China Articles - July 17, 2022
Friends,
It has been another busy week and I’ve highlighted a series of stories about Chinese citizens resisting the Chinese Communist Party and the Party’s efforts to stamp out that resistance. This is a sensitive time for the Party as they are months away from holding the 20th Party Congress and just weeks away from their annual retreat for the Party elite at Beidaihe.
As Lynette H. Ong describes in her new book, Outsourcing Repression: Everyday State Power in Contemporary China (Oxford University Press, 2022), the Chinese Communist Party has a well-organized system to coerce Chinese citizens who resist the Party’s desires and corruption. In the video of the protest in the capital of Henan province, Zhengzhou (#3), one can witness what Professor Ong describes as ‘Thugs-for-hire’ (TFH). Hundreds of men, dressed in white, fall upon Chinese citizens conducting a peaceful protest and beat them as uniformed police stand aside at a distance.
As Professor Ong writes, “outsourcing violence to third-party agents provides the pretense for plausible deniability and evasion of political accountability.” This tactic allows the Chinese Communist Party to partly avoid the costs of violent suppression while ensuring that Chinese citizens live in fear of disobeying the Party. In the OpEd by Chen Guangcheng (#1), this tactic is on display with “thugs pinning people to the ground while their homes are destroyed.” Similar events took place a year ago during the forced demolition of another community (Hired thugs beat up Xiaotangshan inhabitants protesting against forced demolitions, April 24, 2021). This practice was on display during the 2014 and 2019 Hong Kong protests in which suspected triad members, dressed in white t-shirts, would chase down and beat Hong Kong students while Hong Kong police stood aside. For examples see:
Hong Kong protesters beaten and bloodied as thugs attack sit-in
Armed thugs returned to the streets of Hong Kong to attack protesters
'Where were the police?' Hong Kong outcry after masked thugs launch attack
Horrifying Footage Shows Masked Thugs Beating Pro-Democracy Protesters with Metal Rods in Hong Kong
Employing thugs to use violence against Chinese citizens is just one part of what Professor Ong describes as a multi-faceted strategy used by the Chinese Communist Party to stay in power.
Thanks for reading!
Matt
MUST READ
1. Why the Chinese Communist Party Is Destroying My Village
Chen Guangcheng, Wall Street Journal, July 13, 2022
Suppression of dissent and local corruption drive a plan to force thousands out of their homes.
The Chinese Communist Party is again burying history to make a profit and hide its inhumane deeds. How else can one describe its plan to build a dam submerging 27 villages—including my own—without a demonstrated need for such a large-scale public-works structure?
Some time ago, people in my hometown, Dongshigu, reported they’d heard that the government was considering building a massive reservoir nearby. The details were unclear, but surveyors soon began staking out land. No one knew what was coming or when.
This past spring, villagers along the Meng River in Shandong province received written notification from the authorities. They were informed in a two-page document that the proposed project will span 28,000 hectares, roughly 30 by 40 miles. It will engulf more than two dozen villages along the gentle waterway that flows eastward, north of the city of Linyi, into the larger Yi River. More than 4,400 households will be moved, the notice says, equaling more than 13,000 individuals (in reality the numbers could be much greater). Stretches of two major roadways will also be covered.
The authorities have already begun attempting to evict the inhabitants of the 27 villages through a combination of spurious documents and coercion. In so doing, they’re ignoring Chinese laws. While the notice suggests that authorities would like to seek “feedback from stakeholders,” the reality is much different. Villagers are verbally threatened with no compensation if they don’t register their homes, land and belongings. Preposterously, the documents they’re being forced to sign claim the villagers themselves are “demanding” the demolition of their homes.
There is no arguing with the regime’s language, because refusal can come at a real cost. Villagers are all too familiar with the Communist Party’s playbook on forced evictions: electricity and water shut-offs, harassment, road blockades and thugs pinning people to the ground while their homes are destroyed. In some cases, bulldozers have buried people alive in their own homes.
Given the party’s penchant for gaslighting, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that the officially stated rationale for the project—flood control and water security for nearby Linyi—ignores the realities on the ground. Locals understand that the area isn’t prone to excess water. Countless generations living along the banks of the Meng who have drawn water for irrigation and drinking know how the river swells briefly after summer storms and then shrinks to a trickle in the dry winter months. The area has recently settled into a drought, leaving villagers unable to plant peanuts, a local staple. I’ve spoken to people who are just now planting corn, knowing that it’s at least a month too late to expect a crop in the fall.
