World News

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/41500314

• Despite being against the law, working 72-hour weeks still common
• Aggressive performance targets, low wages, and desire for job security key factors
• Recent drive to tackle '996' partly due to EU Forced Labour Regulation, which includes excessive overtime
• Intense price wars in key industries also seen as factors

[...]

Many Chinese employees are expected to work a 72-hour week under the country’s gruelling “996” culture: 9am to 9pm, six days a week. The work style has been endorsed by some of China’s most successful entrepreneurs, including Alibaba’s founder, Jack Ma. But some critics have described it as labour exploitation, even modern slavery.

For the past few years, the Chinese government has attempted to stamp out “996”, including by outlawing it in 2021. That year, tech giants including TikTok parent company ByteDance and Tencent also tried to halt “996” after a 22-year-old woman at e-commerce firm Pingduoduo reportedly collapsed to her death on her way home from work past midnight.

But intense overtime has remained a common practice in China.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/41451370

Archived

China's Heihe Rural Commercial Bank has stopped accepting payments from Russia after falling under European Union sanctions, Russian pro-government media outlet Vedomosti reported on Sept. 1.

Heihe, a small rural lender, was one of the last Chinese banks willing to process transactions for Russian non-sanctioned credit organizations after larger Chinese banks cut off such services.

Many Russian small and medium-sized businesses had shifted to Heihe following earlier restrictions.

The EU sanctioned Heihe on July 18 for providing cryptoasset services that allegedly helped Russia bypass sanctions. The measures took effect on Aug. 9, barring EU entities from engaging with the bank. Payments reportedly continued for several weeks, but were blocked last week.

[...]

While China claims neutrality in Russia's war against Ukraine, it has supplied Moscow with dual-use technology and continues to purchase Russian oil, indirectly bolstering Russia's war effort.

[...]

The reporting comes as Russian President Vladimir Putin met Chinese President Xi Jinping in China on Sept. 1 during the Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit, highlighting Moscow's dependence on Beijing amid Western pressure.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/41383616

Archived

[...]

“I believe nothing will happen at the SCO summit or during Putin’s four-day visit to the Shanghai forum, which will include Modi and others. In my view, nothing will occur. Putin is certainly going to talk with Xi Jinping, with the main topics being the war in Ukraine, relations with the U.S., and how to protect his interests in this situation.

Xi will consider Putin’s arguments in light of China’s own interests: China wants the war to continue until it is offered something that interests it, at which point it would intervene in the negotiations to stop the war. What could that be? Only Taiwan. Everything else is less important and can be resolved through bilateral negotiations: the tariff war with the U.S., trade issues, raw materials, waiving secondary sanctions on Beijing - these are all bilateral matters that Moscow is not needed for; Beijing can handle them on its own,” said [Russian opposition politician] Mark Feygin.

[...]

In his view, the Taiwan issue cannot be resolved by China alone, because the U.S. and its allies will not agree to hand over Taiwan or reintegrate it into mainland China.

“And here China wants to use the war in Europe to achieve this, and that is its main goal. Everything else — economic issues — is secondary; this is geostrategic, geopolitical, and historical. For China and Xi Jinping, reintegration is the key issue. So far, there are no signs that this could be imminent. Therefore, China has no motive to make sudden moves.

[...]

“In places like Australia and the U.K., there is already a split happening between the internet that people who are willing to identify themselves or go through age verification can see and the rest of the internet. And that’s historically a very dangerous place for us to end up,” said Jason Kelley, activism director at the nonprofit digital rights group Electronic Frontier Foundation.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/41062700

Archived

On Aug. 4, Russia announced that it would no longer adhere to a self-imposed “moratorium” on the deployment of missiles previously banned under the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty, which has been defunct since the U.S. withdrew in 2019 over alleged Russian violations. The INF Treaty, originally signed in 1987 between the United States and Soviet Union, forbade both countries from possessing ground-launched ballistic and cruise missile systems with ranges between 500 and 5,500 kilometers.

Now, as Moscow openly resumes its development of such missiles, European members of NATO must respond by ensuring that their own arsenals are sufficiently robust to guarantee peace on the continent.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/40716296

Archived

Russia’s crude oil exports to India have plunged threefold in recent weeks as European sanctions and impending U.S. tariffs have shaken one of Moscow’s most important energy lifelines.

