Politics

Bloomberg China has profoundly changed how it deals with the outside world under President Xi Jinping, a top Australian diplomat says, describing the Asian nation as “dogged by insecurity.” “The clock has been wound back in terms of the priority accorded to ideology, quashing voices of civil society, and erecting new barriers to external connections and the free flow of ...

Bloomberg Justin Trudeau had harsh words for China after Beijing called for a United Nations probe into crimes against Indigenous children in Canada. The prime minister slammed the “systemic abuse and human rights violations” against Uyghur Muslims, as well as the situations in Hong Kong and Tibet. Chinese diplomats raised Canada’s treatment of its First Nations in an apparent response ...

Bloomberg During one of Angela Merkel’s final appearances in German parliament on Wednesday, an opposition lawmaker tried to lure the chancellor into a trap. But as happened so often during her 16-year reign, she managed to sidestep it. “Ever since you became chancellor, young girls can imagine themselves as chancellor one day,” Ulle Schauws, of the Green party, told Merkel ...

Bloomberg Swedish PM Stefan Lofven moved closer to resolving a political crisis that threatened to bring down his fragile ruling coalition in the biggest Nordic economy. After losing a confidence vote in parliament this week over easing rent controls, the 63-year-old Social Democrat leader has until midnight on Monday to forge a new deal that can save his government, or ...

Bloomberg Civilians in Afghanistan have taken up arms to push back against the Taliban as the militants fight for control of a crucial northern city and make deeper territorial inroads with the US set to withdraw all troops by September. The insurgents are battling to take control of strategic cities in the country’s north, including its regional hub Mazar-e-Sharif, after ...

Bloomberg Kim Jong Un’s sister said the US has “wrong” views in thinking North Korea might be offering an opening to return to talks, in comments coming shortly after an envoy for President Joe Biden said the US was ready for dialogue “anywhere, anytime” with Pyongyang. The official Korean Central News Agency released a statement from Kim Yo Jong on ...

Bloomberg Thailand’s parliament has unlocked a process for an overhaul of the constitution, one of the key of demands by a youth-led protest movement that has swept the nation in the past year. Lawmakers in the Senate and the Lower House voted to endorse a bill that would pave the way for a public poll on rewriting the charter. The ...

Bloomberg Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte threatened to jail those who refuse Covid-19 vaccines as the nation ramps up inoculations to prevent the spread of the highly contagious delta variant. “If you’re a person who’s not vaccinated and a potential carrier, to protect the people, I have to sequester you in jail,” Duterte said. Village leaders should keep a list of ...

Bloomberg President Joe Biden’s point man for North Korea said the US was ready for talks “anywhere, anytime” with Pyongyang, providing a strong signal Washington is prepared to revive a stagnant disarmament dialogue. Sung Kim, the US special representative for North Korea, said after discussions on Monday in Seoul with South Korean counterpart Noh Kyu-duk and Japan’s Takehiro Funakoshi that ...

Bloomberg China will risk international isolation if it fails to allow a “real” investigation on its territory into the origins of the virus that caused the Covid-19 pandemic, US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said. Sullivan’s comments follow last week’s call by Group of Seven leaders including US President Joe Biden for another probe into how the virus originated. Biden ...