Hong Kong visitors to Europe will need prior travel authorisation from 2025

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2/ Hongkongers who travel to 30 European countries including France and Germany will need to apply for prior authorisation from the first half of next year, the EU has said.

1/ Exclusive: The University of Hong Kong (HKU) has not arranged an election study tour to Taiwan this year, despite running previous trips to witness the self-ruled island’s presidential and parliamentary polls.

hongkongfp.com/2024/01/12/exc… 2/ The university cited periodic “changes in destinations.” However, a source told HKFP that manpower shortage, as well as politics, were among the considerations.

Photo: Kyle Lam/HKFP.

1/ Facebook group Free Food Flow, which facilitates food swaps between Hongkongers, began as a university project 10 years ago. It now has more than 60,000 members.

hongkongfp.com/2023/03/19/fre… 2/ Members donate food items - including homemade cakes, leftovers, pre-packaged snacks, takeaway food from fast food chains that people could not collect in time, even one single apple - for others to collect.

Snap decision: the street photographers being airbrushed out of an iconic Hong Kong tourist venue

🔗 hongkongfp.com/2023/03/12/sna… 2/ Small instant-photography stalls have long been part of the vibrant scene at Tsim Sha Tsui Promenade, frequented by tourists – and sometimes locals – who want high-resolution snapshots of themselves against Hong Kong’s iconic skyline and Victoria Harbour.

As masks come off, Hong Kong children may struggle to face the world

🔗 hongkongfp.com/2023/03/05/as-… 2/ Hong Kong's Covid-19 face mask mandate was in place for more than 2.5 years, leaving some young children with no memory of life without masks.

BREAKING: 3 Hong Kong Tiananmen vigil group activists convicted of refusing national security data demand

🔗 hongkongfp.com/2023/03/04/bre… Chow Hang-tung, Tang Ngok-kwan and Tsui Hon-kwong appeared on Saturday at the West Kowloon Magistrates' Courts in front of designated national security judge, Principal Magistrate Peter Law. They now face up to six months in jail and a HK$100,000 fine. hongkongfp.com/2023/03/04/bre…

BREAKING: China’s Xi Jinping secures historic third term, becoming most powerful leader since Mao

hongkongfp.com/2022/10/23/bre… Update: No women in Chinese Communist Party Politburo for first time in 25 years [AFP]

1/ 1,500 swimmers gathered at Wan Chai's Golden Bauhinia Square Public Pier as Hong Kong's Cross Harbour Race kicked off on Sunday morning. 2/ 18-year-old Jimmy Kwok, first-time champion of the open category men’s individual, completed the one-kilometre swim to Tsim Sha Tsui in 14 minutes and 25.6 seconds.

Dark side of the moon festival: Mountains of Mid-Autumn waste sour the occasion for Hong Kong green groups

hongkongfp.com/2022/09/09/dar… 1/ Leftover mooncakes are a problem for many Hongkongers following the Mid-Autumn Festival. According to estimates from Hong Kong environmental charities Food Grace and Green Community, more than 4.64 million unwanted mooncakes were left over after last year's festival.

1/ BREAKING: Hong Kong Polytechnic University has cut ties with its student union, ordering it to vacate campus premises and cease using the university name, according to an email seen by HKFP. 2/ It cited the union's non-compliance with requests, since 2013, to provide an Acknowledgement of Compliance with the university ordinance.

JUST IN: Hong Kong social distancing rules, including the closure of scheduled premises such as gyms, bars, and swimming pools, and no dine-in services after 6 p.m., will extended until April.

https://twitter.com/hkfp/status/1496067569081630723

The government aims for a 90 per cent vaccination rate for the first dose of vaccine by the beginning of March, and an 80 per cent rate for the second dose in mid-March.

BREAKING: Hong Kong to undergo citywide compulsory Covid testing, schools to halt early for summer

hongkongfp.com/2022/02/22/bre… With the help on the Central government, Hong Kong will implement citywide testing, Chief Executive Carrie Lam has announced. Three rounds of testing will be conducted, said Lam on Tuesday, and no less than one million tests will be carried out per day.

HKFP_Live: Chief Exec. Carrie Lam is meeting the press about city-wide compulsory Covid-19 testing [English interpretation] twitter.com/i/broadcasts/1… JUST IN: Lam said that social distancing measures will be extended until mid-April, or as late as the end of April. Schools will have an early summer holiday starting from March or April. instead of the usual July, she added.

HKFP_Live: Chief Exec. Carrie Lam is meeting the press. facebook.com/hongkongfp/vid… Chief Executive Carrie Lam said on Tuesday the Election Committee polls on Sunday fulfilled the goal of the sweeping overhaul - to ensure only patriots administer Hong Kong. She said she could not say why democrats did not take part.

1/ Hong Kong beverage firm Vitasoy has confirmed that Leung Kin-fai - the suspect who stabbed a policeman in Causeway Bay on Thur and died after knifing himself - was their employee. 2/ In a Weibo statement on Fri, it said it "fully supported" a probe under the national security law, adding it was committed to supporting the stability, prosperity and development of Hong Kong and mainland China.

HKFP_Live: Pro-democracy activists are being searched in Mong Kok as police try to thwart gatherings on the July 1 Handover anniversary.
facebook.com/hongkongfp/vid… Convenor of Student Politicism Wong Yat-chin was searched by police on Soy Street in Mong Kok, just before the student activist group was set to open a street booth.

Raphael Wong, chairman of the League of Social Democrats, has set up a street booth under the Canal Road flyover in Causeway Bay.

The group originally planned to put up a counter near Great George Street, but the location was changed after police cordoned off the street. Around 20 police officers are stationed under the flyover, pointing a video camera at LSD's booth.

1/ Hong Kong's Victoria Park - the iconic venue for the only annual commemoration on Chinese soil of the Tiananmen Massacre in Beijing on June 4, 1989 - stands empty and barricaded at 8pm on Friday, the first time in 32 years. 2/ Hundreds of police officers were deployed at Victoria Park on Friday evening in anticipation of people showing up for the city's annual Tiananmen Massacre vigil in defiance of a police ban.

1/ Danny Chan, 30, made a sketch of the Victoria Park security guards standing in front of him as they held signs directing people to use other routes to access the swimming pool and tennis court amid the Tiananmen Massacre vigil police lockdown. 2/ Chan, who described himself as a "war zone artist," said he never commemorated the Tiananmen crackdown but enjoyed watching others pay attribute as well as documenting "peaceful scenes" at a protest or demonstration.

A man places a "goddess of democracy" statue, a symbol of the Tiananmen student movement, on a harbourside decoration in Wanchai. Police have banned the usual annual vigil in Victoria Park. Photo: HKFP. Artists gathered in Hong Kong the night before the 32nd anniversary of the Tiananmen Massacre and commemorated the victims with different street performances. Photos: @StandNewsHK

HKFP_Live: There are reports that the government is set to put some residents in Yau Ma Tei on lockdown owing to a Covid-19 outbreak. facebook.com/hongkongfp/vid… Some residents in the area told @HKFP that they were buying food enough for a couple of days. Otherwise, the district appears to be calm.