China’s first man in space, Yang Liwei, has officially retired from active duty, but he has not stopped training and remains ready to don a spacesuit again if needed. He said in a CCTV interview on Saturday that the country’s first group of astro...

Bangladesh has invited Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to attend Tarique Rahman’s swearing-in as the country’s next leader, a gesture analysts say could help steady relations after months of strain between the neighbours. Rahman’s Banglades...

After a year of refusing to choose between Washington and Brussels, Keir Starmer shifted tone in Munich by edging Britain closer to the European Union and calling for an end to over-reliance on American military support. In a speech to the Munich Sec...

The Chinese region of Inner Mongolia expects to start work this year on two new “flexible” power plants mixing coal and green energy. The plants, which will provide power to the eastern economic hubs of Shanghai and Jiangsu province, mark a major...

Alibaba Cloud has unveiled its next-generation open artificial intelligence model, Qwen-3.5, in a move set to have major implications for the global AI race between China and the US. The much-anticipated release, timed on the eve of the Lunar New Yea...

Hong Kong-based Kerry Properties has won a tender for a residential plot in Shau Kei Wan for HK$1.38 billion (US$177 million), which drew heavy bidding interest from both mainland Chinese and local developers. Kerry beat seven other bidders for a 50-...

Thailand’s economy grew faster than expected last quarter, prompting the government to raise its 2026 outlook and bolstering hopes for a gradual recovery despite lingering economic challenges. Gross domestic product grew 2.5 per cent in the October...

In Malaysia, one question about corruption keeps being asked by the public no matter who is in power: who investigates the investigators? Fresh allegations over the investments of the country’s top anti-corruption official have brought that conundr...

In China, death is traditionally seen as a taboo and often tied to bad luck. But in Heze, a city in eastern China’s Shandong province, this cultural barrier has given rise to a booming industry. According to Personage magazine, Lisa Liu, 29, from H...

Thousands of Chinese retail investors spent the last day of the Year of the Snake on Monday filing complaints against UBS SDIC Fund Management for an overnight valuation change that caused steep losses for holders of its silver fund, even after the f...

A Hong Kong court has ordered the liquidation of a scandal-plagued Christian charity for failing to repay HK$61 million (US$6.8 million) granted by the government to renovate a defunct boarding school for drug addicts. In a written judgment on Monday...

President Xi Jinping has deemed the acceleration of consumption and innovation, particularly in artificial intelligence, an essential task as the world’s second-largest economy seeks to overcome challenges in 2026. The president’s priorities, off...

Hong Kong will kick off the Year of the Horse on Tuesday with its annual night parade, featuring floats and performers from more than 60 countries and regions. The Cathay International Chinese New Year Night Parade will feature a street party at 6pm ...

Australian police have recovered a trove of stolen Egyptian artefacts and charged a 52-year-old man with a nighttime smash and grab at a museum. The man was accused of breaking a window and making off with the priceless treasures in the early hours o...

As families across China gather for the 2026 Lunar New Year holiday, pre-made dishes at their reunion dinners – the centrepiece of Spring Festival celebrations – have again come under scrutiny. Chinese households, many of which tend to reduce the...

Hongkongers made close to 1.4 million outbound trips in the three days leading up to Lunar New Year’s Eve, a 21.6 per cent increase from the same period last year, while inbound journeys rose slightly by five per cent to more than 550,000. In this ...

A Hong Kong appellate court will announce its verdict next Monday on the appeals of 12 activists convicted of conspiring to subvert state power in an unofficial election, and also rule on an acquitted defendant in the city’s largest national securi...

As Western pressure tightens on traditional buyers of Russian crude, analysts say Indonesia’s status as a fast-growing net oil importer with limited fiscal headroom could position it as a potential new market for Moscow’s discounted supplies. But...

Heavy rain and strong winds disrupted flights, trains and ferries, forcing the closure of roads across large parts of New Zealand’s North Island on Monday, while snapping power links to tens of thousands. Domestic media reported a few flights had r...

Hong Kong will “move with agility and steadiness” in the Year of the Horse to seize opportunities and overcome challenges, the city’s leader has said in a message to residents. The one-minute Lunar New Year video, broadcast on Monday, showed Ch...

Former US president Barack Obama said in a podcast interview on the weekend that aliens are real, but they aren’t at Nevada’s Area 51. During an appearance on YouTuber Brian Tyler Cohen’s show, Obama said he hadn’t seen extraterrestrials but ...

Gold, mahjong sets, fancy lai see packets and dinners with fireworks views are among the incentives Hong Kong banks are using to lure wealthy customers from the city and the mainland during the Lunar New Year, which kicks off on Tuesday. Hong Kong au...

Some shopping centres in Hong Kong display unclear parking discount terms that often lead to disputes, the consumer watchdog has said, citing a case where a driver was billed HK$1,210 (US$155) for a full day, more than seven times the advertised rate...

We have put together stories from our coverage last weekend to help you stay informed about news across Asia and beyond. If you would like to see more of our reporting, please consider subscribing. 1. China allows visa-free entry to British, Canadian...

