Oman's sultan signs currency swap on first China visit in 48 years
Sultan Haitham bin Tarik met Xi Jinping in Beijing on 2 November, the first state visit by an Omani head of state in 48 years. The two sides signed agreements on BeiDou navigation, industrial and supply chains, green development, a local-currency swap and digital payments, and agreed to align the Belt and Road Initiative with Oman Vision 2040. Xi said the Gulf should not become an arena for major-power rivalry.
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UN vote against Cuba embargo passes, but backing falls to 130
The General Assembly adopted the resolution for the 34th time, with 130 votes in favour, 17 against and 25 abstentions. Support fell from 165 last year. China voted in favour, and its envoy Fu Cong said the 64-year US embargo violates the UN Charter.
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Hong Kong housing secretary resigns over failures before deadly tower fire
Winnie Ho, Hong Kong's secretary for housing, resigned on 29 October after an independent committee found that four government departments had left fire-safety complaints unaddressed before the blaze at Wang Fuk Court killed 168 people. A Public Service Commission inquiry has three months to report. A new building-control section will replace the Independent Checking Unit, and the government plans to criminalise bid-rigging in building maintenance.
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- Associated Press (via WDSU), 30 October 2026
- Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, 29 October 2026
Liu Yandong, Chinese vice premier who oversaw education and science, dies at 81
Liu sat on the Politburo of the 17th and 18th Central Committees and was a state councillor from 2008, then vice premier from 2013 to 2018. An official statement called her "a time-tested and loyal communist fighter" and praised her work on the Party's united front, its outreach to non-communist groups, as well as education, science and technology, health, and women and children. She died in Beijing on 28 October.
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Chinese carmakers' profits fall 68% despite record electric car sales
New energy vehicles, which include battery-electric and plug-in hybrid cars, accounted for a record 61.6% of new cars sold in China in September, with volumes up 13.6% to 1.82 million. The industry's combined profit fell 68% year on year to 14.2 billion yuan (US$2.11 billion), as rising costs and a price war squeezed margins.
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Upgraded China-Peru trade pact takes effect, adding e-commerce and environment rules
The upgraded protocol took effect on 1 November. It adds five chapters, covering e-commerce, global supply chains, and environment and trade, and updates seven existing ones. Two-way trade reached US$50.4 billion in 2025, up from US$6.4 billion in 2009, nearly eight times more. China is Peru's largest export market, and Peru is China's fourth-largest trading partner in Latin America.
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Qingdao seafood fair draws 1,600 exhibitors from 50 countries
The 29th Qingdao Seafood Expo ran from 28 to 30 October, with 1,617 exhibitors from 50 countries and 27 national pavilions across 117,600 square meters. The floor covered raw and processed seafood, aquaculture and processing equipment, and cold-chain logistics, drawing suppliers from Ecuador, Vietnam and Norway to meet buyers from China and abroad.
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China's first water-infrastructure REIT begins trading in Shenzhen
An infrastructure REIT is a listed fund that owns assets such as toll roads or water plants and pays out their revenue to investors. The Yinhua Yuehai fund, listed in Shenzhen on 28 October, is China's first publicly offered infrastructure REIT backed by water-conservancy assets. Its revenue comes from the Feilaixia and Chaozhou water hubs for up to 30 years, and the proceeds will fund the Huangmaoxia Reservoir and Beibu Gulf water-allocation projects.
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Chinese ecologist Fu Bojie wins Volvo Environment Prize for dryland research
Fu received the prize at a ceremony in Stockholm on 2 November. The jury credited decades of dryland science that linked local ecological recovery to sustainable development across the Global South, including research showing that replanting can deepen water scarcity when species and density are poorly chosen. Drylands cover more than 41% of the Earth's land surface and are home to more than 2.5 billion people. Fu co-chairs the Global Dryland Ecosystem Programme, launched in 2017.
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China details plan to land astronauts on the Moon before 2030 with two rockets
Wang Xiang, deputy chief designer of China's manned space programme, described the sequence at a symposium in Beijing. The Lanyue lander and the Mengzhou crew spacecraft will launch on separate rockets, rendezvous and dock in lunar orbit, and the crew will enter the lander for the descent and work on the surface. Wang said development is proceeding steadily and the goal remains a first crewed landing before 2030.
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After Xizang quake, 1,495 students resume classes in Lhasa
A 7.0-magnitude earthquake on 22 October left two township primary schools in Nagqu, in the Xizang Autonomous Region, unfit for classes. All 1,495 students and 89 teachers were moved to a campus in Lhasa in three batches, and classes there began on 4 November. Across seven affected counties, 286 schools were inspected and 72 buildings were assessed as dangerous by 31 October.
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China identifies eight more Korean War dead, bringing total to 44
The Ministry of Veterans Affairs identified eight more Chinese People's Volunteers killed in the 1950-53 Korean War and located their relatives on 28 October. Since 2014, 13 handovers from South Korea have returned 1,023 sets of remains, and DNA matching has now named 44 of them.
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