Category: News

The CEO of Chinese humanoid robot unicorn Unitree 688836.SS said on Thursday the industry is edging towards a “ChatGPT moment” for robot brains, after the company’s blockbuster Shanghai listing crystallized China’s ambitions to lead the next frontier of AI-powered machines.

Shares in China's best-known humanoid robot maker fell 11% on Thursday, a day after soaring nearly sixfold in their market debut, highlighting intense investor enthusiasm for a fledgling sector that enjoys strong backing from Beijing.

“We are marching towards a ‘ChatGPT moment’ in embodied intelligence,” said Wang Xingxing, the Hangzhou-based startup’s founder and CEO, at a major robot conference in Beijing.

The global AI boom that has reshaped the world economy was sparked in late 2022 by ChatGPT's breakthrough large language model, a watershed moment that drove mass adoption. No comparable inflection point has yet emerged for world models, the physical AI simulation systems designed to help robots understand and navigate real-world environments.

Wang said the industry is nearing a breakthrough where robots can be placed in unfamiliar environments and complete most tasks through simple voice or text instructions.

"We hope that in the future, we can see a robot be introduced into an unfamiliar household and it can achieve approximately 80% of tasks successfully through voice or text commands," he said.

"It is an important tipping point for the robot industry to usher in explosive growth."

At the same time, Wang cautioned that a major leap in robot software could arrive within two to three years in an optimistic scenario, or within five to 10 years at the latest.

"Relative to the mood around World Robot Conference and Unitree’s spectacular IPO, Wang Xingxing was notably sober about current capabilities," said Georg Stieler, head of automation at robotics consultancy Stieler.

Unitree is the world's largest producer of robot dogs and the second-biggest maker of humanoid robots by shipments, according to industry data.

It rose to fame with impressively choreographed performances of robots dancing and performing kung-fu, showcased on Chinese television, and is increasingly deploying its machines in real-world industrial settings. Its IPO prospectus shows most customers are universities and research institutions.

Wang He, founder of Chinese robotic startup Galbot, expects the sector's "ChatGPT moment" to arrive by 2028, defining it as the point when robots can perform about 70% to 80% of everyday tasks without specialized training.

"With continued accumulation of data and further technological breakthroughs, we expect to reach the 'ChatGPT moment' for embodied intelligence by 2028," he said.

Unitree's Wang said the company's biggest current investment in terms of capital and manpower is in world models and that it is "lagging behind" in the real-world application of physical AI models.

He also said humanoids are not yet capable enough for mass deployment, pointing to limitations in the AI models that power robots' decision-making and interactions as the industry's biggest bottleneck.

Even so, Wang expects the sector to enter a decade of rapid autonomous evolution of humanoid robots, as the AI boom accelerates and AI language models learn to improve themselves.

China delivered over 40,000 humanoids in the first half of this year alone, and accounts for 97% of global shipments of humanoid robots, a Chinese humanoid industry body said in a report Thursday.

Beijing is betting that robots can eventually replace human labor in repetitive, low-value and dangerous settings as it faces a shrinking workforce due to demographic decline.

While humanoids are gradually being introduced to factory floors and logistics warehouses, they remain less efficient than human workers in most applications.

Humanoid robots have also become a new front in US-China technology rivalry.

Last month the US Federal Communications Commission banned future imports of foreign-made humanoid and quadruped robots citing national security concerns, in a major blow to Chinese producers.

Several companies at the World Robot Conference in Beijing told Reuters they were looking to expand overseas.

South Korea estimates North Korea possesses between 80 and 120 nuclear warheads, its defence minister said on Thursday, citing a range significantly higher than US President Donald Trump’s recent assertion that Pyongyang has 57 nuclear weapons.

Defence Minister Ahn Gyu-back told lawmakers that North Korea was generally believed to have around 80 to 120 warheads, although he cautioned it was difficult to determine an exact figure.

"We usually see it as around 80 to 120, but it is considerably limited to state an exact number," Ahn told a parliamentary committee.

