Global Pulse

标签： Asia

亚洲

  • China’s housing market free-falls as buyers wait for floor prices

    China’s housing market free-falls as buyers wait for floor prices

    China’s residential real estate market has extended its downward trajectory through the first half of 2026, held back by widespread buyer hesitation that stems from widespread expectations of further price declines. With both transaction volumes and average values continuing to drop, market analysts see almost no evidence that a near-term turnaround is on the horizon.

    New data published Wednesday by the China Index Academy offers a clear snapshot of the current downturn: across 100 major Chinese cities, secondary-market residential prices fell 0.42% month-over-month in June, pushing the national average to 12,639 yuan (approximately US$1,750) per square meter. Price drops were far more common than gains, with 88 of the 100 tracked cities recording lower values and just 12 seeing minor increases.

    The slump in the resale market cuts across all city tiers. Year-over-year data for June shows first-tier city prices fell by 6.95%, while second-tier centers fared worse with an 8.21% annual drop. Smaller third- and fourth-tier cities, which have shouldered heavy oversupply for years, recorded a 7.48% year-over-year decline.

    Among China’s 10 largest cities, Nanjing and Wuhan saw the steepest annual drops, with resale prices falling 11.45% and 10.89% respectively. Beijing, Tianjin, Guangzhou and Chongqing all recorded declines between 8% and 10%, while Hangzhou, Shanghai, Chengdu and Shenzhen saw drops ranging from 5% to 8%. Shenzhen outperformed its peer major cities, posting the smallest annual decline at 5.27%.

    Market commentators across China broadly agree that first-half data confirms the downward trend has not yet hit bottom, with most predicting further price drops through the second half of 2026. One Henan-based columnist, writing under the pen name Qingjin Wenwang, highlighted the stark shift in negotiating power between sellers and potential buyers over just a few months.

    “A friend of mine began house-hunting for marriage in late 2025. Back then, sellers were confident and refused to budge on asking prices,” he shared. “By June 2026, when he returned to the same district to view comparable properties, most sellers had softened their stance and were constantly pressing him to sign a deal as soon as possible.”

    Even with more flexible sellers, the columnist noted that the experience left his friend more cautious than ever: the visible shift in market conditions only reinforced his fear that prices would continue to fall even after he completed a purchase, leaving him with an underwater asset.

    Citing earlier data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), Qingjin Wenwang outlined four core factors that continue to block a sustainable market recovery: First, prices have not yet stabilized: in May, only 16 out of 70 major cities recorded month-over-month new home price gains, and just 10 saw resale price increases, with declines accelerating in smaller third-tier markets. Second, buyer demand remains muted: new home sales dropped 10.8% year-over-year by floor area and 13.5% by value through the first five months of 2026, with millions of households delaying purchases indefinitely. Third, developer activity continues to contract: real estate investment fell 16.2% year-over-year between January and May, new construction starts dropped 22.6%, and project completions declined 23.4%. Fourth, confidence in the resale market has deteriorated sharply, with market price benchmarks shifting lower across most cities, and cautious buyer psychology takes significant time to reverse once it sets in.

    Official NBS data from June 16 reinforces this grim outlook: across 70 major cities, only four recorded year-over-year new home price increases in the first five months of 2026. No city recorded year-over-year resale price gains over the same period, with most cities seeing annual declines between 5% and 8%.

    A Guangdong-based property columnist noted in a Wednesday analysis that China’s property market has undergone a dramatic structural shift since 2021, when new home sales peaked at 1.79 billion square meters. Sales have declined every year since that peak, falling below 1 billion square meters in 2025. In dozens of cities across the country, prices have fallen more than 40% from their 2021 peak, with some markets dropping more than 50% – a contraction that qualifies as severe by any global standard, he emphasized.

    He outlined three long-term structural drivers behind the ongoing downturn that cannot be addressed with short-term stimulus: first, China’s population entered negative growth in 2022 and has continued to shrink, a trend that international experience shows is extremely difficult to reverse, and one that will keep long-term housing demand muted. Second, the era of rapid urbanization that drove decades of explosive housing demand has largely drawn to a close, after decades of mass rural-to-urban migration pushed prices steadily higher. Third, after decades of rapid construction, overall national housing supply is no longer scarce, with only a small number of major cities and prime urban districts facing tight supply.

    In late April, a wave of viral online commentary drew widespread public attention to a startling trend: after adjusting for inflation and currency depreciation, four years of continuous declines have pushed inflation-adjusted national home prices back to levels last seen around 2006. The claims drew on data compiled by the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) and sparked fierce debate across Chinese social media about the true health of the property sector.

    The Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis visualized BIS data to track China’s home prices against a 2010 baseline index of 100. A first chart tracking nominal residential prices shows China’s index climbing from 78 in 2006 to a peak of 145.9 in 2021, before sliding back to 114 in the first quarter of 2026. When adjusted for inflation and currency depreciation, however, the picture is far more stark: the index rose from 88.5 in 2006 to a peak of 113 in 2021, then fell to 85.1 in Q1 2026, putting real home prices lower than they were two decades ago.

    This adjustment works the same way as the distinction between nominal and real GDP growth: stripping out the impact of price changes to show the actual change in asset value.

    Not all analysts agree that the national average data applies uniformly across the country. Jiangsu-based commentator Duanwei Liwen pointed out that top-tier markets remain far more resilient than smaller urban centers. “Home prices in Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen are still extremely high, and there is no sign they have returned to 2006 levels,” she noted. “You cannot use a single national average to describe the situation in every Chinese city.”

    Duanwei added that while first-tier cities have held their value far better, most of the downward pressure is concentrated in third- and fourth-tier cities, where real prices have indeed fallen back to levels not seen in a decade or more. She emphasized that the real value of the BIS data is as a warning to buyers who try to time the market and bet that prices have hit bottom.

