Following the launch of the “Sustainable Social Value Innovation” strategy with an investment of 50 billion yuan (US$7.5 billion) (in April), Chinese tech giant Tencent announced on August 18 that it would increase its capital by another 50 billion yuan to launch the “Common Prosperity Special Plan” (or “Get-Rich-Together Plan”). The funds will be used to provide continuous assistance in areas such as rural revitalization, increases in income for low-income groups, improvements in the primary health care system, and balanced development of education.
The 10th Conference of the Central Finance Committee, held on August 17, made it clear that common prosperity should be promoted in stages, allowing some people to get rich first. Then the riches should help the poor to get rich.
Source: Techweb, August 19, 2021
http://www.techweb.com.cn/finance/2021-08-19/2854250.shtml
Global Times Editorial: Lessons the Taiwan Authorities Need to Learn from Afghanistan
China’s state-run media, Global Times, published an editorial warning Taiwan that today’s Afghanistan may be tomorrow’s Taiwan. The article stated that, “The U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan led to the rapid collapse of the Kabul regime. The U.S. used helicopters to transport diplomats to the airport to flee Kabul while Taliban soldiers poured into the presidential palace. This scene left a deep impression on the world and gave a critical hit to the credibility and reliability of the United States.”
The article said, “Some parts of Asia have felt the hit of the U.S. abandoning the Kabul regime particularly hard, with Taiwan being the first to bear the brunt. Taiwan is undoubtedly the region in Asia that is most heavily dependent on the United States for protection. The DPP authorities have exacerbated this aberrant line of dependence. After the United States abandoned Afghanistan, the situation suddenly turned upside down. The United States left the country alone and only cared about its own withdrawal. Is this some kind of harbinger of Taiwan’s future destiny?”
The article warned: “Once a war breaks out across the strait and the mainland forcefully seizes the island of Taiwan, the United States will have to have much more determination to implement military intervention in Taiwan than it did to to persist in Afghanistan and northern Syria, and not to abandon South Vietnam in 1975.”
“The DPP authorities need to stay awake with their last bit of brain power, and all kinds of the “Taiwan independence” forces that are still dreaming need to be able to wake up. They should understand from the Afghan incident that once a full-scale war breaks out in the Taiwan Strait, the resistance of the Taiwan military will collapse in the span of hours. The aid of the U.S. military will not come. The DPP authorities will soon surrender, and some high-ranking officials may escape by plane. Such a situation will be a sure thing.”
Source: Global Times, August 16, 2021
https://opinion.huanqiu.com/article/44NXKQHceOw
Xi Jinping Calls for Wealth Redistribution and Common Prosperity
On August 17, Xi Jinping, in his keynote speech at the tenth meeting of the Central Finance and Economics Committee, highlighted the need to redistribute wealth and strengthen the “regulation and management” of high-income earners.
After cracking down on Chinese technology giants, financial companies, and the after-school training industry, the CCP is now targeting “high-income earners.”
According to the People’s Daily, Xi told the CCP leadership that there must be a mechanism to redistribute wealth, to promote “social equality,” to establish basic system arrangements for the coordination of primary distribution, redistribution, and third-time distribution; to intensify efforts and to improve the accuracy in taxation, social security, transfer payments, and related areas.; … to rationally regulate high income; ban illegal income; … and to promote social equality.”
It is necessary to “strengthen the regulation and adjustment of high incomes, …, rationally regulate excessively high incomes, and encourage high-income groups and enterprises to return more to the society. We must clean up and standardize unreasonable income, rectify the order of income distribution, and resolutely ban illegal income.”
Xi Jinping’s “common prosperity” is regarded as the key for the CCP to maintain its power. “The meeting emphasized that common prosperity is the prosperity of all people, ‘not the prosperity of a few people.’ We must take the promotion of common prosperity for all the people as the focal point for seeking happiness for the people, and constantly consolidate the foundation of the Party’s long-term governance.”
At this meeting, the CCP did not provide specifics on the criteria for “high-income earners.” Xi Jinping’s focus on wealth redistribution is closely related to the broader economic goals of the CCP. In recent months, in the name of curbing financial risks, protecting the economy, and fighting corruption, the CCP has issued a number of regulations and directives against industries such as technology, finance, and education. Xi Jinping’s redistributing wealth and realizing “common prosperity” is believed to be behind the CCP’s latest regulatory crackdown on these industries.
Source: People’s Daily, August 18, 2021.
http://jhsjk.people.cn/article/32197470?isindex=1
China Built Zambia’s Largest Hydropower Plant
The first generator for the Kafue Gorge Lower Hydropower Station, an infrastructure project in Zambia, which Chinese companies built, was recently put into operation. The power plant is the largest single infrastructure project in Zambia. It is also the largest hydropower plant in the country.
Zambia has been tackling power shortages for a long time. Only about 25 percent of the urban population and 3 percent of the rural population have a stable electricity supply. According to China’s state media, People’s Daily, the Kafue Gorge Lower Hydropower Station, Power Construction Corp of China, or Power China, plans to install five turbine power generating units, with a total installed capacity of 750 megawatts. Once the five generating units go into full operation, the country’s power supply will see an increase of 38 percent.
Source: People’s Daily, August 12, 2021
http://paper.people.com.cn/rmrb/html/2021-08/12/nw.D110000renmrb_20210812_3-17.htm
A Bill to Create a China and Russian Translation and Analysis Center
In July, a group of Republican and Democratic congressmen introduced the Open Translation and Analysis Center Authorization Act. This legislation establishes a new Federally Funded Research and Development Center called the Open Translation and Analysis Center (OTAC).
