World News by Wild Rose

Taiwan’s transfer of a former coastguard vessel to the Philippines has triggered a dual controversy – raising concerns over the interests of Taiwanese fishermen and prompting strong criticism from Beijing. The matter centres on a 61-metre (200-foot) retired cutter handed over to the Philippine Coast Guard through a non-governmental organisation on Monday, as Taipei and Manila expand practical maritime cooperation despite the absence of formal diplomatic ties. Beijing’s Taiwan Affairs Office...

Chinese President Xi Jinping has completed a whirlwind 43-hour trip to the United States, his first state visit to the country in more than a decade, with US President Donald Trump pulling out all the stops to make it a grand affair. The two leaders met several times during the visit, including at a ceremonial airport welcome, the White House reception and bilateral talks on a wide range of topics including trade, tariffs and Taiwan. They also attended a state dinner in Xi’s honour with top...

Chinese President Xi Jinping pressed his US counterpart Donald Trump to explicitly oppose Taiwan independence – a call that would require a shift in Washington’s long-standing position and further restraint on American arms sales to the island, according to analysts. During the meeting between the two leaders on Thursday, Xi said he hoped the US side would “adhere to the correct position of opposing ‘Taiwan independence’”, according to a statement from the foreign ministry in Beijing. The...

Chinese President Xi Jinping and US President Donald Trump discussed artificial intelligence (AI) and Taiwan at the White House on Thursday as part of a state visit dominated by pageantry. On AI, Xi said that “the right thing to do is to draw on each other’s strengths, not guard against each other”, according to a statement from the Chinese foreign ministry. He also backed continued dialogue about risks, joint efforts to prevent misuse and keeping AI under human control. Trump earlier said on...

“Bloomberg: The China Show” is your definitive source for news and analysis on the world's second-biggest economy. From politics and policy to tech and trends, Yvonne Man and David Ingles give global investors unique insight, delivering in-depth discussions with the newsmakers who matter. (Source: Bloomberg)

The two superpowers seek greater dialogue despite differences over issues such as Iran, Taiwan, AI and trade.

President Donald Trump has welcomed Chinese President Xi Jinping to Washington, praising what he called their “truly great friendship” as the two leaders opened talks focused on trade, Taiwan, Iran and artificial intelligence.

Xi’s first White House visit in more than a decade comes amid ongoing disputes over trade, AI, Taiwan and war in Iran.

Paraguayan President Santiago Pena told the United Nations General Assembly on Wednesday that his country “is not neutral” on the Taiwan Strait, pledging support for the self-ruled island and calling for its “full and meaningful participation” in the UN system. Casting a conflict in the strait as a potentially far greater threat than the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, Pena warned of “ominous clouds gathering over the Indo-Pacific” and of a conflict that would hit Japan, the rest of East and...

Taiwan’s coastguard fired a supersonic anti-ship missile during a military exercise last week, an unusual move by a civilian law enforcement agency that analysts say could be aimed at complicating potential war plans. The drill matters not only because it highlights the growing integration between the agency and Taiwan’s navy, experts argue, but also because missile-armed coastguard vessels would add another threat the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) would have to account for in a conflict. On...

Reports that Taiwanese officials have been asked to scale back visits to Washington have sparked debate over whether the island’s ties with the United States remain as “rock solid” as Taipei has maintained. The New York Times reported on Monday that some Taiwanese officials travelling to the US had been told by Trump administration officials to “curtail their visits to research groups in Washington”. The report came as US President Donald Trump prepared to host Chinese leader Xi Jinping for a...

The top Democrat on the US Senate’s foreign policy panel urged Donald Trump on Monday not to signal any retreat from Taiwan when he hosts Chinese President Xi Jinping this week. Speaking at the Concordia Summit in New York, Senator Jeanne Shaheen said she hoped the president “will not say anything that indicates a lack of support for Taiwan” during his talks with the Chinese leader. Shaheen is the ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, which reviews US arms sales abroad,...

The United States, Japan and South Korea announced a new economic-security consultation and reinforced their support for stability across the Taiwan Strait on Monday, sending a coordinated message on two of Beijing’s most sensitive issues just days before Chinese President Xi Jinping’s summit with US President Donald Trump. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Japanese Foreign Minister Motegi Toshimitsu and South Korean Foreign Minister Cho Hyun unveiled the initiative after meeting on the...

Nearly half of Taiwanese lack confidence that Washington will continue military aid and arms sales to the island, according to a new survey released on Monday ahead of this week’s Trump–Xi summit. The poll by Taiwan-based United Daily News found 47 per cent were not confident the United States would continue providing military assistance and selling weapons to Taiwan, slightly exceeding the 44 per cent who remained confident. Nine per cent had no opinion. Conducted by the newspaper since 2010,...

Taiwan’s government has launched an international organization for the first time, highlighting its efforts to push back at China’s growing campaign to isolate it on the global stage.

In a rare development, Taiwanese Labour Minister Hung Sun-han is expected to travel to Nanjing on Sunday, becoming the first cabinet-level official under William Lai Ching-te’s administration to visit mainland China. Hung will attend an Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) ministerial meeting on Monday to discuss employment, vocational training, social security and the impact of artificial intelligence on jobs. Hung will be the most senior Taiwanese official to visit the mainland for Apec...

