China
Lessons for Trump from Nixon-Mao summit
When US President Richard Nixon visited China in 1972, the US economy had been effectively decoupled from that country since the establishment of the Communist rule in 1949. A…
China’s chance in Papua to bolster Indonesia’s green credentials
Indonesia’s latest announcement of expanded cooperation with China in Papua deserves attention not because it signals geopolitical tension, but because it may finally bring long…
Trump and Xi put Southeast Asia in a bind – giving Canberra a moment to move
When Donald Trump meets Xi Jinping in Beijing this week, the American president has said he expects the Chinese leader to greet him with “a big, fat hug.” While Southeast Asians…
Trump in China and the 13-out-of-10 problem
After a delay due to launching a war on Iran in late February, US President Donald Trump is finally confirmed to go to China on 14 May. This is the moment, heralded by his most…
US “minerals mafia” report reveals the battle with China for the next industrial era
When a tailings dam collapsed at a Chinese-owned copper mine in Zambia last year, tens of millions of litres of toxic waste spilled into waterways feeding the Kafue River, the…
Beijing arrived late to a war it cannot end
Beijing has cast itself as a mediator between Pakistan and the Taliban, neighbours locked in a border conflict that was bound to erupt. China has leant on its ties to both sides…
Analysis
After annexation: How China plans to run Taiwan
Beijing needs to do more than just take Taiwan; it needs to govern it as well, a task that its scholars admit will be a fraught, decades-long project.
Beijing intensifies diplomatic isolation of Taiwan’s president
Last week, Beijing deployed a new tactic for diplomatically isolating Taiwan. On 21 April, President Lai Ching-te postponed a trip to Eswatini, Taiwan’s last remaining diplomatic…
China is remaking the South China Sea with a return to island-building
After nearly a decade of relative pause, China has resumed large-scale island-building in the South China Sea. Satellite images of Antelope Reef show a once-submerged feature…
Taiwan’s deeper vulnerability is politics at home
Most analysis of Taiwan’s security predicament begins from the outside: in particular on Chinese military modernisation, the credibility of American extended deterrence, the risk…