• How far-reaching is China’s assimilation policy? | News
• Why politicians are obsessed with mythical Chinese land grabs | United States
• China’s top lawmaker vows to share governance notes with Djibouti, deepen belt and road ties
• Alibaba’s South Asian platform Daraz names new CEO in latest executive reshuffling at the Chinese e-commerce giant
• China smartphone maker Oppo ends protracted legal battle with Nokia, agrees to pay 5G royalties
• China’s ethnic affairs officials urged to promote integration of minority groups
• ASML orders triple in fourth quarter amid soaring demand for advanced chip gear, especially in China
• China-Nauru foreign ministers meet in Beijing to shore up shift in diplomatic allegiance away from Taiwan
• Elderly China woman leaves US$2.8 million assets to beloved pets instead of children who never visited even when she was ill
• German firms plan to increase China investment in next 2 years despite ‘reality check’ in 2023
• Thousands of people are forced out of their homes after 7.1 quake in western China
• Chinese Singaporean teen who identified as white supremacist given restriction order under anti-terror law
• China vows to open immigration ‘at stable pace’, more policies to lure foreign talent
• China to double down on support for Hong Kong as nation’s international financial hub for bonds, green finance, minister says at AFF
• China to cut banks’ reserve requirement ratio next month, set to inject 1 trillion yuan into market
• China takes its chip war to space as it uses Tiangong space station to test processors and gain a tech edge
• Jimmy Lai inflamed anti-China sentiments in US, urged hostilities through ‘extreme’ articles, Hong Kong court hears
• China firm sets up filial piety fund, gives US$340 to parents of staff every year to encourage respect for elders
• Between China and Russia, landlocked Mongolia eyes summit to enhance ties as geopolitical pressures mount
• Blinken tours West Africa amid looming shadow of China and Russia
• As US-China tech war heats up, scientists find new material to cool quantum computers
• 2 strong earthquakes hit western China in a month: is the Earth getting restless?
• Most Japanese do not have ‘friendly feelings’ towards China amid Beijing’s aggression in South China Sea, Taiwan: poll
• Chinese research ship turned down by Sri Lanka to make Maldives resupply call
• Chinese firms, anxious to avoid choppy geopolitical waters, chart a course for Vietnam
• Nvidia CEO’s low-key China visit seen as a goodwill gesture towards key market as US chip firm grapples with sanction issues
• US-China science deal must address American national security concerns: senior State Department official
• China’s ban on Australian lobsters has Asean members clawing way into market
• Hong Kong property: Templeton joins China Re in relocating to Two IFC as office rents fall
• Young China neighbours who fell in love while chatting about interior design marry, keep separate homes on same floor
• Countries Press China at UN Human Rights Review

How far-reaching is China’s assimilation policy? | News

https://www.economist.com/news/2024/01/23/how-far-reaching-is-chinas-assimilation-policy

China’s attempts to assimilate ethnic minorities leaves no stone unturned. It has even reached one of China’s quirkiest communities—a pocket of 6,000 people in a Mongolian township in Yunnan province, more than 2,500km from Inner Mongolia where most ethnic Mongols live.

David Rennie, our Beijing bureau chief reports from a traditional Naadam ceremony in Xingmeng. Together with Alice Su, our senior China correspondent, they ask: What does the Party’s treatment of this tiny community tell us about ethnic policy in Xi Jinping’s China?

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Why politicians are obsessed with mythical Chinese land grabs | United States

https://www.economist.com/united-states/2024/01/22/why-politicians-are-obsessed-with-mythical-chinese-land-grabs

There was a time when Kim Reynolds, the governor of Iowa, had no problem with Chinese investment. In 2012, when she was the state’s lieutenant governor, she met Xi Jinping, then China’s vice-premier, on a visit to Beijing. In 2017, as governor, she visited again, this time posing with Vice-Premier Wang Yang. No longer. In her Condition of the State address to Iowa’s legislature on January 9th, Ms Reynolds claimed that “China continues to grow more aggressive, and buying American land has been one of the many ways they have waged this new battle.” Later this year she intends to introduce a new law that would toughen land-ownership reporting rules in Iowa. “American farmland should stay in American hands,” she says.

Ms Reynolds joins a chorus of state and federal politicians who worry about Chinese land grabs. On January 2nd Missouri’s governor, Mike Parson, issued an executive order banning “foreign adversaries” from buying land within ten miles of a military facility. Last October Arkansas ordered a Chinese-owned agricultural firm to sell 160 acres of land. Laws to restrict Chinese ownership of land have spread as far as Florida and Texas. Over the past few years the number of states with restrictions on foreign ownership has grown from 14 to 24, according to Micah Brown, of the National Agricultural Law Centre in Arkansas. Federal politicians are getting in on the act, too. Jon Tester, the Democratic senator from Montana, is among those to have proposed tighter federal laws on foreign land ownership.

Yet there is little reason to think that Chinese firms are really buying much American land at all—whether near military bases or otherwise. In fact, if official data are to be believed, Chinese landholdings are both tiny and shrinking. And Chinese investment in general into America has collapsed in the past few years. Is it all a storm about nothing?

Since 1978 foreign owners of agricultural land have been required to declare it to the US Department of Agriculture (USDA). The agency’s data show that, at the end of 2022, around 3% of privately held land nationwide was declared foreign-owned. The biggest holders were firms and individuals from Canada, followed by the Netherlands, Britain and a few other European countries. Declared Chinese entities held less than 1% of all foreign-owned land, or 0.03% of the total. People in Luxembourg own more. Foreign land ownership has grown by 40% since 2016, but China is not evidently the driver. From 2021 to 2022 the total amount of land owned in full or in part by Chinese firms shrank from 384,000 acres to 347,000. In Iowa, Chinese holdings totalled just 281 acres—an area smaller than the state fairgrounds in Des Moines.

So why the panic? Mr Brown says that the surge of lawmaking is driven by a change in the political climate, caused by two relatively high-profile incidents of Chinese land purchases near military bases. One was for a grain-milling plant in North Dakota, a few miles away from Grand Forks Air Force Base. The other was land purchased to build a wind farm in southern Texas, near Laughlin Air Force base. Those, combined with the shooting down of a Chinese spy balloon last year, meant that: “Nobody wanted to stand up against restricting [Chinese] purchases of land,” says Mr Brown. Politicians of various stripes have suggested that the Chinese either want to spy, or to control America’s food supply, or both.

The patchiness of official data does not help. That 281 acres in Iowa, for example, is owned by Syngenta, an agricultural-science firm with its headquarters in Switzerland. The firm was purchased outright by ChemChina, a state-owned chemicals firm, in 2017. But until 2021 the land was listed as Swiss-owned in the USDA records—as were several other Syngenta sites. Late last year, tax records revealed that Chen Tianqiao, a Chinese billionaire with past links to the Communist Party, who lives in the San Francisco Bay Area, owns almost 200,000 acres of forestry land in Oregon, which was not declared as foreign-owned. (Mr Chen’s firm now says that, following media questions, it has submitted the relevant USDA filings.) A review by the Government Accountability Office published on January 18th found that the Treasury and Defence departments need timelier and more accurate data to judge security risks.

Still, it is unlikely that data gaps hide a surge of secret Chinese land purchases. Overall Chinese investment into America peaked in 2016, and has fallen off a cliff since the pandemic, says Derek Scissors, who maintains a database of Chinese foreign investment in America for the American Enterprise Institute, a think-tank. What investment is continuing is generally confined to the supply chain for electric vehicles. The flood of Chinese land purchases that began a decade or so ago was more to do with wealthy Chinese people trying to get their money out of China than about spying, according to Mr Scissors. The new laws are a bit like ones “preventing snow emergencies in Florida”, he says. That is to say, pointless.

Some politicians are frustrated with the endless focus on land. Raja Krishnamoorthi, a Democratic congressman who is the ranking member of the House select committee on China, admits that enforcement of filing requirements for USDA’s database is “pretty lax”. But some laws intended to stop any Chinese-origin individuals buying any land at all, such as one passed in Florida last year that restricted even residential-property purchases, drift into “outright racism and xenophobia”, he complains. Mr Krishnamoorthi says he wishes politicians would focus more on improving American competitiveness in general. Sadly that is harder than blustering about farmland. ■

Correction (January 23rd 2024): This article was updated to note that Chen Tianqiao no longer has links to the Chinese Communist Party.

China’s top lawmaker vows to share governance notes with Djibouti, deepen belt and road ties

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy/article/3249649/chinas-top-lawmaker-vows-share-governance-notes-djibouti-deepen-belt-and-road-ties?utm_source=rss_feed

China is willing to exchange notes with Djibouti on state governance and deepen cooperation under the Belt and Road Initiative, the country’s top legislator has said.

Zhao Leji, chairman of the National People’s Congress Standing Committee, China’s top legislative body, made the comments as he met Djiboutian counterpart Dileita Mohamed Dileita in Beijing on Tuesday to mark 45 years of diplomatic ties.

“[China is] ready to deepen cooperation [with Djibouti] under the Belt and Road Initiative, strengthen strategic alignment, and expand cooperation on ports, free trade parks, investment and infrastructure construction,” Zhao was quoted as saying by Chinese state news agency Xinhua.

Tiny Djibouti to get spaceport under deal with Hong Kong firm, Chinese investor

Djibouti, a tiny Horn of Africa nation facing the oil-rich Arabian peninsula, is strategically significant because of its maritime location. It sits at the intersection of the Gulf of Aden and the Red Sea – the gateway to the Suez Canal through which 10 per cent of the world’s oil exports and 20 per cent of all commercial goods travel.

It is also one of more than 50 African countries to have signed up for Beijing’s trillion-dollar belt and road infrastructure programme, and is an important node in the plan’s maritime section seeking to connect China to the rest of Asia, and Africa and Europe.

“China is willing to work with Djibouti to strengthen exchanges of experience in state governance on the basis of mutual respect for each other’s choice of development path and institutional model,” Zhao told Dileita, speaker of the National Assembly of Djibouti.

He also pledged support for Djibouti “in safeguarding its national sovereignty, security and stability [and] in independently exploring a development path suited to its national conditions”, according to Xinhua.

Djibouti is home to several foreign military bases, including China’s only overseas military base – set up in 2017.

China says Djibouti is ideally placed for operations to resupply its peacekeeping and humanitarian missions in Africa, and combat piracy off the Yemen and Somalia coasts – a region where Western countries have long been the dominant external security actors.

Apart from the United States’ only military base in Africa, Camp Lemonnier, Djibouti accommodates the militaries of several American allies, including Italy, Germany, Spain, France and Japan.

Zhao also called for deeper exchange of legislative and supervisory experiences with Djibouti and closer cooperation on education, culture, health and local affairs.

Dileita spoke of “fruitful results” gained from cooperation on politics, the economy, culture and people’s livelihoods, the Xinhua report said. The National Assembly of Djibouti was willing to “strengthen friendly exchanges” with the NPC, he was quoted as saying.

Dileita also met Vice-President Han Zheng, who reaffirmed Beijing’s commitment to promoting cooperation on investment, financing and infrastructure, and pledged to support Djibouti in promoting the 2035 Vision for China-Africa Cooperation – a framework adopted two years ago.

China has invested heavily in infrastructure in Djibouti and the wider Horn of Africa region under its belt and road strategy.

The Chinese-built Ethiopia-Djibouti standard gauge railway, also known as the Addis Ababa-Djibouti railway, was Africa’s first electrified transboundary railway and a flagship belt and road project. Operations began in 2017, with some staff training still continuing in China.

Alibaba’s South Asian platform Daraz names new CEO in latest executive reshuffling at the Chinese e-commerce giant

https://www.scmp.com/tech/big-tech/article/3249650/alibabas-south-asian-platform-daraz-names-new-ceo-latest-executive-reshuffling-chinese-e-commerce?utm_source=rss_feed

Daraz Group, a South Asian online shopping platform owned by Alibaba Group Holding, has named a new chief executive, amid continued leadership reshuffling at the Chinese e-commerce giant.

James Dong, who already runs Southeast Asian e-commerce platform Lazada Group, has been appointed as the platform’s acting CEO, Daraz Group said in a statement on Wednesday. He replaced Daraz founder Bjarke Mikkelsen as head of the company, taking over all his existing duties.

Daraz and Lazada, another Alibaba subsidiary, have long had “extensive collaborations and synergies”, the company said. Dong was installed to “support the long-term healthy development” of Daraz, and to lead the two firms towards “greater mutual learning and collaboration”, according to the company.

Alibaba also owns the South China Morning Post.

Jack Ma, Joe Tsai replace SoftBank as Alibaba’s largest shareholders

The new CEO will work to deepen integration between Daraz and its sister companies, and the move aims to bring the company a “more focused strategy and efficient business model”, Mikkelsen, the founder, said in the company statement.

Dong, 44, took over as Lazada CEO in June 2022 after stints running the company’s Thailand and Vietnam operations. Prior to that, Dong was Alibaba’s head of globalisation strategy and corporate development.

The new appointment is the latest executive reshuffling at Alibaba, which has been making a series of moves to revamp its sprawling empire in the face of intensifying competition from emerging players, both foreign and domestic. In March 2023 it announced a group-wide overhaul with a plan to split the company into six independently-run business units, although efforts to spin off its cloud computing unit have since been nixed.

Last month, the e-commerce juggernaut reshuffled the top ranks of its biggest domestic profit earner, Taobao and Tmall Group (TTG), and installed TTG chairman Eddie Wu Yongming as the group’s new CEO.

The appointment, which came two weeks after Pinduoduo owner PDD Holdings surpassed Alibaba in market value, was seen as part of the company’s effort to sharpen its focus on becoming more “artificial intelligence-driven” and consumer-oriented to fend off rivals.

Alibaba has also been taking more steps to boost its international businesses, as budget shopping platforms Shein and Temu, another PDD brand, rapidly expand.

