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RFI Chinese: China Shocked the United States by Building A Military Port in the Persian Gulf

Radio France Internationale (RFI) Chinese Edition recently reported that, according to people familiar with the matter, U.S. officials believe China is secretly constructing military installations at a port about 50 miles north of the UAE capital, Abu Dhabi. China’s secret port project in the Persian Gulf shook the U.S. relations with the UAE. The UAE government does not seem to be aware of the military nature of Chinese activities. The UAE is the host country where the U.S. military is stationed in the region and is seeking to purchase advanced U.S. fighter jets and drones. Around one year ago, confidential satellite imagery led U.S. officials to conclude that the Chinese are building some kind of military facility in the port. At some point, the construction site was covered. The Biden administration is trying to persuade the UAE government to block the construction of the base. Beijing denied all the accusations. U.S. officials recently inspected the site and expressed the belief that the construction has stopped. A senior UAE official lamented last month that the UAE was caught in a duel between the United States and China.

Source: RFI Chinese, November 20, 2021
https://bit.ly/3nzhmWy

Briefings | | |   Geo-Strategic Trend US-China Relations

Lianhe Zaobao: Senior Chinese Public Security Official Competes for INTERPOL Executive Position

Singapore’s primary Chinese language newspaper Lianhe Zaobao recently reported that a senior official at the Ministry of Public Security of China is seeking to compete for a post in the Interpol Executive Committee. INTERPOL will hold a conference in Istanbul from November 23 to 25, and will elect the new members of the executive committee, including two executive committee members from Asia. Hu Binchen, deputy director and First-Grade Inspector of the International Cooperation Bureau of the Ministry of Public Security of China, is one of the candidates for the member from Asia. The INTERPOL Executive Committee consists of 13 members, responsible for overseeing the daily work of the Secretary-General and the General Secretariat. Meng Hongwei, former deputy minister of the Ministry of Public Security of China, was elected as the president of INTERPOL in 2016. However, in 2018, Meng disappeared after returning to China. He was later sentenced to jail for 13.5 years. In March 2019, China’s official anti-corruption agency reported that Meng had “refused to implement the decisions of the Party Central Committee.”

Source: Lianhe Zaobao, November 16, 2021
https://www.zaobao.com.sg/realtime/china/story20211116-1213956

Briefings | | |   Geo-Strategic Trend

Global Times: Russia Started Delivering S-400 Missiles to India

Global Times recently reported that, according to Russian and Indian media reports, Russia has begun to deliver the S-400 air defense missile system to India, and will complete the delivery of the first batch of S-400 missiles when Putin visits India next month. The United States wants to impose sanctions on India for this, but it also fears that, as a result, India may fall to Russia. Recently, The U.S. has been trying to engage India as an ally. Nonetheless, this Russian deal did bring serious obstacles to strengthening political and military relations between Washington and New Delhi. It is puzzling that India is buying the same system that China also bought. It thereby suffers the risk that China will have full knowledge of the system’s technical details. On the other hand, it is understandable that most of India’s current mature air defense systems are medium and short-range missiles. There are not many choices for missiles with a maximum range of 250 kilometers in the market. The S-400 makes sense when India wants to establish multi-source weapons procurement channels.

Source: Global Times, November 15, 2021
https://world.huanqiu.com/article/45aZZrm81et

Briefings | | |   Defense/Military Geo-Strategic Trend

India Says China Is its No. 1 Security Threat

On Thursday, November 11, multiple Indian media reported that  the Indian government told the country’s Supreme Court  that the Indian military needs to expand the roads along the India-China border to meet the need to transport the army’s current state-of-the-art BrahMos supersonic cruise missiles and other military equipment. Earlier India’s Chief of Defence Staff Gen Bipin Rawat told a forum that China has become India’s number one security threat.

The move came after India unveiled an INR120 million strategic project to connect four pilgrimage sites in North Akhand with a 900-kilometer highway. The government on Thursday petitioned the Supreme Court to revise the plan, as Attorney General K. K. Venugopal reportedly claimed that local terrain conditions were harsh and that the 5.5-meter-wide road was insufficient to transport the 12.8-meter-long BrahMos missile and its launcher. If the Indian military cannot transport the device and other heavy mechanical equipment to the northern border of India and China, it will be difficult for India to respond in the event of war.

The BrahMos missile is the most advanced long-range supersonic missile of the Indian military. Rawat said that the Indian military has prepared for “any misadventure.” “If a Galwan [Editor: referring to the place of a previous clash] were to happen again, it would not be in our hands; it is up to the Chinese. They can carry out a Galwan again but should they do it, they will get in the same coin they got last time.”