Years of sand extraction from the Meng have in many places reduced the Linyi riverbed to a series of water-filled pits between which nothing can flow. The government can easily look elsewhere for access to water. There are already large dams and major reservoirs upstream on the far more substantial Yi River, one large enough to enter the Guinness Book of World Records for largest rubber dam.
With no justification for a plan that would cause so much damage, what, then, is behind it?
The answer is corruption. It’s at the heart of many similar projects in China. Local officials have the opportunity to skim the budget for their personal use. Bidding for contractors leads to more graft, as companies with the biggest bribes will be guaranteed the work. It matters little what will become of the regular people affected, not to mention the land or environment.
Worth noting is that the central government is directing the plan, despite its intended local use. This corner of Shandong is especially significant to the authorities in Beijing. When my family and I were being held in brutal long-term house arrest, people from around the world began traveling to the area to bear witness to our suffering and call for our freedom. Such spontaneous physical gatherings are a thorn in the regime’s side and require effort to eliminate. Take the case of Nobel Prize winner Liu Xiaobo. When Mr. Liu died in custody in July 2017, the Chinese Communist Party had his remains scattered at sea, so that honoring him at a grave or memorial site wouldn’t be possible.
After I escaped from house arrest to the U.S. Embassy in Beijing in 2012, the Communist Party and the U.S. negotiated an agreement. The party assured that it would conduct a full-scale investigation into my persecution, prosecute those responsible and provide compensation. Ten years on, it is poised to bury the evidence of its crimes.
But it isn’t too late. The U.S. should still insist that the Chinese Communist Party follow through with its international agreement. In the process, these village communities—and the truth—could be saved.
Mr. Chen is a distinguished fellow at the Center for Human Rights at the Catholic University of America and author of “The Barefoot Lawyer: A Blind Man’s Fight for Justice and Freedom in China.”
2. China crushes mass protest by bank depositors demanding their life savings back
Nectar Gan, CNN, July 11, 2022
Thousands of depositors have protested in the city of Zhengzhou, the province capital of Henan. The protest is among the largest since the pandemic, since domestic travel has been limited by various Covid restrictions. This time, most protesters arrived outside the bank before dawn, some as early as 4 a.m., chanting slogans and holding up banners.
3. VIDEO – China crushes mass protest by bank depositors demanding their life savings back
Steven Jiang, CNN, July 11, 2022
Chinese authorities on Sunday violently dispersed a peaceful protest by hundreds of depositors, who sought in vain to demand their life savings back from banks that have run into a deepening cash crisis.
4. Chinese Communist Cells in Western Firms?
Dennis Kwok and Sam Goodman, Wall Street Journal, July 11, 2022
The legal and regulatory risk of doing business in China may be about to get a lot higher. The rules include requiring foreign-owned fund managers to create Communist Party cells when operating in China, but analysts have been warning since 2018 that these laws could soon apply to foreign companies operating through Chinese joint ventures. Since 2016, Xi Jinping has pushed for state-run companies and subsidiaries to establish party cells through the provisions of the Chinese Communist party’s Articles of association.
U.S. National Counterintelligence and Security Center, July 2022
For decades, a broad range of entities in China have forged ties with government and business leaders at the state and local levels of the United States, often yielding benefits for both sides. However, as tensions between Beijing and Washington have grown, the government of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) under President Xi Jinping has increasingly sought to exploit these China-U.S. subnational relationships to influence U.S. policies and advance PRC geopolitical interests.
6. Purchasing with the Party: Chinese consumer boycotts of foreign companies, 2008 - 2021
Viking Bohman and Hillevi Parup, Swedish National China Centre, July 11, 2022
In the past decade, consumer boycotts of foreign companies have become an increasingly common phenomenon in China. This study presents the first comprehensive overview of this development. Between 2008 and 2021, we have found evidence of 90 boycotts of foreign companies, the majority of which have occurred since the beginning of 2016. Most of the boycotts targeted companies from North America, Europe, Japan or South Korea that operate in the apparel, automotive, and food and beverages sectors.
Boycotts were most commonly triggered by company statements or actions perceived as challenging China’s governance in Hong Kong or sovereignty over Taiwan, or as unfairly criticising China’s human rights record in Xinjiang. Some boycotts were in reaction to business communications or marketing seen as prejudiced against China or the Chinese people, such as accusations of racism and cultural appropriation. Occasionally, foreign companies have been made scapegoats for geopolitical or human rights-related decisions made by the governments in their home countries.
