China Articles - January 9, 2022
Friends,
Happy New Year and welcome back to the weekly newsletter on the malign activities of Chinese Communist Party.
With less than a month remaining before the Chinese Government and the International Olympic Committee holds the opening ceremony of the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing, pressure continues to mount on countries to boycott diplomatically. Within the past week, Annalena Baerbock, the new German Foreign Minister, announced that she will not attend the Games.
Combine that pressure with the Party’s zero-COVID policy in the face of the rapid spread of Omicron (since December 23rd, the Party has implemented a harsh lockdown of Xi’an, a city of 13 million residents) and there is a very real chance that Beijing could decide to preempt the controversy and postpone the Games or significantly curtail them.
2022 is a critical year for Xi Jinping domestically and I think it is important to keep some milestones in mind when looking at what the future might bring:
February 2022 – The Chinese New Year is February 1st which means that celebrations last for 16 days through the Lantern Festival (January 31st to February 15th). Traditionally, huge numbers of Chinese citizens travel to spend time with family and much of the nation’s business sector shuts down for the holidays. This will be the third year in which the pandemic has disrupted these celebrations and given the spread of Omicron, it is reasonable to expect the Party to impose significant restrictions on Chinese citizens and downplay any dissatisfaction and harm this causes. The Chinese New Year celebrations will coincide with the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics (opening ceremony will be held on February 4th and the closing ceremony is on February 20th). Given the importance of what will begin in March, there is a reasonable chance the Party will postpone or significantly curtail the Olympics.
March 2022 – The PRC will hold the annual meetings of the National People’s Congress (NPC) and Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), also known as the “Two Sessions.” These two events will formally kickoff a year of careful stage management in the run-up to the 20th Party Congress in October 2022 and the formal “election” of the President and Vice President of the People’s Republic of China, as well as the Premier of the State Council, which will take place a year later at the March 2023 NPC. Trumpeted as the world’s largest legislative body with nearly three thousand members, the NPC is China’s rubber-stamp legislature which the Chinese Communist Party controls through a direct majority of the seats, control of the nomination and election process of all members, as well as control of the eight so-called “independent” political parties that the CCP permits to participate in the pageantry. When CCP leaders claim that the PRC is a “democracy” they point to the National People’s Congress as their proof. The CPPCC is the principal body that the CCP employs to execute their “United Front” strategy: the CCP’s control or influence over multiple “independent” groups and networks to provide the public veneer of democracy while the Party retains full control.
This year’s ‘Two Sessions’ will likely be focused on amplifying consensus around Xi’s third term as leader of the People’s Republic of China. Expect to see themes and talking points generated at the NPC and CPPCC parroted across media outlets and by United Front actors in foreign countries. The ‘Two Sessions’ will help manufacture the consensus and homogeneity of acceptable political views that the CCP depends on to retain power. Expect to see the finger prints of Politburo Standing Committee Member, Wang Huning all over what is generated in the ‘Two Sessions.’ As Matt Johnson described in a recent episode of Misha Auslin’s The Pacific Century podcast, Wang is the Party’s ideologue-in-chief.
July-August 2022 – The Party holds their annual Policy retreat at the resort district of Beidaihe in Hebei Province on the Bohai Sea. This is the CCP’s “smoke-filled room” in which the policies and intrigues of the Party Congresses and plenums are worked out before being unveiled publicly in October. If Xi’s plans to further consolidate power are going to be derailed, it would become evident at Beidaihe… unfortunately, the retreat is shrouded in secrecy.
October-November 2022 – Every five years, the Party holds their “National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party”, also known as the Party Congress. This year’s will be the 20th Party Congress. It has been held in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing (just as the NPC and CPPCC are) and since 1987 the event has been held over a series of weeks in October and November. This is the venue for the Party to publicly unveil leadership changes by approving the membership of the Central Committee. Starting in the early 1990s, the Party attempted to routinize leadership transitions and provide stability by effectively limiting leaders to two five-year terms by swapping out leadership in the even numbered Party Congresses. Xi is on track to break that precedent and extend his rule into a third five-year term. The leadership decisions announced at the 20th Party Congress will then be rubber-stamped by the NPC in March 2023.
