WASHINGTON — “I love you, China. My dear mother,” former U.S. President Donald Trump, standing in front of a mic at a lectern, appears to sing in perfect Mandarin.

“I cry for you, and I also feel proud for you,” Vice President Kamala Harris, Trump’s Democratic opponent in this year’s election, appears to respond, also in perfect Mandarin. Trump lets out a smile as he listens to the lyric.

The video has received thousands of likes and tens of thousands of reposts on Douyin, China’s variation of TikTok.

“These two are almost as Chinese as it gets,” one comment says.

Neither Trump nor Harris knows Mandarin. And the duet shown in the video has never happened. But recently, deepfake videos, frequently featuring top U.S. leaders, including President Joe Biden, singing Chinese pop songs, have gone viral on the Chinese internet.

Some of the videos have found their way to social media platforms not available in China, such as Instagram, TikTok and X.

U.S. intelligence officials and experts have long warned about how China and other foreign adversaries have been implementing generative AI in their disinformation effort to disrupt and influence the 2024 presidential election.

“There has been an increased use of Chinese AI-generated content in recent months, attempting to influence and sow division in the U.S. and elsewhere,” a Microsoft report on China’s disinformation threat said in April.

Few of the people who saw the videos of the American leaders singing in Chinese, however, were convinced that they were real, based on what users wrote in the comments. The videos themselves do not contain misinformation, either.

Instead, these videos and their popularity reflect, at least in part, a sense of cultural confidence in Chinese netizens in the age of perpetually intensifying U.S.-China competitions, observers told VOA Mandarin.

By making the likes of Biden and Trump sing whatever Chinese songs the creators of the videos want them to sing, they can “culturally domesticate powerful Americans,” said Alexa Pan, a researcher on China’s AI industry for ChinaTalk, an influential newsletter about China and technology.

“Making fun of U.S. leaders might be especially politically acceptable to and popular with Chinese viewers,” she said.

Political opponents sing about friendship

Videos of American leaders singing in Chinese started to spread on Chinese social media in May. In many of the videos featuring Biden and Trump, creators made the two politically opposed men sing songs about friendship.

After Biden announced his withdrawal from the presidential race in July, one viral video had him sing to Trump, “Actually I don’t want to leave. Actually, I want to stay. I want to stay with you through every spring, summer, autumn and winter,” to which Trump appeared to sing, “You have to believe me. It won’t take long before we can spend our whole life together.”

“Crying eyes,” one Chinese netizen commented sarcastically. “They must have gotten along really well.”

Another such video posted on Instagram received mostly positive reactions. Some users said it was a stark contrast to the bitterness that has permeated U.S. politics.

“Made me laugh,” an Instagram user wrote. “Wouldn’t that be so refreshing to actually have them sing like that together?”

Easy to make

After reviewing some of the videos, Pan, of ChinaTalk, told VOA Mandarin that she believes they were quite easy to make.

Obvious flaws in the videos, including body parts occasionally blending into the background, suggest they were created with simple AI technology, Pan said.

“One could generate these videos on the many AI text-to-video generation platforms available in China,” she wrote in an e-mail.

On the Chinese internet, there are countless tutorials on how to make AI-generated videos using popular lip-syncing AI models, such as MuseTalk, released by Chinese tech giant Tencent, and SadTalker, developed by Xi’an Jiaotong University, a research-focused university in northwestern China.

One Douyin account reviewed by VOA Mandarin has pumped out over 200 videos of American leaders singing in Chinese since May. One of the account’s videos was even reposted by the Iranian embassy.

Chinese leaders off-limits

The release of ChatGPT by OpenAI in 2022 has triggered a global AI frenzy, with China being one of the leading countries developing the technology. The United Nations said in July that China had requested the most patents on generative AI, with the U.S. being a distant second.

On the Chinese internet, the obsession has been particularly strong with deepfakes, which can be used to manipulate videos, images and audio of people to make them appear to say or sing things that they have not actually uttered.

Some deepfake videos are made mostly for fun, such is the case with Biden and Trump singing Chinese songs. But there have also been abuses of the technology. Earlier this year, web users in China stole a Ukrainian girl’s image and turned her into a “Russian beauty” to sell goods online.

 China has released strict regulations on deepfakes. A 2022 law states that the technology cannot be used to “endanger the national security and interests, harm the image of the nation, harm the societal public interest, disturb economic or social order, or harm the lawful rights and interests of others.”

Yang Han, an Australian commentator who used to work for China’s Foreign Ministry, told VOA Mandarin that the prominence of U.S leaders and the absence of Chinese leaders in these viral AI videos reflects a lack of political free speech in China.

He said that it reminds him of a joke that former U.S. President Ronald Reagan used to tell during the Cold War.

“An American and a Russian compare with each other whose country has more freedom,” Yang said, relaying the joke. “The American says he can stand in front of the White House and call Reagan stupid. The Russian dismisses it and says he can also stand in front of the Kremlin and call Reagan stupid.”
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WASHINGTON — On Monday, after the U.S. State Department announced the release of David Lin, an American pastor, from nearly two decades of imprisonment in China, officials said more work remains to secure the freedom of other Americans held in China. 

U.S. State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller told reporters that the U.S. government had been working to secure Lin’s release for some time. 

“When it comes to David Lin, we are glad to see he is released. We welcome it. We’ll continue to push the release of other Americans,” Miller said during a regular press briefing.

Lin, 68, was detained in 2006 after entering China. He was later convicted of contract fraud and given a life sentence in 2009. After Chinese courts reduced his sentence, he was set to be released from Beijing in 2029.

Bob Fu, a pastor and founder of ChinaAid, a nonprofit dedicated to religious freedom in China, called the original charges against Lin a “scam” and said they were facilitated by the Chinese government as a gambit to unjustly take hostages.

The imprisonment and now release of Lin, Fu told VOA, is especially significant as China is increasingly cracking down on religious practices within the country, with human rights violations in Xinjiang and Tibet and growing governmental restrictions on Christian traditions. 

Despite this, Fu said that the success of Lin’s release could be attributed to two factors: the souring of the global public opinion on China and the hard work of U.S. officials.

“This shows that if our top political leaders really take this seriously and persistently, it will bear fruits for our citizens’ freedom,” he said.

According to the Dui Hua Foundation, a nonprofit dedicated to freeing detainees through dialogue with China, over 200 American nationals in China under coercive measures, including wrongful detentions and exit bans.

The State Department has listed two other detained individuals as priority cases: Businessman Kai Li, accused of espionage in 2016, and Mark Swidan, convicted of drug trafficking in 2019.

“We’ll continue to push the release of other Americans,” Miller said. “It’s something that we have been working on for some time.”

Miller declined to say if Lin’s release had been the result of a swap, according to a report by Reuters.

China’s embassy in Washington declined to comment when asked if Beijing had received anything from the U.S. in return for Lin’s release, according to Reuters. The embassy also told Reuters that Chinese authorities handle criminal suspects in accordance with the law and “treat them equally regardless of their nationality.”

Later this week, a U.S. congressional hearing is set to be held on Americans who have been arbitrarily imprisoned in China.

Some material for this report came from Reuters.
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HONG KONG — A Hong Kong man on Monday pleaded guilty to sedition for wearing a T-shirt with a protest slogan, becoming the first person convicted under the city’s new national security law passed in March.

Chu Kai-pong, 27, pleaded guilty to one count of “doing with a seditious intention an act.”

Under the new security law, the maximum sentence for the offense has been expanded from two years to seven years in prison and could even go up to 10 years if “collusion with foreign forces” was found involved.

Chu was arrested on June 12 at a MTR station wearing a T-shirt with the slogan “Liberate Hong Kong, revolution of our times” and a yellow mask printed with “FDNOL”- the shorthand of another slogan, “five demands, not one less.”

Both slogans were frequently chanted in the huge, sometimes violent, pro-democracy protests in 2019 and June 12 was a key kick-off day of the months-long unrests.

Chu told police that he wore the T-shirt to remind people of the protests, the court heard.

Chief Magistrate Victor So, handpicked by the city leader John Lee to hear national security cases, adjourned the case to Thursday for sentencing.

