country:china

On China’s New Silk Road, Democracy Pays A Toll – Foreign Policy
▻http://foreignpolicy.com/2018/05/16/on-chinas-new-silk-road-democracy-pays-a-toll

https://foreignpolicymag.files.wordpress.com/2018/05/gettyimages-682506440.jpg

To understand how the #Belt_and_Road Initiative can threaten human rights and good governance, consider first how its projects are financed.To understand how the Belt and Road Initiative can threaten human rights and good governance, consider first how its projects are financed. Thus far, China has largely favored loans over grants. It is not a member of the Paris Club of major creditor nations, and it has shown little inclination to adhere to internationally recognized norms of debt sustainability, such as the sovereign lending principles issued by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development. At the same time, many of the recipient countries participating in the project lack the capability to assess the long-term financial consequences of China’s loans — or they may simply accept them, assuming the bills will come due on a future government’s watch.

Ballooning, unsustainable debt is the predictable result. Sri Lanka, where in 2017 some 95 percent of government revenue went to debt repayment, represents the best-known example of Belt and Road’s negative impact on a country’s balance sheet. But Sri Lanka is only the most prominent case; a recent study by the Center for Global Development identified eight countries — Djibouti, the Maldives, Laos, Montenegro, Mongolia, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Pakistan — that are at particular risk of debt distress due to future Belt and Road-related financing.
[…]
China’s planned development of a “#new_digital_Silk_Road ” has received comparatively less attention than other elements of the initiative but is equally troubling. China’s digital blueprint seeks to promote information technology connectivity across the Indian Ocean rim and Eurasia through new fiber optic lines, undersea cables, cloud computing capacity, and even artificial intelligence research centers. If realized, this ambitious vision will serve to export elements of Beijing’s surveillance regime. Indeed, Chinese technology companies already have a track record of aiding repressive governments. In Ethiopia, likely prior to the advent of Belt and Road, the Washington Post reports that China’s ZTE Corporation “sold technology and provided training to monitor mobile phones and Internet activity.” Today, Chinese tech giant Huawei is partnering with the government of Kenya to construct “safe cities” that leverage thousands of surveillance cameras feeding data into a public security cloud “to keep an eye on what is going on generally” according to the company’s promotional materials. Not all elements of China’s domestic surveillance regime are exportable, but as the “New Digital Silk Road” takes shape, the public and online spaces of countries along it will become less free.
[…]
States financially beholden to China will become less willing to call out Beijing’s domestic human rights abuses, for instance, and less eager to object to its foreign-policy practices. This dynamic is already playing out within the European Union. In mid-2017, for the first time, the EU failed to issue a joint condemnation of China at the U.N. Human Rights Council. Greece, which had recently received a massive influx of Chinese investment into its Port of Piraeus, scuttled the EU statement.

#OBOR

Electronics-Recycling Innovator Going to Prison for Extending Compu...
▻https://diasp.eu/p/7152379

Electronics-Recycling Innovator Going to Prison for Extending Computers’ Lives

[ ▻https://returntonow.net/2018/05/10/ewaste-innovator-prison ]

Eric Lundgren built the first “electronic hybrid recycling” facility in the United States, which turns discarded cellphones and other electronics into functional devices.

Known for building an electric car out of “garbage” that outlasts a Tesla, his company processes more than 41 million pounds of e-waste a year.

Lundgren has received international praise for slowing the stream of harmful chemicals and heavy metals into the environment, and counts IBM, Motorola and Sprint among clients grateful for his cheap refurbished products.

Unfortunately, Microsoft is not such big a fan of Lundgren’s work.

When he figured out how to recycle e-waste from China (...)

ANALYSIS-Data-bait: using tech to hook globe’s multi-billion-dollar fishing cheats
▻https://af.reuters.com/article/africaTech/idAFL8N1Q94J5

In 2016, a Thai-flagged fishing vessel was detained in Seychelles on suspicion that it had been fishing illegally in the Indian Ocean, one of the world’s richest fishing grounds.

The Jin Shyang Yih 668 was caught with help from technology deployed by FISH-i Africa, a grouping of eight east African countries including Tanzania, Mozambique and Kenya.

But as the vessel headed to Thailand, which pledged to investigate and prosecute the case, it turned off its tracking equipment and disappeared. Its whereabouts remain unknown.

