More than 7,000 cases of a mosquito-borne virus have been reported across China’s Guangdong province since July, prompting measures similar to those taken during the Covid-19 pandemic.

In Foshan city, which has been hit the hardest, chikungunya patients must stay in hospital, where their beds will protected with mosquito nets. They can only be discharged after they test negative or at the end of a week-long stay.

Spread through the bite of an infected mosquito, the virus causes fever and severe joint pain, which sometimes can last for years.

Although rare in China, chikungunya outbreaks are common in South and South East Asia and parts of Africa.

How widespread are the infections in China?

Aside from Foshan, at least 12 other cities in the southern Guangdong province have reported infections. Nearly 3,000 cases were reported in the last week alone.

On Monday, Hong Kong reported its first case – a 12-year-old boy who developed fever, rash and joint pain after traveling to Foshan in July.

The virus is not contagious, and only spreads when an infected person is bitten by a mosquito that then goes on to bite others.

Officials say all the reported cases have been mild so far, with 95% of the patients discharged within seven days.

Still, the cases have led to some panic, given the virus is not widely known in the country.

“This is scary. The prolonged consequences sound very painful,” one user wrote on Chinese social media platform Weibo.

The US has urged travellers to China to exercise “increased caution” following the outbreak.

Getty Images

What else is China doing to curb infections?

Authorities across Guangdong province have vowed to take “decisive and forceful measures” to stop the spread of the disease.

Those with symptoms, such as fever, joint pain or rashes, are being urged to visit the nearest hospital so they can be tested for the virus.

Authorities have instructed residents to remove stagnant water in their homes, such as in flowerpots, coffee machines or spare bottles – and warned of fines up to 10,000 yuan ($1,400) if they don’t do this.

They are also releasing giant “elephant mosquitoes” that can devour smaller, chikungunya-spreading bugs; and an army of mosquito-eating fish.

Last week, officials in Foshan released 5,000 of these larvae-eating fish into the city’s lakes. In parts of the city, they are even flying drones to detect sources of stagnant water.

Some neighbouring cities had ordered travellers from Foshan to undergo a 14-day home quarantine, but that has since been withdrawn.

Some people have compared these measures to those imposed during the pandemic, and questioned their necessity.

A user on Weibo wrote, “These feel so familiar… But are they really necessary?”

Another wrote: “What’s the point of the quarantine? It’s not as though an infected patient will then go around biting other people?”

China implemented severe restrictions during the pandemic, including forcing people into quarantine camps and sealing residential buildings and whole neighbourhoods on short notice for days or even weeks.

What is chikungunya?

Most people bitten by an infected mosquito will develop symptoms of chikungunya within three to seven days.

Apart from fever and joint pain, other symptoms include rash, headache, muscle pain and swollen joints.

In most cases, patients will feel better within a week. In severe cases however, the joint pain can last for months or even years.

Those at risk for more severe disease include newborns, the elderly, and people with underlying medical conditions, such as heart disease or diabetes.

There is no cure, but deaths from chikungunya are rare.

The virus was first identified in Tanzania in 1952. It then spread to other countries in sub-Saharan Africa and South East Asia.

To date, it has been reported in more than 110 countries.

The best way to prevent the virus from spreading is to reduce pools of stagnant water that allow the mosquitoes to breed, according to the World Health Organization.

Source: BBC

The UK-China Transparency (UKCT) think tank says its survey of academics in China studies also highlighted reports of Chinese government officials warning lecturers to avoid discussing certain topics in their classes.

It comes days after a new law came into force placing more responsibility on universities to uphold academic freedom and free speech.

The Chinese embassy in London called the report “groundless and absurd”, adding that China respects freedom of speech in the UK and elsewhere.

The regulator, the Office for Students (OfS), says freedom of speech and academic freedom are “fundamental” to higher education.

The new legislation, which came into force last week, says universities should do more to actively promote academic freedom and freedom of speech, including in cases where institutions have agreements in place with other countries.

Universities could be fined millions if they fail to do so, the OfS has said.

However, the UKCT report says some universities are reluctant to address the issue of Chinese interference because of their financial reliance on Chinese student fees.

The report alleges that some Chinese academics involved in sensitive research had been denied visas by the Chinese government, while others said family members back in China had been harassed or threatened because of their work in the UK.

Those sensitive topics can range from science and tech to politics and humanities, the report says, such as alleged ethnic cleansing in China’s Xinjiang region, the outbreak of Covid or the rise of Chinese technology companies.

Some academics reported intimidation by visiting scholars or other Chinese officials, as well as by staff at Confucius Institutes.

These are partnership organisations operating at several UK universities, which bring together institutions in the UK and China, as well as a Chinese government agency which provides funding.

They promote Chinese culture and language on UK campuses, but have been criticised over alleged ties to the Chinese Communist Party.

OfS chief executive Susan Lapworth previously said she expected Confucius Institutes to be looked into under the new free speech laws, over concerns that they could present a threat to free speech on campuses.

The OfS already has powers to ensure free speech is upheld by universities, including against any threats from the influence of foreign states or institutions.

Those powers are due to be strengthened with a new complaints system, in which university staff members and visiting speakers will be able to raise issues directly with the OfS.

The regulator also said universities should amend or terminate any agreements which threatened free speech on campus, including scholarships or schemes funded by foreign countries.

The BBC understands the OfS expects universities to have “an appropriate level of curiosity” about any such arrangements, regardless of any potential loss of income for the university.

A Chinese embassy spokesperson said the country had always adhered to its policy of not interfering with other countries’ internal affairs.

However, the UKCT says its survey responses from academics suggested some students from China had told their lecturers they had been asked to spy on their peers by Chinese officials.

Other students, of various nationalities, reported being uncomfortable discussing issues in class deemed sensitive to the Chinese government, and were reluctant to pursue further academic interest in these subjects, the report says.

Skills Minister Jacqui Smith said any attempt by a foreign state to intimidate, harass, or harm individuals in the UK “will not be tolerated.”

“We are also working directly with the Office for Students to support universities in safeguarding free speech and tackling any form of harassment on campus,” she added.

She said academic freedom was “non-negotiable in our world-leading institutions”, adding that the implementation of the new legislation made that “explicitly clear”.

The record £585,000 fine handed down by the OfS earlier this year has “put universities on notice” that they must do their part to protect these freedoms, she added, or they will “face the consequences.”

Source: BBC

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The country’s birth rate has been falling, even after the ruling Communist Party abolished its controversial one-child policy almost a decade ago.

The handouts will help around 20 million families with the cost of raising children, according to state media.

Several provinces across China have piloted some form of payouts to encourage people to have more children as the world’s second largest economy faces a looming demographic crisis.

The scheme, which was announced on Monday, will offer parents a total of up to 10,800 yuan per child.

The policy will be applied retroactively from the start of this year, Beijing’s state broadcaster CCTV said.

Families with children born between 2022 and 2024 can also apply for partial subsidies.

The move follows efforts by local governments to boost birth rates in China.

In March, Hohhot – a city in the northern region of China – started offering residents up to 100,000 yuan per baby for couples with at least three children.

Shenyang, a city northeast of Beijing, offers 500 yuan a month to local families with a third child under three.

Last week, Beijing also urged local governments to draft plans for implementing free preschool education.

The country is among the world’s most expensive places to have children, in relative terms, according to a study by China-based YuWa Population Research Institute.

Raising a child to the age of 17 in China costs an average of $75,700, the study found.

In January, official figures showed that China’s population fell for a third year in a row in 2024.

China recorded 9.54 million babies born in 2024, according to the National Bureau of Statistics.

That marked a slight increase from the year before but the country’s overall population continued to shrink.

The country’s 1.4 billion population is also ageing fast, adding to Beijing’s demographic concerns.

BBC

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The UK government is no longer ruling out a youth visa deal with the EU, ahead of a summit next month to “reset” relations after Brexit.

Labour has previously said it has “no plans” for such a scheme, which would make it easier for young people to study and work abroad.

But an agreement has emerged as a key European demand in ongoing negotiations between the two sides to boost co-operation. Downing Street declined to repeat its previous opposition to reporters on Thursday, saying it would not provide a “running commentary” on talks.

It comes as over 60 Labour MPs called on ministers to strike a “new and bespoke youth visa scheme for UK and EU citizens aged under 30”.

In a letter to EU relations minister Nick Thomas-Symonds, they argued a mutual deal for time-limited visas, subject to a cap, would “extend new cultural, educational, and economic opportunities to young people in the UK”.

Sir Keir Starmer met European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen later, as preparations increase for the summit in London on 19 May.

Following the meeting, a Downing Street spokesperson said: “Discussing the ongoing negotiations to strengthen the UK-EU partnership, they both agreed that good progress had been made.

“They asked their teams to continue their important work in the coming weeks, with the aim of delivering as ambitious a package as possible at the first UK-EU summit next month.”

The Labour government is aiming to forge closer economic ties to the EU after Brexit. Both sides have also expressed a renewed interest in a defence and security pact amid the war in Ukraine.

A defence deal would potentially unlock full UK access to a €150bn (£128bn) EU-backed loans scheme, with British firms otherwise limited to providing up to 35% of the value of projects funded under the programme.

Speaking at UK Trade and Business Commission meeting on Thursday, Germany’s ambassador to the UK Miguel Berger said he wanted to see progress on a youth visa deal as part of a “package approach” to the talks, where different topics are linked together.

He added that EU citizens had faced “many obstacles” to moving to the UK since Brexit, including “very high thresholds” for skilled work visas.

Existing schemes

The UK currently offers visas allowing young people from 12 non-EU countries including Japan, South Korea and Uruguay to study or work in the UK for up to two years. Those from Australia, Canada or New Zealand can extend by a further year.

These visas are subject to annual quotas, ranging from 100 visas for Andorra to 42,000 for Australia, with ballots held where they are oversubscribed.

Applicants from these countries need at least £2,530 in savings, cannot apply for most benefits, and have to pay an annual NHS surcharge of £776 for students and £1,035 for workers.

The European Commission first suggested an EU-wide youth deal in April last year, claiming Rishi Sunak’s government had approached European capitals to discuss individual visa deals, risking “differential treatment” of EU citizens.

Under its original proposal, people aged between 18 and 30 would be able to apply for visas lasting up to four years to work, study, train or volunteer, with no overall cap on the number of visas issued.

It also said EU applicants should not have to pay the NHS surcharge, and should be able to pay the same university tuition fees as British students, rather than the higher fees they have had to pay since Brexit.

‘Youth experience’

There have been suggestions that the Home Office, tasked with delivering government plans to lower overall migration, is pushing for any eventual agreement to be more limited than that suggested by the European Commission.

Home Secretary Yvette Cooper is reportedly arguing for visas to be limited to one year so that EU citizens taking part do not show up in official immigration figures, with applications also subject to an overall cap.

Asked about the reports, Mr Berger declined to comment, saying that “we have to leave that to the negotiations”.

The EU has been keen to stress that a visa deal would not replicate the bloc’s rules on freedom of movement, under which EU citizens were automatically entitled to live and work in the UK without applying for a visa.

