Links - 3rd March 2026 (1 - China's 'Peaceful' Rise: Mark Carney)

Mark Carney on X - "The Canada-China relationship has been distant and uncertain for nearly a decade. We’re changing that, with a new strategic partnership that benefits the people of both our nations."
Tristin Hopper on X - "I'm trying to think of a Liberal principle that *isn't* betrayed by this. It betrays Ukraine. It betrays their supposed love of the climate and the world's oceans. It erases any lip service they've ever given to human rights or the rule of law. It's evil, is what it is."
Melissa Chen on X - "Many pro-democracy Chinese liberals who end up immigrating to Canada are often stunned by the strange misalignment of the stated progressive beliefs of the Liberal Party with their warm embrace of the CPP, an authoritarian regime that governs in opposition to every value that progressives claim to hold dear.  I believe Trudeau accidentally blurted out part of the truth back in 2013. Carney isn't far off - he too admires the China model and he's supercharging its implementation in Canada."

Isaac Stone Fish on X - "Many Chinese Canadians are far more hawkish on China than their non-Chinese descent peers. They often know the country better, and they often understand the problems with the Chinese Communist Party. Politicians need to be very careful in implying that diaspora Chinese want closer relations with China. It's disingenuous and dangerous."

Rick Perkins on X - "It’s amazing how all the Carney Elbows up crowd who want everyone to buy Canadian are cheering 70,000 EVs coming from China and displacing Canadian and North American assembled cars and crushing our auto industry jobs. Hypocrites much?"

Carney’s China pivot raises risks for Canada’s democracy | Toronto Sun - "Walking through Lafayette Park and across the north side of the White House on Monday afternoon, there was the usual gaggle of people taking selfies. There were also the usual protesters, people with signs reading “not my president” and of course given the recent news, protesting ICE in Minnesota.  Regardless of who is in the White House, there are always protesters outside expressing their displeasure with the president of the day. Across Washington you can see signs of support for Donald Trump and signs of opposition. Democracy, despite reports of its demise, is not dead in America. When Mark Carney arrives in Beijing to meet with President Xi Jinping there won’t be any protesters outside as he arrives. No one will hold up signs that claim Xi is not their president and if they tried, they would be arrested or worse.  It’s important to keep these distinctions in mind as Carney travels to China to “pivot” our trading relationship away from the United States.To many Canadians this is welcome news since they see the United States under Donald Trump as being authoritarian, dictatorial, against democracy and an unreliable trading partner. Every single one of those descriptions already applies to China and yet in reaction to the election of Trump our elite class want to embrace an actual authoritarian dictatorship that has already snuffed out democracy in Hong Kong and is threatening to do so in Taiwan... Many Canadians will be old enough to remember Nortel, at one point Canada’s biggest tech success. The company was taken down in large part due to Chinese industrial espionage designed to hurt Nortel and help Chinese firms.  Ask anyone who has been involved in joint ventures with Chinese firms. Often, once the technology from the Canadian firm has been transferred to China, the Canadian firm is eventually cut out.  On direct trade on current issues such as canola, China is an incredibly unreliable partner. They disrupted trade back in 2013-14, they slapped tariffs on Canadian exports in 2017 and had a two-year ban starting in 2020 over the arrest of Meng Wanzhou, the heiress of Huawei.  Their push for cheap electric cars, heavily subsidized by the Chinese government is all part of a plan for industrial dominance. Flood the market with cheap product, take market share, undermine domestic production, leave Canada dependent on Chinese made products — that is the plan in a nutshell... “China has never threatened our sovereignty,” is the common retort from those defending the move.  Of course, China has threatened our sovereignty and continues to do so.  They have meddled in several of our federal and provincial elections to ensure the outcome of their choice. They have established secret police stations to intimidate Canadian citizens, especially those who have immigrated from China — a move that puts Beijing’s power in the heart of Canada.  In our Arctic, China continues to ignore our sovereign waters and probe throughout our territorial waters with both ice breakers and ghost ships.  But sure, China never threatens our sovereignty.  It’s also a country that threatens democracy. They took Hong Kong from a beacon of freedom to a police state rather quickly, even imprisoning people like Jimmy Lai who dared to speak out. They continue to repress Tibet and Uyghur Muslims and are threatening the independence of Taiwan.  As Prime Minister Carney is heading to China, two Liberal MPs cut their trip to Taiwan short so as not to anger President Xi and the other dictators in Beijing. Trump and his policies are a challenge for Canada, no doubt about that. To pretend that he is running a dictatorship that we can’t possibly work with while cozying up to China is beyond ridiculous."
When you just hate the US and Trump. This is like how "pro-Palestine" left wingers love it despite it embodying almost everything they otherwise hate

How Carney's trip to Beijing struck a surprising new tone with China - " The Carney government says its taking precautions in its dealing with China, described by Canada’s national security agencies as the most sophisticated and able threat actor facing the country.  Carney said Canada discussed its expectations and “red lines” with the Chinese government last week with respect to foreign interference and other public safety issues. He also promised that the government was going into this new “strategic partnership” with “clear eyes” and guardrails preventing China from investing in certain sensitive industries. He recently cited artificial intelligence and critical minerals as examples.  But will that be enough to prevent China from continuing to be the most sophisticated and prevalent cyber and foreign interference actor against Canada, as described by Canada’s national security agencies?  In the meantime, the public service’s concerns about security while in China were certainly obvious from the start of the trip.  One hour before Can Force One entered Chinese airspace Wednesday, all public servants and political staff were required to power down their usual work and personal devices and stash them in a Faraday bag.  While in Beijing, they all used “burner” devices, which were promptly returned as soon as the delegation’s plane left Chinese airspace Saturday.  There’s no need to use burners in Qatar and Switzerland — the next stops on the eight-day trip — showing that not all allies are on equal security footing."

What they’re saying an independent Alberta would look like - "Prime Minister Mark Carney gave a press conference announcing that Canada would “increase cooperation” with Chinese law enforcement in order to “better combat narcotics trafficking, transnational crime, cyber crime and money laundering.” According to Canadian law enforcement, a disproportionate amount of all those categories can be blamed on the very Chinese authorities Carney is looking to partner with. As one of several examples, the Chinese military was the chief suspect in a devastating hack of the Canadian telecom firm Nortel. More recently, a Canadian subsidiary of the state-owned Industrial and Commercial Bank of China was identified as a habitual violator of Canadian money laundering regulations."

Thread by @MichaelKovrig on Thread Reader App – Thread Reader App - "What to make of PM Carney’s first official visit to China? This was never just a courtesy call. Xi Jinping framed the visit as a “turning point” because the CCP wants concrete things from Canada, including market access for its hypersubsidized EVs, stable energy supplies, and geopolitical deference. With Canada–U.S. relations under strain, the General Secretary smelled blood in the water and seized a moment of increased leverage.  Carney secured limited relief for farmers and reopened dialogue channels, but Xi kept his pressure tools and is sure to keep using them. So Canada needs to treat this as a rope-a-dope in an ongoing trade slugfest, and redouble its efforts to reduce dependence on China by diversifying markets for vulnerable sectors. And it needs a plan for how its domestic car industry and cybersecurity defences will cope with Chinese EVs. Guardrails for national security, sovereignty, political interference, and harm to Canadians will need to rise. More on this in my conversation with David Cochrane on @CBCNews @PnPCBC. Full video link here:"

Tristin Hopper on X - ""All Carney did was sign a trade deal. Everyone trades with China." That's not what he did, though. It's literally on video that this isn't what he did. It's international headlines that this isn't what he did. Do you idiots even listen to yourselves?"
BTN1973 on X - "Everyone conveniently leaves out the security cooperation and New World Order part. I told my wife that today (she's left of centre) and she was actually very concerned with the pivot to China. She listens to CBC daily and had no idea about the security part of the conversation."
Brian Forbes on X - "Not a lot of people have called a trade agreement "the new world order"..."

Meme - Mark Carney giving Trump an upturned finger: "CANADA WILL Never BE THE 51T STATE!"
Mark Carney hugging Xi Jinping: "WE'RE CHINA'S 24th PROVINCE"

Meme - "Communist China:
Interferes in our elections
Places bounties on Canadians' heads
Sets up secret police stations on our soil
Kidnaps our citizens
Steals our tech
Tariffs our goods
Donald Trump:
Made some 51st state jokes
Also tariffs our goods"
WHY ARE THE CARNEY LIBERALS MOVING TOWARD CHINA?"

