Former HSBC Holdings global insurance head Edward Moncreiffe will join rival AIA Group as regional CEO from November 2, following a path taken by former HSBC Group chairman Mark Tucker, who returned to the Asia-Pacific region’s largest insurer as n...

The Philippines is turning to the United States to build its oil stockpile amid the global energy crunch, with observers saying the move could also serve Washington’s military interests and deepen strategic ties. A bilateral deal could deliver more...

Suspected Palestinian militants wounded five Israelis on Friday before two gunmen were killed in a prolonged shoot-out, leading Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to order the closure of the West Bank days before Israeli elections. Netanyahu, facing a...

Hong Kong recorded its highest-ever temperature for the traditional Chinese calendar’s “Frost” solar term on Friday, with the weather forecaster warning of a very dry weekend ahead. The Hong Kong Observatory said the temperature reached 32.1 de...

Flight disruptions and cancellations are compounding across East Asia as Typhoon Champi approaches Taiwan, grounding hundreds of domestic and international services in Taiwan and poised to affect major mainland Chinese airports next. Taiwan’s trans...

This article was first published by The Korea Times in a partnership with the South China Morning Post. Chinese humanoid robot makers are accelerating efforts to gain a foothold in South Korea, moving beyond dance performances and showroom displays t...

Malaysia’s oil-rich Sarawak state will dissolve its assembly on Monday in a test of political strength for a powerful regional coalition whose support has become crucial to Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim’s government. Anwar is facing growing pressu...

Ren Xiaoping, who once vowed to perform the world’s first human head transplant, has operated on a patient’s severed spinal cord in a 12-hour landmark operation in Moscow, according to the Chinese surgeon and Russian state sources. Ren said the p...

Hong Kong’s top government officials and police officers have paid their final respects to a former constable who died 21 years after being left paralysed in an attack while on duty, during a funeral with full police honours. Jacky Chu Chun-kwok, w...

The World Health Organization has warned that Africa faced a “complex” Ebola outbreak after the virus crossed from east Africa to Nigeria, marking the first case in the west of the continent. Nigeria on Tuesday had announced an imported case of t...

More than 70 flights between Hong Kong and Taiwan have been cancelled as Super Typhoon Champi approaches the island ahead of a possible landfall later on Friday. As of noon on Friday, more than 30 flights between the city and Taiwan Taoyuan Internati...

The world’s oldest cave paintings on the Indonesian island ⁠of Sulawesi are under threat ⁠as heat and smoke from the ⁠country’s worst wildfires in more than a decade risk accelerating the deterioration of the more than 67,000-year-old works...

Chinese artificial intelligence model developers DeepSeek and MiniMax have completed export registration procedures and proceeded with open-source releases and overseas licensing activities, according to Chinese state media, days after Beijing moved ...

Two women have been arrested in Hong Kong on suspicion of child abuse after an 11-year-old girl posted videos on social media in a plea for help, capturing moments of emotional distress inside her home. Police arrested the girl’s 61-year-old grandm...

Police across France are under pressure to maintain security during further protests expected in some cities, while facing scrutiny over their riot-control tactics used during previous unrest that left some teenagers seriously injured. Officers appea...

US and South Korean officials see the chances fading of ⁠a meeting between President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un this year, according to five people with knowledge of the situation. Trump, the only US president to have met a No...

The Fire Services Department will bear “ultimate responsibility” for following up on fire safety complaints across Hong Kong, the security chief has said, pledging legal reforms after the deadly Tai Po blaze, as an independent committee’s repor...

Japan’s communications ministry on Friday unveiled draft guidelines outlining measures for 13 major social media operators to help reduce the impact of misinformation and disinformation that could undermine fairness during elections. The guidelines...

Embattled Negeri Sembilan chief minister Ismail Lasim has denied claims that he has resigned, as a constitutional crisis in the Malaysian state spiralled further following a move by his executive council to challenge their sacking by the state’s ru...

We have selected seven stories from this week’s news across Hong Kong, mainland China, the wider Asia region and beyond that resonated with our readers and shed light on topical issues. If you would like to see more of our reporting, please conside...

Internet users in China are watching the protests in France with a mix of geopolitical cynicism, domestic pride and sadness at the damage to French landmarks. The protests started in September, when students and teachers in southeastern Paris rallied...

El Salvador deployed 100 special forces soldiers to Haiti on Thursday to help rescue four missing soldiers from the Central American country who recently came under attack by gangs, two officials told Associated Press. The special forces arrived a da...

Tennessee execution team members failed multiple times to establish working IV lines in Christa Pike’s arms before her attempted execution and warned that some of her veins may have ruptured, or “blown”, before she was injected with the lethal ...

The annual Hong Kong Wine and Dine Festival later this month promises more booths and longer hours to help attract over 168,000 visitors. The South China Morning Post unpacks what is on offer so you can enjoy the event to the fullest. 1. What is the ...

Chinese state media has called for a Japanese telecoms firm to apologise to China over a huge wildfire in neighbouring Mongolia, as diplomatic tensions run high between Beijing and Tokyo. The grassland fire broke out on October 8 and burned about 80 ...

All efforts need to be focused on search and rescue for survivors and treating the injured, President Xi Jinping instructed on Friday morning, after a 7.0-magnitude earthquake killed 16 and injured 65 in China’s Tibet autonomous region overnight. �...