Documents circulated between EU states also suggest a deal could be rebranded as a “youth experience” scheme, in an apparent bidto downplay any link to migration.

But any deal that is negotiated is likely to lead to a political row, with the Conservatives and Reform UK critical of a proposed agreement.

During a local election campaign visit earlier, Tory leader Kemi Badenoch said a deal risked “another avenue which people might use to game the system,” adding that Labour “doesn’t know how to negotiate”.

She added: “Where are all these people they want to bring in going to work?”

Reform leader Nigel Farage said a deal could lead to a “huge number of people” coming to the UK, adding it would be “completely against what the Brexit vote demanded”.

An agreement has however been strongly supported by the Liberal Democrats and the Greens, which have long been calling on the Labour government to reach an agreement with the EU.

In his comments on Thursday, Mr Berger insisted a deal would have “nothing to do with migration” as those taking part in the scheme would “go home” once their visa has ended.

Kelly Ortberg said two planes had already been returned, and another would follow after trade tensions between the two countries escalated.

Boeing’s chief executive told CNBC that 50 more planes were due to go to China this year, but their customers had indicated they will not take delivery of them.

The US put 145% tariffs on imports from China and it hit back with a 125% tax on US products.

Speaking in the Oval Office on Tuesday, Trump said he was optimistic about improving trade relations with China, saying the level of tariffs he had imposed would “come down substantially, but it won’t be zero”.

However, Mr Ortberg said China “have in fact stopped taking delivery of aircraft because of tariff environment”.

Boeing is America’s largest exporter with about 70% of its commercial aircraft sales outside of the US.

Mr Ortberg said Boeing was assessing options to re-market 41 of the already built planes to other customers as there was high demand from other airlines.

He said there were nine planes not yet in Boeing’s production system and he wanted to “understand their intentions and if necessary we can assign to other customers”.

He added Boeing was “not going continue to build aircraft for customers who will not take them”.

Boeing in daily talks with Trump’s team

Later in the afternoon, Mr Ortberg told an investor call “there is not a day that goes by that we’re not engaged with either cabinet secretaries or either POTUS himself (President Trump) regarding the trade war between China and the USA.”

He added he was “very hopeful we’ll get to some negotiations”.

On Wednesday, America’s Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told the International Monetary Fund (IMF) conference there was an opportunity for a “big deal” between the US and China on trade.

Asked about an upcoming meeting between the countries, Bessent said it would be an “incredible opportunity” to strike an agreement, if China was “serious” on making its economy less dependent on manufacturing exports.

Mr Ortberg also told investors others in the Boeing supply chain were now exposed to tariffs – mainly in Japan and Italy where universal tariffs of 10% are being implemented.

Brian West, Boeing’s chief financial officer said during the call “free trade policy is very important to us” and Boeing will continue to work to with suppliers to ensure continuity.

Boeing has reported smaller losses for the first quarter of the year after it manufactured and delivered more planes.

Production had slumped in 2024 due to a series of crises and a strike by about 30,000 American factory workers.

It wants to increase output of its 737 MAX jets to 38 a month in 2025.

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Beijing announced the plan on 4 February, minutes after new US levies of 10% on all Chinese products came into effect.

On Sunday, Trump said he would impose a 25% tariff on all steel and aluminium imports into the US, with a full announcement to come on Monday.

Speaking to reporters on Air Force One en route to the Super Bowl, he also said he was planning reciprocal tariffs on other nations – but did not specify which ones would be targeted.

China’s latest tariffs on US goods include a 15% border tax on imports of US coal and liquefied natural gas products. There is also a 10% tariff on American crude oil, agricultural machinery and large-engine cars.

Last week, Chinese authorities launched an anti-monopoly probe into technology giant Google, while PVH, the US owner of designer brands Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger, was added to Beijing’s so-called “unreliable entity” list.

China has also imposed export controls on 25 rare metals, some of which are key components for many electrical products and military equipment.

Trump’s announcement over the weekend of plans to impose a 25% tax on the US’s steel and aluminium imports comes days after he reached deals with Canada and Mexico to avoid 25% tariffs that he had threatened on all goods from the countries.

He introduced similar measures during his first term as president, imposing 25% tariffs on steel and 10% on aluminium, but later granted several trading partners duty-free quotas – including Canada, Mexico and Brazil.

The European Union (EU) import taxes were not resolved until the Biden administration took over the White House.

There was no mention on Sunday of which countries, if any, would be granted similar exemptions if these new tariffs are implemented in the following days.

Trump’s intention to implement reciprocal tariffs would fulfil an election campaign pledge to levy tariffs at the same rates that are imposed on US goods.

He also said import taxes for vehicles remained on the table after reports he was considering exemptions to universal tariffs.

Trump has repeatedly complained that EU tariffs on imports of American cars are much higher than US levies.

Last week, Trump told the BBC tariffs on EU goods could happen “pretty soon” – but suggested a deal could be “worked out” with the UK.

The day after the latest US tariffs came into effect, Beijing accused Washington of making “unfounded and false allegations” about its role in the trade of the synthetic opioid fentanyl to justify the move.

In a complaint lodged with the World Trade Organization (WTO), China said the US import taxes were “discriminatory and protectionist” and violated trade rules.

But experts have warned China is unlikely to secure a ruling in its favour as the WTO panel that settles disputes remains unable to function.

Trump had been expected to speak to his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping in recent days but the US president has said he was in no hurry to hold talks.

“China is much better prepared [than during Trump’s first term],” said Scott Kennedy, an expert in Chinese business and economics at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

“Although their economy cyclically has slowed down quite a bit, their technology capabilities are a lot greater than they were before and they have diversified their trade and investment with others”.

Some of the many measures brought in by Trump since he took office on 20 January have been subject to change.

On Friday, he suspended tariffs on small packages from China, which, along with the additional 10% tariffs, came into effect on 4 February.

The suspension will stay in place until “adequate systems are in place to fully and expediently process and collect tariff revenue”.

After the order ended duty-free treatment of shipments worth less than $800 (£645) the US Postal Service (USPS) and other agencies scrambled to comply.

USPS temporarily stopped accepting packages from China, only to U-turn a day later.

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The death of a teenage boy sparked violent protests in a city in north-west China, the BBC has confirmed through verified video.

In the videos shared on social media, protesters can be seen hurling objects at police and officers beating some demonstrators in Pucheng in Shaanxi province.

Authorities said the teenager fell to his death on 2 January in an accident at his school dormitory. But following his death allegations began spreading on social media that there had been a cover-up.

Protests erupted soon after and lasted several days, before they were apparently quelled earlier this week. The BBC has seen no further evidence of protest in Pucheng since then.

Videos on social media appear to show hospital units overrun with patients in face masks, and parents holding sick children in long lines in pediatric units.

There have also been unverified reports that crematoriums and funeral homes are being overwhelmed.

Local news reports have blamed a little-known virus called human metapneumovirus (HMPV) — which normally causes a mild cold-like illness — for the latest outbreak, though officials have yet to confirm this.

The situation is similar to winter 2022/23 when China was hit with a wave of mycoplasma pneumonia cases, a condition dubbed ‘white lung’, which is also normally mild.

That outbreak was blamed on children having low natural immunity due to the effects of China’s harsh lockdowns and school closure measures aimed at containing Covid.

But official reports from the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention suggest that regular flu is leading the latest outbreak, with 30 percent of tests coming back positive for influenza and one in seven people hospitalized with a severe respiratory illness testing positive for it.

But the Chinese CDC warned that rates of multiple flu-like illnesses are on the rise.

In its latest report, for the week to December 29, data suggested that 7.2 per cent of outpatient visits to local hospitals in northern provinces were due to a flu-like illness.

This was up 12 per cent on the previous week, and above the levels for the same week every flu season since 2021.

Data for the southern part of the country suggested that 5.7 per cent of outpatient visits were due to flu-like illness.

This was up 21 per cent on the previous week, and also above the level’s for the same week in 2021 when 4.1 per cent of visits were due to flu-like illness. It was, however, below the levels in 2022 and 2023.

The dam, which will be located in the lower reaches of the Yarlung Tsangpo River, could generate three times more energy than the Three Gorges Dam, currently the world’s largest hydropower plant.

Chinese state media has described the development as “a safe project that prioritises ecological protection”, saying it will boost local prosperity and contribute to Beijing’s climate neutrality goals.

Human rights groups and experts, however, have raised concerns about the development’s knock-on effects.

Among them are fears that the construction of the dam – first announced in late 2020 – could displace local communities, as well as significantly alter the natural landscape and damage local ecosystems, which are among the richest and most diverse on the Tibetan Plateau.

China has built several dams in Tibetan areas – a contentious subject in a region tightly controlled by Beijing ever since it was annexed in the 1950s.

Activists have previously told the BBC that the dams are the latest example of Beijing’s exploitation of Tibetans and their land. Mainly Buddhist Tibet has seen waves of crackdowns over the years, in which thousands are believed to have been killed.

Earlier this year, the Chinese government rounded up hundreds of Tibetans who had been protesting against another hydropower dam. It ended in arrests and beatings, with some people seriously injured, the BBC learned through sources and verified footage.

They had been opposing plans to build the Gangtuo dam and hydropower plant, which would displace several villages and submerge ancient monasteries with sacred relics. Bejing, however, said it had relocated and compensated locals, and moved the ancient murals to safety.

In the case of the Yarlung Tsangpo dam, Chinese authorities have stressed that the project would not have a major environmental impact – but they have not indicated how many people it would displace. The Three Gorges hydropower dam required the resettlement of 1.4 million people.

Reports indicate that the colossal development would require at least four 20 km-long tunnels to be drilled through the Namcha Barwa mountain, diverting the flow of the Yarlung Tsangpo, Tibet’s longest river.

Experts and officials have also flagged concerns that the dam would empower China to control or divert the flow of the trans-border river, which flows south into India’s Arunachal Pradesh and Assam states and onwards into Bangladesh.

A 2020 report published by the Lowy Institute, an Australian-based think tank, noted that “control over these rivers [in the Tibetan Plateau] effectively gives China a chokehold on India’s economy”.

Shortly after China announced its plans for the Yarlung Tsangpo dam project in 2020, a senior Indian government official told Reuters that India’s government was exploring the development of a large hydropower dam and reservoir “to mitigate the adverse impact of the Chinese dam projects”.

China’s foreign ministry has previously responded to India’s concerns around the proposed dam, saying in 2020 that China has a “legitimate right” to dam the river and has considered downstream impacts.

China has constructed multiple hydropower stations along the course of the Yarlung Tsangpo over the past decade in a bid to harness the river’s power as a source of renewable energy. Flowing through the deepest canyon on Earth, one section of the river falls 2,000 metres within a short span of just 50 km, offering huge potential for generating hydropower.

The river’s dramatic topography, however, also poses major engineering challenges – and this latest dam is by far China’s largest and most ambitious to date.

The site of the development is located along an earthquake-prone tectonic plate boundary. Chinese researchers have also previously flagged concerns that such extensive excavation and construction in the steep and narrow gorge would increase the frequency of landslides.

