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Originating as a strand of Japanese manga comics in the 1960s known as "yaoi", the genre has attracted a cult following in Asia and beyond, leading to popular screen adaptations and web series.

The stories defy social stereotypes about the roles of men and women, a 22-year-old writer who asked to go by the pseudonym Miu Miu [said].

"It's a kind of resistance... resisting a male-dominated society," she said.

[...]

The latest crackdown ensnared mostly amateur writers who earned little to nothing for their work.

Under Chinese law, profiting from "spreading obscene content" can lead to fines and prison. "Serious" instances can carry jail terms of up to a decade.

The obscenity law applies when someone's work gets at least 10,000 clicks or is "used" to collect fees exceeding 10,000 yuan (nearly $1,400).

[...]

Activists see the crackdown on alleged obscenity as part of a wider push to suppress LGBTQ expression -- an effort that has expanded under President Xi Jinping.

China classified homosexuality as a crime until 1997 and a mental illness until 2001. Same-sex marriage is not legal and discrimination remains widespread.

[...]

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Archived

A Turkish tourist has exposed the alarming transformation of mosques in Urumqi, the capital of the Uyghur homeland, into controlled, securitized spaces that no longer serve as centers of Islamic worship but rather as tools for state propaganda and surveillance.

Taha Yasin Erel, a Turkish national, visited Urumqi in May 2025 and documented his experiences in a one-hour video. During his visit, he explored how Uyghur Muslims live under Chinese rule and observed the state of religious freedom—or the lack thereof—in the region. What he uncovered was deeply disturbing.

[...]

At the Aq Mosque, Erel attempted to pray but was denied access to the worship hall. The individual in charge refused to let him enter the main prayer area, told him to remain outside, and even declined to turn on the lights. Across the street, Salar Mosque was similarly closed, with no sign of active worship.

[...]

On Friday, May 23, 2025, Erel returned to observe Friday prayers. Upon entering a mosque, his passport was photographed—a clear sign of state surveillance. He noted that despite being in the Uyghur region, the congregation was forced to follow Beijing Standard Time rather than local time.

The Friday sermon (khutba) was not delivered in the Uyghur language, nor did it begin with the Islamic invocation “Bismillah.” Instead, the imam delivered the sermon entirely in Chinese, reading directly from state documents, particularly the “Regulations on National Unity and Progress in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region” (《新疆维吾尔自治区民族团结进步工作条例》). He recited sections of Chapters 4 and 5—covering surveillance, propaganda, and patriotic education—before closing with a single line from the Qur’an.

[...]

Erel attempted to engage with Uyghur worshippers, but many appeared afraid to speak openly. In one instance, he tried to initiate a conversation in Uyghur with a small group after prayer, but they refused to speak and urged him to leave.

When he tried to take a photo of another mosque, he was aggressively stopped, shouted at, and expelled from the site.

A Clear Pattern of Suppression

Erel concludes in his video that the Islamic and Turkic identities of Uyghurs are under systematic attack. He describes an atmosphere of fear, control, and cultural erasure. What he witnessed was not religious freedom but a performance stage-managed by the Chinese state to neutralize Islam and rewrite Uyghur identity under the banner of “ethnic unity.”

His firsthand account adds to the growing body of evidence that religious repression in the Uyghur homeland is not just a policy—it is a core element of China’s assimilation strategy through “Sinicization” of Islam.

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Archived

In a grave assault on Tibetan religious heritage, Chinese authorities have demolished over 300 Buddhist stupas and a revered Guru statue in the Drakgo (Ch: Luhuo) County, Karze (Ganzi) Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture in the traditional Tibet’s province of Kham last month, sources from Tibet report amid heightened restrictions in the region.

The destruction took place in late May or June 2025 at Lungrab Zang-ri (ལུང་རབ་བཟང་རི།) near Janggang Monastery (འཇང་སྒང་དགོན་པ།), where Chinese forces razed hundreds of medium-sized stupas of Tibetan Buddhism and three larger Buddhist stupas. In a brazen act of cultural vandalism, authorities also destroyed a newly constructed statue of Khenpo Jigme Phuntsok, the late founder Abbot of Serthar Buddhist Institute, and a sacred statue of Guru Padmasambhava, generally referred to as Guru Rinpoche (meaning “precious master” in Tibetan). Such acts have left the local Tibetans and community deeply traumatized.

[...]