The artificial intelligence agent software market across Asia, Australia and New Zealand is set to expand more than 14-fold by 2030, according to research firm Omdia, as Chinese tech companies increasingly deploy automated tools across office and ind...

A Florida police officer who found a man dead during a welfare check in 2022 is accused of taking possession of the man’s home and impersonating him for years while fixing up the place, authorities said. The officer said he took possession of the p...

Australia said on Friday it had sanctioned two North Korean individuals and companies over the use of “fraudulent” IT workers and cybercrime to earn cash for the isolated nuclear-armed state. The two men are alleged to be key operators in Pyongya...

Lu Yong, who has a slow-growing blood and bone marrow cancer and inspired the 2018 blockbuster Dying to Survive, has begun reducing his medication and hopes to stop taking it completely within three months. The acclaimed film is based on Lu’s exper...

Severe haze in Hong Kong over the past two days has prompted a government warning of serious health risks, with experts urging the elderly and vulnerable to stay indoors until sunset. Air quality health risk levels at some of Hong Kong’s roadside m...

The son of Myanmar’s Aung San Suu Kyi said she sounded “fairly healthy” after speaking to the detained ex-democratic leader on Thursday for the first time in more than five years. Suu Kyi, 81, is under house arrest in the capital, Naypyidaw, ac...

This year has opened a rare window of relative calm in global commerce. On October 8, the World Trade Organization doubled its forecast for global goods trade growth, from 1.9 to 3.9 per cent. The easing of US-China and Europe-China tensions has give...

In author and computer engineer Liu Cixin’s science fiction hit The Three-Body Problem, three suns throw a doomed world into chaos. Chinese astronomers say they have found a real three-star system that is far better behaved. Using FAST, the world�...

The United Nations’ climate loss and damage fund moved to provide US$20 million in aid sought by flood-stricken Nepal – the first time it has set aside money for any country – in a key test of the body’s credibility. In an extraordinary meeti...

Fresh Hong Kong graduates are increasingly feeling the impact of artificial intelligence (AI) as they enter the workforce, human resources experts have said, after a survey found the starting salaries for degree holders and sub-degree graduates had n...

A wind energy partnership between Vietnam and Denmark has fuelled expectations of the Southeast Asian country boosting its competitiveness in renewable electricity to serve overseas and domestic markets. Vietnam is well placed to grow its renewable e...

Mississippi released video on Thursday showing the fatal shooting of a one-year-old boy by a police officer whom state authorities have cleared of criminal wrongdoing. Kohen Wiley was killed in June when Senatobia police officer Sergeant Hunter Foste...

With one eye on her baby in a stroller, Minae Kamata operates an arcade machine in a Tokyo suburb, manipulating a claw to grab not a stuffed toy but a pack of toilet paper. As inflation weighs on Japanese households, huge arcades on the outskirts of ...

The Asia Society announced on Thursday that it had marked out territory on the Washington policy landscape with the purchase of a US$17.5 million building that will give it a permanent spot alongside other US capital think tanks dating back more than...

HSBC will launch its Hong Kong dollar-backed stablecoin in stages from Friday for more than 3.3 million users of its PayMe app, as the bank pushes to bring digital currencies into the city’s mainstream retail and investment markets. HSBC RedCoin, a...

US ⁠President Donald Trump determined ⁠on Thursday that petroleum ⁠production, refining and related activities are essential to national defence, a move that could open up US funding for fossil fuel projects. In a presidential memo, Trump also ...

Global pharmaceutical firm AstraZeneca on Thursday said it would start selling a cancer drug after coming under criticism for failing to bring it to the US market faster, prompting some Americans to fly to Shanghai to procure the potentially life-sav...

Versatile actor Tom Skerritt, who starred in Hollywood megahits including the sci-fi classic Alien, the ⁠war comedy M*A*S*H, and the action drama Top Gun, ⁠has died at the age of 93. Skerritt, a Detroit native ⁠whose Hollywood career spanned fr...

US President Donald Trump on Thursday accused LeBron James of disrespecting the United States after the NBA star appeared to continue his warm-ups while the national anthem was performed before Philadelphia’s season opener on Tuesday. “I said rig...

Diplomats from the EU’s 27 member states were pressured this week to lift sanctions on Yusha Group, a Chinese textiles manufacturer accused of selling sensitive European technology to Russian buyers. In exchange, Beijing has pledged that the compan...

At least 16 people were killed and 32 more injured when a strong 7.0-magnitude earthquake struck China’s western Tibet autonomous region late on Thursday, state news agency Xinhua said, citing local authorities. More than 300 houses collapsed in th...

A truckers’ protest in southern Italy has halted the production of the famed buffalo mozzarella, causing an estimated loss of €3 million (US$3.37 million) in just 24 hours as the milk cannot reach dairies in the Naples region and the finished che...

A federal judge on Thursday ordered US President Donald Trump to sit for a deposition in his US$10 billion defamation lawsuit against the BBC by December 11. The order from US Magistrate Judge Enjolique Lett came as lawyers for the British broadcaste...

Hong Kong and mainland Chinese authorities have condemned a UK report that said the city’s national security law had further eroded the openness underpinning its success as a financial hub. In a statement issued in the early hours of Friday, the Ho...