Japanese police on Saturday searched the house of one of the patients at a mental clinic where a fire gutted an entire floor in an eight-storey building, killing 24 people trapped inside.An Osaka police investigator said the man is a possible suspect...

A quarantine-exempt Cathay Pacific cargo pilot has been confirmed as the first carrier of the coronavirus’ more transmissible Omicron variant to enter the Hong Kong community.The confirmation brings the total number of Omicron infections recorded i...

Foreign nations should realise by now that China’s so-called over the top approach in handling the pandemic was the correct one, the country’s top respiratory expert has said, as the Omicron variant spreads around the world at record-breaking pac...

US lawmakers confirmed Rahm Emanuel as the country’s next ambassador to Japan Saturday, after a contentious nomination process in which fellow Democrats opposed the former Chicago mayor over his record on police violence.Senators confirmed Emanuel ...

Emergency teams in the Philippines on Saturday rushed aid to areas battered by the strongest typhoon to hit the country this year, which killed up to 24 people and displaced more than 330,000. A governor said her island province has been “levelled ...

Yeung Ming-hon was 18 and a medical student when he found himself picking up soldiers wounded in the Battle of Hong Kong and attending to their injuries.Now 98, he is one of the last two living veterans involved in the fall of Hong Kong in 1941. Inva...

For nearly a thousand years, Chinese people believed an ancient emperor was buried in a mountain outside Xian, the city in northwest China that was once the centre of political power across multiple empires.It turned out the tomb lied several kilomet...

Australia won a landmark court ruling against Singapore Telecommunications, a victory in the country’s battle against tax avoidance by multinational companies through cross-border financing arrangements.The Federal Court of Australia on Friday dism...

Calls for a boycott of Sunday’s Legislative Council election and interference by “foreign forces” may contribute to a potential low voter turnout, Hong Kong’s constitutional affairs chief has said a day before residents head to the polls.Secr...

The US has recommended that Alphabet’s Google and Facebook parent Meta get permission to use a Pacific undersea cable system to handle growing internet traffic with Asia.The Biden administration urged the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to ...

China is changing the way it invests in Central Asia under its Belt and Road Initiative to grow global trade, as Chinese companies increasingly have to adapt to the demands of the region’s governments and citizens who want more jobs, exports and sk...

Indonesian authorities raised the alert level for the highest volcano on Java island, saying Mount Semeru could blow up again after a sudden eruption earlier this month left 48 people dead and 36 missing in villages that were buried in layers of mud....

China has updated its carrier-based J-15 fighters for catapult take-off, suggesting China’s third aircraft carrier is likely to be equipped with the device.The new variant of the Shenyang J-15 “Flying Shark”, the People’s Liberation Army’s ...

Hong Kong’s zero-Covid strategy has almost shut down the local aviation industry and its infection-control policies are “killing” Cathay Pacific, the CEO of Qatar Airways, the flag carrier’s third-largest shareholder, has warned.Akbar Al Bake...

China’s power sector could reach peak carbon emissions as early as 2025 – five years ahead of the national target, according to a new study by Chinese researchers.Beijing has pledged to hit peak emissions before 2030 and to become carbon neutral ...

Australia reported record high new Covid-19 cases on Saturday for a third day, with outbreaks growing in the two most populous states.New South Wales state reported 2,482 new cases, Victoria state reported 1,504 new cases and Queensland state reporte...

South China Morning Post managing editor Brian Rhoads recently flew home to the United States to attend a memorial service for his late father. After he had already left, the Hong Kong government moved the US into a new high-risk category, meaning he...

Every so often, we hear the “death knell” sounded for the imminent demise of Cantonese, as more and more speakers are trading it in for Mandarin.Just like Welsh and Hawaiian – both of which were nearing extinction around 30 years ago – Canton...

When two police officers responded to a complaint about noise at a public apartment complex in Incheon, South Korea, last month, little could they have known how events would spiral out of control.How, by the time the day was out, a mother would be l...

Voters across Taiwan will cast their ballots on Saturday in four contentious referendums, with the results tipped as a test of public confidence in President Tsai Ing-wen and her government.Voters trickled in to some of the 17,500 or so polling stati...

The newly crowned Miss America has made history, becoming both the first Korean-American and the first Alaskan to hold the title in the competition’s 100-year history.“I never could have imagined in a million years that I would be Miss America, l...

A controversy over a sexual assault allegation at Alibaba Group Holding became a hot topic again after the e-commerce giant fired the female employee who accused her boss of sexual assault in August, but key facts are still missing about the saga tha...

The Hong Kong government may be in for a surprise if it expects an easy ride with a Legislative Council made up of “patriots” after Sunday’s election.Some heavyweight candidates told the Post that if they won, they intended to hold the administ...

A state-owned bank in China cleared an employee of wrongdoing following an internal investigation after a woman accused her of accumulating assets and receiving a salary despite barely working.A video post from Liu Yinyue went viral and she accused h...

It took Hongkonger Jerry Chan Chun-lai some time to adapt to life across the border in Shenzhen, going cashless everywhere and speaking Mandarin instead of Cantonese. He missed his parents and brother back home too.But he has no regrets about moving ...

