Day: May 27, 2026

The global energy crisis stemming from the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz has added complexity to already competitive China-India maritime relations. The bottleneck in the Gulf has disrupted the provision of vital supplies of oil, gas and fertilisers to Asia, underscoring the fragility of global supply chains and the significance of trade chokepoints. Amid uncertainty over the Strait of Hormuz’s reopening, India’s US$10 billion plan to transform remote Great Nicobar Island into a major defence and logistics hub near the strategically critical Strait of Malacca has gained momentum.…

Scientists have discovered a thriving and previously unknown ecosystem in the planet’s deepest ocean trenches, feeding on organic debris from above. At those depths the pressure is enough to crush a submarine, and combined with perpetual darkness and temperatures near freezing, it makes the deepest reaches of the oceans among the least explored places on Earth. Until now, researchers believed that only a few anemones, sponges or bacteria could survive under such conditions. Advertisement But an international research team supported by China’s crewed submersible the Fendouzhe, or Striver, has uncovered…

Central Asia is tilting more decisively towards China as geopolitical uncertainty deepens, with Beijing’s expanding influence recasting the former Soviet states’ strategic orientation. In the first of a three-part series, Laura Zhou looks at how vulnerabilities laid bare by the Iran war might make the region look to China for water security. The US-Israel war on Iran has crippled global supply chains, choking off the world’s energy supply alongside reserves of critical commodities like fertiliser and helium. It has also exposed the vulnerability of the world’s most indispensable resource: water.…

Singapore’s founding prime minister Lee Kuan Yew once offered a striking observation on the nature of American power, wrote Harvard professor Joseph Nye in 2011. China, Lee argued, could draw upon its massive population but the United States possessed a deeper structural advantage: the ability to attract and recombine global talent within an unusually open, diverse and creative ecosystem. America’s innovation system was not merely large. It was generative. Fifteen years later, on April 30, President Xi Jinping convened China’s top scientific leadership in Shanghai for a symposium on strengthening…

China’s military said on Wednesday that it had used measures including electronic interference to drive away a Dutch warship near the disputed Paracel Islands, and in a rare move accused the Dutch navy of triggering “miscalculation”. The People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) Southern Theatre Command, which oversees the South China Sea, said in a post on its official WeChat account on Wednesday evening that the Dutch frigate De Ruyter had “illegally intruded into China’s Xisha Islands” and that its shipborne helicopter had “repeatedly taken off and entered Chinese airspace”. The Paracel…

China and Cuba held talks on expanding agricultural cooperation in Beijing on Tuesday, the latest in a series of moves by Beijing to shore up support for the Caribbean island as Washington intensifies a campaign of sanctions, criminal indictments and military posturing against Havana. Chinese Vice-Minister of Agriculture and Rural Affairs Zhang Zhili met Cuban Deputy Agriculture Minister Telce Gonzalez to review joint projects and explore new areas of collaboration in the sector. The Cuban embassy in China said both sides discussed opportunities to deepen ties as part of the…

China has unveiled an artificial intelligence platform for drug discovery that can screen a vast library of chemical compounds, cutting the initial drug screening phase from months or years down to tens of seconds. Developers said they expected the system to provide a novel method for identifying lead molecules to treat tumours, neurodegenerative conditions, rare diseases and emerging infectious diseases, as well as possibly speeding up drug research during public health crises. Called GalaxyVS, the platform is powered by China’s new generation of Tianhe supercomputers, the official Science and Technology…