Day: August 25, 2023

Germany’s University of Erlangen-Nuremberg stops accepting state-funded Chinese students and researchers over spying fears

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It also warned: “The political landscape has changed significantly in recent times and topics such as protection against scientific and industrial espionage, data security and safeguarding intellectual property also post a challenge for our FAU.” It also said its previous collaboration with the Chinese telecoms giant Huawei – which has been blacklisted by the United States and excluded from several Western broadband networks over security concerns – had been the cause of growing international concern. It said that as a result it would not sign any more research or partnership…

US Accuses Russia, China of Covering for North Korea at UN

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united nations —  The United States on Friday accused China and Russia of blocking a unified U.N. Security Council response to North Korea’s missile launches, including Thursday’s attempt by Pyongyang to put a spy satellite in space. During an emergency Security Council meeting, 13 of the 15 members — all but Moscow and Beijing — condemned Pyongyang’s second spy satellite test in three months, which used ballistic missile technology. “This should be an issue that unifies us. … But since the beginning of 2022, this council has failed to live…

India’s ‘heart’ closer to US than China on trade, says New Delhi’s commerce chief at G20 meeting

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India’s commerce chief has described the country’s “heart” as belonging to the US and not China as it relates to trade in remarks delivered before ministers from both countries in New Delhi on Friday. The RCEP, a free-trade agreement focused on Asia-Pacific and led by Beijing, comprises Australia, Brunei, Cambodia, China, Indonesia, Japan, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, New Zealand, the Philippines, Singapore, South Korea, Thailand and Vietnam. In response, Wang singled out the growing trade relationship between China and India. In 2022, their bilateral trade reached US$130 billion, he said, adding…

Security Agreement Could Prompt Chinese Retaliation Against S. Korea  

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WASHINGTON —  China’s discontent over security and economic agreements that Seoul forged with Washington and Tokyo at a Camp David summit leaves open a possibility it could respond with coercive economic and military measures against South Korea, experts say. During last week’s summit at the U.S. presidential retreat of Camp David, South Korea agreed with the U.S. and Japan to hold regular meetings to put into practice security and economic measures, bringing trilateral ties closer than ever before. In a statement, the three leaders reaffirmed the “importance of peace and…

Uyghur News Recap: Aug. 18-25, 2023

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WASHINGTON —  Here’s a summary of Uyghur-related news from around the world this week: Uyghur Activist Learns of Father’s Passing in Xinjiang Months Later Uyghur activist Abdulhakim Idris has learned of his father’s death seven months after it occurred in China’s Xinjiang region. Abdulhakim, the executive director of the Center of Uyghur Studies in the U.S., was informed this month by an anonymous source that his father died in January. His contact with his father had been cut since a 2017 call, with most of his family detained by Chinese…

US, China to cover ‘expansive’ range of topics during Gina Raimondo visit, but no immediate solutions expected

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US Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo is expected to raise issues including raids on American consultancy firms and market access during her four-day China visit, according to sources with knowledge of the discussions. Beijing, meanwhile, will demand further relaxation of US export controls as part of its broad concerns over ongoing containment efforts, they added. China’s ban on the sale of products from US memory chip firm Micron Technology, data security and Beijing’s anti-espionage law are also set to be discussed, according to one source, with the issues seen as top…

Isabel Crook, Whose Life in China Spanned a Century of Change, Dies at 107

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Isabel Crook, a China-born daughter of Canadian missionaries who became one of her adopted country’s most celebrated foreign residents, beloved as an educator, anthropologist and articulate advocate for the Communist state, died on Sunday in Beijing. She was 107. Her son Carl Crook said the cause of death, in a hospital, was pneumonia. Mrs. Crook was among the last of a generation of Westerners born to missionaries in China in the decades before the Japanese invasion, World War II and the subsequent Communist revolution. The experience defined them. Some, like…

China Reopened to Tourists, But Few Traveling There

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LONDON —  The number of tourists visiting China is a fraction of the level it was before the start of the coronavirus pandemic, despite the country fully opening in March. China has not published official nationwide tourism statistics since 2021. However, regional statistics show foreign visitors are staying away. In Shanghai, international tourist arrivals from January to May this year totaled just over 910,000, with almost half arriving from Hong Kong, Macau or Taiwan. Four times as many tourists visited Shanghai before the pandemic in 2019. Zero-COVID China’s “zero-COVID” policy…

Operators of Fukushima Plant Say Water Samples Within Safe Limits

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Operators of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant said Friday that initial ocean water samples taken since the discharge of wastewater from the plant were well within the acceptable range for radioactive material. At a news conference near the plant in Fukushima prefecture, officials from the Tokyo Electric Power Company — TEPCO — told reporters they took samples Thursday of water from 10 locations within three kilometers of the power plant. They reported all the samples showed the concentration of tritium — a radioactive material that is the biproduct of…