Like a Drifter, He was Born to Walk Alone

General Zhang Shengmin, the last man standing

Friends,

For more than a week, rumors swirled that General Zhang Youxia, a member of the Politburo of the Central Committee and the senior Vice Chairman of the Central Military Commission, and General Liu Zhenli, director of the Joint Staff Department and member of the Central Military Commission, had been purged.

I was a bit skeptical, there are plenty of rumors on the interwebs of purges, coups, revolts, and general scheming by the Chinese elite. Most turn out to be untrue, and I’ve learned over the years to wait before commenting and passing judgment.

However, on Saturday afternoon, a spokesman for the PRC Ministry of National Defense issued a short statement that the two generals had been placed under investigation for “severe violations of discipline and law,” and that their misconduct caused “an extremely negative impact on the party, the nation, and the military.”

The Wall Street Journal provided a bit more detail today with this article.

Hmmm… what happened? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I would be very surprised if General Zhang actually leaked “core technical data on China’s nuclear weapons to the U.S.,” but that is an accusation that would undermine the credibility of anyone who tried to defend Zhang from Xi’s purge. I suspect the details will slowly emerge over months/years and will be filtered through the Party’s propaganda apparatus… meaning we won’t really know for sure.

Some have written that Generals Zhang and Liu were planning, or had already tried, a coup against Xi Jinping. Others claim that Generals Zhang and Liu haven’t been apprehended at all and are on a military base outside the capital protected by a loyal special operations brigade. I find both of these hard to believe, but I’ve been wrong before… more than once.

The two had only been missing from public events for just over two weeks. They were not spotted at a Party study session that they had attended in the past and this got folks talking.

Zhang Youxia had been thought of as a Xi Jinping loyalist. While Zhang was a princeling (his father was an important general for Mao during and after the Revolution), he was also seen as a competent and experienced commander. He was one of the few senior PLA officers to have actual combat experience, having fought in the border war with Vietnam in 1979. Liu Zhenli was also thought to be a competent and experienced commander, having fought in a border skirmish with Vietnam in 1984, and he was in charge of the PLA’s joint operational planning.

Here’s where we should probably discuss that unique institution called the Central Military Commission or CMC.

Xi Jinping holds a few independent positions, President of the country, General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, and Chairman of the Central Military Commission. The last one, is perhaps the most important as it makes him essentially the Commander-in-Chief of the military. The CMC, the body which exercises command of the CCP’s military and sits outside the purview of the administrative state of the government. Notice that I did not write “the PRC’s military” because the People’s Liberation Army is not a national military, it is a Party military. Its officers are NOT apolitical… they are card-carrying members of the Chinese Communist Party. While there is a “Ministry of National Defense,” this institution sits beneath the CMC and represents the military’s interests in government affairs and interacts with foreign militaries, like the United States. The Minister of National Defense, Admiral Dong Jun, who portrays himself as the equivalent of the U.S. Secretary of Defense, isn’t even on the CMC.

In “normal times” (and I deliberately put that in quotation marks because there has never really been a normal period in the bloodsport that is CCP domestic politics), the CMC has seven members including the Chairman, which is usually the General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party. With these purges, there is only one member left aside from Xi Jinping.

Now I could spend the next several pages describing the lives, careers, and downfalls of Zhang Youxia, He Weidong, Li Shangfu, Liu Zhenli, and Miao Hua… but to be honest that isn’t very interesting. These guys were all chewed up by a Party system that feeds on its own members to ensure loyalty and discipline to the emperor.

I thought it would be more interesting (and concise) to focus on General Zhang Shengmin.

Walk Along the Lonely Street of the China Dream…

I don’t know General Zhang Shengmin, I’ve never met him and his public biography is a bit thin. Maybe he has lots of friends and a close relationship with his family… but I’m going to guess that while he is lonely at this point, he feels very little regret at being the last man standing.

Xi Jinping promoting Zhang Shengmin to full general and appointing him to the Central Military Commission in November 2017.

In keeping with this theme, I had thought about using that classic by Hank Williams, “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry” which Elvis covered and is probably the version most folks recognize (view Elvis performing the song in Honolulu in 1973)… but I suspect that Zhang Shengmin doesn’t feel particularly attached to his comrades, therefore the angst and sadness of that song really isn’t appropriate.

A more appropriate song for how Zhang Shengmin likely feels is Whitesnake’s 1982 hit, “Here I Go Again.”

The music video we all know is the re-recorded version of the song from 1987 which featured the model, Julie Ellen “Tawny” Kitaen doing the splits between a pair of Jaguars.

Little known fact, Kitaen was having an affair with O.J. Simpson in the early 1990s, while he was married to Nicole Brown Simpson. Kitaen’s life spiraled out of control in the late 1990s when this affair went public with arrests, DUIs, and drug problems. She died of heart disease and a drug overdose in 2021 at the age of 59.

