China

China is about to upend the $160 billion iron ore trade with the biggest change in years as Beijing expands efforts to increase control over the natural ...

It will also increase its cyber warfare capabilities. Earlier this week, Beijing urged Tokyo to view their relationship as a cooperative partnership. Prime ...

The UK has surpassed it and is aiming to spend 3% of GDP on defence by 2030. "These are also now becoming more outstanding. A national security strategy document approved by the cabinet and quoted by AFP news agency described China as "the greatest strategic challenge ever to securing the peace and stability of Japan".

BEIJING — (AP) — A squadron of Chinese Navy ships sailed through straits near Japan into the Western Pacific this week, while Beijing on Friday blasted ...

But experts say China’s growing influence, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and fear of Taiwan emergency prompted many Japanese to support increased capability and spending. [Russian and Chinese strategic bombers also flew](https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-china-beijing-moscow-europe-3d694c61d318e083076b681cd913102d) over the Sea of Japan and the East China Sea during an eight-hour mission in a show of increasingly close defense ties between the two countries. [Tokyo's adoption of a new national security strategy](https://apnews.com/article/business-japan-8d8fe00c6e87914f1dd1ea3388a7f6db) putting itself on a more offensive footing — largely as a result of the perceived threat from China.

Tokyo to acquire counter-strike capabilities under national security strategy that seeks assertive regional role.

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BEIJING — China Mineral Resources Group (CMRG), a new state-owned agency, is set to be the world's biggest iron ore buyer as soon as next year, ...

Beijing created CMRG in July with a registered capital of 20 billion yuan ($3 billion). Article content

Tokyo plans to spend 2% of GDP on defense and says its missiles will be able to hit other countries.

[2% of its gross domestic product](https://www.wsj.com/articles/japan-ruling-party-calls-for-defense-spending-boost-to-2-of-gdp-11650554786?mod=article_inline) on defense, up from about 1% now. [Kohl's Coupon 30% off sitewide](https://www.wsj.com/coupons/kohls) Based on current GDP, that would bring annual spending to the equivalent of around $80 billion, putting Japan third in the world behind the U.S.

Japan's controversial major defense policy shift to obtain an enemy base strike capability underscores that the Asian country has become seriously wary of ...

China regards Taiwan as a breakaway province to be reunified with the mainland. The weapons would put China's coastal areas within strike range. Former vice admiral Ito said the possession of a counterstrike capability is categorized as a "natural right of self-defense" and does not mean that Japan will abandon its exclusively self-defense policy, which the nation has stuck to for the past 75 years. In the updated NSS, Japan's government pledged "not to become a military power," saying the country would only launch a counterstrike as a "bare minimum self-defense measure." Ito said Japan's acquisition of a strike capability and expansion of its defense spending would serve as a "bargaining power" to discourage China from exerting its military might against Taiwan "to some extent." But it is uncertain whether Japan's possession of what the government calls a "counterstrike capability" can work as a deterrent against China, as the concept is not designed to enable Tokyo to boost its defense capabilities to pose a threat to Beijing.

US welcomes doubling of military spending but critics express unease over abandoning seven decades of pacifism.

“The Japanese government will depict these changes as necessary, moderate and wholly in line with previous defence posture,” said Hughes, author of Japan as a Global Military Power. The more forceful tone in the national security strategy is expected to anger China. Money will be spent on upgrading Japan’s missile defence and buying up to 500 US-made Tomahawk missiles, media reports said. But critics say that has left Japan ill-equipped to respond to present-day security threats posed by China and North Korea. One of the documents, the national security strategy, said Japan faced “the severest and most complicated national security environment since the end of the war” and singled out China as “the greatest strategic challenge ever to securing the peace and stability of Japan”, as well as a “serious concern” for Japan and the international community. Japan’s government has renamed what is known as a preemptive strike to “counterstrike capability,” apparently to emphasise that it would be used strictly in self-defence when the country is confronted with signs of an imminent attack.

China Mineral Resources Group (CMRG), a new state-owned agency, is set to be the world's biggest iron ore buyer as soon as next year, when it will start ...

