Matt Turpin's China Articles - October 1, 2023
Friends,
Late last night the United States averted a federal government shutdown with a stopgap spending agreement. Unfortunately, the agreement only extends through mid-November meaning that the U.S. has done little to resolve the gridlock and we may see an effort by some Republicans to push Speaker McCarthy out of his leadership role.
2024 is three months away and it will become even more difficult to find a solution as all sides await the outcome of the next elections.
Both Beijing and Moscow will see opportunities to roll back the progress the Biden Administration has made in insolating them, particularly as the Administration becomes increasingly focused on domestic priorities (last night’s funding extension did not include aid for Ukraine), consumed with election campaigning, and willing to compromise to achieve a degree of international stability.
Over the next year, Xi and Putin will have leverage to improve their positions.
I just finished reading a new book by Mathias Döpfner, the CEO of the German media company, Axel Springer (Americans know that company through its ownership of Politico). Döpfner makes the argument that Europeans and Americans should seize the opportunity we have now to fundamentally remake the global trading system, as well as the broader economic and political system.
In The Trade Trap: How to Stop Doing Business with Dictators, Döpfner sees the economic dependencies that we’ve built on authoritarian regimes as critical vulnerabilities that we must address.
The experiment of the World Trade Organization was a disaster (letting the PRC lock-in asymmetrical advantages with no way to enforce rules) and it is time for democracies to establish a GATT 2.0, which provides economic incentives for countries that have the rule of law and provide for individual freedoms, while imposing harsh economic costs on countries that deny those freedoms.
This is the kind of bold proposal that should be coming out of the Biden Administration.
I recommend picking up his book, you can read an excerpt (#6 below) or hear an interview with him (#5 below)
Thanks for reading!
Matt
MUST READ
1. Biden Hosts Pacific Islands, with a Rising China in Mind
Michael Crowley, New York Times, September 25, 2023
Mr. Biden’s second U.S.-Pacific Islands Forum Summit, as the White House calls the event, is part of a larger Biden administration effort to deepen ties with a string of islands in the South Pacific, where officials say Beijing hopes to project military power.
The event, reprising one from last September, was mainly designed to strengthen and spotlight ties after what officials concede were years of bipartisan neglect. But Mr. Biden also announced that he was working with Congress to invest $40 million in infrastructure spending for the islands, among other initiatives.
Those announcements hardly amount to a seismic diplomatic event. But they are two of many recent moves the Biden administration has made to strengthen America’s presence in a region east and northeast of Australia.
Over the past year, the United States has opened embassies in the Solomon Islands and Tonga, and plans to open one early next year in Vanuatu. When Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken landed in Fiji in February 2022, it was the first visit there by an American secretary of state in 36 years.
COMMENT – This is a critical diplomatic initiative that began in 2018 and sought to reverse the multi-decade withdrawal by the United States from this region.
2. Why Xi Jinping Doesn’t Trust His Own Military
Joel Wuthnow, Foreign Affairs, September 26, 2023
Over the last two months, a series of senior Chinese generals have disappeared from public view, including the defense minister and the leadership of the force responsible for China’s intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs). These disappearances are surprising given the perception that Chinese President Xi Jinping dominates the People’s Liberation Army and his ruthless commitment to rooting out malfeasance earlier in his tenure. In fact, that such incidents have not only continued but also affected some of the most sensitive parts of the PLA showcases the limits of Xi’s power.
Xi and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) more broadly have long granted the PLA considerable autonomy to run its own affairs. Allowing the PLA a high degree of independence helps ensure its political compliance with Xi and the party, yet with no civilian checks and balances, it also creates the conditions for malfeasance and poor accountability to fester. Although the details of the recent purges are still murky, they reflect Xi’s lack of confidence in some of his most senior officers.
Such doubts about the competence of his people and the equipment they have apparently mismanaged could weigh on Xi’s calculations of the risks of initiating a conflict—making him less certain that a decision to use force would achieve the intended results. As long as Xi doubts the stories his generals are telling him about their own proficiency, his mistrust in his own military will likely serve as a deterrent to war.
COMMENT – I can’t decide if these purges of senior PLA officers represent a sign of caution by Xi Jinping, meaning that he would be reluctant to use military force given the levels of disloyalty across his military, or whether it suggests that Xi is preparing to use force and wants to clear out the leadership ranks of compromised officers.
If it is the former, and Xi’s calls for military preparedness signify his frustration that the PLA has not improved over the past decade, then perhaps we should rest a bit easier.
If it is the latter and Xi is preparing the PLA, and his country, to wage war, then we should be doing much more to prepare ourselves for that scenario.
I’m concerned that for many in the United States, Europe and Japan, there is a tendency to discount the latter because it does not seem rational from our perspective and we don’t want it to happen (there is a whole set of cognitive biases in which we tend to project our own mindset and assumptions on to the future and that we believe we know what other people are thinking).
3. China’s defense minister has been MIA for a month. His ministry isn’t making any comment
Associated Press, September 28, 2023
COMMENT - The spokesperson for the PRC defense ministry responded for the first time this week to a question of the whereabouts of his defense minister (sort of).
In a non-answer, Senior Colonel Wu Qian said: “I’m not aware of the situation you mentioned.”
General Li Shangfu was last seen in public on August 29, 2023.
4. Tiny Liechtenstein roars back at China in fight over satellite array
David Ignatius, Washington Post, September 27, 2023
“The Mouse that Roared” was a 1959 comedy in which a tiny duchy defied a nuclear superpower. Something a bit like that happened for real in recent months, when little Liechtenstein, backed by Germany, thwarted an apparent Chinese effort to obtain broadband satellite frequencies granted to a company in the principality a decade ago.
