April 15, 2026

03a China

Prime Minister Emmanuel Macron had a phone chat with Chinese Chairman Xi, with both sides promising to work closer to one another to “safeguard the global order.” As Xi reached out to France, reports of Greenland making overtures to China make it seem as if China is aggressively attempting to peel off American allies using the promise of investment dollars to do so.

Xi, Macron commit to deepening bilateral cooperation and safeguarding global order – CGTN
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Chinese President Xi Jinping on Thursday afternoon held a phone conversation with French President Emmanuel Macron at the latter’s request. The two leaders had an in-depth exchange of views on China-France relations, China-Europe cooperation, and major international and regional issues of mutual concern.

President Xi recalled that during his visit to France last May, both sides agreed to carry forward the original aspirations of establishing diplomatic relations – independence, mutual understanding, foresight, and mutually beneficial and win-win cooperation – and to infuse these principles with new relevance for the times.

China and France should maintain high-level exchanges and strategic communication to consolidate consensus, seize opportunities, and expand cooperation, he pointed out.

He encouraged deepening collaboration in traditional areas such as investment, aerospace and nuclear energy, while exploring new cooperation opportunities in emerging sectors including the digital economy, green development, biopharmaceuticals and the silver economy.

Xi also underscored the importance of enhancing people-to-people exchanges to foster mutual understanding and friendship between the two nations.

JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon warned Trump foreign policy would push allies to China. Greenland is reaching out now – Independent UK

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Foreign governments, including Greenland, are currently considering investment alternatives to the U.S., such as China. This comes as JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon warned that President Donald Trump’s foreign policy could isolate the U.S. under what he characterized as an “America alone” doctrine.

Dimon has stressed the need to keep in place strong economic and military ties, indicating that the CEO is frustrated with U.S. diplomacy as Trump’s foreign policy has prompted concerns at home and abroad.

Renaming the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America and making threats of annexing Canada and Greenland are just some of the issues that have created consternation. The tariffs put in place by the Trump administration on allies and foes alike

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Most Americans assume the United States is the world’s unrivaled nuclear superpower. The truth is, America’s nuclear stockpile has shrunk significantly. Meanwhile, China is building nuclear weapons at a rapid pace, and arms experts believe the world’s security is now at serious risk due to the communist regime’s expansionist schemes.

Since the end of the Cold War, the United States has dramatically reduced the number of nuclear weapons it has deployed or in storage. That arsenal today is roughly 85 percent smaller than at the height of the nuclear arms race with the Soviet Union, and the number of operational nukes is tiny compared to 40 years ago.

America’s nuclear stockpile has fallen to levels not seen since the 1960s, while China has embarked on an unprecedented nuclear buildup.

JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon warned Trump foreign policy would push allies to China. Greenland is reaching out now – Independent UK

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Foreign governments, including Greenland, are currently considering investment alternatives to the U.S., such as China. This comes as JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon warned that President Donald Trump’s foreign policy could isolate the U.S. under what he characterized as an “America alone” doctrine.

Dimon has stressed the need to keep in place strong economic and military ties, indicating that the CEO is frustrated with U.S. diplomacy as Trump’s foreign policy has prompted concerns at home and abroad.

Renaming the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America and making threats of annexing Canada and Greenland are just some of the issues that have created consternation. The tariffs put in place by the Trump administration on allies and foes alike

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In the 1950s and 1960s, professor Paul Samuelson was arguably America’s preeminent economist. His textbook for introductory economics was used at colleges and universities across the United States. He was a close adviser to President John F. Kennedy.

In 1961, Samuelson predicted that the then Soviet Union would overtake the United States in economic size somewhere between 1984 and 1997. By 1980, he continued to suggest that the Soviet Union would become the world’s largest economy within a few decades.

Obviously, Samuelson was wrong. He did not understand that extreme authoritarianism and the rejection of free market capitalism would consign the Soviet Union to the dustbin of history.

Today, however, other respected academics are making Samuelson’s mistake in their assessments of Communist China. They opine that in the current century, China will become the dominant global economic power. One researcher from Princeton University wrote recently in the New York Times that the battle for global economic superiority is being “decisively” won by China and that the U.S. is becoming economically irrelevant.

 

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China is the original riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma. A country striving for modernity but feudal in its treatment of its citizens, Beijing’s economic identity is a combination of Communist orthodoxy and crony capitalism. As you might expect, the two don’t work well together.

On the outside of the riddle, China is booming, the people are subservient and happy, and the government is looking to the future with confidence. This is the picture the Chinese Communists paint for the world to see. The reality is much different.

China is being crushed by debt, has become dependent on high levels of debt, and has created a bubble in several sectors, like housing and household goods.

One noted Chinese economist said in 2019, “Basically, China’s economy is all built on speculation and everything is over-leveraged.” He was proved right when the massive overbuilding of housing caused the market to collapse in 2021.

Pro-CCP sites like “Bastille Post Global” are producing a narrative around the recent U.S.-China tariff deal that suggests world leaders should reconsider moving too fast to concede to Trump’s demands on tariffs given China’s “success” in bringing Trump’s initial tariffs to heel with counter-tariffs of their own.