Now that you have the song stuck in your head, you’ll remember the chorus.

And here I go again on my own

Going down the only road I’ve ever known

Like a drifter I was born to walk alone

Looking at Zhang Shengmin’s list of jobs, one thing stands out: he is a snitch.

Someone who has made his career ratting out his colleagues and running informants inside the PLA, instead of focusing on warfighting, command, and taking leadership responsibility.

Thus is the job of the political commissar, that most despised of “military officers.”

Since 2017, he has been the Secretary of the Commission for Discipline Inspection at the Central Military Commission (placed there by Xi Jinping personally) AND one of the deputy secretaries of the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI) which is the CCP’s top “anti-corruption” body.

Of the multitudes of Party members that have been investigated, arrested, punished, and disappeared since Xi Jinping came to office, Zhang Shengmin is likely responsible for a good chunk of them.

I thought this post by Edward Luttwak put things in perspective well:

The guy who does the dirty work of “investigating” his fellow generals is the political commissar and the only “leadership” they exercise is over the discipline inspection teams that find dirt on their comrades.

General Zhang Shengmin thinking to himself who he wants to rat out next, as he perfects the art of the comb over.

Zhang (no relation to General Zhang Youxia) spent most of his career in what was once known as the Second Artillery Force and is now called the PLA Rocket Force. During the 19^th Party Congress, he was “elected” as a member of the Central Committee of the CCP and a month later, Xi promoted him to full general after less than two years as a lieutenant general and placed him on the CMC as his official mole.

Zhang Shengmin’s career tracked closely with his mentor, General Wei Fenghe, who served as the PLA Rocket Force Commander when Zhang Shengmin was his political commissar, before becoming Minister of Defense and State Councilor in early 2018. In 2024, Wei and his successor as Defense Minister, Li Shangfu, were purged from the Party for corruption.

You can bet that Zhang Shengmin remains in his position today because he aggressively pursued the investigation and purging of his old boss and mentor.

While this kind of behavior is highly valued by Xi Jinping, and every other dictator who has nightmares that he might be betrayed by his subordinates, it is incredibly corrosive to military order and unit cohesion.

It is hard to imagine that middle and senior ranked PLA officers are inspired to sacrifice and work together as a team, when individuals like Zhang Shengmin rise to the top.

I think it is worthwhile considering what this means for the future of the Central Military Commission. Will Xi reform it or will he create a new institution to exercise power over his military? Only time will tell.

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Speaking of actions that are damaging to cohesion…

What is happening in Minneapolis is appalling. Yesterday, Alex Pretti, an Intensive Care Unit nurse, who for the last decade worked at the Minneapolis Veterans Administration Medical Center, was murdered by DHS agents in broad daylight after being forced to the ground on his face and disarmed.

To give you a sense of who Alex Pretti was, here is a clip from 2024 of Pretti honoring a deceased veteran at the VA hospital where he worked. To its shame, the Veterans Administration has yet to officially recognize that Alex Pretti worked for them as a nurse.

Much has been made of the fact that Pretti was carrying a 9mm pistol with two magazines, with DHS Secretary Kristi Noem accusing him, without investigation, of “intending to kill law enforcement” and that his “violence against the Government… [met] the definition of domestic terrorism.”

However, it looks pretty clear on the multiple videos available that Pretti did not have the pistol in his hand and that it was holstered on his belt even as the eight agents had him on the ground, face down.

Pretti appears to have been shot AFTER the agents took his weapon and he was subdued. One agent reaches in and secures the handgun that was in a holster on Pretti waist and just seconds later another agent unholsters his own weapon and shoots Pretti in the back. Immediately following the first shot, the same agent (or another) shoots Pretti nine more times in the back, as the other agents step away.

The videos are disturbing, but something you must watch… particularly the video filmed by the “pink jacket lady.” Pretti is seen helping two women who were being shoved and pepper sprayed by a DHS agent. Pretti is then sprayed in the face with pepper spray, tackled by 6-8 agents, disarmed, and shot. This does not look like someone intending to harm law enforcement, it looks like a man trying to protect his fellow citizens and flailing about after being pepper sprayed.

Shortly afterwards, Bill Essayli, an Assistant U.S. Attorney in Central California, appointed by Attorney General Pam Bondi last year, (with presumably no more knowledge of the situation than anyone else following it on the internet) wrote on Twitter/X that if you approach law enforcement with a gun, “there is a high likelihood they will be legally justified in shooting you.” This generated an immediate rebuke by the National Rifle Association (NRA) which called his comments “dangerous and wrong” and that the Government should not be “demonizing law-abiding citizens.”

