https://www.scmp.com/rss/322194/feed Yonden Lhatoo started his journalism career in print, covering the far-reaching changes Hong Kong went through before and during the city’s handover to China, as a senior newspaper reporter. He switched to broadcast journalism after the transfer of sovereignty in 1997 and worked as a television news anchor and editor for nearly two decades. He was the main anchor and editor-in-chief of ATV’s English news department before joining the South China Morning Post as a senior editor and eventually... en https://assets.i-scmp.com/static/img/icons/scmp-meta-1200x630.png https://www.scmp.com Yonden Lhatoo Yonden Lhatoo The thing about every ridiculous or outrageous public statement coming from US President Donald Trump and his cronies is how the world responds with a token bit of collective pearl-clutching and then moves on like nothing has happened until the next shocker. That’s why it’s important to keep reminding everyone what kind of people are now, in their own words, “running the world” from the White House. A case in point is the vile racism that US Vice-President J.D. Vance spewed recently while going... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/3310532/racists-and-losers-jd-vance-and-americas-stupid-trade-war?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/3310532/racists-and-losers-jd-vance-and-americas-stupid-trade-war?utm_source=rss_feed Thu, 15 May 2025 15:12:27 +0000 Heaven hath no rage like love to hatred turned, nor hell a fury like a city scorned. That’s why Hong Kong hates Lionel Messi now. And it’s a totally understandable sentiment, given how the Argentine football star has not only insulted his many fans here by sitting out the much-vaunted exhibition match they paid exorbitant prices to watch, but also rubbed salt on their wounds with his churlish behaviour. Messi deserves to bear the brunt of public anger, but the minders of his Inter Miami squad,... https://www.scmp.com/comment/opinion/hong-kong/article/3251036/hong-kong-hates-messi-and-he-deserves-it?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/comment/opinion/hong-kong/article/3251036/hong-kong-hates-messi-and-he-deserves-it?utm_source=rss_feed Mon, 05 Feb 2024 23:30:08 +0000 Wait, what really happened at the United States Consulate General in Hong Kong on October 27 when four young anti-China activists suddenly turned up at the gates with the intention of seeking asylum? The official silence from the US and Beijing governments has been deafening – which is kind of understandable, given the high political sensitivity and potential for a damaging flare-up at a time of extreme tensions between the two powers, with Hong Kong caught in the middle – but let’s look at what... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3107920/useful-idiots-just-plain-idiots-now-how-us-has-betrayed-hong-kong?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3107920/useful-idiots-just-plain-idiots-now-how-us-has-betrayed-hong-kong?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 31 Oct 2020 08:58:04 +0000 Just like the young Dick Whittington of English folklore who found out the hard way centuries ago that the streets of London were not in fact paved with gold, many Hongkongers getting excited over Britain’s great offer of a “pathway to citizenship” are in for bitter disappointment. Purportedly out of overwhelming concern for the safety of their loyal former colonial subjects, the people in charge of good ol’ Blighty announced this week that they were creating a special class of visa for... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3106950/uk-peddling-citizenship-pipe-dream-naive-hongkongers?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3106950/uk-peddling-citizenship-pipe-dream-naive-hongkongers?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 24 Oct 2020 13:44:28 +0000 Love him or loathe him, everyone is talking about US President Donald Trump dad-dancing on the campaign trail to the beat of YMCA, the 1970s hit song by American disco band the Village People. Video clips of his dance moves, an awkward combination of intermittent fist-pumping, swaying, knee-bobbing, finger-pointing and clapping, have gone viral and make for compulsive viewing. But it’s the incongruity of the iconic song itself in the context of his rightwing, conservative, Bible-thumping,... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3105954/whats-donald-trump-and-his-ymca-dad-dance?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3105954/whats-donald-trump-and-his-ymca-dad-dance?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 17 Oct 2020 12:20:38 +0000 Let’s hit the rewind button to go back to a little piece of news that hardly got any traction this past week because of the focus on far more sensational stories ranging from the White House becoming a Covid-19 Petri dish to the endless social and political fallout from the imposition of the new national security law in Hong Kong. I’m talking about the open and rampant racism and discrimination that members of this city’s ethnic minority communities are up against when hunting for affordable... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3104984/not-just-greedy-also-racist-hong-kong-landlords-covid-proof-attitude?