    “Over the past few years, many people have already fallen into this trap,” she said. “They see a small price pullback and assume the floor has been reached, or they see a minor policy easing and conclude a rebound is coming. Then prices keep falling, and they are stuck with assets they cannot sell.”

    A writer for Beijing-based financial outlet Sina Finance pushed back on the inflation-adjusted framing, arguing that nominal prices are far more relevant for most household buyers, since household incomes and everyday living costs are not adjusted for inflation. Using the BIS nominal price index, he noted, it is undeniable that national average prices have returned to 2016 levels.

    Any reliable forecast for future price trends, he added, must weigh a full range of interconnected factors, including demographic shifts, rental yields, income inequality, and the evolving balance between housing supply and buyer demand.

  • Robotic elephants draw crowds and controversy in some of India’s Hindu temples

    Robotic elephants draw crowds and controversy in some of India’s Hindu temples

    In a sun-dappled backyard workshop in Chalakudy, a small town in India’s Kerala state, mechanical engineer Prasanth Prakashan crafts life-size robotic elephants that mirror the core traits of their living, breathing counterparts. The animatronic creations, built from fiberglass, iron and molded rubber, can flap their ears, swish their tails and spray water from their trunks. While they cannot yet walk, Prakashan says that capability is already in development, and the machines already serve a radical new purpose: replacing captive live elephants in Hindu temple rituals and festivals across southern India.

    Elephants hold profound sacred meaning across multiple faiths across South Asia. In Hinduism, they are revered as physical manifestations of the divine. Buddhism honors them as symbols of patience, wisdom and enlightenment. In Kerala, the heart of India’s temple elephant culture, processions featuring decorated live elephants are major cultural and tourist draws. The annual Pooram parade at Thrissur Vadakkunnathan temple showcases roughly 100 elaborately caparisoned elephants, while the iconic Guruvayur Sree Krishna Temple maintains a herd of nearly 50 captive elephants, hosts annual elephant races, and has turned iconic temple elephants into national celebrities. One legendary elephant, Guruvayur Keshavan who died in 1976, is memorialized with a life-size statue and has been the subject of a feature film and television series, while another popular modern elephant, Thechikkottukavu Ramachandran, boasts more than 150,000 Facebook followers. This cultural reverence extends beyond Hinduism: Christian and Muslim festivals in Kerala also regularly include elephant parades.

    But behind this cultural prestige lies a grim reality of animal welfare abuse and public safety risk. Captive temple elephants in Kerala are almost exclusively adult males, which enter musth — a periodic hormonal state marked by a 60-fold surge in testosterone that triggers extreme aggression. For decades, captive elephants have been routinely abused: chained for hours, beaten into submission, separated from their wild herds, and forced to endure blistering heat, deafening fireworks and crushing crowds during multi-day festivals. In 2024 alone, nine people were killed in elephant rampages at Kerala temple events, a statistic that underscores the dangers of the status quo.

    To address this crisis, animal welfare organizations including PETA India have launched an initiative to replace live captive elephants with custom-built animatronic versions. The organization, which has already donated roughly 40 robotic elephants to small and medium-sized temples at a cost of $6,000 per unit, first connected with Prakashan in 2023 after a video of his robotic elephant creations for a Dubai festival went viral. Working alongside a small team of artists and technicians, Prakashan has refined his design: starting with a rigid fiberglass frame, artisans mold flexible rubber skin that replicates every wrinkle and visible vein of a real elephant, with electric motors powering the animatronic movements of the head, eyes, ears, tail and trunk. The full build process takes just 15 days per elephant. Prakashan acknowledges a robotic creation can never fully replicate a live elephant, noting, “You can’t create an original elephant just as you cannot duplicate a human. But we try to capture the majestic animal’s essence as much as we can.”

    For smaller Kerala temples, the robotic innovation has been a welcome change. At the Irinjadapilly Sree Krishna Temple, which received the first Prakashan-built robotic elephant in 2023, head priest Rajkumar Namboothiri says the animatronic version allows children to interact freely with the ceremonial elephant — something that would never be safe with a captive live animal. He also notes that ancient ritual texts do not require live elephants for ceremonies, arguing the tradition of using live elephants emerged only a few centuries ago when elephants were part of royal processions. For temple administrators, robotic elephants eliminate the risk of fatal attacks and the steep cost of caring for and insuring a live elephant. “With a robotic elephant, we don’t have that fear. That’s a big relief,” said K.I. Purushottaman, president of the Cheekamundi Sri Mahavishnu Temple in Thrissur. Even many devotees support a nuanced approach: while large, famous temples can maintain the tradition of live elephants, smaller community temples can adopt robotic alternatives that are more feasible and ethical.

    Not everyone supports the shift, however. Traditionalists and elephant owners, many of whom earn significant income renting out live elephants for festivals, argue that live elephants are an irreplaceable part of sacred tradition. “If you don’t believe elephants are sacred, what’s the point of a robotic elephant in a temple?” asked K. Mahesh, an elephant owner who has rented his animal out for 25 years, calling his elephant a beloved member of his family. Some temple administrators have publicly rejected robotic elephants for rituals, and artists involved in building the animatronics report being shunned at temple festivals.

    Wildlife experts say the resistance to robotic elephants is less about spiritual tradition and more about profit from religious tourism. “Sadly, there’s a lot of money to be made with elephants. It’s not about spirituality or even tradition. It’s religious tourism,” said P.S. Easa, a Kerala-based wildlife biologist who helped draft the state’s captive elephant protection regulations. While regulations have cut India’s captive elephant population nearly in half since 2010, enforcement remains weak, and around 400 captive elephants still remain in Kerala. Easa is skeptical that robotic elephants will achieve widespread acceptance in his lifetime, noting that centuries-old tradition changes slowly — but he holds out hope that as the technology improves, particularly when robotic elephants gain the ability to walk in processions, attitudes may shift. For creators like Nambiat, the robotic elephant project is not an attack on tradition, but an effort to preserve elephants for future generations: “If we don’t stop treating elephants like commodities, future generations won’t have them.”

