What has the US energy department said about the origin of the Covid outbreak? According to the Wall Street Journal, an updated and classified 2021 US energy department report has concluded that the coronavirus behind the recent pandemic most likely emerged from a laboratory leak but not as part of a weapons programme. Does this report mean it is more likely Covid came from a lab? Not necessarily. The report’s conclusion runs counter to that from several scientific studies as well as reports by a number of other US intelligence…
Month: February 2023
US importers go to court seeking refund of Trump-era tariffs on Chinese goods
Faced with rising prices for consumer goods, the Biden administration has been mulling partial lifting of the tariffs to ease inflation. An analysis by economist Pablo Fajgelbaum of the University of California, Los Angeles, found that tariffs through 2019 had led to a net loss of US$16 billion annually to the US economy, including losses to firms and consumers. Another study co-written by Mary Amiti of the New York Federal Reserve Bank, said that “US tariffs continue to be almost entirely borne by US firms and consumers”. Acting on his…
Demanding an end to junta’s air strikes, Burmese in U.S. march on White House
Braving snow flurries and chanting slogans, roughly 300 members of the Burmese diaspora in the United States marched to the White House over the weekend, demanding an end to the junta’s air strikes and the establishment of a no-fly zone over Myanmar. “Democracy is coming today, dictatorship is going away,” they chanted as they marched through the streets of Washington on Saturday. The procession included Buddhist monks, children, young people and middle-aged couples. Many drove hundreds of kilometers through freezing temperatures from as far away as Minnesota and upstate New…
What will China’s ‘two sessions’ 2023 bring?
This year’s “two sessions” – the annual meetings of the legislature and political advisory body – begin on March 4 and will complete a twice-a-decade leadership transition, with a reshuffle of top government jobs including the premier, and Xi Jinping set to secure a third term as president. In a six-part series, the Post looks at what to expect from this key event. South China Morning Post
Lukashenko’s planned Xi meeting shows gulf between China and the US
Alexander Lukashenko, the president of Belarus and close ally of Russian leader Vladimir Putin, is due to visit Beijing on Tuesday for a meeting with Xi Jinping, in a high-profile trip symbolising the widening gulf between the US and China over the war in Ukraine. US officials spent the weekend reiterating their concerns that Beijing is considering sending lethal weapons to Russia, amid China’s attempts to position itself as a peacemaker and deny that it would provide arms to Moscow. Speaking to ABC News on Sunday, Jake Sullivan, the White…
China’s Growing Foothold in Hungary
Advertisement Over the last decade, the Hungarian government under Viktor Orban’s deepening ties with authoritarian actors, most notably Russia and China, have been reason for concern in the European Union. Hungary’s participation in the 16+1 format, a cooperation format linking China and Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), and in the Chinese Belt and Road initiative (BRI) are prime examples of the tightening Sino-Hungarian relationship. Hungary’s Opening to the East The reason for Hungary’s increased commercial and political relations with the East lies in a particular policy known as Eastern Opening…
Some politicians seem comfortable with the prospect of a new cold war. They shouldn’t be | Christopher S Chivvis
Events surrounding the first year anniversary of the Russian invasion of Ukraine have had a cold war-esque feel, with America and its allies lined up on one side and China and Russia on the other. Some politicians in Washington – and perhaps Beijing – seem comfortable with this. But they should be careful. There’s no reason to believe a cold war re-run in the 21st century would turn out well for anyone, above all the US. This past week, President Biden paid a dramatic visit to Kyiv and then addressed…
Junta shells Chin state village killing 3 family members
A junta attack on a village in Myanmar’s northwestern Chin state killed a child and its parents, and also claimed the life of a former Chrisian pastor, locals told RFA. Saturday’s artillery bombardment of Am Laung village in Mindat township also killed a soldier from the anti-junta Chinland Defense Force. The group identified him as Cpt. Salai Billi Aung Thang. It said he was a Christian pastor in Mindat before the military coup. Villagers declined to give the names and ages of the dead family members for fear of reprisals. A…
China Dismisses Latest Claim That Lab Leak Likely Caused Covid
China accused the United States of politicizing the coronavirus pandemic again on Monday, in response to reports that the Energy Department had concluded that an accidental laboratory leak had likely triggered the spread of Covid worldwide. The rebuke marks the latest salvo in a running war of words between the two countries over the origins of the virus, an issue that has taken on as much of a political dimension as a scientific one as the rivalry between the two superpowers deepens. “Covid tracing is a scientific issue that should…
China blazes a trail to the stars with Asia’s largest observatory
Three years of continuous data collection proved them right – that conditions on Saishiteng offered a promising solution to China’s decades-long bottleneck in the development of optical astronomy. Since then, the local government has built a US$30 million road to connect astronomers and construction workers on the mountain’s peaks with the nearest town Lenghu, or Cold Lake – home to an abandoned petroleum base from the 1990s and a few hundred regular residents – about 1½ hours away. Astronomer Deng Licai and his team risked their lives to confirm that…