The Liechtenstein saga illustrates the new space race that’s underway as China and other countries scramble to match Elon Musk’s Starlink constellation of thousands of low-Earth-orbit satellites providing broadband coverage around the world, most famously to Ukraine. The Chinese coveted Liechtenstein’s frequencies, granted by the International Telecommunication Union in 2014, because they offer priority use of the Ka band of frequency spectrum, which experts say is the fastest and most reliable for space communications.
What’s at stake here? I’ll quote from a Sept. 14 statement from the German ministry that reviewed the case and, expanding on Liechtenstein’s decision, rejected the Chinese bid on national security grounds: “There is a risk that the satellite constellation will be used for military purposes to the detriment of the defense capability of [Germany] and its allies.”
The German Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action explained: “The Chinese military is aware of the military importance of satellite-based communications. China perceives Starlink as a potential threat to China’s national security and is therefore itself pursuing the construction of a state-owned constellation of nearly 13,000 [low-Earth-orbit] satellites” to rival Starlink and other Western competitors. People involved in the case said the statement was approved by the German cabinet and Chancellor Olaf Scholz.
This battle had been brewing over the past few years in obscure international agencies, courts and arbitration panels. The permits were initially acquired by a Liechtenstein firm that subsequently received Chinese investment, and several years of infighting and litigation followed. Several people on the receiving end described the Chinese campaign as “lawfare,” or warfare though litigation. Chinese investors filed more than 160 lawsuits, according to one litigant. But Liechtenstein resisted — and decided to withdraw the permits from the Chinese team and grant them instead to a U.S.-based company, Rivada Networks.
“The former Chinese investors thought that because we are a small authority, they could railroad us with a relentless slurry of lawsuits,” said Rainer Schnepfleitner, the Liechtenstein regulator, in an interview. He decided in February to withdraw the frequencies and award them instead to Rivada’s Liechtenstein subsidiary, which has ambitious plans for a 600-satellite constellation.
Liechtenstein, a roughly 15-mile-long slice of land between Austria and Switzerland, is one of the world’s smallest countries, with fewer than 40,000 people. But Schnepfleitner, who runs the principality’s Office for Communications, said “what gives us strength is that we have an extremely strong rule of law.”
Declan Ganley, the chief executive of Rivada, said in an interview that the battle for control of the Liechtenstein permits “underlined to us that somebody in the [People’s Republic of China] thought this was a very important asset and they wanted it.” He said Rivada plans to use the very fast and resilient spectrum to operate what he called an “outernet” in which broadband signals can be shared in space for business and government users at speeds like those of undersea cables, without connecting to the terrestrial internet, before being delivered directly to users on the ground.
Kleo Connect, a German company controlled by the Chinese investors, issued a statement on Tuesday warning that, despite the German government decision, it will “relentlessly pursue” its legal rights. “It is shocking to witness how Rivada takes advantage of the geopolitical considerations that are at the core of the government decision to hide its illegal actions.”
This case is a preview of future international legal and regulatory battles for control of what will be the crucial “high ground” in military and economic rivalry between the United States and China.
Michèle Flournoy, a former deputy secretary of defense who recently joined the Rivada board, explained during an interview: “China is a committed competitor in the space domain, and they are particularly interested in building their own broadband network” to rival Starlink. Flournoy described the battle over the Liechtenstein permits as “a small example of a much larger effort by the Chinese to gather up spectrum and space.”
What’s most interesting to me is that, despite Chinese pressure, the “mouse” in this case actually did roar. Liechtenstein refused to buckle under legal pressure. And Germany, once so eager to accommodate China for economic reasons, took a firm stance against what the economy ministry, in unusually blunt language, called a “systemic rival” of Germany and the European Union.
The moral of the story, Schnepfleitner told me, was that “by sticking to the rules and being courageous, you win.” It’s good to see people stand their ground in this early round of the space game.
COMMENT – I’ve been highlighting this battle over space-based, broadband internet connectivity for a few years now (“The corporate feud over satellites that pitted the west against China,” Financial Times, June 22, 2022 and “China, Lawfare, and the Contest for Control of Low Earth Orbit,” The Diplomat, August 10, 2023).
While we’ve all seen how space-based, internet connectivity (Starlink) has enabled Ukraine to continue fighting and communicating with the outside world, even as Russian attacked their terrestrial telecommunications infrastructure, there is another dynamic we should watch.
Almost all the PRC’s capabilities to control information available to the Chinese people, depends upon terrestrial internet connectivity either through cable/fiber-optic connections or through wireless networks. These terrestrial networks are controlled by the PRC Government through the physical infrastructure that resides within PRC territory. Connectivity to the outside world and access to information and communication is controlled by the Great Firewall through Beijing’s control over terrestrial networks that Beijing can exercise sovereignty over.
Space-based, broadband internet connectivity (from satellites to individual users) offers a way around the Great Firewall by moving the connection between the individual and the network from terrestrial nodes controlled by the PRC Government to a spaced-based connection beyond the reach of PRC sovereignty. Think Radio Free Europe broadcasts into Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union.
5. AUDIO – Escaping the Trade Trap - How to Stop Doing Business with Dictators
The Realignment, September 21, 2023
Mathias Döpfner, Chairman & CEO of Axel Springer SE, the biggest digital publisher in Europe and owner of U.S. media brands Insider, Morning Brew, and Politico, joins The Realignment.
Mathias is the author of a new book: The Trade Trap: How to Stop Doing Business with Dictators. Marshall and Mathias discuss his proposal for a new trade regime based upon a values-based alliance of democracies, the cost of doing business with dictators, Germany's revamped post-Ukraine invasion foreign policy, and how encounters with figures from Vladimir Putin to Jack Ma shaped the book's perspective.
