China Articles - July 4, 2021
Friends,
Last week marked the 100th Anniversary of the founding of the Chinese Communist Party and the Party’s leader, Xi Jinping, took the opportunity to heap praise upon the country’s red aristocracy for all that they had accomplished. For those of you with some time on your hands, I recommend reading Xi’s speech, as it provides insight in the Party’s worldview: both the centrality of Marxism-Leninism ideology and the view that the Party’s continued leadership is the only way for the Chinese people to avoid disaster and chaos. The link takes you to the Party’s official English translation or you can access other official translations here.
Thanks for reading and Happy Fourth of July!
Matt
MUST READ
Human Rights Watch, June 1, 2021
In 2020, nearly 160,000 students from China were enrolled in Australian universities. Despite the Chinese government in Beijing being thousands of kilometers away, many Chinese pro-democracy students in Australia say they alter their behavior and self-censor to avoid threats and harassment from fellow classmates and being “reported on” by them to authorities back home.
Students and academics from or working on China told Human Rights Watch that this atmosphere of fear has worsened in recent years, with free speech and academic freedom increasingly under threat. The Chinese government has grown bolder in trying to shape global perceptions of the country on foreign university campuses, influence academic discussions, monitor students from China, censor scholarly inquiry, or otherwise interfere with academic freedom.
2. China-US Relations in the Eyes of the Chinese Communist Party: An Insider’s Perspective
Cai Xia, Hoover Institution, June 29, 2021
As a former member of the CCP system, looking back at the changes in China-US relations over the past fifty years, I have three basic perspectives that I wish to share with Americans, so that they can more clearly see the CCP and its strategies for what they are.
First, in the more than seventy years since it came to power, the CCP has treated domestic and foreign affairs as “one integrated game,” with the top priority of strengthening the CCP’s control and preventing the collapse of the regime. In this regard, diplomacy is an extension of domestic affairs and is seen as a device to keep the party in power.
Second, as far as the CCP’s global strategic objectives are concerned, China-US relations are the primary, and most important, factors among all. Therefore, the CCP’s attitude toward China-US relations and the engagement policy is determined by how well they serve the CCP’s internal political needs.
Third, international engagement and economic development have failed to soften the political character of the CCP regime. Its combination of ideology and extreme repression make it a totalitarian regime, and the sophisticated digital nature of its surveillance and repression has given totalitarian control a new dimension. All of this makes China a more dangerous adversary for the United States.
3. Open Gates: Technology Transfer from Chinese Universities to the Defense Industry
Coby Goldberg, C4ADS, June 1, 2021
In recent years, a growing body of national security literature has highlighted the role that Chinese universities play in the Chinese military-industrial complex. Past research has explored the role universities play in technology transfer into China, and has shed light on which Chinese universities have the most labs sponsored by defense conglomerates or the most graduates working for them. This report builds on that research by developing a methodology for identifying specific individuals at universities with ties to the defense industry, in order to provide a tool for differentiating academics and labs at civilian universities who have ties to the defense industry from those at the same universities who have no such ties.
4. Watching China in Europe - July 2021
Noah Barkin, German Marshall Fund, July 1, 2021
5. Most threatening when weak? The risks China poses to global security
Niall Ferguson, Times Literary Supplement, July 2, 2021
Authoritarianism
6. China Falls Behind U.S. in Global Image, Survey Data Shows
Sha Hua, Wall Street Journal, June 30, 2021
7. ‘Heads bashed bloody’: China’s Xi marks Communist Party centenary with strong words for adversaries
David Crawshaw and Alicia Chen, Washington Post, July 1, 2021
8. Locked Up: Inside China’s Secret RSDL Jails
Safeguard Defenders, January 1, 2021
In the year that Xi Jinping became president of China – 2013 – a custodial system was introduced that gave police the powers to disappear anyone into a secret facility, deny them all contact with the outside world, including legal counsel and family, and interrogate them at will, for a total of up to six months. The system gave police officers from the ministries of Public Security and State Security the powers to act with virtually no oversight, ensuring that they could arbitrarily detain, coerce confessions from, and torture, threaten and mistreat victims. The system is called Residential Surveillance at a Designated Location or RSDL.
Article 75 of China’s Criminal Procedure Law (2018 revision) (CPL) contains minimal safeguards for those subjected to RSDL, such as prosecutor oversight of the decision to impose RSDL and a requirement to notify the family within 24 hours, but these are routinely bypassed by police who either simply ignore them or invoke exceptions by asserting the victim is suspected of national security crimes. RSDL is an extra-judicial measure, there is no requirement for a court order and is imposed before arrest.