The company last month injected US$634 million into Lazada, taking the total amount of cash injections to the Singapore-headquartered company to around US$7.4 billion since Alibaba acquired it in 2016.

In the three months ending September, Alibaba’s international operations grew 53 per cent, outstripping growth in China, which has been weighed down by a sluggish economy.

Daraz covers markets totalling more than 450 million people – including Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka – but it has faced challenges amid a global economic slowdown and sweeping lay-offs in the technology sector. The company in February last year cut 11 per cent of its workforce, affecting about 360 people.

China smartphone maker Oppo ends protracted legal battle with Nokia, agrees to pay 5G royalties

https://www.scmp.com/tech/big-tech/article/3249623/china-smartphone-maker-oppo-ends-protracted-legal-battle-nokia-agrees-pay-5g-royalties?utm_source=rss_feed

Chinese smartphone maker Oppo and Finnish electronics giant Nokia said they had struck a global patent licensing deal, ending a years-long legal battle over cellular patent rates that spanned continents.

The two companies had been engaged in multiple patent lawsuits across 12 countries since 2021, as they failed to agree on the price for Oppo to use Nokia’s 5G patent portfolios on the Chinese firm’s smartphones.

In some markets, court rulings in favour of Nokia have resulted in Oppo being banned from selling to local customers. After losing a patent infringement lawsuit to Nokia in Germany in 2022, Oppo halted smartphone sales there and delisted most products from its local website.

On Wednesday, Oppo – the world’s fourth-largest smartphone brand, according to data from research firm IDC – said it had signed a global patent cross-licensing agreement with Nokia, covering standard-essential patents (SEPs) in 5G and other cellular technologies.

SEPs are essential for products to comply with industry standards.

“Following the agreement, both parties will resolve all pending litigation in all jurisdictions,” Oppo said in a statement.

In a separate statement, Nokia said Oppo would pay royalties according to the agreed rates and settle payments it had owed Nokia. The two companies did not disclose the licensing fees and other specific terms of the deal, which are “confidential as per mutual agreement”, according to their statements.

Oppo did not comment on the deal’s implications for its German business.

The Chinese firm is still grappling with legal challenges in Germany, where a Munich court ruled in late December that Oppo infringed on the patents of InterDigital, a US wireless and mobile technology company, and granted an injunction against the Chinese company.

The deal between Nokia and Oppo came after a Chinese court supported Oppo’s petition to set lower royalty rates for Nokia’s SEPs for 2G to 5G technologies.

According to a ruling released last month, the Chongqing First Intermediate People’s Court decided that the fair licensing fees should be US$1.151 per 5G multi-mode handset in developed markets, including Europe, and US$0.707 per device in other countries, including China.

Oppo is under pressure to clear up its patent disputes and boost its global sales amid fierce competition. The Dongguan-based company’s smartphone shipments fell 9.9 per cent in 2023 amid macro economic headwinds, according to IDC data.

Earlier this month, Oppo’s domestic rival Honor, a spin-off of US-sanctioned Huawei Technologies, signed a patent licensing deal with Nokia covering SEPs in cellular technologies including 5G.

China’s ethnic affairs officials urged to promote integration of minority groups

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politics/article/3249651/chinas-ethnic-affairs-officials-urged-promote-integration-minority-groups?utm_source=rss_feed

China’s ethnic affairs officials have been asked to boost efforts to promote the integration of the country’s ethnic minority groups in the new year.

The Tuesday meeting brought together senior ethnic affairs policy directors from around the country and outlined goals for China’s ethnic affairs policies.

Beijing has stressed the need to enforce President Xi Jinping’s vision of “forging a sense of community of the Chinese nation”, which calls for greater integration of ethnic minority groups.

China’s security tsar calls on Tibet’s neighbours to oppose ethnic separatism

The meeting noted that efforts should be made to “build a system of historical materials, a system of discourse and a system of theories on the community of the Chinese nation” and to “scientifically reveal the reasons, theories and philosophies of the formation and development of the Chinese nation”.

It called for efforts to launch cultural products and exhibits that “reflect the commonality of the Chinese nation” to “fully demonstrate Chinese cultural heritage”.

It also outlined the goal of addressing risks and “hidden dangers” in the field of ethnic affairs and safeguarding ethnic unity and stability.

The meeting noted that ethnic affairs offices across China should “have a sense of responsibility and urgency” and “thoroughly implement” the latest decisions by Communist Party leaders on ethnic affairs.

Ethnic grievances were once a major source of tension in Chinese society, especially in Tibet and Xinjiang. Beijing has largely brought down the intensity of those tensions in recent years, but has been widely criticised for the security and cultural policies that were used during the process.

At a Politburo study session in October, President Xi Jinping noted the need to promote the party’s work in guiding ethnic minority groups. He emphasised the importance of educating ethnic minority groups about party history, theories and policies and to further integrate them into the Chinese nation.

“Efforts should be made to let people cultivate awareness that people from all ethnicities are in the same community, where they share weal and woe and stick together through thick and thin,” he was quoted as saying at the time by state news agency Xinhua.

Is China doubling down on assimilation of ethnic groups?

In Tuesday’s meeting, Pan Yue, party chief of the National Ethnic Affairs Commission, said efforts should be made “to open up a brand new situation of high-quality development of the party’s work on ethnic affairs in the new era”.

The commission is responsible for drafting laws regarding China’s policies towards its ethnic minority groups as well as implementing those laws and regulations.

Pan is also a deputy head of the United Front Work Department, the body responsible for liaising with non-party groups, overseeing the country’s ethnic and religious issues and overseas Chinese affairs.

The Tuesday meeting also called for efforts to make economic development “a process of forging a sense of community of the Chinese nation”.

It also emphasised “strengthening the party’s centralised and unified leadership on ethnic affairs” to promote “strong synergy for the party’s work on ethnic affairs in the new era”.

ASML orders triple in fourth quarter amid soaring demand for advanced chip gear, especially in China

https://www.scmp.com/tech/big-tech/article/3249620/asml-orders-triple-fourth-quarter-amid-soaring-demand-advanced-chip-gear-especially-china?utm_source=rss_feed

ASML Holding NV orders more than tripled last quarter from the previous three months as demand for its most-sophisticated machines soared, in a sign that the semiconductor industry may be recovering.

Order bookings rose to €9.19 billion (US$9.98 billion) in the fourth quarter from €2.6 billion in July to September, Europe’s most valuable technology company said in a statement on Wednesday. That compares with an average estimate of €3.6 billion by analysts surveyed by Bloomberg.

Bookings of its most-advanced extreme ultraviolet lithography machines in the period was €5.6 billion.

“The inventory levels in the end markets are improving and are definitely at a better level than they were a couple of quarters ago,” chief financial officer Roger Dassen said in a statement accompanying the earnings result.

ASML wants to speed up deliveries of mature lithography machines to China

ASML is the only company that produces equipment needed to make the most sophisticated semiconductors, and demand for its products are a bellwether for the industry’s health. Late last year, it started shipping major parts of the first of its newest chip-making machine to Intel.

ASML also benefited from strong demand from China last year as chip makers there rushed to get lithography machines ahead of Dutch export rules meant to hobble Beijing’s semiconductor ambitions. The rise in Chinese demand helped offset the effects of a global chip industry slowdown on ASML, which is the only producer of the equipment needed to produce most advanced semiconductors.

China accounted for 39 per cent of ASML’s sales in the fourth quarter, down from 46 per cent in the previous period. China accounted for only 8 per cent in January to March.

“The business in 2023 with China was very, very strong,” Dassen said.

Net sales rose to €7.24 billion in October to December, from €6.67 billion in the previous three months.

ASML has been targeted by the US effort to curb exports of cutting-edge technology to China, one of the Veldhoven-based company’s biggest markets. Last year, US President Joe Biden’s administration urged the Dutch government to prevent ASML from shipping some immersion deep ultraviolet lithography machines, its second-most capable machinery, to China without a licence.

The Dutch manufacturer had licences to ship three top-of-the-line DUV lithography machines to Chinese firms before this month, when the new restrictions took full effect. However, US officials reached out to ASML late last year to ask them to immediately halt scheduled shipments of some of the machines to Chinese customers, Bloomberg News reported previously, citing people familiar with the matter.

ASML, which is already restricted from selling its most advanced extreme ultraviolet machines to China, expects as much as 15 per cent of China sales this year will be affected by the new export control measures.

China-Nauru foreign ministers meet in Beijing to shore up shift in diplomatic allegiance away from Taiwan

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy/article/3249630/china-nauru-foreign-ministers-meet-beijing-shore-shift-diplomatic-allegiance-away-taiwan?utm_source=rss_feed

Beijing hosted Nauru’s foreign minister on Wednesday as the two countries finalise official ties in another diplomatic upset for Taipei.

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi and Lionel Aingimea, Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade of the Pacific island nation, held talks in Beijing and signed a joint communique saying the two countries had resumed diplomatic relations at the ambassadorial level, state news agency Xinhua reported.

Nauru will sever diplomatic relations with Taiwan and “no longer develop official relations or official exchanges with Taiwan”, the communique said.

“Although China and Nauru are geographically far apart and separated by vast oceans, the friendship between the two peoples has a long history,” Wang told the press on Wednesday morning.

Wang also said a “very small number of countries” that maintained diplomatic relations with Taipei “constitute a violation of China’s sovereignty”.

China’s foreign minister urged these countries to “stand with the international community”, adding that China was willing to develop relations with them on the basis of the one-China principle.

“We look forward to the practical cooperation that’s going to happen between Nauru and China. The prospect is bright,” Aingimea said at the press conference.

Nauru, population 12,500, severed diplomatic ties with Taiwan this month, two days after the pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) candidate William Lai Ching-te was elected president.

Nauru established formal relations with Taiwan in 1980, but switched its official recognition to the mainland in 2002. It re-established ties with Taipei in 2005, before switching again this month.

Nauru announced on January 15 it would no longer recognise Taiwan “as a separate country” but “as an inalienable part of China’s territory”, hailing the switch as “in the best interests” of its country and people.

Beijing sees Taiwan as part of China, to be reunited by force if necessary. Most countries, including the US, do not recognise Taiwan as an independent state, but Washington opposes any attempt to take the self-governed island by force and is committed to arming Taiwan.

No need to be ‘anxious’ over China’s Pacific presence, envoy tells Australia

Beijing has repeatedly condemned President-elect Lai as a “stubborn separatist” and said he and the ruling DPP posed a risk of war to Taiwan.

Taiwan has lost 10 allies since the DPP’s Tsai Ing-wen was elected president in 2016 and rejected the one-China principle, an unofficial agreement that there is only “one China” but that each side has its own interpretation of what that means.

As a result, Beijing suspended official dialogue and exchanges with Taipei and stepped up its operations around the island. Beijing also took trade measures ahead of this month’s presidential election, cancelling tariff reductions on some Taiwanese products.

The last country to switch from Taipei to Beijing was Honduras in March last year. Taipei now has just 12 formal allies.

Tsai’s office lashed out at Beijing last week, saying it had lured Nauru into severing formal ties with Taiwan as “an attack on democratic values and a challenge to the international-based order”.

China not targeting Australia’s Pacific Island ties: Communist Party official

Tuvalu, another Pacific island nation, is likely to review its diplomatic ties with Taiwan after the island nation’s election on Friday, according to a report by Reuters on Wednesday.

Tuvalu is one of Taiwan’s three remaining allies in the Pacific. Under a bilateral agreement, it must consult Australia before signing security arrangements with another country.

Canberra said on Tuesday it would not interfere with Tuvalu’s decision.

Elderly China woman leaves US$2.8 million assets to beloved pets instead of children who never visited even when she was ill

https://www.scmp.com/news/people-culture/trending-china/article/3248592/elderly-china-woman-leaves-us28-million-assets-beloved-pets-instead-children-who-never-visited-even?utm_source=rss_feed

An elderly woman in China has decided to leave her 20 million yuan (US$2.8 million) fortune to her cats and dogs and give nothing to her adult children.

The woman, surnamed Liu, from Shanghai, made an initial will some years ago in which she left her three children money and property.

However, she has changed her mind about the inheritance because her offspring did not visit or care for her when she was ill, also, they seldom even contact her.

Only her pet cats and dogs are there for her, Liu said, according to a report by Zonglan News.

She changed her will and insisted all her money must be used to care for her pets and any of their offspring after she dies.

A local veterinary clinic has been appointed as the administrator of her inheritance and is responsible for the care of the animals.

Although Liu wanted to leave all her money directly to her pets, that is not legal in China, according to Chen Kai, an official from the country’s Will Registration Centre headquarters in Beijing.

“However, there are alternatives to solve this issue,” Chen said.

“Liu’s current will is one way, and we would have advised her to appoint a person she trusts to supervise the vet clinic to ensure the pets are properly cared for,” he added.

Another official from the eastern China branch of the China Will Registration Centre said they had alerted Liu to the risks of putting all her money in the hands of the pet clinic before she made her final will.

“We told Auntie Liu that if her children change their attitude towards her, she could always alter her will again,” the official said.

Liu’s story sparked a lively online discussion about inheritance and families.

“How disappointed and heartbroken she must have been to make the decision not to leave anything to her children,” said one online observer.

“Well done. If my daughter treats me poorly in the future, I will also leave my house to others,” another said.

In December last year, a Shanghai court ruled that the will of a man who left all his assets – totalling 3.3 million yuan (US$466,000) – to a kind fruit stall owner instead of his relatives, was valid after they challenged it.

German firms plan to increase China investment in next 2 years despite ‘reality check’ in 2023

https://www.scmp.com/economy/global-economy/article/3249635/german-firms-plan-increase-china-investment-next-2-years-despite-reality-check-2023?utm_source=rss_feed

Despite multiple headwinds and uncertainties dimming China’s appeal as an investment destination, most German businesses plan to stick around as intensifying competition raises the bar and the allure of the Chinese market is too big to walk away from, according to a new survey.