Thanks for reading!
Matt
MUST READ
Anonymous Columnist, Yale Daily News, January 2, 2022
Yale University’s student newspaper publishes an anonymous article from a Chinese student calling on the Yale endowment to end its investments in China due to the gross human rights abuses perpetrated by the Chinese Communist Party. The editors of the student newspaper took the unusual step of granting anonymity based on the right threat they assessed that the student’s family would be under if they published it with the student’s name.
2. As Beijing Takes Control, Chinese Tech Companies Lose Jobs and Hope
Li Yuan, New York Times, January 5, 2022
In the midst of a campaign for ironclad market authority, the CCP appears willing to cripple the economy it is attempting to bring under its control. Nowhere is this phenomenon clearer than in the Chinese technology sector, writes Li Yuan for The New York Times. From e-commerce giant Alibaba to Didi, the flourishing ride-hailing service, few major technology firms have managed to evade the careful and ruthless gaze of government regulators. The consequences of this crackdown are far reaching—and risk undercutting a key ingredient of the economic expansion Beijing strives to sustain. Across the Chinese mainland, the government has rendered entrepreneurs timid. Increasingly, founders and executives have shunned exciting and lucrative consumer opportunities for development in industries deemed more acceptable to the CCP. In the meantime, their firms are shedding workers and casting countless employees out of jobs.
3. Germany Nervously Tests the Indo-Pacific Waters
Blake Herzinger, Foreign Policy, January 5, 2022
As a new government settles in at home, Germany finds itself undertaking an awkward naval deployment in the high-tension Indo-Pacific theater. Since its dispatch in August, the German frigate Bayern has been transiting regional waterways in an exercise which has “created more questions than it has answered” and offers a strikingly appropriate encapsulation of the current crossroads facing policymakers in Berlin, argues Blake Herzinger in Foreign Policy. German officials appear unable to strike a common chord towards Beijing—and Bayern appears handicapped by this indecision. While any deployment to the Indo-Pacific raises raises eyebrows in Beijing, and Germany has stated its commitment to the “Democratic Camp,” Berlin has refused to direct Bayern through contested waterways in a stark departure from courses charted by other western naval ships. Just as this deployment appears lacking in its efficacy, so, too, are German efforts to balance an increasingly cold relationship between Beijing and its closest Western allies.
4. #StopXinjiangRumors: the CCP’s decentralised disinformation campaign
Jake Wallis and Albert Zhang, The Strategist, December 3, 2021
The Chinese Communist Party employs American and Chinese social media platforms to wage a disinformation campaign against those who are seeking to shed light on Beijing’s genocide against Uyghurs in Xinjiang. The hashtag, #StopXinjiangRumors is used to organize an astroturf campaign of supposedly Uyghur voices speaking out about how much good the Chinese Communist Party is doing in Xinjiang.
5. Russia and China will threaten the peace in 2022
Peter Jennings, Australian Strategic Policy Institute, January 4, 2022
The Director of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute points to the efforts by Moscow and Beijing to undermine the liberal international order in 2022.