COMMENT – I just finished reading The Trade Trap and I recommend reading it yourself. It is refreshing to see someone recognize just how counterproductive it is for democracies to allow themselves to become dependent on countries like the PRC and Russia. Döpfner recommends building a new international trade organization to replace the WTO and basing membership on a set of values and political systems, while imposing high tariffs on authoritarian regimes that refuse to provide freedom to their citizens and observe the rule of law.
For him, we should pursue intentional “freedom trade,” rather than naïve “free trade” – instead of Wandel durch Handel (Change through trade), we should pursue Wandel durch kein Handel (Change through no trade).
Here is Döpfner’s essay in the Wall Street Journal a few weeks ago;
6. What the West Loses by Trading with Dictatorships
Mathias Döpfner, Wall Street Journal, September 14, 2023
In the face of rising challenges from China and Russia, the U.S. needs a new framework for free trade among free countries.
In 1989, the political scientist Francis Fukuyama declared the end of history: “What we may be witnessing is not just the end of the Cold War, or the passing of a particular period of postwar history, but the end of history as such: that is, the end point of mankind’s ideological evolution and the universalization of Western liberal democracy as the final form of human government.” Today we have to acknowledge: Fukuyama was wrong.
After decades of increasing globalization, democracy and freedom have not prevailed. On the contrary, they are in retreat. For the 17th year in a row, the independent think tank Freedom House has recorded a decline in democracy; 40% of the world’s population now lives in countries it ranks as “not free,” the highest level since 1997.
The phrase “change through trade,” which Western politicians and bankers loved so much, turned out to be true—but in sharp contrast to its original meaning. Instead of becoming more tolerant and democratic through intensified business links with the West, autocracies in China, Russia and the Middle East have become even more radical and undemocratic. At the same time, more and more democratic economies have grown dependent on their nondemocratic counterparts. The West has been led into a trade trap.
The World Trade Organization is a particularly sorry case of good intentions gone wrong. The date that marks its key strategic failure is Dec. 11, 2001, when China was admitted as a full member after 15 years of negotiations. It was a great day for China but possibly the biggest mistake Western market economies have made in recent history. Since then, the U.S. share of global GDP has fallen from 31.47% in 2001 to 24.15% in 2021, while China’s share has grown from 3.98% to over 18% in the same period. This asymmetry has been further amplified by the fact that China, the second biggest economy in the world, still enjoys the status of a developing country, granting it many privileges and exemptions under WTO rules.
The West’s fundamental error was to expose its market economies to China’s state-led capitalism, which creates its own rules and abuses existing terms of trade and competition. If we keep heading down this road, China will continue to gain in economic power and dominance, which will lead to increased political influence and the global rise of AI-boosted surveillance autocracies.
In an increasingly polarized America, perhaps the only truly bipartisan consensus is that China’s actions are dangerous. But while the U.S. has decided to act, Europe is still hesitating. Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission, has taken a “de-risking” approach, trying to balance economic interests and national security concerns. This is encouraging, but it might not be enough. Europe has to make a clear decision for the U.S. and against China. Pleasing both is impossible.
Europeans and Americans must decide between two possible paths. One is that Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin continue their attempts to drive the U.S. and Europe apart. In this scenario, Europe would follow Africa in growing increasingly dependent on China. The Old World would become a historically instructive theme park for tourists from around the world. Value creation would happen elsewhere. China, Russia and Islamist autocracies would coordinate their interests and activities, becoming increasingly confident aggressors. The U.S. would isolate itself through unilateral decoupling, and what was once the largest economy in the world would become ever weaker politically and economically—yesterday’s superpower.
The alternative is to revive the trans-Atlantic alliance as an economic and values-based partnership and as the basis of a broader global alliance of democracies including India, Japan and others. It would offer freedom, security, dignity and a sustainable way of life, founded on diversity, competition and meritocracy. In this scenario, China would become a strong but isolated power, weakened in the long run by its extreme homogeneity. Post-Putin Russia would have two options: to rely on a deteriorating China or to opt for the growing West. And one day, China too may realize that a little more freedom brings a great deal more prosperity.
The crucial incentives lie, as always, in the economy. That’s why it is time for a new world trade order—an alternative to the dysfunctional WTO, which should cease operations. We need a trade alliance that would provide a multinational framework for truly free trade.
This alliance of democracies would have three criteria for membership: proven respect for the rule of law, for human rights and for sustainability. Alliance members would be able to engage in truly free trade without any tariffs or restrictions, while nonmembers would be subject to high tariffs. The underlying hypothesis is that, in the long run, cooperation among democratic states leads to more value creation than fragile partnerships with autocracies, and that short-term damage is vastly overcompensated by long-term gains.
Democratic nations today still have the upper hand, generating almost 70% of the world’s GDP. This part of the world would remain globalized, forming the critical mass to draw more countries in step by step.
Russia’s war in Ukraine has already taught us that, for democratic countries, waiting is not a good strategy. An orderly transition to energy independence from Russia would have caused the EU, and especially Germany, significant hardship and losses in the short- to medium-term. But a growing dependency on Russia that allowed the aggressor state to determine events has turned out to be even more painful, and not just economically.
This experience is the final wake-up call in the face of a possible Chinese takeover of Taiwan. It should make democratic countries realize that “business as usual” when dealing with China and other authoritarian economies is the most dangerous solution of all. It creates not only a dangerous dependency but also a credibility dilemma.
The CEO who makes virtuous speeches about ESG standards in the morning and then shifts a bit more of the company’s production to China or Russia in the afternoon should decide for one of the two. We must examine the fact that an employee can lose their job because of misplaced gender pronouns but their colleague can brag about increased sales in countries where women are stoned to death for adultery or where the death penalty applies for being gay. In this respect our current trade policy isn’t just short-sighted. It is contradictory and bigoted.
