SCMP World·Friday, January 2, 2026

SCMP World - Friday, January 2, 2026

10 stories~15 min

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Stories Covered

1 dead, 12 injured as 6.5-magnitude quake shakes Mexico City and beach resort

A 6.5-magnitude earthquake rattled Mexico’s capital and a tourist hotspot on the Pacific coast on Friday, killing at least one person but causing no serious damage. The US Geological Survey said the earthquake struck just before 8am near Acapulco, a major port and beach resort. It was felt around 400km (250 miles) away to the north in Mexico City, where alarms sent people rushing into the street for safety, disturbing the peace of a holiday weekend. A 60-year-old man died of his injuries after..

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Angelina Jolie visits Egyptian side of Gaza’s Rafah crossing to meet aid volunteers

Hollywood star Angelina Jolie on Friday visited the Egyptian side of the Rafah crossing into Gaza, where she spoke to members of the Red Crescent and truck drivers ferrying humanitarian aid, Agence France-Presse journalists said. Accompanied by an American delegation and greeted by former and current officials, Jolie said she was “honoured” to meet aid volunteers at the crossing. A Red Crescent volunteer told the Oscar winner that “there are thousands of aid trucks just waiting” at the border...

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FBI says it disrupted potential New Year’s Eve attack inspired by Islamic State

The FBI said on Friday it had disrupted a plot to attack a North Carolina supermarket and fast-food restaurant on New Year’s Eve, arresting a man who officials said was inspired by Islamic State and had pledged loyalty to the extremist militants. Christian Sturdivant, 18, of Mint ‍Hill, North Carolina, was charged with attempting to provide material support to a foreign terror organisation after officials say he communicated his attack plans to an undercover FBI (Federal bureau of Investigation)

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Driver in fatal Anthony Joshua car crash charged with dangerous driving by Nigerian police

The driver of a car carrying British boxer Anthony Joshua that was involved in a fatal crash in Nigeria has been charged with reckless and dangerous driving, police in Nigeria’s southwestern Ogun state said on Friday. Adeniyi Mobolaji Kayode, 46, was driving the boxer and two of his friends, Latif Ayodele and Sina Ghami, on a busy highway linking Lagos and Ibadan in southwest Nigeria when the Lexus SUV in which they were travelling rammed into a stationary truck on Monday. Kayode is expected to.

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Champagne sparklers blamed for Swiss bar fire that killed 40

Investigators said on Friday that they believe sparkling candles atop champagne bottles ignited the fatal fire at a Swiss ski resort when they came too close to the ceiling of a bar crowded with New Year’s Eve revellers. Authorities planned to look into whether the material on the ceiling that was designed to muffle sound conformed with regulations. The candles, which give off a stream of upwards-shooting sparks, were the same type that is commonly available for parties, officials said. Forty...

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China’s BYD dethrones Tesla as world’s top EV maker amid Musk’s politics, tax credit woes

Tesla lost its crown as the world’s bestselling electric vehicle maker (EV) on Friday to China’s BYD, as a customer revolt over Elon Musk’s right-wing politics and stiff overseas competition pushed sales down for a second year in a row. Tesla said that it delivered 1.64 million vehicles in 2025, down 9 per cent from a year earlier. By contrast, BYD is now the world’s largest EV maker, having sold 2.26 million vehicles last year – a 27.9 per cent increase. For the fourth quarter, Tesla sales...

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7 dead as Saudi jets strike UAE-backed separatists in ‘peaceful’ Yemen operation

Seven separatist fighters died in air strikes on Friday as the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen hit back against a sweeping advance by the UAE-backed Southern Transition Council (STC) that threatens to spiral into a major confrontation. The deaths are the first from coalition fire since the secessionist STC seized swathes of Hadramawt and Mahra provinces last month. Saudi Arabia and the UAE have for years supported rival factions in Yemen’s government-run territories, but the STC’s offensive has...

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Swiss investigators rush to identify victims of New Year’s fire

Investigators on Friday set about the ‌painful task of identifying the burned bodies from a blaze that engulfed a crowded bar and killed around 40 people at a New Year’s Eve party in the ‍Swiss ski resort of Crans-Montana. Emanuele Galeppini, a 16-year-old Italian international golfer who lived in Dubai, was named on Friday as the first of several possible victims from Italy to be identified. So severe were the burns suffered by the mostly young crowd of revellers in the Le Constellation bar...

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Trump and Iran official exchange threats after protests turn deadly in the Islamic Republic

US President Donald Trump and top Iranian officials exchanged duelling threats on Friday as widening protests swept across parts of the Islamic Republic, further escalating tensions between the countries after America bombed Iranian nuclear sites in June. At least seven people have been killed so far in violence surrounding the demonstrations, which were sparked in part by the collapse of Iran’s rial currency but have increasingly seen crowds chanting anti-government slogans. The protests, now..

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2025 was the year of denial. What now?

As an undergraduate student of anthropology long ago, I remember studying the phenomenon of “compartmentalism” as a hallmark of primitive cultures or societies – their capacity to hold contradictory beliefs without inner conflict or even appearing to notice the contradictions. We well-educated rationalists in the rich West were supposed to be above this kind of schizophrenic inconsistency, seen as a symptom of a defective imagination or the shallowness of the masses. Think of street hawkers in..

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