AUTHORITARIANISM
6. Even in secret, China’s leaders speak in code
The Economist, January 1, 2022
7. Chinese banks cut back traditional lending as concern over economy mounts
Sun Yu, Financial Times, January 5, 2022
8. China’s data ‘disappearance’ makes information access rough going for outsiders
Sébastian Seibt, France 24, December 31, 2021
9. China increases scrutiny of companies seeking overseas listings
Sun Yu, Financial Times, December 27, 2021
10. Chinese lockdown rule-breakers shamed to encourage Covid compliance
David Averre, Daily Mail, December 29, 2021
11. VIDEO — The last day of Hong Kong's Stand News website
Wei Wang and Grace Tsoi, BBC, January 4, 2022
12. Hong Kong’s Citizen News to close citing fears for staff safety
Helen Davidson, The Guardian, January 3, 2022
13. Alibaba Exploring Options for Weibo Stake with State Firm
Bloomberg, December 29, 2021
14. Covid gives China the perfect excuse to help Hong Kong self-isolate from democracy
Stephen Vines, Sunday Times, January 2, 2022
15. Eat, sleep, love Xi: China’s new rules for parenting
Didi Tang, Sunday Times, January 4, 2022
16. Denise Ho: The Cantopop star and pro-democracy activist arrested in Hong Kong
Rhoda Kwan, The Guardian, December 29, 2021
17. Hong Kong elections: Beijing redefines democracy
Katja Drinhausen, Mercator Institute for Chinese Studies, December 22, 2021
18. China’s suspension of new video game licenses stretches into 2022
Josh Ye, South China Morning Post, December 31, 2021
19. Western allies condemn Hong Kong election over ‘erosion’ of democracy
Thibault Spirlet, Politico, December 21, 2021
20. ‘Atmosphere of fear’: Hong Kong students lament loss of Tiananmen statues
Rhoda Kwan, The Guardian, December 31, 2021
21. Taiwan sees rise in immigration from Hong Kong amid national security crackdown
Raymond Chung and Fong Tak Ho, Radio Free Asia, December 31, 2021
22. Explainer: The decline of Hong Kong’s press freedom under the national security law
Candice Chau, Hong Kong Free Press, January 5, 2022
23. Why Sequoia Capital Will Split from Star Chinese Partner
Kate Clark and Shai Oster, Information, December 29, 2021
ENVIRONMENTAL HARMS
24. Earth’s final frontier: China and the deep-sea gold rush set to cause environmental catastrophe
Stuart Heaver, Hong Kong Free Press, January 2, 2022
25. Overfishing fuels South China Sea tensions, risks armed conflict, researcher says
Radio Free Asia, January 5, 2022
26. Beijing’s smog woes cast pall over ‘green’ Winter Olympics
Hong Kong Free Press, January 4, 2022
27. Across China, Species on the Brink
Yuan Ye, Ye Ruolin, and Cai Yiwen, Sixth Tone, December 2021
FOREIGN INTERFERENCE AND COERCION
28. It’s China vs. Walmart, Latest Western Brand Entangled in Human Rights Dispute
Liza Lin and Stu Woo, Wall Street Journal, January 2, 2022
29. EU has "cognitive split" in its China policy - senior Chinese diplomat
Reuters, December 30, 2021
30. China’s participation in RCEP has implications for Europe
Aya Adachi, Mercator Institute for Chinese Studies, January 4, 2022
31. China Accuses Walmart of ‘Stupidity’ Over Missing Xinjiang Goods
Brendan Case, Bloomberg, December 31, 2021
32. Lithuania admits ‘error’ in Taiwan row with China
