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News - South China Morning Post

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Train collides with crane arm in Spain’s fourth rail...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2026/01/22

‌A commuter train collided with a crane arm that ‍swung into its path in southeastern Spain on Thursday, the transport minister said, in the country’s fourth rail accident in less than a week. Six people suffered ⁠minor injuries after the arm hit the passing train’s windows, close to the port city of Cartagena in Murcia region, authorities added. The incident - which did not derail the train but briefly disrupted traffic ‍on the line - came four days after a high-speed train collision in ‍the...

Deadly storm in Athens dumps six months of rain in a...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2026/01/22

A deadly storm this week dumped nearly six months of rain on the Greek capital, Athens, in less than a day, one of the country’s top weather experts said on Thursday. Wednesday’s storm lashed the country and left two dead, with disaster crews spending Thursday cleaning up debris. Kostas Lagouvardos, research director at the National Observatory in Athens, said the “extreme” weather phenomenon had dumped up to 170 mm (6.7 inches) of rain on the capital. That amounted to “about 40 per cent of

No Hong Kong cabinet reshuffle until Tai Po blaze...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2026/01/22

Any potential Hong Kong cabinet reshuffle will take place only after the investigation into the deadly Tai Po blaze wraps up, sources have told the Post, following a media report suggesting two ministers were set to step down. A government spokesman on Thursday did not deny the report suggesting that Secretary for Housing Winnie Ho Wing-yin and Secretary for Constitutional and Mainland Affairs Erick Tsang Kwok-wai would step down “in the near future”, adding only that the administration would...

Hong Kong’s John Lee wants to fast-track I&T sector...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2026/01/22

Hong Kong’s leader has vowed to expedite the growth of innovation and technology (I&T) across the product development cycle by streamlining the path from lab to market, including using a “dual-engine” strategy that partners with the finance industry. Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu made the pledge at a ceremony on Thursday that marked the 10th anniversary of the Hong Kong Academy of Sciences. In his speech, he underscored the government’s commitment to transforming the city into an...

How 1,000 Chinese J-20s could challenge US dominance...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2026/01/22

By 2030, China could operate about 1,000 units of the J-20 fifth-generation fighter jet, possibly challenging the US and its allies’ air power projection near the first island chain, according to a British think tank. A report this month by the London-based Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) found a “dramatic increase” in the past five years in China’s capacity to contest Western air power, citing the production of “modern and highly capable” fourth- and fifth-generation fighters. While

Elon Musk’s mother reveals hopes, fears for future at...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2026/01/22

Having children is a “good investment” in one’s happiness, Elon Musk’s mother has said at a Hong Kong event on fertility, encouraging more women to start families and saying they do not have to sacrifice their careers. Dietitian and model Maye Musk also said one of her greatest fears was that her 18 grandchildren would not have friends if people stopped giving birth. “Babies are the most wonderful things in your life,” the 77-year-old said at the Global Fertility Crisis Forum, which was...

‘Outrageous’: families of Hong Kong ferry crash...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2026/01/22

Relatives of the 39 victims in one of Hong Kong’s deadliest maritime disasters expressed anger after the coroner overseeing an inquest said it was “impractical and unrealistic” for them to expect inspectors could have spotted a missing watertight door if they had examined the ship’s structural drawings. Coroner Monica Chow Wai-choo said on Thursday, the second day of the verdict, that the Marine Department’s officers would not have detected the missing watertight door on the underdeck of the...

How Trump 2.0 accelerated China’s push for tech and...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2026/01/22

After a year of Trump 2.0, China has much to be thankful for. This is not an endorsement of US hegemony but an expression of confidence in China’s increased resilience – and an acknowledgement of the US policies that pushed China there. The Chinese government’s stance towards Trump 2.0 remains the same: to adhere to its own principles, respond rationally and look to turn any crisis into an opportunity. For a start, Trump 2.0’s tariff war on China has backfired. All it did was force China to...

China’s private sector increases presence among top...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2026/01/22

Private sector enterprises comprised 40 per cent of the top 100 listed Chinese companies by market value in the second half of last year, led by high-profile technology firms involved in China’s artificial intelligence (AI) boom, according to the Peterson Institute for International Economics. That represented an increase of 2.4 percentage points from the first half of last year, the Washington-based think tank said in a report released on Tuesday that also highlighted a marked rebound from a...

Are Hong Kong labs offering cross-border gender tests...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2026/01/22

A business claiming to offer fetal gender testing is advertising for delivering blood samples from mainland China to Hong Kong as of Thursday, despite city health authorities warning that such services require prior approval, the Post has learned. According to its website, HK LongKang DNA can provide testing services from as early as four weeks of pregnancy with a 99.995 per cent accuracy rate. The company charges HK$3,000 (US$385) for testing at the six-week mark, with same-day appointments...