Beijing created CMRG in July with a registered capital of 20 billion yuan ($3 billion). "It's a political mission," he said, adding that it is backed by the state-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission. 5, oil secretary Pankaj Jain said on Friday. [(RIO.AX)](https://www.reuters.com/companies/RIO.AX), Vale SA [(VALE3.SA)](https://www.reuters.com/companies/VALE3.SA) and BHP Group [(BHP.AX)](https://www.reuters.com/companies/BHP.AX), the report said on Thursday, citing people familiar with the situation. [(FMG.AX)](https://www.reuters.com/companies/FMG.AX) , not named in the report, said it is "continuing to engage constructively with the China Mineral Resources Group on ways to collaborate". Register for free to Reuters and know the full story

Japanese Ground Self-Defense Force (JGSDF) soldiers take part in a military demonstration at the JGSDF Kisarazu base, east of Tokyo, Japan June 16, 2022.

In 2021 alone, Beijing spent an estimated U.S.$293 billion on the People’s Liberation Army. Tokyo nevertheless is set to increase its military spending with a focus on countermeasures. policy makers pointed out that China’s “coercion and aggression spans the globe, but it is most acute in the Indo-Pacific.” does it for them.” In a statement Friday, U.S. The two countries also plan to start a defense hotline in the spring to minimize risks of incidents at sea and in the air. “This reflected the Abe administration's strategy toward China at the time, and was an expression of its policy of showing a certain degree of accommodation with China for its economic interests while building a gradual encirclement of China,” said Sasaki. China is Japan’s largest trading partner, and the 2013 National Security Strategy, while expressing concerns about China's military activities, stated that China and Japan would "work to build and strengthen mutually reciprocal strategic relations and work to strengthen it" in all areas. Japan's ruling coalition, however, stopped short of using the word “threat” when describing China in the National Security Strategy and instead designating it a “strategic challenge.” Rena Sasaki, an East Asian security analyst based in Washington D.C., told RFA that in her opinion, “describing China as a ‘strategic challenge’ in the new National Security Strategy is a break with the usual accommodating attitude toward China for economic gains.” In the previous security strategy formulated in 2013, Japan described China’s "external stance and military activities" as an "issue of concern.” The change of language has been criticized in Chinese state media as “aggressive” and “provocative.” Japan has designated China an unprecedented "strategic challenge" and is boosting defense spending to cope with new challenges in a National Security Strategy launched Friday.

The policy change is widely seen as a major step toward rearming Japan more than seven decades after its demilitarization after World War II.

already brings to the U.S.-Japan alliance. Japan's government, though, he adds, may be able to successfully argue that simply possessing the weapons as a deterrent without using them is in line with the constitution. Japan also plans to develop its own weapons, including [advanced fighter jets](https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-63908284), [hypersonic missiles](https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/japan-considering-hypersonic-missile-deployment-by-2030-nikkei-2022-11-03/) and [armed drones](https://asia.nikkei.com/Politics/Japan-to-develop-combat-drones-to-assist-jet-fighters). So it's difficult to debate this point." "Not only do we lack a deterrent, we will also prompt a counterattack" from an enemy. The security documents name China, its military buildup and tensions with Taiwan, as primary threats. Japanese politicians are [debating](https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2022/12/12/business/kishida-defense-tax-rises-opposition/) where the money to fund the increase will come from. [missiles](https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2022/11/30/national/japan-buy-tomahawk-missiles/) from the United States, such as [Tomahawk](https://english.kyodonews.net/news/2022/10/b7fc6dbc9e60-urgent-japan-considering-buying-us-cruise-missiles-to-counter-n-korea.html) cruise missiles, capable of reaching North Korea and parts of China. [indicate](https://japan-forward.com/poll-%E3%83%BC-64-see-enemy-base-strike-capability-as-necessary/) a majority of Japanese now agree that the country needs to have a strike capability. [reinterpreted](https://www.mofa.go.jp/fp/nsp/page23e_000273.html) the constitution in 2014 to allow the military to fight in support of an ally under attack. In a statement, U.S. [accused](https://english.kyodonews.net/news/2022/12/da2cb6187b61-china-wary-about-japan-defense-stance-budget-hike.html) Tokyo of "hyping up the 'China threat' to find an excuse for its military buildup."

(Bloomberg) -- The US has sharpened its assault on China's technology industry with a flurry of export bans and stifling restrictions on companies, ...

