Brazil's first lady ‘upset Xi's wife' by chiding TikTok in China
Her well-meaning attempt to bring up the issue of children addicted to TikTok received a frosty response from her Chinese opposite number, Xi's wife Peng Liyuan, it was later reported. A Chinese minister was also said to have been upset.
The controversy has now moved from China to Brazilian politics, where attention has focused on how the story was made known to newspapers. The chief suspect is Rui Costa, chief of staff to President Lula, who was present and whose wider role as
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Telegraph
6 minutes ago
- Telegraph
Chinese vessels collide while pursuing Filipino boat
Two Chinese vessels crashed into each other while chasing a Filipino patrol boat in the South China Sea on Monday. The incident occurred near the contested Scarborough Shoal as the Philippine coast guard escorted boats distributing aid to fishermen in the area, according to Cdre Jay Tarriela, a Filipino spokesman. Video released by Manila showed a China coast guard ship and a much larger navy vessel bearing the number 164 on its hull colliding with a loud crash. Cdre Tarriela said: 'The CCG 3104 [China coast guard vessel], which was chasing the BRP Suluan [Filipino coast guard vessel] at high speed, performed a risky manoeuvre from the [Filipino] vessel's starboard quarter, leading to the impact with the PLA [People's Liberation Army] navy warships. 'This resulted in substantial damage to the CCG vessel's forecastle, rendering it unseaworthy.' 'Necessary measures' Gan Yu, a Chinese coast guard spokesman, confirmed that a Monday confrontation had taken place without mentioning the collision. He said: 'The China coast guard took necessary measures in accordance with the law, including monitoring, pressing from the outside, blocking and controlling the Philippine vessels to drive them away.' The reported collision is the latest in a series of confrontations between China and the Philippines in the South China Sea, which Beijing claims almost entirely despite an international ruling that the assertion has no legal basis. More than 60 per cent of global maritime trade passes through the disputed waterway. Ferdinand Marcos, the president of the Philippines, said the country's patrol vessels would 'continue to be present' in the area to defend, as well as exercise Manila's sovereign rights over, what it considers to be part of its territory. The Scarborough Shoal – a triangular chain of reefs and rocks – has been a flashpoint between the countries since China seized it from the Philippines in 2012. It was unclear if anyone was hurt in Monday's incident. Cdre Tarriela told AFP that the Chinese crew 'never responded' to the Filipino ship's offer of assistance. Earlier in the confrontation, the BRP Suluan was ' targeted with a water cannon ' by the Chinese but 'successfully' evaded it, according to Cdre Tarriela.
Reuters
2 hours ago
- Reuters
Trump hopes China will quickly quadruple its US soybean orders
Aug 10 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump said on Sunday that he hoped China would quadruple its soybean orders from the U.S, adding that it was also "a way of substantially reducing" Beijing's trade deficit with Washington. "China is worried about its shortage of soybeans. Our great farmers produce the most robust soybeans. I hope China will quickly quadruple its soybean orders. This is also a way of substantially reducing China's Trade Deficit with the USA. Rapid service will be provided. Thank you President XI," Trump said on Truth Social. A tariff truce between Beijing and Washington is set to expire on August 12, but the Trump administration has hinted that the deadline may be extended. China, which takes more than 60% of soybeans shipped worldwide, buys the oilseed mainly from Brazil and the United States. The most active soybean contract on the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT) was up 2.13% at $10.08 a bushel at 0446 GMT, having been little changed before Trump's post. China imported roughly 105 million metric tons of soybeans last year, just under a quarter coming from the U.S. and the remainder from Brazil. Quadrupling shipments would require China to import the bulk of its soybeans from the U.S. "It's highly unlikely that China would ever buy four times its usual volume of soybeans from the U.S.," Johnny Xiang, founder of Beijing-based AgRadar Consulting, said. It is unclear if securing China's agreement to buy more U.S. soybeans is a condition for extending the trade truce. China's Ministry of Commerce did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. The country has steadily reduced its reliance on U.S. soybeans in recent years, shifting more purchases to South America. Under the Phase One trade deal signed during Trump's first term, China agreed to boost purchases of U.S. agricultural products, including soybeans. However, Beijing ultimately fell far short of meeting those targets. This year, amid Washington–Beijing trade tensions, it has yet to buy any fourth quarter U.S. beans, fuelling concerns as the U.S. harvest export season approaches. "On Beijing's side, there have been quite a few signals that China is prepared to forego U.S. soybeans altogether this year, including booking those test cargoes of soymeal from Argentina," said Even Rogers Pay, an agricultural analyst at Trivium China. Reuters previously reported that Chinese feedmakers have purchased three Argentine soymeal cargoes as they aim to secure cheaper South American supplies amid concerns about a possible soybean supply disruption in the fourth quarter. U.S. soybean industry has been seeking alternative buyers, but no other country matches China's scale. Last year, China imported 22.13 million tons of soybeans from the U.S., and 74.65 million tons from Brazil.