Hong Kong was returned from Britain to China in 1997 under Beijing’s promise of guaranteeing its freedoms, including freedom of speech, would be protected under a “one country, two systems” formula.

Beijing imposed a national security law in 2020 punishing secession, subversion, terrorism or collusion with foreign forces with up to life in prison, after the months-long protests in the financial hub.

In March 2024, Hong Kong passed a second new security law, a home-grown ordinance also known as “Article 23” according to its parent provision in the city’s mini constitution, the Basic Law.

Critics, including the U.S. government have expressed concerns over the new security law and said the vaguely defined provisions regarding “sedition” could be used to curb dissent.

Hong Kong and Chinese officials have said it was necessary to plug “loopholes” in the national security regime.
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BANGKOK — Military leaders from the U.S. and China met in Beijing for routine talks that only resumed in January after being suspended for two years as ties between the two countries soured. The meetings ended Sunday and officials discussed ongoing issues such as Taiwan, the Russia-Ukraine war and clashes in the South China Sea.

Michael Chase, deputy assistant secretary of defense for China, Taiwan and Mongolia led a delegation to engage in the bilateral Defense Policy Coordination Talks, which were last held in January. While the talks weren’t expected to resolve long-standing differences in stances over issues ranging from South China Sea claims to Taiwan, the U.S. has continued to push for the discussions to avoid conflict.

The meetings were held after Chase attended the Xiangshan forum in Beijing, a defense forum that is China’s answer to the Shangri-La Dialogue.

Communication between the two militaries broke off in 2021, as U.S.-China tensions ratcheted up over widening differences on issues such as Taiwan’s sovereignty, the origin of COVID-19 and economic issues.

Beijing has ignored U.S. requests to engage in the past, especially over intercepts between U.S. and Chinese aircraft and ships. While communications resumed after U.S. President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping met in San Francisco last November, it is unclear whether the talks could continue as the U.S. is poised for a presidential election.

In the bilateral talks, the two sides discussed China’s support for Russia during the ongoing Ukraine war, as well as China’s actions in the South China Sea, said a U.S. senior defense official briefing reporters on the meetings. On Sunday, the Philippine ship at a disputed shoal, BRP Teresa Magbanua, had left to resupply and provide medical care to its crew members. The defense official said that they were “watching further developments there very closely.”

China’s claims over the South China Sea have become increasingly assertive, with increasing clashes with the Philippine coast guard. In August, both sides accused each other over a collision between their ships which left gaping holes in the Philippine ships.

The maritime claims have meant clashes at sea, such as at the Sabina Shoal, which both China and the Philippines claim. China had blocked attempts to resupply the BRP Teresa Magbanua, in August, with a force of 40 ships.

The Philippines said it would replace the ship immediately, but the departure of the ship raises questions of whether China would seize the shoal. Filipino scientists had previously found submerged piles of crushed corals in its shallows, leading to concern that China may be preparing to build a structure to stake its claim.

China confirmed the departure of the ship, which it said, “infringed on China’s territorial sovereignty.”

“During this period, China had taken control measures against the ship in accordance with the law and multiple attempts by the Philippine side to forcibly resupply the ship had failed,” China Coast Guard spokesperson Liu Dejun said in a statement.
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BEIJING — At Beijing’s largest antiques market, Panjiayuan, among the Mao statues, posters and second-hand books are prominent signs warning against the sale of publications that might have state secrets or “reactionary propaganda.”

Some of the signs display a hotline number so that citizens can tip off authorities if they witness an illegal sale.

China’s antique and flea markets were once a gold mine of documents for historians, but now the signs are emblematic of the chill that has descended on their ability to do research in the country.

On one hand, Beijing wants to increase academic exchange and President Xi Jinping last November invited 50,000 American students to China over the next five years — a massive jump from about 800 currently.

How much steam that will gather is very much an open question. But scholars of modern Chinese history in particular — arguably among the people most interested in China – fear that tightened censorship is extinguishing avenues for independent research into the country’s past.

This is especially so for documents relating to the 1966-76 Cultural Revolution — the most historically sensitive period for the Chinese Communist Party — when Mao Zedong declared class war and plunged China into chaos and violence.

“I would say the period of going to flea markets and simply finding treasure troves is pretty much over,” said Daniel Leese, a modern China historian at the University of Freiburg.

Trawling for documents “has basically gone out of favor because it has simply become too complex, difficult and dangerous,” he said, adding that younger foreign scholars are increasingly relying on overseas collections.

The Chinese Communist Party has exerted control over all publications including books, the media and the internet since establishing the People’s Republic of China (PRC) in 1949, with the degree of censorship fluctuating over time.

But censorship has only intensified under President Xi Jinping, who came to power in 2012 and has blamed “historic nihilism” or versions of history that differ from the official accounts for causing the collapse of the Soviet Union.

In recent years, a raft of new national security and anti-espionage legislation has made scholars even more wary of citing unofficial Chinese materials.

Some scholars of modern Chinese history who have published studies that either challenged Chinese state narratives or are on sensitive topics say they have been denied visas to China.

James Millward, a historian at Georgetown University, said he had been visa-blocked on several occasions after contributing to the 2004 book Xinjiang: China’s Muslim Borderland but has since received short-term visas a few times albeit after a lengthy process.

The political climate is also shaping how historians choose their research subjects. One historian based in the U.S. said he has chosen to work on non-controversial topics to maintain travel access to China. He declined to be identified due to the sensitivity of the issue.

China’s education ministry did not respond to a Reuters request for comment. The foreign ministry said it was unaware of relevant circumstances.

Documentary discoveries

Leese and other foreign historians say they previously found case files of persecuted intellectuals as well as secret Communist Party documents at Chinese flea and antique markets.

These were often donated by relatives of deceased officials or painstakingly rescued by booksellers from recycling centers near government offices disbanded during the mass state sector layoffs of the 1990s.

But the government has, since 2008, cracked down on flea markets and other sources of used books and documents. Buyers have been arrested, sellers have been fined and used book websites have been cleared of politically sensitive items, according to domestic media reports, collectors and four overseas researchers who spoke with Reuters.

In 2019, for example, a Japanese historian was detained for two months on spying charges after buying 1930s books on the Sino-Japanese War from a second-hand bookshop.

Two years later, a hobbyist accused of selling illegal publications from Hong Kong and Taiwan publishers on Kongfuzi, China’s biggest website for used books, was fined 280,000 yuan ($39,000) for not having a business license, Chinese media reported.

And this year, two workers at a recycling center were punished for selling confidential military documents, state media said.

Buyers now cultivate personal relationships with merchants who sell through WeChat, said a Beijing-based collector interested in documents from the Cultural Revolution, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Historians also note that access to the vast majority of local government archives has been restricted since 2010 and their digitization has enabled censors to heavily redact them.

Foreign-based historians add that their counterparts in mainland China can only preserve materials for posterity in the current political climate. But not all are downbeat.

“Even under Xi, Chinese scholars continue to seek openings and enlarge the understanding and interpretation of PRC history,” said Yi Lu, assistant history professor at Dartmouth College, who has worked extensively with Chinese university collections of 20th-century materials. “All is not lost.”
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TOKYO — Japan and the United States should avoid confrontation about the steel industry and work together amid competition from China, the world’s top steelmaker, leading prime ministerial candidate Shinjiro Koizumi said Saturday.

Sources told Reuters Friday that a powerful U.S. national security panel reviewing Nippon Steel’s $14.9 billion bid for U.S. Steel faces a September 23 deadline to recommend whether the White House should block the deal.

Koizumi, Japan’s former environment minister, said at a debate Saturday that Japan and the U.S. should not confront each other when it comes to the steel industry but to face together the “shared challenge” coming from China’s steel industry.

“If China, producing cheap steel without renewable or clean energy, floods the global market, it will most adversely affect us, the democratic countries playing by fair market rules,” Koizumi said.

Nippon Steel’s key negotiator on the deal, Vice Chairman Takahiro Mori, said last month that his company and other Japanese steelmakers were urging Tokyo to consider curbing cheap steel imports coming from China to protect the local market.

On Sunday, Nippon Steel and U.S. Steel sent a letter to U.S. President Joe Biden about their deal, as Biden, Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris and Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump have all opposed the merger.

