Month: June 2021

Jun 24th 2021 BEIJING UNTIL CHILDREN reach the age of about 15 in China, education is free. So why is it that more than half of a typical family’s spending goes on it? The answer is cramming classes: a financial burden so great that it is often said to discourage couples from having children at all. Now officials are trying to rein in the industry, in part, it appears, to relieve the pressure on people’s wallets. Parents are not sure it will work. Listen to this story Your browser does…

Jun 24th 2021 HONG KONG’S largest pro-democracy newspaper, Apple Daily, ceased publishing on June 24th. Under the city’s security law, police in recent days had frozen its bank accounts, raided its newsroom and arrested six people, including its editor and chief executive, who have been charged with colluding with foreign powers. Apple Daily printed 1m copies of the final edition, nearly 13 times more than usual. Newsstands swiftly sold out. Staff are pictured greeting supporters outside the paper’s office. Listen to this story Your browser does not support the <audio>…

Advertisement Over the last quarter-century, as China’s “peaceful rise” carried the country to new economic and geopolitical heights, Beijing was engaged in an ever-expanding campaign of transnational repression. From neighboring Pakistan and the states of Central Asia, to Saudi Arabia and Egypt, to Thailand, Cambodia, and Myanmar, China has seen through the detention and, at times, deportation of Uyghurs and other Turkic minorities fleeing Beijing’s grasp. A new report and dataset put together by researchers Bradley Jardine, Edward Lemon, and Natalie Hall under a joint initiative by the Oxus Society…

Advertisement As detailed in Part 1, the New Zealand Supreme Court recently gave conditional approval to the extradition of Kyung Yup Kim, a South Korean national and long-term New Zealand resident who is accused of murdering a young Chinese woman in Shanghai. The Court’s decision rests upon the belief that official assurances from China can alleviate the risks and doubts that a fair trial will be granted to Kim. For example, if by July 30 the New Zealand government can obtain assurances that the prosecution will not have greater opportunity…

Jun 24th 2021 Hong Kong AT ABOUT 54, the average age of retirement in China is among the lowest in the world. This is a problem. Since standards were set, life expectancy has soared while the number of working adults—those whose labour, in effect, supports retirees—has begun to shrink. But persuading people that they should work longer is proving hard. In 2008 the government said it was mulling the idea of raising retirement ages, but backed away amid a public outcry. Now it feels it can wait no longer. Listen…

Advertisement As the People’s Republic of China has expanded its international power, so too has it expanded its efforts to coerce unwilling Chinese nationals to return to the motherland for anticipated punishment, whether formally or informally imposed. Moreover, China has increasingly tried to force certain foreigners, by a variety of means, to reenter Chinese territory for criminal prosecution or even lawless and indefinite incommunicado confinement. Some of these foreigners are former Chinese nationals, while others are not. Recently, under its 2020 national security law for Hong Kong, China, like other nations, has reasserted…

Advertisement Australian Trade Minister Dan Tehan stated last week that the government called in the World Trade Organization to help arbitrate China’s decision to impose tariffs of more than 200 percent on Australian wine. “We would love to be able to sit down [with China’s government] and be able to resolve these disputes. While we’re not in a position to do so, we will use every other mechanism to try and resolve this dispute and other disputes that we have with the Chinese government,” Tehan said. Australian wine is one…

Advertisement Taiwan, Asia’s first nation to legalize same-sex marriage, is a trailblazer in its region. Despite the monumental victory of the 2019 same-sex marriage law, it was a compromise reflecting Taiwan’s struggle to push forward a divisive agenda. Today, there are more than 5,800 registered same-sex couples in the country, and public opinion has shifted decisively toward more support and tolerance for LGBTQ rights, with public acceptance of same-sex marriage growing to over 60 percent since 2018. However, equality for same-sex couples has not yet been reached and continued progress will…

Advertisement Hong Kong’s pro-democracy Apple Daily newspaper will close by this weekend, its parent company said Wednesday, following last week’s arrest of five editors and executives and the freezing of $2.3 million in assets under the city’s national security law. The board of directors of Next Media said in a statement that Apple Daily’s print edition and online edition will cease no later than Saturday due to “the current circumstances prevailing in Hong Kong.” The paper’s closure comes as authorities crack down on dissent following months of anti-government protests in…

Advertisement China’s ambassador to the United States, Cui Tiankai, officially announced his departure from the post in a letter posted to the Chinese Embassy website on June 21. Cui’s departure had long been rumored, but now it’s official: For the first time since April 2013, China will have a new top representative to the United States. Since the normalization of relations in 1979, no other Chinese ambassador to the U.S. has served even five years, with three to four years being a typical posting length. Cui’s eight-plus years were a…