Average daily shipments of Russia’s Urals crude to India have fallen to just 400,000 barrels in August, according to data from the ship-tracking firm Kpler cited by Bloomberg.

That is a sharp decrease from the 1.18 million barrels a day that India had been importing on average this year, with deliveries holding steady at roughly that level through June and July.

In mid-July, the EU banned the purchase of fuels refined from Russian crude and introduced restrictions on Nayara Energy, making many counterparties reluctant to supply crude to the company’s refineries.

India’s third-largest refinery, Nayara is part-owned by Russia’s state oil giant Rosneft and by United Capital Partners, a fund run by investor Ilya Shcherbovich.

President Donald Trump then announced 25% tariffs on Indian exports to the U.S. before doubling those duties, tying the move explicitly to India’s continued purchases of Russian oil. The U.S. tariffs are set to take effect on Sept. 17.

Nayara Energy received only four cargoes of Urals crude in August, Bloomberg reported last week, with no further deliveries expected before the end of the month.

That would leave Nayara averaging just 94,000 barrels per day this month, a record low compared with nearly 366,000 barrels per day in the third quarter of last year.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/40715951

Archived

The Kremlin, through the mouth of one of its key ideologues, First Deputy Chief of Staff of the Russian Presidential Administration Sergei Kiriyenko, who is in charge of domestic policy, declared the continuation of the course of aggressive propaganda treatment of Russians, reports The Moscow Times [original article in Russian language].

He said Russia must counter the information war allegedly waged against Russia by Western countries, which are not going to curtail ideological attacks even if the real one is over ."There is an information war going on, and you and I have said many times that the hot war will end, we hope it will be soon, but the information war will never end," he said, addressing participants in the propaganda "Festival of New Media." Kirienko explained the steady increase in the number of media people participating in the propaganda event and the fact that their tasks are becoming "more and more serious and more important."

[...]

The New Media Workshop, a project of the Kremlin-linked Dialogue Regions Autonomous Nonprofit Organization and the Russia - Land of Opportunities Autonomous Nonprofit Organization created by President Vladimir Putin's decree, is responsible for organizing the New Media Festival. Participants in the festival, which took place in Senezh on August 15-17, are supposed to form a "new media reality of Russia."

In July, Kremlin spokesman Dmitri Peskov said that Russia had developed military censorship "unprecedented for our country" amid the invasion of Ukraine. "After all, the war is going on in the information space too. And it would be wrong to turn a blind eye to media outlets that are purposefully engaged in discrediting Russia," Peskov said in an interview with Expert magazine.

According to Vedomosti [a Russian state-controlled daily broadsheet newspaper] a new department may be created for Kiriyenko, which would essentially take over the functions of the "Russian Houses" that were actively expelled from former Soviet republics, such as Azerbaijan or Moldova. This department will primarily deal with "humanitarian cooperation" and the promotion of the Kremlin's "soft power" in neighbouring countries as well as the Global South.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/40557807

Archived

More than 1,000 Ukrainians fleeing Russia's invasion found refuge in Alaska. Now, Russian President Vladimir Putin was in Alaska to a state for his first in-person talks with his U.S. counterpart on ending the war — but Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky wasn’t invited.

[...]

One Ukrainian refugee said:

"And I want to add that we feel huge support for our country here. Every time we’ve held a fundraiser — and there have been several — Americans have been incredibly generous. I work in a store, and today four people came up to me and asked, “You’re Ukrainian, right? Friday is the meeting. What do you think about it? We’re with you, everything will be fine, we support Ukraine.”

"People don’t even know what to expect. It’s a shock — how is it that Putin, Vladimir Putin, a war criminal who’s now a suspect in a war crimes case, is actually coming to America? It’s nonsense, especially for us Ukrainians. How can you talk to someone who doesn’t want the war to end? He’s pursuing absolutely inhumane, brutal policies toward Ukraine. As a Ukrainian, I believe there’s nothing to talk about — there needs to be relentless pressure on this man and on that country."

[...]

crosspostato da: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/40529863

The human rights group Safeguard Defenders (SD) says that traditional reports, of which SD has released many, don’t reach everyday readers. Few people have the patience or the time to sift through dry human-rights analyses. By disguising these human rights abuses in the familiar format of leisure reading, we aim to lure in unsuspecting audiences. Someone picks it up to kill time, admires a few shots of mountains or cityscapes— and only then realizes what they are actually reading.

