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The China Problem

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    Topic moved from The Lounge by dthead on 17 Feb 2022 16:40
      Myrtone Chief Commissioner

    Location: North Carlton, Melbourne, Victoria
    No one will dispute Covid19 appeared first in China either being from a Laboratory or from the streets and a wet market.
    NSWGR8022
    Yet many who hate China refuse to take the vaccine against it, worse still, may not even want their children vaccinated.
    Posted: 23 Dec 2021 09:14

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      Mr. Lane Chief Commissioner

    Trucks can run without urea in their fuel anyway, they just add it as a pollution control thing from what I understand. But it does prove that the CCP is finding new and interesting ways of squeezing us.
    don_dunstan

    Many modern trucks will not run without urea added, the computer that manages fuel will reduce power for a time and then shut the engine down. This is in part a way to prevent dodgy companies adding water to the fuel as a cost saving measure.
    Posted: 23 Dec 2021 12:32
      Carnot Minister for Railways
    Posted: 23 Dec 2021 16:34
      don_dunstan Oliver Bullied, CME
    Posted: 23 Dec 2021 19:16
      bingley hall Minister for Railways

    Location: Last train to Skaville
    Plenty of statues of Stalin and Lenin torn down in Russia after the fall of communism.

    Saddam after the US invasion of Iraq.

    Didn't hear a peep out of you cry babies back then :p
    Posted: 23 Dec 2021 21:35
      billybaxter Chief Commissioner
    Posted: 23 Dec 2021 23:17
      Carnot Minister for Railways

    China upset at the fact Western companies have policies to avoid suppliers using slave labour:

    US chip maker Intel apologises in China over Xinjiang supplier statement
    https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-12-23/intel-apologises-in-china-over-xinjiang-supplier-statement/100723468
    Posted: 24 Dec 2021 06:11
      Madjikthise Deputy Commissioner

    The CCP will keep turning the screws wherever they can, south China sea, trade, Belt & Road, whatever, until one country or other decides enough is enough and the only response they have left is military action. This will give the CCP the excuse they are looking for to blame someone else for the action they are "forced to take to defend their honour". It is what they do best, pretend to be offended by the actions of others when they caused the reaction. Like a sibling saying "I'm not touching you! I'm not touching you!" while fake punching you 16 hours a day.
    Posted: 24 Dec 2021 09:07

    Last edited by Madjikthise on 24 Dec 2021 18:01; edited 1 time in total
      doyle Chief Commissioner

    https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/solomon-islands-says-china-send-police-advisers-after-riots-2021-12-23/

    In the back yard........

    Australia is a terrible neighbour........  What kind of middle power are we, truly pathetic


    Crystal balls = said it age's ago
    Posted: 24 Dec 2021 17:51
      doyle Chief Commissioner

    Sorry i forgot this is the country we are



    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=TpEJJyayzx8

    Except for the manufacturing bits (no cars)
    Posted: 24 Dec 2021 17:56
      Carnot Minister for Railways

    The Solomon Islands situation is largely due to their PM being paid $$$ millions under the table by the CCP to shift diplomatic relations from Taiwan to the PRC.

    Money talks. And if the Chinese have their way the joint will become a puppet state and likely inflame another civil war. Sad.
    Posted: 24 Dec 2021 20:09
      doyle Chief Commissioner

    Well your reply sort of reinforces my point.. Useless neighbour. Its our neighbourhood we of course should of done a better job.. Nah way to hard.
    Posted: 25 Dec 2021 23:59
      Carnot Minister for Railways

    Yeah, as a neighbour we've effectively propped up a corrupt Govt that is now loyal to the CCP.  Kicked an own-goal really.
    Posted: 26 Dec 2021 06:32
      303gunner Train Controller

    Sorry i forgot this is the country we are



    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=TpEJJyayzx8

    Except for the manufacturing bits (no cars)
    doyle
    Oh, yes when we were a minion at the behest of multinational corporations, just like South Africa.



    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x1wvQ7ERXhY

    And it made proud to be Aussie!



    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9s7V8xpiUrs
    Posted: 27 Dec 2021 10:01

    Last edited by 303gunner on 27 Dec 2021 10:09; edited 1 time in total
      justapassenger Minister for Railways

    Yeah, as a neighbour we've effectively propped up a corrupt Govt that is now loyal to the CCP.  Kicked an own-goal really.
    Carnot
    Correct.

    Our recent police/defence intervention should have been limited to providing an escort for the CCP's embassy staff to safely make their way to the airport for a departing flight and place the PM in protective custody pending fresh elections.