  • Indonesians fight a German cement giant over a mine and factory project

    Indonesians fight a German cement giant over a mine and factory project

    A landmark legal complaint brought by Indigenous communities and activists in Indonesia against one of the world’s largest cement manufacturers is paving the way for a new era of corporate accountability, as global South communities leverage European regulations to hold multinational firms liable for environmental and human rights harm.

    The case, filed against Germany’s Heidelberg Materials, marks the first time Indonesia’s communities have invoked Germany’s groundbreaking Supply Chain Due Diligence Act, a regulation that requires large European companies to audit and address human rights and environmental risks across their entire global supply chains. At the center of the dispute is a proposed limestone mine and integrated cement factory that the firm’s local Indonesian subsidiary PT Indocement Tunggal Prakarsa plans to develop in Central Java’s ecologically sensitive Kendeng Mountains.

    For Indigenous Samin communities that have called the Kendeng range home for generations, the project represents an existential threat. The mountains are a rare karst ecosystem that functions as a critical natural carbon sink and supplies regional groundwater reserves. Activists and complainants warn that open-pit mining would irreversible damage the unique landscape, destroy agricultural land relied on by local communities, and displace Indigenous populations that have sustained their livelihoods on this land for centuries.

    “If the project moves forward, we will face an ecological catastrophe, mass impoverishment, and widespread violations of our basic human rights,” said Bambang Sutikyo, one of the 10 individual complainants backing the case. Gunretno, a Samin community leader and plaintiff who uses only one name, emphasized that the fight extends beyond local land rights. “As global citizens, we share a collective responsibility to protect our only shared planet when any form of environmental destruction is at stake,” he said.

    In response to the allegations, Katharina Plonsker, Heidelberg Materials’ senior sustainability communications manager, noted that local stakeholders were given opportunities to raise concerns during the project’s permitting phase, and that community feedback was incorporated into project planning. “No final decision on the implementation of the project has been taken,” Plonsker confirmed in a statement.

    Supported by local legal advocacy groups including the Semarang Legal Aid Institute and transnational non-profits such as Inclusive Development and Watch Indonesia, the complaint is being submitted to the German Federal Office for Economic Affairs and Export Control. Legal analysts say this case is far more than a local environmental dispute: it is a test case that will shape future regulatory and legal frameworks across the European Union, as multiple member states move to implement their own mandatory supply chain regulations aligned with Germany’s model by 2028.

    “This current wave of complaints is exceptionally significant, because outcomes from these early cases will guide how other EU nations structure their own legislation,” explained Annabell Brüggemann, a legal expert with the Berlin-based European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights. Resistance to extractive projects in the Kendeng Mountains is not new, but the ability to bring claims under German domestic law marks a major shift in how global communities can challenge corporate activity.

    The Indonesian case is part of a rapidly growing trend of transnational climate and corporate accountability litigation emerging across Asia and the Global South. In recent years, affected communities across Cambodia, Pakistan, the Philippines, and other regions have launched similar legal action against major European firms including energy giant Shell and apparel brand Adidas. In 2023, Indonesian fishers from Pari Island filed a climate complaint against Swiss cement manufacturer Holcim, which is currently appealing a Swiss court decision to allow the case to proceed. Just last year, nearly 70 survivors of Super Typhoon Rai in the Philippines brought a claim against Shell, arguing the company’s historical greenhouse gas emissions amplified the storm’s destructive impact, while 40 Pakistani farmers filed a joint complaint against Heidelberg Materials and German energy firm RWE over the companies’ role in worsening the 2022 Pakistan floods that killed more than 1,700 people.

    For multinational European companies that have long operated in Asian markets with less stringent environmental regulations, this growing wave of litigation introduces new material financial and reputational risks, said Jameela Joy Reyes, a climate governance researcher at the London-based Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment. “The transboundary nature of these cases is a groundbreaking development, and we can expect to see far more of these claims in the coming years,” Reyes noted. “These cases are pushing a larger global conversation about climate reparations, and accountability for corporations that have profited for decades from extracting resources from Global South nations.”

    Laurie Parsons, a researcher at Royal Holloway, University of London and author of *Carbon Colonialism*, said Germany’s supply chain law has already transformed the landscape for communities affected by corporate activity worldwide. “It has not only created new legal pathways; it has shifted the mindset of both companies and governments about what accountability for global corporate activity can look like,” Parsons said. Brüggemann added that the Indonesian case makes clear the growing demand for corporate accountability globally. “This case demonstrates how strong the movement for corporate accountability is, and how urgent the need for regulation of the globalized economy has become,” she said.

    As of 2024, the Grantham Research Institute tracks nearly 3,000 climate-related legal cases across 60 countries, with at least 226 new cases filed in the first half of this year alone, reflecting a steady upward trend in transnational climate litigation.

  • Australian officials ask fans to respect the privacy of Neil, a 1-ton seal who respects nothing

    Australian officials ask fans to respect the privacy of Neil, a 1-ton seal who respects nothing

    A thousand-kilogram, 5-year-old male elephant seal named Neil has made his biannual return to the southern Tasmanian coast where he was born, and this year his visit has thrown small beachside communities into disarray — while turning him into an unexpected global social media sensation. After spending months fattening up on open ocean feeding grounds, Neil hauled himself ashore in June for his annual resting and molting period, bringing his massive bulk (equivalent to the weight of a compact car) straight into populated urban areas, where his antics have left a trail of damaged infrastructure and captivated millions of online followers.