Following the demolitions, Chinese authorities have imposed an iron curtain of silence over the region. Anyone attempting to share information and even talk about the destruction with the outside world faces immediate detention on charges of “leaking state secrets.” The entire area surrounding the demolition site has been sealed off, and no one is permitted entry or exit.

[...]

This latest assault represents, what Tibetan sources inside Tibet call “second phase of Cultural Revolution”, a deliberate campaign to “Sinicize” Tibetan Buddhism and systematically eradicate

[...]

“The crackdown has intensified following Decree No. 22 issued by the National Religious Affairs Bureau on 1 December 2024, which mandates that all monasteries must operate under strict government control starting 1 January 2025, through the implementation of Article 43 of the Monastery Management Regulations”, said the source.

[...]

[Edit typo.]

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A man who used an onboard emergency hammer to smash a hole in the window of a stalled train to relieve the suffering of his fellow passengers in a sweltering carriage has become an unlikely and memeworthy hero. His small act of rebellion—in defiance of a perspiring train attendant who half-heartedly attempted to stop him—has become a timely metaphor for other forms of altruistically motivated disobedience.

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The flow of goods in Manzhouli, China’s main border crossing with Russia, underscores increasingly close ties between the two countries, complicating China’s relationship with Europe.

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https://archive.is/rS9Cg

AstraZeneca, Pfizer and other multinational drug companies have spent a record amount on medicines developed by Chinese biotechs this year

AstraZeneca has signed the most licensing deals with Chinese biotechs, at least $13.6bn of licensing deals with five companies so far this year

US pharmaceutical companies AbbVie, Merck, Pfizer and Regeneron also signed multibillion-dollar licensing deals in the first half of 2025.

Pfizer signed the biggest Chinese licensing deal this year, a $6bn agreement with 3Sbio to develop a cancer drug

All this [pharmaceutical] money has gone into China because China has invested in their industry while the US government has not,” Axelsen said.

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Archived

China’s top military body has ordered a sweeping overhaul to restore the credibility of political leaders as the commission faces its largest vacancy in years following a series of corruption scandals.

The Central Military Commission (CMC) issued regulations in recent days to “comprehensively purge toxic influence and rebuild the image and credibility of political leaders”, the official People’s Liberation Army Daily reported on July 21 on its front page.

The regulations direct political leaders to “eradicate poison and eliminate malpractice”, according to the report, which did not elaborate. The term “liudu”, or widespread poison, is Communist Party parlance for serious offences involving factions of corrupt officials. It previously applied to the cliques of former security chief Zhou Yongkang and ousted Chongqing party boss Bo Xilai.

[...]

The directive comes as corruption scandals have engulfed the world’s largest military by active personnel.

They have led to the downfall of two consecutive defense ministers and several officials with ties to the secretive Rocket Force. Former political commissar Miao Hua, who served on the elite Central Military Commission led by President Xi Jinping, was also removed from the CMC in June.

CMC Vice-Chairman He Weidong, also a Politburo member, has been absent from official events for months, though no public evidence of wrongdoing has emerged. If investigated, Mr He would become the most senior sitting defence official probed since Zhao Ziyang was ousted in 1989 for supporting students during the pro-democracy movement.

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cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/39121996

Archived

Chinese-made engines are being covertly shipped via front companies to a state-owned drone manufacturer in Russia, labelled as "industrial refrigeration units" to avoid detection in the wake of Western sanctions, according to three European security officials and documents [...]

The shipments have allowed Russian weapons-maker IEMZ Kupol to increase its production of the Garpiya-A1 attack drone, despite the U.S. and E.U. sanctions imposed in October designed to disrupt its supply chain, according to the sources and documents, which included contracts, invoices and customs paperwork.

[...]

The long-range drone is being deployed to attack civilian and military targets deep within Ukrainian territory, with around 500 being used by Russia per month, the Ukrainian military intelligence agency said in a statement to Reuters.

[...]

The European Union's top diplomat Kaja Kallas told Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi on July 2 that Chinese firms' support for Russia in the war posed a threat to European security and she urged China to cease trade that sustains Russia's military machine, the EU said in a statement.

[...]

[Edit typo.]

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At the moment, the iQiyi series King of Stand Up Comedy mentioned in the article is still available.

(Video doesn't play in Firefox, use a Chromium-based browser. For free, 6-minute samples only; VIP membership required to view full episodes.)

