UN rights chief Michelle Bachelet’s six-day trip to China began with some controversy, and ended with even more. On Saturday, western journalists left the virtual press conference without satisfying answers. Some complained Bachelet had dwelled too much on the US’s human rights problems but not China’s. Knowing a top envoy from the UN would be restrained in her tone and delivery, Beijing took the occasion to say Bachelet’s trip was an opportunity “to observe and experience first-hand the real Xinjiang”. State media claimed that Bachelet had expressed “admiration” for China’s…
Day: May 30, 2022
China Is Not the Biggest Threat to the World Order. It’s Russia.
In a speech on Thursday, Secretary of State Antony Blinken revealed the long-awaited outlines of the Biden administration’s official posture toward China. Rather than Vladimir Putin’s Russia, Mr. Blinken said, it is China that represents the most potent and determined threat to the American-championed world order. Only China, he continued, has “both the intent to reshape the international order” and the power to do so, he said. The United States will seek to rally coalitions of other nations to meet Beijing’s challenge. The writing had been on the wall. Just…
‘Tragically ugly’ school textbook causes social media outcry in China
China’s education ministry has ordered a state-owned publisher to rectify a school textbook that went viral owing to what social media users described as “tragically ugly” and inappropriate depictions of children. The mathematics books published by the People’s Education Press contain illustrations of people with distorted faces and bulging pants. Boys are seen grabbing girls’ skirts and one child appears to have a leg tattoo. The books are reportedly used in elementary schools across the country, from Shandong province in the north-east to Yunnan in the south. Photos of the…
Elon Musk gives ringing endorsement to China’s global lead in renewable energy and electric vehicles on Twitter and Weibo
In this file photo taken on December 1, 2020 SpaceX owner and Tesla CEO Elon Musk poses as he arrives for an awards ceremony in Berlin. Musk, a strong clean energy supporter, said in a post on Weibo two months earlier that “sustainable energy generation from sun and wind is making great progress”. Photo: AFP South China Morning Post