Two thousand years ago, in a bid to conquer death itself, China’s first emperor Qin Shi Huang commissioned a city of the dead: a 49 sq km mausoleum guarded by an army of clay warriors, built to defend his tomb for eternity. When farmers near Xi’an unearthed the first clay head in 1974, they cracked open one of humanity’s greatest archaeological mysteries, with more than 8,000 Terracotta Warriors discovered over the last 50 years. Now, fragments of that dream of immortality rise again – this time in Perth, where the…
Tag: Asia Pacific
Student rescued from Mount Fuji twice in one week
A university student has been rescued from the slopes of Mount Fuji twice in the space of a week – the second time during an attempt to retrieve his mobile phone. The hapless climber, a 27-year-old Chinese national who has not been named, was airlifted from Japan’s highest mountain last week, only to be the subject of a second search four days later. It emerged that he had returned to the scene of his first rescue to retrieve his phone, Japanese media reported. The student, who lives in Japan, was…
Boonie Bears: Future Reborn review – kiddie Chinese eco-fable is like Mad Max on mushrooms
When George Michael recorded Careless Whisper, there can be no doubt his ultimate ambition for it would have been to soundtrack a garish animated sequence in which two anthropomorphic bears gambol through a prairie of giant fungus experiencing ecstatic visions as hallucinogenic spores rain down on them. Such is the frantic way of this Chinese cartoon franchise, as relentless and exhausting as ever in its 11th feature-film instalment. Five minutes in, before the credits, it has crammed in a post-apocalyptic prologue, oodles of eco-babble, a time-travelling tyke and an avalanche.…
Revealed: online campaign urged far right to attack China’s opponents in UK
One morning last August, a troubling message appeared in a social media group for Hongkongers in the UK. It was already a tense time to be an immigrant. Rioters, propelled by false claims online that the man who had murdered children in Southport was an asylum seeker, were descending on hotels housing refugees, trying to burn them alive. The message alerted the Hongkongers to posts on far-right channels suggesting some new targets. “They all help refugees who come to the UK to take resources,” one of them read. When Finn…
China and Philippines display competing flags on disputed South China Sea sandbank
China and the Philippines have displayed their national flags in competing photo opportunities on a disputed sandbank in the South China sea, ratcheting up longstanding regional tensions between the two countries. The dispute played out at Sandy Cay, which is part of the disputed Spratly Islands, and comes days after the US and the Philippines launched their annual joint military drills called “Balikatan”, or “shoulder to shoulder”, which this year will include an integrated air and missile defence simulation for the first time. The latest confrontation appears to have begun…
US treasury secretary says ‘there is a path’ with China over tariff negotiations
The US treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, said “there is a path” to an agreement with China over tariffs after he had interactions with his Chinese counterparts last week in Washington. “I had interaction with my Chinese counterparts, but it was more on the traditional things like financial stability, global economic early warnings,” Bessent told ABC News’s This Week on Sunday, explaining that he spoke to the Chinese during International Monetary Fund meetings in Washington. “I don’t know if President Trump has spoken with President Xi,” he added. On Friday, President…
Chongqing, the world’s largest city – in pictures
The largest city in the world is as big as Austria, but few people have ever heard of it. The megacity of 34 million people in central of China is the emblem of the fastest urban revolution on the planet. The Communist party decided 30 years ago to unify and populate vast rural areas, an experiment that has become a symbol of the Chinese ability to reshape the world The Guardian
Taiwan cracks down on holders of Chinese ID amid fears over propaganda and espionage
Taiwan has launched a crackdown on holders of illegal Chinese identity documents, revoking the Taiwanese status of more than 20 people and putting tens of thousands of Chinese-born residents under scrutiny. Under Taiwan law it is illegal for Taiwanese people to hold Chinese identity documents. In the past decade, hundreds of people have had their Taiwanese papers or passports cancelled for also holding Chinese ID, effectively revoking their citizenship. But a renewed hunt for dual ID-holders has drawn controversy after the public expulsion of three women and threats to the…
Trump administration investigating California university over foreign gifts
The Trump administration launched an investigation into the University of California, Berkeley, on Friday centered on foreign funding, making it the latest university to be targeted by the federal government. The investigation revives criticism from several years ago about the university’s partnership with China’s Tsinghua University. It comes after Donald Trump earlier this week signed a series of executive orders focused on universities that he views as liberal adversaries to his political agenda. One order called for harder enforcement of Section 117, a federal law requiring colleges to disclose foreign…
Xi announces plan for Chinese economy to counter impact of US trade war
Xi Jinping has announced a plan to counter China’s continuing economic problems and the impact of the US trade war, as reports swirl that it could drop tariffs on some US products, including semiconductors. Friday’s meeting of the politburo was convened to discuss China’s economic situation, which since the pandemic has faced difficulties fuelled by a housing sector crisis, youth unemployment, and Donald Trump’s tariffs on all Chinese exports. A readout of the meeting published by the official state media outlet, Xinhua, said China’s economy had showed a “positive trend”…