By James Pomfret | NANSAN, China NANSAN, China Within earshot of mortar fire echoing from beyond a ring of hills, a sprawling relief camp in Southwestern China is swelling steadily after fighting erupted last week between a rebel ethnic army in Myanmar and government troops just across the border. In a recent Reuters visit to the rugged area in southwestern Yunnan province, aid workers and those displaced […]
Stuart Gulliver has told the HSBC board he will quit as chief executive next year, making the search for his successor a priority for Mark Tucker, who has decided to leave Asian insurer AIA to become the bank’s chairman. The appointment of Mr Tucker was announced before the Hong Kong market opened on Monday by AIA and HSBC, which first approached the insurer’s president and chief executive last […]
Stock photo The price of Bitcoin plummeted after the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) denied a request to bring Bitcoin to the financial market, highlighting how the value of the virtual currency can change within minutes. In February, the virtual currency’s value reached an all-time high of over $1,300 with investors taking a punt on rumors SEC would allow the first Bitcoin ETF. An exchange-traded fund […]
SEOUL Ousted South Korean leader Park Geun-hye faced criticism on Monday over a defiant vow that the truth of her impeachment would be revealed, with the main opposition party urging prosecutors to investigate her quickly. The Constitutional Court dismissed Park from office on Friday when it upheld a parliamentary impeachment vote over an influence-peddling scandal that has shaken the political and business elite. Park has denied any […]
TAIPEI China does not understand Taiwan’s laws and its democracy, a senior Taiwanese justice ministry official said Monday, in the latest spat between the self-ruled island and Beijing, after island authorities detained a Chinese man in a suspected spy case. Deputy justice minister Chen Ming-tang said comments from a senior Chinese official that Taiwan was trying to use the case to stir up trouble with China was […]
March 13, 2017 by: Lucy Hornby and Archie Zhang in Beijing and Jane Pong in Hong Kong Sceptics about China’s economic statistics have taken a special pleasure in revelations of faked data in the north-eastern province of Liaoning dating at least to 2011. Along with an officially reported contraction in its economy last year, they have given the impression that Liaoning’s economy is unusually troubled. That impression may be […]
By Jeremy Wagstaff | SINGAPORE SINGAPORE In today’s so-called smart home, you can dim the lights, order more toothpaste or tell the kids to go to bed simply by talking to a small Wifi-connected speaker, such as Amazon’s (AMZN.O) Echo or Google’s (GOOGL.O) Home. This voice-first market – combining voice with artificial intelligence (AI) – barely existed in 2014. This year, Voice Labs, a consultancy, expects 24.5 […]
Chinese leasing companies have taken ownership of hundreds of vessels in deals worth tens of billions of dollars in the latest sign of the industry’s rapid transformation amid a long-running financial crisis. The deals made by Chinese companies, including the leasing businesses of ICBC, China Minsheng Bank and Bank of Communications, have provided badly-needed financing for shipowners as miserable trading conditions dominate most shipping sectors. Although there […]
Saudi King Salman’s stop in the Maldives on his month-long tour of Asia brings into focus how this tiny archipelago – best known for high-end tourism and an existential battle against climate change – has emerged as a key player in a regional struggle for influence. Both Riyadh and Beijing are currying favour with the strategically located 820km-long chain of Indian Ocean atolls, in efforts analysts believe […]
Eldridge Industries, the U.S. owner of Dick Clark Productions Inc, said on Friday that one of its affiliates terminated an agreement to sell off the TV production company to Chinese conglomerate Dalian Wanda Group. Eldridge, which also owns magazines such as the Billboard and the Hollywood Reporter, said the affiliate terminated the agreement after Wanda failed to honor contractual obligations. In February, Reuters reported that Dalian Wanda’s […]
BEIJING The number of corruption cases heard by Chinese courts jumped by about one-third last year, as the country’s top prosecutor vowed on Sunday there would be no let up in China’s campaign against deep-seated graft. Since assuming office more than four years ago, President Xi Jinping has waged war on corruption, warning, like others before him, that the problem is so bad it could affect the […]
Authored by Federico Pieraccini via The Strategic Culture Foundation, While the world continues to decipher, or digest, the new Trump presidency, important changes are afoot within the grand strategic triangle that lies between Russia, Iran and China Away from the current chaos in the United States, major developments are progressing, with Iran, Russia and China coordinating on a series of significant moves crucial for the future of […]