Melissa Chen on X - "It's funny how so many libs are hailing Carney's WEF speech as one of the greatest political speeches ever. Here's a recap:
> He described the old post-WWII order as a "useful fiction" propped up by US hegemony, now over, requiring middle powers to band together, diversify dependencies, and prioritize withstanding coercion from larger powers
> "They'll buy insurance, increase options in order to rebuild sovereignty – sovereignty that was once grounded in rules, but will increasingly be anchored in the ability to withstand pressure."
> "We accept what's offered. We compete with each other to be the most accommodating. This is not sovereignty. It's the performance of sovereignty while accepting subordination."
Carney's speech uses sovereignty as a central, muscular theme in a way that feels unusually nationalist and realist for a WEF setting, which typically emphasizes global cooperation, integration, and stakeholder capitalism. That rhetorical shift from "global rules" to "real sovereignty through resilience and options" and resistance to external pressures sound familiar, don't they? It sounds strikingly like a speech that could have been made by Viktor Orbán who Western libs and Eurocrats have despised for precisely holding these views and running his country this way."
Meaghan Mobbs on X - "This whole thing would be far more credible if he hadn’t just bent the knee to Beijing.   How exactly does partnering with China square with his talk of “ad hoc coalitions based on shared values and interests”? Or do his newfound “principles” about standing up to great powers and no longer tolerating violations of international norms apply only to the United States?  China has waged a far more aggressive, years-long pressure campaign against Canada itself, including intimidation and targeting of Canadian MPs on Canadian soil. That record is conveniently ignored.  It would also help if Canada weren’t consistently near the back of the pack on NATO defense spending, or if it had demonstrated even baseline seriousness about investing in its own defense.  At best, this speech reads as thinly veiled frustration with Trump and the U.S., dressed up as moral clarity. At worst, it will become the “sophisticated” excuse adopted by every wavering Western country looking to justify accommodation with China while outsourcing real risk and responsibility to Washington."

Jason James on X - "I watched this speech in full last night. Here's the takeaway:  The EU and it's subordinates (Canada, Australia, etc) are committed to this narrative of Trump as a Hitlerian figure.  Carney begins his speech by asserting that the western rules based order was always a façade—which is correct.  He then evokes Václav Havel's Power of the Powerless—one of the great dissenting pieces on Soviet era communism. The irony here is insane considering he just signed Canada into a partnership with China—the nation that adopted Stalinist communism and turned it up to a degree that would've even made Stalin sweat—while Canada is adopting much of the authoritarianism in the Chinese system.  The rest of the speech is a diatribe against America as the global hegemon. He uses a lot of fancy WEF style phrases like "value based realism", which don't really mean anything other than "we're not afraid to show our hand now." He spends much of his speech justifying the middle powers clinging to the Chinese globalist machine by contextualizing Trump and the United States as global bullies.  Which is historically true. But in this context, US hegemony is actually the wall holding back the China-led "new world order" global finance bloodsuckers like Carney and Larry Fink are desperate to introduce. They're all in on China because China's version of communo-fascism (public private partnerships) is the system that will deliver them the neofeudal future they seek (Carney, Fink, Gates, etc as the aristocracy and the rest of us as techno-slaves).  I'm convinced Mark Carney was installed as an economic assassin for China. His close financial proximity to the Trump family ($1 billion loan to Jared Kushner via Brookfield) and his connection to London makes him the perfect weapon against the Reagan era free markets Trump is trying to restore.  Juxtapose this speech against Howard Lutnick's comments on the WEF economics panel, and you get a full view of what's happening here. Canada and the EU are shilling for China, the United States is trying to isolate the American continent before the hammer drops.  The American Empire is messy, but it's far more preferential to what Carney and his China-fueled globalist creep club have planned for us. The world will have a superpower whether we like it or not, and America has to win."

Dean Allison on X - "Carney is wrong.  While the overwhelming approval of the chattering class in Canada’s state funded/subsidized media of Carney’s speech was expressed in a planned, coordinated unison, the content of the speech was inaccurate in many respects.   Let’s face it: Carney has barely done anything as Prime Minister since he was elected last April. Whatever little he’s done is overshadowed by his performative and drama inducing rhetoric, very much like this speech in Davos. Reminiscent of someone?   Reality is, the US will continue to be Canada’s neighbour, sharing the longest land border in the world, our closest economic ally, with the most powerful military in the world. These are the facts.  Given this reality, where is the desperately needed deal Carney promised by July 21, 2025? Today is January 21, 2026!   Is he prioritizing China over the US? Is he aligning with China over the US? Does he think the dictatorship in China is a more trustworthy and reliable partner than the US? Because those are the signals he’s sending out.  Another reality. The world started materially changing (yet again) about a decade ago, while successive Liberal governments made things here exponentially worse in domestic and international matters. Guess who was Trudeau’s advisor since 2020? Our current and dear Prime Minister Carney.   So, Mr. Prime Minister, spare us the performance for your pals in the state funded/subsidized media with rhetoric only they clap to and approve of.   Get the real work done, in reality - you know, where Canadians live and work and raise families. These folks can’t afford homes, and find it hard to buy food. They can barely afford to heat their homes. This is largely because of your advice to Justin Trudeau, Mr. Prime Minister.   So go out there and speak with the real people of Canada. In reality. Not the Davos fantasyland you’re used to, Mr. Prime Minister. Land in reality because Canadians here at home are desperate for solutions, while you jet set around the world pretending to understand their struggles, just to get your rich and powerful pals’ stamp of approval."

Carney's warning against U.S. misses mark in Switzerland - "he spoke about how middle powers, which Canada once was, can work together to try to shape the world.  “The middle powers must act together, because if we’re not at the table, we’re on the menu,” Carney said.  It’s a good sound bite but also sounds like a slogan, the kind that Carney formerly railed against... Much of his speech was about the great power rivalry that is happening between the United States, Russia and China. The problem is that he was highly critical in the Americans walking away from the international rules-based order while not acknowledging that China and Russia walked away from it years if not decades ago... Sure, the Russians took Crimea from Ukraine in 2014 and did a full invasion in 2022. And yes, China has been occupying Tibet for decades and has oppressed Uyghur Muslims in the Xinjiang district of the company, but let’s be worried about the Americans. As American Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent pointed out at Davos, the Europeans have not stopped buying Russian oil and gas even as Putin wages war against Ukraine.  The big problem with Carney’s speech is that he described the Americans as abandoning from the rules-based order while never acknowledging that both China and Russia did the same years if not decades ago. A big part of why Trump was elected is that he promised not to let China and Russia grow at the expense of America.  Carney then stated that the rules-based order was dead due to the Americans. “Stop invoking the rules-based international order as though it still functions as advertised. Call it what it is, a system of intensifying great power rivalry, where the most powerful pursue their interests, using economic integration as coercion,” Carney said.  The problem is, his warning against the United States would more likely be applied to China. Carney has decided to align our country with China rather than the United States and that is unlikely to play well for us long term."

Harrison Lowman on X - "Why is the Carney government rolling out the red carpet for Chinese propaganda media?... A 2024 National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians report states when looking at covertly influencing Canadian opinion through media, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) has been the “most capable." They found that China is “interfering with Canadian media content via direct engagement with Canadian media executives and journalists.” A 2018 Guardian investigation states, “China is trying to reshape the global information environment with massive infusions of money—funding paid-for advertorials, sponsored journalistic coverage and heavily massaged positive messages from boosters…to exploit the vulnerabilities of the free press to its advantage.” In 2012, Xinhua news service, while operating in this country, was accused by their own employee of “working as agents of the Chinese government" while in Canada, after allegations they had that Canadian journalist spy on the Dalai Lama. They were also accused of attempting to collect the names and addresses of people who protested a Chinese premier in Ottawa. They've since been banned from Parliament military briefings. They deny wrongdoing. In China, foreign journalists are repeatedly spied on, censored, intimidated, with sources often whisked away in vans by government minders. Media tycoon Jimmy Lai was just convicted of sedation and foreign collusion in Hong Kong. Canada currently has no permanent correspondents based in mainland China, nor are we seemingly permitted to. During Carney’s recent trip to China, Canadian journalists admitted they used burner phones for the first time, lest they be spied on by the Chinese government. So...why are we rolling out the welcome mat to Beijing-controlled media?"
Howard Anglin on X - "Great catch, and great point. Carney's deal with the Chinese Communist Party says: "The two sides consented to provide mutual support and convenience for media to work in each other's countries ..." But, because we know that Canadian journalists can't operate freely in the PRC, this "deal" can only redound to the benefit of Chinese state media, to whom Carney is giving more access here in Canada.   Why, this one-way deal?   Are any Canadian media asking?"