Source: Radio Free Asia, November 13, 2021
https://www.rfa.org/mandarin/Xinwen/7-11132021171839.html

Briefings | | |   Geo-Strategic Trend

UDN: Hong Kong Refused to Renew another Foreign Reporter’s Visa

United Daily News (UDN), one of the primary Taiwanese news groups, recently reported that, under the new Hong Kong National Security Law, the Hong Kong government refused to renew another foreign reporter’s work visa. The British magazine The Economist issued a statement on November 12, saying that  Hong Kong government refused to renew the work visa of Sue-Lin Wong, a journalist based in Hong Kong. Zanny Minton Beddoes, the editor-in-chief of the magazine, also said, “We regret the decision of the Hong Kong authorities to refuse to renew the visa, and the authorities have not given a reason.” He is proud of Wong’s reports and calls on the Hong Kong government to maintain access to foreign media, which is critical to Hong Kong’s status as an international city. Wong’s reporting focused on social and political news in China and Hong Kong. Before joining The Economist, she was a reporter for the Financial Times and Reuters. The Hong Kong Immigration Department said it does not comment on individual cases. Since the implementation of the Hong Kong National Security Law last year, the Hong Kong government has rejected the work visas of many foreign journalists, including the Irish reporter Aaron McNicholas from the English media The Hong Kong Free Press (HKFP), and Chris Buckley, a reporter from The New York Times. The government did not give the reason for the refusal.

Source: UDN, November 13, 2021
https://udn.com/news/story/7331/5888787

 

Briefings | | |   Geo-Strategic Trend Social Stability

German Technologies Used in Chinese Warships

ARD Fernsehen, a German TV station, reported that one of its investigative programs, “The Munich Report” and the German newspaper Welt am Sonntag (“World on Sunday”) discovered the role that German technology has been playing on Chinese warships.

German manufacturers have developed and even built a sizable portion of the engines that power the Chinese Navy’s warships. The MTU Friedrichshafen, a manufacturer of internal combustion engines, and MAN, the French subsidiary of Volkswagen, are involved. One can find detailed information about the German engine and turbine manufacturer’s supplies to China in the publicly accessible database of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). MTU is said to have been a regular supplier of China’s most advanced Brigadier III class destroyers until at least 2020. The supply comes through the circuitous route of licensed production in China. MAN and MTU assured the Munich Report and Welt am Sonntag that they have always complied with export control regulations. According to MTU, the business of delivering submarine components to China “completely stopped” after the Song-class submarines were equipped. The company “has never signed a contract with the Chinese Ministry of Defense or armed forces itself.” The engines installed in the Brigantine III-class destroyers, as SIPRI calls them, do not require an export license because they are so-called dual-use goods. That is, the engines can also be used for civilian purposes.

This year, the Chinese Navy is putting more of its Brigantine III-class destroyers into service. The most recent is the destroyer Kaifeng, which was unveiled in July on the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

MTU and MAN can claim that their deliveries are permitted. The EU imposed an arms embargo on China after the Tiananmen massacre in 1989, but the embargo’s binding effect is limited. Sebastian Rossner, a Cologne-based lawyer and export expert, told Germany’s ARD public broadcaster, “Because the EU arms embargo on China was not formally decided in accordance with the European treaties, certain exports of ship engines may also be permissible (if intended for the Chinese navy).” He added, “If you want to change this, the EU must either amend the Dual-Use Regulation or formally impose an arms embargo.”

Source: Radio France International, November 7, 2021
https://rfi.my/7tZR

Briefings | | |   Geo-Strategic Trend

China Times: 37 Countries Discontinued Generalized System of Preferences for China

Major Taiwanese news network China Times recently reported that, 37 different countries including Switzerland, the European Union, and Japan have stopped granting the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) to Chinese goods. After they did so, the General Administration of Customs of China issued an announcement to stop issuing GSP certificates of origin (Form A) for the export of goods to the aforementioned 37 countries. The only countries that still retain China’s GSP treatment are Norway, New Zealand and Australia. For goods exported to these three countries, companies can still apply for a GSP certificate. The Generalized System of Preferences is a universal, non-discriminatory, and non-reciprocal preferential tariff system in which developed countries (beneficial countries) grant exports from developing countries (beneficiary countries). It is based on the most-favored-nation tariffs and further provides tariff reductions, exemptions, or even full tax exemptions in order to help the economic development of developing countries.

Source: China Times, November 2, 2021
https://www.chinatimes.com/cn/newspapers/20211102000132-260203?chdtv

Briefings | | |   Geo-Strategic Trend

German Federal Minister of Education Minister Calls for Termination of Confucius Institutes

According to the German weekly news magazine Der Spiegel, Anja Karliczek, the Federal Minister of Education and Research, has called for the termination of all Confucius Institutes in Germany.

Karliczek has written a letter to the German Rectors’ Conference and to the Conference of Ministers of Education and Cultural Affairs. She advises to reassess the roles of Confucius Institutes in German higher education and to draw the right conclusions.

The Confucius Institutes at the universities of Duisburg-Essen and Hanover received wide attention last week, as a planned online lecture about a book on the head of state, Xi Jinping, was canceled because of the intervention of Chinese government representatives.

Karliczek writes that for some time she has been “very concerned” with the activities of the 19 Confucius Institutes at German universities. Their influence on the work at the universities is “unacceptable.” The minister recommends that universities “carefully analyze their cooperation with institutes” and “resolutely counter China’s influence.”

Karliczek said that, In addition, universities should maintain closer contact with the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution and the Federal Intelligence Service,.

Confucius institutes, installed at the university campuses of many Western countries as a Chinese language teaching facility, are considered a propaganda and infiltration tool of the Chinese Communist Party.

Der Spiegel commented that university policy falls into the purview of the individual federal states. It is a matter of concern when a German federal minister expresses explicit concerns and criticism over with the work of universities and their cooperation agreements.

Source: Radio France International, October 31, 2021
https://rfi.my/7sNG

Briefings | | |   Geo-Strategic Trend