There is public evidence that almost one-third of all boycotts were supported by party-or state-affiliated organisations. We argue that the state has also been instrumental in most of the remaining cases by encouraging “patriotic” behaviour through propaganda and leading consumers by example by lashing out at foreign companies that challenge China’s positions on Taiwan, Hong Kong or Xinjiang.
Aniruddha Dhar, Hindustan Times, July 17, 2022
In the last week of June, a Chinese aircraft breached the Indian perceived LAC and flew over the friction points for a few minutes. The fighter was detected by the Indian radars and Indian fighters were launched to ward off or intercept the PLAAF fighter.
Authoritarianism
8. China May Be Using AI to Determine People’s Response to ‘Thought Education’
Ed Browne, Newsweek, July 4, 2022
Chinese researchers have reportedly developed an artificial intelligence system that is able to judge how receptive people are to "thought and political education."
9. China’s internet expresses glee at Abe’s assassination
Nicolle Liu, Phelim Kine, Politico, July 8, 2022
Online vitriol reflects the power of anti-Japanese “patriotic education.”
Japan and much of the international community reacted to the assassination of former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe with shock and dismay. But not in China, where social media response was sprinkled with glee and anti-Abe vitriol.
Multiple commentators on Weibo, a Chinese social media platform, greeted news of Abe’s shooting — allegedly by a 41-year old Japanese man whose motives remain unclear — at a campaign event Friday by calling for “wine and dine” to toast his death. Some said his killer is a “hero,” as Abe pioneered a foreign policy geared to countering the expansion of China’s growing economic, diplomatic and military footprint in the Indo-Pacific that infuriated Beijing.
10. Xi’s Covid Authoritarian Meets Red Line at Vaccine Mandates
Bloomberg, July 12, 2022
11. China’s court AI reaches into every corner of justice system: report
Stephen Chen, South China Morning Post, July 13, 2022
12. Hong Kong accuses US commission of ‘cheap, bullying behaviour’ over sanctions report
Chris Lau, Natalie Wong, South China Morning Post, July 13, 2022
13. The Biden Administration’s China Policy: An Inventory of Actions to Address the Challenge
Philip Mousavizadeh, Just Security, July 8, 2022
14. ‘I Don’t Mind Being a Martyr’: Ailing Hong Kong Activist Defiant in Court
Austin Ramzy, New York Times, July 12, 2022
15. Protesting bank depositors in China beaten by mob as police stand by
Christian Shepherd and Pei-Lin Wu, Washington Post, July 11, 2022
16. Xi Jinping has nurtured an ugly form of Chinese nationalism
The Economist, July 13, 2022
Environmental Harms
17. U.S. lawmakers ask Biden administration why some China solar giants left off slave labor list
Nichola Groom, Reuters, July 12, 2022
18. 5 Worrisome Environmental Issues in China in 2022
Martina Igini, Earth.org, June 23, 2022
19. Iron Promise
Isabella Borshoff, The Wire China, July 10, 2022
Why is mining giant Rio Tinto pushing ahead on a nearly impossible project? Possibly because China wants it done.
Foreign Interference and Coercion
20. Police remove two Chinese defence attaches from Pacific Islands Forum meeting
Kate Lyons, The Guardian, July 13, 2022
Fijian police escort the men from media space where US vice-president Kamala Harris was making virtual address.
Two Chinese defence attaches have been kicked out by Fijian police from a Pacific Islands Forum meeting at which the US vice-president, Kamala Harris, was giving a virtual address.
The men were sitting in on a session of the forum’s fisheries agency at which Harris announced the step-up of US engagement in the region, believed to be in response to China’s growing influence.
They were sitting with the media contingent, but one was identified as a Chinese embassy official by Lice Movono, a Fijian journalist who is covering the forum for the Guardian.
Movono said she “recognised him because I’ve interacted with him at least three times already”, including during the visit of the Chinese foreign minister, Wang Yi, to Suva last month, at which journalists were removed from events and blocked from asking questions.
“He was one of the people that was removing us from places and directing other people to remove us,” she said. “So I went over to him and asked: ‘are you here as a Chinese embassy official or for Xinhua [Chinese news agency], because this is the media space. And he shook his head as if to indicate that he didn’t speak English.”
Movono alerted Fijian protocol officers, who told her to inform Fijian police, who then escorted the two men from the room. They did not answer questions from media.
Diplomatic sources later confirmed that the men were a defence attache and a deputy defence attache from China, and part of the embassy in Fiji.