Mark Carney's dalliance with dictators - "Carney’s choice of China as the signature stop on his trip should not surprise avid observers of Canadian politics. Liberal prime minister Jean Chrétien made no less than four voyages to the Middle Kingdom, as part of his legacy-building Team Canada missions to open China to the Canadian market. After the Liberals returned to power in 2015, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau attempted to follow suit, travelling to China twice between 2016 and 2017, before Sino-Canadian relations soured with the abduction of Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor the following year. In the intervening time, the Communist Party of China has emerged as the single greatest threat to western democracies. It is a staunch ally of Russia, which has been waging an unprovoked war against Ukraine since 2022 and is threatening its European neighbours, Iran, the world’s leading exporter of terrorism, and North Korea, a nuclear-armed state run by a certifiable madman. China was responsible for unleashing the COVID pandemic on the world and hampering international efforts to determine how it originated. It then used the cover of a global health crisis to crush Hong Kong’s democracy, in clear violation of its treaty with the United Kingdom. It has militarized the South China Sea and is actively threatening Taiwan. All the while, Beijing has been spying on the West, interfering in western democracies, including Canada, and intimidating Chinese expats living abroad. It was less than a year ago that a public inquiry found that China is “the most active perpetrator of foreign interference targeting Canada’s democratic institutions” — a warning Carney seemed to take seriously during the election campaign... Through a combination of subsidies, tax breaks and other policy incentives, China has become a world leader in the production of EVs, controlling roughly 70 per cent of the global market. And it has been accused of dumping excess vehicles, along with cheap metals, in foreign markets at rock-bottom prices, in an effort to further hollow out the West’s manufacturing base. Moreover, Chinese vehicles potentially represent a massive security threat. In the United Kingdom, the Defence Ministry banned Chinese cars from sensitive military sites, and defence contractors have told employees not to discuss classified information in them or connect their mobile devices to their vehicles’ Bluetooth. I personally would have been happy to let Chinese taxpayers backstop Canada’s climate commitments by providing us with cheap EVs — espionage concerns could surely have been assuaged by banning factory-installed transmitting devices — but Canadians and their political leaders need to be clear-eyed about how the Chinese do business. The Chinese government does not make a distinction between politics and economics, or between state and private enterprises: everything it does is designed to further the Communist party’s geopolitical goals and its grip on power. For decades, Chinese spies have been stealing trade secrets from western countries to give domestic industries a competitive edge. The most notable example in this country was a targeted campaign to steal intellectual property from Nortel Networks, which ultimately succumbed to competitive pressure from China’s Huawei Corporation. Despite this long history of state-industrial espionage, western intelligence agencies are only recently waking up to the insidious threat posed by Chinese spies, who simultaneously work to gather information on foreign governments, steal proprietary information from private companies and influence elections in favour of Beijing-friendly candidates. While it makes sense that Carney would want to broker a truce with the world’s second-largest economy, he needs to realize that any gains made by his Chinese counterparts will be intended not just to increase the economic well-being of their citizens, but to achieve global economic dominance at the expense of our own standard of living. China’s share of global manufacturing output increased from five per cent in 1980 to 28.9 per cent in 2023, while America’s dropped from over 20 to 17.2 per cent. In 2000, China’s net exports of manufactured goods was lower than the European Union’s and Japan’s; 23 years later, it had outpaced both, and is now double that of the EU’s. The data clearly shows that its strategy of positioning itself as a manufacturing powerhouse and hollowing out its competitors’ industrial base is working. China’s economy is too large to ignore, and it certainly has to be part of our strategy to diversify away from the U.S. But Carney could have come to China with a much stronger hand if he had first worked to shore up trading relations with our allies. The free trade agreement we signed with the EU a decade ago has still not been fully ratified. We still don’t have a free trade deal with the U.K., despite sharing a king and a constitution based on common principles. Numerous countries — including democratic allies like Taiwan and Ukraine — have applied to enter the Trans-Pacific Partnership, but are waiting in limbo. Working on these files could help open friendly markets to Canadian goods and services, while giving consumers a wider range of non-American products to choose from on store shelves. Most importantly, improving trade relations with these allies would expand the West’s economic clout and help build a broad coalition to counter malevolent actors like China. Instead, Carney showed a distinct lack of imagination, running, like the Liberal prime ministers who came before him, cap-in-hand to China, which is already our second-largest trading partner (not exactly a “new market”), before jetting off to kiss the ring of Qatari Emir Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, whose government has for years harboured the leaders of Hamas and, like China, has an atrocious human rights record. Rather than “building strength at home,” the prime minister’s dalliance with dictators will only serve to strengthen the hands of our enemies."

Links - 13th February 2026 (1 - China's 'Peaceful' Rise)

Dustin Grage on X - "🚨 BREAKING: Tim Walz spoke this morning on who can be the voice in the world that could negotiate some type of deal with moral authority.  “It might be the Chinese.”  Thank God this guy isn’t in the White House. WOW. 😮"

China's Largest Comic Convention Bans Anime & Manga - "China’s largest comic convention, COMICUP, has effectively banned Japanese anime and manga from its upcoming event after organizers announced a sudden shift to a “New Chinese Style–only” format... Posts claim that cosplayers portraying non-Chinese IP characters may be denied entry and that staff will conduct inspections inside the venue to ensure compliance...   The COMICUP decision comes amid a series of recent restrictions on Japanese entertainment in China, particularly in the anime and manga.  In December 2025, the theatrical run of Demon Slayer: Infinity Castle ended abruptly after regulators declined to grant the film a standard release extension. The decision was officially attributed to “unavoidable circumstances,” despite box office performance that would typically support a longer run.  Other Japanese anime films have faced similar uncertainty. Screenings of Detective Conan: The Time-Bombed Skyscraper and the latest Crayon Shin-chan movie have been postponed indefinitely, alongside the live-action adaptation of Cells at Work!, with no revised release schedules announced.  In late November, Japanese singer Maki Otsuki was escorted offstage during a performance in Shanghai, while scheduled Sailor Moon live stage shows in China were also canceled."

Natalie Winters on X - "WATCH: Neil Bush, son of George H.W. Bush and Chair of Bush China Foundation Chair, outlines a plan to make Americans “less fearful” of China. He’s speaking to a Chinese Communist propaganda and spy front that’s paid him millions. Exclusive report below ⬇️"
Melissa Chen on X - "The Chinese have been cultivating influence amongst some of the most prominent American political families for DECADES.  The Bush family's China friendship began in 1974 when George HW Bush served as de facto ambassador to Beijing. As president in 1989, Bush worked hard to smooth relations after Tiananmen, sending a secret delegation to Beijing just a month later.  When Jeb Bush ran against Donald Trump in 2016, he was backed to the tune of $1.3 million by a Chinese couple named Gordon Tang and Haudan Chen who own a property development company in California called SingHaiyi.  They had already appointed Jeb's brother, Neil Bush, as non-executive chairman of their company.  Neil chairs the George HW Bush China-US Relations Foundation which has ties to a known united front body, the Chinese Peoples' Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries (CPAFFC). This is an agency that forms an integral part of the CCP's united front work.  In June 2019, Chinese state media People's Daily enthusiastically reported Neil Bush opining that the US was using trade barriers as a "political weapon to bully China." He's on record saying that China is becoming more mature, and that US democracy is flawed and politicians are "brainwashing Americans into seeing China as a problem."  In short, this isn't new. He has been spouting lines as if lifted directly from the CCP's Propaganda Department for years and he is actually DIRECTLY working with the united front, having been personally enriched by these liaisons."

Nguyen Ho on X - "China is trashing the oceans. Each year, 4M tons of juvenile fish are caught before they can breed. That is 1/3 of China’s catch. China has exceeded its legal catch limits every year since 1994."
Noah Smith 🐇🇺🇸🇺🇦🇹🇼 on X - "China is destroying much of Earth's ocean life and most environmentalists don't even give a shit"
Melissa Chen on X - "This is so frustrating. It's getting quite hard not to conclude that the environmental movement is primarily an anti-Western vehicle given its silence about arguably the biggest environmental destruction currently being wrought on the planet.   The massive - and potentially irreversible - oceanic destruction by China's huge trawler fleet has been known for about a decade now, but still no one seems to care.  The history of funding and influence links between Russia, China, and some Western environmental groups is well known:  See @UnHerd  article here: https://unherd.com/2025/05/how-china-co-opted-the-green-movement   The longer our most visible environmental activists and orgs stay silent about the behavior of the Chinese trawler fleet, the more we know what their game plan was all along.  Also I seem to recall celebs like Leo DiCaprio caring very much about marine conservation and protection of biodiversity. Sadly, he won’t say shit about this because he would never make another movie again.   He would sooner denigrate Western consumption habits on stage at the Oscars than criticize or use his foundation to do anything about the Chinese destroying swathes of marine ecosystems and overfishing."

BLACK DUMPLING™ on X - "You mean the Leftost movement that crippled American nuclear because "the environment", destroyed American manufacturing to save "the environment" and targeted American AI development for destruction because "the environment" didn't care about the environment?"
Mommar on X - "It's not an accident that the entire western world has been manipulated into killing its fossil fuel industry, limiting its energy usage and output, and thereby destroying its manufacturing base meanwhile China does the complete opposite without an ounce of criticism. This is by design"

Ken Cao-The China Crash Chronicle on X - "Finally, someone in the United States has started asking the obvious question:  what exactly happened to the Qing Dynasty and Republic of China government bonds that the U.S. still holds? If the Chinese Communist Party insists those debts don’t count, then by the same logic, there’s no sacred reason the United States must honor U.S. Treasury bonds held by the CCP either.  And if Beijing’s defense is that “the Qing Dynasty and the Republic of China are not today’s China,” then congratulations—you’ve just invalidated the entire “since ancient times” narrative in terms of Taiwan in one sentence.  You can’t disown history when it comes to debt and then reclaim it when it comes to territory.  I used to think the CCP was playing some kind of grand, long-term chess game. Turns out it wasn’t chess at all. Just a pile of rhetorical boomerangs—thrown confidently, only to come spinning back at full speed."