    Neil’s list of local “offenses” reads like a small-town crime report: he has bent metal traffic bollards, crushed a public safety seal warning sign, flattened a fence when he tried to climb over it, and frequently sprawls across paved roads and public sidewalks, bringing local movement and commerce to a complete standstill. During this, his 12th recorded return to Tasmanian shores, he has added new misdeeds to his reputation: picking scuffles with parked cars and smashing through temporary barriers erected to keep him away from busy roadways. With no other juvenile male elephant seals in the region to practice with, Neil’s roughhousing is just natural instinct, according to marine biologists. Sophia Volzke, an elephant seal researcher at the University of Tasmania in Hobart, explained that young male elephant seals build strength and fighting technique for future adult dominance battles, where males compete for breeding opportunities by rearing up and crashing their chests against one another. With no partners his size around, parked cars and roadside infrastructure have become Neil’s training stands-in.

    His mischievous, unapologetic behavior has earned him a cult following online, with more than 1.4 million followers on TikTok alone — a number more than double the entire human population of Tasmania. Many online fans have even embraced Neil as a tongue-in-cheek anti-authoritarian hero, celebrating his refusal to stick to designated wild spaces and ignore human rules. What makes Neil’s presence in Tasmania unusual is that he is the only mature male elephant seal that regularly hauls ashore on the state’s coasts. While breeding populations of elephant seals reside on Sub-Antarctic islands hundreds of kilometers south of Tasmania, Neil’s mother traveled from one of these groups to give birth to him on Tasmania’s shore. Female elephant seals have been spotted on Tasmanian beaches before, but they rarely grow larger than Neil was at age two, so they never cause the same level of disruption that comes with his current size.

    Volzke noted that Neil’s return may also be a sign of a larger ecological shift: after human activity wiped out local elephant seal populations decades ago, the species may slowly be recolonizing its former habitat. “We do need to find a way to coexist,” she said.

    But for local officials, Neil’s viral fame is a dangerous double-edged sword. They have issued urgent public warnings that the thousands of fans flocking to catch a glimpse of the massive seal are putting both human lives and Neil’s future at risk. At a press conference Thursday, Kris Carlyon, a wildlife official with Tasmania’s Department of Natural Resources and Environment, pleaded with followers to give Neil space and avoid sharing his exact current location with online audiences. Carlyon pointed to multiple already documented reckless incidents, where visitors have carried small infants within meters of Neil just to snap a viral photo for Instagram.

    Carlyon warned that a single serious negative encounter between a reckless visitor and Neil could force wildlife officials to move Neil from his traditional habitat — or worse, referencing the 2023 case of Freya, a wild walrus that drew massive tourist crowds in Norway before officials euthanized her over growing public safety risks. “There is a risk here of essentially loving Neil to death,” Carlyon said. If Neil survives to reach sexual maturity around age 10, he could grow to 16 feet long and triple his current 1,000-kilogram weight, making future interactions even more high-stakes. Volzke added that roughly 90% of juvenile male elephant seals do not survive to breeding age, so Neil’s survival is already uncertain.

    Local reactions to Neil’s visit are deeply mixed. Some residents, like Dale Creamer, who has not been personally inconvenienced by the seal’s occupation of public space, embrace his fame. “He’s one of our biggest exports at the moment,” Creamer said. “It’s Neil’s world and we’re just living in it.” As of Thursday, Neil has settled into a stretch of sidewalk near a bend in the coast, claiming a small puddle surrounded by toppled bollards as his personal resting spot, remaining unmoved even after rangers tried to usher him elsewhere. Fans have already fallen for his latest casual stunt: he has been spotted playfully nudging and canoodling with an orange traffic cone, a new bit of behavior that has already sent the internet into a fresh wave of delight. For now, the town waits, adjusts, and hopes that the giant seal’s celebrity does not end in tragedy.

  • Hind Rajab Foundation calls on top prosecutor to investigate Ben Gvir ahead of NYC visit

    Hind Rajab Foundation calls on top prosecutor to investigate Ben Gvir ahead of NYC visit

    Two prominent human rights organizations have formally called on New York’s top law enforcement official to open a criminal probe into a far-right Israeli government minister ahead of his scheduled public appearance in Manhattan next week.

    The Hind Rajab Foundation (HRF), a two-year-old accountability group focused on pursuing legal action against Israeli officials and military personnel accused of involvement in atrocities against Palestinians, joined forces with the New York-based Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) to deliver an official letter to New York State Attorney General Letitia James this Thursday. The filing urges James to launch a criminal investigation into Itamar Ben Gvir, Israel’s Minister of National Security, who is set to attend the Chief of Police Summit in Manhattan from July 7 to 8.

    Ben Gvir has long been a controversial figure, known for his overtly hostile, violent rhetoric targeting Palestinians and Muslim communities globally. He was previously sanctioned by the Biden administration over his documented role in encouraging deadly violence carried out by Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank, a punitive measure that former President Donald Trump reversed in one of his first actions after taking office last year.

    Beyond his history of incitement, the groups outline multiple allegations of misconduct tied to Ben Gvir, including his direct role in distributing firearms and gun permits to Israeli settlers in the occupied West Bank as part of what the letter frames as Israel’s state-led policy of apartheid and forced dispossession of Palestinian land. The letter also accuses Ben Gvir of direct incitement to genocide against Palestinian people in Gaza, where Israeli military operations have killed more than 73,000 Palestinians since the October 7, 2023 Hamas attacks.

    The organizations claim there is credible, reasonable evidence that Ben Gvir has violated at least nine separate provisions of the New York Penal Code, creating legal standing for an investigation within the state. They are also calling on James to meet directly with local New York-based victims who say they have been harmed by Ben Gvir. These survivors include a Palestinian American who was subjected to torture and starvation while detained in an Israeli prison, as well as 10 participants in the 2025 and 2026 Global Sumud Flotillas who allege Ben Gvir directly ordered or oversaw their abuse.