Such activity is rampant in the global fishing industry, experts say, where illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing is estimated to cost $23.5 billion a year.

However, a range of non-profit and for-profit organisations that are developing technology solutions to tackle IUU say it is a matter of time before vessels can no longer vanish.

“The industry is developing very fast ... basically the oceans will be fully traceable. There is no place to hide,” said Roberto Mielgo Bregazzi, the co-founder of Madrid-based FishSpektrum, one of the few for-profit platforms.

With backing from Google, Microsoft’s Paul Allen and Leonardo DiCaprio, among others, such platforms also track fishing on the high seas and in marine reserves, aided by radio and satellite data that send vessels’ locations and movements.

They use satellite imagery, drones, algorithms and the ability to process vast amounts of data, as well as old-fashioned sleuthing and analysis, to help countries control their waters.

Algorithms could identify illegal behaviour, Mielgo Bregazzi told the Thomson Reuters Foundation, including predicting when a fishing vessel was about to meet its quota, triggering an alarm.

Bradley Soule, the chief fisheries analyst at OceanMind, a non-profit, said technology can help even rich countries, which might otherwise struggle to process the volume of data broadcast by hundreds of thousands of vessels.

Organisations such as his crunch that data and help to differentiate between normal and suspicious activity.

“The bulk of the threat is non-compliance by mainly legal operators who skirt the rules when they think no one’s looking,” said Soule, who helps Costa Rica monitor its waters.
[…]
Dirk Zeller, who heads the Sea Around Us - Indian Ocean project at the University of Western Australia, said as the ocean’s bounty is a public resource, the world should know who is taking what.

Part of the problem, he said, is overcapacity in the global fishing fleet.

But he also points to difficulties in calculating IUU’s scale: the FAO’s estimates of fish stocks, for instance, are based on official government data, which are open to under- and over-reporting.

His research shows global catches from 1950 to 2010 were 50 percent higher than countries had said.
[…]
The FAO’s senior fishery officer, Matthew Camilleri, agrees technology is no silver bullet.

“What use is it if you’re able to detect IUU fishing and find the vessel with illegal fish on board, but you do not have the process in place to enforce, to prosecute?” he said.

Progress is underway towards that in the form of the FAO’s 2009 Port State Measures Agreement, which is aimed at curbing IUU fishing. Close to half of the 194 U.N. member states have signed it, including four of the top five fishing nations - Indonesia, the United States, Russia and Japan.

China, though, has not. It is the world’s largest fishing nation, whose 2014 catch of 14.8 million tons, the FAO’s 2016 State of the World’s Fisheries report showed, was as much as the next three nations combined.

When asked whether it was likely to sign, China’s mission to the FAO in Rome told the Thomson Reuters Foundation it was not authorized to comment.

Tony Long from GFW - which runs a free-to-access platform that uses Automatic Identification System (AIS) data to track the global movement of vessels - said combining technology with cooperation between countries could close the loopholes.

China Sends Military Plane to Third #South_China_Sea Airstrip - Bloomberg
▻https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-05-10/china-deploys-military-plane-to-third-south-china-sea-airstrip

https://assets.bwbx.io/images/users/iqjWHBFdfxIU/iBZRfPA96qEQ/v1/800x-1.jpg

China has landed a military plane on the last of its three airstrips in the disputed South China Sea, a Washington-based research institution said, amid renewed complaints about the country expanding its military presence in the busy shipping lane.

The Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative said satellite images from April 28 showed the first confirmed deployment of a military aircraft — a Shaanxi Y-8 transport plane — on #Subi_Reef. The structure hosts one of three runways China has built as part of a massive dredging and reclamation operation in the Spratlys chain since 2013, and was the last of three where military aircraft had been observed.

“This should be particularly concerning to the Philippines,” AMTI, a unit of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said on its website. About 100 Philippine civilians and a small military garrison are stationed on the Thitu islet, about 12 nautical miles away from Subi.

The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs said it wasn’t aware of situation described by AMTI. “China’s peaceful construction activities on the #Spratly_Islands, including the deployment of necessary homeland defense facilities, is necessary to protect sovereignty and national security,” the ministry said in an emailed response to questions. “It is an absolute right a sovereign country enjoys and it doesn’t target any country.”