Indeed, I have to agree with the NRA on this one.

Just a quick reminder, the Bill of Rights has the Second Amendment… Americans are allowed to own and carry firearms.

This is the third shooting in Minneapolis since the start of the year and two weeks after another murder of a Minneapolis citizen, Renee Good, who the DHS Secretary accused of being a “domestic terrorist” immediately after the shooting and without investigation.

While I agree that citizens should not be impeding law enforcement, that does not justify killing those citizens. The Trump Administration seems to be intentionally pouring gasoline on a fire that their own operations started and are using this to generate partisan outrage against their domestic political opponents.

I was particularly disturbed to hear that when the Minnesota State Police showed up to collect evidence at the scene, after securing a judicial order to do so, DHS agents blocked their access. Investigating and prosecuting homicides in America is, for the most part, a state-level function, even when it involves federal law enforcement. Arguably, since this involved a federal activity (DHS agents enforcing federal immigration laws), it could be investigated and prosecuted at the federal level, but preventing the State of Minnesota from conducting its own investigation is unacceptable and is bound to generate even more distrust and loss of legitimacy.

The President and his appointees have a responsibility to protect all Americans and uphold the law fairly, designating those who disagree with your policies as “domestic terrorists” is atrocious.

The Administration should be seeking to de-escalate this situation, and it appears they are intentionally doing the opposite.

Thanks for reading!

Matt

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MUST READ

1. Right-wing pundits suddenly hate an AI bill. Are they getting paid to kill it?
   Tyler Johnston, Model Republic, January 17, 2026

Suspicious similarities in posts from over a dozen conservative influencers including Laura Loomer, Brad Parscale, and Ryan Fournier hint at a coordinated-yet-slapdash effort to stop the AI OVERWATCH Act.

Something strange happened on conservative social media in the last few days.

Around a dozen right-wing influencers suddenly launched a barrage of false and misleading attacks on X this week against a bill meant to block American adversaries from getting advanced AI chips. In reviewing these X posts, we found indications that they’re the result of a coordinated effort — potentially funded by big tech companies — similar to previously reported political influence campaigns.

It began on Thursday, when popular conservatives including Laura Loomer, Brad Parscale, and Ryan Fournier suddenly began posting extremely similar criticisms of the AI OVERWATCH Act. The bill had received relatively little public attention since its introduction in December 2025.

The posts shared not just a viewpoint, but linguistic fingerprints: the same metaphors, the same framings, and the same false and misleading narrative about what the bill actually does and where it comes from.

COMMENT - I was very happy to see Chairman Brian Mast of the House Foreign Relations Committee, come out swinging after these posts went up.

He first went after Nvidia CEO, Jensen Huang:

Then pointing out the campaign contributions Nvidia made during the 2024 election.

Much of Rep. Mast’s ire was directed at Laura Loomer over her post on January 15:

Shortly after posting this, David Sacks, Trump’s AI and Crypto Czar, posted “correct.”

Four days later, the AI OVERWATCH Act passed out of the House Foreign Relations Committee with a vote of 42-2… the two against were Representative Andy Barr (R-KY) and Rich McCormick (R-GA), with Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) voting “present.”

Who says we can’t have bipartisanship!

2. Washington’s New Lobbyists: Paid Online Influencers with Few Rules
   Maggie Severns, Natalie Andrews, Josh Dawsey and Eliza Collins, Wall Street Journal, January 11, 2026

Corporate and foreign interests pour money into getting pro-Trump social-media stars to push their causes.

Corporate and foreign interests that used to rely primarily on paid lobbyists to pitch their case to lawmakers and administration officials are instead pouring money into trying to get their cause promoted by a group of young, conservative influencers known to be close to Trump’s staff.

3. China’s Xi Places His Top General Under Investigation as Military Purges Heat Up

   Chun Han Wong and Lingling Wei, Wall Street Journal, January 24, 2026

Gen. Zhang Youxia is most senior active member of military hierarchy to face dismissal since Tiananmen Square fallout.

Chinese leader Xi Jinping placed his most senior general under investigation, defenestrating a longtime ally and escalating a crackdown on military corruption and disloyalty into Beijing’s biggest shake-up of its armed forces in decades.

Gen. Zhang Youxia, the senior of two vice chairmen on the Communist Party’s top military decision-making body and China’s No. 1 general, is being probed for allegedly committing severe violations of party discipline and state laws, a spokesman for China’s Defense Ministry said Saturday.

Another high-ranking officer, Gen. Liu Zhenli, chief of the Chinese military’s Joint Staff Department that handles combat planning and operations, is also under investigation over similar allegations, the spokesman said.

