Month: January 2024

China, Papua New Guinea Discuss Policing, Security Cooperation

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sydney —  Papua New Guinea is in early talks with China on a potential security-and-policing deal, Foreign Minister Justin Tkachenko told Reuters, weeks after deadly riots in the South Pacific nation’s capital. Amid jostling between Washington and Beijing for influence in the Pacific, the biggest Pacific Islands nation, Papua New Guinea (PNG), has previously said Australia and the United States are its security partners, while China is an important economic partner. China approached PNG in September with an offer to assist its police force with training, equipment and surveillance technology,…

China boasts bubbling crude discovery – oil that is, 107 million tonnes – in Henan province, adding fuel to energy-security drive

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China has discovered what could amount to 107 million tonnes of crude oil in its central region – a quantity equivalent to more than half of the nation’s production in 2023 – as authorities intensify efforts to enhance energy security and rely less on oil imports. The presence of the abundant oilfield was verified while drilling in the Sanmenxia basin of Henan province, according to the state-run Henan Daily, which said the estimated size was announced by the China Geological Survey under the Ministry of Natural Resources. “The field has…

Myanmar junta sentences nearly 400 women in 3 years since coup

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Nearly 400 women in Myanmar have been sentenced to prison, some for more than 20 years – or even death – for political offenses in the three years since the coup, a report by the Burmese Women’s Union said. The report included high-profile women including ousted leader Aung San Suu Kyi and documentary filmmaker Shin Daewe among the 398 women sentenced by the junta, which took control of the country on Feb. 1, 2021. The most recent high profile sentencing occurred on Jan. 10, when journalist and film director Shin…

US and Chinese officials to discuss crackdown on fentanyl precursors

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Stay informed with free updates Simply sign up to the US-China relations myFT Digest — delivered directly to your inbox. US and Chinese officials will this week hold talks aimed at stemming the flow of chemicals from China used to make fentanyl as they implement a deal struck by President Joe Biden and President Xi Jinping in November. White House deputy homeland security adviser Jen Daskal will lead a delegation to Beijing for talks on Tuesday and Wednesday. The two sides will discuss efforts to crack down on the export…

US and Chinese officials to discuss crackdown on fentanyl ingredients

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Stay informed with free updates Simply sign up to the US-China relations myFT Digest — delivered directly to your inbox. US and Chinese officials will this week hold talks aimed at stemming the flow of chemicals from China used to make fentanyl as they implement a deal struck by President Joe Biden and President Xi Jinping in November. White House deputy homeland security adviser Jen Daskal will lead a delegation to Beijing for talks on Tuesday and Wednesday. The two sides will discuss efforts to crack down on the export…

Why is China mixing its economic messages when business confidence is so low?

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The move immediately raised fears of the sorts of industrial clampdowns the market has seen in other sectors, triggering a global sell-off in China’s tech stocks and wiping out billions of dollars of value. The regulator then sacked Feng Shixin, a long-serving official and publication bureau chief at the NPPA, sources told the South China Morning Post. Feng was expected to stay on in a different position, but that post has not yet been confirmed, another government source told the Post. The NPPA did not respond to the Post’s request…

North Korean orphans ‘volunteer’ for grueling mine and farm work

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North Korean state media reported that hundreds of young people across the nation have “volunteered” for arduous work in coal mines and on farms out of a sense of patriotic duty, but sources told Radio Free Asia that most of them are orphans aging out of the system, and it’s usually because they have nowhere else to go. On Jan. 17, the state-run Rodong Sinmun newspaper reported on a ceremony in the eastern province of South Hamgyong that congratulated the young volunteers, who appear to be in their late teens,…

More than 200 people sign petition urging Vietnamese activist’s release

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More than 200 people have signed a petition calling for a detained Vietnamese activist who was recently diagnosed with stage 2 cervical cancer to be declared exempt from any criminal prosecution. Before her 2021 arrest on “anti-state propaganda” charges, Nguyen Thuy Hanh raised money for families of people jailed for their political or religious views. After a year at a Hanoi prison, she was forced into treatment for depression at the Central Mental Institute in Hanoi. Earlier this month, she was diagnosed with stage 2 cervical cancer, according to her…

The ‘tinderbox’ Middle Eastern borderlands where US troops were attacked

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For years, Arab and western officials have kept a watchful eye over an arid tract of land in a remote corner of the Middle East, where US troops, Iran-linked militias and the remnants of Isis all operate. Tehran-backed militants sit at checkpoints and makeshift bases along the strategically important Baghdad-Damascus highway, which they long ago seized — the epicentre of a highly prized smuggling network in the border triangle, a centre for drugs and weapons trafficking by militants and criminal gangs. On Sunday, this corner between Jordan, Syria and Iraq…

China ‘gamed’ UN human rights review, experts say

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A top Chinese diplomat said Beijing would “earnestly study” 428 recommendations for addressing human rights submitted by U.N. members, calling them “objective and balanced.” But leading experts said China “gamed” the once-every-five-year “universal periodic review” to avoid scrutiny of its rights abuses. Chen Xu, China’s ambassador to the U.N. offices in Geneva, said following the adoption of the report that he was happy with the many recommendations by 141 countries, and that Beijing would release its positions on each of the suggestions next month. “The report just adopted is, in…