The mutual expulsions of Indian and Chinese reporters are now almost complete. The last Chinese journalist in India, a reporter for Xinhua, was expelled last week, leaving just one reporter from the Press Trust of India still in China as the only remaining Indian foreign correspondent. (THE HINDU)
Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Ali Sabry began a six-day visit to China on Sunday with talks with Foreign Minister Qin Gang. Specific details of their discussion were not released but their meeting comes as attention shifts back to China’s role in Sri Lanka’s debt crisis now that creditors have restructured Zambia’s bilateral loans. (NEWSWIRE)
A French warship, the frigate FS Lorraine, arrived in Manila on Friday, marking the latest entrant into a South China Sea theater brimming with international naval power. Heightened tensions between China and the Philippines over maritime claims are particularly raising tensions. (NAVAL NEWS)
Indonesia changed where it will host ASEAN’s first-ever joint military exercise to a location away from the South China Sea where several countries, including China, have overlapping territorial claims. The exercise (scheduled for later in September) will now be moved out of the strategic waterway altogether to the South Natuna Sea in Indonesian waters. (REUTERS)
50 Chinese nationals have been arrested in Libya for setting up an illegal crypto mining center, which also employed minors, according to a video posted by prosecutors. The crackdown in Zliten (160 km from Tripoli) follows a similar bust in the port city of Misrata, where ten Chinese citizens were arrested. (CRYPTO NEWS)
Officials from China and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) are gathering in Kunming to hammer out the third iteration of their Free Trade Area agreement, the newest update of a 2002 deal. The Version 3.0 China-ASEAN FTA will focus on supply chains, digital and green economies, and deeper cross-border integration. (XINHUA)
Mia Mottley, the Prime Minister of Barbados, is following her co-convening of the Summit for a New Global Financing Pact with French President Emmanuel Macron last week with a visit to Beijing. Mottley will attend the World Economic Forum’s “Summer Davos” gathering in Tianjin. She said Barbados was ‘happy’ to have signed on to the BRI and that “In spite of differences and size, the commitment to a number of key values allows us to be able to work cooperatively together.” (TELESUR)
Zambia’s private creditors expect a deal to restructure the country’s $3 billion of bond debt to happen “in the coming weeks.” A committee of bondholders said it’s now more optimistic about the situation in Zambia following last week’s announcement of a deal to restructure $6.3 billion of bilateral debt, mostly owed to China. (REUTERS)
Heavily armed Philippines police backed by commandos launched a massive raid to free 2,700 victims of human trafficking from China, Vietnam and more than a dozen other countries. Tuesday’s operation took place in Las Piñas outside of Manila and marks the latest effort by SE Asian governments to crack down on human smuggling syndicates. (ASSOCIATED PRESS)
A Namibian court found that the country’s mining minister overstepped his authority in cancelling a mining license granted to the Chinese lithium miner Xinfeng and that it should have happened through the courts. This follows an October 2022 banning of a Xinfeng shipment of 75,000 tons of lithium ore to its headquarters in China. The government said the export was irregular, but Xinfeng argued it was needed to design a future processing plant in Namibia. (REUTERS)
Algeria will soon start producing its own versions of Chinese weaponry under license. ECMK, a company linked to Algeria’s Ministry of National Defense will produce key products developed by China’s Norinco, including truck-mounted machine guns and grenade launchers. (MILITARY AFRICA)
Jack Ma, the founder of the Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba, reportedly visited Nepal this week. Ma used to represent China as a prominent public diplomacy actor before falling afoul of public regulators and largely disappearing from the public eye for a while. He reportedly requested meetings with Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal and Finance Minister Prakash Sharan Mahat, but more details have not been divulged. (THE KATHMANDU POST)
