’s unexpected announcement that Singapore’s Deputy Prime Minister Heng Swee Keat has stepped aside as the designated successor to Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong has taken mainland Chinese political observers and netizens by surprise. Chi...

A former opposition lawmaker charged in Hong Kong’s largest national security law crackdown had his bail revoked after prosecutors cited alleged collusion with the United States before the new law took effect, the judiciary has revealed.The judicia...