The British foreign secretary James Cleverly has met China’s vice-president, Han Zheng, during the first visit to Beijing by a UK foreign secretary in five years. During the meeting, Cleverly said it was important the two governments continued with regular face-to-face meetings to avoid misunderstandings. He also said it was important to address the challenges and differences of opinion that all countries had in bilateral relations, according to Reuters. Han said he hoped the bilateral relationship would make new advances through mutual respect and practical cooperation. On Wednesday afternoon, Cleverly…
Tag: UK news
The London art student whose Chinese political slogan mural caused a storm
When Wang Hanzheng, a Chinese student at the Royal College of Art, attended a graduate show in a warehouse on Brick Lane in east London in July, he found the space crowded, unimaginative and unfit for presenting art. It was with this in mind that at 11pm one night earlier this month Wang and a team of 22 others painted a Chinese political slogan in bold red characters along a nearby wall stretching nearly 100 metres. The artwork – which spelled out the Chinese government’s “socialist core values”, including the…
UK should take China to task on human rights and Taiwan, MPs say
Britain must take a tougher stance on China over its severe human rights abuses and help Taiwan build its defences to deter a potential attack from Beijing, an influential group of MPs says. With the foreign secretary, James Cleverly, scheduled to land in China on Wednesday for a first official visit in five years, a report from the foreign affairs select committee says ministers have to call out the country’s transnational repression. China’s behaviour is a threat to world security that cannot be ignored, it says. The Chinese Communist party…
UK foreign secretary to challenge China over support for Russia in Ukraine war
The UK foreign secretary, James Cleverly, will challenge Chinese officials in Beijing on Wednesday over their growing military support for Russia, but is intent that his meetings are seen as the renewal of a political dialogue that eventually revives UK trade with China. Before the meetings, he said no major international issue could be solved without China but added that the country had to live up to its international commitments and obligations. No significant global problem – from climate change to pandemic prevention, from economic instability to nuclear proliferation –…
How can the US and China prevent a war? | Nouriel Roubini
The US and China remain on a collision course. The new cold war between them may eventually turn hot over the issue of Taiwan. The “Thucydides trap” – in which a rising power seems destined to clash with an incumbent hegemon – looms ominously. But a serious escalation of Sino-American tensions, let alone a war, can still be avoided, sparing the world the cataclysmic consequences that would inevitably follow. There will always be at least some tensions when a rising power challenges the prevailing global power. But China is facing…
China wants to erase Tibet. Will Britain stay quiet about this crime? | Simon Tisdall
Last week’s US sanctioning of Chinese officials involved in Beijing’s ongoing criminal efforts to erase Tibet as a separate political, ethnic, cultural, linguistic and religious entity showed America at its best. Few other governments give a hoot. Most cravenly look the other way. Citing a recent UN report on the “forced assimilation” of one million Tibetan children ordered into Mandarin-language state boarding schools far from their homes and families, Antony Blinken, the US secretary of state, demanded China stop trying to eradicate Tibet’s distinct identity. “We urge PRC [People’s Republic…
A US growth-inflation ‘soft landing’ is vital to solving the global economy puzzle | Mohamed El-Erian
The global economy this year is full of puzzling surprises. Japan’s GDP growth is currently surpassing that of China, and July retail sales in the US were double the consensus forecast, despite the US Federal Reserve pursuing one of the most concentrated rate-hiking cycles in decades. In the UK, wage growth has risen to an annualised rate of 7.8% and core inflation has remained high, even after 14 consecutive rate increases by the Bank of England (with more to come). Meanwhile, Brazil and Chile have cut interest rates, diverging from…
China’s economic model is faltering – does it have the political will to fix it? | George Magnus
The long days of summer are proving to be rather too long for the government in Beijing. In an attempt to stabilise the faltering real estate market, the authorities announced earlier this week a modest decline in interest rates that was underwhelming in scale and intent. Those who recall the bad old days in which the west was buffeted by successive crises such as those involving Northern Rock, Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers will recognise the futility of lower interest rates in stemming systemic problems in real estate and finance…
Chinese economic slowdown is a result of debt supercycle | Kenneth Rogoff
The 2008 financial crisis in the US kicked off a debt supercycle, which spread to Europe in 2010 and has recently engulfed many of the world’s low-income and lower-middle-income countries. Could the debt woes of Country Garden, the behemoth Chinese real estate developer now facing billions of dollars in losses, augur the cycle’s next turn? The answer remains unclear. While the Chinese authorities have a remarkable track record when it comes to containing economic crises, the challenges posed by a significant growth slowdown, combined with high debt levels – especially…
China cuts key interest rate amid economic slowdown
China’s central bank has cut one of its key lending rates but left another unchanged, surprising economists who had expected more forceful action to support economic growth amid widespread concerns over its path. The world’s second-largest economy is in the midst of a slowdown, and has slipped into deflation with prices falling year on year as slowing domestic spending weighs on the country’s post-Covid economic recovery. The Chinese property industry is also in crisis, as the slowdown exposes overextended developers. Evergrande Group, once China’s leading property developer, filed for bankruptcy…