Chinascope – Page 455

People’s University Report: Real Estate Has Sucked Chinese Families Dry

Well-known Chinese news site Sina recently reported that the high-ranking Chinese university, People’s University, just released its Report on the Chinese Macro economy for 2018 to 2019. The Report showed that Chinese consumers suffered a major increase in debt over the past year mainly due to their investments in the housing market. For the vast majority of the middle class and mid to lower class, their wealth has been locked into the real estate that they acquired and they have almost emptied their savings. This consequently triggered a significant reduction on regular consumer spending. The Report also concluded that, before the year 2015, most of the spending in the housing market was sourced from the mid-upper class. Now the primary housing buyers are in the lower income category. As of September, Chinese residents’ savings saw a year-over-year decline of 6.7 percent, and a two-year decline of 12.6 percent.

Source: Sina, November 24, 2018
https://finance.sina.com.cn/meeting/2018-11-24/doc-ihpevhck4429400.shtml

Briefings | | November 27, 2018 | Economy/Resources

Beijing News: Chinese Government Is Now the Biggest Owner of Apple iCloud in China

Beijing News recently reported that the Chinese cloud technology company Guizhou Cloud has completed a series of mergers and become Guizhou Cloud Big Data. In February, Apple officially handed its iCloud services to Guizhou Cloud and Guizhou Cloud is now fully serving all Chinese region Apple iCloud customers. This arrangement was to comply with Chinese data location laws and allowed Guizhou Cloud to have the master encryption key to decrypt all Chinese region traffic and data. The recent ownership changes made China’s Guizhou Province government the biggest stockholder (around 38.24 percent) of the newly formed company Guizhou Cloud Big Data. This is a “strategic move” of the Guizhou government’s big data industrial development plan. The Guizhou Communist Party appointed Kang Keyan as the Party Secretory of the Guizhou Cloud Big Data Group and, at the same time, nominated him as the chairman of the board of the Group. Kang is the former Deputy Director of the Guizhou Big Data Development Authority.

Source: Beijing News, November 16, 2018
http://www.bjnews.com.cn/finance/2018/11/16/522023.html

Briefings | | November 27, 2018 | Information/Technology

The U.S. Launches Encirclement Campaign against Huawei

Well-known Chinese news site Sohu recently reported that the U.S government is undertaking an unusual “encirclement campaign” to work with its allied countries to cut off Huawei’s breathing room internationally. These governments include Germany, Italy, and Japan. The U.S. excuse for the campaign is national security and these countries all have U.S. military bases. The U.S. argued that the military operations have partial but significant communications dependency on the local communications infrastructure, and Huawei’s equipment introduces uncertainty and security concerns into that infrastructure. However, Huawei is now the world’s largest communications equipment provider (around 22 percent of the global market) and has a competitive pricing advantage. Realizing Huawei’s pricing power, the U.S. government has been offering subsidies to the allies who obtain communications equipment from any non-Huawei suppliers. For years, the U.S. government has also been mounting pressure on domestic Huawei buyers such as Best Buy. The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs said it had no detailed knowledge and was unclear about the situation, but that China always asks its companies to obey domestic laws in foreign countries.

Source: Sohu, November 24, 2018
http://www.sohu.com/a/277504780_610300

Briefings | | November 26, 2018 | Defense/Military Geo-Strategic Trend Information/Technology

RFA: Mainland Sets Up First Provincial Level Media in Hong Kong

Almost all of the major official media from the mainland have set up branch offices in Hong Kong. However it is unprecedented for a provincial level media from the mainland to set up a branch office in Hong Kong.

