{
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  "dek": "The United States has downgraded Hong Kong to the lowest tier in its annual human trafficking report, citing shortcomings in prosecutions and victim identification, an assessment the city’s government rejected as “entirely unfounded”. The US State Department’s 2026 Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report, released on Thurs",
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      "source_name": "South China Morning Post — China",
      "title": "Hong Kong rejects US downgrade to lowest tier in human trafficking report",
      "url": "https://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy/article/3370244/hong-kong-rejects-us-downgrade-lowest-tier-human-trafficking-report",
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    "The evidence-strength label describes source structure, not truth, intent, impact, or causation.",
    "Declared instrument links are topical pointers until a separate scan or economic observation is joined by time and method.",
    "Title-similarity clustering can miss differently worded or cross-language accounts and can join closely worded updates.",
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      "attribution": "South China Morning Post — China",
      "evidence_item_id": "item-2a38db46bfb91bf689f38222",
      "published_at": "2026-10-08T21:43:50Z",
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