Kinaforum

tirsdag 11. august 2026

Torbjørn Færøvik: China is hot on the heels of the US

Hardly a day goes by without Donald Trump receiving bad news from Beijing. Despite all the American sanctions, China continues to close the gap with the United States in most strategic areas. Not least in the most important of all: artificial intelligence and new technology.

The superpower that wins this race will also win the economic and military duel. It must therefore be all the more frustrating for Trump to see China making new and remarkable advances almost every week. Stanford University in the United States concludes in a recent report that America’s lead over China in AI has almost disappeared. But the race will not be decided solely by who develops the most advanced models. Being able to roll out the technology faster and more cheaply is just as important, and here China is in the lead.

Trump is now considering banning several Chinese AI models. At the same time, he is expanding US sanctions against Chinese companies producing semiconductors and other sensitive technologies. Nor does he intend to approve China’s latest humanoid and quadrupedal robots.

Torbjørn Færøvik: Kina puster USA i nakken

Det går knapt en dag uten at Donald Trump får dårlige nyheter fra Beijing. For trass i alle amerikanske sanksjoner fortsetter Kina å nærme seg USA på de fleste strategiske områder. Ikke minst på de viktigste av alle: kunstig intelligens og ny teknologi. De puster oss i nakken, lyder omkvedet blant datahjernene i Silicon Valley.

Den supermakten som vinner dette kappløpet, vinner også den økonomiske og militære duellen. Desto mer frustrerende må det være for Trump å se at Kina nesten ukentlig gjør nye oppsiktsvekkende fremskritt. Det amerikanske Stanford-universitetet fastslår i en fersk rapport at USAs KI-forsprang på Kina nesten er eliminert. Men kappløpet avgjøres ikke bare av hvem som lager de mest avanserte modellene. Like viktig er det å kunne spre teknologien raskest og billigst, og her er Kina i tet.

Nå vurderer Trump å utestenge flere av de kinesiske KI-modellene. Samtidig utvider han USAs sanksjoner mot kinesiske selskaper som produserer halvledere og annen følsom teknologi. Han vil heller ikke godkjenne Kinas nyeste humanoide og firbente roboter.

How China Is Reordering Global Governance From Within

On June 17, the State Council Information Office published “More Just and Equitable Global Governance: China’s Principles, Proposals and Actions.” Its most revealing line was also its most conservative: “All countries should firmly uphold the international system with the U.N. at its core, safeguard the international order based on international law, and uphold the basic norms governing international relations underpinned by the purposes and principles of the U.N. Charter, instead of reinventing the wheel.”

On July 16, 29 governments signed the founding agreement of the World Artificial Intelligence Cooperation Organization (WAICO) in Shanghai. The new body, headquartered in China, invokes the United Nations Charter and a “people-centered” approach.

Together, these two events capture Beijing’s method for remaking global governance. Rather than propose a rival constitution, China preserves the institutions and texts of the postwar order while reweighting their principles and creating new, China-led venues to operationalize them.

The Chinese Parts in US Data Centers and Why Trump Wants to Ban Them

The Trump administration is reportedly laying the groundwork to ban a Chinese-made component from data centers amid growing concerns that dependence on China could pose risks to the security of America's AI (artificial intelligence) infrastructure.

Administration officials are drawing up plans to bar Chinese imports of optical transceivers—devices that transmit data over fiber-optic cables inside sprawling data centers—by the end of 2026, Reuters cited four people familiar with the matter as saying. The Federal Communications Commission could still modify or abandon the reported restrictions, the sources said.The report comes as the U.S.-China AI competition expands beyond chips and algorithms to the infrastructure needed to run them.

The U.S. has already tightened export controls on advanced AI chips to China in an effort to slow the development of technologies that could give the People’s Liberation Army a battlefield edge and erode America’s technological lead.

Whoops, Apocalypse! Why Five Conflicts Could Become One World War

The war between the United States and Iran began as a regional confrontation with global economic consequences. It could remain that way, but the situation also contains a far darker possibility: as in 1914, a series of individually rational decisions by world powers could lead to international catastrophe.

Unresolved flash points current and potential—Ukraine, the Gulf, Yemen, Lebanon and Taiwan—could begin reinforcing one another until every major power finds itself committed to multiple fronts simultaneously. The global tension could reshape the calculations of Russia, China, Europe and the United States in ways that trigger interlocking escalation.

China state-employed experts attacks India's standardizing of Arunachal placenames

China’s state-employed experts have criticized India’s counter-move to standardize on its map the names of 27 locations in its strategic border state of Arunachal Pradesh. Speaking to the Party-mouthpiece globaltimes.cn Aug 9, they have called the move “self-deception”, saying it “runs counter to the improving momentum in bilateral relations and could complicate efforts to properly handle border issues.”