#Spratleys #Mer_de_Chine_méridionale

Japan, China and South Korea hold talks on North Korea and trade - World Socialist Web Site

▻https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2018/05/11/asia-m11.html

Leaders of Japan, China and South Korea met in Tokyo on Wednesday in their first trilateral summit for two-and-half years. Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Chinese Premier Li Keqiang and South Korean President Moon Jae-in held talks on North Korea, as well as trade in the region. The three leaders each held one-on-one meetings with their counterparts on the sidelines.

The summit was portrayed as a renewal of relations between the three countries. Li is the first Chinese leader to visit Japan in seven years, while Moon is the first South Korean president to do so in six-and-a-half years.

#corée_du_nord #japon #chine #corée_du_sud
In a joint statement, the three said they “strongly hope that, building on the results of the Inter-Korean summit, further efforts by relevant parties, in particular through the upcoming US-DPRK (North Korea) Summit, will contribute to comprehensive resolution of concerns of the parties for peace and stability in the region.”

19th Century shipwrecks found during search for #MH370 | Western Australian Museum
▻http://museum.wa.gov.au/about/latest-news/19th-century-shipwrecks-found-during-search-mh370

Two shipwrecks discovered 2,300km off the coast of Western Australia during the initial search for missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 have been identified as 19th Century merchant sailing vessels carrying cargoes of coal.

The sites provide tangible archaeological evidence for use of the historic Roaring 40s trade route for ships between Europe, North America, Australia, New Zealand, India, Southeast Asia, China and Japan. 

The Western Australian Museum was asked by the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) to analyse sonar and video data taken in international waters by the search vessels Fugro Equator and Havilah Harmony in May and December 2015. The work was undertaken by Dr Ross Anderson, Curator of Maritime Archaeology at the WA Museum.

“Both wrecks were found at depths between 3,700 and 3,900 metres, roughly 36km apart. We used a combination of all of the data supplied by ATSB, historical research and maritime archaeological analyses to determine both wrecks were in fact 19th Century merchant sailing ships – one wooden and one iron – both carrying coal,” Dr Anderson said.
[…]
“Historical research into all 19th Century merchant ships that disappeared in international waters is incomplete so we cannot conclusively determine identity of the individual ships,” Dr Anderson said. “However, we can narrow the possibilities to some prime candidates based on available information from predominantly British shipping sources.

“For the wooden ship the brig W. Gordon and the barque Magdala_ are two possible candidates; for the iron ship the barques_ Kooringa (1894), Lake Ontario (1897) and West Ridge (1883) are possible, with the West Ridge best fitting the evidence.”

The #Iran deal explained: what is it and why does Trump want to scrap it? | World news | The Guardian

▻https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/may/08/iran-nuclear-deal-what-is-it-why-does-trump-want-to-scrap-it

Au cas où on aurait oublié.

https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/a7688a93af0d5a3c933dec28d94b2116d616e75a/0_83_2760_1656/master/2760.jpg?w=1200&h=630&q=55&auto=format&usm=12&fit=crop&crop=faces%2Centropy&bm=normal&ba=bottom%2Cleft&blend64=aHR0cHM6Ly91cGxvYWRzLmd1aW0uY28udWsvMjAxOC8wMS8zMS9mYWNlYm9va19kZWZhdWx0LnBuZw&s=abfa557e55b54968bbc6f96a0f68167a

What is the Iran nuclear deal?

Iran and a six-nation negotiating group reached a landmark agreement known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action in July 2015. It ended 12 years of deadlock over Tehran’s nuclear programme. Struck in Vienna after nearly two years of intensive talks, the deal limited the Iranian programme to reassure the rest of the world that it would be unable to develop nuclear weapons, in return for sanctions relief.

At its core, the JCPOA is a straightforward bargain. Iran’s acceptance of strict limits on its nuclear programme in return for an escape from the sanctions that grew up around its economy over a decade prior to the accord. Under the deal, Iran unplugged two-thirds of its centrifuges, shipped out 98% of its enriched uranium and filled its plutonium production reactor with concrete.
Iran deal: Donald Trump says US will no longer abide by nuclear agreement – live
Read more

Tehran also accepted extensive monitoring by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which has verified 10 times since the agreement, and as recently as February, that Tehran has complied with its terms. In return, all nuclear-related sanctions were lifted in January 2016, reconnecting Iran to global markets.
Which countries are involved?

