Years ago, I spoke to the head of a large factory in the Cambodian capital, Phnom Penh. She was worried that more than 100 of her workers lived in riverside slums around the building. Their homes were on land at risk of flooding, but the workers were more afraid of being expelled from them.

It seems that instead of de-escalation, the bilateral relations between the world’s two largest economies has gone from bad to worse following the recent visit of Alex Azar, the United States (US) Secretary of Health and Human Services to Taiwan; the imposition of economic sanctions on the 11 current and former Chinese officials including Hong Kong’s chief executive Carrie Lam over the imposition of a new national security law in Hong Kong; Washington’s banning of the Chinese social media app

India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi issued a new warning to China over deadly border tensions on Saturday, using his most important speech of the year to promise to build a stronger military.With talks on easing a military build-up in their Himalayan border region at a stalemate, Modi told an Independence Day ceremony that India's sovereignty was "supreme" and that relations with neighbours depended on security and trust.Attendance at the historic Red Fort in New Delhi fo

Negotiators from the United States (US) and China will discuss today the "phase one" trade deal signed earlier this year – before the coronavirus slammed the world economy and relations between the two economic powers took a turn for the worse.Washington and Beijing's January deal represented a partial truce in their months-long trade war, and obligated Beijing to import an additional US$200 billion in American products over two years, ranging from cars to machinery to oil and

Observers of United States (US)-China relations increasingly talk of a new cold war. On top of a long-running trade war, the two countries now find themselves in a destructive cycle of mutual sanctions, consulate closings, and increasingly bellicose official speeches. Efforts to decouple the US economy from China’s are underway as tensions mount in both, the South China Sea and the Taiwan Strait. A cold war between the US and China would leave both countries and the world worse off.

China is trying to turn democratic Taiwan into another Hong Kong, the island's foreign minister warned Tuesday as he met with a senior US official making a historic diplomatic trip.A crackdown on dissent in Hong Kong has gathered pace since China imposed a sweeping security law on the financial hub in June, with opposition politicians disqualified and activists arrested.That has caused alarm in Taiwan, a self-ruled island of 23 million people that Beijing claims as its own territory and

A United States (US) cabinet member heaped praise on Taiwan's democracy and its success in battling the coronavirus as he met the island's leader on Monday during a historic visit that China has slammed as a threat to peace.Health Secretary Alex Azar is in Taipei for a three-day visit billed as the highest-level visit from the US since it switched diplomatic recognition from the island to China in 1979.His trip comes as relations between the United States and China are in tumult, wi

Global demand for personal luxury goods has been steadily increasing for decades, resulting in an industry worth US$308 billion in 2019. However, the coronavirus crisis has hurt major industries and even negatively affected livelihoods and the economy in general. Fast-fashion brands have even closed down their retail stores, one by one.

Chinese entrants in the race to put autonomous vehicles on the road are bringing "robotaxis" online in hopes that a hired-car format can be the key to unlocking wide acceptance of the futuristic technology.It is expected to be years before cars that operate completely without human intervention are unleashed owing to lingering technological, regulatory, and safety hurdles.But as China challenges United States (US) tech dominance, Chinese players such as Baidu, Alibaba-backed AutoX a

On 3 August, President Duterte issued a directive disallowing the Philippines from joining naval/maritime exercises and drills of other countries like the United States (US) in the South China Sea (SCS) to reduce tensions in the disputed waters.