HONG KONG (AFP) - Dozens of people were evacuated on Monday (Jan 23) after a World War II bomb was discovered at a construction site in Hong Kong, near a university campus and staff quarters.

Building workers and residents of a university hall were moved after the 227kg US-made bomb was unearthed on Pok Fu Lam Road, local news site Apple Daily reported.

The bomb was to be detonated on site on Monday (Jan 23) evening, reports said.

Unexploded wartime bombs or grenades are frequently found by hikers or construction workers in the southern Chinese city, which was the scene of fierce fighting between Japanese and British allied forces in 1941.

US and allied air forces bombed Japanese occupiers after the then-British colony fell.

Last year, police disposed of eight explosive devices found by a hiker.

In 2014 police defused a wartime bomb weighing nearly one ton, the largest yet found in the city. More than 2,200 people were evacuated.