"De terugtrekking kwam er volgens de Finse overheid na een analyse van de verdedigingsnoden van het land. ... De overheid zegt dat het haar "andere verplichtingen onder internationaal recht, inclusief internationaal humanitair recht" zal blijven nakomen." vrtnws.be/p.7n9OqPwpA

"Een van de hefbomen die Europa heeft is militair. De Amerikaanse militaire macht is sterk afhankelijk van toegang tot Europa. Zonder Europa kunnen de VS hun macht in het Midden-Oosten nauwelijks projecteren."

"Some people said the lack of US support was ironic given that Elbridge Colby, the under-secretary of defence for policy, had pushed Japan to make clear what role it would play if the US and China went to war over Taiwan."

"By 2029, Germany is expected to spend €153 billion a year on defense. That’s about 3.5 percent of GDP, the country’s most ambitious military expansion since reunification. France, by comparison, plans to reach about €80 billion by 2030."

"Dat er vanuit de oppositie vragen gesteld worden die gebreken blootleggen, maakt deel uit van de normale werking van het parlement. Het zijn de veelheid en de mate van detail die voor onrust zorgen."

Four of the "seven sons of national defence" are banned from the PLA's procurement process on account of “bid-rigging”, with Beijing Institute of Technology also accused of “transferring benefits during the bidding process”.

"Building a shiny new carrier is nice, but ... the Chinese ‘don’t know what they don’t know’ about carrier ops."

"The intelligence prompted a fierce debate in the administration about US relations with the UAE and whether it should co-operate more with the Gulf state on AI on condition that it agreed to stop working with China."

"Communication between the US and China remains precarious and insufficient, consisting of occasional phone calls between top government or military officials. This fragile framework cannot be counted on to quickly defuse potential accidents and it remains vulnerable to rupture in tense times."

"Het aanwakkeren van vriend- of vijandbeelden leidt tot minder autonomie, in plaats van méér. Het is van belang dat Nederland de negatieve en positieve kanten van China niet overdrijft, en dat het beperkte maar realistische doelen stelt in de relatie."

"China routinely accessed low and medium level classification information on UK government servers for at least the last 10 years, including information marked “official-sensitive” and “secret,” as well as some material on the government’s secure IT networks."

" China has multiple mechanisms to mediate between Islamabad and Kabul, including trilateral foreign ministers’ meetings, the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, which has consistently focused on counterterrorism in Afghanistan, and the platform of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor."

Communities in Zambia have filed lawsuits seeking $80B in damages from Sino Metals after a February mining spill. Chinese social media is now openly debating the case.

"Moscow’s challenges create a fresh opening for Western powers to regain the access and influence in the Sahel they had lost after the military coups." www.wsj.com/world/africa...

"The papers reflect broad problems in scientific publishing and how research is rewarded. The publishers accepted fees, likely on the order of $1000 each, to publish this junk. And researchers are incentivized to publish more papers, rather than higher quality papers, to advance in their careers.”

"Last year, China settled the final instalment of its $480mn contribution on December 27. Only North Korea paid the last of its roughly $157,000 in dues later, on December 30."

"Showcasing China’s standards, tools and practices positions China as the arbiter of what counts as security and who provides it best. China’s bid to rewrite global security governance may displace the US, not by directly confronting it, but by creating alternatives that circumvent and surpass it."

"Beijing has chosen to patch up the system with administrative measures, shifting excesses from one sector to another, and relying on exports to cushion the imbalance. But this is a stopgap solution that “works” only by shifting excess capacity across different sectors in the economy."

Sinologe Dorien Emmers: ‘Xi Jinping en Poetin? Dat is eerder een open relatie’

"During the 2015 event, which took place about 3 years after Xi rose to power, senior officials accompanied him. By 2025, he ushered the rest of the CCP upper echelon to the side. Instead, Xi was flanked by foreign leaders he had invited from Russia, North Korea, Iran and other like-minded states."

Jumia’s race to profitability is complicated by the entrance of Chinese low-cost giants Temu and Shein into Africa. Both offer aggressive discounts to attract price-conscious customers and have steadily cut down their shipping times to improve delivery. Temu in particular offers discounts up to 50%.

The pigeon gold rush was full of opportunities to get rich. But pigeon racing was on a crash course with the Chinese government as it began cracking down on conspicuous displays of wealth and illegal gambling. Then stories started emerging about thefts of pigeons from Flemish fanciers.

"The Salt Typhoon attack was a yearslong, coordinated assault that targeted more than 80 countries and infiltrated major telecommunications companies and others, investigators said in a highly unusual joint statement last week. The range of the attack was far greater than originally understood."

"If AI can't capture the uniqueness of human interaction, it risks reinforcing stereotypes of how people ought to speak, rather than reflecting how they actually do. It may even promote a new procedural ideology of conversation, where talk is merely a functional but impoverished tool of cooperation"

"🇨🇳’s industrial policy worked because the state built the deep infrastructure needed to become a resilient technological powerhouse. It created an innovation ecosystem centered on powerful electricity and digital networks and it established a massive workforce with advanced manufacturing knowledge."