Radio Free Asia reported that www.fjsen.com, which the Publicity Department of the Fujian Provincial Party Committee manages, recently set up a branch in Hong Kong and is openly recruiting staff. Back in May of this year, the Fujian Media Centre placed a job posting in Hong Kong to fill 20 new positions for a media group. They included reporters, columnists, and program hosts. The new hires will be responsible for the release of official news information and for building a platform for exchanges between Fujian, Hong Kong, and Macao. RFA found out that the media group that is actually hiring is fjsen.com. According to RFA, on its Hong Kong page, hk.fjsen.com, most of the news sources are from pro-Beijing media and all of its special reports carry contents that exhibit party patriotism. A number of items of news coverage are about leaders of the Fujian Provincial Committee who came to Hong Kong to attend the “United Front” activities that the Hong Kong Fujian Association organized. The fjsen.com Hong Kong page claims that they are the only authorized media that the provincial government of Fujian has organized and that it is also the first provincial level media in Hong Kong.

According to fjsen.com, the website fjsen.com is part of Fujian Daily, an official media of the party in Fujian Province. It was registered in Hong Kong in April of this year under the name “Fujian Media Centre.” It has recently changed its name to “Southeast Media.” In October of this year, an official opening ceremony for Southeast Media was held at the Wan Chai Convention and Exhibition Centre.

Source: Radio Free Asia, November 21, 2018
https://www.rfa.org/cantonese/features/hottopic/propaganda-11212018064250.html

Briefings | | November 26, 2018 | Geo-Strategic Trend

RFA: Lingnan University Graduates Protest during Commencement Ceremony

Radio Free Asia reported that, on November 22, Carrie Lam, the Chief Executive of Hong Kong, participated in the commencement ceremony that Lingnan University held. During the ceremony, a dozen students who were graduating with master’s degrees held up a banner and shouted several slogans. They said that the university should abandon its policy of automatically appointing the Chief Executive as the supervisor of the university. The Hong Kong government should drop the charges against the participants of the Occupy Central Movement. They also oppose the East Lantau Metropolis project which plans to build artificial islands in the waters between East Lantau Island and South Hong Kong Island. One protester told RFA that they chose to protest because they are Hong Kong residents; they care about Hong Kong’s development; and they hope to have a dialog with Carrie Lam. Another protester told RFA that they felt that, at Lingnan University, they are losing their freedom of speech.

In the speech that the President of Lingnan University gave, he said that some people challenge the political order of Hong Kong in the name of freedom of speech.

Source: Radio Free Asia, November 22, 2018
https://www.rfa.org/cantonese/news/htm/hk-student-11222018081312.html

Briefings | | November 26, 2018 | Government/Politics

Duowei News Commentary: Democratic Progressive Party, What Else Can You Do but Give up Taiwan Independence?

Duowei News, a pro-Beijing news media, published a commentary titled, “Democratic Progressive Party, What Else Can You Do but Give up Taiwan Independence?” It stated that the major defeat that the Democratic Progressive Party suffered suggests that it must make a change to its Taiwan Independence Policy or it will face an unprecedented crisis. Below is a summary of the commentary.

The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) suffered a major defeat in the recent Taiwanese Local Elections. In addition to the big loss in the non-traditional DPP regions, it is no longer holding the lead in the traditional DPP regions, including Kaohsiung, where the DPP has held the lead for the last 20 years.

Unlike the loss the DPP encountered in 2008 when Chen Shui-bian was removed from his post due to corruption, the DPP’s loss this time fully reflects the dissatisfaction of the Taiwanese people with the DPP. The DPP’s pursuit of Taiwan Independence has resulted in an unprecedented crisis in Taiwan’s economic development. The decline of Taiwan’s society has led the DPP to fall, eventually, into an unprecedented crisis.

The unprecedented defeat of the DPP has highlighted the deepening of the mistrust of Taiwanese society towards the regime that is for Taiwan Independence. It has resulted in Taiwan missing the development opportunities of the past 20 years, which was the golden period when the mainland was growing. It has lost the huge market in the mainland which would have belonged to Taiwan.

The development dividends that Taiwan created on the basis of Ten Major Construction Projects are being depleted rapidly. The self-derogation within Taiwan is getting more and more serious. The turbulence that the political chaos caused and the diminishing of the people’s income have finally turned the public from support to opposition. All of this became completely clear during the elections.

The facts show that the DPP’s Taiwan independence policy is totally unsuitable for Taiwan’s social development as well as for meeting the actual needs of the Taiwanese people. The DPP must change and it has to change.

