Tag: china

EU Wants Crisis Powers To Seize Control Of Chip Supplies, Seeks Restrictions On Chinese Imports

The EU – which is badly lagging the rest of the world when it comes to AI development – is preparing sweeping emergency powers to intervene in Europe’s semiconductor supply chains during shortages, including by forcing chipmakers to override existing contracts, the FT reported. So much for the sanctity of those “contract-backed” backlogs… 

The draft law also enables common purchasing to boost the bloc’s negotiating power, and would mark a clear expansion of the EU’s powers to intervene directly in industrial supply chains.

Amid tensions between Beijing and Washington, there are growing fears in Europe that semiconductors can become a tool of economic coercion, heightened by European reliance on Taiwan for high-performance chips.

The clearest example of Europe’s heavy hand was laid bare last year when the Dutch government took control of chipmaker Nexperia from its Chinese owner over concerns that it was moving production and assets out of Europe. The flow of chips from Nexperia’s China arm slowed dramatically, forcing some European car companies to reduce production.

The draft law, which is still subject to change ahead of its expected publication next week, would allow the European Commission far-reaching powers in the event of semiconductor shortages that threaten supplies of weapons, medical devices, digital infrastructure and other key categories of goods. In such a crisis, the Commission could impose fines of up to €300,000 on companies that fail to provide requested information on their supply-chain capacity. It could also “force semiconductor manufacturers to prioritize orders for crisis-critical products, overriding existing contracts”, the draft reads.

Brussels could also enable common purchasing to “strengthen negotiating power and prevent competition between EU countries for limited supplies”. The Commission would then act as a central buyer for multiple EU countries, as it did to acquire vaccines during the pandemic.

According to the FT, the so-called Chips Act forms part of a wider push from the bloc to reduce its dependence on US technology by backing European alternatives in sectors from semiconductors and cloud computing to AI. In the document, Brussels acknowledges that the bloc is “almost entirely dependent on the US and Asia” for the most advanced chips.

Semiconductor supply chains are vast and complex, with a typical Nvidia system tapping thousands of suppliers in dozens of countries. And yet, the EU currently produces less than 10% of global semiconductors. Earlier plans to double the EU’s global market share in semiconductors by 2030 are far behind schedule.

The bloc, like the rest of the world, is overwhelmingly dependent on Taiwan for its supply of high-performance chips, with the home of semiconductor company TSMC accounting for more than 90 per cent of leading-edge chip manufacturing. China has made repeated threats to use force against Taiwan if Taipei continues to resist its sovereignty claims. Any conflict in the region could cause global shortages of components critical to electronics from smartphones and AI data centres to cars and medical gear. 

Separately, the Guardian reports that EU commissioners will meet on Friday for talks aimed at imposing new restrictions on imports from China amid growing concern that Beijing is fuelling conditions for US-style rust belt towns in Europe.

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How Much Smaller Is the Chinese Economy Than the U.S.?

The U.S. economy is $11.2 trillion larger than China’s. The average American is roughly six times richer than the average PRC citizen. At China’s claimed 5% annual growth rate, which is likely inflated, it would take approximately 30 years of uninterrupted expansion for China to reach parity with the United States.

However, Donald Trump’s tariffs may permanently foreclose China’s access to the U.S. market as a low-cost export platform. China’s population is shrinking, with births in 2025 falling to 7.92 million, less than half the number recorded a decade ago, and the working-age population declining by 6.62 million in that year alone.

Beijing has already acknowledged the demographic reality by downgrading its own long-term GDP growth target from 4.8% to 4.2% annually through 2035. At 4.2%, the convergence timeline stretches to roughly 40 years. The IMF, however, projects China’s growth rate dropping to 3.4% by 2030. At that rate, China may never reach parity with the U.S., which has grown at an average rate of just over 2% for roughly a century.

Those projections also assume no shocks. Manufacturing is already shifting away from China at a measurable rate: China’s share of U.S. imports fell from 21.6% in 2017 to 7.1% by May 2025, the lowest since 2001. Every percentage point of manufacturing that relocates to Vietnam, India, or Mexico is output, employment, and tax revenue that China does not generate. The 30-year scenario is Beijing’s best case. The evidence points toward China never reaching parity with the US.

The IMF’s April 2026 World Economic Outlook puts the nominal gap between the U.S. and Chinese economies at $11.2 trillion. Using 2024 full-year actuals, U.S. GDP stood at $29.18 trillion against China’s $18.74 trillion, a difference of $10.4 trillion.

The Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) claim to legitimacy rests on its ability to grow the economy.  After the Tiananmen Square massacre, Deng Xiaoping forged an informal social contract: the state would open the economy and deliver prosperity; the people would not challenge party authority. This is why the CCP is so concerned that GDP growth has declined steadily over the past 30 years, and that the decline has accelerated since President Trump began the trade war during his first term.

For decades, companies from around the world have manufactured in China to take advantage of low labor costs and then exported to the U.S. market. During the years of high economic growth, salaries in China increased, and profit margins narrowed. With tariffs now significantly higher, manufacturing in China has become less competitive, and investment has been redirected.

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China and Russia Issue New World Order Declaration: All Talk, No Action

Russia and China just released two documents outlining how they want to remake the world order and displace the United States as the leader of the global system. The documents are heavy on aspirations but absent any means of achieving those goals.

One of the key themes in the documents is increased defense cooperation. However, there is still no mutual defense agreement between the two countries. Essentially, the documents confirm what China and Russia want and what they have already been doing, while the United States remains the world’s leading economic, military, and diplomatic power.

On May 20, 2026, Chinese leader Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin met the press at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing following two days of talks. The visit marked Putin’s 25th trip to China. The summit produced two distinct joint statements, issued simultaneously as a package, along with more than 40 bilateral agreements. The first was a Joint Statement on Further Strengthening Comprehensive Partnership and Strategic Cooperation, which focused on the practical bilateral relationship.

The second was a Joint Declaration on Advocating a Multipolar World and New Types of International Relations, ideological in nature and targeted at the existing U.S.-led international order. The two sides also agreed to extend the 2001 Treaty of Good-Neighborliness and Friendly Cooperation. This year marks the 30th anniversary of the China-Russia strategic partnership.

The bilateral statement deepens cooperation between the Eurasian Economic Union and China in transport, logistics, digitalization, e-commerce, and agricultural trade, and links the Eurasian Economic Union development plans to the Belt and Road Initiative. Russia reaffirmed the one-China principle, recognizing Taiwan as an integral part of China and supporting Beijing’s actions to protect its sovereignty and territorial integrity.

The statement also commits both sides to expanding joint military exercises, increasing air and maritime coordination, and strengthening cooperation within the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. The only genuinely new and concrete outcome was a separate agreement to build a second railway line through the Zabaikalsk-Manzhouli crossing, an actual infrastructure project backed by a signed deal.

The military language falls well short of a defense alliance. There is no Article 5-style collective defense clause, no obligation for either country to come to the other’s aid, no defined trigger for military intervention, no integrated command structure, no basing rights, no pre-positioned forces, and no shared nuclear doctrine. Joint exercises and military-to-military contacts already existed.

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US author and son of Texas politician charged with helping to provide classified information to China

The son of a prominent Texas Republican politician has been swept up in an explosive federal case accusing him of helping funnel sensitive information to China.

Thomas Pauken II, an American author and political commentator who spent years living in China, allegedly acted as a go-between for contacts linked to Beijing dangling cash incentives to influence US policy from inside the federal government.

Pauken is now facing a felony charge alleging he operated on behalf of the Chinese government inside the United States without properly registering with the attorney general.

Federal investigators claim Pauken compiled confidential reports for a Chinese intelligence-linked handler who allegedly told him the material would ultimately be passed up the chain to Chinese President Xi Jinping. 

According to an FBI affidavit filed in federal court, Pauken also delivered electronic devices to another individual seeking work in the Trump administration later offering that same person a lucrative arrangement tied to providing weekly policy-related reports.

The allegations have thrust Pauken, who wrote under the pen name Tom McGregor while working in China, into the center of an increasingly tense standoff between Washington and Beijing over espionage, foreign influence and national security.

Court documents obtained by Politico say Pauken was first confronted by US authorities after returning from China in January 2025. 

But instead of immediately arresting him, investigators allegedly instructed him to continue behaving normally out of concern that abruptly cutting ties could place him in danger from China’s Ministry of State Security.

FBI Special Agent Timothy Healy wrote in the affidavit that Pauken was specifically warned not to alert Chinese officials about his contact with American law enforcement.

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House Bombshell: JPMorgan, BofA, Morgan Stanley Accused of Helping CCP-Linked Firms Cash In

An investigation carried out by the House of Representatives Select Committee on China has revealed that American banks may have been involved in helping Chinese interests tied to the Chinese Communist Party and the Chinese People’s Liberation Army raise billions of dollars. It is belaboring the obvious that having China raise money on this scale isn’t in the best interests of the United States.

The Committee broke the news first on X.