As for sustainability, China’s CO2 emissions have increased by over 200% since its accession to the WTO. This increase offsets the rest of the world’s decrease by far. The real problem with climate policy is that we have almost no influence over the world’s largest CO2 polluter and allow China to benefit from trade with the West while not complying with mutual CO2 goals. We ourselves contribute to the problem by outsourcing the climate sins we don’t want in our own backyards to China or elsewhere. Double standards don’t come more glaring than this.
Creating a new trade architecture and redefining our relationship with autocracies wouldn’t simply be a form of damage limitation. It would also help us to avoid one of the biggest perils of our time: progressive and dangerously escalating deglobalization, and with it, a new and lasting rise of nationalism. Only when we proactively and jointly change our economic behavior will democracies truly prevail. The U.S. cannot go solo. If we let it happen or leave things up to the autocracies, we will either lose democracy, have to decouple unilaterally or be the ones being decoupled abruptly. In all cases the damage will be fundamental.
If we want to save democracy, we need a renaissance of truly free trade and a rebirth of “liberalism” in the spirit of Adam Smith. This is an American-European project. It can only be achieved together.
COMMENT – Mathias Döpfner has described an approach that leaders in Tokyo, Seoul, Canberra, Washington, Delhi, Brussels, and Brasilia should take seriously and pursue.
7. China Is All About Sovereignty. So Why Not Ukraine's?
Michael Schuman, The Atlantic, September 25, 2023
Russia’s war has confronted Xi Jinping with a stark choice between standing for principle or defending his strategic partner in Moscow.
By beijing’s reckoning, the U.S.-led global order is in turmoil, and a Washington in decline has no answers to the world’s mounting problems. Fortunately for the future of humanity, however, the Chinese leader Xi Jinping does. He would like to replace Washington’s “rules-based” world order with a framework of his own—one whose most sacred principle is national sovereignty, or the right of states to govern themselves, free from outside interference.
In the world Xi envisions, nations will no longer have to endure Washington’s preaching about democracy and human rights. All governments, no matter how repressive, will be equals, with their sovereignty assured. Xi enshrined the protection of sovereignty as the very first plank of his Global Security Initiative, an ideological blueprint for a new global system that he introduced, probably not coincidentally, several weeks after the start of the Ukraine conflict in 2022.
That war has posed a bit of a problem for China’s professed position, however. Russia, China’s strategic partner, trammeled an international border to invade a neighboring country in what could hardly be a clearer violation of that country’s sovereignty. But rather than sympathize with Ukraine’s desperate struggle to preserve its independent existence, Xi cemented his partnership with the Russian invaders intent on annihilating it.
“You can’t be helping Russia conduct this war and say you believe in Ukraine’s territorial integrity,” John Herbst, a former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, told me. “Obviously, you can’t square that circle.”
Yet Xi has tried to do so. His contradictory stance on the war has forced his diplomats to tap dance, seeking to preserve Beijing’s pretense of principled neutrality even to the point of staging a purported peace mission. Meanwhile, the war has raised serious questions about the place of sovereignty in Xi’s vision for a new world order, and, relatedly, about his ability to achieve his grandiose plans.
In practically every diplomatic statement, Communist China affirms its commitment to honoring the sovereignty of other countries. It expects no less in return: Sovereignty, China’s leaders claim, confers upon the Communist Party the authority to govern as it wishes within China’s borders. Sovereignty, from the Chinese viewpoint, gives Beijing the right to lock up Uyghurs in Xinjiang and democracy advocates in Hong Kong, and it forbids Washington from interfering in China’s internal affairs by complaining about its human-rights record. Beijing rejects the notion of “universal values” that apply to all people, no matter where they live.
Beijing’s fixation on sovereignty is inseparable from its claim that Taiwan is part of China: By so much as interacting with Taiwan’s government, other countries are violating China’s sovereignty, Beijing maintains. Because they believe the country is not yet completely unified, says Maria Adele Carrai, an international-law expert at NYU’s Shanghai campus, Chinese leaders “feel very sensitive and also partly fragile about their sovereignty.”
Xi’s position on sovereignty holds obvious appeal for other autocrats intent on suppressing dissent without interference. But it also attracts adherents in the developing world, where many leaders still contend with the persistent, detrimental legacy of Western colonialism. For those leaders, says Jonathan Fulton, a specialist in Chinese relations with the Middle East at Zayed University, in Abu Dhabi, “when they hear a great power say, ‘We’re not going to do the kind of stuff that the West did to you,’ that resonates.”
The deeper Xi wades into international affairs, however, the more his purported principles come into conflict with his strategic goals. His government routinely intrudes on other countries’ sovereignty; witness the Chinese spy balloon caught floating in American airspace, or the scandal over alleged Chinese interference in Canada’s national elections. But little has challenged Xi’s ideological framework more than the Ukraine war. His choice was stark: Stand with Russian President Vladimir Putin, whom Xi has called his “best” friend, and sacrifice his supposed commitment to sovereignty, or stand for sovereignty by siding with Ukraine, thereby breaking a partnership that he perceives as crucial to his campaign against U.S. hegemony.
COMMENT – the simple answer to the title’s rhetorical question is: the Chinese Communist Party only cares about its sovereignty and isn’t al all interested in an international system that imposes limits on Beijing’s desires.
Authoritarianism
8. Beijing should be cautious about going too far on China’s public security, academic tells forum
Vanessa Cai, South China Morning Post, September 26, 2023
9. China Blocks Executive at U.S. Firm Kroll from Leaving the Mainland
Rebecca Feng and Chun Han Wong, Wall Street Journal, September 29, 2023
Move highlights an increasing risk facing foreign companies in China—getting their employees out.
A senior executive at U.S. risk advisory firm Kroll has been barred from leaving mainland China for the past two months, heightening concerns about the risks foreign companies face when doing business in the country.