    HRF’s U.S. representative Jake Romm told Middle East Eye in an interview Thursday that the attorney general has a clear legal and ethical obligation to act. “The ball is in her court; she needs to meet with these people. They are New Yorkers. They deserve the protection of the law, and she has an obligation to bring justice,” Romm said. The groups are additionally pushing James to establish a specialized Atrocity Crimes Accountability Task Force within the state criminal justice division, focused specifically on investigating claims against Israeli officials and crimes stemming from Israeli state policy.

    While James’ office operates independently from New York’s executive political leadership, she maintains a close political alliance with New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, one of the most prominent U.S. political voices critical of Israeli government policy toward Palestinians. Romm noted that this political context, paired with shifting public opinion across the U.S. and particularly in New York, creates a more favorable opening for the request to gain traction.

    “In New York, I do think there’s more of a political will,” Romm said. “We saw with the primaries these candidates’ stances on Palestine played a major role in this election. It also played a major role in the mayoral election. And I mean truthfully, the majority of the country is against Israel’s actions in Palestine and Lebanon.”

    Brad Parker, associate director of policy at CCR, emphasized that growing impunity for Israeli officials at the federal level makes state-level action all the more critical. CCR, a progressive legal advocacy non-profit, has already taken on high-profile cases representing pro-Palestine students targeted by the Trump administration, and has a long history of human rights advocacy related to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. “Israeli officials like Ben Gvir enjoy near complete impunity. When [US President Donald] Trump is complicit and works to foster that impunity, it is imperative that New York State officials act to challenge it,” Parker said in the organizations’ joint press release.

    HRF, for its part, has already built a track record of legal action against Israeli actors, bringing cases against senior state officials, military commanders, and lower-ranking soldiers accused of complicity in what the group frames as ongoing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.

  • Hong Kong bookseller Lam Wing-kee, seized by Chinese authorities in 2015, dies in Taiwan at 70

    Hong Kong bookseller Lam Wing-kee, seized by Chinese authorities in 2015, dies in Taiwan at 70

    Veteran Hong Kong bookseller Lam Wing-kee, who became a globally recognized symbol of resistance against Beijing’s tightening restrictions on free speech after his 2015 abduction by Chinese authorities, has passed away in Taipei, Taiwan, Taiwan’s official Central News Agency reported Friday, citing an anonymous familiar source.

    No official cause of death has been released, but details shared by the outlet indicate the 70-year-old had experienced a recurrence of cancer last year, and was admitted to Taipei’s MacKay Memorial Hospital earlier this week. After slipping into a coma on Wednesday, Lam died on Thursday evening, the report added.

    Lam, who spent years working at Hong Kong’s iconic Causeway Bay Books, fled to Taipei in 2019 amid growing fears that he would face politically motivated legal charges under Hong Kong’s new national security law. A year after relocating, he fulfilled his long-held goal by reopening the iconic bookstore under the same name in the Taiwanese capital. Earlier this year, in June, Lam told the Central News Agency he had been forced to temporarily shut down the Taipei store due to his declining health, and could not confirm when or if the shop would welcome customers again.

    News of Lam’s death drew immediate condolences from Taiwanese leadership. President Lai Ching-te shared a statement on his official Facebook page honoring Lam’s legacy. “The passing of Mr Lam Wing-kee is deeply saddening, but the courage he left behind would not fade,” Lai wrote. “Taiwan will remember that a Hong Kong bookstore worker once told us in the most ordinary yet most steadfast way how precious freedom is and reminded us that democracy requires the efforts of generation after generation to defend it.”

    Lam’s rise as an international figure for free expression began in late 2015, when he became one of five people connected to Causeway Bay Books who disappeared within a span of months. The bookstore had long drawn the ire of Chinese authorities for selling texts that alleged to expose unreported details of Chinese Communist Party leadership’s personal lives and alleged political scandals. Among the five missing booksellers was publisher Gui Minhai, who vanished from his vacation home in Thailand before ultimately being sentenced to 10 years in prison in China on charges of illegally providing state intelligence overseas.

    In a bold act of defiance that shocked Beijing’s official narrative, Lam spoke publicly in 2016 to share a firsthand, explosive account of his abduction that directly contradicted the Chinese government’s official version of events. He told reporters that plainclothes Chinese agents seized him in October 2015, immediately after he crossed the border from Hong Kong into the mainland city of Shenzhen. He was blindfolded for a 13-hour train ride to Ningbo, a coastal city in eastern China, where he was held in solitary confinement in a small room for five months, with two-person surveillance teams rotating around the clock to monitor his every move, Lam said. He added that after months of detention, he was forced to deliver a scripted televised confession to criminal charges to be broadcast across mainland China.

    Lam’s death comes as authorities in Beijing and Hong Kong have continued to ramp up restrictions on political and press freedom in the semi-autonomous territory, following mass pro-democracy protests that swept Hong Kong in 2019. Just this past June, Hong Kong police arrested two individuals under the sweeping national security law, accusing them of selling seditious publications and receiving funding from foreign political organizations, marking the latest in a years-long crackdown on independent speech in the city.

  • Instagram running ads promoting child sexual abuse material in India, BBC finds

    Instagram running ads promoting child sexual abuse material in India, BBC finds

    A groundbreaking undercover investigation by BBC Eye has exposed a disturbing criminal operation: paid advertisements promoting child sexual abuse material (CSAM) are actively circulating on Instagram, one of the world’s most popular social media platforms, across India.