Later, Ahn clarified that the figure was derived from estimates by private research organisations, adding that South Korea’s military could not officially confirm the numbers.

Asked about Trump's comment a day earlier that Kim possessed 57 "very powerful nuclear weapons", Ahn said, "the numbers appear somewhat different."

Trump made the remark at the White House on Wednesday while discussing North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and his plans to meet him later this year.

South Korea has traditionally avoided publicly disclosing detailed estimates of North Korea's nuclear stockpile and does not officially recognize Pyongyang as a nuclear weapons state under its long-standing policy supporting denuclearisation.

Ahn reiterated that position when asked whether the government acknowledged North Korea as a nuclear-armed state.

"We cannot officially acknowledge that," he said.

He also declined to comment on whether Trump's reference to 57 warheads amounted to US recognition of North Korea's nuclear status, saying it would not be appropriate for South Korea's defence minister to comment on the US president's remarks.

Ahn said South Korea would continue to rely on the US nuclear umbrella, in line with Seoul's longstanding non-nuclear policy.

"We cannot develop nuclear weapons. Nor should we accept the deployment of US tactical nuclear weapons," Ahn said.

The comments came as Trump seeks to revive engagement with Kim after ordering a scale-back of joint US-South Korean military drills, which he described as "hostile" to North Korea.

North Korea responded coolly to the move. Kim Yo Jong, the influential sister of the North Korean leader, said the reduced exercises remained provocative and aggressive despite their shortened duration.

She dismissed any suggestion that Pyongyang would view the move as a meaningful goodwill gesture and said she was unaware of any recent contacts between Trump and Kim, although she described the personal relationship between the leaders as "excellent."

Trump said at the White House on Wednesday that he expected to meet Kim later this year, potentially reviving diplomacy that stalled after a series of unprecedented summits in 2018 and 2019 collapsed over disagreements on sanctions relief and North Korea's nuclear weapons programme.

Prince Harry and his wife Meghan plan to move back to Britain this month, six years after they stepped down from their royal duties and relocated to the United States, media outlets reported on Wednesday.

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are moving with Prince Archie, 7, and Princess Lilibet, 5, from California to Britain for an extended period and the children will begin school there in September, People magazine and British newspaper The Telegraph reported.

There was no comment from Harry's spokesperson or from Buckingham Palace. However, a source close to the couple confirmed the reports' accuracy.

According to The Telegraph, the couple will not live in a royal residence. Their status will be unchanged, and they will remain non-working royals as agreed with the late Queen Elizabeth when they left in March 2020.

Harry married Meghan Markle in a dazzling ceremony at Windsor Castle in 2018, and it was hoped his union with the former actress, whose mother is Black, would reinvigorate the historic institution.

But it was not long before cracks in their relationship with the rest of the royal family began to emerge. Two years later in March 2020, they announced they would step down from official duties and move to the US. 

They moved to the wealthy seaside enclave of Montecito near Santa Barbara, California, with media reports putting the 2020 purchase price of their 16-bedroom home at $14.7 million.

In the following years, Harry, now 41, and Meghan, 45, repeatedly criticized the royal family and the monarchy in TV interviews, a Netflix documentary series and most notably in Harry’s memoir Spare.

Harry had some particularly barbed comments for his father, King Charles, and his elder brother, heir-to-the-throne Prince William, leading to a total breakdown in their relationship.

Harry was also angry the British government changed his security arrangements and said the lack of ​automatic police protection meant he was unable to bring his children to Britain.

But relations with the king appeared to be thawing in September, and father and son met briefly for the first time in 20 months.

Last month, Harry, Meghan and their children visited Britain, and Charles saw his grandchildren for the first time since 2022.

However, the king, while welcoming the chance to see more of the Sussexes, himself only became aware of the couple's plans to return to Britain on Sunday.

While Harry and the king's relationship might have improved, he is still barely on speaking terms with his brother.

A US Navy destroyer assigned to the 7th Fleet spent four days in July stranded in the South China Sea without functioning bathrooms, galley services, or air conditioning, CNN reported on Monday.

