Month: August 2023

Adani shares slide and politicians demand action after reports on hidden investors

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Receive free Adani Group updates We’ll send you a myFT Daily Digest email rounding up the latest Adani Group news every morning. Shares in Indian industrial conglomerate Adani slid and opposition politicians demanded action after the Financial Times and two other media outlets reported new revelations about family-linked shareholders in the company’s stock.  The reports shone a spotlight on Indian institutions and the relationship between the conglomerate’s founder Gautam Adani and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in a febrile atmosphere ahead of elections early next year.  The value of the group’s…

Yang Huiyan: Country Garden owner who was once Asia’s richest woman

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Just two years ago she was the richest woman in Asia with an estimated $29.6bn (£23.4bn) fortune, but now Yang Huiyan, the chair and majority owner of Chinese property developer Country Garden Holdings, is battling to save the company from collapsing into default. Country Garden, which was founded by Yang’s father – a farmer – in 1992, had grown to become China’s largest property developer, completing thousands of projects across the country. As the Chinese property bubble bursts, the company is now fighting for its very survival and Yang’s billions…

Britain has done more than ignore the Uyghur genocide – from politics to business, it is complicit | Rahima Mahmut

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This week, yet another foreign secretary has justified engaging with the perpetrators of genocide, on the basis that going to Beijing would allow them to raise concerns in private. According to an official statement, James Cleverly made clear the UK’s “strength of feeling about the mass incarceration of the Uyghur people” in his bilateral meetings with senior Chinese government figures. Once again, this has shown China that when it comes to the mass contravention of human rights, the UK government has nothing but words in response and fails to stand…

Will Taiwan Still Be a Peacekeeper After Its Upcoming Presidential Election?

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Advertisement Taiwan’s presidential election is coming on January 13, 2024. The poll is already attracting attention due to its implications for China-U.S. relations and geopolitics. Taiwanese Vice President William Lai, the presidential candidate for the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) is currently leading in polls, generating speculation as to what his election would mean for Taiwan and the world.  Despite Lai’s reiteration of his intention to maintain the status quo, concerns linger over his previous self-description as a “pragmatic worker for Taiwan independence.” The title given to a recent cover…

Typhoon Saola Churns Toward South China, Suspending Transport and Delaying School Year

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BEIJING —  Chinese state media report at least 121 passenger trains are suspending service in anticipation of the arrival of Typhoon Saola. People in areas of southern China were warned to stay away from the coastline, and several cities delayed the start of the school year. The suspensions on key lines running from north to south, as well as on regional networks, will begin Thursday and continue through Sept. 6, state broadcaster CCTV reported. China’s National Meteorological Center said Saola was moving toward the coast at a speed of about…

Brics expansion helps China, but bigger bloc could bring fresh risks and conflict, analysts say

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These include the westward expansion of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) – a security bloc founded by China and Russia in 2001 – to include Iran in July as well as a Beijing-brokered peace deal between Riyadh and Tehran in March. “It clearly signals China’s growing influence, not only just in economic matters but in diplomatic consultations too,” Samaan said. Advertisement He added that China would benefit from the expansion, at least on the diplomatic front, as it gave “credence to Beijing’s narrative of building an alternative world order challenging…

China spells out ‘obstacles’ to resuming high-level military talks with the US

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Arms sales to Taipei and a refusal to lift sanctions imposed on Chinese defence chief General Li Shangfu are still the main obstacles to resuming high-level military talks to Washington, Beijing has said. The US “should mind its own business”, a defence ministry spokesman told a regular press briefing on Thursday, while clarifying that communication channels remained open. “I want to clarify that military-to-military communication between China and the United States has not stopped,” ministry spokesman and senior colonel Wu Qian said. Both sides had maintained “candid and effective communication”…

When China thought America might invade

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Listen to this story.Enjoy more audio and podcasts on iOS or Android. Your browser does not support the <audio> element. When foreign foes threaten, an impregnable fortress is worth more than a comfortable home. Time and again, that doctrine guided China’s Communist Party in its first decades of rule. Under Chairman Mao Zedong, talk of invasion was a constant. In those dark times, the usual priorities of peacetime government—feeding and clothing the masses, striving to raise living standards—were all too often neglected. In their stead came campaigns to ready China…

An old health insurance scheme in China may have saved millions

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In a country of 1.4bn people, even small improvements in health care can have a big impact. That appears to have been the case with the New Co-operative Medical Scheme (NCMS), a health-insurance plan for rural Chinese that was launched in 2003 and folded into a more comprehensive programme in 2013. Though it is perhaps best known for being stingy, the NCMS saved millions of lives, according to a new working paper by Jonathan Gruber of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Junjian Yi of Peking University and Mengyun Lin of…