China Is a Paper Dragon - The Atlantic - "In 2018, the Tufts University professor Michael Beckley published a richly detailed study of Chinese military and economic weaknesses. The book is titled Unrivaled: Why America Will Remain the World’s Sole Superpower. The book argues that China’s economic, financial, technological, and military strength is hugely exaggerated by crude and inaccurate statistics. Meanwhile, U.S. advantages are persistently underestimated. The claim that China will “overtake” the U.S. in any meaningful way is polemical and wrong—and wrong in ways that may mislead Americans into serious self-harming mistakes. Above all, Beckley pleads with readers not to focus on the headline numbers of gross domestic product. China may well surpass the United States as the largest economy on Earth by the 2030s. China was also almost certainly the largest economy on Earth in the 1830s. A big GDP did not make China a superpower then—and it will not make China a superpower now, or so Beckley contends. Beckley is a voracious reader of specialist Chinese military journals and economic reports. And, he argues, many of the advances cited as Chinese strengths don’t hold up to close scrutiny. American analysts often publish worries about China’s growing navy, and especially its two aircraft carriers. But, Beckley writes, “Chinese pilots fly 100 to 150 fewer hours than U.S. pilots and only began training on aircraft carriers in 2012,” and he adds that “Chinese troops spend 20 to 30 percent of their time studying communist ideology.” When Chinese forces do train, Beckley argues, the exercises bear little resemblance to the challenges the People’s Liberation Army would face in a great-power conflict... Worried about Chinese students’ high scores on comparative math tests? You’re looking at the curated outputs of highly selective groups of students... Repression is expensive. Comparing China’s military spending to that of the United States, for example, doesn’t make much sense. The Chinese military’s first and paramount mission is preserving the power of the Chinese Communist Party against China’s own people. The U.S. military can focus entirely on external threats. The lines that plot the comparative GDP of the United States and China distort the real balance of power between the two societies, Beckley argues, because China must devote such a large share of its resources to basic subsistence needs to avert the overthrow of the state... in the 1800s, the Chinese empire had a GDP much larger than that of Great Britain. The Chinese army of 800,000 men also enormously exceeded Britain’s troop numbers. Yet when the two states clashed in the two Opium Wars, from 1839 to 1842 and again in 1858, China was crushingly defeated. Why? A great part of the answer, then as now, was the cost of repression. Nineteenth-century China faced an average of 25 local uprisings a year. Most of its troops had to be deployed to suppress rebellions and control banditry, leaving few available for war-fighting. The next part of the answer is that mass is not power. Although China’s resources were enormous in the aggregate, most were consumed by the basics of subsistence. In the 19th-century, Britain produced only half as much as China, but it did so with one-thirteenth the population—making more wealth available for more purposes. A final piece of the answer is that technological copycats face huge disadvantages against technological innovators. They will always lag behind the more creative rival, not only in the factory, but on the battlefield. “Repeatedly during the Opium Wars … Chinese armies of thousands were routed in minutes by a few hundred, or even a few dozen, British troops,” Beckley notes... the very real limits besetting China: a fast-aging population, massive internal indebtedness, and a regime whose worsening repression suggests its declining popularity... As China’s population ages, it will deplete its savings. Chinese people save a lot to compensate for the state’s meager social-security provision. For three decades, the savings of ordinary people financed the spectacular borrowing of China’s state-owned enterprises. How much was borrowed? Nobody knows, because everybody lies. What happens as the savings are withdrawn to finance hundreds of millions of retirements? Again—who knows? China misallocates capital on a massive scale. More than a fifth of China’s housing stock is empty—the detritus of a frenzied construction boom that built too many apartments in the wrong places. China overcapitalizes at home because Chinese investors are prohibited from doing what they most want to do: get their money out of China. Strict and complex foreign-exchange controls block the flow of capital. More than one-third of the richest Chinese would emigrate if they could, according to research by one of the country’s leading wealth-management firms. The next best alternative: sending their children out."
From 2021

China’s new restrictions on rare earth exports send a stark warning to the West - "Beijing’s new rules announced on Thursday stipulate that licenses will be required for the export of technologies used in rare earth mining and processing, as well as for the manufacturing of magnets, which can be used in military technologies. Crucially, any foreign firm that wants to supply rare earths produced in China or processed with Chinese technologies outside China will also need to get a license, according to China’s Ministry of Commerce... China’s willingness to use its trade heft to advance geopolitical goals should make policymakers in the West wake up to the burgeoning power of China’s manufacturing supply chain and its control over certain so-called ‘chokepoint’ technologies – which it can limit access to at will... Chinese companies compete not only with mid-technology counterparts in the West but also at the apex of the tech pyramid. Research from the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) shows that China leads the US in 57 out of 64 critical technology categories."
Time for China to increasing funding for environmental groups blocking rare earth mining

Xi Jinping’s rare earths weapon is backfiring on China - "The dominant narrative at the moment is that Xi has put America in its place with restrictions on rare earths, over which China has a near monopoly. In April, Beijing announced a strict export licensing regime. The measure was turned into a comprehensive set of controls on Oct 9. These actions enhanced restrictions issued in previous years. Reuters reports that Beijing last week agreed not to go ahead with the October rules but left the April measures in place. The White House’s fact sheet has a different slant, stating that general licenses for the export of certain minerals “means the de facto removal of controls China imposed in April 2025 and October 2022”. But the details of the agreement may matter less than the direction of travel. Scott Bessent, the US Treasury Secretary, told the Financial Times that China had “made a real mistake” by weaponising rare earths. He also predicted Beijing’s leverage would last no more than 24 months. The Treasury Secretary is right. First, America is moving at “Trump speed” in signing rare earths deals with alternative suppliers, most notably the $8.5bn (£6.5bn) pact inked on Oct 20 when Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese visited the White House. Moreover, agreements with Thailand and Malaysia signed on Oct 26 and the one with Japan two days later have rare earths provisions. The G7 announced a production alliance on Oct 31. Moreover, the US is working on technologies, such as those being developed at the University of Texas at Austin, that “increase domestic supply and decrease reliance on costly imports”. These new methods could crack Beijing’s firm hold on processing: China currently processes 92pc of the global output of these minerals. While America will make good use of the truce, China will do the opposite. Beijing’s rare earths embargo is accelerating its isolation. “Each embargo justifies a new refinery, alliance, or export control [by China’s opponents],” Tanvi Ratna, an engineer who writes on emerging tech and state power, posted on X. “China’s leverage is real,” she notes, “but it peaks on use”. More fundamentally, Beijing’s rare earths rules take on all other nations, not just the United States. As such, they accelerate the de-globalisation that started with the Covid pandemic. China was clearly the biggest beneficiary of globalisation after the Cold War, and now the country is more trade dependent than at any other time in its history. It, therefore, will almost certainly end up the biggest victim of the de-linking process. Additionally, Xi is now doubling down on policies that make China even more dependent on America. At the Fourth Plenum of the Central Committee, which ended on Oct 23, the Communist Party continued to emphasise industrial production over domestic consumption as the primary driver of the economy, incorporating this priority in the 15th Five-Year Plan, which begins next year. China’s consumers cannot absorb existing factory production, and the economy is already trapped in a deepening deflationary spiral. The Consumer Price Index has been negative six of nine months of this year, and September was the 36th straight month the Producer Price Index, which measures factory-gate prices, was in negative territory. So the country will have to export even more... In response to Trump’s tariffs, Beijing has been selling more to what it calls the “Global South”, but, as Brookings scholar Robin Brooks explains, margins on those sales are lower. China still needs America. American consumers account for about 34pc of global household consumption. With more products to sell, China will need the US more than before. Last year, America accounted for 29.8pc of China’s merchandise trade surplus of $992.2bn (£755bn). Moreover, as each month passes, China’s economy continues to erode. The country’s reported growth figure of 4.8pc for the third quarter of this year is not credible. With even industrial production slowing – the country’s official Purchasing Managers’ Index showed that the contraction in the all-important factory sector deepened last month – President Trump was right to crow that the meeting with Xi was a 12 on a scale of zero to 10. But not for the reasons many commentators might imagine."

Sadly for China, rare Earth elements aren’t actually all that rare - "It all started in July 2023, when the Chinese government announced it would restrict the export of gallium and germanium, two critical minerals that are mostly used in making solar panels and semiconductors. Over the following two years, China’s list of controlled products expanded to include antimony, graphite, and other materials. Earlier this month, the Chinese government escalated things even further, subjecting seven rare earth elements to a more comprehensive export licensing program that covers the whole world and is designed to further choke off American companies... Without them, in many cases, technological infrastructure and consumer gadgets won’t be able to perform at the same level—but they will still maintain their basic functions. “The wind turbines will just go out of service 10 years earlier; electric vehicles will not last as long,” says Wang. Lange agrees that the impact of losing access to heavy rare earth elements would be somewhat manageable for American companies. “One place where that rare earth is in your car is in the motors that pull up and down your window,” says Lange. “There are ways to just deal with some things that are not as fun, like rolling down your windows by hand.” In the past, China’s critical mineral restrictions haven’t worked very well. One reason is that US companies that want to buy rare earth minerals can simply go through an intermediary country first. For example, Belgium has emerged as a possible re-export hub that appears to pass germanium—one of the minerals Beijing first restricted in 2023—from China to the US, according to trade data. Since the European Union has much closer ties with Washington than with Beijing, it’s difficult for the Chinese government to effectively stop this flow of trade. Another sign that China’s export controls haven’t been very effective is that the price of critical minerals has increased only slightly since the policies were first implemented, indicating that supply levels have remained steady. “Whatever they did in 2023 hasn’t really changed the status quo” of the market, says Lange... In the long run, however, companies may be able to find technological solutions to address a potential shortage of rare earth minerals. Tesla, for example, announced in 2023 that it had reduced the use of them in its EV motors by 25 percent, and it planned to get rid of them completely in the future. The carmaker hasn’t clarified what it would use instead, but experts speculate it could be turning to other types of magnets that don’t rely on rare earths... Unlike making advanced semiconductors, which requires using sophisticated machinery worth hundreds of millions of dollars and building extremely complicated factories, critical minerals aren’t that hard to produce. The technologies involved to mine and refine them are mature and both the US and Canada have large natural deposits of some of them. But the mining industry was pushed out of the West because it doesn’t generate much value and is also extremely polluting. In the past, efforts to build up the critical minerals supply chain in the US have either been slowed down or called off. That’s more due to basic economic calculations, says Lange, rather than technological difficulties. “It’s like bending down to pick up a nickel,” he says, meaning the effort isn’t worth the reward. Because companies only need tiny quantities of these minerals, the market for them is very volatile—prices can drop when a single new factory comes online and starts mass producing and refining them. That means if a mining company were to open up shop in the US, it could inadvertently tank the price of the same mineral it’s trying to profit from, says Lange. But if China succeeds in strictly enforcing its export control policies, it might provide just enough incentive for the US government and private companies to finally reshore the mineral refining industry. If that happens, Lange says, it could take about two years for a new critical mineral operation to open in the US."

