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News - South China Morning Post

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Sanae Takaichi is set to be Japan’s next leader. What...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2025/10/04

Tensions between Beijing and Tokyo may escalate further with Sanae Takaichi poised to become Japan’s next leader, observers warn, citing her controversial positions on the Taiwan issue and Japanese wartime history. Takaichi, a former internal affairs minister known for her conservative views, was chosen to lead Japan’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) on Saturday in a run-off vote against more moderate candidate Shinjiro Koizumi. The victory sets her up to be Japan’s fifth prime minister

China’s struggling restaurants feeling queasy as...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2025/10/04

In the run-up to National Day, a week-long celebration viewed as a litmus test for the strength of China’s domestic consumption, a fiery feud between a celebrity entrepreneur and one of the country’s best-known restaurant chains has drawn widespread attention to cost-saving practices in the food industry. The drama began on September 10, when influencer Luo Yonghao – a former teacher known for his outspoken views – blasted the popular Xibei restaurant chain on social media, claiming his...

Hong Kong’s Unesco-listed park is big hit with...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2025/10/04

Some tourists have been camping, cooking over open fires and removing marine creatures washed ashore in a Unesco-listed geopark in Hong Kong, potentially violating park rules and posing an ecological threat, the Post has found. Visitors who talked to the Post on Saturday were also split about how the park could be better protected – some suggested crowd control measures, while others questioned how authorities could balance such measures with the tourism experience. The Post’s visit followed...

Hamas response to Trump plan wins hardline support

News - South China Morning Post ·

2025/10/04

Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a hardline ally of Hamas that also holds hostages, on Saturday endorsed the group’s response to a US plan to end the war in Gaza – a move that could help pave the way for the release of Israelis still held by both parties. Hamas, the Palestinian militant group that controls Gaza, on Friday accepted certain key parts of US President Donald Trump’s plan, including ending the war, Israel’s withdrawal and the release of Israeli hostages and Palestinian captives. Hamas’s...

First developer withdraws from Hong Kong land sharing...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2025/10/04

An application made to a scheme designed to boost Hong Kong’s housing supply by tapping into developers’ reserves has been withdrawn for the first time amid a lukewarm response, with experts attributing the move to a sluggish economy. Brasilia, a subsidiary of Lee On Investment (Holdings), made the withdrawal of its application to the Land Sharing Pilot Scheme for a plot measuring 3.1 hectares (7.7 acres) in Yuen Long involving more than 2,000 homes earlier this year. The government did not...

China stakes a claim on the future with sci-fi and...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2025/10/04

Speculative fiction, which encompasses sci-fi and other futuristic literature, is emerging as a strong vehicle for China to project soft power in a competition with the United States over the imagined future. The genre may help China and the Global South challenge Western views of colonialism, capitalism and future tech, according to Chinese scholars of literature and culture. “Speculative fiction, as a genre that imagines the future while critiquing the present, has long been dominated by...

Hong Kong revamping school history subjects, with...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2025/10/04

Senior secondary school students will learn more about the Communist Party’s founding and its socialism under a coming overhaul of the curriculum of the Chinese history and history subjects, which analysts say will reinforce patriotism and Hongkongers’ national identity. Under the revamp, the Cultural Revolution will no longer be a stand-alone topic in the Chinese history curriculum while several issues have been removed, including the “Outer Mongolia Incident” and the “Tibet Incident” from

China’s Chang’e-6 samples reveal the moon’s...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2025/10/04

Scientists in China and Britain have found that the far side of the moon is not only visually different from the near side, but it may also be colder. The team made the discovery after analysing the first-ever rock samples returned to Earth from the moon’s far side, retrieved during China’s Chang’e-6 mission last year. By comparing the samples with those taken from the near side, they revealed a thermal asymmetry between the two sides of the moon, with the minerals from the far side appearing

‘Chicken Steak Brother’ sells snacks for 85 US cents,...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2025/10/04

A street food vendor in eastern China has trended on social media because of the unique way he carries out his business and his humorous interactions with customers. Some people have even described him as being as passionate about his job as the popular cartoon character, SpongeBob. Li Junyong, 48, has been selling chicken steak on the street in Jingdezhen, Jiangxi province for years. As a result, he has earned the nickname “Chicken Steak Brother”, the mainland news outlet Shandian News...

