Editor’s Note for Wednesday, April 20, 2022

My thoughts today:

If you’re a China government and Communist Party nerd, you’ll really love the Tracking People’s Daily newsletter by Indian scholar Manoj Kewalramani.

Today’s edition includes a summary of the official Chinese readout of a meeting between China’s beautifully named Vice Foreign Minister Lè Yùchéng 乐玉成 and Russian ambassador to China Andrey Ivanovich:

Le Yucheng said that under the guidance of President Xí Jìnpíng 习近平 and President Vladimir Putin, China and Russia maintain high-level development of the comprehensive strategic partnership of coordination for a new era and continue to deepen cooperation in various fields. In the first quarter of this year, the bilateral trade volume between China and Russia reached $38.2 billion, an increase of nearly 30%.

…No matter how the international landscape may change, China will continue to strengthen strategic coordination with Russia for win-win cooperation, jointly safeguard the common interests of the two countries and promote the building of a new type of international relations and a community with a shared future for mankind.

This will hurt me, and many of The China Project’s readers and friends: The New York Times reports: Star Ferry, ‘emblem of Hong Kong,’ may sail into history after 142 years.

Our words of the day are:

• 1930 Forced Labor Convention
  1930 年强迫劳动公约
  yījiǔsān líng nián qiǎngpò láodòng gōngyuē
• 1957 Abolition of Forced Labor Convention
  1957 年废除强迫劳动公约
  yījiǔwǔqī nián fèichú qiǎngpò láodòng gōngyuē