Day: June 23, 2026

US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Tuesday said China surpassing the United States on artificial intelligence was the “biggest risk” of the technology – outweighing concerns over safety or job losses. “The biggest risk to AI is China getting ahead of us,” Bessent said at the Economic Club of New York, adding that China’s willingness to discuss AI underscored America’s technological lead. “I am one of the point people on our AI policy. I am the point person in terms of the economic relationship with China,” he said. “I could…

Lithuania’s decision to suspend negotiations on an economic cooperation plan with Taiwan has cast fresh doubt over one of Taipei’s most celebrated foreign relations breakthroughs as the Baltic state’s incoming government seeks more pragmatic ties with Beijing. Lithuania’s foreign ministry said on Monday that negotiations on an economic cooperation action plan with Taiwan had been temporarily suspended by mutual agreement because of changes in the European country’s domestic political environment following the formation of a new coalition government. It said talks could resume once the incoming administration formally took office…

Leading immigration lawyers and activists say the US government has intensified its crackdown on Chinese scientists and researchers – a campaign they argue is even more aggressive than the controversial “China Initiative” launched during US President Donald Trump’s first term. “I think now we are clearly in an era of China Initiative 2.0,” said Robert Fisher, a former Assistant US Attorney and a partner at Nixon Peabody, a Boston-based international law firm. The initiative, launched by the Trump administration in 2018 to counter alleged Chinese espionage and intellectual property theft,…

Bankers working for JPMorgan Chase and Goldman Sachs in Hong Kong must have been miffed when they were shut off from using artificial intelligence (AI) models from Anthropic, a pioneering American firm in the field. Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase pulled the plug in April and last week respectively, based on a strict interpretation of Anthropic’s terms of use, which reflect Washington’s stringent restrictions on China’s access to frontier American AI models. The banks’ decisions are seen as a potential blow to the competitiveness of the city’s financial sector. In…

Chinese technology and e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding has sued the US Department of Defence, seeking to be removed from a blacklist of companies deemed to support China’s military. In a lawsuit filed on Tuesday in a district court in San Jose, California, the Hangzhou-based company said the Pentagon had added Alibaba to a list of companies that allegedly aid the People’s Liberation Army without providing substantial evidence or explanation. The Pentagon’s move violated constitutional due process and the company’s right to free speech, Alibaba said in the filing. Alibaba…

The Trump administration expanded its sanctions campaign against Cuba on Tuesday, targeting a state-owned mining company and other key economic entities in a move that comes as Washington seeks to build alternative supply chains for critical minerals and reduce reliance on geopolitical rivals. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced sanctions against five entities and one individual, including state-owned mining company GeoMinera, which oversees foreign-backed mining ventures and manages Cuba’s non-nickel metallic mineral assets. The measures also targeted financial and logistics companies linked to military-run conglomerate Grupo de Administracion Empresarial…