Day: January 8, 2026

We have selected seven stories from this week’s news across Hong Kong, mainland China, the wider Asia region and beyond that resonated with our readers and shed light on topical issues. If you would like to see more of our reporting, please consider subscribing. 1. China’s Hurricane 3000 microwave weapon can ‘sweep and kill’ drone swarms at 3km The truck-mounted Hurricane 3000 was showcased during China’s huge military parade in September. This week its developer – state-owned defence contractor Norinco – disclosed some details of the weapon system for the…

Led by only the second civilian the country has sent into space, China had started a series of experiments on board its Tiangong space station that could lead to the development of safer and more powerful space batteries, state media reported on Wednesday. The tests on lithium-ion batteries run by Zhang Hongzhang, a professor at the Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics, could help scientists better understand how gravity affects the workings of the batteries. Advertisement The country’s first civilian astronaut was an aerospace engineer and professor at Beihang University, Gui…

A senior Trump administration official has defended exports of advanced chips to China, arguing that the US was building its own “digital silk road” to counteract concerns that Washington was eroding the competitiveness of top US models. “Every minute that Chinese developers spend building on top of the American AI stack is time they’re not spending building on top of the Chinese stack,” US Undersecretary of State for Economic Affairs Jacob Helberg told the audience of tech executives, investors and policymakers. Advertisement Addressing concerns that such exports to China would…

China’s consumer prices stayed unchanged from the previous year in 2025 while factory-gate prices fell by 2.6 per cent, suggesting lingering deflationary pressures and underscoring the need for further efforts to boost prices in 2026. The flat annual reading of the consumer price index (CPI), a major inflation indicator, missed the official 2 per cent growth target for the metric unveiled in March and slowed from the 0.2 per cent increase in 2024, according to data released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) on Friday. In December, the CPI…

US President Donald Trump has said the Taiwan issue was “up to” Chinese leader Xi Jinping, as he sought to draw a sharp distinction between the self-ruled island and Washington’s recent military action in Venezuela. In an interview with The New York Times published on Thursday, Trump rejected suggestions that his audacious operation targeting the Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro could set a precedent that Beijing might apply to Taiwan. Maduro’s government posed a direct threat to the United States that Taiwan did not pose to Beijing, according to Trump. Advertisement…

I attended a memorial service last month for victims of the Nanking massacre, held at the Hong Kong government offices in Admiralty. Such occasions are solemn reminders of history’s darkest moments, forcing us to pause and reflect on the scale of the tragedy that unfolded after the city was seized on December 13, 1937, and the broader suffering inflicted on China during World War II. Government figures estimate that military and civilian casualties exceeded 35 million, with 21 million lives lost, leaving an enduring scar on the nation. For many…