Canada and China expel each other’s diplomats, Hong Kong’s democracy has taken another hit,
And Mexico’s president says he’s got proof of illegal Chinese fentanyl smuggling.
That and more on this week’s headlines.
Welcome to China Uncensored. I’m Chris Chappell.
This episode is sponsored by Incogni.
You probably know that companies are collecting your personal data. But you may not realize just
how many. Dozens, maybe hundreds—most of which you’ve never heard of. And you have
no idea what they’re doing with it. Incogni helps stop them. I’ll explain more at the end.
Well, Canada finally did it. It announced this week that it’s
expelling a Chinese diplomat accused of trying to intimidate a conservative MP.
Zhao Wei, who was based out of Toronto, has until May 13th to leave the country.
He’s accused of collecting intelligence on conservative MP Michael Chongcornerbox,who
sponsored a motion to condemn China’s treatment of the Uyghurs.
According to the Globe and Mail, Canadian intelligence knew that
this was happening since at least 2021, and the government should have known as well.
But it was only after the Globe and Mail publicly named Zhao
earlier this month that the Canadian government did anything about it.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau claims he was never briefed on the allegations.
We’ve reported before about how chummy Justin Trudeau is with China
But after the Globe and Mail article came out, even he was forced to do something about it.
China has denied the accusations and has expelled a Canadian diplomat in response.
It’s also threatened further retaliation if Canada doesn’t take back its accusations.
Let me guess, it’s going to send *two* spy
balloons across Canada this time. And speaking of spy balloons,
high level dialogue between China and the US may be restarting for the first time since a
Chinese spy balloon floated over America. Climate envoy John Kerry said this week that
Beijing has invited him to visit for talks with his counterpart.
According to inside sources, US Trade Rep. Katherine Tai plans to meet with China’s commerce
minister on the sidelines of an upcoming summit. So far no one’s publicly confirmed that, though.
And Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang met this week with US Ambassador to China Nicholas Burns.
Burns said they discussed the “necessity of stabilizing ties
and expanding high-level communication.”
This is actually his second sitdown with a ministerial level official.
Burns met with diplomat Liu Jianchao,
the head of the Communist Party’s International Department, two weeks ago.
But that’s the end of the white list. The US is still trying to get meetings for
the US Secretary of State, Secretary of Treasury, Secretary of Commerce, and Secretary of Defense.
China’s foreign ministry said after the meeting with Burns and Qin Gan that “The
US should not talk about communication while continuously suppressing and containing China.”
So yeah, instead of this being a thaw in relations, I think it’s
more of a “keep your friends close but keep your enemies closer” type thing.
Speaking of US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, he’s putting pressure on the World Health
Organization to have Taiwan attend a regular WHO meeting later this month as an observer.
Taiwan isn’t recognized as a country by the UN,
which is why the US is asking for Taiwan to have observer status at the meeting.
Taiwan hasn’t been able to attend since 2017. This is because China sits on the all-powerful
United Nations Security Council. It believes that Taiwan is part of China so Taiwan doesn’t need
independent representation at the UN. “A spokesperson for China's foreign
ministry said the United States' comments were confusing the public,
and urged it to avoid using the WHO assembly meeting to ‘hype up’ Taiwan-related issues.”
And after the break, a US accounting watchdog organization finds problems with audits on
China-based companies listed in the US. Welcome back.
Afghanistan is planning to join China’s belt and road initiative.
Over the weekend, China, Pakistan, and the Taliban agreed that Afghanistan would join the China
Pakistan-Economic Corridor. It’s a $60 billion infrastructure project that connects Pakistan to
China through a number of different projects. Will the deal go anywhere? Who knows.
Afghanistan is broke, and building infrastructure requires money, or at least the promise of
money if they’re going to get a loan. And then there’s the issue of terrorism.
“Chinese businesses have been wary of investing in Afghanistan due to attacks by the Islamic State
group, which is competing with the Taliban for influence. In December, the militant
group took credit for an attack at a Kabul hotel popular with Chinese diplomats and businessmen.”
China’s also worried about the East Turkistan Islamic Movement,
a Xinjiang-based militant group that lives in Afghanistan.
“China has asked the Taliban to restrict [their] activities . . . at a bare minimum,
or preferably to arrest them or send them back to China.”
Of course, the US has removed the East Turkistan Islamic Movement from
a terror list in 2020 because “there's ‘no credible evidence’ that it still exists.”
But it’s definitely a real problem and not just the Chinese Communist Party trying get the Taliban
to nab up Uyghurs fleeing genocide in China. And speaking of people overseas that
China doesn’t like… US authorities arrested
a Boston man for allegedly providing China with a ‘blacklist’ of dissidents.
