An American seismologist has been detained in China on espionage charges since 2024, his family has revealed, saying Donald Trump’s direct appeal for the scientist’s release to his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, went unanswered. Youlin Chen – who has researched how to detect underground nuclear tests using seismological data – was detained on 5 November 2024, according to a statement from the NGO Global Reach, which is working with his family to secure his freedom. Global Reach said Chen’s arrest may be linked to the US government’s accusation that China…
Day: July 14, 2026
China economic growth falls sharply, missing target
China’s economic growth slowed sharply between the start of April and end of June as weak domestic demand and the Iran war’s impact on oil prices overshadowed the country’s strong exports. Official gross domestic product (GDP) figures showed the world’s second largest economy grew in the second quarter by 4.3%, below Beijing’s annual target, and after a 5% rise in the first quarter. It comes a day after government data showed that China’s exports jumped by 27% in June compared to a year earlier. In March, China cut the growth…
China detains US scientist who studied North Korea nuclear tests
China has detained a US seismologist who tracks nuclear tests for nearly two years on espionage charges, his family says. Chen Youlin, 54, was arrested in November 2024 during a trip to Beijing to visit family, according to hostage advocacy group Global Reach. The family decided to speak out after they saw no sign of Beijing freeing Chen. His wife Rong Yufang, also a seismologist, said Chen worked closely with Chinese colleagues, and the allegations are “both wrong and inconsistent with the public and collaborative nature of the work that…
Taiwan’s opposition TPP launches historic first trip to mainland China
The Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) has sent its first formal delegation to mainland China since the party’s founding, seeking to maintain cross-strait peace through dialogue amid heightened tensions with Beijing. The nine-member delegation from the island’s smaller opposition party left for Shanghai on Tuesday for a four-day visit focused on youth exchanges, urban governance, artificial intelligence (AI), technological innovation and entrepreneurship. “The trip aims to build goodwill and mutual trust through pragmatic engagement, reduce misunderstandings across the Taiwan Strait and explore a more stable and sustainable model for exchanges,” the…
US must act quickly to counter China’s growing tech progress, lawmakers told
China is an existential threat to the United States, and Washington needs to slow Chinese momentum and accelerate US technological advances, or fall well behind the Asian giant, witnesses told lawmakers at a Congressional round table on Tuesday. Among the possible strategies needed to counter Beijing’s growing prowess, analysts said, included expanding the Silicon Shield – an attempt to remove China from semiconductor supply chains – to drone and other vital technologies; drastically reducing US bureaucracy; focusing more on emerging technologies like quantum; and countering China’s aggressive bid to create…
How Beijing’s islands of control are reshaping the South China Sea
A decade after Beijing rejected the ruling by The Hague’s Permanent Court of Arbitration on its South China Sea claims, rival nations continue to manoeuvre for control. In the third of our series on the anniversary, Laura Zhou looks at why the gap between international law and geopolitical reality on the water has never been wider. On a scorching morning this summer, more than a hundred Chinese tourists stepped ashore on Tree Island in the hotly contested Paracels. They were greeted not only by blue skies and turquoise waters, but…
Boko Haram exploited US and Chinese AI chatbots for attacks, Cambridge study finds
Huddled in a room around a big screen, dozens of Boko Haram members listened intently as external consultants, whom they called “the white guys”, coached them on how to use leading artificial intelligence chatbots with laptops pre-installed with VPNs and encryption software. The workshop was one of several training sessions delivered by specialised AI “trainers”, likely members of the vast Islamic State network, to Boko Haram members in northeastern Nigeria sometime during 2023 or 2024, according to a former Boko Haram commander, who added that it was also the first…
US says Nvidia’s H200 exports to China remain ‘trivial’ despite approvals
American chipmaker Nvidia has shipped “very few” H200 artificial intelligence (AI) chips to mainland China and Hong Kong, a top Trump administration official told lawmakers on Tuesday, marking the first deliveries since the United States approved such sales. US President Donald Trump cleared the sale of Nvidia’s H200 chips to China in December, with the Commerce Department approving around 10 Chinese firms to purchase the powerful AI processors this year, including Tencent and ByteDance. “For the American people, the bottom line is very few shipments against licenses for H200s and…
What Americans Need to Understand About China
This is an edited transcript of “The Ezra Klein Show.” You can listen to the episode wherever you get your podcasts. Since 2012, Xi Jinping has been the leader of the Chinese Communist Party. He has consolidated power to a level very few people ever expected, and under his rule, China has strengthened technologically, diplomatically and militarily. It is now widely understood to be an industrial juggernaut on a scale the world has never seen, in a way the world does not quite know how to respond to. But Xi’s…
Trump scraps Hormuz toll plan but presses ahead with Iran blockade
US President Donald Trump on Tuesday abandoned plans to impose a 20 per cent charge on commercial cargo passing through the Strait of Hormuz, less than a day after unveiling the proposal, while pressing ahead with a naval blockade targeting Iranian trade. Trump said the proposed fee would be replaced by trade and investment agreements with Gulf states following discussions with regional leaders. “Based on highly productive conversations with Middle East leadership, I have decided to replace the 20% United States Reimbursement Fee with Trade and Investment Deals that the…