GOOD MORNING FROM LONDON
WHY CHINA IS NOT A THREAT
PROFESSOR PERCY ALLEN
China has no imperial legacy,
China’s foreign policy is not ultra-nationalist.
China’s military is defensive.
China has no territorial ambitions.
China is not exporting its ideology.
China’s key focus is secession.
China is driven above all by economic concerns.
PEARLS AND IRRITATIONS WANG WEN
1 OCTOBER 2023. BRI.
The ten years of the Belt and Road Initiative has proven that the rise of China has not brought colonialism, disaster, war, refugees, and crises. Instead, it brought the world trade, commodities, tourists, infrastructure, economic growth and civilisation. No matter how Western politicians, media, and think tanks vilify the BRI, they cannot cover up a basic fact—that is, when China is strong, it does not take the old path of aggression and expansion we see in the histories of Europe, the US, Japan, and others.
As of July 2023, a total of 152 countries have signed BRI cooperation agreements with China. In Africa, China has built more than 6,000 kilometres of railways, over 10,000 kilometres of highways, 20 plus ports, more than 80 major infrastructure developments and 80% of telecommunications facilities. In the past ten years, China has opened more than 1,300 new airline routes with BRI countries.
NEW YORK TIMES 27 SEPTEMBER 2023
CHINA AND US – MUTUAL ESPIONAGE POLICIES
China and the U.S. are taking bold steps in their espionage shadow war to try to collect intelligence on leadership thinking and military capabilities. For the U.S., espionage efforts are a critical part of President Biden’s strategy to constrain China’s military and technological rise. For Beijing, the new tolerance for bold action among Chinese spy agencies is driven by Xi Jinping, China’s top leader, who has pushed his foreign intelligence agency to become more active in farther-flung locales.
U.S. officials have honed their ability to intercept electronic communications, including using spy planes off China’s coast. Chinese agents use social media sites — LinkedIn, in particular — to lure potential recruits, and China even has artificial intelligence software that can detect the gait of an American spy.
Context: The spy game between the U.S. and China is even more expansive than the one that played out between the Americans and the Soviets during the Cold War, Christopher Wray, the F.B.I. director, said. China’s large population and economy enable the country to build intelligence services that are bigger than those of the U.S.
SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST 1 OCTOBER 2023
CHINA’S RESPONSE TO SLOWDOWN
The general direction has swung to pro-growth through “normalising” economic activities, and in recent months, Chinese authorities have accelerated their tactical correction amid intensifying pressure of an economic slowdown.
These moves have delivered the message that economic growth is still a priority for the Chinese leadership and that the 5 per cent gross-domestic-product growth target for this year still matters.
While some of the adjustments seem to show that officials are behind the curve, at least Beijing appears ready to do more to reach its growth target: the deeper the economic slump, the more forceful the government’s efforts to stem the tide
NIKKEI ASIA 21 SEPTEMBER 2023
HUAWEI BOUNCES BACK
Huawei has developed its own processors for its latest smartphone, a significant breakthrough that will help reduce its dependence on foreign technology in the face of U.S. sanctions.
With this push, the Chinese group has followed Apple to join an elite group of tech companies capable of designing smartphone processor chips, an analysis of the Mate 60 Pro has shown.
The smartphone’s “system on a chip” has eight central processing units, four of which rely on the designs of Arm, while the other four feature Huawei’s designs and adaptations, according to three people with direct knowledge of the phone’s development and Geekerwan, a Chinese technology testing company.
Huawei’s strategy is similar to Apple’s Silicon initiative, in which the iPhone maker has spent years improving on Arm’s basic architecture to give its products an edge in performance. The complexity and cost of semiconductor development means only a few companies are capable of such an approach.
SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST
23 SEPTEMBER 2023
China’s economy has become a global concern after a worrying performance since late spring. Nevertheless, talk that China’s economy is collapsing may have been exaggerated. Growth is slowly crawling back after a spate of policies unveiled two months ago. The rebound, however, is uneven and may be facing a bumpy road ahead. Consumption and manufacturing picked up in August, but on the other hand, property contraction deepened and investment in the private sector is still struggling Senior economic officials and state media have issued stern rebukes against the doomsayers who suggest that China is in crisis mode, although authorities admit that the country is facing a number of challenges and difficulties. The market may see more upbeat news on consumption and travel as the nation is bracing for a peak during the “golden week” National Day holiday starting from Friday. But more is still needed to bring overall growth back to a resilient and balanced trajectory.
GRAHAM PERRY
E-mail: graham@grahamperry.eu
Web: https://grahamperryonchina.com
Web: https://grahamperryondisputeresolution.com
Twitter: @arsenalcircular
