Category: China

China Tests Supposed “Guam Killer” Missile

| February 1, 2019

China is trying to send a message against US military patrols in the South China Sea region:

This still from a video broadcast by the state-run China Central Television shows the Chinese military test-firing a DF-26 anti-ship missile during a recent exercise in northwest China.

Analysts gave the DF-26 its foreboding “Guam Killer” nickname for its ability to strike targets 3,400 miles away, which is within range of Andersen Air Force Base.
China mobilized the missile after the USS McCampbell guided-missile destroyer on Jan. 7 sailed near the Paracel Islands in a freedom-of-navigation exercise. The Paracels are claimed by China; however, that claim is not recognized by international law.
The Thursday CCTV report came the same day the United States sent the McCampbell and fleet replenishment oiler USNS Walter S. Diehl through the Taiwan Strait on a freedom-of-navigation operation.
Chief of Naval Operations Adm. John Richardson has said China should not consider such actions provocative, but Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying on Friday used an analogy to explain Beijing’s discomfort with the passage.
“Suppose that a family has two courtyards … divided by a passage which could be used by passersby to come through for convenience’s sake,” Hua said in an official translation of her Friday press conference. “If there is someone who frequents this passage just to issue provocative words or make provocative moves … then how would you feel?”

Stars & Stripes

You can read more at the link, but in regards to the Chinese analogy at the end, the passerby through the courtyard is only making provocative messages because a family forcibly took over a number of courtyards. Additionally the rogue family is looking to take over more courtyards from the friends of the person passing by. The person continuously passing by is a discouragement to that family from trying to take over even more courtyards.

Are Confucius Institutes Being Used for Chinese Intelligence Gathering?

| January 29, 2019

It makes sense that the Chinese government is using the Confucius Institutes for intelligence gathering and promoting Chinese government propaganda:

As Chinese cybertheft increases and the numbers of Chinese exchange students and scholars rise, officials have stepped up pressure on administrators to take more precautions to guard against espionage and efforts to steal American technologies and research data.


Opponents of the Confucius Institutes argue that such programs give Beijing a toehold in prominent American academic communities to influence attitudes and censor discussions of subjects sensitive to China, such as the Dalai Lama, Taiwan and human rights.
Robert Daly, a China scholar at the Wilson Center who previously directed the University of Maryland’s initiatives on China, dismissed as “nonsensical” the suggestion that Confucius Institutes are hotbeds of espionage. But he and many other experts agree that they are clearly instruments of the Chinese government.


“You can ask why American universities are letting the Chinese Communist Party set up soft-power agencies on their campuses,” Daly said. “A lot of university presidents believed that having a Confucius Institute will somehow curry favor with China such that they will be able to raise development dollars in some way or another. What they find is that it doesn’t create leverage for them, but leverage for the Chinese Communist Party, that if the university does something that the Chinese Communist Party disapproves of, they may withdraw Confucius Institute funding.” (……..)

Scrutiny of China’s efforts on college campuses has increased on many fronts. FBI Director Christopher Wray warned universities in February not to be naive about Chinese spies in their midst and said the Confucius Institutes are on his radar. Vice President Mike Pence, in an October speech, accused Beijing of using organizations on campuses to monitor Chinese students for anti-China speech or activities.

LA Times

You can read more at the link.

China Claims Meng Detention Because of “White Supremacy”

| January 11, 2019

I wonder if this Chinese envoy realizes the irony of his statement when China currently has tens of thousands of ethnic Uighur in internment camps because they are Muslims:

Chinese ambassador Lu Shaye has accused Canada of applying a double standard, and has decried what he sees as “Western egotism and white supremacy” in the treatment of detained Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou.
China’s envoy to Canada penned a Jan. 9 column in The Hill Times, a twice-weekly Ottawa publication that focuses on parliamentary affairs, in which he harshly criticizes Canada for demanding the release of two jailed Canadians while detaining Ms. Meng.
“It’s understandable that these Canadians are concerned about their own citizens. But have they shown any concern or sympathy for [Ms.] Meng after she was illegally detained and deprived of freedom?” Mr. Lu wrote.
China has imprisoned former Canadian diplomat Michael Kovrig and entrepreneur Michael Spavor in what appears to be retaliation for Canada’s arrest of Ms. Meng for extradition to the United States to face allegations of bank fraud related to U.S. sanctions on Iran.

Globe and Mail

You can read more at the link.

Kim Jong-un in China for Talks with President Xi

| January 8, 2019

It looks like a second Trump-Kim summit must be close to becoming a reality because Kim Jong-un is off to China to get his marching orders from Emperor President Xi:

North Korea’s leader Kim Jong-un (R) and his wife, Ri Sol-ju, leave for China in this photo from the North’s Korean Central News Agency on Jan. 8, 2019. The report said Kim will visit China from Jan. 7-10 at the invitation of Chinese President Xi Jinping.

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un arrived in Beijing on Tuesday for talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping apparently aiming to coordinate strategies ahead of his possible second summit with U.S. President Donald Trump.
A special train carrying Kim and his wife, Ri Sol-ju, arrived at a highly secure station in Beijing at around 10:55 a.m. Escorted by Chinese police, he and his entourage headed in prearranged limousines to Diaoyutai State Guesthouse in Beijing.
Kim was accompanied by party, government and military officials, including Kim Yong-chol, a key nuclear negotiator with the United States, and Ri Yong-ho and No Kwang-chol, the country’s foreign and defense ministers, respectively, Pyongyang’s Korean Central News Agency earlier reported.
In footage later unveiled by North Korea’s state TV, Kim Yo-jong, the leader’s younger sister, was also seen among the people leaving for China. She accompanied her brother on his second trip to China in May last year.

Yonhap

You can read more at the link.