The 2023/24 Business Confidence Survey released on Wednesday by the German Chamber of Commerce in China showed 54 per cent of surveyed firms believe China’s investment appeal is declining in comparison to other markets.

But the survey also revealed an equal percentage are planning to increase their investments over the next two years despite de-risking calls, although the size of the investment was not surveyed.

And the report, which surveyed 566 member companies in October from industries including machinery and industrial equipment, automotive and business services, showed 91 per cent of companies plan to continue doing business in China.

‘Growth nothing to write home about’: 7 takeaways from China’s economic data

Confidence among China’s foreign business community has been eroded by an increasingly tightened and volatile regulatory environment, and Beijing is seeking to restore trust as a lack of transparency and a weak economic recovery has led to an exodus of foreign capital.

Despite a 40 per cent rise in the number of newly established foreign-invested enterprises in 2023, which pushed the total to 53,766, yuan-denominated actual foreign capital used dropped by 8 per cent year on year to a three-year low of 1.1 trillion yuan (US$155 billion), according to the Ministry of Commerce.

“If we ask companies now, and I’ve just done this, the companies are, I would say, a little bit less optimistic than they were in October,” said Jens Hildebrandt, executive director of the North China branch of the German Chamber of Commerce in China.

The survey showed that German companies operating in China face a range of challenges, including increased competition from local companies, unequal market access, economic headwinds and geopolitical risks.

A third of respondents consider legal uncertainty as the most significant regulatory challenge.

More than half of the firms who participate in public procurement – selling goods and services to governments and state-owned enterprises – encountered obstacles, such as a lack of transparency and “Buy China” policies, the report showed.

“Last year was a reality check for German companies operating in China,” said Ulf Reinhardt, chairperson of the German Chamber of Commerce in China – South and Southwest China.

“The current regulatory environment undermines the competitiveness of German companies, which are determined to succeed and harness the country’s innovative potential.”

But while 83 per cent of companies surveyed think China’s economy is facing a downward trajectory, 64 per cent of those view the slowdown as temporary and predict that it would bounce back within the next one to three years.

After a disappointing 2023, when only 21 per cent of German companies expected a positive industry development, the share has doubled to 42 per cent in 2024, with 78 per cent expecting consistent growth over the next five years.

German companies believe that the market growth would depend on addressing key structural problems, Reinhardt added.

“The potential of the Chinese market is still there, but China’s market attractiveness is shifting, making a profit in China is not as easy as it has been in the past because the market changed. There are still opportunities, as are challenges and risks,” he said.

Germany has always been a crucial part of trade between China and the European Union, but as Chinese companies increase their competitiveness in industrial and automobile sectors, the bar of innovation has also been raised for German firms.

In the automotive sector, 11 per cent of companies view their Chinese competitors as innovation leaders, with 58 per cent expecting the firms to take on the role over the next five years, the report showed.

Refreshed China-Germany deal helps Beijing keep a foothold in West

But due to rising risks of operating in China, including geopolitical tensions and its uncertain economic development, nearly half of the surveyed companies said they have taken steps to ramp up risk management.

The steps include building China-independent supply chains, setting up additional operations outside China, but also localising research and development operations in China.

Amid the emergence of strong competitors in China, the German Chamber of Commerce in China called on Chinese policymakers to create a true level playing field for foreign businesses by implementing measures that promote fair competition and strengthen investor confidence.

“There needs to be a build-up of trust so that investment can happen again, what we need for that is an improvement of legal certainty and transparency,” Hildebrandt added.

“It is important to simplify cross-border data transfer, but also in other areas where language is vague in laws and regulations. Intellectual property protection is also another topic that won’t go away.”

Thousands of people are forced out of their homes after 7.1 quake in western China

https://apnews.com/article/china-earthquake-xinjiang-kyrgyzstan-kazakhstan-361d226d2cf4013941d1c9a63b125932Men gather near a fire at a checkpoint into Wushi county in China's western Xinjiang region on Tuesday, Jan. 23, 2024. A massive earthquake has struck a sparsely populated part of China's western Xinjiang region, killing a few and damaging or collapsing more than 120 homes in freezing cold weather. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan)

2024-01-24T06:01:32Z

UCHTURPAN, China (AP) — As aftershocks continued to rock western China on Wednesday, more than 12,000 people were staying in tents and other shelters, lighting bonfires to fend off the freezing weather.

The previous day, a magnitude 7.1 earthquake in a remote part of China’s Xinjiang region killed three people and left five injured, while damaging hundreds of buildings.

The quake caused significant damage amid freezing temperatures, but the toll on lives and property was relatively light, owing to the sparse population around the epicenter in Uchturpan county, near the border with Kazakhstan.

Footage shown by state broadcaster CCTV on Wednesday showed evacuees eating instant noodles in tents with bonfires providing heat.

Jian Gewa, a 16-year old student in Uchturpan, said he was in the bathroom when the quake began. The entire building shook violently.

“I just thought I had to get myself to safety as quickly as possible,” Jian said.

He was evacuated to a school where he was staying in a dorm room with his grandfather, joining about 200 others. Local officials said they planned to check houses’ stability before people could return.

The earthquake hit in a sparsely populated area with clusters of towns and villages scattered across an otherwise barren winter landscape. A two lane highway runs from the city of Aksu about 125 kilometers (78 miles) to the area, through frozen brown flatlands on one side and craggy outcroppings on the other. Power lines and an occasional cement factory are virtually the only signs of human presence.

In Kizilsu Kirgiz prefecture, the earthquake caused damage of various degrees to 851 buildings, collapsing 93 structures near the epicenter and killing 910 livestock, according to the prefecture deputy party secretary Wurouziali Haxihaerbayi.

The area is populated mostly by Kyrgyz and Uyghurs, ethnic Turkic minorities who are predominantly Muslim and have been the target of a state campaign of forced assimilation and mass detention. The region is heavily militarized, and state broadcaster CCTV showed paramilitary troops moving in before dawn to clear rubble and set up tents for those displaced.

Two of the three people who died were members of a Kyrgyz sheep herding family who had brought their flock up the mountain and spent the night in their rest hut, said Shi Chao, the Communist Party head of Kulansarike township.

Rescuers found the family of three, including a 6-year old girl, and brought them down the mountain but only the father survived, Shi said.

The township has been replacing the huts with sturdier structures partially subsidized by the government, he said. The third death happened elsewhere in Akqi county.

The prefecture has deployed more than 2,300 rescuers, and Akqi county evacuated 7,338 residents. In total, 12,426 people have been evacuated.

Rescue crews combed through the rubble while emergency survival gear including coats and tents arrived to help the thousands of people who fled their homes.

“This 7.1 rating is very strong, but the death and injury situation is not severe,” Zhang Yongjiu, the head of Xinjiang Earthquake Administration, told a news conference.

The quake’s epicenter was in a mountainous area about 3,000 meters (9,800 feet) above sea level, Zhang said.

In the village of Yamansu, about 115 people were staying in a Communist Party meeting hall, their bedding neatly rolled up on Wednesday morning on top of five long rows of metal bed frames. Medical staff were on hand to check on older residents.

A grandmother fed one of her grandchildren on one of the beds, while an older one slurped instant noodles.

Outside, men chatted around a large metal wood-burning cooker with a stove pipe, two wearing chef’s toques. Chunks of meat and vegetables in large plastic and metal containers sat on two weathered desks set up on the ground outside.

A light layer of snow covered the frozen ground as temperatures remained well below freezing, although the sunshine brought people outside.

The quake hit shortly after 2 a.m. on Tuesday. By evening, authorities said three people had died and five were injured, two seriously.

State broadcaster CCTV said 1,104 aftershocks, including five that were above magnitude 5.0, were recorded as of 8:00 a.m. Wednesday. The largest registered at magnitude 5.7.

Among the buildings damaged, 47 houses had collapsed, the government of the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region posted on its official Weibo social media account Tuesday.

Officials said most of the houses that collapsed were in remote areas and were built by residents. Newer public housing built by the government did not collapse.

Footage broadcast by CCTV showed staff at Aksu’s train station ordering passengers out of the waiting hall in a speedy but not panicked manner.

Associated Press journalists saw some walls cracked or partially collapsed in the empty Aksu country village of Youkakeyamansu, a name transliterated in Mandarin from Uyghur. All residents had been evacuated to a shelter.

The mountainous Uchturpan county is recording temperatures well below freezing, with the China Meteorological Administration forecasting lows reaching negative 18 degrees Celsius (just below zero Fahrenheit) this week.

The county had around 233,000 people in 2022, according to Xinjiang authorities.

The quake downed power lines but electricity was quickly restored, Aksu authorities said. The Urumqi Railroad Bureau resumed services after 7 a.m. following safety checks that confirmed no problems on train lines. The suspension affected 23 trains, the bureau serving the Xinjiang capital said on its official Weibo account.

The U.S. Geological Survey said the area’s largest quake in the past century was also magnitude 7.1 and occurred in 1978, about 200 kilometers (124 miles) to the north of Tuesday’s epicenter.

Tremors were felt hundreds of kilometers (miles) away.

Tremors also were felt in neighboring Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan and reportedly as far away as New Delhi. Videos posted on the Telegram messaging platform showed people in the Kazakh city of Almaty running downstairs in apartment blocks and standing in the street, some of them wearing shorts in the freezing weather.

In Xinjiang and Kazakhstan, classes were suspended to allow children to recover from the shock.

Earthquakes are common in western China.

A 6.2 magnitude earthquake that struck Gansu province in December killed 151 people and was China’s deadliest quake in nine years. An earthquake in Sichuan province in 2008 killed nearly 90,000.

Elsewhere, authorities raised the confirmed death toll to 31 on Tuesday in a landslide in a remote, mountainous part of China’s southwestern province of Yunnan, Chinese state media reported.

The disaster struck just before 6 a.m. on Monday in the mountain village of Liangshui. Authorities said Tuesday that a total of 44 people were either missing or had been found dead.

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Chinese Singaporean teen who identified as white supremacist given restriction order under anti-terror law

https://www.scmp.com/news/asia/southeast-asia/article/3249615/chinese-singaporean-teen-who-identified-white-supremacist-given-restriction-order-under-anti-terror?utm_source=rss_feed

A 16-year-old Singaporean student who identified as a white supremacist and aspired to conduct attacks against minority groups overseas was issued with a restriction order under the Internal Security Act in November 2023, the Internal Security Department (ISD) said on Wednesday.

Investigations found the teen, who was a Secondary Four student at the time, had been self-radicalised by online far-right extremist propaganda and wanted to further the white supremacist cause, even though he is of Chinese ethnicity.

He is the second Singaporean to be dealt with under the Internal Security Act (ISA) for being radicalised by far-right extremist ideologies.

The first was detained under the ISA in December 2020, and ISD said on Wednesday that he was released and issued with a Suspension Direction this month.

ISD said the 19-year-old Singaporean has made good progress in his rehabilitation and is assessed to “no longer pose an imminent security threat”.

The 16-year-old who was issued the restriction order in November first chanced upon videos online by American far-right political commentator and white supremacist Paul Nicholas Miller, who advocated for a race war, in 2022.

Singapore arrests teacher over attempt to join militant group in Palestine

By early 2023, he had developed an intense hatred of communities typically targeted by far-right extremists, including African Americans, Arabs and LGBTQ individuals.

Fuelled by online extremist rhetoric, he came to believe that African Americans were responsible for a significant percentage of crime in the United States and deserved to “die a horrible death”.

He subscribed to the Great Replacement Theory commonly referenced by far-right terrorists such as Christchurch attacker Brenton Tarrant, which propagates the idea that the indigenous white population in Western countries are in danger of being replaced by non-white immigrants.

He also perceived illegal Arab immigrants as having committed violent attacks against white populations in Western countries.

The youth took part in several far-right online chat groups and channels, where he shared violent anti-African American videos, as doing so gave him a sense of belonging to the white supremacist community, the ISD said.

At the point of investigation, he strongly identified as a white supremacist and pro-white sympathiser, and hoped to be recruited for violent attacks by white supremacist groups overseas to “fight for the whites”.

The student had considered travelling to Western countries such as France, Italy, the US, and Russia, to participate in attacks against his vilified communities.

Specifically, he shared his interest to conduct a mass shooting in the US in 10 years’ time in a far-right online chat group.

But beyond online searches for weapons, he did not take steps to actualise his attack aspirations as he lacked the financial resources and know-how to do so.

There was no indication that the youth had tried to influence his family or friends with his violent extremist views, nor were they aware of his attack ideations.

The youth also had no plans to conduct any attacks locally, as he felt that these communities had not caused trouble in Singapore.

In contrast, the earlier case who was radicalised by far-right extremist ideology had made detailed plans and preparations to conduct terrorist attacks using a machete against Muslims at two mosques in Singapore, and was detained under the ISA.

Will Singapore’s transport payment card saga weigh on voters’ minds?

As part of his restriction order, the 16-year-old youth will be required to undergo a holistic rehabilitation programme aimed at countering the violent extremist ideologies that he had imbibed online.

The rehabilitation programme will be geared towards helping the youth internalise that his racial supremacist views are incompatible with Singapore’s multiracial and multi-religious society, the ISD said.

They added that the teen will receive psychological counselling by ISD psychologists to address his propensity to violence and factors that render him vulnerable to radical influences.

Such factors include his emotional regulation and self-identity issues, which had fuelled his desire to identify as a white supremacist and be part of a like-minded, seemingly powerful group.

‘Very non-Singaporean’: an abandoned mall emerges as an unlikely art haven

ISD case officers will also engage the youth regularly to monitor his rehabilitation and work closely with his family and school to ensure that he has sufficient support.

