Kinaforum

mandag 5. oktober 2026

Trump’s Iran Strategy Has a China Problem

Chinese President Xi Jinping’s state visit to Washington was a grand affair, full of pomp and circumstance designed to convey a clear message: America, under President Donald Trump, is seeking a more cooperative relationship with the People's Republic of China.

The symbolism was unmistakable. In an unusual diplomatic gesture, Trump personally greeted Xi on the tarmac at Joint Base Andrews, and the Chinese leader subsequently received the full treatment at the White House, complete with an elaborate arrival ceremony and a lavish state dinner. The president himself was effusive, describing his meeting with Xi as one of “friendship, strength and success.”

Behind all the pageantry was a clear strategic objective. After nearly two years of a decidedly rocky relationship with Beijing, Washington is now seeking to stabilize—or at least contain—the strategic competition between the two countries.

The environmental cost of a war over Taiwan

Off the coast of Taichung lies the well known Gaomei Wetlands, a popular nature preserve. On weekends, especially in the evenings, the site’s walkways are crowded with sunset watchers, its mudflats filled with people wading and taking pictures of the local wildlife. Birds, amphibious fish, crabs and other organisms flourish.

A few hundred meters to the south Berth number 8 of the Port of Taichung juts inland, surrounded by chemical plants, cement factories, chemical storage sites, warehouses and wind turbines. This infrastructure, critical to the running of a major industrial economy, will be targeted in wartime. Though they do not know it, the nearby creatures of Gaomei and elsewhere are going to be among the first casualties of strikes by the People’s Republic of China (PRC).

The Reckoning Deferred: Tibet’s Succession Question

For decades, diplomacy toward Tibet has rested on a single unstated premise: that the hardest question could be deferred indefinitely. Governments could criticize religious repression without contesting sovereignty, host the Dalai Lama without endorsing independence, raise cultural rights in Geneva (UN Human Rights Council) while avoiding the sovereignty question in New York (UN General Assembly).

This worked because it was cost-free: a set of positions that never had to resolve into one decision. The succession of the 14th Dalai Lama will end that arrangement, because recognizing a reincarnation is not a statement of values but an act that confers legitimate religious-political authority on one person and delegitimizes any rival.

India issues standard Ladakh placenames that identify incursion spots

After Arunachal Pradesh, India has issued standard, official names of places and geographical features in its Union Territory of Ladakh in a new map to make clear they are parts of its territory, given that they remain under Pakistani or Chinese occupation or claims.

With intend to remove any ambiguity or misplaced perception regarding certain land areas, peaks, mountains, passes, glaciers and water bodies in Ladakh, including those bordering Chinese occupied Tibet, being an integral part of India, the government has, in consultation with the Union Territory, identified 28 places and features in it by standard names on the of-ficial map of the Survey of India, reported timesofindia.com Oct 3.

Among the 28 are stated to be places in Aksai Chin, ceded provisionally by Pakistan to China in a 1963 border agreement, and Gilgit-Baltistan in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir, which India treats as part of Ladakh.

Seven Years in Tibet back on Netflix shelves after 20 years

Subscription-based streaming service Netflix has included on Oct 1 the biographical epic Seven Years in Tibet (1997) among many movies it added to its digital shelves, reported uk.news.yahoo.com Oct 1. The film follows the true story of Heinrich Harrer, an Austrian climber and Nazi Party member who escapes a British POW camp in India, finds solace in Tibet’s holy capital Lhasa, and is transformed by his friendship with the young 14th Dalai Lama. Harrer said he joined the party only in order to be able to pursue his mountaineering interests.

The Chinese government objected to the film’s depiction of its occupation of Tibet, particularly its portrayal of Chinese military officials and its positive depiction of the Dalai Lama. Brad Pitt who starred as Harrer, co-star David Thewlis, and director Jean-Jacques Annaud were reportedly banned from entering China as a result.

New eastern Tibet discovery bolsters China’s lithium reserves by over one million tonnes

China has greatly increased the amount of lithium deposit present in an already super-large reserve located in the eastern Tibetan city of Barkham (Chinese: Maerkang), in Amdo Ngaba, which is currently part of Sichuan province. The new discovery is expected to help China reduce its dependence on foreign sources for this vital mineral as it pushes to lead the world in the development, use, and export of modern high-tech products.

China has announced the expansion of the resource base for a major lithium deposit in Sichuan province by about 70%, strengthening the country’s potential long-term supply for the metal – an essential component in the production of batteries for electric vehicles (EVs) and energy storage, reported scmp.com Oct 3, citing state news agency XinhuaOct 1.