Due to an engineering failure on the guided-missile destroyer, the USS Benfold was forced to stop, Navy Cmdr. Matthew Comer, spokesperson for the 7th Fleet, told the network. An Arleigh Burke-class warship carrying hundreds of seamen, the destroyer normally accompanies the USS George Washington aircraft carrier, which left Vietnam this month for the Middle East.

The engineering failure impacted the ship's galley services, bathrooms, air conditioning, and potable water, though the crew suffered no injuries, Comer told CNN.

During the incident, meals were provided to the vessel by another ship, the report cited the Navy as saying.

Former Navy captain Charles Schuster gave his viewpoint on the incident, himself having been in the same situation for four hours in an incident near Puerto Rico.

“It would have been quite stressful," Schuster told CNN.

"Operations officers were worried about crew morale and operational concerns, the engineers were focused on how to solve it and the navigator was worried about the direction they were drifting and what weather was coming."

"The crew was worried about weather, food and what was next. The [commanding officer] and [executive officer] were worried about all of that and when help would arrive,” he said.

“I can assure you four hours in the waters southeast of Puerto Rico is not nearly as stressful as four days in the South China Sea,” he added.

The Nimitz-class George Washington, one of the US Navy’s newest aircraft carriers, is set to replace the USS Abraham Lincoln, which is headed to port in San Diego after months in the Middle East. The move will mean that no US carrier will be present in the western Pacific area, a decision which some military analysts consider a security threat.

The Lincoln has spent over two hundred days at sea, and reports of worsening conditions aboard the vessel have made the rounds lately, including unhygienic bathrooms and a lack of food.

In a Saturday letter to US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, several US lawmakers enumerated their concerns about the Lincoln crew’s wellbeing.

"As the Secretary of Defense, you [Hegseth] are accountable to the men and women who serve our nation," the letter read.

Fuel stations in Moscow have reimposed limits on gasoline purchases due to fuel shortages linked to Ukrainian drone attacks on refineries and strong seasonal demand, according to Reuters witnesses and fuel suppliers.

Shortages began to gather pace in May and had spread to most Russian regions by July, but fuel stations in Moscow were able to ease an earlier wave of restrictions in June.

Ukraine has targeted Russian oil refineries in an effort to undermine Moscow’s war effort and reduce energy revenues.

To boost domestic supplies, Russian authorities have banned exports of gasoline and diesel, eased fuel quality requirements and began importing petroleum products.

Reuters witnesses also saw long queues at some filling stations in Moscow and the surrounding region.

A customer hotline operator at Gazprom Neft SIBN.MM said gasoline and diesel sales at the company's automated filling stations in Moscow were limited to 40 liters per customer.

At Gazprom Neft's other filling stations, diesel sales remain unrestricted, while gasoline purchases are capped at 60 liters per vehicle.

Rosneft ROSN.MM, Russia’s largest oil producer, said gasoline sales at all its filling stations across Russia were limited to 30 liters per vehicle, while diesel sales faced no restrictions.

The company also warned customers of longer waiting times because of heightened demand.

Lukoil LKOH.MM said it had introduced fuel sales restrictions in Moscow and the surrounding region because of elevated demand, unscheduled refinery maintenance and the need to ensure stable operations at its filling stations.

It did not disclose the specific limits.

Tatneft's TATN.MM customer hotline said gasoline sales at its filling stations were limited to 50 liters per vehicle.

US President Donald Trump confirmed on Wednesday that he plans to meet North Korean leader Kim Jong Un during his upcoming visit to Asia, telling reporters at the White House that maintaining a good relationship with Kim was important given North Korea’s nuclear arsenal.

Trump then addressed his relationship with the North Korean leader, emphasizing that "the fact that I get along with him is a good thing, because he has 57 very powerful nuclear weapons."

Trump also addressed the situation in the Strait of Hormuz, claiming that the United States has “complete control” of the waterway.

Earlier on Monday, Trump said he had received a response from Kim following his attempts to reengage. The Wall Street Journal reported that he has pushed aides to arrange an in-person meeting with Kim as soon as this autumn.

