Month: April 2026

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un said on Friday that relations with Beijing had been elevated to new heights. He was speaking at a meeting in Pyongyang with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, where both sides pledged to deepen strategic coordination and “practical cooperation”. Wang’s two-day visit to North Korea is his first since 2019. At the meeting he conveyed greetings from President Xi Jinping, according to China’s state news agency Xinhua. Wang also said the meeting at the Workers’ Party of… South China Morning Post

The high-profile talks between leaders of the Communist Party and the Kuomintang are a step towards cross-strait stability despite the KMT’s opposition status in Taiwan, according to observers. Communist Party chief Xi Jinping and KMT chairwoman Cheng Li-wun met in Beijing on Friday in the first such talks between the sitting leaders of the two parties in nearly a decade. Analysts in mainland China and Taiwan broadly agreed that the encounter signalled a revival of cross-strait engagement… South China Morning Post

The Islamabad talks scheduled to begin on Saturday will represent the first direct US-Iran negotiations since the Pentagon launched Operation Epic Fury six weeks ago. Vice-President J.D. Vance will lead the US team, which will include special envoy Steve Witkoff and President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, according to the White House. The Iranian delegation is expected to be led by parliament speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf and Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi. Observers in China… South China Morning Post

China’s green energy transition is expanding from a domestic security priority into a potent geopolitical asset at a time of heightened global uncertainty, according to the latest official reading of the country’s 15th five-year plan. That shift has been tested in recent weeks by the US-Israeli war in Iran and Tehran’s effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz – a chokepoint for 20 per cent of global oil and gas supplies. While Tehran signalled it would reopen the strait on Tuesday under a… South China Morning Post

South China Morning Post

Travellers stepping out of the railway station at Hungary’s second-biggest city, Debrecen, are immediately greeted by a banner hanging over the street that reads “No battery, no deal”, “Debrecen belongs to Hungarians” and “Chinese, go home”. Targeting a mega-factory set up by Chinese battery giant Contemporary Amperex Technology Ltd (CATL), it also calls for a protest on Saturday, on the eve of Sunday’s general election in the central European nation. Ahead of the elections, battery companies… South China Morning Post

China’s new-generation medium-lift transport aircraft will surpass America’s best counterpart, the C-130J “Super Hercules”, in most performance metrics, according to a Chinese military magazine. The four-engine turboprop aircraft, frequently referred to as the Y-30 or Y-15, conducted its maiden test flight in December last year. It is developed by Shaanxi Aircraft Industry Corporation, a subsidiary of the Aviation Industry Corporation of China (AVIC). The Chinese “new medium-lift transporter”,… South China Morning Post

South China Morning Post