He has also been assigned two mentors who will provide him with additional guidance and cyber-wellness skills. The two mentors are Ministry of Education-trained teachers who are volunteers from the Religious Rehabilitation Group, who have experience working with and coaching youths.

In addition, ISD is working with community partners such as the Inter-Agency Aftercare Group to explore suitable community-based programmes which will equip him with pro-social skills.

While under the restriction order, the teen cannot access the internet or social media, issue public statements, address public meetings or print, distribute, contribute to any publication.

He is also not permitted to change his residence or travel out of Singapore without the approval of the Director of the ISD.

ISD said that while far-right extremist ideologies have not gained a significant foothold in Singapore, the cases of these two youths serve as a reminder that Singaporeans are not immune to such ideologies, and that there is a need to maintain vigilance.

Far-right ideologies, which often espouse white supremacist, anti-Islam, xenophobic and anti-immigration beliefs, can be adapted to fit the Singaporean landscape, they added.

“Far-right extremist rhetoric promotes an ‘us-versus-them’ narrative, ‘them’ being members of other communities who are perceived to be the enemy.

“Such divisive rhetoric can create deep societal divides, amplify prejudices, and encourage acts of violence towards minorities or ‘out-groups’,” ISD said.

This story was first published by

China vows to open immigration ‘at stable pace’, more policies to lure foreign talent

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politics/article/3249597/china-vows-open-immigration-stable-pace-more-policies-lure-foreign-talent?utm_source=rss_feed

China’s immigration agency has pledged to further open up the country “at a stable pace” while calling for more efforts to fend off what it called infiltration by “hostile forces”.

It comes a year after the nation’s tough Covid-19 border controls were lifted, and as authorities try to encourage foreigners to travel to China.

“[We must] open up the immigration services system at a stable pace, comprehensively implement more positive and effective policies to attract, keep and gather overseas talent,” officials were told at an annual meeting of the National Immigration Administration in Beijing.

There was also a call for more international cooperation on managing immigration, according to a statement on the agency’s website on Tuesday.

In addition, immigration officials were told to combat infiltration and disruption by “hostile forces”, as well as illegal cross-border activities, to “fully safeguard the nation’s political security, border stability and management of immigration”.

Cadres at Monday’s meeting were told they needed a “profound understanding” of China’s current and future circumstances, the statement said without elaborating.

Beijing has been trying to signal its openness to the international community to lure foreign businesspeople, students and tourists to return to China amid a sluggish post-pandemic economic recovery.

But China’s rivalry with the West and a national security drive – that has seen anti-espionage and state secrets legislation tightened and raids of foreign consulting firms – has had a chilling effect.

Foreigners who stayed during China’s Covid lockdowns are now leaving. Why?

In the past year, Beijing has introduced measures aimed at making the visa process easier and other incentives to try to woo foreigners and spur more cross-border exchanges.

Most recently, while visiting Switzerland and Ireland this month, Premier Li Qiang said nationals of the two countries would be able to enter China without visas.

It followed November’s announcement that travellers from France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain and Malaysia could visit China for up to 15 days without a visa – a measure that will be in place until November 30.

Foreign visitors accounted for just 8.4 per cent of the total inbound and outbound trips last year, according to the latest immigration data.

That compares to 2019, before the pandemic, when foreign visitors made up 14.6 per cent of cross-border travel.

The number of foreign residents in China last year was also 15 per cent below that of 2019, according to immigration data released last week.

In recent months, state media has also been highlighting the need to attract more foreign talent to China to boost innovation and entrepreneurship and revive the economy.

The State Council on Monday released a plan calling for redoubled efforts to draw international talent to Shanghai’s Pudong district for a “high-level opening up”, including by making it easier for foreigners to live in China.

China to double down on support for Hong Kong as nation’s international financial hub for bonds, green finance, minister says at AFF

https://www.scmp.com/business/banking-finance/article/3249595/china-double-down-support-hong-kong-nations-international-financial-hub-bonds-green-finance-minister?utm_source=rss_feed

Beijing’s financial authorities will double down for their support of Hong Kong as China’s global financial centre, opening the doors for more bonds and green financing instruments to be issued and traded in the city, the bank regulator said.

The mainland branches of banks domiciled in Hong Kong and Macau will be allowed a broader business scope, including the issuance of bank cards, according to Li Yunze, Minister of the National Financial Regulatory Administration (NFRA).

Financial firms from the two special administrative regions will also be able to enjoy a lower qualification threshold for them to invest in mainland insurers, he said.

“Hong Kong is a well-known international financial centre with a liquid financial market, big talent pool, and [sound] legal environment,” Li said during the Asian Financial Forum (AFF) conference organised by the Trade & Development Council (HKTDC). “The central government supports the development of Hong Kong as a connector between the mainland and the world.”

Chinese banks and insurers will be encouraged to issue yuan-denominated bonds and other financial instruments related to green financing in Hong Kong, he said.

“These issuances will further support the bond market of Hong Kong and its role as an offshore yuan trading centre,” he said.

Will Greater Bay Area solidify Hong Kong’s role as a fintech hub?

The overture appeared to have resonated with Egypt’s finance minister Mohamed Maait, who said the country is exploring opportunities to issue green bonds and other instruments in sustainable finance in multiple currencies.

Egypt, the host nation for the 2022 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP27), could well consider issuing dim sum bonds, which are yuan-denominated bonds issued in Hong Kong, said Christopher Hui, the Secretary for Financial Services and the Treasury. Hui hosted a panel discussion with financial officials from Thailand, Indonesia, Egypt and Croatia, offering the city as the destination for them to raise capital.

With the theme ‘Multilateral Cooperation for a Shared Tomorrow”, the 17th AFF has attracted more than 3,000 attendees over its two-day programme.

“Hong Kong will be at the heart of the continuing eastward shift of economic prospects,” the city’s chief executive John Lee Ka-chiu said in his welcoming speech to kick off the two-day event. “We are the ‘superconnector’, as well as the ‘super value-adder’ bringing East and West together for rewarding opportunities long down this 21st century road of promise.”

China will continue to open its economy and financial system to global investors, said Li, a veteran banker who was nominated last year as the first minister to run the NFRA. The new body is an enlarged version of the China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission, the regulatory body for the country’s banks and insurers.

China’s various transborder investment channels, the so-called Connect schemes, will continue to be enhanced and enlarged for more capital to flow from abroad via Hong Kong into the mainland’s bonds, stocks and derivatives, he said. Similarly, mainland capital will be allowed to flow into international issues via Hong Kong.

“The open door policy is a long-term state policy for China, and the driving force for the financial markets in the country,” Li said. “We will support more foreign firms investing in China and will offer them a good business environment, with investor protection. The doors of the financial sector will continue to widen.”

China to cut banks’ reserve requirement ratio next month, set to inject 1 trillion yuan into market

https://www.scmp.com/economy/economic-indicators/article/3249606/china-cut-banks-reserve-requirement-ratio-set-inject-1-trillion-yuan-market?utm_source=rss_feed

China’s central bank announced on Wednesday it would cut the reserve requirement ratio for commercial banks by 50 basis points from February 5, according to governor Pan Gongsheng.

The move is expected to inject 1 trillion yuan (US$140 billion) of liquidity into the market, Pan told a press conference in Beijing.

More to follow …

China takes its chip war to space as it uses Tiangong space station to test processors and gain a tech edge

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/science/article/3249569/china-takes-its-chip-war-space-it-uses-tiangong-space-station-test-processors-and-gain-tech-edge?utm_source=rss_feed

The chip war between China and the United States now extends beyond the Earth and into space.

According to scientists directly involved in China’s extraterrestrial chip programme, China’s Tiangong space station can now test more than 100 computer processors simultaneously.

More than 20 new high-performance chips spanning the 28 to 16-nanometre process range have already passed testing. They are considerably more advanced than chips used by other countries in space.

Nasa has said the chips it currently uses in space are based on 30-year-old technology. For example, the RAD750 processor used in the James Webb Space Telescope, the most powerful space telescope ever that was launched in 2021, was manufactured using antiquated 250-nanometre technology and has a clock frequency of only 118 MHz – less than a fraction of that of a typical smartphone chip.

The scientists said the chips tested on Tiangong were designed and manufactured entirely within China. During testing they were run on China’s independently developed SpaceOS operating system which is widely used on China’s space station and other space facilities.

It is expected that more domestic chip makers will soon be queuing up to put their top-tier offerings through the rigours of space testing, said the project team led by Liu Hongjin, of the China Academy of Space Technology, in a peer-reviewed paper in the Chinese academic journal Spacecraft Environment Engineering in December.

Conducting large-scale chip testing in orbit is a massive and challenging task, but it is crucial for China’s rapidly growing space ambitions.

The scale of this work on Tiangong is much larger than China’s previous testing platforms carried by satellites, according to Liu’s team.

During routine supply missions to the space station a large number of confidential new chips for civilian or military use can hitch a ride into space and be installed on the outside of the space station by astronauts for rigorous radiation testing in space.

These chips have to run various software programs and the data generated can be beamed back to Earth through the space station’s powerful communication system. If needed, these chips can be returned to Earth with astronauts for further in-depth testing.

This large-scale testing can rapidly improve the technology and cut research and development costs of China’s space-grade chips, according to Liu and his colleagues from the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation. However, they did reveal the manufacturers, design details and performance parameters of the chips.

China enters hi-tech imaging race with new ‘core’ electron microscope

This is a benefit of having a completely self-built space station. While the International Space Station (ISS) is larger than the Tiangong and can conduct similar experiments, its rules stipulate that the 15 countries taking part have the right to know detailed information about all payloads sent to the ISS, which would be an inconvenience for chip testing involving national security and technical secrets.

The charter of the ISS also explicitly prohibits experiments related to military technology. In 2017, a Russian cargo spacecraft was questioned by Nasa and the US media for carrying equipment with an unclear purpose.

It was only last year that Nasa finally decided to have two private contractors design and manufacture a new chip for its future important space missions, such as manned moon landings and Mars exploration. This new chip, based on the open-source RISC-V architecture, will be 100 times faster than previous processors and is expected to enter space next year.

China believes that its biggest competitive pressure no longer comes from Nasa but from private space companies, represented by SpaceX. For example, Starlink satellites use a large number of inexpensive commercial chips because of the large quantity required and the short expected lifespan.

According to Liu’s paper, Chinese aerospace engineers have been caught in a paradox of progressiveness and caution.

They eagerly adopt advancements such as artificial intelligence, hungry for the heightened processing power it demands for new space applications. However, as the number of transistors on chips increases, they become more vulnerable to attacks from cosmic high-energy particles. This phenomenon, known as a “single-event upset”, can affect the accuracy of computing and information storage.

Liu said China aimed to develop a diverse range of high-performance chips that could maintain stable and reliable operation in orbit for extended periods.

Scientists anticipate potential challenges such as single-event upset with a combination of radiation-hardened design, optimised layouts and enhanced quality.

Yet, as Liu’s team attests, the radiation of space cannot be wholly replicated on Earth. Occasionally, a rogue high-energy particle breaches multiple layers of defence, striking a transistor at an unforeseen angle. It might occur every few months or several times a day, posing a daunting task for chip designers.

Large-scale testing on the space station would help China develop advanced protection technologies and allow as many suppliers as possible to compete on an equal platform, rather than selecting suppliers first and then testing their chips, the researchers said.

Year of the Dragon: China sends Spring Festival gifts to Tiangong astronauts

China’s new generation of space chips is mainly produced using mature processes ranging from 28 to 16 nanometres. China has a large number of deep ultraviolet lithography machines, enabling it to produce a significant quantity of the chips at low costs.

It plans to build a satellite internet constellation comparable to Starlink. The Chinese satellites will not only handle communication functions but also carry sensors to monitor the Earth and space.

Some Chinese space experts believe that in the coming years there will be an explosive demand worldwide for high-performance, low-cost space-grade chips.

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Jimmy Lai inflamed anti-China sentiments in US, urged hostilities through ‘extreme’ articles, Hong Kong court hears

https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/law-and-crime/article/3249583/jimmy-lai-inflamed-anti-china-sentiments-us-urged-hostilities-through-extreme-articles-hong-kong?utm_source=rss_feed

The ex-publisher of Hong Kong’s now-defunct Apple Daily tabloid has accused Jimmy Lai Chee-ying of inflaming anti-China sentiments in the US and instigating hostilities by feeding overseas readers “extreme” and “negative” articles.

Prosecutors on Wednesday took aim at what they called the “unbalanced” reporting of Apple Daily’s English-language edition, as defendant turned witness Cheung Kim-hung continued giving evidence on the 15th day of the national security trial at West Kowloon Court.

Cheung said the English platform, launched a month before Beijing implemented the national security law in Hong Kong in 2020, was created with a view to influence American politics, particularly Washington’s approach to China.

Hong Kong’s Jimmy Lai behind efforts to get Trump to sanction China, trial told

The witness said Lai had also asked his right-hand man, former US intelligence agent Mark Simon, to invite then US president Donald Trump and other senior officials to subscribe to the newspaper’s digital version, hoping they could provide Apple Daily with “the greatest level of political protection”.

But Cheung said he was later told by Simon that the attempt failed because the United States government did not want to leave any transaction records on Apple Daily’s website.

The court heard Lai decided to go ahead with the English edition after it was proposed to him by an Apple Daily columnist and online political commentator, who was only known by the pen name Fung Hei-kin.

WhatsApp messaging records submitted to the court showed Lai hoped to attract overseas subscriptions for digital content.

“If foreigners want to support Hong Kong by supporting us, we will be safe,” he told senior editorial staff. “The more I think [about it], the more I feel an English edition is what we must do now.”

The tycoon stressed that balanced reporting was not necessary for the tabloid’s new branch, adding xenophobic sentiment was “what Americans needed the most” after the Covid-19 outbreak.

