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The News Feed is curated by CGSP’s editors in Asia and Africa.

U.S. Senator Ted Cruz Wants to Lead the Effort to Curtail China’s Growing Influence in Latin America

US Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) speaks during a Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation hearing to examine advancing next generation aviation technologies, on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, on March 29, 2023. Stefani Reynolds / AFP
U.S. anxieties about China’s increasingly influential presence in Latin America and the Caribbean will be a popular topic of discussion on Capitol Hill this week. Conservative Texas Senator Ted Cruz will introduce a ...
by Eric Olander

Chinese Contractor Pledges to Complete Nigerian Capital’s Light Rail in Eight Months

Jason Cheng (center), chairman of the Chinese contractor CCECC, assured Nigerian Vice President Kashim Shettima that the Abuja light rail will only take eight months to build. Image via @officialSKSM.
The local head of Chinese construction major CCECC, Jason Zheng, pledged that it would only take eight months to build the once-abandoned light rail in the Nigerian capital Abuja. Zheng made the promise ...
by Eric Olander

U.S. Acknowledges It Can’t Cut China Out of the EV Battery Supply Chain

A Ford worker in the United States assembles a new electric powered F-150 Lightening pick-up truck that is powered by a bettery with that uses Chinese-processed minerals and metals. JEFF KOWALSKY / AFP
For much of the past year, since the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) in 2022, U.S. officials have spoken at length about the urgent need to remove China from the critical ...
by Eric Olander

Vietnamese EV-Brand VinFast Hopes Possible EU Sanctions Against Chinese Electric Cars Will Give It an Opening

Low-priced China's EVs are driving Southeast Asia’s surge. Vietnam is now second in Southeast Asia’s China-led EV market. (Photo: Nhac NGUYEN / AFP)
Vietnamese electric vehicle company Vinfast plans to ship its first batch of 3,000 VF8 crossovers to Europe later this year and the upstart EV brand may even get an assist from European Union ...
by Eric Olander

Blockbuster Movie Scares Chinese Tourists Away From Thailand

Movie poster for the hugely-popular Chinese movie "No More Bets" that was set in Thailand.
Chinese tourists landing in Bangkok on Monday were greeted with a heroes welcome, including Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin, who went to the airport to personally welcome the first batch of visa-free visitors.
by Eric Olander

WEEK IN REVIEW: ASEAN Kicked off First-Ever Joint Naval Drills in South China Sea on Tuesday

ASEAN logo.
The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) kicked off its first-ever joint naval drills in the South China Sea on Tuesday near Indonesia’s Nantuna island. The five-day exercise comes at a sensitive time when ...
by Eric Olander

Nepal Walks a China-India-U.S. Tightrope as Prime Minister Heads to Beijing

File image of Nepal's Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal (L) meeting with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping during a previous term in office in 2017. Image: Lintao Zhang / AFP
Nepal’s Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal (nicknamed “Prachanda”) arrives in China on Friday for the second overseas visit since he took office. His first, in June, was to India, and the choice of destinations ...
by Cobus van Staden

Climate Chart of the Day: China and the U.S. Spend the Most on Fuel Subsidies

Fossil fuel subsidies in 2022 amounted to $7 trillion globally, about 7.1% of global gross domestic product. It shot up by 18.3% year on year, partly in response to the Ukraine war, according ...
by Cobus van Staden

Climate Change Dilemma: How Can the Global South Get Rich from Their Own Minerals?

Local workers at the massive Chinese-owned Tenke Fungurume copper and cobalt mine in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Image: Emmet Livingstone / AFP
This week, the Democratic Republic of Congo convened its inaugural DRC-Africa Battery Metals Forum in Kinshasa. Under the theme “Creating Wealth for the DRC and Africa’s Battery Metals Industry Value Chain,” the event tackles ...
by Cobus van Staden

Kuwait’s Crown Prince Heads to China

File image of Kuwait's Sheikh Mishal Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah who is looking to China to help develop the emirate's oil-dependent economy to more diversified post-carbon industries.
Kuwait’s Crown Prince Sheikh Mishal Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah left for China on Wednesday for an official visit that will likely include a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping (the Foreign Ministry has to confirm ...
by Eric Olander