“We are also in the midst of elections, just like the U.S., and during elections, various ideas may arise. Overreacting to each of these would, in my view, call into question diplomatic judgment,” Koizumi said when asked about the deal.

Sanae Takaichi, Japan’s minister in charge of economic security and another prime ministerial candidate, also defended the deal during the same debate attended by eight other Liberal Democratic Party’s, or LDP, leadership contenders Saturday.

“It appears they are using CFIUS to frame this as an economic security issue,” she said,  referring to the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States. “However, Japan and the U.S. are allies, and the steel industry is about strengthening our combined resilience.”

The 43-year-old son of former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, the junior Koizumi, is seen as a leading contender in the September 27 race to pick the LDP’s new leader, who will become the next prime minister due to the party’s control of parliament.

Koizumi said Saturday that he would seek a dialog with the North Korean leadership to resolve the issue over the abduction of Japanese citizens kidnapped by North Korean agents in the 1970s and 1980s. The purported primary goal was to train North Korean agents to impersonate Japanese people.

“We want to explore new opportunities for dialog between people of the same generation, without being bound by conventional approaches, and without preconditions,” Koizumi said.

After admitting in 2002 that it had abducted 13 Japanese, North Korea apologized and allowed five to return home. It said eight others had died and denied that an additional four entered its territory. It promised to reinvestigate but has never announced the results.

Japan says North Korea has refused to send the others home because of concern that they might reveal inconvenient information about the country.
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Washington — The United States Navy’s elite SEAL Team Six would likely have a limited role in defending Taiwan should China invade the self-governing and democratic island, say analysts responding to a Financial Times report that the unit has been training for it for more than one year.

Lyle J. Morris, senior fellow for foreign policy and national security at the Asia Society Policy Institute’s Center for China Analysis, tells VOA Mandarin if the unit is indeed preparing for an attack by Beijing, it may indicate that the U.S. is more deeply involved in defending Taiwan than previously thought.

However, he stressed that the secret and precise combat characteristics of SEAL Team Six mean its role in resisting China’s invasion of Taiwan would be very limited, and the focus would be on carrying out special tasks.

“As far as their sheer capability to repel an invasion. I think that’s more limited,” he says. “I think it’s in a very discreet, narrow way of coming in for a specific task that Taiwan might need, whether it’s helping to protect, let’s say, an airfield in Taiwan or protect a communication asset in Taiwan, in Taipei, they could come in and out very discreetly and very lethally to protect that asset.”

SEAL Team Six specializes in performing sensitive, highly difficult missions. In 2009, the unit rescued Richard Phillips, captain of the MV Maersk Alabama, who was taken hostage by Somali pirates.

The elite unit gained an international reputation after the successful raid on al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden’s compound in Pakistan in 2011.

It is one of the most highly regarded U.S. military units, along with the United States Army’s Delta Force, the 75th Ranger Regiment’s Regimental Reconnaissance Company, the Intelligence Support Activity, and the Air Force’s 24th Special Tactics Squadron, and part of the Joint Special Operations Command.

“Navy SEALs usually deployed from submarines or, most likely, small ships. And are useful for targeting vulnerabilities in enemies’ presentation,” Richard D. Fisher Jr., senior fellow with the International Assessment and Strategy Center, tells VOA.

Analysts say the U.S. military likely revealed the SEAL Team Six training program to the Financial Times to send a warning to Beijing amid China’s increasingly assertive moves in the region.

“This is one way the U.S. is bolstering deterrence towards China, towards preventing a Chinese invasion of Taiwan,” says Morris. “So, I think this is just an added factor getting China to second guess or to reconsider what it will face if it were to invade Taiwan.”

Dennis Wilder, a senior fellow for the Initiative for U.S.-China Dialogue on Global Issues at Georgetown University and a former Central Intelligence Agency military analyst, posted on social media platform X, “It is sure to get under Beijing’s skin.”

In a written response to VOA Mandarin, Liu Pengyu, the spokesperson of the Chinese Embassy in Washington, D.C., said, “The Taiwan question is the very core of China’s core interests and the first red line that must not be crossed in the China-U.S. relationship.”

He urged “the U.S. to earnestly abide by the one-China principle and the three China-U.S. joint communiqués, stop enhancing military contact with the Taiwan region or arming it by any means or under whatever pretext, stop creating factors that could heighten tensions in the Taiwan Strait, and stop conniving at and supporting the separatists’ attempt to seek ‘Taiwan independence’ by force.”

Taiwan split from China during the civil war that saw the Communist Party seize power in Beijing in 1949 and the Nationalist Party flee to the island, which developed into a flourishing democracy. But China’s one-party, authoritarian state never gave up its claim to Taiwan and considers it a renegade province that must one day reunite with the mainland, by force if necessary.

Admiral Philips Davidson, former commander of the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, warned in 2021 that China could attack Taiwan within six years. President Joe Biden has repeatedly stressed that if China invades Taiwan, the U.S. will intervene militarily to defend it.

The U.S. Department of Defense declined to confirm or deny the Financial Times report. Pentagon spokesperson John Supple said in an email to VOA, “The DoD and our service members prepare and train for a wide range of contingencies. We will not comment on specifics, but will restate that we are committed to our longstanding one China policy, guided by the Taiwan Relations Act, the Three Joint Communiques, and the Six Assurances. As we have said before, conflict is neither imminent nor inevitable.”

America’s one-China policy is a strategically ambiguous agreement it made in 1972 to establish relations with China that recognizes Beijing as the only government of China and acknowledges, but does not endorse, Beijing’s claim that Taiwan is part of China.

Washington has unofficial relations with Taiwan defined through the Taiwan Relations Act, the Three Joint Communiques with Beijing, and the Six Assurances with Taipei, which underscore U.S. opposition to attempts to unilaterally alter the status quo and determination to help Taiwan defend itself through weapons sales.

There has been previous U.S. military training for Taiwan’s defense, both on the island and in the United States. Reuters reported last year the U.S. was set to expand the number of troops helping train Taiwanese forces on the island and Taiwanese officials confirmed more of their troops would be training in the U.S.
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BEIJING — China’s military on Saturday condemned the transit of two German navy ships through the Taiwan Strait saying it increased security risks and sent the “wrong” signal, adding that Chinese forces monitored and warned the vessels.

China, which claims democratically governed Taiwan as its own, says it alone exercises sovereignty and jurisdiction over the strait. Both the United States and Taiwan say the strait — a major trade route through which about half of global container ships pass — is an international waterway.

The People’s Liberation Army’s Eastern Theater Command said the passage of the two ships — a frigate and a supply vessel — was “public hyping,” and that its navy and air forces monitored and warned them throughout.

“The German side’s behavior increases security risks and sends the wrong signal. Troops in the theater are on high alert at all times and will resolutely counter all threats and provocations,” it said in a statement.

China’s embassy in Germany said in a separate statement it had lodged “representations” with Berlin, saying Taiwan belonged to China, a position the democratically elected government in Taipei strongly rejects.

“The question of Taiwan is not a matter of ‘freedom of navigation’, but of China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity,” it said.

The Taiwan Strait is Chinese waters “and there are no so-called ‘international waters’ at all,” the embassy added.

China urges Germany to avoid any “interference” that would jeopardize the healthy and stable development of bilateral relations, it added.

Taiwan’s government says only the island’s people can decide their future.

U.S. warships sail through the strait around once every two months, drawing the ire of Beijing, and some U.S. allies like Canada and Britain have also made occasional transits.

China, which has never renounced the use of force to bring Taiwan under its control, has over the past five years stepped up military activities around the island, including staging war games.

On Saturday, Taiwan’s coast guard said it had again sent ships to monitor and warn away four Chinese maritime police vessels sailing in restricted waters near the Taiwan-controlled Kinmen islands, which sit right next to China’s coast.

The Chinese ships have continued to provoke and damage peace in the strait, and the coast guard is determined to defend Taiwan’s sovereignty upholding the principles of no provocation, no conflict and no show of weakness, it said.

Calls to China’s defense ministry seeking comment went unanswered. 
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BANGKOK — Dozens of Hong Kong journalists and their families have been harassed and intimidated in the past three months, according to the chair of a local press club.