The Guardian
3 hours ago
- The Guardian
‘I don't expect to live a normal life': how a Leeds teenager woke up with a Chinese bounty on her head
It was Christmas Eve 2024 and 19-year-old Chloe Cheung was lying in bed at home in Leeds when she found out the Chinese authorities had put a bounty on her head. As she scrolled through Instagram looking at festive songs, a stream of messages from old school friends started coming into her phone. Look at the news, they told her. Media outlets across east Asia were reporting that Cheung, who had just finished her A-levels, had been declared a threat to national security by officials in Hong Kong. There was an offer of HK$1m (£94,000) to anyone who could assist in her arrest or capture. News reports included a photograph of her aged 11, seemingly the only picture officials had of her before she and her family left to resettle in the UK in 2020. 'I couldn't even really recognise myself,' she says. Cheung says she was still in a state of shock as friends started jokingly congratulating her on her infamy. After finishing school, she had been working as a communications assistant for a campaign group in the UK that advocates for democracy in Hong Kong. She could barely believe that Chinese officials would care about a teenager living thousands of miles away. Yet, as friends started unfollowing her on social media, the life-changing consequences of what had just happened became clear. 'They were saying 'sorry, but you are a criminal in Hong Kong now so we can't be associated with you.' Even friends here in Leeds said they would have to stop seeing me as they wanted to be able to go back to Hong Kong,' she says. Cheung had dreamed of a gap year travelling the world and visiting friends in Hong Kong. Neither was possible now, after Chinese officials vowed to 'pursue for life' Cheung and others they accuse of promoting democracy. Beijing has a history of targeting critics in exile and pressuring countries to detain and deport them. 'The bounty will follow me for ever. It's a form of psychological warfare – telling the world that dissent has no safe haven. Even if you were just a teenager when you spoke out, you're not safe,' says Cheung. But if China's aim was to dissuade her from taking a public stance on Hong Kong or criticising it, it has not worked. Cheung says she has no intention of staying quiet. Growing up in Hong Kong, Cheung says she always felt patriotic and used to 'love running home for the flag-raising ceremony that happened on TV at 6.30pm'. But that all changed in 2019-20 when millions of people took to the streets of Hong Kong. The demonstrators were protesting against the increasingly autocratic authority of Beijing and the control it wanted to exert over the former British territory, which since 1997 has been classified as a 'special administrative region' – part of Chinese territory but governed under separate rules and laws to the mainland. Transnational repression is the state-led targeting of refugees, dissidents and ordinary citizens living in exile. It involves the use of electronic surveillance, physical assault, intimidation and threats against family members to silence criticism. The Guardian's Rights and freedom series is publishing a series of articles to highlight the dangers faced by citizens in countries including the UK. Until then, Hong Kong had been allowed a degree of autonomy from mainland China, including a partially democratically elected executive and an independent media. From 2020, after several years of pro-democracy protests known as the 'umbrella revolution', Beijing began to impose closer control over the territory, including changing election laws so that only pro-Beijing 'patriots' could run for office, and introducing extradition powers allowing it to transfer fugitives to the mainland. The constitutional principle of 'one country, two systems', agreed with the British before the handover in 1997, was abandoned, with Hong Kong's pro-democracy parties later disbanding as the possibility of peaceful political change receded. 'At the time I attended my first protest, I was expecting it to be completely peaceful because I was taught at school that we have freedom of speech and press in Hong Kong,' Cheung recalls. 'Then suddenly, the police started shooting teargas and rubber bullets at us and started arresting people really violently; dragging protesters and standing on their necks. I was just 14 and my worldview completely changed. 