Didi Tang, Beijing, Sunday Times, January 5, 2022
33. Revealed: Huawei’s Oxbridge millions
The Spectator, December 30, 2021
34. Scholz tells Xi he wants to ‘deepen’ economic ties with China
Hans Von Der Burchard, Politico, December 21, 2021
35. The most important number for China policy
Derek Scissors, American Enterprise Institute, January 3, 2022
36. Germany’s Dangerous (Economic) Entanglements: Chinese Edition
Andrew Stuttaford, The National Review, January 4, 2022
37. China-Taiwan geopolitical rivalry fuels tensions in Pacific Islands
James Robertson and Andy Lin, Financial Times, December 26, 2021
38. Taiwan ‘buys 20,400 bottles of Lithuanian rum rejected by China’
Helen Davidson, The Guardian, January 4, 2022
39. Intel faces backlash in China over stance on Xinjiang
Nat Rubio-Licht, Protocol, December 22, 2021
40. China opens embassy in Nicaragua for first time since 1990 after Taiwan ties cut
The Guardian, January 1, 2022
41. Taiwan to support Lithuania with $200m fund after dispute with China
Richard Milne and Kathrin Hille, Financial Times, January 5, 2022
42. The leader who's standing up to China
Mari Saito, Yimou Lee, and David Lague, Reuters, December 24, 2021
HUMAN RIGHTS AND RELIGIOUS PERSECUTION
43. Chinese swap possessions for food in lockdown city
Didi Tang, Beijing, Sunday Times, January 5, 2022
44. Can American firms rid their supply chains of Xinjiang goods?
The Economist, January 1, 2022
45. Historic conclave: Chinese bishops, priests brief Hong Kong clerics on Xi's religious views
Greg Torode, Reuters, December 30, 2021
46. Xinjiang’s Killing Fields: A Uyghur Scholar Who Survived Speaks
Alexandra Cavelius, Bitter Winter, January 4, 2022
47. Megastatue of Buddha Destroyed in Sichuan
Lopsang Gurung, Bitter Winter, December 31, 2021
48. Olympic Committee Becomes Latest Target of Critics of Treatment of Uyghurs
Stu Woo, Wall Street Journal, January 4, 2022
49. Faced With Questions About Forced Labor in China, the I.O.C. Is Tight-Lipped
Vivian Wang, New York Times, January 4, 2022
50. Ma Xingrui Is the New Xinjiang Party Secretary, Promises More of the Same
Li Haoyu, Bitter Winter, December 29, 2021
51. Tesla Opens Showroom in China’s Xinjiang, Region at Center of U.S. Genocide Allegations
Liza Lin, Wall Street Journal, January 4, 2022
52. Baerbock demands forced-labor ban, won’t attend Olympics
Hans Von Der Burchard, Politico, December 29, 2021
53. Cases of injustice against journalists — January 2022 10 Most Urgent
One Free Press Coalition, January 3, 2022
54. Crackdown on Association of Disciples Extends to Inner Mongolia
Fang Yongrui, Bitter Winter, December 30, 2021
55. China: Christians Arrested for Attending Conference in Malaysia
Yuan Changpu, Bitter Winter, January 3, 2022
56. Detained, missing, close to death: the toll of reporting on Covid in China
Helen Davidson, The Guardian, January 4, 2022
57. Tory peer to lead boycott of Coca-Cola over role in Beijing Winter Olympics
Aubrey Allegretti, The Guardian, January 2, 2022
INDUSTRIAL POLICIES AND ECONOMIC ESPIONAGE
58. Recalibrating the EU's research and innovation engagement with China
Rebecca Arcesati, Irène Hors, and Sylvia Schwaag Serger, Mercator Institute for China Studies, December 22, 2021
