SCMP News Digest
Daily News • Sunday, 1 February 2026
K-pop Demon Hunters song Golden earns first K-pop Grammy
The 68th annual Grammy Awards are taking place on Sunday at the Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles, and spirits were high from the jump after a few back-to-back, history-making moments.
“Golden” from K-Pop Demon Hunters won best song written for visual media, marking the first time a K-pop act has won a Grammy. The songwriters delivered their acceptance speech in both English and Korean, highlighting the song’s bilingual appeal.
Best music film went to the documentary Music by John Williams, which…
Lawrence Lau on why China must ‘work smarter’ and how it can invent from scratch
Lawrence J. Lau is a Hong Kong economist specialising in economic development and East Asian economies. He was a professor of economics at Stanford University before serving as vice-chancellor and president of the Chinese University of Hong Kong until 2010. Lau has held the Ralph and Claire Landau Professor of Economics chair at the university since 2007. This interview first appeared in SCMP Plus. For other interviews in the Open Questions series, click here.
What is your take on China’s drive…
US-China rivalry: great powers that don’t make things won’t be great for long
As global trade fragments and tariffs return, economic power is increasingly defined not by financial scale alone, but by productive strength. At the World Economic Forum in Davos last month, leaders spoke openly about a harsher world order.
Chinese Vice-Premier He Lifeng warned that trade wars have no winners. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen called for a new security architecture amid rising protectionism. French President Emmanuel Macron described a world becoming more…
US winter weather leads to heavy snow, cancelled flights and, in Florida, falling iguanas
A huge swathe of the United States from the Gulf coast into New England was mired in extra-cold temperatures on Sunday after a bomb cyclone brought heavy snow and hundreds of flight cancellations to North Carolina, flurries and falling iguanas in Florida, and more misery for thousands who are still without power from last weekend’s ice storm in the south.
About 150 million people were under cold weather advisories and extreme cold warnings in the eastern portion of the US, with the coldest air…
Trump hopeful of Iran deal after Ayatollah Ali Khamenei warns of regional war
US President Donald Trump on Sunday said he was hopeful of agreeing a deal with Iran after the country’s supreme leader warned that any US attack on the Islamic republic would trigger a regional war.
Following the Iranian authorities’ deadly response to anti-government protests that peaked last month, Trump has threatened military action and ordered the dispatch of an aircraft carrier group to the Middle East.
Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Sunday likened the recent protests to…
Screenwriter of Oscar-nominated Iranian drama It Was Just an Accident arrested in Tehran
One of the Oscar-nominated screenwriters of the Iranian drama It Was Just an Accident has been arrested in Tehran just weeks before the Academy Awards.
Representatives for the film on Sunday said Mehdi Mahmoudian was arrested on Saturday. No details on the charges against Mahmoudian were available but his arrest came just days after Mahmoudian and 16 others signed a statement condemning Islamic Republic leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and the regime’s violent crackdown on demonstrators.
Two other…
Russian drone strike on bus kills at least 15 miners as Kyiv announces new talks
A Russian drone strike on a bus carrying miners killed at least 12 people, Ukrainian officials said on Sunday, hours after President Volodymyr Zelensky announced new peace talks amid uncertainty over a Russian suspension of attacks on energy infrastructure.
First Deputy Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said the strike in the southeastern Dnipropetrovsk region was a “cynical and targeted” attack on energy workers. Their employer DTEK said the victims were finishing a shift.
Kyiv is under US…
5-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos and father return to Minnesota from Texas ICE centre
Five-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos and his father, who were detained by immigration officers in Minnesota and held at an ICE facility in Texas, have been released following a judge’s order. They have returned to Minnesota, according to Texas politician Joaquin Castro.
The two were detained in a Minneapolis suburb on January 20. They were taken to a detention centre in Dilley, Texas.
Katherine Schneider, a spokeswoman for the Democratic congressman, confirmed the two had arrived home. She said…
US House Speaker Johnson says he has votes to end partial government shutdown by Tuesday
US House Speaker Mike Johnson said on Sunday he believes he has the Republican votes to end a partial government shutdown within days and that the chamber will debate Immigration and Customs Enforcement reforms for two weeks after that.
“I’m confident that we’ll do it at least by Tuesday. We have a logistical challenge of getting everyone in town,” Johnson said on NBC’s Meet the Press programme. Transport problems are persisting following a snowstorm that affected travel in the southeastern…
Sacked UK ambassador Mandelson has ‘no recollection of US$75,000 payments from Epstein’
British politician Peter Mandelson on Sunday said he does not remember receiving payments from paedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein totalling US$75,000.
Mandelson, who was sacked as ambassador to the United States last year because of his links to Epstein, appears to feature in several bank statements released on Friday in the huge tranche of files related to the disgraced financier by the US government.
In one bank statement, a payment of US$25,000 to the account of Reinaldo Avila da Silva, now…
Nigerian army kills top Boko Haram commander, 10 militants in night raid
The Nigerian army said on Sunday it killed a top commander of Boko Haram and 10 members of the Islamic extremist group in a night raid in the northeastern part of the country.