In the more than eight years since RSDL’s introduction, UN experts have repeatedly called on China to repeal the system, citing serious human rights concerns. In 2018, ten UN Special Procedures, including the Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances, described RSDL as “analogous to incommunicado and secret detention and tantamount to enforced disappearance; they expose those subjected to RSDL to the risk of torture and other inhuman and degrading treatment and other human rights violations.”
An ongoing, longform study by Safeguard Defenders, utilising interviews with victims, victims’ families and friends, and supplemented by online research, has revealed shocking details of conditions in RSDL. As of June 2021, we have documented 175 individual cases. While our research has focused on human rights defenders, there is no reason to believe that conditions are significantly better for other victims. It is almost unheard of for police to permit lawyer access (just one case recorded), to allow contact with family (four cases) and to allow prosecutor visits (two cases). Police routinely keep victims locked up in RSDL for the maximum allowed limit of a full six months (32 cases). There is also abundant evidence that RSDL is frequently used outside its stated purpose – the investigation phase of a criminal case – since a significant proportion of RSDL victims are never formally arrested (52 victims, or just under a third, were released on bail or simply freed). Instead, it is thought RSDL may be being used as a tool of intimidation and to coerce testimony against others.
While the vast majority of its victims are Chinese, RSDL has also been imposed on a number of foreigners. Some of the more well-known individuals include victims of China’s hostage diplomacy – Canadians Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor, Swedish bookseller Gui Minhai, who was kidnapped by Chinese state agents from Thailand, Swedish rights activist Peter Dahlin (who is also the founding director of this report’s publisher, Safeguard Defenders), Taiwanese NGO worker Lee Ming-che and even a US basketball player called Jeff Harper. In some cases, diplomatic access has been denied to foreign RSDL victims (Australian writer Yang Hengjun).