Yet Beijing’s response to the recent US moves on semiconductors has been “very reserved,” according to Henry Wang Huiyao, founder of the Center for China and Globalization, a policy research group in Beijing. Those US efforts gathered momentum this week with Japan and the Netherlands nearing an agreement to join Washington in tightening controls over the export of up-to-date chipmaking machinery to China. There’s a risk that unilateral actions could eventually alienate key US partners, said Jon Bateman, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Beijing is preparing to unleash a $143 billion aid package for its chip industry, according to Reuters. “We may be surprised when that finally happens.” Beijing is also reportedly preparing a multibillion-dollar aid package for its semiconductor industry, a crucial sector for the global economy given the widespread use of chips in everything from cars and mobile phones to guided missiles. “From the US side, they are now building walls and barriers, pushing for decoupling and severing supply chains,” Liu told reporters. “It’s these technological chokepoints they are still vulnerable to.” Among the most notable firms on that list is emerging chip equipment-maker Shanghai Micro Electronics Equipment Group Co., or SMEE, which could stifle Beijing’s efforts to create next-generation semiconductors. for mobile phone and personal computer components. “Those hopes are now greatly diminished, if not dashed altogether.” The tech battle comes as US-China relations have eased since hitting a low point earlier this year following a visit to Taiwan by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

Washington announced some of the broadest export controls on chipmakers in October.

"I'm not going to get ahead of any announcements," Mr Sullivan told reporters. For instance, Apple's new laptop will contain chips from industry leader Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company measuring 3 nanometres. If not, China will be allowed to request for a panel to review its case. Washington's measures also prevent US citizens and green card holders from working for certain Chinese chip companies. The US said it "strongly rejects" the ruling and has no intention of removing the measures. In its WTO filing, China alleged that the US is abusing export controls to maintain "its leadership in science, technology, engineering and manufacturing sectors".

President Xi Jinping and his senior officials pledged to shore up China's battered economy next year as the deaths of two veteran state journalists ...

22, for the first time in years. The last official deaths were reported on Dec. It also advised travellers to reduce contact with elderly relatives. China's national health authority has not reported any official COVID deaths since the policy switch. In a sign of the drive for economic recovery and an indication of the country’s reopening, business magazine Caixin reported on Friday that the government is seeking to aggressively increase both domestic and international flights by the end of next month. Register for free to Reuters and know the full story

BEIJING/SHANGHAI — China set out urgent plans to protect rural communities from COVID-19 on Friday as millions of city-dwellers planned holidays for the ...

It also advised travelers to reduce contact with elderly relatives. Article content

Experts are predicting COVID cases in China will explode after the country ended its strict zero-COVID policy. Here's how the US may be affected.

The Masimo Foundation does not provide editorial input. because it delayed its outbreak until after the arrival of vaccines. Both he and Bouey said they don't think the government is accurately reporting COVID-19 cases right now. "China has a very, very hard road ahead of it in the coming months, don't get me wrong, but in the absence of vaccination, it would be much, much worse." Chan School of Public Health, on the call with Luban. Ashish Jha, the White House coronavirus response coordinator, in a Thursday news conference. Blood banks are already seeing a shortage of donations, she said. "There's no specific reason to be concerned other than that a lot of infections are bad for evolution of new things that we can't predict," Luban said Wednesday on a Massachusetts Consortium on Pathogen Readiness media call. The U.S. 1](https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2022/12/07/china-anti-covid-19-measures-rolled-back/10850310002/). Jeremy Luban, an expert in viruses at the UMass Chan Medical School. [ zero-COVID policy](https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2022/12/07/china-anti-covid-19-measures-rolled-back/10850310002/).

China House will ensure the U.S. government is able to responsibly manage our competition with the People's Republic of China (PRC) and advance our vision for ...

China House is a key component of the Secretary’s modernization agenda, which is focused on equipping the Department to meet the challenges and seize the opportunities of the decade ahead. policy and strategy towards the PRC as the most complex and consequential geopolitical challenge we face. China House will ensure the U.S.

The new unit in the US Department of State aims to create 'more consistent policy' towards China, a rival global power. US President Joe Biden stands with ...

