Seven out of eight power bank rental platforms tested by Hong Kong’s consumer watchdog displayed inaccurate navigation or positioning data on map applications, a problem that may waste users’ time and incur extra charges due to delays.

The Consumer Council on Thursday also found a significant variance in rental fees across different stations within the same platforms, with charges for a 30-minute rental differing by nearly 1.3 times and the daily cap on charges differing by more than 2.3...

China is recruiting social workers for disputed islands in the South China Sea.

According to a notice published on Monday, the government of Sansha, the authority set up to administer the disputed territories, said it was looking for 11 “community workers” to post on eight reefs and islands in the Paracel and the Spratly islands.

The territories include Woody Island, the administrative centre of the disputed territories, and Mischief Reef, which is home to a large military base.

The notice was..…

A 50-year-old Japanese woman, who was mocked for being “ugly” as a child, has shunned cosmetic surgery and spent 13 years taking more than 30,000 selfies to study make-up, skincare and fashion.

The ridiculing left Kozue Sakurada with deep emotional scars, but her persistence has inspired countless people online.

A male classmate once stared at her and repeated the word “ugly” to her face 10 times.



Other boys even made up a parody of a children’s song to mock her large nose.

By her early...

Extra costs and the use of public resources may be incurred under the Hong Kong government’s proposed moves to increase professional scrutiny of building maintenance projects following the deadly Tai Po inferno, a lawmaker has said, calling for further discussion.

Election Committee lawmaker Andrew Lam Siu-lo, a town planner by training, said on Thursday that expanding the Urban Renewal Authority’s (URA) role in such projects might require extra time and money, urging the government and...

A crane collapsed over a Thai highway outside Bangkok, crushing cars and killing two people on Thursday, just a day after another construction crane plunged onto a rail track in the country’s northeast, killing 32 passengers.

Thursday’s incident occurred just outside Bangkok in Samut Sakhon province, where a crane installed on an under-construction elevated highway toppled onto the busy road below.

Dashcam footage shared on social media shows the crane collapse onto unsuspecting drivers in a...

Pakistan is increasingly confident of making billion-dollar arms sales, headlined by JF-17 fighters co-produced with China, as up to six Muslim-majority countries look to upgrade their air forces amid growing geopolitical turbulence and civil wars.

A preliminary deal worth US$4 billion for an unspecified number of JF-17s and other training aircraft manufactured by Pakistan Aeronautical Complex was struck last month with the Libyan National Army, according to Reuters reports citing Aamir Masood,.…

Passenger trips at the Hong Kong International Airport reached 61 million in 2025, marking a 15 per cent year-on-year increase, after a full year of operation with the facility’s third runway.

The Airport Authority said on Thursday that the strong figures came on the back of a busy Christmas season, which saw over 200,000 daily passenger trips over eight days in December. Cargo throughput for the year also rose by 2.7 per cent to 5.07 million tonnes.

“The strong traffic performance in 2025 marks…

Japan and the Philippines signed a defence pact on Thursday that would allow the tax-free provision of ammunition, fuel, food and other necessities when their forces stage joint training to boost deterrence against China’s growing aggression in the region and to bolster their preparation for natural disasters.

Japan has faced increasing political, trade and security tensions with Beijing, which was angered by Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s remark that potential mainland Chinese action against..…

Hong Kong’s consumer watchdog has called on businesses to improve services for elderly customers after receiving more than 9,200 complaints in the past three years, including a woman who spent HK$400,000 (US$51,294) on beauty treatments.

The Consumer Council said on Thursday that improving services for seniors would help boost the spending potential of the “silver economy”, a priority for the city’s government amid a rapidly ageing population.

“The council urges traders to review their sales...

China’s military says it is using quantum technology to gather high-value military intelligence from public cyberspace.

The People’s Liberation Army said more than 10 experimental quantum cyber warfare tools were “under development”, many of which were being “tested in front-line missions”, according to the official newspaper Science and Technology Daily.

The project is being led by a supercomputing laboratory at the National University of Defence Technology, according to the report, with a...

The announcement that BTS will return to Malaysia after more than a decade has sent K-pop fans into a frenzy, with many calling it a once-in-a-lifetime moment.

The South Korean supergroup will stage two concerts in Kuala Lumpur on December 12 and 13, marking its first appearance in the country since 2015, when it performed its Red Bullet Tour at Mega Star Arena.

This will also be BTS’ first-ever concert in Kuala Lumpur as its previous Malaysia performance was held in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah.

For...

Hong Kong and Shenzhen can work closely to empower finance with artificial intelligence, delegates said on Thursday at the China Conference: Greater Bay Area, an event hosted by the South China Morning Post.