Litang Liang is a U.S. citizen who was charged with working as an agent of China
without notifying the government. (Corner box: Litang Liang)
According to the indictment, from 2018 to 2022,
he collected information on Chinese dissidents in the US and fed that info back to Beijing.
As of this recording, he hasn’t yet had his detention hearing.
A US accounting watchdog organization has found problems with audits done
on Chinese companies listed in the US by Chinese auditors
Last year was the first year the U.S. Public Company Accounting Oversight
Board or PCAOB was allowed into China . It was there to audit the auditors of
Chinese companies listed on US stock exchanges. The PCAOB said that it found “unacceptable rates
of deficiencies” for accounting firms KPMG Huazhen LLP in mainland China and PricewaterhouseCoopers
in Hong Kong . Together, those two firms audit about 40% of Chinese companies listed in the US.
PCAOB chairwoman Erica Y. Williams said the deficiencies were so significant that they believe
“the audit firm failed to obtain sufficient appropriate audit evidence to support its work”.
Said another way, they didn’t collect enough information to do their job.
However, she also said this is not uncommon in countries that are being audited for the
first time, and that the companies will have a year to correct their mistakes.
If they don’t, the PCAOB will make their deficiencies public,
or, in some cases, recommend sanctions.
Both companies told Reuters they’re now working to address the issues that were found.
Currently, US rules require Chinese companies listed in the US to give
auditors access to records by 2024 or else be delisted.
So this audit is actually a huge relief to investors, even with the errors.
And speaking of reports, China came in almost dead
last on Reporters Without Borders’ press freedom index this year.
China ranked 179 out of 180 countries and regions, which is four spots lower than last year.
The only country that had worse press freedom was North Korea.
Remind me again why the US is pushing so hard to
restore normal relations with China? Oh right, it’s got tons of money.
Reporters without Borders called China “the world's largest prison
for journalists,” and said it “conducts a campaign
of repression against journalism and the right to information worldwide.”
It also said China is currently detaining 101 journalists.
And after the break, Hong Kong loses even more of its democracy.
Welcome back.
China’s got a new financial regulator that no one saw coming.
Li Yunze was a little known vice governor of Sichuan province before he was picked to be
China’s top financial regulator. Before Li went into government,
he was the vice-president of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China , the country's
largest State-owned commercial lender. Li was appointed party secretary of the
newly formed National Financial Regulatory Administration, which oversees thousands
of banks, insurers, and trust firms. State media said the body was established
to “tighten government control of financial markets” and reduce risk.
Ah yes. More communist government control of the economy. What could go wrong.
Speaking of China’s government,
Hong Kong’s district councils are becoming less democratic.
The councils will now be chaired by government officials. And all
candidates for the few remaining elected seats will have to undergo vetting.
There are 470 seats in the district councils, but now only 88 of them will be chosen through
popular election. 179 will be chosen by the chief executive. And 176 will be chosen by a
government-appointed committee. The other 27 seats will be held by indigenous villagers.
Hong Kong’s Chief Executive said the reforms were necessary to “depoliticise” the councils.
And by that, he means there will be no opposition to the government.
“He stressed the need to prevent ‘anti-China troublemakers’ and
those promoting separatism and violence from ‘manipulating and paralysing’ the councils”
He’s referring to 2019, when the city councils were taken
over by pro-democracy activists who opposed mainland Chinese influence.
The reforms come two years after most of the city council seats were left vacant
in the face of a new oath-taking law that was meant to rat out dissidents.
The new changes will go into effect during the next election later this year.
And finally, Mexico’s president says he now has proof of Chinese fentanyl smuggling.
He says Mexico found containers with hidden packages in them that had
traces of fentanyl and meth. The drugs were reportedly hidden in fuel resin.
Mexico says the drugs were sent from Qingdao, China, to Busan,
South Korea, before they were intercepted at a Mexican port .
China has denied that there’s been any drug smuggling between the two countries.
To which Mexico responded that it would send China the proof.
I hear that spy balloons are a popular way to get messages across the pacific. Maybe
China should try sending it back that way. A lot of fentanyl or the precursor drugs
for it are made in China and then sent to Mexican drug cartels who sell it in the US.
Mexico has faced pressure from the US over its role in the drug trade, which is why,
in March, President Obrador wrote a letter to Xi Jinping asking him to help stop it.
I’m sure that will get as much of a response as Trump got when he asked.
Although, who knows, maybe a few more “pretty pleases” and a cherry on top will get Xi to budge.
And this episode is sponsored by Incogni.
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Once again, I’m Chris Chappell. Thanks for watching China Uncensored.