Tag: Communist Party of China

As Pandas Leave D.C., Is Panda Diplomacy Over?

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The two adult pandas, Mei Xiang and Tian Tian, and their 3-year-old cub, Xiao Qi Ji, are scheduled to be loaded into crates that day and driven in trucks to a FedEx Boeing 777 called the Panda Express. They will then be flown 19 hours from Dulles International Airport to China, where they will join about 150 other pandas in a lush nature preserve in the misty mountains of Sichuan Province. And with that, an era of panda diplomacy will end, at least for now. It began when Patricia Nixon,…

China’s Male Leaders Push to Get Women to Stay Home for Family

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At China’s top political gathering for women, it was mostly a man who was seen and heard. Xi Jinping, the country’s leader, sat center stage at the opening of the National Women’s Congress. A close-up of him at the Congress was splashed on the front page of the Chinese Communist Party’s newspaper the next day. From the head of a large round table, Mr. Xi lectured female delegates at the closing meeting on Monday. “We should actively foster a new type of marriage and childbearing culture,” he said in a…

Antisemitism Surges in China Online and in State Media

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Hu Xijin, an influential commentator and a former editor in chief of Global Times, a Communist Party newspaper, responded to hawkish statements from an Israeli minister directed at Hezbollah, the powerful militia in Lebanon, writing on Chinese social media: “Oh, calm down, Israel. I’m worried you’ll wipe the Earth out of the solar system.” At times, the anti-Israel comments took on a nationalist tone. In a widely viewed post, an influencer with 2.9 million followers on the Chinese social media platform Weibo said that he would opt to call Hamas…

Biden Hosts China’s Top Diplomat Ahead of Expected Xi Meeting

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President Biden met with China’s top diplomat on Friday to prepare for Mr. Biden’s planned meeting with President Xi Jinping next month as relations remain strained between Washington and Beijing. Amid cordial talk of cooperation between the United States and China, the official, Wang Yi, wrapped up a visit to Washington. During the three-day trip, the diplomat also met twice with Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken and with Mr. Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan. In all, the meetings lasted about 10 hours, U.S. officials said. Mr. Wang’s trip…

Li Keqiang, Former Chinese Premier, Dies of Heart Attack at 68

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China’s former premier Li Keqiang died of a heart attack on Friday, Chinese state media announced — an abruptly early end to a leader who had served alongside Xi Jinping for a decade until March. Mr. Li, 68, was visiting Shanghai when he suddenly suffered the heart failure near midnight on Thursday, a report on Chinese state television said. “All efforts to resuscitate him failed,” said the report. Mr. Li was once considered a potential top leader of the ruling Chinese Communist Party. But in the end, he was overtaken…

Gavin Newsom, on Climate Mission to China, Meets With Xi Jinping

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Gavin Newsom, the governor of California, met with China’s leader, Xi Jinping, in Beijing on Wednesday, according to the Chinese state media, as part of an ambitious weeklong mission to negotiate climate partnerships. The two-term Democratic governor wants California to set an aggressive pace for the United States — and the world — to cut carbon emissions that are dangerously heating the planet. Mr. Newsom’s moves to tackle the climate crisis have elevated his national profile, just as he is widely believed to be preparing for a White House run…

China Dismisses Defense Minister Amid Swirl of Speculation

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Just four months ago, China’s defense minister, Gen. Li Shangfu, was at a forum for regional officials in Singapore, serving as the face of his country’s bold vision for reshaping Asia’s balance of power. He cast China as a force for stability and accused the United States of stirring trouble in the region, suggesting that its leaders should “mind your own business.” Now, General Li has been dismissed after nearly two months out of public view — the latest example of China’s capricious rules of power under the strongman leader…

Across U.S., Chinese Bitcoin Mines Draw National Security Scrutiny

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When a company with Chinese origins broke ground last year on a crypto-mining operation in Cheyenne, Wyo., a team at Microsoft that assesses national security threats sounded the alarm. Not only was the site next door to a Microsoft data center that supported the Pentagon — it was about a mile away from an Air Force base that controlled nuclear-armed intercontinental ballistic missiles. The location could allow the Chinese to “pursue full-spectrum intelligence collection operations,” the Microsoft team wrote in an August 2022 report to the Committee on Foreign Investment…

Xi-Schumer Meeting Raises Hopes of Smoother U.S.-China Relations

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China’s top leader, Xi Jinping, met with Senator Chuck Schumer, the majority leader, in Beijing on Monday and expressed hopes of “peaceful coexistence” between China and the United States, even as escalating violence in the Middle East threatens to deepen a wedge between the two powers. “We have 1,000 reasons to make China-U.S. relations work well and not a single reason to make China-U.S. relations bad,” Mr. Xi said while meeting with the Democratic senator from New York. Mr. Xi’s amicable tone is likely to increase expectations that he will…

Here’s What to Know About Tensions Over Tibetan Buddhism

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Tibetan Buddhism has long been led by the Dalai Lama, the 88-year-old spiritual leader who fled Tibet in 1959 and has been living in exile in India ever since. Beijing considers the Dalai Lama a separatist and asserts that only the ruling Communist Party — an avowed atheist organization — can name his next incarnation and those of other high lamas. By seeking to control the religion’s leadership, China hopes it can all but erase the Dalai Lama’s influence in Tibet and any challenges to the party’s rule. As the…