The report said that after recent detection efforts, the Jiada Lithium Mine had registered about 1.05 million tonnes of lithium carbonate equivalent in the deposit, bringing its total resources to 2.53 million tonnes. The increase has reinforces the mine’s status as a major hard-rock lithium deposit.

America wants to wean itself off Chinese technology. Will the pain pay off?

Seven years after founding a robotics startup in San Francisco, Rajat Bhageria is confronting a daunting new task: building robots without any help from China.

Like most US-based robotics firms, Chef Robotics has come to rely heavily on Chinese components to make the robot arms it sells to food manufacturers to automate the assembly of ready-made meals. China’s ability to churn out cheap parts at incomparable volumes has made it an integral source of competitive tech products around the world.

But as China has begun to dominate advanced industries from electric vehicles to automated factories, an increasingly protectionist US under President Donald Trump has ratcheted up restrictions on domestic use of Chinese technology, including drones, mobile robots and other critical electronics.

California woman arrested for spying for China and surveilling Taiwanese president’s son, officials say

The FBI on Sunday arrested a 34-year-old California woman who has been charged with acting as an unregistered agent for China and allegedly surveilled the Taiwanese president’s son and his family, federal officials said.

Wanying “Heather” Zhang, of Irvine, allegedly surveilled a close relative of a Taiwanese government official after traveling to Seattle in 2025, according to a federal complaint. The complaint signed on Saturday alleged Zhang was directed by Chinese officials to gather information about and take photos of the relative, who was not named in the complaint. The FBI said in a social media post that Zhang had been surveilling the son of Taiwan president Lai Ching-te and his family.

The China factor behind the Iran war

The war between the United States and Iran is no longer just a confrontation between Washington and Tehran. A second contest is taking shape alongside and behind it. China is not fighting the United States directly, but its economic, technological and diplomatic links to Iran are complicating Washington’s strategy and ability to win the conflict.This raises a larger, crucial question: Is the Iran war becoming another indirect front in the wider US-China rivalry?

Nothing in the evidence suggests that Washington is at war with Beijing. Indeed, the two powers professed their fondness for each other at the recent Trump-Xi gala summit in Washington. But the Iran conflict is putting the two powers in direct competition over energy, sanctions, technology, maritime security and, perhaps most crucially, the future balance of power in the Middle East.

New F-16s buy Taiwan time and space against China’s air coercion

Taiwan’s new American-made F-16V Block 70 jets deliver much-needed breathing room against daily Chinese gray-zone coercion, yet surging Chinese stealth numbers and cratered runway risks mean their wartime utility would be sharply contested.

Taiwan received its first two new-build Lockheed Martin F-16V Block 70 fighter jets, touching down on October 2 at Taitung’s Chihhang Air Base after a trans-Pacific ferry flight via Hawaii and Guam, multiple media outlets reported.The single-seat aircraft mark the initial delivery of a US$8 billion, 66-jet procurement approved by the US in 2019 to modernize the Republic of China Air Force (ROCAF) and reinforce deterrence against escalating military pressure from China.

The handover ends years of delays stemming from production-line relocations, supply-chain bottlenecks and electronic warfare software integration issues with the AN/ALQ-254(V)1 Viper Shield suite.

Trump announces $200bn in energy investments from South Korea

United States President Donald Trump has announced $200bn in investments from South Korea, $54bn of which is slated to go to a liquefied natural gas (LNG) project in Alaska. The announcement was made at the White House on Wednesday and comes as Trump seeks to defend the Republican Party’s economic record during a heated midterm election season. “We’re thrilled to announce one of the largest energy infrastructure investments in American history,” Trump said.

The president highlighted the involvement of Senator Dan Sullivan of Alaska, referencing the challenges the Republican incumbent faces defending his Senate seat in the November 3 race.

US delivers F-16V fighter jets to Taiwan as island eyes threat from China

The United States has delivered two F-16V ⁠Block 70 fighter jets to Taiwan as the island seeks to build its defence capabilities to deter a feared attack by China.

The aircraft, built by US defence contractor Lockheed Martin, are part of an $8bn deal for 66 F-16Vs approved during President Donald. The jets, which flew via Hawaii and Guam, touched down at noon (04:00 GMT) local time. They arrived a week after Trump met Chinese President Xi Jinping in Washington.

Taiwan is eyeing a rising military threat from Beijing, ⁠which claims the democratically governed island as its own territory. first term. They landed on Friday following months of delay due to repeated requests from Beijing to the US to stop arming Taiwan.

