Month: August 2025

Beijing’s top envoy in New Delhi on Thursday expressed strong support for India, citing the steep US tariffs imposed against the country, and called for “teamwork” and “collaboration” between the world’s two most populous nations in standing up to the “bully”. Advertisement “US imposed tariffs of up to 50 per cent on India. China firmly opposes it. Silence only emboldens the bully. China will firmly stand with India, uphold the multilateral trading system,” Ambassador Xu Feihong said. He said tariffs and trade wars are undermining the very free trade international…

As US destroyers closed in on Venezuela’s coast on Thursday, China condemned Washington’s military build-up and warned against foreign interference, backing Nicolas Maduro in a showdown that is drawing in powers far beyond the Caribbean. Advertisement Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said that China opposed “any move that violates the purposes and principles of the UN Charter and a country’s sovereignty and security”. She added that Beijing rejected “the interference of external forces in Venezuela’s internal affairs under any pretext” and urged the United States to “do more things conducive…

Newly published details of the recent EU-US trade deal show the bloc cleaving closer to Washington on technology, security and commerce, potentially driving a new wedge into Europe’s relationship with China. Advertisement A joint statement released on Thursday confirmed that the European Union will accept tariffs of 15 per cent on 70 per cent of its exports to the US, as agreed in July. It will also consider exempting American goods from some of its sweeping climate laws, even as it moves to lower tariffs on American products, including industrial…

Advertisement The Beijing-based company said it would pay a special dividend of HK$0.46 per share after reporting better-than-expected financial results in the second quarter, driven by gains made from its artificial intelligence tools, according to its filing. Dividend payments to shareholders will be made on October 6. Second-quarter revenue rose 13.1 per cent to 35 billion yuan (US$4.87 billion), up from 31 billion yuan a year earlier. Profit attributable to equity holders was 4.9 billion yuan, compared to about 4 billion yuan a year ago. First-half revenue increased 12 per…

Resource constraints and precedent mean China is unlikely to become one of Ukraine’s security guarantors – despite Russia’s suggestion that it could, according to analysts. Advertisement With rising expectations for a face-to-face meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky, security guarantees for Kyiv have taken centre stage in discussions about a peace deal with Moscow to end Europe’s deadliest conflict since World War II. During a press conference on Wednesday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Moscow had agreed to develop a system of security…

Chinese artificial intelligence start-up DeepSeek said that China will soon have home-grown “next generation” chips for AI stacking, fanning speculation over breakthroughs China may have achieved. Advertisement In a one-line note on its official WeChat account explaining the “UE8M0 FP8 scale” of its newly released model V3.1, the Hangzhou-based firm said that the model was particularly designed “for the home-grown chips to be released soon”. It did not specify the vendor of these chips or whether their use would be in the training of AI models or inferencing. In a…

China’s exports of diesel generator sets are on the rise as the global boom in artificial intelligence (AI) drives investment in data centres, which in turn is fuelling demand for reliable backup power systems – an area where diesel units remain critical. Advertisement Analysts said diesel generator sets sell for higher prices overseas, opening up vast opportunities for overseas market growth. In the first seven months of this year, China exported 502,463 diesel generator sets, up more than 20 per cent year on year. The value of the shipments rose…