The Hong Kong Journalists Association or HKJA said Friday it had tracked “systematic” and “organized” attacks on journalists from June to August this year.

At least 15 journalists and their family members, employers and neighbors were harassed both online and offline, the press club said.

Selina Cheng, the chair of the HKJA, said in a press conference Friday that it is the biggest case of intimidation that the association has ever seen.

“I don’t believe this is right, and that’s why we are making a loud call today to say we do not accept such behavior,” she said.

“This type of intimidation and harassment, which includes sharing false and defamatory content and death threats, damages press freedom,” she added.

Journalists from multiple Hong Kong media outlets have been affected, with anonymous threats and harassment made via social media email or in the mail, the HKJA said in a statement.

Some of those targeted received threats to their personal safety and were warned to give up their employment or position within associations, the HKJA added.

“HKJA has gathered detailed information on a number of affected journalists and organisations,” the statement read. Those affected include two journalism education institutions and 13 media outlets, including the executive committee of the HKJA, Hong Kong Free Press, InMediaHK, and HK Feature.

Many of the letters and emails warned that association with the named organizations or people could be a violation of Hong Kong’s national security laws.

The emails and letters were sent anonymously, with emails sent from Microsoft Outlook accounts.

On social media, posts showed photos of journalists and members of the HKJA executive committee pictured alongside images of knives, blood, shooting targets and “memorial” signs.

The Hong Kong Free Press condemned the attacks. In a statement shared on social media, it said that the landlord of the news website’s director, Tom Grundy, had received threatening letters, saying “unimaginable consequences” would occur unless Grundy was evicted from his property.

Grundy reported the threats to police, the news website said.

Media watchdog Reporters Without Borders or RSF called on the international community to take action.

“We strongly condemn this harassment campaign led against the independent media outlets that managed to survive the previous waves of government repression,” said Cedric Alviani, RSF’s Asia-Pacific bureau director. “We urge the international community to intensify its pressure on the Chinese regime so press freedom is fully restored in the territory.”

VOA requested comment late Friday from the Hong Kong Police Force but did not immediately receive a response.

Hong Kong’s undersecretary for security, Michael Cheuk, told media “no one should be intimidated, insulted, or so-called harassed.”

Cheuk urged anyone who felt under pressure to report it to law agencies, Reuters reported.

The HKJA said that it has contacted Meta, which owns Facebook, and Wikimedia Foundation, the two main platforms used in the harassment campaign.

Cheng told VOA she believes a person or group of people are responsible.

“Bots means they are machine-controlled. I don’t think that’s the case,” she added.

Details of the intimidation campaign come as critics warn that press freedom is being eroded in Hong Kong.

Since Beijing imposed a national security law on Hong Kong in 2020 — which carries life imprisonment for those found guilty of what are deemed as sedition, subversion, foreign interference or terrorism — news outlets have shuttered and there is greater self-censorship on sensitive issues, say media experts.

Activists, political figures, lawmakers and reporters are cautious about speaking on the record to the media, with most declining to be interviewed for fear of reprisal.

Media unions like the Hong Kong Journalist Association have also come under pressure, after being criticized by authorities and Chinese state media for alleged links to activist organizations.

The governments of Hong Kong and China have said that the security law has brought stability back to the former British colony.

But since 2020, dozens of people have been arrested under the legislation. At least 28 of those arrested were journalists or press freedom defenders.

In August, two journalists from the now-defunct Stand News website were found guilty of sedition in a landmark case. And the pro-democracy publisher Jimmy Lai is in prison and on trial under the national security law for charges he denies.  
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BEIJING — Starting next year, China will raise its retirement age for workers, which is now among the youngest in the world’s major economies, in an effort to address its shrinking population and aging work force.

The Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress, the country’s legislature, passed the new policy Friday after a sudden announcement earlier in the week that it was reviewing the measure, state broadcaster CCTV announced.

The policy change will be carried out over 15 years, with the retirement age for men raised to 63 years, and for women to 55 or 58 years depending on their jobs. The current retirement age is 60 for men and 50 for women in blue-collar jobs and 55 for women doing white-collar work.

“We have more people coming into the retirement age, and so the pension fund is (facing) high pressure. That’s why I think it’s now time to act seriously,” said Xiujian Peng, a senior research fellow at Victoria University in Australia who studies China’s population and its ties to the economy.

The previous retirement ages were set in the 1950’s, when life expectancy was only around 40 years, Peng said.

The policy will be implemented starting in January, according to the announcement from China’s legislature. The change will take effect progressively based on people’s birthdates.

For example, a man born in January 1971 could retire at the age of 61 years and 7 months in August 2032, according to a chart released along with the policy. A man born in May 1971 could retire at the age of 61 years and 8 months in January 2033.

Demographic pressures made the move long overdue, experts say. By the end of 2023, China counted nearly 300 million people over the age of 60. By 2035, that figure is projected to be 400 million, larger than the population of the U.S. The Chinese Academy of Social Sciences had previously projected that the public pension fund will run out of money by that year.

Pressure on social benefits such as pensions and social security is hardly a China-specific problem. The U.S. also faces the issue as analysis shows that currently, the Social Security fund won’t be able to pay out full benefits to people by 2033.

“This is happening everywhere,” said Yanzhong Huang, senior fellow for global health at the Council on Foreign Relations. “But in China with its large elderly population, the challenge is much larger.”

That is on top of fewer births, as younger people opt out of having children, citing high costs. In 2022, China’s National Bureau of Statistics reported that for the first time the country had 850,000 fewer people at the end of the year than the previous year, a turning point from population growth to decline. In 2023, the population shrank further, by 2 million people.

What that means is that the burden of funding elderly people’s pensions will be divided among a smaller group of younger workers, as pension payments are largely funded by deductions from people who are currently working.

Researchers measure that pressure by looking at a number called the dependency ratio, which counts the number of people over the age of 65 compared to the number of workers under 65. That number was 21.8% in 2022, according to government statistics, meaning that roughly five workers would support one retiree. The percentage is expected to rise, meaning fewer workers will be shouldering the burden of one retiree.
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Washington — When Kamala Harris and Donald Trump met in a presidential debate on Tuesday, they spoke about a range of foreign policy issues, including China and Russia’s war in Ukraine.

But while the debate attracted large audiences and coverage in the United States and Europe, Beijing and Moscow’s state-run media were relatively quiet on the event.

The minimal coverage is a contrast to the presidential debate between Joe Biden and Trump in June.

Chinese media

After that debate, Beijing-run outlets — like media around the world — were flooded with coverage of Biden’s poor performance.

But Harris-Trump coverage was noticeably slimmer in state-run outlets such as Xinhua, the Global Times and the People’s Daily newspaper, China media analysts say.

The shift is a subtle but significant distinction, according to China media analysts, that reflects how the Chinese Communist Party, or CCP, employs its propaganda apparatus.

The relative lack of coverage wasn’t all that surprising to Kenton Thibaut, a senior resident China fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensic Research Lab in Washington.

The Chinese government is probably still figuring out how to move forward following Biden’s abrupt withdrawal, said Thibaut. She believes that’s a primary reason for the reduced coverage of this week’s debate.

“This is really reflective of how China handles changes in foreign policy issues,” Thibaut said. “They just stick to very fact-based coverage, basically restating what the candidate said, until they — the propaganda department and such — can figure out basically how to cover it globally and domestically.”

Another reason for the reduced coverage may have to do with democracy itself, according to China experts.

“The presidential debate is important for U.S. democracy, and democracy is always a sensitive topic for the CCP,” Anne-Marie Brady, a professor and specialist in Chinese politics at the University of Canterbury in New Zealand, told VOA in an email.

Jonathan Hassid, an Iowa State University professor who specializes in Chinese media, agreed.

“Chinese media does not like covering democratic successes,” Hassid told VOA. “Democratic failures are highlighted, but the successes are not.”

That helps explain the difference between the coverage of the two debates. During the first debate, which by many accounts was a fiasco, Biden sounded hoarse and frail, and his repeated fumbles highlighted concerns over the 81-year-old’s capacity to serve another four-year term as president.

In coverage of that debate, Chinese state media relied on narratives about how democracy doesn’t work well, Hassid said.