“Earthquake-induced landslides and mud-rock flows are often uncontrollable and will also pose a huge threat to the project,” a senior engineer from Sichuan provincial geological bureau said in 2022.

The project could cost as much as a trillion yuan ($127bn; £109.3bn) according to estimates by the Chongyi Water Resources bureau.

An American citizen has pleaded guilty to helping run what has been described as the first known secret police station in the US on behalf of the Chinese government.

Prosecutors say Chen Jinping and his co-defendent Lu Jianwang opened and operated the station in Manhattan’s Chinatown neighbourhood in early 2022 on behalf of China’s Ministry of Public Security (MPS).

At least 100 such stations have been reported worldwide across 53 countries, with rights groups accusing China of using the outposts to threaten and monitor Chinese nationals abroad.

But China has denied that they are police stations, saying they are “service stations” providing administrative services to nationals overseas.

You can see thick plumes of smoke rise from the Agbogbloshie dumpsite from miles away.

The air at the vast dump, in the west of Ghana’s capital Accra, is highly toxic. The closer you get, the harder it is to breathe and your vision starts to blur.

Around these fumes are dozens of men, who wait for tractors to unload piles of cables before setting them on fire. Others climb up a toxic waste hill and bring down TVs, computers and washing machine parts and set them alight.

The men are extracting valuable metals like copper and gold from electrical and electronic waste – or e-waste – much of which has made its way to Ghana from rich countries.

“I don’t feel well,” says young worker Abdulla Yakubu, whose eyes are red and watery as he burns cables and plastic.

“The air, as you can see, is very polluted and I have to work here every day, so it definitely affects our health.”

Novo Nordisk has launched its weight-loss drug Wegovy in China after it was approved by local health authorities in June.

It is set to intensify competition with rival Eli Lilly, whose popular weight-loss treatment also got the green light months ago but has yet to go on sale in the world’s second largest pharmaceutical market.

More than 180 million people live with obesity in China, which has a population of 1.4 billion.

According to Chinese business news website Yicai, a dose of four Wegovy injections will cost 1,400 yuan (£153; $194), a fraction of the drug’s price in the United States.

A 62-year-old male driver, surnamed Fan, is alleged to have driven an SUV through a barrier and into Zhuhai Sports Centre in what local police described as a “serious and vicious attack”. Chinese media reported that many elderly people, as well as teenagers and children, were among the injured.

Fan was arrested while trying to flee, police said, and is currently in a coma as a result of self-inflicted wounds.

The incident took place despite heightened security in the city, which is hosting a major civil and military airshow.

Police have said initial investigations suggest the ramming attack was triggered by Fan’s dissatisfaction with the outcome of a property settlement following his divorce.

However, due to his coma, he is unable to be questioned by the authorities.

Most videos of the incident posted by eyewitnesses had been scrubbed off Chinese social media by internet censors by Tuesday morning, but some footage still circulating online showed many people lying on the ground and being attended to by paramedics and bystanders.

An eyewitness, Mr Chen, told Chinese news magazine Caixin that at least six groups of people had gathered at the stadium for their regular walks when the incident happened.

The groups use a designated walking path that traces the stadium’s perimeter.

Mr Chen said his group had just completed its third lap around the stadium when a car suddenly charged towards them at a high speed, “knocking down many people”.

“It drove in a loop, and people were hurt in all areas of the running track – east, south, west, and north,” another eyewitness told Caixin.

It is unclear whether the incident was linked to the high-profile Airshow China, which started on Tuesday at a venue just 40km (24 miles) away from the stadium. China is showcasing its latest warplanes and attack drones at the show, and top Russian official Sergei Shoigu is expected to attend.

Several entrances and exits to the sports centre have been closed during the airshow to facilitate “control”, the centre’s management said on Tuesday.

Chinese President Xi Jinping expressed his deep concern over the incident, instructing authorities to make every effort to treat the injured and calling for the perpetrator to be severely punished.

In response, the central government dispatched a working group to help handle the incident.

Investigations into the case are ongoing.

China has seen a spate of violent attacks on members of the public in recent months.

In September, a man went on a stabbing spree at a supermarket in Shanghai, killing three people and injuring several others.

In that same month, a 10-year-old Japanese student died a day after he was stabbed near his school in southern China.

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The country plans to tackle tens of billions of dollars of local government debt to prevent it from being a drag on growth.

Trump won the US election on a platform that promised steep import taxes, including tariffs as high as 60% on Chinese-made goods.

His victory is now likely to hinder Xi Jinping’s plans to transform the country into a technology powerhouse – and further strain relations between the world’s two biggest economies.

A property slump, rising government debt and unemployment, and low consumption have slowed down Chinese growth since the pandemic.

So the stakes are higher than ever for the latest announcement from the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress (NPC), the executive body of China’s legislature.

During his first term in office Trump hit Chinese goods with tariffs of as much as 25%.

China analyst Bill Bishop says Trump should be taken at his word about his new tariff plans.

“I think we should believe that he means it when [he] talks about tariffs, that he sees China as having reneged on his trade deal, that he thinks China and Covid cost him the 2020 election”.

The pressure from Washington did not ease after Trump left the White House in 2021. The Biden administration kept the measures in place and in some cases widened them.

While the first wave of Trump tariffs were painful for China, the country is now in a much more vulnerable position.

The economy has been struggling to return to pre-pandemic levels of growth since abruptly abandoning its tight Covid restrictions two years ago.

Instead of delivering a widely expected fast-paced recovery, China became a regular source of disappointing economic news.

Even before Trump’s election victory and after China began rolling out measures to support its economy in September, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) lowered its annual growth target for the country.

The IMF now expects the Chinese economy to expand by 4.8% in 2024, at the lower end of Beijing’s “about 5%” target. Next year, it projects China’s annual growth rate will drop further to 4.5%.

The latest plan involves using an additional 6 trillion yuan ($840bn) from now until 2026 to bail out local governments which have piled up unsustainable levels of debt.

For decades, local governments have helped drive growth throughout the country by borrowing massive sums of money – much of which paid for infrastructure projects. But a downturn in the property industry has left some cities unable to pay their bills.

But the country’s leaders were not caught entirely off guard by the end to decades of super-fast growth.

Speaking in 2017, President Xi said his country planned to transition from “rapid growth to a stage of high-quality development.”

The term has since been used repeatedly by Chinese officials to describe a shift to an economy driven by advanced manufacturing and green industries.

But some economists say China cannot simply export itself out of trouble.

China risks falling into the type of decades-long stagnation that Japan endured after a stock and property bubble burst in the 1990s, Morgan Stanley Asia’s former chairman, Stephen Roach, says.

To avoid that fate, he says China should draw “on untapped consumer demand” and move away from “export and investment-led growth”.

That would not only encourage more sustainable growth but also lower “trade tensions and [China’s] vulnerability to external shocks,” he says.

This more robust economic model could help China fend off the kind of threats posed by Trump’s return to power.

New economy, old problems

But China, which has long been the world’s factory for low-cost goods, is trying to replicate that success with high-tech exports.

It is already a world leader in solar panels, electric vehicles (EVs) and lithium ion batteries.

According to the International Energy Agency (IEA) China now accounts for at least 80% of solar panel production. It is also the biggest maker of EVs and the batteries that power them.

The IEA said last year that China’s investments in clean energy accounted for a third of the world’s total, as the country continued to show “remarkable progress in adding renewable capacity.”

“For sure there is an overall effort to support high-tech manufacturing in China,” says David Lubin, a senior research fellow at London based-think tank, Chatham House.

“This has been very successful”, he adds.

Exports of electric vehicles, lithium ion batteries and solar panels jumped 30% in 2023, surpassing one trillion yuan ($139bn; £108bn) for the first time as China continued to strengthen its global dominance in each of those industries.

That export growth has helped soften the blow to China’s economy of the ongoing property crisis.

“China’s overcapacity will increase, there is not doubt about it. They have no other source of growth,” said Alicia Garcia-Herrero, chief economist for the Asia Pacific region at investment bank Natixis.

But along with those increased exports, there has been a rise in resistance from Western countries, and not just the US.

Just last month, the European Union increased tariffs on Chinese-built EVs to as much as 45%.

“The problem right now is that large recipients of those goods including Europe and the US are increasingly reluctant to receive them,” said Katrina Ell, research director at Moody’s Analytics.

Today, as Trump is set to head back to the Oval Office with a pledge to hammer Chinese imports, Beijing will have to ask itself whether its latest measures to boost its slowing economy will be enough.

These minerals are essential for making advanced technology including smartphones, semiconductors, lithium batteries, laptops and electric vehicles. The list goes on.

China produces 60% of the world’s rare earth elements supply and processes 90% of it.

It gives the country unparalleled power – power it’s willing to use.

Since July last year, China has introduced export restrictions on three important critical minerals: gallium, germanium and antimony.

The US Geological Survey says China produces 98% of the world’s gallium and 60% of its germanium.

Both are used to make semiconductor chips, which power the world’s advanced technologies.

The export controls are the latest frontier in a trade battle between China and the West, and it’s heating up.

The US is attempting to block China from accessing its advanced technology and semiconductor chips.

Chim Lee, senior Asia analyst with the Economist Intelligence Unit, says: “This is about how China is still feeling threatened.”

“It is using critical minerals to have stronger leverage in its trade negotiations with Western countries,” Mr Lee says.

“It is showing that it can, and it will retaliate.”

The mountains and mines of Yunnan Province

Yunnan province in southern China is known for its mountains, more than its mines.

But travel away from the main highways and you find valleys littered with small mines that process critical minerals.

We come across three of them only a short drive from each other on a rainy, misty day.

Even the closest village is called ‘Kuangshan Zhen’ or Mine Town.

Opposite a mine, we met a local farmer, Mr Tan. He tells us the mines are a national asset.

“It means a lot of economic revenue,” Mr Tan explains. “This mine produces lead, zinc and germanium. They are our country’s treasure.”

China is committed to protecting its treasure and says its export restrictions are “fair, justified and non-discriminatory” and not targeted at any one country.

The country’s latest export restriction is on antimony. It came into force in September.

China mines half the world’s supply of antimony, and it is a key ingredient for military applications including night vision goggles, flares and infrared sensors.

‘Potential price shocks’ to come

The northern British city of Durham feels far from the global competition to dominate resources.

But on the outskirts of the city a pioneering British company, called Pragmatic Semiconductor, is getting ready to expand its manufacturing hub of wafer-thin, flexible semiconductor chips.

Richard Price, Pragmatic Semiconductor’s co-founder and its chief technology officer, says: “As countries like China – but also other countries around the world – look at tariffs, protections and export controls, it will place shocks on the supply chain.”

“We’re likely to see potential price shocks.”

Across the world resource-rich countries are rushing to develop their own reserves of critical minerals.

But demand for these precious metals is surging and China has already raced ahead.

But all that is about to change as the Chinese government passed new legislation on Friday laying out a plan to delay the retirement age over the course of 15 years, starting January 1, according to state news agency Xinhua.