The probes into Zhang and Liu, who have been leading figures in efforts to modernize the armed forces and among the few Chinese generals with combat experience, show the extent of Xi’s push to clear out officers deemed corrupt and politically unreliable. Dozens of high-ranking officers and defense-industry executives have been toppled in recent years, raising questions about China’s quest to forge a fighting force capable of taking on Western militaries.

4. Thousands of Chinese Fishing Boats Quietly Form Vast Sea Barriers
   Chris Buckley, Agnes Chang and Amy Chang Chien, New York Times, January 16, 2026

China quietly mobilized thousands of fishing boats twice in recent weeks to form massive floating barriers of at least 200 miles long, showing a new level of coordination that could give Beijing more ways to impose control in contested seas.

The two recent operations unfolded largely unnoticed. An analysis of ship-tracking data by The New York Times reveals the scale and complexity of the maneuvers for the first time.

Last week, about 1,400 Chinese vessels abruptly dropped their usual fishing activities or sailed out of their home ports and congregated in the East China Sea. By Jan. 11, they had assembled into a rectangle stretching more than 200 miles. The formation was so dense that some approaching cargo ships appeared to skirt around them or had to zigzag through, ship-tracking data showed.

COMMENT – Fascinating graphics by the New York Times.

5. Canada mustn’t forget political prisoners in its China reset
   Shannon Van Sant, ASPI, January 15, 2026

Prime Minister Mark Carney’s trip to Beijing this week—the first trip by a Canadian prime minister in more than eight years—signals a high-stakes attempt to reset Canada-China relations. This visit comes as pro-democracy publisher Jimmy Lai’s mitigation hearing reaches an end and as Ottawa looks to expand Canada’s oil exports to China. Carney has called this moment a ‘turning point’, but his Beijing debut will test whether that reset rests on principle—or veers toward capitulation.

Beijing is seizing upon tensions in the United States–Canada relationship to provide a fig leaf to the Canadian government—and much of the rest of the world—presenting itself as an alternative trusted partner in trade and investment. Carney shouldn’t accept that offer without conditions, including the release of the Hong Kong publisher Jimmy Lai, which he has already said he supports. Lai’s mother was a Canadian citizen, and his sister, nieces and nephews are Canadian citizens and residents of Ontario. Lai’s companies also employ more than 1,500 people in Canada.

Lai’s conviction last month for sedition and collusion with foreign forces was a shocking abrogation of rule of law in Hong Kong, once a trusted bridge between China and the rest of the world. Lai’s ‘crime’ was running a newspaper critical of Beijing and advocating for democracy, for which he faces life in prison. Hong Kong authorities arrested Lai, now 78 years old, in December 2020. He has already spent nearly five years in solitary confinement, and Lai’s trial was a sham, with handpicked judges and no jury. Prosecutors’ evidence of his crimes included tweets, newspaper articles and his meetings with US officials. If Canada won’t stand up for a 78-year-old journalist imprisoned for running a newspaper, what red line will Beijing have to cross for Ottawa to act? Lai’s case is also part of Beijing’s broader campaign of transnational repression, with Hong Kong issuing bounties on Canadian citizens and activists worldwide for speaking up in defence of democracy.

6. Canada and China: Star-cross’d Lovers: The Truth About Canadian Diplomacy with China

   Chris Pereira, January 24, 2026

Canada, on paper, should be a diplomatic powerhouse.

With over 23% of its population foreign-born, representing nearly every nation on earth, the country possesses what should be an unparalleled reservoir of cross-cultural understanding and talent. This is especially true when it comes to understanding China: Mandarin is one of the most commonly spoken languages in Vancouver and Toronto. Canadian universities graduate thousands of students with Chinese language skills and regional expertise every year. The country has decades of engagement with China dating back to Pierre Trudeau’s groundbreaking 1970 visit to Beijing.

And yet, when it comes to actually navigating the complex realities of great power politics, Canada displays a surprising ineptitude. Watching Canada’s recent diplomatic maneuvering fills me with unease.

Let me explain.

The Trust Fund Baby of the North

Canada’s fundamental problem is that it has never had to develop sophisticated diplomatic muscles. Protected by geography, sharing the world’s longest undefended border with a friendly superpower and separated from other major powers by three oceans, Canada has enjoyed what amounts to a geopolitical trust fund for over a century.

Canada’s relationship with the United States has grown increasingly strained, with Canada now seemingly viewing China as a counterbalance to an unreliable southern neighbor.

This is the diplomatic equivalent of a privileged teenager threatening to run away from home because their parents are demanding they clean their room. The problem is, Canada doesn’t have a job, doesn’t have a driver’s license, and Dad is President of the United States.

COMMENT – I suspect that there are many in Ottawa who won’t be happy with this commentary from one of their own.