“When we choose writers, we don’t have to think about giving foreigners a balanced view of what happens here of every different [colour]. We only concentrate [on] our Apple Daily [Hong Kong] view, a general view of the yellow side,” he said, referring to the colour identified by supporters of the 2019 anti-government protests.

Lai specifically asked colleagues not to engage Hong Kong-based financier Weijian Shan, who he said was his friend but whose views were “on the positive side” of China.

The Jimmy Lai trial so far: daily updates on his Hong Kong national security case

“We are not trying to strike a balance, but the point of view of the people on the side of protecting [Hong Kong]. This is the voice the world wants to know,” Lai wrote.

Cheung said Lai, his former boss, appeared intent on galvanising support in the US to take hostile actions towards mainland China, such as through imposing sanctions.

The English edition had portrayed the central government as a totalitarian regime which lacked integrity and violated human rights, with a focus on its accusations that authorities attempted to cover up the Covid-19 pandemic and caused the coronavirus to spread to Western countries, the court heard.

“The English edition was a lot more extreme, I can say,” Cheung said, comparing the new platform with regular Apple Daily articles written in Chinese.

China firm sets up filial piety fund, gives US$340 to parents of staff every year to encourage respect for elders

https://www.scmp.com/news/people-culture/trending-china/article/3248582/china-firm-sets-filial-piety-fund-gives-us340-parents-staff-every-year-encourage-respect-elders?utm_source=rss_feed

A company in China has set up a special fund to distribute 2,400 yuan (US$340) to the parents of its employees every year, highlighting the tradition of filial piety.

The jewellery firm, Mengjinyuan, from eastern China’s Shandong province, held an annual ceremony on January 12 to mark the event.

A total of 2.6 million yuan was distributed to more than 1,000 members of staff, who passed the money on to their parents, who were also invited to the ceremony.

For the parents who did not attend the event, the company directly transferred the money into their bank accounts.

One staff member’s father said he was “excited” to receive the money.

The company’s boss, Wang Zhongshan, said the fund was set up 11 years ago in the hope that it would encourage employees to appreciate their parents and inspire filial piety.

The good deed received praise online, with many sharing their own companies’ gestures with the same aim.

A person who works in China’s southwestern Sichuan province said her employer “deducts 10 per cent of our salary to send to our parents’ bank account every month”.

“It is an opportunity for parents to be reassured their children have a good job, and for the children to not worry about their parents so they can focus on work,” said another online observer.

“Some bosses exploit their staff, which makes the gesture of giving money to employees’ parents appear even greater,” somebody else wrote.

The Chinese character for filial piety, Xiao, stands for a child supporting an elderly person, and has been in existence since oracle bone script, the earliest known form of Chinese writing that is thought to date back 3,600 years.

Filial piety is a central pillar of the Confucian ethical system.

In the traditional system of values, an adult is expected to not only financially and emotionally support their parents at home to be considered filial, but also work hard and continue their parents’ good name in the community.

It is still considered a much-valued virtue today, and people who are in the news for respecting and loving their parents, always win praise and admiration.

In 2021, mainland social media was shocked to hear about a middle-aged man who loaded his luxury Maserati car with waste his mother had collected from rubbish bins for recycling.

A relative said the family did not support her hobby, but had to respect it after failing to persuade her to stop.

Between China and Russia, landlocked Mongolia eyes summit to enhance ties as geopolitical pressures mount

https://www.scmp.com/economy/china-economy/article/3249585/between-china-and-russia-landlocked-mongolia-eyes-summit-enhance-ties-geopolitical-pressures-mount?utm_source=rss_feed

Mongolia says it is trying to arrange a summit with China and Russia to enhance their collaborative projects, and a gathering of the neighbours could speed up new railway connections, economic corridor developments and a widely watched gas pipeline known as the Power of Siberia 2.

Mongolia’s prime minister also tells the Post that a feasibility study is being conducted to further enhance the nation’s involvement in China’s Belt and Road Initiative that aims to link economies into a trading network.

“Our Ministry of Foreign Affairs is working with different diplomatic channels to organise the summit with Russia and China,” Luvsannamsrai Oyun-Erdene said in a video chat via Zoom last week while attending the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. “[But] we have not set a date, yet.”

Such a summit is seen as vital against the backdrop of mutually concerning issues. Nearly three years into its war in Ukraine, Russia’s economy is still weathering a sanction storm from the West. And China, which has never condemned Russia’s invasion, saw trade with its northern neighbour hit a record high last year.

China trade heads into 2024 under a cloud despite December uptick

Mongolia, a landlocked country squeezed between Russia and China, is heavily dependent on both.

The last meeting of the three countries’ respective government heads was held in the Uzbekistan city of Samarkand in September 2022.

Oyun-Erdene also expressed hope that President Xi Jinping will visit Mongolia this year to mark the 10th anniversary of his last visit to the country.

A China-Mongolia-Russia economic corridor, proposed by Beijing as part of the belt and road to enhance regional infrastructure connectivity, trade and investment flows, would be discussed at any such summit, according to Oyun-Erdene.

Mongolian authorities told the Post in November that the resource-rich nation was planning seven new dry ports to expand trade with China and Russia.

Oyun-Erdene says the landlocked country “is ready to connect” to the Power of Siberia 2 pipeline, which will pass through Mongolia to deliver 50 billion cubic metres of Russian gas annually to China.

“We’re waiting for the Chinese and Russian sides to finalise their detailed study on the numbers and economic figures,” he added. “I believe that we can commence this project soon – once the Chinese and Russian sides are ready.”

The Post previously reported that discussions for the natural gas pipeline were progressing slowly as China was wielding “bargaining power” with Russia over the line that could divert gas previously intended for Europe.

Oyun-Erdene said that his country’s relationship with China was “at its highest level”, and that both sides were developing a “comprehensive strategic partnership”.

The value of Mongolian merchandise shipments to China – comprising mainly coal, copper and other materials – jumped 40.9 per cent, year on year, to US$13.1 billion last year, China customs data showed. Mongolia bought US$3.5 billion worth of Chinese goods in the period, up 25 per cent from a year earlier.

‘We’re open and ready’: Mongolia prime minister courts global investors

“Between 2024 and 2025, we will have new ports for exports to China, and we truly believe that it will greatly enhance trade and economic cooperation between the two countries,” Oyun-Erdene said.

“And we believe that this will increase our exports fourfold,” he said, without providing a timespan.

Both countries are extending cooperation into other new sectors, including joint efforts to curb traffic congestion in Mongolia’s capital of Ulaanbaatar, as well as address climate change, urban planning, public housing and rural development.

“Mongolia is open to investments, especially with the Chinese government, and some of the fundraising process is ongoing,” said Oyun-Erdene, who made an official visit to Beijing in June.

He also said Mongolia is looking to court more tourists to the country, intending to pull in 1 million a year – up from 650,000 in 2023 – and he expects that a third of those could come from China.

Blinken tours West Africa amid looming shadow of China and Russia

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/01/24/africa-blinken-china-russia-influence/2024-01-23T16:43:47.318Z

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The result was not particularly auspicious. On Monday, Secretary of State Antony Blinken and the press pack accompanying him arrived at the main soccer stadium in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire, at half time. The United States’ top diplomat, on a five-day swing through countries in West Africa, was presented with a personalized orange jersey in Ivorian colors, as the nation’s soccer team faced off against unfancied Equatorial Guinea in the ongoing Africa Cup of Nations tournament.

Then, Blinken watched disaster strike: In a shock result, Côte d’Ivoire collapsed against their regional adversaries, slumping to a 4-0 defeat and teetering on the brink of elimination from the continental competition.

Like his host’s national team, Blinken is trying to reverse the score line. As the Biden administration grapples with fraught conflicts in the Middle East and Ukraine — and faces a heated election cycle that is poised to suck up much of the oxygen in Washington — it’s also trying to show it remains committed to its partnerships in West Africa.

“We’re here for a very simple reason, because America and Africa’s futures, their peoples, their prosperity, are linked and joined as never before,” Blinken said Tuesday in Abidjan after meeting Ivorian President Alassane Ouattara, and later flying out to meetings in the Nigerian capital Abuja.

Wagner Group surges in Africa as U.S. influence fades, leak reveals

Lurking behind Blinken’s sunny rhetoric are the clouds of geopolitical competition. The stadium where Blinken sat in Abidjan was constructed by China, a global economic juggernaut with a deepening footprint across Africa. Wang Yi, China’s top diplomat, was in Côte d’Ivoire a week prior, hailing Beijing’s “win-win” relationship with the country. Further afield in West Africa, Russia has opportunistically sidled up to a slate of coup-plotting juntas that have subverted once-fledgling democracies in Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger. The region’s troubled “coup belt” is populated by states that U.S. and other Western officials once hoped would become bulwarks of democracy.

Kremlin-linked mercenary organization Wagner has deployed in a number of countries in the arid Sahel region, on the front lines of brutal counterinsurgencies against a hodgepodge of Islamist and other militant factions. A major Chinese arms supplier is expanding operations in West Africa, while Beijing is instrumental in a sprawling set of oil pipeline projects linking the Sahel to the Atlantic Ocean.

Meanwhile, anti-Western juntas in Mali and Niger have compelled the United States and France to scale back their security presence. Blinken’s last trip to the region in March saw him call on Niger and then-President Mohamed Bazoum, a Western ally. The months since saw Bazoum ousted by a junta that staged rallies where supporters denounced Washington and Paris and waved Russian flags. Bazoum remains under arrest.

The shifting security environment is top of mind in Blinken’s deliberations, with the United States touting a $300 million program aimed at buttressing the region’s coastal states along Africa’s Atlantic Coast, including Benin, Ghana, Guinea and Togo, as well as $45 million in security assistance to Côte d’Ivoire, which is seeing Islamist factions make inroads in the country’s north. Later this year, Ghana will host a set of U.S.-led military exercises involving the special forces or commando detachments of the region’s militaries.

China’s growing influence, explained

U.S. officials downplayed the competitive aspect to the current mission. “Senior diplomats joining Blinken have said the trip is about concrete opportunities for economic cooperation, not pushing back on China and Russia,” reported my colleague Michael Birnbaum, who is traveling with Blinken.

“Many African countries, they note, are already rejecting Russian offers of support from military contractors,” he added. “China, meanwhile, has been less active with new infrastructure projects, mostly finishing those it launched years ago — although China’s imprint on the region is an inescapable feature of the trip, with Blinken’s meetings at his first stop in Cabo Verde, the island chain-nation off the western coast of Africa, taking place in the government palace also constructed by Beijing.”

The Biden administration also wants to change the narrative about its role in the region, emphasizing other priorities beyond counterinsurgency. “We’re really good at security assistance and we’re really good at going after terrorists,” Molly Phee, assistant U.S. secretary of state for African affairs, told journalists ahead of Blinken’s departure. “But if you neglect governance, economic development, factors like climate change, you can’t really get at a durable solution.”

This is Blinken’s fourth African trip of the Biden presidency. Last September, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin became the first American defense secretary to visit Angola, the final stop on Blinken’s trip. Vice President Harris and first lady Jill Biden have made their own trips to the continent.

The United States hopes to tout a major railway project to transport minerals from the Democratic Republic of Congo to an Angolan port, from which these critical resources can be shipped to Europe and North America. “The corridor helps the United States keep pace with China, which has invested tens of billions of dollars in Angola,” the New York Times noted.

Putin courts Africa at summit, but many African leaders stay away

Analysts contend that the United States, for all its distractions, still offers Africans something more intangible than the shiny infrastructure proffered by Beijing. “Democracy is something that African citizens value deeply. That is something that China and Russia do not,” Oge Onubogu, director of the Africa program at the Wilson Center, told my colleagues. “For the U.S., I think our hearts are in the right place, but we have to be able to able to invest the time and the resources to show that the relationship and partnership is for the long term.”

But in world politics, there may be a thin line between what seems intangible and ephemeral. President Biden’s apparent decision not to visit the continent this term — despite a promise to do so — shadows the considerable efforts made by Blinken and a number of other Cabinet members.

“There’s no number of Cabinet-level visits that can make up for one presidential visit,” Cameron Hudson of the Center for Strategic and International Studies told CNN.

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As US-China tech war heats up, scientists find new material to cool quantum computers

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/science/article/3249562/us-china-tech-war-heats-scientists-find-new-material-cool-quantum-computers?utm_source=rss_feed

A Chinese-led team of scientists say they have found a new material that could be used to create the ultra-low temperatures needed for hi-tech applications such as quantum computing.

It could be a significant development for China, which depends on imports of helium – the coolant used for this purpose – from countries including the United States.

As their tech war heats up, China also faces the threat of the US restricting access to the dilution refrigerators needed to create an ultra-cold environment, which a researcher involved in the study says are already hard to obtain.

Liquid helium – through cryogenic technology – has been used as a coolant for nearly a century in research and applications that require extreme cold, from medical equipment to deep space exploration.

But helium is a scarce resource, and demand is growing for its use in hi-tech industries. That is especially true for helium-3, a rare isotope that is more effective as a coolant in extreme conditions and mainly comes from ageing nuclear warheads.

What is quantum computing and how does it work?

Driven by the need to find an alternative to the helium-based cooling system, the international team – led by researchers at a Chinese Academy of Sciences laboratory in Beijing – went looking for a solid material that could achieve big energy changes by changing its state.

After years of experimentation, they discovered a cobalt-based quantum magnetic material that is “supersolid” – meaning it has a solid structure but also behaves like a fluid.

But the scientists said it was also observed cooling to below 1 Kelvin and could potentially be used to achieve ultra-low temperatures.

The lowest possible temperature in physics is minus 273 degrees Celsius, or 0 Kelvin (minus 459 Fahrenheit), according to the third law of thermodynamics. Physicists define ultra-low temperatures as being between 0 and 4.2 Kelvin, and that is the range needed to develop cutting-edge technologies, including in quantum computing.