Joseph Chan Ho-lim, undersecretary for Financial Services and the Treasury in the Hong Kong government, said Hong Kong and Shenzhen were seeking deeper cooperation between finance and technology.

Chan said at the event in Qianhai, a bonded zone in Shenzhen, that Hong Kong, as a...

Elon Musk’s platform X on Wednesday announced measures to prevent its AI chatbot Grok from undressing images of real people, following global backlash over its generation of sexualised photos of women and children.

The announcement came after California’s attorney general launched an investigation into Musk’s xAI - the developer of Grok - over the sexually explicit material and multiple countries either blocked access to the chatbot or launched their own probes.

X said it would “geoblock the...

Recent events in Hong Kong, particularly the tragic blaze at Wang Fuk Court in Tai Po last November, have focused society’s attention on reforms to the legal system, especially those concerning building management and maintenance.

Corruption and improper practices in the tendering process for large-scale building renovation or maintenance have also become a hot-button issue.

In response, the government has established an independent committee to uncover the causes of the fire and examine...

“Rural heating problems in Hebei cannot wait any longer” declared a recent report in Farmers’ Daily. It described a disturbing reality in parts of northern China: elderly villagers who would rather shiver through freezing temperatures than turn on their heaters, because they simply cannot afford the cost. For many urban readers, this may sound implausible. For millions of rural elderly, it is routine.

On the surface, the problem appears to be a side effect of China’s well-intentioned...

In a landmark case in China, two AI chatbot developers have appealed against their convictions on pornography charges over software that generated sexual content for paid users.

The Shanghai First Intermediate People’s Court began on Wednesday hearing the appeal by the two defendants against an earlier decision by a lower court to sentence one of the developers to four years and the other to 1½ years in prison for “creating pornographic material for profit”.

The hearing has been adjourned,...

Social media in China has been shocked and outraged by a midwife who cut off a newborn baby’s finger when severing his umbilical cord during a caesarean section.

The infant boy was born on the morning of December 25, at Xuyi County People’s Hospital in Jiangsu province, eastern China.

Two hours later, his father was told by doctors that the child’s left middle finger had been snipped by accident during the surgery, the Red Star News reported.

The baby then faced two hospital transfers before...

Hong Kong lawmaker Duncan Chiu owns 54 properties at home and overseas, more than any of the other 89 lawmakers, a review of their declaration of interests shows.

But Chiu indicated that he is considering selling his properties in the West, citing geopolitical risks and his limited time for managing them.

Chiu, the son of the late entrepreneur Deacon Chiu, represents the technology and innovation sector.

He is among the five lawmakers who have declared ownership of more than 10 properties, and..…

A requirement to set minimum prices for their cars in the European Union will reduce sales there for Chinese electric vehicle (EV) makers, but higher profit margins will eventually improve their bottom lines and brand reputations, according to analysts and industry officials.

Assemblers of Chinese pure-electric cars from BYD to Leapmotor will avoid a brutal discount war after European authorities accepted price undertakings to replace punitive anti-subsidy tariffs of up to 35.3 per cent.

Minimum…

Komeito is emerging as a potential political kingmaker in Japan ahead of a widely expected snap lower house election, three months after the party affiliated with a religious movement announced it was ending an alliance with the ruling Liberal Democratic Party over differences with Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi.

On January 23, the opening day of the Diet, Takaichi is expected to announce the dissolution of the House of Representatives, with polling likely to take place on February 8 or February.…

Four crew members departed the International Space Station on Wednesday after a medical issue prompted their mission to be cut a month short - a first for the orbiting laboratory.

A video feed from Nasa showed American astronauts Mike Fincke and Zena Cardman, Russian cosmonaut Oleg Platonov and Japanese astronaut Kimiya Yui undocking from the ISS at 2220 GMT, after five months in space.

The US space agency has declined to disclose which crew member has the health problem or give details about...

Hong Kong and mainland Chinese stocks outpaced their US peers for the first two weeks of 2026 and should continue to do so for the rest of the year on the back of relatively cheaper valuations, a firmer yuan and policy tailwinds, as geopolitics drives more global investors to look to China as a hedge against rising risks in US assets, according to analysts.

The CSI 300 Index has gained 2.4 per cent so far this year, while the Hang Seng Index has climbed 5.3 per cent, both outpacing a 1.7 per...

The race between the US and China to dominate the world’s artificial intelligence industry has become “complex and challenging to forecast”, according to ChatGPT creator OpenAI.