Lim Tean | Facebook - "The Great Myth Of China Never Having Invaded Other Countries !
Nothing irks me more than to hear the persistent claim, often repeated in public debate, and even by renown scholars such as Jeffrey Sachs of Columbia University, that China has never invaded other countries and that there is nothing to fear from her unparalleled military build-up over the past 2 decades, and that she is a benign power. This assertion does not withstand serious historical scrutiny and should be rejected plainly and without equivocation.  China’s own imperial history tells a very different story. For more than 2 thousand years, successive Chinese dynasties expanded their territory through military conquest, occupation and coercion, just as other great powers have done throughout history. The Han dynasty pushed Chinese armies deep into Central Asia, conquering the Tarim Basin and waging sustained offensive wars to secure strategic depth and trade routes. The Tang dynasty projected military power across much of Inner Asia, subjugating Turkic states and repeatedly intervening by force in Korea and Vietnam.  The Yuan dynasty launched large-scale invasions across East and Southeast Asia, including Korea, Vietnam and Burma. The Ming dynasty occupied Vietnam for 2 decades, following military conquest while the Qing dynasty- the most territorially expansive of all- used force to absorb Xinjiang, Tibet and Mongolia, effectively doubling the size of the Chinese state. These were not defensive actions. They were wars of expansion, conducted to secure dominance over China’s periphery.  Some argue that these campaigns were softened by so-called tributary system. That, too, is a distortion. Tributary relations were not partnerships of equals ; they were hierarchical arrangements enforced by the credible threat and frequent use of military force. States that resisted were punished. Those that complied did so under pressure. This was order imposed by power, not harmony achieved by consent.  Those who promote the myth of China’s historical exceptionalism ignore one of the most enduring insights of human experience. The great Greek historian Thucydides, who wrote the history of the Peloponnesian Wars, warned us that human nature does not change, and that fear, interest and power drive the behaviour of states across all eras and cultures. Winston Churchill put it even more starkly when he observed that “the story of the human race is war”. China, like every civilisation before it, is not exempt from these truths.  We must be clear-eyed instead of viewing China through rose-tinted glasses. Power, when unchecked, has always sought expansion. That lesson is as relevant today as it was in antiquity. China’s rise to become a powerful country was never peaceful. It is therefore pointless to pontificate whether her continued rise will be peaceful. It can never be. If we ignore this simple truth and choose to be hypnotised by the smiling Tiger mouthing multi-literalism, we do so at our peril.  In a subsequent post, I shall explain how China has continued with her hard-edged expansionism even in the 20th and 21st centuries."

Roman Baber on X - "The Chinese Communist Party has 2 million muslims in labour camps. The Liberal/Left pretend it's not happening, while Canadian media is fear mongering a US invasion. I lived in USSR for almost 9 years. Canadians are now subjected to Soviet level lies."
Someone claimed this was Russian propaganda. Time to abolish Amnesty International!

Meme - "Is homelessness common in China? I imagine the PRC has social programs to combat this no?"
"No it isn't."
"It's incredibly rare that's why Chinese tourists are always shocked by how many homeless people there are in western cities like Paris or New York"
"For Chinese people, and anyone influence by Confucian thought, homelessness Is heavily looked down upon and is to be prevented as much as possible. It is seen as a sign of a mismanaged or failing society."
"as someone living in china, have seen a lot of homeless people, heck i could probably go outside right now and within a few minutes find 4 or 5
https://ibb.co/rGxbqV5 there you go"

Melissa Chen on X - "YIKES  China just posted a record-breaking $1.2 trillion global trade surplus. The EU's is up 18.1%. Germany's numbers are BONKERS - a staggering 108% surge in surplus, meaning that it now accounts for nearly a third of China's entire EU surplus.   The US has been aggressively correcting its own trade imbalance with China through tariffs and restrictions. The result? China's exports to the US plummeted 20% in 2025, with imports from the US down 14.6%.   Those diverted goods are flooding into Europe, especially Germany. Beijing is redirecting its export machine to softer targets, exploiting the EU's open markets while building dependencies in critical sectors like EVs, batteries, and solar panels. Germany, with its auto giants like Volkswagen and BMW deeply entangled in the Chinese market, is particularly vulnerable.   China's mechanism is through excess production capacity. It identifies a key industry, builds the capacity to produce 90% of global demand, and then flood markets with subsidized exports priced at marginal cost, backed by a 20% undervalued currency.   Domestic markets are decimated. Germany is de-industrialized.   Germany can either admit "Trump was right" or continue getting teabagged by the Chinese."

Pete North on X - "I don't think people truly understand the extent to which China has been plundering and deceiving the West, or the extent to which their own governments let them. The Chinese economy is built on fraud that would make Somalians blush. Virtually everything China sells us is based on stolen IP with fraudulent certification, and made with slave labour, while plundering the world's oceans and polluting the planet like no other.   Then as Europe deindustrialises and offshores its manufacturing to China (along with the knowledge economy that goes with it), it passively allows China to subvert its customs enforcement and tariff regime, and rolls out the red carpet for industrial scale data theft.   Make no mistake. China IS at war with the West. This is an economic war that's been going on for thirty years or more. But Western liberals would rather align with China because Orange man bad. That's the mentality we're dealing with here. For sure, China isn't planning on invading the West, but they don't need to - because we're already handing over everything of value without a fight."

Links - 11th February 2026 (1 - China's 'Peaceful' Rise)

China’s youth unemployment hits 11-month high as army of graduates joins job hunt | South China Morning Post - "China’s youth unemployment rate rose to its highest level in 11 months in July, as a record number of graduates enter an already shaky labour market.  The urban jobless rate for the 16-24 age group, excluding students, rose to 17.8 per cent last month from 14.5 per cent in June, putting an end to four straight months of decline and marking the metric’s highest level since last August, according to data released by the National Bureau of Statistics on Tuesday."

China Mulls Helping Local Governments With $1 Trillion of Bills - Bloomberg - "China is preparing to tackle the significant backlog of unpaid bills owed by local governments to the private sector, according to people familiar with the matter, an amount of arrears some have estimated at over $1 trillion.  The government is considering asking state lenders and policy banks including China Development Bank to lend to local authorities so they can make the payments in arrears... President Xi Jinping warned in a February speech made public last month that the government’s delayed payments to companies risks undermining people’s trust in the authorities. Underscoring the importance Beijing is placing on the issue, China’s top leader said unpaid bills could “cripple” affected businesses in the embattled private sector and was hurting “society at large.”... Local government-related entities in China are estimated to owe 10 trillion yuan, or about $1.4 trillion, to corporates and civil servants — equivalent to 7% of the country’s gross domestic product last year, according to economist David Li Daokui’s estimate... Chinese banks are struggling with their profitability after being enlisted over the past few years to help prop up the economy with cheap loans, driving their margins to a record low. At the same time, their balance sheets are under pressure from a growing pile of bad loans. In the first half of this year, the five biggest commercial banks set aside allowances for losses on loans of 3.51 trillion yuan, up almost 6% from the end of last year."

Calvin Cheng  | Facebook - "The huge military parade celebrating China’s victory in WW2 is truly ironic.  China would never have been so easily liberated from Japanese occupation if not for the Americans.  Before Japan’s unconditional surrender after the US dropped 2 atomic bombs , this was the situation in China: Japan controlled all the major city cities and coastal areas ; the Chinese resistance fought them to a stalemate in the countryside.  The KMT was making some slow gains in Guangxi and Hunan.  Without American being drawn into the war against Japan, China would have been occupied for a much longer time.   But America was not invited to this massive victory parade.  Worse , the parade was used as a chance to gather America’s rivals. And showcase military equipment that could possibly be used to challenge America.  What an irony."