Here is the first online version: Holidays in handcuffs: new report examines forced travel in China

But there is also a print version available - for free - and SD asks for help to distribute copies and spread the word.

Imagine picking up a glossy travel magazine in your dentist’s waiting room or airport lounge—stunning landscapes, glossy paper, and an invitation to explore. But flip past the photos, and you’ll discover that these aren’t vacation packages at all. They’re forced “escorted holidays” imposed by the Chinese Communist Party on its most vocal critics, taken at sensitive moments to silence them.

The length to which the CCP is willing to go to silence critics is sometimes absurd, which explains why we lampoon it (with victims’ blessings) in our satirical China Travel Magazine: Dissident Edition. In fact, some police fight over who gets to take dissidents on these forced holidays, because they can use it as an excuse to go sightseeing, eat fancy food, and drink, which their meager pay can rarely otherwise cover.

Now for the good part – you can help us in our guerrilla campaign, to break the echo chamber, and get this into the hands of people who normally would not spend their time thinking about human rights, China, or reading long and heavy reports on the subject.

[...]

Drop a DM on twitter (@SafeguardDefend), BlueSky (‪@safeguarddefenders.bsky.social‬), or email (all emails are Protonmail) with your location and some distribution ideas. We’ll send you a bundle of magazines—keep a few for yourself and a friend or two, and place the rest in public spaces, and help break the echo chamber.

If you prefer, you can also request a print-ready PDF complete with bleed marks—simply send it to any local print shop to produce your own high-quality edition.

Want to spread the word digitally? The complete China Travel Magazine - Dissident Edition is also available on our website as a PDF, but nothing beats a real, hard copy, magazine. But please do share the link, post the visuals, tweet it with #ChinaTravelMagazine.

Geneva – Talks aimed at striking a landmark global treaty on plastic pollution fell apart Friday as countries failed to find consensus on how the world should tackle the ever-growing scourge.

Negotiators from 185 nations worked beyond Thursday's deadline and through the night in an ultimately futile search for common ground.

A large bloc wants bold action such as curbing plastic production, while a smaller clutch of oil-producing states want to focus more narrowly on waste management.

The stalemate was a resounding failure for the environment and for international diplomacy at a time when its frailties are in the spotlight.

Countries voiced anger and despair as the talks unraveled, but said they wanted future negotiations — despite six rounds of talks over three years now having failed to find agreement.

crosspostato da: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/40512053

Archived

Even as the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has relentlessly suppressed free expression, the China Dissent Monitor (CDM)—Freedom House’s initiative to track dissent in the country—has revealed that protests take place regularly in every region of China. Marking its third year of research this June, CDM has documented more than 10,000 protest actions, ranging from rural residents protesting land development to nationwide demonstrations against the unprecedented social controls of the government’s zero-COVID-19 policy. The insights that CDM gains into protest actions often shed light on broader trends within China: for example, the recent increase in demonstrations against unscrupulous residential property management companies has exposed another layer of the country’s complex economic woes.

[...]

CDM first observed an increase in labor protests—such as strikes over unpaid wages—in early 2023 after the end of pandemic controls. We predicted that these might be linked to a broader economic downturn in China. As the ensuing economic malaise has dragged on, CDM’s latest data suggest that labor dissent has indeed continued to rise; the 1,219 labor protests we documented in the first half of 2025 represent a 66 percent increase compared with the same period in 2024.

[...]

China’s slowing economy has [also] prompted protests beyond those related to labor. Since CDM’s inaugural report, we’ve charted a steady rise in protests by homebuyers and homeowners amid a deepening financial crisis in China’s real-estate sector. [...] In [2024] we observed that, given the persistence of these protest events, the central government’s efforts to address problems in the real-estate sector through subsidies, loan programs, and other tools were proving inadequate.

[...]

CDM’s latest data indicate that these trends have endured or even accelerated in recent months: we recorded 1,220 protests linked to the housing sector in the first half of 2025, double the number of events in the first half of 2023 or 2024. There has been a particularly sharp rise in homeowners protesting against the unscrupulous practices of property management companies—such as sudden price increases or the use of a community’s shared spaces for side businesses—with nearly the same number of events in the first six months of 2025 as in the previous two years combined.

[...]