OTAC would be charged with translating important open source foreign-language material from the People’s Republic of China, Russia, and other countries of strategic interest into English. The translated material would be available on a public website, serving as a key resource for the U.S. and allied governments, media outlets, and academicians and analysts around the world.
The bill was introduced by Democratic congressmen Joaquin Castro and Bill Keating, and Republican congressmen Mike Gallagher and Brian Fitzpatrick. “By translating foreign-language materials into English and making them publicly available, the Open Translation and Analysis Center will enhance America and its allies’ ability to compete on the world stage, while also serving as a tremendous resource for academicians, journalists, and other members of civil society,” said Rep. Castro.
OTAC got its idea from the Foreign Broadcast Information Service (FBIS), which was created during World War II to intercept, translate, and publish broadcasts from the axis powers. The documents were regularly distributed to war agencies.
Ryan Fedasiuk, an analyst from Georgetown’s Center for Security and Emerging Technology (CSET), told Radio Free Asia, “Many Chinese companies, non-profit organizations and government agencies deliberately hide information, assuming that foreigners do not know Chinese.”
In May Fedasiuk co-authored a report titled “China’s Foreign Technology Wish List,” which analyzed the 642 reports filed by the S&T directorates of Chinese embassies and consulates from 2015 to 2020. He noted, “These are Chinese language materials. The Chinese government or some agencies can talk openly and freely in Chinese about topics that they would never dare to discuss in English.”
Source: Radio Free Asia, August 16, 2021
https://www.rfa.org/mandarin/yataibaodao/junshiwaijiao/xx-08162021102203.html
China Closes China-Foreign Education Institutions and Programs
On August 14, China’s Ministry of Education approved the termination of 286 China-foreign cooperative education institutions and programs at the undergraduate level and above.
The list includes the London Metropolitan University, New York University, and other well-known universities that have been cooperating with China in running schools. The majority of the closed projects involve disciplines of engineering, economics, language, art, and the social sciences. These include undergraduate education programs in information engineering, automation, and other areas that were jointly organized by the Harbin University of Science and Technology; the London Metropolitan University; and master’s degree programs in China Social Service Management jointly organized by the East China University of Science and Technology, the Hong Kong Polytechnic University, and others.
Late last month, China published a plethora of regulations in a sweeping overhaul that bans companies that teach the school curriculum from making a profit, raising capital, or going public.
Companies that teach school subjects can no longer accept foreign investments. In addition, publicly listed firms will no longer be allowed to raise capital in any stock markets to invest in businesses that teach classroom subjects. Outright acquisitions are now off-limits. Vacation and weekend tutoring related to the school syllabus are also forbidden.
Sources:
Sina.com, August 11, 2021
https://news.sina.com.cn/o/2021-08-11/doc-ikqcfncc2289112.shtml
Sina.com, July 25, 2021
https://finance.sina.com.cn/china/2021-07-25/doc-ikqciyzk7469579.shtml
Taiwan’s Language Learning Centers to Land in the U.S.
Many countries around the world have expressed concern about China’s growing influence on international academic campuses. Beijing’s Confucius Institutes, by investing heavily overseas to promote the study of the Chinese language and culture, are viewed as China’s move to increase its soft power.” According to the National Association of Scholars (NAS), there were 103 Confucius Institutes in the U.S. in 2017. As of July 9, the number had dropped to 41, with several schools set to close later this year or next.
This year, Taiwan started to explore the international Chinese language teaching market more actively. The Overseas Community Affairs Council under the Executive Yuan of Taiwan announced in June that it would set up 20 “Taiwan Chinese Language Learning Centers” in the U.S., U.K., Germany, France and other countries in the hope of promoting the Chinese language. Seventeen of these will be in the U.S.
Since last year. the U.S. has been seeking to expand the platform for learning Chinese. Last December, the U.S. and Taiwan signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) on international education cooperation and launched the “U.S.-Taiwan Education Initiative.”
In March of this year, twenty-one Republican members of the U.S. Congress wrote a letter to the U.S. Secretary of Education to consider using a program with Taiwan to offer “censorship-free alternatives” to the China-backed Confucius Institutes on many U.S. college campuses.
Taiwan’s representative in the U.S., Hsiao Bi-khim, said in an interview, “The learning environment in Taiwan (Centers) is different from that in the Confucius Institutes. The biggest difference is that we are in a free space. There will be no government to influence or challenge personal freedom in this regard due to the issue of speech.”
Source: BBC Chinese, August 13, 2021
https://www.bbc.com/zhongwen/simp/world-58170293
Lithuanian Ambassador to China: I Just Arrived; Now They Asked Me to Leave
Well-known Chinese news site Sina (NASDAQ: SINA) recently reported that Lithuanian ambassador to China Diana (Diana Mickeviciene) had just arrived in Beijing and completed the mandatory quarantine. Then they immediately told her to “go back home.” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying commented on the matter and emphasized that the meaning of the one-China principle cannot be distorted. Hua said that Lithuania allowed Taiwan to set up a “representative office” under the name of “Taiwan,” which seriously damaged China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity. China has the right and should make a legitimate and reasonable response. China will never agree to the act of adhering to the one-China principle, while in fact openly engaging in official contacts with the Taiwan authorities, or even standing for the “Taiwan independence” forces. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Lithuania said that it “regrets” China’s decision. According to French media, Mickeviciene had just arrived in Beijing when she was told that she must return to Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania, as soon as possible.
Source: Sina, August 12, 2021
https://news.sina.com.cn/c/2021-08-12/doc-ikqcfncc2497414.shtml