‘For the world’: Trump launches his Board of Peace...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2026/01/22

US President Donald Trump on Thursday inaugurated his “Board of Peace” to lead efforts at maintaining a ceasefire in Israel’s war with Hamas, insisting that “everyone wants to be a part” of the body that could eventually rival the United Nations – despite many US allies opting not to participate. In a speech at the World Economic Forum, Trump sought to create momentum for a project to map out a future for the war-torn Gaza Strip that has been overshadowed this week, first by his threats to

Israeli forces kill Palestinian children and...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2026/01/22

Israeli forces on Wednesday killed at least 11 Palestinians in Gaza, including two 13-year-old boys, three journalists and a woman, hospitals said, on one of the war-battered enclave’s deadliest days since the ceasefire between Hamas and Israel took effect in October. The United States is trying to push the deal forward and implement its challenging second phase. Among the dead were three Palestinian journalists who were killed while filming near a displacement camp in central Gaza, a camp...

Complaints against Hong Kong property agents outpace...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2026/01/22

Complaints against Hong Kong property agents jumped 56 per cent in 2025, outpacing the rise in property transactions, as a reviving housing market exposed pressure points in industry practices, according to the Estate Agents Authority (EAA). The EAA said it opened 253 complaint cases in 2025, up from 162 in 2024, even as overall residential transactions rose 18.3 per cent year on year. The faster growth in complaints suggests tensions between agents and consumers intensified more sharply than...

White House responds after Trump repeatedly refers to...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2026/01/22

US President Donald Trump repeatedly made an apparent gaffe in a speech on Wednesday to world leaders assembled in Switzerland by referring to “Iceland” several times instead of his much coveted “Greenland”, with the White House furiously denying any confusion on his part.The 79-year-old Republican has been clamouring for the United States to acquire Greenland, a large island territory of Denmark, citing what he called security threats from Russia and China in the Arctic Circle. On

Businesses in Malaysia’s Johor prepare for...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2026/01/22

Businesses in Malaysia’s Johor state are gearing up for an influx of shoppers from Singapore ahead of Lunar New Year. They said the number of customers had risen gradually in recent weeks, with a sharper increase in sales expected. Hamper store owner Loo Chok Nan said he began getting Lunar New Year orders from Malaysian and Singaporean buyers about two weeks ago. “We would normally deliver the orders as soon as they have been wrapped and packed, so that we have enough room to pack more

Japan survey finds 1 in 6 men groped on Tokyo public...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2026/01/22

A Tokyo metropolitan government survey has found that about one in six men who use the city’s trains and stations say they have been groped – a level experts describe as unexpectedly high and a reminder that women are not the only targets of the Japanese capital’s notorious chikan molesters. The same survey found that 54.3 per cent of women reported having been inappropriately touched on public transport, a figure that remains far higher than for men but has long been the focus of official...

Fine brews: Hong Kong milk tea and the Opening of the...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2026/01/22

It is that time of the year – January – the start of a legal year, marked by a decidedly Western ceremonial event. This month alone, the Bar has sent representatives to attend Opening of the Legal Year ceremonies in Singapore, Malaysia and, of course, Hong Kong. Similar ceremonies are also part of the tradition in other common law jurisdictions, such as England and Wales and Ireland, as well as civil law jurisdictions like France. Each jurisdiction’s ceremony has its own flavour, but one

China found something strange on far side of moon no...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2026/01/22

Tiny carbon nanotubes with walls just one atom thick found on the far side of the moon have provided the first confirmed evidence that a material long thought to require sophisticated human engineering could also be produced naturally. They were found in rocks collected by China’s 2024 Chang’e-6 mission, the first probe to land on the far side of the moon and bring samples back to Earth. Using high-resolution electron microscopes, a team from Jilin University in northeastern China detected

Thai woman dates twin brothers at once, gains family...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2026/01/22

A woman in northeastern Thailand who has been dating a pair of twin brothers at the same time has received support from both families. The 24-year-old from Nakhon Phanom, known as Fah, recently shared her unconventional relationship on social media. Fah, who had been single for more than a year, was not seeking a relationship until the twins, Suea and Sing, reached out to her. The younger twin, Suea, said he first messaged Fah and later encouraged his brother to contact her. The trio began...

As cold spell grips Hong Kong, homeless shun shelters...

News - South China Morning Post ·

2026/01/22

As a cold spell grips Hong Kong, scores of homeless residents are choosing to endure the chill rather than take refuge in government shelters, where they say it feels “like being imprisoned”. When the Post visited the 5.5-hectare Tung Chau Street Park in Sham Shui Po – one of the most popular spots for street sleepers – on Tuesday night, around 70 people were found staying there in about seven clusters. Most were sheltered in tents or on foldable beds, some tucked behind flower beds, pillars

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