Editor’s note for May 25, 2023
A note for Access newsletter readers from Jeremy Goldkorn.
Dear reader:
A lot of today’s news is about the U.S.-China relationship, after a week of Chinese diplomacy that highlighted Beijing’s tight embrace of Russia and its efforts to shape China’s backyard, with visits to Beijing of the Russian Prime Minister, and the attendance of Xí Jìnpíng 习近平 at China’s Central Asian schmoozefest in Xi’an last week, and speech by video call to the Eurasian Economic Forum in Moscow today.
China’s Minister of Commerce Wáng Wéntāo 王文涛 is visiting the U.S. and will meet U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo and U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai today and tomorrow. This news comes after China’s ambassador to Washington Xiè Fēng 谢锋 arrived in the U.S. on Tuesday.
Some media reports are referring to a “thaw” in U.S.-China relations.
But yesterday there were also new allegations from Microsoft and U.S. officials that Chinese state-sponsored hackers have been targeting critical U.S. and Five Eyes infrastructure, and as you can see in our top story, U.S. states are increasingly adopting legislation that you could fairly describe as anti-China.
One sunny day does not mean winter is over.
Our Word of the Day is: unconstitutional (违宪的 wéixiàn de).