    Propping up the government was a bad idea.
    Posted: 27 Dec 2021 11:41
      don_dunstan Oliver Bullied, CME

    Location: Adelaide proud
    Yeah, as a neighbour we've effectively propped up a corrupt Govt that is now loyal to the CCP.  Kicked an own-goal really.
    Correct.

    Our recent police/defence intervention should have been limited to providing an escort for the CCP's embassy staff to safely make their way to the airport for a departing flight and place the PM in protective custody pending fresh elections.

    Propping up the government was a bad idea.
    justapassenger
    The trouble is that we can't allow (yet another) failed state on our doorstep - not just ripe for exploitation by the CCP but also any other nefarious mob that wants to come and set up shop somewhere nice and isolated like the Taliban provided for Osama. These sorts of operations are becoming more common - the CCP using money to get individual politicians to swap allegiances - hell, it's even happened in this country and in places that you normally wouldn't expect to become a battleground between the CCP and its adversaries (eg University of Queensland).

    We've got to become clever about how we respond to this threat or we're doomed to repeat the same mistakes over and over.

    I think its already too late for the Solomons - we now have yet another CCP client state on our doorstep: ABC;

    On Thursday Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare's besieged government announced it would accept Beijing's offer of assistance to strengthen its anti-riot policing capabilities.

    In a statement the government said it was "mindful of the urgent need to strengthen Royal Solomon Islands Police Force capability and capacity to respond to future unrest".

    "The government has agreed to accept the Peoples' Republic of China's offer of riot equipment and six Police Liaison Officers to equip and train Royal Solomon Islands Police Force with the skill sets complimenting ongoing training received under existing bilateral assistance," it said.
    Posted: 27 Dec 2021 12:41
      BrentonGolding Chief Commissioner

    Location: Maldon Junction
    Well your reply sort of reinforces my point.. Useless neighbour. Its our neighbourhood we of course should of done a better job.. Nah way to hard.
    doyle
    What exactly would you have the Australian government do? Outbid the CCCP in the Brown paper bags full of money game?

    This country has poured millions and millions dollars into the economies of our Pacific neighbours and where has it got us? Their leaders are now pitting us against China in a game of chequebook diplomacy in order to line their own pockets

    In the meantime their countries seem to make no meaningful progress economically or socially (PNG being a case in point, people I know who work for NGOs say Port Moresby is pretty much a no go zone for female staff and even their male counterparts live in what amounts to a fortified compound due to the risk of being robbed and murdered)

    Many of these so called Nations are divided along ethnic lines with people voting for their tribe or ethnic group no matter how bent they are (think Fiji and Solomons as cases in point)

    It is a no win situation for the Australian Government and her poor long suffering taxpayers
    Posted: 27 Dec 2021 13:36
      don_dunstan Oliver Bullied, CME

    Location: Adelaide proud
    The CCP have been trying to control every aspect of their citizenry's life and that (recently) includes what they see on video gaming sites and in the games themselves. That also extends to what foreigners see of Chinese life and society through these games - Foreign Policy;

    Last year, gaming industry revenues were estimated at $159.3 billion, a 9.3 percent increase over 2019. The boom wasn’t just because the coronavirus pandemic forced people to stay home: Gaming studios are turning out increasingly sophisticated entertainment. It should come as no surprise that Chinese behemoths such as Tencent have started paying considerable attention, especially to the West’s successful studios. In fact, they are buying many of them. On just one day in July, Tencent acquired two gaming firms: one British and one Swedish.

    That may seem like just business, but many video games include strong political content, even if their only mission is to entertain players. Games feature endless variations on fights between good and evil. Unsurprisingly, many espouse Western values such as democracy and free speech—simply because their creators live in societies where such things are taken for granted.

    China’s increasing interest in video games brings lots of cash, but it’s bad news for the global gaming industry, particularly when it comes to artistic freedom. “The Chinese companies that invest in or acquire firms here are perfectly reasonable. But there’s concern regarding the fact that the Chinese government can force them into cooperation under the 2017 National Intelligence Law,” said Per Stromback, the spokesperson for the Swedish Games Industry, a trade association. The law broadly stipulates that “any organization or citizen shall support, assist, and cooperate with state intelligence work according to law.”

    And if they don’t want to? The state can demand it. That may explain why the longtime sponsor of a competition for video game creators backed out this year. A source close to the organizers of the competition told me that the sponsor feared that the winning entry might offend Beijing and it didn’t want to be held accountable for the game’s content—or the consequences in the Chinese market. Video game studios acquired by Chinese firms also feel pressure to adjust their content for Chinese values.