BRI Isn’t Intended to Undermine the West, Says China’s EU Ambassador

China's Ambassador to the European Union, Fu Cong, acknowledged the Western criticisms of the BRI but said it was more important for Beijing to listen to the feedback from recipient countries instead. Image via Euractiv.
Fu Cong, the Chinese ambassador to the European Union in Brussels, challenged the widely-held perception in Brussels and other Western capitals that the Belt and Road Initiative aims to undermine U.S. and European ...
by Eric Olander

Republican Lawmakers in the U.S. Propose Yet Another Strategy to Challenge China’s Belt and Road Initiative

A trio of GOP representatives want the State Department to come up with a new strategy to counteract China's "debt trap diplomacy disguised as infrastructure development." Paul J. RICHARDS / AFP
Three Republican legislators in the United States feel enough isn’t being done to counter China’s Belt and Road Initiative and want the State Department to come up with yet another plan to blunt ...
by Eric Olander

Prominent Chinese Professor Explains Why the U.S., Not China is Actually to Blame for Global South Debt Distress

Tsinghua University professor Tang Xiaoyang makes is a leading architect of China's rebuttal against Western accusations that China engages in predatory lending to developing countries.
One of China’s foremost scholars on international debt says accusations that Beijing engages in predatory lending, or “debt trap diplomacy” do not align with the facts — and that it’s actually the U.S., ...
by Eric Olander

China’s Two-Pronged Auto Export Strategy: EVs to the North, Gas-Powered to the South

AFP
Analysts are forecasting Chinese automakers will ship 5 million vehicles this year, solidifying the country’s position as the world’s largest auto exporter. But there’s a stark discrepancy in terms of what kind of ...
by Eric Olander

Analysis from Cobus van Staden

The Pain of Un-Polarity

“THE G2 WILL BE CONVENING SHORTLY!”
This post by U.S. President Donald Trump in the run-up to his meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping last week may end up leaving a more lasting mark than the actual summit he attended.

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Chinese Flag Mysteriously Appears at Protest in Niger

AFP
Russian flags have become a regular sight among supporters of military juntas that have thrown governments across West Africa this year — but never a Chinese flag, until now. A bright red five-star ...
by Eric Olander

What Does Chinese Lending to Africa Look Like Now?

Source: Chinese Loans to Africa (CLA) Database, 2023. Boston University Global Development Policy Center.
China has been one of the most important development lenders to Africa over the last quarter of a century. This has transformed the African development landscape in helpful and problematic ways. It is ...
by Cobus van Staden

Chinese Loans to Africa by Region, 2000-2022

Source: Chinese Loans to Africa (CLA) Database, 2023. Boston University Global Development Policy Center.
From 2000-2022, countries in Southern Africa and East Africa historically borrowed the most from China primarily due to large-scale loans in Angola, Zambia, South Africa, Ethiopia and Kenya. In 2021 and 2022, the ...
by Cobus van Staden

The Emerging Talking Points Restructuring the Africa-China Relationship

L-R: President of the Comoros Azali Assoumani, President of South Africa Cyril Ramaphosa, Chinese President Xi Jinping, and Senegalese President Macky Sall at the China-Africa Leaders' Roundtable Dialogue in Johannesburg in August. Image: Alet Pretorius / AFP
The last few weeks have been punctuated by both an alphabet soup of big summits (BRICS, ASEAN, G20) and much discussion of the optics of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s presence or absence from ...
by Cobus van Staden

G77 Gathering Reinforces the Talking Points of China’s Global South Diplomacy

Li Xi, Member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of China (L) being greeted by Cuban President Manuel Diaz Canal at the G77 Plus China. Image: Yamil Lage / AFP
China sent its most senior official in recent years to the G77 gathering in Havana on Friday. The presence of Li Xi, the CPC’s seventh-ranking member and the head of the corruption watchdog, ...
by Cobus van Staden

South China Sea, Infrastructure Top Agenda in China-Malayasia PM Talks

Malaysian Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim held bilateral talks with his Chinese counterpart Li Qiang on Sunday in Nanning, capital of south China's Guangxi autonomous region.
Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim met with his Chinese counterpart Li Qiang on Sunday on the sides of the 20th China-ASEAN Expo in the southern Chinese city of Nanning. The two PMs addressed ...
by Eric Olander