    The investigation began after BBC researchers observed that Instagram’s algorithm was pushing sexually suggestive content to users even when no explicit search for such material had been conducted. To probe this issue further, the BBC created an anonymous alias account based in India, which followed 10 accounts featuring Indian women posting about daily life topics like food and weather, while using revealing clothing and sexual innuendo in their content. In less than seven days, the account started being served explicit ads, first for adult pornography and nude content, and soon after for CSAM that linked directly to paid channels on the messaging platform Telegram.

    Over the course of the investigation, roughly 30 unique CSAM advertisements appeared on the account’s feed, alongside an additional 20 ads for unregulated adult pornography. Both distribution of CSAM and adult pornography are classified as serious criminal offenses under Indian law, and Meta — Instagram’s parent company — has explicit public policies prohibiting ads that contain nudity, sexual exploitation, or content that endangers children. The ads included graphic, exploitative content: one depicted two pre-teen children estimated to be around 12 years old engaged in a sexual act, while another showed a 52-year-old man with a 12-year-old girl with text inviting viewers to click through to a Telegram channel to watch more content. When the BBC reported an ad featuring a crying young girl labelled as a sexual assault victim to Instagram’s moderation team, the platform replied 24 hours later that the ad did not violate its community guidelines and refused to remove it.

    All pre-publication ad reviews on Instagram are conducted via Meta’s moderation system, which the company says vets every ad before it goes live. The system relies primarily on automated technology to scan content, with uncertain cases escalated to human reviewers. In a March 2026 announcement, Meta said it would reduce its reliance on third-party human moderators and shift further toward AI-powered moderation, claiming that expert teams would oversee and refine the new systems.

    After the BBC shared its full findings with Meta, the company said it had disabled multiple violating ads, suspended the accounts behind them, and blocked offending URLs in line with its policies. Meta also pushed back against criticism, saying in an official statement: “Child exploitation is a horrific crime and Meta works aggressively to fight it on our apps.” The company denied claims that it prioritizes revenue over user safety, noting that it automatically disabled more than four million accounts in 2025 for suspicious behavior linked to child exploitation. Meta added that it complies with all legal requirements to report suspected CSAM to the U.S.-based National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC), the global central clearinghouse for CSAM reports. When reached for comment by the BBC, Meta acknowledged that “no system is perfect” and that automated reviews may miss some policy violations.

    The CSAM ads direct users to Telegram channels where the exploitative content can be purchased for as little as 99 Indian rupees, equal to roughly $1. When the BBC reported two of these CSAM-selling channels to Telegram, one was removed for violating the platform’s terms of service, while the other remained active and continued posting new content for sale. Telegram has faced longstanding criticism for insufficient action against criminal content sharing, and it is not a member of either NCMEC or the Internet Watch Foundation, two leading global organizations that partner with platforms to detect and remove CSAM. In a response to the BBC, Telegram said it uses a combination of automated and human moderation to remove CSAM, and claimed it has “virtually eliminated the public spread of CSAM from its platform.” The company also noted that it removed more than 274,000 CSAM-linked groups and channels in 2026.

    The investigation has sparked sharp condemnation from legal and law enforcement experts in India. Retired Indian Supreme Court Justice Madan Lokur told the BBC he believes Instagram is “making money by participating in a criminal activity.” Lokur called the issue severe enough that India’s Supreme Court should initiate suo moto cognisance — an automatic legal proceeding without a formal complaint being filed — to force government action against the platform. He added that while Indian law shields platforms from liability for user-uploaded content in many cases, “the platform cannot, cannot shirk its responsibility.”

    Former Meta executive Brian Boland, who served as a vice president at Facebook (Meta’s predecessor brand) between 2009 and 2020 and helped build the company’s advertising business, told the BBC he was “horrified and unsurprised” by the investigation’s findings. Boland, who left Meta in 2020 because he believed the company did not prioritize user safety, explained that Instagram’s algorithm is intentionally designed to maximize user engagement and time on platform by serving increasingly extreme and titillating content. “It’s not like an algorithm that says ‘let’s make people paedophiles’, but because they’re not responsibly guiding and controlling it – and it’s just pursuing the goals of revenue and clicks – it will create these outcomes if people aren’t being truly, aggressively protective over these systems,” Boland said. He added that early in his tenure, he was authorized to remove a large share of revenue-generating scam ads to protect users, but over time the company began prioritizing revenue gains over user safety. Boland deleted his own Instagram account in 2025, and urged mass user action to force Meta to change its policies.

    Boland testified against Meta earlier this year in a trial in New Mexico, where the company was found liable for misleading the public about the safety of its platforms for children. The court ordered Meta to pay $375 million in damages, a ruling the company has said it will appeal.

    Advertising makes up nearly 98% of Meta’s total annual revenue, which hit $200 billion in the 2025 financial year, and analysts estimate advertising accounts for over 90% of Instagram’s standalone revenue.

    Indian law enforcement and child welfare organizations have long flagged Meta platforms as the most common source of CSAM reports in the country. Shikha Goel, director of the Cyber Security Bureau in the southern Indian state of Telangana, noted that Meta platforms generate more CSAM reports to the NCMEC tipline than any other provider operating in India. In 2025, India received 1.9 million CSAM reports via the NCMEC system, second only to the United States’ 2 million reports. Goel added that higher reporting volumes may reflect better detection systems, not simply more content. The Mumbai-based Rati Foundation, an NGO that runs a helpline for children affected by online harm, confirmed that the vast majority of CSAM reports it receives come from Meta platforms. Rati co-founder Siddharth Pillai told the BBC that criminals exploit the seamless connection between Instagram and Telegram to evade moderation: after one piece of content is removed, offenders simply reupload it to a new channel. Experts note that most CSAM in India is produced by organized criminal groups like human trafficking networks, though community and family members are sometimes responsible for exploitation. Many offenders go unreported, and Indian law enforcement is still building the technical expertise needed to tackle the transnational crime. Bhuwan Ribhu, founder of child welfare network Just Rights for Children, said cross-border international cooperation and intelligence sharing are critical to dismantling these criminal networks, saying “the entire chain of demand and supply needs to be tracked” to root out the crime. The BBC has formally shared all evidence of the ads and Telegram channels with Indian law enforcement authorities.