Nepalese candidates launched their campaigns on Monday for next month’s parliamentary election, the first since deadly anti-corruption protests toppled the previous government last year. “This election will draw the future of the country,” Sush...

The Ministry of Emergency Management has warned officials of the urgent need to prevent a repeat of the fireworks explosion that killed eight people in Jiangsu province, eastern China, on Sunday, the start of the country’s nine-day Lunar New Year h...

A foreign national has been arrested at Hong Kong International Airport on suspicion of criminal damage and drug possession after a viral video showed him wrecking self-check-in kiosks. The video, posted on social media on Monday morning, showed a ma...

Arthur Konnerth, a recipient of the prestigious Brain Prize, has joined the Shenzhen Bay Laboratory (SZBL) on a full-time basis, the institute announced on January 29. Konnerth is a leading figure in neuroscience whose work has helped transform the u...

A man who paid HK$170,000 (US$22,000) for a hair transplant has complained that “nearly all” of the initial 1,000 artificial strands fell out within a year – far earlier than the company’s claim that the results would last more than six years...

Income earned by single-person media creators such as YouTubers in South Korea has risen by more than 25 per cent over the past four years, surpassing 70 million won (US$49,000) annually on average, while the top 1 per cent made nearly 1.3 billion wo...

Electricity has been restored after a four-hour outage at a residential high-rise in a Kwai Chung housing estate, caused by a suspected water leak that triggered a power trip ahead of Lunar New Year’s Eve. The city’s biggest electricity company, ...

This story has been made freely available as a public service to our readers. Please consider supporting SCMP’s journalism by subscribing. Hong Kong has seen its hottest Lunar New Year’s Eve since records began in the 19th century, with the mercu...

The Year of the Horse is set to bring volatility for the investments of Hong Kong’s 4.8 million Mandatory Provident Fund (MPF) members, following a record-breaking Year of the Snake that ended on Monday, according to analysts. The next zodiac year,...

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s push to accelerate the roll-out of rooftop solar power is falling short of targets despite heavy subsidies due to loan delays and limited support from state utilities, vendors and analysts say. The shortfalls r...

We are ready to head into the Year of the Horse. But, before we do, let’s take stock of what the Year of the Snake brought Hong Kong. Some say the Year of the Snake is all about change and not meant to be comfortable. For Hong Kong, the past year h...

A Chinese man experienced an emotional roller coaster as he discovered the latest iPhone model he won at his company’s year-end party turned out to be just tiles. The man, known as Jiang Jiang, said his firm played the prank by announcing him as th...

Hundreds of black-clad Malaysians gathered in the capital on Sunday, calling for the arrest of anti-corruption chief Azam Baki after reports alleged he had improper shareholdings and that abuse of power took place in the commission he leads. The crow...

Jeffrey Epstein committed at least US$113,000 to American scholar Ben Goertzel – known for popularising the term “artificial general intelligence” – to help him secure at least HK$8.9 million in Hong Kong government grants at a top city unive...

After deadly floods and landslides swept through Sumatra last year, Indonesia’s government has moved to revoke permits blamed for damaging forests – ensnaring a flagship China-backed hydropower project and rattling investor confidence in one of S...

Long after Jeffrey Epstein was known as a convicted sex offender, he was also a top contributor to an elite cluster of groups founded by Harvard University students. For years, he was able to fill a table with “girls” at an annual gala that featu...

A group of scholars, professionals and former government officials has formed a new think tank in Hong Kong that aims to fill what it calls a talent gap in the shrinking field of local studies. The newly established Hong Kong Future Economy Institute...

US military forces boarded another sanctioned tanker in the Indian Ocean after tracking the vessel from the Caribbean Sea in an effort to target illicit oil connected to Venezuela, the Pentagon said on Sunday. Venezuela had faced US sanctions on its ...

Iran’s top diplomat has arrived in Geneva ahead of a second round of negotiations with the United States, Iranian state television said on Monday, as Washington keeps up pressure on the Islamic republic. Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and his dele...

Chinese military activities – and the need to respond to them – were framed as a major driver of cooperation between US allies in the Indo-Pacific and Europe during this year’s Munich Security Conference (MSC). It comes as Washington pushes its...

Chinese tech companies are competing to make their mark during the Spring Festival Gala presented by state-run broadcaster CCTV, a variety show and annual spectacle that provides a rare nationwide marketing opportunity, like the Super Bowl in the US,...

Last month, in the same week that Chinese and Philippine diplomats restarted political dialogue for the first time in over a year, the People’s Liberation Army bombers conducted combat patrols over Scarborough Shoal. China then released a video mar...

A glove containing DNA found about 3km from the house of Today show host Savannah Guthrie’s mother appears to match those worn by a masked person outside her front door in Tucson the night she vanished, the FBI said on Sunday. The glove, found in a...

A Filipino man awaiting the result of a deportation order has been released from Tacoma’s Northwest ICE Processing Centre following a federal court order that called the man’s detention unconstitutionally “punitive”. US District Judge Tana Li...

White House border tsar Tom Homan said on Sunday that more than 1,000 immigration agents have left Minnesota’s Twin Cities area and hundreds more will depart in the days ahead as part of the Trump administration’s drawdown of its immigration enfo...