The search for the origin of the novel coronavirus behind the Covid-19 pandemic has turned up surprising results for an international team of scientists, according to a non-peer reviewed paper published on Monday.The researchers found 24 previously u...

Nearly a year to the day after Covid-19 grounded tours and forced performance venues to close, the music world will celebrate its stars at the Grammys on Sunday, and try to move past a crushing 2020.The normally glitzy gala will be scaled back, like ...

China’s top legislative body will soon set out the detailed plan for shaking up Hong Kong’s elections system so the necessary changes to local laws can be completed by May, its sole local delegate has revealed.Tam Yiu-chung, of the National Peopl...

At least two people were killed when security forces fired on anti-junta protesters in Myanmar on Sunday, witnesses and domestic media said, while the acting leader of the parallel civilian government said it will seek to give people the legal right ...

Kenya is terminating its contract with Chinese-owned Africa Star Railway Operation Company (Afristar) for the operation of the Standard Gauge Railway, a move expected to save the country more than US$120 million in annual fees.The East African nation...

Beijing is cleaning house, and it’s not just getting rid of those troublesome obstructionists; they may not be the only ones Beijing has found lacking in “patriotism”. Given the electoral overhaul the National People’s Congress has just rolle...

Israel this month will hold its fourth election in under two years, with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu hoping goodwill from a world-beating coronavirus vaccination campaign can finally secure him an elusive majority government.When Israelis last ...

Rajammah, a homemaker who lives in the southern state of Tamil Nadu, had unexpected visitors last week when three volunteers from one of India’s myriad political parties arrived to distribute freebies to the women residents of her village – colou...

US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin said on Saturday he was travelling to Asia to boost military cooperation with American allies and foster “credible deterrence” against China.Austin kicked off via Hawaii, seat of the American military command for...

Hong Kong confirmed 24 new cases of Covid-19 on Sunday, with 10 of those linked to a super-spreading gym cluster in the city.As fears of a fifth wave of coronavirus infections grew, officials said the latest cases were all local, with 10 of unknown o...

British Airways’s new boss said vaccinated people should be allowed to travel without restriction and non-vaccinated people with a negative Covid-19 test, as he set out his ideas for a travel restart a month before the UK government finalises its p...

Over Christmas 2019 and into the New Year, there was hardly a hotel room, chalet or high-end condominium to be had in the Hokkaido mountain town of Niseko. Restaurants were no longer taking bookings, drinkers spilled out the doors of packed bars – ...

Chinese President Xi Jinping in 2015 launched a military modernisation drive, and China has since poured millions of dollars into the research and development of new military equipment.Money that went to the navy drove a shipbuilding frenzy and expan...

China’s decisions and foreign policy positions have given rise to “significant” uncertainty and anxiety as countries globally assess their implications, and this is not an ideal situation for Beijing, Singapore’s Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loon...

Almost 12,000 veteran police officers in Hong Kong will be given the option to delay their retirement and continue working until 60 as the force deals with an ongoing manpower crunch.Assistant Commissioner of Police Ronny Chan Man-tak told the Post t...

Chinese Premier Li Keqiang insisted last week that Beijing wanted to promote peaceful relations across the Taiwan Strait, but many Taiwanese are questioning how this can be achieved when the mainland authorities have shown no signs of reducing the pr...

Australia is “working with Singapore” to create a travel bubble between the two nations as early as July, officials said on Sunday, in an effort to restart tourism and travel put on hold by Covid-19.Early in the pandemic Australia effectively clo...

The wildfire of accusations started with a pair of online posts accusing South Korean women’s volleyball team members Lee Jae-yeong and Lee Da-yeong of bullying during their schooldays before spreading to men’s volleyball and other sports and the...

China’s parliament on Thursday approved the biggest overhaul of Hong Kong’s electoral system since the city’s return to Chinese sovereignty in 1997. In the second of a two-part special, the Post looks at what the revamp will mean for the opposi...

North Korea has not responded to behind-the-scenes diplomatic outreach since mid-February by President Joe Biden’s administration, including to Pyongyang’s mission to the United Nations, a senior Biden administration official said on Saturday.The...

Three young people who received the coronavirus vaccine manufactured by AstraZeneca subsequently developed internal blood clots or bleeding in the brain, Norway's public health institute Folkehelseinstituttet said on Saturday.All three work in health...

The upcoming talks between US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and China’s top diplomat Yang Jiechi in Alaska is not likely to lead to any major diplomatic breakthrough, Chinese observers have said.While Thursday’s meeting may offer a starting p...

Israel is highly likely to have been behind an attack in the Mediterranean this week that damaged an Iranian container ship, an Iranian investigator said on Saturday, Iran’s media reported.The Shahr e Kord vessel was hit by an explosive object whic...

Four people died and two more were badly injured on Saturday when a military plane crashed and caught fire while trying to land in Kazakhstan’s largest city Almaty, the latest accident to hit the country’s aviation industry.City authorities said ...

Murray Walker, the infectiously excitable television commentator who became the voice of Formula One for generations around the English-speaking world, died on Saturday at the age of 97.The news was announced by the Silverstone-based British Racing D...