My Mandarin is terrible so I had to try to understand it by the English subtitles. After the 20th time the crowd laughed without me having the slightest clue why, I gave up.

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Archived

In recent days, two senior officials handpicked by the Chinese Communist Party to head the leadership in the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) have been prosecuted for misuse of funds exposing the deep ties between corruption and repression in Tibet.

Wu Yingjie, former TAR Party Secretary and previously sanctioned by the US and Canada for human rights violations, has been convicted of corruption while serving in TAR. On July 16, Beijing No. 3 Intermediate People’s Court sentenced Wu to a death sentence with a two-year reprieve.

Similarly, on July 22, 2025, Chinese state media announced that Che Dralha (Qi Zhala), a Tibetan and former head of the TAR Government, was expelled from the CCP and dismissed from public office for misappropriating public funds. Che and Wu were serving in Lhasa around the same time. In January 2025, the CCP Central Commission for Discipline Inspection and the National Commission of Supervision had launched an investigation against Che. Che is probably the seniormost Tibetan among many others working under the Chinese system who have been subjected to investigation for misusing public funds indicating that corruption is pervasive in the Tibetan areas.

[...]

Numerous senior officials across the CCP party-state structure in Tibetan regions, spanning 17 prefectural-level and two county-level “autonomous” administrative divisions, are currently under prosecution or investigation for corruption. A recent International Campaign for Tibet report, Crisis of Credibility: China’s Leaders in Tibet Selected for Loyalty to CCP Over Welfare of Tibetan People, highlights a partial list of these officials, arguing that China’s leadership in Tibet faces a credibility crisis due to ineffective Tibetan representation and rampant corruption and misrule.

The CCP’s anti-corruption campaigns, heavily publicized through state-controlled media, are strategically designed to bolster the Party’s image and legitimacy both domestically and internationally. However, endemic corruption in Chinese-ruled Tibet is pervasive in an environment devoid of checks and balances, independent oversight, and transparency. High-profile prosecutions of officials, such as Wu Yingjie, are trumpeted to showcase the Party’s commitment to rooting out corruption. Yet, these actions often function as political theater to project an illusion of accountability and justice while leaving the broader system of patronage and power untouched.

[...]

In the absence of a free press, independent judiciary, or vibrant civil society, the CCP maintains unchallenged control over the narrative, portraying itself as a resolute opponent of corruption while suppressing any scrutiny that might expose the depth of systemic graft and mismanagement.

[...]

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cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/39074993

Archived

  • The US ambassador to NATO said China needs to be "called out for their subsidizing" of Russia's war in Ukraine.
  • NATO ambassador Matthew Whitaker said "China thinks they're fighting a proxy war through Russia" to keep the US and its allies occupied.
  • The US has threatened to impose tariffs on countries that buy Russian oil, including China, with Whitaker saying "the secondary sanctions are going to be significant".

[...]

China’s imports of Russian oil have climbed since Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Washington and other capitals allied with Kyiv view such oil purchases as a form of tacit support for Russia, helping to bolster its economy and undercut sanctions. Russia’s crude exports hit a one-month high ahead of Trump’s tariff threat on buyers of Russian oil.

[...]

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cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/39065475

Archived

[...]

Ukraine’s Main Intelligence Directorate has published a detailed breakdown of the drone’s construction. Although its main function is to act as a false target alongside long-range drones, it can also carry a warhead weighing up to 15 kg.

The complete list of components has been published on the War&Sanctions portal. The Website identify the drone as TsBST.611000.

All onboard systems and electronic blocks are of Chinese origin. Nearly half of them — including the flight controller with autopilot, navigation modules and antennas, airspeed sensor, and Pitot tube — come from a single Chinese company, CUAV Technology. The company specializes in developing and producing UAV system modules and applications.

[...]

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[Op-ed by Linggong Kong, Ph.D. Candidate in Political Science, Auburn University.]

China has long maintained that it does not supply arms to any party at war – a central tenet of its “noninterference” foreign policy. But in recent years, Beijing has repeatedly faced accusations of doing the opposite: providing direct military assistance to nations engaged in conflict, while publicly denying doing so and even adopting a position of diplomatic neutrality.

That has seemingly been the case for two of China’s closest allies: Russia in its war against Ukraine and Pakistan during its recent armed standoff with India in May.

