Even by today’s standards of rapid geopolitical change it has been a fast moving few weeks. On March 7, China’s new foreign minister, Qin Gang, warned that ‘confrontation and conflict’ are inevitable unless the US stopped trying to ‘contain’ and ‘suppress’ his country. This threat was followed by President Xi flying to Moscow, where he […]
Earlier this week Rishi Sunak set out a new vision of Britain’s relationship with China. The headlines were clear enough: David Cameron and George Osborne’s ‘golden era’ is now over, and the relationship between the two countries must ‘evolve’. The People’s Republic represents ‘a systemic challenge to our values and interests’, and wishful thinking will […]
For those who have been tracking the global growth of China’s digital reach, the message from the head of GCHQ this week was a very welcome development. In an unprecedented speech, Sir Jeremy Fleming warned that Beijing was looking to export its technology around the world to create ‘client economies and governments’ beholden to China for […]
For all the economic damage caused by the invasion of Ukraine – huge increases in commodity prices, soaring inflation, the biggest fall of living standards since the 1950s – it could have been worse. It could have been China, not Russia on the other side of the sanctions. Russia’s economy is relatively small – a little […]
Looking back, it is hard to believe that the invasion of Ukraine came as such a shock to the West. Not only were nearly two hundred thousand troops amassed on the border, but President Putin set the scene by dismissing his neighbour’s lack of a right to exist in the first place. ‘Ukraine has never […]
Last week China, the world’s largest carbon emitter, published its long-awaited national plan on greenhouse emissions. Produced as part of the country’s programme around the COP26 talks in Glasgow, there was disappointment that Beijing was only looking at 2060 to achieve net zero, a full decade later the America’s declared goal. While net zero is […]
The UK has made it clear that it views South East Asia as a key strategic priority. “Any nation with global interests needs to be present and engaged in this region,” said a former British High Commissioner to Singapore, in a speech in 2018. To underline Britain’s focus, in June this year the Foreign Secretary, […]
China takes the study of history very seriously. For years its civil servants have been scrutinising the West, trying to learn the secrets behind its hundreds of years of world domination. One of the areas it has paid special attention to is the link between the civilian and the military when it comes to technological […]
The decision to reduce the UK’s spending on foreign has caused an angry response from those who believe that Britain is abandoning the poorest in the world. The good news is that just this week there is a new tool in Britain’s overseas aid armoury that promises to make a startling impact on the world […]
When David Cameron and President Xi Jinping enjoyed a pint at the pub in 2015 it was hailed as the sign of a new, golden age of Sino-British relations. Just five years later a very different relationship between the two countries is emerging. It’s not just the UK’s hard-hitting pronouncements on Hong Kong, but a […]