7. Fed Turmoil Is Threatening Dollar Supremacy Just as China Pushes the Yuan
   Rory Jones, Wall Street Journal, January 17, 2026

Economists see a politicized central bank damaging confidence in the U.S. system while Beijing advances in globalizing yuan.

One potential beneficiary of the tug of war over the Federal Reserve’s independence: China.

The criminal investigation into Fed Chair Jerome Powell is being viewed globally as an effort by the Trump administration to wrest control of monetary policy from the central bank. That, according to some economists, risks damaging investor confidence in the U.S. financial system and the dollar, just as China is expanding use of its own currency around the world.

“The institutional setup of the U.S.—through actions like those against the Fed—is being undermined,” said Bert Hofman, a former World Bank country director for China now teaching at National University of Singapore. “Holding dollars becomes a relatively less attractive proposition as a form of safety.”

China’s push to globalize its own currency—recently given renewed importance by Beijing in a five-year policy plan—has already alarmed officials in Washington.

Before entering office, President Trump warned about China’s push to globalize the yuan and has since threatened tariffs on the Brics bloc of emerging-market countries—which includes China—should they create an alternative to the dollar. Wider use of the yuan could also allow adversaries to avoid the scrutiny of the dollar-based financial system.

“If we lost the world standard dollar, that would be like losing a war,” Trump said in a cabinet meeting in July.

Since it became the world’s dominant currency in the post-World War II era, the dollar has weathered many crises before, in part because there is no obvious replacement.

China’s strict controls over capital and exchange rates make it unlikely that the yuan could fill all the roles the dollar plays now, and even Beijing’s leaders don’t say they want that. More widespread use of the yuan could push up demand and the value of the currency versus the dollar, eroding China’s competitive advantage and hurting its exporters.

Instead, with gradual steps, Beijing is competing with the U.S. for global influence by chipping away at the dollar’s ubiquity in certain areas such as bank payments.

COMMENT – This battle between President Trump and Fed Chair Jerome Powell strikes me as incredibly shortsighted. I get it, the President wants Powell to do something that helps the President, and Powell doesn’t agree… but having an open war between the White House and the Federal Reserve is deeply unwise.

8. TikTok Strikes Deal for New U.S. Entity, Ending Long Legal Saga

   David McCabe and Emmett Lindner, New York Times, January 22, 2026

The Chinese parent company of the popular video app said a group of non-Chinese investors would create an American TikTok to avoid a federal ban.

COMMENT – ByteDance retains control of the algorithm under this arrangement… which is a direct violation of the law passed by Congress, signed by the President, and upheld by the Supreme Court.

The Administration gets around this by a technicality… the law gives the President the authority to declare whether the deal is a qualified divestiture or not, and the President “declared” it was.

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Authoritarianism

9. Xi’s Enforcers Punished Nearly a Million in 2025—and China’s Leader Wants More
   Chun Han Wong, Wall Street Journal, January 17, 2026

10. A Tradition in Retreat: As Chinese media greet 2026 by publishing their annual New Year’s messages, the space for truth-telling continues to narrow in Xi Jinping’s China.

    Lingua Sinica, January 13, 2026

11. CDT 2025 Year-End Roundup: Person of the Year – Silenced Livestreamer Hu Chenfeng

    Samuel Wade, China Digital Times, January 15, 2026

On September 20, influencer Hu Chenfeng was banned on several platforms within the Great Firewall. In the space of a few days, his accounts on Weibo, Bilibili, Douyin (TikTok’s counterpart in the Chinese market), and other platforms were wiped out, and for some time even fan-edited clips and reaction videos were hard to find.

Over the previous two years, Hu had won attention first with videos focusing on poverty among the underprivileged, and later by visiting countries including Thailand, New Zealand, and South Korea to shoot street interviews for a “Global Purchasing Power Challenge” video series. His accounts were repeatedly hit with censorship restrictions, but he would return whenever they were lifted, adjusting his content each time to probe the boundaries of what censors would allow.

Hu entered 2025 with almost daily livestreams in which he connected with viewers and used dialogue and debate to express his view of the world. Amid steadily tightening online censorship, Hu’s streams gave fans a sense of directness and candor that was hard to find elsewhere.

Hu Chenfeng was born in Jiangsu in 1998. After graduating from high school, he first worked as a car mechanic before joining an asset management company, which he left soon after. In 2023, social media brought him to a turning point in his life. That August, after his video on the purchasing power of China’s elderly pensioners had gained widespread attention, he said during a livestream, “Chatting on these streams is exhausting … having to duck and dodge the restrictions here makes me feel like I’m always on thin ice.”