The six major powers involved in the nuclear talks with Iran were in a group known as the P5+1: the UN security council’s five permanent members – China, France, Russia, the UK and the US – and Germany. The nuclear deal is also enshrined in a UN security council resolution that incorporated it into international law. The 15 members of the council at the time unanimously endorsed the agreement.

#nucléaire

ALERTE - #Iran : les sanctions américaines effectives immédiatement pour les nouveaux contrats (Bolton)
▻https://www.romandie.com/news/915941.rom

#UE #Etats-Unis

The Perils of a Putsch in Venezuela – Foreign Policy
▻http://foreignpolicy.com/2018/05/04/the-perils-of-a-putsch-in-venezuela

https://foreignpolicymag.files.wordpress.com/2018/05/venezuela.jpg

Encouraging a coup in Caracas will give Russia and China a foothold in the United States’ backyard.
BY BRIAN FONSECA

In recent months, high-ranking U.S. officials have been signaling to Venezuelan military leaders that they have Washington’s blessing to take the reins in Caracas. In a February speech ahead of his trip to Latin America, then-Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said, “In the history of Venezuela and South American countries, it is often times that the military is the agent of change when things are so bad and the leadership can no longer serve the people.”

Others have been blunter. Just a few days after Tillerson’s remarks, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio (R) took to Twitter to say that the world “would support the Armed Forces in #Venezuela if they decide to protect the people & restore democracy by removing a dictator.” And earlier this week, in a speech at Florida International University, Juan Cruz, U.S. President Donald Trump’s special assistant and senior director for western hemisphere affairs at the National Security Council, urged “the military to respect the oath they took to perform their functions.”
 
Giving the green light for a military coup is not only bad for America’s image; it is also a threat to U.S. strategic interests.Giving the green light for a military coup is not only bad for America’s image; it is also a threat to U.S. strategic interests. That’s because encouraging a putsch in Venezuela could backfire and end up increasing Russian and Chinese influence in the Western Hemisphere.
The U.S. officials praising the prospect of a military takeover seem to disregard the fact that U.S.-Venezuelan military relations are virtually nonexistent today. U.S. defense contacts with Venezuela declined sharply in the years following the rise of former Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez in 1999. Meanwhile, the Russians, Chinese, and Cubans have replaced the United States as the primary sources of financial, technical, and material support to the Venezuelan military. The mere threat of a coup in Venezuela could be enough to rally the military around hard-liners and compel U.S. rivals to consider their preferred alternatives to the Maduro regime as collapse becomes imminent. Rivals with economic, political, and geostrategic interests in Venezuela, such as Russia and China, are far better positioned than the United States to influence the Venezuelan military during any transition.

Moscow and Beijing will be especially interested in cultivating ties with the top brass in Caracas if they sense that offering economic and political support to a new Venezuelan leadership could change the mineral-rich country’s trajectory from an economic basket case to an economically and politically stable authoritarian regime. In such a situation, Russia, China, and Cuba — in some formal or informal configuration — could abandon the flailing and ineffective leadership of President Nicolás Maduro and back a military regime in uncomfortably close geographic proximity to the United States.

The current situation in Venezuela is untenable. Oil production is declining, public unrest is spreading, inflation is up nearly 13,000 percentage points in the last two months, and military and civilian elites are becoming increasingly dissatisfied. Moreover, other countries in Latin America that stood by Chavez in the past are now denouncing Maduro. Pressure for regime change is growing.

Avoiding a Cold War in the High North - Bloomberg
par l’amiral (en retraite) James G. Stavridis, ancien SACEUR…

▻https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2018-05-04/russia-is-gearing-up-for-a-cold-war-in-the-arctic

https://assets.bwbx.io/images/users/iqjWHBFdfxIU/i9Mp2_zFpgK4/v1/1200x780.jpg

In the classic Cold War novel (and fine 1965 film) "The Bedford Incident," a U.S. destroyer on a NATO mission tangles with a Soviet submarine in the frigid waters near the Arctic Circle. Mayhem ensues in a tautly described set of interactions that lead the world to the brink of nuclear war.

Today, as we watch U.S. and Russia continue to confront each other around the world — from Syria to Ukraine to the cyber sphere — the High North is no exception. “Our goal is to make it a truly global and competitive transport route,” Putin said of the Arctic in a March address to the Russian Federal Assembly. China may also be getting into the game: President Xi Jinping recently met with Putin to discuss a collaborating on a kind of “frozen Silk Road.”