For instance, Hu Xijin, a Chinese media commentator and former state media editor, wrote, “Objectively speaking, the low-quality performance of these two old men was a negative advertisement for Western democracy.”

By contrast, Hassid said, this week’s debate may have been perceived as a better display of democracy.

Still, China also didn’t even feature that largely in the latest debate.

While Harris didn’t go into much detail, she said that “a policy about China should be in making sure the United States of America wins the competition for the 21st century.” Trump, meanwhile, has previously proposed tariffs up to 100% on Chinese products.

When asked about Harris and Trump’s views about tariffs on imports from China, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning on Wednesday said she had no comment.

“The presidential elections are the United States’ own affairs,” she said. “That said, we are opposed to making China an issue in U.S. elections.”

A spokesperson for China’s embassy replied to VOA’s request for comment with a similar statement: “On the issue of the U.S. election, China’s position is consistent and clear. China has no intention and will not interfere in it. At the same time, we hope that the U.S. side will not make accusations against China in the election.”

Russian media

Russia — another propaganda powerhouse — also didn’t offer much coverage of the debate. “But that doesn’t mean that they don’t drop in plenty of spin,” according to Darren Linvill, co-director of Clemson University’s Media Forensics Hub.

Based on his analysis of Russian state media coverage of the debate, Linvill said outlets such as RT and Sputnik were focused on downplaying Harris and playing up Trump.

There were some outliers, such as a Sputnik article in which a psychiatrist claimed Harris was trying to “hide her imposter syndrome” during the debate. But most of the coverage was subtler, Linvill said.

Articles tended to be anodyne and not necessarily critical of either side, Linvill said, but they still reveal Moscow’s well-documented preference for Trump.

U.S. officials are again warning about Russian efforts to influence this year’s election. Last week, the Justice Department accused two Russians who work at the Kremlin-backed RT of money laundering by funneling nearly $10 million to a conservative Tennessee-based media outlet that is a leading platform for pro-Trump voices.

While it’s important to monitor disinformation in the lead-up to and during an election, according to Thibaut, the period immediately after is perhaps even more important, especially if the election is close.

“This is a prime time for threat actors to take advantage of information, the polarizing narratives, the charged-up atmosphere to really sow social division,” Thibaut said.

“We have to really remain vigilant after the election as well.”
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With the start of the new school year, some students are choosing to study abroad to experience a new culture. Some American students are studying in China, but that number is far fewer than that of Chinese students attending American universities. Katherine Michaelson looks at why this imbalance could be problematic. Camera: : Elizabeth Lee 
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Washington — The White House said on Thursday it is acting on Democratic lawmakers’ demands to close what they see as a legal loophole that allows manufacturers — most from China — to dodge tariffs on low-priced goods and flood the U.S. with illegal and unsafe products.

The Biden administration is targeting the “de minimis” exemption, which allows parcels valued at less than $800 to enter the U.S. duty free. More than 1 billion such parcels entered the U.S. in fiscal 2023, U.S Customs and Border Protection said.

White House officials attribute the more than fivefold increase from several years ago to the growth of Chinese e-commerce platforms such as Shein and Temu, and administration officials name-checked both of those popular fast-fashion retailers in a briefing with journalists on Thursday.

Daleep Singh, deputy national security adviser for international economics, said these moves to close the loophole would have a big effect on Chinese apparel, and “will drastically reduce the number of shipments entering through the de minimis exemption.”

This would likely hamper Americans’ ability to score items like an $8 T-shirt – available in a range of colors – that features a gunslinging, pants-wearing cartoon cowboy duck who proclaims, “you just yee’d your last haw.” Or a $6 crop top that reads, in English, LIVE LAUGH LOBOTOMY. Or an $8 bra made of two fuzzy, dead-eyed cat faces shorn of their noses, mouths, whiskers and facial expressions, strung together and tied halter-style around the neck. Or an $8 item that can only be described as a business-formal bra, as it is made entirely of ties. It is available in a patchwork of leopard-, zebra- and tiger-print ties, presumably for a formal office that is animal themed.

Singh added that the administration also seeks to tighten information collection requirements and consumer safety standards – and block products that don’t make the cut. And further, he said, the White House is calling on Congress to pass a law this year to “comprehensively reform the de minimis exemption.”

In a Wednesday letter, 126 House Democrats urged the president to use his executive authority, saying they could not act “amid interminable stagnation in Congress that has precluded legislation from passing.”

“While lawmakers would rather see the de minimis issue dealt with legislatively, the Democrats on the call said their patience was wearing thin,” the letter read. “Despite the fact that the concept of de minimis reform has engendered broad bipartisan support, politicking has precluded a concrete resolution.”

Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro of Connecticut, one of the initiative’s leaders, expressed concerns over fast fashion’s documented use of forced labor to make their cut-rate clothing. Rights group Amnesty International has reported that Shein, in particular, upholds “questionable labor and human rights standards.”

Shein’s model, the group says, leans on subcontracting the making of garments, which leaves no room for transparency or accountability for worker conditions, and gives workers no right to unionize or assemble.

Navtej Dhillon, deputy director of the National Economic Council, also said the moves address concerns over fentanyl shipments and for declining U.S. industry.

“Some foreign companies are attempting to use this pathway to ship illegal and dangerous products for our health, avoid our health and safety and consumer protection laws, and evade tariffs to undermine American manufacturers,” he said. “Textile and apparel manufacturing supports tens of thousands of jobs in key states like Georgia and North Carolina. These American workers and manufacturers deserve to compete on a level playing field.”

The congressional group pushing the administration cited approval from law enforcement and industry groups.

“The de minimis loophole is severely exacerbating our nation’s opioid crisis,” said Bill Johnson, executive director of the National Association of Police Organizations. “Closing it would help staunch the flow of fentanyl and other narcotics coming across our borders and help safeguard the lives of our children, families, and friends.”

And Kim Glas, president and CEO of the National Council of Textile Organizations, said the industry group “strongly supports closing the de minimis loophole,” noting the closure of 18 textile plants in the U.S. in the past year.

“De minimis is a free trade agreement for the world at the expense of U.S. manufacturers, retailers, and consumers,” she said in a statement. “Shockingly, it has now become a black market for dangerous products facilitating fentanyl, precursors and pill presses. De minimis is destruction.”

Shein said last year that they support “responsible reform” of the policy but did not give precise recommendations.

“The de minimis exemption needs a complete makeover to create a level playing field for all retailers,” SHEIN Executive Vice Chairman Donald Tang said in a statement. “At the same time, American consumers deserve to know that the products they purchase are authentic and ethically produced. We believe de minimis reform can and should achieve both.”
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Taipei, Taiwan — Chinese authorities have rolled out new propaganda efforts aimed at countering Western narratives about the human rights situation in the northwest Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region and Tibet.

In recent weeks, they have continued to invite foreign vloggers to visit Xinjiang, home to millions of Uyghur people, a majority Muslim ethnic minority group. Also this month, China inaugurated an international communication center to produce content portraying some “positive developments” in Tibet, such as Tibetan people’s growing income.

Since 2017, the United States, United Nations, European Parliament and rights organizations have condemned China for interning up to 1 million Uyghurs, forcing hundreds of thousands of Uyghur women to go through abortion or sterilization, and forcing Uyghurs, Kazakhs and other ethnic minorities in Xinjiang to work in factories, which prompted the United States to pass the Uyghur Forced Labor Protection Act in 2021.

In Tibet, human rights organizations and Western countries, including the U.S., have accused the Chinese government of erasing the Tibetan language and culture through compulsory Chinese language education for Tibetan children, forcing hundreds of thousands of rural Tibetans to relocate to urban areas and replacing the name “Tibet” with the Romanized Chinese name “Xizang” in official documents.

Taiwan said on September 5 it knows of reports China has been recruiting Taiwanese influencers to visit Xinjiang and help promote a more positive narrative about the region through their videos.

Taiwan’s Mainland Affairs Council, which oversees cross-strait exchanges, said it was still looking into the recent surge of Xinjiang-related content produced by Taiwanese influencers and urged them to avoid violating an anti-infiltration law by accepting payment from Beijing.

