US-China relations

If President Xi Jinping’s team carries out annual job appraisals, China’s overseas propaganda team will surely be found to have performed catastrophically.  Whether it is Hong Kong or Xinjiang, Huawei or the trade war with the United States, the Chinese regime has had a string of notable public relations failures this year. While the regime’s propaganda efforts have worked quite well on the domestic audience, mainly because of the Great Firewall, the overseas propaganda arm has suffered major defeats.  Despite deploying numerous resources via official and unofficial channels, the regime has not only failed to achieve its intended purpose of interacting well with the rest of the world but als

Scientists in southern China are planning to create machines that will be used to unravel the mysteries of the building blocks of the universe. They said two ring-shaped electron-ion colliders – one 1.2 miles long – will be built in Huizhou, a city in Guangdong province, beginning in 2025 and they will be designed to accelerate electrons to close to the speed of light. The project – known as the Electron-Ion Collider of China, or EICC – will see electrons being fired at the nuclei of heavy elements such as iron or uranium at high speeds. The scientists said the machines – among the biggest of their kind – would act as “cameras” when these collisions took place. This will allow them to study

The US and China have reached consensus on the terms of a “phase one” trade deal, multiple US media outlets have reported. Intended to be the first in a series of incremental agreements to resolve the trade war, the deal has the approval of US President Donald Trump, Bloomberg reported, citing several unnamed people briefed on the matter. As part of the agreement, the US would not only postpone tariffs on around $160 billion of Chinese goods scheduled to go into effect on Sunday, but also make cuts in duties already in place, Myron Brilliant of the US Chamber of Commerce told CNBC, citing US administration sources who had briefed him on the plans. Neither the White House nor the Office of th

As Beijing steps up its defense of its mass internment measures targeting Muslims in China’s far west, one key target of its messaging campaign remains decidedly unconvinced: the US Congress. On Monday, representatives of the regional government in the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region said that all “trainees” in what China calls vocational training centers have “graduated” and found stable employment. Foreign governments and international human rights watchdogs remain skeptical of China’s efforts to ward off accusations of a campaign to forcibly bring ethnic minority groups in the region into line. And Uygurs living overseas point to silence from their relatives in Xinjiang as proof they a

China will move to “normalize” mass internment facilities in Xinjiang and open what Beijing calls education facilities in the region in the future, amid rising US-China clashes over the treatment of ethnic minorities in the western region. In a press conference on Monday, Shohrat Zakir, chairman of the Xinjiang government, took aim at foreign media and western governments, blaming them for distorting the image of China’s controversial counter-terrorism efforts in the predominately Muslim region, in particular its mass detention of Uygurs accused of harboring extremist ideas by the authorities. “The US is getting restless and has launched a smear campaign against Xinjiang,” he said. “But no f

China’s growing economic strength is seen by most people as positive, but the country’s rise as a global superpower is not making it popular with neighbors in the Asia-Pacific, a survey released on Thursday showed. The survey of nearly 39,000 people in 34 countries by the Pew Research Center also showed the world had an overwhelmingly negative view of Chinese President Xi Jinping. Over the past 70 years, China has transformed itself from an economic backwater to the world’s second-largest economy and a major source of investment around the world. Some 58% of people across 16 countries recognized China’s strong economy as mutually beneficial, while 52% said they see Chinese investment as posi

China’s Xinjiang autonomous region has attracted international attention for all the wrong reasons – police crackdowns and reports that local ethnic Uygur people are being held in internment camps.  What hasn’t gained much attention is the difficulty Beijing has drafting staff to execute its policies in the far northwest area. The measures targeting Muslim ethnic minorities in Xinjiang have triggered “widespread discontent among Han Chinese officials and citizens,” a source close to the central government told the South China Morning Post.  The source said Chinese President Xi Jinping was aware of the problem because he had been briefed by the country’s chief Xinjiang policy coordinator, Wan

The Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act and the US Congress’ 150-odd other pieces of China-related legislation underscore elder statesman Henry Kissinger’s recent assertion that the US and China are “in the foothills” of a new cold war. Perhaps we’re even further up, above the tree line. As recriminations beget more recriminations and new fronts in the ideological battle seem to open every week, Washington’s wannabe cold warriors need to pause and reassess. The non-stop news around the advance of the Hong Kong act and the stand-off at Polytechnic University last week obscured new data released by the Institute of International Education and the State Department showing that the number o

US President Donald Trump may have his critics in China, but some internet users have suggested, albeit sarcastically, that he has been a positive force for the country.  They joke that he is acting as a catalyst for much-needed reforms. In social media circles and even on some academic forums, the American leader earned the nickname Comrade “Chuan Jianguo,” which translates as “Trump Building the Nation.”  The backhanded compliment stems from the assumption that, by starting a trade war with China, Trump unwittingly forced the country into a program of domestic reforms to counter its impact. Such is people’s familiarity with the nickname that Wang Manchuan, head of the public administration

The US government is planning a major new Mandarin-language initiative in an effort to bolster its global reputation at a time of Chinese ascendancy and eroding American soft power. Voice of America (VOA) and Radio Free Asia (RFA) are joining forces on a new network called Global Mandarin, according to internal memos, job placement advertisements and interviews with people close to Washington’s information arms. Its annual budget would be between $5 million and $10 million, potentially rising in the second year, according to a source who requested anonymity given links to the networks. It would focus on softer content aimed at reaching younger Chinese in the US, China and beyond. The US roll