The post is a lengthy one, but here is a key point:

Just months after @DeptofWar designated Contemporary Amperex Technology Co., Ltd. (@catl_official), the world’s largest battery maker, as a “Chinese military company,” JPMorgan and Bank of America moved forward with underwriting its Hong Kong IPO, helping the company raise billions in new capital. According to our investigation, the banks proceeded even after CATL was linked to China’s Military-Civil Fusion strategy and despite evidence connecting the company to entities tied to the PLA, China’s defense-industrial base, and forced labor in Xinjiang. 

The investigation uncovered CATL partnerships and business relationships with blacklisted Chinese defense-linked entities, including @Huawei, NORINCO, CETC, @CSSC_global>, COMAC, @ChinaMobile_X, and @CN_Nuclear_Corp. The report also details CATL’s ownership stake in Wuhu Shipyard, a key builder of Chinese naval vessels and military equipment, as well as research partnerships tied to the PLA’s National University of Defense Technology and China’s nuclear weapons complex.

And:

In a separate transaction, Morgan Stanley sponsored the IPO of Zijin Gold even after its parent company and Xinjiang subsidiaries were added to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act Entity List. Internal documents showed the firm identified significant sanctions and national security risks and moved forward regardless.

In simple English, American financial institutions are implicated in a financial scheme that may well have raised money for the Chinese military – and for Chinese operations that use forced labor in their operations. 

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Trump Says He Will Speak to Taiwan President, Prompting Panic in China

President Donald Trump told reporters that he would speak to Taiwanese President William Lai Ching-te on Wednesday, downplaying the significance of such a conversation by adding, “I speak to everybody.”

Trump’s comment follows a visit to communist China just a week ago in which he claimed to have a positive personal relationship with genocidal dictator Xi Jinping. While the Chinese government attempted to describe Taiwan as an issue of significance in their conversations, the White House’s descriptions of the visit suggest that topics such as economic cooperation, the ongoing war with Iran, and Chinese students in American universities took priority over Taiwan.

Taiwan, formally the Republic of China, is a sovereign, democratic state off the coast of communist China. The Chinese government falsely claims Taiwan as a “province” that belongs under Beijing’s rule, disparaging its legitimate government as a rogue “separatist” entity. As a result of China’s outsized geopolitical leverage, Taiwan is routinely excluded from basic activities of normal states, such as participation in the United Nations or bilateral negotiations with almost all of the world’s countries, including America.

America’s recognition of China means that the United States does not technically recognize Taiwan as a country, a policy established by leftist former President Jimmy Carter in 1979. While Washington does sell weapons to Taiwan, no president has ever held a conversation with a Taiwanese president since Carter’s policy went into effect. The closest contact between a Taiwanese and an American leader occurred in 2016, when then-President Tsai Ing-wen held a phone conversation with President Trump, who at the time had yet to be inaugurated into the presidency.

Trump suggested on Wednesday that he could soon hold a conversation with Lai, Tsai’s successor, but offered no details.

“I’ll speak to him,” he said when asked while preparing to board Air Force One. “I speak to everybody… We’ll work ⁠on that, the Taiwan problem.”

Reuters cited a “person familiar” with the situation on Wednesday who said that no concrete plans for such a conversation had been formalized yet.

Lai issued a speech in Taipei on Wednesday defending the existence of his country and rejecting any foreign interference, first and foremost from China.

“Taiwan’s future cannot be decided by forces outside our borders, nor can it be held hostage by fear, division, or short-term gain. Taiwan’s future must be determined together by our 23 million people,” he said, according to the Taipei Times. “True peace can only be secured through strength.”

Lai was asked what he would say to Trump if he had the opportunity to speak to him.

“My government is committed to maintaining the status quo, and Taiwan is also a guardian of peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait,” he responded. “Second, China is the one undermining peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait.”

The Taipei Times observed that Trump last year approved $11 billion in arms sales to Taiwan, a record high sum that indicated high support for the country. Trump has since suggested that any future sales to Taiwan would depend on America’s relationship with both Taipei and Beijing. He noted that he has yet to approve pending weapons sales to the country, telling Fox News, “I’m holding that in abeyance, and it depends on China. It depends. It’s a very good negotiating chip for us, frankly.”

“I want them to cool down. I want China to cool down,” Trump added.

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How China Used the Green Scam to Win American Taxpayer Dollars

Former Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback, who also served as U.S. ambassador-at-large for international religious freedom, joined The Patriot Perspective to discuss his new book, China’s War on Faith, and delivered a blunt warning about the threat Communist China poses to the United States, religious freedom, and Western civilization.

Brownback, who served as U.S. ambassador-at-large for international religious freedom during President Donald Trump’s first term, called the Chinese Communist Party “the most significant adversary we’ve faced in the last century.”

