China

After a week of turmoil following President Donald Trump’s decision to impose additional tariffs on imports from China, global markets are cheerful again. Shares are recovering and currency markets have stabilised. The bond rally is fading. No new retaliatory actions have been announced by either

While President Donald Trump’s bull-in-a-China-shop approach to reforming international trade doesn’t appeal, it is possible that some of his objectives might make sense. This was the logic behind comments by former Barack Obama adviser Daniel Russel, suggesting that Australia

Beijing, over the years, has become more focussed and explicit in recognising and explaining its security threat perceptions. China last week released its 11th national defence paper, and such white papers have come a long way since 1995, when US activity in Asia wasn’t presented as an immediate

Despite the recent spotlight on Chinese aid and labels of China as an “emerging donor”, China has actually been delivering foreign aid since as far back as the 1950s. Indeed, China provided aid to North Korea for reconstruction purposes after the Korean War, along with Cambodia, Nepal and Egypt

Exercise Talisman Sabre has finished, and the Australian, American and Japanese units involved have dispersed to their bases or operational deployments. So has the Chinese ship which monitored their activities. The Type 815G intelligence gatherer (AGI) No. 853 Tianwangxing (in English Uranus) was

For international governance of the near-pristine expanse of the Antarctic, consensus decision making is powerful indeed. This model, is the modus operandi of Antarctic law, and has formed the basis for the successful operation of the Antarctic Treaty System. It can be corrosive to such a

If scientists are right, 85% of what comprises the universe is unseen, so-called “dark matter” material that neither reflects nor emits light. In recent times, “south-south” interactions have been somewhat analogous to “dark matter” for the West – that is, largely invisible. Studying

Last week Paramount Pictures released the trailer for its much-hyped Top Gun sequel, Top Gun: Maverick. The new movie sees Tom Cruise reprise his role as Pete “Maverick” Mitchell, now an aging fighter pilot facing the political and technological realities of a world in which there may no longer

Episode 5 of the Lowy Institute’s new podcast, Rules Based Audio, is out today. In Xi Jinping - The Backlash, Lowy Senior Fellow Richard McGregor discusses his new book on the Chinese leader, which studies the domestic and international reaction to Xi’s centralisation of

Other than the Chinese government in Beijing, the authorities in Taiwan are closely watching the latest developments in Hong Kong. After a series of protests in the Chinese special administrative region, Hong Kong’s Chief Executive Carrie Lam has since abandoned a proposed extradition bill that

China is sparing no efforts in promoting the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), which, as Beijing claims, aims to enhance regional connectivity between China and countries in Asia, Africa, Europe, South America and even the Pacific. The role for SOEs is a two-way process. SEOs could affect China’s

Among many interesting findings in this year’s Lowy Institute Poll, one new question produced a particularly striking result given Australia’s debate over how to navigate the looming tech cold war between the US and China. 44% said “protecting Australians from foreign state intrusion”

Rare earth minerals have emerged as the latest front in the escalating US-China trade war. Nearly a decade after the Chinese government controversially suspended rare earth exports to Japan during the 2010 Senkaku dispute, similar threats are now being made if the bilateral trade dispute with the US

Claims by Chinese and Hong Kong officials that the huge protests of the last week were instigated by “foreign forces”, rather than Hong Kongers fighting for their rights, are laughable. However, the Hong Kong government’s decision on Saturday to suspend the hated extradition bill will ease

China has dominated Australian media over the past week. Warships, baby milk formula, Hong Kong protests, the US China trade war, the list goes on. Politicians, academics, commentators and journalists are all weighing in. Confusing at the least, damaging at the worst, the result is chaotic

Liberal senator Concetta Fierravanti-Wells’ opinion piece published on Friday in The Australian criticising the government over the visit of Chinese naval ships to Sydney is rather extraordinary. A few observations:  Less than three weeks after the election, we are witnessing the first

This article is based on this month’s episode of the Little Red Podcast, Tiananmen’s Final Secret. In the final moments of this week’s episode of ABC Four Corners recounting the pro-democracy movement in China that came to an abrupt halt 30 years ago, former student leader Wang Dan observes

Whether high-profile concessional loans for a Sri Lankan port, large-scale Belt and Road deals with Islamabad, or an international push for its newly rebranded China Global Television Network, China’s efforts to boost its place in Asia haven’t gone unnoticed, particularly in Australia. And

There are a lot of different ways for the region to approach China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). We should not assume that all BRI projects are necessarily one sided or economically unfeasible. Indeed, some countries have been better than others in maximising the benefits of BRI investment and

It is said that no one can fully understand China. Lately, that oft-repeated axiom has seen a new iteration: no one can fully understand the affection and admiration that so many Chinese people seem to feel for US president Donald J. Trump. This mystery has long been a source of bewilderment for

For American author F. Scott Fitzgerald, the test of a great intellect was the ability to “hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time.” By this measure, Australian foreign policy has been very smart for decades. Australian leaders have long used a duality to describe and guide our

On the sidelines of the second Belt and Road Forum in China last month, Cambodia’s Hun Sen was busy. He secured a further $90 million defence grant from Beijing, adding to the $100 million already pledged in June last year. The defence deal was one of at least nine agreements signed with China at

Although China’s top-ranking diplomat Yang Jiechi has repeatedly assured the world that his country’s supreme foreign policy project, the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), “does not play little geopolitical games”, many governments believe this is exactly what it does. The second BRI

China’s Xi Jinping recently completed a high-profile trip to Europe. In Italy, Xi and his Italian counterpart Giuseppe Conte last month signed a non-binding memorandum of understanding linking the struggling Italian economy to Belt and Road Initiative, the sprawling infrastructure