Simulated Chinese blockade of Taiwan reveals Singapore as lifeline - "Southeast Asians account for about 94% of the almost 1 million foreign nationals resident in Taiwan, according to Taiwan's National Immigration Agency. Indonesians, Vietnamese and Filipinos make up the vast majority of those foreigners, with comparatively small numbers of Japanese and Americans."

Lord Bebo on X - "🇹🇼🇨🇳🇯🇵 Taiwanese blogger Gym Boss warns not to get too close to Japan! "If it's Taiwan alone, mainland China probably will not attack, 80%. But If Taiwan stands with Japan, I can guarantee they will 10000% attack. … Japan has slaughtered over 35 million Chinese. All the Chinese attach great importance to this period of history.""
Dan Collins on X - "Taiwan gym bro is correct. Mainland just didn’t forget WW2. At one time I remember just browsing thru the 🇨🇳TV channels to count how many programs were set in the “Kang Ri” 抗日 period. (Resist Japan) It was about 1/4. Even kids cartoons."
涵瞰世界/杨涵 Han Yang on X - "Dan, the reason you see so many anti-Japanese war dramas on Chinese TV is, first, the government promote them for their propaganda values, falsely setting up the Communists as the main fighting force against Japanese invaders (they weren't), whipping up patriotic fervor among the masses; second, along with historical palace intrigues dramas, they are the safest topics for producers, since more contemporary themes touch too many censorship minefields."

Melissa Chen on X - "Let me sum up the Japan -China row that has now made it to the UN:
China: Taiwan belongs to us - reunification is a matter of when, not if. Here, look at our unprecedented military buildup!
Japan: if warships and the use of force are involved to take Taiwan, that threatens Japan’s survival. We may have an obligation to get involved.
China: you should be beheaded! As a defeated WWII Axis power, Japan must reflect on its historical crimes and stop making provocative statements, and withdraw Takaichi’s erroneous remarks immediately. Japan is behaving “dangerously” so we hereby cite UN Charter Article 53 which allows us to take military action without the UN Security Council approval against Japan
******
This is the classic inversion where the perpetrator plays the victim.   There’s a Chinese idiom that goes 贼喊捉贼(zéi hǎn zhuō zéi) - it translates to "the thief cries 'catch the thief!’”  It describes a tactic where the real culprit (the thief) deliberately shouts to catch the thief in order to shift suspicion away from themselves, or even to frame someone else.  This is what’s happening here"

David Walpiri on X - "Here’s a reminder: China has destroyed 20,000 acres of coral reefs in the South China Sea, mostly in Philippine and Vietnamese waters. If they can wreck reefs at home and in neighboring countries, they could do worse in Latin America or Africa."
Michael Ron Bowling on X - "David's video shows how China is destroying the environment of its nearest neighbors. Clams and coral reefs devastated in the waters of the Philippines and Vietnam. The map below shows how it's state subsidized fishing fleet is expanding this destruction around the world."
Kangmin Lee | 이강민 on X - "China is responsible for a global-level catastrophe that is destroying natural ecosystems & biodiversity all across the world. And no one is talking about it. Instead, all the "environmentalists" continue to nag the West. The Right needs to reclaim environmental  / X

Drew Pavlou 🇦🇺🇺🇸🇺🇦🇹🇼 on X - "“Greenpeace needs to do what they did to Japanese whalers in the 1980s to Chinese fishing trawlers today”. They won’t do this because China is not aligned with the West. Greenpeace types were vaguely critical of China and supported Tibet in the 90s, when America supported China.  Now that America and China are opposed, they no longer care. They only care about opposing the West"
NERV2nd Branch on X - "Japanese whalers couldn't shoot back."

China’s War on Dissidents Comes to the United Kingdom - The Atlantic - "he was walking down a quiet street in London, three masked men jumped him and beat him unconscious. Now 31, Lau still has a faint scar on his boyish face. British authorities called the incident a hate crime, but Lau was convinced that Beijing had sent the men to silence him. He wasn’t being paranoid: Last year, Chinese authorities declared that Lau would be “pursued for life.” They froze his remaining assets in Hong Kong and offered a bounty for information leading to his arrest. Since then, fake journalists have approached Lau seeking interviews, dozens of social-media accounts have impersonated him, and he’s received death threats. A group on Telegram posted his address in London, forcing him to move multiple times. The intimidation extended to his family members in Hong Kong. Eventually they had to flee too. Lau is one of thousands who fled Hong Kong to Britain once the protests started—and particularly since June 2020, when China passed a national-security law that led to often-violent suppression. I’ve spoken with more than 30 activists like Lau who have come to the United Kingdom, where the harassment and surveillance they tried to escape has followed them. Assailants have stalked them in public and smeared them online. Letters have shown up at their neighbors’ doors promising a reward for turning over dissidents to the Chinese embassy. Back home, government authorities have suspended their retirement savings and interrogated their families. Some have been attacked. Their stories illustrate a campaign that China is waging against dissidents across the globe. Not all of the incidents in the U.K. can be tied directly to the Chinese government, but the tactics mirror those Beijing has used to discredit and silence critics in Europe, Canada, Australia, and the United States. Last month, Freedom House found that China was responsible for more recorded cases of repression beyond its borders than any other country over the past decade. The nonprofit had already concluded that the Chinese Communist Party’s war on exiles is “the most sophisticated, global, and comprehensive campaign” of its kind in the world. “This is the product of a top-down system, ordered by Xi Jinping,” Yaqiu Wang, a senior researcher at Freedom House, told me. “Whether this comes directly from Beijing or from Hong Kong, it’s ultimately a part of the CCP’s global, transnational campaign to silence anyone who is critical.” Even though China’s responsibility is an open secret, Western governments have struggled to deter the country from interfering on their soil. Xi’s crusade appears so brazen and far-reaching that it suggests he has little fear of provoking the West. By the same measure, it seems to reveal that something else really does scare him: China’s exiles. The United Kingdom is home to the largest Hong Kong diaspora in the world. Since relinquishing its former colony in 1997, the country has admitted hundreds of thousands of Hong Kongers, who represent a growing threat to China’s leaders. Thanks to globalization and social media, dissidents can organize and inspire political opposition from abroad more easily than before. That helps explain why the Hong Kong government has steadily escalated its campaign against exiles. Last year, it enacted another national-security law, called Article 23, which carries penalties that extend to activists outside the country; authorities have used it to sanction organizers overseas and revoke their passports. Many exiles told me they no longer feel safe returning to Hong Kong because they fear interrogations, imprisonment, or the confiscation of  their passports. They worry that Hong Kong authorities have started importing elements of Xi’s surveillance state in order to track them abroad. Xi “feels threatened by any kind of collective action,” Wang told me—whether it originates at home or overseas. Since 2019, more than 5,000 emigrants have moved to the South London borough of Sutton, where a local group organized a camp in 2023 to educate children of the Hong Kong diaspora about Chinese repression. Then the former chief executive of Hong Kong heard about it—and warned on social media that the organizers would be reported to British and Hong Kong police. Accounts of intimidation and harassment have emerged from virtually every corner of Britain where Hong Kongers have gathered... She showed me a video on her phone of a Chinese man shouting death threats at her during a protest she helped organize in November. After another demonstration, two Asian men followed her into a restaurant; she alerted the police, who opened an investigation. On Instagram and X, strangers send her sexually explicit messages written in Mandarin. Friends have asked her to stop contacting them, worried that ties to her could create problems for their relatives in Hong Kong. “It feels impossible, suddenly, to meet new people or apply for jobs,” she said. “I have no idea who I can trust.”... Police had summoned some of his extended family to tea, where they unfurled printouts of Alvin’s posts on Telegram and photos of him demonstrating in London. One team of officers had traveled from mainland China to treat Alvin’s parents in Hong Kong to an extravagant dinner. The officials said he could face a lengthy prison sentence for helping “high profile” activists—a charge that could extend to his mother and father, too, unless they persuaded their son to become an informant... China has two main goals when it targets activists online: to encourage self-censorship and to “discredit the targets in the eyes of the audience hosting them.”... In 2022, someone hacked the artists’ page and replaced their profile photo with an image of an ISIS flag, which prompted Facebook to remove them. “That account held all our important connections from the past five years. They disappeared overnight,” Lumli and Lumlong told me. “It was like a company going bankrupt.”

Scottish Labour MP warns Chinese Communist Party to keep 'hands off Hong Kong Scots' - "Blair McDougall said many of his constituents "live in fear of repression" from China. The East Renfrewshire MP said this was partly because of a 'secret police station' run by the Chinese state in a Glasgow restaurant.  It was revealed in 2022 that the Scottish Government and Police Scotland were aware of a secret Chinese outpost operating out of the Loon Fung restaurant on Sauchiehall Street. A report from the time claimed the station was part of an attempt to force Chinese dissidents to return to the country. It shut last year.  McDougall said in the House of Commons on Tuesday afternoon: "My constituency is home to a new and growing population of Hong Kongers, who, although they live in a free country, live in fear of the repression."