Justifying China’s own similar move that began in 2017, the report said the country has been carrying out standardization of geographical names in the region for a long time, calling the territory “Zangnan” (Southern Tibet) on the basis of its occupation rule over Tibet.

“Zangnan” region covers parts of Nyingchi (Nyingtri) and Shannan (Lhokha) prefecture-level cities and is located in Southwest China’s “Xizang” (referring to Tibet Autonomous Region), which has been China’s territory since ancient times, the report claimed, using Sinicized names for Tibetan areas.

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India counters China by mapping 27 standardized place names in Arunachal Pradesh

Ahead of President Xi’s arrival, India and China agree to maintain border peace to boost ties

Taiwan's top representative in Japan boycotts Nagasaki bombing anniversary ceremony over seating

Taiwan’s top economic representative in Japan said he boycotted this year’s memorial marking the 81st anniversary of the U.S. atomic bombing of the Japanese city of Nagasaki, accusing city officials of being pro-China and insulting Taipei.

Lee Yi-yang, head of the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office in Tokyo, said in a social media post that seat assignments showed Nagasaki “deliberately denied Taiwan’s status as a nation, completely disregarding Taiwan’s sovereignty and dignity.” Lee said he and two deputies boycotted because their designated seats as representatives of Taiwan were not among those reserved for diplomatic missions. Lee instead sent a lower-ranked official from Fukuoka.

Shanghai cancels at least 1,300 flights as Typhoon Dolphin hits China’s eastern coast

Typhoon Dolphin hit China’s eastern coast on Sunday evening after forcing over 300,000 people to preemptively relocate and Shanghai’s two airports to cancel more than 1,300 flights. The storm brought heavy rains to northern Taiwan the day before.

In the Philippines, five people were rescued and seven remained missing after a landslide that hit three houses in the northern mountain resort city of Baguio on Sunday. The landslide was set off by days of heavy monsoon rains, which had been intensified by Dolphin, officials said.

Dolphin hit the Chinese city of Taizhou in Zhejiang province and the northern parts of neighboring Fujian province, bringing strong winds, estimated at 151 kph (93 mph) when it made landfall, and massive waves to the city’s coastline. Heavy rains have created a risk of severe flooding in Zhejiang, and authorities have warned of severe landslide risks.

Africa wants more homegrown solar to boost self-reliance, but China’s shadow remains

Africa’s largest economies are accelerating plans to build more domestic solar manufacturing capacity, a shift industry analysts say reflects both industrial ambition and growing unease over dependence on imports from China that dominate the global market. Ethiopia, South Africa, Morocco and Nigeria have been stepping up efforts to localize manufacturing of equipment for solar power, from module assembly to more advanced manufacturing, according to industry experts.

However, they say China is likely to retain its dominant global role in making solar cells and other components. Its exports of such equipment have soared, partly due to a glut in supply back home. Chinese renewable energy investment and related construction projects in Africa reached $66 billion between 2010 and 2024, according to the think tank ODI Global.

AI race loss fears behind Trump’s planned September hosting of Xi

Managing the risks of frontier artificial intelligence (AI) models and protecting intellectual property are set to top the agenda when United States President Donald Trump hosts Chinese President Xi Jinping in Washington on September 24.

Chinese state media and commentators say the Trump administration called for the AI summit because it fears Beijing is gaining the upper hand in the global AI race, particularly after China forged AI partnerships with 28 nations, mainly from the Global South, at the 2026 World Artificial Intelligence Conference (WAIC) in Shanghai on July 17.

They say Washington will further tighten its controls on AI development in China, but the Chinese consensus is that more curbs will only push Chinese firms to advance their self-sufficiency and build an AI ecosystem.

US weighs tactical nukes as China, Russia raise escalatory stakes

The US may be entering a period of significant nuclear reassessment as it confronts a growing mismatch between its predominantly strategic arsenal and adversaries increasingly prepared for limited nuclear use.

This month, Breaking Defense reported that the US Department of Defense (DoD) has initiated a review of the nation’s nuclear posture to expand tactical nuclear strike options for the White House. Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Elbridge Colby confirmed the re-examination of nuclear employment guidance, citing the need for “rational nuclear options” in response to potential regional conflicts with China or Russia.

The policy review comes amid longstanding US DoD concerns over foreign developments in low-yield warheads, which risk leaving the US without proportional non-strategic responses.

India-China thaw is a supply-chain truce, not a strategic reset

For six years, India ran its China policy on one simple assumption: if you’re economically dependent on a rival with which you share a disputed border, that dependence is a liability.

After the 2020 Himalayan clashes, New Delhi tightened the screws – more scrutiny on Chinese investment, restricted business travel, several deals blocked or slow-walked. The message wasn’t subtle: India would eat the economic cost if it meant shrinking China’s grip on strategically sensitive sectors.That’s now being dialed back.