CDM research has identified [also] 85 protests led by consumers, investors, and small-business owners in the second quarter of 2025 represent a 200 percent year-on-year increase, extending an upward trend reported by CDM in Issue 9. Retiree protests over unpaid benefits or disfavored local-government policies have also persisted since CDM first reported on a relative increase in such events in 2023. These incidents are driven by sudden business closures, cash-strapped firms, and indebted local governments, suggesting that the impact of China’s economic pain may be broadening.

[...]

While much of the dissent described so far is centered in urban areas, rural protest also appears to be climbing. [...] While the central government rolled out new rules in July 2024 to loosen restrictions on rural land use, CDM has documented a 44 percent rise in protests over land disputes since that month.

[...]

CDM has observed numerous other protest movements that stretch across municipal and provincial boundaries, including those against corruption and malfeasance, stalled housing, and sexual harassment. Such movements show that even under enduring one-party authoritarianism, citizens in China are finding ways to link their acts of dissent through symbolism, without centralized coordination.

[...] As the CCP under Xi Jinping has deliberately dismantled civil society and movement networks over the past decade, patterns of dissent have become more difficult for anyone to detect—especially in China’s heavily manipulated media environment, where information about dissent is quickly deamplified or deleted. The ability to uncover and follow up on trends like those discussed here depends on regular monitoring and analysis of information from varied sources.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/40431544

Op-ed by Tom Harper, Lecturer in International Relations, University of East London, UK.

[...]

This potential to control downstream water supply to another country has been demonstrated by the effects that earlier dam projects in the region have had on the nations of the Mekong river delta in 2019. As a result, this gives Beijing a significant degree of leverage over its neighbours.

One country restricting water supply to put pressure on another is by no means unprecedented. In fact in April 2025, following a terror attack by Pakistan-based The Resistance Front in Kashmir, which killed 26 people (mainly tourists), India suspended the Indus waters treaty, restricting water supplies to Pakistani farmers in the region. So the potential for China’s dam to disrupt water flows will further compound the already tense geopolitics of southern Asia.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/40362700

Archived

Tiremaker Pirelli & C. SpA, where China’s state-owned Sinochem International Corp. owns 37%, is a prominent example. U.S. authorities have warned that Pirelli’s tires equipped with cyber sensors could face restrictions, citing data security risks. Rome has already used its “golden power” rules to limit Sinochem’s influence, and in April, Pirelli’s board downgraded the investor’s governance role. Officials are now weighing steps that could pressure Sinochem to sell, the people said.

Other potential targets include CDP Reti SpA, which controls Italy’s power grids and is 35% owned by a unit of State Grid Corporation of China, and Ansaldo Energia SpA, where Shanghai Electric cut its stake from 40% to 0.5% but whose Chinese ties still block participation in some U.S. tenders.

About 700 Italian firms have Chinese investors, but the government’s focus is on large entities in energy, transport, technology, and finance. Rome’s moves reflect a broader European effort to “de-risk” from China while maintaining selective engagement, particularly in green industries.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/40297303

Archived

Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. said Monday his country would inevitably be drawn “kicking and screaming” into any war over Taiwan due to its proximity to the self-ruled island and the presence of large numbers of Filipino workers there, despite China’s strong protest over such remarks.

Marcos also told a news conference that the Philippines’ coast guard, navy and other vessels defending its territorial interests in the South China Sea would never back down and would stand their ground in the contested waters after the Chinese coast guard on Monday staged dangerous blocking maneuvers and used a powerful water cannon to try to drive away Philippine vessels from the hotly disputed Scarborough Shoal.

It’s the latest flare-up of long-simmering territorial disputes in the busy waterway, a key global trade route, where overlapping claims between China and the Philippines have escalated in recent years. Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan also lay claims to parts of the contested waters.

Relations between China and the Philippines have been severely strained after Marcos, who took office in mid-2022, and his administration emerged as some of the most vocal critics in Asia of China’s increasingly aggressive actions in the South China Sea. The Marcos administration deepened its treaty alliance engagements with the United States and started broadening security alliances with other Western and Asian countries like Japan, Australia, India and some EU member states to strengthen deterrence against Beijing’s assertiveness.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/40239934

No-one would want to work without getting a salary, or even worse – having to pay to be there.

Yet paying companies so you can pretend to work for them has become popular among young, unemployed adults in China. It has led to a growing number of such providers.

The development comes amid China's sluggish economy and jobs market. Chinese youth unemployment remains stubbornly high, at more than 14%.

With real jobs increasingly hard to come by, some young adults would rather pay to go into an office than be just stuck at home.