The United States is considering postponing the announcement of major arms sales to Taiwan until after November’s Apec summit in Shenzhen, multiple sources told the South China Morning Post. The potential delay comes as Chinese President Xi Jinping prepares to travel to Washington next week for a state visit. The sources said there was a strong possibility US President Donald Trump could extend the delay through to the end of the year, pointing to a planned bilateral meeting between the two...

Progress towards reunifying with Taiwan hinges on factors like the island’s level of provocation, retired PLA major general Luo Yan told the South China Morning Post, warning that Taiwan’s leader had challenged Beijing’s red lines. Speaking on the sidelines of the Xiangshan Forum in Beijing on Wednesday, Luo said the timeline for reunification with mainland China was shaped by “the development of our national strength, our defence needs, the global security environment, as well as the degree of...

Washington, Sept. 15 (Jiji Press)--Japanese and U.S. lawmakers Tuesday agreed that deterring China is important to prevent a contingency involving Taiwan. The view was shared at a meeting in Washington between a pro-Taiwan group of lawmakers from Japan's ruling Liberal Democratic Party and a bipartisan group of U.S. lawmakers, including Sen. Thomas Tillis, co-chair of the Senate Taiwan Cauc...

Beijing, Sept. 15 (Jiji Press)--A senior Chinese Foreign Ministry official has told visiting Japanese lawmakers that Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi's remarks last November on a possible Taiwan contingency are the main reason for difficulties in bilateral relations, it was learned Tuesday. Chinese Assistant Foreign Minister Liu Bin criticized Takaichi during a meeting in Beijing on M...

Taiwan’s military has taken delivery of 291 one-way attack drones from US maker Anduril Industries, only to find they came without chargers and require American assistance to recharge them. The revelation involving the Altius-600M loitering munitions has prompted Taiwan’s opposition lawmakers to question the military’s procurement and logistical planning, days before the drones join other weapons systems in a three-day live-fire exercise. The controversy comes at a sensitive time in...

Tokyo, Sept. 14 (Jiji Press)--Policy officials from Japan's ruling Liberal Democratic Party and Taiwan's ruling Democratic Progressive Party agreed Monday to strengthen cooperation to promote peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait. In a policy dialogue held at the LDP's headquarters in Tokyo, the two sides mainly discussed diplomacy and security, including responses to Chinese military an...

“Separatists” and the United States are putting Taiwan in greater danger, China’s state broadcaster CCTV warned on Friday after Washington’s de facto ambassador said the island could convince a potential adversary that landing forces would be very difficult. Raymond Greene, the director of the American Institute in Taiwan, said in a keynote address at the 2026 Taipei Security Dialogue on Wednesday that “Taiwan doesn’t need to demonstrate that it can win a war outright”. He added that Taiwan had...

Beijing has strongly condemned a visit to Italy by senior Taiwanese officials and lodged formal diplomatic protests with both Rome and Brussels. Criticising the visit on Friday, foreign ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning said Beijing had submitted “serious representations against Italy and the European Union” following reports that Taiwan’s No 2 official, Hsiao Bi-khim, had arrived in Italy to attend an international forum. “[Taiwan’s] Democratic Progressive Party authorities and individual...

On September 1, former Ukrainian defence minister Mykhailo Fedorov announced that Alex Karp, CEO of artificial intelligence and data analytics firm Palantir Technologies, would become the lead investor in a new defence technology company he is building. This confirmed what Fedorov had only gestured at two days earlier in an interview with the Financial Times: that what he was selling investors was never really drones. In that interview, he also suggested he was ready to trade drone-warfare...

The United States is leaning on its coastguard to reinforce its presence in the West Pacific as its navy comes under increasing strain in the Middle East. Although this move may be seen as a lower-risk way of countering Beijing’s growing presence in the region, increasing US cooperation with the Taiwanese coastguard risks further mainland Chinese pressure on the island. Recently, the US announced that six fast-response cutters that had been based in the Middle East for more than 20 years would...

Taiwan’s representative office is among a list of entities US President Donald Trump has threatened to sue as part of his crusade against a progressive American think tank, triggering debate about the island’s US policy ahead of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s visit to Washington later this month. Trump named the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office (Tecro) in a social media post on Monday attacking the Centre for American Progress, a prominent left-leaning Washington think tank,...

Taiwan’s opposition and tour operators have hit back at new registration rules for travellers heading to mainland China, with politicians accusing the ruling Democratic Progressive Party of trying to fan cross-strait fears ahead of local elections. Since September 1, travellers to the mainland, Hong Kong and Macau have been required to register details of their trip, including the purpose of their visit, contact information, travel dates as well as the numbers of their passports and mainland...

The risk of a conflict over Taiwan is shaping Japanese defence planning, with Tokyo shoring up security at home and abroad for a potentially prolonged fight. But there are economic, demographic and political constraints on how far its military transformation can go. In the first of a three-part series, Gabriel Dominguez examines how Japan is building a network of partnerships to strengthen its strategic endurance. Japan is rapidly building a web of defence partnerships spanning the Indo-Pacific...

A television drama produced by Beijing’s top counter-espionage agency has put the spotlight on real-life cases in the high-stakes intelligence battle between mainland China and Taiwan. Over the past decade, mainland Chinese spy dramas have rarely touched on contemporary espionage across the Taiwan Strait but on Sunday state broadcaster CCTV began airing a 40-episode television series about such intelligence efforts from 1998 to 2018. Overseen by the Ministry of State Security, The Long Watch...