New judiciary guidelines in China specify that crimes of secession by Taiwanese “separatists” are punishable under Chinese law. The guidelines authorize the use of trials in absentia and even the death penalty for anyone asserting Taiwan’s independence.

Archived version: https://archive.ph/DzpzK

Peace Now says approval of more than 12 sq km is biggest since peace process began in 1993

Report: https://peacenow.org.il/en/state-land-declaration-12000-dunams

Archived version: https://archive.ph/4HYjn

In his five-page statement, Commissioner Edward Caban identified no inaccuracies in ProPublica's investigation but instead argued the story was unfair and that he’s “in compliance” with the guidelines. Our reporting shows otherwise.

Archived version: https://archive.ph/2RCvz

‘Severe’ and ‘potentially record-breaking’ heatwave sends temperatures soaring across US

Archived version: https://archive.ph/gEdL5

The public broadcaster's management said in its defence that RAI bought the show from an external partner and pledged to clarify the incident.

Archived version: https://archive.ph/SdND9

• Indonesia is preparing to impose tariffs and use other means to protect its textile industry from imports from China, the latest in a series of countries and blocs such as the US and the European Union, which are responding to the flood of goods out of the world’s largest manufacturing nation.

• After the government in Jakarta rolled back some import restrictions earlier this year, protests from thousands of textile workers are pushing the government to introduce new curbs. Indonesia imported almost 29,000 tons of imports of woven fabrics made from artificial filament yarn last year. Goods from China accounted for most of that.

• It’s unclear whether the government is considering imposing only safeguard duties or also other tariffs. "We have actually provided many fiscal instruments to protect the textile industry, including safeguard duties and anti-dumping duties, which are usually related to unfair trade that harm the domestic industry,” said Febrio Kacaribu, head of fiscal policy agency at the finance ministry.

• Indonesia has maintained an overall trade surplus for the last four years. However, the surplus with China flipped to a deficit in May, driven by imports of machinery and plastic goods.

Archived version

• Nepal has shied away from signing a plan to implement China’s ambitious Belt & Road Initiative (BRI) in the Himalayan nation. Resisting immense pressure from Beijing, Nepal’s Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal refused to greenlight the signing that would have paved the way for the implementation of nine mega and more than a dozen major BRI projects in Nepal.

• That’s because soon after Nepal signed the BRI framework agreement in May 2017, India launched a massive but silent campaign to educate and explain Nepal’s political leadership, economists, bureaucrats, diplomats, academia, media and civil society leaders the pitfalls of China’s BRI to them, making Nepal’s top politicians and others fully aware of China’s sinister plan to ensnare nations into a debt trap through the BRI.

• PM Deuba eventualky told China that Nepal would only agree to a small component of the cost of BRI projects in the form of loans. However, the interest on such loans should not be more than what multilateral lending agencies like the World Bank and Asian Development Bank (ADB) charge for their loans (one per cent per annum).

• This was not acceptable to China which charges more than two per cent on the loans it gives to other countries to finance BRI projects. Also, China insists on the contracts for these projects being awarded only to Chinese companies and refuses to do away with or water down penalty clauses (in case of failure to repay the loans on time).

What also worked against China was Nepal’s experience with the Pokhara International Airport which cost US $ 305 million. China’s Exim Bank provided a loan of about US $ 215 million at 2 per cent interest. Chinese firms were awarded contracts for construction and technical works.

Allegations of shoddy construction, inflated costs and mismanagement by the Chinese have fuelled public anger against China in Nepal. The airport has turned into a huge liability (read this) since no commercial and scheduled flights are operating from there.

Buddhist monks in the Cambodian capital Phnom Penh chanted blessings and threw flowers on Thursday to welcome 14 trafficked artifacts repatriated from the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.

Archived version: https://archive.ph/EI4Zb

Three planes, 270 tons of equipment, 800 square meters of stage: the figures from Madonna's massive free concert in Rio in May sounded like they came from another age.

Archived version: https://archive.ph/mhFj9

cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/461080

Germany's economy ministry will look "very closely" into a deal to supply Chinese-made wind turbines for an offshore project in Germany's North Sea, saying on Wednesday questions of critical infrastructure and competition must be addressed.