  • Possible super typhoon threatens US Pacific territories still recovering from last storm

    Possible super typhoon threatens US Pacific territories still recovering from last storm

    Residents across U.S. territories in the western Pacific entered a state of emergency preparation Friday as they brace for an approaching storm forecast to strengthen into a super typhoon, arriving just months after the region was battered by the most powerful tropical cyclone recorded on Earth this year. The U.S. Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands is still picking up the pieces from April’s Super Typhoon Sinlaku, which brought destructive, gale-force winds and torrential, unrelenting rainfall that left lasting damage across the archipelago. As of Friday, full electrical service had not been restored across the islands, and dozens of residents whose homes were leveled by the storm continue to live in temporary tent shelters.

    Edwin Propst, a former legislator who now serves in the Saipan governor’s office, called the timing of the new storm nothing short of catastrophic. “We’re getting ready to do this all over again,” he said Friday, as the first outer bands of the system began to approach the island. “The timing is terrible.”

    Paul Stanko, senior meteorologist with the National Weather Service’s Guam office, told reporters that Typhoon Bavi was on track to intensify into a super typhoon by late Sunday or early Monday, when it is projected to make landfall in the Mariana Islands chain. The threshold for classification as a super typhoon is maximum sustained wind speeds of 150 miles per hour (241 kilometers per hour) or higher, a strength equivalent to an upper-tier Category 4 or Category 5 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson scale, Stanko explained. As of Friday afternoon, Bavi was located 760 miles (1,223 kilometers) east of Guam, with measured sustained winds of 80 mph (129 kph), and continuing to gain strength as it moves west across the Pacific.

    Stanko noted that a growing number of Guam residents have expressed a quiet hope that the island will absorb the full force of Bavi, sparing the still-recovering Northern Marianas from another catastrophic blow. “That’s what we’re actually hoping for because then Saipan wouldn’t get it as bad,” he said. Propst confirmed that this sentiment is widespread across the region, calling the gesture a reflection of close-knit island community values. “That’s so island-style,” he said. “God bless them for saying that.”

    Guam, which lies west of the International Date Line, is nicknamed “Where America’s Day Begins” due to it being multiple hours ahead of Hawaii, Alaska, and the entire U.S. mainland. The island is also a key strategic outpost for the U.S. military, hosting two large active-duty bases.

    Propst reported that residents across the region have already begun prepping for the storm: covering home and business windows with plywood, stockpiling drinking water and non-perishable food, and queuing for gasoline at filling stations — a repeat of the long lines that lasted for weeks after Sinlaku knocked out power to most fuel infrastructure.

    The Rev. Francis Hezel, assistant pastor of Santa Barbara Catholic Church in Dededo, Guam, said he holds out hope that no island will suffer a direct hit. A long-time Guam resident who has weathered dozens of typhoons over decades, Hezel said he remains cautiously optimistic that Bavi will shift course before reaching populated areas. “Right now the pattern is heading towards us, but those patterns change,” he noted. Even so, he said, church staff and local residents have not cut corners on preparedness, adding that frequent typhoon drills have become a new way of life for the region. “This is getting to be the normal thing now, typhoon preparedness,” he said. “It’s happening more frequently.”

    Climate scientists link the increasing frequency of intense Pacific typhoons in part to the current El Niño event, a natural ocean warming cycle that amplifies tropical cyclone activity across the eastern and central Pacific. Experts warn that this natural warming is compounded by human-caused climate change driven by fossil fuel emissions, which has already raised global average ocean and atmospheric temperatures, creating conditions that supercharge extreme weather events across the globe.

    While Sinlaku did not claim any lives on land in the Northern Marianas, Propst said residents are still grieving six crew members who died when their cargo ship overturned during the storm. Search teams recovered the body of one crew member, but the U.S. Coast Guard ended a more than 100-hour search operation without locating the remaining five. Though recovery efforts after Sinlaku have made steady progress, Propst said the region is still not fully back on its feet. “A few more months would have been good,” he said of the time needed to fully rebuild.

  • Gaza’s breast cancer patients face immediate mastectomies as doctors plead for end to blockade

    Gaza’s breast cancer patients face immediate mastectomies as doctors plead for end to blockade

    On Thursday, medical practitioners and public health experts across the Gaza Strip marked a grim milestone: 1,000 days of unrelenting humanitarian crisis, issuing an urgent plea for the global community to impose targeted pressure on Israel to end its 16-year blockade of the enclave and lift a sweeping ban on life-saving critical medical and sanitation supplies—including basic chlorine bleach used to disinfect hospital facilities.

    The appeal came during a virtual briefing organized by Doctors Against Genocide, the global non-profit, where participating clinicians and sector leaders painted a catastrophic picture of a collapsed health system that can barely meet the needs of healthy Gaza residents, let alone vulnerable groups including elderly people, disabled individuals, and patients living with chronic pre-existing conditions. These conditions have drastically worsened following the October 7, 2023 Hamas-led attacks on southern Israel and the subsequent large-scale Israeli military campaign in Gaza.

    Official data from the Gaza Ministry of Health confirms the devastating toll on the enclave’s healthcare infrastructure: Israel’s military operations have killed more than 1,700 medical personnel, destroyed 38 hospitals either partially or completely, and damaged or destroyed nearly 200 ambulances across the blockaded territory.