Are Hong Kong trade offices just Chinese propaganda machines? | The Spectator - "Bill Yuen, the office manager of the Hong Kong trade office in London and a retired Hong Kong police officer, was arrested and charged under Britain’s new National Security Act. He and two others were accused of espionage, including gathering information and surveillance of Hong Kong exiles, during which they allegedly broke into a residential address in the UK.   At the time, Regina Ip, a former security chief and convener of the Hong Kong’s executive council, declared that it was reasonable and legal for trade office staff to conduct intelligence on ‘anti-China MPs and Hong Kong exiles’. The territory’s government offered a reward of 1 million Hong Kong dollars (£100,000) for information about wanted fugitives, while John Lee, its chief executive and himself a former Hong Kong policeman, said that fugitives should be treated like ‘rats in the street’, who would be ‘pursued for life’ and ‘spend their days in fear’. He has embraced with enthusiasm the role of Communist party enforcer, and there is plenty of reason to fear that he expects the territory’s de-facto embassies to do the same."

Boko Haram Destroyed Chinese-made VT-4 Temu Tanks in Nigeria using RPG - "The Chinese VT-4 is touted as an advanced main battle tank, but the Nigerian Army questions its performance. Pakistan and Nigeria reported significant mechanical failures by both export customers.  The Nigerian Army purchased 35 VT-4 tanks under a reported $152 million agreement with Norinco and received the initial tanks in April 2020. These tanks were intended to fight back against the terrorist group Boko Haram, but instead, Boko haram is blowing up these Chinese tanks like a tin can... Nigerian defence sources have reported critical failures. During a military demonstration observed by high-ranking army officials, a VT-4 reportedly failed to fire its main cannon. Nigerian media outlets confirm the VT-4 fleet suffers from persistent breakdowns and difficulties obtaining necessary spare parts, leaving numerous tanks non-operational. A similar incident occurred publicly in November 2024 when a VT-4 reportedly broke down during a dynamic display at the Zhuhai Air Show in China.  These recurring issues raise concerns about the tank’s build quality and Norinco’s commitment to providing adequate after-sales support to its international clients.  Pakistan, another major customer for the VT-4, is experiencing similar difficulties"
The cope is going to be that they didn't maintain them properly

Melissa Chen on X - "🚨Breaking: US and UK universities collaborated with Chinese state + military-linked AI labs that are embedded in or linked to China's surveillance and security system.  The 20+ institutions include MIT, Stanford, Harvard, UC Berkeley, and Oxford.  This report is based on tens of thousands of publications, grant records and institutional documents from 2020-2025.  We trace how Western expertise and public funding connect to state-backed Chinese labs through co-authorships, joint projects, and shared grants.   Major public funders acknowledged in this work include the US National Science Foundation (NSF), the National Institutes of Health (NIH), UK Research and Innovation’s Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (UKRI/EPSRC), and Horizon Europe.   What this means:
- US and UK taxpayers are funding the development of dual-use AI technologies in collaboration with PLA-linked Chinese universities and research institutes
- These technologies are already being deployed in China's surveillance state apparatus on its own people, political dissidents and Uyghurs in Xinjiang
In collaboration with @HRF , we examined two Chinese AI labs:   Zhejiang Lab and SAIRI (Shanghai AI Research Institute).
These state-backed labs partner with defense conglomerates and work on surveillance technologies. Crucially, both labs have collaborated with leading Western universities since 2020.  Zhejiang Lab partners with CETC (China Electronics Technology Group Corporation) the defense conglomerate and state-owned enterprise sanctioned by the US for building IJOP, the mass surveillance platform used to detain Uyghurs in Xinjiang.  SAIRI is run by a senior CETC scientist and partners with iFlytek and SenseTime - both sanctioned for Xinjiang abuses.  Western taxpayers funded Zhejiang Lab and SAIRI’s work:
> National Science Foundation - 106 acknowledgments; >UK's EPSRC - 31 acknowledgments (including formally listing Zhejiang Lab as partner) > @NIH - 27 acknowledgments; Horizon Europe - 26 acknowledgments.
Out of ~30 major AI ethics centers worldwide, only 2 publicly condemned Chinese AI practices: Ada Lovelace Institute and Stanford HAI.  The rest were silent on these collaborations, which is ridiculous if you consider that their telos is to weigh in on the ETHICAL dimension of AI development.  Our report details the extensive network of collaboration between Western universities and institutions linked to China's state security apparatus and military. Western institutions lend credibility, knowledge, and resources to China's surveillance apparatus.  Funding bodies such as the US National Science Foundation (NSF) have no due diligence procedures, instead relying on universities themselves, which often have a strong financial incentive to defend these collaborations and the traditional scientific culture of openness and transparency, even though this is being systematically exploited by Beijing.   This isn't about blocking all research collaboration. It's about recognizing the structural reality that you are simply not in a neutral academic space when you partner with labs embedded in authoritarian surveillance infrastructure, when there is no separation between academia, the military and the state. You're simply enabling repression.  And this further begs the question: if we are indeed in an AI race, why are US taxpayers funding AI research in a nation considered a geopolitical adversary? During the Sputnik era, Americans were not funding and collaborating with Soviet scientists and researchers.   US taxpayers were rightly incensed when it was revealed that American public money was used to fund risky research on coronaviruses at the PLA-linked Wuhan Institute of Virology through shady NGOs.   Now, it's been revealed that taxpayer resources are being used to generate knowledge that flows into institutions embedded in China’s apparatus of repression, and develop cutting-edge AI technologies while our nations are locked in a competitive AI race.  It's time for the Trump administration to mandate transparency and for these universities to be subjected to greater scrutiny.   @SecRubio  @DrJBhattacharya  @SenateForeign  @ChinaSelect  @DOJNatSec  @StateDept"

Michael A. Arouet on X - "German carmakers‘ business model was based on growing sales in China to subsidize overblown, unions protected structures at home. Guess what, the party is over. Good luck negotiating with the unions and the workers councils."
Melissa Chen on X - "Germany escaped the first China shock that hit the US economy because it produced higher end goods and because China needed the machinery that the Germans produced.   The core of German industry is being threatened by China now because China has moved up the value chain, producing the machinery that it once had to import. The German-China shock will be even more severe than the US shock as machinery and cars are the heart of German industry.  I hope Germans wake up to how their leaders sold their country out under the guise of promoting trade and "win-win" business opportunities with China. The list of culprits include Helmut Schmidt, Gerard Shröder and Rudolf Scharping. An export nation was seeking a huge market of consumers but the truth of the matter is, China never wanted to consume foreign goods.   This was a Faustian bargain all along. Germans should re-read Goethe."

Lim Tean | Facebook - "The Great Myth Of China Never Having Invaded Other Countries !
Nothing irks me more than to hear the persistent claim, often repeated in public debate, and even by renown scholars such as Jeffrey Sachs of Columbia University, that China has never invaded other countries and that there is nothing to fear from her unparalleled military build-up over the past 2 decades, and that she is a benign power. This assertion does not withstand serious historical scrutiny and should be rejected plainly and without equivocation.  China’s own imperial history tells a very different story. For more than 2 thousand years, successive Chinese dynasties expanded their territory through military conquest, occupation and coercion, just as other great powers have done throughout history. The Han dynasty pushed Chinese armies deep into Central Asia, conquering the Tarim Basin and waging sustained offensive wars to secure strategic depth and trade routes. The Tang dynasty projected military power across much of Inner Asia, subjugating Turkic states and repeatedly intervening by force in Korea and Vietnam.  The Yuan dynasty launched large-scale invasions across East and Southeast Asia, including Korea, Vietnam and Burma. The Ming dynasty occupied Vietnam for 2 decades, following military conquest while the Qing dynasty- the most territorially expansive of all- used force to absorb Xinjiang, Tibet and Mongolia, effectively doubling the size of the Chinese state. These were not defensive actions. They were wars of expansion, conducted to secure dominance over China’s periphery.  Some argue that these campaigns were softened by so-called tributary system. That, too, is a distortion. Tributary relations were not partnerships of equals ; they were hierarchical arrangements enforced by the credible threat and frequent use of military force. States that resisted were punished. Those that complied did so under pressure. This was order imposed by power, not harmony achieved by consent.  Those who promote the myth of China’s historical exceptionalism ignore one of the most enduring insights of human experience. The great Greek historian Thucydides, who wrote the history of the Peloponnesian Wars, warned us that human nature does not change, and that fear, interest and power drive the behaviour of states across all eras and cultures. Winston Churchill put it even more starkly when he observed that “the story of the human race is war”. China, like every civilisation before it, is not exempt from these truths.  We must be clear-eyed instead of viewing China through rose-tinted glasses. Power, when unchecked, has always sought expansion. That lesson is as relevant today as it was in antiquity. China’s rise to become a powerful country was never peaceful. It is therefore pointless to pontificate whether her continued rise will be peaceful. It can never be. If we ignore this simple truth and choose to be hypnotised by the smiling Tiger mouthing multi-literalism, we do so at our peril.  In a subsequent post, I shall explain how China has continued with her hard-edged expansionism even in the 20th and 21st centuries."

The West has woken up to China’s threat far too late - "A Pentagon report in 2021 warned that concentrated supply chains, offshoring and a “business climate that has favoured short-term shareholder earnings” had all “severely damaged” America’s ability to arm itself.  Suppliers went from two to one to none, in critical defence sectors ranging from milling to chemicals.  It’s what Karl Marx identified when he predicted, “the last capitalist we hang shall be the one who sold us the rope”.  He was saying that greedy businessmen can’t resist a deal, even if it’s a deal that ultimately kills them.  Alas, the modern, monopoly-friendly, globalist version of capitalism has left us in the same spot. A war with any adversary will be very short indeed."

