Deceased Chinese Nobel Peace Prize-winning dissident Liu Xiaobo was cremated on Saturday and his wife is "free", a government official said, as a state-run newspaper attacked him as a "despised" criminal out of step with Chinese society.
Sealed behind the steel doors of two bunkers in a Beijing suburb, university students are trying to find out how it feels to live in a space station on another planet, recycling everything from plant cuttings to urine.
The US cautioned it was ready to use force if need be to stop North Korea's nuclear missile program but said it preferred global diplomatic action against Pyongyang for defying world powers.
China and the United States agreed that efforts to denuclearise the Korean Peninsula should be "complete, verifiable and irreversible", Chinese state media said, reporting the results of high level talks in Washington this week.
Hong Kong's next leader said she would work to rebuild "social harmony" and push economic development while announcing a new cabinet with few new faces to govern the financial hub.
Eight people were killed and 65 injured in an explosion at a kindergarten in eastern China that police have described as a "criminal" act, state media said.
China's civil aviation authority has fined Dubai-based carrier Emirates and barred it from adding new destinations and aircraft in China for six months after two incidents of "unsafe operations", the state news agency Xinhua reported.
A man has been arrested and two are missing in China after conducting an investigation into a Chinese company making Ivanka Trump-branded shoes, China Labor Watch, a New York-based advocacy group, said.
China's capital is stepping up a campaign against foreign espionage, offering rewards ranging from $1500 to $73,000 ($NZ2160 to $NZ105,00) to citizens who blow the whistle on suspected spies, state media said.
The Beijing city government has told officials to not set off fireworks or firecrackers to welcome the Lunar New Year on Friday, to help prevent smog.
A little dinosaur that scampered across northwestern China 160 million years ago boasted a unique trait not seen in any other dinosaur or prehistoric creature yet found.
Five districts in Beijing have announced plans to cap or lower their population in the next few years, local media reported on Wednesday.
New Zealand still relies heavily on the fortunes of its two largest trading partners, China and Australia, for its success. Business editor Dene Mackenzie talks to Forsyth Barr brokers Suzanne Kinnaird and Peter Young about the economic prospects for those trading partners.
Depressed commodity prices and slowing Chinese demand continue to weigh on Australian exports, Forsyth Barr broker Peter Young says.
China is ''open for business'' - but it is not going to wait around for New Zealand to get its act together, Oritain Global chief executive Dr Helen Darling says.
Chinese have welcomed the arrival of the Year of the Snake with raucous celebrations, setting off a cacophony of firecrackers in the streets and sending fireworks blazing into the sky to bring good fortune.
China has tested emerging military technology aimed at destroying missiles in mid-air after an initial test in 2010, state media says, in a move that will unnerve its neighbours.
New Zealand dairy exports to China for the 10 months to October have virtually matched full-year 2011 exports, with two months still to go.
China's ruling Communist Party has unveiled an older, conservative leadership line-up that appears unlikely to take the drastic action needed to tackle pressing issues like social unrest, environmental degradation and corruption.
Chinese inflation hit a 29-month low in June but still people are complaining about the rising costs of food and high housing prices. Business editor Dene Mackenzie was in China last week and reports on the economic situation of New Zealand's second-largest trading partner.