21. China influenced Kiribati exit from Pacific Islands Forum, MP claims
Rimon Rimon, The Guardian, July 11, 2022
22. Kiribati’s Shock Withdrawal Overshadows Pacific Leaders Meeting in Fiji
Voice of America, July 11, 2022
23. Analysis: The US steps up its game as China circles the Pacific
Hilary Whiteman, CNN, July 12, 2022
24. U.S. Steps Up Pacific Engagement to Challenge China’s Clout
Rhiannon Hoyle, Wall Street Journal, July 12, 2022
25. Five Men Indicted for Crimes Related to Transnational Repression Scheme to Silence Critics of the People’s Republic of China Residing in the United States
Office of Public Affairs, U.S. Department of Justice, July 7, 2022
A federal grand jury in Brooklyn returned a superseding indictment yesterday charging five defendants, including one current federal law enforcement officer and one retired federal law enforcement officer, with various crimes pertaining to a transnational repression scheme orchestrated on behalf of the Government of the People’s Republic of China (PRC).
Defendants Fan “Frank” Liu, 62, of Jericho, New York; Matthew Ziburis, 49, of Oyster Bay, New York; and Qiang “Jason” Sun, 40, of the PRC were charged in March 2022 with allegedly perpetrating a transnational repression scheme that targeted U.S. residents whose political views and actions are disfavored by the PRC Government. Among other items, these defendants allegedly plotted to destroy the artwork of a PRC national residing in Los Angeles, who was critical of the PRC government and planted surveillance equipment in the artist’s workplace and car to spy on him from the PRC. Liu and Ziburis were arrested pursuant to a criminal complaint in March 2022, while Sun remains at large.
The superseding indictment adds two new defendants, Craig Miller and Derrick Taylor, to the scheme. Miller is a 15-year employee of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), currently assigned as a deportation officer to DHS’s Emergency Relief Operations in Minneapolis, and Taylor is a retired DHS law enforcement agent who presently works as a private investigator in Irvine, California. Miller and Taylor are charged with obstruction of justice for allegedly destroying evidence after they were approached by FBI agents and asked about their procurement and dissemination of sensitive and confidential information from a restricted federal law enforcement database regarding U.S.-based dissidents from the PRC. Both Miller and Taylor were arrested pursuant to a criminal complaint in June 2022.
“We will defend the rights of people in the United States to engage in free speech and political expression, including views the PRC government wants to silence,” said Assistant Attorney General for National Security Matthew G. Olsen. “As charged, these individuals aided agents of a foreign government in seeking to suppress dissenting voices who have taken refuge here. The defendants include two sworn law enforcement officers who chose to forsake their oaths and violate the law. This indictment is the next step in holding all of these defendants responsible for their crimes.”
“As alleged, this case involves a multifaceted campaign to silence, harass, discredit and spy on U.S. residents for exercising their freedom of speech – aided by a current federal law enforcement officer and a private investigator who provided confidential information about U.S. residents from a restricted law enforcement database, and when confronted about their improper conduct, lied and destroyed evidence,” said U.S. Attorney Breon Peace for the Eastern District of New York. “This office will always work closely with our law enforcement partners to root out corrupt officials in all levels of government and will prosecute those who act on behalf of a hostile foreign state to target the free speech of U.S. residents on American soil.”
“This case exposes attempts by the government of the PRC to suppress dissenting voices within the United States. Actions taken by the defendants – two of which are current or former federal law enforcement officers – demonstrate how the PRC seeks to stalk, intimidate, and silence those who oppose it,” said Assistant Director Alan E. Kohler Jr. of the FBI’s Counterintelligence Division. “The FBI battles transnational repression because it is an evil in its own right, and an assault on the freedoms of an open society. Our community’s safety and our nation’s security were jeopardized by this criminal behavior, and we remain dedicated to combating transnational repression and bringing to justice those that perpetrate it.”
Liu and Ziburis are charged with conspiring to act as agents of the PRC government. Liu, Ziburis and Sun are charged with conspiring to commit interstate harassment and criminal use of a means of identification. Liu and Sun are charged with conspiring to bribe a federal official in connection with their scheme to obtain the tax returns of a pro-democracy activist residing in the United States. Both Miller and Taylor are charged with obstruction of justice, while Taylor is charged with making a false statement to the FBI.
If convicted, Liu faces up to 30 years’ imprisonment; Ziburis, Sun and Taylor face up to 25 years’ imprisonment; and Miller faces up to 20 years’ imprisonment. The defendants will be arraigned at a later date.