During my budding career, I have been fortunate to work with veteran journalists many years my senior. I was and continue to be grateful for their experience, insight and wisdom, dispensed frequently and with candor. Some of the most innovative journalists I know are also some of the most experienced. That’s because, to stay in this business through a punishing recession and unceasing technological disruption, they had […]
In this Policy Forum, Cong Cao and Richard P. Suttmeier highlight the immense work and challenges China will encounter as it attempts to reform its scientific and technological development strategy. (via WSJ)
Bird flu has reared its ugly head not only in China but also in the U.S. and as fears of an epidemic escalate, measures are being taken all over the world to control the outbreak. The latest victim of the Avian Flu scare is the Schoenbrunn Zoo in Vienna, Austria, which has administered euthanasia on a flock of 20 Dalmatian pelicans after the bird flu virus was found in […]
SEOUL Opponents of South Korea’s ousted leader, Park Geun-hye, demanded on Saturday that she be arrested a day after she was thrown out of office over a corruption scandal involving the country’s conglomerates. Park’s critics said they would rally in central Seoul, where they have been gathering every weekend for months, while the former president’s conservative supporters also planned protests, raising the risk of confrontation. The Constitutional […]
When Rex Tillerson visits Japan and South Korea next week, the new US secretary of state will not escape the whispers back home: the former ExxonMobil chief executive has been all but invisible since arriving in Washington. In his first weeks as the top US diplomat, the Texan has been conspicuously low-profile. His silence has fuelled concerns that President Donald Trump intends to downgrade diplomacy — and […]
A Chinese property developer constructing a huge housing project in southern Malaysia has become the latest corporate victim of Beijing’s crackdown on capital flight. Country Garden has closed showrooms in mainland China for its flagship $100bn Forest City development in response to measures by Chinese regulators that have made it harder for individuals to move money out of the country. A slowing Chinese economy, rising US interest rates […]
By Phil Stewart and Idrees Ali | WASHINGTON WASHINGTON The U.S. military said on Friday it plans to forge ahead with building the THAAD missile defence system in South Korea, separating the issue from a political crisis in Seoul that saw President Park Geun-hye’s removal from office on Friday. The United States started deploying the first elements of its advanced anti-missile defence system in South Korea on […]
Like millions of young readers around the world, Chinese children have grown up with popular titles such as Roald Dahl’s Fantastic Mr Fox and the Harry Potter series. But Beijing is now introducing new measures to restrict access to foreign books and publications as it opens a new front in its battle to limit outside influence on Chinese society. Regulators have given verbal instructions to publishers to […]
A global research team has built five new synthetic yeast chromosomes, meaning that 30 percent of a key organism’s genetic material has now been swapped out for engineered replacements. This is one of several findings of a package of seven papers published March 10 as the cover story for Science. Led by NYU Langone geneticist Jef Boeke, PhD, and a team of more than 200 authors, the […]
BEIJING/SYDNEY/TAIPEI China said it would “resolutely strike” against the “Dalai Lama clique’s separatist activities” as protesters planned demonstrations in major world cities on Friday to mark the anniversary of a Tibetan uprising against Chinese rule in 1959. The sensitive anniversary coincided with the yearly news conference of Tibet’s delegation to China’s annual meeting of parliament, under way in Beijing. Che Dalha, Tibet’s governor, said the government would […]
D.C. bureau chiefs from major news organizations, including The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, the wire services, Fox News and CNN sent a letter to the State Department earlier this week protesting Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s decision to ditch reporters on his upcoming trip to Asia. “We were deeply concerned to hear that Secretary Tillerson plans to travel to Beijing, Seoul […]
By Kentaro Hamada and Makiko Yamazaki | TOKYO TOKYO The Japanese government, fretting over the future of Toshiba Corp’s flagship memory chips unit, is prepared to block a sale to bidders it deems a risk to national security, sources said, a stance that gives U.S. suitors a major advantage. The government would use Japan’s foreign exchange and foreign trade laws to control the auction if need be, […]