On November 16, Du Jia, a 32-year-old mother in the Guangdong provincial city of Maoming, posted a video of her son, nicknamed Little Mili, on China’s Little Red Book social media platform.In the video, Little Mili reached out to grab a toy, an ins...

A defiant Ghislaine Maxwell said on Friday that prosecutors had failed to prove her guilty of sex crimes, as her defence wound up in a trial that heard lurid claims she groomed minors for abuse by the late financier Jeffrey Epstein.Speaking for the f...

In dramatic evidence Friday in the federal criminal trial of Harvard professor Charles Lieber, the scientist was shown on video denying having brought back tens of thousands of US dollars from China before acknowledging he put it in his luggage and s...

There was widespread anticipation that the United States would offer more details on its Indo-Pacific security and economic plans in Southeast Asia during Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s recent visit to the region.But apart from criticising Bei...

New York state is experiencing a dramatic spike in Covid-19 cases, driving a fresh wave of school closings, work-from-home migrations and business disruptions.The 21,027 new cases reported Friday surpassed the previous record of 19,942 set in January...

Long-time Trump confidant Roger Stone says he has asserted his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination in an interview with the House panel investigating the January 6 Capitol insurrection.Stone – who was convicted in 2019 of lying to Cong...

China risks losing an opportunity to leverage its trade clout and offset United States containment efforts if it continues with its harsh border restrictions in 2022, a prominent Chinese academic has warned, as calls mount for Beijing to strike a bal...

A giant straw Yule goat in the Swedish town of Gavle was set ablaze on Friday for the first time in five years, reviving a long-running tradition of locals illegally attempting to torch it and authorities scrambling to stop them.Police said they had ...

European countries braced to impose further travel and social restrictions in an effort to stem fast rising cases of Covid-19, just as a major study warned that new variant Omicron was five times more likely to reinfect people than Delta.The risk of ...

Russia unveiled proposals to contain the United States and Nato in the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, calling for urgent negotiations with Washington as it amasses forces near Ukraine.The United States said it was willing to talk but stated ...

The World Health Organization has given emergency approval to a coronavirus vaccine made by US-based Novavax and the Serum Institute of India, paving the way for its inclusion in the UN-backed programme to get such vaccines to poorer countries around...

Chinese workers building what would be the world’s longest tunnel have come up against an unexpected problem in one of the driest areas on Earth – gushing streams of water.That is according to engineers involved in the project in China’s far we...

Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding has reiterated its focus on three key strategic engines – China consumption, globalisation and technology – to drive future growth, as it seeks to fight off a growing list of contenders.“Our vision...

The authenticity of three boundary stones once used to mark the limits of Hong Kong’s first colonial settlement has been confirmed, after the relics were uncovered by groups of history lovers.The Antiquities and Monuments Office said on Friday its ...

Hundreds of inmates set fire to a prison in southern Thailand in a riot over demands for better medical care for those suffering from Covid-19, officials said Friday.Some 400 inmates at Krabi’s main provincial prison became violent late Thursday ni...

Pro-establishment heavyweights have dismissed suggestions ahead of Sunday’s Legislative Council election that Beijing has issued instructions on who to vote for, while city officials are ramping up calls at the eleventh hour to boost turnout.But wi...

At least 2,500 people including hundreds of children have fled a flare-up in fighting between the Myanmar army and ethnic minority rebels and have taken refuge across the border in Thailand, Thai authorities and an aid group said.Those displaced had ...

China’s hydrogen energy industry is taking off thanks to huge investment over the past five years, as the country pushes towards peaking emissions by 2030 and reaching carbon neutrality by 2060, industry insiders and experts say.Authorities’ tole...

A senior US official has again stressed the need for China to agree to arms control talks with the United States, amid increasing concern in Washington over Beijing’s expanding nuclear arsenal.Thomas Countryman, senior adviser to the State Departme...

Hong Kong’s primary and secondary schools have lost some 6,200 pupils in the four months since the summer holidays amid a broader emigration wave, according to new official figures, with districts having more elite campuses hit the hardest.The late...

India has decided to raise the legal age of marriage for women from 18 to 21 – the same as men – in a push to ensure that girls complete their education and climb up the economic ladder.On Wednesday, the national cabinet approved the recommendati...

Voters in Hong Kong with attire sporting slogans deemed sensitive by polling station authorities on Sunday will be given jackets to cover up the designs, with police intervening if people refuse requests to leave, the Post has learned.The measure was...

On-demand service provider Meituan aims to be the first company in China’s southern tech hub of Shenzhen to officially deliver orders to customers using drones, after kicking off a trial run in the city’s commercial district.Meituan’s applicati...

China is pressuring German car parts giant Continental to stop using components made in Lithuania, two people familiar with the matter told Reuters, amid a dispute between Beijing and the Baltic state over the status of Taiwan.The targeting of Contin...

China’s video games market had its slowest revenue growth in three years in 2021 amid Beijing’s crackdown on the industry while the number of players stagnated, according to an industry report released on Thursday.According to the report released...