Existing rules stated that men in urban areas could retire at 60 and receive their pensions, and women at 50 or 55, depending on their occupation. The new rules gradually push back the age to 63 for men, and to 55 and 58, respectively, for women.

The measures, which were approved by the country’s top lawmaking body following signaling from a key Communist Party body in July, also lay out plans to extend the minimum working period for employees to receive a monthly pension from 15 to 20 years, with changes starting from 2030.

They also include some flexibility in retirement age, especially for those who have already completed the minimum working period.

The change, which the government has been considering for about a decade, comes as China’s economy slows while Beijing grapples with the looming consequences of a rapidly aging population and a pension funding crisis.

The announcement sparked immediate widespread discussion – and backlash – across Chinese social media.

Some social media users appeared encouraged that the changes weren’t more drastic and included some flexibility. One comment on the X-like social media platform Weibo that garnered thousands of likes said: “As long as there are options to retire or not based on our will, I have no objections.”

Others voiced discontent over the prospect of delayed access to their pension and years of extra work, as well as concern about whether the policy would strain China’s already tough job market, where unemployment levels among young people remain stubbornly high.

“Delayed retirements just means you can’t get your pension until you hit 63, but it doesn’t mean everyone will have a job until then!” wrote one user.

Chinese state media in recent days has hailed the anticipated changes as an urgent and necessary reform for an outmoded system, highlighting how the existing policy had been in place since the 1950s when life expectancies and education levels were both lower.

“The current retirement policy framework has remained unchanged for 73 years. Especially since the reform and opening up (starting around 1978), the demographic, economic and social landscape has transformed dramatically,” demographer Yuan Xin was quoted by state media as saying earlier this week.

The existing retirement age is seriously mismatched with the current “national realities” and the new normal of future economic and social development, said Yuan, who is deputy head of the China Population Association and a demographer at Nankai University in Tianjin.

China’s existing retirement ages are lower than those in a number of major economies. The 2022 average standard retirement ages across Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries stood at 63.6 years old for women and 64.4 years old for men.

Other countries have also grappled with how to manage the retirement age. Major protests erupted in France in 2023 in response to a government attempt to raise the retirement age from 62 to 64. The US has also been debating retirement reform and gradually increasing the retirement age, with Social Security incentives in place for retirees who delay taking benefits until age 70.

Demographic and economic challenges

The changes come as China’s leadership has become increasingly concerned by the country’s demographic challenges, which some economists warn could see the still-developing country fall into the trap of “getting old before it gets rich.”

China’s population has shrunk for the past two years, and in 2023 it recorded its lowest birth rate since the founding of Communist China in 1949, despite a reversal of the country’s long-standing “one-child policy” from 2016 and government-led efforts to incentivize more young couples to have children.

China’s elderly now account for more than 20% of the population, according to a report earlier this month from the Ministry of Civil Affairs, which said about 297 million were aged 60 and above by the end of last year.

Demographers cited in state media have said that, between 2030 and 2035, the elderly population will make up 30% of the total population. That is likely to increase to more than 40% of the population by the middle of this century – making China a “super-aged society.”

Those projections have seen the government ramping up efforts to expand elderly care services and boost private-sector efforts to build a “silver economy.”

It’s also put heightened focus on the ability of the country’s pension system to handle a shrinking workforce alongside its burgeoning elderly population.

A 2019 report from the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, a top government think tank, forecast that China’s state pension fund would run dry by 2035 because of its dwindling workforce. Years of strict pandemic-related restrictions, which have shrunk the coffers of local governments, could make the pension shortfall even more pronounced.

Early last year, thousands of elderly people protested in several major cities against big cuts to their medical benefits payments, fearing that local governments were dipping into their individual accounts to cover the shortages in the state pension fund.

Even for those of working age, employment remains a steep challenge following the pandemic and a raft of government-led industry crackdowns in recent years. In July, the youth unemployment rate hit 17.1% among those aged between 16 and 24 who are not students, and was 6.5% for those 25 to 29 that month, according to state media.

Employers continue to pull back on hiring as the economy slows and people, especially in tech sectors, have widely noted age discrimination in hiring for those over 35.

The new regulations also call on the state to “support young people’s employment and entrepreneurship, strengthen the development of employment positions for older workers … and strengthen the prevention and governance of employment age discrimination.”

A former CIA officer has been sentenced to 10 years in prison for spying for the Chinese government.

Alexander Yuk Ching Ma, 71, was arrested in August 2020 after admitting to an undercover FBI agent that he sold US secrets to China.

Ma, a naturalized US citizen born in Hong Kong, worked for the CIA from 1982 to 1989. He went on to work for the FBI later in his career.

Part of his plea agreement states that he must co-operate with prosecutors “for the rest of his life, including by submitting to debriefings by US government agencies”.

Visitors can stay in the South-East Asian nation for up to 60 days under the new scheme that took effect on Monday,

Previously, passport holders from 57 countries were allowed to enter without a visa.

Tourism is a key pillar of the Thai economy, but it has not fully recovered from the pandemic.

Thailand recorded 17.5 million foreign tourists arrivals in the first six months of 2024, up 35% from the same period last year, according to official data. However, the numbers pale in comparison to pre-pandemic levels.

Most of the visitors were from China, Malaysia and India.

Tourism revenue during the same period came in at 858 billion baht ($23.6bn; £18.3bn), less than a quarter of the government’s target.

Millions of tourists flock to Thailand every year for its golden temples, white sand beaches, picturesque mountains and vibrant night life.

The revised visa-free rules are part of a broader plan to boost tourism.

Also on Monday, Thailand introduced a new five-year visa for remote workers, that allows holders to stay for up to 180 days each year.

The country will also allow visiting students, who earn a bachelor’s degree or higher in Thailand, to stay for one year after graduation to find a job or travel.

In June, authorities announced an extension of a waiver on hoteliers’ operating fees for two more years. They also scrapped a proposed tourism fee for visitors flying into the country.

However some stakeholders are concerned that the country’s infrastructure may not be able to keep up with travellers’ demands.

“If more people are coming, it means the country as a whole… has to prepare our resources to welcome them,” said Kantapong Thananuangroj, president of the Thai Tourism Promotion Association.

“If not, [the tourists] may not be impressed with the experience they have in Thailand and we may not get a second chance,” he said.

Chamnan Srisawat, president of the Tourism Council of Thailand, said he foresees a “bottleneck in air traffic as the incoming flights may not increase in time to catch up with the demands of the travellers”.

Some people have also raised safety concerns after rumours that tourists have been kidnapped and sent across the border to work in scam centres in Myanmar or Cambodia.

A fatal shooting in Bangkok’s most famous shopping mall last year has also caused concern among visitors.

Here is the list of the 93 countries and territories exempt from visa entry into Thailand for a period of 60 days:

Albania
Andorra
Australia
Austria
Bahrain
Belgium
Bhutan
Brazil
Brunei
Bulgaria
Cambodia
Canada
China
Colombia
Croatia
Cuba
Cyprus
Czech Republic
Denmark
Dominica
Dominican Republic
Ecuador
Estonia
Fiji
Finland
France
Georgia
Germany
Greece
Guatemala
Hong Kong
Hungary
Iceland
India
Indonesia
Ireland
Israel
Italy
Jamaica
Japan
Jordan
Kazakhstan
Kosovo
Kuwait
Laos
Latvia
Liechtenstein
Lithuania
Luxembourg
Macau
Malaysia
Maldives
Malta
Mauritius
Mexico
Monaco
Mongolia
Morocco
Netherlands
New Zealand
Norway
Oman
Panama
Papua New Guinea
Peru
Philippines
Poland
Portugal
Qatar
Romania
Russia
San Marino
Saudi Arabia
Singapore
Slovakia
Slovenia
South Africa
South Korea
Spain
Sri Lanka
Sweden
Switzerland
Taiwan
Tonga
Trinidad and Tobago
Turkey
Ukraine
United Arab Emirates
United Kingdom
United States
Uruguay
Uzbekistan
Vietnam

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A man tried to smuggle more than 100 live snakes into mainland China by stuffing them in his trousers, according to custom officials.

The unnamed traveller was stopped after passing through the “nothing to declare” gate at the crossing between semi-autonomous Hong Kong and the city of Shenzhen, officials said.

Upon inspection, he had 104 snakes in “six canvas drawstring bags” inside his trousers, a statement from China Customs said.

“Each bag was found to contain living snakes in all kinds of shapes, sizes and colours,” it added.

Video released by Chinese customs shows a pair of agents peering into transparent plastic bags filled with live red, pink and white snakes.

They were mostly small, but it is a large and squirmy haul of slithering reptiles for anyone to carry in their trousers.

The Iowa Cornell College instructors are in hospital after a “serious incident” during a daytime visit to the park in the northern province of Jilin, a college statement said.

Iowa Representative Adam Zabner said his brother, David, was one of the four instructors injured in the incident, which he described as a stabbing.

China’s foreign ministry says that none of the injured are in a life-threatening condition.

Police said an assailant with the surname Cui clashed with one of the Americans and then stabbed the person. He went on to injure three other US visitors and a Chinese tourist who tried to come to their rescue.

Mr. Zabner said the group of instructors had been visiting a local temple on Monday when they were attacked by a man wielding a knife.

He said his brother had been stabbed in the arm at Beishan Park in Jilin city and was recovering well in hospital.

“My family is incredibly grateful that David survived this attack,” he told the BBC.

“We’d like to see David home in Iowa as soon as possible,” he added. “We’re deeply thankful to the state department and Iowa’s federal delegation and understand that they are working hard to make that happen.”

Cornell College said the four instructors had been teaching “as part of a partnership with a university in China”. The group had been accompanied by a member of Beihua University at the time of their visit to the park on Monday.

China’s foreign ministry said the injured were immediately rushed to hospital where they received treatment.

Spokesperson Lin Jian told reporters that police believe the attack was a random incident, but an investigation is ongoing.

“This was an isolated incident and the investigation continues,” he said. “China is widely considered one of the safest countries in the world and China will continue to take relevant measures to ensure that foreigners are safe in the country.”

“We believe this will not damage relations with other countries,” he added.

A US State Department spokesperson had earlier told the BBC they were aware of reports of a stabbing incident in Jilin, but could not provide more information.

Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter, that she was in contact with the department about the “horrifying” attack.

“Please pray for their full recovery, safe return, and their families here at home,” she wrote.

Images of the incident circulating online appear to show at least three people bleeding and lying on the ground.

The instructors had been visiting a local temple on Monday when they were attacked by a man with a knife

However, the pictures appear to have been quickly censored on China’s internet.

On Tuesday, searches for terms such as “foreigners Jilin” produced no results despite the search term trending on Weibo.

Internet users instead resorted to discussions under adjacent topics while some were also seen asking for more information about the incident.

Online commentator Hu Xijin, who is formerly the chief editor of China’s Global Times, had earlier posted on Weibo that China has been seeing a growing number of foreign visitors and the Chinese are “typically friendly” toward them. He described the incident as a “chance event”.

The post has since been removed.

There are also few reports about the incident in Chinese state media.