Hong Kong minister rejects imposing storm chasing...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2025/10/04

Hong Kong's security chief has ruled out introducing fines for reckless people who need to be rescued during adverse weather, adding that drafting a new law against storm chasing would be challenging. Instead, Secretary for Security Chris Tang Ping-keung on Saturday warned residents against taking the risk to chase storms, saying such action was like “committing suicide”. Tang made the remarks during a television interview as Typhoon Matmo headed closer to Guangdong province’s coast. Last

Hong Kong police hunt for man who attacked 2 people...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2025/10/04

Hong Kong police are searching for a man who attacked two people with a knife in a park, leaving one with a neck injury and the other unconscious. A source said the two male victims were attacked in Hoi Sham Park in To Kwa Wan at about 12.30pm on Saturday. “The person who reported the case was passing by Hoi Sham Park in Yuk Wa Street, where he saw two men injured and bleeding by a checkerboard table,” he said. The insider added that a man with bloodstained hands, suspected to be the...

Pair caught bagging up fresh seafood, beef to take...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2025/09/28

Two diners at an all-you-can-eat hotpot restaurant in Hong Kong have been caught trying to sneak fresh seafood, beef and instant noodles into bags to take home, prompting staff to intervene.A video clip circulating on social media on Saturday shows an employee at the restaurant in Tsuen Wan approaching a man and woman to ask if they had put uncooked materials into their backpack. “Please take them out, for the sake of food safety,” the waiter says, explaining that all uncooked food must be...

China’s ‘full stack’ AI ambitions on show at...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2025/09/28

China’s full artificial intelligence technology stack was on display at this year’s Apsara Conference, the annual gathering of Alibaba Cloud users and developers held every September in Hangzhou, capital of eastern Zhejiang province. Downpours on Wednesday failed to keep crowds away following an opening speech by Alibaba CEO Eddie Wu Yongming, where he announced new AI infrastructure spending beyond the originally promised US$53 billion, sending the company’s shares to a four-year

Japanese flock to Hong Kong as city boosts ‘kawaii’...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2025/09/28

The number of Japanese travellers to Hong Kong jumped more than 32 per cent for the first half of this year compared with the same period in 2024, an encouraging sign of recovery for tourism authorities in the Chinese city seeking to draw more visitors from the Land of the Rising Sun. Between January and July, 395,375 Japanese travelled to Hong Kong, a healthy 32.2 per cent increase on the same period last year. This figure is still, however, slightly more than 46 per cent down on arrivals in...

China’s Sanxingdui Museum eyes future tech to...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2025/09/28

China’s Sanxingdui archaeological site – considered a cornerstone of early Chinese civilisation from 4,500 years ago – is pioneering digital exhibitions to show a broader international audience its immense collection, including top national treasures not permitted to travel overseas. Yu Jian, deputy director of the Sanxingdui Museum in southwestern China, said the institution planned to show its artefacts at an international exhibition next year. Final plans for the exhibition required state...

‘How are we going to survive?’: Iran in a bind as UN...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2025/09/28

Iran’s clerical rulers face one of their gravest crises since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, caught between growing discontent at home and a stalled nuclear deal that together have left the country more isolated and divided. The United Nations reimposed sanctions on Iran on Saturday after last-ditch talks between Tehran and European powers Britain, France and Germany failed to resolve the latest of decades of stand-offs over Iran’s nuclear programme. Without a breakthrough in talks with the

As Fed lowers rates, which real estate markets should...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2025/09/28

Now that the US Federal Reserve has embarked on a policy easing cycle, with some other central banks around the world following suit, property investors must treat these changes as temporary and remember that there is no substitute for proper research into specific markets and assets, according to consultants. The Fed cut its target rate by 25 basis points to a range of 4 to 4.25 per cent during the sixth meeting of the Federal Open Market Committee last week. The Fed’s easing was widely...

Trump era could herald the end of ideology in...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2025/09/28

Convergence theory has long been a Western fantasy in conquering the world with liberal democratic values. It proposes that societies, especially as they industrialise, tend to become more alike in various aspects of social organisation, including work, class structure, family patterns and culture. However, convergence theory oversimplifies the complexities of social change and ignores the unique cultural and historical contexts of different societies. It does not adequately account for power...

Hong Kong’s global standing vital to country’s...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2025/09/28

Hong Kong may lack natural resources such as gold and oil, but its international standing remains valuable to mainland China, tycoon Michael Kadoorie has said, while also encouraging younger residents to view the city’s situation as a glass half full rather than half empty. In a 20-minute TV interview aired on Saturday, the chairman of electricity supplier CLP Holdings and Hongkong and Shanghai Hotels (HSH), which owns and runs the luxury Peninsula group of properties, weighed in on issues

Chinese woman falls into old well, circled by snakes,...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2025/09/28

A woman from southeastern China was miraculously rescued after accidentally falling into an abandoned well, where she clung desperately to the side for 54 hours, battling exhaustion, relentless mosquitoes, and even bites from water snakes. The incident unfolded on September 13, when the 48-year-old woman, surnamed Qin, was out for a leisurely stroll in the woods of Quanzhou, Fujian province, before unexpectedly tumbling into the deep well. Her family quickly noticed her disappearance, and

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