“It’s really an emerging frontier,” said Sun Peijie, a professor with the Beijing National Laboratory for Condensed Matter Physics at the CAS and a co-corresponding author of the study.

He said scientists had only in recent years seen the potential for using solid state to achieve ultra-cold temperatures, and this research was only being conducted by a small number of scientists around the world.

‘US users top list’ after China’s state-of-the-art quantum computer goes global

The team’s findings were published in the peer-reviewed journal Nature on January 11. The research was carried out by scientists from institutes including the CAS lab, Beihang University’s School of Physics, and the Institut Laue-Langevin’s Jülich Centre for Neutron Science in France.

“This study shows that we can theoretically achieve extremely low temperatures without relying on helium,” Sun said.

The shortage of helium, especially helium-3, is a challenge for China as it races to develop quantum technologies.

In 2022, 94 per cent of China’s helium was imported – most of it from Qatar, followed by the US and Australia.

According to Sun, China “has no helium-3 at all and is almost always dependent on Russia and the United States” for the isotope.

But he said the research team’s progress should not be overinterpreted and they could not yet replace helium. He said it was still at an early stage and the material had limitations, including that it would have to be used in an environment where the temperature was already at about 4 Kelvin.

Most quantum machines, from computers to satellites, use basic units of information called qubits, or quantum bits – like the digital bits used in conventional computing. But qubits are sensitive and easily disturbed by heat so they must be kept at extremely cold temperatures close to 0 Kelvin.

“All quantum technologies, including quantum communications and quantum computing, almost invariably require an ultra-cold environment,” Sun said.

Creating that environment can only be done with a dilution refrigerator – a piece of equipment China has had more difficulty obtaining from overseas in recent years, according to Sun. He said that had “seriously stifled the development of China’s quantum technologies”.

Chinese-led test raises doubts about US ‘room temperature’ superconductor

Beijing has made it a national priority to support Chinese production of this key technology and significant investment has already gone into it. In October, Origin Quantum became the latest Chinese company to announce it had produced a dilution refrigerator, according to a report in the official Science and Technology Daily.

Sun said the team had developed devices to replicate and apply their experiments in certain environments, but noted there was still a long way to go and engineering issues to overcome before it could have any widespread applications.

He said the study could also be a starting point for further discussion and research in fundamental physics.

“For half a century it has been thought that supersolids exist, and now we have somehow confirmed it,” Sun said. “Scientists may be inspired to look for new evidence in other materials, which could ultimately push physics forward.”

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2 strong earthquakes hit western China in a month: is the Earth getting restless?

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/science/article/3249525/two-strong-earthquakes-hit-western-china-month-earth-getting-restless?utm_source=rss_feed

Two strong earthquakes have struck western China in just over a month with the latest, a magnitude 7.1 quake, striking a remote part of Xinjiang on Tuesday.

It hit days after China Earthquake Networks Centre released statistics suggesting global seismic activity had shifted from weak to strong in 2023 due to a rise in the number of earthquakes with a magnitude above 7.

Some scientists believe there is a potential for earthquake activity to increase in the future, but many say that there is nothing unusual about strong quakes happening in quick succession, nor do they see any patterns that suggest a long-term increase in seismic activity.

Instead, they say more quakes are being recorded due to better monitoring equipment and people may be more aware of strong earthquakes today because of the ease with which news can travel around the world quickly.

Tuesday’s quake in Xinjiang’s Aksu prefecture was felt across the border in Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan and was followed by around 40 aftershocks but there were no immediate reports of casualties.

What living on the fault line means for China’s Sichuan province

It followed a magnitude 6.2 earthquake that hit the neighbouring province of Gansu last month killing over 150 people – the deadliest to hit China in almost a decade.

The country has been struck by some of the most devastating earthquakes ever recorded and has also experienced several periods of increased seismic activity.

One of the worst years was in 1976, when four earthquakes above magnitude 6 hit the country, including one of the deadliest in Chinese history that killed an estimated 300,000 people in Tangshan in Hebei province.

In 2008, when a magnitude 8 earthquake in Sichuan – the country’s worst since then – killed 69,000 people in May, there were two further quakes of magnitude 6 or above later that year, both occurring within weeks of each other in western China.

More recently, there were two quakes of magnitude 6 or above in 2021 and 2022, but only one last year.

Tuesday’s earthquake happened in a seismically active region but it was stronger than usual. The United States Geological Survey (USGS) said “earthquakes of this size occur somewhat infrequently”.

Meanwhile Yang Haibin, a geo-scientist at Zhejiang University, said USGS records over the last 10 years “do not show [a] higher frequency,” of magnitude 6-plus quakes, which are recorded at a rate of between 120 and 160 a year around the world.

Han Yanyan, a senior engineer from the China Earthquake Networks Centre, said that within the wider Tianshan seismic zone an earthquake of magnitude 7 or above occurs on average once every seven years.

The US agency has said that peaks and troughs in seismic activity are “part of the normal fluctuation of earthquake rates”, an assertion supported by many other scientists.

But one senior researcher at the Chinese Academy of Geological Sciences believes that there may be more frequent quakes in western China in future because of the movement of the Indian tectonic plate, which meets the Eurasian plate in the Tibetan plateau.

Scientists in China believe they received ominous signal days before earthquake

The scientist, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorised to speak to the media, mainly studies the geology of that region, and said the Indian plate was converging into the other at a rate of 5cm (2 inches) a year, causing the Tibetan Plateau to “grow” upwards.

“I personally believe that the probability of geological disasters in the western part of mainland China will increase in the future,” the scientist said.

He said the increased risk should spur greater disaster preparation efforts in western China, where most of the country’s earthquake activity happens, and the introduction of stricter building standards – addressing one of the causes of the high death toll in the 2008 Sichuan quake and other disasters.

The researcher also warned that global warming may further increase the risk, arguing that increased rainfall on the Tibetan Plateau and neighbouring regions has made it easier for vegetation to develop in the geological fault zones.

This means that water, oxygen and carbon dioxide have penetrated the interior of these zones through plant roots, causing more geological activity.

Tectonic activity along with climate change could “increase the likelihood of geo-hazardous activities” – which also include mudflows, landslides and avalanches – in the region, the scientist said.

But Yang from Zhejiang University said: “Anthropogenic activities may trigger some small earthquakes, but cannot systematically change the trend of strong earthquakes, which are thought to be controlled by tectonic behaviours.”

He also said that modern communications meant that people “have more chances to hear news about strong earthquakes than ever”.

The USGS also said that it was logging more earthquakes globally, but this was not because of increased activity but because “there are more seismic instruments and they are able to record more earthquakes”.

Most Japanese do not have ‘friendly feelings’ towards China amid Beijing’s aggression in South China Sea, Taiwan: poll

https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/politics/article/3249515/most-japanese-do-not-have-friendly-feelings-towards-china-amid-beijings-aggression-south-china-sea?utm_source=rss_feed

Less than 13 per cent of Japanese have positive or “friendly feelings” towards China, according to the latest results of an annual government poll, the lowest since Tokyo introduced the survey in 1978.

The negative feelings of 86.7 per cent of the 3,000 respondents to the Cabinet Office survey, released on Friday, were reflected in interviews conducted by This Week in Asia, with many Japanese expressing concerns about Beijing’s increasingly aggressive moves in the South China Sea, as well as against Taiwan and the Diaoyu Islands that Japan calls the Senkaku Islands, which Beijing claims.

Some respondents also expressed dismay at the way the Uygurs of Xinjiang have been treated and the loss of democratic freedoms among the people of Hong Kong.

Upgrade of Japan-Asean ties a ‘natural’ move amid growing Chinese influence

Survey respondents that spoke to This Week in Asia, however, emphasised that they did not dislike the Chinese people and that they held largely positive feelings towards Chinese cuisine, history, art and culture. Their dislike was aimed primarily at the government in Beijing and the Communist Party.

“The aversion that many in Japan feel towards the government in Beijing or the Communist Party is shared, I believe, by people in other countries in the free world,” said Yoichi Shimada, a professor of international relations at Fukui Prefectural University.

“Japan is just geographically closer to China, and it is our territory that Beijing is claiming, so it comes as no surprise if the distrust of China is greater here,” he told This Week in Asia.

Many Japanese have positive feelings towards Taiwan, Shimada said, so when Beijing ramps up rhetoric against Taiwan or conducts threatening military moves close to its coast, distrust of China worsens while sympathy or support for Taiwan increases.

Ken Kato, a Tokyo-based businessman, echoed the belief that Japanese do not like to be “bullied” or see others treated in the same way.

“We see on the news that pretty much every day the Chinese military is threatening the Japanese Senkaku Islands, and it is inevitable that people are angry,” he said. “And we see how the people of Tibet and Xinjiang are treated, and how the freedom of the people of Hong Kong has disappeared.”

“I do not blame Chinese people for this, but I do see the Communist Party acting in ways that are completely against our democratic values,” he said. “In truth, many people in Japan also see Chinese people as victims of the party.”

Maya Hamada, a professor of Chinese literature at Kobe University, says the image of China among the vast majority of young Japanese is “very negative”, which may be contributing to the gradual decline in numbers of those studying Chinese language, literature and culture.

“There has clearly been fewer and fewer people interested in studying Chinese since around 2019, with many young people shocked at the actions and image of China in the early stages of the pandemic.”

“But I believe that my students do distinguish between ordinary Chinese people and the government,” she added.

And Hamada is not optimistic that things will improve, in part because her experiences have shown that the Chinese are just as hostile towards Japan.

“I went to Beijing last autumn, and it was clear that attitudes towards Japan and the Japanese are becoming more negative and severe,” she said. “People there repeatedly asked me what I thought about the release of water from the Fukushima nuclear power plant and, when I expressed my opinion, it was clear that Chinese people believe what their government tells them through the media about Fukushima.”

‘Clickbait’: Japan slams UK tabloid report linking dead fish to Fukushima water

Personal friends with experience of Japan and Japanese people were more open to alternative viewpoints, Hamada said, but “everything on the internet and on television takes whatever Japan does and finds a way to be critical”.

“It seems to me that the government’s policy is to make the people dislike Japan to praise and elevate their own country, which is exactly what the extreme right-wing does here in Japan,” she added.

That distrust of Japan’s neighbour appears to carry over into the commercial sector. Another survey, released on January 15 by the Japanese Chamber of Commerce and Industry in China, indicated that just 15 per cent of member companies increased investment in China last year, while 48 per cent did not invest in their Chinese operations or cut spending.

There have been reports of Japanese companies shrinking their operations in China and some shifting their manufacturing operations to other countries entirely, with Vietnam being a popular destination for firms. Rising costs in China are a factor for many, but some officials have expressed concern about the theft of intellectual property and the arrest of Japanese businesspeople on flimsy charges of espionage.

“There are many in Japan who believe companies should accelerate their withdrawal from China because of the intimidation that businesspeople there are experiencing,” Shimada said. “There is also deep concern about advanced Japanese technology in areas such as IT, which we know China is seeking to access.”

Yet there are signs that some Japanese politicians are attempting to build bridges with Beijing.

Mizuho Fukushima, head of the opposition Social Democratic Party, visited China last week and met senior government officials to discuss improving bilateral relations. In a meeting with Wang Huning, the fourth-highest ranked official in the Communist Party, the SDP leader was told that Beijing hopes to improve ties and “constructively manage differences”, Jiji Press reported.

Analysts pointed out, however, that there is little chance of Fukushima influencing the policies of either government as the SDP has little power in Japan and, with the public concerned about China’s growing influence, is unlikely to win any new followers by appearing in Beijing.

Chinese research ship turned down by Sri Lanka to make Maldives resupply call

https://www.scmp.com/news/asia/south-asia/article/3249550/chinese-research-ship-turned-down-sri-lanka-make-maldives-resupply-call?utm_source=rss_feed

The Maldives has granted permission for a controversial Chinese vessel to make a resupply call, but it will not undertake any “research”, the Indian Ocean archipelago nation’s foreign ministry said on Tuesday.

China’s Xiang Yang Hong 3, which has been reportedly turned down port entry by Sri Lanka, is due to call at Male in early February, according to ship monitoring website MarineTraffic.

The vessel will “not be conducting any research while in the Maldivian waters”, the foreign ministry said, following media reports from neighbouring India accusing Beijing of using the ship for “surveillance”.

The Maldives said the vessel would stop only for “a port call, for rotation of personnel and replenishment”.

There was no immediate comment from China.

Maldives orders Indian troops to leave as row escalates after tourism boycott

India is suspicious of China’s increasing presence in the Indian Ocean and its influence in Sri Lanka and the Maldives, which are strategically placed halfway along key east-west international shipping routes.

Relations between Male and New Delhi have plummeted since pro-China President Mohamed Muizzu won elections last year.

Muizzu has asked India to withdraw the 89 security personnel deployed to the Maldives to operate three reconnaissance aircraft by March 15.

However, Muizzu insists he does not want to upend ties with New Delhi by replacing Indian troops with Chinese forces.

Tensions with New Delhi flared this month after three of Muizzu’s junior ministers reportedly called Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi a “clown” and a “terrorist” in since-deleted social media posts.

Bollywood actors and some of India’s cricket greats responded with calls for compatriots to boycott their southern neighbour – a popular tourist destination – and instead book their next holidays closer to home.

Muizzu said the Maldives will also slash reliance on India for healthcare and medicine, adding more countries where citizens needing government-paid health treatment abroad can go.

Meanwhile, Sri Lanka has reportedly told China that the Xiang Yang Hong 3 will not be allowed access to its ports after two similar visits since 2022 raised objections from India, according to media reports on the island.

Indians vow to boycott Maldives after Modi called a ‘clown’ over Gaza stance

The Chinese vessel, Shi Yan 6, was allowed port access in Colombo in October, and Sri Lankan authorities later granted it 48 hours to carry out marine research following diplomatic pressure from Beijing.