Chinese authorities have taken an increasingly tough stance on foreign businesses this year. Authorities have raided the offices of due-diligence firm Mintz Group, questioned the staff of U.S. consulting firm Bain & Co., and implemented strict new data rules. These moves have damaged American businesses’ confidence in China, which is at its lowest level in decades.
Kroll operates a similar business model to some of the foreign firms targeted earlier this year, offering corporate investigations and due-diligence checks, as well as advising on restructurings and insolvencies. Michael Chan, a Hong Kong-based managing director at the company who specializes in corporate restructuring, traveled to the mainland in July and subsequently informed his employer that he cannot leave, according to people familiar with the matter. Chan declined to comment.
Chan is assisting an investigation into a case that dates back a few years, the people said. A Hong Kong passport holder, Chan can move freely in mainland China and is still working. Neither Chan nor Kroll is the target of the investigation, the people said.
The use of exit bans has become increasingly common, according to Western officials and human-rights groups. Beijing uses travel restrictions to facilitate criminal probes, intimidate dissidents, or even create leverage in disputes with foreign companies and governments. Exit bans can last for months or even years as the investigations that prompt the restrictions drag on.
COMMENT – Foreign companies should NOT send employees to the PRC. The U.S. Government has been warning U.S. citizens not to travel to the PRC since 2018 and here is just another example.
10. China bans Nomura senior investment banker from leaving mainland
Reuters, September 25, 2023
Authorities in China have ordered a senior Nomura Holdings (8604.T) banker overseeing the firm's investment banking operations there not to leave the mainland, two sources with knowledge of the matter said.
The ban comes as concerns grow among Western businesses about darkening prospects in the world's second-largest economy at a time of slowing growth, coupled with new laws that make for tougher operating conditions.
COMMENT – It is not safe for business leaders to travel to the PRC.
11. Law firm layoffs rise in Hong Kong as China business slows
Pak Yiu and Echo Wong, Nikkei Asia, September 26, 2023
12. China is flooding Taiwan with disinformation
The Economist, September 26, 2023
13. The disappearance of China’s defence minister raises big questions
The Economist, September 20, 2023
14. What Is the State of the Chinese State?
Jamie Horsley, The Diplomat, September 20, 2023
15. China urges countries to boycott Hong Kong media freedom event
Emma Farge, Reuters, September 26, 2023
China is pressing countries to boycott a British-organised event at the United Nations in Geneva on media freedom in Hong Kong with the son of a jailed media tycoon, a letter showed and four diplomats confirmed on Tuesday.
The event on Wednesday titled 'Media Freedom in Hong Kong' is being held on the sidelines of the five-week meeting of the U.N. Human Rights Council. Among the speakers is Sebastien Lai, the son of Jimmy Lai who this week marked his 1,000th day in a Hong Kong prison on charges related to the former British colony's national security law and sedition.
In a letter circulated widely among diplomats at the U.N. in Geneva, China's mission asked countries "to refrain from participating in this event in any way".
"Hong Kong-related issues are China's internal affairs that brook no external interference," said the diplomatic note reviewed by Reuters.
Four diplomats confirmed having received it and three of them said that Chinese diplomats had also been contacting some countries individually to not attend or support the event in any way. The diplomats declined to be identified because of the sensitivity of the matter.
Still, so far, at least 22 countries have co-sponsored the event, a document showed, including the United States, France and Germany.
China's diplomatic mission in Geneva did not respond to Reuters request for comment. Hong Kong authorities released a general statement saying it condemned "misleading and slanderous remarks" by organisations and media in the context of the Lai case which amounted to political interference.
Britain's Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office said it would continue to raise "longstanding and legitimate concerns over the erosion of rights and freedoms in Hong Kong," citing the Sino-British Joint Declaration which is meant to guarantee Hong Kong's autonomy.
The financial hub returned to China from Britain in 1997. Diplomatic tensions between Chinese authorities and Britain have been running high in recent years.
Britain released a report this month saying that Hong Kong authorities have extended the application of a Beijing imposed national security law "beyond genuine national security concerns". Jimmy Lai's trial under the new law has been postponed to Dec. 18 and is expected to last 80 days.
China, one of the 47 members of the Geneva-based Human Rights Council and seeking re-election next month, has in the past sought to counter criticism of its human rights record.
Last year, it asked the then-U.N. human rights chief Michelle Bachelet not to publish a highly-anticipated report which said that China's arbitrary and discriminatory detention of Uyghurs in Xinjiang may constitute crimes against humanity.
COMMENT – We need more events like this.
16. Image control: How China struggles for discourse power
Katja Drinhausen, Mareike Ohlberg, and Ivana Karásková, MERCIS, September 27, 2023
17. How China’s Underground Historians Fight the Politics of Amnesia
Ian Buruma, The New Yorker, September 25, 2023
18. How Xi Jinping is taking control of China’s stock market
Hudson Lockett and Cheng Leng, Financial Times, September 22, 2023
19. ‘What adjectives describe Xi Jinping?’ China’s new English textbook asks
Sun Yu, Financial Times, September 22, 2023
20. China Says It’s Talking to the US About Xi Attending APEC Summit
Bloomberg, September 26, 2023
China said it’s talking to the US about who will represent the Asian nation at a summit in less than two months, after President Xi Jinping recently skipped a major gathering of world leaders.
At a press briefing in Beijing on Tuesday, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi responded to a question about whether Xi will attend the event in November, saying: “We are in communications with relevant parties and we will make an announcement in due time.”
Wang added that the Chinese leader “places high importance on multilateral diplomacy” and said his nation is “never absent in important multilateral forums.” Xi recently snubbed a Group of 20 leaders’ meeting in India for the first time since taking power in 2012, sending Premier Li Qiang instead.
COMMENT – Given Beijing’s economic coercion of Japan over an IAEA-approved release of treated water from Fukushima, threats against the Philippines and Taiwan, hostage-taking of foreign business leaders, and the CCP’s withholding of economic data, why is the United States so desperate extend the red-carpet to Xi at APEC.