This quote was later widely seen as the most accurate summation of Hu’s situation. He hoped to express his own way of thinking, but had to be constantly wary of censorship red lines; he wanted to maintain an image of “rational debate,” but had to rely on emotive expression to sustain traffic. He managed to balance these contradictions for more than two years until, at the end of September, censors shuttered the accounts on which he had accumulated millions of followers across multiple platforms.

12. Hong Kong begins national security trial of Tiananmen vigil group

    CNA, January 22, 2026

Hong Kong’s High Court is set to start on Thursday (Jan 22) the landmark national security trial of three former leaders of a now disbanded group that organised annual vigils marking Beijing’s 1989 Tiananmen Square incident.

Once legal in China-ruled Hong Kong, such public commemorations were seen as a symbol of the city’s relative freedom compared to mainland China.

The events on Jun 4, 1989, when Chinese troops opened fire to end student-led protests, are not publicly discussed in China, which treats the date as taboo and allows no ‍public remembrance.

Dozens of people queued overnight outside the West ⁠Kowloon Magistrates’ ‍Courts building despite a cold weather warning, with scores of police officers and vehicles deployed amid tight security.

13. Xi Jinping is carrying Deng Xiaoping’s authoritarian torch
    The Economist, January 19, 2026

14. India Disputes China Construction Work on Strategic Land
    Newsweek, January 20, 2026

15. Russia Is Losing Money on Jet Sales to China but Can’t Do Anything About It, Leaked Files Show
    Joseph Place, United24Media, January 12, 2026

16. China’s Birthrate Sinks to Record Low
    Hannah Miao, Wall Street Journal, January 19, 2026

17. China registers lowest number of births since records began
    Eleanor Olcott, Financial Times, January 18, 2026

18. China-North Korea trade jumps 26% as relations thaw
    Kohei Fujimura, Nikkei Asia, January 19, 2026

19. Did China, Russia, Iran joint naval drills in South Africa signal a BRICS shift?
    Cao Jiaxuanin and Jevans Nyabiage, South China Morning Post, January 18, 2026

20. Court watchers at Jimmy Lai mitigation hearing must register ID cards with police

    James Lee, Hong Kong Free Press, January 12, 2026

The registration system, which appears to be the first of its kind, was implemented on Monday outside the West Kowloon Law Courts Building, where the mitigation hearing is being held.

Court watchers queueing to observe jailed pro-democracy media mogul Jimmy Lai’s mitigation hearing have told HKFP that they were required to register their ID cards with the police before entering the courtroom.

The registration system, which appears to be the first of its kind, was implemented on Monday outside the West Kowloon Law Courts Building, where the mitigation hearing for Lai, as well as eight other defendants, is being held.

On Monday morning, the first day of the mitigation hearing, officers seated in a tent outside the courthouse could be seen asking members of the public queuing to enter the courtroom to hand over their ID cards for registration.

The registration arrangement, which was not implemented at Lai’s verdict last month, or in other national security trials that drew long queues, appeared to be a new one. HKFP has reached out to the police force for confirmation.

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Environmental Harms

21. US Congressional committee accuses China’s distant-water fishing fleet of intimidation, ecological destruction

    Nathan Strout, Seafood Source, January 20, 2026

22. China’s Global Fishing Offensive

    Small Wars Journal, January 18, 2026

23. Inside China’s shadow fleet – Sanctions evasion, surveillance, sabotage, and illegal fishing: Clare McKendry, Adam MacDonald, and Kurtis H. Simpson for Inside Policy
    MacDonald Laurier, January 7, 2026

24. “Plastic clouds” in China: the disturbing discovery that reveals invisible air pollution

    Noticias Ambientales, January 22, 2026

25. Chinese Mining Pollution Tests Zambia’s Resolve

    ADF, January 20, 2026

26. Subsidies and the solar panel industry
    OECD, January 14, 2026

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Foreign Interference and Coercion

27. How Mamdani’s Democratic Socialists Sought Ties with Chinese Officials
    Didi Kirsten Tatlow, Newsweek, January 20, 2026

28. Britain Approves Contentious Chinese Mega-Embassy in London
    Michael D. Shear and Stephen Castle, New York Times, January 20, 2026

29. China urges Canada to break from US influence as PM Carney visits Beijing
    Ken Moritsugu, The Independent, January 13, 2026

30. US says Canada will regret decision to allow Chinese EVs into their market
    David Shepardson, Reuters, January 16, 2026

31. Canada’s Carney hails warmer ties with China and signs energy pact
    Maria Cheng, Reuters, January 16, 2026

32. “China’s Troll Army” and the New Face of Influence Operations

    Massimo Introvigne, Bitter Winter, January 20, 2026

A model investigation by an award-winning magazine highlights how Beijing uses trolls to shape public opinion in “hostile” countries.

