Beijing - The African Mirror

Apr

2024

China invites Uganda’s energy minister for talks on pipeline financing

CHINA has invited Uganda's energy minister to Beijing to discuss the East African country's $5 billion crude oil pipeline, Uganda's presidency said. The development could signal a possible breakthrough in Uganda's efforts to woo Chinese financiers to fund the pipeline, which the country requires to start crude production from oilfields that were discovered in 2006. Potential Chinese funding is being considered as pivotal after Western banks declined to fund the pipeline after pressure from environmentalists who said the project would add to global carbon emissions. China's special envoy for the Horn of Africa Affairs, Xue Bing, delivered a message to…

Feb

2024

By ABBEY MAKOE

Hong Kong has every right to implement the “long overdue” Article 23

THOUGHT LEADERSHIP

THERE was a time, a time not too long ago, when Hong Kong was regarded as the outpost of the West on China’s door-step. And then, a little over 26 years ago, the stranglehold of the colonial masters – Great Britain – over Hong Kong came to an eventual end when the territory was handed over back to its rightful owners, the Peoples Republic of China. Under Hong Kong’s semi-autonomous rule, the Western interests gradually dissipated. Reports of the so-called “Hong Kong’s fall from grace” have become a constant in the Western mainstream media. At the heart of the negative…

Dec

2023

By ABBEY MAKOE

US attempt to help Taiwan to secede from China “doomed to fail” – Beijing

THOUGHT LEADERSHIP

AT a time of great geopolitical flux – decried by the UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres as a consequence of the “obsolete” global governance system – indications are that international peace efforts lag way behind a satiable appetite for conflict. The UN was founded in the aftermath of WW11 in 1945 in a noble effort to ensure no repeat of global conflict that had left nations in ruins. The UN Charter espouses the essence of a consensus-led international world order. The ethos of multilateralism has therefore formed a nucleus of the UN system, where debate and consensus triumph over bullying and…

Nov

2023

By LIZ LEE and XIAOYU YIN

China cremates ‘people’s’ premier, lowers national flag amidst outpouring of grief

WORLD

CHINA lowered the national flag in Beijing's Tiananmen Square amid an outpouring of online grief as the country cremated Li Keqiang, known as "the people's premier" for his down-to-earth, hands-on leadership. Li, a former economist and pro-reform leader who served as premier for 10 years before retiring in March, died of a heart attack in Shanghai last Friday. He was 68. At Li's funeral at a Beijing cemetery where high-ranking officials and national heroes are laid to rest, President Xi Jinping and his wife, with the six other members of the Communist Party's Politburo Standing Committee, the highest rung of political power…

Oct

2023

By The African Mirror

China says it uncovered another spying case in US

WORLD

CHINA'S top spy agency said that a Chinese citizen who worked for a defence institute had been accused of spying for the United States and his case had been transferred to a court in the southwestern city of Chengdu for trial. The case is the latest to underscore Beijing's heightened commitment to national security, its expanded anti-spying laws and crackdown on domestic corruption. Chinese state broadcaster CCTV said in a television report that a man surnamed Hou who worked at an undisclosed defence institute was sent in 2013 as a visiting scholar to a U.S. university, where he was coerced…

Oct

2023

By The African Mirror

Putin filmed in China accompanied by officers with Russian nuclear briefcase

WORLD

RARE footage was shown of Russian President Vladimir Putin in Beijing accompanied by officers carrying the so-called nuclear briefcase which can be used to order a nuclear strike. Putin, after a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing, was filmed walking to another meeting surrounded by security and followed by two Russian naval officers in uniform each carrying a briefcase. The camera zooms in on one of the briefcases. Russia's nuclear briefcase is traditionally carried by a naval officer. Known as the "Cheget" (named after Mount Cheget in the Caucasus Mountains), the briefcase is with the president at all times but…

Jun

2023

By TREVOR HUNNICUTT and RYAN WOO

China lashes back as Biden labels Xi a ‘dictator’

WORLD

CHINA hit back after U.S. President Joe Biden referred to President Xi Jinping as a "dictator", saying the remarks were absurd and a provocation, in an unexpected spat immediately following efforts by both sides to lower tensions. Biden's comments came just a day after top U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited Beijing to stabilize bilateral relations that China says are at their lowest point since formal ties were established. Attending a fundraiser in California, Biden said Xi was very embarrassed when a suspected Chinese spy balloon was blown off course over U.S. airspace early this year, making a personal comment on…

Mar

2021

By The African Mirror

U.S. won’t force NATO allies into ‘us or them’ choice on China

WORLD

ROBIN EMMOTT THE United States will not force any NATO ally to choose sides between Washington and Beijing, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Wednesday, although he warned that the West needed to show authoritarian states that democracy was superior. European allies France and Germany are looking for a strategic balance in relations with Beijing and Washington that ensures the European Union is not so closely allied with one of the world's two big powers that it alienates the other. "The United States won't force allies into an 'us-or-them' choice with China," Blinken, on his maiden voyage to…

Dec

2020

By The African Mirror

China to leapfrog US as world’s biggest economy by 2028 – think tank

WORLD

CHINA will overtake the United States to become the world's biggest economy in 2028, five years earlier than previously estimated due to the contrasting recoveries of the two countries from the COVID-19 pandemic, a think tank said. "For some time, an overarching theme of global economics has been the economic and soft power struggle between the United States and China," the Centre for Economics and Business Research said in an annual report published on Saturday. "The COVID-19 pandemic and corresponding economic fallout have certainly tipped this rivalry in China's favour." The CEBR said China's "skilful management of the pandemic", with…