Chinese police have offered rewards for information about 18 people that Beijing accuses of being Taiwanese military psychological operations officers spreading “separatist” messages, a day after Taiwan pledged to strengthen its defences. China views democratically governed Taiwan as its own territory, over the strong objections of the government in Taipei, and has increased its military and political pressure on the island. The public security bureau in the Chinese city of Xiamen, which sits opposite Taiwan on the other side of the Taiwan Strait, said the 18 were core members of…
Day: October 11, 2025
Chinese local governments warned not to give AI access to sensitive information
Chinese local governments have been told they may use artificial intelligence to help decision-making, but must ensure they do not leak any sensitive data or “blindly” pursue technological superiority. Advertisement New guidelines, published by the Cyberspace Administration of China and the National Development and Reform Commission on Friday, said AI models could make government more efficient and benefit the public. It listed areas where AI models could be used. These included online consultations to answer questions from the public; the use of drones and surveillance cameras to spot decaying infrastructure;…
China’s ‘health silk road’ in Africa gets a boost with insulin, pharma projects
China is advancing its “health silk road” in Africa by initiating major offshore projects to manufacture essential medicines, such as insulin and antiretrovirals. Advertisement Nigeria is set to produce Chinese-made insulin, while in the Ivory Coast further west, Chinese giant Shanghai Fosun Pharmaceutical is on track to complete the first part of its three-phase €50 million (US$58 million) facility by the end of the year. The facility near Abidjan, the country’s biggest city, will manufacture antimalarial and antibacterial drugs. Chinese firms are stepping in to fill Africa’s medicine manufacturing gaps,…
Research reveals mismatch between China’s fertility incentives, local birth rates
How much do financial incentives and other means of support influence the decision to have children, or how many to have? In China, the connection appears weak. Advertisement Despite being the country’s top contributor of newborns, the southern economic powerhouse of Guangdong offers one of the poorest environments for childbirth, Chinese researchers said in a recent study. The most populous province and a rare bright spot amid a national fertility downturn, Guangdong placed second to last in a composite fertility-friendliness index across China’s provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions. The ranking…
Trump’s latest tariffs trigger record cryptocurrency liquidations
Advertisement Crypto prices tumbled on Friday after Trump said he would impose an additional 100 per cent tariff on China and export controls on software. The declines precipitated – and then were made worse by – what data tracker Coinglass described as “the largest liquidation event in crypto history”. While market weakness had already been present coming into Friday, Trump’s post sparked a more than 12 per cent decline in bitcoin. The largest token, which had earlier this week reached an all-time high of more than US$125,000, was hovering below…
Living in the grey zone
Stay informed with free updates Simply sign up to the Life & Arts myFT Digest — delivered directly to your inbox. As ever with “golden age” television, the beauty of the picture is the first thing you notice and in the end the only thing you notice. Netflix’s adaptation of Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa’s The Leopard is gorgeously empty. It is worth your time only insofar as it sends you back to the 1958 novel. True, the story is faithful to the original. 1860. A unifying Italy. The modern world…
How to live in the grey zone
Stay informed with free updates Simply sign up to the Life & Arts myFT Digest — delivered directly to your inbox. As ever with “golden age” television, the beauty of the picture is the first thing you notice and in the end the only thing you notice. Netflix’s adaptation of Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa’s The Leopard is gorgeously empty. It is worth your time only insofar as it sends you back to the 1958 novel. True, the story is faithful to the original. 1860. A unifying Italy. The modern world…
What retail investors need to know about Japan’s ‘Iron lady’
Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter. She once played drums in a heavy metal band and calls herself Japan’s Margaret Thatcher, conjuring up an image of Britain’s first female prime minister that takes time to dislodge. Sanae Takaichi’s election as leader of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party gave a further boost to a Japanese equity market already up around 40 per cent over the past six months. This is despite the country’s bond market being among the worst-performing…
China’s lesson for the US: it takes more than chips to win the AI race
When Alibaba Group Holding’s CEO Eddie Wu Yongming took the stage at the company’s annual Apsara conference in Hangzhou on September 24, few people expected the media-shy executive to deliver anything shocking, especially since he read from prepared statements at last year’s event. Advertisement Wu, however, immediately outlined a clear road map for Alibaba’s AI development, with a goal towards so-called artificial superintelligence (ASI) – when the firm’s Qwen open-source models and cloud services would serve as the software and computing infrastructure of the future. In essence, Alibaba aimed to…
A bad bet on globalisation — and the new age of tech autocrats
Journalist David Lynch’s The World’s Worst Bet is like a disaster movie. The Washington Post correspondent (formerly at the FT) opens his book with one senior politician after another asserting, as if to camera, that China’s imminent membership of the World Trade Organization in 2001 presented no threats, but only opportunities. China, said Joe Biden said at the time, was “a nation with the impact on the world economy about the size of the Netherlands”. It was absurd to think it would have any impact on the American manufacturing economy.…