News Briefing for Thursday, September 29, 2022

Here’s what else you need to know about China today:

Chinese billionaire Richard Liu (刘强东 Liú Qiángdōng) goes on trial next week: The founder and former CEO of ecommerce giant JD.com, and one of the richest people in the world, will defend himself in a high-profile civil trial in Minneapolis against allegations that he raped a former University of Minnesota student in 2018.

“A previously unknown” Pakistani separatist group, which called itself the Sindhudesh People’s Army, claimed responsibility for the attack on a dentist clinic owned by a Chinese couple who had Pakistani citizenship in which one ethnically Chinese employee died. Most previous attacks on Chinese interests in Pakistan have been claimed by the Baloch Liberation Army.

Paraguay asks Taiwan to pay up: The South American country, which is one of the island’s few remaining formal allies, has asked Taipei to fork over $1 billion in investment so that it can resist “enormous” pressure from Beijing — such as enticing offers of aid, loans, and trade — to switch diplomatic ties to mainland China.

• “We are working with the president of Taiwan…so that the Paraguayan people feel the real benefits of the strategic alliance,” Paraguay’s president, Mario Abdo Beníte, told the Financial Times.

Opinions about Xi’s China have turned “precipitously more negative” in advanced economies over the superpower’s human rights record, military activities, and economic policies, according to a new survey by the Washington, D.C.–based think tank Pew Research Center — and it’s only gotten worse since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Some interesting findings:

• In the United States, the view that Beijing handled COVID-19 poorly and is responsible for the virus’s spread is related to negative opinions of China, but is not the only factor driving attitudes.
• South Koreans have dramatically soured in their opinions on China since 2017, after Beijing retaliated against Seoul for its decision to install an American missile interceptor (THAAD). Negative views increased again in 2020 at the start of the pandemic.
• Japan hasn’t been keen on China in the past decade, despite the fact that both nations today celebrated the 50th anniversary of the normalization of diplomatic ties.

China’s $12 trillion BRI trade: The National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) announced earlier today that as of the end of August 2022, China’s cumulative trade in goods with countries that are part of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) has reached about $12 trillion since 2013. See today’s Business briefs from the Chinese media, with more links and info on:

• Almost 90 million tons of solid waste was cleaned up last year.
• BYD launches three new electric cars in Europe.
• New Pengbu Bridge opens to traffic.

Britain’s new foreign secretary, James Cleverly, had some choice words about China after he wrapped up his first tour of the Indo-Pacific:

When China departs from global rules and norms, when it aligns itself with aggressive countries like Russia — its standing in the world suffers. Now China will always have a choice about the direction that it wants to take.

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