China called on major nations to “foster a free and facilitative trading environment” ahead of two summits next week that may herald a trade war with the European Union. Vice-Premier Zhang Guoqing said China was “steadfastly expanding high-stan...

Chinese scientists have uncovered differences between American and Chinese vaginal microbiomes, revealing that a bacterium closely linked to bacterial vaginosis and preterm birth is significantly more prevalent and virulent in American women. The stu...

Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jnr will travel to Russia next week for a summit with Moscow and Southeast Asian leaders, a visit analysts say will allow Manila to show it can fulfil its role as Asean chair and keep diplomatic channels open wit...

In their 2022 book Sinostan, Raffaello Pantucci and Alexandros Petersen saw Central Asia as China’s “inadvertent empire”. If that is true – and the five-country region embracing Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan and Tajikistan ...

The EU’s concept of tech sovereignty may prove an “illusion” in a world where artificial intelligence is dominated by China and the US, a Chinese expert has argued, urging Beijing to seize the opportunity provided by Donald Trump to make its pr...

Bangladesh and India have agreed to deepen cooperation along their shared border with improved intelligence sharing and coordinated patrols, according to a joint statement released on Friday, amid strained relations over alleged undocumented migratio...

A series of emergency management and local government officials in central China’s Hunan province have come under investigation following a catastrophic fireworks factory explosion that killed 37 people last month. The provincial discipline inspect...

Pet-friendly caterers in Hong Kong say a new licence allowing dogs in restaurants from July could lift business by up to 20 per cent, after 1,000 operators secured places in the scheme’s first ballot. The Food and Environmental Hygiene Department o...

Hong Kong can be “more than New York and Silicon Valley combined” by positioning itself as a hub that integrates global financial depth with technological innovation and manufacturing capacity, the city’s finance chief has said. Financial Secre...

Crying without a clear reason can be a major source of anxiety for parents. As families look for new ways to navigate the uncertainty of early childcare, Japanese developers are rolling out AI-powered tools designed to identify the possible causes of...

More than 1,000 Orang Asli, the indigenous people of Peninsular Malaysia, rallied outside a federal ministry in Putrajaya on Friday in a rare mass protest to demand recognition of their ancestral land and an end to evictions and development on their ...

A Hong Kong retiree has received 40 hours of community service for slapping a five-year-old boy who threw a tantrum and berated his domestic helper at a shopping centre earlier this year. Lok Kam-ming, 61, returned to Tuen Mun Court on Friday to be s...

A major immigration corruption scandal could mar Indonesia’s ambition to entice foreign funds and high-skilled workers, according to observers, further tanking investor confidence in Southeast Asia’s largest economy. The country’s Corruption Er...

The global business appetite for China’s yuan is strengthening as Beijing’s long-term campaign to internationalise its currency gains traction, according to a new industry white paper. More than 95 per cent of overseas companies expect to maintai...

India’s new ambassador to China has paid his first visit to Tibet in the latest sign of thawing relations between the two Asian neighbours. Vikram Doraiswami – who speaks Chinese and took up the post in Beijing last month – arrived in Lhasa, ca...

A one-legged teenage boy from a mountainous village in southwestern China has gone viral on social media for excelling at basketball using a wooden crutch handmade by his father. The story of the 13-year-old boy, nicknamed Apei, was first shared by a...

A Hong Kong school recovering from the tragic suicides of a Primary Six pupil and her mother does not suffer from intense academic pressure, a student and the vice-principal have said, stressing that promotion to its secondary section is automatic. T...

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...

A mechanical technician has died after he was injured and left unconscious during an inspection of an amusement ride at a Hong Kong theme park. Police received a report at 9.08am on Friday that the 63-year-old man was found unconscious in Ocean Park�...

It’s the ultimate symbol of American politics under Donald Trump – a blood-soaked cage match on the lawn of the White House for the US president’s 80th birthday. A giant arena dubbed “The Claw” has been built on the famed South Lawn for Sun...

Investors across Asia have been largely shut out of the world’s largest-ever initial public offering, which has forced them to find creative ways to make bets on SpaceX’s US$75 billion global spectacle. With no direct access to the IPO, traders f...

Hong Kong’s catering industry is aiming for 6 to 8 per cent business growth during this year’s Fifa World Cup, with the sector exploring creative ways to attract customers and keep fans from travelling to mainland China, despite time differences ...

The vulnerability of submarine cables during conflicts has made seabed infrastructure a fresh concern for global communication and maritime safety, prompting 17 Asian and European nations to step up collaboration on defence strategies in recent month...

This article was first published on June 13, 1966 36 feared dead in storm horror At least 36 people are feared to have died in the fierce floods following one of the worst rainstorms in Hongkong’s history. Last night (June 12, 1966) officials— st...

A South Korean court sentenced ex-president Yoon Suk-yeol to 30 years in prison on Friday for sending military drones into North Korea, saying he planned the action as pretext for his disastrous martial law declaration in 2024. The drone flights two ...

US Park Police opened an investigation on Thursday into giant markings of the numbers “8647” – which have been associated with opposition to President Donald Trump – on the grass of the National Mall. A spokesperson for the Department of the ...

