If US troops were deployed on Taiwan, China’s government-run Global Times warned in August, Beijing would “destroy and expel” them and “realise reunification by force.” Two months later, media reports confirmed that the Pentagon had indeed placed small numbers of US forces on Taiwan. The People’s Liberation Army didn’t strike. But the episode was enough to make one wonder whether ...

US manufacturers hired 60,000 people in October, double economists’ estimates and the most since June of last year. It was a robust showing, led by automakers. But payrolls in the sector are still down by almost 300,000 since the end of 2019, even as many large industrial companies are reporting sales above pre-pandemic levels. Last month’s recruitment success will only ...

Arrangements for Hong Kong’s first legislative election under a revamped system are leaving little to chance. There must be competition — but not too much, and of the right kind. Meanwhile, the anti-corruption agency has warned against calls to cast blank ballots or abstain from voting — two of the few ways left for people to register disapproval of a ...

Did India’s political leaders learn anything from the deadly second wave of Covid-19? Hospitals in the capital, New Delhi, are once again overwhelmed with patients and the health authorities don’t have beds for them. The disease has changed — dengue, not coronavirus — but the dysfunction remains the same. For the country that wants to be the pharmacy to the ...

Bloomberg UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson is battling a mounting backlash over his attempt to protect a Conservative lawmaker found to have broken lobbying rules, with Parliament set to hold an emergency debate. Johnson was forced to perform a U-turn following widespread condemnation — including from fellow Tories — of his decision to try to tear up Parliament rules rather ...

Bloomberg The African Union’s special envoy held talks with a top Tigray official on the civil war engulfing Ethiopia. The discussions, which took place at an undisclosed location, were “fruitful,” Tigray People’s Liberation Front official Getachew Reda said on Twitter. African Union Special Envoy Olusegun Obasanjo, a former Nigerian president, travelled to Ethiopia last week to help mediate an end ...

Bloomberg Nicaraguan leader Daniel Ortega is on course for a landslide in Sunday’s presidential election after he jailed his main opponents. With nearly half of ballots tallied, the 75-year-old former guerrilla had 75% of the votes, according to a partial count by the electoral authority published in state-run-newspaper El 19. The US, the European Parliament and Human Rights Watch have ...

Bloomberg Polish officials warned of intensified tensions at its eastern border as hundreds of migrants gathering at the Belarusian side are expected to try to enter European Union country in one group. “We’re now seeing the largest attempt of mass forced entry into Poland,” Stanislaw Zaryn, the spokesman for the country’s secret services chief, said on Twitter on Monday. He ...

Bloomberg Germany’s Social Democrats (SPD) nominated one of the main architects of their victory in September’s election to take over as party co-leader, and played down suggestions that their goal of forming a new government by early December is at risk. Top SPD officials meeting in Berlin on Monday proposed Lars Klingbeil, general secretary since 2017 and a close ally of ...

Bloomberg A rift is opening at the European Central Bank (ECB) over how rapidly monetary policy should respond to stubbornly high inflation. A key meeting to determine the fate of post-pandemic stimulus is just six weeks away, and opinions are diverging on whether price pressures will mostly fade or endure. The debate is unfolding as global policy makers try to ...