If Xi doesn’t want to attend, that’s great, let Beijing isolate itself even more and then re-name APEC (Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation) to IPEC (Indo-Pacific Economic Cooperation)… the grouping really should only be for those countries that actually want to “cooperate.”
Environmental Harms
21. China and Japan shippers are worst emitters, says U.N. report
Rhyannon Bartlett-Imadegawa, Nikkei Asia, September 27, 2023
22. Europe is about to crack down on Chinese electric cars
Zeyi Yang, MIT Technology Review, September 26, 2023
23. Solar supply chains must diversify away from China, warns EDP
Rachel Millard and Barney Jopson, Financial Times, September 25, 2023
24. Guangdong’s stalled energy transition reflects Beijing’s mixed climate messages
Lu Chen and August Rick, South Morning China Post, September 24, 2023
Foreign Interference and Coercion
25. The Philippines condemns China for installing floating barrier in disputed South China Sea
Alex Stambaugh, Manveena Suri, and Heather Chen, CNN, September 25, 2023
26. Philippines removes Chinese barrier at disputed shoal in 'special operation'
Enrico Dela Cruz, Reuters, September 25, 2023
The Philippines said on Monday it executed a "special operation" to remove a floating barrier installed by China at a prime fishing patch in the South China Sea, a move that could stoke tension after a years-long detente in Asia's most disputed waters.
The Philippines expressed outrage on Sunday and shared images of Chinese coastguard policing a long, ball-buoy barrier near the Scarborough Shoal, a rocky outcrop 200 km (124 miles) from the Philippines and the site of years of intermittent flare-ups over sovereignty and fishing rights.
COMMENT – This will likely continue to escalate.
27. Philippines urges fishermen to keep up presence at China-held shoal
Neil Jerome Morales and Andrew Hayley, Reuters, September 27, 2023
28. China drastically cuts seafood imports from Japan in wake of Fukushima water release
Justin McCurry, The Guardian, September 25, 2023
29. China, resource-rich East Timor upgrade bilateral ties
Nikkei Asia, September 23, 2023
30. Chinese envoy takes aim at Europe’s ‘de-risking’, national security fears
Sylvie Zhuang, South China Morning Post, September 21, 2023
Wu Hongbo, Beijing’s special representative for Europe, says it’s not logical to see a key partner like China as a systemic rival. European ambassadors at forum hit back, saying concerns are justified and China has been doing the same thing for years.
A senior Chinese diplomat has traded barbs with European envoys at a forum in Beijing, urging Europe not to see Beijing as a threat, as European capitals pursue a “de-risking” strategy in dealing with China.
Wu Hongbo, China’s special representative for Europe, made the remarks at a forum held by a Chinese think tank, the Centre for China and Globalisation, in Beijing on Thursday.
He called on envoys at the event to try to understand China properly and not overemphasise national security in relation to China.
“Decoupling is the baby of the USA, de-risking was invented in Europe, and the concept of national security has been overstretched,” Wu told the forum, which has been held annually since 2015.
He said Huawei Technologies – which has been at the centre of US-China rivalry – was an example of this. Wu said no country had produced any evidence that the Chinese telecoms firm had threatened their national security.
“China is a key partner for cooperation with Europe and that such a key partner is considered as a systemic rival is neither reasonable nor logical,” Wu said.
But European envoys at the forum said concerns about China were justified.
Thomas Østrup Møller, Denmark’s ambassador to China, said it was “not fair to blame Europe for inventing de-risking as a new out-of-the-blue policy”.
“The need to increase our resilience or to de-risk came about because of the energy crisis generated from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the breakdown of supply chains during Covid,” he said.
“In addition, this kind of economic security thinking has also been a prevailing theme within China for several years.”
EU ambassador Jorge Toledo Albinana said the European Union strategy to classify China as a partner, competitor and systemic rival “is not intended to be a strategy, it is a description”.
“But, like it or not, that is how we have been [in] our relations with China.”
Patricia Flor, Germany’s ambassador to China, told the forum it was natural for any country to identify and manage the risks posed to national security in uncertain times.
Germany unveiled a new China strategy in July that marks a break from an era in which bilateral ties and trade blossomed under former chancellor Angela Merkel.
“[The strategy] presents the means and the instruments by which the federal government can actually work with China, while not endangering our way of life, our sovereignty and prosperity,” Flor said.
Spanish ambassador Rafael Dezcallar de Mazarredo also weighed in, saying de-risking meant eliminating excessive dependency in supply chains for strategic goods and taking into consideration security concerns.
“All this is something China has been doing for decades,” he said. “I find it difficult to understand why we should be criticised for doing the same thing that China has been doing.”
Sun Yongfu, a senior researcher at the think tank and a former head of European affairs at the commerce ministry, told the forum that he did not want to see “political issues” interfere with business and trade cooperation.
He also hit out at China being called a “systemic rival”. “Why is it mentioned again and again? Too much … We should not [just] concentrate on conflicts.”
Concerns over China’s position on the war in Ukraine were also raised. Beijing has never condemned Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, despite pressure from Western countries and the UN voting overwhelmingly for Moscow to immediately and unconditionally withdraw its troops from the former Soviet state.
“[Russia’s invasion of Ukraine] has affected our relationship [with China],” EU ambassador Albinana said. “The future of this war will continue to affect our relations until China condemns the aggression and asks Russia clearly to withdraw from the illegal and unprovoked annexation and occupation of a sovereign country.”
German envoy Flor said the EU could not accept “a fake peace” but sought a “just and sustainable peace in Ukraine”, which meant restoring the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine in its internationally recognised borders.