As alleged, Liu and Ziburis operated under Sun’s direction and control to discredit pro-democracy PRC dissidents residing in the United States, including those in New York City, California and Indiana. with efforts to disseminate negative information about, and to spy on, stalk, harass and surveil U.S.-based dissidents.
According to the indictment, one of Liu’s co-conspirators (“Co-conspirator”) retained Taylor to obtain personal identification information regarding multiple PRC dissidents residing in the United States, including passport information and photos, and flight and immigration records, which Taylor allegedly tasked to two DHS law enforcement officers, including Miller. As alleged, Miller and the other DHS agent obtained the information from the restricted database and improperly provided it to Taylor, who shared it with the Co-conspirator. Liu, Ziburis and Sun used this information to target and harass these U.S. residents while acting on behalf of the PRC government.
According to court documents, Miller and Taylor both lied about their past conduct when confronted by the FBI. According to the indictment, Miller deleted text messages with Taylor from his phone while being interviewed by the FBI, and Taylor instructed a co-conspirator to withhold evidence from the U.S. government. When interviewed by the FBI, Taylor falsely claimed that he obtained the records in question from a friend who was using the “Black Dark Web” — likely a reference to the dark web.
According to the indictment, the Co-conspirator called Taylor and claimed he received a subpoena from the Department of Justice seeking the Co-conspirator’s communications with Taylor, and Taylor directed the Co-conspirator to withhold such information from the U.S. government.
According to court documents, when interviewed by the FBI, Miller initially claimed to be in sporadic contact with Taylor and said the two did not discuss work matters. After agents admonished Miller to be honest, Miller admitted that Taylor provided him names to run through law enforcement databases. Miller granted consent to the FBI to search his phone, and ultimately admitted that he ran the queries for Taylor and sent the results to Taylor via text message, and that Taylor had provided a gift card in return. Miller then admitted that he deleted the text chain with Taylor during the interview earlier that day and that he fabricated all earlier statements about the text chain, including whether the chain included the names requested by Taylor.
26. China puts Taiwan ‘reunification’ effort at heart of national revival plans
Amber Wang, South China Morning Post, July 7, 2022
27. China complains to Japan about Taiwan vice president at Abe funeral
Eduardo Baptista and Ben Blanchard, Reuters, July 12, 2022
28. Lessons From Lithuania’s David-Goliath Clash with China
Nathaniel Taplin, Wall Street Journal, July 12, 2022
In mid-2021 the small Baltic republic of Lithuania—a European Union member and former Soviet satellite—irked Beijing by permitting Taiwan to open a local representative office with “Taiwan” in the name. Most countries with friendly but unofficial relations with Taiwan have long used “Taipei” instead to avoid provoking Beijing, which claims the self-ruled island as its own. China responded by restricting Lithuanian imports and exports in late 2021—and eventually targeting supply chains that run through it.
How the saga has played out so far illustrates both the strengths and the weaknesses of the global trading system in an era of heightened geopolitical tensions.
One might expect that a global heavyweight like China would find it easy to punish a minnow like Lithuania, whose economy in 2021 was about 0.4% the size of China’s. But in fact Beijing’s initial response—an unofficial block on Lithuanian exports to China, which plunged by about 80% between September 2021 and March 2022—was relatively ineffective.
China is a crucial trading partner for Germany and several other key European economies, but the same can’t be said for Lithuania. Even before tensions began spiraling in 2021, only around 1% of Lithuania’s exports went to China directly. The story in investment is similar. China has become an enormous investor abroad, pumping out $145 billion in direct investment last year. But the lion’s share of that, $112 billion in 2020, goes to Asia or back into the mainland via Hong Kong. The stock of Chinese investment in Lithuania amounted to just 28 million euros in 2020, equivalent to $28.1 million, up 70% since 2015 but still less than 1% of total FDI in the country.
None of this, however, means that China is without leverage.
In December, media outlets including Reuters and the Financial Times reported that German manufacturers in Lithuania, including car-parts heavyweight Continental AG, were being pressured by Beijing to cut ties with the country. German exports to China containing Lithuanian components were struggling to clear Chinese customs. Some shipments of goods and raw materials from China to Lithuania were also disrupted. Ultimately the EU filed a World Trade Organization case against China and announced a lending facility for affected Lithuanian firms worth 130 million euros, but the Lithuanian government was clearly spooked—in early January Lithuania’s president said the decision on the representative office name had been a mistake.