Abu Khalid, a commander of Boko Haram in the Sambisa Forest in Borno state, was a key figure within “the terrorist hierarchy, coordinating operations and logistics in the Sambisa axis,” army spokesman Sani Uba said in a statement.
The soldiers attacked the Boko Haram militants on Saturday night in the Kodunga area of Borno…
62% of Hong Kong Zoomers fear they can’t compete with AI: Chinese YMCA survey
More than 60 per cent of Hong Kong Zoomers fear they cannot compete with rapidly advancing AI in the workplace, a survey has found.
The survey by the Chinese YMCA of Hong Kong also showed about 30 per cent of respondents did not know how to use artificial intelligence (AI) tools, while only 11.5 per cent considered themselves “very familiar” with the technology.
The young members’ council under the Chinese YMCA interviewed 1,178 Hongkongers aged between 15 and 30 – commonly known as “Generation…
Japan’s Takaichi seeks mandate, improved majority with snap election: poll
Japan’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party, led by Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, has extended its lead from last week in a new poll on the race ahead of the February 8 election, with 36.1 per cent backing the party, up 6.9 percentage points, the survey showed on Sunday.
The Centrist Reform Alliance, a new major opposition force, was second with 13.9 per cent, up 2.0 points. At the single-constituency level, the survey conducted over two days from Saturday showed that 44.0 per cent would vote for…
Ex-Hong Kong chief secretary Rafael Hui, jailed for graft, dies at 77
Rafael Hui Si-yan, a former Hong Kong chief secretary who was jailed for pocketing nearly HK$20 million from a prominent land developer, has died at the age of 77.
“Mr Rafael Hui passed away at [Pamela Youde Nethersole Eastern Hospital] peacefully on Sunday after a brave fight with an acute illness,” a source told the South China Morning Post.
Hui served as the city’s No 2 official from 2005 to 2007. He was jailed for 7½ years after being convicted in 2014 of plotting to commit misconduct in…
Pentagon eyes expanded role for South Korea-based US forces to help deter China
The Pentagon has signalled a shift for US forces in South Korea, pushing them to expand their role beyond North Korea to help deter Beijing in the Taiwan Strait and elsewhere in the region, according to experts.
The analysis follows a visit to South Korea this week by Elbridge Colby, the US undersecretary of defence for policy and a key architect of the Pentagon’s National Defence Strategy. In his first trip outside the United States since taking office in April, Colby hinted at a possible…
CK Hutchison faces limited legal options after Panama voids port rights: experts
Hong Kong-based CK Hutchison Holdings faces limited legal avenues to challenge a Panama court ruling that nullified its rights to operate two major ports at the country’s canal, while taking the case to the International Court of Justice will require Beijing to act on its behalf, a legal expert has said.
Basil Hwang, managing partner of law firm Hauzen LLP, said billionaire Li Ka-shing’s conglomerate could turn to a suitable court with jurisdiction over Panamanian assets to seek damages against…
Iraq’s parliament delays presidential vote again amid US pressure
Iraq’s parliament has again postponed the election of the country’s new president, state media reported on Sunday, amid intense political horse-trading and US pressure over the new prime minister.
It was the second time parliament has delayed the presidential vote, which had first been due last week.
A journalist in the parliament said the required quorum was not reached on Sunday.
The vote was therefore delayed, according to the official INA press agency, which did not say whether a new date…
How to prevent war with China: return Taiwan to the mainland
A publisher kindly offered me an opportunity to interview Eyck Freymann, a Hoover Fellow at Stanford University, and to review his new book, Defending Taiwan: A Strategy to Prevent War with China.
I think I must decline. I am sure he is a great scholar and thinker but I already have too many unread books on the shelves demanding my attention, a constant accusing presence reminding me what a slow and lazy reader I am.
And Taiwan? I don’t think I want to waste time engaging with the indoctrinating…
New rules of expansion: Chinese firms urged to ‘go local’ as they chase sales abroad
As dwindling domestic profits push more Chinese firms onto the global stage, industry titans – forerunners who know what such a shift entails – are offering crucial advice for navigating challenges abroad.
“The most important thing is to become a local company,” said Zhu Lei, chief marketing officer for air conditioner giant Gree Electric Appliances, which was among the first Chinese companies to enter the Latin American market.
The advice comes as Chinese firms are expected to ramp up their…
China’s plan to internationalise yuan quietly takes a step forward as Zambia gets on board
As of January, Zambia has begun collecting taxes and royalties from Chinese mining firms in yuan, and will cycle the currency directly back to Beijing to fund imports and service loans.
Experts said the shift reflected the southern African country’s urgent need to ease a US dollar shortage and manage debt, rather than geopolitical alignment, but also a quiet advance for China’s long-term strategy to internationalise its currency.
It had also created a tangible blueprint for other resource-rich,…