BloombergIn living rooms across the world, Christmas lights this year tell a complicated tale about the US-China trade dispute that stretches all the way to Vietnam. For many years the holiday lights were produced almost solely in China, but increased US tariffs on Chinese goods pushed many buyers to source the goods elsewhere. One country that has come out a clear winner is Vietnam: Seaborne shipments of Christmas lights from Vietnam to the US more than doubled in the first 10 months of the year from the same period last year, according to US customs data. At the same time, US imports of the lights from China fell 49 percent. In May, the Trump administration slapped 25 percent tariffs on Christmas lights from China, up from 10 percent previously.

By Crystal Hsu / Staff reporterInterContinental Hotels Group PLC has launched a new hotel in Taichung under the Holiday Inn Express brand with the aim of achieving 80 percent occupancy next year. It is targeting young, individual leisure and business travelers, general manager Wilson Chang (張惟森) said by telephone. The hotel is a collaboration with Taipei-based Earnest Development and Construction Co (誠意開發), which is expanding into the hospitality industry after three decades of property development, Chang said. InterContinental, which operates 5,603 hotels under 15 brands worldwide, is keen to expand its business presence in Taiwan and the rest of Asia. It is soon to add Hotel Indigo Taipei in the Dazhi (大直) area to its portfolio, which also includes Indigo Kaohsiung, Indigo Hsinchu, Crowne Plaza and Kimpton.

AP, VATICAN CITYPope Francis on Wednesday offered a Christmas message of hope against darkness that cloaks conflicts and relationships in large parts of the world, from the Middle East to the Americas and Africa. The pope told tens of thousands of tourists, pilgrims and Romans gathered in Saint Peter’s Square for the annual Christmas Day message that “the light of Christ is greater” than the darkness “in human hearts” and “in economic, geopolitical and ecological conflicts.”The traditional Urbi et Orbi (“To the city and to the world”) Christmas message has become an occasion for popes to address suffering in the world and press for solutions. Francis was flanked by Cardinal Renato Raffaele Martino, president emeritus of the Pontifical Council for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerant People, and Cardinal Konrad Krajewski, the Apostolic Almoner. Once migrants arrive in “places where they might have hoped for a dignified life,” they “instead find themselves before walls of indifference,” he said. The religious leaders offered assurances “of our spiritual closeness as you strive for a swift implementation” of peace agreements and prayers “for a renewed commitment to the path of reconciliation and fraternity.”

AFP, TOKYOJapan yesterday hanged a Chinese man convicted of the murder of a family of four, whose bodies were found handcuffed and weighted down with dumbbells in a bay, Japanese Minister of Justice Masako Mori said. Mori said that she ordered the execution of Wei Wei (魏巍) “after careful consideration” over a robbery and multiple murders carried out with two other students in 2003. Wei, a 40-year-old former language student in Japan, had pleaded guilty to the four murder counts, but contended that he was not the central figure in the case. A Chinese man was hanged for killing three Chinese that he lived with near Tokyo and for injuring three, the Asahi Shimbun said. Japan last executed inmates in August, when two men were hanged after being convicted of murder.

This is a look at five themes set to shape the world of technology after a year in which debate intensified over privacy. “You have to sell the entire experience, the entire ecosystem,” said Dominique Bindels, senior analyst for home and tech with London-based research firm Euromonitor International. PRICE OF PRIVACYMost companies are now engaged across the spectrum of another tech acronym, SMAC: social, mobile, analytics and cloud. For consumers, SMAC is felt in how they communicate with friends, and how they search and shop. “People are becoming more conscious of sharing data, but also in the same moment, the Nest cameras and smart speakers are flying off the shelves,” Bindels said.

Anamichelle Castellano said that she and another volunteer for her nonprofit group were stopped on Monday at a bridge crossing from Brownsville, Texas, to Matamoros, Mexico. Authorities discovered a small box of ammunition inside the vehicle that she was driving, she said, adding that it had been left there by her husband. While her husband drove into Matamoros without incident, an official told Castellano that her vehicle would require extra screening. That scan uncovered a small box of ammunition, which she described as about the size of the palm of a hand. “To tell me that I can’t go back, and give them their gifts and their needed supplies, I can’t risk that.”

The GuardianTHE WITCHESWe had a pretty good version of Roald Dahl‘s The Witches in 1990, but that was a whole generation ago. Now the story gets a redo with Anne Hathaway taking over from Anjelica Huston as the leader of the witchy cause. MULANDisney’s latest live-action reboot seems a shameless ploy to penetrate the lucrative Chinese box office, now rivalling the US’s in size. He’s a boat captain, she’s a scientist, and together they are heading upriver to find the tree of life. RAYA THE LAST DRAGONDisney are positioning this for a Thanksgiving/Christmas release: it’s pitched as a mix of classic Disney and kung fu movies.

Reuters, TOKYOJapanese authorities yesterday raided the headquarters of a pachinko operator as part of a bribery investigation centered on a lawmaker, media reported. Laws to legalize casinos in Japan have been met with public opposition because of concern about gambling addiction. Prosecutors have arrested three other people suspected of bribery and raided the offices of former Liberal Democratic Party legislator Shigeaki Katsunuma, and Liberal Democratic Party Legislator Takaki Shirasuka in connection with the case, media reported. Las Vegas-style casino resorts are among Japanese Prime Minster Shinzo Abe’s plans to attract foreign tourists. Japan, which has a shrinking population and economy, is desperate to maintain growth in tourism, particularly after the Tokyo Olympics next year.