Under the deal between German asset manager Luxcara and Ming Yang, the Chinese group would supply 16 turbines, each with a capacity of up to 18.5 MW, set for installation in 2028.

The ministry comments come amid broader trade tensions between Europe and China, recently focused on electric cars where the EU has proposed tariffs on Chinese imports.

Earlier on Wednesday, Europe's wind industry lobby criticized the deal, saying it gave China access to critical infrastructure in Germany and that Europe's supply chain had been ready to deliver turbines for this project.

[Edit for introducing the link.]

cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/459808

Archived link

“What [authoritarian] regimes have in common is their fear of a well-informed public,” Christoph Jumpelt, the head of the international relations unit at Germany’s public broadcaster, Deutsche Welle, said this week in Taiwan.

International media groups like AP, Reuters and PA Media Group cooperate with China's state-controlled agency Xinhua for being able to operate within the country. It should be obvious that such a conditionality has no place in what they say is a “purely commercial” arrangement, not in the least as this does a huge injustice to the thousands of journalists who struggle each day to report the facts.

• Last month Fu Hua, President of China’s official Xinhua News Agency, which sits directly under the country’s State Council, made a whirlwind tour from New York to London, meeting with top executives from AP, Reuters, and PA Media Group, to foster long-standing business relationships.

• Such deals with Xinhua should invite tougher questions about how international media companies with a stated commitment to professional standards should deal with Chinese media giants whose sole commitment — crystal clear in the country’s domestic political discourse— is to strengthen the global impact of Party-state propaganda.

• Xinhua's Fu is not a champion of independent media values, or a partner in tackling the information challenges of the future. Prior to his role at Xinhua, Fu served as a deputy minister of the Chinese Communist Party’s Central Propaganda Department. His agenda is that of China’s ruling Chinese Communist Party, the CCP. Plain and simple.

• The partnerships with Western media are part of a broader effort by Xinhua to deepen its global media influence, curtailing criticism of the Chinese government and shaping international discourse that portrays the CCP in a positive light. And yet, year in and year out, Western media executives insist, even against the substance of their own statements, that this type of cooperation is just normal business.

• If it is true, for example, that AP “publishes none of the stories" by Xinhua as it claims, what then is the point of such empty formalities? “Like most major news agencies,” said a former agency head, “AP has an agreement with state-run media in China that allows AP to operate inside the country.”

• And there we have the crux. AP’s relationship with Xinhua, in place since 1972, forms the political foundation on which AP and other major news agencies, including Reuters, are able to operate in China.

• It should be obvious such conditionality has no place in any “purely commercial” arrangement. And as they obscure the true nature of the arrangement, news outlets do a huge injustice to the thousands of journalists who struggle each day to report the facts.

• Western outlets that claim to uphold professional values need to decide where they stand while insisting on the charade of standing with Xinhua, shaking hands and signing on the dotted line.

cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/445597

A ban on politicians lying will be brought in before the 2026 Senedd [the Welsh parliament] elections, the Welsh government has promised.

Counsel General Mick Antoniw [...] promised that the law would disqualify Senedd politicians and candidates found guilty of deliberate deception from being a Member of the Senedd (MS). [...] It is not yet clear whether the proposed law would make lying a criminal offence or a civil sanction. [...] Mr. Antoniw said it was a "matter that goes to the heart of everyone".

The ruling brings to an end a decades-long fight for justice by victims who were forcibly sterilised.

Archived version: https://archive.ph/oZMR0

Content warning: mentions of sexual and physical abuse.

Sex trafficking survivors say the hotel chain ignored obvious signs that they were being trafficked to protect its profits. The company is set to face hundreds of lawsuits across the country, write Richard Hall and Alicja Hagopian

Archived version: https://archive.ph/jc8GM

A Delta flight from Detroit to Amsterdam was diverted to New York's Kennedy Airport on Wednesday after passengers were served spoiled food, airline officials said.

The department restored more than 2,000 missing discipline records to its public database of uniformed officers, weeks after ProPublica revealed data reliability issues. But it also removed case numbers, making future oversight more difficult.

