Health authorities say the number of PCR testing for arrivals will be halved from next week. But they have warned of a significant rise in the number of local Covid infections over the past week and again urged people to get vaccinated, especially with the first batch of new BioNTech bivalent booster vaccine expected to arrive at the end of the month. Frank Yung reports:

Two former Cathay Pacific flight attendants, who may have brought the Omicron Covid variant into the community last December, have been convicted of violating quarantine rules. Maggie Ho reports:

Chief Executive John Lee has embarked on his first official trip overseas since taking office in July. He is in Bangkok to attend the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit with other regional leaders. Lee is also leading a Hong Kong business delegation to try to boost trade ties with Thailand. Violet Wong reports from Bangkok:

A child welfare organisation has called on the government to beef up measures to tackle child abuse, such as speeding up work on legislation to make reporting of abuse mandatory. Against Child Abuse said it received over 1,100 reports through its hotline from April 2021 to March this year. It said 168 calls were reports of suspected child abuse - which was down from 200 the year before. More than half of these cases were of physical abuse, with most suspected abusers being family members. The group’s chairperson, Patrick Cheung, told Kelly Yu that while reports of abuse had fallen slightly, more needed to be done to address the problem:

Customs officers say they have made their largest-ever seizure of suspected counterfeit national football team shirts and sports shoes just ahead of the start of the World Cup in Qatar on Sunday. They say the haul is estimated to be worth more than $50 million, as Vanessa Cheng reports:

Malaysia's former Deputy Prime Minister and current leader of the opposition, Anwar Ibrahim, has told RTHK that he is "cautiously optimistic" his Paraktan Harapan coalition will win Saturday's general election. The coalition, championing multi-culturalism and equality, is well ahead in the polls. It broke the political mold in Malaysia by winning power four years ago, only for its government to implode two years later in infighting and a political coup. That scuppered the agreed plan for Anwar to take over as Prime Minister from his mentor-turned-nemesis, Mahathir Mohammed. Given that record, Mike Weeks asked Anwar if he and his team have managed to convince voters that they can now restore political stability in Malaysia:

Millions of Britons will pay more in taxes under plans announced by Britain's finance minister, Jeremy Hunt. The Chancellor of the Exchequer told MPs that income tax thresholds would be frozen until 2028, save for the top rate, whose threshold was being lowered. Hunt acknowledged that the UK was in recession but said his plan would help to rebuild the economy. RTHK's UK correspondent Gavin Grey told Samantha Butler that the taxation levels would be at their highest for 75 years:

A ceremony marking the 35th anniversary of the Operation Santa Claus fundraising campaign was held on Thursday night at Broadcasting House in Kowloon Tong. The annual charity drive is jointly organised by RTHK Radio 3 and the South China Morning Post. Steve James brings us highlights of the event: