Month: March 2024

Chinese social media platform Weibo has deleted a number of accounts publishing and spreading a retouched photo of a grey-haired and wrinkle-faced Pony Ma Huateng, Tencent Holdings’ founder and CEO, in the latest example of efforts to protect the country’s top entrepreneurs from online abuse. “A small number of users posted and hyped up false information about companies and entrepreneurs, and even deliberately spread rumours through Photoshopped pictures,” Weibo said in a statement. These “rumour-mongering” behaviours have infringed the legal rights of enterprises and entrepreneurs, and damaged the online environment…

“Artificially creating scientific and technological barriers and fragmenting industrial and supply chains will only lead to division and confrontation.” EU sees 200% surge in Xinjiang imports despite human rights concerns The Netherlands is the home of ASML, the world’s biggest developer of advanced semiconductor equipment for chip makers, and the country has found itself caught in the middle of the tech war between the United States and China as Washington pushes its allies to help exclude Beijing from access to the most cutting-edge semiconductors. The Dutch government has restricted the…

Palacios took office last year, overseeing the US territory comprising 14 islands that share a maritime border with Japan in the Western Pacific Ocean. Saipan, its main island, lies about 2,700km (1,600 miles) east of Taiwan. The Northern Mariana Islands form a vital part of the US military’s defence posture in the Indo-Pacific region. While the Northern Mariana Islands has a population of fewer than 50,000, it is home to American military bases vital to Washington’s strategic defence posture as Beijing raises its profile in the region. The archipelago is…

Cooperation between China, Japan and South Korea is more important than ever as the neighbours face a series of intertwined crises, according to the head of a trilateral organisation for the three countries. Speaking to reporters on Wednesday at the annual Boao Forum for Asia in Hainan, China, Lee Hee-sup, the secretary general of the Trilateral Cooperation Secretariat (TCS), said the current “polycrisis” shows the need for closer trilateral cooperation and deeper exchanges between China, Japan and South Korea. “Any country cannot handle [these crises] by themselves … so the…

Apple’s iPhone shipments in China fell by about one third in February from a year ago, according to official state data released Tuesday, a sign that the US tech giant is losing ground to Chinese smartphone brands in the world’s second-largest economy. Apple chief executive Tim Cook visited Shanghai last week in an apparent charm offensive to improve relations with Chinese consumers, suppliers and local authorities. Cook attended the opening of a new Apple Store in Shanghai’s Jing’an district, the largest in Asia, and he also met representatives from three…

China’s home-grown C929 widebody passenger jet has entered “a crucial stage” of its development process, according to its manufacturer, amid Beijing’s continuous efforts for a strong presence in the aviation industry. “It’s a crucial stage in the development process, which indicates the overall technical scheme of the aircraft has been determined,” Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China (Comac) marketing director Zhang Xiaoguang told a science and technology innovation conference in Shanghai on Tuesday. It would then be followed by the design and manufacturing of systems and components, he added. The update…