Mr Zabner said his brother, a Tufts University doctoral student, had visited China before and was on his second trip to the country with Cornell College.

According to a 2018 news release from Cornell, the US school began a partnership with Beihua University that year to provide money for Cornell professors to live in China and teach a part of a course over a two-week period.

The partnership focused on computer science, mathematics and physics, Cornell said at the time.

Beihua University serves 24,000 students in the north-eastern Chinese city of 4.4 million people.

Amid tense diplomatic relations, Beijing and Washington have sought to re-establish people-to-people exchanges in recent times.

Chinese President Xi Jinping has unveiled a plan to invite 50,000 young Americans to China in the next five years, while Chinese diplomats say a travel advisory by the US State Department has discouraged Americans from going to China.

According to fresh data from the 2023 Trade Vulnerability report by the Ghana Statistical Service, in 2023, “China retained its position as Ghana’s largest import partner, increasing from GH₵26.4 billion in 2022 to GH₵33.9 billion.”

The Russian Federation emerged as a significant contributor, “replacing the UK in the top five, with imports primarily consisting of mineral fuels and oils.” The Netherlands remained a major player, with Ghana primarily “importing mineral fuels and oils, standing at GH₵17.3 billion,” the report stressed.

Notably, gold was exclusively exported via air, while mineral fuels and oils and cocoa beans and products rely on sea transport, with a share of 98.5 percent and 98.9 percent respectively. Plastics (93.0%) and iron and steel (92.4%) on the other hand, were mainly exported via road.

The majority of imports were through sea transport. Apart from sea transport, a portion of vegetable products and mineral fuels and oils were also imported via road, with shares of 25.1 percent and 10.2 percent, respectively.

The discounting comes as the U.S. tech giant seeks to defend its position in the high-end smartphone market, where it faces increasing competition from local rivals such as Huawei.

Running from May 20 to May 28, it is more substantial than the one Apple offered in February.

While the highest discount in the February campaign was 1,150 yuan, this time discounts are up to 2,300 yuan. The steepest discount applies to the 1TB iPhone 15 Pro Max model, while other models also see significant price cuts.

For instance, the 128 GB version of the base iPhone 15 model has a discount of 1,400 yuan, according to Reuters’ checks on Monday.

The increased competitive pressure on Apple comes after Huawei last month introduced its new series of high-end smartphones, the Pura 70, following the launch of the Mate 60 last August.

Apple’s previous discounting effort in February appears to have helped the company mitigate a sales slowdown in China.

Apple’s shipments in China increased by 12% in March, according to Reuters’ calculations based on data from the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology (CAICT). This marks a significant improvement from the first two months of 2024, when the company experienced a 37% slump in sales.

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The announcement from the Ministry of Commerce that Imports of polyoxymethylene copolymer -which is used in electronics and cars – is a signal that China will hit back in its trade disputes with the US and Europe.

The announcement comes as China’s trade rows with the US and the EU have deepened in recent months.

Less than a week ago, Washington sharply increased tariffs on Chinese goods, including electric vehicles (EVs), solar panels, and computer chips.

The new US moves also expanded on sweeping border taxes that were imposed on Chinese goods under the Trump administration.

In response, China’s commerce ministry said the new moves would “severely affect the atmosphere for bilateral cooperation”, and criticized what it characterized as the politicization of economic issues.

Ahead of the heavily-trailed White House announcement, a spokesperson for China’s foreign ministry said it would “take all necessary measures to safeguard its legitimate rights and interests”.

Separately on Monday, China sanctioned three American defense firms over their sales of weapons to Taiwan, state media said.

The announcement that General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, General Dynamics Land Systems, and Boeing Defense, Space & Security are barred from “import and export” business in China came as the self-ruled island inaugurated a new president.

Senior executives of all three companies are banned from entering, working, or living in China, the commerce ministry said.

Meanwhile, Europe has launched a series of probes into Chinese imports.

On Friday, the EU said it would launch an investigation into Chinese tinplate steel.

And last month, Brussels said it was probing two Chinese solar panel makers, that it says benefit from government subsidies.

The European Commission (EC), which oversees the EU’s trade policies, has also given itself a 4 July deadline to decide whether to impose measures against imports of Chinese-made EVs.

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Mr Wang acknowledged the China-US relationship was beginning to stabilise, but said it was still being tested by “negative factors”.

After meeting China’s President Xi Jinping, Mr Blinken stressed the need to “communicate clearly about our differences”.

This was to “minimise the risk of miscalculation and misunderstandings”.

Mr Blinken’s visit, his second to China in less than a year, forms part of a significant increase in dialogue and diplomacy – however frosty – between these rival powers as they attempt to put relations on an even keel after a period of immense tension last year.

Ties have been strained by China’s claims over Taiwan and the South China Sea, and US export bans on advanced tech. They were further damaged by a row over a spy balloon last February.

Then, just a few days ago, the US passed a law that would force Chinese-owned TikTok to sell the hugely popular video app or be banned in America.

Mr Blinken said TikTok had not come up in the talks with the Chinese leader, but a number of US concerns had.

Washington approved its latest aid package early this week which included military assistance to Taiwan. This drew sharp criticism from Beijing.

In Beijing, Mr Blinken reaffirmed US support for the “one-China policy” – a cornerstone of US-China relations under which the US recognises and has formal ties with China rather than Taiwan.

China claims self-governed Taiwan as a breakaway province that will eventually be under Beijing’s control, but the island sees itself as distinct.

At a news conference after meeting Mr Xi, the US secretary of state went on to reiterate the US’s “ironclad” support for the Philippines in their dispute over the South China Sea.

He also said he had raised concerns about the erosion of Hong Kong’s autonomy, and human rights abuses in Tibet.

Addressing China’s role further afield, Mr Blinken said he had urged the Chinese president to stop sending supplies to Russia to be used in its full-scale invasion of Ukraine and to discourage Iran and others from escalating tensions in the Middle East.

During a call earlier this month, US President Joe Biden and Mr Xi discussed avenues of co-operation, including efforts to combat climate change and narcotics.

But they clashed over the US’s support for Taiwan and trade restrictions on technology.

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“ByteDance doesn’t have any plans to sell TikTok,” the company posted on its official account on Toutiao, a social media platform it owns.

TikTok did not immediately respond to a request for comment from the BBC.

Earlier this week, TikTok said it would challenge in court the “unconstitutional” law.

The statement from ByteDance came in response to an article by the technology industry website The Information that said it was exploring the potential sale of TikTok’s operation in the US without the algorithm that powers it.

“Foreign media reports of ByteDance selling TikTok are not true,” the company said in the post, which included a screen shot of the article with the Chinese characters meaning “false rumour” stamped on it.

The sell-or-ban measure was signed into law by US President Joe Biden on Wednesday.

Beijing’s tightening grip on private companies has raised concerns in the US, and other Western countries, about how much control the Chinese Communist Party has over ByteDance, and the data it holds.

TikTok has repeatedly denied claims the Chinese government has control over ByteDance.

“We are confident and we will keep fighting for your rights in the courts,” said TikTok boss Shou Zi Chew in a video posted on the platform this week.

“The facts, and the Constitution, are on our side… rest assured, we aren’t going anywhere.”

According to TikTok, ByteDance’s Chinese founder owns 20% of shares, through a controlling stake in the company.

About 60% is owned by institutional investors, including major US investment firms Carlyle Group, General Atlantic, and Susquehanna International Group.

The remaining 20% is owned by its employees around the world and three of ByteDance’s five board members are American.

The Chinese government has also dismissed such concerns as paranoia and has warned that a TikTok ban would “inevitably come back to bite the US”.

However, TikTok is not facing an immediate ban in the US.

The new law gives ByteDance nine months to sell the business, and an additional three-month grace period, before a potential ban can be enforced.

That means the sale deadline would most likely come some time in 2025, after the winner of the 2024 presidential election takes office.

The supermarket in Abuja allegedly “exclusively permits individuals of Chinese descent to enter”, Nigeria’s consumer protection watchdog said on X.

It has summoned the supermarket’s owner.

The Chinese Chamber of Commerce in Nigeria has denied the racism allegations.

The supermarket is a tenant in a building run by the China General Chamber of Commerce (CGCC).

Boladale Adeyinka, an official at Nigeria’s Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC), said that the watchdog had launched an investigation into the allegations.

This follows widespread outrage on social media after some Nigerians shared their experiences of allegedly being turned away by security when they attempted to go to the supermarket.

In one of the videos, a man said he had discovered the supermarket online but was blocked from entering the complex where it is located.

“At the gate, the security people told me that the supermarket is strictly for Chinese people. If you are a Nigerian, you can’t go inside or buy anything,” he said in the clip posted on X, formerly Twitter.

In another video on X, a group of Nigerians are seen visiting a building to verify the reports that non-Chinese shoppers were being turned away.

A security guard outside the entrance appears to tell them that the supermarket had cut off access to Nigerians since January.

Several Nigerians have demanded the closure of the supermarket, including former senator Shehu Sani, who said that any store in Nigeria that was not accessible to citizens “should be forcibly opened or be pulled down”.

In a statement quoted by local media, the CGCC said it stood for “equality and inclusiveness”.

“Our principles are to enhance friendship between the people of both countries and promote economic development,” it added.

The FCCPC quoted an administrator at the building, Sanusi Shuabiu, as saying that the supermarket mainly sold Chinese groceries and that while it was initially opened to serve the building’s tenants, it permitted entry to outside shoppers, including non-Chinese visitors.

The supermarket’s owner has not yet commented.

She has been summoned to appear before the consumer protection agency by Wednesday.

The watchdog says that the supermarket will remain closed until she complies with the summons.

Nigeria has a Chinese population of less than 10,000, according to the Statista website.

“We are obligated to follow the laws in the countries where we operate, even when we disagree,” an Apple spokesperson told CNN on Friday. “The Cyberspace Administration of China ordered the removal of these apps from the China storefront based on their national security concerns. These apps remain available for download on all other storefronts where they appear.”

The apps, both owned by Meta (META), were already blocked in China and not widely used. They could be accessed in the country only by using virtual private networks (VPNs) that can encrypt internet traffic and disguise the user’s online identity.

The removal of the apps by Apple (AAPL) represents a “further distancing between already separated tech universes” in the country and beyond, said Duncan Clark, chairman of Beijing-based investment advisory BDA China.

“It will cause inconvenience to consumers and businesses (in China) who deal with family, friends or customers overseas. Even if they use VPNs to access their existing WhatsApp apps, these over time will become obsolete and require updating,” he said.

Other popular Western social media apps including X (formerly Twitter), Facebook, Instagram and Messenger are still available on Apple’s China app store, according to a check by CNN.

The tech giant’s announcement comes against a backdrop of plunging iPhone sales in the world’s second-largest economy. Its smartphone sales tumbled a stunning 10% in the first quarter of this year, according to market research firm IDC.

The company has lost momentum in China as nationalism, a rough economy and increased competition have hurt Apple over the past several months.