That warning should shape how Americans view one of the greatest policy scams of the modern era: the so-called green transition.

For years, the American people were told that solar panels, wind turbines, electric vehicles, and battery mandates were necessary to save the planet. Politicians framed green energy as a moral cause, not just an economic program. Anyone who questioned the agenda was accused of denying science, opposing progress, or standing in the way of a cleaner future.

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UK State Green Energy Project Refuses to Rule Out Use of Slave Labour

The left-wing Labour Party government in Britain has refused to confirm that it is not using slave labour in its publicly owned green energy project, despite having passed a law last year committing to do so.

The push in the UK to eliminate the use of fossil fuels and replace them with supposedly cleaner forms of energy may be coming with a hefty human toll, with it being unclear if the state-funded Great British Energy (GBE) project is using forced labour in places like China to prop up its so-called renewable sector.

Following pressure from campaigners, after initially baulking at the idea of banning slavery from its key green initiative, the Labour government adopted legislation last year committing GB Energy to ensure its “supply chains are free of forced labour” as it seeks to build a “new energy infrastructure using ethical supply chains.”

However, this week, the government appeared to admit the reality that it is nearly impossible to guarantee that any large-scale purchases of solar panels and other green products are free from slave labour, given the dominance that Communist China has over the industry.

A government spokesman said, per the Daily Mail, that GB Energy has “strict procurement controls in place” for solar panels, but admitted that it could not make any guarantees, only saying that the measures will look to root out forced labour from supply chains “as far as possible”.

The tacit admission of continued reliance on slavery sparked backlash, with Britain’s independent anti-slavery commissioner, Eleanor Lyons, saying: “The race to net zero should never come at the expense of people forced to produce goods in horrendous conditions, working endless hours and under constant surveillance.

“The Government promised taxpayers their money would not fund products linked to forced labour. They should not abandon that commitment.”

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China Off-Balance-Sheet Debt Exceeds GDP of Most Nations

For decades, there have been claims that China had the fastest-growing economy, and that it would eventually overtake the U.S. as the world’s largest economy. However, the fastest-growing economies are always developing economies because mature economies do not have as much room to grow.

In other words, a country with a per-capita GDP of $80 per month, as China had in the year 2000, has far more room for rapid expansion than a country like the United States, where the figure now stands at around $7,000 per month.

There is also the concept of low-hanging fruit. When a country has no highways or rail infrastructure, building highways and railways causes GDP to skyrocket. But once all major cities are connected, building additional highways and rail lines has only a marginal impact on economic growth.

A case in point is China’s famous high-speed rail system. Once highways and conventional railways already existed in China, converting to high-speed rail represented a massive economic investment and a large accumulation of debt, while the resulting increase in GDP was relatively minimal. For one thing, high-speed rail cannot be used to carry freight.

While China is still building high-speed rail lines, linking small communities with other small communities, the world is moving toward a remote-work model, making the movement of people a smaller contributor to GDP. Moving freight, however, remains critically important. Despite having a population less than one-quarter the size of China’s, the United States operates approximately 220,000 kilometers of total rail, about 33 percent more than China’s 162,000 kilometers, the vast majority of which is dedicated to freight.

Along with this development boom in China came debt. Because of the centrally planned economy, the central government was able to order local governments to invest and develop by creating debt. That debt was financed largely through real-estate sales, as the Chinese government controls actual land ownership rather than simple lease arrangements, which is what individual “homeowners” in China actually possess.

In order to keep this debt from detracting from the appearance of investment and economic performance, large portions of the debt were kept off the balance sheet.

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Rep. Chip Roy Files Bill to BAN Chinese Communists and Radical Islamists from Buying American Homes

Rep. Chip Roy has introduced new legislation to stop Chinese Communist Party members, radical Islamists, and other designated foreign adversaries from purchasing homes and real estate in the United States.

In an announcement on Tuesday, Roy declared that American property should belong to American citizens, not to geopolitical foes who seek to undermine the country from within.

The bill would explicitly prohibit individuals affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party, Islamist groups, or other designated adversaries from acquiring residential property.

“American homes belong to American families — not the Chinese Communist Party, foreign Islamists, or our geopolitical foes,” Roy told the Daily Caller. “While Americans struggle to afford housing, hostile regimes are buying up our land and neighborhoods.”

“This bill slams the door on foreign adversaries owning American housing and forces them to sell what they already control,” Roy added. “We’re putting America’s homes back in American hands.”

Housing affordability is a top issue for American families struggling with high prices and limited inventory, while foreign entities, especially from China, continue to snap up homes and farmland in strategic locations.

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