Month: April 2025

The leaders of Taiwan’s two main opposition parties will hold an emergency summit on Tuesday to confront what they call a deepening political crackdown by the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), amid an escalating battle over lawmaker recall campaigns and growing judicial scrutiny of opposition activists. Advertisement Eric Chu Li-luan, chairman of the main opposition Kuomintang (KMT), said he and Huang Kuo-chang, head of the smaller Taiwan People’s Party (TPP), would meet to coordinate responses on defending judicial fairness, safeguarding democracy, and addressing the economic impact of US import tariffs…

A call by US President Donald Trump’s top economic adviser for other countries to foot the bill for the “global public goods” provided by the United States has stirred unease among Chinese scholars and prompted some sharp criticism. Advertisement As Stephen Miran, chairman of the Trump administration’s Council of Economic Advisers, lays out options for other countries that range from accepting US tariffs without retaliation to directly writing cheques to the US Treasury, many Chinese academics worry that such coercive actions could exacerbate the chaos spawned by Trump’s “reciprocal tariffs”…

A new study has shed light on how the geopolitical rivalry between the United States and China is playing out at the local level in the Philippines, with provincial support for national security strategies often shaped by economic ties and exposure to Chinese activities in the South China Sea. Advertisement The report by the University of the Philippines, titled “Localization of the United States–China Rivalry: Cases from the Philippines”, examined the influence of both superpowers in Cagayan and Palawan, two provinces that host sites accessible to American forces under the…

Advertisement “Sodium-ion battery technology is no longer a research achievement in laboratories,” Gao Huan, chief technology officer for EV business at CATL, told reporters at a press conference in Shanghai on Monday. “We have achieved a breakthrough not only in terms of energy storage density and cost, but also found a new key to environmental protection.” The company’s latest product, which uses sodium as cheaper raw material, will provide EV assemblers and users an alternative to existing technologies that rely on cobalt and lithium. Gao said the new battery has…

Many people were taken aback by the ferocity of Xia Baolong’s speech on Hong Kong National Security Education Day. Beneath the director of the Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office’s calm and resolute delivery, there was anger and frustration. The message is clear: this is war – not war in the literal sense but war nevertheless. Advertisement Does his speech signal the start of a chain reaction that will lead to total decoupling between the United States and China? If so, could Hong Kong be affected? While Hong Kong government…

Vietnam, Malaysia and Cambodia rolled out the red carpet for Chinese President Xi Jinping during his weeklong trip to the neighbouring countries. Advertisement In Hanoi, hundreds of children waved flags as he appeared at the Presidential Palace. In Kuala Lumpur, an honour guard fired off a 21-gun salute. And in Phnom Penh, King Norodom Sihamoni broke protocol to greet the Chinese president at the airport. But beyond the pomp, the substance of the trip was a message of unity – of the need for countries to stand firm against protectionism…

China is poised to grow more soybeans and improve the crop’s yield over the coming decade amid an accelerated self-sufficiency drive, and the nation’s more abundant domestic harvests are expected to hit American exporters and farmers who have long relied on China’s business. Advertisement While the nation of 1.4 billion people will continue seeing a “tight balance” between the supply and demand of food, agricultural authorities say China’s reliance on imports is set to decrease as it prioritises domestic production of soybeans, which represent the bulk of its agricultural imports.…