At a rehearsal studio in Hong Kong on an early February morning, a group of 12 dancers gathered around a table, hands on deck and eyes locked in intense glances. They slammed the counter in unison. Then they twisted and turned their bodies with fierc...

Researchers in China have been excluded from the European Union’s most advanced collaborative technology programmes. However, specialists in the sectors affected say the impact of the ban may be limited because some areas of collaboration are alrea...

Five European nations have announced a new programme to produce low-cost air defence systems and autonomous drones using Ukrainian expertise hard-won over the past four years of war against Russia. Friday’s initiative of the E5 nations – France, ...

The Philippines has fallen in a global corruption perception ranking, as allegations of financial wrongdoings and court cases surrounding a multibillion-peso flood-control programme have deepened doubts about its governance and dented investor confid...

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is at last showing a bit of spirit. While it might not yet be attacking the egregious economic and financial antics of US President Donald Trump, it is at least turning its attention to the fiscal foibles of Japa...

Chinese railway giants look set to scout Eurasia in the years ahead to build high-speed train lines as the domestic market matures and some countries are more prepared than others for capital-intensive yet transformative ventures, analysts said. Insp...

Two China-based foreign influencers who hired a taxi driver to take them on a 4,000-kilometre trip from the south to the north of the country gave their cabby what he has described as an “incredible” experience. One, an Israeli internet celebrity...

Hong Kong authorities will spend about HK$6.8 billion (US$870 million) to buy back homes damaged in the deadly Tai Po fire from flat owners, offering HK$8,000 to HK$10,500 per square foot as part of a long-term resettlement plan involving HK$4 billio...

Nepal’s Lumbini has long anchored the Buddhist pilgrimage map as the Buddha’s birthplace. Nearby, however, stand the fortified ruins of Tilaurakot – believed to be the ancient capital where Siddhartha Gautam spent his princely years – a site ...

Turning the house where Adolf Hitler was born into a police station has raised mixed emotions in his Austrian hometown. “It’s a double-edged sword,” said Sibylle Treiblmaier, outside the house in the town of Braunau am Inn on the border with Ge...

The new 10 per cent global tariffs imposed by the United States will have only a “limited impact” on Hong Kong, the treasury chief has said, adding that the move highlights the city’s strength as a safe haven for capital amid geopolitical uncer...

About 600 motorists from Guangdong province have driven their vehicles into Hong Kong’s urban areas during the Lunar New Year holiday under a new scheme that has so far attracted 3,000 applications, according to the transport minister. Secretary fo...

US President Donald Trump will travel to China from March 31 to ⁠April 2 for talks with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping, the White House has announced. The summit between Trump and Xi, the leaders of the world’s two biggest economies, will be ...

US President Donald Trump told Vietnam’s top leader To Lam he would “instruct the relevant agencies” to remove the country from a list restricted from accessing advanced US technologies, Vietnam’s government announced on Saturday. The two lea...

The ecological health of China’s Yangtze River is undergoing a meaningful recovery, just halfway through a 10-year fishing ban to restore the ecosystem, a new study has found. As one of the country’s vital waterways – and among the world’s mo...

Two weeks after an election that was called to cut through Thailand’s political stalemate, much is still in doubt. The threat of annulment hangs over the entire vote, while the final shape of Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul’s governing coaliti...

On a crisp January afternoon, the Shenzhen Bay Sports Centre, just a stone’s throw from Tencent Holdings’ headquarters, was packed with employees gathering for a party featuring celebrity cameos and prizes. But before the fun started, they witnes...

ChatGPT-maker OpenAI said on Friday that it had considered alerting Canada’s police last year about the activities of a person who months later committed one of the worst school shootings in the country’s history. OpenAI said the company identifi...

The US military has carried out another deadly strike on a vessel accused of trafficking drugs in the Eastern Pacific Ocean. US Southern Command said on social media that the boat “was transiting along known narco-trafficking routes in the Eastern ...

For decades, China’s role in the global economy was easy to define. It made things cheaply and at astonishing scale. “Made in China” became shorthand for industrial capacity. It was often contentious, sometimes admired, sometimes feared. In the...

A wave of online backlash against South Korea is spreading across Southeast Asia, fuelled by a dispute over fan behaviour at a K-pop concert and intensified by controversial comments from public officials, highlighting how quickly digital tensions ca...

Once, young people in China were obsessed with emulating trendy lifestyles, attending parties, enjoying fine dining and treating consumption as a social currency. But as this fast-paced lifestyle became the norm, many began to feel exhausted. In resp...

Hong Kong’s improving fiscal position has prompted a groundswell of calls for the government to offer more “sweeteners” in the coming budget, including a cross-party demand for more tax relief for the middle class, but economists have cautioned...

North Korea’s ruling party congress, convened only once every five years, opened in Pyongyang this weekend with supreme leader Kim Jong-un poised to formalise a military doctrine with far-reaching implications for security on the Korean peninsula a...

US President Donald Trump said on Friday that he was considering limited military strikes to pressure Iran into signing a new nuclear deal, but bombing the country may have the opposite effect, risking a new destabilising conflict in the Middle East....