33. How Chinese Agents Posed as American Media
    Micah McCartney, Newsweek, January 13, 2026

34. Musk-owned X sued by exiled dissident for closing his account at China’s behest

    Tibetan Review, January 8, 2026

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Human Rights and Religious Persecution

35. Underground church says leaders detained as China steps up crackdown

    Amy Hawkins, The Guardian, January 11, 2026

Early Rain pastor said to be among those held in sweep that followed arrests of members of other unregistered churches.

Leaders of a prominent underground church have been detained in south-west China, according to a church statement, the latest blow in what appears to be a sweeping crackdown on unregistered Christian groups in the country.

On Tuesday, Li Yingqiang, the leader of the Early Rain Covenant Church, was taken by police from his home in Deyang, a small city in Sichuan province, according to the statement. Li’s wife, Zhang Xinyue, has also been detained, along with two other church members: Dai Zhichao, a pastor; and Ye Fenghua, a lay member. At least a further four members were taken and later released, while some others remain out of contact.

The crackdown followed the arrest of 18 senior members of Zion Church, another prominent underground church, in a nationwide sweep in October. In December, there were also reports of approximately 100 members of another unofficial church in Zhejiang province being detained , according to Human Rights Watch.

Yalkun Uluyol, the China researcher at the rights NGO, said: “The recent detention of Early Rain members appears to be part of the Chinese government’s blatant attack on house churches in China. As Beijing tightens its ideological control, unofficial churches are seen as ‘disobedient’ to the Communist party ideology and, therefore, pay a heavy price.”

One Early Rain member was summoned on charges of “picking quarrels and provoking trouble”, a catch-all offence used to target anyone the government considers to be a troublemaker. It is not clear whether the people who remain in detention have been formally charged. The public security bureaux in Deyang and Chengdu, Sichuan’s capital, declined to comment.

In a statement, the church called on members “to hold fast to the faith, to love one another, and to remain united amid persecution”.

The US Congress select committee on China said in a post on X that Early Rain was targeted because it refused “to bow” to the Chinese Communist party (CCP).

Early Rain is one of China’s most well-known unofficial “house churches” – so-called because worshippers meet in private gatherings rather than in state-sanctioned venues. The church’s founder, Wang Yi, a prominent legal scholar and human rights activist, was jailed for nine years in 2019 for inciting subversion of state power.

Although the CCP promotes atheism, China’s constitution guarantees religious freedom and the government formally recognises five religions: Catholicism, Protestantism, Islam, Taoism and Buddhism.

But under the rule of President Xi Jinping, the space for religious freedom has been squeezed, with fears that any kind of religious activity outside state-sanctioned venues is being snuffed out.

36. Persecution of Uyghurs in Xinjiang: Torture, Crimes Against Humanity, and Genocide

    Hanh Vu, Human Rights Research Center, January 21, 2026

In the past decade, there has been increasing documentation of human rights abuses in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (referred to as “Xinjiang”). Various investigations, by journalists, governments, and independent groups, indicate a coordinated, state-led effort to suppress core aspects of Uyghur identity.

Reported abuses include arbitrary detention, torture, sexual violence, invasive surveillance, forced labor, state-imposed birth control measures, and family separation. In response, the Uyghur Tribunal investigated and reviewed evidence to assess whether Chinese actions meet legal standards for torture, crimes against humanity, and genocide under international law.

This article outlines the Tribunal’s findings and its application of international law in assessing whether documented abuses constitute torture, crimes against humanity, or genocide. The following sections provide essential background on Xinjiang and the Uyghur communities to contextualize these findings.

37. China Rejects UN Experts’ Concerns for Alleged Forced Labour in Xinjiang

    U.S. News and World Report, January 23, 2026

38. Does anyone still want to help the Uyghurs?

    The Economist, December 23, 2025

39. Canada: Confront China’s Heightened Repression

    Human Rights Watch, January 9, 2026

40. China, Chengdu’s Early Rain Church: Yet Another Wave of Arrests

    Feng Reng, Bitter Winter, January 9, 2026

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Industrial Policies and Economic Espionage

41. China’s Pyrrhic trade win
    Phelim Kine, Politico, January 14, 2026

42. As U.S. orders fade, Chinese salespeople face tough grind in new markets
    Claire Fu, Reuters, January 20, 2026

43. China blames US for trade imbalances as surplus hits record $1.2tn
    Joe Leahy and Haohsiang Ko, Financial Times, January 13, 2026

44. Rare-Earth Magnet Maker Raises $215 Million to Amp Up U.S. Supply
    Heather Somerville, Wall Street Journal, January 19, 2026

45. China Reports Robust Economic Growth, Thanks to Resilient Exports
    Hannah Miao, Wall Street Journal, January 19, 2026