Another Chinese vessel, Yuan Wang 5, which specialises in spacecraft tracking and which New Delhi described as a spy ship, visited Sri Lanka in 2022.

A pair of Chinese submarines docked in Sri Lanka in 2014, raising protests from India. Since then, Sri Lanka has not allowed Chinese submarines to enter its ports.

Chinese firms, anxious to avoid choppy geopolitical waters, chart a course for Vietnam

https://www.scmp.com/economy/china-economy/article/3249488/chinese-firms-anxious-avoid-choppy-geopolitical-waters-chart-course-vietnam?utm_source=rss_feed

Carl Ying gets a throbbing headache every time a new season for orders rolls around.

In recent years, the electric shaver exporter has seen fewer purchases from his United States-based clients.

But the obvious impatience he observed late in 2023, when they discussed this year’s shipments, was a worrying sign their relationship may be at stake.

“They told me to go outside,” he recalled. “It’s their suggestion of relocating to a country with lower costs.”

Quarrels like these are common for Chinese exporters amid protracted trade tensions with the United States and an exodus of manufacturers to cheaper locales like Vietnam.

Ying has supplied a majority of his products to American barbershops and beauty parlours for years through his two factories in China.

Previously, both agreed to split the cost of 10 per cent punitive tariffs, imposed by Washington since September 2018.

But many of his entrepreneur friends have already moved, in whole or in part, to Vietnam. Tariffs had taken a heavy toll on their profits and threatened to drive them out of the business.

“I may go there someday,” said Ying, who paid two visits to Haiphong last year. The Vietnamese coastal city is already packed with factories backed by Chinese investment.

Vietnam is often the first choice when Chinese manufacturers consider relocating overseas, because the country has a large working population and easier access to developed markets.

But as the trade stand-off approaches its sixth year and Washington steps up scrutiny over origins of production, more US-bound exporters no longer consider it an option – it is a must.

“Vietnam is an important locality for firms that want a China+1 strategy,” said David Zweig, professor emeritus with the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.

“Chinese factories that are manufacturing for these US firms and then shipping the goods to the US are going to have to follow their customers and go to Vietnam.”

Yan Shaohua, a researcher with Fudan University’s Institute of International Studies, also acknowledged the pressure from American buyers, who are moving some orders and partnerships out of China as a hedge against Washington’s de-risking strategy.

“Moving to Vietnam or elsewhere in [Association of Southeast Asian Nations] may become inevitable,” he said.

Vietnam is a member of two major US-led trade agreements, the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for Prosperity and the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership.

Chinese firms poured US$2.92 billion in direct investments into the country for the first nine months of 2023, nearly doubling the amount from the previous year according to Vietnam’s Ministry of Planning and Investment.

The world’s top exporter saw outbound shipments dip 5.2 per cent year on year to US$3.07 trillion in the first 11 months of last year, with exports to the US and European Union slumping by 13.8 per cent and 11 per cent, respectively.

The impact is reverberating across coastal provinces like Guangdong, Jiangsu and Zhejiang, where purchases from the West are a source of considerable income.

These regions are seeing some of their production migrate to countries like Vietnam, as rising costs at home and geopolitical tensions have become major “push factors.”

Relocation, however, is no guarantee of success.

Yang Yaoyuan, a diplomacy and governance analyst with Beijing International Studies University, warned of issues similar to those faced by foreign firms in China.

“Changing laws and regulations with clauses not clearly defined, as well as issues like national security and data security, usually worry non-local firms,” the researcher said.

In Vietnam, foreign firms may face risks as the country introduces laws on intellectual property, competition and data management.”

“The revised Cybersecurity Law mandates all foreign entities to store and host data in Vietnam, which may increase costs and compliance risks,” Yang added.

Yang urged Chinese investors to carefully study Vietnam’s complex tax, land use and labour laws before making the plunge.

“Exporters not troubled by US tariffs should see Vietnam as just one of many expansion options.”

Tjia Yin Nor, an associate professor with City University of Hong Kong’s Department of Public and International Affairs, said one issue of note is labour law compliance.

Amid global supply chain shifts, China eyes Vietnam for ‘strategic’ cooperation

“Chinese companies tend to employ interns in Vietnam, but this practice has been criticised. Some firms, unfamiliar with local laws, face charges of youth exploitation,” she said.

There have been reports, Yang said, of Chinese workers on business visas being fined or deported after raids where local enforcers found them working without a permit.

In 2022, Beijing’s embassy in Hanoi issued a reminder to those doing business in Vietnam to abide by local employment laws.

Overall costs have also soared.

Zhou Libin, a manager of Tiansu Machinery and Technology from east China’s Zhejiang province, said the monthly salary of a skilled worker in Haiphong was 1,000 yuan (US$140) in 2018, the year when then-US president Donald Trump launched the trade war. But that has since tripled.

The average daily rent for a plant in Haiphong runs from 1 yuan to 1.5 yuan per square metre, almost identical to many industrial estates in Zhejiang with better infrastructure – and before the cost of shipping intermediate goods from China is factored in.

“We’re trapped in losses in Vietnam … If there’s no turnaround this year, we may pull up stakes and return,” Zhou said.

He lamented that today’s Vietnam is radically different from what it was just six years ago.

“Yes, exporting to the US is easier [from Vietnam] but we are barely making profit,” he said.

“Everything is getting more expensive, to the point you wonder if it would be better to produce back home.” This is not just talk – he shifted some of his production back last year.

Small players are not the only ones who are beating a retreat.

In November, Texhong International, one of China’s largest textile producers, sold its 250,000-square-metre (2.7-million-sq-ft) plant in Vietnam’s Quang Ninh province, a major setback for the firm’s operations, which began in 2006.

The Shanghai-based company said in its exchange filings the move was part of a larger disposal of loss-making operations.

But Beijing still views Hanoi as a preferred gateway, as the existing US tariff structure on Chinese products remains intact and more – encompassing commodities, services and technologies – could be adjusted in the future.

President Xi Jinping visited Vietnam last month, his first trip there in six years. A joint statement, encouraging the building of a “strategic China-Vietnam community”, indicated a mutual desire to deepen ties.

“Both countries will encourage and support enterprises with strength, credibility and advanced technologies to invest and will create a fair, convenient environment,” the document read.

China’s southern neighbour is its biggest trading partner in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.

“Vietnam’s export substitution economy has a need to draw Chinese manufacturers to its economy,” said Ha Hoang Hop, an associate senior fellow at the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute in Singapore.

“Both Chinese and Vietnamese manufacturers should leverage the momentum [from Xi’s visit], and avoid the unfavourable side of big power competition.”

Vietnam is a major channel in Beijing’s Belt and Road Initiative, a wide-ranging strategy to build infrastructure linkages across the region.

Many provinces provide subsidies to local firms, including those specialising in consumer goods, home appliances and photovoltaic cells, to incentivise expansion into participating countries.

Zhejiang is one such region. According to a report from local state media outlet Zhejiang Daily, the province hoped to emulate the overseas expansion of Korean and Japanese companies by using investments abroad to benefit the domestic economy while preventing the hollowing out of indigenous industry.

The report quoted Oscar Liu with Powernice Intelligent Technology, a producer of photovoltaic panel and cell components that runs a plant in Vietnam.

Liu, a partner, said expanding overseas did not mean the company had given up on the domestic market.

“We hope the government can help when we bring overseas profits and experience back to China, to plough our overseas earnings into innovation and upgrades at home,” Liu said.

Nvidia CEO’s low-key China visit seen as a goodwill gesture towards key market as US chip firm grapples with sanction issues

https://www.scmp.com/tech/tech-war/article/3249524/nvidia-ceos-low-key-china-visit-seen-goodwill-gesture-towards-key-market-us-chip-firm-grapples?utm_source=rss_feed

Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang’s first trip to mainland China in four years has been a goodwill gesture to the chip designer’s staff and clients in the country, which remains a key market despite tough US restrictions, analysts say.

While Nvidia did not release details of Huang’s itinerary, a person familiar with the situation who asked not to be identified, said the firm invited several key distributors to its Beijing office for a get-together attended by Huang. A second person, who also requested anonymity, said Huang did not have any private meetings with Chinese officials.

“Following four years of disruption from the pandemic, Jensen is resuming his annual tradition of celebrating the Chinese New Year with our local employees,” said an Nvidia spokesperson, without elaborating.

Xinbang, a Chinese online media outlet that covers the semiconductor industry, reported that Huang visited Nvidia’s Beijing office on January 15, Shanghai on January 17 and Shenzhen on January 19, to attend annual meetings with local employees.

There have been no media reports of Huang meeting with Chinese clients or government officials during the trip, in contrast with recent visits by other high-profile US executives, such as Tesla founder Elon Musk and Apple CEO Tim Cook.

Nvidia chief visits China for first time in 4 years amid mainland market headwinds

Video clips of Huang meeting Chinese staff went viral on the mainland’s internet in recent days. In one clip, Huang, 60, was dressed in a red-and-green flowered vest, dancing on stage with other performers.

In another video, Huang drew a lucky number from a lottery box and called out the winner’s name as “Hua Wei”, which sounds similar to Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei Technologies, currently under tough US trade sanctions.

Huang’s visit comes as Nvidia is caught between US-China geopolitical hostilities. On the one hand, the mainland remains the most important market in Asia for Nvidia, contributing 20 to 25 per cent of revenue in the past several quarters.

On the other hand, the US government tightened chip export restrictions to China last October, blocking the mainland’s access to graphics processing units (GPUs) that Nvidia had specifically designed for Chinese clients in response to earlier curbs.

Yuyuantantian, a Chinese social media account run by state television, said in an opinion piece on Tuesday that Huang’s visit “reflected his concern about the possibility of losing the China market”.

“China’s artificial intelligence (AI) sector is growing rapidly and is leading the world along with the US … Nvidia knows what’s at stake. Loss of the China market and Chinese customer data would mean a double hit for Nvidia,” it added.

Analysts said Huang will have a tough job in the short-run to shore up business amid widening tensions between Washington and Beijing.

“Huang is trying to make a goodwill gesture to the important China market, although he doesn’t want to draw too much attention amid the current political environment,” said Arisa Liu, a semiconductor research director at the Taiwan Institute of Economic Research.

Su Lian Jye, a chief analyst with research company Omdia, said while Huang’s trip was a friendly gesture, it is unlikely to solve Nvidia problems in the Chinese market.

As China pushes ahead with its AI development, Nvidia GPUs have seen high levels of demand from cloud services clients such as Baidu, Tencent Holdings, Alibaba Group Holding and ByteDance. Alibaba owns the South China Morning Post.

However, under an October update to US trade sanctions, Nvidia cannot ship its leading A800 and H800 chips to China-based customers. As such, the US chip giant has developed three new data centre GPUs – the H20, L20 and L2. Nevertheless, US Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo has warned that Washington will take a dim view of any workaround solutions targeted at the mainland.

US-China science deal must address American national security concerns: senior State Department official

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/article/3249547/us-china-science-deal-must-address-american-national-security-concerns-senior-state-department?utm_source=rss_feed

The future of a seminal US-China science deal depends on both sides agreeing on new stronger terms to address Washington’s national security concerns, a top government official negotiating the pact said, amid calls from American academics for its renewal.

Washington’s posture going into the talks was to bolster the US-China Science and Technology Cooperation Agreement “to have it be more robust, to have the guardrails be more firm and more clear”, according to Jason Donovan, director of science and technology cooperation at the US State Department.

An amended STA must ensure “fewer opportunities” for any activity compromising American national interests, he said in response to a question from the Post at a National Science, Technology and Security Round-table meeting at Stanford University in California.

“If we are able to do that in negotiations, we will do so. If we’re unable to do that we won’t do so,” Donovan added.

In a similar vein, Condoleezza Rice, a former US secretary of state and national security adviser, said in her keynote address at the event that “Chinese insistence on being able to marry their civilian and military capabilities” was problematic.

As Sino-American competition has intensified in recent years, concerns have mounted in the US over the protection of intellectual property rights and China’s military obtaining unintended benefits from the science and technology agreement.

Signed in 1979 by then-US president Jimmy Carter and Chinese paramount leader Deng Xiaoping, the STA was the first bilateral pact finalised between the two countries after they established diplomatic ties.

The STA laid out the terms for government-to-government cooperation in science, opening the way for academic and corporate interactions.

‘No need to be so nervous’ about competing with US, Beijing’s advisers say

The State Department extended the deal by six months in August, when it was originally scheduled to expire.

Donovan on Tuesday said a team from his office was negotiating the STA with its Chinese counterparts in Washington “as we speak”.

The round-table group, established in 2020, facilitates discussion among the intelligence, law enforcement, industry and academic communities on threats and benefits of open research and international collaboration.

Rebecca Keiser of the National Science Foundation recalled that during an STA meeting in the 2000s China was pushing for making traditional Chinese medicine a priority.

Xi-Biden summit: leaders agree to revisit historic science and technology pact

Scientific advancements in the world’s second-largest economy showed how “different things are today”, said Kaiser, observing that US-China interactions had become “even more complex and more challenging”.

Many from the research community on Tuesday agreed and warned against the STA being discontinued.

Thomas Fingar, a Stanford scholar, argued the US could not let the pact “go to zero”, believing such a scenario would “effectively stigmatise cooperating with Americans, American institutions [and] Americans participating in international enterprises”.

“And that’s just too big a price, in my judgment, to pay for a feel-good political gesture,” the former US assistant secretary of state for intelligence and research said.

AI deal shows China, US can cooperate on tech rules despite rivalry: analysts

Richard Meserve, a past president of the Carnegie Institution for Science, agreed there was “value” in working together, but cautioned that “we need to be careful on what we collaborate in”.

Rice, who served in the George W Bush administration, went further, urging a defence of American national interests while not shutting the door on the world’s best minds.