Chinese scientists have made a long-lasting, eco-friendly battery using organic electrodes and an electrolyte safe enough to be used as tofu brine. The team’s water-based battery is non-toxic and can be discarded without posing an ecological risk, ...

When you buy a stock, you are paying for future profits, not current earnings. It seems that a similar principle applies to countries. The fact that a company or a country is at the top now means nothing if the main indicators are flashing red. I am ...

Slumped in the back seat of his Range Rover, a visibly shaken man once referred to ⁠as the “Playboy Prince” stares ahead of him ⁠as the car leaves Aylsham police station in ⁠Norfolk, England. The photo, taken by Reuters photographer Phil No...

Britain’s government will consider new legislation to remove the former prince Andrew from the line of royal succession once the police investigation into his ties with Epstein is over, a UK official has said. Any changes to the line of succession ...

Nasa aims to send astronauts to the moon in March after completing the latest rocket fuelling test. Administrator Jared Isaacman said on Friday that launch teams made “major progress” between the first countdown rehearsal, which was disrupted by ...

US President Donald Trump said he was considering a limited strike on Iran after ordering a major naval build-up in the Middle East aimed at heaping pressure on Tehran to cut a deal to curb its nuclear programme. The latest threat came after Iran’s...

For overseas researchers, policymakers, businesses and casual users alike, access to China’s public information is quietly shrinking as a growing number of official websites go dark outside the country, a new study has found. The contraction is far...

Barcelona’s towering Sagrada Familia basilica reached its maximum height on Friday, though the magnum opus of Catalan architect Antoni Gaudi remains years away from completion. A crane placed the upper arm of a cross atop the Tower of Jesus Christ,...

In a consequential decision with billions of dollars on the line, the US Supreme Court on Friday upheld a lower-court ruling striking down President Donald Trump’s tariffs, coming just as the White House confirmed his visit to Beijing from March 31...

As US President Donald Trump prepares for a possible visit to China in April, analysts say that one issue is likely to “cast a shadow” over his looming negotiations with Beijing: America’s need to maintain access to supplies of gallium and othe...

Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi highlighted what she called Chinese “coercion” as she delivered her first parliamentary speech since her party’s landslide victory about two weeks ago, while also calling for continued communication with B...

They are young, intensely competitive, and unapologetic about 80-hour work weeks. Welcome to the United States’ new generation of tech founders. Gen Z’s start-up class is reframing “millennial hustle culture” by shifting from side gigs and pe...

Quentin Griffiths, who co-founded British fast-fashion retailer Asos, has died after a fall from a balcony in Thailand, Thai police said on Friday. Police said that Griffiths, 58, had fallen from the 17th floor of a flat block in the seaside resort c...

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz will visit China from Wednesday, shortly after the Lunar New Year holiday, according to the chancellor’s spokesman. “This date was proposed by the Chinese side,” spokesman Sebastian Hille said on Friday. “We c...

Mary Ann Pajo watched quietly as cemetery workers opened her son’s tomb in Manila this week and removed his body for examination by a forensic pathologist. Accused of dealing drugs, 30-year-old Joewarski Pajo was shot dead while playing a game on h...

China has defended the World Trade Organization’s non-discrimination principle after the United States and the European Union recently proposed reforms that could weaken it – though analysts say the rule would likely remain despite deepening divi...

Two Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) graduates have lost a judicial challenge against their disqualifications from an election for the institution’s advisory body, after their pro-independence views or convictions arising from the 2019 anti-g...

Turkey has arrested six European activists who came to the country to examine prison conditions of political detainees, their lawyer said on Friday. They were detained in Istanbul on Thursday after meeting a legal collective called the Office of Peop...

If 2026 were a chess match, critical minerals would be the opening gambit, and both China and the United States are going all out. On January 28, China’s Zijin Mining announced a US$4 billion takeover of Allied Gold’s three African mines. On Febr...

The biggest challenges that the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) has to tackle following its recent victory in the general election are the country’s sluggish economy, high inflation and unemployment. Speaking at a webinar, panellists said voters...

US and Chinese fighter jets have engaged in a rare stand-off over the Yellow Sea, according to media reports in South Korea. This comes at a time when the United States has been trying to shift the focus of its troops stationed in the country away fr...

Hong Kong police are investigating the suspected poisoning of four dogs on farms in the northern New Territories, with an animal welfare group saying another canine was missing and describing the cases as “heartbreaking”. The Sai Kung Stray Frien...

A law firm has asked a Hong Kong court to bar police from inspecting privileged documents seized during a raid earlier this month as part of an ongoing investigation into the rising number of “crash-for-cash” scams. In a written application for j...

The UN human rights agency on Friday called on governments to clamp down on scam centres, which have mushroomed in Southeast Asia and where hundreds of thousands of people have been trafficked into forced labour. The agency released a report document...

Hong Kong’s jobless rate edged up by 0.1 percentage point over the past three months to 3.9 per cent after holding steady since the August to October period last year, with unemployment rising in the insurance, construction and finance sectors. But...