In terms of geopolitical optics, this week was nothing short of a banquet. It served up at least two sets of images that seem to crystallize our historical moment and that will live on in the Wikipedia of history as shorthand for where the world was in 2025.
One is the waves of uncannily synchronized soldiers and a bewildering array of high-tech weaponry gliding down Beijing’s Chang’an Avenue. The ...
Month: May 2023
Related Posts
Argentina Scores $924 Million in Deals from China
Argentina’s Economy Minister Sergio Massa managed to secure almost a billion dollars' worth of investment deals on the first leg of his trip to China. He is on an economic rescue mission, with talks expected to renew and extend a currency ...
How Zambia’s Debt Mix is Forecast to Evolve
This projection of how Zambia’s public and publicly guaranteed (PPG) debt servicing will shift over the next few years showed up in a recent public lecture by the Johns Hopkins University debt expert Deborah Brautigam at Peking University. PPG refers to ...
Anti-Chinese Campaign on Nigerian Twitter Raises Questions
Readers following West Africa-China relations will know that unhappiness about Chinese involvement in small-scale mining is ongoing, especially in Ghana. However, a new campaign on Nigerian Twitter under the tag #STOPCHINESEILLEGALMINING is raising all kinds of questions. First, a significant number of the ...
G7 Food Security Plan “A Castle in the Sky”: Chinese Researcher
At their summit in Hiroshima, Japan, earlier in mid-May, the Group of Seven wealthy industrial nations committed themselves to improving global food security. The Hiroshima Statement for Resilient Global Food Security called for increasing development assistance and food aid to address an ...
Q&A: Indonesian, Chinese Nickel Workers Struggle With Racial Tension, But Must Tread Path to Solidarity
This year opened with a clash that erupted between Indonesian and Chinese workers at Gunbuster Nickel Industry (GNI), a Chinese-owned nickel processing plant in Central Sulawesi, Indonesia, claiming lives from each side. It’s tempting to count the clash as evidence ...
Q&A: Hong Kong Expertise Playing Pivotal Role in Transitioning Popular Motorbike Taxis in Kenya
A small group of entrepreneurs from Hong Kong and China is pioneering a new e-mobility business model in Kenya that aims to revolutionize the country’s ubiquitous motorbike taxis known as bodabodas. Tucked away in a garage in Nairobi’s Upperhill business district, ...
China, U.S. Compete in Military Cooperation With South China Sea Countries As Tension Simmers
This week it was confirmed that the U.S. and Japan will conduct joint exercises in the South China Sea with the Philippines. This comes as duels between Chinese vessels and counterparts from around the South China Sea are becoming an almost daily occurrence.
Russia Not the Only Big Issue At BRICS Foreign Ministers’ Meeting This Week
The Foreign Ministers of the BRICS group will meet in Cape Town, South Africa, on Thursday. The meeting is an important step towards the BRICS summit in August. The South African government announced this week that attendees to both this week’s FM meeting ...
Egypt’s Suez Canal Economic Zone Attracts Chinese Investment Bonanza
Egypt’s Chinese-built Suez Canal Economic Zone attracted a whopping $3 billion in Chinese investments, according to its chairperson Walid Gamal El-Din following his visit to Beijing in late May. The deals cover a broad range of industries, from apparel to power ...
Tshisekedi’s Trip to China Was a Total Waste of Time and It’s His Fault
Two somewhat perplexing stories today in the China-Africa space. First, the visit to China by President Félix Tshisekedi is wrapping up in Hong Kong and it appears, at least based on what we know so far, that the trip was a colossal waste of time for the ...
Lots of Pomp, Little Substance: DRC President Didn’t Get Much Out of His Trip to China
DR Congo President Félix Tshisekedi is wrapping up his near-week-long visit to China with a two-day stopover in Hong Kong before returning home later Monday. The president will meet with Chief Executive John Lee ka-chiu and members of the territory's powerful business community.
Ethiopian Foreign Minister Wraps Up 5-Day Visit to China
Ethiopian Foreign Minister Demeke Mekonnen Hassen, who is also deputy prime minister, concluded a five-day visit to China on Sunday following meetings with his Chinese counterpart Qin Gang and Chinese Vice President Han Zheng. None of the readouts from Chinese state media provided ...