“China House will ensure the US government is able to responsibly manage our competition with the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and advance our vision for an open, inclusive international system,” Blinken said in a press release on Friday. Officially known as the Office of China Coordination, nicknamed “China House”, the unit will work to manage and implement US priorities on a range of issues, such as technology and economic policy. After the meeting, Biden told reporters, “There need not be a new Cold War.”

Joe Biden waves as he participates in a virtual meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping. The establishment of China House reflects the sense inside ...

China House is “not the solution to upping the State Department’s game on China … “The sheer scale, scope, complexity and stakes of the China challenge required us to think, collaborate, organize and act differently,” a senior State Department official said. They also include posting “regional China officers” throughout the world to monitor Chinese activity. “We have not traditionally brought up our teams across the department in this way to do this kind of work.” For instance, the department agreed it would not give certain China House-related authorities to people who were not confirmed by the Senate, according to Risch. Although they were eager to promote their plans for China House, State Department officials stressed that the overall U.S. China House will be physically located inside the State Department’s headquarters in Foggy Bottom. spending on diplomacy, meanwhile, has remained effectively flat, as has the size of the U.S. Jim Risch of Idaho, the ranking Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, refused to sign off on the proposal for months, with his spokesperson saying it was structured as a “bureaucratic power grab.” bureaucracy isn’t nimble enough to combat the multitude of challenges from communist-led China — ranging from trade to military power. China House — formally known as the Office of China Coordination — replaces the China Desk in the State Department’s East Asian and Pacific Affairs bureau. The State Department-based unit is designed to eliminate silos among sometimes redundant government bodies, giving U.S.

My huge thanks to China and Canada for their respective roles in bringing us to Montreal to agree on the post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework.

I look forward to seeing how China moves forward on increasing finance for implementation of the framework. So, at this meeting, we must adopt a transformational framework that speaks to all parts of government and society. Plans are afoot to establish mechanisms to realize the market value of ecosystem goods and services and improve the compensation system for ecological conservation. We know for example that China has established and improved the system for protected areas. What China has already done will serve as a staging platform for meeting any commitments under the global biodiversity framework. My huge thanks to China and Canada for their respective roles in bringing us to Montreal to agree on the post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework.

Beijing's goal of a shift to greener high-tech industry requires a much more efficient financial system.

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The U.S. State Department on Friday launched its long-planned "China House" unit, an internal reorganization to help expand and sharpen its policymaking ...

moves to expand export controls on strategic technology, such as semiconductors, and an August visit to Taiwan by U.S. The two countries have worked to steady relations rocked by a series of recent U.S. President Joe Biden's administration has laid out a strategy to compete with China focused on investing in U.S.

The US State Department announced it is opening a "China House" on Friday which will serve as the convening point for US policy toward Beijing and boost the ...

“China House is a key component of the Secretary’s modernization agenda, which is focused on equipping the Department to meet the challenges and seize the opportunities of the decade ahead. There will also be US government personnel from different agencies that rotate through the China House, making it an interagency effort. “China House will ensure the US government is able to responsibly manage our competition with the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and advance our vision for an open, inclusive international system.

Officials are no longer tracking asymptomatic COVID-19 infections, leading to a large underestimate of the real surge.

"This is a really high level of transmissibility," Cowling said. It is also present in the U.S. “We continue to caution that the road to a full reopening may still be painful and bumpy.” Still, economists do expect the country to have a strong rebound, but it may take months. With hordes of people out sick, many businesses have come to a standstill and once-populated streets are empty. In Beijing, there's already a load of cases and [in] other major cities because it's spreading so fast.”

About a month ago, President Joe Biden met Chinese leader Xi Jinping in Bali and agreed to chart a less volatile path forward in US-China ties, which had ...

In the wake of a wave of protests that gripped numerous Chinese cities last month, the Beijing government relaxed its strict Covid-19 restrictions.