    The desire to control absolutely everything that goes on in that country must crush any intellectual pursuits or research into new areas - which in turn is why industry probably has to steal intellectual property from other countries all the time. They just aren't allowed to be innovative and creative - anything that you come up with that challenges norms or is too outrageous could be considered 'counter-revolutionary' and could land you in a gulag.
    Posted: 27 Dec 2021 23:38
      Carnot Minister for Railways

    Another pro-democracy news outlet killed off in Hong Kong with many arrested.  Governor Patten was always right about how Beijing could never be trusted:
    https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-59807734
    Posted: 29 Dec 2021 21:05
      don_dunstan Oliver Bullied, CME

    Location: Adelaide proud
    China harvests every single piece of data from the West that it can, including posts that individuals make on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and TicTok - Washington Post;

    China is turning a major part of its internal Internet-data surveillance network outward, mining Western social media, including Facebook and Twitter, to equip its government agencies, military and police with information on foreign targets, according to a Washington Post review of hundreds of Chinese bidding documents, contracts and company filings.

    China maintains a countrywide network of government data surveillance services — called public opinion analysis software — that were developed over the past decade and are used domestically to warn officials of politically sensitive information online.

    The software primarily targets China’s domestic Internet users and media, but a Post review of bidding documents and contracts for over 300 Chinese government projects since the beginning of 2020 include orders for software designed to collect data on foreign targets from sources such as Twitter, Facebook and other Western social media.

    The documents, publicly accessible through domestic government bidding platforms, also show that agencies including state media, propaganda departments, police, military and cyber regulators are purchasing new or more sophisticated systems to gather data.

    These include a $320,000,000 Chinese state media software program that mines Twitter and Facebook to create a database of foreign journalists and academics; a $216,000 Beijing police intelligence program that analyzes Western chatter on Hong Kong and Taiwan; and a cybercenter in Xinjiang, home to most of China’s Uyghur population, that catalogues the mainly Muslim minority group’s language content abroad.

    “Now we can better understand the underground network of anti-China personnel,” said a Beijing-based analyst who works for a unit reporting to China’s Central Propaganda Department. The person, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss their work, said they were once tasked with producing a data report on how negative content relating to Beijing’s senior leadership is spread on Twitter, including profiles of individual academics, politicians and journalists.

    I'm kinda flattered that the CCP would bother recording stuff that I write here on Railpage (amongst other places) but I guess if they have the resources and time to do it then why not... I'll add them to the list of people who hang off my every word...
    Posted: 02 Jan 2022 23:49
      Carnot Minister for Railways

    I'm stuffed then if I ever step foot in China or HK again, or Australia is invaded by them.

    It isn't going to stop me criticising the CCP though.
    Posted: 03 Jan 2022 06:01
      don_dunstan Oliver Bullied, CME

    Location: Adelaide proud
    I'm stuffed then if I ever step foot in China or HK again, or Australia is invaded by them.

    It isn't going to stop me criticising the CCP though.
    Carnot
    I've got no doubt whatsoever that they keep large catalogues of people in the west who criticise them likely all the way down to little old humble Railpage posters. The CCP is a living, breathing example of a paranoid control-freak government in the extreme and thanks to the internet their reach extends globally - Taiwan English News;

    The government of the People’s Republic of China has blacklisted an individual from Iceland, after the island nation joined the European Union in sanctioning Chinese officials over human rights abuses in Xinjiang Province, international news agencies are reporting, and the individual has been identified as a retired lawyer who wrote “negative” articles about the communist regime, according to the Icelandic press.

    “Beijing has sanctioned an individual from Iceland”, China’s embassy in Reykjavik announced, Friday, April 16 [2021], after Iceland joined the EU in sanctioning Chinese officials believed to be involved in human rights abuses in Xinjiang Province.

    The Chinese embassy said that it had decided to impose reciprocal sanctions on an Icelandic person “who seriously harms China’s sovereignty and interests by maliciously spreading lies and disinformation.”...

    ...“Jónas Haraldsson, a pensioner who was blacklisted by the Chinese government on Thursday, says he is stunned that his writing has become entangled in a certain international dispute,” reported Iceland’s daily newspaper, Morgunblaðið‘.

    A statement issued by the Chinese embassy yesterday confirmed that the coercive action against Jónas was China’s response to Iceland’s participation in coercive measures against Chinese individuals and legal entities involved in human rights abuses in Xinjiang province against Uighur Muslims.”

    The most likely explanation for him being blacklisted in China is his writing in Morgunblaði, Haraldsson told Iceland news outlet Vísir .

    He has been writing about various issues related to China for the past six years, but says he is mainly surprised that they bothered to stand on this, Vísir reported.

    “I have written a lot of articles over the years. Among other things about the Chinese, complaining about the embassy and everything around it – the mess there, and wanted to get rid of it. Which succeeded in the end,” Haraldsson told Vísir.