'I realised whatever we had been learning in school was a lie,' she says. 'I'd been brainwashed. I felt helpless and fooled.' Sign up to Global Dispatch Get a different world view with a roundup of the best news, features and pictures, curated by our global development team after newsletter promotion Thousands of protesters and opponents of the new powers were arrested and charged in a brutal crackdown that led to condemnation from countries including the UK, which offered residents in Hong Kong the chance to resettle. Although her parents were not political, Cheung says they could see that it was better for her and her younger brother's future to move to the UK. Her family, says Cheung, 'knew I was someone who doesn't know how to shut up. They didn't want either of us to end up in prison for speaking our mind, because my mum said, 'You are kind of nobody. No one would know that you're in prison.'' The family arrived in Leeds in 2020, where Cheung, then 15, threw herself into studying for her GCSEs. With the UK going through Covid lockdowns, she spent most of her time at home catching up on the syllabus and practising past exam papers. After a successful first year, she went on to study maths, further maths and economics for A-level. Her first taste of activism outside Hong Kong came at 18 after she made a submission to the UN on the experiences of women during the 2019-20 protests in the city. She was later invited to the UN office in Geneva to join an NGO meeting on the topic. It was here that she met members of the Committee for Freedom in Hong Kong, which advocates for democracy. 'At that point I knew I could not afford to go to university yet [as she would have to pay the higher overseas tuition fees] so asked the committee if I could take a job working for them,' she says. 'I didn't imagine it would be a career and when I was hired it was just on a short-term contract, more or less as an intern,' says Cheung. 'I was happy just to save up money.' She soon began taking on a more public role at the committee, speaking to MPs and journalists while using her real name. She thinks it was this that irked Chinese officials. 'I spoke with a lot of media and my quotes were used as someone who was born and grew up in Hong Kong and so with a personal connection. The authorities saw that and intentionally want to target people who have got a profile.' After the bounty and warrant for her arrest were announced, Cheung says she did consider taking herself out of the public spotlight. 'But I thought if I do this now everyone will know it is because I am scared and giving up,' she says. 'They [China] want to stop others from speaking out publicly, but I know I am fortunate to have my family here in the UK.' However, it has not been easy. Cheung has faced an onslaught of sexual harassment and abuse via social media and was followed by two 'suspicious-looking' Chinese men to a restaurant after an event. She reported the incident to the police. She has had to change her address and is now cautious about meeting new people. In 2022, a pro-democracy protester demonstrating on the pavement was dragged into China's consulate in Manchester before being beaten up in a 'barbaric' attack. 'It was certainly because a UK police officer broke diplomatic protocol and stepped into the grounds of the consulate to save him that something worse didn't happen to that protester,' she says. 'He could have disappeared. It's just a matter of time before someone is kidnapped or killed, given how much China is escalating their overseas repression.' Aside from her personal safety, Cheung realises her public profile is now limiting her future choices in life. 'I have shut off a lot of job opportunities with any company that has business ties or trade with China. They won't hire me now. 'I don't expect to live a normal life, but compared with the people in prison back in Hong Kong, my sacrifice is nothing. I really want to see a free Hong Kong so if my public role can help the situation a little bit, it will be worthwhile.' A spokesperson for the government of the Hong Kong special administrative region said Cheung was an 'absconder hiding in the UK' and wanted for 'blatantly engaging in activities endangering national security'. They added that she would be 'pursued regardless of distance'.