In a blog post this week, published ahead of the first anniversary of DeepSeek’s release of breakthrough reasoning model R1 on January 20, OpenAI said another “seismic shock” from China could be on the cards, as anticipation heightened about a potential new major release from the Hangzhou-based start-up around the Lunar.…

The White House’s top science adviser on Wednesday said that the Biden administration’s decision to get rid of the Justice Department’s China Initiative was “damaging”, though stopped short of recommending that it should be fully brought back.

Asked by Florida Republican Daniel Webster whether the termination of the programme aimed at combating alleged economic espionage from Beijing was detrimental, Michael Kratsios, the director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, said:…

China’s electric vehicle (EV) exports doubled in 2025 amid rising overseas demand for affordable cars and Beijing’s anti-involution campaign.

The country – the world’s leading EV manufacturer – sold more than 2.6 million units to overseas markets last year, up 104 per cent from a year earlier, according to data from the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM) on Wednesday.

Despite persistent trade tensions, Chinese brands were expected to further deepen their presence in overseas...

On January 17, a quiet revolution will take place across around two-thirds of the world’s oceans. A landmark United Nations agreement known as the High Seas Treaty will formally enter into force, creating the first legally binding global framework to protect marine biodiversity in international waters.

For the first time, activities beyond national jurisdictions – from industrial fishing to deep-sea mining and bio-prospecting – will be subject to environmental impact assessments, marine...

A French applied mathematics professor has been charged with allowing a Chinese delegation to visit sensitive sites in a case of suspected espionage, a prosecutor said on Wednesday.

The lecturer at a university engineering institute in the southwestern town of Bordeaux was charged on December 16 but released under judicial supervision, the Paris prosecutor’s office said.

The charges against him include “providing information to a foreign power” and “colluding with a foreign power”, which can be.…

Hong Kong Cantopop singer and actor Raymond Lam Fung has cancelled two coming concerts in Japan, adding to a growing list of high-profile entertainment disruptions amid escalating diplomatic tensions between Beijing and Tokyo.

Japanese promoter Promax Inc said on Wednesday that Lam’s “Go With The Flow in Japan” tour – originally scheduled for January 31 and February 1 at the Tokyo Garden Theatre – had been postponed indefinitely.

“After careful consideration and extensive discussions with all...

Trade between Brazil and China hit a record US$171 billion in 2025, more than double Brazil’s total with the United States last year, as Chinese demand for Brazilian oil, farm goods and minerals surged and US tariffs on Brazilian exports nudged Brasilia to deepen ties with Beijing.

Washington imposed a sweeping 50 per cent tariff on a broad range of Brazilian products, citing political grievances linked to the prosecution of former president Jair Bolsonaro.

As Brazilian officials scrambled to...

Hong Kong’s newly elected lawmakers, many of them fresh faces on the political scene, held their first meeting on Wednesday, with officials pledging to address policy gaps exposed by the deadly Tai Po inferno, from tightening oversight of maintenance project tenders and raising homeowner voting thresholds to imposing a smoking ban at construction sites.

Wednesday also marked the first time since Hong Kong’s return to Chinese sovereignty 28 years ago that a city leader had addressed the first...

Hong Kong customs has arrested 62 people and seized about 1.4 tonnes of suspected drugs worth roughly HK$431 million (US$55.27 million) in a major crackdown at the city’s airport, carried out with mainland Chinese and overseas authorities.

The Customs and Excise Department said on Wednesday that a months-long operation conducted from October to December targeted criminals smuggling drugs through passenger and cargo channels at Hong Kong International Airport.

Officers uncovered syndicates...

Chinese chip designer Montage Technology is set to enlist Alibaba Group Holding and JPMorgan Asset Management among the key investors in its upcoming Hong Kong listing, according to people familiar with the matter, in a sign of promising demand for the city’s latest share sale related to artificial intelligence.

Alibaba and the JPMorgan Chase asset manager were participating as cornerstone investors, which get guaranteed allocation in exchange for holding the shares for a period of time, the...

China has opened an antitrust investigation into Trip.com Group, the country’s largest online travel services provider, weeks before hundreds of millions of people on the mainland go away on holiday during the Lunar New Year break.

The State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR) on Wednesday said the group – operator of namesake platform Trip.com, Skyscanner, Ctrip, Qunar and Dutch site Travix – abused its “dominant market position” and engaged in “monopolistic practices”.

The...

A leading young Chinese chemical engineer has left the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to return home to Peking University.

Zheng Yu recently completed her postdoctoral training in bioelectronics in the US but has now joined the Chinese university’s college of chemistry and molecular engineering as an assistant professor.

According to her Peking University webpage, Zheng is working on wearable and implantable electronic devices, such as smart bandages that are used to monitor health.

Her..…