COMMENT – Party officials will continue to harp on this topic as long as they can plainly see a division between Europe and the United States. Beijing understands that it has an opportunity to drive a wedge in the transatlantic relationship (a strategic goal that Beijing shares with Moscow). Beijing will seek to undermine transatlantic unity by undermining European Union unity.
Unfortunately, Beijing’s strategy stands a chance of succeeding as long as EU members let themselves be divided based on their own narrow self-interests.
31. China's media mouthpieces troll West over India-Canada spat
James Hand-Cukierman and Cissy Zhou, Nikkei Asia, September 27, 2023
32. How China and Russia Have Helped Foment Coups and the Growing Militarization of Politics
Joshua Kurlantzick, Council on Foreign Relations, September 25, 2023
33. Biden aides in talks with Vietnam for arms deal that could irk China
Trevor Hunnicutt and Nandita Bose, Reuters, September 23, 2023
34. China's top diplomat calls on US to host an APEC summit that is cooperative, not confrontational
Toronto Star, September 26, 2023
35. D.C. Is in Panda-monium as China Takes Back Beloved Bears
Andrew Duehren, Wall Street Journal, September 23, 2023
COMMENT - The Party’s use of pandas as a form of international coercion, provides a microcosm of how the CCP views international relations.
Human Rights and Religious Persecution
36. ‘A jealous god’: China remakes religions in its own image
Frederik Kelter, Aljazeera, 26 September 2023
Authorities are violating religious freedoms across China as the leadership seeks to assert control.
37. Star Uyghur Scholar Who Vanished Was Sentenced to Life in China
Tiffany May, New York Times, September 24, 2023
38. Covid helped China secure the DNA of millions, spurring arms race fears
Joby Warrick and Cate Brown, Washington Post, September 22, 2023
39. All Roads Lead to Rome: Two “Official” Chinese Bishops Will Attend the Catholic Synod
Massimo Introvigne, Bitter Winter, September 25, 2023
40. US restricts imports from three more Chinese companies tied to forced labor
Doina Chiacu and Karen Freifeld, Reuters, September 27, 2023
41. China #MeToo journalist and labor activist expected to appear in secret trial as crackdown deepens
Nectar Gan, CNN, September 21, 2023
Industrial Policies and Economic Espionage
42. China lists mobile app stores that comply with new rule, but Apple missing
Josh Ye, Reuters, September 27, 2023
43. Macron Is Pushing Europe into $900 Billion Fight with China
William Horobin and Ania Nussbaum, Bloomberg, September 26, 2023
44. Mitsubishi Motors to exit from China production, Nikkei reports
Reuters, September 27, 2023
45. Even China's 1.4 billion population can't fill all its vacant homes, former official says
Reuters, September 24, 2023
46. China’s state investment arm said to be planning US$14 billion fund to support strategic new industries
Che Pan, South China Morning Post, September 25, 2023
47. American businesses welcome, Chinese Vice-President Han Zheng tells Henry Paulson in Beijing
Cyril Ip, South China Morning Post, September 27, 2023
Beijing sent a welcoming message to US companies during a visit by American banker and former treasury secretary Henry Paulson, while urging Washington to expand “positive” policies and cut “negative” ones.
COMMENT – Hank Paulson again serves as a useful “friend of China”… allowing himself to be used as a prop in a drama of the CCP’s design.
Surveys of American business leaders suggest that the PRC has never been as unwelcoming as it is in Xi’s third term (40% of 325 American companies polled said they were redirecting investment outside of China) and the U.S. State Department warns U.S. citizens not to travel to the PRC due to concerns of arbitrary detention and exit bans, but Hank Paulson allows himself to be used to portray the opposition impression.
48. China boosts rare earths production to bolster booming EV industry
Shunsuke Tabeta, Nikkei Asia, September 26, 2023
49. Distressed developer China Oceanwide declared bankrupt in Bermuda
Kenji Kawase, Nikkei Asia, September 25, 2023
50. US finalizes rules to prevent China from benefiting from $52 billion in chips funding
David Shepardson, Reuters, September 22, 2023
51. China Won’t Overtake US With Broken Model, SocGen’s Baader Says
Craig Stirling, Bloomberg, September 25, 2023
52. China’s Economic Slowdown Was Inevitable
Yasheng Huang, Foreign Affairs, September 25, 2023
53. AUDIO – Silicon Triangle: Matt Turpin On Mitigating China’s Nonmarket Behavior In Semiconductors
Matters of Politics & Policy, September 22, 2023
54. Even the US's planned rare earth magnet factory can't shake the influence of China
Mary Hui, Quartz, September 22, 2023
55. Ford suddenly pauses massive EV battery project that Republicans are probing over CCP ties
Thomas Catenacci, Fox Business, September 25, 2023
56. AUDIO – Best Of: Why Apple can’t leave China
Behind the Way, September 27, 2023
57. Venture firm GGV Capital to split off China business after US pressure
George Hammond and Tabby Kinder, Financial Times, September 21, 2023
58. U.S. and China Agree to New Economic Dialogue Format
Alan Rappeport and Keith Bradsher, New York Times, September 22, 2023
59. NATO’s €1bn venture fund offers defence start-ups an alternative to China
Ivan Levingston, Henry Foy, and Tabby Kinder, Financial Times, September 25, 2023
60. China and EU agree export controls ‘mechanism’ to ease trade tensions
Andy Bounds, Nian Liu, and Joe Leahy, Financial Times, September 25, 2023
61. U.S. Issues Final Rules to Keep Chip Funds Out of China
Ana Swanson, New York Times, September 22, 2023
62. Slowing, Graying and in Debt, Can China’s Industrial Heartland Be Revived?
Keith Bradsher, New York Times, September 26, 2023
Cyber & Information Technology
63. Huawei unveils new products but keeps quiet on Mate 60 Pro technology
Iris Deng, South China Morning Post, September 25, 2023
64. China's AI 'war of a hundred models' heads for a shakeout
Josh Ye, Reuters, September 21, 2023
65. Intel sees massive demand for AI chips designed for China: report
Ben Jiang, South China Morning Post, September 21, 2023
66. Apple’s iPhone 15 draws long queues in China despite Huawei’s comeback
Ben Jiang, South China Morning Post, September 22, 2023
67. Can TikTok conquer the American shopper?
Scott Nover, Quartz, September 19, 2023
68. TikTok Employees Say Executive Moves to U.S. Show China Parent’s Influence
Georgia Wells, Wall Street Journal, September 27, 2023
TikTok has spent the past three years trying to convince U.S. lawmakers it can operate independently in this country from its China-based parent company, ByteDance. After recent personnel moves, some employees aren’t so sure.