The Philippines has a rare opening to turn its geography, skilled workers and deepening ties with Japan into a stronger maritime industrial base, but analysts say Manila’s push to make shipbuilding a strategic industry will be judged by whether fre...

A prominent backchannel political figure between Japan and China has died, days before a reported planned trip meant to ease deep bilateral tensions. Yohei Kono, best known for his historic apology on August 4, 1993, to tens of thousands of “comfor...

Ohin Construction, its managing director and several employees were charged on Thursday over alleged lapses linked to the sinkhole that appeared in Singapore’s Tanjong Katong neighbourhood in July last year. The company faces eight charges, mostly ...

Before Scott Pelley was fired from 60 Minutes last week, he accused CBS’s editor-in-chief of “murdering” the programme he had served for over two decades. For a show that once defined hard-edged journalism, his dismissal raises questions about ...

Chinese deep-sea explorers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) have discovered the largest “whale-fall site” ever recorded in the Indian Ocean. The graveyard is the Earth’s deepest and most extensive known accumulation of whale fossils, ...

[The content of this article has been produced by our advertising partner.] Nearly one in ten people in Hong Kong now live with diabetes, and the city’s burden is growing. An ageing population, shifting lifestyles, and a substantial number of undia...

A 25-year-old woman in China has been diagnosed with acute pancreatitis after she followed an extreme weight-loss regime which consisted of eating once a week and hardly eating a thing for the remaining six days. The woman, who uses the alias Qingqin...

The Thai government will observe a 15-day period of official mourning following the death of Princess Bajrakitiyabha Narendira Debyavati, though Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul said the public need not alter their daily routines. The king’s elde...

A sea of 500 tents covered the white sands of remote Ham Tin Wan in Sai Kung during a recent holiday, turning one of Hong Kong’s most scenic beaches into a makeshift campsite for crowds of overnight visitors. Some of the campers had joined tours fr...

Electric vehicles accounted for a record 66.7 per cent of new car sales in mainland China during the first week of June, the latest sign that the country’s battery-powered carmakers are benefiting from the global energy crisis. Two out of every thr...

China’s ports continued to dominate global efficiency rankings in 2025, with seven Chinese trade hubs placing in the top 10, according to a study by the World Bank and S&P Global released on Wednesday. The latest edition of the annual report comes ...

A spate of agreements Nvidia has reached with South Korean companies presents a long-term road map for the country to expand its role in the semiconductor and physical AI industries, observers say. The most significant deal Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang ma...

Republican Congressman Rob Wittman on Thursday called the US killing of three Indian sailors off the coast of Oman “a very, very unfortunate incident”, claiming that the US military is trying to “determine exactly what happened”. “Our thoug...

A Malaysian mother of two broke down in tears as she begged for leniency from the sharia High Court in Melaka for attempting to have sex with another woman’s husband last year. According to Sinar Harian, the accused, Siti Iqbar Mazlan, 35, during t...

Prices for some new homes in Hong Kong have rebounded by as much as a third from the housing market’s lowest level a few years ago amid robust demand, according to analysts. Developers have priced new units this year in Tseung Kwan O, Wong Chuk Han...

Elon Musk’s SpaceX on Thursday confirmed it will begin trading on the Nasdaq exchange Friday in the biggest initial public offering in history, a blockbuster market debut that could propel the entrepreneur to trillionaire status. In a filing with t...

The United States must ensure the next chapter of responsible innovation is written in America, not in China, lawmakers and witnesses told a congressional hearing on Thursday as they sounded the alarm over US-China competition for global supremacy in...

A Toronto police officer was shot and killed Thursday by a suspect in the investigation into a shooting attack that damaged the facade of the US consulate in the Canadian city in March, police said. One 19-year-old suspect was in custody at a hospita...

Taiwan’s representative to the United States expressed confidence that Washington would approve a new round of arms sales to Taiwan, though US President Donald Trump has yet to make a decision on the matter. Asked on Thursday about a pending US$14 ...

For much of the reform era, the United States occupied a special place in the Chinese imagination. When I was growing up in China in the 1980s, the US – or meiguo, the “beautiful country” – was more than a country. It was an idea. Many Chines...

A Chinese biotechnology company sued the US government on Thursday over being placed on a list of businesses from China that the ‌US Department of Defence has linked to that country’s military. WuXi AppTec filed its complaint in the Washington fe...

The Trump administration on Thursday imposed sanctions on Cuba’s state-owned oil and gas company, escalating pressure on Havana’s communist government and targeting a sector central to the island’s worsening energy crisis. The move came hours a...

US President Donald Trump said he is nominating Jay Clayton to be the next director of national intelligence, following backlash over his selection of housing regulator Bill Pulte to serve in the role on an acting basis. Clayton, the top federal pros...

The condition of the Belfast stabbing victim is “improving” and he could be awoken from a coma within the next 48 hours, pro-British Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) leader Gavin Robinson said on Thursday. Stephen Ogilvie lost his left eye and suf...