Shui Zhou, 30, had a food business venture that failed in 2024. In April of this year, he started to pay 30 yuan ($4.20; £3.10) per day to go into a mock-up office run by a business called Pretend To Work Company, in the city of Dongguan, 114 km (71 miles) north of Hong Kong.

There he joins five "colleagues" who are doing the same thing.

"I feel very happy," says Mr Zhou. "It's like we're working together as a group."

Such operations are now appearing in major cities across China, including Shenzhen, Shanghai, Nanjing, Wuhan, Chengdu, and Kunming. More often they look like fully-functional offices, and are equipped with computers, internet access, meeting rooms, and tea rooms.

And rather than attendees just sitting around, they can use the computers to search for jobs, or to try to launch their own start-up businesses. Sometimes the daily fee, usually between 30 and 50 yuan, includes lunch, snacks and drinks.

[...]

Dr Christian Yao, a senior lecturer at Victoria University of Wellington's School of Management in New Zealand, is an expert on the Chinese economy.

"The phenomenon of pretending to work is now very common," he says. "Due to economic transformation and the mismatch between education and the job market, young people need these places to think about their next steps, or to do odd jobs as a transition.

"Pretend office companies are one of the transitional solutions."

Mr Zhou came across the Pretend To Work Company while browsing social media site Xiaohongshu. He says he felt that the office environment would improve his self-discipline. He has now been there for more than three months.

Mr Zhou sent photos of the office to his parents, and he says they feel much more at ease about his lack of employment.

While attendees can arrive and leave whenever they want, Mr Zhou usually gets to the office between 8am and 9am. Sometimes he doesn't leave until 11pm, only departing after the manager of the business has left.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/40233079

The latest round of aerial attacks on Ukraine has left six dead and 19 wounded.

Russia targeted the regions of Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson in the east of Ukraine where the invaders have gained a strong foothold in the country.

The attacks on Zaporizhzhia hit residential areas, a bus station and a clinic, with this man saying his family were close to being killed.

[...]

The strikes come just days before what could be a pivotal diplomatic moment: a meeting between United State President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin in the U-S state of Alaska this Friday [15 Aug]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/40231744

Archived

Overseas Chinese dissidents staged coordinated rallies in major cities worldwide this weekend to urge people in China to unite against authoritarian rule and push for democratization.

Organized by China Action and the Civil Resistance Association, the two-day campaign began Saturday with events in New York, Washington, Los Angeles, San Francisco, London, Berlin, Sydney, Toronto and Tokyo.

At the events, activists unveiled a "Rights for Chinese Citizens" declaration, which also condemns Beijing's military threats toward Taiwan.

[...]

Lead organizer Yang Zili (楊子立) said the campaign aims to inspire people in China to "rise up" and commit to a clear timeline - within three years - for nationwide resistance to achieve democracy.

The declaration also denounces the CCP's repression of Tibetans and Uyghurs, the dismantling of Hong Kong's freedoms, and intimidation of Taiwan.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/40174024

Archived

European countries are ill-prepared for threat of co-ordinated sabotage attacks by Russia and China, a classified EU intelligence report has warned

[...]

The assessment, sent to Brussels in the spring [...] underscores increasing concerns from Western officials that Beijing and Moscow are working in parallel, learning from each other’s tactics to undermine Western democracies and sow chaos.

“What is innovated by China on one end of the globe will be perfected by Russia on the other,” according to a portion of the report. “[EU nations] need to respond jointly and globally to attacks – even (or especially) those countries who are only indirectly affected.”

In a stark warning from EU diplomats to European commissioners, the document warns of “a gap” in Western thinking which China and Russia are seeking to “exploit”.

Experts consulted in the report, [...] said that Russia is learning from Beijing’s so-called “grey zone” tactics in Taiwan, and perfecting them for use in Europe.

The term “grey zone” is used to describe the situation which exists between peace and open warfare and hostile activities fall just below what might be considered traditional acts of war.

[...]

Since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the UK and other European nations has seen an increase in suspected hybrid attacks co-ordinated by Moscow, such as cyber hacks, arson, disinformation and possible sabotage of critical undersea communication cables.

China has continued to deploy grey-zone warfare tactics by repeatedly encircling Taiwan with fighter jets and navy ships, launching cyber attacks, and making provocative statements of its desire to “reunite” with the self-ruled island. It has also launched at least a dozen rockets – or satellite missions – that have passed over Taiwan’s air defence zone in the past two years as fears of an all-out invasion grow.