Now, Beijing is facing scrutiny over alleged military links to Iran – a country engaged in a long-running shadow conflict with Israel that recently tipped into a short-lived hot war.

[...]

Although Beijing has consistently said it is neutral in the Russia-Ukraine war that broke out in 2022, China has, in practice, quietly supported Russia. In part, that is because China shares the same strategic goal of challenging the Western-led international order.

Recently, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi reportedly told European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas that Beijing cannot afford to see Russia lose the war in Ukraine. He was said to have warned that a Russian defeat would likely bring the full force of U.S. strategic pressure to bear on China.

From Beijing’s perspective, Moscow plays a vital role in keeping the West preoccupied, offering China valuable strategic breathing room by diverting American attention and resources away from the Asia-Pacific region.

[...]

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[...]

The incident, which occurred in Gansu province earlier this month, is one of China’s worst school food safety incidents and has drawn national attention. An investigative report released by the Gansu provincial party committee on Sunday found a litany of failures in safety and oversight, as well as attempts to cover up the incident, bribe people in charge and modify test results.

The report said the principal at the Tianshui kindergarten had wanted to attract more enrolments by “enhancing” the colour and look of the food served to children. The school’s cook bought industrial-grade pigment online, adding it to dishes despite the packages saying it was “not for consumption”.

[...]

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Geng Jun’s “Bel Ami” (“Piaoliang pengyou”) is a queer film from the People’s Republic of China that will likely never see the light of cinema projectors in its home country. The film has caused quite a stir internationally. It was nominated in numerous categories at the prestigious Golden Horse Awards in Taipei and won three of the most important prizes: Best Editing: Chen Hoping, Best Cinematography: Wang Weihua, and, above all, Best Actor: Zhang Zhiyong.

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cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/39026396

Archived

China needs to cut steel output from the coal-powered blast furnace process by more than 90 million metric tons from 2024's level to achieve its green steel target this year, researchers said in a report published on Tuesday.

The global steel industry is responsible for around 8% of the world's carbon dioxide emissions and China accounts for more than half of global steel output.

[...]

China has lagged far behind its global peers in terms of electric arc-furnace steel share. The average share is around 30% globally, 71.8% in the United States, 58.8% in India and 26.2% in Japan, [a report by the Helsinki-based Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air] said.

From 2021 to the first half of 2025, China's blast furnace capacity utilisation rose from 85.6% to 88.6%, while electric-arc furnace utilisation fell from 58.9% to 48.6%, it added.

[...]

"A credible strategy to curb emission-intensive production and rein in excess capacity would not only tackle the sector's structural issues but also ease global tensions," said Belinda Schaepe, an analyst at the Helsinki-based centre.

[...]

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cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/39002052

Archived

China plays a key role in Russia's war against Ukraine, supporting Russia while also being interested in preserving the semi-destroyed Russian economy. This allows Beijing to control the Russian economy and influence political processes in Moscow, according to Volodymyr Ohryzko, Director of the Centre for Russian Studies in Ukraine [and Ukraine's former Minister of Foreign Affairs].

"China, through the words of its foreign minister, has said that it will not allow Russia to lose. Therefore, this means that China has been helping and will continue to help Russia wage war against Ukraine. It's obvious and clear whose side China is on. On the other hand, will China help Russia too much? Here, I have huge doubts," Ohryzko noted [on Espreso TV].

[...]

Today China controls practically everything that happens in the Russian economy. It dictates the prices at which it buys or will buy goods from Russia now or in the future. Therefore, China needs a half-dead Russian economy that it can manage as it pleases and accordingly influence what happens in Moscow, according to Ohryzko.

"Thus, in this triangle of Beijing–Washington–Moscow, the last one (Russia, ed.) is a zero without a stick. It's the third wheel, which will be invited to the table only when the key issues between the two serious players are resolved. That is, this is already obvious and clear to everyone," Ohryzko remarked.

[...]

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cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/38969776

Archived

Students for a Free Tibet (SfT) raised concerns over Labour’s early years minister, Stephen Morgan MP, following his trip in May to Wuhan, where he represented the UK at the World Digital Education Conference.

SfT is a global chapter-based organisation that campaigns in solidarity with Tibetans seeking freedom and independence after China’s invasion in 1950.

According to various media sources and the United Nations, around 80 per cent of Tibetan children aged between four and eighteen - around one million pupils - have been placed in state-run boarding schools. These schools reportedly remove children from their families and replace Tibetan with Chinese as the primary language of education.