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3104984/not-just-greedy-also-racist-hong-kong-landlords-covid-proof-attitude?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 10 Oct 2020 10:16:10 +0000 “It’s called karma and it’s pronounced ha ha ha,” the sarcastic saying goes, and the whole world seems to be rubbing it in after US President Donald Trump and his wife, Melania, came down with Covid-19. Dictionary publisher Merriam-Webster reported a 30,500 per cent surge in searches for the meaning of “Schadenfreude”, which it defines as “enjoyment obtained from the troubles of others”. The lack of sympathy is fully understandable, considering this is the man who, just days ago, was publicly... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3104063/how-it-ok-wish-donald-trump-would-die-covid-19?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3104063/how-it-ok-wish-donald-trump-would-die-covid-19?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 03 Oct 2020 14:41:11 +0000 Some weeks ago, I faced the prospect of hunting for a taxi after a dinner event in a part of town that is off my beaten track, and was rescued by a very kind gentleman who offered me a ride in his official car back to civilisation as I know it. He was the head of Canberra’s consulate-general in Hong Kong and, like just about every Australian I’ve met over so many years, he came across as a typical product of his country – friendly, helpful and down to earth. My impression of the people from down... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3103185/australias-travel-warning-hong-kong-dodgy-dishonest-and-just-not?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3103185/australias-travel-warning-hong-kong-dodgy-dishonest-and-just-not?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 26 Sep 2020 12:49:40 +0000 It’s not quite like the world is waiting with bated breath, but we’ve entered the home stretch for this year’s Nobel Peace Prize, and there’s a bit of a buzz as to whether Hong Kong’s anti-government protesters should be crowned laureates. It would be a politically charged, China-bashing choice by the Norwegian Nobel Committee that decides this much-vaunted trophy, tying nicely with the ongoing crusade against all things Chinese by the US and its loyal Western vassal states. The groundwork for... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3101324/if-hong-kong-protesters-deserve-nobel-peace-prize-what-about-black?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3101324/if-hong-kong-protesters-deserve-nobel-peace-prize-what-about-black?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 12 Sep 2020 13:46:44 +0000 Readers who buy this newspaper in its physical form, rather than access it online, may have noticed a little, illustrated booklet tucked into Friday’s edition. It looks and reads like a children’s picture book, telling the story of the “Sand People” and the “Sea People”, who “have been sceptical about one another, feeding myths and negative beliefs” until one day, two youngsters from the opposing tribes fall in love, Romeo and Juliet-style, and run away from home. That “brings both tribes... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3100385/hong-kong-has-covid-19-under-control-not-real-pandemic-hate-and?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3100385/hong-kong-has-covid-19-under-control-not-real-pandemic-hate-and?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 05 Sep 2020 12:40:47 +0000 Are the chickens finally coming home to roost for cocky little Taiwan? Just this week, China’s coastguard intercepted a boatload of bedraggled anti-government activists from Hong Kong with a one-way ticket to Taiwan. All 12 were arrested for illegally entering mainland Chinese waters. Among them was Andy Li, a previously little-known agitator who faces prosecution back home on charges of collusion with foreign forces and money laundering. He is accused of lobbying Western powers to slap... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3099405/why-does-taiwan-treat-fleeing-hong-kong-activists-illegal-immigrants?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3099405/why-does-taiwan-treat-fleeing-hong-kong-activists-illegal-immigrants?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 29 Aug 2020 11:53:30 +0000 For all the magnanimity, nobility and divine right theory it preaches as it goes about unilaterally righting the world’s wrongs, the United States can be astonishingly bloody minded and ridiculously petty. A case in point is its slapping of sanctions on nearly a dozen top Hong Kong and mainland Chinese officials over the imposition of this city’s national security law. Going beyond the hypocrisy of opposing and blatantly interfering in a sovereign nation’s right to protect itself – while... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3098443/us-encouraging-murderers-and-rapists-hide-hong-kong-suspending?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3098443/us-encouraging-murderers-and-rapists-hide-hong-kong-suspending?