Verbal warnings, strongly worded statements and freedom of navigation operations (FONOPs) – all seem to have fallen on deaf ears as Beijing continues its pursuit of militarising islands in the disputed South China Sea.Last week during Asia’s premier defence summit, the Shangri-La Dialogue, United States (US) Secretary of Defense, James Mattis called out China for their assertive actions.

Pregnant and scared, Yin hides in a house on the outskirts of Phnom Penh - one of an untold number of Cambodian surrogate mothers risking jail time for lucrative pay-outs from Chinese clients.The end of China's one-child policy has driven desperate couples too old to bring a baby to term to poorer countries in the Mekong region, where a "womb-for-rent" industry is brushing up against legal barriers.Cambodia banned commercial surrogacy in 2016 but still has brokers - and eligibl

It has been just five years since China initiated its major land reclamation in the South China Sea, and the country has already shifted the territorial status quo in its favour – without facing any international pushback. The anniversary of the start of its island building underscores the transformed geopolitics in a corridor central to the international maritime order.

Throughout 2018, much of Asia has been shaken by the new and increasingly unpredictable dynamics in Sino-American relations. One year ago, United States (US) President Donald Trump returned from Beijing after his “state-plus” visit, which China hoped had finally laid his anti-Chinese campaign rhetoric to rest.

Both by design and proximity, China has had an immense influence on the Southeast Asian region.

Last month, a report quoted Philippines Trade and Industry Secretary Ramon Lopez as saying that the construction of a 305-hectare integrated steel manufacturing plant in Mindanao, is expected to generate 50,000 jobs for Filipino workers.Set to be completed in six to seven years, the project will be carried out in three phases, and will consist of a port, an integrated steel mill with a capacity of 10 million tons, as well as an industrial park.Panhua Group, a Chinese steel company, will set u

China’s ambitious Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) celebrates its fifth anniversary this month. The euphoria that initially followed Chinese President Xi Jinping’s announcement in Kazakhstan and Indonesia has somewhat faded.In its place is a West-driven narrative of a debt-trap; an “insidious plot” by China for global domination where the world’s second largest economy strikes opaque deals and inflates the value of projects, leaving poorer countries unable to repay their debts.

Between June 2017 and April 2018, the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health’s Center for Humanitarian Health carried out a study on almost 400 migrant women from Myanmar between the ages of 15 and 55, who were married to Chinese men and experienced childbearing in the five years they were in China. The study, supported by the Kachin Women’s Association Thailand (KWAT), found that almost 40 percent of them were victims of forced marriages.

In the 1940s, the British historian Arnold J. Toynbee predicted that the United States (US) and the Soviet Union would remain the world’s only two great powers.

There’s good news hidden in China’s tumbling stock markets and slowing economy.A government bid to curb risky lending, clean up industry, and restrain home prices is holding firm even as growth heads for its slowest annual pace in almost thirty years and the U.S.