As a result, some children return home unable to speak their mother tongue, making communication with their families difficult. SfT describes this as a form of “cultural erasure” that can result in long-term emotional trauma.

In 2022, the UK government told the United Nations that Tibet remained an issue of “deep international concern, including new reports of boarding schools being used to further erode cultural, linguistic and religious identity.”

The following year, UN experts expressed alarm at what they described as the “forced assimilation” of Tibetan children and "erosion of their identity".

Following Mr Morgan’s visit, SfT wrote to the MP seeking clarification. The group said it received only a vague reply in which Mr Morgan asserted that a Labour government would “challenge where we must, to protect UK values,” and highlighted that there is no record of him raising the Tibet issue during the conference.

In a statement, SfT said:

“The fact that Stephen Morgan, as the individual entrusted with overseeing Early Childhood Education and representing the United Kingdom abroad, is publicly contradicting an established, major foreign policy position held by the UK and echoed in consensus by many like-minded countries and allies cannot be ignored, as the potential political consequences are significant.”

The group has called on the UK government to release a statement detailing the purpose of the visit, including who funded it and what was discussed at the conference roundtable.

[...]

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[...]

Chinese authorities have begun constructing what will be the world's largest hydropower dam in Tibetan territory, in a project that has sparked concerns from India and Bangladesh.

Chinese Premier Li Qiang presided over a ceremony marking the start of construction on the Yarlung Tsangpo river on Saturday, according to local media.

The river flows through the Tibetan plateau. The project has attracted criticism for its potential impact on millions of Indians and Bangladeshis living downriver, as well as the surrounding environment and local Tibetans.

[...]

Experts and officials have flagged concerns that the new dam would empower China to control or divert the trans-border Yarlung Tsangpo, which flows south into India's Arunachal Pradesh and Assam states as well as Bangladesh, where it feeds into the Siang, Brahmaputra and Jamuna rivers.

A 2020 report published by the Lowy Institute, an Australian-based think tank, noted that "control over these rivers [in the Tibetan Plateau] effectively gives China a chokehold on India's economy".

In an interview with news agency PTI earlier this month, Arunachal Pradesh chief minister Pema Khandu expressed concern that the Siang and Brahmaputra could "dry up considerably" once the dam was completed.

He added that the dam was "going to cause an existential threat to our tribes and our livelihoods. It is quite serious because China could even use this as a sort of 'water bomb'".

"Suppose the dam is built and they suddenly release water, our entire Siang belt would be destroyed," he said. "In particular, the Adi tribe and similar groups... would see all their property, land, and especially human life, suffer devastating effects."

[...]

China has been eyeing the steep valleys and mighty rivers in the rural west - where Tibetan territories are located - to build mega-dams and hydropower stations that can sustain the country's electricity-hungry eastern metropolises. President Xi Jinping has personally pushed for this in a policy called "xidiandongsong", or "sending western electricity eastwards".

[...]

Activists say the dams are the latest example of Beijing's exploitation of Tibetans and their land - and past protests have been crushed.

Last year, the Chinese government rounded up hundreds of Tibetans who had been protesting against another hydropower dam. It ended in arrests and beatings, with some people seriously injured, the BBC learned through sources and verified footage.

There are also environmental concerns over the flooding of Tibetan valleys renowned for their biodiversity, and the possible dangers of building dams in a region rife with earthquake fault lines.

[...]

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Archived

[Alternative news on the issue are to be found across the web, e.g., Wells Fargo exit ban revives fears about doing business in China.]

The Chinese government is preventing a Chinese American banker for Wells Fargo and, separately, an employee of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office from leaving the country, reports said Sunday.

The identity of the detained U.S. government employee was not known to the Washington Post, which first reported the news. Mao Chenyue, the managing director of Wells Fargo Credit Solutions, was confirmed as the bank employee facing the exit ban by the company in statements to The New York Times and the Wall Street Journal.

People familiar with the Patent and Trademark Office employee's case told the Washington Post that he traveled to China to visit family but allegedly failed to disclose on his visa application that he worked for the government.

Wells Fargo has since reportedly suspended travel by its executives to China, noting in its statement to The New York Times that the company is tracking the situation and working "through the appropriate channels" to ensure their employee is returned.

[...]

