Kinaforum

onsdag 20. mai 2026

EU says plight of unregistered Tibetans in Nepal a priority

The European Union has said Apr 29 that it has been urging Nepal, as a part of the Refugee Core Group in Nepal, to address the long-standing humanitarian challenges faced by Tibetan refugees in the country as many of them have continued to remain undocumented for decades. It has vowed to bring up the issue during the next annual EU-Nepal joint Commission planned to be held in the second half of this year.

This message was conveyed by the European External Acton Service – the diplomatic service in charge of executing all international relations of the European Union – in response to a Mar 3 letter from MEPs Dainius Zalimas and Hannes Heide, Co-Chairs of the Inter-parliamentary Group for Tibet in the European Parliament, addressed to EU Trade Commissioner Maros Sefcovic regarding the precarious status of Tibetan refugees in Nepal.

The EU has been pushing for the issuance of Personal Account Number (PAN) cards as an immediate measure to at least give the Tibetan refugees an identity that should enable them to open bank accounts, access the labour market, and manage daily administrative tasks.

Putin: Ties to Xi's China reach 'unprecedentedly high level'

There is no point comparing the ceremonial parts of Russian leader Vladimir Putin's and US President Donald Trump's visit to China, the Kremlin said. "There is a point in comparing ‌the content," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry ‌Peskov told state television when asked about comparisons with the Trump visit.

"It is not ⁠always easy to compare the content as not everything is ‌shown on the surface. However, the main ⁠value lies in the content, not ⁠in the ceremonial aspects," Peskov added.

Just days after hosting Trump, Chinese President Xi Jinping welcomed Putin with military honors and a red carpet outside the monumental Great Hall of the People in Beijing. Putin's reception had the hallmarks of the typical state-visit welcome, much like what Beijing bestowed on Trump.

Putin-Xi talks revive stalled Russian gas pipeline as Iran war rattles energy markets

Russian President Vladimir Putin met with Chinese leader Xi Jinping in Beijing on Wednesday, with the long-stalled Power of Siberia 2 natural gas pipeline on the agenda, as the Iran war disrupts energy supplies.

Kremlin foreign policy aide Yuri Ushakov said Tuesday that the project “will be discussed in great detail between the leaders.”The planned 2,600-kilometer pipeline would carry 50 billion cubic meters of gas annually from Russia’s Yamal fields to China via Mongolia. Moscow and Beijing signed a legally binding memorandum to advance construction in September 2025, but pricing, financing terms, and a delivery timeline remain unresolved.

China reportedly wanted pricing terms for the new pipeline to match Russia’s domestic rate of around $120-130 per 1,000 cubic meters, while Moscow is seeking terms closer to Power of Siberia 1, which analysts estimate would more than double that figure.

Taiwan’s Lai says he would tell Trump he hopes to continue arms purchases from the US

Taiwan President Lai Ching-te said Wednesday that if given the chance he would tell U.S. President Donald Trump of his hope to continue U.S. arms purchases, which Lai called essential for peace, while offering assurances that the island’s future would not be decided by external forces.

Lai is marking two years in office, the halfway point of his term, under growing pressure from China, which sees Taiwan as a breakaway province to be retaken by force if necessary. Trump’s recent narrative on Taiwan also raised concerns about U.S. traditional support for the island even without formal diplomatic ties.

Lai said if he could talk to Trump, he would emphasize that peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait was crucial for global security, alleging China was the “destroyer” of the strait’s peace.

Lai said he also would tell Trump that Taiwan’s increasing defense budget was a response to threats and purchases of U.S. arms would be an essential means to safeguard the strait’s stability. Lai said he believes “only strength can bring peace.”

Trump weighs Taiwan arms package

US President Donald Trump yesterday said he has not made a decision on whether to move forward with a major arms package for Taiwan after hearing concerns about it from Chinese President Xi Jinping.

Trump’s comments on Taiwan came as he flew back to Washington after wrapping up critical talks in which both leaders said important progress was made in stabilizing US-China relations even as deep differences persist between the world’s two biggest powers on Iran and Taiwan.

“I will make a determination,” Trump said, adding: “I’ll be making decisions. But, you know, I think the last thing we need right now is a war that’s 9,500 miles [15,289km] away.”

President Lai speaks on democracy, security in anniversary address

President William Lai today addressed the nation to mark the second anniversary of his inauguration and 30 years of democracy in Taiwan, speaking on national security amid growing global threats and future economic and social development.

Taiwan’s future cannot be decided by forces beyond its borders, nor can it be held hostage by fear, division or short-term gain, Lai said.