Hundreds of British buses have Chinese ‘kill switch’ - "Hundreds of electric buses on Britain’s roads could be remotely switched off by China with a “kill switch”, Britain’s security services have found.  The buses are connected to the internet by onboard SIM cards that are intended to be used for software updates, but could also be vulnerable to meddling by Beijing, officials at the Department for Transport (DfT) and the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) believe.   The security experts launched an inquiry in November after concerns were raised in Norway that Yutong electric buses from China could be remotely “stopped or rendered inoperable by the manufacturer”. The NCSC, the public-facing branch of Britain’s GCHQ, said it was “technically possible” for the buses to be remotely shut down from China.  But Whitehall sources said that ministers are not able to block the sale of the buses in Britain because there is no concrete evidence of Chinese subterfuge and that banning them could cause further diplomatic tension with Beijing...  the findings will fuel concern about the level of Chinese control over British infrastructure, after calls from Labour MPs for Beijing to be shut out of industry, rail, water and power.  Downing Street has instead pushed for more foreign investment from China, which ministers believe will boost economic growth and provide private sector capital for Labour’s green power plans."

Carney-China deal full of Trojan Horses on police, propaganda

Glavin: Carney-China deal full of Trojan Horses on police, propaganda

"While the public’s attention has been focused on its trade components, the new Canada-China concordat contains several core provisions that go far beyond the projected expansion of Chinese electric car imports in exchange for Beijing’s promise to ease tariff barriers on Canadian canola seed and meal and any other trade-related aspects of Canada’s “reset” with China.

“These are all Trojan horses,” Cheuk Kwan, co-chair of the Toronto Association for Democracy and the spokesman for the Canadian Coalition on Human Rights in China, told me this week. Edmund Leung, chair of the Vancouver Society in Support of Democratic Movement (VSSDM), described the dozen or so non-trade deals as “very, very upsetting.”

It’s as though Canadians are expected to simply forget all the national scandals over the past several years involving the efforts by Beijing’s United Front Work Department to monkeywrench the 2019 and 2021 federal elections to the Liberal party’s advantage and to unseat former Conservative party leader Erin O’Toole in 2022. It’s as though Ottawa has decided to be wholly oblivious to the voluminous evidence provided by Canada’s intelligence agencies documenting Beijing’s strongarming of Canada’s Chinese-language media into submission and obedience to Xi Jinping’s party line.

“It is very, very upsetting to me and to our organization,” Leung said. “This is all about expanding the Communist party’s influence and expanding their capabilities in Canada, in all those agreements, for transnational repression, political interference and disinformation.”

The proposed collaborations can be made to seem quite benign. They’re all about “people-to-people ties and cultural exchanges,” investment in museums, support for “digital content creators” and “visual artists,” heritage, education, “travel exchanges and cultural ties” and cooperation in the “creative industries” deep down into the “sub-national” level. But these are precisely the methods Beijing employs to extend the global reach of its “soft-power” operations in targeted countries.

Similarly, it’s all well and good for Canada to seek Beijing’s cooperation to “combat corruption,” cyber fraud and the traffic in illegal synthetic drugs. But last month’s memorandum of understanding between the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and China’s dreaded Ministry of Public Security (MPS) revives a collaboration from 25 years ago that fell apart after a series of scandals involving tortured witnesses and trumped-up corruption charges.

The proposed RCMP-MPS collaboration also effectively airbrushes the more recent revelation, from 2023, that China’s various Public Security divisions were running several clandestine police stations under the cover of various Beijing-affiliated community organizations in Montreal, Toronto and Metro Vancouver. Owing to the inadequacy of Canada’s foreign-interference laws, the RCMP was reduced to a strategy of simply detecting and disrupting the overseas MPS operations in Canada. Bill C-70, the Countering Foreign Interference Act, was tabled in the House of Commons two years ago, and it was only this past week that C-70- emerged from its public consultations stage...

Among other things, the agreements Carney entered into in Beijing will formalize the Canadian operations of two key divisions within the Central Propaganda Department of the Chinese Communist Party’s central committee. The arrangements elevate the Canadian opportunities for the senior party ideologist Shen Haixiong, a prominent Propaganda Department deputy minister, and also for another Propaganda Department deputy, Sen Yeli, Bejing’s Minister of Culture and Tourism.

Shen Haixiong is the director and editor-in-chief of the all-powerful China Media Group, the propaganda conglomerate that has radically expanded its control over media in China and overseas Chinese-language news platforms since the CCP’s 20th National Congress in 2022. Shen’s CMG controls China Central Television (CCTV) as well as the overseas operations of CGTN and China Radio International (CRI). He has described the CMG as Beijing’s propaganda “aircraft carrier,” and he has boasted that in 2023 alone, the CMG had landed 12,000 hits favourable to Xi Jinping on 1,188 overseas news platforms in 88 different countries.

In an MOU signed by Shen and Canadian ambassador Jennifer May during Carney’s visit to Beijing last month: “The two sides consented to provide mutual support and convenience for media to work in each other’s countries, and provide greater convenience for two-way travel.” In the Chinese context, “media” should not be understood to mean independent journalists. The CMG’s staff in all its platforms are propaganda officials. According to Reporters Without Borders, China remains the primary jailer of journalists among the United Nations member states. As of this week, at least 114 reporters and media workers were in prison for asking the wrong questions or reporting unflattering news...

Over the past 20 years, Beijing’s Canadian proxies have either directly taken over Canada’s Chinese-language media or they’ve bullied the Chinese language press into submission. According to a Canadian Security Intelligence Service assessment released with the final report of the Hogue Inquiry into foreign interference last year, Beijing-friendly “narratives” have inundated Chinese-language media in Canada. “Censorship (including self-censorship) is pervasive and alternative media voices are few or marginalized . . . this includes traditional media such as newspapers, and in new media provided by online platforms and applications such as WeChat.”

Another direct relationship between Canada’s undertakings and the CCP central committee’s propaganda department is the restoration of the briefly-lived collaboration between the Department of Canadian Heritage and China’s Ministry of Culture and Tourism, headed by Shen’s Central Committee propaganda department colleague Sun Yeli. The point of the joint committee is to “expand people-to-people ties, cultural exchange, and trade in the creative and cultural sectors.”

A typical CCP “soft power” foreign operation, the Canada-China Joint Committee on Culture collapsed after only a few months in December, 2018, when President Xi ordered the kidnapping of Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor in a fit of rage over Canada’s detention of Huawei heiress Meng Wanzhou on U.S. charges related to Huawei’s sanctions evasions in Iran.

And now it’s back up and running.

To China experts and Chinese diaspora leaders, the most alarming agreement Carney concluded in Beijing was the restoration of the relationship between the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and China’s dreaded Ministry of Public Security (MPS).

That agreement has its origins in a fairly straightforward police liaison arrangement that had evolved during the Harper years into a joint effort to target the Chinese Communist Party’s wealthy fraudsters and embezzlers who routinely absconded to Canada. But it quickly turned out to be a cover for Beijing to target “political criminals,” often relying on coerced interrogations and blackmail.

During the early months of Justin Trudeau’s government, the collaboration was elevated in priority. Within a week of Trudeau’s first trip to China in September, 2016, Ottawa and Beijing established the “Canada-China High-Level National Security and Rule of Law Dialogue.” Among its objectives were the same commitments to improve cooperation in counter-terrorism, cyber-crime and transnational organized crime, with Canada adding a border-security offer to assist in “the verification of the identity of inadmissible persons . . . to facilitate their return from Canada to China.” The Trudeau government also pledged to “start discussions on an Extradition Treaty and a Transfer of Offenders Treaty.”

Would Carney wind the clock back that far?

“That was my major concern of the whole trip, this deal between the RCMP and China’s public security,” the VSSDM’s Edmund Leung told me. “I’m really fearful that this may evolve into something like the extradition treaty that China wants so badly. That’s what China wants. China wants the return of ‘political’ criminals.”

The China expert, author and former diplomat Charles Burton shares Leung’s concerns about Carney’s RCMP-MPS agreement. “If the Chinese police have the ability to request information from Canada in their ongoing investigations, it’s very bad news. If we feel compelled to share information — names and addresses or whatever — we would simply be enabling China’s transnational repression.”

Another point overlooked in the “new world order” Carney declared during his visits in Beijing: The Chinese Communist Party has already issued arrest warrants and rewards for information that would secure the detention of 19 diaspora Chinese. They include two Canadians: the former Sing Tao B.C. edition editor-in-chief Victor Ho, and Joe Tay, the Conservative candidate in last year’s federal election in Don Valley North.

Ho has chronicled Beijing’s strangulation of the free Chinese-language press in Canada, and Tay was subjected to a crude “joke” at a Beijing-friendly Chinese media press conference: The Markham-Unionville Liberal MP Paul Chiang suggested that Tay should be delivered to the Chinese consulate in Toronto in exchange for the $1 million (HK) reward for his detention."