Taiwanese Youtuber Potter Wang claimed in June that the Chinese government had been inviting Taiwanese influencers on paid trips to China to produce content. His claims prompted several Taiwanese YouTubers who have recently published videos about Xinjiang to deny receiving payment from Beijing.

In response to warnings from Taiwanese authorities, China’s Taiwan Affairs Office said Beijing welcomed “Taiwan compatriots” to visit China and enjoy “the magnificent mountains and rivers, taste the various kinds of food, experience the local customs, and share what they have seen and heard.”

Apart from inviting Taiwanese influencers to visit Xinjiang, Beijing has been inviting foreign journalists and vloggers to visit Xinjiang since the start of 2024.

In several reports, China’s state-run tabloid Global Times said these foreigners learned about “Xinjiang’s latest economic achievements, religious freedom, and ethnic integration” following visits to local industry, religious venues and residential homes.

Some experts say Chinese authorities usually impose tight control over foreign influencers’ itineraries in Xinjiang to ensure the content they produce is aligned with the positive narrative that Beijing aims to promote, which is contrary to existing foreign media reports about mass internment of Uyghurs, forced labor of ethnic minorities or harsh birth control programs.

“Foreign influencers usually spend time in Xinjiang’s capital, Urumqi, and visit places like the Grand Bazaar, where they will try local food and watch dance performances that could seem to suggest that cultural forms of the Uyghur people are protected,” said Timothy Grose, a professor of China Studies at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology in Indiana.

In addition to showcasing aspects of Uyghur culture, Grose said, foreign influencers’ Xinjiang videos will often portray Uyghurs being employed and local signs containing Chinese and Uyghur characters.

“Beijing believes this is an effective strategy [to counter existing international narratives about Xinjiang] if they are indirectly controlling the types of pictures that are exported out of Xinjiang,” he told VOA by phone.

By flooding social media platforms with Xinjiang content produced by these foreign influencers, Grose said, the Chinese government is trying to reach and influence casual viewers, especially younger audiences, with no deep knowledge about China or Xinjiang.

“These casual viewers don’t have expertise in China, so they won’t know where to find signs of oppression in the videos since they are unfamiliar with the Uyghur culture or China’s ethnic policy,” he said.

Since China is directly or indirectly filling social media platforms with content aligned with their preferred narrative for Xinjiang, Grose said, it will be difficult for academics, activists, and journalists to counter Beijing’s propaganda efforts with content that reflects the reality in the region.

Telling the Tibet stories

Beijing has also launched a new initiative to “tell the Tibet story well.”

On September 2, several local and central Chinese government agencies inaugurated an “international communication center” in the Tibetan capital, Lhasa, that aims to enhance Beijing’s ability to promote its preferred narratives about Tibet.

During a roundtable event focusing on “building a more effective international communication system for Tibet-related issues,” French writer Margot Chevestrier, who works for China’s state-run China International Communications Group, said that many young Chinese people are affected by “biased reporting” on global social media and that these misunderstandings often stem from “misleading reporting by some media or individuals.”

The new international communication center will “enable more people at home and abroad to know Tibet, understand Tibet, and love Tibet,” according to China’s state-run China News, an online news website.

Some analysts say the communication center may serve as a centralized institution to “coordinate” Beijing’s propaganda efforts focusing on Tibet.

“Since there doesn’t seem to be as much propaganda efforts on Tibet as on Xinjiang, Beijing might be thinking how they can use this tactic,” said Sarah Cook, an independent researcher on China and former China research director at nonprofit organization Freedom House.

Cook said the amount of propaganda effort that China dedicated to Xinjiang and Tibet shows that these two issues are of a high priority for Beijing.

“While Tibet and Xinjiang are their priorities, the tactics that the Chinese propaganda apparatus deploys are similar, including spreading disinformation through fake accounts, restricting foreign journalists’ access to certain places, and suppressing information that contradicts their preferred narrative,” she told VOA by phone.

Since its propaganda efforts have been seemingly successful, Grose said, Beijing will continue to employ the same set of strategies to challenge existing facts about the situation in Xinjiang and Tibet.

To push back against Beijing’s campaigns, he said, Xinjiang and Tibet-focused groups should try to increase their presence on social media platforms and create more “captivating and moving” visual content that is “properly contextualized” but can influence young audiences.

Additionally, Cook said it’s important for individuals concerned about the situation in Tibet and Xinjiang to work with like-minded research groups and expose the different propaganda campaigns that China is pushing.

“They can try to produce short videos informing people of Beijing’s tactics,” she said.
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HONG KONG — China must reprioritize economic growth and reforms and boost investor confidence by leveling the playing field for all companies in the country, a European business group said Wednesday. 

With “business confidence now at an all-time low” over lagging domestic demand and overcapacity in certain industries, the annual European Business in China Position Paper called on China to open its economy and allow a more free market to determine resource allocation. It also recommended introducing policies to boost domestic demand. 

Profit margins in China are at or below the global average for two-thirds of the companies surveyed earlier in the year, according to the paper published Wednesday by the European Chamber of Commerce in China. 

In August, China filed a complaint with the World Trade Organization over European Union tariffs on electric vehicles made in China. It also launched anti-dumping and subsidies investigations of European dairy products, brandy and pork exports. The tit-for-tat actions have raised fears that a trade war may break out. 

Many European businesses are deciding that the returns on investments in the world’s second-largest economy are not worth the risks, due to issues including China’s economic slowdown and a politicized business environment. 

“For some European headquarters and shareholders, the risks of investing in China are beginning to outright the returns, a trend that will only intensify if key business concerns are left unaddressed,” Jens Eskelund, president of China’s European Union Chamber of Commerce, said in a message at the beginning of the paper. 

The European Chamber’s paper proposes over 1,000 recommendations for China to resolve challenges and problems faced by European businesses operating in the country and boost investor confidence. Among them are calls for China to refrain from punishing companies for the actions of their home governments. Others include ensuring that policy packages for attracting foreign investment are followed by implementation, and refraining from “erratic policy shifts.” 

The report also recommended that the EU proactively engage with China and keep its responses “measured and proportionate” when disagreements arise. 
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Taipei, Taiwan — As China is set to host bilateral talks with the Philippines this month, their South China Sea dispute is expanding from sea to air, increasing the risk of military confrontation, analysts warn.

The Chinese Communist Party’s People’s Daily newspaper on Monday published an article warning that “China-Philippines relations stand at a crossroads” over the South China Sea dispute.

The warning came after Filipino Foreign Affairs Secretary Enrique Manalo told reporters at a diplomatic reception on September 4 that Beijing will host the next round of the Bilateral Consultative Mechanism meetings designed to manage differences between the two countries.

Manalo did not say on which date the talks would start this month but expressed hope the two countries would discuss an incident in late August when coast guard ships from both sides collided at a disputed shoal. Both countries blame the other for the collision, though video released by the Philippine coast guard appears to show the Chinese coast guard ship ramming their vessel, BRP Teresa Magbanua.

It was the second such collision of their coast guard ships in August at the disputed atoll.

Vincent Kyle Parada, a former defense analyst for the Philippine Navy and a graduate student at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, says the frequency of the sea clashes is pushing the two sides to expand their operations to the air.

“Over the past few weeks, China has been actively working to disrupt resupply missions to the ship and crew, to the point that after one such failed attempt, the Philippine government announced that essential supplies reached critical levels,” he told VOA Mandarin. “Manila did manage to resupply BRP Teresa Magbanua through a helicopter, signaling this potential shift.”

Parada added, “This potential shift from maritime to aerial resupply emissions in the future is obviously a risk because China has also been escalating aerial operations in the South China Sea.

“Beijing would increase its aerial presence in the Spratlys and send fighter jets to its artificial islands for extended deployments. I think the goal there really would be to make aerial resupply emissions an incredibly dangerous policy option for Manila. That way, it limits Manila’s ability to sustain a long-term presence in the disputed territories.”

According to the latest data from the Philippine Department of Foreign Affairs, the administration of Ferdinand Marcos Jr. has lodged 176 diplomatic protests with the Chinese government, which claims almost the entire South China Sea, putting it in conflict with Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan and Vietnam.