[monitoring](https://www.voanews.com/a/us-monitors-new-variants-from-china-as-beijing-relaxes-zero-covid-approach-/6878471.html)” the outbreak in China closely, looking for new variants. resumes, which it may at some point in 2023, this would of course be the vector for the (sub)variants’ spread. [massive surge](https://www.ft.com/content/73eba78a-1bMassive%20Surgedb-4b32-be3e-b0329470b946) in Covid-19 infections has ensued. Disruptions across the Chinese manufacturing sector are likely to impact the global supply chain of goods and the world’s economy as a whole. Indeed, people have observed [long lines](https://twitter.com/jenniferzeng97/status/1602675947462860800) of vehicles at crematoria and cemeteries. [peak in March](https://www.ft.com/content/4e1f0062-279c-4390-86f8-4d331418a8f5). China is particularly vulnerable, given that its elderly - who are most prone to suffer severe Covid-19 disease – is relatively under-(booster)vaccinated, has comparatively little natural immunity from prior infections, and until now has a limited supply of treatments. Also, China’s National Health Commission [stopped providing total Covid-19 case counts](https://www.ft.com/content/1e0f2260-fac5-4bd2-b570-b56f249a5711) this week. China is the world’s largest producer and exporter of consumer goods. Nationwide, as the virus spreads from region to region, demand for intensive care units may rise to 10 times higher than capacity by March, with daily hospitalizations hitting 70,000. Further, models project that the wave will The pandemic control system of lockdowns, mass testing, quarantining in state-sanctioned facilities, and electronic contact tracing and surveillance, has largely been lifted.

Administrators of the Xiangfu Nursing Home, a high-end facility for the elderly in Shanghai's Changning district, are struggling to keep pace with the ...

(Bloomberg) -- China pledged stronger monetary and fiscal stimulus for the economy and support for private businesses, as Beijing shifts toward boosting ...

The meeting said officials should defuse financial risks of the biggest property developers and improve their ratio of assets to liabilities. Officials at all levels should concretely help private companies deal with difficulties,” the meeting said. Officials said they would ensure that normal life can persist through the current spike in Covid cases, and better coordinate Covid control measures with economic development. The officials also vowed financial support for the property sector, which is in its longest-ever slump, but said they want to avoid financial speculation on housing. Expanding domestic demand topped a list of priorities decided at the meeting. The ruling Communist Party’s annual Central Economic Work Conference comes after the abrupt ending of its Covid Zero policy, which has led to a wave of infections, reducing economic activity.

Three years into the pandemic, the world could be on the cusp of the biggest outbreak yet — in China. The country had some of the strictest COVID polices ...

It was edited by William Troop, Vikki Valentine and Nishant Dahiya. How could that impact China and the world? This episode was produced by Karen Zamora and Michael Levitt.

China's abrupt lifting of stringent COVID-19 restrictions could result in an explosion of cases and over a million deaths through 2023, according to new ...

There are also 8 million people aged 80 and older who have never been vaccinated. "China has since the original Wuhan outbreak barely reported any deaths. China's national health authority has not reported any official COVID deaths since the lifting of COVID restrictions. The last official deaths were reported on Dec. Disease modelers at the University of Hong Kong predict that lifting COVID restrictions and simultaneously reopening all provinces in December 2022 through January 2023 would result in 684 deaths per million people during that timeframe, according to a paper released on Wednesday on the Medrxiv preprint server that has yet to undergo peer review. Register for free to Reuters and know the full story Yanzhong Huang, a senior fellow for global health at the Council on Foreign Relations, said there are 164 million people in China with diabetes, a risk factor for poor COVID outcomes. Another study published July 2022 in Nature Medicine by researchers at the School of Public Health at Fudan University in Shanghai predicted an Omicron wave absent restrictions would result in 1.55 million deaths over a six month period, and peak demand for intensive care units of 15.6 times higher than existing capacity. Other experts expect some 60% of China's population will eventually be infected, with a peak expected in January, hitting vulnerable populations, such as the elderly and those with pre-existing conditions, the hardest. The independent modeling group at the University of Washington in Seattle, which has been relied on by governments and companies throughout the pandemic, drew on provincial data and information from a recent Omicron outbreak in Hong Kong. CHICAGO, Dec 16 (Reuters) - China's abrupt lifting of stringent COVID-19 restrictions could result in an explosion of cases and over a million deaths through 2023, according to new projections from the U.S.-based Institute of Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME). China's zero-COVID policy may have been effective at keeping earlier variants of the virus at bay, but the high transmissibility of Omicron variants made it impossible to sustain, he said.