Latest news with #JoeCash
The Star
27-05-2025
- The Star
At least five dead and another six missing after chemical plant blast in China's Shandong
There were no immediate details of casualties. - PHOTO: SCREENGRAB FROM WEIBO via The Straits Times/Asia News Network BEIJING (Reuters): An explosion at a chemical plant in the eastern Chinese province of Shandong killed at least five people, with 19 injured and six missing, the state-run Xinhua agency said late on Tuesday. The blast occurred a few minutes before noon on Tuesday, shaking part of a chemical plant operated by Shandong Youdao Chemical in the city of Weifang. Videos circulating on Chinese social media and verified by Reuters showed plumes of orange and black smoke billowing into the sky. Windows of nearby buildings were ripped from their hinges by the explosion, one of the videos showed. More than 200 emergency workers responded to the blast, according to a statement issued by China's emergency response authority on Tuesday afternoon. Drone video posted by The Beijing News, a government-run publication, showed smoke emerging from the chemical plant and from a second, unidentified facility nearby. Baidu Maps, a navigation app, shows other manufacturing companies next to Youdao's plant, including a textile company, a machinery company and a firm that makes industrial coating materials. The Weifang Ecological Environment Bureau dispatched staff to test the site of the blast but said there were no results yet available. The bureau advised nearby residents to wear face masks in the meantime, Beijing News reported. Shandong Youdao Chemical is owned by Himile Group, which also owns listed Himile Mechanical, shares of which closed down nearly 3.6% on Tuesday. Youdao was established in August 2019 in the Gaomi Renhe chemical park in Weifang, according to the company's website. The plant covers more than 47 hectares (116 acres) and has more than 300 employees. The company develops, produces and sells chemical components for use in pesticides and pharmaceuticals. Blasts at chemical plants in China in recent years have included one in the northwest region of Ningxia in 2024 and another in the southeastern province of Jiangxi in 2023. Two massive explosions at warehouses containing hazardous and flammable chemicals in the port city of Tianjin in 2015 killed over 170 people and injured 700. That incident prompted the government to tighten laws covering chemical storage. An explosion in 2015 at another chemical plant in Shandong killed 13 people. (Reporting by Joe Cash, Ethan Wang, Yukun Zhang, Xiuhao Chen and Shi Bu in Beijing and Farah Master in Hong Kong; editing by Clarence Fernandez, Christian Schmollinger, Alison Williams and Mark Heinrich) - Reuters
Yahoo
06-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Chinese fighter jets soar over Egypt in first joint exercises
By Joe Cash BEIJING (Reuters) - The sound of Chinese fighter jets roared over the Egyptian pyramids and could echo across the Middle East, as Beijing wrapped up military drills with Cairo aimed at chipping away at U.S. strategic influence in the volatile region. China's military on Monday released videos of its fast jets, helicopters and transport planes flying high above the Sahara and hailing inaugural joint air force exercises with Egypt as "a signal of deepening military ties and shifting alliances". The joint exercises with one of the United States' biggest security partners come as Washington increasingly turns inward under President Donald Trump, allowing China to deepen ties across North Africa and invest billions in security projects. "As Egypt looks beyond its traditional U.S. partnership, a new era of cooperation is taking flight over Cairo's skies," said a video released by the international division of state broadcaster CCTV, as a jet plane takes off into the night. Global Times, a tabloid owned by the newspaper of the ruling Communist Party, People's Daily, said the "Eagles of Civilisation 2025" drills had established a foundation for various potential cooperation between the two countries' militaries at a time when Egypt is trying to upgrade its combat equipment, citing experts. Analysts say the 18-day drills also help Egypt assert itself as a major regional power among the Arab nations and North Africa amid growing regional turbulence. "It's great public diplomacy for (China), particularly