Police in Vietnam’s Dong Nai province have suspended an officer involved in the case of Vu Minh Duc who died just hours after being summoned for investigation. His family told Radio Free Asia his body bore signs of torture after it was released from hospital on March 22, the day he died. On March 27, Tien Phong (The Pioneers) newspaper reported that Capt. Thai Thanh Thuong, deputy head of the Police Team for Social Order Crimes Investigation of Long Thanh District Police had been suspended. The female officer signed the…
Month: March 2024
China axes Covid-era tariffs on Australian wine
Australian wine representatives said the industry lost A$2.1bn ($1.37bn, £1.08bn) in the year after China was shut off. Despite pivoting to other markets, winemakers struggled to sell the volume of bottles to other countries and have faced a significant glut in recent years. BBC
Kongjian Yu Has a Plan for Urban Flooding: ‘Sponge Cities’
Cities around the world face a daunting challenge in the era of climate change: Supercharged rainstorms are turning streets into rivers, flooding subway systems and inundating residential neighborhoods, often with deadly consequences. Kongjian Yu, a landscape architect and professor at Peking University, is developing what might seem like a counterintuitive response: Let the water in. “You cannot fight water,” he said. “You have to adapt to it.” Instead of putting in more drainage pipes, building flood walls and channeling rivers between concrete embankments, which is the usual approach to managing…
Myanmar ethnic army sets eyes on ninth township in Rakhine state
An ethnic army captured an outpost in a strategic township in western Myanmar, residents told Radio Free Asia. On Wednesday evening, Arakan Army forces seized the camp near Ge Laung and Lone Kauk villages of Rakhine state’s Ann township, where the junta’s Western Regional Military Headquarters is located. This will be the ninth township in which the Arakan Army has captured territory since ending a year-long ceasefire with the junta in November. The rebel army has also captured a neighboring township in Chin state to the north. The group said…
Xi lieutenant calls for Asia to ‘jointly’ manage security in rebuke of US
Stay informed with free updates Simply sign up to the Chinese politics & policy myFT Digest — delivered directly to your inbox. Asia should manage its own security and not allow itself to become an “arena for geopolitical contests”, one of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s most senior lieutenants has said, in a veiled rebuke to US efforts to strengthen alliances. Zhao Leji, a member of the Communist party’s elite Standing Committee, also called for closer trade ties in the region to build a “common regional market”, saying Asia was already…
A no man’s land is key to unlocking a 20-year Thai-Cambodian spat
More than two decades since agreeing to a memorandum of understanding for sharing fossil fuels in the Gulf of Thailand, Cambodia and Thailand are poised to resume the efforts. However, ongoing disputes regarding the ownership of Koh Kood Island might present a hurdle, especially amid public scrutiny. The two neighboring countries agreed to discuss further the joint exploration of the hydrocarbon resources in the Overlapping Claims Area (OCA) next to the island, Thai Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin told a joint press conference on Feb. 7 in the presence of his…
China-US ties: world powers urged to keep ‘finger-pointing and scapegoating’ in check to preserve global stability
Major powers can prevent fraught ties from spiralling if they stop finger-pointing and “scapegoating” one another, a forum in Beijing has heard as diplomatic analysts warned of a “breakdown” of multilateral institutions such as the United Nations. Da Wei, who heads Tsinghua University’s Centre for International Security and Strategy (CISS), said there had been a deterioration in major power relations – including US-China ties – in what he described as “very difficult times”. “If we continue to be very angry with each other, if we continue finger-pointing at the other…
China Lifts Punishing Tariffs on Australian Wine
In a sign of easing tensions between Australia and China, China said Thursday it will lift the tariffs it placed on Australian wine more than three years ago. The tariffs, which were first imposed in 2020 amid a nasty diplomatic spat between Australia and China, had all but vaporized the country’s biggest overseas market, worth 1.2 billion Australian dollars or around $800 million at its peak. Australian winemakers faced desperate hardship and were stuck with a surfeit of big-bodied red wines. The decision to lift the tariffs was announced by…
China scraps tariffs on Australian wine
China has dropped tariffs on Australian wine, a long-awaited decision heralded by the Albanese government as validation of its “calm and consistent approach” with the superpower on a series of controversial trade disputes. In a statement on Thursday the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, foreign minister, Penny Wong, and trade minister, Don Farrell, said they had been informed that from Friday, China’s duties on Australian bottled wine would come to an end. Australia would, in turn, discontinue its legal proceedings in the World Trade Organization, the government said. “We welcome this…
China’s Xi meets US execs as Beijing aims to woo, regain investor interests
Chinese President Xi Jinping said bilateral relations with the United States “cannot return to the past” as he met with American business leaders and academics The meeting came amid Beijing’s ongoing efforts to arrest declining foreign investments into the world’s second-largest economy and rebuild ties with investors. Foreign businesses have been spooked by China’s draconian measures during the COVID-19 pandemic and tightened regulations such as the anti-espionage law, and raids on consultancies and due diligence firms. China’s foreign investment last year sank 8% as the economy sputtered at its slowest…