The former Australian prime minister Scott Morrison will testify at a US House panel hearing next week about countering China’s “economic coercion against democracies,” the committee said on Friday. Rahm Emanuel, the former US ambassador to Japan, will also testify before the House select committee on China. Relations with China, already rocky after Australia banned Huawei from its 5G broadband network in 2018, cooled further in 2020 after the Morrison government called for an independent investigation into the origins of the Covid-19 virus. China responded by imposing tariffs on Australian…
Tag: US news
Apple inks $500m deal for rare earth magnets with US mining firm
Apple has signed a $500m deal with a US firm for rare earth magnets, essential for manufacturing electronics, after China curbed exports of the scarce, vital materials. The backing from one of the world’s most valuable companies comes after MP Materials, which operates the only US rare earths mine, last week agreed to a multibillion-dollar deal with the US Department of Defense that will see the Pentagon become its largest shareholder. Both deals are aimed at mitigating supply chain risks after China limited the outgoing supply of rare earths earlier…
Trump permits Nvidia to sell advanced chips in China, CEO says
Nvidia’s CEO, Jensen Huang, says the chipmaker has won approval from the Trump administration to sell its advanced computer chips used to develop artificial intelligence to China. “Today, I’m announcing that the US government has approved for us filing licenses to start shipping H20s,” Huang told reporters in Beijing. The news came in a company blog post late on Monday. “The US government has assured Nvidia that licenses will be granted, and Nvidia hopes to start deliveries soon,” the post said. Huang also spoke about the coup on China’s state-run…
Rare earths: how these critical minerals impact Australian industry and global politics – video
What do tariffs, Australian mining, geopolitics and the trade war between China and the US have to do with tiny magnets made from rare earth minerals like yttrium and scandium? Guardian Australia’s Matilda Boseley explains China has a stranglehold on the world’s rare-earths supply chain. Can Australia break it? Commonwealth to invest a further $200m in rare earth mining project backed by Gina Rinehart Continue reading… The Guardian
Trump to start TikTok sale talks with China, he says, with deal ‘pretty much’ reached
Donald Trump has said he will start talking to China on Monday or Tuesday about a possible TikTok deal. The United States president said the US “pretty much” had a deal on the sale of the TikTok short-video app. “I think we’re gonna start Monday or Tuesday … talking to China – perhaps President Xi or one of his representatives – but we would, we pretty much have a deal,” Trump told reporters on Air Force One on Friday. Trump also said he might visit Xi Jinping in China or…
Here we go again: latest Trump tariff deadline looms amid inflation concerns
When Donald Trump unveiled his “liberation day” tariffs in the spring, only to pull the plug days later as panic tore through global markets, his officials scrambled to present the climbdown as temporary. Three months of frenetic talks would enable the Trump administration to strike dozens of trade agreements with countries across the world, they claimed. “We’re going to run,” the White House trade adviser Peter Navarro told Fox Business Network. “Ninety deals in 90 days is possible.” The 90-day pause Trump ordered on his steep tariffs is almost up,…
Albanese heads to China as Trump upends the global order. The PM may wish he lived in less interesting times | Tom McIlroy
Anthony Albanese watched on from the opposition benches when Xi Jinping addressed a joint sitting of federal parliament back in 2014. In Australia for the G20 summit, and hosted by Tony Abbott, China’s president told MPs he had visited the country five times over 30 years, spending time in every state and territory. Xi said the friendship between Australia and China would be as “strong and everlasting” as Uluru and the Great Wall of China. As he prepares to meet Xi later this month, Albanese may be forgiven for wishing…
Former UK civil service chief calls Xi Jinping a ‘dictator’ over plans to reunify Taiwan
The former head of the UK’s civil service has described the Chinese leader Xi Jinping as a “dictator” and said Donald Trump had put “helpful pressure” on Europe to increase defence spending. Simon Case, who served as the cabinet secretary until December, when he stepped down on health grounds, said China had sent a clear message to “prepare for serious conflict” in Taiwan. The UK has committed to spend the equivalent of 2.6% of GDP in 2027, and it and other Nato members have signed up to increasing spending to…
‘A billion people backing you’: China transfixed as Musk turns against Trump
Few break-ups have as many gossiping observers as the fallout between the once inseparable Donald Trump and Elon Musk. The ill-fated bromance between the US president and the world’s richest man, which once raised questions about American oligarchy, is now being pored over by social media users in China, many of whom are Team Musk. The latest drama comes from Musk’s pledge to found a new political party, the America party, if Trump’s sweeping tax and spending bill, which Musk described as “insane” passed the Senate this week (it did).…
US attacks on Iran redraw calculus of use of force for allies and rivals around globe
For US allies and rivals around the world, Donald Trump’s strikes on Iran have redrawn the calculus of the White House’s readiness to use force in the kind of direct interventions that the president said he would make a thing of the past under his isolationist “America First” foreign policy. From Russia and China to Europe and across the global south, the president’s decision to launch the largest strategic bombing strike in US history indicates a White House that is ready to employ force abroad – but reluctantly and under…