In the grounds of the big North Korean embassy in central Beijing workers are busily erecting an impressive new wing. Across Beijing, restaurants owned by Pyongyang and staffed exclusively by North Koreans serve delicious but expensive chao xian food and repatriate the profits home. North Korea's state-owned airline, Koryo Air, flies four times a week to Beijing. As the DPRK's expanding missile and nuclear capabilities are causing alarm in major capitals, in Beijing, on the surface at least, it is business as usual.

When viewed from Beijing, regional security concerns look rather different than when viewed from Washington or Canberra. Nothing is more important for Beijing than Taiwan. With the return of the DPP to power, Beijing sees risks returning to levels of the mid 2000s, where fears of conflict were widely held.