Hong Kong’s embattled government is about to ban people from wearing masks at protests, sources have told the South China Morning Post.

Officials are planning to announce the ban on Friday through legislation under a tough colonial-era emergency law in an attempt to curb street violence during anti-government protests that have been continuing for nearly four months.

The move comes amid rising tension between the police and demonstrators after an officer shot an 18-year-old student during a…

Researchers in eastern China say they have developed an airborne laser device that can detect underwater objects at unprecedented depths.

The technology might one day be used to track submarines.

The team from the Shanghai Institute of Optics and Fine Mechanics said the device could pick up objects more than 525 feet beneath the sea, twice as deep as devices used today.

“It is the first time [to have reached that depth] … with potential for further improvement,” the institute said on its…

The central government in Beijing made up its mind very early on that the ongoing mess in Hong Kong is fuelled to a large extent by “foreign interference,” something to which the Chinese are particularly sensitive, given the nation’s near-capitulation to foreign powers from the mid-19th to the mid-20th centuries.

Informed by a toxic mix of resentment for past humiliations and pride in recent achievements, many mainland Chinese belligerently view the developed world as conspiring to deny their…

Peaceful and violent protesters alike vowed to be even more resolute in escalating their anti-government campaign in Hong Kong after a high school student was hit by a live round fired by a policeman under attack.

Protesters called the shooting on Tuesday “a debt of blood” that would have to be paid, capping a day of all-out street violence across the city as they seized on the 70th birthday of Communist China to call on the government into meeting their demands. 

On Wednesday, hundreds of…

At the end of a grand parade celebrating the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China, a massive flock of “peace doves” were released into the sky.

Except they were homing pigeons: about 70,000 of them, in a nod to the septuagennial anniversary, according to Beijing media.

The pigeons were collected from owners in the capital, Beijing Communication Radio reported, with 90% of them successfully flying back home after being released.

“It’s like a political assignment,…

The gigantic bazaar in Baigou, Hebei province has 216 escalators.

There, shoppers can browse more than 10,000 stores and, for the cost of a movie ticket, buy a handbag that looks like a Louis Vuitton or Gucci original.

The bazaar, officially known as the Hedao International Trade Center for Cases and Bags, symbolizes the northern Chinese town’s dream of finding a place in the global trading landscape.

Around two hours south of Beijing, Baigou’s effort to put itself on the map has come a long…

The animated film Abominable, the first Hollywood cartoon to feature a modern Chinese family, has conquered the US box office in its opening weekend, taking in more than $20 million, according to Box Office Mojo.

But in order to recoup its reported $75 million production budget and related marketing costs, it’ll have to do better than that. Film watchers say it’ll have to be a global hit, particularly in China, the world’s second-largest box office.

Luckily, Abominable is a co-production…

China publicly displayed its Dongfeng-41 missile for the first time on Tuesday as the country celebrated 70 years under Communist Party rule.

With the ability to hit a target almost anywhere in the world, the Dongfeng (literally East Wind) missile is China’s most powerful nuclear deterrent to date.

Decades in the making, the intercontinental ballistic missile was unveiled at a massive military parade on the anniversary of the People’s Republic’s founding, against a backdrop of intensifying…

As China marks the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic on Tuesday, Beijing’s communist rulers have much to celebrate. 

In the past few centuries, the country has never looked as strong as it does today, a consequence of the four-decade economic boom ushered in by the late leader Deng Xiaoping’s free market reforms and opening-up policy.

In those 40 years, China has witnessed something of an economic miracle. 

Nevertheless, China is still neither an advanced nor a…

A Hong Kong man whose suspected killing of his girlfriend in Taiwan triggered a fiery extradition debate is to be freed from prison next month, the South China Morning Post has learned.

The suspect, Chan Tong-kai, is currently imprisoned in Hong Kong for lesser charges associated with the dead woman, Poon Hiu-wing.

While Chan has admitted to killing Poon, the man cannot be sent to the self-ruled island of Taiwan for a murder trial because the two places lack an extradition agreement.

The…