Tsai Ing-wen’s government has two more years to go. Although it is losing its balance, it still has the real power. There are still many things to do.

If the DPP adjusts its Taiwan independence policy, it will be a wise move. On the one hand, it can establish a more moderate relationship with the mainland and at the same time it will let Taiwan voters who are increasingly disappointed see the possibility of re-acceptance.

Of course, the DPP can also choose to continue its strong confrontation with the mainland and become a pawn of the U.S., but it has to understand the consequences that will result from more and more radicalization of its Taiwan independence policy.

Whether the DPP can thoroughly reflect on the Taiwan independence policy is worthy of attention. However, among all the issues, the survival of the DPP is the first. It may have to make changes in the Taiwan independence policy. Otherwise, the DPP will only face a crueler living environment in Taiwan until Taiwanese society completely abandons it.

Source: Duowei News, November 25, 2018
http://blog.dwnews.com/post-1072139.html

Briefings | | November 26, 2018 | Geo-Strategic Trend

Oxford-Suzhou Centre for Advanced Research Opened in Suzhou City

On November 22, 2018, the Oxford-Suzhou Centre for Advanced Research (OSCAR) celebrated its grand opening at the Suzhou Industrial Park in Suzhou City of Jiangsu Province.

Oxford University President Louise Richardson and Jiangsu Provincial Chinese Communist Party Committee Standing Committee member and the Suzhou Municipal Party Committee head, Zhou Naixiang, jointly unveiled OSCAR.

According to OSCAR’s website, “The Oxford-Suzhou Center for Advanced Research (OSCAR) will be the University of Oxford’s first overseas centre for physical science and engineering research, primarily expanding on activities from across the University’s Mathematical, Physical, and Life Sciences Divisions.”

Oxford scholars in the fields of engineering, physics, chemistry, and material science will lead the initial research programs. The applications will cover the research range from health information, tissue engineering, biomedical imaging, and environmental remediation, to advanced materials and electronic devices.

So far twelve Oxford scholars will be the lead principal investigators (PIs) and establish research projects. PIs will each spend two months every year at OSCAR to supervise the research.

The initial contact between Suzhou and Oxford University started in 2012. Cui Zhanfeng, the first Chinese tenured professor in the history of Oxford University, also the first dean of OSCAR, originally proposed the cooperation. The two parties signed a collaboration agreement in December 2016.

Source: The Paper, November 23, 2018
https://www.thepaper.cn/newsDetail_forward_2663211

Briefings | | November 25, 2018 | Geo-Strategic Trend

Radio Free Asia: Beijing’s Internal Documents Ask: “Tighten Your Belts”

Radio Free Asia reported on November 22, citing its own sources, that the Chinese Communist Party recently distributed an internal document to mid-level and above government agencies, asking them to prepare for the worst situations due to the ongoing trade war. The document told Chinese officials to follow the leadership of the CCP and rely on China’s own efforts in order to overcome the difficulties.

Different sources also pointed to the increased social panic due to the deterioration of the economic situation. The document also predicted that some Chinese companies will close down, that the stock market and the property market will fluctuate, and that social conflicts will arise.

“A number of observers pointed out that the domestic economy has continued to deteriorate while pressure from home and abroad has increased. Despite personally leading the team, Xi Jinping failed to achieve anything at the recently concluded APEC summit. The government is feeling the pressure. At the same time, it also shows that Chinese officials are pessimistic about the upcoming China-US summit.”

Source: Radio Free Asia, November 22, 2018
https://www.rfa.org/cantonese/news/trade-11222018063712.html

Briefings | | November 25, 2018 | Government/Politics

Wu Guoguang: Xi Jinping’s Reversal of the Course, Will China’s Transition be Peaceful or Marked with Bloodshed?

Cheng Xiaonong: U.S.-China Strategic Relations Have Crystallized

Xinhua Commentaries: “Exposing the Three Major Political Deficits of the U.S.”

The CCP’s Performing Arts Troupes in the U.S.