The way the confrontation unfolded has interesting echoes of other trade conflicts. Recent attempts to force change by targeting an antagonist’s direct exports—for example the Trump administration’s trade tariffs on China, China’s boycott of Australian wine or the European boycott of Russian oil—have often been relatively ineffective, in part because so many exports are fungible. U.S. tariffs on China curbed direct imports, but Chinese exports as a whole held up well and simply went elsewhere. European sanctions on Russian crude have forced a discount on Russian oil, but also dramatically lifted global prices, diluting most of the impact.
However, targeting key links or components of the global supply chain itself has proven far more effective. Huawei, China’s telecommunication equipment champion, is being slowly strangled by the U.S.’s chip ban, as are Russian auto makers. By the same token, small countries or companies without big direct export exposure to China could find themselves very vulnerable to Chinese pressure if Beijing finds ways to strong-arm their direct customers downstream or withholds key materials or parts.
For now Lithuania’s government has refused to back down: finance from the EU, the U.S. and Taiwan, as well as the unfavorable optics for any major Western firm contemplating pulling out, has buttressed its position. For the West, unity helps ward off economic coercion, and so does commanding positions atop key global technological supply chains. Should either of those advantages ebb in the future, developed democracies—small and large—may find themselves toeing a far different line.
29. China Escalates Efforts to Influence U.S. State and Local Leaders, Officials Warn
Kate O’Keeffe and Warren P. Strobel, Wall Street Journal, July 07, 2022
Michael Orlando, who leads the NCSC, briefed The Wall Street Journal on the Chinese campaigns, saying the pace of influence operations directed at state and local leaders has accelerated as views of Beijing in Washington, including among members of Congress, have stiffened. These operations have “become more aggressive and pervasive,” he said.
The warning notice said China’s influence operations range from public diplomacy, in which the Chinese government’s role is acknowledged, to covert activity, where Beijing’s hand “is hidden, as well as coercive or even criminal in nature.”
Tactics, according to the notice, include collecting personal information on state and local leaders and their associates; targeting such leaders early in their careers with the aim of using them for Chinese interests should they reach higher office; and using trade and investment to reward or punish leaders.
The goal, the notice says, is to advance U.S. policies favorable to China and to reduce criticism of Chinese policies regarding Taiwan—a democratically governed island that China claims as its territory—and on human rights in the China-controlled regions of Tibet and Xinjiang as well as on other issues. Ultimately, it says, the Chinese government’s efforts can “threaten the integrity of the U.S. policy-making process and interfere in how U.S. civil, economic, and political life functions.”
A spokesman for the Chinese embassy in Washington said the notice’s content is based on speculation and denied any meddling by Beijing. “China has always adhered to the principle of non-interference in internal affairs, and we have no interest in interfering in the internal affairs of the United States,” said the spokesman, Liu Pengyu.
30. Beware China ‘catastrophe’, UK university campuses told
Emma Yeomans, Sunday Times, July 11, 2022
31. Analysis: China is relentlessly trying to peel away Japan's resolve on disputed islands
Brad Lendon, CNN, July 8, 2022
32. U.S. VP Harris will join Pacific Islands meeting in push to counter China
Nandita Bose, Reuters, July 12, 2022
33. US woos Pacific island nations in effort to push back against China
Nic Fildes, Financial Times, July 12, 2022
34. Australia ‘doesn’t respond to demands’, Anthony Albanese tells China
Tory Shepherd, The Guardian, July 11, 2022
Arpan Rai, The Independent, July 12, 2022
Human Rights and Religious Persecution
36. Brands Apologizing Quickly to China Consumers, Except on Xinjiang
Jinshan Hing and Yasufumi Saito, Bloomberg, July 11, 2022
37. Racist videos about Africans fuel a multimillion-dollar Chinese industry
Viola Zhou, Rest of World, July 7, 2022
38. ‘I Don’t Mind Being a Martyr’: Ailing Hong Kong Activist Defiant in Court
Austin Ramzy, New York Times, July 12, 2022
39. U.S. Aims to Expand Export Bans on China Over Security and Human Rights
Edward Wong and Ana Swanson, New York Times, July 05, 2022
President Biden and his aides call China the greatest long-term rival of the United States—surpassing Russia. The effort involves broadening the circumstances under which so-called export controls would be imposed and getting partner nations on board, current and former American officials say. U.S. officials are looking at traditional military uses of technologies, but are also considering the roles of Chinese companies in creating a surveillance state or building security infrastructure and using forced labor camps to repress ethnic minorities.