in the Middle East," said Eric Orlander, co-founder of the China-Global South Project. "It's what brings people in the door for them to sell drones, SAMs, light arms, transports, et cetera." "A major regional power needs an Air Force, right?" he added. Orlander cautioned that switching jet fighter systems is very expensive, and Washington could choose to withhold financial military support from Cairo if it upped its purchases of Chinese technologies. But the United States - the primary security partner to Egypt, neighbouring Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states since the late seventies - has made large foreign cuts under Trump that have been keenly felt across the region. And with the Gaza crisis unfolding to its north-east, ethnic violence in Sudan to the south, and political instability in Libya to its west, Egypt finds itself squeezed on three fronts. China has since pledged billions in fresh investment for projects such as satellite manufacturing facilities in Egypt capable of producing military-grade surveillance equipment. Beijing's air force said the drills represented "a new starting point and a significant milestone in military cooperation between the two countries," in a statement marking their conclusion. (Reporting by Joe Cash; Editing by Saad Sayeed)
Japan Today
30-04-2025
- Business
- Japan Today
'Never kneel': China uses Korean War and AI memes to hit back at Trump
By Joe Cash China is leveraging its propaganda machine to hit back at U.S. tariffs, rolling out videos using Cold War imagery to lambaste "imperialists" and send a simple message - capitulation to bullies is dangerous, and we won't back down. Beijing has made little effort to contain its anger at the tariffs, which it says are tantamount to bullying and will do nothing to address issues such as fentanyl abuse and cannot stop the rise of the world's second-largest economy. On Tuesday, China's foreign ministry released a video, complete with a voice-over in American-accented English, on its social media feeds that likened yielding to U.S. President Donald Trump's 145% tariffs to "drinking poison". "China won't kneel down, because we know standing up for ourselves keeps the possibility of cooperation alive, while compromise snuffs it out," the narration said, over footage of a Chinese MiG-15 fighter shooting down a U.S. jet in the Korean War. "Imperialists are always arrogant. If they show a bit of reason it's only because they are forced to do so," it added, this time over footage of the signing of the armistice that ended the war. China's top diplomat Wang Yi on Monday likened Trump's trade policy to "the open return of the law of the jungle," during a meeting of foreign ministers from developing nations in Brazil. "If we choose to stay silent or compromise, it will only embolden the bully further," Wang told his BRICS bloc counterparts, according to a foreign ministry readout. One Chinese official, speaking to Reuters on condition of anonymity, said Beijing's view is that yielding or compromising now would only weaken China in the future and allow Trump to change the terms later. Messaging such as "Do Not Kneel" conveys this to a domestic and international audience, the person said. On Chinese social media, where censors scrub anything sensitive, such as alleged human rights abuses, tariff memes abound. "The King has come up with new tariffs! Peasants, peasants, listen up!" run the lyrics to an up-tempo, electro-beat song on Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok, referring to comments from Vice President J.D. Vance who used the term "peasants" to refer to Chinese people earlier this month. "Tariffs for you even if you are not human!" the song continues, showing a picture of a penguin, after U.S. levies were applied to uninhabited Antarctic islands. One AI-generated image on WeChat shows Trump, Vance and Tesla boss Elon Musk assembling sneakers and cheap flip-flops at a factory. Another shows a picture of Trump next to a pig's snout. Still, not all Chinese social media perspectives are positive for Beijing. On Zhihu, China's equivalent to Quora, many of the answers to a question about the foreign ministry's video were negative. "Our foreign propaganda department is really poor in terms of ability. If you don't know how to do propaganda, then just don't do it," wrote one user. © Thomson Reuters 2025.