Song Zhongping, a Chinese military expert and researcher at Xuanyuan (Hong Kong) Science and Technology Exchange Center, says any Chinese military moves in the airspace over the South China Sea are due to what he calls “illegal expansion” by the Philippines.

“Whether it’s Scarborough Shoal, Second Thomas Shoal or Sabina Shoal, these are all China’s sovereign territories,” he told VOA Mandarin, repeating Beijing’s claims. “If the Philippines wants to conduct patrols or resupply by air, this in itself is violating the security of China’s airspace, and China will inevitably take certain measures to intercept it.”

An article published on September 2 by the Beijing-based think tank South China Sea Strategic Situation Probing Initiative says since 2024, the Philippines has “repeatedly dispatched military aircraft to invade the islands and reefs of Spratly Islands and Macclesfield Bank” and also sent military aircraft to carry out airdrops and replenishment missions over the sea, indicating that “air intrusion is becoming another major path for the Philippines to cause trouble in the South China Sea.”

The article warned that if the Philippines insists on carrying out an “air invasion,” China will have to take corresponding measures, and “once there is friction or even collision, the consequences will be much more serious than the collision with a ship.”

Su Tzu-yun, a research fellow and director at the Division of Defense Strategy and Resources in Taiwan, says China is more likely to take coercive actions in the air, making it difficult for the Philippines to defend its sovereignty.

“China may first take measures to interfere, as it does with the United States and Australian military aircraft, and it will scatter thermal flares to interfere so that Philippine helicopters may not be able to get close,” Su told VOA Mandarin. “It may use jets to create turbulence, meaning it uses air from the jet tail to interfere with the Philippine helicopter when it’s flying.”

Su says Beijing is taking more aggressive interception actions, which greatly increase the risk of accidental conflict.

“The number of Chinese ships has increased. Second, coupled with the previous conflict between China and the Philippines in the sea, which caused injuries to Philippine coast guards, and now it threatens to use stronger means against the Philippine so-called aircraft, so it is moving the definition of gray zone operations closer to the direction of war.”

Philippine National Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro in August said the Philippines plans to purchase 40 new multirole fighter jets and mid-range missiles to strengthen its territorial defense, Reuters reported.

The U.S. in July repeated its commitment to the Philippines’ security after China’s increasingly assertive actions in the South China Sea. US reiterates ‘ironclad’ commitment to Philippines amid China actions in South China Sea.

Parts of the disputed South China Sea are believed to be rich in oil and gas, and the waters are an important transit point for trillions of dollars in annual shipping.

The Hague-based intergovernmental Permanent Court of Arbitration in 2016 unanimously ruled that China’s claim to almost all the South China Sea had “no legal basis,” which Beijing rejected.

Adrianna Zhang contributed to this report. Some information for this report came from Reuters.
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SINGAPORE — An Australian think tank that tracks tech competitiveness says China is now the world leader in research on almost 90% of critical technologies. In a newly released report, the research group adds there is also a high risk of Beijing securing a monopoly on defense-related tech, including drones, satellites and collaborative robots — those that can work safely alongside humans.

Analysts say the huge leap forward for China is the result of heavy state investment over the past two decades. They add that despite the progress, Beijing is still dependent on other countries for key tech components and lacks self-sufficiency.

The report from the government-funded Australian Strategic Policy Institute, or ASPI, released last Thursday, says China led the way in research into 57 out of 64 advanced technologies in the five years from 2019-2023.

ASPI’s Critical Technology Tracker ranks countries’ innovation capabilities based on the number of appearances in the top 10% of research papers. It focuses on crucial technologies from a range of fields including artificial intelligence, biotechnology, cyber and defense.

The report found that “China and the United States have effectively switched places as the overwhelming leader in research in just two decades.”

China led in only three of the 64 technologies between 2003 and 2007 but has shot up in the rankings, replacing the U.S., which is now a frontrunner in just seven critical technologies.

Josh Kennedy-White is a technology strategist based in Singapore. He says China’s huge leap is a “direct result of its aggressive, state-driven research and development investments over the past two decades.”

He adds that the shift toward China is “particularly stark in fields like artificial intelligence, quantum computing and advanced aircraft engines, where China has transitioned from a laggard to a leader in a relatively short period.”

ASPI also determines the risk of countries holding a monopoly on the research of critical technologies. They currently classify 24 technologies as “high risk” of being monopolized — all by Beijing.

Ten technologies are newly classified as “high risk” this year, with many of them linked to the defense industry.

“The potential monopoly risk in 24 technology areas, especially those in defense-related fields like radars and drones, is concerning in the current and future geopolitical context,” Tobias Feakin, founder of consultancy firm Protostar Strategy, told VOA.

Chinese President Xi Jinping has sought to boost his country’s advanced manufacturing capabilities with the ambitious “Made in China 2025” initiative.

The policy, launched in 2015, aims to strengthen Beijing’s self-reliance in critical sectors and make China a global tech powerhouse.

Xi, according to Feakin, views advanced technologies as “strategic priorities for China’s development, national security and global competitiveness.”

He adds that technologies are seen as a “central component of China’s long-term economic and geopolitical goals.”

Beijing’s ambitions are being closely watched in Washington, with the Biden administration working to limit China’s access to advanced technology.

Last week, the U.S. introduced new export controls on critical technology to China, including chip-making equipment and quantum computers and components.

That announcement came shortly after U.S. national security adviser Jake Sullivan made his first ever visit to Beijing. He met with Xi and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi.

Sullivan told reporters that Washington “will continue to take necessary action to prevent advanced U.S. technologies from being used to undermine national security.”

The continued efforts to curb China’s chip industry mean that Beijing must look further afield for advanced technology.

“Even though it leads in areas like artificial intelligence and 5G, China still depends on Taiwan, the U.S. and South Korea to produce high-end semiconductors”, Kennedy-White told VOA.

Describing this as China’s Achilles’ heel, Kennedy-White says the lack of self-sufficiency in the semiconductor industry could “stunt Beijing’s progress in artificial intelligence, quantum computing and military applications.”

As China continues its dominance in critical technology research, questions have been raised over exactly how the country is making these breakthroughs.

Last October, officials from the Five Eyes intelligence alliance (Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the United States) issued a joint statement accusing China of stealing intellectual property. U.S. FBI director Christopher Wray described it as an “unprecedented threat.”

Kennedy-White, managing director of Singapore-based venture catalyst firm DivisionX Global, agrees with this assessment. He says China’s jump up the ASPI rankings is “not entirely organic.”

“There is a correlation between China’s rise in certain technologies and allegations of intellectual property theft,” he added.

ASPI also recommends ways for other countries to close the gap on China. It advises the AUKUS alliance of Australia, the U.K. and the U.S. to join forces with Japan and South Korea to try to catch up.

The report also highlights the emergence of India as a “key center” of global research innovation and excellence.

The South Asian nation now ranks in the top five countries for 45 out of the 64 technologies that are tracked by ASPI. It’s a huge gain compared with 2003-2007, when India sat in the top five for only four technologies.

Feakin says countries across the Asia-Pacific “will benefit from leveraging India’s growing technology expertise and influence.”

It will also provide a counterbalance to “overdependence on China’s technology supply chain,” he added.
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washington — More than a year after China’s former foreign minister, Qin Gang, disappeared from public view, raising a host of questions, the Chinese government remains silent on his whereabouts.

A new report this week from The Washington Post, citing two former U.S. government officials, suggests Qin has been spared any jail time and now is nominally holding a low-ranking position at a publishing house under the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Earlier reports speculated that he was sentenced to life in prison or had died from suicide or torture.

Some are skeptical about the Washington Post report, while others see it as evidence of uncertainty and impermanence within the political system directed by the Chinese Communist Party, or CCP.

According to Sunday’s Washington Post report, Qin, 58, now works, at least on paper, for the World Affairs Press, a state-owned publishing house under the Foreign Ministry.

One of the former officials said Qin is “not going to jail, but his career is over.”

Before he disappeared from public view in July of last year, Qin was the youngest foreign minister since the founding of the CCP. A leading theory among Chinese political analysts is that Qin was removed because he had an affair with Fu Xiaotian, a prominent Chinese television journalist, and that the pair had a child born out of wedlock in the United States.