Latin America sees China as more positive global influence than US: Poll

China is perceived more positively as a global influence than the United States in Latin America, according to a new regional survey, in a first since the poll began in 1995. The 2026 Latinobarometro survey published on Friday found that 65 percent of respondents in 17 countries saw China as a positive influence. That was compared with 57 percent who said the same of the US.S upport for China has risen sharply since 2020, when 48 percent of respondents viewed its influence positively. The figure for the US has fallen from 60 percent over the same period.

Costa Rica and the Dominican Republic were the only countries surveyed where respondents viewed US influence more positively than China’s.

A rickety Europe tries to stand up to China

The European Union is embarking on diplomatic hand-to-hand combat with China in an effort to rework its trade with Beijing and show it is not a geopolitical weakling.

Using unusually direct terms, the EU has given China a mid-October deadline to provide ways it will reduce its massive trade advantage over Europe. If not, the EU Commission will make unilateral moves to limit imports of Chinese goods, imposing specific limits on electric vehicle imports and putting tariffs on other industrial goods.n an early September speech, EU Commission President Ursula van der Leyen laid out the stakes as she sees them. “Our companies do not compete on a level playing field,” she said.” “It leads to deindustrialisation in the industrial heartlands of Europe. This is unsustainable.”

China countered this expression of exasperation with its own harsh language. “Voluntary export restraint is one of the egregious misnomers of modern trade policy, wrote China Daily, an English-language government newspaper. “There is nothing voluntary about a choice made under the threat of punitive tariffs.”

U.S. Department of State: China is one of the world's most closed economies

China remained one of the world’s most closed major economies and the 17th most restrictive country out of 104 surveyed by the OECD in 2024 (the latest year for which data are available) despite decades of rhetorical commitments by the Chinese government to open its economy to foreign investment. China’s 15th Five-Year Plan for 2026-2030 marked the end of the “Reform and Opening” period begun under Deng Xiaoping and a transition to General Secretary Xi Jinping’s ambitious, ideologically-driven “Chinese Modernization” policy.

Chinese modernization brings an intensification of China’s focus on indigenization and technology self-reliance, and “autonomous opening-up,” which CCP media describe as China’s selective alignment with international standards and practices only where there are clear benefits for China’s economy and industry.

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Report: China’s energy transition and climate status report 2026

China’s GDP growth remained stable at 5.0%, unchanged from 2024 and well above the 2.3% pandemic-era level in 2020, despite continued property sector challenges and weak domestic demand. China’s dependence on net oil imports rose to 72.7%, slightly above both 2024 and 2020 levels, underscoring persistent energy security concerns as well as stockpiling building efforts.

Coal’s share in China’s energy mix fell further to 51.4% in 2025, down from 56.7% in 2020 and 53.2% in 2024, indicating continued progress in energy transition despite heightened energy security concerns.

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‘They are crying’: Refugees in Malaysia in fear amid Myanmar deportation

The phone hasn’t stopped ringing in recent days. Raf, a leader of refugees from Myanmar who are living in Malaysia, receives more than 100 calls a day, and they follow a common pattern.

The Malaysian government on Tuesday deported nearly 1,500 refugees, part of its stated plan to send back at least 5,000 refugees as part of a deal with the military government of Myanmar. That move, from a country that had long taken in the refugees, has sparked fear among the tens of thousands of other refugees from Myanmar in the country, who have one question at the top of their minds: Who might be next?

The deportation was carried out during escalating raids on refugee communities by immigration officials, which have led to the detention of more than 50,000 refugees this year alone. Those working with refugees in Malaysia said the frequency of the raids has increased since June when Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim announced the repatriation agreement with Myanmar.They are crying, asking me to do something,” Raf told Al Jazeera.

US bans Chinese data center gear as Beijing grounds its AI talent

The artificial intelligence (AI) race between the United States and China has accelerated in model protection, supply chains and talent controls, even as the two nations’ leaders agreed last week to open a new dialogue on AI safety.

A string of moves announced or uncovered this week shows that both sides are now guarding their models, hardware and engineers more tightly than ever. The rivalry has spread from chips to the data center equipment and the people behind the technology.

OpenAI said Wednesday that it had disrupted a coordinated campaign of adversarial distillation, the unauthorized use of one model’s outputs to train another. It attributed a core cluster of the activity to individuals associated with Moonshot AI, the Beijing-based developer of the Kimi K3 chatbot, and said it had shut down related activity across more than 15,000 users by July 28.