Yahoo
12-04-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
China retaliates again in Trump's trade war, prompting flight from US assets
By Joe Cash, Karin Strohecker and James Oliphant BEIJING/WASHINGTON/LONDON (Reuters) -Beijing increased its tariffs on U.S. imports to 125% on Friday, hitting back against President Donald Trump's decision to raise duties on Chinese goods and upping the stakes in a trade war that threatens to upend global supply chains. The retaliation intensified global economic turmoil unleashed by Trump's tariffs. U.S. stocks ended a volatile week higher, but the safe haven of gold hit a record high during the session and benchmark U.S. 10-year government bond yields posted their biggest weekly increase since 2001 alongside a slump in the dollar, signaling a lack of confidence in America Inc. One U.S. survey of consumers showed inflation fears have mounted to their highest since 1981, while financial institutions have been forecasting an ever greater risk of recession. Trump downplayed the market turbulence, predicting the dollar would strengthen and saying many tariffs could settle in around 10% once the United States cut trade deals with all the countries that want to negotiate. "When people understand what we're doing, I think the dollar will go way up," he told reporters aboard Air Force One late on Friday. "The bond market's going good. It had a little moment but I solved that problem very quickly." The White House has said more than 75 countries have sought negotiations and that future deals would bring certainty. India and Japan are among the powers to have advanced toward trade talks, but generally foreign leaders have puzzled over how to respond to the biggest disruption to the world trade order in decades. The tit-for-tat tariff increases by the U.S. and China stand to make goods trade between the world's two largest economies impossible, analysts say. That commerce was worth more than $650 billion in 2024. "The president made it very clear: When the United States is punched, he will punch back harder," White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters on Friday. The dollar slid and a sell-off intensified in U.S. Treasuries, the world's biggest bond market, as gold climbed. With the dollar weakening, selling of U.S. assets was perhaps most exemplified by t The price decline in the U.S. 10-year Treasury note. decline drove its yield - which moves opposite to the price and is critical for determining interest rates on mortgages - to a two-month high. On the week, its yield has climbed nearly half a percentage point. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is closely monitoring the bond market, Leavitt said. A second day of data on U.S. inflation showed price pressures were not yet building broadly across the U.S. economy, although the Producer Price Index for March did show industrial metals prices rising due to import levies on things like steel and aluminum, in place for a month now. "Tarifflation will be much more important for the outlook than backward-looking data," said Bill Adams, chief economist at Comerica Bank. "If tariffs stay in place they will push inflation considerably higher in coming months." The University of Michigan said its Consumer Sentiment Index dropped to 50.8 this month from 57.0 in March. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast the index falling to 54.5. In a reversal of previous surveys, the latest one also showed weakening confidence among Trump's fellow Republicans. Consumers' 12-month inflation expectations soared to 6.7% this month, the highest since 1981, from 5.0% in March, according to the survey. TRADE WAR WITH CHINA This week, Trump announced a 90-day tariff pause on dozens of countries while ratcheting up tariffs on Chinese imports effectively to 145%. China retaliated with more tariffs on Friday. China's finance ministry called Trump's tariffs "completely unilateral bullying and coercion." Beijing indicated this would be the last time it matched U.S. tariff rises but left the door open for other types of retaliation. "If the U.S. truly wants to have talks, it should stop its capricious and destructive behavior," Liu Pengyu, spokesperson for the Chinese embassy in the U.S., wrote on social media. "China will never bow to maximum pressure of the U.S." UBS analysts in a note called China's declaration "an acknowledgement that trade between the two countries has essentially been completely severed." Leavitt, in turn, delivered a warning to Beijing: "If China continues to retaliate, it's not good for China." On Thursday, Trump told reporters he thought the U.S. could make a deal with China and he respected Chinese President Xi Jinping. On Friday, Xi made his first public remarks on Trump's tariffs, telling Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez in Beijing that China and the European Union should "jointly oppose unilateral acts of bullying."