Clearly, the Arctic is dangerously close to becoming a zone of conflict. How can we achieve what our Canadian allies wistfully call “high north but low tension"?

Bon, on ne voit pas en quoi les deux déclarations d’intérêt géopolitique des « méchants » élèvent le niveau de tension, mais bon, c’est un ancien patron de l’OTAN…

La suite, n’est guère plus rassurante, car, hormis le point 2, appel au renforcement des moyens plus que classique chez un responsable militaire, les trois autres points laissent assez peu de place à un optimisme raisonnable vu l’approche états-unienne actuelle des relations internationales…

First, the U.S. should invest in the international institutions that provide forums for dialog between Russia and the rest of the Arctic nations. At the top of the list is the Arctic Council, a loosely organized but bureaucratically functional international organization with all the Arctic nations (and many observer states as well, notably China). The council brings together both the foreign ministers and military chiefs from the member nations, and uniquely could hold a summit and convene the heads of state from every state with either geographic or economic interest.

Second, the Pentagon must increase its ability to monitor and operate militarily in Arctic. Congress must allocate financing for at least half a dozen significant icebreakers, and joint private-public partnering could help develop a strategic plan for constructing appropriate infrastructure — from airfields to ports to offshore platforms.

Third, Washington should seek zones of cooperation with Russia (and eventually China if it becomes a regional player). These could include using “science diplomacy” to jointly sponsor missions to measure environmental issues from warming sea temperatures to melting ice; conducting exercises to test our ability to respond to ecological disasters (including oil spills); practice search-and-rescue operations over wide areas (Canada has invested heavily in this); and so on.

Finally, Americans simply need to pay more attention to the vast stretches of ocean and ice at the top of the world. The stakes — geopolitical competition, hydrocarbons, a fragile environment with global effects, the emergence over time of important shipping lanes — are enormous. We can avoid a real world Bedford Incident, but it will require attention, resources and imagination applied to the High North.

#Arctique

China installs cruise missiles on South China Sea outposts: CNBC | Reuters
▻https://www.reuters.com/article/us-southchinasea-china-missiles/china-installs-cruise-missiles-on-south-china-sea-outposts-cnbc-report-idUS

https://s3.reutersmedia.net/resources/r/?m=02&d=20180503&t=2&i=1258002327&w=1200&r=LYNXMPEE420EL#.jpg

China has installed anti-ship cruise missiles and surface-to-air missile systems on three of its outposts in the South China Sea, U.S. news network CNBC reported on Wednesday, citing sources with direct knowledge of U.S. intelligence reports.

The installations, if confirmed, would mark the first Chinese missile deployments in the Spratly Islands, where several Asian countries including Vietnam and Taiwan have rival claims.

China has made no mention of any missile deployments but says its military facilities in the #Spratlys are purely defensive, and that it can do what it likes on its own territory.
[…]
CNBC quoted unnamed sources as saying that according to U.S. intelligence assessments, the missiles were moved to Fiery Cross Reef, Subi Reef and Mischief Reef within the past 30 days.

#mer_de_Chine_méridionale
#Spratleys

#Turkmenistan seeks to tap into East-West cargo flows with new seaport | Agricultural Commodities | Reuters
▻https://af.reuters.com/article/commoditiesNews/idAFL8N1S92X2

Turkmenistan on Wednesday opened a new $1.5 billion cargo and passenger seaport on the Caspian Sea aiming to boost its export revenues by handling shipping traffic between Asia and Europe.

The Central Asian country’s main source of hard currency is its gas exports, which took a hit when Russia, once its main customer, stopped all purchases in 2016 after a pricing dispute.

The port, in the city of #Turkmenbashi, will more than triple Turkmenistan’s cargo handling capacity to 25-26 million tonnes a year, the government has said.

Speaking before the official opening ceremony, Turkmen President Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov said Ashgabat was ready to discuss the use of the seaport with its landlocked neighbours, a reference to Uzbekistan and Afghanistan.

Turkmenistan already has a railway link with China through neighbouring Kazakhstan and the new port could help Ashgabat win a slice of cargo flows moving between China, the Middle East and Europe. Russia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Iran also have Caspian ports.