Industrial Policies and Economic Espionage
40. American Factories Are Making Stuff Again as CEOs Take Production Out of China
Ryan Beene, Blomberg, July 5, 2022
41. SEC’s Gensler Casts Doubt on Prospects for China Audit Deal
Paul Kiernan and Michelle Chan, Wall Street Journal, July 13, 2022
Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Gary Gensler expressed doubt Wednesday that negotiators in Washington and Beijing will reach an agreement over audits that is necessary to prevent Chinese companies from being delisted by U.S. stock exchanges.
42. Heads of FBI, MI5 Issue Joint Warning on Chinese Spying
Max Colchester, Wall Street Journal, July 06, 2022
43. China’s Tsinghua Unigroup concludes debt restructuring, ownership change
Che Pan, South China Morning Post, July 12, 2022
44. China left counting cost of ‘darkest hours’, economy set for 2-year low
Orange Wang, South China Morning Post, July 05, 2022
45. ‘Barely a boost’: China to buy Xinjiang cotton as US ban hits home for mills
Ji Siqi, South China Morning Post, July 12, 2022
46. VC's China gamble
Protocol, July 8, 2022
47. Taiwanese iPhone Maker Arm Backs Top China Chipmaker After $9 Billion Rescue
Bloomberg, July 13, 2022
48. Canada Fund Aimco Picks Singapore Over Hong Kong for Asia Beachhead
Derek Decolet and Layan Odeh, Bloomberg, July 12, 2022
49. China-South Korea ETF cross-listing scheme stalls
Echo Huang, Financial Times, July 12, 2022
50. Morningstar Cuts Hundreds of Shenzhen Jobs in China Shift
Shirley Zhai and Lulu Yilun Chen, Bloomberg, July 12, 2022
Cyber & Information Technology
Scott Galloway, No Mercy/No Malice, July 8, 2022
52. KOL Crackdown
Garrett O'Brien, The Wire China, July 10, 2022
53. Beijing’s watchful eye on all data flowing in and out of China
Kai von Carnap, Mercator Institute for China Studies, July 8, 2022
54. China’s Suspected IP Thieves Targeted by Twin’s Utah Startup
Jordan Robertson, Bloomberg, July 12, 2022
55. The US is Thwarting China’s Love Affair with Israeli Tech
Sarah Zheng and Coco Liu, Bloomberg, July 12, 2022
56. WeChat Is China’s Most Beloved (and Feared) Surveillance Tool
Lulu Yilun Chen, Bloomberg, July 11, 2022
57. The metaverse with Chinese characteristics
Derek Robertson, Politico, July 13, 2022
58. CEO Arrested for Selling $1 Billion in Fake Cisco Hardware on Amazon, eBay
Michael Kan, PCMag, July 8, 2022
59. The dream is over for China’s tech workers
Viola Zhou, Rest of World, July 12, 2022
60. Ban TikTok Now
Klon Kitchen, The Dispatch, July 7, 2022
Military and Security Threats
61. Executives seek briefings on Taiwan war risk
Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson, Financial Times, July 12, 2022
62. US urges UK to 'step up' efforts to defend Taiwan amid growing threat of Chinese invasion
Nicola Smith, The Telegraph, July 09, 2022
63. China says it 'drove' away U.S. destroyer near Paracel Islands
Nikkei Asia, July 13, 2022
64. More Island Upgrades Across the South China Sea
Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative, July 8, 2022
China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations, Chen Xiangyang, Dong Chunling and Han Liqun, May 9, 2022 – ORIGINAL IN CHINESE
66. China Acquiring New Weapons Five Times Faster Than U.S. Warns Top Official
Thomas Newdick, The War Zone, July 6, 2022
One Belt, One Road Strategy
67. Myanmar's junta rolls out Chinese camera surveillance systems in more cities
Fanny Potkin, Reuters, July 11, 2022
68. China’s Ganfeng Lithium buys lithium mines in Argentina
Harry Dempsey, Financial Times, July 11, 2022
69. A Reckless Dynasty Has Brought Calamity to Sri Lanka
Kapil Komireddi, New York Times, July 11, 2022
70. Sri Lanka may be on cusp of tipping out of China’s sphere of influence amid economic crisis
James Griffiths, The Globe and Mail, July 11, 2022
Opinion Pieces
71. Hong Kong’s Coming Religious Crackdown
Editorial Board, Wall Street Journal, July 13, 2022
A Vatican envoy warns Catholics in the city of possible persecution.
