Politics

BLOOMBERG A veteran Chinese diplomat warned that unless the US fundamentally changes its attitude towards the nation, there’s no point in talks on ways to safeguard the relationship. “China-US relations are very much strained,” said Xu Bu, head of the China Institute of International Studies, a think tank affiliated with the country’s foreign ministry. “One of the most important causes ...

BLOOMBERG Russian security services have stepped up attempts to recruit Ukrainian refugees traveling to Estonia, the Baltic nation’s counterintelligence agency said in an annual report. The EU country bordering Russia provided refugee status to 45,000 Ukrainians fleeing Russia’s invasion. It’s one of the biggest influxes seen by any country on a per-capita basis, with many of the displaced Ukrainians arriving ...

BLOOMBERG Brazil President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva arrives in China as President Xi Jinping seeks to build momentum for talks to halt fighting in Ukraine more than a year after Russia’s invasion. Lula’s trip to Shanghai and Beijing comes as Xi embarks on a round of diplomacy in the weeks after visiting Moscow, where he strengthened political ties with ...

BLOOMBERG Emmanuel Macron urged Europe to develop more strategic autonomy as a way to avoid the risk of turning the European Union (EU) countries into “vassals” in the event of a global crisis such as a US-China confrontation. “Strategic autonomy must be the battle of Europe,” the French president told the business daily Les Echos during his visit to China. ...

BLOOMBERG North Korea appears to be purposefully cutting a communication link with South Korea as it ratchets up tensions by testing new weapons and denouncing its neighbour as a “puppet traitor” for holding military drills with the US. South Korea’s Unification Ministry said that North Korea failed to respond for a fourth straight day to regularly held calls on an ...

BLOOMBERG South Korea played down any possibility of a rift with the US over a report that American intelligence agencies had eavesdropped on allies’ discussions about Ukraine, reiterating that its alliance with Washington remains strong. “We will review past precedents and cases from other countries to come up with countermeasures,” and will hold consultations with the US on the issue, ...

BLOOMBERG China held a second day of military drills around Taiwan, with multiple exercises involving aircraft and ships, after the island’s president, Tsai Ing-wen, returned from a visit to the US. Taiwan’s Defense Ministry said in a statement that it detected 58 aircraft from China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) and nine warships near Taiwan as of midday, with 31 of ...

BLOOMBERG Russia has formally charged Wall Street Journal (WSJ) correspondent Evan Gershkovich with spying, Russian state media reported, citing people familiar with the case. The reported charges by Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB), come more than a week after the US citizen was detained during a reporting trip to Ekaterinburg in Russia’s Ural Mountains region. Gershkovich has denied the changes, ...

BLOOMBERG The US is opposing efforts by some European nations to offer Ukraine a clear “road map” to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (Nato) membership at the alliance’s July summit in Lithuania, the Financial Times (FT) reported, citing four officials involved in the talks. Lines were drawn at a meeting of Nato foreign ministers in Brussels, the newspaper reported. Ukraine ...

BLOOMBERG After former US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi touched down in Taiwan last year, it took less than an hour for China to announce missile tests and military drills encircling the island. By that standard, Beijing’s initial reaction to President Tsai Ing-wen’s unprecedented meeting on US soil with House Speaker Kevin McCarthy has been muted. Although China released statements condemning ...