The one-time Stanford provost recounted how she told FBI boss Christopher Wray in a recent meeting that US visa application-vetting must be improved to avoid sending Chinese spies to American institutions of science and research.

“If we are about to admit somebody who you think is working for the PLA, don’t give them a visa,” Rice said, referring to the People’s Liberation Army. “But don’t let us admit them … and then tell us that that person is working for the PLA and can’t be in our labs.”

Academic institutions “are not intelligence agencies,” she added. “Don’t treat us like intelligence agencies”.

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China’s ban on Australian lobsters has Asean members clawing way into market

https://www.scmp.com/economy/china-economy/article/3249500/chinas-ban-australian-lobsters-has-asean-members-clawing-way-market?utm_source=rss_feed

Southeast Asian countries are fishing for more opportunities to get their lobsters onto Chinese plates, and analysts expect that the trend will not only intensify, it will become increasingly difficult to reverse the longer that Beijing’s protracted ban on Australian rock lobsters remains in effect.

According to the General Administration of Customs, China’s major source of rock lobsters is now New Zealand, which accounts for almost 40 per cent of the total market share, followed by Mexico and the United States at 20 and 16 per cent, respectively.

Meanwhile, three Asean members – Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam – have strived to grab a greater market share by seizing on China’s crustacean demand that swelled during the 2010s as its middle class expanded.

The door for their lobsters to enter China has opened wider in the nearly three-and-a-half years since Beijing banned lobster imports from Australia in response to calls from Canberra for an inquiry into the origin of the coronavirus. And despite bilateral ties improving since last year, the ban has remained in effect.

The three members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations accounted for 6.8 per cent of China’s total import share last year – doubling the rate from 2019.

Australian rock lobsters face ‘severe’ competition if they return to China

The increase also came as Beijing has been moving closer to its Southeast Asian neighbours to buffer growing geopolitical complications with the US-led West, while the vast market potential of the world’s second-largest economy has continued to attract Southeast Asian exporters to expand their presence.

Customs data shows that Indonesia ranked as the fifth-largest lobster exporter to China, with the value of such shipments reaching US$18.27 million in 2023, up nearly 44 per cent, year on year, and accounting for 2.9 per cent of the market share.

And Thailand, China’s seventh-biggest importer of this seafood, saw its lobster shipments increase 160-fold since 2019, from a total value of US$88,123 to US$14.1 million last year, or a 2.2 per cent market share.

Before China’s import ban on Australian lobsters went into effect in 2020, more than half of its lobsters had come from Australia in 2019.

“China is a major consumer market, and Australia’s withdrawal gives seafood exporters within the [Southeast Asian] region vast opportunities to target this seafood market,” said Song Seng Wun, an economic consultant with CGS CIMB Securities, a financial services firm in Singapore.

Due to the ban, large volumes of lobsters from Australia have also become more affordable for Asean consumers, Song said.

However, China’s lobster imports from Vietnam, which ranked as the eighth-biggest source, fell drastically last year, dropping from nearly 39 per cent of the total in 2022 to 1.7 per cent last year.

“Vietnam’s lobster industry lacks the same well-established farming procedures and regulations as Australia’s, and some farmers fish for wild lobsters – a clear violation of China’s animal-protection laws, Song added. “This is why last year China banned many imports of Vietnamese lobsters.”

In 2019, Vietnam accounted for just 1.7 per cent of China’s lobster imports.

Mainlanders shell out for smuggled Australian lobsters via Hong Kong

US exporters have also seized on the Chinese market amid Australia’s exit. The US accounted for nearly 16 per cent of China’s lobster market share last year, up from 2.9 per cent in 2019, and the related trade value grew 3.5 times to US$97.33 million.

However, these rising imports still have not filled the hole left by Beijing’s blockade on Australia. The value of China’s rock lobster imports hovered above US$900 million in the three years before the ban, but since 2021, it has dropped to around US$600 million.

Last year, the value of China’s lobster imports was US$629 million, down 31 per cent from 2020, official figures show.

China lifted its trade ban on Australian coal last year as relations between the two countries improved, and the move led to market speculation that Australian lobsters could be allowed back into China.

“Unless this mini trade war is resolved soon, there could be irreversible changes that will negatively impact Australian lobster exporters,” said Jayant Menon, a senior fellow at the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute in Singapore.

Menon explained that, when new trading relationships with alternative suppliers are firmly established, there are costs associated with switching back, even if strained bilateral relations are fully restored.

China has also been exploring the cultivation of locally raised varieties of overseas lobsters to meet domestic demand.

China has farmed rock lobsters – like those from Australia – in its northwestern Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region since 2021, by building ponds that simulate seawater.

And this month, China shipped an Eastern European variety of lobster, which was found indigenously in Xinjiang, to the eastern regions of Zhejiang and Jiangsu for farming.

King prawn, lobsters on offer as rural Xinjiang develops seawater aquafarming

For its part, Australia is still holding out hope that its lobsters will be welcome back in China someday.

“The lobster industry has worked hard to optimise the efficiency of supply chains between Australia and China to get the product to market as fresh as possible,” said James Clarke, president of the Australia China Business Council (West Australia). “The council believes that premium Australian products still provide exceptional quality and value for Chinese consumers.”

Clarke added that the national president of the Australia China Business Council, David Olsson, wrote a formal letter to Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese in November, advocating for the resumption of the live lobster trade to China while “noting that the ban affects small fishing communities around [Australia], and hardworking Australian families”.

“The council understands that the issues surrounding the live lobster trade are different to barley and wine,” Clark said, referring to other targeted Australian exports to China. “However, we hope that with increasing good faith in the bilateral relationship, breakthroughs may be on the horizon.”

Additional reporting by Kandy Wong

Hong Kong property: Templeton joins China Re in relocating to Two IFC as office rents fall

https://www.scmp.com/business/article/3249472/hong-kong-property-templeton-joins-china-re-relocating-two-ifc-office-rents-fall?utm_source=rss_feed

Hong Kong’s Two International Finance Centre (Two IFC) seems to be the preferred address for the banking and finance sector, as office vacancy rates rise and rents fall in the city.

Just a week after China Re Asset Management, a state-owned reinsurer, said it would relocate to the grade A tower in the core Central business area, US asset manager Franklin Templeton confirmed it was moving to a bigger office in the building that also houses the Hong Kong Monetary Authority’s headquarters.

“The new office space at IFC will be larger, significantly larger, than our current space,” a Franklin Templeton spokeswoman said. The company, which has been based in Chater House, another prime office tower in Central, for the past 22 years, did not say when it planned to move to the new office.

Based in San Mateo, California, Templeton is a global multi-asset manager overseeing about US$1.6 trillion of funds.

In November, average monthly rents for Hong Kong offices fell by 0.5 per cent to HK$52.30 (US$6.70) per square foot, while vacancies edged up to 12.9 per cent from 12.6 per cent in October, according to the latest data from JLL.

The decline in office rents has triggered many tenants to upgrade to premium buildings in the heart of Central, according to property agents.

Located on 8 Finance Street, the IFC complex consists of two skyscrapers, a shopping centre, as well as a Four Seasons Hotel. One IFC opened in 1998 and Two IFC in 2003.

While the Franklin Templeton spokeswoman declined to give details about the lease deal, citing confidentiality, property consultancy CBRE said the company had taken up 21,700 sq ft on the 62nd floor of the 88-storey Two IFC.

The fund manager will be paying HK$130 per square foot or HK$2.99 million a month for the space, according to local media reports.

Lease transactions so far this year in Two IFC have ranged between HK$130 and HK$150 per square foot, data from Centaline Commercial’s website showed. In 2023, leases were between HK$120 and HK$160 per sq ft. The peak price achieved in 2022 was HK$180 per square foot, about 28 per cent higher than the least expensive deal so far this year.

Swiss watchmaker Audemars Piguet rents entire floor at The Henderson

Franklin Templeton has been operating from the 17th floor of Chater House on 8 Connaught Road, Central, since 2002, where it had leased 18,397 sq feet of prime office space.

Leases in Chater House ranged between HK$130 and HK$199 per square foot from 2018 to 2022, according to data compiled by Landvision, a commercial property agent.

Centaline Property Agency last week confirmed China Re had leased 6,740 sq ft on the 41st floor of Two IFC for HK$150 per square foot, or just over HK$1 million a month.

China Re was previously based in Three Exchange Square, where it had leased 5,000 sq ft on the 12th floor for HK$130 per square foot, or HK$750,000 a month.

Young China neighbours who fell in love while chatting about interior design marry, keep separate homes on same floor

https://www.scmp.com/news/people-culture/trending-china/article/3248445/young-china-neighbours-who-fell-love-while-chatting-about-interior-design-marry-keep-separate-homes?utm_source=rss_feed

Two young neighbours in China who married after falling in love while swapping ideas about doing up their flats, have sparked a wave of delight on mainland social media.

Zhangtian and Minmin, from Zhejiang province in eastern China, bought properties next door to each other on the 11th floor of a block of luxury flats in 2022.

The couple did not know each other but would meet when they were decorating their homes before they moved in. Zhang is an interior designer, so Minmin would ask for his advice.

“I helped design the shoe cabinet by her door. It’s the same as mine,” he said.

As they got to know each other, they began to fall in love. They realised they have a lot in common in addition to interior design tastes, such as hobbies and enjoying sport.

They felt comfortable together and affection grew between them but they did not begin a romantic relationship immediately.

Zhangtian thought he was very lucky to have bought a flat next door to a person as lovely as Minmin. “She is very pretty,” he said.

He moved into his new home in March last year, and Minmin moved into her three months later. That is when they started dating and, after seven months Zhangtian proposed to Minmin and they married on January 6.

Minmin moved in with Zhangtian but kept her flat with her cat in it. When their parents visited, they would stay at Minmin’s place. The couple do not plan to combine the two homes.

“Even if though we are a couple, we do need some personal privacy and space sometimes,” Zhangtian said.

They have received blessings from their neighbours who think they are ideal for each other, and the story has touched people online.

“They are really a perfect match,” one online observer said.

Another said: “Oh, it’s so sweet, isn’t it?”

Many other people were envious of them, with one person adding: “They are meant to be together.”

Heartwarming love stories are very popular in China.

In February last year, millions of people were delighted about a love-match between an interior design guru and a woman who left the flirtatious comment beneath his online video: “Does this flat need a lady?”

In the same month, hearts were warmed by the story of a chance encounter between a rejected lover and a woman who boldly took his unwanted bunch of flowers, which has blossomed into love.

Countries Press China at UN Human Rights Review

https://learningenglish.voanews.com/a/countries-press-china-at-un-human-rights-review/7452077.html

China faced a review of its human rights record at the United Nations offices in Geneva, Switzerland on Tuesday.

All U.N. members face what is called a “universal periodic review” every four and a half years by the U.N. Human Rights Council.

Many nations used the review to press China to permit more freedom of expression. Some also called on China to protect the rights of ethnic minorities and to end a disputed national security law for Hong Kong.

China’s ambassador to the U.N., Chen Xu, led a group of delegates. They represented about 20 ministries in the Chinese government. Chen told the U.N. Human Rights Council about China’s efforts to reduce poverty. He said citizens voted in “democratic elections,” and said freedom of religious belief is protected.

“China upholds respect for and protection of human rights as a task of importance in state governance,” Chen said.

The review process meant that many countries offered advice and criticism.

Leslie Norton of Canada called on China to end “all forms of enforced disappearances targeting human rights defenders, ethnic minorities and Falun Gong practitioners.”

Falun Gong is a spiritual movement in China that has been targeted by the Chinese government. Rights activists say the government has arrested, imprisoned, tortured, and sometimes killed Falun Gong members.

Norton also pressed for an end to Hong Kong’s national security law. The law calls for punishment against those who are accused of harming China’s national security. Protestors, activists, and former opposition lawmakers have been arrested under that law.

Czech Ambassador Vaclav Balek urged China to “end the criminalization of religious and peaceful civil expression by ethnic and religious groups — including Muslim, Uyghurs and Buddhists, Tibetans and Mongolians — under the pretext of protecting state security.” He urged China to stop kidnappings of Chinese people in foreign countries and to stop threatening Chinese citizens living in foreign countries.

U.S. Ambassador Michele Taylor presented a list of concerns, including condemning “the ongoing genocide and crimes against humanity in Xinjiang…”

Some independent organizations in the U.S. and other countries have accused China of genocide in Xinjiang, but no U.N. bodies have used that word.

Kozo Honsei, Japan’s U.N. representative, called for better protections of the rights of minorities in the areas of Tibet and Xinjiang.

Burundi’s representative urged China to improve health care in central areas and to improve housing in Hong Kong and Macao. And Iran praised China’s “national action plan for human rights.”

More than 160 countries registered to take part in the review, which was to take about three hours and 30 minutes. That meant each country’s delegate had 45 seconds to speak. Some ambassadors had to read very quickly.

China’s delegation had a total of 70 minutes to make its case.

Several groups such as Falun Gong and pro-Tibet activists held small demonstrations outside the U.N. Geneva buildings during Tuesday’s meeting. Inside, about 100 activists from nongovernmental groups watched, officials said.

The Tibet Advocacy Coalition, the World Uyghur Congress, and human rights defenders in Hong Kong were expected to hold a joint news meeting after the discussion.

China’s last review took place in 2018.

I’m Gregory Stachel.

Jamey Keaten reported this story for The Associated Press. Gregory Stachel adapted it for VOA Learning English.

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Words in This Story

review –n. to carefully give thought to a subject, examine information and give opinions or suggestions about it

universal – adj. done or experienced by everyone

task – n. a piece of work that has been given to someone: a job for someone to do

practice – v. to live according to the customs and teachings of (a religion)

civil – adj. of or relating to the people who live in a country

pretext – n. a reason that you give to hide your real reason for doing something

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