Scott Kennedy is a senior adviser and trustee chair in Chinese business and economics at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies. His areas of focus include China’s hi-tech drive, US-China relations and global economic governance. SCMP Plus readers get early access to articles in the Open Questions series. How would you characterise the outcomes of the China-US summit compared to expectations going in? Is it largely a continuation of that track or do you see it moving the relationship...

⁠Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ⁠visited Abu Dhabi and met UAE President Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan on Sunday, a senior Israeli official told Reuters. There was no immediate comment from Netanyahu’s office and the UAE’s foreign ministry. The unannounced visit comes ‌after Israeli newspaper Haaretz this month reported that Sheikh Mohamed had warned Netanyahu a week and a half before October 7, 2023 that Hamas was planning a major operation against Israel. The warning was not...

US President Donald Trump said on Sunday that he expects talks with Iran to resume in the coming week, despite his rejection of a truce proposal put forward by Tehran. Iranian officials brought with them to the UN General Assembly in New York a plan for a seven-day truce followed by the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz shipping channel. Trump dismissed the plan and has mused on resuming full-scale air strikes on Iranian targets but he told the news platform Axios that he expects negotiations to...

Three people were killed and four others were injured when an argument led to gunfire at an after-hours strip club on Sunday morning in Detroit, officials said. Police responding to the 7.21am shooting on a largely residential street found three men who had been fatally shot, Detroit Police Chief Todd Bettison told reporters at a news conference. Four more people – two men and two women – were taken in private cars to area hospitals. All the victims are thought to be in their 20s and 30s,...

Britain’s ruling Labour Party on Sunday launched its first annual conference under Andy Burnham’s leadership, buoyed by his debut as prime minister as he pledged to take the tough decisions needed to tackle looming challenges. The former mayor of Manchester has injected new life into the centre-left party since MPs propelled him into Downing Street in July after ending Keir Starmer’s two-year premiership. In an interview from the conference in northwestern Liverpool, Burnham pledged to show in...

Swiss voters on Sunday roundly rejected a proposal to tighten their country’s neutrality, final results showed, dismissing an initiative championed by the hard-right and dubbed “pro-Russian” by opponents. While the Swiss widely embrace their neutrality, the initiative to enshrine a strict definition into the constitution exposed deep disagreement over what that neutrality entails. The proposal was rejected by 70.1 per cent of voters, according to the final results. “This result is not a vote...

Hong Kong police have arrested a 34-year-old gym user in connection with the installation of three suspected pinhole cameras found in changing rooms at a 24/7 Fitness branch in Sha Tin. The arrest on Sunday came a day after police launched an investigation into the suspected voyeurism case at the outlet on Lek Yuen Street. A police spokesman said officers arrested the suspect, a local man, in Sha Tin and he remained in custody as investigations continued. In a statement on Sunday night, 24/7...