[...]

The classified EU report argues that Taiwan is only a “sub-theatre” for a much larger war against the West “rather than just one country”.

Dr Sari Arho Havrén, a associate fellow at the Rusi think-tank and China analyst, said the tactics are “perfect tools” to attack the “vulnerabilities of open, democratic and rule of law societies” because Russia and China can work together to weaken Western nations while simultaneously maintain a “plausible deniability”.

She [said]: “China and Russia have deepened their co-operation and co-ordination on all areas, and not least on security and militarily.

[...]

“China’s support for Russia’s war economy through dual-use goods and sanctions evasion could be mirrored in a Taiwan scenario, with Russia also providing combat expertise or hybrid distractions like cyber attacks on European infrastructure.”

[...]

If Chinese President Xi Jinping wanted to attack Taiwan, “he would first make sure that he makes a call to his very junior partner in all of this, Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin… telling him, ‘Hey, I’m going to do this, and I need you to to keep them busy in Europe by attacking Nato territory’,” Rutte said in an interview with The New York Times.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/40112762

The German media outlet TAZ - a centre-left publishing house - has published the linked article in German. Here is a English summary, but you're gonna find useful translation for full text.

More than a thousand protesters fought a street battle with special police forces in the southwestern Chinese city of Jiangyou [in Sichuan province]. The angry crowd threw bottles and rubbish on the security forces and shouted again and again: “Give us back our democracy!”

The police beat up on the crowd, dragged individuals over the asphalt and finally drove them on barred cargo areas of trucks like cattle.

What caused the popular anger? The so-called Jiangyou incident started with an apparently apolitical crime case. A 14-year-old girl from simple backgrounds – the mother deaf, the father physically disabled – was lured into an abandoned building by three classmates.

Authorities responded only after massive public pressure

The abuse took place on 22. July, but the alarmed authorities were apparently slow and unmotivated. Only after massive public pressure did they issue a statement that the perpetrators got away with mild punishments – two are supposed to be transferred to a school with special educational measures, one came away with an instruction.

The father of the victim, an illiterate, is also said to have been urged by the police to sign a settlement that he did not understand.

The public suspected a two-class justice system. Because the parents of the perpetrators, it was said in rumors on social media, have good connections to the authorities.

With hundreds of sympathizers, the family of the victim moved to the city administration, where some people stormed the building. The police mobilized special forces units and at least one military vehicle with jammers to block Internet and mobile phones.

Circumventing censorship with the help of US platforms

In China’s Internet, the Jiangyou incident is a politically sensitive issue. The state-controlled media are only allowed to report on the basis of strict guidelines. And on social media, the algorithm of the censorship authorities selects which comments become public.

But activists abroad, who have been observing China’s protest movements for years, were able to archive images of the incident in the few minutes before censorship took effect. Then videos and texts were uploaded to X, Youtube or Instagram. China’s censorship has no access to these US platforms.

There, Chinese can debate the topic with a VPN software. “My heart hurts,” comments an Internet user. Another says: “A government without credibility; a breeding ground for corruption and bribery; a country tainted to its foundations.”

“The case is not unique, but it really excited me because I was once a victim of bullying in school,” recalls a Chinese man who lives abroad today: In front of classmates, gawking passers-by and even the guard of the school, he was once beaten hospital-ready. The advertisement tried to prevent the school management in order not to damage their reputation.

Small local protests are commonplace in China

In fact, there are thousands of social protests in China every year. They usually take place far from the public. They are local protests with few participants against forced relocations, medical malpractice and corrupt cadres.

[...]

The number of demonstrators is also crucial: the more protested, the more likely the police intervene.

This was also the case at the end of 2022, when, for the first time in years, protesters in the major metropolises directly challenged the central government. “Down with Xi Jinping!” shouted crowds in Shanghai at protesters against the zero covid policy. Identification thanks to effective digital monitoring

But the power of the digital surveillance state was also evident: All demonstrators, even if they took to the streets without a smartphone and wore face masks, could be identified. Some got away with an interrogation and a warning, others disappeared for months.

