China's Xinhua News Agency has started using lifelike robotic news anchors that can imitate human facial expressions and mannerisms while reading reports, the agency said in a statement.

Axar.az reports citing foreign media that, the female artificial intelligence robot, called "Xin Xiaomeng", has started "working" as a newsreader at Xinhua's News Media Centre, the network stated in a video published on the agency's official account.

The robotic female anchor reportedly read news about delegates visiting an annual parliamentary meeting in Beijing.

Her male colleague, "Xin Xiaohao", who first appeared on the news programme last year, was also in the video. Both anchors were reportedly developed by Xinhua and the Chinese search engine company Sogou.

Remember Xinhua's first #AI anchor "who" made his first appearance last year? Now he can make more hand gestures and facial expressions! He also now has a colleague as Xinhua unveils the world's first female AI anchor pic.twitter.com/M96OHtV9kN

— China Xinhua Sci-Tech (@XHscitech) 21 Şubat 2019