While good journalistic practice has conventionally meant avoiding becoming part of the news story, in the war against disinformation, journalists find themselves fighting in the trenches, and an integral part of the story themselves. This is part of a “global awakening to the realities of contact with Beijing.”“Taiwan obviously is a special case because of Beijing’s ambitions to annex it,” Cole, a former Taipei Times deputy news editor, added. Such tactics have made it even trickier for the government to balance protecting freedom of expression and clamping down effectively on disinformation. “If Taiwan were not a democracy, it would be quite easy for the government to come up with the solutions,” Cole said. “The last thing that you want to do is go down a road where you start curtailing freedom of expression.

Reuters, HONG KONGHong Kong anti-government protesters yesterday marched through several shopping malls chanting pro-democracy slogans, a day after violent clashes with police left a shroud of tear gas over a prime tourist district decorated for Christmas. The protests, which escalated in June, have been largely peaceful for much of this month after pro-democracy candidates overwhelmingly won district council elections a month earlier. Riot police patrolled several past protest hotspots, while tourists and shoppers, many wearing Santa hats or reindeer antlers, strolled past. Television footage showed police pepper-spraying a man, who they then arrested, outside a shopping center in the densely populated Mong Kok District. Hundreds of protesters, dressed in black and wearing masks, descended on shopping malls around the territory — mixing with shoppers and shouting popular slogans such as: “Liberate Hong Kong” and “Revolution of our Times” — but most shops remained open.

By Lin Chia-nan / Staff reporterTo keep African swine fever at bay, Taiwan has banned imports of canned pork products from Vietnam, after a can of food from the Southeast Asian country tested positive for the virus earlier this month, the Council of Agriculture said yesterday. The council made the announcement at a news conference in Taipei after a meeting of the Central Emergency Operation Center for preventing swine fever. As canned foods are disinfected at high temperatures, the risk of transmitting the virus is very low, he said. The ban on imports of canned pork products from Vietnam was put in place on Tuesday last week, after the FDA completed the relevant paperwork and informed affected businesses, she said. People caught attempting to carry banned pork products through customs would face a fine of NT$200,000 (US$6,622) for a first offense and NT$1 million for repeat offenses.

Tsai, who won a draw to speak first, began her presentation by touting her economic achievements. Tsai said that she would also seek to establish a bilateral free-trade agreement with the US. Han said that if elected, he would improve the economy by continuing the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA), and establish free economic pilot zones in Taichung and Kaohsiung. He called Tsai an incompetent president whose administration has been hijacked by Presidential Office Secretary-General Chen Chu (陳菊) and Premier Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌). Taiwan’s real crisis is having Tsai as its president, Han said, adding that her lack of power has allowed her administration to grow corrupt.

By Haeril Halim / AFP, BANDA ACEH, INDONESIASurfboard tucked under his arm, Dery Setyawan sprints into the crashing waves. It is not just a physical challenge but an emotional one — most of his family and friends were swept to their deaths when a tsunami hit these shores 15 years ago. His hometown of Lampuuk was almost destroyed entirely, but despite his devastating loss, the father-of-two sees the water as a way to heal. “Waves from the beach are our friends, the ones that killed people during the tsunami were from the deep ocean. “Surfing is one way of attracting people to come to this place again after the tsunami,” Setyawan says.

By Tsai Shu-yuan, Lee Hsin-fang and William Hetherington / Staff reporters, with staff writerThe Taichung City Government has revoked the operating permits for two units at the Taichung Power Plant, Taichung Mayor Lu Shiow-yen (盧秀燕) announced yesterday morning, saying that the plant had exceeded its annual allowance of raw coal. “The limit is in place to protect the health of Taichung residents, to safeguard the city’s air quality,” she said. “Administrative responsibility means setting an example, but more importantly, it means protecting the public’s health and improving the environment,” Lu said. The Taichung plant is the nation’s largest power plant, meaning that the municipality has for decades been responsible for more than its fair share of power generation costs, which is unreasonable, she said. “Confusing the facts ahead of the elections is unnecessary.”The central and local governments must cooperate on reducing pollution and generating power, she said.

AP, MOSCOWRussia has a strong edge in designing new weapons and has become the only country to deploy hypersonic weapons, Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday. “Not a single country has hypersonic weapons, let alone hypersonic weapons of intercontinental range.”The US military has been working on the development of hypersonic weapons in the past several years, and US Secretary of Defense Mark Esper in August said that he believes “it’s probably a matter of a couple of years” before the US has one. The Pentagon has also repeatedly warned the US Congress about hypersonic missiles being developed by Russia and China that would be harder to track and defeat. US officials have talked about putting a layer of sensors in space to more quickly detect enemy missiles, particularly the more advanced hypersonic threats. Russia must have the best weapons in the world, Putin said on Tuesday, citing a buildup of NATO forces near Russia’s western borders.