China’s President Xi Jinping pitches for ‘sound and steady China-US relations’ after meeting US Foreign Secretary Blinken
China has refused to entertain Washington’s bid to resume military-to-military communication channels, citing US sanctions as the obstacle. The two sides appeared entrenched in their positions over everything from Taiwan to trade, including US actions toward China’s chip industry, human rights and Russia’s war against Ukraine.
US foreign secretary Antony Blinken flies to Beijing in effort to sensibly manage tenuous US-PRC relations
In its readout of the Blinken-Qin phone call, China’s foreign ministry said Qin urged the United States to respect “China’s core concerns” such as the issue of Taiwan’s self-rule, “stop interfering in China’s internal affairs, and stop harming China’s sovereignty, security and development interests in the name of competition.”
Trap or collaboration? Fears rise globally about growing Chinese influence in Africa’s security sector
Technical disciplines within the Chinese police system are taught within the larger context of China’s political system. The CCP’s definition of terrorism, for example, derives in part from weiwen. This includes curbing anti-government uprisings and what the CCP calls the “three evils” (san gu shili: terrorism, “splitism” or separatism and religious extremism. This approach, in turn, informs China’s international counterterrorism partnerships.
China’s teetering economic recovery unleashes hordes of hawkers on streets as low wages bite
For decades, street stalls and hawkers – common elsewhere in Asia – have been banned or tightly regulated in many Chinese cities, with authorities seeing them as unsightly. There are signs, however, that local governments are giving hawkers more leeway, a trend expected to continue.
Chaina says Ukraine war raises urgency for unconventional warfare to repulse US threat
Despite the hundreds of billions of dollars poured into defence spending, China’s armed forces do not have much recent experience in a hot war, with its last – and brief – military conflict in 1979 with Vietnam. The ability to win is needed to maintain national security, Wang wrote.
China court sentences US citizen to life in prison for espionage, without specifying offence
The sentencing comes amid growing tensions between China and the US on a number of fronts, from accusations of Chinese spying and human rights abuses, to US efforts to build up military alliances to curb China’s ambitions toward Taiwan and in the Pacific.
Chinese President Xi Jinping discusses Russian army withdrawal from Ukraine with President Zelensky
Zelenskiy also said Xi had expressed “words of support” for the extension of a deal to export Ukrainian grain from its Black Sea ports. Moscow has said the pact will not be renewed beyond May 18 unless the West removes obstacles to Russian grain and fertiliser exports.
War in Yemen winds down with complete absence of US role as China parades influence
The war in Yemen looks like it’s coming to an end. US media reported on Thursday that a ceasefire extending through 2023 had been agreed to, but those reports also included Houthi denials. On Friday, Al Mayadeen, a generally pro-Houthi Lebanese news outlet, reported optimism from the Houthi side that...
Germ warfare: No animal host of Covid has been pinpointed, China now suspected to have lab engineered coronavirus
A lab leak in Wuhan is still thought to be the most likely origin of Covid because an animal host has not been found after two years of searching, top scientists believe. Dr Alina Chan, a specialist in gene therapy and cell engineering at MIT and Harvard, said there was...
While China plans to stop financing new coal plants overseas, its domestic consumption has tripled
China’s pledge to stop financing new coal plants abroad, announced by President Xi Jinping at the United Nations summit last week, has raised hopes that the world could soon wean itself off the most carbon-intensive fossil fuel. But although this is a positive step from the world’s biggest emitter of...