The new port also has container handling facilities and a polypropylene terminal which will handle products from a nearby plant which is set to be launched later this year.

Turkmenistan does not report how much cargo its existing Caspian port currently handles.

#Caspienne

‘Forget the Facebook leak’ : China is mining...
▻http://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/2143899/forget-facebook-leak-china-mining-data-directly-workers-brains

‘Forget the Facebook leak’ : China is mining data directly from workers’ brains on an industrial scale Government-backed surveillance projects are deploying brain-reading technology to detect changes in emotional states in employees on the production line, the military and at the helm of high-speed trains Workers outfitted in uniforms staff lines producing sophisticated equipment for telecommunication and other industrial sectors. But there’s one big difference – the workers wear caps to (...)

#travailleurs #surveillance #cerveau

What separates China and the West in #Mobile?
▻https://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2018-05-02-what-separates-china-and-the-west-in-mobile

GameRefinery compares the traits of the top 100 grossing mobile games in China and America, including one feature found in 29% of top Chinese games completely absent in the US

Tencent to publish Freejam’s Robocraft in China
▻https://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2018-05-01-freejam-to-publish-robocraft-in-china-through-tencent-part

Deal announced one week after UK studio pledged to remove all loot boxes from the game

#Publishing

‘Going out’ – China in African media
▻https://africasacountry.com/2018/04/going-out-china-in-african-media

June 17, 2015 was the date set by the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) for countries in Europe,

North Korea’s nuclear test site has collapsed ... and that may be why Kim Jong-un suspended tests | South China Morning Post
▻http://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy-defence/article/2143171/north-koreas-nuclear-test-site-has-collapsed-and-may-be-why-kim-jong-un
▻https://cdn4.i-scmp.com/sites/default/files/styles/620x356/public/images/methode/2018/04/25/7ed3c416-47d3-11e8-85b3-af25d27017e0_image_hires_191717.JPG

North Korea’s mountain nuclear test site has collapsed, putting China and other nearby nations at unprecedented risk of radioactive exposure, two separate groups of Chinese scientists studying the issue have confirmed. 

The collapse after five nuclear blasts may be why North Korean leader Kim Jong-un declared last Friday that he would freeze the hermit state’s nuclear and missile tests and shut down the site, one researcher said. 

The last five of Pyongyang’s six nuclear tests have all been carried out under Mount Mantap at the Punggye-ri nuclear test site in North Korea’s northwest.

A research team led by Wen Lianxing, a geologist with the University of Science and Technology of China in Hefei, concluded the collapse occurred following the detonation last autumn of North Korea’s most powerful thermal nuclear warhead in a tunnel about 700 metres (2,296 feet) below the mountain’s peak. 

The test turned the mountain into fragile fragments, the researchers found.

Ah ! souvenirs de Beryl…

China’s behavior monitoring system bars some from travel, purchasing property
▻https://www.cbsnews.com/news/china-social-credit-system-surveillance-cameras

By 2020, China plans to give all its 1.4 billion citizens a personal score based on how they behave. Some with low scores are already being punished if they want to travel. Nearly 11 million Chinese are not allowed to fly and 4 million are barred from trains. Next week, the program will start expanding nationwide. The government says it is trying to “purify” society by rewarding people who are trustworthy and punishing those who are not, reports CBS News correspondent Ben Tracy. So like (...)

#CCTV #contrôle #vidéo-surveillance #voyageurs #surveillance #profiling #SocialCreditSystem

##voyageurs

Tencent will invest $15 million in Fortnite’s rollout in China
▻https://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2018-04-24-tencent-will-invest-usd15-million-in-fortnites-rollout-in-

Seeding an #eSports community for Epic’s game will be a focus of the investment

#Publishing

Khartoum preparing upcoming visit of China’s president to Sudan: Ambassador

April 22, 2018 (KHARTOUM) Sudan’s Foreign Ministry on Sunday said arrangements are underway for the upcoming visit of China’s President Xi Jinping to Sudan during this year.

http://www.sudantribune.com/local/cache-vignettes/L399xH280/chinese_president_xi_jinping_r_shakes_hands_with_sudanese_al-bashir_during_a_signing_ceremony_in_beijing_sept_1_2015._reuters_parker_song-60844.jpg?1474198448#.jpg

China’s War on Pollution Will Change the World
▻https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2018-china-pollution

https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2018-china-pollution/img/2018-china-pollution-facebook-1.png

#pollution #cartographie #palette #chine

U.S. questions COSCO’s takeover of California cargo terminal : WSJ
▻https://uk.reuters.com/article/us-ooil-m-a-cosco-ship-hold/u-s-questions-coscos-takeover-of-california-cargo-terminal-wsj-idUKKBN1H

A U.S. national security review has raised concerns about a takeover by China’s COSCO Shipping Holdings Co (601919.SS) of a large container terminal in Long Beach, California, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday.