“Taiwan’s future must be determined together by our 23 million people,” he added. The past two years have not been easy, as a changing geopolitical landscape, growing authoritarianism, supply chain restructuring, climate change, energy transition and the rise of artificial intelligence have challenged Taiwan’s competitiveness and resilience, he said.

Putin visits China to reaffirm Russia ties as Xi also seeks stable US relations after Trump summit

Russian President Vladimir Putin arrived Tuesday night in China for meetings with Chinese leader Xi Jinping less than a week after U.S. President Donald Trump wrapped up his own trip to Beijing.

Putin’s plane landed in Beijing, where he was greeted by Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi and an honor guard, as well as youths in light blue shirts waving Chinese and Russian flags and chanting, “Welcome, welcome, warmly welcome!” His two-day visit is likely to be closely watched as Beijing seeks to maintain stable relations with the United States while also preserving strong ties with Russia.

The Kremlin has said Putin and Xi plan to discuss economic cooperation between the two countries, but also “key international and regional issues.” The visit coincides with the 25th anniversary of the Sino-Russian Treaty of Friendship signed in 2001.

Xi’s double act: Putin arrives in China days after Trump’s departure

Less than a week after Xi Jinping rolled out the red carpet for US President Donald Trump, the Chinese leader is hosting another guest of honor — and this time it’s a close ally. Russian President Vladimir Putin arrived in the Chinese capital Tuesday for a state visit clearly calibrated to showcase Beijing and Moscow’s alignment in the face of global geopolitical upheaval.

China and Russia are both navigating shifting relationships with the Trump administration and are weighing up whether to play any role in helping to end a US-Iran conflict that has ensnared global oil supplies and distracted Washington from Russia’s own yearslong war in Ukraine.

Putin Needs Xi’s Help. The 3 Things Russia Wants From China

The red carpet from Donald Trump’s visit to Beijing had only just been packed away before it was rolled out again for Vladimir Putin.

The Russian president's visit to China on Tuesday and Wednesday will see the embattled leader - weakened in the fifth year of fighting in the Ukraine war - push for even more help from its biggest and most important ally. In a video released right before he got on the plane, Putin said the countries' decades-long relations had "reached a truly unprecedented level".

Speaking to "Chinese friends", he said: "I deeply appreciate President Xi Jinping’s commitment to long-term cooperation with Russia", emphasizing the "special nature" of the relationship and "warm and friendly" ties.

Torbjørn Færøvik: China Puts Trump on the Rack

Will he? Won’t he?

Donald Trump is in a quandary. During his visit to China last week, he received a clear message from his otherwise affable host, President Xi Jinping: If the United States continues to support Taiwan, the two superpowers could end up in “a dangerous place.” “I listened to him, but chose not to respond,” Trump said on the flight home to Washington.

It is not often that the blusterer in the White House chooses to remain silent, but for once he did the right thing.

In January, Congress approved a weapons package for Taiwan worth 14 billion dollars. Trump has not yet signed the bill, but will he do so? On the return journey, he merely said that he would make up his mind quite soon. The problem is that whatever he does, he will face a storm of criticism. If he bows to Xi, he will win applause from China but provoke an outcry both in Taiwan and at home. If he signs, he risks wrecking America’s relationship with China for a long time to come.

Soccer players become first North Korean athletes to visit the South in more than 7 years

South Korea received North Korean athletes for the first time in more than seven years on Sunday, when a women’s soccer team arrived to contest the Asian club championship.

Thirty-nine players and staff from Pyongyang’s Naegohyang Women’s Football Club rushed past a crowd of media and security at Incheon International Airport after the team arrived on a flight from Beijing. Arriving smartly dressed in matching blazers and skirts, the North Korean players walked straight to their bus, without glancing at the gathered pro-unification groups cheering, “Welcome.” The players and staff remained silent and emotionless until the door of their bus closed and left for Suwon under police escort.

Torbjørn Færøvik: Stairways to Heaven - China's Sacred Mountains

Imagine a staircase with 7,863 steps. At this very moment, thousands of Chinese are streaming to the famous Mount Tai to offer their prayers and greet the sunrise, 1,545 metres above sea level.

The mountain lies in Shandong province, south of Beijing, where it rises abruptly from the plain, facing the morning sun. In May it is at its most welcoming. The winter cold has withdrawn, while the summer heat has not yet arrived. On the summit the temperature is pleasant during the day, but chilly in the morning. Be careful, though, for spring rain can make the stone steps slippery.

For more than two thousand years, Mount Tai was an important place for China’s emperors. Here, on the Jade Emperor Peak, heaven and earth met. A Chinese ruler could not govern by force alone; he also had to show that he possessed the “Mandate of Heaven”. Mount Tai was perfectly suited to this purpose, and so the mountain became a political altar. By climbing it, the emperor could symbolically report to Heaven and say: “The realm is in order. I am the rightful ruler.”