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 22 Aug 2020 09:20:04 +0000 Good heavens above and great balls of fire, did US President Donald Trump just consign Hong Kong, like some modern-day Sodom and Gomorrah, to the everlasting fires of hell? Did he, godlike in his omnipotence, condemn us wretched sinners to eternal damnation, declaring us no longer worthy of his grace and radiance that might otherwise have saved our souls? Well, that was pretty much the message, though his exact words over the phone to his acolytes at the right-wing Fox Business news channel... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/3097513/if-hong-kong-going-hell-isnt-trumps-america-already-there?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/3097513/if-hong-kong-going-hell-isnt-trumps-america-already-there?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 15 Aug 2020 11:26:42 +0000 “It is to one’s honour to avoid strife, but every fool is quick to quarrel,” Proverbs chapter 20, verse 3 advises those who are being provoked into a fight. You don’t really have to follow the Scriptures to appreciate the wisdom in these words, but how immensely ironic to see the officially atheist Chinese Communist Party taking the “honourable” road in such a context while the Bible-thumping administration of US President Donald Trump adopts the role of the belligerent “fool” picking all the... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3096597/trumps-america-provoking-real-war-china-will-unthinkable-happen?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3096597/trumps-america-provoking-real-war-china-will-unthinkable-happen?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 08 Aug 2020 09:20:12 +0000 So Hong Kong’s police unit recently set up to enforce the new national security law has issued arrest warrants for half a dozen activists who have fled the city. They’re accused of inciting secession and collusion with foreign forces to endanger national security. The only one of note among this motley crew of self-styled dissidents, would-be freedom fighters and somewhat confused independence advocates, frankly speaking, is Nathan Law Kwun-chung, a bright young man with a once-promising future... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/3095655/price-we-pay-loving-hong-kong-too-much?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/3095655/price-we-pay-loving-hong-kong-too-much?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 01 Aug 2020 09:56:15 +0000 Listen to the screams of panic-stricken passengers, children’s voices among them, crying in terror and calling out prayers, as an Iranian airliner is intercepted and harassed by US warplanes over Syrian air space just the other day. Passengers were left bruised and bloodied after the pilot of the civilian aircraft suddenly changed altitude to avoid a collision with one of the F-15 jets, although the US claimed it kept a safe distance and was only protecting its military base below. There’s... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3094704/trumps-america-has-become-unstoppable-out-control-bully?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3094704/trumps-america-has-become-unstoppable-out-control-bully?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 25 Jul 2020 12:51:32 +0000 “Success breeds complacency. Complacency breeds failure.” That, in a nutshell, explains why Hong Kong is now struggling to contain a resurgence of Covid-19 infections, the so-called third wave and the most alarming so far because of the potential it has to overwhelm our city’s health care system if we don’t get a grip on it soon. To think that just weeks ago this city was the envy of the world for its exemplary efficiency in handling the coronavirus crisis and its remarkable success in putting a... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3093767/hong-kong-stares-covid-19-abyss-and-has-only-itself-blame?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3093767/hong-kong-stares-covid-19-abyss-and-has-only-itself-blame?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 18 Jul 2020 12:23:33 +0000 I received a death threat this week – not really something new, but my first since the arrival of Hong Kong’s much-feared national security law. It came in the form of an email message that assumed I must be feeling “at ease, smug maybe” and warned that I should not be “lulled into a false sense of security” under the new legal regimen. “That would be a terrible error on your part. We watch you at home, we watch you commute from your private residence to work, and we watch you at work. We watch... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3092778/my-first-death-threat-arrival-hong-kongs-much-feared-national?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3092778/my-first-death-threat-arrival-hong-kongs-much-feared-national?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 11 Jul 2020 07:40:49 +0000 Has anyone noticed the recurring martial arts theme when it comes to China versus the world these days? First we have the whole fallout over “kung flu”, a racial slur against Chinese people – and Asians by extension – that US President Donald Trump has legitimised as America vents its frustrations over becoming the Covid-19 basket case of the world. While the coronavirus crisis has seen a surge in hate crimes against Asian-Americans, Trump and his cohorts have no qualms about race-baiting to... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3091839/everybody-loves-kung-fu-fighting-china-these-days-it-seems?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3091839/everybody-loves-kung-fu-fighting-china-these-days-it-seems?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 04 Jul 2020 14:11:13 +0000 So the US has just fired another salvo at China, using Hong Kong as convenient cannon fodder in their steadily heating Cold War. And once again, it was delivered by secretary of state and thug-diplomacy specialist Mike Pompeo. “President [Donald] Trump promised to punish the Chinese Communist Party [CCP] officials who were responsible for eviscerating Hong Kong’s freedoms. Today, we are taking action to do just that,” Pompeo said. “I am announcing visa restrictions on current and former CCP... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/3090847/least-make-america-well-again-first-then-carry-fighting?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/3090847/least-make-america-well-again-first-then-carry-fighting?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 27 Jun 2020 08:47:52 +0000 What really happened on Monday night in the Galwan Valley, a harsh, frozen and godforsaken part of the disputed Aksai Chin-Ladakh region in the western Himalayas? All we know so far about the worst bloodletting between India and China in 60 years of border tensions is what we can glean from Indian media reports. They are mostly unverified, nationalistic, one-sided accounts citing anonymous sources, but will have to suffice in the absence of more official details about what went down in one of... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3089936/savage-horror-india-china-border-clash-serves-warning-avoid?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3089936/savage-horror-india-china-border-clash-serves-warning-avoid?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 20 Jun 2020 14:52:44 +0000 One of the most appalling, distressing and unstomachable aspects of Hong Kong’s great “revolution of our times” has been the mob beatings on the streets. Anyone foolhardy enough to openly express the slightest objection to what those of the militant persuasion among anti-government protesters may be doing, whether it’s throwing petrol bombs, causing traffic chaos or vandalising public property in the name of fighting for our freedoms, is instantly set upon and beaten into a bloody pulp. A recent... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3088951/will-hong-kongs-new-national-security-law-really-put-stop-street?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3088951/will-hong-kongs-new-national-security-law-really-put-stop-street?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 13 Jun 2020 13:47:00 +0000 Remember when the People’s Liberation Army was “deployed” at the height of Hong Kong’s “revolution of our times” last year? Unarmed, in PT shorts and T-shirts, about 50 Chinese soldiers filed out of their Kowloon East barracks to join local residents, firefighters and police officers in clearing the bricks, barbed wire and debris that radical anti-government protesters had blocked the road with. It was a one-off, lasting for an hour, and they jogged back into their barracks, never to be heard of... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3087857/unbearable-hypocrisy-donald-trumps-crackdown-peaceful-us-protests?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3087857/unbearable-hypocrisy-donald-trumps-crackdown-peaceful-us-protests?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 06 Jun 2020 09:04:03 +0000 Here’s a little reality check for America’s many useful idiots in Hong Kong: your great white hope for saving you from China’s clutches, US President Donald Trump, just gave everyone an unpleasant taste of what he really feels about the kind of dissent that has been on display on the streets of this city since last year. Trump’s first response to violent public protests triggered by the death of an unarmed black man in the custody of Minneapolis police, apparently at the hands of a white... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3086823/while-america-burns-donald-trump-busy-fixing-hong-kongs-problems?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3086823/while-america-burns-donald-trump-busy-fixing-hong-kongs-problems?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 30 May 2020 09:24:53 +0000 So Beijing has decided enough is enough and taken matters into its own hands to bulldoze ahead with a national security law tailor-made for Hong Kong, because the city is utterly incapable of fulfilling its constitutional duty to come up with the necessary legislation of its own, 23 years after its return to Chinese sovereignty. And now, the very people who brought all this upon us are having conniptions over what it means for our basic freedoms and fundamentals, which the government is... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3085790/hong-kong-american-or-chinese-territory-beijings-new-national?