Hun Manet Meets With Xi on First Overseas Trip as Cambodian PM

Cambodia's newly-appointed Prime Minister Hun Manet made his first overseas trip to Beijing where he met with Chinese President Xi Jinping on Friday. Image via Xinhua.
Cambodia’s new prime minister, Hun Manet, promised even closer ties with China during a meeting with President Xi Jinping in Beijing on Friday. The newly-named Cambodian leader thanked Xi for China’s economic ...
by Eric Olander

Zambian President Returns Home From Week-Long Visit to China, No Updates on Debt Restructuring Deal

Chinese President Xi Jinping reviews an honor guard at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on Friday during a welcome ceremony for Zambian President Haikinda Hichilema. Image via Xinhua.
Zambian President Haikinde Hichilema returned home this weekend from a week-long trip to China that appeared to be as much about sightseeing as it was about conducting substantive diplomacy. During the last stop of ...
by Eric Olander

Chinese Debt Servicing Costs Surge for Angola and Uganda

Debt servicing costs have been steadily rising across Africa, largely due to the falling value of local currencies that are used to repay dollar-denominated loans. But in Angola and Uganda, interest payments to ...
by Eric Olander

China’s Share of Nigeria’s Ballooning Debt Remains Steady at Around 4%

Chinese creditors account for just 4.1%, or $4.7 billion, of Nigeria’s $114 billion total public debt, according to the latest figures released by the Debt Management Office in Abuja. While China’s share is ...
by Eric Olander

Jaishankar: “India is the Only Country in the World Today Standing Eye-to-Eye Against China”

Indian External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar responded to accusations that Prime Minister Narendra Modi is "fears" China. Image via India TV.
India’s top diplomat, S. Jaishankar, pushed back forcefully against accusations Prime Minister Narendra Modi “fears China” saying New Delhi is the only in the world today country that stands “eye-to-eye against China” with ...
by Eric Olander

Q&A: Financing a Renewables Shift in African Countries as China’s New “Small or Beautiful” Model Takes Root

Solar power projects like this plant in northern Kenya highlight China's new focus on smaller, more environmentally sustainable infrastructure development in Africa. Image via Xinhua.

If you look at the specific demands of many African countries, they are now more focused on production-related activities rather than fancy highways that lead to nowhere.

by Njenga Hakeenah

WEEK IN REVIEW: Chinese President Xi Jinping Will Not Attend This Week’s G77 Summit in Havana

South Africa's President Cyril Ramaphosa bestowing the Order of South Arica on Xi Jinping during the recent BRICS summit - only his second foreign trip this year. Image: Phill Magakoe / AFP
Chinese President Xi Jinping will not attend this week’s G77 Summit in Havana, making this the third major international event in as many weeks that he’s avoided. Li Xi, head of the Chinese Communist Party’s powerful ...
by Eric Olander

43 Arrested in Protests Against Chinese Glass Factory in Indonesia

Presidents Joko Widodo of Indonesia (L) and Xi Jinping of China in 2022. Image: Achmad Ibrahim / AFP
Indonesian police arrested 43 people during large-scale protests against a Chinese-led glass and solar panel factory. The factory that’s being planned for Rempang, a small island close to the border with Singapore, would displace ...
by Cobus van Staden

Philippines Pushing for Permanent Structure on Second Thomas Shoal

A file image of BRP Sierra Madre, a stranded wreck from the Second World War, now at the heart tof a diplomatic dispute between China and the Philippines. Image: Ted Aljibe / AFP
The Philippine parliament is reportedly calling for funding to construct a permanent structure on the Second Thomas Shoal (known as the Ayungin Shoal in the Philippines and Ren’ai Jiao in China.) The atoll is ...
by Cobus van Staden

China Calls for Africa-Focused Reform of the UN Security Council

Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning at a press briefing on Wednesday where the reform proposal was announced
On Wednesday, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued an expansive statement titled “Proposal of the People’s Republic of China on the Reform and Development of Global Governance.” According to FM spokesperson Mao ...
by Cobus van Staden
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