Archived version: https://archive.ph/8IixW

New yen bills use 3-D holographic technology to curb counterfeiting, which Japan’s money printing agency called a world-first. Cashless payment has been slow to catch on in Japan.

Archived version: https://archive.ph/ID6Os

Labour administration says ‘globally pioneering’ legislation will be brought in before next Senedd elections in 2026

Archived version: https://archive.ph/6LFaV

Israel’s assault has displaced over 1 million people just since May, a UN human rights official said.

Archived version: https://archive.ph/Ile2Z

cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/442629

Archived link

Original report is gated.

Chinese and Russian companies are developing a strike drone similar to Iran’s “Shahed,” which has been actively used in attacks on Ukraine, according to European officials familiar with the matter, as reported by Bloomberg.

Officials did not identify the drone under development, but Chinese defence websites and several media outlets have indicated that China is working on a kamikaze strike drone named Sunflower 200. This drone reportedly bears a resemblance to the Iranian Shahed 136 in its appearance and functionality.

The officials noted that Chinese drones have not yet been used in Ukraine.

Several countries believe that supplying Russia with drones for attack purposes would cross the threshold of lethal assistance. Two officials conveyed this concern, highlighting the implications of such actions.

Regional and smaller universities say they should be exempt from limits on overseas enrolments and elite capital city institutions should be targeted

Archived version: https://archive.ph/3RA2S

cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/404448

Archived link

Taiwan said the Chinese coast guard boarded a Taiwanese fishing boat Tuesday before steering it to a port in mainland China, and demanded that Beijing release the vessel.

The Tachinman 88 was intercepted by two Chinese vessels Tuesday evening near the Kinmen archipelago, which lies a short distance off China’s coast but is controlled by Taiwan, Taiwanese maritime authorities said in a statement.

Taiwan dispatched three vessels to rescue the Tachinman 88, but the one that got close to the fishing boat were blocked by three Chinese boats and told not to interfere, the statement said. The pursuit was called off to avoid escalating the conflict after Taiwan’s maritime authorities detected that four more Chinese vessels were moving closer, the statement added.

“The Coast Guard calls on the mainland to refrain from engaging in political manipulation and harming cross-strait relations, and to release the Tachinman ship and crew as soon as possible,” the statement read.

The boat had six crew onboard, including the captain and five migrant workers, according to Taiwan’s official Central News Agency. The vessel was just over 20 kilometers (12 miles) away from Jinjiang in mainland China when it was boarded, Taiwanese authorities said.

China claims self-governing Taiwan as its territory and says the island must come under its control. The Chinese military regularly sends warplanes and ships toward the island and staged a large exercise with dozens of aircraft and vessels in May.

Fishermen from both Taiwan and China regularly sail the stretch of water near the Kinmen archipelago, which has seen a rise in tensions as the number of Chinese vessels — including sand dredgers and fishing boats — have notably increased in the area.

In February, two Chinese fishermen were drowned while being chased by Taiwan’s Coast Guard off the coast of Kinmen, prompting Beijing to step up patrols in the waters.

cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/429369

Germany's cabinet blocked the planned sale of Volkswagen's subsidiary MAN Energy Solutions' gas turbine division to a Chinese company on Wednesday, two government sources said.

The decision comes as Germany and the European Union try to reduce risks from economic ties with China.

MAN Energy Solutions said last September that the government would take a closer look at the planned sale to Chinese state-owned CSIC Longjiang GH Gas Turbine Co (GHGT).

The deal was first announced in June 2023 at an undisclosed price. GHGT belongs to the China State Shipbuilding Corporation (CSSC), which dominates the Chinese shipbuilding industry.

A spokesperson for MAN Energy Solutions declined to comment. Three people familiar with the matter had told Reuters on Tuesday that Germany would block the plans.

MAN Energy Solutions will wind down gas turbine development and production as a result of the blocked sale, one source had said, adding the group would retain its profitable turbine service business.

Germany's economy ministry has the right to review and block transactions deemed to have implications for national security.

The incident took place at a Hindu religious event in Hathras district in Uttar Pradesh state.

Archived version: https://archive.ph/H1eKv