Simon Leplâtre, Le Monde, January 5, 2022 — ORIGINAL IN FRENCH
60. Pharmacy of the world: China’s quest to be the No. 1 drugmaker
Anna Nishino, Nikkei Asia, December 23, 2021
61. How Apple Grew Closer to China by Turning ‘Little Foxconn’ Into a National Champion
Wayne Ma, The Information, December 30, 2021
62. China’s Unpredictable, Heavy-Handed Governance Threatens Growth
Greg Ip, Wall Street Journal, January 5, 2022
63. The Made in China Plan Is Back, and It’s Better
Anjani Trivedi, Bloomberg, January 4, 2022
CYBER AND INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY
64. The Geopolitics of Video Games
Elisabeth Braw, Foreign Policy, January 5, 2022
65. Cybersecurity, Made in China
Eliot Chen, The Wire China, January 3, 2022
66. Beijing’s cyber watchdog issues new data and algorithm rules
Chang Che, SupChina, January 4, 2022
67. China’s New Algorithm Rules Take Aim at Big Tech Companies
Luo Meihan, Sixth Tone, January 4, 2022
MILITARY AND SECURITY THREATS
68. Japan, Australia to Sign Defense Pact That Might Irk China
Jason Scott, Bloomberg, January 4, 2022
69. Could A Chinese Attack to Reunite Taiwan with The Mainland Still Be a Surprise?
Yigal Carmon and M. Reiter, Middle East Media Research Institute, December 30, 2021
70. Russia might invade Ukraine. What will China do?
Joe Webster, SupChina, December 30, 2021
71. Flagged For Security
Brent Crane, The Wire China, January 3, 2022
72. Why China could win the new global arms race
David Brown, BBC, December 21, 2021
73. China and Russia Military Cooperation Raises Prospect of New Challenge to American Power
Brett Forrest, Ann M. Simmons, and Chao Deng, Wall Street Journal, January 2, 2022
74. Rising Threat from China Pushes U.S. and Japan to Deepen Military Cooperation
Alastair Gale, Wall Street Journal, January 2, 2022
75. Asia's top risk in 2022 will be U.S.-China tensions over Taiwan, says political risk analyst
Sumathi Bala, CNBC, January 5, 2022
76. ‘We’re falling behind’: 2022 seen as a pivotal lap in the space race with China
Bryan Bender, Politico, December 31, 2021
77. China’s Two-Ocean Strategy Puts India in a Pincer
C. Raja Mohan, Foreign Policy, January 5, 2022
78. China says it has hypersonic missiles with heat-seeking tech – years before US
Stephen Chen, South China Morning Post, December 31, 2021
ONE BELT, ONE ROAD STRATEGY
79. China buckles in its belt and road ambitions with Suez investments
Jevans Nyabiage, South China Morning Post, January 1, 2022
80. In the China-Laos Railway, Beijing reveals its designs for Southeast Asia
Harry Seavey, SupChina, January 4, 2022
81. Can Latin America and the Caribbean Trust China as a Business Partner?
Leland Lazarus and Evan Ellis, The Diplomat, December 29, 2021
82. AUDIO — Chinese surveillance tech in Africa, with Jili Bulelani
Soenke Jordan, Mercator Institute for China Studies, December 22, 2021
83. Uganda Finds China’s Leverage Is in the Fine Print of Its Lending
James T. Areddy and Nicholas Bariyo, Wall Street Journal, December 27, 2021
84. China’s Soft-Power Advantage in Africa
Lina Benabdallah, Foreign Affairs, December 24, 2021
OPINION PIECES
85. How Japan sees China
The Economist, January 1, 2022
86. Appeasement is not the solution to the China problem
Geoffrey Barker, The Strategist, December 1, 2021
87. No One Is Safe in Hong Kong
The Editorial Board, Wall Street Journal, December 29, 2021
88. China Immortalizes ‘Pillar of Shame’
Victoria Coates, Wall Street Journal, January 5, 2022
89. The Two-Headed Fight for Ukraine and Taiwan
Seth Cropsey, Wall Street Journal, January 4, 2022
90. China’s nationalistic cancel culture is out of control
Lizzy Lawrence, Protocol, December 30, 2021
91. Can the EU really re-engage with China?
Francesca Ghiretti, Mercator Institute for China Studies, December 20, 2021
92. Universities must not allow those killed in Tiananmen Square to be forgotten
Peter van den Dungen, The Guardian, December 27, 2021
93. US shows China its hand on strategic value of ‘unsinkable’ Taiwan
Kathrin Hille, Financial Times, December 29, 2021
94. Is Strategic Cooperation with China Possible?
Michael Spence, The Wire China, January 3, 2022
95. Computer Chips vs. Potato Chips: The Case for a U.S. Strategic-Industry Policy
Robert D. Atkinson, Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, January 3, 2022
96. Can Europe Avert a US-China War?
Robert Williams and Moritz Rudolf, Project Syndicate, December 28, 2021