Freedom of speech, assembly and the press are gone in Hong Kong, and there’s good reason to fear religious liberty will be the next target.
That was the warning from Monsignor Javier Herrera-Corona, the Vatican’s unofficial envoy in Hong Kong, as he prepared to leave the city this spring after six years. Reuters reports that in four private meetings he encouraged some 50 Catholic missions in the city to safeguard their property, files and funds in anticipation of more mainland Chinese control.
“Change is coming, and you’d better be prepared,” Monsignor Herrera-Corona warned the missionaries, according to Reuters, which quoted an attendee as summarizing the monsignor’s message: “Hong Kong is not the great Catholic beachhead it was.”
Hong Kong’s Basic Law guarantees freedom of religion, and diverse faiths have flourished there. The city has also long been a haven for mainland Christians, who traveled to Hong Kong to study. Father Laszlo Ladany, a Hungarian Jesuit based in Hong Kong, famously reported on Chinese political and legal developments during the Mao Zedong era.
Yet China has violated other liberties it swore to respect under the Sino-British Joint Declaration, and there’s no reason to believe religious freedom will be an exception.
The Communist Party has installed Xia Baolong —who presided over a crackdown on Catholic and Protestant churches in Zhejiang Province—as the head of its Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office. In May Hong Kong authorities arrested 90-year-old Cardinal Joseph Zen under the new national security law. His supposed crime is that he was a trustee for the 612 Humanitarian Relief Fund, which supported participants of the 2019 pro-democracy protests.
Communist Party chief Xi Jinping has tightened control over religion in China to a degree not seen since Mao. The U.S. has declared China’s treatment of Uighur Muslims a genocide, and its oppression of Falun Gong practitioners is longstanding. Beijing claims authority to appoint priests and pastors and dictate sermons. It has arrested mainland Catholic clergy and Protestant pastors, razed churches and confiscated religious texts.
Monsignor Herrera-Corona’s warning underscores the folly of the Vatican’s 2018 attempt to appease Beijing by allowing Communist Party discretion over the appointment of Catholic bishops. Cardinal Zen said the secret pact was “selling out the Catholic Church in China,” which is probably the real reason for his arrest. The crackdown on believers has proceeded despite Rome’s concessions, and the deal with Beijing will tarnish Pope Francis’s record as head of the Church.
Beijing reserves special animus for mainland churches that welcome foreign missionaries or maintain ties with believers abroad. Hong Kong’s national security law prohibits “collusion" with vaguely defined foreign forces or external elements. Don’t be surprised if the Communist Party uses this provision against believers. Under the national security law, the maximum sentence is life in prison.
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“China is one of the world’s worst abusers of religious liberty,” says William Mumma, CEO of the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty. “What makes China’s repression especially repugnant is the heavy involvement of the highest levels of government. Whether it is Christians, Tibetan Buddhists, Falun Gong or Uighur Muslims, the government attacks religious freedom in pursuit of absolute power. No religious believer, no religious leader, can in good conscience turn their gaze away from this repression.”
But this is precisely what Pope Francis is doing. Hong Kong’s Cardinal Joseph Zen notes it is not a recent development, that Hong Kong hearts have been “broken” by the lack of encouragement from the pope amid the protests and mass arrests that have marked their continuing struggle with Beijing. “It has been 1½ years that we are waiting for a word from Pope Francis,” he says, “but there is none.”
Would it make a difference if the pope were to speak? History suggests it could, by highlighting the lack of moral legitimacy that is any Communist regime’s greatest insecurity. Not to mention the enhanced moral standing of a church that would come from insisting on speaking the truth about such regimes.
In a passing mention in a new book, Pope Francis rightly refers to the Muslim Uighurs in a list of “persecuted peoples.” It is as tepid a criticism as it gets and may well be the only critical thing he has ever said about China. Even so, the Chinese Foreign Ministry apparently felt wounded enough that this single sentence required public repudiation at a press conference.
Alas, Pope Francis not only chooses to see no evil in China, he won’t hear of any, either. In September, Cardinal Zen flew to Rome on his own initiative to talk to Pope Francis about what Beijing was doing to the Catholic faithful in Hong Kong and China. Pope Francis refused to see him. Yet later the pope did find the time to discuss justice and inequality with an NBA players union delegation, which presented him with a Black Lives Matter T-shirt.
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