On August 6, Indian and Chinese officials sat down in New Delhi for the 36th round of their border-affairs working mechanism – one more step in a thaw that’s already brought easier business travel, renewed commercial ties and a selective loosening of investment rules. Both sides went through the usual language about peace and tranquillity along the Line of Actual Control.

Typhoon Dolphin hits eastern China, more than one million evacuated

Typhoon Dolphin has made landfall on China’s eastern coast, bringing torrential rainand hurricane-force winds with more than one million people evacuated.

Dolphin, the most powerful tropical cyclone to hit China this year, made landfall near Yuhuan in eastern Zhejiang province at about 5:30pm (09:30 GMT) on Sunday, according to China’s meteorological authorities. The storm packed maximum sustained winds of 151km/h (93mph) near its centre as it came ashore, equivalent to a Category 1 hurricane.

Authorities have warned of severe flooding and landslide risks as the storm moves inland and continues to bring heavy rain to densely populated areas of eastern China.

As US and China throw up tit-for-tat sanctions, is Trump’s Xi meeting at risk?

The road to Chinese leader Xi Jinping’s expected visit to the United States next month is shaping up to be rockier than Beijing would have hoped. Weeks ahead of the state visit, the world’s two largest economies have revived a tit-for-tat exchange of sanctions, with Beijing unveiling multiple measures against US firms or interests in what it said was retaliation for “erroneous” American moves.

The US has banned imports of new humanoid robots (largely produced in China); sanctioned Chinese shipping operators alleged to be handling Iranian fuel; placed more than 40 Chinese firms on an entity list for alleged human rights violations; and added two top civilian universities to a Pentagon blacklist. It’s also threatened to sanction Chinese AI firms.

Can AI Preserve a Homeland in Exile? Tibetan Memory in the Age of Artificial Intelligence

In the Sonamling Tibetan Settlement outside Leh in Ladakh, I found that the most venerable memories were not to be had in any museum or archive. They were to be found in conversation. My fieldwork there put me in the company of elderly Tibetan refugees who would talk of the monasteries from their youth, the villages they put behind them and the Himalayan crossings that altered the course of their lives. Younger members of the family would be seated about them, keenly listening. Now and then, one might subtly raise a mobile phone to put the exchange on record. An unremarkable thing to do, perhaps, but with no small import. In a sense, these were more than family tales, they were pieces of a homeland being put aside for the keeping of those who have never set eyes on it.

For Tibetans in exile, memory is never just an act of recollection, it is how culture endures. Before such things ever made it into an institution’s files, they made their way through the home and the prayer hall, in song and in the ordinary course of talk, conveying language and faith and an abiding connection to Tibet over the years.

Nepal puts Tibetan refugee population at over 3,500

The police in Nepal have put the number of Tibetan refugees living in the country at over 3,500, the second largest group after Bhutanese refugees, with the total being over 10,000, reported myrepublica.nagariknetwork.com Aug 7. The report said the police made the figures public after misleading comments and discussions about refugees began circulating on social media.

The report cited police spokesperson Abi Narayan Kafle as saying 6,272 Bhutanese refugees were currently living in Nepal. Kafle has put the number of Tibetan refugees living in the country, per police data, at 3,527, followed by 527 Rohingya refugees.

The vast majority of Tibetan refugees living in the country remain unregistered and therefore uncounted. Nepal stopped registering Tibetan refugees decades ago due to pressure from China which insists they are illegal migrants.

Taiwan military exercises indicates closer ties with the US

Through this year’s military drills, Taiwan has chosen to emphasize its army’s and society’s flexibility and resilience as opposed to primarily putting advanced weapons on display. Experts say the exercises’ structure indicates closer ties with the U.S. military in the face of China’s ongoing military threat.

The annual Huang Kuang drills kicked off on Wednesday and are set to extend through Aug. 14 in various locations around the island. The live-fire exercises will test the Taiwanese army’s ability to sustain 24-hour defense operations as well as counter China’s “gray-zone tactics,” which stop just short of open warfare. China claims the self-ruled democracy as its own territory, and has not renounced the use of force to bring it under its control. Taiwan dismisses China’s claims and insists it is a sovereign state.

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A rare glimpse into Tibet, where some hope to preserve language and customs despite China’s new law

Kalsang Lhamo traces a series of vertical strokes, slow but firm, practicing Tibetan calligraphy. A 73-year-old retired nurse, she has spoken Tibetan all her life but never learned to write it. Now, in classes at a center for older adults, she immerses herself in the script.

Lhamo also speaks and writes Chinese, which China mandated as its primary language for schools and government agencies in a sweeping new “ethnic unity” law implemented July 1. Under the new regulations, acts deemed to incite division among China’s 56 ethnic groups are prohibited, and schools, families and other institutions are expected to foster patriotism, national unity and a strong sense of community for the Chinese nation.

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