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3085790/hong-kong-american-or-chinese-territory-beijings-new-national?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 23 May 2020 10:19:19 +0000 We all know US President Donald Trump hates reporters who don’t ask him “nice” questions, and he often clashes with feisty members of the White House press corps who call him out on everything. A striking example was his heated exchange recently with an Asian-American reporter who challenged his hyperbole about the “tremendous” progress he’s made against Covid-19. “Why is this a global competition when, every day, Americans are still losing their lives?” asked the reporter, a Chinese-born US... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3084709/hong-kongs-carrie-lam-can-use-page-donald-trumps-playbook-handle?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3084709/hong-kongs-carrie-lam-can-use-page-donald-trumps-playbook-handle?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 16 May 2020 10:17:38 +0000 A top police officer told me an interesting story about the siege of Polytechnic University last year, when anti-government protesters of the militant persuasion had occupied the campus. He recalled intercepting and arresting a group of youngsters trying to flee the war zone and how he was struck by the reaction of a petrified teenager among them when she was being booked. “Absolutely terrified, shaking,” was how he remembered her. “She thinks I will take her around the back and shoot her.... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3083658/hong-kong-police-need-be-whiter-white-shed-their-black-label?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3083658/hong-kong-police-need-be-whiter-white-shed-their-black-label?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 09 May 2020 12:48:34 +0000 Forget about any thaw in the Cold War between China and the US, exacerbated by the political fallout from the coronavirus pandemic, but the Battle of the Blame Game just got a whole lot hotter with Beijing’s latest, gloves-off broadside. In response to a relentless barrage of American accusations over the origin of Covid-19 and the extent of China’s responsibility and culpability, Communist Party mouthpiece People’s Daily has challenged the US to answer 10 awkward questions suggesting that the... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3082595/china-us-cold-war-heats-coronavirus-conspiracy-and-cover-charges?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3082595/china-us-cold-war-heats-coronavirus-conspiracy-and-cover-charges?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 02 May 2020 10:44:15 +0000 Among the variety of video clips that I’ve come across so far of people running the gamut of human thought, expression and behaviour in their imbecilic to insane responses triggered by the coronavirus pandemic, a recent one from India really tickled my fancy. It features a distressed young man’s sincere plea in the middle of the world’s biggest lockdown to Prime Minister Narendra Modi to “please, sir” open up the liquor shops for a couple of hours. He complains about the unreasonable price of a... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3081549/donald-trumps-coronavirus-cure-ideas-are-not-just-crazy-more?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3081549/donald-trumps-coronavirus-cure-ideas-are-not-just-crazy-more?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 25 Apr 2020 10:07:18 +0000 Exactly how many desperate Hongkongers are trapped in India’s monumental lockdown, pleading for help to get back to the relative safe haven that our city has become in a world ravaged by the coronavirus pandemic? How many of them are “real” Hongkongers who deserve to be rescued? Only the ones who hold Hong Kong passports, or were actually born here? Or do they have to be ethnic Han Chinese to qualify? These all-important prerequisite questions may well have to be answered, perhaps a working... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3080541/if-not-racism-whats-stopping-hong-kong-rescuing-its-citizens-trapped?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3080541/if-not-racism-whats-stopping-hong-kong-rescuing-its-citizens-trapped?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 18 Apr 2020 08:14:58 +0000 By now we must all be familiar with the term “Covidiot”, trending slang in the coronavirus glossary to describe a person whose response to the greatest global health crisis of our times can range from needlessly hoarding daily essentials to recklessly flouting public health warnings and social-distancing protocol. Hong Kong is home to all variants of the species, and they’re on the verge of dismantling every hard-fought milestone achieved in the city’s struggle against Covid-19, as cabin fever... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3079499/coronavirus-social-distancing-becoming-joke-hong-kong-will-end-tears?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3079499/coronavirus-social-distancing-becoming-joke-hong-kong-will-end-tears?