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crosspostato da: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/38898325

Archived

Several human rights and civil society organizations published an open letter urging the European Union to prioritize human rights in the forthcoming European Union (EU)-China Summit to be held in China on July 24-25.

"At the recent G7 meeting, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen spoke of a “new China shock,” and urged that G7 members respond with greater cooperation, resilience and alternative approaches. We believe similar ambition should apply to the approach of the EU and its member states regarding the deepening human rights crisis in China," the letter reads.

[...]

Despite the "EU’s longtime support to independent civil society and human rights defenders across China", the groups say that the "wholesale assault on human rights" has been continuing since President Xi Jinping assumed power in 2012.

"He [Xi Jinping] and other officials are confident in their impunity for widespread arbitrary detention, forced assimilation, forced labour and torture in China; and transnational repression, including in Europe. Chinese authorities not only refuse to comply with the vast majority of their international human rights obligations, they also seek to rewrite global human rights norms and weaken key international institutions."

[...]

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crosspostato da: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/38844541

Archived

Op-ed by Marcus Kolga, founder of DisinfoWatch and a senior fellow at the Macdonald-Laurier Institute.

Almost every night since May, Russian missiles and drones – powered by Iranian designs and packed with Chinese components – have torn through Ukrainian schools, hospitals and homes, killing or maiming thousands in a ruthless campaign of terror. Those drones are now reaching further into Ukraine, striking apartment buildings in Lviv over the weekend.

In June alone, 5,429 Russian drones and ballistic missiles struck Ukrainian targets. According to the UN, they have caused more than 3,000 civilian casualties since the start of the war, with 232 civilians killed in June. Analysts warn that Russia could soon develop the capacity to launch up to 1,000 drones in a single night against Ukrainian civilian targets.

Russia’s weapon of choice in its war of terror is the Iranian-designed Shahed drone – now mass-produced in Russia and rebranded as the “Geran.” Day after day, waves of these drones hover over Ukrainian cities, with their operators safe inside Russia, actively targeting civilian infrastructure and hunting civilians.

[...]

What is less known, but deeply disturbing, is the extent to which China is supplying components and technology to enable Russia’s growing ability to build these drones. The collaboration of Chinese companies and the Chinese regime in building these weapons makes them directly complicit in facilitating and enabling the war crimes being committed against the Ukrainian people.

The evidence of Chinese involvement is clear. Ukrainian security services have identified Chinese-origin components in Russian drones recovered after attacks on Kyiv. A recent Bloomberg investigation revealed a direct partnership between Russian firm Aero-HIT and Chinese suppliers and engineers to help Russia mass-produce drones. A growing list of Chinese companies have been exposed for supplying critical components: engines, carbon fibre airframes, electronics, navigation systems and antennas – all essential parts integrated into drones now rolling off Russian assembly lines.

[...]

While Canada was among the first to sanction Iranian drone manufacturers in 2022, Ottawa added just 20 Chinese entities to our sanctions list last February, far fewer than our allies and nowhere near sufficient given the growing scale of China’s support for Russia’s drone program.

Even here in Canada, there is disturbing evidence of complicity. In June, the RCMP charged Anton Trofimov – a Russian national living in Canada – for allegedly exporting restricted technologies to Russia via Hong Kong for the purpose of manufacturing weapons, underscoring how Canada itself has been exploited as a platform for Russian sanctions evasion.

[...]

Canada should designate Russia as a state sponsor of terrorism under the State Immunity Act – an action that would allow victims to pursue civil cases in Canadian courts, including against Chinese entities that enable Russia’s war.

The need to act is dire and undeniable: thousands of lives are at stake. As innocent Ukrainian civilians endure relentless nightly bombardments from Russian drones powered by Chinese-made components, we cannot afford to hesitate. Disrupting the supply lines that fuel Russia’s campaign of terror and holding the Chinese private and government entities enabling this deadly collaboration to account will help save innocent Ukrainian lives.

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A provocative argument. Tibet has nothing to show for its well-intentioned pacifism, says the author.

Tibet today has the distinction of being the world’s largest colony. In official Chinese documents, it is classified as “Water Tower Number One”— a source of prized minerals and hydropower. Since annexing Tibet, Beijing has relentlessly disfigured it. It has mined and carted away its mineral wealth, dammed and diverted waters from its bountiful rivers, herded innumerable Tibetans into communes, stamped out the expression of Tibetan identity, and annihilated whole ways of life.

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