    “Jónas Haraldsson lives right next to the building that previously housed the Chinese embassy,” a report in Iceland’s Mannlif noted.

    After the Chinese embassy moved to its current location, the former building stood empty for several years and decayed, and the grounds around it also deteriorated, Haraldsson explained.

    Many people expressed their dissatisfaction with the situation, including Jónas, who wrote about this issue in three articles that appeared in Morgunblaðið in 2013, 2016, and 2019.”

    He also wrote articles criticising the behaviour of Chinese tourists in Iceland for littering and the Chinese government for covering up the origins of COVID19. But it proves the the CCP isn't beyond stalking and singling out people in the West who write about them - so its likely that anything that you and I have written about them on this board has been hoovered up and put on an intelligence list somewhere in the People's Republic.

    They really are that paranoid, like the former East German government that paid one-in-four of the population to spy on their families and work-mates.
    Posted: 03 Jan 2022 06:38
      don_dunstan Oliver Bullied, CME

    Location: Adelaide proud
    Chinese developers owe US$197,000,000,000 to creditors - mostly unpaid migrant workers living in the big cities - and they have no way of paying them. From Bloomberg;

    The industry will need to find at least $197 billion to cover maturing bonds, coupons, trust products and deferred wages to millions of migrant workers, according to Bloomberg calculations and analyst estimates. Beijing has urged builders like China Evergrande Group to meet payrolls by month-end in order to avoid the risk of social unrest.

    Policy for the property market remains tight even after China in December pivoted toward supporting economic growth. Future focus is likely to be on ensuring homes are delivered, and the country’s central bank is encouraging financial firms to help acquisition activity in the real estate sector. Bond payments for stressed firms are larger this month than November and December combined.

    Calculations of January’s bill include:

    • Worker wages: 1.1 trillion yuan ($173 billion), estimate according to Nomura Holdings Inc. economists
    • Dollar bonds: $6.04 billion in principal payments and $1.7 billion in coupons, according to data compiled by Bloomberg
    • Onshore notes: 37.2 billion yuan in principal payments and 6.6 billion yuan in coupons, Bloomberg-compiled data show
    • Trust products: 60.2 billion yuan come due, according to data tracker Use Trust
    • There’s also interest payments on local and offshore bonds, bills to suppliers and potential hidden debt
    For smaller or struggling firms it’s unclear where the cash will come from. Yields have been so elevated offshore that the dollar bond market remains effectively shut for refinancing, a situation that HSBC Holdings Plc analysts predict will continue for at least another six months. Only a handful of the strongest private-sector builders have recently tapped the inter-bank credit market onshore, while low stock valuations limit the scope for equity financing.

    There's also been quite a flight of foreign capital from China in the last few months I've been reading, a lost of investors frightened about the potential that their capital could be acquired by the CCP to help rescue the Chinese economy.
    Posted: 04 Jan 2022 19:29
      Carnot Minister for Railways

    Not many people will be watching the Winter Olympics:
    https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-01-18/spectator-ticket-sales-beijing-winter-olympics-restricted-covid/100763202

    Note they are blaming parcels from overseas for spreading Covid...
    Posted: 18 Jan 2022 11:53
      don_dunstan Oliver Bullied, CME

    Location: Adelaide proud
    Not many people will be watching the Winter Olympics:
    https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-01-18/spectator-ticket-sales-beijing-winter-olympics-restricted-covid/100763202

    Note they are blaming parcels from overseas for spreading Covid...
    Carnot
    The birthplace of SARS/COVID blames the rest of the world for it...

    Meanwhile President-for-life Xi pleads with the West to not raise interest rates. CNN;

    China is urging central banks in the West not to hike interest rates too fast to fight inflation as it goes in the other direction to battle a sharp economic slowdown.

    Chinese President Xi Jinping on Monday called on major world economies to spur growth by coordinating their policies as the world continues to pull itself out of the turmoil caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

    "The global industrial chains and supply chains have been disrupted. Commodity prices continue to rise. Energy supply remains tight. These risks compound one another and heighten the uncertainty about economic recovery," Xi told attendees of the 2022 World Economic Forum during a speech delivered online.

    He warned against the effects of raising interest rates too much too quickly, saying that such measures could threaten global financial stability.

    "If major economies slam on the brakes or take a U-turn in their monetary policies, there would be serious negative spillovers," Xi said. "They would present challenges to global economic and financial stability, and developing countries would bear the brunt of it."

    There's nothing else the West can do - look at the United States where inflation is already the highest its been in forty years and Biden is guaranteeing even more inflation by passing even more big-spending legislation in the hope that it'll kick start the economy.

    We've had a super-low interest rate environment for nearly ten years now - it can't last.
    Posted: 18 Jan 2022 22:04

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