Since the start of the year, a string of high-level executives have transferred from ByteDance to TikTok, taking on some of the top jobs in the popular video-sharing app’s moneymaking operations. Some moved to the U.S. from ByteDance’s Beijing headquarters.
The ByteDance executives have taken on roles overseeing swaths of TikTok’s advertising business, human resources, monetization, business marketing and products related to advertising and e-commerce initiatives. Some have brought teams from Beijing.
The moves have concerned some U.S.-based TikTok employees, who have complained internally to high-level TikTok managers, according to current and former employees familiar with the discussions. The TikTok employees say they are worried that the appointments show ByteDance plays a greater role in TikTok’s operations than TikTok has disclosed publicly.
COMMENT – Unsurprising.
69. What the U.S.-China Chip War Means for a Critical American Ally
John Liu and Jin Yu Young, New York Times, September 27, 2023
Military and Security Threats
70. Taiwan security chief says AUKUS, NATO must counter China threat
Thompson Chau and Cheng Ting-Fang, Nikkei Asia, September 27, 2023
71. US-China rivalry spurs investment in space tech
Jonathan Josephs, BBC, September 25, 2023
72. Chinese Parts in the F-35 Highlight Concerning Trend in the US Defense Sector
A.B. Abrams, The Diplomat, September 17, 2022
73. U.S. seeks military access in Philippine eastern seaboard
Ryo Nakamura, Nikkei Asia, September 23, 2023
74. China lab suspected of Covid leak stripped of US funding for violating biosafety rules
Sarah Knapton, The Telegraph, September 24, 2023
75. US and Japan warn of Chinese hackers backdooring Cisco routers
Bill Toulas, Bleeping Computer, September 27, 2023
76. Blasting Bullhorns and Water Cannons, Chinese Ships Wall Off the Sea
Hannah Beech, New York Times, September 23, 2023
77. U.S. Blacklists 28 Entities from China, Russia and Other Countries, Citing National Security Risks
Yuka Hayashi, Wall Street Journal, September 25, 2023
78. Tensions With China Cross a New Line in the South China Sea
Sui-Lee Wee, New York Times, September 26, 2023
One Belt, One Road Strategy
79. China wants to be the leader of the global south
The Economist, September 21, 2023
80. Solomon Islands joins China-backed AIIB days after PM snubs Biden invite
Jevans Nyabiage, South China Morning Post, September 27, 2023
81. 10 years on, Belt and Road goals shift with China's ambitions
Huang Yiyi, Radio Free Asia, September 26, 2023
82. China has poured billions into Africa’s infrastructure. Is it now tightening the tap?
Simone McCarthy, CNN, September 27, 2023
The inauguration of two new electricity-generating units in Zimbabwe’s Hwange power station last month was not an unfamiliar scene when it comes to major infrastructure projects in Africa.
There, in a rural corner of the southern African nation, government officials and the Chinese ambassador gathered to ribbon-cut and laud the expansion of the coal-fired plant meant to reduce power cuts in the country – and Beijing’s role in funding it.
The project, backed by roughly $1 billion in Chinese loans years before Beijing stopped funding new coal-powered projects overseas, is one of the continent’s numerous big-ticket projects bankrolled by Chinese lenders under leader Xi Jinping’s hallmark Belt and Road Initiative.
The impact of those funds is felt across Africa, where residents in major cities like Lagos, Nairobi and Addis Ababa now transit daily via railways, highways and airports built in recent years with Chinese loans and often by Chinese construction firms.
Now, as the global infrastructure building spree enters its second decade there are questions about how Beijing will choose to direct the initiative in the years ahead – and whether it will downsize funding amid new challenges and signs of a recalibration.
Debt repayment issues amid global economic headwinds from the Covid-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine, Beijing’s own bubbling financial woes and a need to better address environmental issues are among new pressures on how China lends and countries borrow.
Some data suggest a shift is already underway, with researchers from the Boston University Global Development Policy Center in the US tracking what they say is a steady decline in new loan commitments from Chinese entities to African government borrowers that deepened in the past two years.
Opinion Pieces
83. DJI isn’t the only Chinese drone threat to US security. Meet Autel.
Eric Sayers and Klon Kitchen, Defense News, September 15, 2023
COMMENT – After writing this piece the authors received the following letter warning of legal penalties if they didn’t retract their article… needless to say, it is still posted at Defense News.
84. Tricks of the Trade
Robert Lighthizer, The Wire China, September 24, 2023
85. US restricts legacy chip production for quantum in China, but is it too late?
Judy Lin, Digitimes Asia, September 25, 2023
86. US support for democracy will smash the new rise of authoritarianism
Tom Daschle and Dan Sullivan, The Hill, September 17, 2023
87. China Prepares to Crack Down on ‘Hurt Feelings’
Benjamin Qiu, Wall Street Journal, September 25, 2023
88. The Rules-Based International Order Is Quietly Disintegrating
Walter Russell Mead, Wall Street Journal, September 25, 2023