Category: Politics

The Solomon Islands caused a bit of a stir last month at a summit in Washington, D.C. when it refused to sign an initial draft of an accord between the U.S. and more than a dozen Pacific nations. Now, we know why.

The Chinese government recently dispatched a high-ranking member of the powerful Ministry of Public Security (MPS) to the Democratic Republic of the Congo for talks with security officials on how to better protect Chinese nationals in the country. Liu Jiingjie, head ...

U.S. President Joe Biden on Wednesday welcomed leaders from 11 South Pacific island nations to the White House for a two-day summit that is widely seen as a critical part of Washington's effort to match China's growing influence in the region. ...

A meeting this week between the general secretary of Kenya's new ruling party, the United Democratic Alliance, and China's envoy to Nairobi provides a fresh reminder of the dual roles that Chinese ambassadors play in their assigned countries. Zhou Pingjiang represents ...

In what’s becoming a standard tactic, China used its support across the Global South to counter a proposal from a U.S.-led group of rich democracies for a special debate in the UN Human Rights Council on China’s anti-Uyghur measures in Xinjiang. The measure followed a recent UN report  citing "serious ...

The most interesting articles published in Chinese media in August revolve around the future of the Iranian nuclear deal and, more broadly, Iran’s role in the Middle East. Chinese experts also commented on the end of France’s Operation Barkhane in Mali, as well as the rising great ...

The prominent Zimbabwean environmental NGO, the Zimbabwe Environmental Law Association (ZELA), published a new policy brief mapping China's influence in key Zimbabwean economic sectors, including extractives, utilities and power. ZELA has been sharply critical of Chinese ...

China’s Vice Minister for Foreign Affairs, Deng Li, met with ambassadors from the Gulf Cooperation Council countries on Monday. Envoys from Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar, and other member countries joined the meeting, which reportedly touched on the ongoing crisis in Yemen, among other (unspecified) topics. 

Xue Bing, China's Special Envoy for the Horn of Africa, wrapped up a four-nation tour of the region on Friday in Uganda following a meeting with President Yoweri Museveni at the State House in Entebbe. One would expect someone in Xue's role to ...

Speculation that newly-elected Kenyan President William Ruto would pull back on ties with China, as he hinted during his election campaign, was quelled last week when the president's ally in the National Assembly, Speaker Moses Wetangula, met with Ambassador Zhou Pingjian and said there are "no plans ...

By Chris Alden It seems a long time since the joint declaration on 4 February 2022 between President Xi Jinping and President Vladimir Putin declared their ‘friendship without limits’ as crucial to ushering in a ‘new era’ in international relations. That ...

India’s Minister of External Affairs, Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, has admitted that his country’s relationship with China “hasn’t been easy” but said the two should find ways of working together to ensure the “rise of Asia.” Jaishankar was in New York for the ...