North Korea’s mission to the United Nations in New York did not immediately respond to Reuters request for comment on Trump’s latest remarks, but they came just after Kim’s powerful sister, Kim Yo Jong, said she was unaware of any recent communications between the two countries’ leaders.

Kim Yo Jong also said that while the relationship between the leaders of the United States and North Korea was "truly great," Washington was still carrying out the drills with Seoul and threatening the national security of Pyongyang.

Trump held an unprecedented series of summits with Kim in 2018 and 2019, but the diplomatic efforts broke down over US demands that North Korea give up its nuclear weapons. Trump has since referred to North Korea repeatedly as a "nuclear power," although his administration has continued to call for the country's denuclearization and does not formally recognize it as a nuclear-weapon state.

Trump has sought to revive the diplomatic efforts in his second term.

"I know Kim Jong Un very well, and he's going to be fine as long as we have a smart president," he told reporters on Wednesday during a tour of a helipad he is constructing on the White House's historic South Lawn.

"The fact that I get along with him – that's a good thing, not a bad thing. He has 57 very powerful nuclear weapons," Trump said. "They should have never allowed it. If I were president, I wouldn't have allowed it. But he's got them."

Trump's citing of a specific number of nuclear weapons held by North Korea was highly unusual.

The US government does not publicly publish an official estimate of North Korea's nuclear arsenal, although a 2025 report by the Congressional Research Service cited non-governmental experts as estimating that North Korea has produced enough fissile material for up to 90 warheads but may have assembled approximately 50.

In June, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute estimated that North Korea has "possibly assembled around 60 warheads, possesses enough fissile material to produce at least 30 more."

During Trump's first term, Kim called Trump a “mentally deranged US dotard” and threatened that he had use of a "nuclear button" on his desk.

But the two leaders turned that tension into face-to-face meetings, including a brief exchange at the demilitarized zone between the Koreas in which Trump became the first sitting US president to step into North Korean territory.

Pakistan’s Supreme Court on Tuesday ordered that former prime minister Imran Khan be transferred to Shifa International Hospital immediately for a comprehensive medical examination. 

For more stories from The Media Line go to themedialine.org

The court also directed the formation of a medical board to assess his health and ordered that he be kept under tight security at the hospital. It further stressed that his transfer should not be politicized and directed the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) not to allow rallies, demonstrations, or protests outside the hospital.

Shifa International Hospital is a leading private tertiary-care hospital in Islamabad, with a team of internationally trained specialists and advanced medical facilities. 

The court sought details of all cases registered against Khan, along with his complete medical records, and ordered the Adiala Jail superintendent to appear at the next hearing.

During the hearing, the court also considered a request by Khan’s sister, Uzma Khan, to meet him. Her lawyer, Uzair Bhandari, told the court that she should be allowed access because she is a doctor. He also said Khan had been kept in solitary confinement for a prolonged period and had not been allowed to meet his sisters.

Justice Shahid Waheed expressed concern during the hearing that Khan’s medical reports could be used for political purposes. The court was told that Khan’s sister would cover the cost of his treatment at the private hospital.

PTI Secretary-General Barrister Salman Akram Raja assured the court that the party would not use the reports for political purposes. The court subsequently stressed that Khan’s health matters should remain separate from political activities.

According to a medical report submitted by Adiala Jail authorities, Khan was experiencing “severe” symptoms of anxiety. The report was submitted in response to a petition Raja filed concerning Khan’s health.

An official familiar with the situation told The Media Line that the medical reports submitted to the Supreme Court showed that Khan’s unstable and poorly controlled blood pressure, combined with significant psychological stress and anxiety, warranted serious attention. 

The official said that while the government-provided medical record did not indicate an acute cardiac condition, it showed that Khan’s levels of stress and anxiety were significant enough to require medical intervention.

Khan, 73, has been imprisoned since August 2023. He was diagnosed earlier this year with a retinal condition in his right eye that his lawyers warned could result in permanent vision loss. 