Yahoo
10-04-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
China hits back at Trump tariff hike, raises duties on US goods
By Joe Cash, Yukun Zhang and Ethan Wang BEIJING (Reuters) - China hit back at U.S. President Donald Trump singling out the world's second-largest economy for tariffs of more than 100% by raising additional duties on American products to 84% on Wednesday, deepening the trade war between the two superpowers. Beijing also imposed restrictions on 18 U.S. companies, mostly in defence-related industries, adding to the 60 or so American firms punished over Trump's tariffs. The move comes after Trump made good on his threat to impose an additional 50% tariff on China unless it withdrew its retaliatory levies on the United States, taking total new U.S. duties on Chinese goods this year to 104%. Beijing announced in response it would also raise its levies on U.S. goods by 50%, adding to the 34% increase previously announced and due to be implemented on Thursday. "The U.S. escalation of tariffs on China is a mistake on top of a mistake, which seriously infringes of China's legitimate rights and interests and seriously undermines the rules-based multilateral trading system," China's finance ministry said in a statement. Trump has imposed "reciprocal" tariffs on dozens of economies he accuses of "ripping off" the U.S. by selling goods into the world's largest consumer economy while maintaining trade barriers that inhibit U.S. firms' market access. But he has singled out China for the most punishing taxes, setting the stage for a standoff between the world's top two economies. In signs that bilateral ties could deteriorate further, China's culture and tourism ministry late on Wednesday issued a travel advisory for citizens visiting the U.S., citing recent "deterioration" of economic and trade relations. Shortly after, the Ministry of Education followed with an alert for students considering studying in the U.S. state of Ohio, saying that a recent state education bill contained "negative" China-related provisions. Travel and education are among the top U.S. services exports to China. TRADE SURPLUS 'INEVITABLE' Earlier on Wednesday, China released a white paper on U.S.-China commercial ties in which it said Beijing did not deliberately pursue a trade surplus. "The trade imbalance in goods between China and the U.S. is both an inevitable result of structural issues in the U.S. economy and a consequence of the comparative advantages and international division of labour between the two countries," the report said. China's trade surplus with the U.S. widened to $295.4 billion last year from $279.1 billion in 2023, according to U.S. Census data. The goods trade gap peaked in 2018 at $418 billion, the same year Trump, in his first term as president, imposed tariffs on Chinese outbound shipments. The first U.S.-China trade war concluded with Beijing agreeing to a "Phase 1" trade deal with Washington in 2020 in which it agreed to increase purchases of U.S. exports by $200 billion over a two-year period. Beijing failed to meet its targets when the COVID-19 pandemic struck, but said in its white paper that it had "scrupulously fulfilled its obligations" by taking steps to boost its purchases of U.S. goods and accused Washington of having reneged on the deal. "The U.S. has systematically escalated economic and other forms of pressure against China, the report said. "Concurrently, the U.S. has promoted false narratives related to human rights, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Xinjiang and the pandemic." China also talked up its efforts to boost its trade in services with the U.S., economic activity that the Trump administration has not factored into its "reciprocal" duties. WAR OF ATTRITION China is bracing for an economic war of attrition as it tries to court other markets in Asia, Europe and the world. But other countries have much smaller markets than America and are also taking a hit from the tariffs. During Trump's first term, China frustrated U.S. financial and professional services firms by holding up licence applications and carrying out office raids. But Beijing cannot dip into the same playbook this time as it is trying to attract fresh foreign investment to bolster its economic recovery. Still, Chinese policymakers are backing themselves to go toe-to-toe with the Trump administration a second time. "If the U.S. insists on escalating trade restrictions, China has both the determination and the means to respond forcefully - and will do so," a commerce ministry spokesperson said in a statement accompanying the white paper's launch. "There are no winners in a trade war. China does not want one, but the government will never allow the legitimate rights and interests of the Chinese people to be harmed or taken away." Ordinary Chinese people have started to voice their concern. "The situation has already reached a blatant financial and trade war on the global stage," said Ling Wanhua, a 20-year-old Shanghai resident. "It's already hard for college graduates to find jobs. If the overall environment gets worse, the employment situation for graduates will be even worse." As worries mount, China began censoring some tariff-related content online, with hashtags and searches for "tariff" or "104" mostly blocked on social media platform Weibo. Reuters reported China's top leaders planned to convene a meeting as early as Wednesday to discuss measures to boost the economy and stabilise the capital markets. "I think the 104% tariffs are kind of exaggerated," said Wu Lina, a 68-year-old tourist holidaying in Shanghai. "This president, the way this country treats China, oh my God, it will definitely cause some harm."
