More teeth for anti-espionage law

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

Top story: Xi spoke with Zelenskyy for the first time since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The Ukrainian president has long asked Beijing for the chance to speak with his Chinese counterpart, who has aligned himself more with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Unsurprisingly, Xi did not mention Russia at all during their call. Click through for the whole thing.

China’s State Council beefed up the country’s anti-espionage law by “expand[ing] the scope of targets of espionage” to include “all documents, data, materials, and articles” related to national security. The revisions come just a few days after Beijing formally arrested a former top Communist Party newspaper editor for espionage, as Chinese President Xí Jìnpíng 习近平 cracks down on anything that may pose a threat to the stability of his ruling party. The law does not define what falls under national security or interests.

The U.S. and the Philippines flexed their military might in the South China Sea, firing off high-precision rockets, artillery fire, and airstrikes to simulate sinking an enemy ship in their largest joint war drills near disputed waters off the coastal town of San Antonio. The military tests were streamed live.

The U.K. should have a “constructive but robust” relationship with China, British Foreign Secretary James Cleverly said in a keynote speech yesterday to lay out his country’s approach to Beijing. “No significant global problem…can be solved without China,” he said, while warning against isolating the Asian giant, which could result in a “tragic miscalculation” in the Pacific.

Urumqi Air will begin offering direct flights from Hong Kong to Xinjiang in a bid to bring foreign investment to the key hub near Central Asia under Beijing’s Belt and Road Initiative.

State media: Xinhua’s top English story today is a piece on Xi Jinping’s call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy titled “Xi says dialogue only viable way out for Ukraine crisis.” Chinese-language readers get a different message: The top story on Xinhua’s Chinese website and on Party newspaper the People’s Daily is about Xi meeting Vietnamese official Truong Thi Mai, a member of the Communist Party of Vietnam’s Politburo Central Committee (in abridged form in English here).

Police visited the Shanghai offices of Bain & Company, a U.S. management consultancy, and questioned several employees, two weeks after a visit when they confiscated electronic devices, according to the Financial Times. This comes on the back of similar events at the Beijing offices of U.S. due diligence firm Mintz in March, when five local staff were detained by police.

Chinese semiconductor heavyweight YMTC has expanded its local sourcing of equipment following an injection of $7 billion in funding from a consortium of investors. Meanwhile, Shanghai is enticing semiconductor projects with generous subsidies of up to $14.45 million, or 30% of the project costs.