Day: April 11, 2023

Vietnam’s Ties to Russia Tested by China’s Moves in South China Sea

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Washington —  As U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken heads to Vietnam, he must negotiate a diplomatic struggle in which Vietnam and China are competing for the right to develop oil and gas reserves off Vietnam’s coast in the South China Sea. Blinken’s visit follows a call between U.S. President Joe Biden and the chief of Vietnam’s ruling Communist Party, Nguyen Phu Trong, on March 29, when the two leaders agreed to expand the bilateral relationship. This year marks the 10th anniversary of the U.S.-Vietnam Comprehensive Partnership. The two countries…

Biden Wants to Build Global Coalition Against Fentanyl

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Washington —  The Biden administration is ramping up efforts to address the fentanyl crisis, increasing sanctions on traffickers and announcing plans to set up a global coalition to combat the illicit drug trade. Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid painkiller 50 to 100 times more potent than morphine. Drug overdoses from synthetic opioids killed more than 70,000 people in the U.S. in 2021, according to data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In a statement, the White House said it will work with international partners to build a…

US Warns Russia Getting Creative in Cyberspace

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washington —  Russia’s cyber operations against Ukraine may not have made as big an impact as some Western officials and cybersecurity experts first feared following the start of last year’s invasion, but top U.S. officials warn that is no reason to underestimate Moscow’s cyber exploits. Instead, these officials caution Russia’s cyber warriors remain actively engaged in a cat-and-mouse game with Ukraine, while learning from each attack and preparing, possibly, to expand their operations beyond Ukraine’s borders. “In cyber, I think people have underestimated really how much game they [Russia] brought,…

Experts Eye Future of US-China Relations

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new york —  Since the first meeting between U.S. President Richard Nixon and China’s leader Mao Zedong in 1972, the U.S.-China relationship has weathered disagreements, often for the sake of mutual profitability. But since 2012, when Xi Jinping came to power, issues such as the trade imbalance, technology competition and human rights have increased tensions between the world’s two largest economies. In November 2022, U.S. President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping met in an effort to stabilize relations, but since then, the U.S. shot down an alleged Chinese…

County chief who oversaw destruction of Tibetan Buddhist sites moved to new position

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A Chinese official who approved the destruction of a huge Buddha statue in a Tibetan-majority area has been assigned to another position in the same prefecture, Tibetans inside and outside the region said.  Wang Dongsheng, former chief of Drago county, now holds an apolitical appointment as director of the Science and Technology Bureau in the Kardze Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture in China’s Sichuan province, they said. Drago county, called Luhuo in Chinese, lies in Kardze in the historical Tibetan province of Kham. A source in India told Radio Free Asia that…

In four languages, young Uyghur gives video testimony about detained uncle

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For Nefise Oghuz, giving testimony about the illegal imprisonment of her uncle and what she says is the genocide of Uyghurs in western China was her “duty.” The 20-year-old Uyghur student provided statements in four languages — Uyghur, English, Mandarin and Turkish — on social media platforms, including Twitter and Facebook, about how police in Urumqi, capital of western China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, arrested her uncle, Alim Abdukerim, 33, at his home on Aug. 28, 2017. “I dared to share this video testimony as I could not bear the…

China orders Mongolian-medium schools to switch to Mandarin by September

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Officials in China’s northern region of Inner Mongolia are ordering all schools to switch to Mandarin-medium teaching and slash Mongolian language classes by September, in what one exile group said is ongoing cultural “genocide.” The regional education bureau ordered schools at every level to implement “teaching in our national Mandarin language” and to ensure high-schoolers are proficient in the language, even if they speak Mongolian at home, in a continuation of a policy that sparked mass protests across the region in August 2020. Schools must “build Chinese national consciousness and…

To curb theft and skip days at factories, North Korea is installing security cameras

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As North Korea’s economy worsens, factory workers are stealing more parts, tools and other items to sell elsewhere and bring in a bit more income. Others are bribing their bosses to skip work so they can make more money doing other side jobs. Authorities have taken notice, and are installing security cameras to monitor their activities, sources in the country say. In the past, such closed-circuit television cameras, or CCTVs, were used only in high-priority areas, such as in busy intersections and government buildings, and almost exclusively in the capital…

Mayflower Church members arrive in U.S. after Thailand deportation scare

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Dozens of members of a persecuted Protestant church in China have arrived in the United States after escaping the country via Thailand, where they were also detained by the immigration authorities amid fears of repatriation. The Mayflower Church members touched down in Dallas on Good Friday after a coordinated effort from advocacy groups and politicians to bring them to the country. All 63 members of the Mayflower Church touched down in Dallas on Good Friday after a coordinated effort from advocacy groups and politicians to bring them to the country,…

Nuclear Energy Has Become One of the Priorities in China-France Cooperation

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Advertisement At a time when tensions between China and the West are at an all-time high, the 51-point China-France joint statement issued on April 7, after French President Emmanuel Macron’s visit to China, not only advanced mutual political trust, but is also a valuable attempt to seek a balance between power competition and cooperation to solve global challenges. Justin Vaïsse, the director general of the Paris Peace Forum, emphasized that geopolitics is slowly killing global governance. He believes that China, the United States, and Europe should show more leadership and…