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 11 Apr 2020 13:07:51 +0000 “You guys are fat. We have fed you for years. I hope you don’t only talk about the spirit of the contracts. I hope you can talk about the conscience of corporate social responsibility.” The quote of the week comes from Tommy Cheung Yu-yan, the lawmaker representing the catering sector, in calling out Hong Kong’s money-grubbing landlords for not chipping in to ease the burden on commercial tenants whose businesses have been devastated by the coronavirus crisis. I’m not sure if Cheung was... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3078458/greedy-landlords-must-be-forced-cut-rent-coronavirus-crisis?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3078458/greedy-landlords-must-be-forced-cut-rent-coronavirus-crisis?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 04 Apr 2020 12:10:57 +0000 A British colleague whom I’m very fond of tested positive for Covid-19 on the same day that Prime Minister Boris Johnson admitted he had contracted the coronavirus. She had just returned to Hong Kong after a two-week visit to London and Birmingham, and was midway through her mandatory self-quarantine in her little flat when she received the bad news. Tracing her own movements and keeping in mind that she took social-distancing precautions to the extent of isolating herself from her own family in... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3077405/blame-boris-johnson-giving-my-colleague-coronavirus?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3077405/blame-boris-johnson-giving-my-colleague-coronavirus?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 28 Mar 2020 11:24:05 +0000 I can’t help feeling rather resentful about what’s happened over the past week in Hong Kong, and how we’ve squandered all the progress we were making in keeping a lid on coronavirus infections. For starters, I’ve been working from home since an unfortunate infection in the newsroom forced the closure of our headquarters at Times Square. On the flip side, social distancing is a critical part of the war against this scourge that is paralysing the world, and I’m fortunate to have a job that allows... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/3076277/selfish-reckless-people-squander-hong-kongs-hard-fought?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/3076277/selfish-reckless-people-squander-hong-kongs-hard-fought?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 21 Mar 2020 10:15:28 +0000 There’s no dearth of conspiracy theories flying around about the origins of the coronavirus pandemic, from reckless speculation in news reports to silly nonsense spread by social media, and they’re all best left ignored at a time of global panic and paranoia. But when a spokesman for China’s foreign ministry jumps on the tinfoil-hat bandwagon to accuse the US military of unleashing a deadly disease that has infected well over 140,000 people in more than 120 countries, it begs closer scrutiny to... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3075227/why-china-amplifying-conspiracy-theory-blame-america-coronavirus?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3075227/why-china-amplifying-conspiracy-theory-blame-america-coronavirus?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 14 Mar 2020 11:28:28 +0000 I know the world is not done yet with crucifying China for the coronavirus crisis, and much of the bad press is justified, given how this contagion was inaugurated by a country with total control over information and a track record of cover-ups. But let’s take a breather from all the xenophobic hysteria and victim-blaming for a calm, calculating look at what China has done so far in containing the epidemic to understand how the dynamics have changed and why the time has come for other countries... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/health-environment/article/3074087/never-mind-china-look-us-next-big-coronavirus?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/health-environment/article/3074087/never-mind-china-look-us-next-big-coronavirus?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 07 Mar 2020 11:12:51 +0000 An all-important and heartfelt disclaimer first for the sake of communal harmony and world peace: I have a soft spot for animals, especially dogs, and I’m constantly in awe of the incredible bonds people build with their pets, often beyond the scope of human relationships bogged down by the general inability of our species to offer unconditional love without an expiry date. I have dog-owning friends and relatives who can be quite militant when it comes to protecting their beloved four-legged... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3053026/careful-you-can-still-catch-coronavirus-your-dog-even-if-it-not?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3053026/careful-you-can-still-catch-coronavirus-your-dog-even-if-it-not?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 29 Feb 2020 12:54:07 +0000 I really, desperately want to trust US President Donald Trump and put my faith in his recent public assurances that the coronavirus crisis will “miraculously” evaporate this summer. “A lot of people think that goes away in April with the heat, as the heat comes in. Typically that will go away with April,” Trump declared. “I had a long talk with [Chinese] President Xi [Jinping] … He feels very confident. He feels that, again, as I mentioned, by April or during the month of April, the heat,... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3050804/can-we-trust-donald-trumps-claim-coronavirus-crisis-will-go-away?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3050804/can-we-trust-donald-trumps-claim-coronavirus-crisis-will-go-away?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 15 Feb 2020 12:16:53 +0000 So our public hospital workers have called off their great strike after holding this city’s health care services hostage for five days. It was ostensibly aimed at forcing an inept and indecisive administration to order a total closure of Hong Kong’s borders in the hope of shutting out the dreaded new coronavirus from mainland China. But it was obviously more of a political hit job on Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor in the anti-government protest movement’s continuing campaign to... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3049661/hong-kongs-despicable-hospital-strike-over-coronavirus-crisis-just?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3049661/hong-kongs-despicable-hospital-strike-over-coronavirus-crisis-just?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 08 Feb 2020 11:37:28 +0000 I must confess I did not put on a face mask even at the height of the Sars pandemic of 2002-03, and obviously lived to tell the tale. But those were different days, when the good people of Hong Kong rallied together to fight the ravages of severe acute respiratory syndrome in a heart-warming display of camaraderie, self-sacrifice and empathy for fellow human beings. Daily stories of charity, magnanimity and heroism against daunting odds inspired us during the worst periods of doom and gloom,... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3048546/coronavirus-crisis-brings-out-worst-toxic-hong-kong-society-already?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3048546/coronavirus-crisis-brings-out-worst-toxic-hong-kong-society-already?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 01 Feb 2020 12:16:33 +0000 Dear me, I was expecting plenty of pearl-clutching indignation among the far-flung diaspora of her majesty’s loyal subjects in this former British colony when I dared to criticise the royal family in my last column, but the ferocity of the feedback was something else. I had questioned the newsworthiness of Megxit – that trendily named but completely unnecessary conniption over the escape of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle from the confines of palace life – and, by extension, cast doubt on the... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3046677/sorry-old-chaps-making-light-megxit-and-branding-britains-royal?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3046677/sorry-old-chaps-making-light-megxit-and-branding-britains-royal?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 18 Jan 2020 09:14:49 +0000 I recently found the time to watch The King on Netflix and loved it, finding it to be a cut above previous big-screen adaptations of the story of Henry V, one of England’s greatest monarchs. It’s an engaging biopic loosely based on William Shakespeare’s series of plays known as the Henriad, starring the young royal who started as something of a juvenile delinquent, “an assiduous cultivator of lasciviousness” as one historical description goes, and went on to become a heroic warrior king. Of... https://www.scmp.com/news/world/article/3045682/megxit-schmexit-theres-no-bigger-waste-time-space-and-money-uks-royal?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/world/article/3045682/megxit-schmexit-theres-no-bigger-waste-time-space-and-money-uks-royal?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 11 Jan 2020 10:49:25 +0000 Hong Kong protest news fatigue, anyone? It certainly feels like post-traumatic stress disorder after nearly seven months of saturation coverage and daily overdoses of news from the revolution of our times. The Western media’s focus on Hong Kong, from unhealthy fixation to unhinged obsession, has been noteworthy. Particularly mainstream American media outlets, which have been called out by the watchdog, Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting, for their disproportionate infatuation in portraying... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3044678/never-mind-hong-kongs-revolution-world-about-go-war?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3044678/never-mind-hong-kongs-revolution-world-about-go-war?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 04 Jan 2020 09:34:12 +0000 “Please, not the traffic lights this time,” I said to myself as I watched the warriors of the revolution of our times go about liberating Hong Kong on Christmas Eve. Why the concern about traffic lights, you might ask, when masked hooligans were also blocking roads, digging up bricks, vandalising shops, and hurling petrol bombs in the name of democracy. Nothing in particular, I guess, other than the fact that they were back to trashing traffic lights just three days after the government... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3043779/no-happy-new-year-ahead-hong-kong-just-endless-protest-chaos?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3043779/no-happy-new-year-ahead-hong-kong-just-endless-protest-chaos?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 28 Dec 2019 11:53:01 +0000 I thought I’d seen it all, living in the twilight zone of Hong Kong’s great revolution of our times, but obviously not. Friday night was yet another surreal, straight-up mental episode when police intercepted a teenage suspect in a Tai Po neighbourhood as part of their investigations following the recent seizures of home-made bombs and firearms. The teenager pulled out a semi-automatic pistol and fired one round at the officers who managed to subdue him without anyone actually getting shot.... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/3043084/fine-then-lets-disband-hong-kongs-police-force-if-thats?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/3043084/fine-then-lets-disband-hong-kongs-police-force-if-thats?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 21 Dec 2019 08:33:01 +0000 While this great revolution of our times has removed Hong Kong’s bragging rights as one of the safest cities in the world, the security situation has not been deemed alarming enough for people to have to be dragged through metal detectors and frisked by security guards when entering shopping centres, cinema halls, train stations and other vulnerable public venues. In the past I have often contemplated how easy it would be for the terroristically inclined to set off bombs pretty much anywhere, in... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3042116/hong-kongs-revolution-sliding-terrorism-home-made-bombs-primed-kill?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3042116/hong-kongs-revolution-sliding-terrorism-home-made-bombs-primed-kill?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 14 Dec 2019 10:35:28 +0000 Sometimes, simple numbers can tell a story louder and better than words. Six months into the biggest political and social crisis Hong Kong has ever experienced, there’s still no glimmer of light at the end of the pitch-black tunnel we’re trapped in, no silver lining to the clouds that have blotted out our horizon, only deeply divided views as to what or who is wrong. And cold, hard statistics that speak for themselves. Since the mass protests first broke out in June, triggered by the... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3041096/extent-hong-kongs-crisis-let-numbers-do-talking?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3041096/extent-hong-kongs-crisis-let-numbers-do-talking?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 07 Dec 2019 12:19:06 +0000 “Tell people there’s an invisible man in the sky who created the universe, and the vast majority will believe you. Tell them the paint is wet, and they have to touch it to be sure,” the late, great American comedian and social critic George Carlin once said. That’s pretty much how it feels, trying to point out the harsh truth to the hara-kiri hordes of America’s useful idiots in this city as they wave US flags on the streets to express their gratitude to Washington for the passage of the... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/3040051/cutting-hong-kongs-nose-spite-china-nothing-celebrate?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/3040051/cutting-hong-kongs-nose-spite-china-nothing-celebrate?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 30 Nov 2019 09:00:02 +0000 Ridiculing Donald Trump is too easy. There’s more than enough of that going on already, and it’s become an exercise in futility because America’s 45th president is who he is, will say what he will say, and will do what he will do. But let’s just pause for a minute, for the benefit of Hong Kong’s anti-China revolution and its US-flag-waving warriors, and deconstruct their great white saviour’s latest message to them. “If it weren’t for me, Hong Kong would have been obliterated within 14 minutes,”... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3039060/14-minutes-obliterate-hong-kong-deconstructing-donald-trumps-bizarre?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/3039060/14-minutes-obliterate-hong-kong-deconstructing-donald-trumps-bizarre?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 23 Nov 2019 08:53:10 +0000 I sat and suffered through a 45-minute media session with Ted Cruz some weeks ago at the US consul general’s home in Hong Kong, listening to the Republican senator pontificate about the worst political and social crisis since the city’s return to Chinese sovereignty in 1997. Fashionably unshaven and dressed in black from head to toe, cowboy boots and all, like some bloated John Wick wannabe, Cruz announced that he was wearing the colour of the anti-government protest movement in solidarity with... https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/3038044/there-no-limit-us-hypocrisy-exploiting-hong-kongs-crisis?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/politics/article/3038044/there-no-limit-us-hypocrisy-exploiting-hong-kongs-crisis?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 16 Nov 2019 08:49:50 +0000