    Dr. Ahmed Shatat, director general of International Cooperation and Planning in Gaza, explained that urgent, invasive procedures have become the standard of care for patients who would normally receive targeted, less radical treatment. “Women with breast cancer are undergoing immediate mastectomies because it’s the fastest way to save their lives when there are no deeper diagnostic tools or cancer drugs,” Shatat reported during the briefing. He added that the enclave has lost access to even the most essential diagnostic equipment: “Previously, we were holding seven MRI machines. Now we have not even one MRI machine – zero – in the Gaza Strip.”

    The crisis extends equally to cardiac care, a specialty that once served tens of thousands of chronic patients across Gaza. “Out of the cardiac catheterisation machines, we were handling seven. Now we are just working in one old machine… with no availability of a stent for catheterisation,” Shatat said. Cardiac catheterization is a common, life-saving procedure used to detect blockages that can trigger fatal heart attacks, making preventive care for heart disease all but impossible today.

    For a region that built a reputation for robust medical training and functional infrastructure even through 16 years of Israeli siege, preventive medicine is now an unattainable luxury. Vaccination rates across the enclave have plummeted from 96 percent to just 80 percent, opening the door to a surge in preventable infectious diseases. Cases of scabies, gastroenteritis, and Hepatitis A have skyrocketed, as the collapse of clean water access leaves residents unable to maintain basic personal hygiene.

    Dr. Munir al-Barsh, head of the water and environment sector in Gaza, reported that water output from local wells has fallen to just one-third of levels seen before October 7 2023, and even that limited supply is often contaminated by raw waste that has seeped into groundwater following infrastructure damage. Most large-scale desalination projects are non-operational, as chronic fuel shortages prevent running the machinery needed to deliver safe drinking water to residents. Most alarmingly, al-Barsh confirmed that even chlorine, a low-cost, essential disinfectant for water and medical facilities, is blocked from entering Gaza by Israeli restrictions.

    Israeli officials assert that between 600 and 800 aid trucks are cleared to enter Gaza daily. But independent analysis from the non-profit Refugees International contradicts this claim, finding that the vast majority of these trucks carry commercial goods for private traders rather than life-saving humanitarian and medical supplies.

    As of the briefing, the Gaza Ministry of Health puts the total number of Palestinians killed in the current campaign at 73,066, with more than 1,000 additional fatalities recorded since the United States announced a fragile ceasefire declaration on October 10. Counting both killed and injured residents, the total number of casualties reaches 250,000—equal to 12.5 percent of Gaza’s entire population. Dr. Mustafa Barghouti, president of the Palestinian Medical Relief Society, framed the scale of harm for a global audience: “Apply that number to the United States of America, and you will be talking about no less than 36 million people killed or injured. You can imagine what the United States would have done if one million Americans were injured or killed.”

    Beyond the visible physical damage and death toll, a growing mental health crisis has overwhelmed the enclave’s limited care system, where most providers have themselves lost at least one family member to Israeli fire. Abdullah el-Jamal, a psychiatric consultant based in Gaza, explained that widespread trauma far outstrips the capacity of local doctors and social workers. He shared the story of a 32-year-old woman struggling with severe depression and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) who was referred to a local psychologist—only for the psychologist to turn the case away, as she herself had recently lost her own son in the conflict. “We don’t know how to deal with this situation,” el-Jamal said. “We need a lot of support.”

    Today, roughly two million of Gaza’s 2.3 million residents are displaced, with close to 500,000 buildings destroyed or rendered uninhabitable by bombardment. Despite the catastrophic conditions, Barghouti maintained a message of steadfastness. “We are steadfast,” he said. “Although we lost maybe almost 22,000 children in Gaza killed by the genocide… [there are now] 82,000 newborn children… These are signs of the resistance of the Palestinian people.”

    This reporting is based on independent original coverage from Middle East Eye, a publication focused on independent reporting and analysis of the Middle East, North Africa and broader global region.

  • Carney and Marcos deepen Canada-Philippines ties as Ottawa looks beyond US trade

    Carney and Marcos deepen Canada-Philippines ties as Ottawa looks beyond US trade

    VANCOUVER, British Columbia – In a diplomatic move aligned with Canada’s broader strategy to expand economic engagement beyond its traditional reliance on the United States, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney and Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. have committed to strengthening bilateral collaboration across trade, energy, and security sectors during their meeting on Thursday. This agreement marks a key milestone in Canada’s deepening involvement in the dynamic Indo-Pacific region.\n\nAddressing the long-standing people-to-people connection between the two nations, Carney emphasized that the 1 million-strong Filipino community in Canada forms an integral social and economic backbone of the country. He noted that a targeted strategic partnership between Ottawa and Manila would deliver mutual gains on two pressing global priorities: bolstering regional energy security and expanding access to critical minerals, resources that are essential to the global transition to clean energy and advanced manufacturing supply chains.\n\nMarcos echoed Carney’s positive outlook, stating that the two nations share aligned global ambitions and common strategic goals that create a strong foundation for enhanced cooperation.\n\nDuring the talks, the two leaders laid out clear next steps for bilateral collaboration: they formally committed to advancing negotiations toward a comprehensive Canada-Philippines free trade agreement, deepening defense and maritime cooperation across the Indo-Pacific, and leveraging the tight-knit Filipino-Canadian community to drive stronger people-to-people and economic ties.\n\nCurrently, Canada is pursuing two parallel trade tracks in Southeast Asia: a bilateral deal with the Philippines and a separate broader agreement with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) bloc. Carney has set an ambitious target to finalize these negotiations ahead of his scheduled November visit to Manila, where Marcos will assume the rotating chair of the annual ASEAN summit, providing a high-profile platform to announce progress on trade cooperation.\n\nThis push for diversified trade ties stems from a deliberate policy shift by the Carney administration. The prime minister has set a national goal to double Canada’s non-U.S. exports over the next 10 years, a target shaped by ongoing trade frictions and persistent American tariffs that have created uncertainty for cross-border investment and slowed business confidence in bilateral trade channels.