9. Former Chinese Party Insider Calls U.S. Hopes of Engagement ‘Naive’
James T. Areddy, Wall Street Journal, June 29, 2021
10. Why Beijing Shut Down Hong Kong’s Leading Pro-Democracy Newspaper
Jiayang Fan, The New Yorker, June 30, 2021
11. 2021 China Transparency Report
Walter Lohman, Justin Rhee, The Heritage Foundation, June 30, 2021
12. An Anxious 100th Birthday for China's Communist Party
Andrew Nathan, Wall Street Journal, June 25, 2021
13. China Communist Party Faces Daunting Future as it Marks 100-Year Anniversary
Bloomberg News, June 28, 2021
14. Fear Grips other Hong Kong Media after China Crushes Apple Daily
Natalie Lung, Iain Marlow, Chloe Lo, Bloomberg, June 29, 2021
15. Xi Jinping's Race to Consolidate Power in China
Jude Blanchette , Foreign Affairs, June 22, 2021
16. Behind China’s Takeover of Hong Kong
Chris Buckley, Vivian Wang, Austin Ramzy, New York Times, June 28, 2021
17. China’s Communist Party at 100: the secret of its longevity
Economist, June 26, 2021
18. When a Free Society Becomes a Police State
Bari Weiss, Common Sense with Bari Weiss, June 27, 2021
19. At age one hundred, Chinese Communist Party is both the authoritarian world champion—and vulnerable
Frederick Kempe, Atlantic Council, June 27, 2021
20. The push to revamp the Chinese Communist Party for the next 100 years
The Economist, June 23, 2021
21. Getting into the vanguard of the Chinese elite
The Economist, June 23, 2021
22. A future, but with Chinese characteristics
The Economist, June 23, 2021
23. Trying to heal the party’s wounds
The Economist, June 23, 2021
Environmental Harms
24. Vast majority of new coal-power plants ‘uneconomic’
Alex Hamer, Financial Times, June 30, 2021
25. Illegal Fishing Is a Global Threat. Here’s How to Combat It.
John C. Vann, Council on Foreign Relations, June 4, 2021
26. Why the world’s most fertile fishing ground is facing a ‘unique and dire’ threat
Michael Field, The Guardian, June 13, 2021
Foreign Interference and Coercion
27. US diplomat says US no longer sees Taiwan as problem in relationship with China: report
Mark Milley, The Hill, June 24, 2021
28. VIDEO – Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan on China
Johnathan Swan, Axios, June 21, 2021
29. France and U.S. Agree on the Perils of a Rising China, Blinken Says
Roger Cohen, New York Times, June 25, 2021
30. Poll Shows Increasing Transatlantic Convergence on China
Bonnie S. Glaser, Garima Mohan, The Diplomat, June 17, 2021
31. China surveillance firm Hikvision hires former lawmakers Moffett, Vitter and Boxer as lobbyists
Drew Harwell, Washington Post, June 25, 2021
32. As Chinese citizens head overseas, the party does likewise
The Economist, June 23, 2021
33. Majorities Say China Does Not Respect the Personal Freedoms of Its People
Laura Silver, Kat Devlin, Christing Huang, Pew Research, June 20, 2021
Human Rights and Religious Persecution
34. 1000+ Church of Almighty God Members Arrested
Li Mingxuan, Bitter Winter, June 30, 2021
35. UN rights boss signals she may move on Xinjiang without China nod
Stephanie Nebehay, Reuters, June 25, 2021
36. Apple Daily Exits From Hong Kong Telling Readers ‘Until We Meet Again’
Elaine Yu, Wall Street Journal, June 24, 2021
37. How China Spreads Propaganda About Uyghurs in Xinjiang
Jeff Kao, Raymond Zhong, Paul Mozur, Aliza Aufrichtig, Nailah Morgan, Aaron Krolik, New York Times, June 22, 2021
38. Ferocious birth-control policies in Xinjiang are racially targeted
The Economist, June 26, 2021
39. 21 Bloody Holy Spirit Members Sentenced in Guangxi
Qi Junzao, Bitter Winter, June 18, 2021
Industrial Policies and Economic Espionage
Information Technology & Innovation Foundation, June 24, 2021
41. How China Could Stymie A Global Tax Deal
Katrina Northrop, The Wire China, June 27, 2021
42. Biden crackdown on Beijing dims hopes for Chinese companies in US
Yifan Yu, Nikkei Asia, June 25, 2021
43. Apparel Importers, Like Uniqlo, Tripped Up by U.S. Ban on Forced-Labor Goods From China
Yuka Hayashi, Wall Street Journal, June 28, 2021
44. The party is eager to expand its influence within business
The Economist, June 23, 2021
Cyber and Information Technology
45. TikTok insiders say Chinese parent ByteDance is in control
Salvador Rodriguez, CNBC, June 25, 2021
46. Microsoft admits to signing rootkit malware in supply-chain fiasco
Ax Sharma, Bleeping Computer, June 26, 2021
47. Xi Jinping’s Complicated Quest for the State-Corporate Technology Complex
Ngor Luong, The Diplomat, June 28, 2021
48. China’s Artificial Intelligence Industry Alliance
Ngor Luong, Zachary Arnold, Center for Security and Emerging Technology, May 1, 2021
49. Busybodies, backed by AI, are restoring the party’s visibility
The Economist, June 23, 2021
Military and Security Threats
50. China is building more than 100 new missile silos in its western desert, analysts say
Joby Warrick, Washington Post, June 30, 2021
51. China Has Stopped Biding Its Time
William A. Galston, Wall Street Journal, June 22, 2021
52. As China-India Border Construction Heats up, So Do Confrontations
Riya Singh Rathore, The Diplomat, June 25, 2021
53. Sino-Russian Military Exercises Signal a Growing Alliance
Alec Blivas, U.S. Naval Institute, June 23, 2021
54. Senior NATO officer warns of China’s ‘shocking’ military advances
Helen Warrell, Michael Peel, Financial Times, June 24, 2021
One Belt, One Road Strategy
55. Italy's 2019 China Flirtation on Belt and Road Didn't Pay Off
Ludovica Meacci, Foreign Policy, June 24, 2021
56. China's Stake in Africa's Mines
Hannah Reale, The Wire China, June 27, 2021
Opinion Pieces
57. What China Did to Apple Daily, It Could Do to Any Company
L. Gordon Crovitz, Mark L. Clifford, Wall Street Journal, June 23, 2021
58. Is China’s Communist Party Still Communist?
Chun Han Wong, Wall Street Journal, June 30, 2021
59. Where did the Coronavirus Come from? What We Already Know Is Troubling.
Zeynep Tufekci, New York Times, June 25, 2021
60. China Is Radically Expanding Its Nuclear Missile Silos
Jeffrey Lewis, Foreign Policy, June 30, 2021