Editor’s Note: Every Wednesday, WPR Newsletter and Engagement Editor Benjamin Wilhelm curates the week’s top news and expert analysis on China. The arrest of Huawei Chief Financial Officer Meng Wanzhou in Canada at the United States’ request has dominated headlines since the story broke last Wednesday afternoon. But it is only the latest chapter in both the Chinese telecommunication giant’s rise to global prominence and Washington’s broader high-tech trade war with Beijing. Meng, who is also the daughter of Huawei’s billionaire founder, Ren Zhengfei, was arrested earlier this month while changing planes in Vancouver. U.S. authorities believe she violated sanctions [...]
Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison has adopted a noticeably softer tone toward China since taking office in August, in contrast to his predecessor, Malcolm Turnbull. The relationship has improved considerably, with Foreign Minister Marise Payne traveling to China in November, the first such visit by an Australian foreign minister in over two years. But according to Simone van Nieuwenhuizen, a researcher at the University of Technology Sydney’s Australia-China Relations Institute, the Australian government will still have to reckon with the challenges posed by Chinese influence operations and China’s increasing investment in Pacific island nations, where Australia has historically enjoyed a [...]
In early November, at its flagship biennial airshow in the southern city of Zhuhai, China displayed the latest accomplishments of its aerospace and defense industries. This year’s exhibition provides further evidence of China’s emergence as a major defense industrial power, one capable of equipping the Chinese People’s Liberation Army and foreign militaries with world-class military equipment. In the context of intensifying great-power competition between the United States and China, the rapidly increasing capacities of China’s defense industry are likely to play an important role in helping Beijing realize its goal of turning the PLA into a top-tier military and cementing [...]