London police faced criticism on Saturday and calls for investigations after clashing with crowds at a memorial for murder victim Sarah Everard whose death has sparked widespread anger and fear about women’s safety.Police told organisers of events ...

The conservative interim president who led Bolivia for a year was arrested on Saturday as officials of the restored leftist government pursue those involved in the 2019 ousting of socialist leader Evo Morales, which they regard as a coup, and the adm...

A French-Norwegian archaeological team has discovered new Christian ruins in Egypt’s Western Desert, revealing monastic life in the region in the fifth century AD, the Egyptian antiquities ministry said on Saturday.“The French-Norwegian mission d...

The leaders of six European Union countries called on Saturday for high-level EU talks on the equitable distribution of coronavirus vaccine doses, saying the current system would create “huge disparities” among member states by the summer.The lea...

At least seven Covid-19 patients died on Saturday when a Jordanian hospital ran out of oxygen, triggering an outcry in the kingdom and forcing the health minister to resign.Jordan’s King Abdullah II ordered the head of the state hospital in the tow...

Jordan’s health minister stepped down on Saturday after at least seven patients in a hospital Covid-19 ward died because of a shortage of oxygen supplies, state media reported.Hours later, King Abdullah II arrived at the Salt government hospital to...

Beijing is inclined to slash the number of directly elected seats in Hong Kong’s legislature from 35 to 20 – the lowest ratio in the city’s election history – to remove “all risk factors” that might allow opposition activists to form a on...

Nobody, it seems, wants to keep the security fence around the US Capitol any more – except the police who fought off the horrific attack on January 6.Lawmakers call the razor-topped fencing “ghastly”, too militarised and, with the armed Nationa...

Bitcoin passed the US$60,000 mark for the first time on Saturday, with analysts saying the giant US stimulus package helped boost the world’s most popular virtual currency on its record-breaking run.The cryptocurrency hit US$60,197 at 12.34 GMT and...

A rapidly expanding cluster of Covid-19 infections linked to a Hong Kong gym has left many people in the city’s embattled fitness industry shell-shocked as they come to terms with public shaming for failing to enforce mandatory mask-wearing.Last Th...

The United States, India, Australia and Japan have pledged to deliver a billion doses of Covid-19 vaccine throughout the Indo-Pacific by the end of 2022 in what is widely seen as a bid to counter China’s influence in the region.Observers said it wi...

Abrar Zenkawi was cruising towards the beach in Kuwait City when she saw a man waving and smiling in her rear-view mirror.Elsewhere, this may have been a benign highway flirtation. But in Kuwait, it’s a haunting routine that often turns dangerous. ...

A job fair organised by one of Hong Kong’s largest developers has attracted more than 10,000 applicants with the city’s unemployment rate sitting at a 17-year high.Those who attended the New World Development event had mostly shown an interest in...

Sri Lanka will ban the wearing of the burka and shut more than a thousand Islamic schools, a government minister said on Saturday, the latest actions affecting the country’s minority Muslim population.Minister for Public Security Sarath Weerasekera...

The 2021 government work report unveiled by Premier Li Keqiang is pragmatic yet encouraging, reflecting China’s growing confidence in managing its domestic market and in playing a role on the world stage. China is the first country to announce its ...

French actress Corinne Masiero stripped naked on stage during a scaled-back Cesar Awards ceremony in Paris to protest the government’s months-long closure of theatres and cinemas during the coronavirus pandemic.She had “no culture no future” wr...

A former Chinese official responsible for cracking down on religious cults is under investigation, the country’s leading anti-corruption watchdog announced on Saturday.The Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, the Communist Party’s top di...

Opposition politicians would still be able to offer “rational, fact-based criticisms” while running for public office, Hong Kong’s justice minister said on Saturday, as she defended Beijing’s coming shake-up of the city’s electoral system a...

Chinese scientists have begun laboratory tests to see if radiation can be used to kill the coronavirus in the cold food chain, according to an official announcement released on Saturday.The research is being led by state-owned China National Nuclear ...

India will carry out a deeper review of post-vaccination side effects from the AstraZeneca coronavirus shot next week although no cases of blood clots have been reported so far, an official said on Saturday.New Delhi decided to conduct the review aft...

Hong Kong education authorities have asked schools to report if they have installed surveillance cameras on campus, the Post has learned, following calls from pro-Beijing lawmakers for the devices to be installed in classrooms to monitor teachers.At ...

Indonesia’s efforts to make the peace in post-coup Myanmar aren’t just about showing Southeast Asian solidarity, they are a way of showcasing Jakarta’s democratic credentials to the new administration in the United States, experts say.The coup ...

Competing claims over a chain of uninhabited islands in the East China Sea are causing escalating tensions between China and Japan, increasing the risk of a miscalculation in the region, according to analysts.While Tokyo has never acknowledged that i...

Hong Kong’s property buyers ignored warnings of a growing cluster of Covid-19 infections in the city to snap up new flats on offer at Cheung Sha Wan, as the roll-out of coronavirus vaccines and a resurgent stock market boosted confidence.Wheelock P...

As the Covid-19 pandemic ravaged America, Esther Lim grew more worried by the day for her parents’ welfare and her own – not just for their health, but their safety in the face of rising attacks against Asian-Americans.When her friend was hurt in...