The resurgence of Huawei and other Chinese brands, including Xiaomi and OPPO/OnePlus, will likely continue, according to IDC. Chinese consumers who once would have considered Apple are now turning to the country’s national brands.

Besides being a key production centre, China remains an important market for Apple, as it is the largest market behind the United States. The company continues to offer discounts in the country to help boost sales.

Its CEO Tim Cook visited Shanghai just last month to open the second-biggest Apple Store in the world.

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The fashion house that bears his name announced the death on Instagram but provided no details.

Italian news agency ANSA reported that he died at home in Florence after a long illness.

He set up his company in the 1970s. His designs have been worn by stars like Brigitte Bardot, Sophia Loren, Kim Kardashian, and Jennifer Lopez.

Roberto Cavalli’s creative director, Fausto Puglisi, said the designer would continue to be seen as “a beacon of inspiration for others.”

In a post on the fashion house’s Instagram page, Mr Puglisi said working with Cavalli was “the greatest honour of my career”.

Getty Images/ Roberto Cavalli was known for his maximalist designs

Cavalli was born on 15 November 1940 in Florence, known for its leather work.

After launching his namesake fashion brand in 1970, he later invented and patented an innovative leather printing process.

Cavalli opened his first small shop, Limbo, in the French city of Saint-Tropez in 1972.

As well as animal prints, he was also known for his hippie dresses, sand-blasted jeans, and patchwork designs on denim.

In 2005 he was tapped to update the Playboy Bunnies’ scanty uniform, and even introduced one version in leopard print.

Getty Images/ Roberto Cavalli was often seen accompanied by glamorous celebrities, such as the Spice Girls

When asked what inspired him to use animal prints in his designs, Cavalli told Vogue in a 2011 interview: “I like everything that is of nature.”

He went on to tell the magazine: “I started to appreciate that even fish have a fantastic coloured ‘dress’, so does the snake, and the tiger. I start[ed] to understand that God is really the best designer, so I started to copy God.”

The founder of Armani, Giorgio Armani, was among those to pay tribute to the late designer, saying his “Tuscan verve” would be missed.

In statement posted on Armani’s social media accounts, he said: “Roberto was a true artist, wild and wonderful in his use of prints, capable of transforming fantasy into seductive clothes.”

Getty Images/ His clothing was worn by the likes of Beyoncé and Jennifer Lopez

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Police said they raided the centre on Thursday and rescued 383 Filipinos, 202 Chinese and 73 other foreign nationals.

The centre, which is about 100km north of Manila, was masquerading as an online gambling firm, they said.

South East Asia has become a hub for scam centres where the scammers themselves are often entrapped and forced into criminal activity.

Young and tech-savvy victims are often lured into running these illegal operations, which ranges from money laundering and crypto fraud to so-called love scams. The latter are also known as “pig butchering” scams, named after the farming practice of fattening pigs before slaughtering them.

These typically start with the scammer adopting a fake identity to gain their victim’s affection and trust – and then using the illusion of a romantic or intimate relationship to manipulate or steal from the victim. This often happens by persuading them to invest in fake schemes or businesses.

Thursday’s raid near Manila was sparked by a tip-off from a Vietnamese man who managed to flee the scam centre last month, police said.

The man, who in his 30s, arrived in the Philippines in January this year, after being offered what he was told would be a chef’s job, said Winston Casio, spokesman for the presidential commission against organised crime.

But the man soon realised that he, like hundreds of others, had fallen prey to human traffickers running love and cryptocurrency scams.

Those trapped in the Bamban centre were forced to send “sweet nothings” to their victims, many of whom were Chinese, Mr Casio said – they would check in on their recipients with questions about their day and if and what they had eaten for their last meal. They would also send photos of themselves to cultivate the relationship.

Mr. Casio said those running the scam centers trapped “good-looking men and women to lure [victims]”.

On 28 February, the Vietnamese man escaped the facility by climbing up a wall, crossing a river, and seeking refuge at a farm. The farm owner then reported it to the police.

There were signs of torture on the man, including scars and marks from electrocution, said Mr Casio, whose team visited the man early this month.

Mr Casio added that several others have tried to escape but were always caught.

Police also seized three shotguns, a 9mm pistol, two .38 calibre revolvers, and 42 rounds of live ammunition from the centre.

Authorities are still in the initial stages of the investigation as most of those rescued from Thursday’s raid are still “shaken”, he said.

In May last year, Philippine authorities rescued more than 1,000 people who were held captive and forced to run online scams inside a freeport zone in Clark, a city also north of Manila – in what remains its biggest bust to date.

A UN report last August estimated that hundreds of thousands of people from around the world have been trafficked to Southeast Asia to run online scams.

The BBC has previously spoken to people who have fallen victim to these criminal networks.

Many have said they travelled to South East Asian countries such as Cambodia and Myanmar in response to job ads and promises of perks. They are trapped once they arrive, and threatened if they refuse to participate in the scams. Escapees and survivors have alleged torture and inhuman treatment.

Governments across Asia, from Indonesia to Taiwan, have expressed alarm at the rise in these scam centres. Foreign embassies in countries like Cambodia and Thailand, for example, have issued warnings to their citizens to beware of being lured into scam centres.

China issued public rewards for warlords who were running scam centres across the border in Myanmar – these centres were run by Chinese mafia families and targeted Chinese nationals. Many of those arrested have been handed over to China in recent months.

Footage shared on social media showed flames and plumes of black smoke engulfing several floors of a skyscraper in Nanjing city.

Officials suggested the blaze started on the first floor of the building, where electric bikes were being stored.

But the specific cause of the fire remained under investigation.

The building is located in the Yuhuatai district of Nanjing, a city of more than eight million that lies about 162 miles (260km) north-west of Shanghai.

Emergency service crews were first alerted to the blaze at 04:40 local time (20:40 GMT) on Friday, officials said on Saturday morning.

Twenty-five fire engines and 130 firefighters were sent to tackle to the blaze. By 06:00 (22:00 GMT), the fire had been extinguished, with the search and rescue operation ending around 14:00.

Of the 44 injured people sent to hospital for treatment, one is in critical condition and another seriously injured, the officials said.

At a press conference, Nanjing Mayor Chen Zhichang offered his condolences and apologies to the victims’ families.

Aerial photos of the skyscraper shared on Friday after the fire had been extinguished showed some flats up the length of the building with blackened fronts.

Fires and other deadly accidents often occur in China due to lax enforcement of safety standards.

A recent spate of deadly fires across the country prompted President Xi Jinping to call last month for “deep reflection” and greater efforts to “curb the frequent occurrence of safety accidents”.

The Nanjing fire comes a month after 13 schoolchildren, aged nine and 10, were killed after a fire broke out in a school dormitory in China’s Henan province.

Days later, at least 39 people were killed and nine injured in a fire that started in the basement of a shop in the city of Xinyu.

The 35-year-old fraudster was already married and raising a daughter when she started dating other men with the specific purpose of defrauding them.

It is unclear what drove the woman to a life of constant pretending, because, according to Chinese media, her husband had his own business and the family had a good financial situation. One thing is for sure, though, one of the factors that allowed the woman, known only as Zhou, to juggle between four husbands over several years was the fact that her real husband was always busy with work and didn’t pay too much attention to his wife.

Zhou reportedly started looking for prospective husbands a few years ago, and her good looks quickly caught the eye of three gullible men who never suspected her true intentions. She dated them all at the same time, managing to spend time with all of them without raising the suspicion of her real husband, before asking them to marry.

Because registering the marriages to her marks would have revealed the fact that she was already married, Zhou used a clever lie to bypass the civil proceedings. She told the men that her house had been illegally demolished and that she needed to remain single in order to be eligible for compensation.

Apparently, none of them thought this was suspicious, especially since she was really good at pretending that she genuinely wanted to marry them, and insisted that the wedding ceremony was what truly mattered.

In reality, she only cared about the wedding ceremonies because she wanted to collect the gifts and money from the attendants. She went to great lengths to ensure that the weddings went through without a hitch, hiring actors to act as her friends and family during the festivities, and apparently, no one suspected a thing. She even paid many of the actors to come visit her and her fake husbands over the years, in or to maintain appearances.

Zhou’s plan came crashing down last year, when she tried to squeeze more money out of one of her fake husbands, a man called Zhang, by telling him that she was pregnant with twins. She told him that she wanted to give birth with her mother in another city, asking him to pay for all the expenses, while he remained home to work.

She constantly sent him pictures of fake checkup results and even photos of newborn babies she downloaded from the internet. It was when Zhang came to see his babies with his own mother that Zhou’s problems began.

In order to trick her fake husband and mother-in-law, Zhou hired another actor to play the doctor who delivered her twins, but when he couldn’t answer their questions or produce the twin babies, Zhang began to suspect that something was wrong. He finally ran a background check on Zhou and was shocked to learn that she was already legally married. He called the police and Zhou’s fake life came crashing down.

After hearing about his wife’s secret life of crime, Zhou’s husband divorced her back in April. She now faces a minimum of 10 years in prison for fraud, as an investigation revealed that she cheated her three fake husbands out of at least 660,000 yuan ($92,000).

Although the full details of how Zhou managed to juggle four marriages, one of her most frequent excuses for leaving home was that she was leaving for training with the company she worked for.

During an interaction with the media on Thursday, Mr Goh indicated the pressing environmental issues facing the planet and urged students to consider studying environmental technology at QIU to mitigate the irreversible damage caused by human activities.

He shared a poignant anecdote from his trip to Mali, which vividly illustrated the extent of environmental degradation.

“I went to Mali once, and before my plane landed, I saw a lot of white coverings I thought to myself, there must be massive agriculture going on. Upon landing, I realised that they were plastic bags which have been caught up in trees, and it really killed me to see this,” he recounted.

Mr Goh’s Mali experience served as a stark reminder of the dire consequences of human actions on the environment.

Ghana faces several significant environmental challenges, encompassing issues such as air and water pollution, the deterioration of green spaces, poor sanitation, and instances of flooding.

Currently, the issue of illegal small-scale mining, popularly known as ‘galamsey’ in Ghana, and deforestation have become an albatross around the country’s neck and need urgent attention.

Considering this and many other environmental issues in Africa, Mr Goh believes that they can be mitigated when individuals are equipped with the needed knowledge to find sustainable solutions to these issues.

He stressed the urgency of addressing these environmental challenges and emphasised the role of environmental technology students in driving positive change in their respective countries.

“There is huge desertification of the continent by human activities, so these are the things that I hope that environmental students can come here to study and go back to their countries and make some changes in their various countries,” he noted on Thursday, September 7.

He made these assertions to journalists from across West Africa touring the campus in Malaysia.

Leave No One Behind

Speaking about the university’s dedication to a holistic educational experience, Mr Goh said QIU prioritises the success and understanding of each student.

Mr Goh’s message “to leave no one behind” underscored a fundamental distinction in an educational phenomenon where the burden of comprehension falls solely on the student.

In tackling this, he introduced the concept of “ensure learning,” where the responsibility for the educational outcome rests on educators themselves.

