Day: February 23, 2024

Will retail investors back Japan’s stock market breakthrough?

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Stay informed with free updates Simply sign up to the Japanese business & finance myFT Digest — delivered directly to your inbox. In towns and cities across Japan the distinctive, delirious buildings of the Bubble era still abound: each one telling a tale of how thoroughly excess and exuberance show their age once the fuel is spent.  These were built during Japan’s frothiest days of the late 1980s. More than enough remain to provide ordinary Japanese with daily visual reminders of what bubbly optimism looked like — and, as the…

At Least 15 Die in Residential Fire in Eastern China’s Nanjing

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BEIJING —  At least 15 people have been killed and 44 injured in a fire at a residential building in eastern China’s Nanjing, local authorities said Saturday. The fire broke out early Friday morning, officials said at a press conference, with a preliminary investigation suggesting the blaze started on the building’s first floor, where electric bikes had been placed. The building is located in the Yuhuatai district of Nanjing, a city of more than 8 million that lies about 260 kilometers northwest of Shanghai. By 6 a.m. local time the…

Apartment block fire in China’s Nanjing city kills at least 15, officials say

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At least 15 people were killed and 44 injured in a fire at a residential building in eastern China’s Nanjing city, local authorities said. The fire broke out early Friday morning, officials said at a press conference, with a preliminary investigation suggesting the blaze started on the building’s first floor, where electric bikes had been placed. The building is located in the Yuhuatai district of Nanjing, a city of more than 8 million about 260km north-west of Shanghai. By 6am (2200 GMT) the fire had been extinguished, and a search-and-rescue…

Chinese hit film Article 20 is ‘a fairy tale’ about the right to self-defence, legal experts say

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As the story unfolds, the two prosecutors race to collect evidence, redefining the case as a right to self-defence. China’s big holiday films spark social media debate about body issues and justice In a scene near the end of the movie, the Han delivers a passionate speech in defence of the suspect. Han tells the court that the defendant in the case, who had seriously wounded another man in a fight after being bullied by him for months, was only defending himself and should be set free. At the public…

OpenAI’s Sora pours ‘cold water’ on China’s AI dreams, as text-to-video advancements prompt more soul-searching

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Zhou Hongyi, the founder of Chinese internet security firm 360 Security Technology, which has joined China’s race to launch its own ChatGPT-style large language model, said the introduction of Sora was like a “barrel of cold water poured down China’s head”, Chinese media Yicai reported on Friday. “It cools down the heads of many people, forcing us to see the gap with leaders overseas,” he added. In one knee-jerk response to Sora this week, Beijing asked its most trusted state-owned enterprises to take a lead on AI. The State Council’s…

Africa’s Donkeys Are Coveted by China. Can the Continent Protect Them?

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For years, Chinese companies and their contractors have been slaughtering millions of donkeys across Africa, coveting gelatin from the animals’ hides that is processed into traditional medicines, popular sweets and beauty products in China. But a growing demand for the gelatin has decimated donkey populations at such alarming rates in African countries that governments are now moving to put a brake on the mostly unregulated trade. The African Union, a body that encompasses the continent’s 55 states, adopted a continentwide ban on donkey skin exports this month in the hope…

US Republicans call for McKinsey to be banned from federal contracts

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Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter. Top Republican lawmakers have called for McKinsey to be banned from securing federal contracts in the US following the revelation that a think-tank led by the consulting firm gave policy recommendations to the Chinese central government. Marco Rubio, the vice-chair of the Senate intelligence committee, and Michael McCaul, the chair of the House foreign affairs committee, said McKinsey had undermined US security through the think-tank’s role in the development of…

China’s Woes Won’t Slow US Economy, but Excess Capacity a Concern – Treasury Official

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U.S. Deputy Treasury Secretary Wally Adeyemo said on Friday that China faces a number of economic challenges, including the property sector and an aging population, but he does not see major spillovers to the U.S. economy outside of China’s excess manufacturing capacity. “I am not concerned about the headwinds from China having a large impact on the US economy,” Adeyemo told a Council on Foreign Relations event in New York. “The thing that I am fundamentally concerned about from China is excess capacity coming from China and hitting the global…

China arrests more than 1,000 Tibetans protesting Chinese dam project

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Police on Friday arrested more than 1,000 Tibetans, including monks from at least two local monasteries, in southwestern China’s Sichuan province after they protested the construction of a dam expected to destroy six monasteries and force the relocation of two villages, two sources from inside Tibet told Radio Free Asia. The arrested individuals – both monks and local residents – are being held in various places throughout Dege county in Kardze Tibetan Prefecture because the police do not have a single place to detain them, said the sources who requested…

Chinese Companies Hit by US, EU Sanctions on Russia

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London —  U.S. and European Union sanctions announced Friday on hundreds of people and companies for supporting Russia’s war in Ukraine included several companies from China. While most sanctions were against Russians and Russian firms, the U.S. and EU measures also included Chinese individuals and companies based in mainland China cities as well as Hong Kong for supplying the Russian military. The U.S. sanctions also targeted individuals and firms based in Kazakhstan, Liechtenstein, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates, while the EU also targeted individuals and entities based in India,…