SCMP World·Friday, December 19, 2025

SCMP World - Friday, December 19, 2025

10 stories~15 min

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Stories Covered

Brown University shooting: how right-wing misinformation hurt the investigation

Officials in the US state of Rhode Island have denounced misinformation that they said complicated their multi-day search for the gunman who killed two students and wounded others at Brown University. Law enforcement identified the suspect as Claudio Neves Valente, 48, a Portuguese national who attended the Ivy League institution decades ago. They said he acted alone and was found dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound in a New Hampshire storage unit. But throughout the week, anonymous and...

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Rome to charge tourists to get close to famed Trevi Fountain

Tourists who want to get close to Rome’s Trevi Fountain will soon have to pay a €2 (US$2.34) fee, the city ‌mayor said on Friday, as authorities look to profit more handsomely from Italy’s ‍many attractions. Mayor Roberto Gualtieri told reporters the new payment system would start on February 1, adding that the measure was expected to raise €6.5 million (US$7.6 million) a year. “Two euros isn’t very much … and it will lead to ⁠less chaotic tourist flows,” Gualtieri said, stressing that citizens.

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Shein avoids France site ban after removing illegal goods

A French court on Friday rejected the state’s request to suspend Shein’s site in France as “disproportionate” after the e-commerce giant removed illicit products sold on its platform. French authorities had requested the ultra-fast-fashion giant’s site be blocked for three months after weapons, banned medications and childlike sex dolls were found on the platform. The authorities asked that the Chinese online platform only be reopened if it applied strict new measures to prevent a repeat of the.

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Coldplay kiss cam woman tells her side of the viral scandal

Satan owns a Bernedoodle. A great big fluffy one that likes to sit in Satan’s lap. That’s if by “Satan” you mean Kristin Cabot, aka the woman from the Coldplay kiss cam scandal, who just gave her first interview about the ever-so-brief moment in mid-July that entertained the internet – and trashed her life completely. The video was an instant classic for those attending the concert: “Ohhh, look at these two,” singer Chris Martin said as the band’s kiss cam spotlighted her wrapped in the arms of.

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UN declares Gaza famine over, but ‘situation remains critical’ amid fragile ceasefire

A famine declared in Gaza in August is now over thanks to improved access for humanitarian aid, the United Nations said on Friday, but warned the food situation in the Palestinian territory remained dire. More than 70 per cent of the population were living in makeshift shelters, it said, with hunger exacerbated by winter floods and an increasing risk of hypothermia as temperatures plummet. Although a ceasefire between Israel and militant group Hamas that took effect in October has partially...

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Secure Arctic shipping route essential for China, senior official says

The Arctic shipping route is essential to safeguard China’s development over the next decade, a senior Chinese official said in Beijing, calling for greater efforts to expand its practical use. With proposals for the next five-year plan incorporating security and development, China must ensure its international transport channels remain unimpeded, Ma Jiantang, deputy director of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference’s economic committee, said. China’s traditional trade lanes...

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Putin warns West as Russia eyes more Ukrainian territory, as peace talks stall

Russia’s Vladimir Putin on Friday said the ball was in the court of the West and Kyiv in talks to end the war in Ukraine, while hailing Moscow’s recent battlefield gains and threatening more. Putin spoke during his annual end-of-year press conference – a staple of his 25-year rule – in which he told Russians Moscow was intent on pressing on in Ukraine, striking a confident tone. The 73-year-old has repeatedly said in recent weeks that Moscow will seize the rest of Ukrainian land he has...

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Trump leaves war with Venezuela on the table, threatens more seizures, NBC News reports

US President Donald Trump said he was leaving the possibility of war with Venezuela on the table, according to an interview with NBC News published on Friday. “I don’t ⁠rule it out, no,” he told NBC News in a phone interview. Trump also said there would be additional seizures of oil tankers near Venezuelan waters, according to the interview. The US seized a sanctioned oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela last week. “If ‍they’re foolish enough to be sailing along, they’ll be sailing along back..

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Six years on, are we better prepared for the next pandemic?

This week, exactly six years ago, as we were gliding cheerfully into the 2019 festive Christmas season, the Covid-19 virus was spreading in Wuhan, China. I was preparing for an important Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting in Australia in February (the last overseas trip I would make for three years), oblivious to the looming pandemic. The world in general had no inkling of the terrible three years that would follow, with death estimates ranging from 7 million to 36 million, over 700...

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UN says Sudan’s RSF killed 1,000 civilians in horrific 3-day attack on camp

More than 1,000 civilians were killed in a three-day attack by the Rapid Support Forces paramilitary group earlier this year on the largest displacement camp in western Sudan, the UN Human Rights Office said in a report released on Thursday. RSF stormed Zamzam camp in April as part of its siege of the city of El-Fasher, the provincial capital of North Darfur province. In the attack, hundreds of people were summarily executed, according to the report. People were killed in house-to-house raids...

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