Some reports suggested that the Chinese government suspected Fu of sharing state secrets with foreign intelligence agencies, but these rumors have never been confirmed. Like Qin, Fu disappeared from public life for more than a year ago.

During a top-level political meeting in July, the Third Plenum of the 20th Central Committee, the CCP agreed to Qin’s request that he be removed from his post as a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, Chinese state media reported. That followed an official announcement in February that said Qin had resigned as a parliamentary deputy.

A reporter from The Washington Post recently visited the bookstore of the World Affairs Press in Beijing, but employees there told the newspaper that they had not heard that Qin worked at the publishing house. A staff member who answered the phone said she did not know if the news was true. China’s Foreign Ministry did not respond to a request for comment.

Some observers pointed out that the Washington Post’s report is based on an anonymous source who has left office, and the authenticity still needs to be verified.

Neil Thomas, a fellow on Chinese politics at the Asia Society Policy Institute’s Center for China Analysis, said on social media platform X, “The rumors of Qin Gang moving to World Affairs Press have been around for months. Sources are U.S. ex-officials and I don’t know what they do. But @nakashimae & @cdcshepherd are top reporters.”

Charles Smith, an encryption security expert, said on X that he doesn’t believe the article, which “even notes the ‘bookstore’ employees have never seen Qin. … He’s on an extended fishing vacation.” His tweet was accompanied by an image of a skeleton fishing underwater.

Last December, online news outlet Politico reported that Qin had been arrested for undermining national security and was tortured to death or committed suicide.

Yen-Ting, an X user who frequently comments on China’s social and political issues, tweeted, “It’s almost poetic justice, a ‘Wolf Warrior’ reduced to selling books while the regime’s whispers suggest he’s paid off the hook rather than locked up. This is China’s way of dealing w/ its wayward wolves: not through the claws of justice but by shoving them into obscurity.”

Kalpit A. Mankikar, a fellow in the Strategic Studies Program with the Observer Research Foundation in New Delhi, tweeted, “Once seen as Stalin’s heir, Soviet politician Georgy Malenkov fell from grace and was banished to Kazakhstan to manage a power plant. In #China, ex-foreign minister Qin Gang seems to have rehabilitated at a Party-run bookshop, says @washingtonpost.”

The Washington Post report also quoted current and former U.S. officials who had dealt with Qin as saying he lacked the diplomatic skills of his experienced colleagues to break out of the “Wolf Warrior” model.

One example is that Qin appeared to threaten the U.S. with China “erasing” Taiwan Strait’s median line, in a heated exchange with U.S. officials amid former U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan in August 2022.

American columnist James Pinkerton tweeted a reader’s online comment on the Washington Post report.

The reader Paul Messina said, “I believe that now that the Chinese economy is falling apart, Xi has realized that this ‘Wolf Warrior’ tactic has actually exacerbated the fall of Chinese industry. Besides aggravating the West, particularly the United States with this nonsense, it has led to multiple Western corporations leaving China, permanently closing their doors and factories in search of friendlier nations to do business.

“Vietnam and other nations have greatly benefited. Thus this idiot actually decreased the CCP’s prestige in the world. I believe that this is why his new ‘career’ is librarian. Xi made a big mistake with his ‘Wolf Warrior’ attitude towards the world. I believe that he now realizes this fact.”

Liu Jianchao, the head of the International Liaison Department of the CCP Central Committee, who is relatively moderate in terms of rhetoric and image, is considered a possible candidate to succeed Wang Yi as the next foreign minister.

According to The New York Times, as China is already seeking to soften its image in the U.S. and Europe and improve relations with some of its neighbors, appointing Liu may mean China is abandoning its “Wolf Warrior” diplomacy.

Adrianna Zhang contributed to this report.
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Taipei, Taiwan — Russia and China are holding a series of joint military naval and air force exercises this month in a bid to deepen ties and counter increased security coordination between the United States and its allies in the Indo-Pacific region, analysts say. 

“Russia wants to demonstrate that they can engage in a full-scale war with Ukraine while deploying resources to the Indo-Pacific region and China wants to show that they can deepen its relationship with Russia and cause problems in the region, primarily in the South China Sea but also around Japan,” said Stephen Nagy, a regional security expert at the International Christian University in Japan.  

On Monday, the Chinese defense ministry said both countries would conduct joint naval and aerial exercises aimed at deepening bilateral strategic cooperation and strengthening their ability to respond to security threats in the waters and airspace near the Sea of Japan and the Sea of Okhotsk. 

In addition to the joint exercise near Japan, the Chinese defense ministry said Chinese and Russian naval fleets will conduct their fifth joint patrol in the Pacific Ocean and take part in the “Ocean 2024” strategic exercise held by Russia. On Tuesday, the Moscow Times reported that the weeklong exercise had begun and would last from September 10 to 16. 

“Russia hopes to increase pressure on the United States on the Pacific front through the joint military exercise with China, which may force Washington to reduce its military deployment to Europe,” said Lin Ying-yu, a military expert at Tamkang University in Taiwan.  

On the other hand, he added that China hopes to divert Japan’s attention from waters near the Taiwan Strait through its closer military partnership with Russia.  

“Japan will have to prioritize threats to their security so they won’t have more bandwidth to focus on the situation across the Taiwan Strait,” Lin told VOA in a phone interview.  

China and Russia’s increased military cooperation near Japan in recent years has prompted Tokyo to characterize their joint activities as a “grave concern.”

“These repeated joint activities are clearly intended for demonstration of force against Japan and are a grave concern from the perspective of the national security of Japan,” the Japanese defense ministry wrote in its annual defense white paper, which was released in July.  

For now, Nagy said Japan is more concerned with how the military cooperation may evolve, adding that there are still limits to what the two can do together when they conduct exercises.  

“Japan will be concerned about whether the coordination between China and Russia will be used to destabilize sea lines of communication, to prop up North Korea, or to move towards some kind of forced reunification with Taiwan,” he told VOA in a phone interview. “The Russians and Chinese will sail beside each other, fly next to each other, or coordinate how their boats move around but they haven’t developed interoperability and inter-command.” 

Enhancing logistics, communication collaboration 

While there are limits to their cooperation, other analysts say Russia and China will still use joint military exercises to enhance their cooperation in logistics, such as exchanging parts, fuel, or services or sharing data or communication channels.  

“The ability for the Chinese and Russian armies to better understand one another and better support each other in the field is an important capability to develop for both countries,” Drew Thompson, a visiting senior research fellow at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy in Singapore, told VOA by phone.  

In addition to that, Lin in Taipei said China could also enhance its forces’ combat capabilities through joint military exercises with Russia since the Russian forces have accumulated real combat experiences from Moscow’s war in Ukraine.  

“Since Russia’s navies have dealt with drone or anti-ship missile attacks launched by Ukraine, the Chinese navy could learn about how to deal with similar attacks in a potential war across the Taiwan Strait from their Russian counterparts,” he told VOA.  

Pushing back against NATO  

China and Russia’s upcoming military exercise near Japan is part of their growing efforts to push back against the United States and NATO allies. Since July, Beijing and Moscow have held at least three joint military drills in different parts of the world, including the South China Sea, the skies off coastal Alaska, and the Gulf of Finland.

“These increased military drills all over the world are part of Beijing and Moscow’s efforts to counter the deepening defense coordination between the U.S. and its allies, both in Europe and in the Pacific,” Sari Arho Havren, an associate fellow at the Royal United Services Institute, told VOA in a phone interview.  

Despite their attempt to challenge the U.S. and NATO through closer military cooperation, Nagy said China and Russia are unlikely to let their partnership escalate out of proportion.  

“Russia and China will continue to reciprocate what the U.S. and its allies are doing, but not escalate since Beijing wants to maintain its narrative to the Global South that they are not a hegemonic power,” he told VOA. 

On Tuesday, Chinese authorities said the United States and China held theater-level commander talks for the first time when Admiral Sam Paparo, head of the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, held a video telephone call with his counterpart Wu Yanan of the Southern Theater Command of the People’s Liberation Army. The Indo-Pacific Command focuses on enhancing security and stability in the Asia Pacific region and hotspots including the South China Sea and Taiwan Strait. 
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