Hong Kong  - More than 3,000 Hong Kong-owned factories in southern China have been idled or closed as the global economic slump takes its toll, an industry leader said in an interview Monday.

Around 3,200 factories have remained closed since the Chinese New Year holiday because of a lack of business, according to Danny Lau, chairman of the Hong Kong Small and Medium Enterprises Association.

Hong Kong  - Hong Kong is close to agreeing on an extradition treaty with Thailand that could be used to send ousted prime minster Thaksin Shinawatra back home, a news report said Sunday.

Talks are at an advanced stage over the wide-ranging treaty which could affect regular visitor Thaksin, facing a two-year jail sentence for corruption in Thailand, according to the Sunday Morning Post.

Hong Kong  - A construction company boss in Hong Kong on Saturday began a two-month jail term for trying to bribe a policeman with boxes of traditional Chinese moon cakes.

Chin Tat-yung, 37, handed 15 boxes of the cakes - usually given to children as a treat for the Chinese Mid-Autumn Festival - to a police officer inspecting road works his company was carrying out.

The police officer, who was responsible for approving the road works, gave them to his senior inspector who contacted Chin and returned the cakes, a court was told Friday.

Hong Kong - Hong Kong shares ended another poor week with a loss of almost 2.4 per cent Friday as bank shares fell heavily on fresh concerns over the financial sector's outlook.

The blue-chip Hang Seng Index dipped below the 12,000-point barrier, losing 289.72 points to end the day at 11,921.52. Turnover was 46.9 billion Hong Kong dollars (6 billion US dollars).

Hong Kong  - Hong Kong officials are considering whether to send home an illegal immigrant who lived undetected in the wealthy former British colony for 28 years, a news report said Friday.

Wong Shen-chee, who is now 71, arrived from Indonesia in 1981 on a 90-day visitor visa and has never left the high-rise city of 7 million since, the South China Morning Post reported.

Hong Kong  - A Chinese woman passenger whose temper tantrum when she missed a flight from Hong Kong was watched by 5 million YouTube viewers has been given an apology and a free upgrade, the airline said Thursday.

An airline employee who filmed the middle-aged woman throwing herself on the floor in a three-minute screaming fit when she arrived at the boarding gate too late to board a flight to San Francisco has also been disciplined, Cathay Pacific said.