Scam alert

As an affiliate of QI Group of Companies, Mr Goh addressed concerns about activities perpetrated by some unscrupulous individuals falsely claiming affiliation with the institution and using QUI’s name to offer non-existent scholarships and subsequently defrauding unsuspecting individuals of their money.

He emphasised that these fraudulent actors are tarnishing the reputation of QIU and causing harm to innocent individuals seeking educational opportunities.

“There are a lot of fake people out there using our name. They go around giving scholarships to people, and we don’t even know about it. They’re using our name to defraud people of their hard-earned cash, claiming they are using it to facilitate the process, making innocent people victims.”

The university’s CEO assured the public that QIU takes these matters seriously and, thus, called on everyone to be vigilant and verify the authenticity of scholarship offers and educational opportunities associated with QUI to avoid falling victim to scams.

The role will be taken up by the Communist Party’s foreign affairs chief, Wang Yi, who was previously foreign minister.

Mr Qin’s prolonged disappearance from public view – and his ministry’s silence over it – has fuelled furious speculation.

The 57-year-old’s last known public engagements were on 25 June.

Appointed to his post last December, Mr Qin was seen as a trusted aide of Chinese President Xi Jinping.

“China’s top legislature voted to appoint Wang Yi as foreign minister,” state news agency Xinhua said.

“Qin Gang was removed from the post of foreign minister.”

No reason was given for Mr Qin’s removal, but the report said President Xi had signed the decree authorising the move.

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The MUA – named after the sound people commonly make when blowing a kiss – also captures and replays sound and warms up slightly during kissing, making the experience more authentic, said Beijing-based Siweifushe.

Users can even download kissing data submitted via an accompanying app by other users.

The idea was borne out of China’s frequent, lengthy and widespread lockdown measures during the three-year COVID-19 pandemic that, at their most severe, saw authorities forbid residents to leave their apartments for months on end.

“I was in a relationship back then, but I couldn’t meet my girlfriend due to lockdowns,” said inventor Zhao Jianbo.

Then a student at the Beijing Film Academy, he focused his graduate project on the lack of physical intimacy in video calls. He later set up Siweifushe which released MUA, its first product, on Jan. 22 priced around 260 yuan ($38).

In the two weeks after its release, the firm sold over 3,000 kissing machines and received about 20,000 orders, he said.

The MUA resembles a mobile stand with realistic pursed lips protruding from the front. To use it, lovers must download an app onto their smartphones and pair their kissing machines, which they plug into the phone charging port. They activate the device using the app, then when they kiss it, it kisses back.

The device is available in several colours though with the same unisex lips. It has received mixed reviews, with some users saying it was intriguing whereas others said it made them feel uncomfortable. Among the top complaints was its lack of tongue.

Some commentators on social media site Weibo also expressed concern that the device could be used for online erotic content, which is strictly regulated in China.

Zhao said his company complies with regulations, but that “there’s little we can do as for how people use the device.”

MUA is not the first remote kissing device. Researchers at Tokyo’s University of Electro-Communications invented a “kiss transmission machine” in 2011, and Malaysia’s Imagineering Institute made a similar gadget called the “Kissinger” in 2016.

This follows backlash from legislators that usage of the app should be banned after accusations of dubious surveillance and inappropriate use of user information.

In his opening speech, the CEO promised to protect US user data, to keep teens safe and to remain free from any government influence.

According to CNN, Mr Chew’s written remarks also defend ByteDance’s corporate structure and outlines steps the company has taken, and plans to take, to resolve fears the Chinese government could gain access to TikTok user data through its potential influence over ByteDance. Among those steps is a vow to “firewall” US user data from “unauthorized foreign access.”

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The iPhone 15 Pro won’t be available until nearly the end of the year, but there is already plenty to report from the supply chain overseas.

The latest bit comes from Taiwanese supply chain research firm TrendForce, which claims Apple has upped its RAM order on the iPhone 15 Pro.

TrendForce writes in its latest newsletter that Apple will “bump up the capacity and specifications of the DRAM solutions featured in the next generation of the iPhone that is scheduled for release this year.”

It follows an earlier report from TrendForce in October when it claimed that Apple would add a “memory capacity upgrade” to the next iPhone, increasing RAM from 6GB to 8GB in the Pro model. The standard iPhone will likely stick with 6GB.

(Although Apple has not officially revealed how much memory is in the iPhone 14/14 Pro, MacRumors discovered the numbers in a batch of Xcode files. This was how the amount of RAM was reported in the iPhone 13. It was also predicted by supply chain analysts.)

Apple’s iPhones have operated with less memory than rival Android devices. It’s curious, considering the homemade Bionic chip periodically outperforms Android devices on Gizmodo’s internal benchmark charts.

We’re using Geekbench and some web-based tests to run relative numbers, but the A16 Bionic scores high—and that’s only with 6GB of RAM. Thus far, it’s faster in every way than Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Gen 2, MediaTek’s Dimensity 9000, and Google’s Tensor G2, all with 8GB to 12GB of RAM.

We know a little bit about what’s in the pipeline for the iPhone 15 coming later this year. We’re looking for a USB-C port, as reports indicate Apple will comply with the switchover beginning with the iPhone 15—especially since its compliance date is 2024.

We might see solid-state buttons on the device that act like tiny trackpads. Apple will employ its Taptic Engines to offer haptic feedback as the buttons are activated. Apple might also offer an “ultra” variant of its iPhone to appeal to rugged users, akin to how it’s marketing the Apple Watch Ultra.

Turkey’s disaster and emergency agency Afad said the tremor occurred at 20.04 local time (17.04 GMT).

Witnesses told the Reuters news agency there had been further damage to buildings in Antakya.

A 7.8-magnitude struck the region on 6 February, killing more than 44,000 people in Turkey and Syria.

Witnesses said the most recent quake was also felt in Syria, Egypt and Lebanon.

It is currently unclear how much damage it has caused or if there are any casualties.

The population in 2022 – 1.4118 billion – fell by 850,000 from 2021.

China’s birth rate has been declining for years, prompting a slew of policies to slow the trend.

But seven years after scrapping the one-child policy, it has entered what one official described as an “era of negative population growth”.

The birth rate in 2022 was also down from 7.52 in 2021, according to China’s National Bureau of Statistics, which released the figures on Tuesday.

In comparison, in 2021, the United States recorded 11.06 births per 1,000 people, and the United Kingdom, 10.08 births. The birth rate for the same year in India, which is poised to overtake China as the world’s most populous country, was 16.42.

Deaths also outnumbered births for the first time last year. China logged its highest death rate since 1976 – 7.37 deaths per 1,000 people, up from 7.18 the previous year.

Earlier government data had heralded a demographic crisis, which would in the long run shrink China’s labour force and increase the burden on healthcare and other social security costs.

Results from a once-a-decade census announced in 2021 showed China’s population growing at its slowest pace in decades. Populations are also shrinking and ageing in other East Asian countries, such as Japan and South Korea.

“This trend is going to continue and perhaps worsen after Covid,” says Yue Su, principal economist at the Economist Intelligence Unit. Ms Su is among experts who expect China’s population to shrink further through 2023.

“The high youth unemployment rate and weaknesses in income expectations could delay marriage and childbirth plans further, dragging down the number of newborns,” she added.

And the death rate in 2023 is likely be higher than what it was pre-pandemic due to Covid infections, she said. China has seen a surge of cases since it abandoned its zero-Covid policy last month.

China’s population trends over the years have been largely shaped by the controversial one-child policy, which was introduced in 1979 to slow population growth.

Families that violated the rules were fined and in some cases, even lost jobs. In a culture that historically favours boys over girls, the policy had also led to forced abortions and a reportedly skewed gender ratio from the 1980s.

The policy was scrapped in 2016 and married couples were allowed to have two children. In recent years, the Chinese government also offered tax breaks and better maternal healthcare, among other incentives, to reverse, or at least slow, the falling birth rate.

But these policies did not lead to a sustained increase in the births. Some experts say this is because policies that encouraged childbirth were not accompanied by efforts to ease the burden of childcare, such as more help for working mothers or access to education.

In October 2022, Chinese President Xi Jinping made boosting birth rates a priority. Mr Xi said in a once-in-five-year Communist Party Congress in Beijing that his government will “pursue a proactive national strategy” in response to the country’s ageing population.

Apart from dishing out incentives to have children, China should also improve gender equality in households and workplaces, said Bussarawan Teerawichitchainan, director of the National University of Singapore’s Centre for Family and Population Research.

Scandinavian countries have shown that such moves can improve fertility rates, she added.

“They are not in a doomsday scenario right away,” says Paul Cheung, Singapore’s former chief statistician, adding that China has “plenty of manpower” and “a lot of lead time” to manage the demographic challenge.

Observers say merely raising birth rates will not resolve the problems behind China’s slowing growth.

“Boosting fertility is not going to improve productivity or increase domestic consumption in the medium term,” said Stuart Gietel-Basten, a public policy professor at The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. “How China will respond to these structural issues would be more crucial.”

Incoming travellers will no longer need to quarantine – marking a significant change in the country’s Covid policy as it battles a surge in cases.

They will still require proof of a negative PCR test taken within 48 hours of travelling.

The move has been welcomed by many eager to reunite with family.

In Hong Kong, 400,000 people are expected to travel into mainland China in the coming weeks with long queues for flights into cities including Beijing and Xiamen.

One woman told news agency Reuters she had not seen her parents in years – despite one of them suffering from colon cancer – and said she was “so, so happy”.

The country’s reopening comes at the start of “chun yun”, the first period of Lunar New Year travel. Before the pandemic it was the largest annual worldwide migration of people returning home to spend time with family.

Two billion people are expected to travel for this Lunar New Year, double the number that travelled last year.

Over the past three years China had one of the world’s strictest Covid health policies that saw numerous lockdowns, frequent testing requirements and had a significant impacts on the nation’s economy.

The government recently walked back that policy after mass protests across the country, triggered by a fire in a high-rise block in the Xinjiang region that killed 10 people. Many Chinese believed the long-running Covid restrictions contributed to the deaths, but authorities denied this.

Since China abandoned the key elements of its Covid zero policy there have been reports of hospitals and crematoriums being overwhelmed, but the country has stopped publishing its case numbers and reported only two deaths yesterday.

Just yesterday, the Chinese government banned over 1,000 social media accounts critical of its handling of the virus.

The anticipated surge in cases and visitors has prompted many countries – including the UK – to impose requirements for a negative COVID-19 test on travellers from China, drawing the ire of the Chinese government.

The country is seeing a surge in cases since the lifting of its most severe restrictions earlier this month.

The latest official figures appear to show a relatively low number of new daily cases.

However, there are concerns that these numbers are an underestimate due to a recent reduction in Covid testing.

The government reported only 2,097 new daily cases on Sunday.

Epidemiologist Wu Zunyou has said he believes the current spike in infections would run until mid-January, while the second wave would then be triggered by mass travel in January around the week-long Lunar New Year celebrations which begin on 21 January. Millions of people usually travel at this time to spend the holiday with family.

The third surge in cases would run from late February to mid-March as people return to work after the holiday, Dr Wu said.

He told a conference on Saturday that current vaccinations levels offered a certain level of protection against the surges and had resulted in a drop in the number of severe cases.

Overall, China says more than 90% of its population has been fully vaccinated. However, less than half of people aged 80 and over have received three doses of vaccine. Elderly people are more likely to suffer severe Covid symptoms.

China has developed and produced its own vaccines, which have been shown to be less effective at protecting people against serious Covid illness and death than the mRNA vaccines used in much of the rest of the world.

Dr Wu’s comments come after a reputable US-based research institute reported earlier this week that it believed China could see over a million people die from Covid in 2023 following an explosion of cases.

The government hasn’t officially reported any Covid deaths since 7 December, when restrictions were lifted following mass protests against its zero-Covid policy. That included an end to mass testing.

However, there are anecdotal reports of deaths linked to Covid appearing in Beijing.

Hospitals there and in other cities are struggling to cope with a surge, which has also hit postal and catering services hard.

Meanwhile, China’s largest city, Shanghai, has ordered most of its schools to take classes online as cases soar.

The guidelines were unveiled as part of a $50bn (£43bn) plan aimed at building up the local semiconductor industry.

It comes as business groups have pushed for more government support in an effort to reduce reliance on China.

They are faced with a global microchip shortage which has slowed production.

“We’re going to be implementing the guardrails to ensure those who receive CHIPS funds cannot compromise national security… they’re not allowed to use this money to invest in China, they can’t develop leading-edge technologies in China…. for a period of ten years,” according to US Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo., explaining the US Chips and Science Act.

“Companies who receive the money can only expand their mature node factories in China to serve the Chinese market.”

The US and China are locked in a long-running dispute over trade and technology.

In August, US President Joe Biden had signed a law committing $280bn (£232bn) to high tech manufacturing and scientific research, amid fears that the US is losing its technological edge to China.

The investments include tax breaks for companies that build computer chip manufacturing plants in the US.

The US currently produces roughly 10% of the global supply of semiconductors, which are key to everything from cars to mobile phones, down from nearly 40% in 1990.

The Chinese Embassy in Washington had opposed the semiconductor bill, calling it reminiscent of a “Cold War mentality.”

Some US chipmakers are already experiencing the impact of Washington’s crackdown on selling US technology to China. Earlier this month, Nvidia and AMD were told by US officials to stop the sale of artificial intelligence chips to China.

Dan Ives of Wedbush Securities called the restrictions a “gut punch” for Nvidia.

“This is really a shot across the bow at China and it’s really going to fan those flames in terms of geopolitical (tensions),” Mr Ives had told teh BBC.

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The 38-year-old Tokyo resident charges 10,000 yen ($71) per booking to accompany clients and simply exist as a companion.

“Basically, I rent myself out. My job is to be wherever my clients want me to be and to do nothing in particular,” Morimoto told Reuters, adding that he had handled some 4,000 sessions in the past four years.

With a lanky build and average looks, Morimoto now boasts nearly a quarter of a million followers on Twitter, where he finds most of his clients. Roughly a quarter of them are repeat customers, including one who has hired him 270 times.

His job has taken him to a park with a person who wanted to play on a see-saw. He has also beamed and waved through a train window at a complete stranger who wanted a send-off.

Doing nothing doesn’t mean Morimoto will do anything. He has turned down offers to move a fridge and go to Cambodia, and doesn’t take any requests of a sexual nature.

Last week, Morimoto sat opposite Aruna Chida, a 27-year-old data analyst clad in a sari, having a sparse conversation over tea and cakes.

Chida wanted to wear the Indian garment out in public but was worried it might embarrass her friends. So she turned to Morimoto for companionship.

“With my friends I feel I have to entertain them, but with the rental-guy (Morimoto) I don’t feel the need to be chatty,” she said.

Before Morimoto found his true calling, he worked at a publishing company and was often chided for “doing nothing”.

“I started wondering what would happen if I provided my ability to ‘do nothing’ as a service to clients,” he said.

The companionship business is now Morimoto’s sole source of income, with which he supports his wife and child. Although he declined to disclose how much he makes, he said he sees about one or two clients a day. Before the pandemic, it was three or four a day.

As he spent a Wednesday doing nothing of note in Tokyo, Morimoto reflected on the bizarre nature of his job and appeared to question a society that values productivity and derides uselessness.

“People tend to think that my ‘doing nothing’ is valuable because it is useful (for others) … But it’s fine to really not do anything. People do not have to be useful in any specific way,” he said.

The child’s parents from Zhengzhou, Henan Province, received his test score on June 23. Upon learning that their son had only received six points for his final math test, the father burst into tears, as seen in a video posted to Weibo by Qilu Evening News.

“I don’t care anymore, my efforts are wasted, let him struggle by himself!” the father reportedly said.

He can be seen crying in a bedroom and wiping his eyes, while his wife can be heard laughing in the background.

The man purportedly tutored his child until midnight every day for the past year. His disappointment also stems from his son’s inconsistent test results. The child’s scores had ranged from 40-50 points to 80-90 points in previous examinations, according to his mother.

The video went viral on Weibo, with many netizens sympathizing with the father’s parenting struggles. However, others argued that the child’s score was a reflection of the father’s inability to teach math. Some viewers also suggested that the father’s late-night tutoring may have affected his son’s ability to pay attention at school.

“Teaching the child in the middle of the night every day, but the child needs a lot of rest to have a good mental state and perform well,” one commenter said. “The more stressed my daughter was when she was a child, the more unable her brain was to think, so she would be fine to let her play.”

Lu Ke was a Malawi resident when he was exposed by BBC Africa Eye, which reported he had used local children to film personalised greetings videos, some of which included racist content.

These videos can be bought for up to $70 (£55) on Chinese social media and internet platforms.

He said he made his videos in order to spread Chinese culture to the local community.

Lu Ke denied making derogatory videos.

In one of the videos seen by the BBC, a group of young children is made to chant – in Chinese – “I’m a black monster. My IQ is low”, clearly unaware of what they are saying.

While being secretly filmed by an undercover journalist posing as a potential buyer, Lu Ke admitted and then immediately denied having made the video.

Malawian police last week launched an investigation but were unable to arrest the Chinese filmmaker as he could not be found.

Department of Immigration and Citizenship Services spokesman Pasqually Zulu confirmed that Lu Ke was arrested in neighbouring Zambia, in the eastern town of Chipata.

Mr Zulu said the two countries were now liaising to have the Chinese national sent to Malawi for the authorities to continue their investigation.

Last week, top Chinese diplomat Wu Peng said he had discussed the issue with Malawi’s foreign minister.

He said his country was against discrimination.

“China has been cracking down on those unlawful online acts in the past yrs,” he tweeted. “We’ll continue to crack down on such racial discrimination videos in the future.”

The Chaoyang district reported 26 cases over the weekend – the highest number so far in Beijing’s latest surge.

Long queues outside supermarkets and shops were seen despite government assurance of a sufficient food supply.

It comes amid fears that Beijing could face a similar situation to Shanghai, which has seen some 25 million people shut in their homes for weeks.

‘All the meat was snatched up’

All 3.5 million residents in the city’s largest Chaoyang district will undergo three rounds of mass testing, according to a notice by the city’s disease prevention team.

The news prompted residents to rush to stock up essential supplies, with images circulating on local media showing supermarket shelves emptied of goods and snaking queues at check-out counters.

Beijing’s major supermarkets also extended their opening hours to accommodate the spike in demand.

“Never thought I would go to the market early in the morning….when I got there, all the eggs and prawns were gone and all the meat was snatched up,” said one Weibo user in Shanghai, before adding they managed to get some vegetables.

Another Weibo user in Shanghai said: “Seeing people in Beijing rush to buy food is both funny and distressing… its like looking at what my own life was like just last month.”

State-media news outlet The Global Times said that Beijing’s fresh food companies have been ordered to increase the supply of groceries like meat, poultry eggs and vegetables.

They also quoted health experts as saying that the results of the mass testing would indicate whether there is a need to escalate measures further, such as locking down several areas.

Separately, Pang Xinghuo, deputy director of the Beijing Center for Disease Prevention and Control, told state-media outlet China Daily that the number of cases in Beijing is expected to increase in the following days.

The latest outbreak in Shanghai, first detected in late March, has seen more than 400,000 cases recorded so far and 138 deaths.

Some of the measures Chinese authorities have enforced include placing electronic door alarms to prevent those infected from leaving and forcibly evacuating people from their homes to carry out disinfection procedures.

Some in locked-down areas of Shanghai say they have been struggling to access food supplies, and forced to wait for government drop-offs of vegetables, meat and eggs.

Green barricades have also been erected overnight in parts of Shanghai without prior warning, effectively preventing residents from leaving their homes.

In contrast to many other countries, China is pursuing a zero-Covid strategy with the aim of eradicating the virus from the country completely.

While officials managed to keep infection levels relatively low at the beginning of the pandemic, later lockdowns have struggled to contain more recent, transmissible variants of the virus.

Until now, there had been separate measures for the eastern and western sides, but the whole city is now subject to indefinite restrictions.

Shanghai is the largest single city to be locked down to date.

The important financial hub has battled a new wave of coronavirus infections for more than a month.

The authorities reacted after new cases rose to more than 13,000 a day, although the numbers are not high by some international standards.

Residents in some areas of the city said the strict policy meant no-one was allowed to leave their housing compounds, not even to collect essential provisions.

They reported difficulties in ordering food and water online, with items selling out before they could be added to digital shopping baskets.

The city is testing the limits of China’s zero-Covid strategy, amid growing public anger over quarantine rules.

The policy sets China apart from most other countries which are trying to live with the virus.

But the increased transmissibility and milder nature of the Omicron variant has led to questions over whether the current strategy is sustainable in the long run.

“Currently, Shanghai’s epidemic prevention and control is at the most difficult and most critical stage,” said Wu Qianyu, an official with the municipal health commission.

“We must adhere to the general policy of dynamic clearance without hesitation, without wavering.”

On Monday, Shanghai reported a record 13,086 new asymptomatic coronavirus cases, after a city-wide testing programme took samples from more than 25 million people in 24 hours.

At least 38,000 people have been deployed to Shanghai from other regions, in what state media have said is the biggest nationwide medical operation since the shutdown of Wuhan in early 2020.

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Some residents woke up before dawn for white-suited healthcare workers to swab their throats as part of nucleic acid testing at their housing compounds, many queuing up in their pyjamas and standing the required two metres apart.

The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) on Sunday dispatched more than 2,000 medical personnel from across the army, navy and joint logistics support forces to Shanghai, an armed forces newspaper reported.

More than 10,000 healthcare workers from provinces such as Jiangsu, Zhejiang and the capital Beijing have arrived in Shanghai, according to state media, which showed them arriving, suitcase-laden and masked up, by high-speed rail and aircraft.

It is China’s largest public health response since it tackled the initial COVID-19 outbreak in Wuhan, where the novel coronavirus was first discovered in late 2019. The State Council said the PLA dispatched more than 4,000 medical personnel to the province of Hubei, where Wuhan is, at that time.