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/40060947

Archived

• Prompt supplies of Russia's Urals crude are being offered to Chinese buyers at cheaper prices, garnering interest from state and private refiners.
• Chinese imports of Urals are not typically part of processors' regular appetite due to geographical distance and high freight costs, but China is seen as a viable alternative market.
• Jianan Sun, an analyst with Energy Aspects, said China will unlikely be able to absorb all Russian barrels backed out from India, as Urals is not a base-load grade for Chinese state-owned refineries.

Prompt supplies of Russia’s flagship Urals crude are being offered to Chinese buyers, a sign of shifts in the global oil market as President Donald Trump takes aim at India over its purchases from Moscow.

Urals shipments for October arrival are being touted to buyers at cheaper prices, garnering interest from state and private refiners who are currently negotiating for cargoes, according to traders with direct knowledge of the talks, who asked not to be identified as they aren’t authorized to speak publicly.

While China is the no. 1 buyer of Russian oil delivered by sea as well as land routes, local refiners predominantly take ESPO, a grade that’s produced and loaded from the eastern part of the country. Chinese imports of Urals, which ships from ports in the west, are not typically part of processors’ regular appetite given the geographical distance and high freight costs.

[...]

While China — with its vast refining system as well as strategic petroleum reserves (SPR) appetite — is seen as a viable alternative market for Urals, it’s unclear if Beijing would pick up the slack amid trade tensions with Washington. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the US may also impose tariffs on China, when asked about targeting countries that buy Moscow’s energy.

[...]

Urals cargoes are being discussed with potential Chinese buyers at premiums as low as $1.50 a barrel to London’s Brent, down from a differential near $2.50 late last week, the traders said. Companies offering these shipments include Russia-affiliated traders such as Litasco.

Traders said between five and 10 cargoes of Urals have been purchased by Chinese buyers in recent days, although this could not be verified by Bloomberg.

[...]

Last month, Chinese refiner Shandong Yulong Petrochemical Co., bought Urals in a rare move

“While India substantially reduces spot Russian buying, some Chinese refineries picked up a few cargoes for Urals for October delivery,” Jianan Sun, an analyst with Energy Aspects wrote in an Aug. 7 note. “But China will unlikely be able to absorb all Russian barrels backed out from India.”

Sun added: “Urals is not a base-load grade for Chinese stated-owned refineries, limiting the country’s interest in stockpiling the grade strategically. We also think Chinese SOEs will be cautious about taking extra Russian barrels amid US–China trade negotiations.”

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/40058759

Many say control measure for mosquito-borne disease hark back to the zero-Covid era, in which people’s daily lives were strictly monitored.

[...]

A single mother living in Zhanjiang, a port city in Guangdong province, posted a video on social media this week showing a group of people, including a uniformed police officer, entering her children’s bedroom in the middle of the night and taking blood samples from the boy and the girl, without their mother’s presence or consent. The mother had been working a night shift so was not at home.

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Health authorities in Guangdong are on high alert because of an outbreak of Chikungunya that started about a month ago in Foshan, a city 260km from Zhanjiang. There have been about 8,000 reported cases so far, and at least one imported case in Hong Kong, a city that borders Guangdong.

Chikungunya is a mosquito-borne disease that can only be spread by being bitten by an insect with the virus. Symptoms include fever, muscle and joint pain, nausea and a rash. In rare cases, symptoms can last for months or even years. But it is rarely fatal. Babies, elderly people and people with underlying health conditions are most at risk.

There are regular Chikungunya outbreaks in Asia, Africa and the Americas, but this is the first time that there has been a major occurrence in China.

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cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/39930917

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Economists at the European Central Bank (ECB) said that between 2015 and 2022, 240,000 jobs in the Eurozone had either "ceased to exist" or been shifted to less-exposed sectors as a result of competition from Chinese manufacturers.

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The ECB highlights the automobile and chemical industries as among those most exposed to increased competition from Chinese rivals. In the former, it said published job vacancies had fallen by 55% between 2019 and 2024, while in the latter the decline was 95%. In sectors unaffected by Chinese competition, published vacancies had been "relatively stable."

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The current US trade policy and the imposition of tariffs are likely to increase Chinese competition. Following the Trump Administration’s announcements of higher US tariffs on Chinese goods, Chinese exporters may expand or seek new markets elsewhere and increasingly redirect trade towards Europe. This trade diversion may amplify the penetration of imports from China into euro area markets, challenging producers [...] While euro area firms may gain some competitive advantage in US markets relative to China because US tariffs on China are comparatively higher, this is unlikely to offset losses in the domestic market.

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