Anonymous analyst “Deep Throat” writes: “The initial breakthrough in US–China trade negotiations has set a precedent, with China’s unwavering stance in the face of Trump’s so-called ‘reciprocal tariffs’ policy serving as a model for other countries in their own tariff talks with the US. China had refused to yield throughout the process and maintained a ‘not backing down’ posture.”

Watch for China’s continued pressure to create a world coalition response to Trump’s tariff actions. It remains to be seen if China’s spin on this deal will look like anything more than bluster. China initially claimed it would not negotiate at all with Trump and would not lower any of its pre-Trump tariff levels, yet ended up doing both in this same deal its trying to spin as a defeat for Trump.

The tables can be turned on China, as other nations might look at what the U.S. has done to bring China to heel, at least in part, and choose to do the same. If Trump were wise, he would be pushing for an anti-China-tariff response from the many nations currently being hammered by Xi’s policies.

China to donate $500 million to WHO, stepping into gap left by U.S. – The Washington Post
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Beijing will replace the United States as the organization’s top state donor, expanding its influence as the U.S. retreats from international cooperation.

U.S. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. called the World Health Organization “moribund” and “mired in bureaucratic bloat” during a speech Tuesday at the U.N. headquarters in Geneva. (Magali Girardin/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock)

China has pledged to give $500 million to the World Health Organization as the country is set to replace the United States as the group’s top state donor, expanding Beijing’s global influence in the wake of Washington’s retreat from international cooperation.

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Secretary of State Marco Rubio didn’t just show up to Tuesday’s Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing; he came loaded for bear. Ostensibly there to discuss the FY26 State Department budget, Rubio instead delivered a scathing indictment of China’s global con game and exposed shocking failures in America’s foreign aid system. What unfolded wasn’t routine testimony; it was a political thunderclap and a long-overdue reckoning.

As I’m sure you recall, Democrats have been having hissy fits over USAID cuts. They claim that the Trump administration was axing vital humanitarian aid when in reality, it was targeting waste, fraud, and abuse.

Just how bad is the waste, fraud, and abuse? Rubio revealed that under the old USAID model, only 12 cents of every dollar made it to the intended recipients. “That means that in order for us to get, you know, aid to somebody, we had to spend all this other money supporting this foreign aid industrial complex,” he said. In other words, U.S. taxpayers were funding bloated overhead while struggling nations got table scraps.

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India’s Operation Sindoor is haunting both Pakistan and China, the former due to the non-explanation for sponsoring cross-border terrorism and the massive physical loss of military assets and face, and the latter due to the utter failure of its military equipment sold to Pakistan and the diplomatic fallout of supporting an “ironclad” friend.

Diplomatically, after the Pahalgam terror attacks, China expressed its concern and called for restraint on India’s part, while reiterating support for Pakistan both regionally and in the United Nations’ #1267 al-Qaeda sanctions committee. China’s Foreign Minister, Wang Yi, discussed issues with his Pakistan counterpart, Ishaq Dar, and India’s National Security Advisor, Ajit Doval, without any concrete proposals in hand.

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US President Donald Trump has unveiled a scheme to build a $175 billion (€154bn) missile defence system called the “Golden Dome”, claiming it could be “fully operational” by the end of his presidential term.

The announcement on Tuesday came roughly four months after Trump signed an executive order, instructing the Pentagon to draw up plans to defend the US against “catastrophic” aerial attacks.

Although the exact scope of the Golden Dome project remains unclear, Trump said the system would involve “next-generation” technologies, including space-based sensors and interceptors.

“Once fully constructed, the Golden Dome will be capable of intercepting missiles even if they are launched from other sides of the world, and even if they are launched from space,” Trump claimed.

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Nvidia and Foxconn Hon Hai Technology Group today announced they are deepening their longstanding partnership and are working with the Taiwan government to build an AI factory supercomputer that will deliver state-of-the-art Nvidia Blackwell infrastructure to researchers, startups and industries.

Foxconn will provide the AI infrastructure through its subsidiary Big Innovation Company as an Nvidia Cloud Partner. Featuring 10,000 Nvidia Blackwell GPUs, the AI factory will significantly expand AI computing availability and fuel innovation for Taiwan researchers and enterprises.

The Taiwan National Science and Technology Council will use the Big Innovation Company supercomputer to provide AI cloud computing resources to the Taiwan technology ecosystem, accelerating AI development and adoption across sectors.

TSMC researchers plan to leverage the system to advance its research and development with orders-of-magnitude faster performance, compared with previous-generation systems.

“AI has ignited a new industrial revolution — science and industry will be transformed,” said Jensen Huang, CEO of Nvidia in a keynote talk at Computex 2025 in Taiwan. “We are delighted to partner with Foxconn and Taiwan to help build Taiwan’s AI infrastructure, and to support TSMC and other leading companies to advance innovation in the age of AI and robotics.”

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The growing impact of U.S. President Donald Trump’s tariffs is creating “tensions” among members of the G7 heading into a critical summit in Canada next month, the federal finance minister says.

Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne and Bank of Canada governor Tiff Macklem are chairing three days of meetings with top finance officials from the world’s largest economies in Banff, Alta., this week. The talks are expected to focus on the war in Ukraine and artificial intelligence, and how the G7 members can work together to grow the global economy.

However, Trump’s aggressive trade policies are likely to dominate the proceedings, and could even impact what members can feasibly agree to.

“There’s no doubt that around the table, you need to find unity, but at the same time, it’s true that the tariffs are creating tensions amongst the different partners,” Champagne told Global News in an interview from Calgary on Tuesday.

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China’s economy slows in April as trade war blues hit retail sales, housing and investment (Photo: AP)

China’s economy showed signs of slowing in April as President Donald Trump’s trade war took a toll, with retail sales, property and investment coming in weaker than economists had forecast. Industrial production slowed as Trump’s painfully high tariffs of up to 145 per cent, and 125 per cent retaliatory duties imposed by Beijing, took effect and shipments were curtailed. National Statistics Bureau spokesperson Fu Linghui said the general trend was positive though he pointed to “external shocks” that had gained intensity.

“It should also be noted that there are still many outside unstable and uncertain factors, and the foundation for the continued recovery and improvement of the national economy needs to be further consolidated,” Fu said. Here are a few key indicators reported Monday.

Retail sales Chinese consumers have been holding back after the shocks of a prolonged downturn in the housing market that is the source of much household wealth. Retail sales rose 5.1 per cent from a year earlier in April, below economists’ expectations for a 6 per cent increase. Fu said Beijing would continue to focus on supporting job creation and spurring more domestic demand.

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President Donald Trump confronted South African President Cyril Ramaphosa about claims of a white genocide by showing video footage in the Oval Office of alleged burial sites of white farmers.

“Turn the lights down and just put this on,” Trump said as he directed Ramaphosa to watch a video montage of political rallies with widespread chants of “kill the farmer!” and images of grave sites.

“These are burial sites right here…. Over a thousand of white farmers,” Trump pointed out to the president, who had denied claims of genocide, saying murder and crime are not unique to white farmers.

Following the video’s conclusion, Trump showed printouts of news articles on persecution as Ramaphosa urged a calm dialogue on the subject.

“What you saw, the speeches that were being made, one that is not government policy,” Ramaphosa told Trump of those calling for killings. “We have a multi-party democracy in South Africa that allows people to express themselves, political parties to adhere to various policies. And in many cases, or in some cases, those policies do not go along with government policy.

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Sharing the costs of hosting U.S. troops in allied countries has been a favorite topic of U.S. President Donald Trump since his first term in the White House.

But as more countries try to eke out a deal to escape the spectre of tariffs in his second term, Trump is making his own moves: bundling negotiations on trade, tariffs, and defense cost-sharing into a single comprehensive deal, which he called “one-stop shopping.”

One such country in his sights is South Korea, which is home to about 28,500 U.S. troops known as U.S. Forces Korea. On April 8, Trump wrote on Truth Social that he had discussed “payment for the big time Military Protection we provide to South Korea,” among other issues, with then-acting president Han Duck-soo.

“We are bringing up other subjects that are not covered by Trade and Tariffs, and getting them negotiated also. “ONE STOP SHOPPING” is a beautiful and efficient process!!!” Trump wrote.

In a dramatic shift in the tariff war dynamic, two major deals were announced by Donald Trump, one with the UK and one with China, the latter being even more impactful on the tariff wars than the former.

The UK deal includes a 10% baseline tariff on most imported UK goods still in place but an elimination of UK Steel tariffs and a reduction on UK auto tariffs from 27.5% to 10%. In exchange, the UK will eliminate tariffs on U.S. ethanol and U.S. beef, as well as reductions and eliminations on “U.S. machinery, sports equipment, and other agricultural products.”

The China Trade deal will see China’s import tariff reduced from 145% to 30% for 90 days. In exchange, China will reduce U.S. import tariffs from 125% to 10% for 90 days as well. They will also remove all retaliatory tariffs for 90 days. The deal also included an informal agreement China will work on preventing fentanyl from reaching U.S. shores.

Trump: Trade deal with Beijing will open up Chinese market for US businesses – Apa.az
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China said Friday sales to the United States slumped last month while its total exports topped forecasts, as Beijing fought a gruelling trade war with its superpower rival.

Trade between the world’s two largest economies has nearly skidded to a halt since US President Donald Trump imposed various rounds of levies on China that began as retaliation for Beijing’s alleged role in a devastating fentanyl crisis.

Tariffs on many Chinese products now reach as high as 145 percent — with cumulative duties on some goods soaring to a staggering 245 percent.

Beijing has responded with 125 percent tariffs on imports of US goods, along with other measures targeting American firms.

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The Trump administration is considering cutting the steep 145% tariff on Chinese imports by more than half, possibly as early as next week, as US and Chinese officials gear up for high-level trade talks in Switzerland,

The New York Post

reported, citing sources close to the negotiations.US officials are reportedly weighing a reduction of the levy to somewhere between 50% and 54%, a move aimed at easing tensions as trade negotiations unfold.