Après un méchant arabe (DP World, 2006), un méchant chinois (2018).
Même cause, mêmes effets.
DP World and U.S. Port Security | NTI
▻http://www.nti.org/analysis/articles/dp-world-and-us-port-security

Tiens, d’ailleurs, je crois bien que j’avais loupé le dernier (?) développement de l’affaire de 2006…

Dubai Ports World controversy - Wikipedia
▻https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dubai_Ports_World_controversy

In 2017, a Turkish company seeks to buy Ports America, bringing us full circle to 2006.

China Will Always Be Bad at Bioethics – Foreign Policy
▻http://foreignpolicy.com/2018/04/13/china-will-always-be-bad-at-bioethics

https://foreignpolicymag.files.wordpress.com/2018/04/gettyimages-53309209.jpg

It’s no accident that the Chinese government is leading the world in medical advances — and in dangerous ethical lapses.

(…) the justification of individual sacrifice for the greater good is contrary to any principle-based bioethics framework. When Jesse Gelsinger died at the University of Pennsylvania as the first casualty of gene therapy in 1999, the tragedy halted this type of experimental treatment on humans for several years in the United States, and it still serves as a somber reminder for the medical community. Had the death occurred in China, it would most likely have been either covered up or turned into propaganda depicting Gelsinger as a national martyr.

le titre est affreux et l’article sans doute biaisé, mais aussi plein de bonnes questions et d’infos

#santé #médecine #recherche #éthique #Chine #parti_unique

Israeli minister : Natalie Portman’s boycott of Netanyahu borders on anti-Semitism - Israel News - Haaretz.com

▻https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/israeli-minister-portman-s-netanyahu-boycott-borders-on-anti-semitism-1.601

Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz said Israeli-American actress Natalie Portman’s decision not to accept the Genesis Prize and her statements on the matter border on anti-Semitism. Portman said she would not accept the award in the presence of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who was scheduled to speak at the award ceremony to be held in Jerusalem.
“Natalie Portman has played into the hands of the worst of our haters and of the worst of the anti-Semites in the Middle East,” Steinitz said in an interview on Sunday with the Kan public broadcasting corporation. Portman had made a serious mistake and owes Israel an apology, the energy minister said.
To really understand Israel and the Jewish word - subscribe to Haaretz
“Criticism of Israel is not anti-Semitism. Boycotting Israel has elements of anti-Semitism,” Steinitz asserted, adding that Portman would not have boycotted China or India. Boycotting the ceremony because of Prime Minister Netanyahu’s participation practically constitutes a boycott of Israel, Steinitz asserted.

Exclusive: U.S. sorghum armada U-turns at sea after China tariffs
▻https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trade-china-sorghum-exclusive/exclusive-u-s-sorghum-armada-u-turns-at-sea-after-china-tariffs-idUSKBN1HR0

Sorghum is a niche animal feed and a tiny slice of the billions of dollars in exports at stake in the trade dispute between the world’s two largest economies, which threatens to disrupt the flow of everything from steel to electronics.

The supply-chain pain felt by sorghum suppliers on the Pacific, Atlantic and Indian oceans underscores how quickly the mounting trade tensions between the U.S. and China can impact the global agricultural sector, which has been reeling from low commodity prices amid a global grains glut.

Twenty ships carrying over 1.2 million tonnes of U.S. sorghum are on the water, according to export inspections data from the USDA’s Federal Grain Inspection Service. Of the armada, valued at more than $216 million, at least five changed course within hours of China’s announcing tariffs on U.S. sorghum imports on Tuesday, Reuters shipping data showed.

http://fingfx.thomsonreuters.com/gfx/rngs/USA-TRADE-CHINA/010061V93NG/SHIPS.jpg

#sorgo #guerre_commerciale