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Belt and Road

June 2024

Anwar Ibrahim, initially viewed by some political observers as pro-Western, has encouraged warmer relations with Beijing.

Premier Li Qiang’s visit has Malaysia wanting more from China pivot

The absence of President Xi Jinping, who sent his number two in his place, has dejected some in the government, according to Malaysian officials and observers.

  • Kathrin Hille and Mercedes Ruehl

May 2024

A Geely Zeekr 001 EV at the Zeekr Centre in Shanghai. The shift in the US approach towards China from engagement to full-throttle competition is no longer in doubt.

The US-China trade war has helped polarise ASEAN

Regardless of their alignment or dependence on one side or the other, South-East Asian states need to stay focused on their common regional interests.

  • Joseph C. Liow

February 2024

Buying growth on credit and using state subsidies can boost growth temporarily, but there comes a payback time.

Optimists about China bouncing back are just hoping

The problem is that China isn’t just another member of the global community and bad economic policy is not punished at the ballot box.

  • Adrian Blundell-Wignall

September 2023

China’s ghost cities cannot be filled by official exhortations.

China learns nothing from the financial crises of others

Beijing’s reluctance to bite the bullet on bad assets looks like an error that the whole global economy may pay for.

  • Adrian Blundell-Wignall

August 2023

China’s President Xi Jinping needs to fire a stimulus bazooka.

China’s economy is stumbling, and it’s a danger to global security

Beijing’s economic model has hit a wall. But a dictatorship is more likely to seek a foreign adventure than try to reform itself.

  • Paul Krugman
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Giorgia Meloni’s government is expanding its populist agenda.

Meloni’s new Italian populism puts investors, Beijing on notice

The prime minister’s nine-month-old far-right coalition government is doubling down on a state-led approach to managing prosperity.

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  • Alessandra Migliaccio and Sofia Gerace

June 2023

The Amur River: not much love lost on either side of the Sino-Russian border.

China is going to be the great winner from Putin’s strife

Russia’s failed attempt to make Ukraine into a buffer state is only helping China’s statecraft on its sensitive own western borders.

  • Geoff Raby
Giorgia Meloni’s government announced at the weekend it would impose a “network of measures to safeguard Pirelli’s independence”.

Italy strips China’s Sinochem of its influence as Pirelli’s largest investor

Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s government has invoked national security concerns about the potential for misuse of Pirelli’s chip technology, as well as Chinese Communist Party interference.

  • Amy Kazmin and Silvia Sciorilli Borrelli
The view of China’s growth is undergoing a big reset.

China is shifting from riches to risk

Without reform, China faces a long-term growth stall. Investors in the country may have to start thinking very differently.

  • Daniel Rosen

May 2023

Giorgia Meloni says she has not yet decided whether to terminate Italy’s participation in the signature foreign policy program of China’s President Xi Jinping.

Italy to hold talks with China about exiting Belt and Road Initiative

Rome was firmly rebuked by Washington and Brussels when it joined China’s ambitious Belt and Road Initiative in 2019, the only G7 country to do so.

  • Amy Kazmin and Yuan Yang

March 2023

The new Presidential Palace under construction at the country’s new capital Nusantara.

China steps up regional Asian investment to counter US influence

The increased focus on investment in East Asia and Pacific nations comes as Washington rolls out its strategy of ‘integrated deterrence’ across the Indo-Pacific to counter China’s rise.

  • Emma Connors

January 2023

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China, Philippines agree to handle disputes ‘peacefully’

The two countries strive to mend a relationship hurt after Manila sought a 2016 arbitral ruling that invalidated China’s expansive South China Sea claims.

  • Yew Lun Tian and Neil Jerome Morales

March 2022

Xi cannot be seen backing a loser in Putin.

China’s big stake in the Ukraine fight

China wants to adjust the global order to its liking, not bring it crashing down. How does it curb its reckless ally?

  • Colin Heseltine

December 2021

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy addresses lawmakers in Kyiv. Putin is uncomfortable with Ukraine’s embrace of Western democracy.

Why Vladimir Putin has Ukraine in his sights

The Russian President’s historical nostalgia and fear of democracy are driving a new crisis.

  • Gideon Rachman

September 2021

The Hambantota Port, which the Sri Lankan government handed over to China when it couldn’t repay its debt, in Hambantota, Sri Lanka.

‘Hidden debt’ on China’s Belt and Road tops $530b, says new study

New research suggests that many countries’ financial liabilities linked to President Xi Jinping’s hallmark foreign policy initiative have been systematically under-reported for years

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  • Edward White
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May 2021

The port of Darwin has become a new test in relations with China.

How we should deal with China’s state-owned behemoths

Australia is uniquely exposed to Chinese investment, trade and companies owned by the Chinese government. The country needs to think about what kind of relationship it wants for the future.

  • Adrian Blundell-Wignall
Liberal MP Ted O’Brien says China responds to collection action so liberal democracies should being taking more of it.

Fight China with boycotts, sanctions: Liberal MP

The Morrison government’s China expert, Ted O’Brien, wants Australia to form new alliances that could use boycotts and sanctions to combat China’s economic warfare.

  • Matthew Cranston

April 2021

India, one of the world’s biggest coal producers, expects the fossil fuel to remain its main energy source as it helps produce inexpensive electricity.

For real progress on climate change, invite the developing world

Next time Joe Biden holds a climate summit, he should not just invite the biggest countries to participate but include those such as Pakistan too.

  • Gillian Tett

October 2020

Aung San Suu Kyi on the hustings ahead of the November 8 election. She remains overwhelmingly popular in ethnically Bamah regions.

November election a step towards democracy, Myanmar-style

There is reason for cautious optimism the procedural aspects of the 2020 elections will be fair, as the population demands. But there’s still cause for pessimism about the near-term prospects for Myanmar’s democracy.

  • David Steinberg

September 2020

A big, grand white elephant? Economists have questioned the merits of the Jakarta-Bandung High Speed Railway that's been under construction for the last four years.

Off the rails – Indonesia's Belt and Road rail mess

South-east Asia's first bullet train is halfway there, the Indonesian government says. Others say the much-delayed $7.8 billion project, part of China's Belt and Road Initiative, should never have begun.

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  • Emma Connors and Natalia Santi

Original URL: https://www.afr.com/topic/belt-and-road-initiative--age-only--1ngu