"Under federal tax law, these nonprofits, which do not pay most taxes, can take positions on policy issues but cannot endorse candidates for office. And yet, in case after case, the hometown groups made endorsements or hosted fund-raisers."

"Chinese investors increased their holdings of gold by a notable 44 per cent year on year to 115 tonnes, while the People's Bank of China added 19 tonnes in the first half of 2025 as part of a strategic effort to diversify foreign reserves away from the US dollar." scmp.onelink.me/3586748601/d...

Yet another name to add to the list of China's brain gain sc.mp/jbrtj?utm_so...

"In young democracies, citizens tend to understand democracy in terms of electoral institutions rather than liberal values. ... in the context of US-China competition, these citizens tend to perceive China’s threats to electoral institutions more seriously than its threats to liberal values."

"Recent examples: Trump’s demand that Intel’s CE resign; the 15% of certain chip sales to China that Nvidia & AMD will share with Washington; the “golden share” Washington will get in US Steel after Nippon Steel’s takeover; and the promised FDI from trading partners Trump plans to personally direct"

"Results for #beijingflood on YouTube Shorts revealed multiple AI-generated thumbnails, 1 of which surpassed 18 million views. By comparison, Chinese social media platforms, including Baidu’s Haokan Video, Weibo and Douyin appeared to be genuine posts documenting the real-world impact of the floods"

"DJI, of Shenzhen, China, accounts for about 70% of all commercial drones sold globally for hobby and industrial use. ... 'No one even comes close,' said a drone industry consultant. 'DJI can make millions of drones per year. That is a hundred times more than anybody in the United States can make.'"

"Zhang believes the window for unification is rapidly opening. ... According to him, Beijing is well-prepared, strategically waiting for the right moment to act. Case in point: China’s national highway plan for 2035 — it already includes Taiwan."

"🇨🇳’s nuclear trajectory indicates that it will, at a minimum, seek effective parity at the regional level. Where it goes from there is unknown. Diplomatically, 🇨🇳 has not acknowledged its nuclear buildup. Nor has it explained its rationale for expansion or the ultimate target it is building toward."

"Discussions on Chinese social media have centered around questions including “Should I go back?” or “Who has been back?” ... They once discussed “runology” — figuring out how to leave China during the lockdowns. Now, they discuss “reverse runology,” or mapping a way back to China."

"It is surprising that Taiwan has pursued energy policies that make itself so vulnerable to disruption. But the Taiwanese people, like those in many other democracies, see themselves as part of a global commons and have thought about their energy system largely through an environmental lens."

"Observers remarked that the guidelines and commentaries contained subtle clues about the misdeeds of recently fallen generals, as well as Beijing’s expectations for political officials in the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to address and repair the damage."

"China did not always enjoy such dominance. Developing an export control regime they could minutely control took decades of sometimes painful trial and error." www.npr.org/2025/07/15/n...

"Criminal networks controlled by Chinese nationals handle the full circuit of goods imported from China into the EU, including distribution, sales to end customers, money laundering and sending the profits to China, while defrauding the payment of customs duties and committing large-scale VAT fraud"

"Neijuan, also known as 'involution', refers to a self-defeating cycle of excessive competition."

With a contribution by yours truly on China's informal trade restrictions

Fintech, IT and software account for nearly 40 per cent of the fastest growing companies in Africa on.ft.com/42W80J7

België, waar de subsidies voor fossiele brandstoffen, mede door bedrijfswagens en tankkaarten, de pan uit blijken te swingen, maar waar er geen draagvlak is voor een uitbreiding van het openbaar vervoer naar de hoofdstad. vrtnws.be/p.BlJOakkJ9

"Wang Yi called on the junta to ensure the safety and rights of Chinese companies and citizens in Niger, and to create favourable conditions for the stable, long-term development of bilateral cooperation projects."

Het systeem waarbij China op ad hoc basis beslist welke zeldzame aardmetalen het land mogen verlaten blijft ook na het raamakkoord van Londen overeind. En dus valt het nog af te wachten of Donald Trump echt victorie mag kraaien. Mijn visie in @demorgen.be

To all the China scholars out there: great opportunity @ @kuleuvenuniversity.bsky.social !

"De prominente Chinese autobedrijven van vandaag zijn niet de partners in de verplichte joint ventures van weleer, maar privébedrijven die jarenlang met die JVs geconcurreerd hebben."

Wat te doen met China? Stap nummer 1: het land beter te proberen doorgronden. Met een genuanceerde en open blik.

Rogier Creemers: ‘Wij gaan er altijd van uit dat China een wereldmacht zoals de VS wil worden, die eisen dat anderen worden zoals hen. Dat zie ik helemaal niet. China wil vooral zo machtig worden dat ze met rust gelaten worden.’ www.mo.be/interview/wa...