His family and party have repeatedly raised concerns about his physical and psychological well-being and called for access to independent medical care.

PTI has repeatedly demanded that Khan be treated at Shifa International Hospital by doctors of his choosing rather than at government medical facilities. His sisters, who are doctors, have also sought access to him.

Authorities, however, have maintained that medical facilities are available to Khan at Adiala Jail.

Frank Beard, the longtime drummer for the rock group ZZ Top, has died at the age of 77, the band said on Tuesday.

Beard died in hospice care at his ranch in Richmond, Texas, with family members at his side, according to the group’s statement.

His cause of death was not disclosed.

Beard was the drummer of the band known for hits such as "Sharp Dressed Man" and "Legs" for 56 years. The trio of Beard, guitarist Billy Gibbons, and bassist Dusty Hill was among the most enduring lineups in music history. They first played together in 1970 and continued until Hill's death in 2021, when Elwood Francis joined the group.

“Today, Elwood and I lost a great friend and collaborator, and the world lost one of the most naturally innovative drummers and a great and true son of Texas,” Gibbons said in a statement. “His signature backbeat was key to keeping ZZ on top. The band of which he was a part for six decades is going to keep on keeping on as he had wished.”

The band said it would cancel Tuesday's show in Salt Lake City and Wednesday's performance in Colorado Springs but return to the stage in Austin, Texas, this weekend.

ZZ Top gained fans in the 1980s as one of the bands showcased on MTV during the heyday of music videos. The group became known for the flowing beards of its members, though drummer Beard was seen mostly clean-shaven.

The band was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2004.

"All I have to say is that most of my life has been a pleasant surprise, and so is this. Thank you," Beard said at the induction ceremony.

Torrential rains lashed China’s southwest to kill 10 in a house collapse and a landslide, state broadcaster CCTV said on Wednesday, with tens of thousands also evacuated as a precaution.

Disaster prevention authorities evacuated 21,784 people following heavy downpours in several areas in China’s southwest, including the areas of Chengdu and Zigong.

Five died in Sichuan province after accumulated rainwater caused the collapse of a roof and wall during a dinner party to celebrate children’s college entrance results on Tuesday, CCTV said.

Three died at the home in Sichuan's county of Changning, while two died in hospital where 17 injured were being treated, but it was unclear if the tallies included children or young people.

​Sichuan ⁠authorities declared a heavy rain alert this week and warned about ​disaster ⁠risks. Torrential rain since Tuesday unleashed two disasters that cut off roads in the mountainous Garze and Aba areas, CCTV said.

Authorities are investigating the cause of Monday's landslide at a construction site in Guangxi region that buried five people, later pulled out lifeless by rescue workers, CCTV said.

Loose sand and gravel in the high mountain canyon area could unleash landslides, authorities said earlier.

Since the start of summer, Guangxi, like many parts of China's southwest, has received heavy rain.

South Korean Foreign Minister Cho Hyun said on Wednesday that US President Donald Trump’s order to curb joint military drills appeared aimed in part at pressuring Seoul to support US efforts in the Iran war, alongside other unresolved issues such as investment.

“I think President Trump’s message includes pressure over several pending issues concerning the South Korean government, as well as a message to North Korea and an intention by the United States to break a stalemate in the Iran war,” Cho said.

One potential source of friction could be South Korea’s pledge to invest $350 billion in the United States under a trade deal signed last year, Cho said.

Seoul has yet to announce details of the investment plan, although Cho said Washington had sent Seoul a proposal outlining projects that could be considered.

"We could not move faster on the investment plan as we had to consider factors such as commercial viability and take legal procedures," Cho said. He cited other unexpected problems, without elaborating.

South Korea and the United States announced on Wednesday that they will shorten annual military drills to five days from 11 and scale back some field training, following Trump’s order on a substantial reduction in US participation.

South Korea's Unification Minister Chung Dong-young, who attended the same hearing, said he believes Trump was moving closer to potentially arranging a new meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un by curtailing exercises that have long angered Pyongyang.