46. Exports are booming, but the property bust is killing household wealth.
    Wall Street Journal, January 19, 2026

47. China’s Soy Purchases Hit 12 million Tons to Meet US Pledge
    Hallie Gu, Alfred Cang, and Erin Ailworth, Bloomberg, January 20, 2026

48. Chinese Policymakers Look Focused on Domestic Demand to Lift Economy
    Wall Street Journal, January 20, 2026

49. Brussels in move to bar Chinese suppliers from EU’s critical infrastructure
    Barbara Moens, Financial Times, January 16, 2026

50. Hardship and hubris collide in China’s two-speed economy
    Joe Leahy, Financial Times, January 19, 2026

51. UK approves China’s ‘mega’ embassy in London
    David Sheppard, George Parker, and Demetri Sevastopulo, Financial Times, January 20, 2026

52. Chinese exports of rare earth magnets to Japan fall in December
    Reuters, January 19, 2026

53. US battery makers shift supply chain from China to South Korea
    Pak Yiu, Nikkei Asia, January 19, 2026

54. China and Russia dominate nuclear power push with 90% of new reactors
    Shunsuke Tabeta, Tomoyo Ogawa, and Ryosuke Hanafusa, Nikkei Asia, January 18, 2026

55. China readies Davos sales pitch as US grants Beijing window of opportunity
    Xiaofei Xu, South China Morning Post, January 19, 2026

56. Real Estate Crash Weighs on China’s Economic Growth
    Keith Bradsher, New York Times, January 18, 2026

57. China battles price wars in fight against deflation
    Eleanor Olcott, Financial Times, January 17, 2026

58. Tesla poised to be early winner as Canada opens door to Chinese-made EVs
    Reuters, January 19, 2026

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Cyber and Information Technology

59. Chairman Mast Introduces AI OVERWATCH Act to Secure America’s Technological Dominance
    House Committee on Foreign Affairs, December 19, 2025

60. China drafting purchase rules for Nvidia H200 chips
    Cheng Ting-fang, Lauly Li, Cissy Zhou and Yifan Yu, Nikkei Asia, January 14, 2026

61. Adjusting Imports of Semiconductors, Semiconductor Manufacturing Equipment, And Their Derivative Products into the United States
    The White House, January 14, 2026

62. Taiwan’s Flagship Chip Maker Charts a Future Beyond Taiwan
    Robbie Whelan and Amrith Ramkumar, Wall Street Journal, January 18, 2026

63. China steers the Gulf’s driverless future as U.S. rivals stay home
    Divsha Bhat, Rest of World, January 20, 2026

64. US Secures Historic Chip Deal Amid Tech War with China
    Micah McCartney, Newsweek, January 16, 2026

65. Fighting back: Beijing builds its own ‘small yard, high fence’ to shut out US tech
    Ben Jiang, South China Morning Post, January 17, 2026

66. Nvidia suppliers halt H200 output after China blocks chip shipments
    Zijing Wu and Eleanor Olcott, Financial Times, January 16, 2026

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Military and Security Threats

67. China flies drone into Taiwan’s airspace for first time
    Barbara Moens, Financial Times, January 17, 2026

68. China-linked dredgers switched identities
    Franco Jose C. Baroña, Manila Times, January 14, 2026

69. China warns of ‘honey trap’ risks in defence sector after official jailed for espionage
    South China Morning Post, January 16, 2026

70. How War with China Begins
    Nicholas Kristof, New York Times, January 17, 2026

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One Belt, One Road Strategy

71. ‘Some Foreign Influence Will Be Hard to Reverse’
    Simon Shuster, The Atlantic, January 14, 2026

72. Beijing pours cash into Belt and Road financing in global resources grab
    Edward White, Financial Times, January 17, 2026

73. U.S. Blockade Shuts Off China, Cuba from Venezuelan Oil
    Collin Eaton and Paul Vieira, Wall Street Journal, January 17, 2026

74. China Plants Another Africa Marker in Campaign to Globalize Yuan
    Bloomberg, January 19, 2026

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Opinion

75. China-Canada Relations: High Tariffs and Low Trust
    Michael Kovrig, July 12, 2025

76. How America Can Stop Getting Played by China
    Liza Tobin and Addis Goldman, Foreign Affairs, January 19, 2026

77. Trade Armageddon has failed to materialise
    Peter Foster, Financial Times, January 18, 2026

78. How Chinese Propaganda Discredits the West and Enhances China’s Appeal in the Global South
    Disinfo Digest, January 16, 2026

79. The New China Trade Shock Is Just Beginning
    Daniel Moss, Bloomberg, January 19, 2026

80. The dangerous triumph of neo-mercantilism
    Martin Wolf, Financial Times, January 18, 2026