China ramps up missile buildup for a Taiwan war

China’s accelerating missile buildup is increasingly turning industrial capacity, stockpile depth, and sustained precision-strike capability into decisive factors in the emerging military balance over Taiwan and the wider Indo-Pacific.

This month, Bloomberg reported that China sharply accelerated missile production in 2025, citing an analysis of corporate filings that showed 81 listed Chinese firms disclosed supplying key components to the country’s missile industry, more than double the number recorded when President Xi Jinping took office in 2013.According to Bloomberg, nearly 40% of those companies posted record revenues last year, with combined sales rising 20% to 189 billion yuan (US$28 billion), even as revenues among China’s 300 largest listed firms declined overall.

From indemnity to indispensability: China’s 125-year reversal

When eight foreign flags flew over Beijing in August 1900, no one in the Forbidden City could have imagined that the city would, 125 years later, host the president of the United States as a guest of honor and the president of Russia just days afterward.

The contrast is almost cinematic. In 1900, some 51,755 troops from Austria-Hungary, Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia and the United States marched into the Chinese capital, looted the Forbidden City and the Old Summer Palace, destroyed volumes of the Yongle Dadian and the Siku Quanshu, and imposed the punitive Boxer Protocol of September 1901.

In May 2026, those same eight capitals — through their successors and alliances — watch as Beijing, not foreign legations, sets the choreography of great-power diplomacy.

The Boxer Protocol was a humiliation engineered around indemnity, extraterritoriality, and the permanent garrisoning of foreign troops on Chinese soil. The 2026 Trump–Xi summit was the photographic negative of that arrangement.

Taiwan vows to maintain ‘status quo’

Taipei presses the US for arms supplies, saying the arms sales are not only a reflection of the US security commitment to Taiwan but also serve as a mutual deterrent against regional threats-Taiwan is committed to preserving the cross-strait “status quo” and contributing to regional peace and stability, the Presidential Office said yesterday.

“It is an undeniable fact that the Republic of China is a sovereign and independent democratic nation,” Presidential Office spokeswoman Karen Kuo reiterated, adding that Beijing has no right to claim sovereignty over Taiwan.

The statements came after US President Donald Trump warned against Taiwanese independence. Trump wrapped up a state visit to Beijing on Friday, during which Chinese President Xi Jinping had pressed him not to support Taiwan. Taiwan depends heavily on US security backing to deter China from carrying out its threat to annex the nation by force.

ROC not subordinate to PRC, Lai says

Sovereignty is the foundation of statehood, Lai said, adding that without Taiwan, there would be no ROC, as the ROC and Taiwan have become inseparable. Without sovereignty, there would be no democracy, he said.

Regardless of how the international community refers to the nation, all terms refer to the 23 million people of Taiwan, Penghu, Kinmen and Matsu, he said, expressing hope that efforts would be made to safeguard the nation’s sovereignty and democracy, and take care of its people. Lai also talked about Taiwan’s democratic pioneers and liberal academics — Free China’s co-founder and publisher Lei Chen, Yin Hai-kuang and Fu Cheng, who he said sought to use the idea of a “democratic China” to counter “communist China.”

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Nine in 10 families in China own a home. But is the property-owning dream being tested?

For the past three decades, China has been a nation of homeowners — supercharging the world’s second-largest economy and fulfilling the dreams of millions. Since the decline and eventual end of a welfare housing policy in the 1990s, government planning has coalesced with deep-seated cultural norms to create a level of private ownership unfathomable in the West.

While tens of millions of Americans are laden with tuition loans – many well into their 30s, leaving renting their only option – their Chinese counterparts start planning the purchase of their first homes straight out of university.

But a slowing economy and crisis-battered housing market could upend that.

Trump's Reversal on China Buying U.S. Farmland Angers MAGA Supporters

During his 2024 campaign for the White House, then-candidate Donald Trump repeatedly pledged to block Chinese nationals and companies from purchasing U.S. farmland as part of his “America First” agenda, and shortly after winning a second term, his Administration moved aggressively to curtail Chinese student visas.

Today, however, President Trump has reversed course on both issues, a development that threatens to isolate many in his base who view China as an existential threat to U.S. sovereignty. Trump’s pivot on the issues was drawn into focus following his visit to Beijing this week for a high-stakes summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping.In an interview on Friday following the diplomatic visit, Trump defended his turnaround, while offering little explanation for his change of heart.

“Frankly, I think that it’s good that people come from other countries and they learn our culture, and many of them want to stay here. I think it’s a good thing,” Trump said in an interview with Fox News host Sean Hannity on May 15, defending his plan to approve some 500,000 visas for Chinese students.